Ten Dates and Counting

by Leah Holden

  The internal battle was raging.

  What if Jared was busy? What if he was away again? Then I would have got my hopes up for nothing. But there was Shellie in the background to think about. She’d be unbearable at least at my lack of a backbone. I sighed heavily and grabbed the phone.

  “Don’t think, Shaniah, just do this,” I mumbled as I scrolled down my contacts list and selected his name.

  “Well, this is a lovely surprise.”

  I swallowed hard; I really hadn’t expected him to answer so quickly.

  “I just thought I’d touch base and see how you’re doing.” My voice sounded high pitched and strained.

  Jared didn’t seem to notice, “I’m doing great,” he said, “just sitting here enjoying some rare down time with a glass of wine.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  I didn’t think that Jared was the type to take too much time out, so now I felt bad, “I’m sorry if I’m disturbing you.”

  “No, not at all, don’t be silly. Of course, it would all be much better if I had some company.”

  I smiled at the phone suddenly confident, “Is that an invitation?”

  “Most definitely. Would you like me to come and get you?”

  That was Jared—chivalrous to the end.

  “No, I think my car is up to the journey. If it acts up, I’ll abandon it somewhere and get a taxi.”

  “Okay. But it would be no problem at all for me to drive over to you.”

  “Seriously, I can make my way over, I assume you’re at the same location.”

  “Yes, I am, so feel free to come whenever you like; I’ll be here.”

  Gosh, that was simple!

  My body was beginning to come to life with desire. I needed to calm down though and take things easy. I breathed deeply and tried to relax.

  Once I’d ended the call, I hurried to run a bath. All I needed to do after that was to make baby-sitting arrangements and I would be on my way.

  I dressed carefully and didn’t even bother to give myself the usual pep talk about being good. Who was I trying to kid? I was going over to visit a good looking man that I had the hots for; the last thing I had on my mind was being good.

  In the end I got a taxi because, in reality, I didn’t fancy abandoning my car by the wayside should it fail to get me to my destination.

  Jared buzzed me in and I tried to gain my composure as I made the long journey in the escalator up to his apartment. He met me at the door and I barely had time to say hello before I was swooped up in a hug and a rather passionate kiss.

  Oh my…if he kept that up, I was definitely not going to last very long, especially as I hadn’t made any particular resolve to abide by.

  The kiss set me alight with desire and I moved back from Jared and looked around the room, just to buy some time.

  “It’s still the same room that you saw last time you were here. I haven’t touched it in any way,” he said wryly.

  I turned back towards him. Maybe I’d bought enough time. I hadn’t come over to inspect his property. This girl had needs and time was a wasting.

  “Yeah, it still looks good,” I said staring at his lips.

  I leaned forward and tugged at the front of his shirt and uttered a seductive little sound of desire as he leaned towards me and into the kiss that I was so eager to share with him.

  I opened my mouth widely as his tongue stroked the inside of my mouth. I felt a familiar tightening in my pelvic area.

  Yeah—so this was it—time to check out my level of self-control. The tightening continued as I caught my breath in anticipation.

  Jared clearly read my response as a signal because he reached behind me to fiddle with the zipper of my dress and I leaned forward to make things easier for him. I could feel the zipper sliding down and then he gently pushed the upper part of the dress off my shoulders. I moved my shoulders to facilitate its removal.

  The dress shifted and slid co-operatively down to my waist. I released my arms and reached over to pull Jared towards me. He was single-mindedly fiddling with my bra and I was refusing to relinquish the feel of his lips against mine.

  I pressed my body against the smooth cotton of his shirt as he dropped kisses on my neck, my shoulders, my collar-bone and finally shifted down to my breast to take a nipple into his mouth.

  “Oh God, you feel so good…taste so good,” he said.

  I kissed him back, equally hungrily.

  “Here, let me help you,” said Jared, as he relinquished my lips finally and stood up, pulling me up with him.

  He gently eased the dress down a little further and I obediently stepped out of it.

  Freedom!

  I stood in front of him in what remained of my undergarments and watched as he started to undo the buttons of his shirt. I silently took over and undid the rest. He slowly cupped one of my breasts before bending his lips to suck a nipple and then pulled me against him as he trailed kisses up my neck, then up the side of my face and finally claiming my lips again in a hungry kiss.

  I clung to him for dear life as wave after wave of desire flowed through me, drawing me into his web, into surrendering to need.

  I needed this so badly. I needed to feel alive after such a stressful and depressing week. Being in Jared’s arms made me feel like there was some hope. I was being offered healing, in whatever form, and I fully intended to reach out and take it.

  We edged towards the sofa and I sat down as he moved in front of me and I boldly undid his belt. He slid the zipper of his pants downwards as he pushed it below his hips and pushed his hip forward. I giggled as I helped him to wriggle out of the excess clothing.

  I scarcely had time to think.

  We were squashed up on the sofa and I pulled Jared towards me, needing to get as close as I could to make this work.

  “I have a perfectly good bed next door,” he said nodding towards a huge wooden door.

  Right then, the door might as well have been a hundred miles away.

