In the Garden of Sin (8 page)

“Aye, Don Domenico. I just… I…”

“She just needs a bit of time, Domenico,” Elic said as he knelt on the top step of the pool, hunched over with his weight on his elbows. Sibylla lay with her legs wrapped around his
back, her hips propped on a pillow. From where I stood, I could see their privy parts united in coitus, his distended organ almost fully sheathed within her.

“She’s
wasting
time, I say,” Inigo countered as he unbuttoned his bulging breeches. The cockstand that sprang forth was unbelievably massive, like that of the satyr in the statues. Even Lucy and Bianca, who had seen their share of male appendages, gaped in wonderment.

Placing herself between his legs, Lucy lapped eagerly at the rampant organ, which twitched in response. Bianca, on the steps next to him, leaned down and licked the tip, murmuring “Mm…”

“One at a time, ladies,” Inigo said, “so that I may give each of you adequate attention. Bianca, you first. Take it in your mouth and lower your head slowly until you’ve taken in as much as you think you can. Be careful to shield your teeth with your lips. That’s right…”

Realizing I was staring with rapt interest, I looked away quickly.

“Hannah,” Inigo said, gentling his voice, “I do realize this is all new to you, but you should at least watch. Sucking cock is a skill even a virgin can acquire, and one that will greatly enhance your desirability as a courtesan, especially if you learn to do it well.”

“He’s right,” Vitturi said. “You claim to have the spirit of a courtesan, Mistress Leeds, but I’ve yet to see evidence of it.”

He wore the same coolly impassive expression that he always wore on those rare occasions when he addressed me directly. No, not always. He’d slipped that evening at supper, where he’d sat next to me at a long, damask-draped table in the castle’s cavernous great hall. We enjoyed a sumptuous banquet with Serge Pépin, Elic, Inigo, my fellow novices, and the gentlemen who had accompanied us there—with the exception of
the Duke of Buckingham, who had chosen to sup in his rooms with only Jonas Knowles for company.

I was dismayed by the absence of the duke, who seemed no more inclined toward conviviality now that we’d arrived at our destination than he had during the long journey there, during which time he’d never so much as glanced in my direction. He still seemed determined to keep himself secluded in the best of the available accommodations—he had an entire tower to himself—attended to by the dozen or so retainers he’d brought with him. How was I to pursue my objective if I couldn’t get anywhere near the man?

Also missing at supper was Elle, much to my disappointment, for I felt more at ease when she was around. She had become a valued friend and chatmate—not that I could confide to her my true purpose in apprenticing myself to Signor Vitturi, of course, for which I felt some measure of guilt. My hope was that, when all of this was over and I had, God willing, saved my uncle from the executioner, I could reveal everything to Elle and she would understand and forgive me my subterfuge.

During supper, Vitturi ignored me almost completely until the lull between the small entrées and the roasts, when he turned to me and asked if I’d brought my book of madrigals. I retrieved the little red notebook from the hidden pocket of my gown and handed it to him. While everyone else feasted upon pork with lentils, stuffed partridges, and glazed leg of lamb, Don Domenico turned the pages of my book with seemingly utter absorption. He did not look up even when the roast course was removed and replaced with entremets of fragrant sour cherry clafouti, prune tarts, and an assortment of Auvergnat cheeses and fruit pastes.

“You wrote all of these? By yourself?”

I turned to find him looking at me, the book open to the last of the two dozen or so madrigals written there. “Of course, signore.”

My voice must have betrayed a hint of umbrage, because he said, “I don’t doubt you, I just…” He closed the book and ran his thumb over the tooled design on the cover. “Your word choices are at times unorthodox, but so apt, and I find your restrained lyricism remarkably powerful. ’Tis quite accomplished work for a person of so few years.”

So unforeseen was this praise that it took me a moment to find my tongue, and when I did, all I could do was stammer something about how most of my work was a good deal less impressive than these handpicked examples.

With a look that was both baleful and amused, he said, “Your inclination toward false modesty is not as endearing as you seem to think it is, Mistress Leeds.”

I groaned in mock exasperation. “I was brought up never to brag.”

“If someone points out how exceptional you are, ’tisn’t bragging to simply thank him.”

With a startled little smile—
exceptional?
—I said,
“Grazie
, signore.”

“Prego.”
He smiled into my eyes, the first time he had looked at me—
really
looked at me—since that all too fleeting moment of rapport on the day we’d met.

The moment seemed to stretch time itself. Once again, I felt a connection with him—with something inside him, something raw and needful that he kept locked in a box within himself.

And once again, his smile faded and he abruptly turned away.

“Um, which one shall it be?” I asked.

He scowled in puzzlement.

“Which madrigal would you like me to sing after supper?” I asked, indicating the book in his hand.

He thrust it at me, saying “You choose. One’s as good as the next.”

I sang my current favorite, to an enthusiastic reception from everyone save Domenico Vitturi. He clapped politely, but he didn’t smile, and when the others stood and cheered and demanded an encore, he turned and left the room.

His frosty demeanor hadn’t thawed between then and now. “’Tis a skill you need to learn,” he said, pointing across the steamy pool.

Inigo sat with Bianca’s head in his hands, guiding her movements. Her sheaf of dark, wavy hair hid the sight of her mouth on his sex, but his directives left no doubt as to what she was doing. “Open your throat, Bianca. That’s right, just relax it. I know you can’t take it all, and I don’t want you to gag, but perhaps another inch…”

“Inigo,” Vitturi said as he lifted his bad leg over the good, “perhaps ’tis time for Mistress Leeds to try her hand at the French arts.”

