Threnody Aschere

Threnody Aschere had slept with just about everyone she’d set her mind to sleeping with. She was a woman who’d grown up accustomed to getting whatever she wanted and she learned quickly how to make sex one of those things she was very adept at procuring. There had been precious few who’d gotten away from her, and some of those missed opportunities—she preferred not to think of them as failures—still rankled a bit.

The handsome Delaney brothers, for instance. She’d tried for years, off and on, to get them into her bed and had come up infuriatingly short. The older two were unswervingly good boys and rejected her advances again and again with a certainty and steadfastness that shook her to her core. She knew for a fact that the dark haired one might have gone for it once or twice, before he’d married, but out of some loyalty to his brother and pretty sister-in-law he’d politely refused.

And the younger one, the one in his thirties? She was almost certain he was gay, so she left him for her brother to devour. Maybe she’d do a threesome with them sometime. But a threesome would be so much less satisfying a conquest.

But there was one Delaney man remaining, one she hadn’t yet approached, but one she’d had in mind since he turned about seventeen years old. Vaughan’s bastard. The one his screaming princess had just about miscarried on the sundeck all those years ago.

When first she noticed him, in the park playing some athletic game with a pack of young things, she’d noted how trim and fit and healthy he was. She loved that about young men, how they glowed with youth and virility and there was something fresh and vital about them. And they were always so keen to please and ready for play, just like eager puppies.

She remembered looking him over and finding him attractive before realizing that he looked incredibly familiar. She watched him for quite a while that day in the park, waiting to meet her brother, and tried to place him. She hadn’t already fucked him, she was almost certain she’d remember. Looking at his pack she recognized a few young men she’d already had, and they continually looked over to her with a range of smiles or scowls or sheepish expressions.

Then the boy took notice of the distraction to his teammates and pulled one of them aside for a few words.

She watched the boy listen to his friend’s explanation and met his eyes when he looked up and stared at her. She lifted her designer sunglasses to her forehead and gave the slightest of smiles. He didn’t react exactly as she’d expected. He stood taller, straightened his shoulders, looked her over from head to toe, met her eyes once more, and with a tilt of his head went back to the game.

Threnody Aschere hadn’t blushed in years, maybe ever, but she blushed then. Who the fuck did he think he was? And then she heard him laugh, the sound floating over the open common, and recognition dawned. She sat forward and tried to get a better look.

Now that she’d heard the laugh, that careless, arrogant, self-satisfied laugh she saw the resemblance at once. This boy was Vaughan Grey’s.

She’d left the park then, without bothering to wait for her brother. Seeing that boy, that young man had suddenly made her feel extremely old. And filthy. And uncomfortable.

She went out and fucked a silver fox that night to make herself feel younger, but she only felt more hollow and haggard in the morning. Her confidence was suddenly in tatters.

Then she’d gone to Vaughan. They still fucked from time to time, and he often recommended young ladies to her that he thought might be to her taste. She supposed she might even call the son of a bitch a friend, but wasn’t quite sure if either one was capable of friendship.

“This is a pleasant surprise.” He’d said, smiling around a freshly lit cigar.

“Are you alone?”

He raised his eyebrows. “What answer would you prefer?”

She smiled indulgently, though she wasn’t in the mood for games.

“Just you tonight.”

He nodded, a mock-gentleman’s nod and stepped aside so that she could enter.

“Just give me a minute.” He said, flicking ash into a standing ash tray. He disappeared up stairs and she gravitated to the bar. She heard voices above and she set about making herself a strong drink. Just as she was plopping an olive into her vodka martini two sopping wet asian girls in various states of undress came stomping down the final few stairs and through the foyer toward the front door.

“It’s been a pleasure ladies, maybe we’ll do this again sometime?” Vaughan purred as he hustled them toward the door. They were furious and hit him with every name in the book but he only smiled a more debonair smile and bid them goodnight, closing the door in their fuming faces.

He turned to her and dropped his smile, his expression smoldering.

“Want a drink?” She asked, her voice low and electric.

He nodded and she reached for the bourbon, but stopped when he made a small ‘uh-uhn’ sound and shook his head. “That’s not what I want.” He said as he approached her.

She narrowed her silver-gray eyes and met his dark, hungry gaze with one of her own. He grabbed her wrist where it was frozen in mid reach and she felt a thrill sizzle down her arm and right to her core. He was one of the few lovers she had that was really effective at being rough. Most men were practically laughable when they played at forcefulness, because that’s all it was: an act, a little game they liked to play to feel more manly.

But Vaughan didn’t play. And he was never laughable. He was one man that made her feel truly feminine, honestly vulnerable, and she needed that from time to time.