  “I’m sure you do,” I said relaxing a bit more into the sofa and grinning back at him.

  “Ah, she’s playing it cool,” he said, looking directly into my eyes and before I could stop him, he stood up and swooped down to pick me up. I gasped and then tried not to squeal too loudly, “You’re gonna drop me; I weigh a ton.”

  “You’re as light as a feather,” he said as he strolled through to the gorgeous bedroom and lowered me gently onto the king-sized bed before becoming rigid in apparent agony.

  “Shit, I think I’ve put my back out,” he said groaning, “Just how much did you say you weigh?”

  “You didn’t!”

  I was horrified. Was I really that heavy?

  “I’m only a hundred and eighteen pounds.”

  “Just joking,” he said as he reached over to grab my ass and pull me closer to him.

  I tried to punch his shoulder. “That’s a rotten thing to do to a girl.”

  ‘Shh, you’re talking too much,” he said as his face came closer and his lips claimed mine. I was more than happy to kiss him back.

  “Do you want to do the honors,” Jared said holding out a condom which I hadn’t even been aware he was holding.

  Todd had always put on his own condoms and I’d always let him. No one had ever asked me to put on a condom on them before and I’d never volunteered.

  I took the package confidently and managed to open it through sheer luck rather than skill. I needed to act the femme fatale and slip the condom expertly over him.

  “Er—I don’t mean to be critical, but I think you’ve got it on the wrong way round,” he whispered.

  There’s a wrong side?

  “Sorry,” I said, trying not to feel like too big a fool.

  He took the condom from me and rolled it on in a flash. Yeah, so I was feeling pretty dumb because how had I got to being thirty-two without knowing this stuff?

  “There’s no obvious reason why you should know that,” he said magnanimously.

  “Mmm, I’m n
ot sure about that,” I said. “Maybe I need to improve on my level of experience.”

  “Feel free to use me.” He said lying back with his hands behind his head looking very much like a close relative of the devil.

  “You’re too generous,” I said giggling, “But now that you’ve offered, we could start by doing this.”

  I bent my head.

  He seemed to like what I was doing because I wasn’t hearing any complaints. So I focused on the task at hand and listened to his sharp intake of breath, his accelerated breathing and his moans of pleasure and took them as an indication that things were going well.

  Sometime later, I lay beside Jared, my head resting companionably on his shoulder and he had one arm slung casually around me.

  After a while, he got up and brought in the wine and poured wine into two glasses. We lay propped up against each other, sipping the wine while he flicked through some movies.

  I was surprised that he hadn’t fallen asleep. I shifted to try and cover my boobs as I was starting to get a bit cold.

  “How many dates have you been on?” he asked, suddenly grinning at my discomfort.

  “You mean, with the online dating thing?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Well, including you, I’ve had about ten dates.”

  “Oh—Jeez—wow! Ten dates and counting, eh? I thought you were, well, I mean, I just assumed…”

  “Oh, don’t get too excited,” I said. “First of all, most of those were before I met you. Secondly, it has been almost a whole month since I last saw or heard from you. But if it helps any, so far you’re the only person I’ve been so wild and reckless with. The others have all been one-off coffee dates.”

  “I’m glad to hear it, but what’s with the so far? Are you still on the site?”

  “After our last encounter, I took a break,” I said.

  It was technically the truth—I was no longer on the site and I didn’t see the point of mentioning the David experience. It wasn’t even like Jared and I were dating properly or like he’d care.

  “I clearly made an impression then,” he said.

  “You made an impression alright. Put me clean off men.”

  He grinned wickedly, “All part of my overall strategy.”

  “So, how many dates have you been on?” I asked.

  “Just the one with you.”

  “Oh, wow!”

  I hadn’t been expecting that, and I wasn’t sure I believed him.

  “I’m sorry our last encounter had such a detrimental effect,” he said taking the wine glass out of my hand, “I’ll have to see what I can do to repair the damage.”

  I giggled a little.

  “Lie on your stomach,” he whispered.

  A thrill zinged through me. Heck, I was lying on a bed in a strange apartment in my birthday suit with a potential Jack-the-lad I’d picked up online. The least I could do was to oblige him and lie on my stomach, you know, to see what he had in mind.

  “Any particular reason?” I asked, also in hushed tones.

  “Be patient,” he said, “I’ll show you.”

  I concluded that lying on your stomach offered mind-blowing opportunities—especially if you’d been putting up with mediocre sex for some time. I was totally submitted to Jared and the feel of his entire body covering mine sent my mind reeling. As he positioned himself, he took hold of my hands and held them above my head. I took a long, deep breath that completely relaxed me as he took possession of my body.

  This was enough. I smiled happily as our bodies moved together as he whispered words that I couldn’t really hear because I was so busy just enjoying the moment. He kissed me where he could. We had sex. We made love. I wasn’t sure what to call it. He raised my ass to slip a pillow beneath me and I was grateful for the pillow as he moved slowly and purposely and hit what I discovered just had to be my long-lost G-spot.

  “Ahh, that feels so good.”

  I moaned deeply as he continued to hold my hands above my head, moving with growing momentum.

  “You like that, eh?”

