Mother Hostile Makeover Ch 05

Within the walls of the Hermitage, Aleksandra Novak went naked. This was her home and her domain and here she did as she pleased.

The fact that Jakob saw her this way every day never blunted his physical reaction to her. She appreciated that. Listening to his morning's report, she idly traced a red-lacquered nail along the worn abalone inlay of her father's old desk, eyes on the erection tenting her young assistant's dark wool trousers.

"De Jong Partners have had quite the run of bad luck." Jakob pursed his lips, suppressing a smile. He could not afford to look pleased with himself. Not this morning. "First the ruined copra in May, now this misfortune at the warehouse. I'm told the cacao burned for days The extent of the combined losses may force them to write off their entire investment in this region."

"De Jong should have consulted us," she replied. "They meant to establish themselves in one of our main markets, but we still reached out to help them. We might have given them some...practical advice. Now then, watch for any properties they put on the market in the next few weeks. We should pick up some bargains. Your people did well."

"Thank you, Ma'am," Relief showed in his eyes, along with more pride than Aleksandra cared to see right now.

"I wish I could say the same about your handling of Frank Palmieri. Jakob, the ideal outcome for us is for Blue Oasis to accept our current offer and partner with us willingly. We want to establish trust and goodwill. What happened with Frank imperils all of that. Do you understand?"

A shadow crossed Jakob's face. "Yes, Ma'am."

"What else?"

"Mr. Novak should be landing late this evening. Lauren Chase will be with him."

"She's coming here?" Aleksandra chided herself for betraying surprise. There was no reason that anyone should ever anticipate her thinking before she spoke. Least of all Jakob. "Our investment in Mr. Bradley is paying off better than I expected when I agreed to let you make use of him. For this, I'll forgive you Frank. Come here."

Aleksandra unbuckled Jakob's belt and lowered his trousers, noting with satisfaction that he was already fully erect.

"I'm making good progress with Janet, which helps. And I never can stay angry with you." Her long, lustrous hair brushed his stomach and spilled over his penis. Pushing the silver and black strands out of her way, she ran a fingertip across his glans as she held it close to her open lips. His breath quickened. She extended her tongue and slid it around the rim of his crown. Looking up at him from under her lashes, she added, "You know you are like a second son to me."

Jakob's blood surged in his cock at those words, as Aleksandra had expected. Men's secret desires were not mysteries to her, least of all the fantasies of young men. She remembered Jakob's mother, Malea, well: dark and small with wide hips and full breasts, possessed of the typically sensual nature of Kai'ulauans. After all this time, he must still long for her.

The first French explorers to reach the island had discovered an indigenous people even more sexually expressive and uninhibited than their debauched European imaginations could have conjured. Such was Aleksandra's own heritage, as a daughter born by the only one of Lukasz Novak's many lovers that he'd chosen to legally wed, carrying on his name and providing him heirs to his burgeoning fortune.

Her brother had fathered Jakob with Malea. Filip Novak had not been as prolific as their father, but she was sure there were two dozen young men and women on the island with his blue eyes. And that would not have been possible had not the mothers themselves been Lukas Novak's issue.

Stefan was Aleksandra and Filip's only child. Seeking out and bringing as many of her brother's offspring as possible into her orbit assuaged some of the hollowness that she still felt every day since Filip's death. He had been her true mate, her lover and for so many years her only ally against the depredations of their father. And the practice served as well to partially satisfy the imperious sexual appetite that defined her as fully as did her pursuit of wealth and power.

Aleksandra ran her hands up the insides of Jakob's thighs. She rolled her thumbs across his balls, slid her fingers under his scrotum, and lifted, feeling the weight and heat of them. He laid a hand on the crown of her head to urge her forward. She liked that. He sought to assert dominance with the gesture. In truth, it betrayed his need and his weakness, and that was good.

To know another's desire and to be the one who could fulfill it was the way to riches.

To be the one who could deny it was the way to power.

She'd learned something useful from her father, after all.

She licked the cleft of Jakob's glans. He groaned as she slipped her lips over the tip of his cock and rolled her tongue around the knob, continuing to move her mouth down along the long hard trunk, taking him into her throat. When he was halfway inside she closed her lips around him and sucked. He gasped and rose up on the balls of his feet, choking back a cry of surprise.

