New Beginnings

by Elle M Thomas

  “What? What about you, Eve?” Gray felt completely out of his depth with this amount of emotion on show.

  “I felt relieved, relieved and released from my obligation, and yet totally devastated and bereft at the loss of the man Max had once been,” cried Eve, sobbing tears of guilt and grief in equal measures having honestly admitted how she'd felt for the first time ever.

  Her shoulders heaved and lurched as her whole body shook uncontrollably.

  “Hey, ssh,” soothed Gray, pulling Eve across him until she was sitting nestled in his lap. He held her firmly against his body as his hand stroked her hair down gently. “Eve, you were in an impossible situation and I am sure that anybody in your position would have felt relieved to be released from the life you were living, including Max. I don't pretend to know Max or understand how he would have felt, but he loved you, he married you in spite of his mother's objections, he planned a future with you and I would put money on the fact that he would want you to live your life to the full, not have a half-life overshadowed by guilt,” said Gray sincerely. They sat for a few minutes before Gray spoke again, “I guess it explains why you would revert to your maiden name and move in with Sally.”

  “I needed to be me, just Eve,” she explained, releasing herself from his grip slightly to look at his face hoping not to see pity.

  He looked sad, concerned, but no pity, not yet.

  “This rarely happens to me, Eve, but I am at a loss for words,” said a serious Gray.

  “Then don't say anything because if you force yourself to say something it is likely to be, 'I am so sorry for your loss, you poor girl', 'not even twenty nine, oh that's no age is it?' or worse still 'what a tragedy'.”

  “I'll just say nothing then,” said Gray with only a hint of a question in his statement.

  “Sometimes less is more.” She smiled weakly as she got to her feet. “I'll be back in a moment.” She excused herself to head to the bathroom.

  Chapter 9

  Gray stood and wondered how to deal with this, it was huge, and he didn't really do emotional stuff. He was at best uncomfortable with it and more usually inept, but with Eve he wanted to do whatever she needed to work through this. Why though? He peered out of the bare window and down onto the communal garden below Eve's third floor flat. He had known Eve for two weeks, had spent two nights with her, that was it, yet he was desperate to be with her and to make things okay for her, for himself, for them both.

  This really was alien to him, he'd never really had what he considered a proper girlfriend before, although he knew some of the fleeting fancies he'd encountered would disagree, but usually it was just sex, an escort to a function, but never anything more, nothing more meaningful or long term, not to him, so why did he want more than just sex from Eve? Eve who was as damaged as he was, one way or another. Eve who may not want anything more than sex. No, he knew she felt it like he did.

  Eve looked at her reflection in the bathroom mirror and wondered if she had overshared. She briefly wondered if Gray would still be there when she returned to the lounge or whether he would have cut his losses, having decided that she was far too damaged and complicated to take a chance on, regardless of the great sex they had shared.

  Max had been her forever and although he was no longer around it still felt strange to be entertaining the idea of seeing someone else. She loved Max and still felt sad and bereaved at his loss and that was surely going to be difficult for another man to empathise with and understand.

  With a splash of water on her face, Eve decided she should return to Gray, assuming he was still there, waiting for her.

  Gray still couldn’t shake the feelings in his head, thoughts about Eve and Max, the fact that there had been a Max, a husband she had once planned on spending her life with. He wondered now if she'd had sex since Max or if he'd been the first and suddenly that mattered to him, he couldn't be jealous of a dead man, well, he could and was in some ways, but he felt reassured that Max posed no threat, it's not like he was coming back to reclaim his wife was it? No, he answered to himself and then, catching sight of his own reflection in the large, silver framed mirror hanging over the sideboard, he didn't like what he saw or what he was thinking about 'poor Max'.

  “You selfish bastard,” he told himself when he noticed Eve's fresh-faced reflection in the mirror, growing larger as she approached him.

  “Have I shared too much?” asked Eve, her own inner, nervous thoughts coming back at the sight of his anxious expression reflected in the mirror.

  Instinctively, she wrapped her arms around his waist from behind and stroked her way up until her hands were resting on his tensed pectoral muscles. She peered around the side of his shoulder watching him watching her.

  “No, I wanted to know what your story was and now I do, well, part of it anyway. I feel a little guilty that I made you tell me things that have upset you, but I think I understand why you've made some of the choices you have recently.” He raised his arm to put it around Eve's shoulders, pulling her to stand in front of him.

  “Hey, you've put your shoes back on.” He smiled as he noticed her increase in height. “Do you want to go out?” he asked, confused now.

  “No,” replied Eve with a confirming shake of her head.

  “What do you want to do then?” Gray dropped his hands to rest on her hips.

  With a roll of her eyes she grinned up at him. “You.”

  “Me?” he asked, frowning.

  “Yes, you, Gray.” She dropped her hands to the hem of his t-shirt and slipped them beneath his clothing.

