One Night Only

by Stewart, Lynsey M.

  I was looking for the good in this situation, like I did with everything. I could feel a crash meandering around the crazy Brighton Lanes, but I didn’t care. His finger was caressing mine, this lovely guy belonged to me tonight, and I wasn’t ready to pass that up.

  ‘Don’t go for the chowder,’ I said as he opened the menu.

  He closed his eyes and shivered. ‘Fish chunder. Don’t remind me.’

  ‘I’m gonna go fish and chips,’ I replied. ‘A classic. Can’t go wrong.’

  ‘Make that two.’

  He held up his hand to the waiter and ordered our meal with a bottle of wine I hadn’t asked for but would gladly drink. Dutch courage and cheers were in order tonight. We talked about everything apart from what we should have done. Reggie’s bored expression. Anna and her frighteningly daunting aura, and how a woman so steely could put up with a husband so disturbingly creepy. How wobbly his thighs felt after the Ironman competition? Mine were too, but not because of physical exertion. This was a wine-hitting-the-bloodstream-too-fast-kind-of-moment coupled with being-with-the-man-of-my-dreams, causing my body to feel whirly.

  ‘How’s the new article going?’ he asked. It wasn’t until I’d started writing my dating article that I realised I’d have to actually be dating for me to draw on real-time inspiration. I’d started off with something I was fairly confident about. Epic failures.

  ‘I’m writing about dating.’ He raised his eyebrows like this was going to hurt. ‘I don’t know why but I remembered being set up on a blind date when I was sixteen.’ I chuckled on the memory. ‘We met at the local fair. He seemed nice, but I couldn’t ignore the sniggers and finger points whenever he came near me. I almost kissed him until a friend dragged me to the dodgems and told me about the rumours.’

  ‘Rumours?’

  ‘Yep,’ I replied, cringing. ‘Apparently, he didn’t have a penis. It’d been sliced off in a freak accident.’ I made a slicing motion and he winced.

  ‘What kind of accident?’

  ‘I don’t know! Stay with me, Matt.’ The waiter brought our food and we stayed in silent merriment, Matt smirking as I lifted my eyebrows to the ceiling. ‘Penis aside, I’m exploring how dating disasters can have an impact on our dating life.’

  ‘How?’ he asked, dipping his chip into tomato sauce.

  ‘Well, it’s made me wonder if we should be focusing on other things, not just the usual, “Is he attractive? Does he work? Is he…normal?”’ I took a sip of wine and almost moaned when he watched me swallow with a look of horniness so sexy, I almost dropped the glass. ‘Basically, are we asking the right questions of potential husbands-to-be?’

  ‘Stace,’ he whispered. ‘I have a penis.’

  I covered my face with my hands and conjured up an image of his fabulous penis and I was certain I’d really like to see it again. Definitely touch it. ‘I remember.’

  ‘Do you?’ he asked, his voice an octave above horny.

  I ignored him and focused on my fish batter. ‘I think women should ask for everything upfront. DNA profiles, police records, medical history’—his gaze never left my face as I carried on like a mad woman—‘blood and sperm samples, you know. So, you can grasp what you’re really dealing with.’

  ‘And establish if they have a penis,’ he said, smirking.

  ‘Please forget the penis.’ I sat back. ‘The point I’m trying to make is that dating would be so much easier if there were no surprises. Imagine if you asked them to do a questionnaire on personal values, or if you had access to emails and social media accounts. I mean, what if they made a homophobic-slash-racist-slash-sexist-tweet three years ago that resurfaces as soon as I fall in love with them and bam, heartbroken again.’

  ‘I don’t tweet,’ he said, holding up his hands. ‘And I shut Facebook down when all the people I purposely chose not to stay in touch with messaged me with “Hey, long time, no see!”’

  I couldn’t help but laugh. I got all of him when he was with me and Matt Shaw shone like the moon. Bright and immense, so full when he was with me, so vivid and clear, but a crescent moon when his attention was focused elsewhere. Not whole, parts hidden, only a glint and sliver of himself.

  Allow yourself to shine brightly.

  ‘There should be a dating app where a private detective follows potential suitors for a month and when they don’t find anything questionable, they give you the thumbs-up to arrange your first date.’

