THE WARMTH OF HIS TOUCH
A collection of five stories
Edited by Antonia Adams
Published by Xcite Books Ltd – 2012
ISBN 9781908766977
These stories have also been published in
Foreign Affairs - 9781908086587
Copyright © Xcite Books Ltd 2012
The stories contained within this book are works of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the authors’ imaginations and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be copied, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publishers: Xcite Books, Suite 11769, 2nd Floor, 145-157 St John Street, London EC1V 4PY
Contents
The Warmth Of His Touch Viva Jones
The Invitation The Invitation
The Oregon Trail Landon Dixon
Escape Clarice Clique
Burning Woman L A Fields
The Warmth of His Touch
by Viva Jones
It started as a dare. When Belinda confided in her best friend, Mia, about Alistair, the new man in her book club, and his quiet good looks, his reserved nature and his intellectual demeanour, she’d jokingly admitted that he was about as far from her type – which was rugged and sporty – as he could possibly hope to be. Mia had got very excited, quoting from the last self-help book she’d just read, and said that it was precisely because he was against type that she should date him.
‘We keep repeating mistakes,’ she’d insisted paraphrasing the book’s contents, ‘and looking for the same guy, only to find he has exactly the same faults as the last one. Until we break this pattern we’ll never move forward and find happiness. Think of your last three boyfriends – they all screwed up in the end, didn’t they? So try Alistair. Go on, I dare you. You never know, he might surprise you.’
Less than convinced, Belinda ensured that she sat next to him at the following book club meeting, and as he analysed and assessed the latest Booker winner (of which she’d only managed the first two chapters), she gazed into his soft grey eyes and studied the lines of his rather too thin lips. When she cracked a joke he didn’t laugh at her heart sank. There was no way she could last a whole date with this man, she thought. If they couldn’t laugh together, which certainly seemed the case, then they didn’t stand a chance. But she remembered Mia’s words, and persisted. A dare was a dare, after all, and Mia herself had just chosen against type and was already on her second date with Mike, an aircraft engineer. (‘Think of all the free flights,’ she’d exclaimed.)
The book discussed and reviewed, the group broke up into convivial chat, and Belinda turned to Alistair and asked about his life. He was a financial analyst, he told her, and had recently returned to the UK after a spell in Frankfurt. He lived alone, having broken up from his German girlfriend, and had a love for the arts, regularly attending concerts on the South Bank. His family originated from Norfolk and his parents owned a ski chalet in Austria. After the arts, skiing was his passion. All the time he was speaking Belinda ensured she watched him with a rapt expression on her face, and avoided revealing how low-brow her own tastes were, and that her favourite programme was Strictly Come Dancing and the last concert she’d attended was Kylie Minogue’s. He was a nice guy, she decided, if a bit stuffy. The sort of guy her parents would approve of. She could imagine them being very impressed. She and Alistair had nothing in common (although she’d love to learn to ski), but if she could just get one date out of him the dare would be won.
A week later, the date was suggested: a low-budget French film followed by a late supper at some Japanese place he knew close by. Subtitles were not really her thing, but Belinda managed to follow the movie (at least she enjoyed the glorious Parisian backdrop and the stylish clothes) and pretended to be interested as he gave it his assessment over bowls of steaming noodles and a cup of Japanese tea. She ached for a glass of wine but thought it inappropriate to ask for one.
Leaving the date with a quick peck on the cheek, Belinda told herself she’d never see Alistair again outside the book club. He was boring, somewhat on the self-engrossed side and they really did have nothing in common. But a few days later she found herself attending a recital with him, and pretending to enjoy it, followed by a stroll around the National Portrait Gallery. Was he trying to educate her? She tried making him laugh – a speciality of hers – and he’d allow her an indulgent smile, like a father being kind to an overexcited child, and on her way home Belinda told herself that was it. She’d refuse his next invitation, if indeed it was forthcoming. She’d had enough. She’d fulfilled her dare, he hadn’t changed her life (just slowed it down a little) and now it was time to move on.
On his next phone call, however, Alistair invited her to his family’s ski chalet in Austria. ‘It’s very modest,’ he insisted, ‘but comfortable and cosy, and there are some gentle slopes nearby making it perfect for beginners. Normally it’s rented out, but we got a last minute cancellation, and I thought it too good an opportunity to miss.’
As did Belinda. Telling herself she’d enjoy learning to ski, and that just maybe there’d be a bit of brandy about to ease the conversation, she decided to let him have one bad shag and then call it a day. Alistair would be wooden and awkward in bed and she was convinced she’d get nothing out of it, but it would mean she could walk away knowing she’d contributed to the weekend in her own special way. If Belinda was confident about one thing, it was her own sexual ability.
Meeting him at the airport, she was pleasantly surprised to see how good he looked in civvies – she’d only ever seen him in his work suit before. Now he was in jeans with a quilted jacket, his hair looked less groomed and he hadn’t shaved, and she began to see another layer of Alistair revealing itself in front of her. She liked the way he insisted on carrying her bag for her, and at security she even got a smile out of him with her striptease quip as she removed her belt, boots and jacket. On the plane they drank coffees and shared a pack of shortbread fingers, and, despite her misgivings, Belinda began to think that maybe the weekend wouldn’t be quite as dull as she’d imagined.