She pulled against his grip and his lips curled into a wicked smile as his fingers tightened enough to pull a gasp from her lips.

His other hand went swiftly to her throat and her lips parted to receive his punishing kiss. He tasted of strong liquor and cigars and strawberry lipgloss and pussy and she felt herself getting wet. She bit his lip hard and he chuckled. He squeezed her slim throat tighter and she couldn’t draw breath.

“You offered me a drink honey,” he said in a menacing growl against her ear. She tasted a slight hint of iron on her tongue and smiled. She’d bitten him hard enough to draw blood. He was going to fuck her senseless. “And I’m going to have that drink.”

Her vision was beginning to darken and she wondered if he planned of using her while she was unconscious. It was something they’d done before, but tonight she wanted to be awake, to feel everything, experience every moment.

He bit hard on her earlobe and she pressed her body into his, desperate and eager and struggling to find breath. Effortlessly he lifted her by the throat and threw her onto the top of the bar. Only then did he release her neck. She gasped and choked and sucked for air. While she struggled to get her wind he deftly ripped open her shirt, sending buttons flying everywhere, and she smiled, even through desperate draws for air, because what woman doesn’t like that old cliché?

Christ, if felt like he’d crushed her windpipe.

He shoved her skirt up to her waist and tore her panties off as though they were made of crepe paper. She bit her lip. Vaughan Grey was good at cunnelingus. In her experience most men who fancied themselves ladies’ men or philanderers or Casanovas weren’t actually great lovers. Vaughan Grey was phenomenal. And most men dabbled with oral, gave it their best and came up wanting. Other than from her brother or another woman, Vaughan gave the best head she’d ever received. He told her once that he loved to taste pussy, to compare and contrast, and he certainly liked to make his partners desperate and needy and willing to do anything for him.

He plunged four fingers inside of her savagely, right up to where his knuckles met his palm, and with his thumb over her freshly waxed mound he gripped her pubic bone from without and from within and pulled her toward the edge of the bar. She couldn’t help moaning. He didn’t release her right away, instead he kept his possessive grip between her legs and leaned over her. He nipped her shoulder, and squeezed his hand tighter around her sex. She responded by gripping back with every muscle available to her and she watched him grin before devouring one of her taut nipples. He sucked it and licked it and bit it until she was ready to scream and then abruptly he pulled his hand out of her and she felt empty, desolate.

But then his face was down there and she curled her toes inside her exquisite strappy stilettos and ran her tongue over her top lip. The thing that she liked about Vaughan’s style was that it really felt like he was doing exactly what he wanted to her. He wasn’t going down on her for her pleasure but for his. He wanted to eat pussy and she was just a vessel, an offering to his hunger. It made her feel used and disposable and hotter than she could ever get with any man or woman who went down there to dutifully bring her to climax.

Instead, with Vaughan, she came whenever he pleased, whenever he decided he wanted to feel her shudder and rock under his lips and fingers, and not a minute before. He was the only man she’d met who could make oral pleasure feel less like worship and more like rape, and she couldn’t get enough of it.

He tortured her, drew pleading words from her lips, made her pull at her own hair in desperation and still he took his sweet time, enjoying his power over her, making greedy, guttural noises against her slick flesh. Had he been almost any other man she’d have already flipped him over and ridden his face until she came, but he held her firmly in submission below him and she knew she was his to do with as he pleased for now. He was in that kind of mood tonight, and she was in the mood to take it.

She had the feeling that he was relieved to let himself go, be completely selfish and take what he wanted. As much as two little asian girls might seem like a dream come true, Threnody knew from experience that he’d have been working very hard to please them, harder possibly than they worked to please him—he had a reputation to uphold afterall—but now he was finally getting to tear into someone he knew he could fuck like a whore with no negative consequences.

Because she wouldn’t cry or complain or run screaming, she wouldn’t report him to any authorities, she would meet him thrust for thrust and take whatever he had to give her.

Her nerves were fraught with all his ministrations and she began to lose feeling in her legs. Suddenly she was all pussy, all she was was whatever he chose to lick or kiss or suck. Her whole being, her whole existence was centered in her cunt and she needed him to get her off or she felt certain she’d cease to be.

She clawed at her own throat, roughly massaged her own tits, writhed as much as his firm grip would allow and still he tortured her. She felt like sobbing. She begged him over and over, begged him to give her release and he only laughed, hot breath searing across her sensitive flesh, the vibrations sending her nerves skittering wildly.

She knew he enjoyed making a woman of her poise and prowess beg and whine and need so much. He enjoyed it when she did the same to him. No woman could make him as desperate and wild as she could when he was in a mood to allow her dominance, and she had a feeling he never let anyone else lead him around by his cock the way he allowed her to do.

