Nailing Neely Jordan - Part 3

19/06/10 21:02 GMT

Okay, Carlotta, call this past week consolidation. Sexual chemistry had been acknowledged on both sides, but Neely almost ran scared as a result, so it was necessary to let her calm things down a touch. Even if it’s meant my taking part in a few ‘young-Christian’ dating activities.

Example, the bowling evening. This allowed for some hands-on instruction in the name of improving her technique, but in all honesty she bowled too good a game to warrant a great deal of that without blowing my cover. I suspect she allowed me less because she needed instruction and more because the situation legitimized some up-close-and-personal. Her little victory dance and taunting smile any time she got a strike or took out a lone-standing pin made we want to throw her down and nail her ass in front of all the other bowlers, while giving her firm tits a good groping. I just can’t decide how calculating this Christian role-model is in her sexiness. Could any girl be such a prick-tease inadvertently?

Role-model she certainly is to the teens at her church. A number of them spotted us at the alley and the girls in the group were waving over, giggling and no doubt debating the identity of youth-leader Neely’s companion. “Wasn’t he at church one evening? Is that her new boyfriend? Where did she find him?” She was quietly mortified, that was clear. “Don’t come over,” she was incanting to herself, “don’t come over…” I’m her guilty secret, you see. The charming unbeliever with whom she should have no truck. No doubt there are plenty at her church who would mark me out as a lure of Satan come to tempt her, to insinuate my way snake-like around the foundations of her morality and squeeze till it all collapses in ruins. Thing is, they’d be absolutely right.

Neely is dancing a subtle tango with her own urges. We have outdoorsy-type dates, her and me, like our day-trip into the Welsh countryside (nice, that), or those surrounded by numerous chaperones, example: the Laser-Quest adventure with some of her grown-up church associates. “Can we make like we’re just friends?” she pleaded, prior to the meet, and I generously acceded to her request, knowing that at the very least I’d have my tongue down her throat before the evening was out. What self-consciously trendy Christians her church friends are, with their well-thumbed music magazines and their fingers so firmly on the pulse of popular culture. Yet so wary of the politely sceptical journalist from outside their circle and comfort-zone. God, and how ferociously competitive they all were in the laser-maze, tearing around corners and firing off shots with the energy only a bunch of sex-starved twenty-somethings could muster.

That is, I should qualify, with the possible exception of her co-worker at the church, in attendance that evening with his hot teenage girlfriend. Neely’s sweetly oblivious to the possibility of any sexual impropriety on his part, but nothing will convince me that he’s not knobbing his little mocha-skinned beauty on a regular basis. There were just too many covert knowing glances between them when they thought no one else was watching. I wonder how my date would react, were she to discover that were the case…

In short, Mr Christian Youth is probably getting more than I am right now. There’s irony for you. Do you know, what with work and the Neely-focus, I haven’t shot a load into any convenient female receptacle in over a month? That trounces the previous record for my adult life. My solace is that the virtuous Miss Jordan has a birthday in three days’ time. I have high hopes that she’ll relinquish a little of the control she’s been exerting over herself that evening. Since the occasion of my pouncing and her brief reciprocation, she’s been keeping our alone-time to a minimum and wrenching her poor conflicted self away anytime she’s seriously tempted to misbehave. Her birthday will include dinner at my place, however, and I think I can work a little magic. If not, I may have to rethink the whole damn strategy…

Ray.

19/06/10 18:58 PST



God, Ray, a month??? You must be jacking yourself into a frenzy. Either that or you have the most advanced case of blue-balls known to man. I repeat my advice – go bust your nut inside some little fuck-friend. I admire the almost religious self-denial with which you’re setting about your holy quest, but hell, Ray, if you don’t ease some of that frustration, you’re going to torpedo your chances instead of this girl’s precious virginity, by making some dumb move on her. Drained balls equal renewed focus, right? More so if it’s the end product of a good hard fuck. You’re in danger of losing momentum – you’ve got to make this birthday supper count and for that you’re going to need all your wits about you.

Does the attached photo help or hinder? I had the shot taken for my married guy when I was out of town. My ass looks particularly hard and sculpted right now, don’t you think? Couldn’t you just bounce quarters off those cheeks? Thank-you half a year’s concerted gym-training. He says he likes it framed in black lace, hence the stockings and suspenders. I smoothed it over in baby oil as well, right down to my tight little butt-hole… I hope you appreciate the effect. He certainly seemed to, judging by how hard he boned me from behind the next time we met. I dressed it up the same as in the pic, down to the oily sheen, and my friend’s repressed husband threw a more vigorous fuck into me than I’d ever thought him capable of doing. Now he claims he wants to take my ass the same way. He’ll get the chance, but I’m gonna make him wait for it. Gonna make him beg.

If you screw your Neely-girl, however, you won’t have any begging to do – my ass will be all yours. You blow it, nada. Show your mettle in this, Raymond. Make her beg. I want to be party to another little saint’s deflowering, the last one was so sweet…

Oh God, did I even tell you about Mindy Crenshaw? My roommate from New Horizons Church Camp, Summer of 2001? Cutesy little Hallelujah-girl from Monterey. Full of the Holy Spirit, but head totally empty. Cried with heavenly joy, hands raised to the sky, during every unending worship session. Get the picture? As though the summer wasn’t hellish enough, I shared it with her. I was eighteen – eighteen! – blackmailed into attending one more Jesus-camp by my parents. They’d discovered I’d done coke, courtesy of a friend’s parent, and it was that or they make me attend rehab. Lesser of the two evils, though not by much, not with Mindy eager to be my new bosom buddy.

