by S F Hopkins
‘It’s beautiful.’
‘Agent Provocateur call it Fifi. I call it my play clothes.’
“It” was a French slip in black tulle and pink Chantilly lace that fell to just below her hips. Fran turned this way and that, showing herself off, deliberately provocative. She reached out and took his hand. Turning, she led him towards the bedroom. The beeping of a cell phone intruded. ‘Can that wait?’ she asked.
John looked at the number on the screen. Tony. He could just imagine what Tony wanted to speak to him about. Alice, and his heartless cruelty in walking out on her. Well, he knew what he knew about Alice, and Tony didn’t. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It can wait.’
He dropped the cell phone on the coffee table and followed Alice into her bedroom.
‘He’s not answering,’ Tony said. ‘The phone rings out, but he doesn’t pick up.’
Merrill gnawed at her finger. ‘You’ve tried him at home?’
‘He doesn’t answer that, either.’
‘Do you think he’s in Brighton?’
‘He could be anywhere.’
‘What are we going to do?’
‘Merrill, my darling love. I want Alice to be happy as much as you do. I want Alice to be happy because if she’s happy, you’ll be happy, and I want that more than I want anything in the world. But if he won’t answer his cell phone, he won’t answer his cell phone.’
‘I know, darling.’ She kissed him on the cheek. ‘You’re a brick, you know that? A real pal.’
‘I hope I’m more than that.’
‘You know you’re more than that. You’re going to have to go down there.’
Tony smiled. ‘Usually, I’m the one who tells people what they have to do. Are we going together?’
‘I can’t go tonight. Alice might need me.’
‘Tonight? You want me to go tonight?’
‘Would you?’
‘Merrill, honey, he may not even be there. For all we know he’s still here. In London.’
‘Brighton’s where he lives. He’s got to go home some time, doesn’t he? What was he planning to do after we’d had dinner tonight?’
‘He’d booked a room at the Savoy. But I’ve already rung there. He cancelled.’
‘Well, then.’
‘Feminine logic. How can you beat it?’
‘Please, hon. For me?’
Tony sighed. ‘I’ll get Ben to call me a cab.’
‘Thanks, Tony. I’m sorry about dinner. And about…you know.’
‘Anything else I might have been hoping for tonight?’
‘That sort of thing.’
‘Can I have a kiss, at least?’
‘You can, my love. A very passionate kiss. And a promise.’
‘Which I’ll be looking to cash in on. Soon.’
Fran sat cross-legged on the bed, her French slip barely concealing the lacy edge of her matching panties, and watched John undress. The potent bulge at the front of his Dolce Vita boxer briefs told her what she had not doubted, but was still glad to know. ‘Is that all for me, my love?’
He stripped them off. Although she had known what she was about to see, she still gasped at the sheer unleashed power of this man. ‘You know something?’ she murmured.
He knelt on the bed before her. ‘Tell me.’
‘I’m so glad I’m a woman. And I’m so glad you’re a man.’
He took the slip by the hem and she raised her arms to help him take it off her. She lay down. John covered her, taking on his elbows the weight of his powerful body. As he began to kiss her, she stroked his powerful shoulders with her hands, so small against this broad expanse. There was an urgency about his kissing, something almost frantic, that had not been there the last time they’d met.
She pressed him gently away so that she could look at his face. ‘John. Has something happened?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You’re different.’
‘Fran…’
‘It’s okay, honey,’ she said, sensing his irritation. ‘I’m not going to psychoanalyze you.’ She reached down and slipped off the panties. Then she took him in her hand. ‘Put it in me.’
‘But…’
‘The foreplay can wait. Let’s call it afterplay, shall we? You need me like you didn’t need me last time. I can sense it. Now. Put it in me. Here. Let me do it for you.’
Spreading her legs as wide as she could, she positioned the rampant cock against her moist opening. ‘Push, honey. Oh, my God, yes! Now, my cherub. Ride me. Ride your little filly like the stallion you are.’
