Leonardo Lain's airship nudged at the tip of the city's tallest tower. He stroked his assistant's bare breast beneath her silk dress as idly and warmly as a kitten, enjoying the stiffening of her nipple like a tactile-purr against his palm.
"None of that tonight, please Mr Lain," Polly said. "My lover will not approve."
"Don't worry, Pretty Polly, she will, eventually."
"Don't call me that." She removed his hand. "Sir."
They watched the crew scrabbling around with ladders, cables and ties on the roof below, and smirked at the shivering tinsel of their party-guests. How they huddled together against the blustering skyscraper winds.
#
Blanche wrapped her fur tighter, held her hat to her head and cursed up at the pompous great blimp. It looked like an entire building had got so big for its boots it had just uprooted itself sideways into the air.
And this roof was not meant for people, either. Not people who cared about their hair, anyway. Worse still - silhouetted at a window against the opulent warmth inside the craft - Blanch could just make out Polly and Mr Lain, watching them. Simultaneously aloft and aloof, beyond the rules of the ordinary world. Blanche sighed, what on earth was she doing here?
"Darling Drip! Life is like a lollipop! So sweet and so fleeting! You must grab every opportunity and suck at it! Suck till there's nothing left!" That had been Polly's sales pitch for the party. And why did she insist on calling her "Drip"? It was unfair of her partner to make her do this. Just unfair. And the way she did it, nonchalantly, when Blanche was at her most vulnerable, splayed to her girlfriend's burrowing mouth and all het up. Polly had whispered into her hollow as if it was a microphone straight to her heart. She could refuse nothing at times like that...
Blanche quickly snuffed the mental image as if someone might read it from her face. A bisexual single-sex coupling was a very modern "marriage", after all, and not to everyone's taste.
Polly joined the trembling queue at the base of a silk ladder, skirts and evening dress billowing like flags as they clambered inelegantly up to worship at the altar of Leonardo Lain. I'll do an hour then bugger off , She grabbed a rope and sighed, by parachute if I have to.
#
An hour later, Polly squirmed while watching Blanche and Leon having the time of their lives on the dance floor. She hated dancing, especially watching, it gave her a sick feeling to see those she loved and respected display themselves so shamelessly. Also, as happy as she pretended to be, Blanche seemed in the oddest of moods tonight.
Polly sipped at her drink and surreptitiously swilled it around her mouth, replacing Leonardo's stubborn saltiness with the tart fizz of champagne. How over-excited he became at parties! But how charming and irrepressible was that man's boyish enthusiasm.
Her eyes narrowed, trying not to let her lusty admiration show as Darling Drip's beautiful body jiggled around to the music. Polly recalled how her lover had to strap her full breasts flat to fit into the "flapper" fashions, to prevent her pearl ropes from going all wonky. Blanche was slim waisted but just so delightfully curved! Her body, face, eyes, lips, all rounded and vital. Uncontainable. Especially her curls. Polly sighed. Blanche really could have made a bit more effort with her hair tonight. Not that it made much difference to Leonardo it seemed, who winked lasciviously at his dance partner, only to get a rather flirtatious gloved slap in return. She decided to intercede, striding over to them.
"Sir, the ambassador's wife would like to dance with you too..." Leonardo - who had been grinning like a schoolboy at Blanche - frowned at Polly, then nodded. He straightened his tie and wandered off. Blanche stamped her foot petulantly at his receding form and Polly raised her eyebrows
"Drip! Did you just... stamp your foot?"
"Oh bugger off." Blanche said without looking at her and lunged for another passing glass.
"You've had enough, my dear." Polly said with a showy smile, then - sensing a storm - left her alone.
Blanche wandered around the glitzy fishbowl of a ballroom, trying to look fascinated by the skyline floating past, her head spinning every time the ground lurched and she was reminded they were - in fact - all airborne. She found one of the random portholes dotted in the floor, the streetlights and neon lit buildings floating by serenely beneath - ants in overcoats scurrying back from work - and couldn't resist standing astride them while she surveyed the braying party idiots.
"I saw you..." Blanche whispered as she gulped down her drink with the tears that threatened to burst out, watching her svelte betrayer as she worked the room. Her feline features, sharp black bob and achingly fashionable figure looked sleek as a sequinned panther in the dark party dress. She had not looked quite so stylish in Lain's office earlier, where Blanche finally - unwittingly - found her. Knelt by his chair, nodding at his lap. That's not why they call it a 'bob', sweetheart She mused with bitter humour. Then there was Lain's expression. Looking straight at Blanche over Polly's rude head, as if he knew she was there, offering a world-weary, knowing smile...
There! The same smile he was pulling now, seeking Blanche out across the room. Lain reminded her of the handsome prince she had adored in a childhood book of fairy tales, and she felt her stomach flip whenever he caught her eye, as if a fairy tale had suddenly popped into life. Looks and Power were a potent combination; she had to admire her lover's taste at least. He was a huge man, too, Blanche couldn't help but wonder if it was the same story in his trousers.
She smirked into her glass, guessing he would have just discovered the secreted underwear in his jacket pocket... Her underwear. She downed another drink and offered her glass for a passing re-fill, enjoying the unusual - vulnerable -feeling of her dress's gossamer silk on her bare buttocks and watching his face recall their dance. How close they had got, her hips to his front... he discretely nodded to a doorway at the back of the ballroom and continued his conversation. So he wanted to get her alone... this could be a sweet revenge indeed!