So I turned it into an entertainment, into order to retain my sanity. It became readily apparent that one of the camp counsellors had the hots for Mindy. Great hulking guy called Trent – looked like he could punch out an oak tree. I could tell from the way he checked her out that this guy was good for a whole lot more than leading prayer breakfasts. So I lured him into the trees one night, slid to my knees, took his impressive cock in my eager little mouth and sucked him dry. God, he stormed down my throat in a torrent, he’d been storing it up many days. (No masturbation at Christian Camp.) Well I had him in my thrall from that point on. Told him I’d help land him the divine Mindy and gave him occasional sexual favours along the way to keep him on board with the plot. Not a huge chore.

Turned out Mindy had quite the teen crush on big Trent and soon they were indulging in steamy make-out sessions every chance they got. But of course she wouldn’t easily let pop the cherry she seemed to be saving up for Jesus. So I buddied up to her, slipped a little something into her cocoa one evening to loosen up her tongue and drew out every scrap of personal info I could – dumb stuff about dreams she’d had and family pets. Then I fed it back to Trent so he could use it on her. He proved more able than I’d expected, fed her bullshit about a divine vision he’d had of them together, throwing in stuff I’d passed on, stuff he’d no way of knowing about her that she could understand. I’d scripted all his lines like fucking Cyrano de Bergerac and the little dimwit fell for it. She was amazed. Figured if God wanted her to be with this guy, it wouldn’t be so bad if she let him do the nasty with her.

I got to spy on it all as part of our deal. I hid in the camp counsellors’ bathroom and peered through a crack in the door as Trent so graciously helped her out of her panties, while all the other counsellors ran a canoeing event down on the lake. Quite a sight, once he’d introduced her to his Sword of the Spirit and got properly warmed up. Sweet doll-like Mind getting the bejesus fucked out of her by that giant stud who’d gone undercover as a disciple of Christ. I’ve watched my fair share of porn, but none of it gets me off like the memory of Mindy bent like a pretzel, Trent’s great shaft sawing in and out of that tight sweet little Christian cunt. He looked like he was thanking me and Satan as he bust his nut inside her. But that was nothing to the look on Mindy’s face when she went to use the bathroom post-coitus and found me masturbating on the edge of the bath. “God,” I said to her, “he fucks like a steam-train, doesn’t he? Don’t know about you, Mindy, but I couldn’t walk the whole next day!” That shut her up the rest of her time at camp, which was about half a day. Then she went crying home to mom and dad.

You know, Ray, it all confirmed what I’d known forever – strip away the sweater and the fish buttons from any fervent little angel of the Lord and all you’ve got it one more naked slut wishing she was moaning on the end of a hard dick. Remember that, when Neely seems hard work. She may have a few more smarts than the divinely dense Mindy Crenshaw, but you’re the man to outsmart, seduce and ruin. I expect and demand it. Your birthday gift doesn’t need purchasing on-line. You’ve already got it in your pants, so go deliver.

Carlotta

* * * *

Neely Jordan strolled leisurely to her café shift on the morning of her twenty-fifth birthday. It was shaping up as one of the first truly hot days of summer, those radiant days on which life seemed all sweetness and God as beneficent as she hoped. There was a text on her phone – HAPPY BIRTHDAY NEELY J, LET ME MAKE IT A SPECIAL ONE. PARTY AT MINE, 8PM – which perfected her mood. She was doing the work she loved at Alton Bridge, topping up her pay amongst friends at the heart of Bristol’s café-society – and cooking for her round at his place later that day would be her new boyfriend.

Today she wasn’t frightened of that word in relation to Ray. This wonderful morning it seemed okay to be attached to a ‘non-believer’, one who after all confirmed her in her faith. She didn’t feel ‘unequally yoked’ as Pastor Simmons would have suggested had he known. This guy respected her values, sought to understand her perspective. He didn’t simply rubber-stamp everything she thought, he made her work it through more thoroughly, as did all her unchurched friends. How could that be a bad thing? And Ray’s departure from his wayward past was due to her – due to his dating a girl who made him think through his behaviour a little more, maybe his whole purpose as a human being. Perhaps she should have a little more faith in herself and in the workings of God rather than fret about everything. As for her squeezable new friend’s immortal soul… Neely liked to think that God’s grace was a bit more far-reaching and innovative than certain of her fellow-Christians would have it. She was sure Raymond Archer was closer to Christ than he would have been had he never met her.

She basked in a warmth that was only partially from the sun glinting through the foliage on her street and turned up Elbow on her i-Pod:

Throw those curtains wide,

One day like this a year would see me right.

Only there would be lots of days like this as she embarked on her twenty-sixth year, right? Jesus was still the rock on which she founded her life, but Ray – well – he just made the place look a lot better.

Jasmin and Leo had opened up by the time she got to Lemongrass and the shop was already smelling of roast coffee and sun-dried tomatoes. “Birthday girl!” A stereo greeting from her friends. Then from Leo: “Glad you decided to drag your lazy bum out of bed and get yourself down here. Just because you’ve notched up another year, don’t think we’re going to do all the bloody work!” She grinned all over her face and thanked God for the good stuff.

Leo was grinning back at her, eyes glinting. Neely flung her arms around his tall skinny body as he seized her in a birthday embrace. He crushed her to him and hauled her off her feet, so that she kicked her heels a little. “See how she loves squishing those boobs up against me?” he said to Jasmin, before setting Neely down. “I’m the only guy she’ll do that to, her new boyfriend included.”

