Chapter
Thirteen
Mim, having watched from the wings, was still laughing
when they made their way back.
“Oh, you poor boys,” she said.
”Poor boys nothing,” scoffed Angela.
“They deserved every minute of it.”
”And more,” Jessie added.
“Well of course they did,” Mim said, earning betrayed
looks from the still naked Patrick and Daniel.
“But I can feel sorry for them.
Here, bend down so I can get that makeup off.”
”Shower first,” Patrick said.
“And then clothes,” Daniel said. “I feel an inexplicable desire to put some
clothes on.”
“Gee, where did we put their clothes?” Jessie asked
Angela.
“Out in their cars, wasn’t it?” Angela responded. She smiled sweetly up into a pair of cool
blue eyes.
“Just how difficult do you think we would find it to
remove those guard’s uniforms?” Patrick asked.
”And whatever you have on underneath them, of course,” Daniel added, running
his hand over Jessie’s bra strap at the back.
“These wouldn’t cover much on you,” Jessie grinned.
“No, but it’d mean we’d have company on our streak to
the cars, wouldn’t it?” Daniel pointed out.
“And we run a lot faster than you do,” Patrick
finished. “Oh alright,
Mim. Take the makeup off now.
It’s not as if we’re showing anything half the adult
population of the country won’t have seen by
”Only half?” Angela queried, eyes twinkling.
“When did Jake agree to this?” Daniel asked, wiping
eyeliner off.
“Just over a week ago,” Jessie said. “We called him and he came to see us.”
”You called him?” Daniel repeated. “YOU
called him? This was all your idea, woman?”
“Mine, actually,” Angela waggled her fingers to get
his attention. “Although
Jessie came up with some interesting variations on the theme. As did Gabrielle.”
”That’s it. That woman gets no
more mothers day cards from me,” Patrick announced. “What sort of a mother endorses this sort of
humiliation of her own flesh and blood?”
“One who believes in tying up loose ends,” Jessie
defended her.
“Wait a minute,” Daniel said, eyeliner smeared all
around his eyes. He looked like he’d
been punched, his green eyes startlingly bright against the smudged black. “Was Maman there when you put the idea to
Dad?”
“Not initially,” Jessie said. She looked to Angela for help.
“But she was later,” Angela said.
“And?”
Patrick asked. “That stuff tastes foul,
Mim. It always has.”
”And if you’d stop talking while I was trying to clean the lipstick off, you
wouldn’t be tasting it, would you?” she
countered.
“And they talked,” Angela said.
”Talked?” That was Daniel again.
“Come here,” Jessie reached for the makeup
remover. “You look like a big
panda. One who’s lost his fur.” She glanced
down. “Well, most of his fur.”
“Oh yes, very funny,” Daniel said, instinctively
covering his groin as Angela and Mim burst out laughing. “Stop changing the subject. Did they talk nicely, or did they yell?”
“We don’t know,” Jessie admitted. “They drove off in Jake’s car to talk.”
”And Gabrielle has said nothing about this,” Patrick commented. “That’s enough, Mim. I’m sure the rest of that colour is
natural. The colour in my face certainly
is. I’m still blushing.”
”You’ve never blushed in your life,” Mim said.
He stood up from the chair and she chuckled. “Although your other
cheeks are definitely pink.”
“Jake said nothing about it either,” Daniel said, both
of them choosing to ignore most of the ongoing laughter and teasing – some of
it hands-on. “Angie if you pinch my butt
again, I swear I’m going to drag you back out on stage and revive some very
unpleasant memories for you.”
“And I’ll help him,” Patrick promised.
Twenty minutes later, showered and dressed, the men
walked out to the back door with Jessie and Angela, who were now clothed in
jeans and blouses instead of uniforms.
After the studio, the sunlight seemed unnecessarily bright, and all four
of them were reaching for sunglasses when they heard the crowd noise in the
distance. Patrick looked over.
”It’s an intake day,” he said. He looked
at Daniel. “Feels weird to not be
involved in some way, doesn’t it?” Daniel nodded.
“But good,” he said.
“And I’m going to feel even better when I get this woman home and start
exacting revenge for what she did to us today.”
”There’s a thought,” Patrick smiled, and looked meaningfully at Angela.
“Actually, Jessie and I were thinking of going
shopping,” she lied.
”Think again,” said Patrick.
…………………
Advertising of the show played all day on the channel
and free advertising was provided by gossip and talkback radio stations, the
hosts of which did their best to contact Patrick and Daniel at the Institute,
then fell back on the telephone number they had in their records for Jessica
Porter, the one who got away.
When the phone rang, Jessie was sitting at her table
with Daniel, outlining her plans for the upcoming School Board meeting she had,
to her surprise, been invited to. She
didn’t know that the rest of the Board had overruled Brad Clarence and insisted
that she be given the opportunity. As
part of that meeting, she hoped to table some notes she’d made on enhancements
to the school.
“Even if they don’t reappoint me, it’d be nice if they
made a few changes,” she said. “Like
some parks, as I said. There’s a field
right beside the school that could…hang on, I’ll just get the phone.” Daniel leafed through her pages of notes as
she picked up the phone.
”Yes, this is Jessie Porter,” she said. “Who is this, please?” Daniel turned in his seat to look at her
face. “Oh, well hello. Am I on air?” Daniel was standing up
now. She held up her hand, a grin on her
face. “Yes, that is true. Yes, both of them, completely naked, full
frontal. Oh yes, it’s quite a sight, I
can tell you.” She laughed as Daniel
held out his hand for the telephone. “Hold
on a minute, please. You want to talk to
them?” Daniel nodded. “No, I don’t think so. Yes, I’m sorry, it’s Daniel, well ‘The Cat’,
I guess most people know him as, and if he takes the phone off me, I’m sure
he’s just going to hang it...” Jessie
sighed. “That wasn’t very polite, Daniel,”
she pointed out.
