Chapter 5.
Dawn was breaking when next Sarah opened her eyes. She was alone in the room, and a long stem yellow rose lay beside her. There was a note attached and she sat up to read it.
'Little Green eyes,' it said. 'I hope you rested well, and do not think too badly of your host for the unfortunate incident of last evening.' It was not signed but Sarah knew it was from the man in the black mask. She reached up to remove the white mask she still wore. There was a tapping at the door and it creaked open.
Sophie, clothes all rumpled peeped in. "Good," She said quietly. "You're awake, come on we gotta haul ass before my mom realizes we didn't sleep in our own beds." She helped Sarah to her feet and handed her the little black purse she'd been using. "She's funny about that kind of thing of late."
Sarah looked around the room, then at Sophie. "You slept with that man, didn't you?"
"Sleep being the operative word?" Sophie made light of the situation as she headed out of the room.
"He's old enough to be your father." Sarah declared make an objection.
Without looking at her, Sophie moved down the stairs, "So was the guy who took my virginity." Her voice didn't register concern.
"Sophie!" Sarah reached for her as they left the house and walked to the car. "What did you just say?"
Sophie turned to her. "It's no big whoop." She handed the tag to the one valet left on duty. "Look, it was two years ago, and the guy was a buddy of my dad, and we were in Paris."
"You were fourteen!" Sarah complained.
"Sarah, if this was the fourteenth century I'd be married at fourteen." Sophie laughed it off.
"Sophie!"
The blond held up a hand. "Look, I like Pablo…and if I had not wanted to, he would have let it go."
"You're telling me you like having that man…."
"Sarah I told you, I'm not a virgin, and yes, I like having that man. I like having that man a lot. I sneak over here three times a week to have that man." Sophie bragged.
Sarah got in the car and fumed. "Did you know someone tried to drug me last night?"
Sophie slammed on the breaks. "What?" She looked at her friend. "Oh honey, I'm sorry… I was having such a good time…when the Master called and said you were resting in the peacock room I just figured the drink was too much for you it being your first time."
Sarah looked at her hands in her lap. "The Master…saved me…sent those guys packing."
"Guys…more than one?"
Sarah nodded. "They tried to pull my top off…"
Groaning Sophie slammed her hand on the steering column, and then looked at Sarah. "Well I can't blame them for that….you've got a glorious set of knockers on you and no red blooded guy wouldn't want to see em. Even Pablo said you're built like a …"
Sarah held her hand up. "Stop."
Sophie turned the car toward the road. "I mean it Sarah, you are a gorgeous girl." She noticed the flinch and laughed. "Easy sister, I don't swing that way. I like men far more. But as an artist I can tell you what I see."
Sarah looked at the other girl and asked quietly. "What do you see when you look at me?"
"A girl who's trying to change her tune," Sophie said after some thoughts. "You just recently changed your long time hair style right?" When Sarah nodded, the other continued. "I'll bet you just put away the last of your dolls recently too."
"Yes…I did." Sarah gasped.
"You're sixteen and you are suddenly aware of it." Sophie said with a wink.
"I won't be sixteen for another week." Sarah commented.
"Close enough." The blonde giggled. "So why not jump in with both feet?"
"Both feet?"
There was no pause now. "Yes, both feet, get new clothes dress like a girl ready to see the world, not a nun on sabbatical."
"I don't dress like a nun!" Sarah protested. "I wear just what everyone else wears."
"No you don't." Sophie laughed. "You wear big baggy shirts that hide that cute figure of yours."
Sarah sunk into the seat. "I like baggy shirts."
"What you need Sarah is someone like my mom to go shopping with you." Sophie stated. "That's it, my birthday present to you is a shopping spree in New York with my mom this coming weekend!"
Sarah frowned. "I can't, I have to go to New York to see my mom in a play."
"She's gonna be busy right?" Sarah nodded. "Well, mom and I will come along; we'll shop during the day and see the play with you that night. Then we can go to dinner and your mom can come along if she likes."
"Mom has plans to attend a thing at some directors…I was suppose to go to the hotel and sleep." Sarah sighed sadly.
"Bummer and a half. My plan is better." Sophie crowed.
"I'll ask my mother." Sarah said not getting her hopes up. "But will your mom go along with it?"
"Bobbie Graves, turn down a chance to go shopping in New York's garment district?" Sophie laughed. "OH Sarah, you are an innocent."