“Does she give you a semi?” Jasmin grinned wickedly.

“God, I think she has done!” Leo checked his lower regions. “And that could be a first, girlfriend!”

“Leo, you perv, just shut up!” Neely swatted his arm in playful outrage and went to change into her uniform in the back. It had occurred to her more than once that sharing such rib- and breast-compressing hugs with Leo was a safe substitute. She’d scarcely dare hug a straight guy that way, for fear of producing that urgent tumescence beneath his trousers.

“You hear that, Jaz?” she could hear him call out. “She’s the only born-again Christian thinks I’m a perv for hitting on a girl.”

“Just… Just so unfair!” she called out as she struggled into her burgundy canvas slacks and apron. “Let it go!” She could hear Jasmin giggling uncontrollably.

“I’m Neely’s token gay friend,” went on Leo with pot-stirring delight. “She hangs out with me so when someone tells her Christians are homophobic, she can say ‘No, check out the camp guy!”

Neely stuck her head around the door and scowled at him, her cheeks burning a little from a genuine sense of hurt. “Leo, you don’t even believe that, do you?”

He had the same broad smile as before. “God, Neely, you are so easy!” He came to her and wrapped her up in a second massive squeeze. “I’m just screwing with you, babe!”

“Okay, okay, you love me!” she laughed in protest. “I feel it! Alright, put me down and leave me be, you’re not allowed to screw with me today. I’m playing the Birthday card here…”

“Speaking of birthday cards…” Jasmin was delving into a plastic bag behind the counter, as Leo set Neely to the floor.

“Oh, and present!” Leo joined the little exotic little sylph to fetch items with enthusiasm from the bag.

“Yes, you’ve got to check this out before we let any customers in,” urged Jasmin with an eagerness that signalled danger to Neely. She approached, tying up her apron, on full Jasmin-alert.

Leo reeled off a quick ‘Happy Birthday’ in a wonky operatic tenor, before handing over the card. It paraded the de rigeur saucy birthday hunk-in-a-thong, under which Jasmin had added the message: ‘Ray on a casual night? Or don’t you know yet?’

Neely did her customary eye-roll. “Thanks guys, it’s a lovely card. And in answer to the question, mind your own.”

“Okay, open the gift, open the gift…” Leo pressed it into her hands – a long scarlet box ribboned in silver. Neely could see her two friends smiling conspiratorially as she prised off the decorative wrappings. The duo were clearly anticipating an entertaining reaction.

The nature of the present was not immediately clear to Neely from the box – some sort of electronic device, hair-curlers perhaps? – so she opened it and continued inside, the seal having been already slit for her. She picked out the object within from its foam-rubber packing and set the box aside. Holding her gift by its white base, she observed how it swelled to bulbous proportions at its other end like a fat zucchini. There was a smaller swollen nodule parallel to the main one, reaching out to create a kind of pincer effect. The main section of the device had a bright purple colour and spongy texture, both of which reminded Neely somehow of children’s TV character Barney the Dinosaur. The nature of the object was not lost on her however – she had seen too many episodes of Sex and the City to be baffled by that – and a split-second after having lifted it before her face her eyes widened and she burst into shocked laughter, clapping her other hand to her mouth.

Jasmin and Leo were exulting in the effect; despite her best efforts Neely had clearly given them exactly what they’d been hoping for. The item did not even pretend to resemble an erect penis in any aspect, but its obvious practical function, the knowledge of where it was meant to be fitted, was enough to make her blush deep. “Check her out,” Jasmin was giggling, “she’s gone the same colour as her hair! Say hello to your new best friend, Neely!”

“Jaz!” Neely could not help but goggle at the article. “I can’t believe you got me… Jaz, you’re wicked!”

“Don’t just blame me,” her friend protested.

“We clubbed together,” Leo informed her, hugging Jasmin gleefully at their success in shocking the recipient.

“But… But… Wasn’t this expensive?” Neely waved the gaudy vibrator before them before realising what she was doing and stuffing it back into its box in a fit of self-consciousness. She couldn’t quite accept that the pair had spent serious money on a joke present, the sole purpose of which was to send her into fits of embarrassed mirth.

“A little,” admitted Jasmin, “but it’ll be totally worth it, trust me. Try this and you might just decide to stay a virgin the next twenty-five years.”

“That’s right,” added Leo. “You might want to wash it though. This dirty bitch has already given it a test-run”

“I’ve got my own!” Jasmin exclaimed, thumping him on the arm, sending Neely into a further bout of scandalized laughter. “Although I got it all charged up for you. It’s ready to rock and roll.”

“So if you want to pop into the bathroom and give it a trial, we’ll cover the customers.”

“She might be a while, Leo, that beauty has a whole lot of functions…”

“The instructions are in the box, Neely, but if you’ve any problems I’m sure Jaz can fetch hers and you two can…”

“Enough!” Neely was clutching a pained stomach and tearing with merriment. “Guys…” she panted. “You don’t… actually think I’m going to use this…”

“Of course we do,” Jasmin exclaimed as though offended. “You think we just bought it to mess with you? We figured if you’re definitely not going to use all Ray’s functions for moral reasons, then the least we could do was provide something to ease your poor frustration.”

“It’s perfect,” said Leo in a reasonable tone. “You don’t actually fuck with a real person, so you can have endless guilt-free orgasmic fun.”