He
was unrepentant.
“That show is going to get quite enough advertising as
it is,” he said. “Come back and explain
these plans to me.” The phone rang
before they were even seated.
“Let it ring,” he said. “Better still, let’s unplug it. No, Jessie, you are not going to talk to any
more of them.”
”But I want to,” she said, eyes dancing.
He sat down and pulled her onto his lap.
“No,” he said firmly.
“You’ve done quite enough already today, young lady, and believe me, you do not want to add to the retaliation I already have
planned.” The mischief in his eyes was
the only thing that stopped her from fighting to get away from him.
By afternoon, there were reporters outside the house
again, reminding Jessie of her first brush with fame, after her release from
the Institute.
“It feels like we’re under attack,” she commented,
peering out through the closed curtains in the front room.
“We are,” Daniel said, unconcerned. “They’ll give up eventually. But not if you keep peeking through the
curtains.”
“They’re not even looking this way,” Jessie said. “They’re…Patrick’s car just turned into the
driveway.”
“That’ll hold their attention for a while,” Daniel
said, getting up. “Why don’t we take the
opportunity to run out the back door and escape?” Jessie laughed.
………………….
Brad Clarence, flicking channels on his television on
to catch a financial report, caught the start of the live feed on ‘The Carlton
Show’. He recognised Jessica Porter’s
house immediately. Standing in front of
it, a toothy female reporter was smiling on a split screen. On the other half of the screen,
“So, they’re there now?” he asked.
“King Dazzler has just arrived,
”And they’re not giving interviews?”
“Not so far,” Melissa said. “Although the King is
talking to a few people now. Hold
on,
”Hello Melissa,” Patrick said. The split screen expanded into one, framing
the reporter, Patrick and Angela, the last two with their arms around each
other.
“Is it true that you appear completely naked on the
show that’s airing tonight?” she asked.
“No,” he said.
Angela’s mouth opened in surprise.
“No?” Melissa prompted. Patrick’s eyes were dancing.
“No, they let us keep our microphones,” he said. There was laughter all round them.
“Full frontal?”
Melissa prompted.
“Yes, full frontal microphones,” he assured her.
“Will the viewing public see full frontal nudity of
you and The Cat?” Melissa tried again, with exaggerated detail.
“You seem quite enthusiastic about this, Melissa,”
Patrick commented, avoiding the question.
“I am,” she assured him, making him laugh this
time. “Along with every other
hot-blooded female in the country, believe me, I am.”
“
“Gee, that’s a big word,” Angela said, looking
concerned. “Did that hurt?” Patrick
rolled his eyes and pulled her closer to him as the laughter from the reporters
sounded again.
“Excuse me,” he said.
“Just have to deliver a private threat here.” He bent down and whispered something in her
ear. Her eyes widened.
“I’m fairly sure that’s not even physically possible,”
she said. She smiled at Melissa. “Full frontal,” she nodded. “Everything on show.” Patrick slumped and pretended to hang his
head in shame as Melissa said “Yessss!” and people
laughed all around them.
In Brad Clarence’s office, an overturned coffee mug
was dripping the last of its contents onto a cream carpet that was never going
to recover from the spillage. The man
himself was sitting at his desk, jaw dropped.
He’d known that there’d been something familiar about that woman with
the brown hair as soon as she appeared on the screen, and seeing her in
conjunction with King Dazzler had set the circuits in his memory buzzing. But when the King bent down like that, his
shoulders hunched forward, the circuits connected and confirmed. He was looking at Gerald and Amanda.
The air seemed to have disappeared from his office,
and his face was scarlet with a combination of rage and frustration. Even after the categorical denial from Jake
Miller, Governor of the Institute, Brad had harboured a few hopes,
that the covert operation was still going on, because of course Miller
would deny that there was a covert operation.
I mean, he, Brad Clarence, could have been anyone – why would Miller
confirm it? And the more he’d looked at
King Dazzler on ‘The Shame Game’, the more he’d decided that the similarities
he’d noticed had been superficial and misleading. There was no way that the golden, blue-eyed
King Dazzler was Gerald. No way.
But deep down, he’d known. He hadn’t wanted to acknowledge it, but he’d
known. He’d been had.
Those two had played him for a fool, and he’d fallen
for it. Those two, right there on his
television screen had humiliated him and put him through hell, and if his
suspicions were correct, they had a film of him displaying himself in a lewd
and embarrassing manner. His lips curled
back as his teeth clenched. There was
nothing he could do about it. Nothing. Was there
anything worse than this feeling of impotent rage and helplessness? Was there…he noticed the coffee and gave vent
to his feelings with a bellow of annoyance.
His office door opened and his secretary appeared.
“Clean up this coffee!” he yelled. “And next time, give me a better cup. That one is unstable!” He stormed out past her, leaving the
television on.
The woman sighed, walked over to his desk to pick up
the remote control and the coffee cup, and bent down to mop up the spill. It was as she was doing it that she noticed
Mr Clarence’s bottom drawer was jammed open.
Wanting to avoid any further temper tantrums, she set about fixing it,
and spent the next ten minutes crouched on the floor in wide-eyed astonishment,
looking through a series of explicit and somewhat unusual magazines catering to
a very specific taste.
…………….
“Is it true that you were in the Shame Institute
yourself, Ms Myers?” Melissa asked, recovering from the news that she was going
to be watching some very entertaining television later that night. Patrick looked down at Angela again, ready to
take over.
“It is,” Angela said.
“Which is another reason why I’m taking such pleasure
in what’s happening today, of course.”
”That the Sauniere brothers are finishing up today,
you mean?” the reporter asked.
“Well that too, of course,” Angela said. “But no, I meant the stripping, undressing,
shucking down, complete, total and unwilling NUDITY of the Sauniere
brothers on their own program, actually.” Patrick shook his head.
