RetroXotique

What a day and night I'd had!

I smiled at the memories as I walked down the Champs Elysees on a brilliantly sunny day to catch the Metro to the Gare du Nord. I felt good as my heels clicked on the pavement accompanied by the drone and rattle of the wheels on the overnight case that I dragged behind me.

I'd survived the mental and phsical tests set by Jean and as I walked I called him on my mobile phone. He asked how I was feeling. 'I'm OK!' I replied. 'Yes! Very happy and comfortable!' It was true. 'Did you get the keys off with DHL?' I hoped that what he told me was correct, as that might take the edge of my visit! I was certainly looking forward to being unlocked and then wallowing in a deep fragrant bath by the afternoon! I dreamed of this and other pleasures that awaited me!

*****

I'd arrived at the hotel around four in the afternoon of the previous day, after the dressmaker had given me a severe lesson in how to follow and completely obey my destiny! And my husband, even if we were no longer married! But she'd also carefully cleaned up and repaired my face and made certain I was fit for a meeting with anyone from royalty or presidents downwards.

I had undressed to my corset and the chastity belt and then tucking the suspenders into the waistband of the belt, I had one of the strangest baths I ever had. I could afford no more than a few centimetres of hot water, if I wasn't going to get the irremoveable corset wet. But it was enough to flush out everything from underneath and make me feel a lot cleaner and much less stickier. Finally after using clean water from the bidet, I had to use a hair-drier to get myself dry! Warm air gave no relief at all, but it was a strange indescribable feeling!

Originally, I had planned to change for dinner, but I decided that it might be best to stay in the clothes that I knew concealed my current state. And concealed it well! So it was about seven that I left my room, wearing the same red suit in which I had arrived. However, in the interim it had been immaculately pressed and rejuvenated by the Hotel!

I was getting glimpses of a life to come! I would have to plan what I wore, where I stayed and how I travelled with the utmost care!

Even the conventional part of the evening had been productive and entertaining. I was able to suggest solutions to the rock star's tax problems that could be investigated. He in turn was a superb host in a discrete two Michelin-starred restaurant hidden away behind the Israeli Embassy, where we both ate well and perhaps drunk too much!

He'd also been the complete gentleman and had escorted me in the taxi back to the hotel for a nightcap. After two Irish whiskies I had wished him good-bye with a very proper kiss and retired to bed.

Alone!

Sometimes I wished I was still unattached!

*****

This time I was by myself on the train and I could spread all over the shared table between the two seats. It was just what I wanted as I needed the time to catch up on the work, that I should have done on the way out!

But I just skipped through everything and only made a few of the most important notes!

I had too many thoughts tugging at my mind. And something very metallic encircling, protecting and generally annoying the lower part of my body!

Yet again, I moved my hand down and touched between my legs for perhaps the twentieth time since I had departed from the hotel. All I could feel under my skirt was the polished and hard steel and the protuding bumps of the locks. I mused as I wondered how many times, an average person touched themselves in an average day. I certainly, hadn't realised I did it quite as much!

Today and perhaps on many other days in the future, I would not be able to give any comforting touch when I needed it most! Itches would go unstratched! Relief would not be available! Sometimes not even in a forseeable future!

I shuddered! Did I really want this?

*****

Suddenly I started, as I felt an intense vibration and a slight rattling sound!

I do not like mobile phones to ring in public, as it is so very annoying and above all extremely bad manners. So on a train, as today, I had switched my phone to a vibrate mode and cradled it in my lap. It was by chance resting on the belt, which was amplifying the gentle high-frequency movements of the phone!

'Hello!' As with nearly everyone else, I very rarely give my name when I answer a phone. But then my PA knew my voice! 'Three o'clock?' It was a meeting in the afternoon, I didn't want. 'Do I have to?' She told me the name of the client. Yes! I had to! 'If there's a delay I'll ring, but we should be OK! We're just approaching the tunnel!'

This was not what I had wanted. I had been planning a quick trip across London to home and a very blessed relief, by means of the Tube to Kings Cross and a train. Now my body would have to endure a few more hours of torture in its self-imposed prison. Fate was conspiring to give me a good and very thorough test!

'It's me!' I phoned my ex-husband and gave him news of the delay. 'Can you organise supper?' This would mean he would book a table at the pub! 'I'm expecting a parcel from DHL. Has it come yet?' His answer was in the negative.

Was this fate again, or had DHL not been able to find our isolated home? They rarely could first time!

