Cleopatra�s Perfume (22 page)

A week later Maxi announced she’d completed her shoot with Ramzi. I stepped back, holding my breath when she opened the sheaf of large photographic prints. Her photos of my Egyptian were stunning, magical. His body seemed to hover just off the surface of the photos, as if he were three-dimensional, breathing, sweating. His face expressed a trancelike sexuality, a sense of his prowess that was both stimulating and frightening.

In Ramzi, Maxi captured the spell of the princely pharaohs that charged the familiar with beauty and mystery. She recreated the ancient world with such depth it was as if I saw the pharaohs of ancient Egypt brought back to life. Holding a flail in his hand similar to what the Egyptian leaders held in the frescoes painted on the walls of the Pyramids, he leaned against a rock face in a casual yet regal manner.

Nude.

My eyes riveted onto his shiny cock clearly discernible in every photo. She also posed him against a stone column, then sprawled on the steps of the Great Pyramid, and on the banks of the River Nile. He seemed to inhabit a timeless world in which every one of his movements was guided by a spiritual power.

What her creative instincts drew from Ramzi didn’t surprise
me. She raised looking at the male body to new heights with a timeless reverence, historical composition, but also with a raw sexual appeal that stimulated me in a way no man ever could. As if she captured in Ramzi the ideal mate of every woman who looked at her photographs of him. She wanted to depict him as more than an objectification, she said, with his skin oiled and shiny against the grainy, rough texture of the Pyramids.

I was amazed at her ability to observe and capture the caressing and intimate qualities of light on her subject. Her photos were about the arrangement of shadow to illuminate his nude body as well as show tenderness and magnify his sexuality. Her love of dramatic lighting was evident, and her approach to photographing Ramzi reflected the intense, startling mysticism of an ancient civilization. It was as if erotic images seeped through the sands of time and rearranged themselves in her images. Yet I had no doubt her photographs were reflections of
her
as much as they were of her subject.

“They’re beautiful, Maxi. I can’t take my eyes off them.”

“They’re my best work.”

“Where will you exhibit them?”

“Paris, then London. Who knows?” she said with enthusiasm. “Maybe New York.”

“Not Berlin?” I asked, surprised.

She didn’t answer me. “I’ve asked Ramzi to accompany me to Paris next week.”

I lifted my too-thin eyebrow, making it nearly disappear. “Impossible. I need him here at the Cleopatra Club.”

“Can’t you get along without him, Eve? This is so important
to me. I need him to create what you Americans call
excitement
about my work.”

“I’m also a British subject, Maxi,” I reminded her in a droll voice. Yes, I was jealous, but trying not to show it. “I’m known as Lady Marlowe here.”

She shrugged, her attitude changing. “How could I have forgotten? Though since I’ve been in Cairo, it’s like the old days again, the parties, the drinking—”

“
And
the sex?”

She turned away. A slight flush reddened her cheeks. “You’ll have to excuse me, Eve. I have more film to develop in the darkroom.”

And with that she was off, downstairs to the crypt where I had indulged in submission with Mahmoud, his strong arm wielding the whip as it hit my bare arse, then I allowed him to touch me in a way he dreamed about but never believed would happen. Ramzi had no knowledge of my indiscretion and had offered the crypt to Maxi for her darkroom. I should have resisted the temptation to sneak down, not allowed my jealous self to rule and my curious sexual self to succumb to what had now become my ultimate fantasy.

Ramzi with another woman.

I didn’t resist, dear reader. Instead, I crept downstairs with the stealth of a ghost on tiptoe, wrapped up so tightly in my own anticipatory indulgence, I could barely breathe, my nerves bordering on sexual hysteria, my body a fountain of pulsating rhythms.

I stopped when I saw them, lying on top of soft velvet cushions and glowing like lightning bugs mating under the dim blue light. Ramzi, Maxi. And Laila. Three nude figures heating up the cool and shadowy room. Teasing, laughing, Ramzi stroking Maxi’s breasts,
her nipples hardening instantly at his masterful arousing touch before gliding down her body and forcing her legs apart, then cupping her outer lips and inserting a finger into her.

