‘White wine sounds good,’ she said, opening the fridge.
She found a Liebfraumilch and poured two glasses. It had a bouquet that was icy, lightly fruity and painfully sweet. Of all the white wines she could have found in his fridge, Trudy conceded that Liebfraumilch was her favourite.
‘Have you eaten today?’ she asked.
‘Aliceon burnt some toast for me this morning.’ He shook his head tiredly and said, ‘She’s got many positive qualities, but cooking will never be one of them.’
‘And you’ve eaten nothing since then?’
‘I’ve been a little busy trying to stay out of jail, negotiate exclusives with newspapers and salvage the remnants of my career.’
She thought of reminding him that he’d also spent some of the day punching photographers. She kept the thought to herself. He would tell her about that in his own time, if he wanted.
‘How’s the career stuff going?’
He shrugged. ‘I’ve got a new TV series on the back of this publicity surge. A couple of the lad’s magazines want to do features on me. There’s talk of a couple of other bits.’ He sipped his wine and said, ‘Sometimes I think I’m the luckiest bastard alive. I’ve got the world’s best restaurant. I’ve got the career I always wanted. Then I look at the women who end up in my life. And that’s when I know I’m the luckiest bastard alive.’
She regarded him with a sour grin.
‘Women? The women in your life? Why are you using a plural word?’
He reached out and pulled her into his embrace.
‘I was talking historically,’ he whispered, as he nuzzled against the sensitive flesh beneath her earlobe. ‘I was referring to the women I’ve known throughout my life. I wasn’t trying to suggest that I have a harem at my disposal.’
He paused for a moment as though considering this prospect. An indulgent smile spread across his lips as though the idea had caught his interest. ‘I don’t suppose …’
She shook her head. ‘Don’t go talking about other women this evening. I don’t want to hear about anyone else.’
He plucked the wine glass from her fingers and set it aside.
His lips met hers in a languid and lazy kiss. She could taste the bittersweet taste of the Liebfraumilch on his lips.
His fingers traced the side of her face and then fell lower to touch the swell of her breast.
‘You’re right,’ he agreed. ‘And you wanted us to make love this evening, didn’t you?’
She nodded into his kiss. She was already aroused by his nearness. His obvious consideration heightened her body’s greedy need for him. She pushed herself against him and basked in a moment’s relief that he was excited and hard for her.
Slowly, gently, he began to pluck open the buttons on her blouse.
Too late, Trudy remembered she had visited him that evening without wearing a bra. As soon as she had decided she needed to make love with him she had simply called a taxi and told the driver to take her to Boui-Boui. Now, she shivered at the idea of their intimacy becoming more urgent and immediate than she had anticipated.
His fingers teased the buttons apart to reveal a sliver of pale flesh.
He leant close to her as his kisses dropped from her lips to her chin and then her throat. He continued to tease buttons open as his mouth moved to her décolletage and then to the exposed swell of one bare breast. He paused and allowed his tongue to trace the shape of her stiff nipple.
‘Mr Hart,’ she muttered.
He moved his mouth away and shook his head. ‘No,’ he said softly. ‘You may call me Mr Hart if you’re being disciplined. But when we make love, you’ll call me Bill.’
‘Bill,’ she repeated. The name felt strange on her lips, especially as the arousal surged through her. She was more used to addressing him with deference and respect when the excitement bristled through her body. Nevertheless, she made a determined effort and said his name again. ‘Bill.’
He lowered his face back to her exposed flesh and continued to work on the buttons. His control, patience and skill were annoyingly determined and sophisticated. He managed to tease the clothes from her body and take her to a state of unexpected desire without any apparent effort. She stood naked in his kitchen as he continued to excite her with his skilful caresses and thoughtful kisses.
When Bill finally lifted her into his embrace she thought he was going to take her up to the bedroom and make love as she had begged him when she arrived at the cottage. She could almost imagine herself as the heroine from some King-Kong-style movie from the fifties, draped across the arms of a powerful masculine figure that was carrying her to the forbidden realm of a bedchamber. It was a romantic idealisation, she realised. But she didn’t think the idea was unappealing.
However, instead of carrying her off to his bedchamber, Bill lifted her onto the kitchen counter. He sat her gently on its cool, polished surface and spread her thighs.
‘Bill,’ she exclaimed.
He arched an eyebrow. His smirk was infuriatingly unreadable.
Trudy folded her arms over her breasts and nodded towards the uncurtained kitchen window. ‘Someone could see,’ she warned him. ‘Isn’t this dangerous?’
He shook his head. ‘We’re behind the restaurant and in the middle of a private estate. No one can see.’
‘But what about reporters?’
‘They’re out of the picture for now. No doubt they’re persecuting some other helpless restaurateur.’
She thought his dismissal was too brusque. She also thought it was stretching things to refer to himself as a helpless restaurateur. Bill wasn’t the one whose body was on display. He wasn’t the one running the risk of potential exposure to the world outside the kitchen window.
