Authors: Lisette Ashton
Panting heavily, Justine pulled herself away from the penitent’s sex and studied her blissful smile. The flush of orgasm had left her cheeks beautifully rouged. The corners of her eyes were wet with grateful tears.
‘I want to spend the night with you,’ Justine whispered. Suddenly aware of what she needed, she said, ‘I want to spend tonight and every night with you: while you read de Sade to me. That’s what I want.’
The penitent’s smile shone bright with adoration. ‘I want that also. I too want every night with you.’
They were on the verge of sealing the arrangement with a kiss when Marie and two maids burst uninvited into the room. Neither Justine nor the penitent responded with embarrassment at the intrusion and the visitors accepted their naked bodies and intimate embrace as though the sight was commonplace.
‘Did you want something?’ Justine asked stiffly.
‘We want you,’ Marie smiled.
‘And we’re going to have you,’ one of the maids giggled.
The other joined her in her laughter until Marie silenced them both with a stern frown. Turning back to Justine, extending a hand, she said, ‘Your presence is needed downstairs. Now. You must come with us.’
Justine considered refusing and then thought better of the idea. The expressions of Marie and her maids were bright with determination and none of them looked ready to accept a refusal. Marie’s smile was stiff with authority when she said, ‘Come along, Justine. You will follow us to the ballroom. We’re here to take you to Captain Sartine’s party.’
For the rest of the evening Justine found her thoughts remained with the penitent. Even though the party promised to be a spectacular affair, and she expected she would be offered every physical pleasure she could want, her thoughts constantly returned to the nameless blonde in her hotel room with whom she believed she was falling in love.
Marie and her maids were naked save for the eye-masks they wore. It was a theatrical nod toward anonymity that didn’t deceive anyone. Leading a nude Justine through the corridors of the hotel, nodding polite greetings to those similarly masked and undressed guests they encountered, Marie clutched Justine’s arm and babbled incessantly about the fun they were going to have. ‘Since the Captain discovered he would be assessing your suitability he has been carefully planning this party,’ she gushed. ‘We have invited our most gifted and talented friends. Several of them travelled for many miles to come here. We also found the most exciting toys and devices that anyone could want to enhance their sexual experience. The Captain and I spent hours calling suitable beautiful partners and trying to organise a party that would rival those of…’ Her voice trailed off as she struggled to find a suitable comparative. ‘A party to rival those of…’ she began again.
‘…of the Roman Empire,’ Justine suggested.
Marie glanced sharply at her; and then smiled enigmatically. It was difficult to read her expression because of the mask. With her thoughts on the penitent, Justine didn’t trouble herself worrying about whether or not she had offended her host’s wife and continued to walk calmly by her side. A single doubt began to nag at the back of her thoughts but she couldn’t immediately place the reason for her unease. There was some small detail that marked her different to Marie, her staff and the others they met. And, while Justine sensed it was important to notice the nature of the dissimilarity, she could only pinpoint a vague feeling of disparity.
She had to concede that Sartine and Marie had invited a guest list of truly beautiful people. The bare flesh she saw on her way to the ballroom was flawless and exciting. Tanned bodies, all bereft of blemishes or bikini lines, glided by the sides of their muscular well-toned partners. Justine caught glimpses of cleanly shaved clefts, neatly trimmed pubic bushes and an array of breasts that ranged from pert to buxom. She wilfully tried to remain cool and composed: as though attending an orgy was something she did every day of the week. Yet, even after a morning with the penitent and the illuminating day she had spent in the penthouse, Justine found herself torn between extreme responses of dread and daring. The trepidation grew worse as they reached the hotel’s ground floor. She could hear the babble of crowded conversation that poured from the ballroom and its drone was almost as loud as the elegant chamber music that accompanied the chatter. Marie squeezed her arm, gently encouraging Justine to step forward and enter the ballroom.
And then she realised the difference between herself and the other guests.
‘I don’t have a mask!’
