Legacy

Evangeline Morgan was sheathed in a dress so light and so delicate that no part of her body was truly hidden. Its silvery material might even have been translucent, but it moved and changed like water, and it was impossible to be sure. Dakota wore a long-sleeve T-shirt that said Have a Coke and a Smile and a pair of jeans with a hole in the knee, but at least she had the decorum to remove her letter jacket at the table.

"What were you expecting?" said Evangeline, clearly amused by Dakota's reaction. "Dinner at Hooters and a night at the Holiday Inn? There isn't a decent hotel within a hundred miles of your hometown."

"So you bought this place?"

"Heavens no! This belongs to a friend. He's hardly ever here, so he was happy to have us as his guests. I've brought my own staff, of course. Now, let's eat. Aren't you hungry? Sit! Sit down and enjoy."

The food was excellent, although Dakota couldn't name most of it. She recognized the caviar, at least—even if it wasn't exactly her favorite. The best part by far was dessert, and her portion was much too large, and yet she enjoyed it too much to even feel properly guilty about it. And then the meal was done, and the staff carried away the plates, and Dakota was alone with Evangeline. And then her mouth was dry, and she didn't dare to ask anything.

"How well did I know your mother?" said Evangeline. She picked up a bottle of wine and her half-full glass and came to sit nearer to Dakota. And then she reached for Dakota's still-empty wine glass and filled it, slowly. She brought the glass to her lips—almost—and breathed the scent of the wine before setting it before Dakota and saying, "Drink."

"I'm not twenty-one," said Dakota lamely.

"This is a private house and you are under my supervision," said Evangeline, and her voice waxed dramatic as she continued. "I'm your godmother, for heaven's sake. Your spiritual guide. Your mentor! Now, have a glass of wine and let's talk properly, woman to woman."

Dakota took a deep breath and obeyed. It wasn't awful or anything. She'd had plenty of beer, and it was better than that, at least. She glanced at the label on the bottle, but it was all in French; it meant nothing to her. Silly of her. She wasn't about to start shopping for designer wines.

Evangeline took a sip of her own wine, too, before beginning her answer. Her smoldering eyes favored Dakota with a searing gaze before settling on her wine once more, and at last she began to speak. "Your mother and I were more than just friends," she began.

So, they'd been lovers? Dakota had almost been expecting that. She tried not to react—to keep her face impassive.

"We were closer than sisters. Closer even than lovers," the woman continued. "We were as close as one woman can ever be to another... I know everything about your mother, Dakota. And as a result I know a good deal about you, too."

Dakota didn't know what that could mean, so she deflected. "Did she cheat on my dad?"

"Cheat?" said Evangeline. She considered the words, her dark eyes glinting as she took another swallow of wine. "Did Sara cheat on Michael Rossi..." Her voice fell away as she tried the words, almost tasting them with the wine. "No, I wouldn't say that. Sara St John could never have cheated on Michael Rossi."

"What's that mean?" That answer—the way she'd phrased it—had only raised more questions. "Ok, never mind... Is Michael Rossi my biological father?"

"Of course not," Evangeline scoffed. "That brute? That blunt oaf? Good heavens no."

"But you just said—"

"Sara owed her fealty first to another. If anything, her marriage to Michael was cheating on her first love."

Dakota frowned. "You?" she guessed.

But her question was met with laughter and with a sparkling smile. Evangeline rose from the table and twirled, all but dancing across the polished floor as she abandoned her half-full glass of wine. "Come with me, darling," she said. "And bring the bottle with you!"

Dakota followed Evangeline to the back of the house, to second-floor deck overlooking the desert, nestled between the house and the hillside. Evangeline flung open the wide glass doors and went out into the cold December air, heedless of the frosty chill. Already she was slipping out of her dress. She left the sheer silk draped over a lounge chair and kicked off her heels as she scampered over the deck toward the steaming, frothing glow of a hot tub.

"What are you waiting for, darling?" she said, glancing over her shoulder as Dakota stood shivering in the breeze.

