'Unhand me, you filthy cad!' Emma shrieked in a fake English accent that sounded more like Cockney Eliza Doolittle than a gently bred young lady.
He opened his eyes just as she threw herself into the bedroom, landing on all fours in front of the bed. For a moment he thought she had dumped a basket of laundry over herself, but then she raised her head and he saw that she had a scarf covering her face except for her eyes, her dark hair spilling in disarray around her shoulders. The rest of her getup came into focus: a dark pink bra-and-panty set with a dozen silk scarves attached all around, both top and bottom.
She turned and looked back over her shoulder, addressing her imaginary captors. 'Ye brutes! When me faither gits ahold o'ye, ye'll be paying with yer hides! Ye'll not fergit that it was Lord Oakley's daughter that ye did this to.'
She turned to him and narrowed her eyes, slowly rising from the floor until she stood before him, her chin raised in defiance. 'Ye'll not be taming me, sirrah!'
He gaped at her.
She scowled and nodded strangely with her head. 'Sirrah! Ye'll not be taming me!'
'Oh! Oh, sorry!' He grabbed the paper and scanned down to the script. 'You'll part your thighs for me, wench, and you'll like it,' he read stiffly.
'Never! Ye shall never sully the rose o'me virginity, ye scurvy dog!' She lowered her voice to a stage whisper. 'Put some emotion into it, Russ!'
He cleared his throat and lowered his voice. 'Your rose is mine to pluck, saucy wench.'
She put her hand on her hip and tossed her head. 'It'll be me thorns yer tastin', not me precious petals.'
'You're mine now, and the sooner you submit to me, the happier you'll be.'
'Never! I'll die first!'
There was a line of stage direction. He paused to read it, then declared, 'First, you'll dance!' He clapped his hands in the air. 'Dance for me, wench, as my concubines have trained you!' He clapped again. 'Dance!'
'I will not!'
'Dance, or I'll give you a taste of the bastinado. You'll not like to have the soles of your feet beaten, my comely wench. Dance! Or feel my wrath.'
'You would beat me?'
'Disobey me once more, and you will feel the cruelty of my anger. Dance!'
She put her hands over her veiled face and pretended to sob.
'And call me 'Master,' ' Russ threw in for the hell of it.
She peeped over her fingers, a questioning look in her eyes.
'Why do you stand there, wench?' he ad-libbed, abandoning sanity and going with the absurd drama Emma seemed so determined to play out. 'Dance!'
'Yes, Master' she said, and dropped her hands, her gaze fixing on the floor as if in shameful submission.
The Rimsky-Korsakov piece had just started to repeat itself. Emma swayed gently to it, the scarves-veils, he supposed she meant them to be-following her movements and reminding him of the floppy rags that shook themselves over your vehicle while going through a car wash.
She lifted her arms and rose up onto her toes, still swaying, and started to move around the room in some perversion of ballet moves, from the looks of it. His momentary amusement began to fade and a faint embarrassment crept in. She wasn't a particularly graceful dancer, nor an erotic one, and his imagination simply couldn't transform her panty set and scarves into a harem girl's sultry silks.
She pranced in a circle, then stopped in front of him and seesawed her hips up and down. She snaked her arms in the air and moved her torso in an undulation that looked like nothing so much as a boa constrictor swallowing a large animal. Good God, had she made this up herself, or had she paid someone to teach her to do this?
He was gathering courage to tell her that Master wanted something different, when she plucked the first scarf off her costume and let it flutter to the floor. It revealed one cup of the bra-which had slits down the center of the cups, allowing the nipple to poke through.
His gaze attached to that revealed nipple, pinched in the slit of dark pink fabric, and he forgot about asking her to stop.
Another veil fell to the floor, revealing a length of thigh. A curve of back appeared. A buttock. She danced between each revelation, her movements seeming saucy taunts now, teasing him, prolonging the unveiling of her lithe body. Soon she was wearing nothing but her undergarments, the veil over her face, and one scarf tucked into the top of her panties, hanging down over her loins. His gaze flitted back and forth between her nipples and that last piece of filmy fabric, unable to decide which was more enticing.
At last she plucked the final veil from her panties and let it fall to the floor. There was a tiny bow down low on her mound, and he realized that they were split-crotch panties. One tug on the end of the bow and they would open wide. Her hand brushed down over her panties and he held his breath, waiting for her to untie them.
Her hand moved away, leaving the bow still tied.
He was hard and ready, and the bow was now a fixation. He wanted her to untie it. Wanted her to part the lacy fabric and straddle him, lowering herself onto him and riding for all she was worth. He wanted to suck on her nipples, lapping at them through their slits, and have her arch her back and moan.
Instead, her dancing slowly stopped and her hands fell to her sides. She looked at the floor.' 'Tis all I know, Master.'
She couldn't stop
She slowly reached for it, grasping one end. She began to pull, the loop of bow shrinking. When it was almost at the point of release she stopped, her hand falling away. She turned her hips slightly away from him, as if in modesty. 'I cannot! I will not shame meself!'
What was he supposed to do now? He snatched up the script and scanned down. Where were they? Ah, here it was. He read through the remainder of her instructions and just as when he'd first read the script, doubt assailed him.
He looked up and met her eyes. She was watching him, waiting. He raised his brows in question. Barely perceptible nodding was her answer, and he thought he saw the shadow of a smile beneath the veil over her face.
It wasn't his type of thing, but for her sake he'd go through the motions. He was going to feel like a fool, and already felt his excitement dying.
He put the paper aside and cleared his throat. 'I told you, wench, that you'll not disobey me. Untie that bow!'
'No, sirrah!'
'That's 'Master' to you, wench.'
'You'll never be my master!'
Oh, Lord. He really wasn't enjoying this. 'Come here.'
She inched closer to him, standing a foot away.
'Closer.'
She took a small step forward.
He reached out and tugged at the end of the bow. She stood motionless, letting him. It came undone and he pulled the ribbon completely free of the lace. He dropped it and brushed his fingertips lightly over her lace-clad mound. He could feel the damp heat of her exertions. He brushed over her again, feeling for the edges of the lace.
He glanced up at her. 'Part your thighs.'
She hesitated, then moved her feet apart a few scant inches, just enough so that he could slide two upturned fingers between her legs. She rocked forward against his hand, her breath catching. He found the center of her heat and gently pressed upward, teasing his fingertips back and forth to part the lace. It opened and one fingertip slipped in, stroking against her entrance, the pad of his finger barely parting her.
He could hear her breathing, and her excitement revived his own. He gently massaged his palm over her mound, his fingertip still against her opening, and felt her hips move in response. She made a soft noise deep in her throat and then pushed away from him, scampering several feet away.
He pushed up off the bed, grabbing the turban to keep it from falling off, and went after her, as her written