“Women can be vicious creatures,” he marvelled. “And this one is worse than most.” He squeezed her tightly. “You can see why I love her.”
“So what’s next for you, King?” Melissa asked.
“Next, I’m hoping to visit my brother and his
girlfriend,” Patrick answered literally.
“Assuming they ever OPEN THE DAMNED DOOR! Well, finally!”
“I would have opened it before, but you looked as if
you were enjoying yourself out here,” Daniel commented, standing in the open
doorway. Reporters and cameras surged
forward.
“No,” Daniel said firmly. “No-one is coming in.”
“Cat, are you marrying Jessica Porter?” someone called
out.
”Not right this minute,” he replied.
“Say hello to Melissa,” Patrick said, nodding at the
toothy blonde as he and Angela went past Daniel into the house. “She’s with
”Hi Melissa,” Daniel said, smiling at her and making her day. “And hi
“Dear heaven, it’s worse than it was when you escaped
the Institute!” Angela said.
”I know,” Jessie said, already pouring coffee in the kitchen. “Anyone would think there was no real news
happening anywhere in the world.”
”Real news?” Patrick repeated. “It’s not real news when the hosts of the
top-rating show in the country are stripped naked for everyone to see?”
“Humiliated and degraded and victimised,” Daniel
added.
“And not even blushing,” Jessie said, shaking her
head. “You two didn’t even look embarrassed.”
”Appearances can be deceiving,” Patrick said. “When Sienna made that comment
about us having enough to satisfy any number of women, I almost ran.”
”Yeah, nothing like having more than a thousand pairs of eyes zeroing in on
your exposed genitals to cause that sort of reaction,” Daniel agreed.
“And you didn’t even have to bend over,” Jessie
said. “Think of all of those women whose
legs you parted for that show.”
“You really want me to think about that?” he asked
her.
”I still wish we could have given you some shame pills,” Angela said, changing
the subject before Jessie thumped him.
“What?” Patrick demanded. He reached out and took her chin in his
hand. “You wanted to give us shame
pills?” She nodded.
“It was the only thing Jake wouldn’t let us do,”
Jessie said. “He said that it wasn’t
wise, that when the shame factor was up, people could be unpredictable, and
that the guards and you two could restrain a woman who panicked, but that we
wouldn’t be able to restrain you if you did.”
”I think a well-placed hand on your testicles would have done it, myself,” Angela said.
“I did think of contacting Russ and asking him to get
some for us,” Jessie added. “But we
didn’t know how much we should give you.
Why is that funny?” Daniel and
Patrick were both laughing.
“Should we tell them?” Daniel asked. “Even though Dad didn’t?” Patrick nodded.
“Definitely,” he encouraged.
”The shame pills are fakes,” Daniel said.
“It’s the one part of the process we lie about. Very few people know – a couple of Government
officials, the doctors, Russ and Eric.”
”What do you mean, they’re fakes?” Angela asked.
”Exactly that.
They’re fakes,” he said again. “Sugar pills. We’re
very practised at telling people that they’re designed to stimulate the part of
the frontal lobe that causes embarrassment, and there are any number of women
who are prepared to talk about how incredibly effective they are.”
”But…they are,” Angela said. “I had
them. They made things much worse.” Patrick shook his head.
“The power of the mind, honey,” he said, putting his
arm around her shoulders. “If you think they’re going to make things worse,
they do. It’s like if someone talks
about being itchy, you need to scratch.”
”But I told myself the exact opposite. I
said that I wasn’t going to let them get to me,” she said, not giving in. “I was determined to fight them, and I swear
I could feel them just sliding into my system and… No, I don’t believe this.”
”Believe it, Angie,” Daniel said. “The
people who decide to fight it are usually the ones who are best at convincing
themselves of its effects. It’s like
hypnosis. The ones who are most
determined they’re not going to go under are often the best subjects.”
”But why?” Jessie asked. Angela was shaking her head, but she was
doing it in annoyance now, not denial. Every now and then she glared at
Patrick, who was grinning at her.
“Tampering with someone’s brain is a bit extreme,
don’t you think?” Daniel asked.
”Stripping and spanking someone on national television is too,” Jessie pointed
out. “No, not you two.
You two deserved it. I meant all of
those women you victimised.”
”Victimised?” Daniel responded, doing a good job of
faking outrage. “Who were the convicted criminals, Jessica Porter? Who were the innocent,
some might even say virtuous servants of justice who were cruelly punished
today for just doing their jobs?”
“Oh please,” Jessie sighed. “You’re breaking my heart.”
”I’ll smack your butt in a minute,” Daniel threatened, grinning.
“Big talker,” Jessie said, but she held the coffee pot
in front of her in self-defence.
“So why was it so horrible for all of us if those
shame pills were just sugar pills?” Angela persisted. “I mean, obviously being humiliated in front
of all of those people for a month is dreadful, but there wasn’t any time at
which familiarity made it feel more bearable.”
She moved away from Patrick, leaning across the counter to pick up a
coffee mug.
”You believed that you had a drug in your system that was making it worse,”
Patrick said. “And in turn, that belief
made it worse.”
“I don’t think it was necessary anyway,” Jessie
said. “Just having to live like that and
earn the points and do all of that stuff with all of those crowds about is bad
enough on its own.” She shuddered and
sent a quick sympathetic look Angela’s way.
“Of course it is,” Patrick agreed. “And keep in mind that, despite the fact that
only youngish, attractive women go there, very few of them have perfect
bodies. While a lot of them are quite
arrogant and sure of their own worth, the fact that they’re not able to hide
big hips, or dimpled butts or saggy boobs can do a lot to diminish their
confidence.” He picked up another of the coffee mugs as Jessie finished pouring
it. “Hardly any of them have lovely
little bodies like you two.”