“And you won’t believe what it does to you,” said Jasmin, plucking it back from the box so she could do a little show-and-tell. “I mean the sensation constantly changes – it stimulates all of you, Neely, I mean all of you. Starts off at the head here, then travels down and around to this little bit, so it buzzes right on you know where…” She tugged the smaller nodule to move it away from the vibrator’s main swell. “And if you’re having problems slipping it in, look… It’s made of silicone, so you just draw this bit away, insert nice and easy, then fit the little guy back so it does its job. And the vibrations kind of travel in a circular motion, so…”

“Okay, okay, I get the idea!” Neely was overwhelmed by the demonstration, by the whole damn conversation. “You can put it back! Guys… I… I don’t know what to say…” She truly did not.

“Don’t say anything until you’ve used it,” said Jasmin. “You are going to use it, right?”

“I… I’ll… I’ll think about it…” Neely didn’t want to disappoint such cheerfully well-meaning friends. She wasn’t sure how to explain that she wasn’t even meant to be thinking about sex. That she could hardly use sex toys on herself without dwelling on all the things she wasn’t supposed to be doing. Doing with Ray, to be specific. Whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, think on these things, as the Bible phrased it. “Guys, it’s… it’s lovely. Really. Very… aesthetic. I’ll display it in the living-room.”

“Pass it off as an objet d’art,” suggested Leo. “If your parents or anyone from the church calls.”

“You know that’s such a good idea,” said Neely. “I ought to kill you guys.”

“But thou shalt not,” Leo responded, then they all broke out laughing and her friends birthday-hugged her again.

There was a festive atmosphere for the whole of Neely’s shift. Jasmin and Leo insisted on telling all the regulars that it was her birthday; this led to general cheeriness and the buying of several of her favourite banana and blackberry smoothies by customers, with added vitamin shots. They cranked up the stereo and she danced while preparing sandwiches behind the counter. By one o’clock when she was hanging up her apron, her natural high of the early morning had only been enhanced.

“Off to do your proper job?” Leo inquired as she emerged in jeans and tee-shirt.

“I’ve arranged for the rest of the day off,” she beamed. “Birthday indulgence.”

“What, so you’re going straight home to play with your new toy?” He nodded to the plastic bag she was clutching.

“Leo!” she appealed to him. “I expect better from you. You’re as bad as Jasmin!”

“We’re just looking out for you, sweetheart. We want our girl to be happy.”

“I am happy,” she insisted, and she kissed his cheek prior to departure. “And my present was a very sweet thought. Thank you.”

It was melting through the bag, or so she felt, as she made her way up Bristol’s steep high street. She sensed the weight of her contraband all the more when she checked her phone and heard a voicemail from co-worker Jonas.

“Happy Birthday Neelers! Don’t want to rain all over your day, but JS wants us to kick off the sex ethics workshops a week from Sunday. Before all the teens finish school for summer, I’m guessing, and have all that extra time on their hands. But look, don’t sweat it, we’ve most of the material thrashed out, just needs a bit of… finessing, right? You have a great day. Enjoy yourself, don’t do anything I wouldn’t. Bye.”

What, like carry around state-of-the-art sex toys of a weekday afternoon? Neely almost burst out laughing on her way into the book store.

The gift token she had received as part of her parents’ birthday package was stowed safely in her back pocket. Her local Waterstone’s had just opened a coffee shop – how better to spend the afternoon of her birthday than immersing herself in a new read over a café lunch? She browsed contentedly until she lit on Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief - she remembered reading a good review somewhere – and soon was ensconced in the café area with a cappuccino and a tuna-salad sandwich, leafing through the opening chapters. The Death character who narrated the story, as darkness closed in on 1930s Germany, seemed rather more benign and sympathetic than the figure conjured up by Pastor Simmons in some of his more imaginative sermons. For just a moment she found herself wondering how such an innately conservative man had found himself leading a young, modern congregation like Alton Bridge.

Zusak’s novel was just taking its hold on Neely when she was distracted by the customer who had sat down at the table next to her. She was not immediately sure that it was him – two years had passed, after all, and she had only spoken to the guy once, and that briefly. His hair was longer than she remembered and his formerly clean-shaven face had a good day’s worth of growth. But the mild swarthiness of his skin and dark eyes made him striking enough to remember. He had caught her glance and done a double-take, so that failure to acknowledge him would have been more awkward than not.

She tensed before she said it. This guy’s name was synonymous around the church with the corrupting nature of sin, that or downright hypocrisy. “It’s Danny, right? Danny Woodward.”

He was sitting with his coffee and a Stieg Larsson novel. There was a slight hesitancy in his response. “Yeah, that’s me. And you’re… Keeley.”

“Neely.”

“Neely, right. Yes, I remember. Alton Bridge. I was introduced to you at a service one evening. Just before I… moved on.”

“ That's right - I wasn't even officially employed by the church back then, I was just kind of sussing it out prior to the interview. I remember hearing you speak. Just before you left.” The final sermon he had ever delivered at Alton Bridge - and from what she had pieced together, the same night that he had been discovered rutting on some girl in the preparation room. He knew that she knew and it sat between them, the rampant snorting elephant in the coffee shop. She suddenly regretted having initiated conversation at all. “So… what are you doing now?”

“Square Deal,” he said cryptically, then delved into his pocket and flipped out a card. “It’s a charity promoting fair trade with developing nations. We’ve done stuff as well on cancelling Third World Debt and we were linked to the Make Poverty History campaign. They employ me full time...”

