Foreign Affairs

by Jacqueline George

  Her kisses were exciting, and the firm clasp she had on him under her skirt made them more so. He wrapped his arms around her and crushed her to his chest. He started to tremble as his outraged senses demanded relief.

  “Do not move! Stop shaking!” she warned. “Do not shake like this…. Oh!” Her warnings stopped as his trembling ignited something deep inside her and a wild crisis swept over her. The grip she had on his sex pulsed rhythmically as her pleasure exploded. Her suppressed moans finished Peter, too, and he hugged her close as he pumped into the hungry mouth that squeezed him.

  For a long time they did not move. She lay in his arms and together they waited for his excitement to soften and fall away. “I do admire you, coming to the beach with no panties on. You came on the bus? That's a really sexy thing to do. What were you thinking about as you came yesterday and today?”

  She rested her elbows on his chest. “I was thinking about you, of course. But Peter, I must tell you one thing and perhaps you will be disappointed with me. Yesterday I wait until I came to the beach. I looked to see if you were here, and then I went to the toilet to take off my panties. But today, my panties are only in my bag, just for emergencies. There—is that too bad?”

  “You cheated! No, it's not too bad. At least you understood how exciting it was for me. Why were you so cruel to me at the beginning? You knew what you were doing to me, but you would not stop to talk.”

  Ingrid chuckled. “You looked so funny, lying there and pretending not to look at me. You should have introduced yourself. Then it would have been good immediately. But because you did not do this, I decide I must punish you.”

  “I'm sorry. I couldn't sit up and talk because I was too excited. What would you have said if I had come to you in this state?”

  “Hmm. Maybe you are right. Are you often hard like this on the beach, Peter? Do all the women make you stand up? Perhaps it was standing up for Helga and not for me.”

  “Oh, no. It was just for you. You are very beautiful.”

  “I think you do not respect me. You look at my body and want sex only.”

  “No, not at all. You are very attractive as a person.”

  “And now? It is hard for my personality? Or because it is in a good place?”

  “Er – it likes all of you.” Peter had the feeling he was being outmanoeuvred. “If it didn't like you so much, it would have gone soft already.”

  That was a truth she could not deny. The hard proof was buried deep inside her at this very moment. “Perhaps you are right. Certainly it is not soft now. If it does not become soft, what will you do? Soon I will start to be hungry, and I must go to the restaurant. Maybe I will go now.” She started to rise, but Peter held her tight.

  “No. Please don't go.”

  “Why not? You think I must stay only so you can hide inside me?”

  Now that his initial hunger was satisfied, Peter was enjoying the strange idea of hiding inside her while life went on as normal only metres away. “No. Not just for hiding. But I think it'd be very hurt if you leave while it's still standing up for you. It's not a thing a real lady would do.”

  Ingrid burst into laughter. “Do you think a real lady would be doing what we are doing? Do you think your English princesses would do this?”

  “I bet they wish they could, but I'm sure they're not half as sexy or as brave as you. Or half as beautiful.”

  Ingrid dropped her bantering and nibbled his neck. Flattery will get you anything, he thought, as he stroked her back. She gave a little shiver. “Peter, when will it be soft again? We cannot stay here for all the night.”

  His sense of being outmanoeuvred faded as Ingrid showed that she, too, did not want the rest of the world to know what they had just done. For her benefit, he sighed out loud. “There's only one way to make it go soft, now that it's hidden where it is, but I'm sure people will see if you start moving. Perhaps we should make ourselves comfortable and wait until the sun goes down. It should start to get dark about seven o'clock, and all the people will go.”

  “Seven o'clock! But this is not possible! It will be hard for another two hours? But Helga will come for me. You must make it be soft before this time. Please, make it be soft now.”

  “Now you're saying that you don't like it in your warm and comfortable place.”

  “Oh, Peter! It is not like this! I like to have it inside me, but now you must make it be soft before Helga comes.”

  “So, the truth is that you like to have it inside you. Otherwise I suppose you wouldn't have let it in to start with, if you didn't like it. But why should I make it go soft, even if I could? It feels very nice as it is.”