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The plans had been made with lightening speed, so quickly that it left Sarah speechless and breathless. Bobbie loved the idea of a trip to New York, and loved the idea of being able to make Linda Williams a contact. Linda loved the idea of not having to worry about entertaining Sarah during her stay. Robert was relived he didn't have to see Linda. Everyone seemed pleased with the idea, the only one with the slightest misgiving was Sarah.
Sophie and Sarah sat beside Bobbie in the compartment of the train. She was busy doing work, and the girls were going over the shopping list. Sophie wanted to make changes from Sarah's skin out. Bobbie looked up at one point to make a suggestion which her daughter wrote down swiftly.
The hotel was the same one Sarah stayed in on her last visit to New York, only this time they were given a VIP suite. Bobbie charged it to Sophie's father who was only too happy to pay her bills. Once settled Bobbie took the girls out for a meal in a little bistro. Sarah spoke to her mother on the phone to let her know they'd arrived and that she'd see her before the show.
Bobbie had made arrangements for Sarah to be fitted at an exclusive lingerie boutique whose owner was a client of Bobbie's. Both Sophie and Bobbie had suggestions of what would work for Sarah. The sales lady set out wonderful selections, and they took almost all of them. The next stop was a hip store that catered to the hip young crowd of New York City. By the end of the day Sarah Williams was no longer what Sophie had called Marian the Librarian.
Sarah had chosen an elegant clingy little dress in a green metallic fabric, and little tee straps. She had spent time with a makeup consultant. Bobbie wore red, her favorite color, and Sophie wore tones of blue. Linda took advantage of the changes in Sarah's appearance; she bragged that of course the child had her sense of flair in dressing. Linda made a point to make an appointment to talk business with Bobbie.
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The butterfly top felt like quicksilver against her skin. Sarah looked at the books in the library and wondered if life would ever change. The kids were still as stuck up as ever, and Sarah had to endure the comments made at her expense over the pictures of her and her mother in the papers. Now two weeks after her trip to New York she was working on keeping up with the changes she and Sophie were implementing.
Sophie came into the library and slumped into a chair. "Blast. I'm doomed." She said as she put her head down.
Sarah smiled and took a seat. "What's wrong?"
"I thought I had all my work done, school and stuff for Pablo…I forgot I have to have a painting in this weekend." She looked up.
"So, paint something." Sarah said lightly.
"Sarah, it's a set assignment." Sophie pulled herself up. "I have to have… a nude."
"You took all kinds of sketches of nudes over the last three weeks. Surely there's something in there you can use." Sarah reasoned.
Sophie looked up, ready to protest then paused. "Sarah, would you pose for me?"
Sarah began to sputter. "Are you out of your mind? I'm not a professional model!"
"I don't want a professional… they all look too hard. I want what Pablo had with Monique… I want fresh, I want innocent! Hell Sarah, I want you."
The librarian Shhhhhhhhhhhhed them loudly.
Sophie pulled Sarah out of the library, and down to the car. "Come on, I'd do it for you."
"You would take your clothes off on a whim!" Sarah snapped at the girl.
"I promise it will be tasteful." Sophie said pulling out the page with the assignment. She handed it to Sarah and begged her to read.
Sarah looked at the page, then her friend's desperate face. "Oh alright! You're never going to let up until I do this are you?"
"Oh Sarah, I love you!" She looked pleased. "Come to my house, and call your folks. Tell them we're studying together."
"No, I'm going to tell them the truth. " Sarah said.
"I wouldn't." warned the blonde.
Sarah thought about it, "Right." She said at long last. "Ok, let's go."
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Bobbie listened to the girls, "Well, it's art." She said at last. "Just don't go turning each other on." She left the pair of them in Sophie's room.
Sophie draped a long lace Mantilla on the satin bed coverlet. She directed Sarah to take her place and sat down at her easel. "You look gorgeous." She said as she started sketching the outline.
"I worry about you." She said to Sophie.
"I'm serious. I don't understand why no guy has been dry humping your leg." She continued to sketch.
Blushing, Sarah shrugged. "Last year I was sort of tied up in myself." She looked up to the ceiling, getting lost in thoughts. Her face took on a dreamy expression. "You were right; I was hiding behind the baggy clothes. Not quite ready for what was happening to me."
"Don't move keep looking at the ceiling like that, it's a perfect look." Sophie softened lines on the canvas. "I still don't understand why you weren't popular."
"Linda." Sarah said softly. "Linda leaving my dad when I was ten, running off with that actor…the scandal…. Then it was my father not trusting old friends not to want something because mom was becoming famous." Sarah sighed deeply. "I didn't make matters any better, getting lost in plays and acting with the local theater group… wearing costumes and being anyone but me."
