Destroying Angel (13 page)

She accepted another glass of wine, this time red and rather thin. The idea of letting herself be seduced in order to investigate the co-op had changed from an amusing joke to a very immediate reality. Charrier had obviously decided that he had made a conquest.

They continued to talk, Paulette sampling each of the four main wines produced by the co-op and the two brought in from the south. The glasses were large, and even with her limited knowledge of wine, Paulette knew that tasting samples were never filled to the brim. Still, allowing him to pour cheap wine into her was making the idea of being seduced by him more acceptable, so that when the other workers began to leave and Charrier offered to show her the cellar, she followed without hesitation.

‘Temptation,’ Charrier declared as he closed the heavy wooden doors behind him at the bottom of the cellar steps, ‘could be defined as a woman’s body. Do you not think?’

Thinking of Susan, Paulette readily agreed with Charrier’s rather over-dramatic philosophy.

‘And yours,’ Charrier continued, ‘is provocation beyond endurance.’

Without warning he pushed her against the wall and was upon her. Paulette responded to his kisses, at first half-heartedly and then more warmly, letting her mouth open under his. He moaned as he mauled her breasts, then sharply tugged the T-shirt up, letting them spill softly into his hands. Paulette shivered as his thumbs found her nipples, then sighed as his mouth disengaged from hers to suck on one hard bud of flesh. She held his head, her passion rising as he moulded and licked her breasts.

She did not resist while he undressed her. He kissed her body and peeled her clothes off to leave her standing naked in the dim yellow light of the cellar. He murmured endearments in French, few of which Paulette understood, except that he clearly had a thing about her being black, and that she had in some way teased him into making his advance. She took very little notice, not worried about his fantasies as long as she got what she now needed; a good fuck. Suddenly he pulled away, leaving her naked and panting against the wall.

‘Would you perhaps allow me to indulge a little penchant?’ he asked, as breathless as she and slightly hesitant.

‘I’ll try,’ Paulette whispered, hoping his fantasy would be to her taste.

‘Come.’ Charrier’s eyes glinted hungrily, and he took Paulette by the hand.

She allowed him to lead her into a smaller room; a chamber of the local yellow stone lined with racks of bottles. In the centre stood a large barrel on a trestle.

‘Get on the barrel for me, my little one,’ Charrier said with a catch of urgent lust in his tone.

Paulette hesitated for a moment, and then straddled the barrel. Her mouthwatering breasts squashed against the smooth wood as she lay forward. Bracing her feet against one end of the trestle and gripping the other with her hands, she managed to get fairly comfortable. The position forced her thighs wide open, as she knew it would, and held her pussy vulnerable and exposed. She felt gloriously available and extremely rude, knowing that when he moved behind her he would be able to see every detail of her pussy – and her anus.

Charrier appeared in front of her, holding a coil of rope.

‘May I tie you?’ he asked hoarsely. ‘Say if you’d prefer otherwise.’

Paulette wavered between lust and caution. To be tied over the barrel fitted so well with her fantasies that it was almost irresistible, yet Charrier was undoubtedly a suspect for fraud, possibly even murder. Then again, he had no reason to suspect her of being in any way involved with an investigation, or even to know that there was an investigation. Also, if he was the sort of man who could murder, backing out now might very well be the wrong thing to do.

Yes, she decided, the wisest course was to let the Frenchman fulfil his fantasy. Not that she had a great deal of choice any more. Even as she pondered her predicament he had busily tied one of her ankles to the trestle and looped the rope underneath. Paulette shivered, the thrill of bondage getting to her despite the danger – or possibly because of it.

‘You are such temptation, my dear,’ Charrier said as he finished securing her to the barrel. She was now utterly available to his every whim.

