Sleight of Hand
4
Inexperience
“YOU CHOSE ME!” she squeaked when the wall opened to admit her. She was so adorable! She was dressed in a shimmering blue gown that hugged her modest but very feminine curves. Her honey blonde hair was piled on top of her head and she wore golden feather earrings that accented the long elegance of her neck and her gently sloped shoulders. I held out my hand and she stepped forward to take it.
“Persephone Student, I am Hero Lincoln. Will you consent to be my caretaker on Crossroads both now and forever?” She gasped and jerked slightly as our fingers touched. I’d read that Cassandran women were highly orgasmic but surely, she didn’t just come from my proposal, did she? She sank to her knees in front of me and looked at me through teary eyes.
“Hero Lincoln, I am yours to command. Now and forever.” I bent to kiss her fingers and I think she came again. I lifted her from her kneeling position and led her to her place at the table. It was only a step, but I was still a little shaky. I noticed a flower at her place and paused with her to fasten the rose corsage to her dress. Now she truly looked like a prom queen. She sat delicately as I held her chair for her and I pretty much collapsed in mine.
“Let us get to know each other over dinner,” I said.
I was nearly overwhelmed by her. The girl was only nineteen years old! All those degrees… she’d finished the first one at the age of twelve. She was smart, talented, an excellent conversationalist, and turned me on instantly. She correctly identified the ingredients in each recipe and the vintage of the wine. I described my medical condition and how I was feeling since emerging from the healing chamber. She jumped up for a moment and ran to the chamber to look at the readouts. Then she discussed precisely where the damage had been and how it had affected my overall physical condition.
“You are probably experiencing a tingling sensation in your lower extremities. This is because even though the nerves have been reconnected, they have not yet sorted out the signals your head is receiving. Your mobility will be impaired for quite some time while we work on your physical therapy. I am sorry to say that you will undoubtedly experience some pain in the course of regaining the feeling. At the point of the accident, when the nerves were impinged, they stored many of the signals that were not transferred to the brain at the time. These may appear as unexplainable phantom pains,” she said intensely. “You must let me know when these pains appear so that I can help relieve them.”
“I have been experiencing some lower back pain today that I dismissed as being fatigue.”
“That will undoubtedly occur as well, but don’t be surprised if there are jolts of unexpected agony.”
“How encouraging,” I laughed. It wasn’t funny.
“Do not fear, Hero Lincoln. It may take a year until you are fully rehabilitated, but I will be here every step of the way,” she said. “I will do my best to distract you from any pain.” Oh shit! How was I going to tell her this?
“Persephone, already I find myself falling in love with you. So, it pains me to say that I will not be staying here for rehabilitation,” I said.
“What? No! Please don’t. They said when our names were selected that you would probably never be back. Please tell me you meant it when you said ‘now and forever.’ Please!”
“Persephone, my sweetheart, I did and do mean it. But there are practical problems that I have to live with. First and foremost is that I cannot simply step through the portal fifteen minutes after I left and be miraculously healed, strong, and fit. It would create so many questions that I might not be able to ever get back. I need to do my physical therapy on Earth. That is where I need to recover my strength and prepare for my first mission. I don’t dare stay here longer and heal more than I am. I will already have to find an explanation for no longer having a colostomy. The healing chamber sealed up all the incisions and removed the hardware. I’m not sure there are even doctors on earth who can do that kind of thing,” I explained. Her lips were trembling and a tear threatened to escape from her eye. I leaned forward and softly kissed her lips.
“Oh,” she sighed. “My hero. I understand. But you need a caretaker with you.”
“Ah. Perhaps that information was not conveyed to you. You are not my only caretaker.” Her eyes were as big as saucers.
“You were given two caretakers? Does that mean that I can go to Earth with you?”
“Sadly, no. Lisa Caretaker, will you join us for dessert and champagne?” I spoke up. I had no doubt that Lisa had been listening to every word that was spoken during our evening. The wall opened and Lisa stepped into the room. I was relieved that she had dressed. Well, sort of. She was wearing red silk pajamas of the sort I expected she had ordered for Persephone and me. Persephone and I stood. “Persephone Caretaker of Cassandra, may I present Lisa Caretaker of Earth. Lisa, Persephone.” Lisa stepped around me quickly and swept Persephone into a hug.