But, once he placed his head between her legs and began to deliver kisses to her inner thighs, she forgot about those reservations. She forgot about the opaque night-blackened window in front of her and she forgot about her worries for photographers with zoom lenses. All that she remembered were the eddies of divine bliss that rippled through her sex from each of Bill’s gentle kisses.
With mounting excitement, she clutched at the worktop and arched her back.
Shiver after shiver of ecstasy flooded through her. She twisted and turned through throes of euphoria as Bill took her to climax after climax.
He spent a sublime half hour between her thighs.
His tongue worked miracles against the thrust of her clitoris and she could feel herself being repeatedly taken to pinnacles of unimagined pleasure. His kisses delved deeper. Her responses shocked her with their mounting intensity.
‘Take me upstairs,’ she breathed.
‘Maybe later.’ He said the words between lazy kisses to her wetness. She could hear the dewy liquid of her arousal on his lips as he spoke. ‘Maybe in a little while.’
She wanted to groan.
She wanted to insist or demand that he do as she asked.
But, knowing that she had already insisted they make love without the element of discipline in their intimacy, Trudy didn’t want to push him to obey.
Instead, she leant back against the smooth tiles of the kitchen wall and allowed him to lick her sex until another dulcet orgasm rippled through her sweetly tortured frame.
When he stood up, she saw he was naked.
She had no idea how he had been able to undress. To her mind his attention to her sex had been so constant and consistent there had been no time for him to remove his clothes. But it was not the first time he had managed to surprise her with his stealthy abilities to undress and she doubted it would be the last.
The sight of his lean physique increased her need for him.
She traced a finger against one muscular pectoral. Then down to the softening muscles of his six-pack. Then onto the thrust of his erection. Her fingers encircled him. He was very hard. She could almost feel the climax ready to spurt from his rigid shaft. Eagerly, she guided him to the sultry heat of where he was needed most.
Bill
’s smile remained bemused as she pressed him against her.
There was no resistance from her body.
She was so lubricated with his kisses and her own intense response that he simply slipped inside. Even as his substantial girth was filling her and stretching her, Trudy felt no echo of discomfort. She only felt the thrilling satisfaction of having Bill make love to her.
They clutched at each other with the frenzied embraces of those desperate to banish loneliness. His hands went to her buttocks.
Urgently, he pulled her close.
Her hands went to his shoulders as she struggled to get him nearer. She wrapped one leg over his hip. He bent his knees, as though the movement would allow him to climb closer to her sex’s centre. Within moments they were a tangle of limbs that were desperate to connect in the most urgent and intimate fashion regardless of how ungainly or impracticable they appeared.
Their bodies slid back and forth together with the easy gliding of true destiny.
Trudy had no idea how long they remained in each other’s embrace. She was in the arms of the man she loved. He was riding her rhythmically and taking her to new plateaus of sultry satisfaction. The sex was more thrilling than she had expected. She told herself that she wasn’t missing the pain of being punished or the formality of his discipline.
He took her to another climax as she sat on the kitchen counter.
It was swift and exhilarating and the release flooded through her with powerful, liquid satisfaction. She could feel the excess wetness spilling from her sex, soaking him and adding an extra frisson of lubrication to their lovemaking.
Gallantly, Bill helped her down from her makeshift seat on the counter. Without a word of direction, he urged her to bend over.
She did it eagerly.
It had hardly been an evening of vanilla missionary position coitus, she thought. This certainly wasn’t vanilla and Trudy wasn’t even sure they were still making love. This position seemed bolder than mere lovemaking. But she couldn’t deny that there was an enormous pleasure to be had from having his thick shaft slide deep into her sex in this position. He was taking her from behind, her inner muscles were already soaked from her previous climax, and it took him only a few seconds to push her close to another, blistering orgasm.
She realised vaguely that this was the same spot she occupied when he was administering discipline. She was bent over the kitchen counter where he had before made her stand whilst he punished her backside with repeated blows from his hands, from his spatulas and from his belt.
Those memories made her sex clench and convulse around him.
She knew there would be no discipline this evening. She was in the company of Bill, not Mr Hart, and he was slipping into the needy depths of her sex and giving her only the pleasurable satisfaction that she needed. Trudy told herself that she was enjoying this as much as she had ever enjoyed the punishment he inflicted.
Her breathing deepened.
Her senses tingled with the electric thrill of encroaching release.
She stared out of the window with the defiant bliss of the supremely satisfied.
When his climax finally burst into her, Trudy shivered with her own empowered response. She felt him tremble against her, the hands clutching at her hips tightening as his fingertips snatched momentarily too sharp against her skin. Then his softening length was slipping from her wetness and she was turning to kiss him with gratitude.
‘Thank you,’ she said. The words didn’t sound enough so she said them again. ‘Thank you. Thank you.’
He silenced her with a kiss.
She could taste the memory of her own sex on his mouth. He had been kissing her wetness. The flavour, sweet and forbidden, lingered there like a balm.
