This is a bit of flash I wrote for a character that I want to do a lot more with. I’d love any thoughts or feedback you have. This contains adult language/situations.
Suzanne crawled out of bed and groaned. She sat back against the edge of the bed, her bare ass on the carpet, held her head and wondered how she had let herself be talked into drinking Scotch again. It always gave her a shattering hangover the next day. When she had the strength to stand, she did so slowly, making sure to use the headboard for support. The oak bedposts were stout. Her fingers brushed the cold steel of a handcuff and she smiled. The night hadn’t been a complete loss.
She looked at the bed and frowned. Liam wasn’t there. He must have found a way to get his foot free from the other set of cuffs. That wasn’t surprising. The man had been a hacker and security specialist for a decade. He knew his way around a lock whether it was electronic or physical. The distant sound of a shower gave her a clue as to where he was.
She stretched towards the ceiling, working the kinks out of her nearly six foot frame. As her hands came down, she let them wander over her body. She thought about his lips on her and smiled as her fingertips brushed her mons. The stubble there made her smile at the thought of no longer having to wax thanks to Sean Michael no longer being in her life. He’d gone “walkabout” and there was no telling where he’d wind up. She wanted to grow a proper seventies bush for once.
As her fingers continued down she reached her vulva and winced. She was a bit raw from last night’s escapades. Liam had thrown her over the back of the couch and rogered her properly. She’d been wet, but not wet enough. The rest of the night had been more leisurely, it not exactly tender. She imagined he’d have fun explaining certain visible marks to his colleagues.
She reached down and touched her toes, letting her spine curve. She held the pose and then moved into a Downward Dog. Keeping that pose for just long enough, she walked out further into a full plank and held it until she began to sweat and her arms trembled. She could feel the toxins leaving her body. Her headache hadn’t abated entirely, but she was no longer mildly nauseous. The odors of last night’s sex mingled with the Scotch from a nearby decanter and sweat from the sheets and her own body. She needed a shower.
She walked out of the bedroom and into the short hall to her bathroom. She hated not having a bath she could access directly from the guest bedroom, but using her actual bedroom for a casual visitation was a no-no. She kept too many precious things there and all under lock and key. The guest bed was comfortable enough and had everything it needed for the love nest it was.
The door to the bathroom was closed. A dark shape waited just on the other side. Its body was size of a rugby ball, and she could see the bifurcated tail switching back and forth.
“Nermal, no!” She hissed at the nekomata.
The creature, on the surface a normal looking gray tabby except for the tail, turned its eyes on her. “But mistress.”
“But me no buts. Liam is a guest and he’s not to be trifled with.” She heard a groan from inside the bathroom. It was followed by a girlish giggle that sounded entirely too familiar. She hissed at Nermal and rushed to the bathroom and threw open the door.
The shower doors were clear glass, but had been fogged up by the three shower heads going full blast. There was room in there for four and right now she could make out Liam’s bulky silhouette and that of someone on their knees in front of him. She had her guesses as to who that was supposed to be.
She slid the door open to two shocked faces. The first was Liams, his strong features twisted in a mixture of pleasure and surprise. The second was her own. Her father’s almond shaped eyes were set in a dark brown complexion she inherited from her mother. After two blinks and what she could swear was a wink, the illusion’s face quickly dissipated leaving only the confused and surprised man.
“What the fuck?” Liam looked down at his throbbing cock, where her mouth had been only seconds before. He looked back up at Suzanne.
She smiled at him and followed the same path down and back up his body with her eyes. “I’m touched dear. You couldn’t get enough of me last night and you were dreaming of me in the shower.” She stepped into the steamy cube and pulled the door closed behind her.
“But you were just here.” He didn’t sound entirely convinced.
“Silly man. I was in the bedroom. You wore me out last night.” She looked down into his eyes. They were brown and sharp as Excalibur, if a little confused. “I’m here now though.” She placed her hands on his chest.
He grabbed her wrists. “I love you babe, but I swear by all I am that you were in here and on your knees doing…” he rolled his eyes to the left “wicked things with that tongue of yours.”
She leaned in and kissed him deeply. Their tongues played. She broke the kiss. “Do you taste anything familiar?”
He bit his lower lip. “Just the Scotch from last night.” His eyes slitted. “Maybe it was a dream after all. I do have an active imagination.”
“It seems you’ve left some things unfinished. Shall I?” Without waiting for an answer, she took the place of the illusion that had been here moments before.
The rest of the shower didn’t take long. Soon they were dressed and staring at each other over mugs of coffee.
Liam was dressed for the day in jeans and a bright red tee shirt with a hammer and sickle at its center. She envied him his dress code.
She wore a dark grey suit over a white blouse with simple hammered silver jewelry at her throat and wrists. The client she had an appointment with was looking for a unique item and the potential retainer was in the six figures. She needed to impress.
“About earlier this morning.” Liam sipped his coffee, leaving the question unfinished.
“Not buying the dream explanation?”
He smiled and shook his head. “Not that I haven’t had just such a dream about you, but it was too real.”
She sipped at her own coffee, careful not to smudge her dark red lipstick. There were rules concerning what could be said about such things. She wasn’t bound by any of them, but respected most of them to keep her status as a neutral party intact. “I can explain it, but you probably won’t believe it.”
“Try me.” He sat his mug on the island’s marble countertop and rested against the counter behind him.
“I have a two hundred year old cat that has gained sentience, the power of speech, and the ability to project powerful illusions.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Not going to tell me then?”
Suzanne laughed. “Let’s just chalk it up to the alcohol, the sex, and your meds.” She couldn’t blame him for not believing the truth. It took her a few years of low level exposure to the paranormal before her brain could handle it.
Liam shrugged. “I do love a good mystery. If I figure it out, will you tell me if I’m right?”
“Deal.” She put her mug down and he set his aside. The spent a few minutes in a goodbye snog, one that would require her to fix her makeup. She let him out and sighed as she closed the door behind him. Now it was time to deal with the naughty little puss.
Suzanne went looking for Nermal. She found him in her inner sanctum. He had his own ways of getting in and out no matter what she did. He lay stretched out on the deep purple sham covering the top pillow. “I suppose you are pleased with yourself?”
Nermal lifted a hind leg and began licking himself.
“We don’t treat guests like that.”
Nermal paused in his grooming. “But mistress was treating him precisely like that last evening.”
She sighed. “That is true. But he was getting the real thing last night.”
He cocked his head and flicked an ear at her twice. “Had you not entered he would never have known the difference.”
She wanted to argue the point but Nermal had made her the target of one of his illusions once upon a time. They were disturbingly realistic. “I won’t argue semantics with a two hundred year old cat. I will remind you that you’re here under probation. The Powers The Be said that it was either live with me, or be cast into the Outer Darkness.”
He stood and walked to the end of the bed. He did his own version of Downward Dog, bowing in an obeisance that she wasn’t sure she bought. “I offer my apologies. I will not do anything quite like that again,”
She walked to the foot of the bed and reached out to scratch him between the ears. “I accept your apology and remind you that when you make statements that precise it smacks of creating loopholes. I’m not your jailor or your lawyer. I turn you back over to them and you’ll be in a spot of trouble that I can’t get you out of. You need to stay on my good side.”
“Yes mistress.” He ducked away and returned to her pillow.
She’d gotten used to the hair. It smelled faintly of ginger. She wouldn’t miss it or its owner though. Much.