Free The Pleasure Quartet by Vina Jackson

found cloying. The lights were turned out and he had lit candles all around the room,
precariously set on small saucers that immediately made me fear for the health of the surrounding drapery, and our lives, if all were to go up in smoke.
    The cushioned seat was low, and atop it, the line of my gaze was only a few inches above the bed. I could not make eye contact with Iris without craning my head back but I had a vision of her
stockinged calves and the onset of her knees peeping out from her skirt. Shadows from the flickering candle flames crept up the walls around us, like a ghost’s long fingers on the verge of
coming to life.
    Thomas handed me a glass filled with pale liquid, and then the same to Iris. His hands were unsteady.
    ‘Take off your shoes,’ he said to Iris. The instruction was whispered, but loud enough for me to hear.
    She gripped her glass to avoid tipping it and prised the heel of one shoe off with the toe of the other, then kicked off the second shoe. The carpet was so thick that the sound her Mary Janes
made when they dropped to the floor was barely audible.
    ‘And your stockings,’ he said.
    I was both shocked and aroused by the dominance he was displaying, and Iris’s almost meek obedience to his diktats.
    She lifted her skirt and still clutching her glass, struggled with her garter one-handed. Then set the wine down and unclipped the fastenings that held the sheer fabric tight against her thighs
and peeled away one stocking, and then the other.
    Neither Thomas nor I made a move to help her. There was something terribly erotic about watching Iris’s movements, each one of them stilted and unnaturally slowed, like a film playing at
half speed. The bare skin of her legs had an unearthly shine to it and I wondered if she had oiled them.
    Thomas sat down next to her. His presence affected her posture; the slant of her shoulders immediately relaxed, as though up until now she had been holding her breath.
    His hands travelled to her face and caressed the line of her jaw. She lengthened her neck, swan-like, to encourage him, almost in imitation of a cat being petted. His fingers moved lower, down
to her clavicle and then to the top button of her blouse. His progress was glacial, infinitesimally slow. I was straining so hard to pay attention to each small detail that I fancied I could hear
the touch of his skin on hers, a faint rasping, like silk on silk.
    The candlelight cast them both in an eerie glow, like puppet figures on a makeshift stage. I focused my gaze on Thomas. He was beginning to sweat. His full lips looked fuller, overripe berries
ready to split. He had an erection, I knew, by the bulge pressing through his jeans. I found it easier to watch him than Iris. I could imagine myself in his place. I was at once terribly curious
– knowing that I would soon witness a man’s cock for the first time since the fascinating if confusing flashes of carnal activity at the Ball – and also terribly jealous. How I
wanted to be the one inside her.
    He unbuttoned her blouse, so neatly the clasps seemed to fold through the holes, a gesture he had no doubt practised many times and perfected. The faint hills of her breasts appeared, the
mid-line of her brassiere and a window of her torso, the white fabric on either side like drapes hiding the view behind. He pulled the blouse apart further, slipping it over her shoulders and
revealing the top half of her body.
    I had seen Iris naked many times before. Every day, now that we lived together. But never like this, unpeeled slowly like a piece of fruit in front of my eyes. Thomas was deliberately unveiling
her for me, giving me a show, I was sure of that. I felt a sudden kinship with him despite my jealousy. As though we were collaborating in Iris’s deflowering.
    Her bra came off next, unhooked and dropped onto the floor on top of her shoes with little ceremony. Her small breasts stood pert, nipples erect. He lowered his head to her chest and