I didn’t have to move closer to know he rubbed her burning clit to and fro in a steady rhythm, her seeds of arousal glowing white hot, building and
building
until the need for release was so strong she could stand no more. I gritted my teeth to stifle a moan, envying her the pleasure of Ramzi’s expertise. She ran her hands through her short dark hair, pulling at the roots as she let out ecstatic cries. Laila leaned in closer toward her and I was struck by the size of the Muslim woman’s breasts, large with huge nipples. They seemed in stark contrast to her small waist and tight stomach. I never dreamed she displayed such a striking figure, so different from Maxi, who was tall and thin, boyish, with small, perfectly shaped breasts and nearly invisible hips.

Laila grabbed the German girl’s breasts, her pinching fingers adding pleasure to her response and causing her to twist her torso in wild abandon. At the same time, Ramzi didn’t let up, his finger (or was it two? He always used two fingers with me) sweeping across her swollen bud so fast his hand seemed to disappear and all I could see was a swirl of blue light. I imagined her moisture overflowing onto his hand, the contractions pulsating through her. Oh, it was too much for me to bear. Their way of moving, turning, touching each other stirred my blood, infusing me with jealousy but also desire, a mystery I wanted to unravel but didn’t. Why question the renewed arousal flowing into me like a heady wine, numbing the negative feelings I harbored toward this unholy trio? Isn’t this what I wanted to see? Ramzi with another woman? If only to prove to myself I had to rid myself of my obsession with him?

Without thinking about what I was doing, moving by instinct, I pressed my fingertips hard against my pubic mound, my insistent touch pushing through the soft silk trousers I wore, so desperate was I to get at my clit begging for relief. I didn’t care if the purity of the silk as well as my resolve dissolved into an ugly stain as my juices flowed through my knickers. All that mattered was that I wasn’t left out of this scenario, erased from their minds as a new passion filled them. I fidgeted with the soft voile of my blouse, wishing I wasn’t wearing a brassiere, wishing I were also nude. They couldn’t know I was here, so what consequence awaited me if I pulled down my trousers? Rubbed myself? Who would see me standing in the shadows?

I pulled down my white silk trousers, their fullness ballooning around me with an ethereal lightness as they slipped down to my ankles. I unbuttoned my knickers then inserted my finger inside me, my voice mewling with the softness of a kitten’s tongue lapping up cream. A twirling circle of pleasure formed in my belly, exciting me as I circled my clit, pushing my fingers back and forth, my head lolling from side to side. I started breathing heavy as my pleasure built, the visual stimulation of watching the ménage pleasuring each other nearly as explosive as my manual acrobatics increased the flow of my wetness, my pubic muscles tightening around my finger. I didn’t dare close my eyes, deprive myself of the three participants bucking and writhing, caught up in their late-afternoon tryst, their needs fueled by a depravity I recognized and coveted to my breast, my desperation made more so by my exclusion from their sexual antics.

Faster and faster I stroked myself, moaning and breathing hard but well out of sight from the nude
tableau vivant
come to life, as if the artist forged each stroke with paint as lucid and wet as the sweat
dripping from their bodies. Maxi arched her back with such ease I could have sworn invisible wires pulled her up toward the Egyptian. Then Ramzi guided his cock deep inside her, making her squeal. Before she could stop him, he plunged into the German girl again and again, her hips pressing against him, driving him toward that exquisite moment I knew so well when he lost control, his seed flooding into me, as if he were drowning in a sea of pleasure.

I stopped rubbing my clit. A subtle chill replaced the burn, so great was my ego bruised at losing Ramzi to her. Envy killed my passion, struck it down with a sharp point that surged through me, right to my heart. I couldn’t reach a climax, though naked and wanting as I was, numbing me.

Then there was Laila. I couldn’t take my eyes off her, kneading Maxi’s breasts, suckling her, licking her. The Muslim woman’s tongue moved hungrily across her flesh, while a wild emotion overwhelmed me, an emotion I couldn’t control. Something rather disturbing to me.

I could no longer ignore my fascination with the two women exhibiting such passion toward each other.

I wanted to join them.

Over the next two days, I watched every move they made, Ramzi and Maxi. They laughed, yelled, fought over the photos, made up, then fought again. I couldn’t believe the extraordinary compassion they exhibited toward one another. They said what they thought (Maxi in German, Ramzi in French), and I believe it was that craziness that brought them together in this wild affair.