She planted a kiss on the girl that was soon returned. I was thinking that Persephone had just had another little orgasm. I wasn’t sure about Lisa.
“Oh, I am so happy Lincoln chose you as his caretaker,” Lisa said. “I love you already.”
“I am speechless! I’ve never heard of an Earth caretaker; only of companions,” Persephone said. Persey? I needed a shortened name for her.
“Well, I believe there will be one of those as well,” Lisa laughed. “As soon as she finds out about it. But for now, I plan to travel with Lincoln wherever he goes. Do not worry, though. Here on Crossroads he is all yours and I am your humble servant.”
“I accept you as my equal and possibly my teacher in some things. I envy you your ability to travel among the worlds. Perhaps I can arrange for you to visit Cassandra as well. The talk shows would go wild!” she laughed.
“May we have dessert now as we get better acquainted?” The table was magically transformed and our chocolate mousse and champagne were served. Computer seemed to have no difficulty in adjusting to the number of people.
“You mean so you can entertain us,” Lisa laughed. “Has he showed you his deck yet?” Persephone blushed scarlet.
“We’ve been fully dressed ever since I arrived. Honest!” Lisa and I both broke out laughing.
“Damn! I left it in the bedroom,” I said.
“It’s detachable?” Seph said. Yeah, I liked that.
“Computer…” I began. My deck of cards materialized on the table in front of us before I’d gotten the words out. “Deck,” I said. “Deck of cards. Although my magic pales in comparison to Computer’s.”
“Magic? Computer is technology. There is a synthesizer on Crossroads and Computer merely transports the synthesized products to the desired location.”
“Any sufficiently advanced form of technology appears to be magical to those of lower technological development. Think what it would be like on Chaos if they saw an airplane.”
“I see what you mean,” Seph said. “So, your cards are an advanced form of technology?” I shuffled the cards and arced them from one hand to the other. I cut them, shuffled them, and fanned them out in my hand. “Ooh.”
“Neither technology nor magic, Sephie. Pick a card.”
“That one,” she said pointing. Lisa laughed.
“Withdraw it from the deck and look at it without showing me. You may show Lisa for verification. I’m going to have to learn a whole new patter for Chaos, aren’t I?” Seph looked at the card and showed it to Lisa before holding it against her chest. “Put it back in the deck without letting me see it.” She inserted the card.
I pinched the deck to prevent it from going all the way in as I closed the fan, cut the cards and did a false shuffle to keep the card on top. I placed the deck on the table and palmed the top card. “Now, cut the deck.” Seph reached for the knife at her place, but of course Computer had cleared it with the other dishes. “Uh, not with a knife,” I said. “To cut the cards is to divide the deck into two piles and place the bottom half on top.” Seph did a very nice job and I thought she might be playing with me a bit. I didn’t think she really intended to use a knife to cut the deck. “You see, your card is as attracted to you as I am, so naturally it has come to the top of the deck.” I turned over the top card—a nine of diamonds. Seph looked at me strangely and Lisa looked shocked. “That’s not your card, is it?” I moaned.
“No, Hero Lincoln. I would have said it was, but Lisa saw it and I couldn’t lie.”
“Of course, it is not your card because you tried to deceive me,” I scolded. “You should never lie to me about anything. Instead of returning your card to the deck, you hid it, didn’t you?” Persephone looked truly alarmed.
“No, my Hero. I did what you said. I promise I did.”
“Oh?” I said, reaching toward her slowly. The girl was near a panic. “Then what is this hiding in the bodice of your gown against your beautiful bosom?” I asked, pulling the queen of hearts from her dress.
“I didn’t! Please believe me! Computer! Did you transport the card to my dress?”
“No, Persephone Caretaker.”
“Don’t lie to me!”
“As you know, I am incapable of lying. It is not in my programming. You see, the card was…”
“Computer!” I snapped. “Never give away the trick!” There was a moment of silence.
“Ah. I see. I beg your pardon, Hero.”
“Trick?” said Seph. “I see now. That’s why you called it magic.” She started grinning.
“It’s called sleight of hand. Or prestidigitation. Or legerdemain. I do it to entertain people, including myself. I don’t do it to frighten beautiful, intelligent, loving… trusting… blue-eyed… blonde…” I lost track of where I was going with that as my lips closed on hers.
