The only thought that passed through the busy mind of Alexis was, 'did I even answer any questions about working here?'
~~~~~
That night, in the comfort of his office, Lincoln found himself thinking about the girl he had met that day. It made so sense for him to do so, but he couldn't stop it. He decided to make an excuse to go back to that store - a follow up meeting with the store manager perhaps. Then he would see her again, and he would probably dismiss her after seeing her a second time, identifying her as just someone who turned his head briefly but was not attractive at all.
So the following week he found an excuse and felt inside of him a nervousness as he talked to the store manager. But when he tried to manoeuvre himself to where the girl would be, he found himself distressed after learning that it was her day off.
"I did want to talk to her about something particular … how could I find her?" he found himself asking, knowing it was not only highly unprofessional, but also wrong.
The store manager looked at him, perplexed. He couldn't give out staff details … but this was his own employer - owner of the whole chain. Could he refuse?
As if sensing the dilemma the store manager was now in, having had such a question put to him, Lincoln retracted, with a sense of frustration beginning inside of him.
"I am very glad to see that you do not easily give out personal details of your staff - that puts my mind at ease. I believe staff safety is paramount, above all other considerations."
The store manager instantly looked relieved at not having had to make a decision then after all - and therefore had evaded having to say something that could have proven to be the wrong decision.
As if fate itself was suddenly speaking to him, in the background behind the store manager Lincoln saw her walk into the store, not for work but as a customer. He wanted to rush to her but knew he could not do that. No, he would have to be more subtle. So he stood where he was, with his eyes moving from the manager who was directly in front of him, to behind the manager and over the store floor.
"Thank you so much. I am delighted with how you are running this store. You are truly a great asset to the company," Lincoln said to the store manager, holding out his hand for a handshake, before turning to leave. He had to leave discretely and get outside before she did.
Sitting in the car outside, he watched the front entrance. He didn't know what he was doing … no, that was a lie. He knew exactly what he was doing, but he just couldn't stop himself.
Finally he saw her walk out and start to walk down the road. He panicked - what should he do? Should he approach her? That would be crossing a workplace boundary - or would it? Was he really considered her employer, given how many levels of people stood between him as the head of the overall company, and her as … whatever her proper job was?
He sat in his car until she was a short way down the road, and then began driving.
He pulled up beside her and lowered the passenger side window of his car.
"Hello!" he called out and saw her immediately startled, before she looked around and then, still from a safe distance, look into the car.
Alexis saw who it was, and although confused by what he was calling out to her for, found she was relaxed with him doing so.
"Hello," she said back without any expression on her face whatsoever.
"I was just in the supermarket, and saw you. Can I give you a lift home?" he asked, feeling a very strange feeling growing inside of him. It was like a blend of nervousness, eagerness, a sense of wrongness … and arousal.
Alexis looked at him doubtfully, not sure what to do. He seemed safe enough, but getting into the car with someone she didn't really know was not something she would normally do.
"Alright," she finally said, not sure if it was right or not, but deciding to trust her gut instinct, which was telling her he was okay.
Lincoln opened the door for her and helped her put her supermarket bags in the back seat. Once they were both sitting in the car again, he looked at her. She was facing forward, like she was frozen in fear, so he resolved to at least help her relax.
"Where to?" he asked and finally she looked at him, at first not seeming to comprehend the question. Then she finally understood and gave him directions.
When the car stopped outside of her home, he waited. He wasn't sure what would be crossing the line, and no matter what he felt he really wanted, he couldn't bring himself to push himself on her too much.
Alexis turned to look at him before she got out of the car.
"Thank you," she said simply, and climbed out.
Lincoln jumped out and immediately came around to the passenger side, to open the back door and get her bags out.
"Let me help you carry these in," he said, feeling that same desperation coming on. He thought she would say no but instead she nodded and turned to walk inside, seeming to expect him to follow.
Inside her small home, Lincoln saw that she lived very simply. The kitchen and living areas were sparse, to say the least. And there was nothing personal about the room - no photos or art work or books. There was nothing about the space to make him think that it was really a home.
"Can I make you a cup of tea?" she asked, surprising him.
"Yes, thank you," he responded, even though he deplored tea, but he was determined to not have any reason not to stay longer.
He watched her as she worked in the kitchen, putting frozen and cold foods away and then making the cups of tea.
When she walked right up to him and handed him his, she looked into his eyes and he felt like she was looking right into him. Like she could see exactly who he was and what his intentions were. Like she didn't mind what his intentions were. Like she wanted his intentions.
She moved to sit on a sofa in the room - the only real seat that was there - and he sat beside her.
"You want something from me," she said simply, making him catch his breath and find himself blushing once again.
He looked at her and saw the complete stark openness, and expectation of honesty, on her face.
"Yes."
"Why?" she asked, not sure if she really wanted to know the answer to the question, but feeling like she had to know.