He began to move, slowly at first and then with increasing speed. With each stroke, as he withdrew and then slammed into her again, the power of the hammering she was taking drew a breathless gasp from Fran. Now they were moving together, two people become one, lovers with a single purpose, and she was crying out, clinging to him, her legs wrapped around his back, what had started as a lustful tingle becoming the unstoppable drive to orgasm and here…and here…’Aaaah!’
She fell back, stunned, overcome by the strength and suddenness of the peak she had scaled. And then John cried out in his turn, his deep thrusting ceased and she felt the fiery burst of his seed as he spent within her.
His desperate climax over, tenderness returned to John. He lay half over Fran, covering her with his strong body, wrapping her in his arms. He rolled sideways and they lay together, limbs entangled, his sex no longer hard as a rock but still powerful against her thigh. They began to kiss. Slow, tender kisses full of gentleness.
The change came just like that. Afterwards, John would be at a loss to put a moment to it, or a cause. One moment, she was his, he was hers, they were together. Happy. At peace. The next, it was gone. He could describe it, but explain or understand it he could not. They were certainly still as one when Fran stirred. ‘What now, my love?’
‘Frank Sinatra,’ John had mumbled.
‘You want Frank Sinatra? After me?’
John nibbled her earlobe. ‘Nitwit. He sang that song.’
‘I preferred Miss Piggy’s version. With the Muppets.’
‘Miss Piggy. Hmm. Yes, I guess I can see why she would appeal to you.’
Fran dug her elbow into his side.
‘Ouch. That hurt.’
‘Watch your mouth, Master Lover. Miss Piggy indeed! I meant, as I do believe you knew, what do you want to do now?’
‘Well, er…’
‘You’re not going to sleep on me, are you?’
‘Sleep? I wouldn’t dare.’
‘Shall I list the options?’
‘Please do.’ He took his arms away and lay back on the bed. ‘I want to watch you while you’re being masterful.’ At this point, he would have said they were still great together.
‘Oh.’ She raised her eyebrows. ‘Is that what turns you on? A bit of Fem Dom?’
He laughed. ‘I couldn’t say. I’ve never tried it.’
‘Why am I not surprised? Now then.’ And still, he would believe, nothing had broken into their idyll. But then came this:
‘Which?’
‘Eh?’
‘It’s now, or it’s then. It can’t be both.’
And with that silly little joke, thrown away offhandedly, he would later conclude he lost her. As far as he could tell. But by then he thought, if it hadn’t been that, it would have been something else.
‘What is it? Darling? What’s the matter?’
She did not answer. Looking away from him, eyes down, her brow and cheeks red, a hand raised as though to wipe away tears though tears he did not see, she raised herself from the bed and moved away to the bathroom.
‘Fran? Fran? Sweetheart, what is it? What have I said?’
There was no answer. He heard the bathroom door lock. He heard the sound of running water. Time passed. Eventually, Fran came back into the bedroom, wiping her cheek with a tissue. She seemed entirely calm. Without looking at him, she stood near the window and started to thread an earring into place. ‘What would you say
to pizza and beer? There’s a place just round the corner. It isn’t bad.’
‘Pizza and beer is great. Do you want to tell me what was going on just now?’
‘Just now? Nothing was going on?’
John looked at her. Then, ‘Okay,’ he said.
They dressed without speaking to each other. Walking to the pizzeria she allowed him to take her hand but left it inert and unresponsive in his.
A plump Italian of about thirty smiled at John and greeted Fran by name as they came through the door. ‘Bring us two Peronis, will you, Renato?’ said Fran. She turned to look at John as she led the way to a table by the window. ‘That okay with you?’
‘Sure. One of my favorite beers.’
‘What are the others?’ asked Fran as they sat down.
‘I like Kronenbourg. The KroColBlanc in the bottle with the white collar that comes from France—not the stuff in tins they brew in Luton.’
Renato put two bottles of Peroni and two glasses on the table and started to pour Fran’s. John picked his up and tipped the bottle carefully against the glass, pouring it down the inside to minimize the head. He glanced at the menu. They ordered their pizzas and Renato went back to the kitchen.
