Purr (5 page)

Perhaps her flights of imagination could be attributed to
that fact alone. She’d never worked her charms on another in the hopes of
manipulating them.

And yet, all Giselle could think about was the attendant
writhing sensuously below her.

“Faster.” The komtesse’s sharp command broke the spell.

Giselle opened her eyes and began to grind her hips. She
hadn’t been punished severely enough to allow herself to take pleasure from
this. Not yet.

She brushed the komtesse’s hand, indicating she needed to
suffer. “Please.”

Katarina let out a laugh before she tightened her clasp on
Giselle’s nipples. The sweet sting elicited a harsh breath from Giselle. She
bit her bottom lip, determined to withstand the tantalizing torture. Her hips
bucked faster. That almost elusive shift in her brain occurred and the pain
twisted into insidious pleasure. Hard spasms caused her cunny to grip the
leather phallus as wave after sweet wave rolled through her like a mountain
thunderstorm.

Moments later, she lay under the thick eiderdown coverlet on
the komtesse’s bed, dozing as Katarina stroked her hair. “Rest for now, pet.
And when you awaken, I’ll have that tight little ass of yours.”

Chapter Four

Arabella quickly fell into a routine of readying the kittens
for the days their presence was requested in the den and then waiting for them
to return. When the kittens were not in service, they were kept separated from
the staff and allowed to walk in the gardens, read or play games in one of the
parlors—always under the watchful eye of the komtesse’s henchwoman, Gudrun.

Helga supervised the attendants when their service was not
required. As long as the kittens weren’t using the garden, the attendants were
permitted to use it or to freely roam certain parts of the villa.

While the kittens seemed to thoroughly enjoy
their
free time, most of the attendants complained of boredom. Helga seemed
sympathetic, but she never allowed favors that were strictly against the rules.

At least the attendants
had
Helga. The kittens were
doomed to Gudrun, who oversaw every aspect of their lives outside the den. A
stern Prussian, she hailed from thick peasant stock. Standing over six feet
tall, she glowered at everyone, arms crossed over her ample bosom, never
offering a friendly smile. Her piggish eyes missed nothing and behind closed
doors, Gudrun tended to be the butt of many a joke. She held none of the charm
of the current fashion of elaborately powdered wigs, voluminous skirts draped
over broad whalebone panniers, ribbons and jewel-encrusted slippers. Instead,
Gudrun dressed daily in a drab gray frock and wore her thin blonde hair in two
tightly plaited braids wound into buns on either side of her head.

Although Arabella had not interacted with the komtesse’s
lackey, she knew the formidable woman would be a barrier to any sort of
clandestine affair—especially with Giselle.

Some part of her had adjusted to the flagrant nudity that
had so shocked and aroused her upon arrival. But nothing lessened her desire
for the komtesse’s favorite pet. Night after night, Arabella massaged herself
to orgasm, biting back Giselle’s name. Every day that the kittens were
summoned, Petra launched herself onto Arabella’s table, preventing any further
contact between her and the brunette kitten.

Today, however, Petra hung back. Her bottom lip protruded in
a sullen pout.

“What’s the matter?” Arabella asked.

“My menses have begun. I will not be allowed to
participate.”

Arabella tried to console Petra but when Giselle came into
the room, all coherent thought evaporated.

Giselle shrugged out of her robe, revealing her voluptuous
body, and without so much as an apologetic glance toward the temporarily ousted
kitten, she mounted Arabella’s vacant table.

Petra’s eyes flashed in a display of shock laced with envy.
Arabella tried her best not to show her own surprise. Knee-weakening
nervousness consumed her as she began to attend her charge.

Even the scent of the kitten’s naked flesh invoked sinful
stirrings between her legs.

“Return to your chamber, Petra,” Helga ordered as Arabella
took up her sponge with trembling hands and began to bathe Giselle’s back.

Arabella tried to focus on the rivulets of warm water
trailing downward over the lush curves but all she could think about was the
fantasy of finding ecstasy in this woman’s arms. Her mouth went dry and the
back of her neck flamed. Perspiration beaded and trickled between her breasts.
Her inner thighs heated and dampness gathered in her channel.

She’d longed for just this moment and now that it was
happening, she couldn’t enjoy it. God, what had turned her into such a
blithering bundle of nerves?

Her fantasies faded when she noticed the faint bruising on
Giselle’s backside. “What happened to you?”

But Arabella immediately regretted asking the question. She
suspected she didn’t really want to know.