*****

'Hello!' I turned to see Pressar standing beside me. 'I hope you haven't forgotten me?'

He was not a welcome sight. 'Of course not!' No chance at all! How could I forget him? He was the sort of man who gave a lot of people, like accountants, women, investors and bank managers, plenty of vivid and gruesome nightmares! Images of rape, pillage and greed came to mind!

'I thought you said you were in customer services.' He bent down and examined one of the documents with my company's letterhead, that I had laid out on the table. 'You look like an accountant to me!' He sat down opposite. 'Do you mind if I sit here? You're so much more interesting than the idiot Eurostar allocated to me!'

'I do mind ! Actually!' I started to gather up the papers from his prying eyes. 'These are all private and confidential!' He grabbed my wrist. 'Let me go or I'll call the steward!' Thankfully, he released me! I took the opportunity to complete the collection.

'I don't like liars!' He still had that awful smile though! This time menace had been added. 'Is this one of your business cards?' He picked up one that had been clipped to a letter I had handwritten. 'So! You're not called Ann! You aren't into specialist customer services! You didn't go to La Defense! I followed you to a dingy dress shop!' He paused to put the card in his wallet. 'Those are for starters. How many other untruths did you tell me? As I said, I don't like liars!'

'Yes! I lied!' I could have been apologetic or unrepentant. I chose the latter. 'You were annoying me, as I had work to do! Just like I have now! Please give me that card back!'

'Why should I, you silly little lady?' He sneered and pointed at me! 'You were teasing me on the journey out! I could ruin you, if I wanted!' He seemed to be enjoying his menace. Bullies often do! 'The tabloids would love the story of how you came on to me. And how you half undressed on the train! How you were wearing a corset! I have a very good picture of you as you walked away.' He took a picture with an imaginary camera and laughed. 'You're not a very clever accountant are you? You illustrate perfectly why women should be seen, fucked when needed, not heard and certainly never given any responsibility higher than the tea and biscuits!'

If there was ever a time, when I might have hit someone, it was then!

But there was no need! He hadn't noticed that nestled in my lap along with the phone was my rather old-fashioned personal dictating machine. Everything he'd said since he had sat down had been recorded for posterity!

*****

'Champagne for two!' He had stopped a passing steward. 'I think we ought to start again!'

'Drink it yourself!' My tone was not conciliatory. I can be quite abstemious, as I never drink before noon unless I'm in bed with my ex-husband. And never half a bottle at lunch except with friends! 'Sorry, but I don't drink this early! And not with people like you, ever!'

'You will!' I didn't like his threatening tone. 'Would you prefer the Sun or the Star? If not, there's always the Sport!'

'Look!' It was my turn to be firm! 'If you don't get up and return immediately to your own seat, I'm going to call the steward and get you forcibly moved there. Now fuck off!' I used the word deliberately and with a rare pleasure.

He didn't move! He just laughed at me!

'OK!' I was putting everything from the table into a plastic folder and the phone and recorder into my handbag. 'You stay here and enjoy yourself! I'm going to go and find the guard!' I stood picking up everything as I did and walked away from him to the end of the coach to collect my case and then find someone who could help.

*****

'Caroline?' Thankfully, she had answered the call, I'd made from the safety of the bar on the train. 'It's good to speak to you! I have a spot of bother and need your help!'

Two minutes later and I'd told Caroline the full story. She in turn had calmed me down and like the good journalist she is, she had hatched a sensible plan to cap everything and gain some revenge. 'Thanks! We'll be in Waterloo in half an hour!' I hoped it would be enough time. 'Will your friends make it?' I hoped they would!

*****

'I think we'll start again!' I was now standing beside my seat looking across at him. 'Can I sit down and have a glass of that champagne you so kindly offered a few minutes ago?' My teeth were slightly gritted and the smile from newly-reddened lips was totally false!

He reached for a glass and filled it with a flourish developed from years of practice. He didn't offer it across. 'Perhaps, I was a bit rude.' Now that was a first! 'Sit down!' He motioned for me to do it. 'Why don't you unbutton your jacket, so I can see if you're still dressed as you were yesterday?'

I sat and unbuttoned the jacket. 'How's that?' I leant forward, still smiling and trying to play the seductress. I wished that I had been wearing one of my more revealing corsets! 'Can your silly little lady have her drink, now?'

'Of course!' He pushed it across. 'Perhaps, you're not so silly!' Another admission!