“Enough with the ‘little’,” Angela protested, ignoring
the compliment. “Jessie might be petite,
but I’m five foot nine. I am not
little.”
”No, you’re huge, you are,” Daniel said straight-faced, moving a step closer so
he could loom over her.
“Go away,” she insisted, pushing at his chest
one-handed. “Just because you’re a giant
does not make me small.”
“Little,” Patrick said, moving in on her from the
other side. “Miniscule.” They’d performed this move several times on
the show they’d just finished with.
Despite her protests, they inched in closer, until all she could see
were expanses of shoulders that seemed to go on forever. She couldn’t even meet their eyes without
craning up.
“Tiny,” Daniel added, grinning now. “Petite. And that red hair’s really coming back well now, isn’t it?”
“Ohhh… fuck off!” she said,
making them all laugh.
Late afternoon, they decided to move from Jessie’s
house back to the Institute, where the gates and fences would at least keep the
reporters from pressing their faces against the windows. They hadn’t moved out of the quarters there
yet, but Patrick rang their father first anyway to confirm that it was
alright.
“Bastard’s laughing his head off,” he said to Daniel
as he hung up. “He watched the live feed on his monitor, even missed intake so
he could watch us.”
”Thereby forgoing birthday, Christmas and any other gifts for the rest of his
life,” Daniel said. “Was he difficult to
convince?” he asked the women.
”Not at all,” Jessie assured him. “Once
he stopped laughing, he even added some ideas.”
“And he listened when we said we didn’t like Doctor
Frank, too,” Angela said. “Do you think
that’s why he took his photographs?”
”Probably,” Patrick said. “You two obviously made a big impression on him. He asked me to pass on his congratulations on
a good show. Bastard. Where did I put the keys to the Jag?” He was looking around the flat surfaces in
Jessie’s house.
“Frank’s still in a sulk about that,” Daniel
said. “Particularly since Dad won’t let
him take any more happy snaps for his book until he sees some text.”
“Which is never going to eventuate,” Patrick
said. “Where are they?” He was patting the pockets of his jeans. Angela’s hand slid into his back pocket and
handed him the keys.
“I only put them there so you’d play with my butt,” he
said.
“Sure you did, Gerald,” she teased, laughing when he
narrowed his eyes at her.
..……………
The two men categorically refused to witness their own
humiliation that night, and went outside to the Jacuzzi so they didn’t have to
listen to Angela and Jessie laughing as they watched it on the big screen
television. There were a few parts where
the laughter dried up, but they were too far away to hear comments like “God,
he’s got a nice butt,” and the confirmation that followed. And when, on the television show, the two men
finally stood, completely exposed, both women just looked, in awe, as did
people in almost every household in the country.
“They are gorgeous,” Jessie breathed.
“I can’t believe they’re ours,” Angela agreed.
“Why are we sitting here watching them on television
when they’re out there in the flesh?” Jessie asked.
”Beats me,” Angela responded, laughing.
“Let’s go.”
Daniel glanced at his waterproof watch as they walked
out to join them in the private, enclosed area filled with lush plants and
steam from the Jacuzzi.
”Surely it’s not over yet?” he asked. He
was stretched out on one side of the spa, Patrick on the other, both of them
holding glasses of wine. A cooler held
the bottle.
“We stayed for the climax,” Angela said. “Then realised that since we had the real
thing out here, we should leave the television images for the rest of the
population and come out and look at you both in the flesh.”
“I wouldn’t count on it,” Patrick said, tilting his
head back to look up at her. “We’re
feeling unloved and unappreciated and taken advantage of.” She laughed as she dropped to her knees beside
the Jacuzzi and leaned in to kiss him.
“Mmmmm, nice wine,” she
commented, tasting it some more. “Marinated Patrick. I
like it.” He smiled,
the heart-throb ‘King Dazzler’ smile his viewing public was even now seeing the
last of.
“How about ‘soaked Angie’?” he suggested, getting a
grip on her arm. Daniel’s arm snaked out
and his hand closed on Jessie’s ankle.
“I think there’s room to soak two at once, don’t you?”
he asked.
“Definitely,” Patrick said. Both of them moved to stand up at the same
time, while Jessie and Angela protested.
“No!” Jessie shrieked, laughing
as Daniel transferred his grip to her knee, then her waist. “You… you haven’t got anything on! Sit down!”
She was averting her eyes because Patrick was directly in her line of
vision. Both men did sit, but only
because they were laughing so hard they had to.
“As we speak, millions of viewers are seeing us in
this state,” Daniel pointed out when he’d caught his breath. “Thanks to the actions of
you and your harpy friend. But
now we have to sit down because your sensibilities are offended by seeing us
naked?”
“Well when you put it like that,” Jessie said. “Stop laughing, Angie!” Angela obediently stopped, although her eyes
were still merry.
”I was only protesting about being dragged in,” she said, prudently moving a
step further away from Patrick. “I had no objection to seeing either of them in
the altogether.”
“Typical,” Patrick commented. “You’re such a tart, Angie Myers.”
”It’s why you like me,” she grinned at him.
“It’s something we have in common.”
He nodded, grinning back. The
bubbles stopped as the timer ran out.
“So, are you going to lose the clothes or come in as
you are?” Daniel asked the women.
“I’m not coming in,” Jessie said. “I’ll just…”
”That wasn’t one of the choices,” Daniel said threateningly, rising up out of the
water again.
“Daniel,” Jessie said, backing up.
“That’s it, just stall a bit longer Jessie,” Angela
encouraged, watching as more of Daniel’s body was revealed. She jumped as a strong, wet hand closed
around her calf. Patrick moved far too
fast, and his arms were way too long.
“Start stripping, babe,” he said sweetly. “Or you’re coming in fully-dressed.” He turned and pushed himself up onto the side
of the Jacuzzi as he spoke. “Not that
you’ll stay that way.”