Relaxing her mouth's hold on him, she swallowed more of the shaft. She repeated the procedure several times, taking a few inches each time, clamping down and sucking. Only when she had his whole cock in her throat did she pull her head back, the soft wet seal of her lips tugging along his length until she reached the head again. She relished his moans and cries and the spasmodic trembling of the lean long muscles in his legs and buttocks as he fought to control himself. She could bring him off at any time she chose, but she did not. Let him believe himself in charge, for now.

She released his cock. "Fuck my face. Use me."

Jakob held her in place and stabbed his hips forward, slamming all the way down her throat. She made happy, gurgling sounds as he rammed into her again and again, grunting loudly and fucking her furiously.

She let her neck go slack. Her head rolled limply in Jakob's hands. Exerting too much obvious control over a young stud broke his spirit. Ease off too much, and he might dare to rebel. Getting it just so was a delicate thing. She had Jakob right at the point of needing to both possess and satisfy her at the same time. On most days, this would guarantee her a long and satisfyingly energetic morning fuck.

Sadly, there was not time enough for that this morning. She had a busy schedule.

She put her hand flat against the hard muscle of Jakob's belly to still his thrusts. It required only a few deft strokes of her fingers and tongue to trigger his orgasm. He climaxed at the moment of her choosing, and she gulped greedily as he exploded in her mouth.

Jakob's dark features twisted in what could as easily have been pain as pleasure. He let out a high-pitched squeal.

That was not the sound you meant to make,

she thought with amusement. His cock jerked spasmodically in her mouth for a few more seconds. She sucked until she'd drawn out every last drop of his jism. When she was sure there was no more, she released him and sank back in her chair, satiated for the time being.

"Thank you, Jakob. That will be all for now." She brushed her long hair back into place with her fingers. "Take Janet with you to meet the plane. Seeing her there will set Mrs. Chase's mind at ease."

"Yes, Ma'am." He refastened his pants, made a short bow, and left.

It was time for Aleksandra to check in on Janet Palmieri.

†††

Lauren and Stefan kissed just inside the cabin of the Novak jet. "We part ways here for a little while." He jerked his head at the cockpit door.

"You're not the

pilot

?"

He grinned. "I only just qualified this month. Don't be alarmed. I'm taking the right-hand seat today."

"Well aren't you the Renaissance man. Jesus. If I'd known, I'd have let you sleep."

"You would not."

"No, I would not." She leaned in for another kiss, holding on for what she feared was a little too long before he gently disengaged and disappeared into the pilot's cabin.

She'd bought a cheap overnight bag and a few necessary items at the airport. She stowed it and reclined her seat into a bed. She doubted she'd really sleep. She was always a nervous flyer. Closing her eyes for a moment, she pondered how to best say the things that she could no longer put off saying to her husband when she finally got back home. She thought about Ethan.

She missed take-off. She missed the misted, scarred ridge of the Appalachians, and the flat green and brown checkerboard of the plains, and the Rockies. The thump of the descending landing gear awakened her just before they barreled onto the runway at LAX.

The young woman who boarded during refueling looked vaguely familiar. Tall. Model-slender. Delicate features without makeup. Dark hair pulled back in a ponytail under a Braves cap. Purple heather tee and sweatpants. She appeared to be either very bored or very tired as she crossed the cabin and stuck out her hand.

"Chelsea."

"Lauren. Pleased to meet you."

That response apparently delighted Chelsea for some reason. "Same. Lauren, don't mind me. I'm completely fried. I'm gonna go aft and sack out."

"Sure."

It was only when Chelsea was snoring away on the mid-cabin divan that Lauren remembered where she'd seen her: Chelsea West, one of the A-listers gazing out from People magazine's "10 Sexiest People" issue on the rack at the airport newsstand. She starred in one of those blockbuster movie franchises that Lauren always surfed right past on HBO. Terry-something-something.

Tara Nova

, that was it.

Tara Nova, Tara Nova II: Starfall, Tara Nova At the End of Time...

So, the busy friend that Stefan had mentioned at lunch was a kick-ass movie superhero. She was cute. A little gaunt. Could stand to gain ten pounds--

Whoa there, lady! What's

that

about?

Jealousy made no sense in this situation, none at all. Chelsea West's casual and entirely expected arrival only served as a reminder of who Stefan really was, a handsome young stranger who had found Lauren attractive. Hormones and a drug-fueled night together did not a relationship make. Not when the drug in question would make a lamb mount a lion.

