by JS Taylor
“I wouldn’t expect anything less,” I retort. “So, what’s for dinner?”
“Scallops with bacon and black pudding to start,” he says.
“Very English,” I say, approvingly. “Sounds delicious.”
“Coq au Vin for the main,” he continues. “And, if you have room, chocolate mousse for desert. I didn’t make the mousse,” he admits.
“You ordered it from Harrods I presume?” I joke.
“There’s a little farmhouse a few miles away. They make incredible things with free range eggs and cream.”
I slide myself onto a diner-style stool and watch as James flips scallops into a broiling hot pan.
“I never thought I’d see you like this,” I say, after a moment.
“Like what?” James looks up from his hot pan.
“So, domestic.” I wave my hand towards him.
He smiles. “That’s what love will do to a man.”
I feel my heart melt. I can hardly believe he’s saying it out loud.
He loves you.
James looks up and catches me smiling. He smiles back.
“Sit down,” he says. “It will be ready soon.”
He gestures to a long dining table. I walk over to it obediently and sit myself down. This whole scene seems somehow surreal. Particularly when there’s a dangerous stalker on the loose.
Can we catch him without offering me up as bait?
James arrives, holding two plates of scallops and a single glass of white wine. He positions a plate and the glass in front of me.
“No wine for you?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “We’re only half a day from apprehending this stalker. I want to keep my head clear. And not make any mistakes.”
James seats himself opposite me.
“There’s a good chance he’ll try and get back to that room we found,” he says.
“A pretty good chance?”
“Try a scallop.” He gestures with his fork. “They’re best hot.”
I eat one and murmur approvingly, as a reflex.
“Delicious,” I say. “I thought they would be.”
“Good.” He eats one of his own.
I stare up at him, and suddenly, what’s wrong with the situation seems to come crashing around me.
“You have to use me,” I say. “You have to use me as bait. You’re not sure the DNA will be enough to catch him.”
“I am sure it will be,” says James. But he won’t look in my eyes.
“You’re risking losing him,” I say. “If you don’t use me, he could get away.”
James strikes the table suddenly with his fist, causing me to jump.
“I will not use you as bait.” His voice is only a little louder than usual. But it’s the sheer force of it which causes me to freeze, wide-eyed.
“I’m sorry,” he says, the gentleness returning to his tone. His puts down his fork and slides his hand over to take mine.
“I can’t do it, Issy. I’m not strong enough.”
I’m shaking my head. “You’re strong enough,” I say, “to protect me from anything.” I really believe it.
James shakes his head.
“I don’t doubt I’m strong enough to protect you,” he says, and I see fire in his eyes. “I would defend you from an entire army of stalkers. But I’m not strong enough to lose you.”
His eyes are searching mine. “I know what is the sensible thing to do,” he admits. “They all tell me. Will. You. But I won’t do it. I won’t risk you. Even slightly.”
We sit for a moment, eating in silence.
“I think you are strong enough,” I say quietly. I let the words hang there, saying nothing else. James doesn’t reply, but he’s shaking his head.
He rises, after a moment, and takes our empty plates back to the kitchen.
“Let me wash up,” I call after him.
“No need. Dishwasher.”
“Let me load the plates.” I rise to my feet and follow him. He’s leaning on the kitchen worktop – a polished cement creation which looks like it belongs in an art gallery. He looks distraught.
I fold my arms around him.
“Look, I’m sorry,” I say. “We won’t talk about it anymore. Ok?”
I pull back to stare into his eyes, and nudge him gently with my nose.
“Ok?”
“Ok,” he says. His eyes fall on mine, full of open honesty. “Let’s enjoy this evening together.”
Something about the finality of it unsettles me. As though he’s thinking it could be our last. Is he risking this movie? Because he won’t risk me?
I have a bad feeling that he’s letting his heart rule his head.
James reaches into an oven and emerges with a pan of bubbling chicken and wine. It smells incredible.
“Go sit back down,” he admonishes me. “You’re not supposed to see backstage.”
I laugh, and return to my seat. I hear him pulling out plates and clinking cutlery.
In a moment, he’s back at the table, dishing up food.
“Why, Mr. Berkeley,” I say, as the amazing fragrances waft from the pan. “You are a man of many talents.”
“You have no idea,” he says with a wicked grin.
I feel a little thrill of lust. How does he do that?
“You do realise,” he says, taking a seat, “that if this movie goes ahead, you will soon be experiencing the Berkeley Method.”
If this movie goes ahead. This is sounding less certain by the minute.
James places a plate in front of me, filled with richly coloured meat, green vegetables and potato dauphinoise.
“Wine?” he asks.
“No thanks,” I reply, not wanting to drink with him abstaining.
He nods without commenting.
“This looks great,” I say, taking a hearty forkful.
The food tastes out of this world.
“That is really, really good,” I say. “You’ll have to cook for me more often.”
“It’s a once a year event,” says James with a smile. “And always the same meal.”