"I … I don't know," he found himself spluttering out, with his body on fire from nerves, and yes, arousal. The frankness of the conversation that she had begun was fuelling him. There was no fakeness to it, like he had to put up with day after day, no matter who he interacted with. Even his wife, Diana, had a fakeness about her, even after all this time of being married.
They sat in silence, both drinking their tea, even though he was not enjoying it.
Alexis let thoughts run through her mind. She had been with men before - she was not a virgin. She knew from a very young age that they wanted sex from women. It was a core part of their souls. And she had come to expect that if they ever wanted anything from her, it was always sex. Sometimes she had wanted it too, but at different times she'd had sex with them just because they wanted it, and she found she had no care at all - she didn't care if they did or they didn't have sex - so she had sex. It wasn't unpleasant, but it never felt truly pleasurable either. It just … was.
The hardest thing that Alexis found with men was that they didn't always say exactly what they wanted. That infuriated her. So as she looked at the man beside her, and could sense his indecision about how to let her know what he wanted, she looked him directly in the eye and told him what she expected.
"Tell me what you want me to do," she said, and immediately saw surprise on his face.
Lincoln was in shock. He felt like he was in the wrong time and the wrong place, but his body was screaming otherwise. He didn't know what he wanted - all he really knew was that she was on his mind, and had been for days now. And whatever it was about her, she had an incredible power over him. But she had said those words - and now she was waiting.
"I want you to kiss me … on my lips," he found himself saying quietly, almost in a whisper. Almost a
question.
Alexis heard the words and immediately took his cup and hers, and walked out to the kitchen to put them on the bench. Lincoln saw her go and thought he was about to be asked to leave. He was cursing himself silently, inside his head, but then saw that she was coming back to him. He watched her, saw her kneel on the sofa beside him, facing him, never taking her eyes from his. And then felt her lips on his.
It was the first time in 20 years he had kissed someone other than Diana. Even in the three years before they had married - when they had both been at the very end of their teen years, entering their twenties and studying at college, where anything could have happened - he had remained faithful to her, wanting only to be with her and no-one else.
Lincoln sat still, not reaching out his hands, not moving to stand up … he was in shock, utterly and completely. He felt a momentary feeling of guilt give way to the increase in his arousal, and hoped that she could not see how much she was affecting him. He would not act any further - he was enjoying the feeling of her lips on his - young lips - exploring lips - that were so different from Diana's - but he would not let it go any further. It wasn't right, on so many levels.
Alexis did as he wanted. His request had surprised her, and she discovered that inside of her she had been expecting him to ask for sex immediately. But she was enjoying just kissing him. She didn't touch any other part of his body, purposely avoiding touching or even looking there. She could feel his lips moving against hers though - he did not seem to want to pull away. But equally he was not trying to pull her against him, or move in any other way, toward anything else. To her it was … different.
Finally Alexis pulled back from him and sat back down on the sofa, as if nothing had happened. Lincoln looked at her, wondering what she was thinking of him in that moment. Wondering what he should think of himself in that moment.
"I should go," he said, feeling overwhelmed in his emotions then. It was too raw for him - everything in his life was calculated, and this conflicted with that. He needed to go and process it before he let anything else happen.
Alexis saw him stand up, and she stood up beside him.
"Will you come and see me again?" she asked, finding that she did not fear the possibility.
Lincoln was uncertain how he should reply, or if she was inviting him…
"Do you want me to?" he asked tentatively.
"Yes," he heard her answer, with no hesitation, and he thought of how different his wife was. Everything Diana said was calculated - he had always known that but in recent years he had felt more and more like he didn't really know what was real with her now.
"I don't even know your name," he said, suddenly feeling even worse at that realisation.
"Lexi," she blurted out, not really wanting to give her formal name. She had played around with the shortened name in her head for a long time, but because everyone she knew already knew her as Alexis, she didn't feel she could change her name. But with this man it didn't matter - while here with him she could be Lexi. She probably wouldn't see him again after today, so what did it matter?
"Lexi," he seemed to breathe out deeply, like it was a foreign name he had never heard before.
They looked at each other intently, and he knew it would not be fair for him to hide the most important fact of his life from her.
"Lexi, I am married," he said quietly, looking and feeling like he was the most deceitful person in the world right in that moment.
"I know," he heard her reply, and he gave her a look of curiosity. "I looked you up," she continued, as if that answered his unspoken question entirely.
"And you would still want me to come back to see you?" he asked, his curiosity growing now, combined with an alertness that came with knowing he was in the media, and his wealth was well known. He'd had women try to come onto him many times before, in attempts to gain his affection - and his money. But he had always felt like he could easily see their intentions, so had moved himself out of their reach very quickly so that nothing could be misconstrued.
