“Nicholas!” I whispered. “I… ooh… you can’t do this now. What if somebody sees us?”
“We’re on the far side of the fire, and it’s very dark out. If anyone walks this way we’ll hear them on the gravel path. Then we’ll have time to make a plan.”
His breath was warm on my skin. He trailed kisses up my thigh before parting my lips gently with his fingers and sliding his tongue in between. Desire bloomed inside me; the orgasm I’d had earlier that day only serving to make me hungrier for his touch now.
With exquisite tenderness, his tongue stroked over my clitoris, the soft thrill of the touch causing me to gasp. I realized that my body was yielding to him, any resistance I might have mustered ebbing away before I could even consider it. I could not have moved if I had wanted to. All I could think about, all that mattered, were his intimate caresses. His tongue slid warmly over my delicate flesh, he sucked my lips in ways that made me bite back a moan of delight.
Such wicked intimacy, and in a place where we could so easily be interrupted. Would I have time to warn him—would I have any wits left to pull myself together if somebody did appear? Oh, this was bold and entirely wrong—but so addictively exciting. I was loving this; loving how much he turned me on, and that he seemed to find me as impossible to resist as I found him.
The thrill of what we were doing was only intensifying the sensory rapture he was offering me.
He circled the tip of his tongue lightly over my clitoris until I was gasping with delight, then thrust his tongue deep inside me, and I felt my fingernails scrape over the wooden corner of the bench as my grip tightened. Sensing my movement, he found my hand with his own and grasped it, his fingers twined in mine and his thumb caressing my palm.
I was throbbing, opened to him, he already had me trembling on the edge. He circled my clitoris again, fluttering his tongue over the swollen nubbin of bliss, then slid a finger inside me. I gasped with delight as he began slowly, gently fucking me with two fingers. With each thrust, his fingertips massaged my G-spot. I could feel myself starting to tighten inside as heat suffused my lower body. I knew that he was going to make me orgasm again soon… easily, effortlessly.
And then, over the thrumming of the blood in my own ears, I heard another and far less welcome sound—the noise of low voices and footsteps scrunching over the gravel path behind me.
I froze into place, listening. I found myself suddenly, intensely aware of every movement that Nicholas was making. The sensual, sliding exploration of his fingers; the soft flickering of his tongue.
“… yes, I’ve got a dish for the meat.” It was Thandiwe’s voice.
“Have you seen Nicholas?” Berndt spoke, and his words sent a thrill of apprehension through me. “Mrs. Groenewald was looking for him.”
“I haven’t seen him for a little while.”
“Who’s that over there by the fire?”
For a moment, I wished I could feign deafness, or preferably disappear into the ground. Then, taking a deep breath, I looked over my shoulder and called, “It’s me, Erin.”
“Ah, Erin. You’re doing okay there on your own?”
At the words, Nicholas’s fingers slid more deeply inside me and I caught my breath. With him sprawled in front of me on the log bench, there was no way Thandiwe or Berndt, who were standing behind me, could see him. Not in this flickering darkness… not unless they came closer, or I gave the game away.
“I’m doing fine, thanks. Star gazing.” I fought for control, to keep my voice steady.
“Dinner’s ready in about ten minutes. You must come and eat.”
“Oh, I will,” I called back.
“Do you know where Nicholas is?” Berndt’s voice this time.
He’s right here on this bench, giving me the most divine oral sex I’ve ever had…
“Last I saw, he was inside, talking to the Groenewalds,” I said, deciding to exact some sweet revenge. “He seemed to be getting on very well with Colette.”
Bad idea to rile him on this subject, Erin, I realized immediately. Bad, bad idea.
Nicholas’s other hand pushed further underneath me and with a start I felt his finger, slick and wet, stroking gently over my anus.
No way. This was too outrageous… far too forbidden. I’d managed to remain coherent so far, but I knew I could not possibly conduct a conversation while he was stimulating me in that way. And nor could I yell “Stop!” Discreetly, I tried to shove his head away with the palm of my hand, but it was like trying to move the Rock of Gibraltar.
“Oh, I’m so glad to hear that. She is a lovely young woman,” Berndt said.
