Temptation in Paradise

by Jyoti Singh

  As his mouth searched hers, he felt Niki’s complete surrender. Her hands moved up his back to bring herself closer. Sid’s lips travelled down the side of her face and onto the base of her neck, he could feel her pulse hammering away between her collarbones. He kissed it before moving further down to where the mounds of her breasts began… Her swift breath gave Sid all the permission he needed. His hand crept under her fleece and T-shirt, cupping her breast. Niki shivered. Not sure if it was the cold mountain air or a physical response, Sid half covered her body with his while unzipping her fleece and pushing her T-shirt up to expose her delectable breasts. His lips followed the curve of her breast with light kisses until he found her nipple. As his lips encircled the areola, Sid could feel his manhood harden. He reached his hand down to undo her pants and push them away from her body, taking her panties with them.

  Niki trembled and sighed, her back arching to give full access to Sid’s wayward mouth. Her hands had been busy too as she pulled at his T-shirt, exposing his rippled torso before making short shrift of his jeans. As skin made contact with skin, Sid could hear how heavy his breath was in the quiet of the night. He said her name and the sound of his voice in the silence opened the floodgates of lust in Niki. She moved restlessly, her legs opening to invite him between them. Sid slid into their warm embrace as she wrapped them around him. Her naked body glistened under him and took Sid’s breath away. She was perfection… and all his for the taking. And he did. Slowly, gently, careful not to cause Niki any pain on her first time… her body curved below him, inviting his thrusts, pulling him with her into a vortex of desire and then merciful release together. Niki’s eyes were closed, her face calm and content. Sid captured the memory in his mind’s eye before placing a gentle kiss on her lips. They lay entwined until their bodies started to lose heat in the chilly mountain air. Words seemed unnecessary as they dressed but Sid had to ask, ‘Are you all right?’

  Niki just nodded, a single tear making its way down her cheek.

  ‘No, Niki… don’t cry. This was beautiful, spontaneous and… just look at where we are,’ Sid said as he gathered her into a hug.

  Her reply was muffled against his chest. ‘I know… it’s just that… don’t get me wrong, it was amazing but I feel a sense of… loss.’

  ‘Do you regret this?’ Sid stiffened. He had taken Niki’s precious gift in good spirit, with the understanding that it was what she wanted. Even though he valued Niki’s honesty, her response hurt.

  ‘Would you understand if I said yes and no?’

  Sid’s arms fell by his sides and he stepped back to ask, ‘I don’t think I understand.’

  ‘It’s hard to explain, Sid.’ Niki reached out to touch him but Sid drew back.

  This was Gauri all over again. Games. Sid hated games – silly emotional games that made something beautiful seem tawdry.

  He was distant as he picked up the blanket.

  ‘Don’t be like this, Sid…’ Niki pleaded but Sid remained stubbornly silent.

  For Sid, the trek had become a metaphor of this whole experience with Niki – up to the peak of pleasure and then down to disillusionment. Was he wrong in thinking that she could be the right woman for him? He was beginning to have doubts.

  Chapter Eight

  What a day it had been… Niki had learnt that the knot of confusion, the need to confess and everything else she felt for Sid was love and she had lost her virginity at the ripe age of twenty-nine! In most circumstances, it would be a reason to celebrate and mark the calendar. The day had all the hallmarks but it had ended with Niki trailing a few steps behind Sid as they walked back to the camp. Then a quick nod to say goodnight was all they shared before retiring to their respective tents.

  Niki was flummoxed. She could not understand why Sid had suddenly withdrawn and shut her out. She had thought that he would understand her conflict, especially given that it was her first time. Her virginity was a treasured gift, one that she had not found a reason to give to any man until now. It would probably not even have happened with Sid if she had not realised that she loved him. That changed everything for her.

  Her newly discovered love was fragile. She was fragile. So many times during their lovemaking, the words had bubbled up within her: I love you, Sid. But she had swallowed them and used her body instead. The sweet surrender was her way of telling him that her gift came from love.

