Sweet Oblivion

by Rhiana Ramsey

  ‘What… what do you mean? The detectives that came to see me before didn’t tell me this!’ she said accusingly.

  ‘You had enough to deal with Janet. And they didn’t stay long enough to tell you if you recall,’ Tony gently reminded her. She had collapsed shortly after being told the news and demanded the detectives leave.

  She nodded, her head downcast, tears running down her cheeks and dripping off her nose.

  ‘They should have tried to tell me. They should have tried.’ She began to sob and Tony felt an overwhelming urge to go and sit with her, to stroke her back and tell her everything would be ok. Except it wouldn’t be ok. Her husband had been murdered and she had just found out that he had probably been playing a sex game at the time.

  ‘Janet, do you know if David was having an affair?’ Tony asked gently.

  ‘Not that I knew of. He’s never cheated on me to my knowledge,’ she sobbed. ‘He loves this family. Fuck it! He loved this family. I can’t believe he’s gone.’

  Tony looked at Robert, beseeching him to take over the questioning, but Robert just sat there, unreadable and silent. Tony was annoyed by his DI’s silence. He was the senior officer; Robert should be doing the talking, not him. He turned away from him, shooting him the best evil eye he could muster.

  ‘There’s something else I need to ask you Janet. Was David into bondage?’

  ‘Excuse me?’ she looked at him, her eyes suddenly steely, her voice hard. ‘What has that got to do with anything and how is it any of your business?’

  ‘Your husband was found tied to the hotel bed. There was a pair of men’s PVC trousers at the foot of the bed. I need to ask the question as we need to consider if he met his killer by chance, or if he met with someone he knew, another woman,’ he paused. Here it was the worst bit to come out of his mouth and he wished he didn’t have to say it ‘another man…?’

  Janet looked at him for a moment, then threw her head back and laughed contemptuously.

  ‘Bondage? Gay bondage! Ha! My husband was not gay detective nor was he into bondage as you call it.’

  The use of his title was not lost on Tony. Janet was pulling down the shutters. He’d hit a raw nerve.

  ‘Mrs Saunders. I am not suggesting your husband was gay, and I am not stating he was definitely into bondage. I’m asking you what you think about this. What can you tell me about your husband’s sexual proclivities?’ he asked.

  She laughed again. ‘Proclivities! It gets better.’ She kept on laughing and Tony thought she’d gone into hysterics.

  Just when he thought he was going to have to get up and slap her out of it, she regained control of herself and stared at him, the beautiful eyes filled with so many different and conflicting emotions.

  ‘I’m only going to say this once, detective. My husband does not practise bondage. He is an upstanding, decent man. He is not a pervert. We have a great sex life, we love each other immensely and he would never, never expect me to tie him up, whip him or whatever it is those people do. My husband is also not gay. He has never looked at or been out with another man. He also does not dress up in women’s clothing nor does he molest small children, got it?’

  She was trembling, and again Tony couldn’t tell if this was with grief or anger. She’d obviously lost her composure as she was again referring to Mr Saunders in the present tense and not bothering to correct it.

  ‘Ok Mrs Saunders. Thank you. I’m sorry I upset you. I understand these are difficult and upsetting questions. I do not mean to cause offence.’ Tony said humbly, almost instantly calming her down and making her think he thought he had over stepped the mark.

  In fact the opposite was true. He was now convinced that not only did her husband practise bondage frequently but that it was an area of contention between them. Her views were very reserved and she seemed to think that those who engaged in bondage sex were ‘perverts’. He could just imagine how her husband’s unusual sexual activities would grate against her traditional values.

  ‘I’m feeling tired now and my children will be back soon. I’d appreciate it if we could end this conversation here. I have nothing else to tell you. I’ve lost my husband. I don’t want his good name dragged through the mire as you spout your theories,’ Janet said quietly, no more fight left in her.

  ‘Mrs Saunders, thank you for your time. Here’s my card. If you think of anything at all, no matter how trivial it may seem to you, give me a call, ok?’ Robert finally spoke, and held out his business card to her.