“Well that’s good,” said Neely, and realised the unspoken follow-up was ‘for someone who’s been kicked out of a church job for shagging a stranger on the premises’. She cringed a little at her faux pas, but Danny Woodward seemed not to have noticed. Either that or he was covering embarrassment by reeling off whatever patter he had ready regarding his job.

“We try to recruit a lot of teens from local schools, youth centres, churches to do summer work, plus we’ve had trips out to Kenya and the Sudan this past couple of years. Great events, had a really mind-broadening effect on the youngsters who went out there. So if you know anyone who might be interested...” He proffered the card to Neely and she took it, slipping it into a back pocket after only a cursory glance.

“Yeah.. Yeah, I’ll keep it in mind.” She couldn't imagine Danny ever setting foot in Alton Bridge again to promote his new cause. There was an understated persuasiveness about his pitch and Neely wondered if he still used those skills along with his striking looks to seduce unassuming young women. The wolf in sheep’s clothing. Pastor Simmons’ words to describe this man in several of his sermons; he had alluded vaguely so that only those in the know (practically everyone in the congregation, had he but realised) could pick up on it.

“Sorry, I’m assuming you’re still working there,” said Danny. Good grief, did he really want to labour on with this conversation?

“Yes, I am. It’s... ehhh... It’s going well. We’ve got a whole bunch of new initiatives going for the kids. Community stuff, you know, kind of... leading on from what you started, I suppose. They’re a good group.”

“I know. Many new, or the same crowd as when I left?”

“Some new, a lot you’d remember. Some real live-wires coming up from the juniors.” She stared at Danny, who was all interest at the mention of his former charges. She wondered at life’s ironies - here the predatory pastor and then later on the self-confessed hedonist/unbeliever who showed nothing but respect to a girl of faith. Had the guy seated before her not been caught out, it occurred to her, she would have been working under him. Who knew what he might have wanted her to do under him? It was a disconcerting thought, one which gave her mild palpitations. “And Pastor Simmons is still there, working hard as ever.” She wasn’t sure why she had thrown that in.

“I figured that. Good old Jack. Keeping everyone on the straight and narrow.” Danny drank at his coffee as though, thought Neely, to wash away the taste of a bitter memory. “Trying to keep them straight and narrow.” He smiled ruefully at his own joke.

Neely flinched, put out a little by his sardonic tone and feeling suddenly defensive about the Pastor she had been silently critiquing along much the same lines. “I think he's a good man. A committed Christian. With the young people’s welfare at heart.”

“Well you’ve got to work with him now, so it’s good you think that.”

“I do think that.” Neely’s defences built themselves a little more strongly. “He cares about those kids.”

“Neely, he cares about how they affect his church’s reputation.”

“That’s not true! Look, just because you had a... a falling-out with him...”

Neely knew from his face that she had explicitly betrayed her knowledge of ‘the incident’.

“So everyone knows now.” His voice was flat, resigned. “I figured as much.”

“I didn’t say that. I don’t know what... what...” Dear Lord, thought Neely as she floundered, why do I ever get to thinking I’m clever?

“So much for keeping it quiet,” Danny mused, almost to himself. “Don’t tell me, Neely, I’m an object lesson from the front of the church every Sunday. ‘How to torpedo your testimony.’”

“Well, you know... It gets an occasional mention,” Neely confessed.

“I’ll just bet it does.”

“He... He just doesn’t want people to fall into the same... trap.”

“Right. So he revives the memory of the fallen preacher, rakes up all his sins. I’m sure he makes quite a tragedy out of it.”

“That's not exactly...”

“Makes sure I’m persona non grata around people I used to consider friends.”

“Well what do you expect?” Neely was shocked by how heatedly the words had come out, loud enough to attract several other customers’ attention. Danny just stared at her and she wilted slightly under his scrutiny. But she remembered the disenchantment in some of the older congregants in the wake of this man and his sinful actions, and the disappointment felt by the youth group members. All because of their Youth Pastor’s hollow platitudes. Words full of Christian integrity and yet he couldn’t even keep it in his trousers. Not long enough to get free of the building. That’s how much store he had put by his faith. She lowered her voice and adopted a gentler tone, but did not back down. “I mean after what happened, after what he saw, can you blame him?”

Danny contemplated Neely gravely and it made her quail just a little. “Do you know what happened?” She tried not to imagine it. “I mean, were you there?” She tried to speak, but found nothing to say. “Neely,” he said, and he pulled his chair up to her table, “you struck me as a smart girl and a sincere one the first time we met. Still do. So why you’d condemn me out of hand without understanding the situation is a mystery.”

“I didn’t condemn you…” she protested.

“Neely, it’s all over your face.” She knew it had been and she reddened. “Yet you know nothing about me. Not the first thing. All rumour, all hearsay. What happened at the church that day, what was going on in my life at the time… The sort of…of turmoil I was in before and after… Okay, someone’s told you about the single biggest screw-up of my life. So… What… Are you perfect, Neely? Do you never get tempted? Can you just assume other people are guilty and not turn it around on yourself?” His eyes bore into her calmly and though he could not have known how keenly his words sliced to her heart, she shuddered a little. “I’ve had plenty of condemnation and I don’t need yours. ‘Judge not, lest you be judged’. Does that one not count for something?”

Neely dropped her gaze, abashed and chastened. She sensed a fundamental sincerity in his words, at odds with everything she had ever thought about him. And even if he was insincere, he was still right. Who was she to write off the moral character of, effectively, a complete stranger? “I’m sorry, I had no business saying that,” she muttered, unable to meet his eye.