Giselle looked at her, her gaze penetrating. “Not to worry.
It doesn’t hurt.”

“But—”

“I wanted it,” Giselle whispered, her eyes revealing the
veracity of her statement. “I
enjoy
it.”

Arabella tried to absorb this new layer of her lovely
charge. She had considered what it must feel like to accept some of the
tantalizing tortures meted out by the komtesse. Doubtless, it was the komtesse
herself who’d dealt these bruises. But to
delight in
such taboo
treatment? The desire to kiss those wounds all better flooded Arabella. She
inhaled, trying to stave the edge off her lust.

It was no use.

When Arabella began to sponge the flesh between Giselle’s
legs, the kitten dropped her back, which raised her buttocks in the most
enticing way. Arabella stepped behind for a superior view. Tight, dark curls
hugged the plump lips. Pink flesh lay visible, the folds parted to reveal the
hint of a glistening aperture that looked as sweet as the most succulent fruit.

Arabella traced her top lip with the tip of her tongue. A
furtive glance told her everyone else paid attention to their own tables. No
one would know if…

She wet the sponge and, as she dragged it across Giselle’s
cunny, trailed her fingertip behind in the barest, daring caress that left her
insides quivering.

Giselle pushed back slightly.

The motion was a gratifying reward that caused Arabella to
swell with pride and hope. Oh, to kiss that scrumptious treat! She felt dizzy
with need.

The bath ended all too soon, but Arabella relished every
second of massaging oil into the velvety skin and taut muscles beneath her
palms. Giselle lay on her belly, the swell of the side of her breast visible.
The cleft of her bottom looked extraordinarily tempting and the sensuous way
her toes curled when Arabella worked her hands dangerously close to the
sensitive flesh there indicated the kitten’s enjoyment.

“Ears and tails, attendants!” Helga barked. “The komtesse
will not be kept waiting.”

Reluctantly, Arabella ended the massage and wiped the oil
off her hands. She retrieved the black ears, tail and mittens. Giselle lifted
her gaze as Arabella fastened the ears on her head. The look shot straight to
Arabella’s heart and squeezed but she couldn’t force herself to look away.

Not wanting to attract attention, she slid the sleeves and
leggings on, fastening each.

“Make haste, Arabella,” Helga ordered with a smart snap of
her fingers.

Giselle had the audacity to look back as Arabella coated the
smooth wooden dowel with lubricant. “Fingers first—to help me accept the tail,”
Giselle whispered and spread her legs slightly.

Arabella eyed the puckered rosette. What she wouldn’t give
to finger that tight hole while bestowing kisses on those succulent folds. She
lubricated two fingers and slid one slowly into the warmth of the orifice.

Giselle shimmied. Her lashes fluttered and her sex tightened
under Arabella’s watch. She withdrew the finger then inserted both, sinking
them deep into the smooth flesh, holding them there to stretch the hole so her
charge could accommodate the plug. A surge of daring compelled her to lightly
stroke the pink folds with the knuckles of her free fingers.

So soft. So fragrant.

A droplet of liquid beaded and then trickled onto her finger
and Arabella’s heart rioted at the thought of Giselle finding pleasure at her
touch—even this touch that prepared her for another.

“Arabella! I’ll not warn you again, girl!” Helga snapped.

Disappointment flared but Arabella removed her fingers and
slid the dowel into place. Giselle shook her bottom bewitchingly. “Oh, that
feels so good,” she cooed before climbing down from the table. “Thank you,
Arabella.”

She was the last kitten to exit the room.

All the other attendants had cleaned their stations and gone
to breakfast. Arabella expected a scolding from Helga but instead, she merely
glowered and walked away. Arabella released a deep breath. Was her infatuation
with the komtesse’s favorite obvious to everyone? Did they know how much she
ached to taste Giselle’s lips and skin, her breasts…her sex?

Did Giselle know?

* * * * *

Giselle watched the other kittens pleasure each other.
Within reach, one lay on her back, thighs sprawled as another straddled her on
hands and knees and devoured her sex.

Clitoris pounding, Giselle watched, wishing her hands
weren’t rendered useless by the damn fur mittens. Her thoughts kept returning
to how her body had responded to Arabella’s touch this morning in the
preparation room. Giselle hadn’t expected to be so moved, so aroused by the
simplest brush of a fingertip against her skin.

The komtesse’s touch awakened Giselle’s need to be punished
for taking pleasure in another woman’s body. It was as if one canceled the
other. That was not so with Arabella.