“I didn’t bring my swimmers with me,” Jessie was still
protesting. Daniel, also sitting on the
side, was laughing, drawing her to him, his hands wet on her hips.
“You wouldn’t be wearing them anyway,” he said. “You want me to help you off with those
clothes?”
”Not in front of Patrick,” she said, sending him a speaking glare. Patrick shook his head at that.
“This would be the Patrick who is sitting here nude in
front of you?” he asked. “The Patrick
who has, un-gentlemanly though it is for me to mention it, seen you naked on a
number of occasions, Jessie Porter?”
“Yes, but you never will again,” she promised, forcing
herself to meet those dancing blue eyes.
“Never?” he protested, hauling Angela closer
still.
”Never,” Jessie promised. “Daniel, let
go. If you and Patrick close your eyes
and look away, we’ll get in, but you have to look away when we get out, too.”
”No way,” Daniel grinned.
“Then you’re going to have to drag us in,” Angela
said.
“Fine,” Patrick said, proceeding to do just that,
while she dug her heels in and fought a losing battle.
“Daniel, please,” Jessie begged, and he looked into
her face and relented.
“Okay,” he said.
“Patrick, let her go. We’ll be
gentlemen.”
”I don’t want to,” his brother protested, but he relinquished his hold on
Angela, squeezing her backside as he did so.
“But alright.” The two of them
kept their word, not only looking away, but also covering their eyes as the
women quickly slipped out of their clothes and stepped into the Jacuzzi,
sinking down low on the seats that had been built to accommodate the tall
men. The water lapped at the top of
Angela’s cleavage, and was just below Jessie’s chin.
“You can turn around now,” Angela said. They did, and Daniel laughed again.
“You’re going to drown when the bubbles start up,” he
said, sliding back down off the side and into the water beside Jessie. “Come on, sit on me.”
”I will not,” she said primly. “Not when
we’re not wearing anything.” Patrick,
still sitting exposed on the side of the Jacuzzi, leaned back, stretching out
for the pole on which the timer switch was located. Jessie looked away, because she was seeing
far too much of him. Angela didn’t. She just smiled and put her hand on his
muscular thigh.
As the bubbles started, Jessie leapt up, arms across
her breasts. Daniel had been right. They were covering her mouth and going up her
nose.
”Come here,” he grinned, pulling her onto his lap. “There, everything’s covered,
no-one can see anything. Just relax.”
”Move your hands and I will,” she said.
“And no, not like that. You know
what I mean.” Patrick eased back down
onto the seat.
“How’s your butt?” Jessie asked him. He grinned ruefully.
“Fine,” he said.
“That ruler stung, though.”
“Poor baby,” Angela said, not sounding
sympathetic. Patrick stretched an arm out
behind her shoulders, and slid her along the seat until she was against him.
“It could have been worse,” he said. “I was hit a few times with a leather belt
once. That hurt for days.”
“Yeah, but that wasn’t just for show,” Daniel pointed
out. “She was wielding that belt with
real force.”
“Who?”
Jessie asked. He smiled.
“Maman,” he said.
Angela gasped at the same time as Jessie.
“Gabrielle hit you with a belt?” she asked
Patrick. He nodded.
“But she loves you two to distraction,” Angela
protested. He nodded again.
“I wasn’t her intended target,” he said. “And she was horrified when she saw that
she’d hit me. I was about seventeen at
the time. She was just…how would you put
it, Daniel? More than mildly annoyed at
the time?” Daniel pretended to shudder.
“A force of nature,” he suggested,
his voice dramatic. “Totally
out of control.” In the face of
the women’s obvious curiosity, he relented.
“She’d just dragged a woman out of her son’s bed. The woman was a model in her late twenties,
and as far as Maman was concerned, her son was still a child. Maman was laying into her with a belt and
Patrick got in the way.”
”What was that woman’s name?” Patrick asked, trying to remember. “Cynthia?
Something like that?”
”Sophy,” Daniel replied. He shook his
head in amazement. “For once, I
remembered a name.”
“So you were trying to defend the woman?” Jessie asked
Patrick. He shook his head.
“I didn’t want Maman to end up in jail,” he said. “I
would have happily let her keep belting her if I hadn’t been scared that she
was going to murder her.”
“Hold on a minute,” Angela said. “You would have happily let your mother keep
belting a woman who’d just got out of your bed?”
“Did Daniel say it was my bed?” he asked her. Both women looked at Daniel.
“But…” Jessie gasped again. “If Patrick was seventeen,
you would have only been thirteen!”
“Fourteen,” Daniel corrected. “He doesn’t have a full four years on me.”
“But you can see why Maman was angry,” Patrick
said. Jessie nodded.
“And why Daniel remembered her name,” Angela said,
shaking her head. “Did you…did she..?”
”Yes,” Daniel replied simply. “Maman was
too late to prevent that. In fact, we
were already asleep when she found us. I
woke up when the yelling started.”
“It was the yelling that brought me running,” Patrick
said. “I’d only been home about twenty minutes, I’d been out on a date that
night, and I’d just undressed and got into bed when I heard this unholy
screaming coming from Daniel’s room, so I raced in there.” He shook his head in memory. “Quite a sight, I have to say. Sophy had long black hair. Maman was holding her by it with one hand,
and laying into her with Daniel’s belt, telling her exactly what she thought of
her.”
”In French. At
full volume,” Daniel agreed. “Maman had one
of Dad’s shirts on, but Sophy was naked, and Maman was putting red stripes all
over her while she screamed and tried to get away.”
“Did you break it up?” Angela asked Patrick.
”Are you kidding?” he said. “I didn’t
have a hope. I hadn’t filled out then,
and Gabrielle was a strong and furious woman.
I tried dragging her off, and when that didn’t work, I got between them,
which is when I got hit. Then Sophy
latched onto me and started trying to use me as a shield, which Maman was even
less happy about.”
