Stephanie's Castle (4 page)

Back in the
main cabin, fully dressed again, Stephanie felt refreshed.

'Who is that
man?' she asked Susie.

'I don't know,
madam.'

'Is he going
to the lake?'

'Yes,
madam.'

'What will
happen to him there?'

'I don't know
madam.'

Susie clearly
knew more than she was prepared to say but Stephanie thought it was
pointless to ask further questions. She ordered a small glass of
champagne which she sipped as the plane banked and came into land.
How much of what had happened on the flight had been planned by
Devlin in advance she did not know and, she had to admit to
herself, she did not care. The experience in itself was enough.

As the plane
taxied to a halt on what was obviously a private landing strip
Stephanie could see a large black Mercedes waiting on the tarmac.
The plane came to rest near the car, the pilot shut down the
engines and Susie opened the exterior door and deployed the landing
steps built into the fuselage of the plane.

'I hope you
had a pleasant flight, madam,' Susie said mechanically without
looking directly into Stephanie's yes. Stephanie said nothing in
reply, stepping out into the balmy heat of an Italian evening.

The uniformed
chauffeur held the back door of the car open for her and Stephanie
climbed in and watched as Susie handed the driver her case.

At the back of
the plane a van had driven up and parked and Stephanie saw two men
manhandling a large coffin-shaped crate off the plane. Susie went
over to supervise. Obviously the other 'passenger' was not going to
have quite as comfortable a ride to the castle.

It took only
five minutes to drive to the lake. It was only as they arrived at a
large wooden jetty that Stephanie realised there had been no
passport control or customs at the airstrip where they had landed.
Either they had entered illegally or Devlin was a very influential
man in Italy. What looked like a brand new motorboat, in highly
polished wood and brass, waited at the jetty. Stephanie was guided
on to the back transom and immediately the engines were fired and
the boat glided away from the moorings. Then the engines were
opened up and the boat surged forward cutting a huge swathe through
the calm water and leaving a vast foaming white wake to mark its
passage.

The sun was
setting now. Whether this was part of Devlin's plan too Stephanie
did not know, but the view from her seat was one of the most
breathtaking she had ever seen. She could see the castle on an
island in the middle of the lake and behind it the sun setting in a
fire of gold and orange. A flock of birds, disturbed by the noise
of the engines, took to flight, flying out towards the sun, black
silhouettes against the light.

With the power
of the engines it took only a few minutes to cover the two or three
miles to the castle. Stephanie thought she saw a glint of
binoculars as they approached, a servant perhaps, going to alert
Devlin that the boat was on its way. And sure enough as they
approached an ancient wooden jetty built at the bottom of a long
stone staircase leading up into the castle, a staircase overhung by
bougainvillaea and jasmine, she saw Devlin standing at the mooring,
smiling energetically.

'Welcome,
welcome!' he shouted as the boatman glided the boat into the rubber
buffers and jumped ashore to moor the boat fore and aft.

He put out his
hand to help her from the boat and she took it. The boat rocked
slightly as she stepped on to the jetty. Seeing her hand in his
again immediately sent a whole panoply of thrills racing through
her. She remembered his huge fingers, each individually the size of
a banana, the whole hand resembling an American baseball catcher's
mit, but had thought perhaps her recollection had exaggerated their
size. In fact, as she looked at them now, she realised her memory
had added nothing to their dimensions. Her own hand was dwarfed by
Devlin's: in his it looked like a small child's. The thought of
what this hand, these fingers, would do to her later, and of what
they had done in the past, made her feel a delicious shiver of
anticipation.

'I'm so glad
you could accept my invitation. I hope all the arrangements were
satisfactory,' Devlin was saying.

'Everything
was perfect, thank you.'

He was as ugly
as she remembered too. His huge bulbous nose veined with blue blood
vessels dominated his face, his pock-marked skin like the surface
of some strange planet.

'I tried to
think of everything.'

