Chapter 4.
It took a while for the implications fully to sink in. Miranda's right hand was firmly shackled to Andrea's left. They instinctively tried to pull apart, which automatically tightened the wrist shackles.
"Ow!"
"How dare you do that to me?"
"You did it first."
"I could wring your neck."
"No you couldn't. You'd need two hands. Let's look in the box again. There must be a set of keys somewhere."
But even when they'd turned the box completely out and shaken it, no hand-cuff keys emerged. They were coupled together as if they were conjoined twins, facing each other in the heat. The air-con was switched off for the weekend. Outside the window the rain began to pelt down, sheeting past them in a tropical downpour.
Miranda decided she had to start behaving like an adult in the situation, and stop unfairly sniping at Andrea. It wasn't the girl's fault. The only trouble was, she badly needed to pee. And if they couldn't unfasten themselves in reasonable time, Andrea would have to assist her with even more activities that were far from appropriate or decent.
"What should we do?" Andrea began to be seriously worried.
Miranda's beautiful face blushed. "First things first. Let's call Roy and tell him we may be a little longer up here than we thought. Meanwhile I need the bathroom. "
"Oh whoops. I….?!"
"Come on, you'll just have to cope with it. I've given birth to twins, and there's nothing more undignified than that. "
Andrea had the extremely bizarre experience for the next five minutes of accompanying Miranda to the bathroom, and helping her pull down her underwear with one free hand, while she sat on the potty and took a long pee. She tried not to look, but helpfully passed the toilet paper.
Miranda pulled her underwear up and smoothed her ball gown down. They both washed their hands together. The hand-cuffs were beginning to be seriously annoying.
Miranda reached for some paper towels and dried both their hands. "You realise we can't change back into normal clothes. We won't be able to get our arms through the sleeves".
Andrea's face showed her mental struggle with knot theory. "My phone is in my purse. Let me call Roy now and tell him. He will know what to do."
"I am not letting my driver see me in this ridiculous situation. There must be another answer. Look, we'll go back down with a scarf or something wrapped round our wrists. It's dark. He probably won't notice. We'll say there wasn't time to change. Just to take us back to the house."
Andrea wasn't convinced.
"And what then?"
"We'll find a way through it. We're not stupid."
Given their current state of affairs, Andrea thought that might be debatable. She fished around in her purse for her phone, and called Roy.
"Hi Roy. . . .Yes, we're fine. We'll be down in five minutes. . . . No, she's well. We just have one or two little things to do." Roy said something else, which Miranda couldn't catch. "No, no, that was nothing…..Yes, thanks. That would be great."
"He says he'll come over to the foyer with a large golf umbrella. But he says to wait for a few moments until the rain lessens. It's cats and dogs out there at the moment."
"Did he ask if the dragon had stopped breathing fire?"
"No…oo., and why would he? Everyone knows you are really a pussy-cat. You just need feeding. Low blood sugar. Hey, I have a chocolate bar in my desk drawer you can have."
Andrea pulled her grumpy goddess a little towards her and produced a large bar of nutty milk chocolate candy from the drawer. The silver foil wrapper needed opening which took both their free hands to achieve.
"Look, you hold it and I'll unwrap it."
"I disapprove of junk food in the office."
Andrea snapped off a couple of chunks and fed them into Miranda's mouth, effectively silencing her. "Good eh? Have some more."
Miranda swallowed and bit again. Her teeth were perfect. Andrea adored her.
Miranda's shackled hand crept round behind Andrea and grasped her backside. Andrea's hand was forced to go with her, but it was nothing if not seductive. She felt herself pulled in tightly against the older woman, crushed against the lame' material of her dress, breathing in Miranda's perfume.
"I'm ashamed I got us into this mess," whispered Miranda. Andrea sought her mouth and kissed her very gently. The dragon was disarmed. She tasted of chocolate and love.
"Don't be ashamed," Andrea responded, when she could. "I am having such fun. I've never done bondage before."
Miranda chortled. "Darling, this is not what bondage is about. This is a farce."
Andrea changed the subject. "How do you get your perfume to stay so strong and so wonderfully heady all day and night? It smells divine."
"I go through a bottle a month. Just pour it on. Another of my stupid extravagances."
"Can I sleep with you tonight?"
"I can't guarantee much sleep, but I think sharing a bed might be a necessity. "
"Then I wouldn't have missed this for the world."
"The rain is slackening off some. Let's make a run for it."
They gathered all their clothes and bags into a pile which effectively disguised what their hands were doing, and went down in the waiting elevator. By the ground floor, Andrea had fed Miranda the rest of the chocolate. Desperate times called for desperate measures.
Roy met them at the door and tried to help with the bags of clothes but the women both resisted.
"We're fine. Let's just get out of the rain."
They jumped into the car one after the other, surprisingly agile, and obviously on much better terms than he had left them. They sat very close together on the wide seat. He pushed his cap back on his forehead and shook out the umbrella before putting it beside him in the front. There was now a silence from behind him.
When they reached Miranda's home, he helped them out and sheltered them under the umbrella to the front door, but they were both pretty wet. Miranda was fumbling for her keys.