”What did you do?” Jessie asked Daniel, trying to imagine him at that age, in
that situation.
“I knew that if Patrick couldn’t stop it, I didn’t
have a chance. So I raced for Dad,” he
said. “Who was,
amazingly enough, still asleep at the other end of the house.”
“And he took the belt out of Maman’s hand and threw it
out of her reach,” Patrick said. “Which is what I should have
done.”
”At which point she went after Sophy with her nails,” Daniel recalled. “Dad bundled her up in his arms and held her,
and Sophy tried to attack her in return, but Patrick was holding on to her by
then.
“My, you have led rich and interesting lives,” Angela
commented. “I’m just visualising
this. Gabrielle would have been…what,
late thirties?” Patrick nodded.
“And Jake was about the same age,” he said. “The lights were all on, and Maman was the
only one among us with any clothes on. You going to use this in a novel?” Angela laughed.
“I might,” she said.
“So what happened?”
“Dad calmed Maman down enough to find out why she was
attempting to kill Sophy,” Daniel said.
“At which point he started
looking for the belt,” Patrick added, shaking his head.
“The look in his eyes scared me more than anything else
that had happened that night,” Daniel agreed.
“He just looked at Sophy, and said something like ‘get out of our house,
slut’, and Patrick let go of her.”
“She went to get her clothes, but Dad shook his head –
remember he was holding Maman, who was still sputtering all sorts of abuse in
French. He said ‘go as you are. Get out now, or I’ll call the police. And I’ll let go of Gabi first’ and Sophy took
off, ran down the stairs and out the front door.”
“Still naked?”
Jessie asked. Patrick nodded. “Where did she go?”
“Everyone knew everyone around there,” Daniel
said. “The nearest house was about ten
minutes walk away.
She probably went there. Her
stuff was gone the next day, so she must have sent for it from somewhere close
by.”
”She wouldn’t have stayed anywhere close by for long,” Patrick went on. “Maman was very popular, and once word got
out what Sophy had done, there wouldn’t have been anyone there who would have
wanted anything to do with her.”
“And were you punished?” Angela asked Daniel.
“Only in terms of embarrassment,” he replied. “That was not the sort of event I would have
chosen to share with my entire family.
No, I wasn’t punished.”
“He was only a kid,” Patrick said, for once sounding
like a big brother. “And Sophy was
very…persuasive, I guess you’d say. Seductive, sexy as all hell, and completely amoral, the bitch.”
“You’re still angry?” Jessie asked.
“Not really,” he said, shrugging the feeling
away. “But I was at the time. I blamed myself. I’d gone out that night, and she’d been
pissed off that I wasn’t available. So
she helped herself to my little brother.”
“I take it that you had been available prior to that
night?” Angela clarified. He nodded.
“Yep,” he said.
“She’d been staying with us for nearly a week. Did I mention that she was seductive and sexy
as all hell?”
”And that you were seventeen,” Jessie put in.
“What would your mother have done to her if she’d known about that
too?” Patrick grimaced.
“I’m glad we didn’t find out,” he said.
“So what happened afterwards?” Jessie asked.
“Lots of talking,” Daniel said. “LOTS of talking.”
“Dad calmed Maman down, Maman hugged Daniel as if he’d
only just escaped death, then hugged me, which is when she discovered that I
had strap marks all over my back and butt, which led to all sorts of
self-recriminations and apologies and medication and more hugging.”
“It was a big night, one way or another,” Daniel
agreed. “Momentous at
all sorts of levels. We all ended
up wrapped up in blankets, sitting in front of the fireplace and drinking hot
chocolate until about four in the morning.”
“You were a close family, weren’t you?” Jessie commented.
“Very,” Patrick answered. “Dad wasn’t always there, in fact, he was
often away, but between them, they did a good job of making us feel loved.”
“And all of those models who stayed in the house
certainly added to our contentment, too,” Daniel added wickedly, prompting a
laugh from Patrick and a splash of water in the face from Jessie.
The men, honouring their promise, did look away when
Jessie and Angela climbed out.
“You don’t mind if we take your towels so we won’t get
all cold and uncomfortable on our way to the bathrooms, do you?” Angela teased,
picking one of them up. Patrick
smiled. They could see it, even though
his hand was covering his eyes. It was a
particularly evil smile.
“Just one more thing to add to the list of things
you’re going to pay for later, woman. Which reminds me. I
have something for you, Daniel.”
“What’s that?” Jessie demanded.
“Did I say Jessie?” Patrick asked. She wouldn’t have thought it possible for
that smile to become even more wicked, but it
did. “I could have sworn I said
Daniel.” There was clearly no way she
was going to get any more out of him, so she gave up. She’d get it from Daniel later.
…………
She was right.
She did. When she came out of the
bathroom, wrapped in a towel, Daniel was waiting, his hair wet, a pair of jeans unbuttoned and low on his hips.
“All nice and clean, Jessie?” he asked, smiling with
definite intent. “Skin
all nice and warm and sensitive?”
He didn’t even bother hiding the look in those green eyes. It was a look that more
than matched Patrick’s smile.
Jessie felt a warning tingle low in her belly, partly of anticipation,
and partly of helplessness. She knew
very well that if she ran, he was going to catch her. She started to edge around him
nevertheless. He laughed softly, and
stretched out one arm on either side of her, his palms flat against the wall,
trapping her. “And where do you think
you’re going?” he asked.
“What did Patrick give you?” she asked. Another grin.
“Have a look at the headboard of the bed,” he
suggested. She peered over his left
arm. And gasped.
“No!” she protested.
“No, Daniel, I mean it. No way
are you putting those things on me!” It
was hard to believe that fur-lined handcuffs could look so ominous, so
threatening, particularly given that the fur was bright pink.
“Wanna bet?” he teased.