'It's nice to
see you again.' And Stephanie meant it. She hadn't been sure what
her reaction to seeing him would be after their brief but intense
affair in London. But she suddenly experienced a strange rush of
affection for this man: whether it was because of the way she was
being treated, like some Oriental princess, or something more
profound she did not know.

'I'll show you
to your room and then we can eat. I think you'll enjoy the food.
I've tried to make it special.'

'Why me?' It
slipped out. She had been determined not to ask that question.

'The time we
had together. You made a very great impression on me.'

'You haven't
made any attempt to see me since.'

'I thought
perhaps it was best to wait a while,' he said seriously, as though
trying to make her believe it was something he had thought about at
length. 'I can assure you I would like to see a great deal more of
you in the future.'

Questions
crowded into her mind again but she decided to ignore them all. The
boatman had untied the motorboat from the jetty and started to nose
out into the lake, no doubt going back to pick up the other
visitor. Devlin indicated the stone staircase and she walked ahead
of him - it was too narrow for more than single file - smelling the
fragrance of the flowers and looking back over the lake, as the
boat cut through the still water again and the sun finally set.
Behind her Devlin followed, his eyes taking in her pinched ankles
immaculately clad in the fully fashioned seamed stockings and soft
Bally shoes he had chosen for her.

They passed a
small courtyard planted with orange trees and through two massive
carved wooden doors into the anteroom of the castle. A vast marble
staircase dominated this area, leading to a long gallery on the
first floor. Everywhere Stephanie looked there were objects of
beauty: hand-woven rugs on marbled floors, oil paintings, all
modern and individually lit. The furniture - tables, chairs, little
chests of drawers, a huge armoire, some antique, some modern - were
works of art in themselves. Everything fitted perfectly against the
grained stone walls of the castle.

Devlin led her
up the marble staircase and along the gallery until they reached a
thick, polished oak door at the end of a short corridor.

'This has the
best view of the lake,' he said, leading her through the door.

The room was
like a suite in the world's most sumptuous hotel: walls lined in
pale cream silk, a deep pile navy-blue carpet, two cream sofas, and
an elaborate modern four-poster bed made from ash and curtained in
white voile. A white lace counterpane covered cream silk sheets.
There were flowers everywhere, all colour coordinated with the room
in shades of white and cream occasionally dotted with blue. Off to
one side Devlin showed her the bathroom of white marble equipped
with a huge bath and powerful shower and amply supplied with every
size of fluffy white towels and matching bathrobes, all neatly
folded on heated towel rails.

Devlin opened
the french windows on to the terrace which ran the whole length of
the bedroom. It was paved in terracotta tiles shaped into hexagons
and furnished with loungers at one end and a table and chairs in
white cast iron at the other. Here there were lemon trees in full
fruit, individually planted in terracotta pots of the simplest
design. On the castle wall honeysuckle and clematis, both dripping
with heavily scented flowers, vied for position in the sun.

Stephanie
walked over to the parapet and looked out across the lake. Devlin
was right: the view was magnificent. Below her she could see the
jetty and the little courtyard in front of the main doors. She
could see the lush vegetation that seemed to grow from every
crevice of the castle to form a cascade of flowers and, in the
distance, as the last light faded, the land on the edge of the lake
disappearing into the mists of twilight. The scent of the flowers
in the still of the early evening air was almost overpowering.

Devlin stood
by the bed as she came back into the bedroom from the terrace. He
looked uneasy, as if trying to gauge whether he should approach her
now or wait till after dinner. Stephanie kissed him lightly on his
pock-marked cheek, having to stoop slightly as Devlin was not a
tall man. Some men, in this situation, would have had no hesitation
in claiming their prize.

'This is so
beautiful. Everything.' She unbuttoned the dress and stepped out of
it, standing in front of him in the cream silk underwear and
stockings, wanting to make a deliberate statement with her
immodesty. He took her hand purposefully and she had the feeling he
wanted to say something, something important to him and necessary,
but at that moment there was a sharp knock on the door.