‘In the seventeenth century, and before,’ Charrier continued, walking around Paulette and looking at her naked perfection, ‘when a whore was taken, she would be tied behind a cart and brought to the village square. There she would be stripped, tied to a stake, and left for the ridicule of the people. Perhaps she would be pelted with refuse, perhaps spat on by the village women, but most often she would be whipped…’

He was now standing in front of Paulette and slowly undid his belt, with clear intent. She watched, hypnotised by his words and the movement of his hands. The belt was a good two inches wide, much broader than would normally be used on a man’s suit trousers, and made of a heavy, supple leather.

‘A fitting punishment for a whore, do you not think?’ Charrier goaded as he moved behind her again, his fingertips lightly following the contours of her back. ‘Yes, it is a terrible sin to tempt men with your flesh, and for sin we must have expiation, must we not?’

Paulette couldn’t answer. She was trembling, and beginning to understand what Susan meant by sexual humiliation. She had been tied up often enough, spanked even more often, but always by indulgent men who only called it punishment because she asked them to. In practice, they’d always been so taken by her body and unashamed sexuality that they’d have done anything she asked. Charrier clearly desired her as much as any of them, but he had called her a whore, and was going to beat her as a punishment for it; beat her without knowing it was what she really wanted.

‘Don’t you see? You are to be whipped like the whore you are,’ Charrier said as he idly stroked Paulette’s raised bottom. ‘Only then will I give you what you crave; my penis.’

Realising that an acquiescent silence was not the reaction he would expect of a girl who was about to be whipped, Paulette began to whimper and stopped trying to control her trembling.

Charrier snickered.

Paulette could not see him, and could do nothing but wait passively for her beating to begin.

But the Frenchman was clearly in no hurry. He explored her buttocks, saying nothing as his fingers slid between them and loitered on her rear entrance with a casual intimacy that had his victim sobbing with frustration.

Charrier snickered again and his hand left her. There was a long pause. Paulette closed her eyes and braced herself, waiting for the whistle of the belt and the explosion of pain across her backside.

Nothing happened.

Her breathing quickened with the agonising frustration of her helplessness, and the sure knowledge that she was about to have his belt taken to her behind. Her buttocks clenched in anticipation. The tension was almost unbearable.

‘Do it…’ she begged, finally unable to endure the waiting any longer. ‘Please… beat me.’

Again she heard his cruel laugh, only this time it was immediately followed by the first stroke. Paulette gasped, feeling her buttocks bounce under the harsh impact. The belt was heavy and stung, a sharp pain delivered with a force that pushed the air from her lungs. The second smack caught the fattest part of Paulette’s bottom, the third the junction between buttocks and thighs. She made no effort to hide her response, squealing and wriggling as best she could in the restraints.

Charrier laughed as he beat her, calling her a whore and then lapsing into French as he became more excited. At first she answered him back, calling him every name she could think of, then subsiding to whispered curses and finally whimpers as her buttocks began to throb and the familiar urgent ache began to build in her pussy. Her whole bottom was a mass of pain, incredibly sensitive; the centre of her awareness as the leather smacked against it again and again.

‘Fuck me, Christian,’ she whispered, breathless and urgent for the Frenchman’s cock inside her.

He stopped the beating immediately. She heard a dull thud as the belt dropped to the stone floor, and then the sound of a zip. She sighed in anticipated as his cock nudged between her thighs and then pushed a little way inside her pussy. He paused for a moment, and then the air was wrenched from her lungs as he lunged forward and filled her aggressively. Fingers locked onto her hips and he began to fuck her with strong, slow motions, each of which pressed his belly against the well-beaten flesh of her buttocks.

Paulette began to grunt as his strokes quickened, each one sandwiching her against the barrel, the fiery pain in her bottom contrasting with the pleasure in her vagina. Tied and helpless, there was nothing she could do but let Charrier take his pleasure from her body.

‘Harder,’ she begged, drawing a new flurry of energy from the Frenchman. He began to moan and mumble her name. She knew he was coming. He pulled away. An instant later something splattered across her bottom, and she knew he had ejaculated on her tenderised flesh. It felt gloriously undignified, and she wondered how she must look for him. Incredibly lewd and wanton, that was for sure.