It was impossible to make the declaration without feeling absurd by the sound of her own panic. She glanced from her host’s wife to the attendant servants and a couple who brushed past them to enter the dining room. Everyone else was nude save for the tiny eye-masks that covered nothing and disguised no one’s identity.
‘I don’t have a mask,’ Justine hissed nervously.
‘Of course you don’t,’ Marie agreed. ‘But that’s because you’re here as our guest of honour.’ Laughing easily, she didn’t allow the conversation to continue and wouldn’t hear any further protests or excuses. With the help of her maids they led Justine into the ballroom and were greeted by a rapturous round of welcoming applause.
Too much was happening too quickly and Justine struggled not to be overwhelmed by the experience. The string quartet playing for the party – an elegant trio of dapper men in tuxedos and one beautiful lady in formal wear – brought their piece to a halt. They moved instantly into Khachaturian’s
Masquerade Waltz
and, as though everyone expected the development, the crowd moved away from the dance floor. A flutter of flashbulbs captured the moment for posterity, Justine briefly cringed at the idea that her nudity had been caught on camera, and then that minor worry was pushed to the back of her mind as she found herself alone in the centre of the room with a hundred or more naked strangers admiring her. While she had thought the masks were a lame excuse for a disguise she suddenly realised their presence added a disconcerting edge to the experience. She could no longer recognise Marie or her maids: those people who had nodded courteous greetings to her on her way to the ballroom were now as unfamiliar as those absolute strangers whom she was seeing for the first time.
Since sitting in Dupont’s church and being humbled by the frescoes and tranquillity, Justine didn’t think she had felt so alone and vulnerable. The memory of the life she had left behind – gloomy libraries and an array of visceral pleasures lived through the pages of dry dusty books – seemed as though it had belonged to someone else. She couldn’t equate that existence with the naked pleasure-seeker she had since become and she struggled to understand when the change had occurred. Was it something that had come about when she kissed the penitent that morning? Had it happened during the sacrilege she had enjoyed with the priest? Or did it go back to Mrs Weiss in the private library and her bullying domination? The questions confused Justine and she knew she wasn’t going to find answers this evening.
Panic rose in her chest as the drunkenly robust music began to pitch and yaw.
A tall figure stepped from the crowd; she was both relieved and disconcerted to recognise Sartine lurking behind the mask; and then he was leading her around the floor in a fast-paced waltz.
‘I wanted the pleasure of the first dance with you,’ he murmured as he kissed her neck. ‘You look absolutely radiant.’
She released a sigh of relief as they danced together. His body pressed close to hers, exciting her with the intimate contact and making her shiver with a thrill of exhibitionism. Bemused and avaricious smiles glinted from beneath the masks that they passed at the edge of the floor. Justine realised she was still the centre of attention but, with Sartine’s hands around her body, and his awakening erection pressing against her stomach, her confidence swelled and she no longer shrank from the interest of the strangers. The worries about when she had been transformed from librarian to libertine were equally easy to set aside.
‘You honour me with this party,’ she said earnestly. ‘Marie tells me that you worked for hours to perfect every detail. Thank you for taking so much time on my behalf.’
The hand on her waist inched slowly downwards as Sartine waltzed Justine around the room. His thickening erection pressed more urgently against her and she could feel the familiar heat of arousal smouldering in her loins. Her bare breasts rubbed against his smooth manly chest and she was stung by a glorious charge of excitement. The music continued to sway at a helterskelter pace – its majestic melodies soaring and swooping – while Sartine hurried her around the dance floor with meticulous grace.
‘You honour our party with your beauty,’ Sartine replied. The tips of his fingers teased against her cleft. He was cupping one buttock but he had managed to get his fingers daringly close to her pussy lips. His nails grazed against the dark curls that covered her labia. The tingle of excitement he provoked was sweet enough to make Justine shiver in his embrace. ‘Is everything to your satisfaction?’
She thought of assuring him that everything was sensational and then decided to voice the only true reservation that still preyed on her thoughts. ‘Why are all your guests, except for me, wearing masks?’