“How do they work?” she asked, willing him to look
that way. As he did, she ducked under
his right arm and raced for the door.
Adrenaline gave her an edge, and if she hadn’t had to open the door, she
might have made it outside. But she did
have to open the door. Seconds later,
she was deposited, kicking and yelling, on the bed.
“No!” she squealed again, wriggling and laughing as he
pinned her down and dragged first one hand up and then the other. Straddling her, he leaned down and kissed her
on the nose.
“Yes,” he assured her.
“Now for the feet.”
He used silk scarves for that, catching her wildly
kicking legs and tying each ankle wide to the bottom corners of the bed. Then, laughing and completely ignoring the
abuse, threats and pleas she was delivering with increasing volume, he opened
up her already dislodged towel and spread it out, still under her nude body.
“Hmmm,” he said, glancing at the bedside clock. “
”Oh, let’s not,” she said. With that
look in his eyes she knew that while the public persona of ‘The Cat’ may have
been retired that day, the characteristics were most definitely living on
privately in Daniel. And right now, ‘The
Cat’ was playing with her.
“Back in a minute,” he said, and left the room. Jessie gasped.
“Daniel!” she called after him. “What are you doing?”
”Getting Patrick, Russ and Eric,” he called back. “They’ve all been looking forward to Round
Two.” Even though she knew he was
joking, she grimaced at the mere thought of it.
Patrick was no doubt in his bedroom with Angela, and there was no way he
was going to be coming back. Was
there? Daniel appeared in the doorway,
one hand behind his back.
“Worried?” he asked, green eyes twinkling.
“No,” she said, trying for nonchalance and almost
managing it. He brought his hand from
behind his back, clutching the black leather case that held his brushes.
“Yes,” she changed her mind.
Daniel laughed.
He brought the other hand out of his pocket, and her eyes widened.
“What are you going to do with that?” she demanded,
looking at the razor he was holding.
‘Well, first, I’m going to get some soap,” he said,
walking towards the bathroom. “And then
I’m going to get a damp washcloth. And
then,” he turned around in the door to the bathroom and grinned. “I’m going to shave my initial into your
pubic hair.”
“You are not!” Jessie objected, and kept objecting as
she heard water running. The man was
actually whistling in there, having a wonderful time teasing her. He came out with a towel over one arm as
well.
Ten minutes later, Jessie strained to look down at his handiwork and made a
noise that was halfway between exasperation and laughter. Sure enough, he’d shaved the hair into a
capital D. It looked ridiculous.
“You rat!” she said, making him laugh even more than
he already had. He put the towel,
washcloth, soap and razor down on the floor, then sat
down on the bed beside her again.
”And you know,” he said conversationally, picking up
the brushes case. “Recently shaved skin
is very sensitive. Even
more susceptible to tickling than normal. Here.
Let me demonstrate, little ‘yes, I think it would be a great idea to
expose my boyfriend naked on national television’ girl.” He picked up a little tub of something, and
unscrewed the lid.
“What’s that?” Jessie demanded, fearing the worst –
one of Dr Frank’s horrible creams, or some of that itching ointment.
“Just something that’s going to help me put my mark on
you,” Daniel grinned. He slid a small
brush out of the case and dipped it into the tub. Then he leaned in close to her and whispered,
tickling her ear with his breath. “Gold paint. Now hold
still, babe.”
It was almost midnight by the time he let her go, two
hours of teasing and giggling and protesting and whispering that ended in an
energetic bout of love-making that left little gold, back-to front ‘D’s all
over Daniel’s body where it had pressed against hers. Jessie was still vowing vengeance when he
turned the light off. It was as he was
pulling the covers back for them to climb in that she noticed something.
“Daniel!” she squealed.
“What?” he asked, settling into the sheets.
“This paint is fluorescent!” He looked down at his body and laughed. And then he looked at hers and laughed some
more.
“Great,” he said.
“Now I have little lights to guide me.
Come here.”
”No,” Jessie insisted. “I’m going to wash this paint off. And you should, too.”
”Tempting as that sounds, in all fairness, I have to tell you that water isn’t
going to wash it off,” he grinned. “It’s
oil-based. You’re going to need
turpentine or something like that.”
“But you painted on my face!” she said,
horrified. He laughed softly.
“I know,” he said. “And I can see it
now, there are some Ds on your cheeks, and on your nose, and your forehead, and
one on your chin. It’s cute.”
“It’s NOT cute,” she insisted. She
smacked his arm. “Go and get me some
turpentine.”
“Nup,” he said, lying down. “I’m happy for you to keep my initials all
over you. You want the turps, you get
it.”
“Where is it?” she sighed.
“In the kitchen, under the sink,” he said. He sat up and punched his pillow to make it
fuller. “And if you’re going, I’ll have
your pillow too.” He stole it before she
could even comment. Jessie climbed off
the bed and started feeling around on the floor for clothes.
“I’d better not get any of this paint on my clothes,”
she said threateningly.
“Well, you could leave them off,” he suggested.
“Yeah, right,” she said, still feeling around.
So far she’d found one of his socks, which was not overly useful. “Can you turn the light on?”
“No,” he said, continuing to be unhelpful, and sounding very amused while he
did it. “I’m loving
seeing all of those Ds glowing in the dark.”
She growled.
“Where are my clothes, Daniel?” she asked.
“In the bathroom,” he said. “Where you left them. But I don’t know why you don’t go out like
you are. Patrick and Angie went to bed
hours ago.”
“So did we, but we’re still awake,” she said.
“Good point,” he said.
“But how often do we get out of bed and wander around the house late at
night? And what would be the odds of
them doing it at the same time?”
“Too high,” she muttered, heading for the bathroom.
“Chicken,” he said, teasing again. Jessie stopped where she was, then slowly
turned.