“I think they seem… very well suited,” I responded. My voice sounded wobbly, my heart was pounding, but I might as well keep agreeing with him now because I was sure nothing I said now would distract my lover from his mission of wickedness.
Slowly, sensually, taking his time over the actions, Nicholas slid the tip of his finger into my backside. I had to bite my lip to keep from moaning at the audacious pleasure of it.
“Can I bring you another drink?” Berndt called.
Oh, God, now Nicholas was pumping his finger gently in and out of my rear, each time pushing in a little deeper. It felt amazingly, shamefully good. He nibbled my clitoris, pressed into my G-spot with the fingers of his other hand, and I felt an urgent heat flood my body.
“Join you… in a minute,” I said, then clamped my lips together hard to stifle a cry of delight. His fingers were all the way inside me, his tongue teasing pulses of ecstasy from my throbbing clit. I was filled by him; opened and utterly possessed, and then, thank God, the scrunching of feet on gravel indicated my hosts were making their way to the entertainment area.
I let out a deep, fast breath as I came painfully hard, thrusting myself against him. I twined my fingers through his hair and tugged his head closer as pleasure spiked through me again and again.
He slipped his fingers out of me. Extricating himself from under my skirt, he sat up, locked his arms around me and kissed me deeply. I tasted myself in his mouth, the flavor of my own arousal on his lips. I kissed him back hard, realizing that while this orgasm had sated my hunger for him, it had also made me greedy for more.
In the firelight I could see his face, taut with lust.
Reaching down for the glass, he gulped a mouthful of champagne and kissed me, letting some of the cold, bubbly liquid froth into my mouth. The sensation was incredible. It made me feel dizzy, as if I was floating.
“Do we dare?” he whispered, and I only realized what he meant when he unbuttoned and unzipped his jeans and, with practiced expertise, took a condom out of his pocket and rolled it on to sheathe his engorged cock.
“Not now,” I breathed, suppressing an amazed giggle. This man was bad, and I was loving it far too much.
“Nicholas, they’re going to come looking for me in a few minutes…” I was breathing hard, and although the risk of being interrupted was adding to my thrill, what was really turning me on was the thought of having him inside me again. I was throbbing, needy, desperate to feel that thick, hard manhood that was his essence.
“Oh, I think we can risk it, Erin.” The firelight illuminated the devilish glint in his eye. He shifted sideways so that he was straddling the narrow wooden seat of the bench. “Come sit on my lap.” His strong arms lifted me into place and I locked my arms around his neck, my face pressed against his, feeling the light rasp of his stubble against my cheek. Oh, God, I could feel him, his wide, swollen head thrusting between my slick, wet lips. I gave a tiny moan of pleasure as he entered me and he shifted his hips in response to it, breathing hard, clamping me down onto him as he arched himself deep inside me.
“If anyone sees us now they might just think we’re having a conversation,” he whispered, and in his voice I could hear the same wickedness I’d seen in his eyes. He was breathing hard, his chest rising and falling against my own, and the musky scent of his skin filled my nostrils. Holding me tight, he eased himself almost all
the way out of me before pushing slowly in again and again. I sank onto him, loving the deep fullness of the sensation, loving that even while I was on top of him, he was in total, masterful control.
“A very close, very intimate one.”
Now he was circling his hips, moving his cock inside me, stretching me deliciously. I dug my fingers into his back, the deep throbbing in the pit of my stomach growing almost painfully intense.
“Don’t tell me you’re starting to enjoy this,” he whispered a while later. “I thought you were going to ask me to stop.”
“Don’t… stop….” How on earth was he managing to hold a conversation, albeit rather breathlessly, when I was now barely capable of getting a word out?
“Do you like to fuck when there’s a risk of being caught?” he murmured, and his words caused me to writhe in guilty delight, another orgasm brewing inside me like a summer storm.
“Yes,” I breathed.
His teeth nibbled at my ear, then bit the lobe just hard enough that I jumped, the involuntary movement causing him to buck his hips and gasp.