  A low gasp left her lips as she felt the heat of Gray's body warming her own, inside and out.

  “Eve,” he said as a protest at her suggestion.

  “Please, Gray, I need you, please.”

  He looked down at her and considered his response; he definitely wanted her, the throb from his already semi hard dick was shouting its objections to him considering an honourable retreat.

  “Gray,” she moaned as her hands made their way to his pecs under his t-shirt and then to the dark, firm discs of his nipples. She gave them a gentle roll. “I'll beg if I need to.”

  “I am trying to do the right thing,” he protested.

  “Then tell me you have a condom,” she replied as one hand dropped to the button of his jeans. “Do you have a condom?” She persisted.

  “You're sure?” he asked, still hesitant. “You want to go to bed?”

  “Forget bed for now.” She pulled her dress up slightly before lifting herself up onto the sideboard.

  “Here?” asked a startled looking Gray.

  Her response was to spread her thighs, exposing her stocking tops and white lace brief.

  “God, Eve!” He gasped as he lunged forward to kiss her but met the obstacle of her hand brushing across his lips.

  “Gray, please, a condom,” she repeated.

  “Already?” he asked, understanding that she was asking for sex, a fuck, no kissing or foreplay, just the physical act of him shagging her.

  Her nod was as much as he needed to proceed. Reaching beneath her dress he hooked his fingers into her underwear and with a lift of her behind he pulled them down over her thighs, to her knees where he allowed them to fall to the floor.

  “I'm not normally a wham, bam, thank you mam kind of guy, so I have a couple of provisos,” he told her with an arched brow. “One, I'll add those to my collection.” He picked her knickers up off the floor and put them in his back pocket. “Two, keep the shoes on. Three, I imagined you were in stockings in the office, so,” he said as he raised her dress even higher so that it bunched above her pubic mound exposing her and her stockings for him completely. “And finally, after this we go out, I buy you a dinner that isn't salad, we buy condoms, hundreds of the fucking things and then I fuck you again, how I choose, not a quickie.”

  “Yes,” she gasped, desperate for him to move closer, so desperate that she attempted to wrap her legs around him to pull him forward.

&nb
sp; Smiling, he smacked her thigh lightly making her squeal as she released him. He pulled his wallet from his back pocket and opened it to reveal a myriad of credit cards in a variety of colours, but she couldn't have cared less about them, she only had eyes for the single, gold, square, foil wrapper that he held up as if it was an Olympic medal as he threw his wallet down next to Eve. He undid the button of his jeans, then the zip before pulling his jeans down as far as his mid-thighs revealing his lack of underwear and his erection.

  “Please, Gray,” she cried as he set a tantalisingly long, cruel pace of sheathing himself before looking from her pained expression to her hands that were opening her own labia to invite him in.

  He thrust into her, burying himself in her fully, causing a huge ripple of excitement to flutter through her along with some discomfort that excited her even more. This is what she'd wanted; if Gray had kissed her, touched her, played with her she would have been sodden before he had been inside her. His passage in would have been well lubricated making it an easy entrance, but that's not what she wanted or needed, she needed the friction of her being almost dry. She gasped again as he pulled back, almost leaving her body before driving back into her.

  “Yes, yes, harder, Grayson, please,” she called.

  Pulling back again and then pounding against her firmly, Gray watched her expression, her eyes illuminated with arousal and pleasure, glittering various shades of green and gold, her breathing becoming louder and more raspy, her lips, red and swollen, covering almost all of her teeth, just the two top front ones biting down into her lower lip firmly. God, that made him horny, watching her like this. It excited him more than the sight of her chest rising and falling, showing off her magnificent breasts, swollen with the two hard bullets of her nipples protruding through her dress. Dropping his gaze lower he watched the image of his own penis disappearing between her stocking clad thighs, into her hot pussy that was pulling and sucking against him. Her voice was making strange little mewling noises that he knew were indicators that she was close to coming, the knowledge of which pushed him closer to coming himself, although he was sure he wasn't as close as she was.

  He looked over her head now and watched his own expression in the mirror until Eve's arousal cranked up a notch and she threw her head to the side so that he could see both of them in the mirror suddenly.

  “Eve,” he called to her.

  “Mmm,” she replied, raising her hips to meet him.

  “Don't come, not yet, wait for me,” he told her pushing her hips back down.

  “I might not be able to,” she cried, grabbing at his shoulders and gripping them firmly.

  “You can do it, baby, for me.” He lowered his mouth to her ear where he whispered, “Do you have a big mirror? In your bathroom or bedroom, maybe on your wardrobe?” he asked so darkly that his words sounded like an enticing threat that made her clench her insides tightly around him, urging her towards her climax. “Eve,” he said firmly. “A mirror?”