“I think it is time for our coffee,” Lisa said after a minute or an eternity. “Then you can go kiss all night long if you want.” Both Persephone and I were blushing.
“There might be a problem in that,” Persephone said softly with her head bowed. “I will do anything to please you, my Hero. But I am not very experienced. I’ve read a lot. But I am one of those Cassandran rarities: A teenage virgin.” I laughed.
“Well, welcome to the club!” I said. Lisa scowled at me.
“Persephone, dear,” she said, “we were told that the Cassandran women were highly sexed. How did you manage to become a caretaker and still be a virgin?”
“Um… Well, you might have noticed that I’ve always been a little precocious.” We nodded. First degree at age twelve? “I started my first Master’s thesis just at the time my body started female cycles. Even though we who are caretakers have little chance of ever becoming pregnant, our bodies still go through a monthly cycle. Here at Crossroads, the healing chamber prevents that. Otherwise, we’re just like any other woman with a menstrual cycle. That’s also when the hormones start kicking in. So, I thought that I would do my History thesis on the sexual preferences of Earth Heroes. I was given access to the notes of many caretakers of the most sexually dominant heroes. In reading, I noted how the men often wistfully spoke of the girls whose cherries they had popped. I had to look that up to find that it meant being the first to place his penis in her vagina, thus ending her virginity. However, there were also several other definitions of virginity, some of which included any sexual experience at all, some of which required that the hymen be intact, and some that simply said no penetration or female manipulation. Since I always intended to apply to become a caretaker when I was eighteen, I decided that it probably wasn’t that big a strain to abstain from all sexual contact until I had either been chosen or had been rejected three times. I had plenty to keep me busy in the meantime. Then, one way or the other, I could have all the sex I wanted, as long as I could get a man erect.”
“So, you saved your virginity for your hero,” Lisa sighed. “That could be a problem.”
“Oh no! Why? Do you wish for me to be deflowered before we make love? I will do that for you, my Hero.”
“No, no. It’s not that,” I said.
“The problem,” Lisa broke in, “is that there is another who has saved her virginity for her hero. And he, inadvertently, has saved his for her.” She looked meaningfully at me.
“You’re a virgin?’ Persephone said with wonder in her voice. I nodded.
“My precious Persephone, I am most happy and willing to receive this lovely gift that you offer me. And if you are still willing to offer it to me when I return, I will be the happiest man on Earth. Or Crossroads,” I said. “But I plan to make Cadence my life companion, if her mother will consent.”
“I do. I’d have stopped it long ago if I didn’t.”
“As much as she dreams of me being her first…”
“…and only,” Lisa added.
“She also dreams of being my first. Of us giving our virginities to each other. I love her, Persephone. As dearly as I love you and Lisa. No matter that I think it’s not much of a gift, I won’t deprive her of it,” I said.
“You are truly a Hero,” Persephone sighed. “I am here to provide for your needs, my Hero. You need to bond with your Earthly mate. I have already pledged my life to you, now and forever. I will not even consider hurting one whom you love. Do you wish to return to Earth now, my love?” she sighed.
“I wish to stay with you tonight, Persephone,” I said. “I wish to hold you in my arms and whisper in your ears and drive all doubt from your mind that I will return.”
“You will have to tell her everything,” Lisa said as we stepped through the portal. We almost fell over my wheelchair and I plopped down in it. Scattered on the floor of the wardrobe was a bunch of loose change, snaps, rivets, eyelets, and my money clip. We laughed. “Back up and let me get the broom to clean up around here. You’ll have to go get dressed again.”
“It should be easier this time,” I laughed. “Lisa,” I said seriously, “you are really okay with Cadence and me being together?”
“Linc, she told me she was going to marry you while you were still in the hospital five plus years ago. No matter what I’ve done, she’s persisted. I know you have been sleeping together for six months, since she turned seventeen. I worry about you. I worry that it is a hero-crush and she will realize her mistake and move on. But I know better. If you let her, Linc, she’ll love you for the rest of your life. You won’t really even have to go back to Crossroads,” Lisa sighed.
“Lisa Caretaker,” I said sternly. “I will not betray that sweet young woman we left behind. And you had better stay in fighting trim, because I plan to take you with me.” Lisa grinned.