And suddenly he was done between her legs and she cried out at the injustice of it but he was pulling her to a sitting position and his mouth was on hers. His face and lips were still glistening with her wetness and she greedily sucked his tongue, tasting herself there. He slid her down onto his cock and she leaned her head back, savoring the length of him within her. The rounded edge of the bar pressed uncomfortably into her back with every forceful thrust and she reveled in it.

When his pace slowed slightly she dragged her head back up to face him. One large, wide hand was gripping her bare ass, holding her up on his cock, now he slid the other down between them and took hold of the base of his shaft.

She dug her fingernails into the fabric of his robe at his shoulders and lifted herself as much as she could to give him better access. And then he slammed mercilessly into her ass and she let herself scream, half pain, half pleasure. He wrapped his fingers around her hip bones and ground himself deeper again and again until she was close to weeping. She wrapped her long legs tightly around him and squeezed as he captured one of her nipples between her teeth and sucked insistently. Slowly he began a steady rhythm, the tight, wet curls of his pelvis brushing up against the raw, sensitive flesh of her clit and she was coming. He made her come once, then again, and then a third time in rapid succession before he ripped himself out of her ass and let her slide down his body until she was kneeling at his feet.

“Lick it.” He said, his voice rough and thick.

She smiled up at him, met his eyes and then shook her head almost imperceptibly. He blinked. Then a small smile flashed across his face just a moment before he back-handed her across her cheekbone.

White lightening flashed across her vision and hot, electric pain exploded in her face. She blinked until she could see again and then she looked back up at his face, a smile pulling at the corners of her mouth.

“I told you to lick it clean.” He said huskily, and he snaked the fingers of one hand possessively through the silky strands of her hair.

“No.” She said tauntingly and he smiled again. She closed her eyes just as the second blow struck her other cheek, this one harder than the first. Her clit throbbed and her thighs were wet and her face stung. He’d held her head in place for the second blow, forcing her to absorb the full impact without recourse and she finally opened her lips obediently.

She met his dark eyes as he pulled her skull toward his cock and she watched his face as her tongue slid up him from base to tip. He made her lick it again and again, encouraging her, denigrating her, praising her skill, before finally gripping around the back of her head and shoving her mouth down over his shaft.

She gripped his ass tight and allowed him to fuck her mouth and throat as vigorously as he would a cunt, and he rewarded her by finishing deep in her throat, choking her, and then pulling out enough to let her taste him on her tongue and on her lips.

He leaned down, crushing her delicate jaw in his fingers so that she was unable to close her lips, and he greedily licked his salty come off her bottom lip and then bit down hard enough to draw blood. It was his answering action for her earlier misdemeanor.

Then he released his vise-like grip with a bit of a shove and moved around to the back of the bar.

She collapsed just a little, and sat with her legs folded indecorously beneath her, her face burning and her cheekbones throbbing with a pulsing ache, her lip bleeding and her clit pulsing erratically, her asshole stinging and sore.

She listened to him pouring bourbon and she leaned her head back against the underside of the bar with a shaky sigh.

She closed her eyes for a moment and only opened them at the sound of his “Here.”

She opened her eyes to see a topped-off vodka martini in front of her face.

She took it with shaking hands and watched his bare legs cross in front of her and she heard him sigh as he sank into the leather couch.

“Not bad for round one.” She said, forcing herself to purr, forcing herself to hide the tremulousness she still felt.

He laughed deeply and sipped his bourbon.

“Not bad at all.” He agreed and patted the couch next to him.

She took a long moment, trying to determine whether or not her quivering knees would be able to support her if she stood right then, and then finally she managed to pull herself to standing with all the grace and composure she was renowned for. She slipped off her ruined blouse casually, placing her vodka drink on the bar top for a moment. Then she slid off her crumpled skirt, reclaimed her martini and sauntered over to the couch, garbed only in those stilettos, and folded her legs underneath her as she settled in next to him. She leaned into him gently and sipped her drink thoughtfully.

“So Kitten, what brings you here this evening?” He asked, leaning his head back and closing his eyes. He was spent and thoroughly at ease.

She decided to go with honesty. “I saw your son.”

His brows contracted but he kept his eyes closed. “Velvet’s boy?” He asked, his words thick, he was drowsy.

“He’s a man now.” She said, staring into her drink, examining the air bubbles that clung to the olive at the bottom.

He shifted slightly, sitting up and shaking his head to clear the encroaching fog of sleep. “Bullshit.” He said with a smile.

She nodded. “No, he is, he’s got to be, what? Seventeen, eighteen?”