“Forget it. Look, I was being a bit spiky and you didn’t deserve it. Guess it’s still a sore subject.”

“Emm…” Neely felt a pressing need to abort conversation. “I’d… I’d… I’d better go. I’ve got stuff needs doing.” She went to gather up her stuff hastily – rather too hastily. The plastic bag she seized by the wrong end as she arose and her boxed birthday present spilled to the floor, free of its wrapping.

She made a panicked dive for it, but Danny got there first and for a moment they held it together, as he made a clear mental note of its contents. His mask-like expression suggested a valiant attempt to conceal his innate reaction. Neely’s blush returned, magnified – or so it felt – to the power of ten. She fumbled for something that would exonerate her, but all she achieved by way of explanation for the mortifying object was a feeble “It’s my birthday…”

Danny released his grip on the present. “Well then ,” he said with an irreproachably straight face, “have a very happy birthday.”

Neely felt like her blushes would irradiate the entire bookstore. “Thanks,” she said shortly. “Bye.” She rose and hurried out of the shop, bristling with humiliation and anger. Anger at Danny for just happening to be there and anger at herself for acting like such an idiot. Her glowing birthday mood had been displaced by a whirl of maddening thoughts: handsome young Pastor Woodward fornicating enthusiastically in a back room at the church, his hurt look across the table to her just now, the image no doubt in his mind of her putting her gift to work, and Ray – lovely Ray, probably buying supplies right now for the birthday celebration he seemed so intent on providing her. So respectful of her virtue for as long as she chose to retain it. Never pressing her for more than she was willing to give, and seeming all the more sexy for it. All the more irresistible.

Stop it, Neely, stop it now. Get a grip, for heaven’s sake. Enough with the sex!

* * * *

The drums continued to thunder and fireworks lit up the night sky, as Lucas and Paulo led Sapphire hand in hand away from the crowd. Her head was spinning a little from the cachaca she had drunk. Its taste was still sweet in her mouth. “Where are you taking me, guys?” she asked with a giggle.

“We’re going to show you what Carnival is all about,” said Paulo with a grin. Lucas laughed along with him.

“Well you guys should know. You’re both such cool drummers,” she smiled. “I wish I could have taken part in the parade.”

“You look as hot as any of those girls,” Lucas told her, making her blush.

“No I don’t. You’re just saying that,” she laughed.

“A beautiful curvy girl like you?” said Paulo. “In that tiny little costume? You’re the one we want to hang out with.”

Sapphire laughed with pleasure at their compliments. She looked about mystified as the two oiled muscular guys led her into a grove of palm trees. “What are we doing here?” she asked. “I thought we were going for something to eat…”

“We’ll give you something to eat,” said Paulo.

“Yes,” Lucas agreed. “We’re going to fill you up real well.”

Good grief , Neely thought. The sense of shock experienced the first time she read Odyssey of Lust had subsided rather, but her amazement at Sapphire its heroine remained. This rich-girl had been travelling the world for several months by chapter seven and had lost none of her propensity for getting herself into the same kind of trouble. There was no learning curve at work here whatsoever. Wherever Sapphire went she demonstrated an unerring tendency to slip up and land on cock. Here in Rio, for example. The girl had slicked herself in oil, then dusted her whole body with glitter, before going dancing in the carnival crowd wearing nothing but a gold-link bikini studded with rubies. She had danced herself into a sweat with a pair of barely-clad samba drummers and was about to be surprised that they were planning to fuck her. Utterly ludicrous. Which did not stop Neely turning the page to find out what happened next, as…

The two Brazilian hunks removed their extravagant feathered headdresses and closed in before and behind Sapphire, their hard sweaty torsos pressing against her skin. She gasped as they both unfastened their feathered tribal skirts to reveal thongs that bulged and stretched with their huge hard-ons. Her pussy moistened as she realised that it was going to happen all over again, only this time with two strapping well-endowed men. All she could do was go with the flow.

“Get down on your knees, beautiful lady,” smiled Paulo. She did, her flesh sliding against the two robust male bodies as she sank down to the ground.

“Go on,” Lucas encouraged her with a mischievous laugh. Once again Sapphire felt very far from home. She plucked the satin thongs away from the heads of both cocks and the guys’ long rigid poles sprang out and bobbed before her face, ready and waiting. She knew what these guys wanted and that they were going to get it.

“Pity you didn’t think of that when you were shaking your booty in front of them, you daft bimbo,” Neely muttered, but she followed the bimbo’s progress nonetheless.

Sapphire seized the two massive cocks by the base and began to massage them, her hands sliding back and forth easily along the lengths with the sweat of the hot Rio evening. Lucas and Paulo laughed and groaned with pleasure. Sapphire took the bulging cock-heads into her mouth in turn, swirling her tongue around them and then sucking the throbbing meat-rods deeper, while she continued to masturbate the guys and fondle their swollen balls. They tasted salty and were leaking pre-cum all over her tongue.

“That’s it, that’s very good,” said Lucas, as she sucked on him. He ran his hand through her long brunette locks and pulled her further down onto him. Paulo did she same thing when she returned to him, making her feel the huge veiny shaft in the back of her throat. She gagged a little and dribble ran down her chin when he pulled her off his dick.