  ‘I’ll look forward to reading the finished article.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah. I think you’re on to something. I mean, you know everything there is to know about me now, but I’m still open to giving you a semen sample.’ I snorted into a laugh, making the waiter jump as he collected our plates. My fork landed on the floor with a clink and I picked it up, apologising as I entered into a conversation about the hazards of the job and how he was sacked from a Mexican restaurant when he dropped a bowl of nachos down the shoulder of a disgruntled diner. Matt watched me in complete fascination.

  I smiled, biting my lip and enjoyed the attention. ‘What?’

  ‘It could be so easy to fall in love with you,’ he said, his voice low and raspy. I almost melted into my chair. Why was he so wonderfully him? I could have bounced up and down, clapped my hands, held in a squeal, but something stopped me. It always did.

  I hid myself from him, holding my hands over my face as I mumbled, ‘What if you are the right man at the wrong time?’

  ‘The wrong time?’

  ‘Your career, your dad. The timing of…us.’

  ‘What if it is the wrong time?’ he said. ‘Does it matter?’ He scrunched his paper napkin into a ball and threw it down on the table. ‘Say the first part again.’

  ‘What if you’re the right man—’

  ‘Stop,’ he said, holding up his hand. ‘Stop there, stop right there. The right man. That’s all I need to know, Stace. Can’t we just enjoy that for a while? For tonight, at least. I don’t want to think about anything else apart from being the right man for you because I’m so fucking sure that I am.’

  ‘Just for tonight,’ I whispered as I felt his hand underneath the table, a soft touch but with complete purpose. A trail of heat burning across my skin.

  ‘Did you hear me?’ he rasped, his fingers moving slowly up. A grip made me gasp until he was back to soft and light touches, a powerful mix of both leaving me desperate for more. ‘Tell me you heard me.’ He pressed his palm against my upper thigh, a quivering wreck beneath his fingers. He started teasing my clit, a featherlike stroke full of meaning, of urgency, of need. ‘Tell me you’re thinking the same.’

  ‘Say it again.’ I was gone. Head in the clouds. Lost to him and his amazing fingers. Fudge. I was wearing skinny jeans and I could still feel his touch like I was bare.

  ‘It could be’—he closed his eyes. I was wet and he knew it—‘so fucking easy to fall in love with you.’

  I reached down, feeling for my bag blindly. His fingers were working their magic and I was doing a great job just finding my purse while all of this was going on. I squirmed in my seat, arched my back, and somehow, through all this sexual mayhem, I found money. I pressed the notes down on the table, scattered some coins to cover the bill, and stilled his hand before I orgasmed—wearing skinny jeans!—in front of the waiter.

  ‘Hooome,’ I said urgently, completely unintelligible after averting a riot in my lady parts. I took his hand and Reggie’s lead, and pulled them both with me. There was no room for changing my mind, or for confused signals. I needed him. Needed him. My mind, heart, and vagina were working in tandem and maybe it was the wine, but I was all for living in the moment.

  My heels normally required a more thorough thought process in order to make it home, but I didn’t care because I had Matt holding my hand, his fingers ready to feel my arousal. That gave me a steely determination to make it over these cobbles in spaghetti straps and a five-inch heel and back to my flat to ravish the bones of him.

  We mad
e it back to Turnip The Beet after a few stops where we couldn’t keep our hands off each other. My hands found his defined shoulders, his hands found my face, the one he described as mesmorising just before I melted into a puddle of lust. We fought hard the urge to remove clothing as he pushed me against bus stops, and I straddled him against the multicolored plastic cow that was chained to the ice-cream parlour at the beginning of North Laines, Reggie barking as we laughed.

  As I tried to find my key with shaky hands, I noticed Skye had sent me a text message.

  Skye: I won’t be home tonight. Don’t worry about me. I’m fine x

  I didn’t have time to wonder about where she was and who she was with because Matt was pressing his impressive body against me, the wonderful curve of his obvious erection right between my bum cheeks.

  ‘Feel me,’ he said.

  ‘I can,’ I replied softly. ‘If I had a penis, I’m pretty sure I’d have a boner too.’ I couldn’t help myself, and loved to hear his laughter against my ear.

  ‘Glad you don’t,’ he said, shaking his head as he smiled.

  ‘You’re a little bit delicious, Matthew.’

