Floral Arrangements – One

This five part piece was written for Regency FemDom Week 2020. Thanks, Regency FemDom! Our romantic leads this week are characters from my upcoming web serial “Honey Tree” (which you may be familiar with if you’ve been following for a while!). And as a brief note; this work contains explicit content, depictions of sex work, and some confusion over correct gendering of a transgender character. Also gerberas were not introduced to the West until 1884, but I’ve appropriated it back here because I think it’s pretty. Enjoy the week!

“You’re brooding, it’s a singularly unattractive quality,” said Gregory, sidling up to Maxim where he was standing at the edge of the room with a tiny glass of barely alcoholic punch. “If you stop frowning for a minute then one of the ladies might actually talk to you, you know?”

Maxim glanced at him without shifting his head to the right, a sideways look from the rim of his punch glass. Gregory didn’t look like he was going anywhere, and experience told him that he wouldn’t regardless of how long Maxim dragged out this drink, so he lowered it instead. “I’m not accustomed to… these kinds of parties,” he said, dragging out the syllables to hide how uncommonly stiff he felt about the whole thing.

Judging by Gregory’s expression it hadn’t worked. He scoffed loudly and downed his own glass of punch in one undignified swig. “Bailey, it’s exactly the same as every other party we’ve been to, just with prettier lighting.” Untrue, but no need to point it out. “The only real difference is now you don’t have to report to a Sergeant in the morning or face ribbing from the others.”

Maxim resisted the urge to hit him and finished his drink instead. “You’re right,” he said, tone clipped. “This suspension is clearly some kind of blessing in disguise.”

Gregory smirked, the bastard, plucking Maxim’s glass from his hand and raising an eyebrow at him. “Look at it this way—if Alix has his way and your discharge is formalised, you’ll surely hold some kind of record for the fastest time between promotion and dismissal from an officer ranking in the last… Well, several years at any rate. Even a bad reputation opens doors, Bailey. Relax a little, take a girl to bed, stop worrying about the attorneys. You’ll feel better for it.”

He wandered off before Maxim could say anything, so he settled for burning holes into the back of Gregory’s head with his eyes for a few moments. If he stayed out of sight until later and then disappeared without Gregory noticing, he could avoid more of the inane conversation.

Unlike Maxim, Gregory had recognised family and actual money to back him, and as a result his little ‘estate’ was significantly nicer than most of the ones Maxim had found himself hosted in before. It wasn’t enormous by any means, but more than enough to host this kind of… affair. There was a little conversation nook upstairs on the balcony landing that overlooked the wide room. It looked thoroughly unoccupied, and anyone who was walking through had their attention fixed elsewhere. If he sat there then he’d be out of sight of the main room (and Gregory), and if he looked disinterested enough then the busy couples would be all too willing to leave him well alone.

When he reached the landing however, it wasn’t as unoccupied as he’d initially anticipated. A woman was standing in front of the bookshelf at the back wall, far enough away from the balcony itself that she couldn’t be seen. She’d been reading a slim volume from the shelf, but had looked up at Maxim’s approach.

Her hair was a dark russet, piled up in last year’s fashion, though it was looser than the strict curls he saw on most women of her age, and a few curls hung loose around her jaw instead of pinned up by her temples. Her eyes were a bright, cornflower blue, taking him in with an interested spark. Her dress was more of the current style, bright, showing off a little more of her shift than was strictly appropriate, and she had a ribbon round her throat in black silk, tied off in a bow as though she were a child.

“Good evening,” she said, a soft lilt to her tone as though she were practising for song, the book clasped gently in her fingers.

Maxim nodded to her, glancing up at the bookshelf so as not to stare. “My apologies for interrupting,” he said, reaching for a volume at random.

“No need for apologies,” she said, sounding rather amused. “I am here to be interrupted, aren’t I?”

“That is true,” said Maxim, his gaze wandering to a couple who were striding past them at a near impolite pace towards the designated rooms at the end of the hall. The man’s hands were wandering, and the woman’s dress was already loosening at the laces. “Although it does beg the question as to why you’re sequestered away up here instead of down among the action, as it were.”

Her smile turned rueful. “I’m afraid my attendance was more an act of insurance than request,” she explained, still with that musical lilt in her tone. “I tend to cater to a more specific set of preferences than the general party-goer is looking for.”

Maxim raised an eyebrow at her and sat down on the loveseat between the shelves, flipping the book open on his lap as though he were going to look at it. “You provide specific perversions rather than general hedonism?” he asked drily.

“Aren’t all perversions hedonistic?” she asked instead of answering him, the corner of her softly red lips curling into a small dimple.

“There’s truth in that, I guess,” said Maxim, returning the smile. “This crowd is a little too introductory for your skills?”

“In some ways,” she said airily. “It’s more of a preference for… physicality, though.”

Ah.

He nodded at her again. “Certain crowds are more, hmm, touchy about that kind of thing than others.”

She brightened a little, her head tilting as a second dimple appeared to match the first, and then sat next to him with a sweep of her skirts that was less the action of a lady and more that of a busy maid. Maxim smiled at her as she settled, a little close for polite society, but they were far from that. “Do you have a flower like your colleagues?”

She held up a slip of paper from the front of the book in her hands. “Gerbera,” she said, handing it to him to inspect. “A recent find from Africa. I’ve not seen one in person.”

The little watercolour was striking; like a wide daisy in a splash of orange-red. “A beauty unfamiliar to those more comfortable on home shores,” he commented, passing it back to her.

“You’re very quick, aren’t you?” she said, still smiling at him as she tucked it into the band of her dress, book clasped closed in her lap.

“Too much so for my own good, I’m told,” he said, realising his own book was slipping from his fingers. “Though I don’t have multiple talents for perversion and physicality as you do, I must say.”

She laughed before she could quite catch herself, a startled, honest sound. “I’m not very good at the skills of a gentle lady,” she said, that rueful note returning to her voice as she covered her mouth to stop the laughter.

Gregory’s comments tugged on the back of his mind despite how much he tried to ignore them. She was rather pretty. “I’ve not had much luck at the skills of a respectable man, myself,” he said with a shrug he’d been told many times was an uncouth gesture.

“Well then isn’t it wonderful there are evenings like these for the skills we do have,” she said with a more contained laugh.

Maxim considered her for a moment, then gave up and threw caution to the wind. “I enjoy your conversation,” he said, picking his phrasing carefully. “But I wouldn’t wish to waste your time. Would you prefer to take this somewhere more private?”

She smiled at him, lips the same colour as the flower in the watercolour. “I would appreciate it,” she said, offering him her hand.

Next >