‘That’s like with Peroni, isn’t it?’ said Fran.
‘What is?’
‘The real stuff comes from Italy in bottles. What you get in cans is made here and it isn’t good.’
‘I guess.’
‘British beer’s rubbish.’
John shrugged. ‘I can’t argue with you.’
Fran sipped from her glass. She stretched a hand across the table for John’s. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Because British beer is rubbish?’
‘You know that isn’t what I mean.’
‘You want to talk about it?’
‘No. Except to say I was a ninny. Can we forget it?’
‘Sure.’
‘I can be a moody cow sometimes.’
The pizzas were good. They talked about this and that, about her life and his life, about what they liked and what they didn’t like. They talked about anything but the uncertainty that had come into existence between them.
Then they went back to Fran’s place, took their clothes off and made love.
And then they slept.
When John woke, he found himself wrapped tightly round Fran, his face against the back of her neck, his penis rock hard. She squirmed softly. ‘Are you awake?’ she whispered.
He kissed her behind the ear. His hand slipped round to smooth her warm belly. She moaned gently as it moved down, passing through the damp tendrils that covered her mound, his fingertips coming to rest between the open lips of her sex. He said, ‘Can I ask you a question?’
Their voices were soft with the languor of first awakening.
‘Sure you can.’
‘Did I just happen to be pointing where I’m pointing?’
She giggled. ‘I wriggled a bit to get you in there. Does it feel good to you? It does to me.’
‘You really want that, huh?’
Her head came up. After a moment, she turned, bringing them face to face. Her eyes looked anxiously into his. ‘I don’t want you to do anything you don’t want to do, John.’
‘But you want it.’ It wasn’t a question.
She pressed close, burying her face in his shoulder so he would not see her face. ‘Yes, I want it. I told you that last time we were together. Nothing’s changed.’
‘Look at me.’
He had to press firmly against her shoulders to get her to move her head far enough back so that they could look at each other. Her face was pink, her eyes defiant while his flickered, searching for signs of what she really wanted, how she really felt. He kissed her and she kissed him back, hard, rolling on top of him, her tongue pushing into his mouth, the roughness of her pubic hair rubbing coarsely against his aching cock. She knelt, straddling him, her hair falling down onto his face. ‘Please?’ she begged. And then she let herself fall, hugging him as though she wanted to meld their bodies by force.
John wrapped his arms around her. He held her tight, kissing whatever bits of flesh he could bring his lips to. ‘Please?’ she whispered again in his ear.
Quietly, he said, ‘You’ll have to show me how.’
Again the averted face as she climbed off the bed, her hair used as a shield to hide behind. She sat on the edge with her back to him as she rifled through the drawer in the bedside table. She placed a wrapped condom on the sheet beside her. ‘We’d better use one of these.’ She clasped a tube of K-Y Jelly in her hand.
Skipping back around the bed, animated as he had never seen her, she took the pillows, shaking his to get him to raise himself out of the way, and placed them in the centre of the bed, one on the other. She lay face down with the pillows under her hips, raising her bottom into the air. She held out the tube of jelly. ‘Use lots of this to get me ready. Lots of it.’
Still she had not looked him in the eye.
Chapter 18
Alice woke to find light streaming through her bedroom window and Merrill beside her in an armchair she had dragged in. ‘What time is it?’
‘Seven. You slept like a baby.’
‘Well, that’s good. I’m going to need all my strength today. And especially tonight.’
‘Alice. Please tell me you’re not going through with this.’
‘Don’t, Merrill. Is that coffee I can smell?’
‘I put it on to perk when I saw you start to stir. And I’m going to scramble you some eggs.’
‘I don’t think I can eat.’
‘You didn’t eat last night. You will eat this morning.’
‘Yes, ma. I’m going to take a shower.’
‘Don’t be long.
‘Where’s Tony?’ asked Alice when she sat down at the kitchen table in her robe, her damp hair tightly wrapped in a towel.