  “What? Yes, in my bedroom, the wardrobe doors are mirrors,” she panted as she attempted to ward off her climax whilst listening to the sounds of Gray's erratic breathing and his balls slapping against her behind.

  “Big mirrors?” he asked, confusing her by his sudden interest in mirrors. Maybe he was thinking of things that wouldn't arouse him so that he could last longer which would cause her problems if he really wanted her to wait for him.

  “Yes, big ones, floor to ceiling,” she told him, making him smile.

  “You look so gorgeous like this, Eve, when you're being fucked and when you come, there is nothing better. I'm going to fuck you in front of your mirror, Evie, so that you see what I see. I am going to make you come so that you can see. I will fuck you and you will watch me coming and do you know what else you're going to see, baby?” he asked with real torment in his voice now as the pace and power of his thrusts increased.

  “What?” she moaned with desperation tingeing her words.

  “You are going to see me spank your arse. I'm going to make it red and sting and you will love it, won’t you?”

  “Yes,” she cried. “Grayson, please,” she pleaded.

  “And when I spank you what will you do, Eve? What will it make you do, you dirty, dirty girl?” He waited for a reply.

  Recalling what happened last time he had done that she could hold back no longer as she replied, “I'll come, Grayson, you'll make me come, oh God, I can't stop!” she cried now.

  “Come baby, now, do it for me, oh yes!” he cried as she began to thrash around screaming some inaudible sentiment as she dragged her nails from his shoulders down his chest which was Gray's undoing too as he viciously drove into her three, maybe four more times before pinning her hips down as his pelvis froze against hers so that his hot semen left him violently.

  Hooking her ankles together behind him she clung to him as she pulled his face up to hers and kissed him, gentle, tender kisses and then a little more passionately as he allowed her to breach his mouth briefly before pulling back.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, making him smile.

  “You are very, very welcome, Eve.” He pushed her hair back into the nape of her neck. “We should probably get off the furniture.” He grinned as he pulled out of her making her wince and him smile. “You wanted it harder,” he told her as if to say that there would be no sympathy for her sore, swollen and bruised delicate folds.

  Flushing slightly, she watched him remove the condom and secure its contents before rearranging himself and pulling up his jeans.

  “Where's the bathroom?” he asked still holding the used condom.

  “In the hall,” she said, pointing, “On the right.”

  She eased herself off the sideboard as he left the room and turning, she looked at her own reflection and thought of what he'd said about mirrors and her watching them, watching herself. That had really turned her on and she really did hope he meant it and that he would do that for her very soon. Pulling her dress down she wondered if her reaction to telling Gray about her and Max and his death was normal. Looking across the room to the huge TV/media storage unit that matched her sideboard she noticed a picture of her with Sally and Max at Sally's twenty-fifth birthday party just before Max had become ill.

  She walked towards it, picked it up. “You'd like him, Maxi.” She stroked across the image of his face with the pad of her thumb before hearing the toilet flush.

  Placing it back down she smiled at the happy smiling faces before heading into the kitchen to put some coffee on while loading the dishwasher.

  Sitting in the window of a small Italian restaurant a few streets from Eve's flat they were waiting for the waiter to return and take their order when Gray asked, “What are you going to do about work? You didn't really resign from your job with Sally, did you?”

  “Yes, I did and I’m rather glad,” she replied as he poured them each a glass of water.

  “Glad? Why? There's no need because of us. I can assure you that if Sally is offered the chance to work on the Marshall campaign it will only be because of her talent, not us,” he said seriously.

  “I know that, well I do now, but as I said earlier I am not an advertising person, it was something to fill my time, what I needed, but no more, even if it does have some common ground with PR. I'm financially secure for the time being so...” she said her voice trailing off as the wine waiter returned.

  “Wine, sir?” he said turning to Gray.

  “Do you want wine, Eve? I might stick with water or soft drinks. I'm driving home and we had wine with lunch.” He looked across the table at Eve's sudden, disappointed expression, confused. “What?”

  “Nothing, sorry. just a half bottle of the house white then, thanks,” replied Eve, directing her order towards the very young Mediterranean looking waiter.

  “What?” asked Gray as the waiter left them alone.

  “Nothing.” She pouted slightly.

  “Eve, what?” he asked for the third time with an expression that sugg
ested he was unlikely to ask her again.

  “I assumed you'd stay, tonight, with me,” she admitted, then shook her head at herself. “Sorry, I appear to have become a crazy, needy, emotionally unstable woman who is incapable of functioning without…I was going to say a man, but that would be incorrect because I don't need a man, I need you.”

  “And you don't like it, I assume?” Gray asked, already sensing that Eve needing someone else was something she wouldn’t really encourage and although he could understand her sense of self-preservation after Max’s death, he felt that she’d always been that way and that her independence may be why she hadn’t ‘needed’ to be married which he could relate to.