Vaughan shrugged.

“He looks like you.” She said, puzzling at the peculiar tone in her voice.

Vaughan put his fingers under her chin and gently angled and lifted her face and waited until she met his eyes.

“And you want to fuck him?” He looked amused.

“I’m not sure.” She confessed, suddenly feeling very foolish.

He snorted once and brought his bourbon to his lips for a long sip, never taking his eyes from hers. She willed herself not to look away, not to break.

“What, do you want my permission or something?” He finally asked, sounding bemused and maybe a little irritated.

“Of course not.” She said dismissively pulling her chin out of his fingers and taking a mouthful of her own drink. She enjoyed the cleansing burn all the way down her esophagus, taking a moment to concentrate on the liquid fire as it curled into her belly.

Neither spoke for several moments.

“You ever fuck Delaney?” He asked, meaning Velvet’s husband, and she immediately detected a tension beneath the forced-casual query.

Her lips quirked but she repressed the smile.

“What business is it of yours?” She asked breathily.

He downed the rest of his bourbon and slammed the tumbler down on the table next to him. When he spoke his voice was cool and level, but his muscles were tense, his body suddenly very aggressive. “Did you ever suck that boy-scout’s cock?”

A slow smile spread across her face but she held her tongue.

He’d rather she fuck his own son than Jonah Delaney. She laughed deep in her throat. “Maybe.” She lied.

His eye twitched and his lips pressed together. He moved over her, laying her down across the leather couch and putting his weight on top of her. Without looking he traced his hand down her arm and removed the glass from her hand, setting it down on the floor next to the couch.

“I’m only going to ask you once more.” He threatened, his voice low and deadly. “Did you let that sackless fucker put his hands on you?”

She bit her lower lip but couldn’t suppress her wicked grin. She’d been with as many if not more partners that he’d been with and jealousy had never been a factor in their unique relationship. She found she was enjoying his ire very much.

“What if I did?” She challenged him, her voice liquid and cloying.

Something wild flashed over his eyes and then it was gone. He smiled easily and kissed her perfectly mildly. Her eyebrows drew together. He stood and retrieved his empty tumbler and headed back to the bar.

He’d guessed she was just fucking with him.

“Never got your claws in him, am I right?” Vaughan asked, pouring another healthy dose of bourbon into his glass. “I know his type.”

She sat up. “I liked it better when you thought I had.”

He laughed appreciatively. “I’ll still punish you accordingly if you’d like.” He crossed to his humidor and drew out a sleek cigar.

She sighed. “Those Delaneys are too fucking pure.” She said peevishly. She watched him clip the end as she’d done a hundred times before. He struck a match and Threnody enjoyed the familiar smell of the ignited chemicals.

“So what about the boy?” Vaughan asked, between puffs, drawing the flame into the cigar patiently.

“He looked interested, and then he found out who I was and then . . . nothing.” She’d never admit this to anyone else, except, of course, her brother.

“hmmmm.” Vaughan responded pensively, shaking the flame from the match and inhaling. He savored the smoke for a long moment before letting it ooze out in a slow exhale.

“Want one?” He asked. She shook her head. She wasn’t in the mood today.

He sauntered over, picked up her glass from where he’d placed it on the floor and kissed her full on the lips so she could enjoy the cigar vicariously through him.

“So the boy knows who you are.” He stated thoughtfully as he headed to the bar.

“Most people know who I am.” She replied, stating fact.

He nodded and reached for the vodka. “Of course, but when most young men know who you are they get more interested, not less so.”

She sighed. “I know. It was very, well, very strange.” She admitted.

He replaced the vodka and reached for the vermouth.

“Can I have a stinger?” She asked, wanting the coolness.

He looked at the martini glass and pulled his cigar out of his mouth and set it in a glass ashtray on the bar. “Come eat your olive.” And he withdrew a fresh glass before rinsing the shaker.

Running her fingers through her long, tousled hair she stretched as she stood and crossed to the bar. She sat on a barstool and smiled a little at the shock of cold metal against her pussy. She watched him plop ice into the shaker and reach for the Crème de menthe and she swirled her olive around in the vodka he’d poured before quickly shooting the liquor and plopping the olive into her mouth.

“Waste not want not.” He said wryly and added a good measure of vodka to the shaker. She waited patiently as he shook it and poured it and slid it across the smooth bar top to her.

“Thank you.” She murmured and instantly felt refreshed just catching the scent of the mint.

“My pleasure.” He took a sip of his own drink and then spoke again. “He knows who you are but more than that, it seems he knows what you’ve done.”