  “Please, Peter. Make it be soft. I promise I will not be cruel to you again. I will let it come inside many times in the future, but now it must get out, please.”

  “Many times? How many times?” He enjoyed exerting his power over her.

  “Whenever you want. You can come with me to my bed tonight. Or I will come to your hotel. But please, let me get off now.”

  “Ah—so it will come and visit you in your hotel tonight, and you will make it especially welcome? Yes? Good. Then let's just relax, and I expect it'll go down quickly. Lie on me.” Moving carefully so as not to uncover herself, she rested on his chest and stretched out her legs between his spread thighs. She felt light and childlike as he folded her in his arms. Together they waited for his desire to weaken.

  Peter remembered an old Roman saying that promises a purse of gold to anyone who can pass a donkey without thinking of its tail. Impossible, of course, to remember the one without thinking of the other, and now they found themselves in a similar position. Far from damping down the fire, the attention they paid to their joined parts only fanned the blaze.

  It seemed to Ingrid that the only thing that stopped her sliding down the bed was the rigid bar she held in her centre. Using the fingertips of both hands, Peter stroked the back of her neck. She sighed and stirred uneasily. The slight movement of her sex around him pleased her, and she tried squeezing her legs together. The possibility of a quick collapse releasing her disappeared as the muscular cock in her belly reared up in answer. She tried again, and it answered just as readily. Every time she squeezed, it gave a heaving spasm. It became clear to Ingrid that only the severest treatment would subdue the stubborn invader, and she started to squeeze him rhythmically, trying to crush him into surrender.

  Ingrid's breathing against his neck became fast and shallow in time with her efforts. Peter felt her panting open-mouthed against his neck as her contractions speeded up. It was not long before her body took over and accelerated her spasms into a frenzied trembling. She was stiff in his arms for a moment and then melted onto him, breathing heavily.

  “Don't stop,” he whispered. “I was just coming–” Uncertainly, she started to squeeze again. “Yes, that's good. Keep doing it like that. I'm coming soon.”

  Her moist lips rested open against his throat and her panting took on a harsh note. Long before Peter could catch up with her, she quivered her way through another climax. “Again!” he ordered. “Keep doing it.” Slowly she obeyed.

  “Please, Peter, please…” She muttered incoherently, eager to please him but unable to hold herself back. Another crisis shook her, and still Peter's stiff cock was inside her.

  “Do it properly. Let me come too.”

  “I can't. They will see me.” But her actions spoke differently. She started to rock her hips as she squeezed, allowing him to slide a centimetre back and forth in her wet sheath. He responded readily to her caresses and soon his climax was coming. Provoked by his reaction, her movements became more vigorous, and soon any thought of concealment had gone. She thrust against him and pulled far back to impale herself again. With a climatic flurry of movement, she finally pushed him over the edge, and he fountained into her. They collapsed together and lay panting.

  As they slowly regained their composure, Ingrid refused to look up from her hiding place against his neck. “Are they watc
hing us?”

  Peter looked around. His neighbours on one side seemed to be politely ignoring them. On the other side, waiting and watching, sat Helga. Seeing they were recovering, she came to sit by them and put a friendly hand on Ingrid's shoulder. “It was good, liebling?”

  She looked up in surprise. “It was—it was fantastic. Did you see us?”

  Helga laughed. “I saw you very well. You have made me completely uncomfortable. And everyone else, I think. Come—now we must go for a celebration.”

  “What are we celebrating?” asked Peter.

  “We must celebrate for you, of course. For your first time as film stars.” She gestured over her shoulder at the smiling fat man who waved a greeting with his free hand. His other hand was wrapped in the grip of a very large and complicated video camera.

  * * * *

  As the recording ended, the chubby girl was there again with her ice creams. She left her tray to be picked over by the members of the Board and brought her favourite over to Priscilla.

  “How did you like that one, Miss Priscilla? Fancy having it off on the beach with everyone watching! I don't think I could ever do that, could you? I suppose you're brave enough for anything. And you've got such a nice figure, I'm sure you don't mind showing it off. I'm so fat that I'd probably break the sun bed when I got excited.