  ‘Matthew?’ He laughed. ‘Am I in trouble?’

  I nodded as I turned, kissing my way down his jawline to his neck, just under his ear. He groaned and jiggled. I remembered the spot. He gave me the same wiggly reaction when we were in bed together.

  ‘Do you know how many times I’ve thought about that night? How many times I’ve jerked off thinking about how fucking perfect we were?’

  ‘As many as me?’ I replied, breathless as I pushed open the door. Reggie disappeared down the hallway and Matt’s guttural moan appeared to have made my bones disappear. All that was left was a collection of smoosh I didn’t know what to do with. It also appeared to be vibrating and giving me a hard time getting my legs to function. He wrapped his hand around my neck, thumb to my hairline, fingers to my collarbone. A kiss there didn’t help the smoosh situation. Neck kisses led to goose bumps and goose bumps led to body parts entwining and a realisation that sex was powerful—connections and sex even more so—and we had more connections than the Piccadilly Tube line.

  Anticipation never felt so good. I wanted him for another night only, not sure if we’d make it to three but didn’t have the mental capacity to give that another thought. One hand was on my bum cheek and the other was skillfully removing my skinny jeans. No easy feat. They normally had to be peeled off like a banana skin. I’d lost a nail doing it before, yet here he was, Matt Shaw, confident and sexy and adept at removing items of clothing with the word ‘skinny’ in the title. I looked down at him, on his knees, cherishing this moment, and as he pulled my panties to the side, all I could hear was my own voice saying, ‘Life is too short not to take chances on good things. I’ve been thinking all this time that you’re the right man at the wrong time, like that’s a bad thing.’

  I laughed as I looked up to the ceiling. The chuckle turned into a cry as his tongue found my clit. ‘I’m an—Ah!—idiot.’

  ‘Is this the wrong time?’ he said, eyes fixed on mine as he ran his tongue along my slit. So sexy. I was sure I was going to die. I shook my head like I’d lost the ability to hold it. ‘I can’t believe I get to do this again.’

  He ate me like a man starved of sex and affection, and I pushed aside the thoughts of how many other women there’d been since our night together, that he couldn’t possibly be thrilled to have his hands on my body again because, deep down, I knew, I saw it in his eyes. This was a privilege for him, something he’d craved. I smiled in ecstasy and laughed in relief. The chains of my thoughts, the ones that had driven me mad, had been unlocked and were curling on the floor.

  ‘I can’t wait for you any longer,’ I said, gasping as he devoured me. ‘Not this…not just this, but us.’

  ‘I’d wait as long as you need,’ he replied. ‘Forever, if I had to.’ He kissed my thigh, my hip bone, my stomach. Chaste after lapping my pussy but filled with what I knew was love. ‘I don’t see anyone else but you. I obsess, I fucking idolise.’

  ‘I want you,’ I replied, pulling his t-shirt over his head, tracing my hands across the curves of his shoulders.

  I missed having him like this, vulnerable and in awe. One look enough to tell me that if I wanted him, he was mine, and always would be, no questions asked.

  ‘Matt?’ I said. ‘Take me to bed.’

  25

  Matt

  First, I needed those jeans gone. Clinging like a second skin and magnificently encasing her arse aside, they had to be gone. Second, I needed to taste her. Had to place my mouth there, my fingers… my tongue.

  ‘I want you,’ she said, pulling my t-shirt over my head. Jesus, she was perfect. Her face, her mesmorising face. I was a goner. Head over heels in love, in infatuation, and she wanted me. Finally, she wanted me. ‘Matt? Take me to bed.’

  I pulled at her clothes, needing to get as close to her as I possibly could. I didn’t need barriers—I needed my skin on hers. I took her with me, fumbling around in the dark and hearing nothing but her gasps and laughter. She giggled as I tripped over what I assumed was the sofa, but could have been Reggie, falling backwards as she landed on top of me. More laughter and a chance to settle. She was almost naked, her breast peeking out over her bra. I couldn’t take my eyes off her as she got up and switched on a table lamp. She was illuminated in soft light, her red hair falling around her. She was all I wanted to see. The truth in her eyes, the fascination. I moved to her, noticing a mirror on the wall where I watched us both, transfixed and captivated.