“Regardless, you will need to tell her. Everything. If you go back to Crossroads, you will have sex with Persephone and at least one Damsel. She deserves to know, even if she doesn’t believe. Now shoo. You need to get dressed and practice your spiel for Sandy. You have to convince her that you’ve just gotten feeling in your limbs and you have to keep her from finding out that you don’t have a bag or catheter.”
I thought I was going to have backup. I thought wrong. Before I was finished with PT—and a screaming, ecstatic Sandy—Lisa got a text message with a demand that she have dinner and her pussy waiting for her husband at seven o’clock. It made my skin crawl. I just couldn’t figure out why she put up with him. She refused to speak of it, saying only that she had made vows and that she would not break them. Fuck! As a result, Cadence picked me up from work and grinned at me as I swung out of my wheelchair and into the passenger seat. She collapsed the chair, put it in back, and then took me home.
“I have you all to myself tonight,” she cackled in an evil witch impression. “And I am horny!”
“Yeah. Me, too,” I said calmly. She jerked toward me so fast that she almost ran off the road. “Hey! Watch where you’re driving.”
“What do you mean that you’re horny?” she demanded.
“Do you think that I don’t enjoy our love-making?” I said. “Do you think I don’t love to make you come? That I can’t wait to taste your pussy?”
“Lincoln!”
“Does that frighten you, sweetheart? You talk about wanting me, but is it only because you think I’m passive? That I don’t crave you?” I said. I wanted to be absolutely sure she was serious before I made the big unveiling.
“Lincoln, do you love me?”
“I love you with all my heart, Cadence.”
“Then nothing frightens me. Nothing at all,” she affirmed.
Cadence made dinner. The tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife. I chuckled at the thought of Persephone cutting the cards with a knife.
“What? What are you laughing about?”
“Mmm. I’ll tell you later. It was something that happened yesterday,” I said. “Do you have homework?”
“It can wait. Let’s go to bed.”
“Sweetheart, study first. I promise that after you give my legs a massage tonight, I’ll do whatever I can to make you happy. Okay? I’ll clean up the kitchen.”
“Okay. I’ll hurry.”
“Do it right.” I cleared the dishes, thinking about how nice it was to have Computer handle the food prep and cleanup on Crossroads. That meal would have taken hours to prepare and hours more to clean up after. The kitchen sink was just a little too high for me to reach comfortably from the wheelchair. Since Cadence and Lisa handled all the kitchen duties, we hadn’t lowered the kitchen counters to optimize for my wheelchair height like we had the bathroom. I could get the dishes into the dishwasher, though. I supposed that I would need to remodel the bathroom back to normal heights again, soon.
I waited in bed for Cadence with the sheet over most of me and my feet sticking out so she could massage my legs. I wondered why I hadn’t had Lisa or Persephone massage me on Crossroads. The tingling sensations were subsiding, but every now and then I’d get a surprise contraction in my muscles and my legs would jump. It had happened at dinner, but the table hid it from Cadence.
She walked into the bedroom naked. I hoped I wouldn’t tent the sheet so much that she’d notice before I had a chance to execute my plan. She didn’t hesitate, but immediately grabbed the massage oil and started in on my legs. Oh god! That felt good. She was quiet and a little rushed, but in a couple minutes she picked up my left foot and began rubbing it against her breast as she sighed. It tickled! She propped my foot against her breast as she started massaging my calf muscles. It was now or never.
I clenched my toes and tweaked her nipple. She froze.
I did it again.
“Linc? You…” She snatched the sheet off of me and stared at my erection. “You can feel me!” she said, pulling my other foot to her breast and getting the same response.
“There is nothing in this world I have wanted more to feel,” I said softly.
She dropped my feet and ran her hands up my legs. Tentatively, she reached out to touch me as she looked into my eyes. I nodded and she traced the length of my cock with her fingers. Tears were running down her cheeks. Now that the shock was past, she was examining my torso and didn’t even find a scar where the colostomy had been. She launched herself at me and kissed me with a ferocity and passion that I’d never felt from her before.
“You went,” she said. “You went and it worked.”
“Went? Worked?” I said.
“You went to Crossroads and got in the healing chamber.”