'The
luggage...' he said, looking crestfallen. He took the case from his
servant, opening the door only a crack so there was no possibility
that the man could glimpse the vision that stood by the bed. The
mood had been broken.

'Let me get
changed,' Stephanie said.

'Of
course.'

'We have all
night.'

'You are a
very beautiful woman. I thought so the moment I saw you that night
in London.'

'Thank you.
You make me feel very special.'

'Do I?'

'Of course you
do, Devlin,' she smiled.

He walked over
to the bedroom door.

'If you want
to...' She was about to finish the sentence when she hesitated. She
would actually have loved him to come over to her now, push her
knickers aside and cram one of his massive fingers into her cunt so
she could have that unique feeling once again.

'No, you're
right. We have all night,' she said, trying to convince
herself.

'So come down
when you're ready.' He left her alone in the room.

Stephanie
stripped off her underwear and showered again. She took the black
lacy basque out of the case and clipped it on to her slim body.
This was the surprise for Devlin she had bought yesterday, after
trying almost everything in the lingerie shop. She knew she looked
at her most sexy in a basque. It accentuated her small waist, firm
tits and full hips and when she had clipped the sheer black
stockings into place the thin black suspenders snaking out over her
thighs made her long legs look even longer. At the back the tight
black material above her waist emphasised her full round arse and,
perhaps by contrast to the constriction above, made it look somehow
more available. She picked up a pair of black high-cut knickers and
was about to slide them over her ankles when she thought better of
it.

Knickers were
superfluous to requirements tonight. She slipped her feet into her
highest heels and stood looking at herself in one of the full
length mirrors with which the room was well furnished. She watched
her hand in the mirror, like the hand of a stranger, as it stroked
the thick bush of her pubic hair, teasing out her clitoris for a
second, producing the faintest thrill.

As objectively
as she could she assessed the reflection in the mirror. The tight
black satin and lace basque hugged her body, the stockings
shimmered, the band of flesh above them white in contrast and
infinitely inviting. It was not possible for her to look more
sexually aware, she thought. And her body was alive, sexually
alive, in a way she had never experienced before. After what had
happened on the plane, after having fucked a man she had never met
and whose face she had not seen, it was not surprising. But it was
more than that. She was removed from reality, here in this lush
medieval paradise. There was nothing to do, nothing to think about,
but her sexuality. She felt like an animal must feel. Everything
else stripped away but her body and her feelings.

She turned
from the mirror and slipped into the strapless black evening dress
provided by Devlin. Her cleavage, well supported by the bra of the
basque, pushed up and together, formed a long dark tunnel between
her breasts. She had no need to shadow it with blusher. She turned
to her make-up. In a few seconds she applied mascara, lipstick, eye
shadow, making sure it was all heavier, bolder than she would
normally have used. She wanted to look like a whore. An expensive
whore, certainly, but a whore nevertheless. That idea excited her:
she was going to enjoy playing her part tonight.

The dining
room was lit with candles. A sheet of one-inch-thick glass
supported on pedestals of polished steel provided a dining table
quite big enough to seat twenty or more people. Two places had been
laid at the end closest to the fireplace where a fire of apple logs
produced its unique heady fragrance. Devlin stood by the fire,
gazing into its depths, as Stephanie walked in. He was smartly
dressed in a suit and tie but there was something about Devlin that
made even the best tailored clothes look slightly scruffy.

'Enchanting,
my dear. Simply enchanting,' he said. His voice was deep and rich,
certainly his most attractive feature.

'This was your
choice?' she said indicating the dress.

'Yes.'

'You have very
good taste.'

A servant
appeared and poured Stephanie a glass of champagne from a bottle
sitting in a silver cooler on one of the many coffee tables. He
wore a white linen jacket with gold-braided epaulettes. The tall
crystal flute he handed her was edged with gold. Devlin picked his
glass from the mantelshelf and clinked it against the side of
hers.