  She looked at him over her steaming mug of tea at breakfast. He seemed well rested and relaxed as he bantered with Jude. She wanted to just walk over and smack him on the side of his head. How could he be so blasé about what had happened between them last night? It was not that he had ignored her. On the contrary, he had gone out of his way to be civil and cordial, both of which put Niki’s teeth on edge. She wanted warm, affectionate and understanding. As her irritation grew, she knew the only way to get around this was to be forthright with Sid and ask him directly. She hoped they would get an opportunity on their way down the mountain. It was called a traverse, Jude had explained—climbing on one side and coming down the other—another nugget of information, which she did not want to define her relationship with Sid.

  The porters wound up the campsite after the group had started their hike down. Niki was surprised that they had already caught up as she heard a mule harrumph behind her. She was straggling, the pain in her feet renewed by being squeezed into the trekking shoes again. She saw Sid ambling with Jude. She needed him by her side so that they could talk. Wow! That made her sound like some tragic heroine in a romantic novel. What had Sid done to her? She was not this person – emotional, raw and vulnerable. Even after her parents’ deaths, she had held herself together with a stoic acceptance, assimilating the pain and guilt into a tight knot and pushing it deep within. Sid had changed her. She could not fathom how she could both love and dislike him in the same instance.

  He must have felt her gaze on him because he turned at that very moment, his eyes searching and only resting when they found her… and she fell in love all over again.

  This was not helping. She took a deep breath and called out, ‘Sid!’

  He stopped. She caught up with him, her pain visible. Walking downhill was not just inverting her knees; it pushed her feet harder into the shoes.

  ‘The feet still hurt, huh?’ he asked casually.

  ‘And how…’ she replied, taking his cue to keep it light.

  ‘You can take relief in the fact that it takes less time to go down, so your torture will not be prolonged.’ He was almost nonchalant.

  ‘Ha! Does more intense pain over a shorter duration triumph over milder, consistent pain over time?’ Her question was a deeper metaphor for what she was thinking. She could just jump in and ask Sid what was bothering him, like pulling off a plaster, or pussyfoot around it and hope he would tell her what she needed to know.

  ‘Really depends on your threshold for pain, doesn’t it?’ he countered and Niki was right back where she’d started. She stopped thinking and went with the quick and painful approach.

  ‘What happened last night, Sid?’ Her voice was tentative.

  ‘Why would you even ask that?’ His response was tetchy.

  ‘Come on, Sid,’ Niki almost pleaded.

  ‘Really, Niki? You made it very clear last night.’ Sid’s irritation was growing.

  ‘I was just being honest… I thought you would understand.’ Niki felt debased.

  ‘Understand what, Niki? Could you please get to the point?’ Sid was in no mood to be accommodating.

  ‘I just want to know what last night meant to you.’ Niki straightened her spine and it brought a degree of firmness to her words.

  He looked at her, his gaze measured. ‘I thought something beautiful and memorable.’

  ‘So did I, but you just shut me out…’ Niki stated a fact.

  ‘I didn’t; you did…’ The words were steel.

  ‘How?’

  ‘By saying you may have regrets…’ His response was both quick and sharp.

&nbs
p; ‘That is not what I meant, Sid,’ Niki clarified.

  ‘Look, Niki, I understand it was your first time and it’s natural to feel conflicted about giving up something so precious but you need to understand that it was a gift wilfully given, not taken…’ His voice was flat and unemotional.

  Niki was surprised at the way Sid had interpreted her conflict. ‘You didn’t really think I regretted making love with you?’

  ‘That’s about right… It wasn’t a game, Niki. You were not some notch on my bedpost— twenty-nine-year-old virgin… check.’ For a logical man, his reasoning made no sense to her.

  ‘Wow! Didn’t know you could be so cruel…’ Niki made to walk past him in a huff.