  “Do you like my tee-shirt? I wore it just to show you.” She stretched the hem of her shirt down to show it off. There they both were: Priscilla on one large round breast and Trehearne on the other. Their names were on a romantically entwined banner below. Above the overhang of her breasts was emblazoned Foreign Affairs 1.

  Priscilla sucked her ice cream thoughtfully. It was growing in her mind that Foreign Affairs 1 had become so well known it might not be possible to ban it. Would it be possible to persuade Trehearne to accept sizeable cuts as a compromise? Somehow she knew he would not. His book was something about which he would never compromise. She might have to accept his dinner after all.

  “Right, Priscilla,” called Valerie, “Let's get started.”

  “Chairperson, I really don't have much to say. Only that the story is based on a stupid but perverse foundation. Only a pervert could imagine wanting to make love on a beach with everybody watching, but as no one would actually do such a thing, I'm not sure we have anything to discuss.”

  To her surprise, her statement prompted shouts from the audience. “I've seen it done!”

  “Me too, and it was in Greece!”

  “Never mind that. We've done it and it was great!” This last comment brought a wave of laughter. Looking around, it seemed to Priscilla that only she and Valerie did not find it amusing. The Major was chuckling, and Susan was clapping her hands and shrieking with laughter. Trehearne hid from her gaze, but he could not hide his smile.

  Priscilla's nature would not let her give up easily. “Chairperson, what two people might do together in private is something I prefer not to speculate about. In this case, because the two people had sexual intercourse in public, everyone else was forced to watch. They were forced to join in a sexual act that they must have found repugnant. And that, I believe, goes against even Trehearne's concept of civil rights.”

  Trehearne stood to answer. “Oh, I think you're making altogether too much of it, Miss Investigator. Haven't you walked through London's public parks during a summer lunchtime? People are enjoying each other's company everywhere.

  “In this case, I can't think that much harm was done. After all, their intimate parts – the naughty bits – were out of sight. They were being quiet and discreet. If anyone had noticed but did not want to watch, all they only had to roll over on their sun bed. But I expect that everyone would want to watch. Wouldn't you, Miss Investigator?”

  Again there were boisterous shouts from the audience.

  “Not her!”

  “She wouldn't know what was happening, would she?”

  “Whisper in her ear, John!”

  Trehearne held up his hand for quiet. “Miss Investigator, I feel that you really do not have a strong objection to this story. It's just a holiday romance that gets a little bit naughty. Nothing much to worry about. Why don't we move on to the next one? It might give you a bit more to get your teeth into.”

  La Vie Parisienne

  Tim had been delighted when he first heard he would be coming to Paris. Less enthusiastic about the project he had to work on, but in the mining business he seldom had the luxury of choosing what he would do. The chance to stay in one of the great cities of Europe, and in a hotel instead of under canvas at the end of a dirt road to nowhere, all showed a great Providence somewhere up there was taking care of him. And in summertime, so he could make do with his tropical wardrobe.

  He had never visited Paris before and had a yen to visit some of the places he had read about over the years: Versailles, the Eiffel Tower, the Seine itself, Notre Dame and the Latin Quarter, the Bois de Boulogne, and the Champs Elysées—where else but Paris would a street have such an ambitious name?

  Then there were the good things in life such as the French alone know how to appreciate, la cuisine, la mode, l'art, and just possibly, l'amour. If such things did not exist in Paris, where else could they be found?

  The project he controlled was laboratory-based. Samples collected from an Indonesian prospect had been giving results that did not tie in with what his employers had expected. A second series of samples gave no clarification, so Tim had supervised the collection and sealing of a third set. A full suite of tests had been ordered on this last set and in view of the questions being asked at board level, Tim himself had been assigned as project supervisor. He flew to Paris with orders to keep working seven days a week until every result had been verified and written up. He brought two Indonesian laboratory technicians— Aidil and Handono, introduced illegally into France as trainees because local French staff could not be expected to work twelve hours a day, seven days a week.