I shrug. “Worth waiting for.”
James begins eating his own food.
“So,” he continues, “are you ready to open up to your fellow actors?”
He’s talking about his famous Berkeley Method, I realise.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” I confess. “Since we spoke in the restaurant.” I take another mouthful of food and swallow, giving myself time to choose my words.
“It frightens me,” I admit, finally.
“I know.” James takes my hand.
“But at the moment,” I continue, “it doesn’t frighten me as much as the fact the movie might not go ahead.”
I pull my hand back from James’s, and sigh.
“I didn’t have a messed up childhood, James,” I say. “I know you might think I did. But I didn’t.”
James says nothing. He simply waits, listening. I feel myself held in his soft green eyes.
“After the death of my father,” I continue, “things were hard. But not how you might think. They were far harder on my mother than they were on me.”
I look up at him. I feel as though he’s absorbing every word. But lightly, without assumption. For some reason, it makes me talk.
“She had it really tough,” I continue. “He left her all alone.”
James raises his eyebrow at my choice of words, but doesn’t comment.
“She was a single mother,” I say, rephrasing. “We were living in a kind of commune situation. Lots of penniless artists everywhere. Things weren’t stable at all. Money was tight. My mother was grieving, and trying to bring me up.”
“How old were you?” he asks.
“I was five,” I say.
James is quiet for a moment.
“It seems strange that a five year old should know so much about her mother’s struggles,” he comments. There is no judgement in his voice. It’s simply an observation. But it sparks a flare of anger
in me.
“She was distraught!” I reply, my voice rising. “She was alone and abandoned. With a five year old to feed and clothe. My mother cried every morning, and every night, for five years after my father’s death.”
I am trying to put things into context. To explain how much worse things were for Mami.
But, something about what I’m saying is starting to reorder itself. Suddenly, scenes of my childhood are making less sense.
“It sounds,” says James, gently, “as though your mother took all the drama of your father’s death. And left none for you.”
The truth of his statement settles around me with cool certainty.
Yes. That’s exactly how it was.
I try and shrug it off.
“That wasn’t all that happened, was it?” asks James. “She failed you in other ways, didn’t she?”
His choice of words is enough to tip me over the edge.
“Don’t you dare judge my mother!” I shout. “At least she didn’t send me away! To some cold boarding school! You have no right. No right! To judge us.”
In a moment, James is by my side. And then I’m in his arms, sobbing, and he’s stroking my hair.
“It’s alright, Issy,” he says. “It’s alright.”
But it isn’t. For some reason, I can’t stop crying.
I lean into him, heaving with great wracking sobs. He holds me tight, and says nothing.
Then, after a few minutes, the storm passes. I feel lighter, suddenly. Freer. Is this what it would be like? To open up to him? To tell him everything?
Nothing bad happened to you. I remind myself. Nothing bad at all.
I find myself staring into James’s eyes, and my thoughts turn back to calm.
Then, in a sudden moment, they twist in another direction. And before I realise what’s happening, I’m kissing him passionately.
He pushes back against me, catching me tight in his arms. And suddenly, every fibre of my being needs him.
James looks into my eyes.
“I want you,” I say, fixing him with my intent.
“Not like this,” he says, shaking his head. “Not to push the pain away.”
“I…” I open my mouth, not sure what to say. Hurt tunnels through me. The rejection burns.
James lifts me up in one easy movement, and I struggle against him.
“Where are you taking me?” I demand, pinned tight in his arms.
“I’m taking you to the bedroom,” says James. “And I’m going to hold you. Until you feel better. And then I’m going to make love to you.”
I stop struggling.
He moves me into the bedroom and lays me gently on the bed, kissing my face and neck.
Then he slides in next to me and wraps his arms around me, nuzzling his mouth into my hair.
We lay like that for a long time, with thoughts buzzing through my head.
I close my eyes, letting the warmth of his arms support me.
Then it is just James and me. Nothing else. Lying next to one another.
I turn to face him.
The sadness that I’d felt has gone. Replaced by a completely different emotion.
“Is that what you want?” he asks, understanding my expression instantly.
I nod and he moves forward to kiss me. Then I pull up my T-shirt over my head.
James responds by helping me relinquish the T-shirt. He unhooks my bra and kisses the tops of my breasts.
Then he unbuttons my jeans and slides them off me.
“Take your clothes off too,” I murmur. I want him naked, his skin next to mine.
James pulls off his T-shirt and tugs off his jeans. In a moment, he’s naked, apart from his boxers.
He loops his fingers around the top of my panties.
“I have a confession to make,” he says, pausing with his hands there. “I’m innocent myself, in a way.”
My eyes widen.
“Not in that way, of course,” he adds. In a sudden movement, he tugs away my panties and frees them from my legs.
I bat his cheek playfully, my previous tears forgotten. “I don’t want to know what you’ve got up to with other women,” I scold.
“Of course. How un-gentlemanly of me to allude to it,” says James. He moves his hand to the top of my legs. I feel myself quiver.