  Her lilac bra was flimsy, the silver embroidery barely hiding what was underneath. Triangles of fabric covered her breasts but didn’t hide her nipples. They were stiff and poking through, and Jesus, fuck, I could look at her through this mirror forever. Her neck was framed with rose gold jewellery. It complemented her skin tone perfectly. Little coins and a longer chain with a bee hanging from it. An arrow on another, pointing to her heart. I held it in my fingers and pressed it against her collarbone.

  ‘Does this lead me to your heart?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’ve already led you there.’

  I turned her in my arms, spinning her, kissing her harshly before the words lost their meaning and she remembered herself and the vice-like grip she held on reality. We were a thrust, a rock, and a kiss. A pattern. The softness of her lips. Kiss. Rock. Thrust. Slow and steady. Falling into each other. Finding our way to love and all the amazingness it brought along with it.

  She linked our little fingers together. Perfect. Another sign I needed that we were fine, more than fine, and I could start to breathe again without fear of frightening her away if I made a sudden movement. I followed her to her bedroom, watching as she flicked on the light at the side of her bed.

  Her room was perfectly hers. If I’d been asked to find it, I’d have chosen it blindfolded. Reggie was asleep on a mini four poster bed in the corner with Union Jack bedding. Brilliant. The windowsill had rows of cacti and mini Aloe Vera in pastel pots. Rose gold stationary sets and photo frames were sitting on a desk alongside her MacBook. Books on art, fashion, biographies of reporters, journalists, and editors. Marie Colvin. Anna Wintour. Oprah Winfrey. Her bed was huge, decorated in pinks and creams. Cushions. Faux fur blankets. Throws. She pushed them all to the floor in one swipe and I laughed as she beckoned me towards her with her finger, naked apart from her bra, knickers, and rose gold jewellery.

  ‘Take off your jeans,’ she said, throwing her arms up behind her head. They were gone in record time and before I knew it, I was climbing on top of her, my hands finding her waist and pulling at her underwear.

  ‘That’s better,’ I said, dropping them to the floor. I sighed, unable to believe I was allowed to do this again, to take her, fuck her. Make love. ‘Your goddamn perfect pussy.’

  Trailing my fingers across her thighs, she gasped but still opened her legs wide. I got in real close. Smelled her. Lifted her folds with my tips, expos
ing her to me, the bundle of nerves already hard when I flicked my tongue across. Circled. Lapped. I reached for her hand and placed it on the back of my head, needing her there, wanting contact and intimacy more powerful than just male and female body parts connecting.

  ‘Do you know how long I’ve waited for this? Fucking agonised.’

  ‘And after?’ she asked. ‘You’ll wait again?’

  ‘Spend my life waiting,’ I replied, climbing up her body until I was hovering over her, but the look on her face terrified me.

  ‘I could fall for you,’ she said, linking our fingers. ‘I think I already am.’

  ‘Don’t be afraid.’ I threaded my hand through her hair, laughing lightly, but inside, my body was screaming out in joy.

  ‘Shall I let it happen?’ she asked, vulnerable and gorgeous.

  ‘Yes, because I’m falling too.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ she replied, smiling like she’d waited, unsure and confused, and now she was ready. Ready and over the moon.

  ‘I’ve waited this long for you,’ I replied. ‘Of course I’m sure.’

  ‘I don’t care how many women you’ve been with before, but tonight, from this point, I can’t accept them from here. Because this is when I finally give in, this is when I say yes.’

  ‘I can’t promise that,’ I whispered. ‘I want to. Fuck, I want to.’ Images started to cut in and flash like strobe lighting. My dad. The centre. Recovery. The need to make something of myself. Singularly, they almost wouldn’t matter anymore, but together, they were stronger than a typhoon. ‘Stace—’

  She put a finger to my mouth, stopping me. ‘I know,’ she replied, her head falling to my shoulder. ‘I know…but I want it anyway.’

  I started peeling her bra from her, her firm nipples sticking to the lace. She gasped as I freed them. Tight and hard and lovely. Fucking beautiful. I didn’t worship bodies. Bodies had always just been part of the job. Clinical, almost. Touch them there and get a reaction. But with Stace, I couldn’t get enough. Her body was mine, belonged to me, forever and ever, amen. I’d never been a religious man, but I was happy to worship her. Spend my days at her feet.