Lauren reminded herself for the umpteenth time that Stefan had designs on the business she'd spent her life building. He was a natural charmer, sure, but much of that sprang from the unguarded exuberance of a youngster who'd been turned loose in a candy store with pockets full of money and no idea what anything in those sparkling glass jars cost, or of the crash that followed a sugar high.

He was too young.

She glanced at the cabin chronometer. Ordinarily, she'd be in her semi-weekly video chat with Bethany Gallegos about now. The tale of the last forty-eight hours would certainly be grist for the therapist's mill.

Well, Doctor, I've been acting out again. I may have been a little reckless. You'll be shocked to hear that he's Ethan's age. Again.

Gallegos would look mildly bemused if she betrayed any reaction at all. She'd tap-tap-tap on her tablet and frame the issue reassuringly, as something she was accustomed to hearing, and completely normal. Whatever the hell that might mean in a case like this.

Lauren had once pressed her for a diagnosis. A label she could hang on her distress.

"At one time the Freudians called it the Jocasta complex," Gallegos had replied. "The sublimated sexual attachment of the mother to her son."

"Except we both know that my feelings for Ethan aren't all that sublimated."

"No. We also both know that you have never acted overtly on them."

"Of course not! But I-I'm..."

"Ashamed? Lauren, if human beings were not universally ashamed of their feelings I would be learning to pull shots at Starbucks.

"Your son is an adult. You tell me that he's highly intelligent, healthy, and sexually active with women of his own cohort. But in your interior drama of guilt, you've cast him as a vulnerable and unwitting victim of your predatory desires."

"My unnatural desires."

"Not unnatural. Forbidden. We as a society don't continually forbid sane people to stick their hands into meat grinders because we don't have to. Such impulses are unnatural and therefore most uncommon. Yours are neither."

Gallegos would often reassure her that way before shifting gears to something annoying like "Frankly, your strong focus on sexual fantasy does serve a different unhealthy purpose. It channels your worry away from the real challenges in your relationship with Jon."

"Jon?"

"Your husband."

Oh, that Jon. Problems, Doctor? Jon and I are peachy keen. How could there be problems? We barely speak to each other.

†††

Janet Palmieri scooted closer to the foot of the bed, spread her legs, and rested her heels against the curved wooden footboard. She thumbed the Hitachi to a low setting and placed the head close beside her clitoris. The pleasure was sudden and intense. There was no slow build-up of arousal or anticipation of her peak, just an overpowering jolt of ecstasy rushing through her within moments. As she climaxed, she breathed a silent "thank you" to Aleksandra Novak for having given her the vibrator.

Aleksandra's gift brought Janet relief, but not satisfaction. She missed the warmth of a lover's body against her own, a mouth on her mouth and on her breasts and her pussy, a cock that she could suck. Someone to hold her and to fill her. As her breathing slowed she thought of Jakob, of Manate and Dominic and Aroha, and of the other men and women she'd fucked in the last week.

Her husband Frank had been enthusiastic when Aleksandra had offered them the chance to sample Libidramine. He'd kept insisting on it, over Janet's objections. Skepticism and caution were her watchwords when evaluating new products, often to the extreme of annoying her partners. Even Lauren too often took the narrow view of their business as being little more than providing the cheapest and fastest delivery of products to their customers. If a health supplement or food was legal and in demand, Blue Oasis sold it. But given the audacity of the claims for Libidramine, the lack of data other than anecdotal testimonials was a red flag waving in Janet's face.

In the end, she had given in to her husband and taken the pills.

An hour later she'd been slouching naked on the sofa in Aleksandra's office, ankles locked around the small of Jakob's back, pumping her hips and shrieking for him to fuck her harder. They'd fucked until she was exhausted, and when she'd given up trying to match his deep thrusts she had clung to him limply and begged him to keep going. Shock waves of pleasure tore through her brain each time he drove his cock deep, penetrating her to the core of her being.

That fucking had transformed her.

But Libidramine had nothing at all for Frank.

Janet remembered Aleksandra sitting beside him, absently fondling his limp cock in the attempt to arouse him while he'd disconsolately watched his wife begging a stranger to keep slamming his cock into her.