On their arrival, he hired a small car and they drove for half an hour up into the hills, through snow-clad forests and chocolate-box hamlets, to where the family ski chalet was based. Belinda had never seen such pretty scenery before, and was sorry that this would probably be the only time she experienced it. As they drew nearer, the chalet was everything she’d been expecting, with its broad snow-covered roof, shuttered windows and dark wooden balcony, and she persuaded herself that Alistair was someone she could maybe fall in love with after all.
‘It’ll be cold at first,’ he warned her as they entered. ‘But I’ll have the heating on in a jiffy and by the time we’re back it’ll be toasty, I assure you.’
Just the words “jiffy” and “toasty” were enough to make her doubt the weekend all over again.
The chalet was indeed cosy, however, with quilted throws over the sofas, lots of wood furniture and big old lamps, rugs that slipped a little on the polished wooden floors and a pretty kitchen that almost made her want to bake apple strudel.
Alistair deposited their luggage into the main bedroom, she noticed, saying they could sort their things out later. ‘Let’s hit the slopes first, eh?’
He had gear for her, his mother’s old skis and a suit belonging to his sister, and in no time Belinda thought she looked like a pro. Once on the slopes he was surprisingly patient with her, guiding her along, giving her gentle demonstrations and correcting her position. She found she liked him mo
re, as if he was the caring brother she never had, and the more she relaxed the better her skiing came along. Once, when she nearly took a tumble, he caught her, and as he held her in his arms, she felt the tiniest jolt of electricity between them.
But then he’d say something like, “You’re doing awfully well for your age”, and all her misgivings would come hurtling back, faster than an out-of-control snow-boarder.
One minute she fancied him, the next she couldn’t wait to get away.
Towards the end of the day, however, she felt guilty about holding him back, and urged him to head for a tougher slope while she enjoyed a hot chocolate laced with rum. Happily he obliged and when, a good hour later, he returned, skiing expertly right up to the café, she was reminded of James Bond, or some kind of action hero, and she reckoned that, with the help of two large tots of rum, he’d just got that little bit sexier.
She’d still dump him after the weekend, though. Deciding you weren’t totally bored by someone wasn’t a good enough excuse to keep seeing them.
When they returned to the chalet in the fading light, instead of finding it warm and toasty, as Alistair had promised, it felt even colder than before. ‘What’s gone wrong here then?’ he asked, checking the radiators and the thermostat. ‘Damn it, the boiler must have broken.’
He spent a while complaining to the management company while she huddled on a sofa, under one of its quilted throws.
‘Belinda I am so sorry,’ he told her once he got off the phone. ‘I feel terrible about this. Let’s go out for supper and warm up in a restaurant.’
They did so, and enjoyed a hearty stew and a good bottle of red wine, followed by a glass each of the house wine. They were in for a cold night, after all. He was mortified about the heating, he kept telling her, and Belinda kept repeating that it wasn’t his fault, and that she’d be all right. But on arriving back at the chalet, it felt so utterly chilled that she didn’t even want to change into her night clothes.
‘I don’t want to sound presumptuous, but if we share a bed we’ll get warmer,’ Alistair suggested, as she nodded bleakly, the buzz of the wine dissipating in the cold air.
While he was in the bathroom, Belinda took a deep breath, pulled off her clothes and threw on her deliberately unsexy pyjamas, adding a pair of thick socks for good measure. Then she climbed into bed, lying flat on her back and pulling the thick duvet up around her. Alistair emerged from the bathroom in his pyjamas, and climbed primly into bed beside her.
‘I’m so sorry about this,’ he whispered, lightly touching her hair. ‘Tomorrow we’ll spend the day skiing and then we’re on the evening flight home. We’ll survive.’
‘It’s OK,’ she whispered back. ‘I’ve had a wonderful time.’
‘Good.’ He leant forward and kissed her gently, a peck on the lips, and Belinda braced herself for what was to come. She might as well let him have sex and get it over with, she decided. What was the harm?
He kissed her again, and this time his tongue poked through to meet hers, and she felt an instinctive darting feeling between her legs. His tongue was surprisingly adept, and she began to relax into the kiss, folding him in closer with her arms. His right hand crept under her pyjama top towards her breast, her nipples already firm due to the cold, and as he touched them she gasped – so warm were his fingers as they stroked and played with her nipples that she could feel her skin immediately reacting to them. He then climbed on top, dislodging the thick duvet as he did so, and allowing more cold air to embrace her body. He pushed her pyjama top right up and took each breast in his hands, and although this meant they were exposed to the cold air, his hands kept them warm, and the difference in temperature was exciting in itself. There was an element of pleasure and pain here, and Belinda didn’t know which she preferred, so chose to lose herself in the sensation.