  He grasped her elbow to make her stop. ‘Seriously, Niki? I thought it was you who wanted to have this conversation and the minute we get to the part that matters, you want to take off… What sort of game are you playing?’

  ‘Will you stop calling it a game? There is no game; I don’t play games…’ Niki was defensive.

  ‘Then tell me what you meant. Honest, hand on heart.’ This was another side of Sid—the one who would not let go until he got answers.

  ‘I hadn’t processed it, Sid… it was an irreversible milestone for me. I just felt torn… I had much longer than most to imagine how and when it would be.’ There was a tinge of self-derision in her tone.

  ‘And, obviously, reality did not match fantasy,’ Sid commented wryly.

  ‘No, that wasn’t it… and don’t laugh at what I’m about to say… I just regretted that it wasn’t like I thought it would be on my first night with my husband…’ Niki was embarrassed. Another confession of something she had never told anybody else.

  Sid’s brows rose. ‘You’re kidding me.’ He had the decency not to laugh.

  Niki looked down and shook her head. Words were beyond her.

  ‘You were born into the wrong time, my dear.’ Sid’s voice softened. ‘Sometimes I really don’t know what to make of you.’

  Niki remained silent.

  Sid let go of her elbow and slipped her hand in his. ‘Come on, we’d better catch up with the rest of the group.’

  Only then did Niki look around to see they were alone and the party had moved along without them.

  They walked in amiable silence. The song returned to Niki’s heart. She looked at Sid, at their linked hands and all was well with her world.

  ‘So how was your first ever trek?’ asked Tanya.

  ‘Quite amazing,’ Niki replied as they sat sipping tea on Tanya’s terrace on the morning after her return. Sid had dropped her here at her request; she had not wanted to go back to the mess in her flat.

  Their trip back had been the onward journey in reverse with no more private moments. Niki didn’t mind because it gave her time to think about what they had discussed a little more rationally. When she was with Sid it was impossible. The Niki she’d thought she was had checked out and left behind this emotionally incontinent person who betrayed her deepest and darkest secrets with nary a care. She felt exposed because Sid knew things about her that even Tanya didn’t know.

  ‘Hey, you’ll have to do better than that!’ Tanya brought her back to real time.

  Niki gave Tanya all the details of the trip except the night she had spent with Sid under the blanket of stars. She was not ready. Something told her that Tanya would find out soon enough that Sid and she were more than friends. She both looked forward to and dreaded the moment. The former to be free of the burden of secrecy and the latter because Tanya would never stop crowing about being the one who’d brought them together.

  Tanya figured that Niki had given her a sanitised version of events and astutely asked, ‘So, how did it go with Sid?’

  ‘Very well,’ was all Niki could muster without blushing.

  ‘Come on, Niki, spill.’

  ‘Not now, T… All I am willing to tell you is that things are moving along rather nicely right now and I don’t want to jinx it.’

  ‘I knew it… I told you, you guys were just right for each other.’ The crowing had begun.

  ‘Still a long way to go before you can say that,’ Niki averred. One thing that had begun to niggle once she got back was – she loved Sid but she didn’t know how Sid felt about her. Was it attraction, infatuation or love? She was afraid of the answer.

  ‘Must have a dinner this Friday… It’ll be good to see you two together. Since you won’t give me all the details, maybe I can twist Sid’s arm and ferret some information… Oh! I have a great idea…’ Tanya was on a roll and Niki tuned out. She should have paid attention because Tanya’s great ideas always had ominous portents.

  Going back to work with Sid was a nightmare of sorts. It was as if their lovemaking had woken this sleeping giant within Niki – libidinous, hungry and overly sensitised to everything on the physical plane. Sounds were sharper, colours were brighter and her senses were heightened.

  Pulling herself together after a distracting make out session on the chesterfield in his study, she told Sid, ‘This is not a good idea. We are not getting any work done.’