‘So that was making love?’ He smiled lightly. ‘If I’d known it was so much fun I would have tried that years ago. That’s me cured now. No more spanking games for me.’
She caught a breath and considered him doubtfully.
‘You don’t mean that, do you?’
‘Of course not,’ he laughed. ‘The next time I have access to your naked body I’ll be paddling your arse cheeks until they’re bright red and I’ll slice stripes across the tops of your thighs that have you aching for a week afterwards.’
The inner muscles of her sex clenched at the prospect of such discipline. She shook her head and tried not to let the thrill of his threat fill her with such a wanton response.
‘Come on,’ he said gently. ‘I’ve made love to you. I’ll now take you upstairs, shower you, and then put you into bed.’
She considered arguing and telling him that she now wanted to feel the discipline he had promised. But the idea of being washed and then tucked into bed sounded too romantic to refuse.
An hour later, after he had spent time with her in the shower, slipping soap over her bare flesh and massaging her pleasure-weary body beneath the warm spray of water, she realised she had been right to accept the offer. She felt content and comfortable as he climbed into the bed with her. As the first waves of sleep began to drift over her weary frame, Trudy drifted to sleep feeling as though Bill had helped her banish all of the day’s worries with the simple act of making love.
Chapter 30
She awoke and decided to go down to the kitchen. It was early in the day and Bill was still snoring in the bed beside her. Needing a coffee and some nourishment, Trudy found his bathrobe and wrapped it around her frame before slipping down the stairs. She thought the gold and red colours of the paisley design looked better on her than they had when he had worn it the previous morning. She also thought the silk fabric clung to her skin as though it was trying to be indecorous.
It held tight against the curves of her hips. It remained close to the swell of her breasts. Glancing down, she could even see the shape of her stiff nipples through the material. The garment was so immodest she was thankful she hadn’t been wearing it whilst Aliceon was patrolling the house.
Her mobile phone was where she had left it the previous day: sitting by the side of the kettle. It was still plugged into the charger there and she realised it had been set to vibrate rather than being completely muted.
Immediately, she changed the settings so that the ringtone was activated.
She saw the screen was flashing and realised she had missed a substantial series of messages since leaving her phone at Bill’s cottage the day before. As the espresso machine began to hiss and bubble, she scrolled through them to see if she had missed anything important.
The first messages had been from Bill.
Where are you? You went without saying goodbye. xx
She smiled at the apparent concern in the tone of his text message. The second message made her smile grow broader.
Ignore that last text. I’ve just found your phone in the kitchen. You probably won’t be able to reply. xx
She blinked as she understood the transparency of his thought process in producing those messages. It was impossible to deny the idea that he did care for her. There were two kisses at the end of each text message. Didn’t that prove that he loved her? The thought was warming and reassuring. It made her feel confident that they shared something special.
William Hart was sending her text message kisses.
She resisted the urge to dance around the kitchen. Her smile was so wide it ached. She made a mental note to keep the text message and never delete it from her phone. It was one of those she knew she would be able to read again and again whenever she wanted to smile.
The next message came from Charlotte.
Can we talk?
The same words, and variations on that same concerned question, were repeated a half-dozen times in a half-dozen different text messages.
Trudy?
Call me back.
I need to talk with you, Trudy.
Where are you?
Why aren’t you responding?
Call me, please.
Trudy had no idea that half a day without her mobile phone could
have caused so much panic in her friend. She was about to respond to the first of the messages when the phone began to ring.
The caller ID told her it was Charlotte.
She pressed the screen to accept the call. She didn’t know what she was going to say to her former friend but she also knew that she couldn’t risk Charlotte’s call waking Bill.
She made no pretence of civility when she spoke.
‘What do you want?’
‘I’m doing the quad killer. Come and join me.’
Chapter 31
They met in the middle of the forest. The air was early-morning cold but there was no mist on this occasion. Everything was sharp in its clarity from the occasional chirrup of a chiffchaff to the dexterous throat twittering of blackcaps. She could see the pliant green-brown branches of blossoming trees and the crisp intersecting ripples of bark on each elderly ash tree. It was good to realise that the quad killer was not just about unpleasant associations she thought. Too often Trudy had come to think of this route as symbolic with atonement and unhappiness. This morning she found herself admiring so many overlooked aspects of nature on the trail and all those glorious details she hadn’t previously taken the trouble to enjoy.
It turned out, she thought, the quad killer was surprisingly beautiful.
‘Morning, hon.’
Charlotte’s cry caught Trudy’s attention. This morning Charlotte was wearing the anonymous black clothes of someone who didn’t want to be noticed. The brim of her cap was pulled low. Her jogging-top was worn with the hood up. She kept her gaze averted when she spoke.
Trudy didn’t waste time with pleasantries.
‘What the hell were you doing with Donny and Gemma?’
‘You know what we were doing.’ Charlotte shook her head. ‘We were fucking, Trudy. Did I need to spell it out for you?’
‘I know you were fucking,’ Trudy agreed. ‘I could see that much. But why were you doing it with them?’
A Taste of Passion Page 20