“You… are so fucking sexy.” He licked my earlobe, then flicked his tongue in and out of my ear, the warm, wet caress so pleasurable it was sending my senses into overload. I was helpless, almost sobbing with arousal, every nerve ending in my body clamoring for more.
I knew we had to be quiet, but it felt to me as if the entire world was holding its breath. I was shaking with tension at the thrilling, shameful risk of discovery. I didn’t know if it would be possible not to cry out. And then Nicholas pushed inside me again, the movement small but deep, but it was enough to trigger my orgasm. Somehow managing to swallow a moan, I buried my face in his neck, tasting his skin, abandoning my control as I spasmed around him tight and hard.
A moment later, betrayed only by the shuddering of his hips and crushing firmness of his arms around me, Nicholas came. His body barely moved as he experienced an orgasm so brutally powerful that I felt every pulsing jerk of his cock inside me.
“I don’t know how much more of this I can take,” I whispered to him, when I could speak again. “This is too intense. One way or another, my heart may give out soon.”
His breathless laugh tickled my hair. “I know. I feel the same.”
As we disengaged and did our best to straighten our clothing, the rumble of thunder and a flash of lightning from the horizon reminded me that it was far from certain that the bridge would be getting fixed the next day. Another of those storms could easily see the river flood again.
My legs felt unsteady from too much alcohol and too much sex. I was ravenously hungry and the aroma of well-cooked meat was drawing me in like a vulture to a kill. When we walked inside, everyone was already eating and we were the object of some curious glances. Mrs. Groenewald had saved just one place at the table where she and her niece were seated, but Nicholas politely refused it, and after piling our plates with food, we sat on our own together at the bar.
I carefully avoided Thandiwe’s gaze, but when I took our empty plates through to the kitchen, I walked in at the same time she was walking out. She looked at me closely and I could only guess what she saw. My hair mussed, my dress creased, my lips swollen and my skin still flushed and sensitive from the friction of Nicholas’s stubble.
She met my gaze as we stacked the plates, and in her eyes I saw a blend of confusion and concern.
Thandiwe had seen us walk in together, late for supper, after I had told her I thought Nicholas was with the Groenewalds. From her face, I guessed she had put two and two together. I felt that some kind of explanation or apology was in order and, clearly, so did she.
“I’m sorry,” I said, feeling ashamed. What must she think of me?
“I—when I said what I did earlier, about Colette—I’m sorry, Erin. That was insensitive of me. I didn’t know you and Nicholas were…”
I tried for a worldly smile, but it didn’t really work and in the end I just stared back at her with what I supposed was much the same expression as her own.
“I didn’t really know either, till a little while ago.”
“Just be careful, my dear,” she said, squeezed my hand, and walked out of the kitchen, leaving me to wonder what exactly she had meant by the words.
CHAPTER 15
I don’t remember much more about the evening. We had another glass of champagne, and after our dinner, rejoined the group to sit at Kobus’s table where I laughed my head off at his series of jokes, and so did Nicholas. Discreetly, under the table, we held hands, Nicholas’s fingers caressing my palm. I remember at one stage exchanging a glance with Joshua across the table and, if I recall correctly, we gave each other a relieved smile.
It was well after midnight when we left, with Nicholas driving slowly and following Joshua’s taillights up the hill. I was trying to conduct a one-woman sing-along, the theme being Phantom of the Opera. My singing voice is not my strongest attribute but, after a few drinks, I love to exercise it. When he wasn’t singing along with me, Nicholas was laughing so hard he was nearly driving off the road. All I could think about was what fun we were having. It seemed like a very long time since I’d enjoyed myself so much.
We then had a discussion about bedrooms. I insisted I was going back to my room. He overrode my decision, giving a reason that seemed compelling at the time but which subsequently escaped my memory.
I told him I needed to brush my teeth and he told me to go and brush my teeth, but to come back afterwards, or he was going to come and find me.
I made my way back to my room. I brushed my teeth and washed my face. It was strange to come back from an evening out and have no make-up to remove. It occurred to me that Nicholas had never seen me with make-up, apart from what I’d been wearing on the day the car went into the river, which by the time he had rescued me, had certainly been a smeared mess. He’d never smelt me wearing my own perfume, only the lightly scented cosmetics in my bedroom.