  “Ahh, hmm.”

  I had clearly moved beyond intelligible speech.

  As our movements grew more rapid we linked our fingers together. I squeezed tightly and bit my lips before crying out as waves of pleasure shook my body. Then I felt his release, even though the condom. I sank into the softness of the mattress with my eyes still closed.

  “Hmm, how’re you doing?”

  Was I still alive?

  “I’m good,” I whispered. I marveled that I hadn’t taken the time to worry about making a long wished for baby. I had simply enjoyed an amazing moment with an amazing man without all that pressure.

  “That’s great,” he grunted

  I tried to twist my head to see his face and he leaned forward to drop a tender kiss on my cheek.

  “Are you okay?” I whispered.

  “Never better,” he nuzzled against my ears.

  I turned to face him properly. I was getting a lot of pleasure from just looking at him. I wanted to remember his face and to treasure this experience, just in case he forgot to call again.

  I snuggled up against his firm body, feeling comforted, resplendent, possessed, intoxicated—and strangely happy. If my life had ended at that moment, I would have been okay. You know, I didn’t want to die or anything, but the moment was so complete that it was really the first time in a very long while that I just lay there feeling absolutely amazing, just luxuriating in the moment.

  We must have dozed a little but after that brief rest, he was pretty much unstoppable.

  When I would have slept he roused me and pulled me over onto my back and kissed me gently and firmly before entering me again. In between glasses of wine, gentle banter, a little teasing, and plenty of laughter, we tried out a few new positions and only finally stopped in the early hours of the morning.

  I opened my eyes to find Jared propped up on one elbow looking down at me.

  “It’s rude to watch a girl while she’s sleeping,” I whispered.

  “You look cute when you sleep. Do you know that your chin quivers when you breathe in?”

  I wondered if a quivering chin was a good thing.

  “Whatever!”

  He grinned crookedly, “Very cute,” he muttered.

  “I should be going home. I’ve stayed out a lot longer than planned. My babysitter will be wanting to get home.”

  “Yeah, that was pretty insane,” he agreed with me.

  “It was actually pretty amazing,” I grinned back at him because it had been a while since I’d struck gold in the sex department.

  “I think you’ve worn me out, woman.”

  “We’re crazy people,” I said, “You’re not on Viagra, are you?”

  “I don’t know whether to be offended or not by that question.”

  “No, don’t be, I just meant that you never seemed to get tired.”

  “That was all me,” he said grinning and I laughed because now he did look pretty lecherous.

  “Has anyone ever told you that you have the makings of a dirty old man?”

  He laughed out loud.

  “No one has ever dared,” he said.

  “Well, you do. You know I always thought that once a man had climaxed, he was done for the night.”

  “Depends on the man,” he said staring at me, “And maybe the woman he’s with.”

  Oh yeah, this guy was real smooth. Smooth, but oh so cute.

  We held each other until long after my smile had faded and I sobered enough to think that maybe I should be thinking about keeping him around. Maybe anybody who could make me feel so wonderful just needed to be a part of my life. I was too comfortable to shift. I closed my eyes for a few moments and when I opened them Jared was looking at me again.

  “You’re going to give me a complex if you keep staring at me like that every time I doze off,” I said.

  “You’re really beautiful,” he said simply.

  “So are you,” I
said, and he laughed and hugged me.

  “Come on,” he said. “I need to get you home; I have a very early start in the morning and you should rescue that babysitter of yours.”

  “It’s Sunday tomorrow,” I said.

  “Which means absolutely nothing when you own your own business as you too will discover,” he said.

  “I just need a taxi,” I said.

  “Shaniah, I’m taking you home.”

  We didn’t speak as we dressed, and I took up my purse and we left the apartment. I didn’t think there was much to say anyway. Jared seemed happy enough just to walk beside me. We actually held hands as we walked out towards the car—we were still holding hands when he engaged the engine and the car edged out of the parking lot.

  “I’ll call you,” Jared said when he eventually pulled up outside my town house. I smiled back at him because, in the cold light of reality, I remembered that I barely knew him and I knew better than to look too deeply into promises that men made. It was best to just take it for what it was—mind-blowing sex with a drop dead gorgeous guy.

  “Yeah, I won’t hold my breath.”

  “Have some faith.”

  “Bye,” I whispered, suddenly feeling a bit emotional because, really, it would have been nice if this was my own man that I could rely on to call me when he said he would.

  Jared walked me to the front door and kissed me tenderly on the lips.

  “Go get some sleep,” he said gently.

  “Good night,” I said as I closed the door quietly behind me.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  “Good morning, sexy.”

  “Who’s this?” I giggled into the phone.

  “You’d better be joking,” Jared laughed with me.

  I was still feeling high from last night and I thought how wonderful it was to have someone think of me first thing in the morning.

  We chatted, briefly, because he had to dash to a meeting but just that little gesture was enough.

  I also got a text from Jared mid-morning and I texted him right back.

  I smiled to myself. It was one of those secret little smiles that women in love often did when they suddenly thought of their lover and when they thought no one was watching. While I wasn’t in love by a long stretch of the imagination, my lust was good enough.