A shadow materialized in the mirror behind Isobel: Joseph, bare-chested and swinging a beer bottle between his finger and thumb. He fell into a bucket chair a few feet away from the bed–not just a golden ticket, but on the front row too.
Isobel’s hair pooled on the pillows. Beside her, I nuzzled into her throat and bit gently. My nipples sat stiffly against her arm.
“Do you like that, Bel?” Joseph said. “When she kisses you?”
“Yes,” she breathed.
“And when she sucks your nipples, does that get you wet?”
Louder this time. “Yes.”
I took the pink tips back into my mouth, swathing them in tongue-laced kisses. My hand crept down her stomach and rested on her satin knickers. I pushed my fingers beneath, probing just enough to coat the tips in her syrup, and she arched her back and moaned into my mouth as I caught the very edge of her clit. Then I drew my hand back up and spread the juices over her nipples, eating it off her in little licks and bites. It was so silky on my tongue.
“Tell me how she tastes, Leila,” Joseph said.
“Like a very bad girl. Like gin and honey.”
The bed braced beneath his weight. “She gets so noisy when I lick her. She squeals like the world is falling in.” A note of amusement lulled beneath the lust in his voice.
I kissed along Isobel’s shoulder. Paused by her ear to whisper. “Is that what you want? Do you want me to lick you?”
“In a moment,” she said. “First...I want you.”
I hadn’t expected her to be so forward. Another kiss, another x for our fucked little equation. “I’d like that a lot.”
“So would I,” Joseph said, his voice just a foot away from me and the worst breed of torment. He was close enough to cover me in those lingering bites, but no...that wasn’t part of the lie.
Not here.
He lay beside me as Isobel urged me onto my back. Then she straddled me, a teasing smile on her full peach lips and her heart-shaped face framed with hair.
Joseph pulled my thigh aside eagerly as she drifted down. I moaned as they exposed me. Something about that manoeuvre teased my nerves. Victims got attacked, prey devoured; which one was I?
Isobel looked up at Joseph. “Will you tell me what to do, schneemann? You know I’ve never done this before...”
He nodded. “Spread her open with your fingers. Look at her.”
An electric little shudder took me as she ran a finger over my slit.
“How does she look?” Joseph said.
Isobel chewed her bottom lip. “Shiny. Pink.” She teased my clit with the pad of her thumb, and I moaned again.
“Sounds almost as beautiful as you, baby.” He smiled.
She edged further down the bed until I felt her breath between my thighs.
“Taste her. Take your time,” he instructed. “Push your tongue into all the little dips and along all the lines. Leave her clit...that comes later.” His last words spilled over me in hot gushes, his eyes searing. I was on the menu.
I’d be served rare.
She spread me again and began a slow assault.
Close, so close now. Joseph knew, too. His smirk grew as my belly quivered. I reached down and pulled Isobel up as gently as I could. “You’re way too good at that...and it’s your birthday. You should be first.” Charlotte’s etiquette. She’s such a people person.
We arranged Isobel on her back with her slender thighs spread, her head on Joseph’s chest and his hands working her nipples. I’d been right about her pussy–a sundae shade of berry pink. The air around us shuddered as she sighed with relief.
I blew along the trail of tiny bites I’d left on her inner thigh. On the third time, she shoved her hips up toward my mouth, groaning loudly.
“Please–”
“Be patient. She’s only teasing,” Joseph murmured.
“Oh,” I breathed. “She’s gorgeous down here, all neat and luscious.”
“No more, please,” she whimpered.
She quivered on my fingers, and the tremble spread to her thighs. I mewed around her clit, sucked until she broke and came in writhing bursts. She cried out as if I bit chunks out of her.
I pressed my wet face into her belly as she calmed, bobbing up and down as she took heaving breaths.
“What do you think, Leila? Is she ready for me now?” Joseph toyed with her hair. The shadows lapped at him–even they wanted a taste of the sweat–had anyone ever told this man no?