What choice did she have? She removed her clothes and followed, bottle in hand.

The water scorched her. Evangeline's eyes burned her. Dakota sank to her neck in the bubbling water, her tanned skin blue and pale beneath the crystal blue surface. She waited, not sure whether she should ask again, press the question, or let Evangeline tell the story in her own time. As the seconds passed, she decided that Evangeline wasn't going to speak unless she prodded, and so she began to ask, "Were you?"

But then Evangeline's toes pushed against her stomach. Evangeline's graceful foot caressed her thigh. Evangeline Morgan's heel pressed against her sex, and she shivered at the sudden contact, drawing a startled breath.

"How can I answer you?" said Evangeline, her movements fast becoming rhythmic and inescapable even as Dakota pressed herself back against the wall of the hot tub. "You don't know the words to hear my answer, so what can I say? You'll never know the full truth unless you can experience it yourself."

Dakota's breath hitched in her throat as she tried—not very hard, admittedly—to push Evangeline's thrusting toes away from her. Evangeline flashed her a wicked smile and pushed harder, and Dakota's hands fell away.

"Just say it!" she gasped.

"Your mother was a slave."

"What!"

"A slave, Dakota. Living chattel. Property."

Images flashed through her mind—of the statues downstairs with their bare breasts and swollen cunts; of the woman called O with her flesh pierced and branded; of nude women on stage, standing before the auctioneer as prices were called out from below... She pushed them aside, trying and failing to ignore the sudden heat that inflamed her.

"My mom was a doctor," she said, her voice more pouting than she would have liked. "She wasn't anyone's property."

"She was a slave first, and then she became a doctor," said Evangeline. "You are correct that she didn't belong to any one person. She belonged to all of us. We all enjoyed her. Her service was a thing of beauty—every moment of it."

"But..." Dakota panted, unable to speak. Unable to find any more words. She lowered her eyes, ashamed that she hadn't climbed out of the water to escape the toes that, even now, continued to massage her swelling petals. "Are you serious?"

"I would never lead you astray, Dakota," said Evangeline. "You are precious to me. More precious than you will ever know."

Evangeline moved toward her in the water, her body rising and glistening, water sheeting down her round, heavy, heaving breasts, falling down her belly and becoming lost in the black tangle of her bush. Dakota joined her, shivering in the December air and then gladly letting Evangeline pull her down into the water once more. She gave herself to the embrace, belly to belly and breast to breast, mouth to mouth and cunt to cunt. She didn't know whether this was a lover's embrace or something else. Something less or something more. She held on tight, trembling in Evangeline's arms.

"We were together from the very beginning," whispered Evangeline, her lips and her voice touching Dakota's ear and Dakota's soul. "We were trained together—broken together... I watched the Masters award her the elm wand..."

Those words were broken by a kiss. Evangeline's lips brushed against hers and Dakota pushed back, caught up in a moment she hadn't asked for and didn't understand. She knew how to kiss but not why—she had never known why, but she gave herself here and now to this kiss.

"She was taken too soon," said Evangeline, her voice a crackling flame. "But I can see her strength in you. Her desire. When you're ready, you'll become—"

Ice gripped Dakota's heart as she realized what Evangeline was offering her. Stricken, she pulled back from the kiss, and she pushed Evangeline away. The woman clung to her, or tried, but Dakota was stronger. Taller. Pain gripped her chest as she understood that Evangeline only wanted her for a slave. Like her mother. Like Sara.

"I don't belong to anyone," she rasped. "And I'm not going to. I'm nobody's property!"

Evangeline's hands clasped hers. The woman's face was wounded, her eyes huge and dark and glistening. "Forgive me," she said, her voice tight and uneven. "I look at you and I see Sara, and..."

Dakota shuddered in the cold. She fell backward onto the deck, scrambling away from the hot tub and wrapping her arms uselessly about herself. She grabbed for her clothes and ran, slamming the glass door behind her.