  She looked at him as if she had forgotten he was there. She accepted the card with a trembling hand and mumbled something about them letting themselves out. Tony followed Robert out of the room; Robert was already getting out his mobile phone to call the local officers and arrange their lift back to the train station. As he looked back he saw Janet draw her legs up under her, making her look small and childlike in the large armchair. He’d never seen anyone look so lost and alone.

  Chapter X

  Louise cursed as she rapped on the front door with her knuckles, the varnished wood fighting back. She made a mental note to buy Steve a door knocker for Christmas. That would be one hell of a Christmas present, she thought amusedly, really show him how much she loved him.

  Darling I love you so much, I really wanted to spoil you this year - look! A fabulous new knocker!

  After a day of silence, a day of stewing, Louise had swallowed her pride and decided that she would have to make the first move and apologise if they were going to move on from their row on Wednesday night. She was still annoyed, but had come round to seeing things from his perspective. She knew she had been neglecting their relationship, putting her work first and that perhaps her priorities were sometimes a bit skewed. So now, here she was, rapping on Steve’s door, ready to eat humble pie.

  The door was promptly answered, jerked open hurriedly in one swift movement. Steve stood silhouetted in the doorway and Louise could hear distorted guitar riffs of some metal band playing on his iPod docking station in the next room. Steve cocked his head to one side and raised an eyebrow, taking in the bag of clothes on the floor by her feet, without saying a word.

  ‘Steve, I’m really sorry I can’t come with you to Cornwall tonight, but I thought I’d come here to get changed for the ceremony,’ Louise began. ‘Besides, I have something for you,’ she grinned, her fingers slowly unbuttoning her overcoat.

  She smiled at Steve coquettishly, then in one deft movement dramatically opened the coat, revealing her naked body. She gave Steve a little wiggle, her breasts wobbling playfully.

  ‘Come on, let me in. We can’t leave it like this. And as you can see,’ she looked down at her nipples, ‘I’m getting rather cold.’

  Steve smiled, moving towards her, wrapping an arm around her naked waist.

  ‘You are one crazy woman Miss Louise Jackson,’ he said.

  He kissed her hard on the mouth, pulling her body against his, and backed through the front door, closing it shut behind them with his foot. They kissed passionately as Steve manoeuvred her across the living room. She could feel him becoming hard against her naked sex, his penis large and firm straining against his jeans; she was overcome with a desperate need to have him then and now. She couldn’t wait.

  She unzipped his flies and pulled out his penis, rubbing it, bringing him to full strength. Steve groaned and bent his head to kiss her breasts, his tongue darting over her nipples, before clamping them gently between his teeth. His hand trailed down Louise’s stomach and rested between her legs.

  She groaned loudly as he inserted his fingers into her, moving her hips in unison with his digital thrusts. Her back was now pressed against the settee, her body arching against it. Steve still fully clothed, his manhood protruding through his open flies, leant into her and kissed her.

  Still holding Steve’s penis in her hand she raised herself onto her tip toes and placed the end of it against her clitoris, moving it slowly against herself, pleasuring them both. Steve moved his hand away from h
er crotch as Louise placed the tip of his penis inside her. Steve picked her up and she wrapped her legs around him, panting with pleasure as he entered her fully.

  He grunted and began raising her up and down as she gripped him hard with her strong thighs. She was vaguely aware that the music had changed, another rock band with heavy guitar chords and a gravely voiced-vocalist; she was so consumed in the moment she found the music strangely seductive.

  Steve carried her over to the seating side of the sofa and lowered them both down onto it, still inside her. He stopped briefly to pull his trousers completely off and Louise hastily pulled his T-shirt over his head.

  Now both naked, she clamped her legs around him, crossing her ankles, her nails scoring his flesh, her mouth urgently demanding his. Louise gasped in pleasure as Steve resumed his thrusts inside her. Turning her head to the side, Louise glanced at the living room window.