“I think she’s never been more ready.” I kissed up Isobel’s belly and lingered at her mouth, my hand still between her legs. “In fact...I might have spoiled her.”
He laughed so close that it poured straight over my ears.
We swapped places, giggling as we bumped into each other in the near darkness. I tucked my legs up so I could kiss Isobel and make her suck my sticky fingers.
In my dirty secret of a profession, I had seen many torrid things–but none so erotic as Joseph fucking another woman. The way his brow dipped as he scooped her legs over his one shoulder, how he caught my eye as he made the first thrust. Isobel scratched down my arm as she was impaled.
I watched as he clutched her hips, his blond hair askew and sticking to his damp forehead. Swallowed up in a dream, I was the one beneath him, he took each long stroke deep inside me, I wailed like Isobel as he slammed her further up the mattress. If this didn’t end soon, his name would rush out before I could bite back down on it.
I hated him for that.
Joseph withdrew, his cock tight in his fist. His first drops splashed across Isobel’s belly and then they caught my breasts and my cheek, the warm aroma smacking up into my nostrils.
“Very resourceful,” Isobel said between breaths.
Oh Christ. Not even whores stoop to those lines.
Shut up, Charlotte.
I looked up at Joseph and he nodded his approval. Well. I slid down and lapped up his mess, rising to deposit it in Isobel’s bruised mouth with a deep kiss. She hummed her delight as she tasted him. Back on the pillows, I massaged the rest into my nipples and watched as they nuzzled at each other the way satisfied lovers do. I was jealous–I freely admit to that. Jealous, trembling, and still slippery wet.
I normally left at this point. The couple were absorbed in their wicked endeavours and wanted to congratulate each other in privacy, to reaffirm their passions with a languorous fuck. So I peeled my damp body from the sheets and crept into the huge living area, blinking in the bright light before I stumbled over to the glass doors.
The chill on the breeze scraped me as I searched for my clothes. I found them in a heap and took my time getting dressed–my limbs ached too much to rush.
Still. I needed a drink.
Inside, I could hear Joseph and Isobel talking and laughing in the bedroom. Cold water sloshed loudly into my glass and I winced at the hissing tap.
Joseph had asked that I wait for him. God, I wanted to. Could even see it play out. He would take me back to the balcony and shove me against the wall, ordering me to stay silent or else. His mouth would work up my thigh until he rested my leg on his shoulder, lashed out with his tongue as I tugged at his hair. When my knees were too weak, he’d push inside me and then–
Ah, no. I couldn’t hang around. What would Isobel say if she walked out now and saw me waiting? Job done, time to go home–this was my etiquette. Charlotte had relished the hunt way too much already.
As I closed the front door, a sigh erupted from the bedroom, and I knew they were immersed in each other. It felt too soon to be wearing my knickers again–the muscles there were taut in mourning. Then there was the lie made corporeal. Isobel thought she had reclaimed her lover…she didn’t know that he was mine, too.
Not that he felt like mine, of course. Not that he should be. Why did the little m-word turn my fists to silent fireworks?
I don’t know what kind of skewed logic had got its claws in, but I hailed a cab in one moment, and stood on Matt’s doorstep the next.
The doorbell chimed. Panic, panic–I looked dishevelled, pink, and probably reeked of sex. I’d barely rearranged my hair when the door swung open, and a topless, younger version of Matt crackled bank notes in his fist.
His eyes were wide as the doorway. “Don’t think I ordered you.”
I blinked, open-mouthed.
“I mean, I ordered pizza,” he went on, “but if they’re going to send me a...you, I’m not complaining.”
“Well, um, thank you. I don’t suppose Matt’s here?”
“Pah. Figures.” He stood aside and ushered me into the hall. “I’m Toby, by the way.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Toby.” Did I have lip gloss around my mouth? Why hadn’t I checked? “I’m a work friend of Matt’s.”
He led me to a sitting room where television licked at the walls in the dark. Matt sprawled over a corner group sofa, as topless as his brother and nursing a bucket of ice cream.
He jumped as he noticed me. “Leila. What the fuck are you doing here? Is there an emergency at the office?”