Then he slid down and started to kiss her breasts, and to suck and gently flick at each nipple with his tongue, and once again his warmth stirred her, and she felt it flooding inside her, permeating her skin, and if there’d been an infra-red camera poised above her, it would reveal her blue skin gently turning a soft red. He began kissing her tummy now, moving gently but persistently down her body, teasing her by taking his time, and Belinda felt herself becoming wet with desire. When he reached the waistband of her pyjama bottoms, he hesitated, but by now Belinda was in no doubt and wanted him to go further. She raised herself up a little so that he could pull them down, and he took the initiative, kissing and nibbling her further along her body, on her tummy, the front part of her hips and the tops of her thighs.
He paused again, as if unsure whether he should go further, and she whispered, ‘Go on,’ while opening her thighs in encouragement.
Soon Alistair’s head was above her pubic mound, and his tongue persuasively searching between her thighs, and Belinda gasped as she felt his heat tickling her, dipping inside her like a searchlight, gently probing and exploring her pussy lips, flicking at her clit and all the nerve-endings surrounding it. She opened her thighs wider and he readjusted, placing his hands – now positively hot – under each buttock and lifting her off the mattress, so that his tongue was free to explore her more deeply. And with every kiss she felt herself warming, with every flick of his tongue she felt her will softening, and every time he scored a direct hit on her clit she felt herself quietly exploding. Even though the air was bitterly cold, she could feel warmth spreading from his tongue to her pussy and further outwards across her body. It was as if she’d been trapped under an avalanche and Alistair was rescuing her: breaking through the ice, digging out the snow, warming her with his very breath.
He inserted his index finger inside her and it was like a bar of heat warming her to the core, and she longed for his cock.
‘My turn,’ she whispered, manoeuvring him off her and onto the bed beside her. As she climbed on top of him, she gasped as the cold air hit her back, and then slid down to where his cock was straining inside his pyjama bottoms. She released it within the open fly and took it in her mouth, where once again she was amazed at how hot it was, like a beacon of heat, and as she licked and sucked him and took him as deep inside her mouth as she could, she felt like an ice sculpture coming to life, as if previously she had been just a form with neither emotional nor spiritual depth, but with his heat her brittle exterior was melting away, and she was becoming a complete and sensitive and emotional living being.
He pulled her up and sat upright, and she straddled him, positioning herself on his cock, and then slid herself down on it, so that he filled her and her pussy became the centre of her warmth, a life-force in itself, and she rode him and they kissed, exchanging fluids and juices, warmth and tenderness, and he held her by her buttocks and she clung onto his back, and when one of his fingers slipped inside her butt she thought she was going to explode, and their kissing became more frantic and feverish, as if without it they would both die of cold, and he pushed her over so that she was on her back and he plunged deeper and deeper inside her, taking control, pummelling her as if without his cock her life would surely slip away, and she came in such an outburst it almost took her breath away, crying and screaming and holding him hard and pulling him inside her until it felt he might split her in two, and then he came, crying out in what seemed like anguish, his heat-force extinguishing, his power subsiding, and he slumped over her and their bodies lay as one, dripping in sweat, and they kissed each other gently, laughing at the strange urgency of their sex, and a need that was greater than them both.
The next morning, nestled against his body under two thick duvets, Belinda wished she could stay that way for ever. Who needed central heating when there was a man like Alistair around? In the rising sun they made love again, more tenderly this time, and she enjoyed seeing his body in the new light, the firmness of his muscles and the smoothness of his skin. For an office-type he kept himself pretty trim, she noted, and although most of her previous lovers had boasted the thick-set physique of rugby players, she now appreciated
his slender form.
‘Breakfast in the café and then shall we hit the slopes again?’ he suggested and, suddenly ravenous, she agreed.
And while they ate, dipping their croissants into hot chocolate and laughing at the resultant mess, Belinda wondered about the overwhelming sense of love she suddenly felt for this man. He was, after all, everything a woman could ask for: he was steady and loyal, he had a love of the arts, he was kind, he made decent money, and he had a chalet in Austria – and she couldn’t understand what had held her back until now. Why hadn’t she seen what had been staring her in the face? Was she so shallow that great sex was all it took?
And with that thought came a new question: was the sex great because she loved him, or did she now love him because the sex was great? Because Belinda knew with a sudden and fierce conviction that she really did love him. As if black had become white, and fire had turned into snow, everything he did and everything he said attracted her. He seemed to smile more, and his conversation had grown lighter and wittier, as if he was no longer trying to impress her with his intellect. His reserve had melted, revealing a quiet confidence that was so much more alluring than the braying beer-swillers she’d found such fun until now. Suddenly Alistair stood out from the crowds, as if there was a glow around him, and his features, which she’d deemed on the bland side before, had become handsome and dashing and sexy.
In a revelation that shocked and excited her, Belinda knew with certainty, over that breakfast, that this was the man she must marry, and that this was the father of her children.
And when it clouded over, chilling the temperature by several degrees, theirs was an easy decision. With two hours to kill before they had to leave for the airport, they climbed back into bed, and once again she was struck by the warmth of his tongue and of his touch, and she knew that with Alistair in her life, she’d never feel cold again.
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