"Here, let me," and he took the keys from her hand, opened up the door and reached inside to de-activate the alarm. "
"Do you want me to wait to take Andy home?"
"No, not necessary. She'll be staying here overnight. She has some essential tasks to fulfil. "
"Oh, fine. Do you need me tomorrow then?"
"No Roy, you take Sunday off with your wife. I expect I'll be tied up most of the day. "
He tipped his cap, and disappeared into the storm.
As soon as the door shut, Andrea rocked with spasms of the laughter she'd been holding in.
"Oh Miranda, I don't mind. You can fire me, or put me in a box and throw me in the Hudson when this is all over, but this will always be the best day of my life. You are so funny!"
Miranda dripped over her immaculately tiled front hall floor. Her eyes flashed.
"Yes, that's all I aim to do each and every day, amuse my minions. Look, it's late. We can't do anything about this …situation….tonight and we need to get out of these wet things. Come on upstairs. I'll give you a bed sheet or something to wear, and we'll find a solution tomorrow morning."
She had thrown all their bags onto the floor, and unceremoniously pulled Andrea into the kitchen where she tugged two bottles of Pellegrino water from the fridge, and a bowl of cherries and doughnut peaches.
"Something to snack on. The candy bar did make me feel more human, but we will doubtless need something to sustain us later."
Andrea took the bowl, and asked a silent question. "?"
"Darling, you don't imagine I'm going to be chained to you all night without taking advantage of it? I am a woman to be feared, and pragmatism is my middle name."
Andrea could think of several other ideas for Miranda's middle name. But then she met her eyes, and wanted to melt into them.
"It takes a lot to frighten me," she murmured. "Are you really that scary? Is this to do with those tasks you mentioned to Roy?"
"Come and find out," said Miranda. And they went upstairs to her bedroom.
But it took longer than Andrea expected actually to get between the sheets. Miranda was a fiend about removing make-up, and insisted on doing it for both of them.
"It's easier like this. I have the wipes. You hold the bottle of cleanser."
They had both unzipped themselves from their highly expensive, classically designed bustier dresses, and hung them off the ground against the door. The dry cleaning firm would have much to do to restore them to perfection, for the hems of both were drenched and stained with the assorted grime from their short exposure to the streets.
If the dresses had been sleeved, Miranda knew they would either have had to wear them to bed, or cut themselves out with a pair of scissors, so she was grateful for one small relief. Tomorrow's wardrobe choices remained a challenge she wasn't ready to meet just yet.
Under her gown she had chosen the smallest underwear possible, which now left nothing to the imagination, but she draped herself round Andrea completely brazenly. Touching Andrea was becoming addictive. As she smoothed away the younger woman's eye shadow and mascara, she couldn't resist kissing her behind her ears. It tickled and made Andrea squirm, but Miranda held her captive and refused to stop the torture until she gasped and begged for mercy.
When she had stripped Andrea's face of all make-up and kissed off her lipstick, she began to dismantle her hair design with one hand, pulling out the clips and undoing the braids.
"It held up so well," said Andrea, gazing at both their faces in the mirror. Miranda looked as hot as hell, and very predatory. She sure wasn't your normal hairdresser. "Thank you. You're right, you are certainlygood with hair."
Miranda said nothing, but spread Andrea's hair out over her shoulders and let it tumble down her back. She brushed all the hairspray out with long, smooth strokes until it rippled and bounced under her fingers. Next she unclipped Andreas's bra with her free hand, and pulled it away. She cupped the exposed breasts with both hands, pulling Andrea's hand into the movement, and placing it against her own body.
"You're like a wood nymph."
Andrea moaned. "I adore you too, Miranda. Can we make love now though, in bed? Please!"
"Oh very well, if you must." Miranda pretended to sound resigned to that fate, but her hands were everywhere she could reach without contorting Andrea into a spiral.
"Oh sorry, but I just need to pee first. Your tickling didn't help."
"For pity's sake!"
They repeated their earlier expedition to the nearest bathroom, but with Andrea seated this time. Miranda distracted her by removing her ear-rings and fondling her ears. Then they repeated the washing of hands ritual, and cleaned their teeth together as well.
Never since she'd been a toddler had Andrea performed her toilet routines in such close proximity to another human being. It was all intensely arousing and she could feel the heat emanating from both their bodies. Her breasts began to rise and fall, as her breathing deepened, and she could see that Miranda's pupils had dilated until her eyes looked like a feral cat's in the moonlight.
"Come to bed," said Miranda, "I'm not waiting all night," and with a certain amount of pushing and pulling, that's where they finally ended the evening.
Miranda's bed was vast, but they made a nest in the center of the mattress. The summer weight comforter was thrown back, and the idea of wrapping themselves in sheets for modesty's sake was immediately discarded as impractical.
The air conditioner unit purred discreetly in the background, as Andrea gave herself up to the various delicious tasks Miranda began to set her. The night was young, but it soon grew into something rather more grown-up. What the next morning would bring seemed a long, long way off, over the horizon of sleep.