  With a start she noticed a face looking in on them, a young woman with flowing black hair, pale skin and sad blue eyes. Her eyes were vacant, as if she had no soul, her mouth slightly open, her jaw slack. Her face was expressionless as she watched them in their intimate act. For a moment Louise could do nothing but gawp incredulously at the woman, shocked, surprised and disgusted that this woman dare spy on them.

  Suddenly, the woman turned her gaze directly onto Louise, her expressionless eyes now filled with hate. As Louise watched, the woman’s mouth blinked into a grimace, the corners rapidly upturning. The twisted smile lasted less than a second before the former soulless expression returned and the woman’s eyes went dead again.

  Louise inhaled sharply, ‘Steve! There’s someone looking at us!’

  Steve looked at her and then around the room.

  ‘What?’ he asked, his breath coming in gasps, ‘Where?’

  ‘The window, look she‘s…’ Louise’s sentence trailed off. There was nobody there. The woman had vanished.

  ‘Where babe? I don’t see anyone,’ Steve said, raising himself up on his forearms, preparing to get off the settee.

  ‘I… I must have imagined it,’ Louise said confused. What the fuck was that? Her mind was reeling. Had she imagined that too? What was happening to her?

  Feeling that Steve was about to withdraw and get up she grabbed his shoulders and said, ‘Don’t get up. Fuck me.’

  Steve looked at her. ‘It’s ok, honest,’ she breathed. ‘I thought I saw someone but there’s nobody there.’

  Steve smiled and then kissed her neck, happily picking up from where they had left off.

  Despite her confusion over the mysterious face, she told herself that nothing was amiss, she was not suffering some kind of mental break down. So, she’d had three weird things happen in as many days? Stress was a strange and malignant beast. She mentally shook herself and focused on the sensations Steve was causing to tingle through her body.

  He began to bite her, on her lips, her neck, above her collar bone, as he knew she liked and this sent Louise to the edge. Her legs began to tremble and she felt the familiar warmth spreading through her body. She could tell from Steve’s now hurried thrusts that he was also nearing climax. Panting together, their bodies sleek with sweat, they climaxed in unison.

  Afterwards, Steve lay on top of her, his warm breath tickling her neck. She wrapped her arms around him and nuzzled him with her face, enjoying the closeness and the feeling of the blood pumping through her veins. They lay that way for a while.

  ‘Am I forgiven?’ Louise eventually whispered.

  ‘You know I can never stay mad at you for long. You are difficult and trying at times, but you make me feel alive.’ He raised his head and smiled down at her, the smile crinkling the corners of his eyes.

  ‘I know I am horrible to you sometimes. I get so… scared, you know? I get overwhelmed by how I feel for you and then my mind goes nuts, does somersaults and tries to make me fuck this up. I sometimes think I truly am crazy. I sometimes don’t know how to feel, or I don’t understand why I feel a certain way. Then other times I feel so sure, so confident about us… but usually I just feel afraid. Does that make any sense?’

  Steve nodded. ‘Yeah, it does gorgeous.’ He hugged her into him, a little surprised by her sudden openness about her feelings; usually, she was more expressive about the weather than she was her own sentiments.

  ‘You’re scared of commitment. It’s no great surprise given…’

  ‘My upbringing? My childhood? I will never let that be an excuse for how I am today,’ she replied.

  She hadn’t had much experience of human bonding. The foster home, whilst a place of warmth and love, had not been her place of warmth and love. They weren’t her family, she’d always felt like a stranger. She knew she was only there because they were getting paid to look after her, at least that is what she had believed at the time.

  She couldn’t remember expressions of love from either of her biological parents prior to her dad running off and her mother going nuts, and she couldn’t remember her sister.

  She could only remember Francis and the semblance of love that had been played out by her in that relationship; even with him, as good and kind as he was, she had held back and kept her own counsel.

  ‘Well, it’s a known fact that the most troubled childhoods result in the most interesting adults,’ Steve said, gently stroking her hair.