Sophie nodded as she worked. "I know what you mean about people being weirded out over a famous parent. Daddy says its part of the business, course they didn't think of how it affects us kids… the perks are great, the drawbacks are just as large."
"See you understand that because we're in the same boat." Sarah said.
"So you were following in Mommy's footsteps?" The blond asked as her hand move over the canvas. "I didn't see you try out for the play at school. What happened?"
Sarah didn't want to think about what had happened she had put that part of her life behind her. She had put away her books and toys and costumes, locked away her childhood. "I can't go into it but I'll say there was something that happened that made me want to stop playacting."
"Any regrets?" Sophie asked quietly.
"No." Sarah said holding her chin tight.
Sophie was applying the first brush strokes to the canvas, "See if you were living in New York all this time it would have been no big deal. Being the child of a actress you'd be more or less the norm."
"You grew up in New York, so why did your mom move here to the boondocks?" Sarah asked.
"That was Daddy's idea. He felt it would do me good to be with people who were less flamboyant. You know get a taste of 'real life' and be with some kids whose parents were not part of the business." She looked at Sarah and then back at the canvas. "He had a point. I was becoming jaded."
"Are you happy here, Sophie?"
The girl thought, answering carefully. "There are things that make me happy here. I like the school, if not some of the kids…I like you… our friendship is important to me. You're more like a sister, than a friend. I like the quiet, the open spaces….and I like Paradisia."
"If your mom ever finds out about you and Pablo…" Sarah warned.
"She's not going to find out unless I want her to." Sophie stated. Changing the subject she looked over at the girl posing. "You never said, did you like the party I took you to there?"
"The party?" Sarah wondered why it troubled her so to think of the Wilde house. "It was interesting."
"I know you're still upset about those guys trying to drag you off and have their wicked ways with you…" Sophie teased. "But did you ever wonder what it would have been like? If you might have enjoyed it?"
Sarah rolled her eyes at the ceiling. "No, Sophie. I don't wonder about being forced to have sex with a group of people…."
The blonde snickered and smirked. "But you do wonder about sex, don't you? So why don't you ask and I'll tell you what I can."
"It's embarrassing." Sarah admitted. "I've thought about asking you …but…"
"Ask." The blonde sitting at the easel smiled a strange smile.
"Was the first time….awful?" Sarah whispered.
"No, actually it was kind of nice." Sophie became wistful. "Jean-Claude was remarkably kind and tender."
"Do you ever regret having lost your virginity?" The girl with dark hair asked.
"Nope." Sophie admitted quickly.
"Aren't you sorry you didn't wait for…love?" Sarah had trouble getting this out.
There was something in the way she'd spoken that made Sophie look at her. "You still believe the old fairy stories you've read all your life, don't you Sarah? Well that's not the world I've lived in. I've never thought there would be a knight in shinning armor coming to woe me. I've lived with hard living rockers, Sarah. They live hard and fast and burn out like stars in the heavens. Love was never in the cards."
"That's sad." Sarah lamented.
Sophie sighed heavily. "I suppose if some man came along and offered you the world, you'd take it."
"I didn't say that." Something about the accusation troubled Sarah.
Sophie stood back from the painting and laughed. "Oh come on, Sarah. I know you. If some man came along and offered you your dreams you telling me you wouldn't just jump into his arms?"
A voice from not so long ago, and yet a life time ago, rang in her ears. 'if you turn it this way, it will show you your dreams…do you want it? Then forget the baby.' Sarah groaned softly. She had been offered her dreams, and had been sorely tempted to just jump into the man's arms. However the cost had been too great and she had set out to rescue her brother from her ill spoken wish. "Sometimes, Sophie the cost is too great, and dreams are not enough."
"Profound words," Sophie said going back to the easel. "You spend too much time with that pretty turned up nose in books, Sarah." She made a few more strokes. "You really are a romantic at heart, and there's nothing wrong with that."
"A romantic, yes perhaps I am." Sarah sighed. "The problem is once you've been romanced by a man…you can't go back and look at boys…"
Sophie heard the words and knew that Sarah was not aware she'd said it aloud. "You've been romanced by a man?" She looked as Sarah's eyes filled with the knowledge she'd spoken the words. "Who, when?"
"No, of course not." Sarah said trying to cover up the misspoken truth.
"So Sarah likes men better than boys too." Sophie teased. "Well, why not? You've been around actors and directors…. Hardly any teen boys there. So who was he? An actor in one of your mother's plays?"
