Wild Desire
Everything and everyone was the same, each pulsing heartbeat matched the other and each body secreted the heady, animal aromas that come from secret places and linger sweetly in the aftermath of desire.
Yet there was a sound in the room that Kate couldn’t place. As her breath came more easily, as the stroking hands around her subsided into stillness, the noise seemed louder. Turning her head towards the fireplace, Kate searched for its source. Her befuddled brain refused to take in what she saw — it was as if she were back in Nero’s gallery of hidden desire and private pleasure. For in a chair by the fire sat one of the women in the portraits. Her eyes were closed in a pose of near-religious