“No, no, it’s nothing like that...” My cheeks were seared in embarrassment. I’d only ever visited him to drop off work stuff, and suddenly, the fact that we weren’t this casual loomed, painful and huge. Why was I here?
The doorbell rang and Toby disappeared into the hall.
“I just wanted to talk to you, is all.”
“Oh.” Matt sat up to pat the space beside him. “Sit down, then?”
I picked my way over the stacks of files, textbooks and computer games.
“Sorry about the mess, by the way,” he said. “If you’d have called, I could have cleaned up–”
“It’s okay.” I smiled weakly. “Sorry for imposing on you like this.”
“No, it’s okay. It’s...nice.”
Toby stumbled through again, pizza box in hand. “I’ll leave you two to it,” he muttered, closing a door behind him.
There would have been an awkward silence, had it not been punctured by the TV.
“Want some ice cream?” Matt said finally, offering me the carton.
I squinted at it. “What flavour?”
“Ginger and lemon. I’m very cultured, as you can see.” He gestured to the surrounding room, littered with men’s magazines and empty beer bottles.
“Looks like it’s been a good night. Did I interrupt a mother’s meeting?”
“Just some brotherly bonding.”
I took the spoon from the ice cream bucket and licked it, tipping my head. His wide eyes followed. “It’s good.”
“Yep. So...what have you been doing tonight?”
“Um.” I tore my gaze from his muscled belly, trying to ignore the v-shaped slope that led to his cock. “I’ve been out for dinner with some friends.”
“Must have been somewhere nice, you being dressed up like that.”
I shrugged. “Yeah, it was okay.”
“You look beautiful.”
“Oh.” I broke into a flushed smile. “Thank you.”
“And you’re looking particularly fine tonight, Matthew,” he said, sighing wistfully. “Why, thank you Leila. That’s nice of you to say.”
I swatted at him. “Shut up, arse. You know you look good.”
“Do I?” He slumped, pushing his belly out. “And here I was, going for hobo slob.”
I laughed.
He watched my mouth, studied the way my lips moved. Contemplated kissing me, perhaps.
“So to what do I owe this little visit? Don’t suppose you changed your mind about my offer?”
“I don’t know. I mean, I did want to talk to you, I just–”
He reached over and stroked the hair away from my face. It was such a genuine gesture that my resolve melted like the ice cream. Then his breath mingled with mine, he sucked my bottom lip, his long eyelashes brushed my cheeks. I whimpered as the cold spoon fell into my lap.
“Who needs to talk?” he said gruffly. “Talk is just…boring...”
I let him peel my jacket away, arched my back, hands empty, breasts swollen against his chest. I was desperate for release now, so comforted by his desire–I wanted to give myself to somebody interested in only me. No rules, no limits. No games. If I felt more for him than I expected…well, I could ignore that, couldn’t I? The thrill of two...so it began.
“You changed your mind, then?” he asked.
I bit his nipple and he jumped. “Yes.”
“I’m thinking my stylish abode was a factor.”
I kissed his grinning mouth. “It’s the chemistry textbooks. I love a man who knows his way around the...periodic table.”
“I would tell you they were Toby’s,” he mumbled, “but I’m not in the mood to share you.”
The phone in my jacket pocket gave a tinny squeal, and Matt pulled away.
“You want to get that?”
“Not right now, no.”
He started to fetch it out himself. “This late, could be important–oh.” He scowled at the name that flashed on the screen. “You want to tell me why Joseph is calling you at this distinctly un-businesslike hour?”
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“I don’t know,” I lied.
“I don’t believe you,” he said quietly.
My voicemail announced its arrival with a chime. I didn’t know what to tell him so I sat awkwardly, wringing my hands.
“Well, only one way to find out.”
“Matt!” I shrieked as he dialled my voicemail.
He clicked on the speakerphone and Joseph’s voice poured out of the receiver:
“Where did you go, sweetheart? I thought you were waiting. She’s all tucked up in bed now and I’m sat here, so hard for you...”