"Not exactly." Sarah was uncomfortable speaking about this; she had worked to put it out of her mind. Now it was slapping her in the face demanding her attention.
Sophie sat at the easel, "Who was he?"
"He was no one." Sarah tightened her jaw. "Just someone who drifted in my life for one night and right out again. Sophie I really don't want to talk about it."
"Wow, he must have really been something, you are so tense." Sophie worked on the painting. She noticed the subtle changes to Sarah's body while speaking of the nameless man. She quickly added the subtle changes with soft strokes of her brush.
A few hours later she finished her last stroke. "Want to see?" She asked her model.
Sarah stood up and shook her head. "No." she picked up her clothes and dressed to leave. "I've got to get home."
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Saturday morning Sophie stood beside Pablo as he critiqued the work. "Why my dear little nymph… this shows more than promise! This shows real talent. "
Sophie looked up at her mentor and lover. "You were so right about not using professional models…"
"Yes Sophie, this is very good work. I'm very pleased." Pablo's voice got husky.
"Don't get too turned on, lover." Sophie teased. "Sarah's a virgin and a romantic…she's still waiting for some knight in shinning armor."
The Master entered the studio, "Knights in armor?" He joined the pair looking at the work of art Sophie had finished. He looked at the portrait and smiled. "Very nicely done, Sophie." He moved closer. "This is your friend Sarah, the one you call Solange? The young lady who came with you and lost her way…"
"Yes, Master." Sophie lowered her eyes, not wishing to offend the Master.
"A lovely creature." The man in the black mask said wistfully. "Like a bud not yet opened." He turned to Sophie. "Invite her to come with you to our little gathering on Halloween."
"I don't think she'll come, not after what happened the last time." Sophie protested before she realized and then looked up guiltily at the Master. "She told me about the attack."
The man didn't seem perturbed or worried; he touched Sophie's face with a gentle hand. "Tell her I asked about her…. Give her something to intrigue her."
Sophie suddenly stiffened. "I won't do anything to hurt her, she's my friend."
The words had been spoken before, not so long ago by a dwarf. This time the Master was far more tolerant and gentle. "I've no intentions of harming her, little one." He felt the corner of his mouth twitch. "And you will do as you are told." His voice was firm. "Won't you?"
Sophie lowered her eyes, "Yes…Master."
Pablo had stood back, keeping his thoughts to himself. "Perhaps if you issued an invitation to a masked party." He suggested.
"Too great a chance that someone other than my objective goal could intercept…The community is already asking questions of what is going on out here. We don't want to alert over protective parents now do we?" The Master replied. "Sophie will invite Sarah to attend with her, and to spend the weekend at her home. Won't you Sophie?"
"Yes, Master." The girl whispered.
"I knew I could count on you." The Master said dismissively. "I don't care how you do it, but you will bring Sarah Williams out here to me."
"Yes, Master." Sophie shook under his gaze. "But…"
The Master looked down at her, his eyes like fires. "But what?"
"Promise me you won't hurt her." Sophie begged.
The master seemed amused for a moment. "Little one, I can not make that promise as you very well know." He mused.
Pablo stood behind Sophie. "Your little friend is going to be one of us, very soon. It should please you that you've made your Master such an exceptional extraordinary gift."
"I don't think Sarah will see it that way." Fretted the girl between the two men.
The Master tipped Sophie's face upward. "Your gift pleases me."
"Master," she whispered. "She's so innocent."
Something in the eyes behind the black mask turned feral. "It is her innocence that makes her such a treasure."
"I feel like a traitor." She looked at the painting. "You ordered me to paint her for you…. And I've done that….You're now ordering me to bring her to you … And you know I will…" her voice shattered with the misery.
Pablo let out a harsh hiss, but the Master silenced him. The man in the black mask spoke softly. "Sarah Williams belongs to me, Sophie. It is time for her to learn her lessons, and take her place."
Sophie looked at the man. "If you hurt her…I'll…"
"Silence." The Master said quietly. "You will do as you're told, and you will enjoy the benefits of our society. Sarah Williams is mine, just as you belong to Pablo. Now, do as you are told."
"Yes….Master." The girl hung her head.
The man in the mask looked at he breathtaking painting of a beautiful young woman lying on lace. "Have this framed, Pablo. I want it hung in my chambers so I may enjoy it." He strolled away.
"As you wish, my King."
Sophie wrapped her arms about herself tightly and began to rock back and forth. What the hell had she gotten herself into?