"If you wish to. I am always here after 6pm, even when I am working," she said so casually, like it was entirely his choice. "If you wish to visit, I would like that, but not after 8pm, please, as I have to start work quite early some days so tend go to bed early."
Lincoln listened. It was the longest amount of ongoing wording he had heard her use at one time. He found he could not find any words, so just nodded, before he saw her move to the door, leading him. She said no more either, and simply held the door open for him to walk out.
Silently, he did so.
Before he went home and made love to his wife for the first time in a long while.
~~~~~
Over the next week Lincoln absorbed himself in his work. He would not think about her during business meetings, he would not think about her in the evenings when he was with Diana, and he would not think about her when he was travelling anywhere. That was what he wanted. That was not how things went.
Alexis did not give him another thought. She had no expectation there - for whatever reason she had caught his attention for a moment and immediately after leaving her home he would have gone back to being who he really was. A husband. A business owner. A wealthy and mature man who could have any woman he wanted, whenever he wanted.
She was very surprised then, when exactly a week later not only was there a knock on her door, but on opening it, she saw he was suddenly standing in front of her.
They looked at each other in surprise - even he seemed to be shocked to have found himself there, in her home. But as much as he had tried to fight it, he could not deny the desperation he felt about her - the need to see her again.
What had impacted him as much as anything else, was the memory of her telling him to tell her what he wanted her to do. All through his lifetime with Diana, he had always had to be the initiator - the one who had to move first, and who had to try and figure out what it would take to please her. And on the rare occasion where he had tried to ask her to do something - to try something different - she had always laughed as if it were a joke, and so things never changed between them. It wasn't bad - he didn't not enjoy making love to his wife - but it was always the same.
Alexis moved aside, welcoming him in. When she had closed the front door, she moved to the sofa once more and waited for him to speak.
Lincoln felt awkward - something he never felt anywhere else, no matter what he was required to do. But he spoke - honestly and openly - just as she had so far.
"I liked being kissed by you," he said simply, expecting her to laugh at him, like his wife would if he said such a thing. He instantly got his reply - and it was not a laugh.
"Then tell me to do it again," Alexis said, and heard him let out a long, deep breath. He was still standing, in one way afraid to sit down beside her.
"Stand up," he said - and she did it. "Kiss me, Lexi."
Immediately she raised up on tiptoe and placed her lips on his. She didn't put her arms around him, or lean into him even. She once again did exactly as he told her to - nothing more and nothing less.
While she kissed him, he relished the feel and taste of her lips on his. There was something so erotic about just their lips touching, without anything else happening. He liked it - he liked this 'not rushing to sex', as had always been the situation in his sexual life.
He pulled away from her and looked closely at her face. She was so young, he made himself observe once again. In fact, she must be around the same age that Diana had been when he had met her.
She sat down again, and now he settled beside her, as they looked at each other.
"Do you want me to listen to you talk about your work?" she asked and he was so surprised that he laughed softly.
"No, thank you Lexi. I don't want to think about my work right now," he said, feeling a bit more relaxed with some form of conversation finally setting in.
"Tell me what you want me to do," she said, with such a raw sound in her voice, and he felt himse
lf stretch to an extreme point of arousal. He had to move, to adjust himself in a way that might at least hide that from her. Then he just smiled at her.
"Have I mentioned how much I enjoy you kissing me?" he asked, shyly.
Alexis looked at him, knowing already that it was what he wanted her to do, but in her mind she needed to be told - clearly - without any hesitation - so she could have no doubt, and not do the wrong thing.
"Tell me what you want me to do," she said again and he fell under her spell again.
"Climb onto my lap," he tried, softly, not sure where she would regard his request as crossing a line, but the words were met with her standing up and then straddling him. "Put your hands on my chest," he ventured to say, feeling a bit more bold now, and he felt her do so. He knew now that there was no way he could hide his arousal from her - she was almost sitting right on it. "Kiss me."
Alexis heard each request and complied, happy to do so since she knew it was definitely what he wanted. She could feel how excited he was, and yet he was not asking her to have sex with him … yet.
They kissed for a long while, him eventually putting his arms around her and pulling her close to him, as he indulged in the feeling of their lips getting to know each other. And he could feel her moving on him, driving him to an extreme level of desire, but he did not sense that she was trying to deliberately pleasure him there - she was only doing what he had asked, and her movements, and the effect they were having on him, were just a by-product of that.
He felt her tongue wrapping around his and, as if from a great distance, he heard himself groan at the sensation. Even just kissing her was so different … it was intoxicating. He didn't want it to end. But it had to.
Firmly he pushed her away from him just enough so that their lips separated, but she was still on him.
"Lexi, I have never cheated on my wife," he said with a sound of despair in his voice. His hands were on either of her hips, and he found they felt very comfortable there. Not wrong at all. Right.
Alexis could see the confusion on him, and didn't want to contribute to that. Not for him. Not for anybody.
Painful Deliverance Page 9