I snatched the phone away and switched it off, my cheeks burning.
“How stupid do you think I am?” Matt snapped. “Seriously, what the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
Tears threatened, my pulse jumped. I’d done many questionable things this past year but I’d never felt as cheap as I did in that moment.
“I can explain–”
“I don’t want to hear it. It’s fucked.” He sprang up. “I think you should do me the courtesy of leaving, Leila.” He didn’t say don’t let the door hit your arse on the way out, but it was more or less implicit.
“I have to work for him now,” I said weakly. “I had to agree, so I can keep my job.”
“What do you mean? He’s blackmailing you?”
“Yes. No. Not exactly.” I stood to look him in the eye–I owed him that much. “I might as well tell you anyway. I’ve got nothing to lose, right? My parents are totally in the shit with their business. I nearly didn’t find out soon enough and I’ve been earning money so the bank doesn’t take everything.” I waited for his reaction for three bloated seconds.
He folded his arms, wouldn’t look at me.
“When you hired me, I had three jobs left before I’d earned enough to take care of things,” I went on. “Joseph said I had to do them with him if I wanted to stay with the company.”
“I guess you really do,” he said, his tone bitter.
I shrugged. “He could make things very hard for me, if he wanted to.”
“Judging by that voicemail, things are pretty hard for you already.”
“You’re acting like a jealous lover.”
“I am a jealous lover! I can’t believe you came over to offer me his fucking leftovers. What does it take to get you to see me as anything other than second rate? Should I beg?”
I squared my shoulders. Where did all of this come from, and when did these obligations settle in the dust of our hotel fuck? “Do you think you need to?”
He said nothing.
“You’re not second rate,” I said. “The way he treats me...I’m not stupid enough to think that I’m anything other than a toy.”
“You would like to be otherwise.”
“No, I wouldn’t.” Right? “Me and Joseph, we don’t...we’ve got nothing in common besides the obvious.”
I brushed my fingers against his arm to see if he would push me away. He eyed me suspiciously, but tolerated my caress anyway. “I like you.”
I meant it. I was as surprised as him.
“You’ve got an awfully convoluted way of showing it.”
The little smile made my lips ache. “I’m aware of that.”
He peeled my hand from his arm. “I can’t do it, Leila. Not while I know you’re still...for him.”
“But after the jobs are done?”
“I don’t know.”
“Would you at least consider being friends again, then?” Failing twice in one night–a new record. Ugh.
“I guess it would make things easier at work,” he said.
“Thank you. If you decide to, I mean.” I gathered up my coat and bag. “I’ll do you that courtesy.”
A mocking silence seeped in as we walked to the door. This was the only little death I’d get tonight–Matt and I.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“I know you are.” He chewed his bottom lip. “I’m sorry too.”
“It’s not your fault.”
He shook his head. “I shouldn’t have tried to complicate things between us. Or...well. It was unfair of me.”
“At least it was honest.” I considered kissing him on the cheek, but thought better of it. “I’ll see you on Monday.”
“Do you need me to call you a cab?”
“No, I’m only ‘round the corner.” The jacket slithered over my arms. “Thanks anyway.”
He’d barely closed the door when Toby erupted.
“Holy shit! She’s a prostitute? No wonder she looked so pissed when I opened the door with a twenty!”
Charlotte wagged a finger at him and laughed like she’d swallowed a wasp.
Chapter 4
There was a reason I’d suffered that split down the middle, and his name was Charlie Flemming.
He was forty-two. I was seventeen. I did work experience at his law firm and got a lot more than a mouthful of meandering Latin. I had my first proper boyfriend at the time, but it never mattered. Never felt wrong. Years passed before I realized why.
Like the silhouette in my dreams, first I blurred at the edges. Then my seams bulged and I peeled apart. Whether Charlotte stirred to life in Charlie’s palms, whether she waited all along as a savant twin, I’m not sure, but what I do know is that by the time Charlie married and our years of trysts came to an end, she was waiting. She was hungry.
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