  ‘Work be damned. Why won’t you just come up to my room with me and we can spend the rest of the evening making slow and languorous love?’ Sid replied.

  ‘You know the rules, Sid. I think, given the circumstances, we should seriously look at establishing some boundaries.’ Niki meant business.

  ‘Like the study is okay and the bedroom is not?’ Sid chuckled.

  Niki couldn’t help smiling. His good humour was infectious. ‘You know what I mean, Sid.’

  ‘You are such a drill sergeant but for now I will surrender to your will.’ He gave a mock bow.

  They agreed that while working they would focus on what needed to be done. No more make out break-out sessions. Any shenanigans would have to be on personal time. That there was very little of it, what with Niki’s full working day, was moot.

  ‘I have the perfect solution.’ Sid’s eyes glinted.

  ‘And what would that be?’ Niki was suspicious.

  ‘Let’s go away somewhere…’

  Niki prevaricated even as her heart skipped a beat. ‘But we only just got back.’

  ‘We have the best reason ever.’ He was determined.

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Your birthday! What better way to celebrate three decades of walking this earth?’ She could see the wheels in Sid’s head turning.

  ‘You do know Tanya’s organising a dinner for that on Friday. She invited you.’ Niki didn’t want to upset any of Tanya’s plans, especially since she had been spending so much time with Sid in this past month. She felt guilty about neglecting her sister.

  ‘So we will leave on Saturday morning…’ Sid was already looking for options and destinations on the Net.

  ‘Sounds like a plan,’ said Niki, giving in to the madness of the moment. She loved the man. He wanted to be with her. Who was she to complain?

  Sid was really excited at the prospect of getting away with Niki. It would give them unadulterated time together. The trek had given him a taste of how much he enjoyed spending time with her. Then that magical night under the open sky was like a trailer to a very good movie. Just the thought stirred his manhood.

  It had helped to clear the air the next day. He had been gobsmacked by Niki’s archaic notions about her first time. He shouldn’t have been because Niki was a surprising mix of the old and new and each time he thought he had her figured out she found a new way to astound him. The uncertainty he felt around Niki was the reason he felt this overwhelming attraction to her. When he stopped to think about it, he had felt the same around Gauri in the initial days. This thought gave him pause.

  Why did he feel this constant need to compare Niki with Gauri? Gauri had been the one who had given him every reason not to trust women, especially in an intimate relationship. He was still single, thanks to her. No woman could get past the barriers she’d helped to build. Except Niki.

  Sid chided himself for letting Gau
ri into his thoughts again. It was as if the deeper his connection to Niki grew, the more Gauri became present in his life. Years had gone by but Sid still harboured unresolved emotions when it came to Gauri. It bothered him because here he was with this amazing woman, starting something new, and he felt as if Gauri was peeking over his shoulder. He had to let the past go and stop listening to Gauri’s siren song.

  He refocused his attention on dealing with the logistics of his trip with Niki and the excitement returned. He had found the perfect destination for them and he looked forward to Niki’s reaction when she found out. He wanted to make her thirtieth birthday special, one she would remember for years to come. Sid did not know then that his wish would be granted in the most unexpected way. If he had known, he would probably have wished for something else.

  Come Friday, Niki still had no inkling about where they were going for their getaway. The whole week was extended foreplay for their time together. Whenever they were alone, it was hard to keep their hands off each other. But somehow neither wanted to make the surreal mountain lovemaking mundane by bringing it to what in Niki’s mind was the workplace. The next time they made love, it would have to be as, if not more, magical than that night. Being in love for the first time in her life had brought out the romantic in Niki and she was not ashamed. It felt good and right.

  ‘All good things come to those who wait,’ was what Sid had said when she had asked him about their destination. She had to plan what to take with her, she had insisted. Sid’s response was that, given what they intended to do, the less she took the better. Niki had blushed, her mind running wild with lascivious images. Sid was amused and showed no remorse.