‘Help me come,’ she begged, hoping that Charrier would have the decency to consider her.

He didn’t. He merely made a noise that sounded to Paulette like disgust.

‘Please…’ she implored again, feeling incredibly frustrated and annoyed at his casual assumption that it was all over just because he’d come.

He snorted contemptuously, but from the corner of her eye she saw him walk to one of the racks and take a bottle, after considering two before making his choice. He moved back out of her view, and a moment later the cold glass was pressed against her wet labia.

‘Thank you,’ she sighed, rubbing with little side-to-side motions of her hips. ‘Oh… that’s so nice. Oh, thank you, Christian… thank you for beating me, thank you, thank you…’

Charrier laughed his same cruel laugh, and in that instant she erupted, screaming her passion in the empty cellar, her mind fixed on the sheer dirtiness of the condition she was in as her orgasm welled up and burst in a shock that speared right through her body.

Charrier untied her even before her orgasm had fully subsided. She was vaguely aware that he was apologising for beating her in a tone that indicated genuine regret and sought mitigation.

‘You tempted me too much,’ he said, almost angry in his attempt to justify his actions.

‘It’s all right,’ Paulette tried to reassure him. ‘Calm down. You might have asked first, but I didn’t mind.’

‘No?’

‘Actually,’ she admitted, ‘it made it rather special, knowing that you didn’t know, if you see what I mean.’

‘
Extraordinaire
!’ Charrier enthused. ‘Normally girls protest when you try, love it when it’s being done, and then complain afterwards.’

‘Not me,’ Paulette said as she climbed off the barrel and stretched her stiff limbs. ‘Do you think I could have a wash?’

‘Of course, how thoughtless of me. There’s a basin in the office, upstairs and to the left. Don’t worry, everyone has gone home.’

Despite Charrier’s assurance, Paulette checked carefully before slipping out of the cellar, then poked her head above the parapet before emerging from the stairwell. Appearing naked from the cellar in front of half a dozen French workmen was beyond her idea of showing off. The place was empty, so she hurried across to the office. She washed quickly, listening for Charrier’s footsteps. Whatever he was doing, it clearly didn’t involve coming back upstairs and so, with her heart in her mouth, Paulette quickly wiped herself dry and moved to the filling cabinets at the far end of the room.

It took no time at all to find what she wanted. The files were clearly labelled and in seconds she was holding the de Vergy Fine Wines file in trembling fingers. The top sheet was an invoice copy, showing that Annabella and Ruddock imported all six of the co-op’s wines. Even as Paulette turned to the next page she heard the firm sound of the cellar door being shut.

‘I’ve brought your clothes, Paulette,’ Charrier’s voice sounded as she hastily replaced the file and scampered back to the basin, making a pretence of finishing her ablutions as he appeared and placed her clothes on the desk.

He grinned at her nudity and made a joke on the state of her bottom. Paulette did her best to return a bubbly smile, even though her heart was pounding in her chest.

‘And will you be a passing delight for me, my dear,’ he asked, watching Paulette slip into her panties and wince a little as they touched her tender bottom, with obvious relish, ‘or perhaps you are staying locally and would care to see more of me and the Loire?’

‘I shouldn’t really be doing this,’ Paul Berner said as he dropped a sheaf of papers in front of Susan.

‘You shouldn’t really tie girls to lavatories, either,’ she said, ‘at least, not at incident sites. Have you got some blank paper and a pen?’

‘Sure,’ Berner confirmed. ‘D’you fancy Chinese or Indian?’

‘Aren’t you going to cook?’ she queried, looking up from where she was spreading the reports of the seven Fire Ghost attacks across his coffee-table.

‘Cooking’s not really my thing.’

‘Chinese, then.’

Berner fetched the pen and paper, leaving Susan absorbed in the details of the arsons. After telephoning for the take-away he went to the fridge for beer. Susan took hers with a murmur of thanks, not even glancing up from her work.