They both gripped her under her arms and raised her to her feet. She stood helpless, her eyes wide and amazed, as they removed her skimpy jewelled brassiere and pulled her jingling panties down her thighs. Lucas moulded his hands around her orbed bosoms and his friend molested her ass, slapping his hand to the cleft of her cheeks and thrusting his finger between them till it stroked her asshole. She gasped again with astonishment.

“Still the astonishment. What’s with that? Good grief, girl, you obviously enjoy it, so stop making such a fuss…” Neely could not quite believe what she had just muttered.

“So who will fuck this beauty first?” asked Paulo.

“You, my friend,” replied Lucas. “But she can still give us both pleasure.” He braced Sapphire as Paulo bent her over at the waist. She felt Lucas’ stiff cock batting against her face, as Paulo fitted his pulsing glans to the swollen lips of her cunt and began to push. Oh dear goodness. Neely held her breath as she always ended up doing at such crucial literary moments. Sapphire gasped as Paulo slid his thick shaft inside her. Then he gripped her ripe ass and began to pound her hard, filling her up on every stroke. His balls bounced off her cheeks as he slapped against her. “This is the sort of rhythm I like to beat out!” he yelled to his friend as he shafted her. “Against a nice big beautiful ass, as I fuck a tight pussy!”

“I hear you, my friend!” replied Lucas, as he gripped Sapphire by the hair and shoved his sturdy cock back inside her mouth. He held her with both hands and rammed his entire length to the back of her throat. “Ohhh shit, I love Carnival!” he cried, as he sawed his length in and out of her spluttering mouth.

“So do I!” shouted Paulo over the noise of music and fireworks, as he continued to deliver hard strokes deep into Sapphire’s cunt. “Life gets no better than this!”

The dancing and celebration continued just feet away, as Sapphire felt herself filled up at both ends by the hard dicks of these two lust-crazed guys. Once again she was having a whole different kind of party…

Party. That was what Ray was planning for her. Neely wondered how often he had used the word as a sex euphemism. But her man (her man, how delicious) was reforming himself, so she had nothing to worry about. And the fact that he was going to make no move on her was not a source of disappointment on this her twenty-fifth birthday. Not remotely. Despite the fact that Sapphire was now taking two cocks at a time, while Neely had yet to experience one.

Damn that book!

Neely was being positively blasé now in the way she just picked it up and leafed through a few more pages every day. Taking her erotic hit. We must be single-minded in our pursuit of holiness, the Pastor would say, and he was right. Because as she set aside Odyssey of Lust and proceeded to her room to begin preparation for the evening, her pussy was throbbing from the memory of all those smut-words and the images they conjured up. Images she did not need before hanging out with a real non-fiction hot guy.

In her room she paused, then with vague curiosity retrieved Jasmin’s and Leo’s birthday gift from where she had stowed it under towels in the bottom drawer the moment she arrived in. Taking it out of the box she examined its bizarre shape, running fingers over the surface to feel the texture of the silicone. So not like a cock, the colour and gently-contoured shape somehow friendly and fun. A recreational item, far from the seediness her mind always associated with sex-toys. To be enjoyed in the privacy of one’s home – a modern woman’s liberating plaything.

She experimented a little, touching one of the controls so that the power-tool hummed into life. The vibrations felt curious under her fingers – she could feel them travelling to the tip of the main bulbous head, then transferring to the smaller one in the circular motion Jasmin had described. The surge of current in the vibrator created a shock of panicked excitement in Neely’s brain; she imagined the sensations transferred to elsewhere in her body and switched the device off instantly, returning it to box and box to drawer-concealment in a few short seconds. She stared at the drawer for a moment, as though expecting the dubious gadget to start buzzing again on its own like in some comedy-horror. Then she calmed herself with a deep breath and set about prettifying herself for Ray’s birthday treat.

All her innocent preparations and ablutions that afternoon had guilty associations they never used to. She had trimmed her pubic hair before, but did she have some ulterior reason for doing so today? Maybe she should have left it a tangle of red, like Bridget Jones wearing her ‘big knickers’, one more reason to keep her panties on and concealed. Was there any need to soap her body quite so luxuriously in the shower? To linger at all on her private zones, since she was going to keep them private? To pay any attention to her breasts, cup them and feel pride in her firm squeezable handfuls, thinking how they made up for size in their pretty pertness?

And after the shower, why brush out her flaming locks with quite so much care? Why shave her legs again when they were still smooth from the day before? It wasn’t as though her powder-blue summer dress was going to be sliding off them that evening, pooling around her on the floor. Gosh, she shouldn’t really be wearing her ‘sexy number’ at all. Or the darker blue lacy bra and panty set beneath them. Ray was endeavouring to be a good boy more than Brian the church deejay ever had, but she still shouldn’t be testing his resolve with such an alluring little outfit.

“Vanity, vanity,” she said aloud, checking herself in the mirror with a reproving grimace. “All is vanity.” So she dressed up a little on her birthday. Applied some bronze lippy and sprayed a brief mist of the Givenchy her sister had bought her for Christmas around her modest cleavage. She was girl-next-doorsy, not some red-carpet stunner who was going to drive Ray into a lustful frenzy. Get a grip, Neely…

“Looking good enough to eat, girl,” was Jasmin’s flattering but unhelpful comment as Neely waited for her taxi. “How does he just not jump on you?” Lord, that wasn’t what she needed to hear either.