She looked at him over the rim of her glass, sipped and then put the glass down. “Maybe he doesn’t like women who sleep around.” She said dully. Those kinds of men were exceptionally tiresome.

Vaughan laughed. “You’re a fucking legend. No red-blooded boy would hesitate to mount you.” He assured her.

“Well this one did.” She responded quickly.

“I know.” He agreed, picking up his cigar from the heavy amber colored glass ashtray. “So it’s likely he’s been warned to stay away from you.”

She smiled lasciviously and cocked her head to the side. “All little boys are warned to stay away from me—it usually only serves to fuel their desire. For the forbidden.”

He ran the back of his fingers under his chin and along his jaw and she heard the scratchy sound of his five-o-clock shadow rubbing against his knuckles. “True.” He was quiet for a moment. “Which can only mean one thing.” He inhaled through the cigar, flared his nostrils and exhaled slowly.

“Well?” She asked at length when he’d fallen silent.

“It means they told him the goddamned truth.” He said with half a smile.

Threnody raised an eyebrow. “The truth about you and me and that ridiculous drama your little bride made up on the sundeck?”

He met her eyes. “They must have.”

She leaned back in a yawn, arching her spine. She caught him admiring her pert breasts and she smirked. “I don’t know about that.” She told him.

“Well kitten, in my experience there’s only a handful of reasons a hot-blooded young man would turn down the prospect of having you.”

She bristled a little, not caring to think of anyone ‘turning her down’. But she stayed silent, waiting for his explanation.

“I don’t see the boy heeding his father’s advice, not for anything—his ‘dad’ I mean of course.” He grinned a feral grin and continued. “In fact, knowing what I do I’d say the boy would be far more likely to fuck you if Delaney had forbidden it.”

She raised her eyebrows and nodded for him to continue.

“And I have it on pretty good authority that the boy isn’t queer—He’s already knocked up a girl a couple towns over and I think Delaney paid for the abortion.”

Threnody was stunned. “That goody-two-shoes paid for an abortion?”

Vaughan nodded smugly. “And in any case, word is he fucks a new girl every week, sometimes more than one in a week and sometimes more than one at a time.” Threnody felt a swirling fire in her belly.

“So he’s got a healthy appetite.”

“Like his old man.” Vaughan laughed. He took his bourbon and his cigar and moved to stand in front of the double French doors that led to the back patio. Threnody swiveled in her seat to watch him, leaning back against the bar, her elbows up and her stinger in one hand.

“Then, what?” He seemed to know a fair amount about a boy he hadn’t raised and hadn’t given a damn about.

“Well I’ve heard he likes virgins—but he’s not exclusively a fetishist, he’s fucked plenty of experienced women.”

So it was just her. Threnody tipped the rest of the contents of her glass into her mouth and swallowed grimly. She was old and used-up and couldn’t get a sex-addicted teenage boy to fuck her.

“So I figure it has to do with his mamma.”

She placed the glass carefully on the bar top. “Excuse me?”

Vaughan turned to her with a smile. “The boy has a soft spot for his mother, and he won’t touch you because of what you did to her.” She could only stare. “You were the other woman,” Vaughan pressed on, impressed with his own Holmesian conclusions. “You broke up his mom and real daddy and in a very public arena too.”

She rolled her eyes. “What the fuck would he care? He wasn’t even born yet.”

Vaughan smiled. “You’re the Wicked Witch kitten. A legend of a monster and he’s decided to steer clear of you. Out of, principle.” He laughed softly.

She tisked. “I want to fuck him.” She said decisively. “I want to fuck him till he can’t get it up for any other piece of ass that struts his way.” She set her jaw and glared into the distance.

Vaughan chuckled. “Then you will kitten.” He said and moved back toward where she sat at the bar. “Give him a few years.” She swallowed. She already felt too old. “Give him some time out from under that roof. Give him some time to fuck strings of drunken barely-legals and get out from under the thumb of his sainted step-father and he’ll be ready to look your way.”

She looked into his dark eyes. Could she wait that long? Did she have the patience to hold off until the time was right? She wasn’t sure. He leaned down and kissed her tenderly.

“I want to see if he’s like you.” She said against his lips and he pulled away enough to study her face. “Or if he’s like him.”

Vaughan’s mouth twitched and he narrowed his eyes. He understood she was ready to be punished again. He pulled his cigar to his lips, took a long, slow puff and then blew the smoke into her face. Her eyes burned and teared-up but she fought he urge to turn her head or blink too much.

“Or maybe if he’s better than either of you.” She said in a low, dangerous voice. His eyes darkened and a deadly smile twisted his features and she knew she’d be leaving the house with a fresh burn mark on her body. And she laughed.