The Three Ways of Desire

Yolande DesPrez and her two younger sisters are the wards of a dark and remote cousin who they must obey without question. Morraine DesPrez is a powerful man, controlling a trading and military empire but he has never been a public figure and very few people know him. Since they became his responsibility twelve years earlier Morraine has raised the three sisters carefully, preparing them for a future as highly-placed breeders in other great families.
Everyone expects that soon Yolande will be sold, but Morraine has begun to plan a different future for his cousin. He has come to deeply desire the young woman and intends to keep her for himself, although if his intention became known it would create a dangerous crisis among the great families who control the planet.
Yolande knows nothing about her guardian’s feelings, and over the years of her young womanhood she has often taken men from the nearby city to be her willing and bonded sex partners. Morraine has allowed her to do this but as the time of her sale approaches, he decides to move.
He forbids her to have contact with other men and begins to take her, unwillingly at first, through a series of sexual adventures. He binds her emotionally to himself and marks her so that few other men will dare to take her. Yolande begins to respond to and to care for the man who treats her with both hard passion and gentle tenderness.
Knowing that the other great families will demand that Yolande should be offered to them, Morraine decides to place her with someone he trusts, someone who will agree to share Yolande in a secret three-part relationship.
He commands his best friend, Hagen Bellmere, to join him in his sensual activities with Yolande but Hagen refuses; he has desired Yolande for a long time and fears that if he becomes involved with her he will not be able to resist her any longer. Morraine insists and Hagen becomes bound to Yolande.
As they move together through a repertoire of sexual experiences, Yolande comes to equally love the two men who now dominate her life. Although intriguing sensuality binds them together, Yolande finds fulfilment also for her heart and her mind in the developing relationship.
Beginning to put his plan for Yolande’s future into action, Morraine gives his cousin the unconditional ownership of a small country, knowing that this will place her far beyond the financial reach of all but the two or three wealthiest great houses.
But Yolande’s reputation for intelligence and beauty is spreading and young men from one of the other houses attempt to kidnap her. Although the attempt fails, Morraine realises that he must move as quickly as possible to secure his ward’s safety.
He asks Hagen to think of a plan which will enable the two friends to share Yolande without the other great houses knowing. Hagen suggests that he should publicly marry Yolande but secretly she will also marry Morraine. Although people will think it to be Hagen’s, her first child will be fathered by her cousin and will become Morraine’s legal heir. Realising that he can trust Hagen, Morraine agrees to the plan, and together the two men propose to Yolande.
There is one problem. Although he has power of his own, Hagen cannot marry a woman as highly placed as Yolande; his social status is too low. However, if Hagen were to perform an outstanding service for the house of Desprez he would be able to marry the woman he has come to love so deeply.
Morraine and Hagen begin to plan how this can be brought about . . . then matters are taken out of their hands.