When Giselle closed her eyes, she envisioned kissing the
fresh-faced attendant, of feeling her lips, pliable and soft beneath her own,
of tasting her tongue, fondling her breasts and dropping to her knees to sample
the mouthwatering flesh between Arabella’s legs.

Giselle squeezed her thighs together, hoping for relief. Her
gaze flicked toward the komtesse, who lounged in her chair lightly flogging one
kitten while laving the crotch of another. The sight only caused Giselle’s sex
to ache worse. She could resist no longer.

Need drove her to crawl to the komtesse and brush her face
plaintively against the aristocrat’s leg. The komtesse said nothing but drew
her skirt open and spread her legs. Giselle latched onto Katarina’s clitoris
and sucked. Hope flared that the komtesse would reward her but after a few
moments, the komtesse pushed her away and pulled her skirts together.

Dejected, Giselle sat back on her heels. Had she displeased
her mistress? Burning with desire, she brushed her cheek against the komtesse’s
shin again. This time, Giselle mewled.

Katarina flicked the flogger and popped Giselle’s bottom.
“Off with you!” But the glint in the komtesse’s eyes revealed she knew the
exact effect of her torture on her needy kitten.

Giselle crawled sulkily back to her rug. Shutting out the
sounds of the others moaning and finding release, she lay on her belly and
toyed with the tufts of soft fur on her rug. The dowel in her ass caused her
cunny to throb with almost painful sexual demand. The fur beneath her felt
supremely sensuous on her bare breasts and the skin of her backside smarted
where the flogger had smacked it.

When she noticed the komtesse getting out of her chair to
kneel between the legs of a kitten, Giselle seized her chance and slipped out
of the room. The festivities wouldn’t last much longer anyway.

After a quick glance over her shoulder, she bolted and raced
down the hallway. When she turned the corner, she slid to a halt upon seeing
one of the attendants. Her breath froze—until she realized it was just the
attendant she sought.

“Arabella,” she whispered hotly.

Arabella stopped and turned. Her lips parted. “What are you
doing out of the den? Is it over?”

Giselle shook her head as she approached slowly. “No.”

“Then why are you…why are you
here
?” Her gaze darted
into the preparation room.

“I need
you
.”

Arabella’s shocked stare confused Giselle.

She continued. “I…I’m so aroused. I need—”

“Get on the table,” Arabella said quickly.

Giselle didn’t hesitate. She climbed onto the table and got
on her hands and knees. The hands that touched the backs of her thighs
trembled. She held her breath as fingertips trailed up her legs then melted
when one worked its way inside her passage. Juices flooded her channel as the
digit slid in and out, igniting sensitive nerve endings.

Pressure on the dowel in her ass added to the thrill and
Giselle gritted her teeth to keep from giving voice to her pleasure. A soft
kiss dampened the spot where the flogger had hit. The idea this other woman
would risk everything—
everything
—to please her rose up hard in Giselle’s
breast.

It was humbling. She tensed and felt herself clamp down to
milk Arabella’s finger. A strangled, stifled cry caught in her throat. The
ecstasy devastated her.

It also confused her.

There had been no precursor of punishment. Only
this
.
This remarkable feeling of release selflessly given by another.

Giselle was still riding the tide of bliss when the fingers
abruptly retracted and began to work the plug in her bottom loose. Her eyes
snapped open at both the unexpected end to the sweet intrusion—and Helga’s
formidable voice.

“What’s going on here?”

“Den time is over. See?” Arabella offered calmly as first
one and then two kittens entered the preparation room. Her attention turned to
Giselle. “Your worry was for naught. You have not yet begun your menses.”

Helga eyed them for a moment before taking interest in the
entry of the other attendants.

“Thank you,” Giselle whispered.

Their gazes locked and held and Giselle felt a strange
stirring in her belly she’d never before experienced. She tried not to think
about anything except how she would get the attendant alone to convince her to
escape as Arabella continued removing the kitten costume.

Giselle, however, found it very difficult to concentrate
when Arabella began to massage her shoulders and back, kneading away the
frustration and tension sexual denial had created.

The attendant avoided her gaze, instead concentrating on the
task at hand. But Giselle could see the perspiration beading at the woman’s
hairline and the way her teeth worried her bottom lip. A tendril of guilt
snaked through Giselle that she had not offered sexual comfort to Arabella.

They both knew the risks. And although this
thing
that had just conspired between them had kindled their need to see each other
again, fighting it until the perfect time would be imperative.

* * * * *

“Bad pussy,” Katarina scolded.