'Why don't we have a quick lunch?' I couldn't believe what I was saying! 'You must remember, I have an appointment at three and must be in my office by two-thirty? I'm never late!' Well sometimes I am! But usually for effect! 'Somewhere in Covent Garden would be very convenient!'

*****

'Shall we get a taxi?' I asked my question, as we emerged on to the main concourse at Waterloo. As requested by Caroline, I'd left my jacket unbuttoned and I was wearing dark glasses. I probably looked and certainly felt like an aged starlet!

'No!' He motioned me to go to the right! 'My driver's here with the limo!'

'That'll be nice!' It also fitted the image he portrayed. Dutifully, trailing my case I followed Pressar, perhaps a couple of metres behind.

I was only slightly prepared for what followed. Two men approached Pressar and stood in front of him. I didn't catch any names, except of that of the FT. So they were journalists! And hopefully friends of Caroline!

'Fuck off!' Pressar was not happy! He grabbed the case from my hand and rushed me towards the exit. 'Come on!' I followed as best as I could, but the heels I wore, were not for running!

'What were you doing in Paris? Who's the lady?' I saw the flash of a camera and the swing of Pressar's fist. I was sure that the latter thankfuly only connected with fresh air. 'She's a bit old for you, isn't she Pressar! Or is it your mother?' Cheek! 'Have you used up all the bimbos in London?' I felt like using a fist myself!

*****

'Are they always like this with you?' He'd bundled me unceremoniously into the back of his over-stretched limo. So much so, that I was now sitting awkwardly at an angle in the deep leather seat, showing him plenty of bare thigh above the lacy tops of my stockings.

'Nice!' He leered back from opposite. 'It's good to be able to check they really are stockings on a lady!'

'Thank you!' I'd noticed a ladder, which had probably been caused in the melee. 'Shit!' I indicated it with a finger. 'I'd better change it! Can you pass me my case?' I smiled at him. 'I take it you like your lunch companions to be perfect?'

I have never been a great dancer and with one notable exception that is deep in the recesses of my mind and will never been released, I have never stripped to music in public. But I did use all of my skills and imagination to tastefully remove first my shoes and then both stockings in a way that was calculated to interest and arouse Pressar. However, I did insist that he stayed opposite and didn't touch.

He almost seemed disappointed as I unpacked a new pair of stockings, rolled them up my legs and fastened them to the suspenders. 'Could you put my shoes back on? Please!' I think it must have been one of the few times in his life, when he knelt in front of a lady!

'Can I sit with you?' I was very surprised he asked.

'You may!' I gave him one of my best smiles. 'But remember I'm a respectable Chartered Accountant!'

'And I'm one of the richest men in the City!' He sat beside me and put his arm around my shoulders. 'So I guess, I could do with some of your special services!'

*****

'What sort of service would you like?' I'd put my hands to his tie and loosened it! 'I do a good line in all things financial!' And in flirting!

'How about of a more pleasurable nature?' His hand moved to my waist, running his fingers along and behind the leather belt. 'Your body is so tight in that corset!' He now lay his hand flat to feel the corset. 'You can't be very comfortable! It's like steel! So hard!'

'Oh! But I am very comfortable!' I could feel the hand moving down further into my lap. 'It's such a wonderful ever present embrace!'

'Why don't you take that skirt off? You'll be so much more comfortable!' He pointed to the darkened windows. 'No-one can see us in here?'

He was not being persistent and he had given me a choice. Say no like the good and faithful lady I am, or say yes! Before yesterday, the choice would have always been no, but now that I was securely locked, I could take a different line and still keep my virtue intact. 'Are you sure we can't be seen?'

'Yes!' He moved his hand to the buckle and unbuckled it. 'The driver can't see either!'

Almost instinctively I shifted forward so that he could remove the belt from behind me. 'The zip is at your side!' I felt him draw it down.

He had now come in front of me and was eagerly grabbing both sides of the skirt. 'Lift your bottom! I'll pull it down!' I did as he asked whilst watching his face for the inevitable reaction. He stopped after a few inches had revealed the steel waist band of the chastity belt. 'What the hell is that?' His hands dropped the skirt and he jumped backwards emphasising his shock!

'It's just what you think it is!' His face was an amazing picture. 'My husband doesn't like to share me sexually in these days of so many perilous diseases! I'm afraid that our extra-professional relationship will have to be restricted to lunches in good restaurants!'