  He had been booked into a small hotel in Montrouge, within walking distance of the laboratories. It was a converted town house opening onto a leafy square, complete with old men playing boules in the evenings. A large Moroccan family owned and ran the hotel. They were a friendly crowd, with an endless supply of brothers and sisters to man the front desk. Tim's room was old-fashioned but adequate. It looked out over the neighbouring yards at the back of the hotel.

  In the laboratory, the three of them settled in quickly. Once their French hosts had shown them around their allocated basement area, they seemed to consider their duty done, and the team was left alone. They opened the first box of air freighted samples right away and settled down to cataloguing and describing. The following day, the analyses proper would start, and for the next two months everything would be on automatic. Tim's workload was heavy to begin with. He had to examine each sample before the technicians could start on it. But his tasks were less time-consuming than theirs, and once he had established a lead, he had a little time to himself and could take an occasional afternoon off to immerse himself in his host city.

  The Metro terminal was a twenty minute walk away, and in very little time he could reach the centre of town. His first reaction to Paris in summer was one of disappointment. In the centre of the French-speaking world, he found himself surrounded by foreign tourists, mostly American and Japanese. The city felt hardly French at all, if you ignored the street signs.

  His school-boy French left him able to read a simple newspaper, but completely unable to speak the language. His attempts to communicate were met with impressive Gallic rudeness; shoulders were shrugged and backs were turned, and he found himself talking only to those people who wanted to speak a little English. His saviour and mentor for the French language was Hussein, the owner of his favourite restaurant.

  The food of Paris came as a big surprise. If Paris was typical of the country as a whole, he had no doubt that the national dish of France was couscous. There seemed to be a couscouserie on every corner, usually run by a North African
family. Hussein was Algerian and had his restaurant not far from the hotel. He had a limited menu, but Tim found that the earthy flavours of the couscous and its bouillon topped off with fiery herissa sauce suited his palate very well. Several evenings a week, he could be found eating slowly and reading his paperback to make the evening last. From the other tables came the soft chatter of Arabic voices and the snap of cards laid on the table. Sometimes Hussein would sit and talk. His English was very poor, so they spoke French, and Hussein slowly breathed life into Tim's dreary school lessons.

  Hussein's favourite subject was his family. How they all enjoyed living in Paris, in spite of the weather, and how life was much better here than at home. His son attended university and hoped to graduate as an engineer. Soon he would be a far grander man than his father. His four sisters were much more of a problem to their father. Too many young Algerians had taken to French ways and forgotten their own culture. Hussein felt his control over the girls slipping, and he doubted if he could marry them off suitably in France. Perhaps he should send them back to his father and find them serious Algerian men to marry. He foresaw some fierce battles when the time came.

  On occasion, Aidil and Handono would join him at Hussein's, and the Indonesians and Algerians felt they should cement their Islamic brotherhood. Of course, they could only converse through Tim, and perhaps because of that the entente Islamique failed to prosper. Or perhaps it was because their cultures were so different that religion alone could not provide a bridge. Where the two Indonesians spent the rest of their evenings was a mystery. Tim knew they had a friend at the Embassy whom they sometimes met. One morning they told him of an expensive evening they had spent around Pigalle. They had been relieved of a lot of francs by the bar-girls, but got nothing to show for it. They did not plan on returning.

  Tim had begun to be concerned about the two technicians. The results they had recorded differed wildly from previous testing. The ore grades they measured were no more than marginal. A worrying scenario built up in his mind, a scenario in which the previous samples had been spiked to make the concession appear better than it actually was. Only one thing could cause that to happen—money. And only two groups of people would benefit from such a deception, people who traded in the company’s shares, and the local controllers of the Indonesian land around the projected mine. He was inclined to discount the share traders because people like that were not found in the jungles of south-east Asia spiking geological samples. On the other hand the local officials, who controlled the land rights and would have to be paid off regularly if a mine started up, were a different kettle of fish. They could quite easily influence local technicians on the rigs or in Jakarta to get samples doctored. Aidil and Handono were paid pathetic salaries by Western standards. They would be very much at risk if anyone could reach them. Tim took to keeping the store room door locked during the day, and slipping blind check samples into the daily schedule.