“How do you know about Crossroads?” I demanded. I tipped her head back to look her in the eye.
“Um… I’m a sneaky bitch,” she admitted. “I saw the box you got from Seth and thought I’d learn a magic trick that he left you and surprise you. Then I read it. All of it. It took me a month, sneaking in here while you were at work.”
“And you believe it?”
“I didn’t at first. I thought it was a game and I’d learn to play. Then you and I could have something else to do. But then I read Hero Seth’s journal. No one plays a game for as many years as he did and still have a normal life. I had to believe.”
“Cadence, honey, you’re right. It is real and I guess the evidence of that is pressing into your thigh right now.” I kissed her again.
“Um… Linc? Does that mean you did it? With her?”
“What?”
“Did you have sex with your caretaker?” she asked. She was very near having tears of happiness turn to tears of disappointment.
“Cadence, I will never lie to you. I intended to tell you all about Crossroads and Cassandra tonight. I did not have sex with either of my caretakers. We fooled around a bit, but no more than you and I have in the past. I promised you that if I ever healed, you would be the first girl for me. I would never break that promise to you,” I said.
“I love you so much, Linc. I wouldn’t have been mad. Just sad.” I kissed her again and she jerked back. “What do you mean either of your caretakers? You have more than one?”
“Apparently, they think I’m special,” I laughed. She looked over at the cabinet and I could see the tumblers in her mind dropping into place to unlock the secret.
“You took Mom, didn’t you!” she said. I nodded. “And you didn’t fuck her lights out? Lincoln, what is wrong with you? That’s the fantasy of both of you.”
“Two reasons,” I said. “First, I promised you. Second, Lisa is committed to these vows she made. I can’t help but think there is more to it than just wedding vows, but she won’t budge.”
“At all?”
“Well, apparently there is a gray area that includes running around naked and making sure all my parts are squeaky clean and functional,” I laughed.
“When the time comes, Linc, know that I am okay with it. I know how much you love Mom and I love her just as much. And the same goes for your Cassandra caretaker. What’s her name?” she asked. Suddenly, making love was less important than interrogating me about every aspect of my visit to Crossroads.
“If you really want this tonight, darling, you’ll have to do most of the work. I’m still shuffling to walk and have difficulty rolling over. Not to mention the fact that Sandy got so excited she kind of overworked me today,” I said as we snuggled into bed. I kissed her and gently squeezed her breasts.
“Or?”
“Or we could wait until I’m able to give you everything you want.”
“Is it what I want that you are worried about, or is it about what you want to give me? I won’t treat you like a piece of meat, Linc.”
“I guess that’s part of it. Though you can’t imagine how good it feels to have you handling my meat,” I laughed. “I want to make your first time the best possible for you.”
“Always putting someone else’s needs above your own,” she said. “Did you sleep naked with Persephone?”
“Well, we started with pajamas.”
“And with mom?”
“Yeah. But we didn’t…”
“And didn’t you for an instant wish that either one of them would throw her leg over you and sink down on your hard cock?” she asked. She had a leg over me and was wiggling around on top of me. The feeling! It was so incredible! To have had no feeling there for six years and now to feel her wet sex against mine… “I suppose I could wait,” she said. “Or not.” She hooked my cock with her fingers and pointed it to her opening. She stopped just short. “Please tell me it’s okay.”
“Cadence, I love you. It is so okay,” I said. She pushed back hard, breaking through her hymen with a cry. She just kept pushing down, even though tears ran from her eyes.
“It’s okay. It’s okay,” she repeated. “It’s so okay. Just let me catch my breath. Now you will always know that you didn’t hurt me when you took my cherry. I did it myself. I love you. I love you.” We kissed. We kissed passionately, and in the midst of that soul-searing kiss, Cadence began to move on me. “You are in me. I have you inside my body as well as my heart. Don’t worry about whether or not I come. I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. Fill me whenever you need to. I love you, my Hero.”
As it turned out, I didn’t need to worry about whether or not she came. Certainly, she wasn’t a Cassandran woman, who would come at the slightest touch, but Cadence was in her own world. I let her drive and just before my cock throbbed and spit into her, she tightened on me and gasped out her own orgasm. She fell asleep on top of me even though my penis shrank out of her. She continued to whisper during the night, “My Lincoln. My Hero.”
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