Why had Lib worked for her, and not for Frank? The mystery piqued her scientist's curiosity. Since the best way to form a testable hypothesis was repeated observation and data collection, she'd trusted that continuing her own experiments with Libidramine was the surest way to find the answer. Yes, more sex was clearly the best investigative protocol. And It would require frequent copulation with a range of partners. To that end, Aleksandra had volunteered to select a broad sample of willing, virile studs from among the population of the island.

That had seemed entirely reasonable to Janet.

It was in that same spirit of scientific inquiry that she thumbed her vibrator back to life now. Rolling the head back and forth on her lower belly, she eased it slowly toward her crotch. She wanted her next orgasm to last a long time.

"I trust that the research goes well?" How long had Aleksandra been standing in the doorway? Her dark eyes sparkled with admiration. "You fascinate many of my people because you are so fair. I think blondes must have been rare even among the first French settlers here. There were a few among Father's European associates. Long since gone."

Aleksandra moved like a dancer on the balls of her bare feet. She was small-boned and her waist was tiny, her breasts round and high and her hips generous as a prehistoric Venus. Save for the silver strands that threaded her straight, waist-length black hair, and the fine wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and mouth, she might have been thirty. She credited that to the daily use of Libidramine. Janet's early incredulity about such claims had diminished with each passing day.

Getting into bed next to Janet, Aleksandra slipped an arm under her shoulders and drew her close. "What intrigues me more are the surprising reservoirs of lust that you harbor. She caressed Janet's cheek. "Why have you hidden your true self for so long, and from whom? Frank? Yourself? There's no longer any need, now that you are among us. Here we are free."

She cupped one of Janet's breasts, stroking her nipple with a fingertip as they kissed. "Tell me what you want."

"Touch my pussy," Janet whispered. "P-put your fingers in me and make me come."

Aleksandra inserted a finger into Janet's vagina and rotated it, stroking the inside of the hot, slick tunnel. She'd had Janet often enough now to have knowledge of her body and in less than a minute Janet felt the little sheath of muscle contract. Her juices leaked into the older woman's hand as she climaxed.

"Let me show you something." Aleksandra stacked three pillows in the middle of the bed. She guided Janet onto her stomach atop the pile, pelvis raised and tilted upward. She placed the head of the vibrator beneath the top pillow, just below Janet's vulva, and set it to high. "Ride it."

The muffled vibrations of the toy shuddered through the layers of soft padding and into Janet's flesh, sending resonating waves of delight through her belly and pelvis. "Oh...oh... that's...I love that."

Aleksandra straddled the younger woman's legs, kneading the muscles of her shoulders and on down her back. She worked downward in a leisurely way, toward Janet's buttocks. Janet rocked her hips against the pillow, opening her thighs wider. She flooded between her legs, opening up, awaiting Aleksandra's touch. When the woman's small fingers slid up inside her hole again, she let out a strangled gasp.

"We will do so many things together, you and I." Aleksandra brought her face to within an inch of Janet's pussy, spreading her inner labia with two fingers. The warm point of her tongue teased the little opening. "We will please one another, and help each other. You will help me, dear?"

"Yes," Janet whimpered. "Yes...yes...yes..." Aleksandra's tongue entered her. She pressed her full weight into the vibrating pillow and screamed.

†††

"I want to thank you for having no fucking idea who I am." The absolute sincerity with which Chelsea said the words as she slid into the seat next to Lauren's was not entirely persuasive.

"Glad I could help," Lauren replied. "I imagine it gets old quickly. Being recognized everywhere, I mean. No privacy."

"Oh, it totally sucks. And the day it stops happening I'll probably saw my wrists open or something. Anyway, sorry I haven't been much company. We wrapped location at four in the morning, on a TV thing my manager says is gonna torpedo my career. Washed up at twenty-four, Oh No!" She leaned past Lauren to look out the window. "Man, I really need this vacay."

In the last hour, Kai'ulau had grown from a dark line on the evening horizon to an island with actual shape and geography. It was roughly triangular, as tropically lush near the coastlines as any resort photographer could ask for. The scrubby central plateau was marked by irregular white slashes of abandoned excavations, their borders softened by nature's patient encroachment. Straight blue rows of solar panels glinted in the fading light, planted in brown acres of cleared land. Most notable were the cultivated terraces cut into the slopes of the hills, neat shelves of brilliant red snaking through the green.