“Please accept my apologies,” he says.
“Accepted,” I whisper.
He’s staring at me intensely now.
“What I mean,” he says, “is that I have never made love. Not to someone I’m in love with. Not to someone like you.”
I blink at him, surprised by the sudden turn in conversation.
“What do you mean?” I ask, swallowing a little.
“I mean that I want to make love to you, if you’ll let me.”
The question is so unexpected, I am hardly prepared for the kiss that comes next.
It takes me into some other place, where only James and I exist. He moves his lips gently against mine, and I feel his heartbeat, his skin on mine.
“Issy,” his whispers, keeping his mouth close.
“Yes?” My voice comes slow, drugged with the pleasure of kissing him.
“Show me how to make love to you.”
“What do you mean?”
He moves so he’s positioned resting over me.
“Show me what you like,” he says.
“I… I don’t know how to show you.”
He’s so experienced. Is he really asking me this?
“Don’t worry about what you don’t know,” says James, sensing my uncertainty. “Just feel it. Feel what you’d like me to do, and tell me.”
He kisses my mouth and runs his hands down the sides of my body.
“Do you like me here? On top of you?”
I think about this for a moment, battling to overcome my embarrassment of talking about it. “Yes.”
“What do you like about it?”
This throws me. What do I like about it?
“I like that your weight is on me,” I say slowly. “It makes me feel protected.”
He thinks about this and wraps his arms tighter around me, circling my back.
Mmmmm. That’s nice.
“Does this make you feel more protected too?”
“Yes.”
“How do you want me to make you wet?”
What a question! I feel myself blushing.
James kisses my lips again. “Don’t be shy. I want to know. Shall I use my hands? Or my mouth?”
This, at least, is easier to answer.
“Your hands,” I say. “Then I can see your face.”
“That’s important to you?”
“Yes.”
James nods. “I’m still learning, Issy, how to best please you. I might not get it completely right at first. If I don’t, you have to tell me.”
He’s trying so hard to please me. I am touched, almost to the point of tears.
Then I feel his hand slide between my legs, and the feelings twist to instant desire.
“You’re wet already,” he murmurs.
“I… like it when you kiss me,” I admit.
“That’s enough to get you wet? Just that?”
“Yes.”
James looks as though he’s understanding something profound.
“Wow,” he says, after a moment. It’s such an uncharacteristically informal word for him, that I smile.
“I mean it,” he says. “I can get you wet just by kissing you. It makes me feel… powerful.”
“That’s love for you,” I reply.
James considers this.
“Yes,” he says slowly. “Yes, I suppose so.”
He slides his hand down further and begins working me softly with his fingers.
“Oooohhh…” I hear myself moan with pleasure. His fingers are so adept.
“So, then,” whispers James. “I presume that if my hand is here, and I kiss you…”
He leans forward, taking me in a deep, passionate kiss.
The two sensations at once are like heaven. I feel myself floating on a golden wave of pleasure, jolting me up and up.
“Mmmmm.” I moan his name and feel my legs beginning to shake beneath him.
“Steady,” he whispers, pulling away, and slowing the movements of his hand. “I don’t want you to come just yet.”
He leans to the side of the bed, opening a foil packet. Then he slides off his boxer shorts, and in a moment, he’s rolling a condom onto himself.
He kisses my mouth gently.
Then he moves his hands down to take my hips.
“I’d love to have my mouth back down here, soon,” he murmurs, looking into my eyes, and stroking again with his hand.
I feel myself tightening at his touch.
Then, very slowly, he pushes himself gradually into me. I feel every inch of him, and I draw in a breath. It’s incredible.
“Show me,” he whispers, “show me with your hands how fast you want me to move.”
I hesitate.
“Show me,” he says. “I want to know what you like.”
I take hold of his hips and begin moving him. A slow, steady rhythm.
“Like this.” I say, shyly, letting my hands fall away from his hips and fold around his body.
“I love you, Issy,” he whispers. “I love you.”
His green eyes are falling into mine.
“I love you too.” It’s so hard to say the words, with the sensations he’s creating in me. But I feel them with every cell in my body.
He moves gently inside of me, and I feel myself open utterly to him. We are one person, moving in slow rhythmic time, our eyes joined.
He kisses me, and my boundaries dissolve completely. And then I feel him build, as though he was part of my own body, and the feeling becomes mine.
“Oh, Issy,” he whispers, rocking me softly with his hips, “this is so different.”
He raises himself, just slightly, moving the pressure of where his body meets mine. And now the length of him is stroking my clitoris as well as inside me.
I am shivering with pleasure.
“Issy,” he whispers, “I can feel you’re close.”
“I can feel you too,” I whisper.
He moves both his strong arms to fully encircle me, and kisses my mouth. And then I orgasm, my mouth moving urgently against his as the sensations wrack my body.
James quivers inside of me, and I feel him reach his peak. He grips me closer, and gasps. Then he’s saying my name, over and over.