What perturbed me about their affair was that Ramzi continued
to engage in sex with me after we closed the club every night. What had been a sacred communion between us, the celebration of an earthly joy, was now pure sex. Where once we played, resisting each other, teasing, none of that existed now. Without such resistance, I found no excitement in our coupling. I admit I complained in earlier pages about the mechanics of my own orgasm, and though I should apologize for my seemingly selfish attitude, I don’t. Sex should be filled with luscious sensations arousing the very core of your soul, surrounded by sights and sounds, fragrant aromas and pleasant tastes, and the most important element of all, a loving touch. I hungered for these sensations, but I refrained from expressing myself in the sexual arena. Ramzi’s prowess diminished (he was, after all, fucking two women at different times each day), making me accept the fact he was a vulnerable mortal after all. Yet I said nothing to him. You see, dear reader, the male ego is very fragile and my Egyptian lover was no exception. Telling him he didn’t please me would arouse his ire. I feared how he would react to such an observation. I couldn’t deny I didn’t trust him. I may have been a slave to my sexual obsession, but my mental capabilities continued to function, warning me to be cautious. It wasn’t anything I could see, but something I felt. In the way Ramzi touched me, his hand lingering on my bare breast, tracing the areola round and round in a circle with his fingers but not pinching my nipple, as if he practiced restraint. Why? I wouldn’t know the answer until some time later. I’m very good at understanding my instincts. Lord Marlowe always said it was my uncanny knack of reading a situation that kept me from landing in a quagmire of trouble when I was a young woman. He also alluded to the fact I exhibited enough
common sense to allow him to become my protector. I have to admit, a hurtful ache hits me in the pit of my stomach when I recall so many of his lordship’s maxims. It is that pragmatic and teasing attitude of his I sorely miss.

And so, dear reader, though I labored to bring back some mystery and wonder into my sex life with Ramzi, it never happened. Days turned into a week, then two, always the same. Ramzi making up some excuse why he couldn’t see me and when he did, why we should indulge in drugs instead of sex. I didn’t believe his lies, telling me he was worried about me, concerned that my lack of sexual fire was a physical malady.
Was I ill?
he wanted to know.
No,
I assured him, removing his hand from my thigh before he could reach under my skirt to find my clit and rub it, my wetness glistening on his brown fingers, fingers stimulating me and making me burn so hot my pubic muscles clamped around his finger as I let go with a shuddering climax I couldn’t stop.

No, I couldn’t allow him to go that far, not when my interest lay in other places. Warm, moist. Pink places. I couldn’t help but wonder, did he know I followed him every afternoon when he sneaked off to fuck Maxi while his stepsister seduced her with feline kisses? Bringing her to climax again and again while I watched them from my secret place? The club was quiet then, lulled into an eerie silence by the lack of human voices everywhere except here in the underground crypt. I swear, when I sighed my breath seemed to mix with theirs, the sweet breath of three women, mouths with hungers of our own wanting, needing the soft touch of a woman’s lips because men had failed us.

Hurt, lonely, disdainful of a man’s infidelity, I found more stim
ulation here than I did with Ramzi, watching the two women, my hand finding my way between my thighs, brushing the soft hair with an inquisitive touch the Egyptian never ventured to do, then playing over the outer edges of my pussy, taking my time, before allowing my finger to slip inside me in such a delicate manner I didn’t feel it at first. Then I’d observe Laila encircling the German girl’s shoulders while Ramzi watched, pressing her mouth to those full lips, her tongue forcing apart her teeth before she nestled her breasts against the other girl’s chest, their nipples touching, peaking in hard brown buds, the honeyed flavor of one body mixing with the cool ivory of the other. Sighing, moaning, their voices echoing round and round the crypt, I added my own vocal pleasure to theirs when I pushed harder and began rubbing my clit, wishing their pink tongues would linger on the peak of my bud, then lick it with the lightest touch, teasing me before flicking back and forth across my engorged ridge. The thought made me pause, then I shivered, my fingers picking up speed, stroking back and forth, not holding back when my moment of release came, allowing it to spread all over me, rippling through me, knowing at the same time I was watching my relationship with the girl I once called my friend dissolve. Strange feelings, losing a friend, loving her at the same time.