He chuckled. ‘There are several reasons for the masks,’ he explained carefully. Each step of the waltz made their bodies merge together as though they were involved in a greater intimacy than merely dancing. Justine knew her excitement was in danger of becoming climactic from the teasing steps of the waltz and she forced herself to listen to his response. ‘Some of my guests are celebrities,’ Sartine explained, ‘and they wish to avoid the media attention of being discovered at a party like this. The same applies to many of the respected professionals who would face embarrassment if caught participating in anything so bacchanal as tonight’s activities. The masks are also a useful device for identifying you. Everyone here is expected to enjoy themselves with you and treat you to the pleasure of their own particular speciality. If they know you are the only one not wearing a mask, they will have no problems singling you out when they want to inflame your passion.’
She faltered in her steps and glanced at the endless circle of faces surrounding them. The thought that everyone in the room was expected to excite her and enjoy her made Justine suddenly queasy. There were so many people – all of them beautiful and each arousing enough to fulfil at least one of her myriad private fantasies – that she worried she might not be up to the challenge of proving herself worthy of Sartine’s standards.
‘When this waltz has finished they will have their way with you,’ he explained. His fingertips had reached the wet split of her sex and the echo of his words trembled through his touch. As they danced smoothly around the floor Sartine continued to tease the oily lips of her pussy. His touch was light and effortless and made her want to weep from the sudden surge of desire he evoked. The stiffness of his erection was now unbearable against her stomach and she wished he would use it to satisfy the urges he had awoken in her loins. Panting softly and pressing herself more firmly into his embrace, she kissed him as they danced.
Sartine teased her lips with his tongue for a moment before pulling away. Smiling lewdly down at her, still leading her through the waltz as though he had been born for the dance, he sighed, ‘I am a little worried that you might not be the right person to own
La Coste
. Is there anything you can say to put my fears at ease?’
The panic his words inspired was almost enough to quell her excitement. Justine’s heart quickened and she clutched him more tightly. Her thoughts were no longer fixed on the fingers insinuating themselves between her pussy lips. She swallowed twice as she struggled to find an answer, and then said, ‘I’m not sure I could say anything to put your fears at ease. You’re assessing how readily I give myself to pleasure, aren’t you?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Didn’t I give myself wholly to pleasure in your penthouse this afternoon? Aren’t I giving myself to this glorious party that you’ve organised this evening?’
‘You proved yourself worthy in the penthouse,’ Sartine agreed. ‘But you seemed very anxious to leave there at the earliest opportunity. That’s hardly the behaviour I would expect from a committed hedonist.’
She nodded, her gaze never leaving his eyes. ‘I was anxious to get out of your penthouse,’ she agreed. ‘I’d experienced all the pleasures I could envision and I wanted to get back to the woman in my room. I spent the remainder of the afternoon listening to her read de Sade while I licked her pussy. If you want to kiss me again, I imagine you’ll taste that her wetness is still on my lips.’
He drew a deep breath and his smile was broad with approval. ‘That would certainly indicate a degree of worthiness,’ he conceded. ‘That response might just be enough to help me make my decision, although I’m sure you won’t mind if I ask further questions as the evening progresses.’
‘Ask whatever you want.’
He nodded and brought the dance to an abrupt halt.
Justine considered him uncertainly, only dimly realising that the music had also been brought to a conclusion. His fingers remained at her cleft and the patter of polite applause rolled around them as the attendant guests showed their approval for the spectacle they had provided with the dance.
‘I will be watching you closely for the remainder of this evening,’ Sartine explained. ‘I will have one or two more questions to help assuage the last of my doubts. But, for now, I want you to enjoy the party.’
He stepped away from her and she suddenly found herself alone and the centre of attention to a room full of masked and naked strangers. The mild arousal she had been enjoying transformed itself into a dire unease and Justine turned from one partially disguised face to the other as she tried to assess the group’s mood. So many of the smiles were ambiguous it was difficult to tell whether she was looking at speculative interest or manic appreciation. Stepping back, continually turning, she realised they were inching closer and bearing down on her.