“Chicken?” she rounded on him. “You think a chicken could have walked out on
that stage this morning in a guard’s costume and done all of that stuff on
national television with no training?”
“Yeah, you sure had the difficult role this morning,
babe,” he said, tongue firmly in cheek.
“Man, it must have been hard for you and Angie to have to carry the show
like that while Patrick and I had such unchallenging, unimportant roles to
play. Heaven knows what I was think –” he broke off, laughing, as she launched herself at
him. “Chicken,” he accused again. “Mind you, there are some benefits in you not
going out and getting the turps. I might
play ‘connect the Ds’. Or perhaps I can
just kiss them all. Yep, that sounds
like a good idea. Hold still.” She was wriggling and squirming in his grasp.
“I’ll get the turps,” she said, already breathless,
partly from her struggles, and partly from what his hands were doing to
her. “I’ll just get my clothes first.”
”Nup,” Daniel said, his voice once again laden with
mischief. “I’m only going to let you go if you go naked.”
“Excuse me?” she demanded, trying once more to push herself free. And failing yet again.
He rolled to pin her down, his hand skimming up her side.
“You heard me,” he said. “Either you go out and get the turps, in the
buff, just as you are. Or, I start
kissing all of these perfect little Ds.
My, there are a lot of them, aren’t there? Oh look, there’s one.”
“Get off!” she protested again. “Daniel, get off!” She was laughing, but she was determined as
well. In this sort of mood, he’d play
all night, and she wanted some sleep.
“Damn you, I’ll go get the turps.
Under the kitchen sink?” She felt him nod.
Opening the bedroom door was the easy part.
“Don’t you turn any lights on or call out or
anything,” she threatened him. “Or else.”
“Or else what?” he responded.
“Daniel,” she said ominously. He laughed.
“Alright, I won’t,” he promised. She felt her way along the wall outside of
the bedroom, blessing the darkness. She moved, one hand on the wall, all the way along the long,
smooth plaster, past the huge entertainment area and sofas, using a wooden
chair rail as a guide, until she felt the corner where the kitchen opened off
it. It was very dark, only the pale
moonlight coming through the windows illuminating the big conversation pits,
the chairs, the lamps, the big screen television gleaming silver-grey on the
wall, and the geometric lines of the space.
There were pools of total blackness everywhere.
She felt along past the refrigerator to the kitchen
counter top and then further along still until it met the sink. Then she crouched down in front and opened
the cupboard. At that point she realised
she had a problem. How was she supposed
to find the bottle of turpentine in the dark?
Cursing Daniel for this silly challenge and herself for falling for it,
she stood up again, preparing to retrace her steps to the light switch. Two cautious steps later, she froze, blinded,
as the fluorescent lights flared on. She
saw the outline of his tall frame and lost it.
“You promised you wouldn’t turn any lights on!” she
said. Then, as the stab of light faded
from her retinas she realised her mistake.
“Oh, no I didn’t,” Patrick said, grinning.
“Aaargh!” she squealed,
turning away, arms covering herself, as he laughed. He covered his eyes with one hand, the other
hand hooked in the pocket of the jeans that were all he wore.
“It’s okay, I’m not looking any more,” he said. “I just saw this little illuminated body
going past and turned on the light to see what was going on. What is that gold stuff on you?”
”Paint,” she said, dropping down to a crouch in front of the cupboard again,
searching for the turpentine. “He
painted his initial all over me.”
”Very effective,” he said. “And you’re looking for something to take it
off?”
”Yes,” she sniffed, mortified. Daniel
was going to pay for this. He and his ‘what are the odds?” comment.
A long arm stretched over her shoulder, reaching right
to the back of the cupboard.
”There,” he said, holding it down to her.
“Thank you,” she snatched at it. “What were you doing out here anyway?”
“Just having a quiet drink and thinking,” he
said. “Angie’s asleep, and I was
restless and didn’t want to disturb her, so I came out here. I didn’t expect this sort of entertainment,
though.”
”I hate you,” she said. He laughed
again.
”No you don’t,” he said. He dropped a
kiss on the top of her head. “Covering my eyes again now.
Off you go.” She looked up at
him. He did have his hand over his eyes,
but she didn’t trust him one bit. Still,
what choice did she have?
“Don’t look,” she said.
”I’m not looking, baby doll,” he said, grinning when she growled at that. She straightened up and scooted past him,
clutching the bottle of turps. Just as
she was rounding the corner, he delivered the coup de gras. “Great shave, by the way, Jess. Did you do that yourself?” Mortification and the sound of his teasing
laugh spurred her, and she broke world speed records racing to the bedroom,
where Daniel’s laughter told her he’d overheard at least some of it.
“It’s not funny!” she protested, slamming the bedroom
door and flouncing into the bathroom. To
her surprise, she was actually close to tears, which was silly. As Patrick had reminded her earlier, he’d
seen her body before, after all. It was
just that she’d thought that she was safe when she’d said he would never see it
again, and within hours…HOURS, he had.
“It is, you know,” Daniel corrected, getting up and
leaning against the doorjamb of the bathroom.
Then he saw her face. “Oh Jessie, I’m sorry, honey. I didn’t mean for him to see you. I honestly didn’t think anyone would be out
there.” He had his arms around her, her
face buried in his shoulder, while he rubbed her back. “It’s okay.”
She sniffed.
“He saw what you did to me with the razor,” she said. Daniel manfully swallowed a smile. Thankfully, she wasn’t looking at his
face.
“I heard,” he admitted. “And he’ll tease a bit, but you don’t have to
worry about that. Patrick teases
everyone. And he teases the people he
loves even more.” Another
sniff from his shoulder.
“Jessie?” he moved back and tipped her chin up. “I am sorry.
It was just a bit of retaliatory fun.
And God, you look cute with that gold paint all over you. No, don’t hit me with the bottle. Here, I’ll clean it off you.”