I closed my eyes, summoning the backbone to get through this.

My reluctance wasn’t lost on the Venetian. “Pleasuring a man with one’s mouth is a fundamental erotic skill, Mistress Leeds. If you want to be one of my courtesans, you must learn to do it—and not just tolerate the act, but relish it.”

I looked toward Elic, who seemed to share his sister’s inclination to protect and defend me, but he was clearly unaware of anything at the moment save his tutelage of Sibylla. He and the darkly beautiful Florentine were moving together slowly, sensually, his buttocks clenching and releasing, the muscles of his back and shoulders flexing with every languid thrust. His
head was lowered toward hers, his hair draping both their faces in damp tendrils.

I turned to look at Inigo, his gaze on me as Bianca’s head bobbed up and down, up and down. He said, “You needn’t take it in your mouth, Hannah, not this first time. I just want you to taste it, to know the feel of it on your tongue.”

“It taste
delizioso,”
Bianca said as she lifted her head from the organ in question and moved aside to make room for me between his legs. “Come, Hannah, you must try. Is not so bad—you see.”

I waded across the pool, thinking
Remove yourself from it. Just do what has to be done
.

OME,” INIGO SAID, gesturing me closer. “Get comfortable.”

I knelt on one of the steps with my face at the level of his glistening cockstand, which he held in his fist. It looked more than a little forbidding, with its twisting network of veins. There was a tiny slit on the purplish tip, from which oozed a bead of clear fluid.

Inigo took my hand and stroked my fingers up the shaft, which felt very warm and hard and surprisingly silken. “Touch your tongue to it,” he said.

Remove yourself…

I closed my eyes and leaned forward, feeling a woozy sense of disbelief that I was actually doing this, and extended my tongue until the tip of it met hot, smooth skin.
I’ve done it
, I
thought, but before I could pull away, Inigo closed a hand around my head and gently restrained me.

“Pretend you’re a cat licking something delectable,” he said. “Start down here at the bottom.”

I drew in a steadying breath and licked the erect organ upward from the base, surprised to find its warm, fleshy taste not at all unpleasant.

“Don’t let your hands be idle,” Inigo said, guiding my right hand to the slippery head and tucking my left under his bulging “stones,” as Elic had called them, to a stretch of firm flesh which he told me was actually the root of the shaft. “Rub it gently, in rhythm with your tongue… That’s right…”

I wondered what Domenico Vitturi was thinking as he sat there watching me from across the pool. How did it make him feel, seeing me with my mouth on Inigo’s sex? Did it please him? Trouble him? Did it arouse him as much as it aroused me?

I had expected to be disgusted by this act, but in fact, I found it strangely exciting. My nipples grew stiff and prickly beneath my sodden shift; my sex felt hotly inflamed.

“You’re doing very well,” Inigo murmured in a voice that sounded slightly winded. He had a length of my hair wrapped around his fist as he leaned back on a braced arm, hips rocking.

I licked and caressed him, gratified on a primal level by his quickening thrusts and harsh breathing.
I did this to him
, I thought.
He is consumed by pleasure because of me
.

Sibylla’s moans drew my gaze to the couple at the other end of the pool. Elic’s thrusts had grown sharp and hectic. “Hold still. Aye…” He reared over her, growling low in his throat.

“I’m about to come, too,” Inigo rasped. I glanced up to see his head thrown back, the muscles of his neck and torso straining.

“Not with Hannah,” Vitturi said sharply. “Bianca, you finish him.”

I stepped aside for the other woman, who grasped his shaft and kissed the tip. “Shall I swallow it?” she asked Inigo.

Vitturi answered for him, saying “Nay. I want Mistress Leeds to see.”

Inigo nodded to Bianca, who pumped him with her fist as she suckled him. “Now,” he gasped. Stepping back, she gave him a few swift strokes, whereupon a burst of milky fluid shot from the tip of his sex. More spurts followed, all of them spattering Bianca’s breasts, at which she was aiming his member.

I watched in astonishment as she leaned down to lick the last few drops that dribbled out. Inigo stroked her hair, then he took a handkerchief out of his pocket and used it to clean his spendings off her.

So ended our first lesson in the arts of the bedchamber, whereupon we climbed out of the pool and prepared to return to the castle. The air felt terribly chilly after the warmth of the water, and I shivered as I wrung out the skirt of my sodden shift.

As my fellow novices searched for their underpinnings among the piles of discarded finery, Inigo told them they needn’t put everything back on, that the staff of Grotte Cachée were accustomed to their guests going about in a state of dishabille. Lucy, Sibylla, and Bianca merely donned their nice, dry shifts and gathered up the rest of their clothes, while I stood with my arms wrapped around myself, shaking from head to foot and dreading the long, chilly walk back to my chamber.

I started as I felt something heavy being lain upon my shoulders—Domenico Vitturi’s black satin overgown. I turned to find him standing behind me, his expression impenetrable as he wrapped me in the capelike garment.

“Nay, signore, ’twill get wet,” I said. “I would hate to ruin such a beautiful—”

“The next time you are instructed to undress, I suggest you do so,” he said without looking at me. “My patience has its limits.”

Before I could summon a response to that, he turned and walked away.

Inigo and Elic gathered up our clothing to carry back to the castle, an unexpectedly gallant gesture. As we left the bathhouse, Vitturi closed a hand over Sibylla’s shoulder and spoke quietly into her ear.