‘In Brighton. Looking for John.’
‘John? John Pagan?’
‘Of course.’
Alice nibbled at a slice of sourdough toast as Merrill spooned scrambled egg onto a warm plate. ‘You take a hell of a lot on yourself, Merrill.’
‘Course I do. Wouldn’t be your best friend, otherwise. Eat that.’
‘Thank you.’ Alice scooped egg onto her toast. ‘It’s delicious.’
‘The secret of scrambled egg is to use a low heat and take it off the stove before it’s done. It goes on cooking in the pan.’
Alice smiled. ‘I’ll try to remember.’ She sipped from her mug of coffee. ‘So what exactly did Tony tell John?’
‘Nothing yet. He hasn’t found him. He isn’t home and he doesn’t answer his cell phone.’
‘Maybe he’s telling you something.’
‘I’m not listening. When Tony does find him, he’s going to tell him the whole story. You, your mother, Martin Planer. Why you did what you did. Until then, I want you to stay here with me and have nothing to do with Planer.’
‘Is that right?’
‘For Heaven’s sake, honey. Can’t you see you’re wrecking your life for no reason? This thing you’re planning to do tonight is pointless. It’s not far short of self-harm. What am I saying? It is self-harm. And I can’t let you do it. Don’t stop eating.’
‘I haven’t stopped eating. See? Every last screvidge, gone. Can I have some more toast, please? And some coffee? There’s marmalade in the fridge.’
‘I’m glad to see you’ve got your appetite back.’
‘I always have a good appetite when I’m involved in a fight. I don’t usually expect the fight to be with you, Merrill.’
‘Now wait a minute…’
‘No, Merrill. I won’t. Turn the dial to the right, would you? I like my toast almost burned.’
‘That’s carcinogenic.’
‘Rubbish. Let me tell you some things you need to hear, Merrill. First off, I told you what I told you in a moment of weakness but also in confidence. Yes, I’m glad to see you look embarrassed. If Tony’s goin
g to tell John the whole story, that means Tony knows the whole story. Which does not make me happy.’
‘I’m sorry. It was your welfare I was thinking of.’ She placed two slices of toast on Alice’s plate.
‘Thank you. Aren’t you eating?’
‘Not while you’re cross with me.’
Alice spread butter and then marmalade on a slice of toast. She stared at Merrill. Then she started to laugh. ‘Oh, Merrill. How can I stay mad at you? You shouldn’t have done it, though.’
‘And Planer?’
‘Martin Planer will call for me at ten this morning. I shall go with him. He won’t come in. Not with Ben to walk past. He’ll call from his car and I will go down to him.’
‘Not in those terrible things he sent you.’
‘In those terrible things he sent me. He will drive us to Southampton where we will take the car ferry to Le Havre. From there we’ll drive to Honfleur, where we will check in to L’Absinthe. We will have dinner. And then we will go to bed together.’
‘He’s an animal.’
‘Possibly.’
‘I don’t know how you can be so calm.’
‘I am not calm. I am shaking with fear. But I will not let it show. I will not let that bastard see what terror he has me in.’
‘You don’t need to go through with it.’
‘I do.’
‘Why?’
‘Are you going to make yourself some breakfast? Or shall I do it?’
Merrill began to slice bread for toast. She broke three eggs into a bowl, added salt and pepper and began to beat them with a fork. ‘I’ll ask you again. Why?’
‘Oh, Merrill. What can I tell you? Think of it as a rite of passage. The day I finally break free of my mother.’
Merrill dropped the cut slices into the toaster. She put a handsome knob of butter into the pan and put it over a low light to melt. ‘I don’t buy that.’
‘It’s the only answer I have.’
‘I think you’re trying to atone.’
‘Atone? For what?’
‘For being such a foolish girl. For not telling John, all those years ago, what Planer wanted you to do. And why he could ask you to do it. The hold he had over you. Which was not your fault. And for the result of that foolishness, which was to throw away the kind of love most people only get to dream about.’