He had only ever seen me as I was.
Vince, on the other hand, had seldom seen me without make-up and when I didn’t wear it, he urged me to do so.
I pondered this fact fuzzily for a while, but without reaching any significant conclusion. Then I turned on my phone, glad that thanks to all the alcohol, I did not feel the usual surge of dread as I waited to see what communications I had received.
There had been seven more missed calls from Vince, and despite my state of drunken relaxation, I felt my stomach twist with anxiety.
The phone beeped. Finally, at a quarter past eight that evening, he had left a message.
His tone was terse and hard.
“I don’t care what time it is when you get this. Call me.”
Before I had time to get too worked up about speaking to him, I phoned him back.
He answered within one ring. “Jesus Christ, Erin, for fuck’s sake, where have you been?”
“Nice to speak to you, too, Vince,” I retorted, noticing I was slurring the words.
“This is not a fucking joke. I have been trying to get hold of you all day. Where the fuck have you been?”
“This morning I was helping to fix a broken fence, to guard against poachers and cheetahs,” I stifled a hiccough. “And this evening, the neighbors hosted a dinner for everyone on this side of the river, and I’ve been over at their farm.”
“And you didn’t fucking call me back?”
“I did. I left a message for you. If it was so urgent, why didn’t you leave any messages for me? I did check my voicemail at lunchtime.”
“Because I assume that when I try to get hold of my own fucking wife, I don’t need to leave messages. And that when you see it’s me calling you would treat it as urgent. Why didn’t you keep your phone on you, for fuck’s sake?”
“Don’t speak to me that way, Vince.”
“I’ll speak to you how I fucking want. You’re drunk, aren’t you?”
Rage simmered inside me and my finger hovered over the disconnect button. Then I decided to giv
e him the benefit of the doubt.
“I had a couple of drinks with dinner. Big deal. And I didn’t take my phone with me. I had no purse, no pockets, and nowhere to put the damned phone. So I left it here.”
“Christ, you can be stupid sometimes!”
“Vince!”
“I had a helicopter organized!” he screamed at me, and I felt myself go cold inside.
“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”
“I was waiting for you to call me back so that I could arrange a pickup with the pilot. One of Helena’s friends was spending some time in the Kruger and said he’d be able to fly by your place and get you out. As a favor. So we spent the whole morning waiting for you to call back. Then he delayed his flight again and we waited the whole afternoon. And meanwhile you were doing other things. You didn’t bother to call back. You were just doing whatever you felt like doing, because it’s all about you, isn’t it, Erin? Really, it always has been, you stupid, fucking, self-centered…”
Abruptly, I jammed my finger onto the disconnect button. I couldn’t bear to hear any more of this. With hands trembling from haste, because I wanted to get it done before he could call me back, I turned the phone off again.
I felt far more sober than I had ten minutes ago. The fuzziness, the laughter, the sense of fun had all evaporated. I felt small, crushed, and very alone.
I was going to break my promise to go back to Nicholas’s bedroom, but it seemed like a small thing compared to the much bigger and more important vows I’d already smashed. I locked my door, drank two glasses of water, collapsed onto my bed, and pulled the sheets over me. Outside, I heard the crashing of thunder. I thought I’d be kept awake, either by the storm or by the tumult of my own thoughts, but within a few minutes I was deeply asleep.
I was awakened by another clap of thunder and the violent hammering of rain.
Opening my eyes, I found the grey daylight unbearably bright. My mouth was a desert and my tongue felt like sandpaper.
Coffee. I needed coffee. And chocolate fudge brownies—my hangover cure of choice. Since I guessed chocolate brownies would be in short supply in the lodge, I decided to settle for a serious dose of caffeine. I fixed myself some in the kitchen, together with a slice of toast. It was six-thirty in the morning, too early for anybody else to be around. I wondered briefly if Nicholas was still asleep. However, when I walked back to my room with my breakfast, I heard the rhythmic slapping and thudding of the punching bag. He was in the gym, sweating out his hangover—and his anger, I supposed.
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