  ‘Tell you what, when I get back from Cornwall we’ll go out and talk about all this ok? Really try and work out what’s holding you back.’

  ‘Hmmm. Not sure if that’s a good idea. You might realise that I am in fact a psychotic knife-wielding murderer who is simply humouring you in order to get her claws well and truly embedded into your flesh before delivering the mercy stroke and thereby ending your miserable existence,’ she joked. Make a joke, always make a joke when the conversation gets uncomfortable.

  ‘Well you already tried to get your nails into my back just now,’ Steve laughed. ‘But seriously, when I get back we’ll go out to dinner or something and if you feel like talking, then we will, if not I’ll bore you with my stories of Cornwall and how I pulled three girls on the beach and had a ménage a quatre,’ he laughed as she punched him on the arm.

  ‘Trust you to fantasize about a foursome! You’re such a greedy bastard,’ she giggled.

  ‘Talking of Cornwall, I’d better get my shit together, and you had better get that gorgeous body of yours dressed for that award thing.’

  He kissed her, before pushing himself off the sofa and padding towards the bathroom. Louise smiled to herself as he walked away, his cute, little butt receding from view. A moment of pure carnal desire and passion, a moment of bonding and closeness shattered in an instant. He still had his socks on.

  ************************************************

  Steve drove quickly. Despite the traffic, he was making good time thanks to his knowledge of the less travelled routes. He thought about Louise as he drove. They’d first met two years ago in a coffee shop on Tottenham Court Road. She’d been buying a hot chocolate without cream, he remembered, and he’d ordered an Americano. She’d almost knocked his coffee out of his hand as she’d abruptly turned to leave the store, splashes of the hot liquid spattering his t-shirt.

  As she stood there apologising to him, wiping at him with serviettes, he had been struck by her beauty and overwhelmed by her presence, instantly drawn to her. She was bold and she was beautiful and in response to her profuse apologies he had insisted she drink her hot chocolate with him.

  She had eventually acquiesced and their coffee break had turned into a lunch break and then into dinner. Before they knew it they had spent six hours together. As they’d parted that evening Steve had thrust his business card into her hand and she had reciprocated. The rest was history as they said.

  Now though he was confused. Louise was a very special woman, full of fire and energy, but she was also extremely complicated and difficult to get close to. Steve had hoped that with time he would be able to break down the walls she had erected
around her heart, but now he wasn’t so sure. He didn’t feel needed, wanted or important to her; he had no doubt that she could very easily walk away from their relationship, without so much as a glance back over her shoulder, and it left him feeling uncertain and insecure.

  She was scared to commit, he knew, and he was too to a degree, but he needed to feel that this relationship was not just one sided. He needed some sort of affirmation from her, some sort of guarantee that she wasn’t about to up and run away. Was it any wonder he had sought affection elsewhere?

  Tonight Louise had opened up to him and he was touched. But at the same time he felt it was too late, he needed more, he’d waited long enough. If only Lou was able to let him in, make him feel like less of a stranger. He had meant it when he said she made him feel alive, but sometimes he just wanted to know that she was really going to be there, to feel that their relationship had some substance. Then he would never have strayed, never have been disloyal. He needed to feel needed and Lou simply didn’t make him feel that way. He felt that she couldn’t care less if he was around or not.

  Steve pulled the car over as he reached his destination, only five minutes late. He sighed deeply, thoughts of Lou drifting out of his mind and gently hit the horn.

  After a few minutes the front door of the apartment block opened and Melissa strolled out, giving him a cheery wave. She was carrying a small holdall and she looked divine in a short red skirt, black skin-tight top and high heels. Steve waved at her as she approached the car.

  ‘Hello gorgeous,’ she said as she got into the car, throwing her holdall onto the back seat. She leant over and kissed Steve on the lips.

  ‘Hi.’ He smiled at her. ‘All set?’

  ‘You bet,’ she replied, placing her hand on his thigh.

  Steve put the car into gear and drove off. Time to forget Lou and focus on the other woman in his life that made him feel alive.

  ***********************************************