It was seven when the cab dropped her off at Ray’s three-storey end terrace in Clifton. His greeting was not a lustful frenzy. It was however a full-on, breath-extracting, pleased-to-see-you smooch with liberal lashings of tongue and full body-contact. When he set her back on the floor, she thought her knees were going to buckle. “Birthday kiss,” he explained, as she tried to refocus. “It won’t happen again. Unless either of us comes up with a good pretext. Which we will, because we’re both smart people. You look stunning, by the way.”

“Thank you…” She blushed and giggled and felt ridiculously adolescent as he led her through to the well-equipped beech-wood kitchen, where pots were bubbling gently on the stove.

“Sit down, let me pour you a glass of wine…” The Cabernet bottle was already open. He poured a large glassful and pressed it into her hand before she could object. Well, he had instructed her to take that taxi after all, so what had she expected?

“This is your night,” he insisted. “All you’re to do is sit back and let it happen around you.”

There was something very comforting about perching on a kitchen bar stool with legs demurely crossed, observing as Ray busied himself at the stove. He looked most presentable in blue jeans and a maroon shirt undone to the second button. “First time I’ve seen you do your Heston Blumenthal impersonation,” she said happily, the wine warming her stomach.

“And it’s the first time I’ve tried this recipe,” he told her as he stirred. “So there you are. It’s an evening of firsts.”

“Re-creating a Medieval banquet are you?”

“No, just cooking tagliatelle. Experimenting with a new sauce though. Taste test?”

She opened wide as he fed the spoon into her mouth. Pesto with pine nuts and added sexiness. “Mmmm – delicious.” She might have meant him, standing so close as she supped. How come this man not actually seducing her was more seductive than any one of several church-based guys who had freely tried to feel her up?

He chatted as he cooked and she felt pampered, tended to, her glass topped up periodically and samples of food placed carefully into her mouth. “Here, I got this Brie at the market earlier, it’s so creamy…” Her whole body goosebumped when he nuzzled her on each of his feeding forays. She felt her filmy dress swishing against her smooth legs as she shifted position to receive. It felt so good to get a little drunk on her birthday with a man she trusted as much as she fancied. What a relief it was to abandon control for a while and know she was in no real danger.

She sat down to dinner with her charming host and personal chef, enjoying just being there amidst the masculine ash furnishings of his open-plan living area. David Gray was agonising melodically on the stereo and candles were burning steadily to supplement the fading daylight. They began with stuffed peppers – a man who did courses! – and went to work on a second bottle of Cabernet along with the pasta.

“And he can cook as well,” Neely said in smiling wonder. “If only you’d get in touch with your spiritual side…” Then you’d be Mr Righteous as well as Mr Right.

“I’m in touch with someone who’s in touch with her spiritual side, won’t that do for now?” Candle-light danced about his finely-crafted features as he gazed at her across the dining-table.

“Yeah,” she said, returning his gaze a little more boldly than she normally allowed herself. “It’ll do just fine.”

They chatted animatedly as they ate and drank – about writers who inspired them and places to which he had been and she wanted to go and how she had come to faith, while he settled on rationalism. Never had their differences seemed less of a problem, so attentive, so respectful was he. And just maybe it was something to do with the wine. The whole evening had a lulling quality. She felt sexy and able to show it. Able to play with her hair a little and give him the full emerald blaze of her eyes. It was all okay.

Her face was a little numb from the wine by the time they got to the final course. “I don’t do dessert,” he apologised, returning from the kitchen with two plates, “not like you serve at the café. So I resorted to Waitrose’s finest Bailey’s cheesecake.”

“So disappointed,” she smirked. “You’re really not trying.” She leaned across the table to kiss him on the lips before her first delicious forkful.

It was after dinner when they were both lazing on the rug, backs propped up against his sofa – the one tastefully upholstered in pistachio – that he delved under a cushion and revealed her presents. The first came with an instruction. “You are not to open this till you get home. Otherwise you’ll get totally the wrong idea about my intentions tonight. It’s a luxury item, but it’s for you to enjoy on your own.”

Oh God, not another vibrator... She almost snorted with laughter at her funny thought before dismissing it. “Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.” Neely blushed and beamed at his consideration. “These, however…”

The second item was a box-set containing ornate hard-bound volumes of Lewis Carroll’s Alice books. They caused her to catch her breath as she leafed through them, admiring the original ink illustrations of her favourite childhood novels encased in such sumptuous bindings. She threw her arms around Ray and kissed his face, before turning to and unwrapping her smaller final gift. Inside the velvet case she found a tiny gold cross on a chain of fine gold – simple and beautiful.

“Is this… appropriate?” he asked tentatively.

“It’s beautiful,” she told him, “and it’s totally appropriate.”

“Can I put it on you?”

“Mmm-hmmm…” There was something suddenly overpoweringly intimate about the way in which he brushed back the thick locks of her hair and hooked the chain at the back of her neck, so that the little cross trickled down her cleavage.

“God…” he said, almost prayerfully, as the necklace settled about her, “it’s so, so difficult…”

“What is?” Neely was anaesthetized by several glasses of wine, but still felt unnerved by the intensity of his tone.

“Being good to my word with you looking so damned gorgeous.”

Ohhh God, oh Lord, help me, help me now, please… “But you will keep your word, won’t you?” She felt like she were pleading for mercy.

“I will,” he said, but only after the longest of pauses.

She succumbed at this assurance to a long, searching tongue-kiss, the fingers of one hand light on her face, those of the other toying with the cross as it dangled about her chest. Her body gave in to it as she had not allowed since that evening at her own place. Her fingers brushed the firm contours of his face as he held her, then combed back through his immaculately-groomed blond hair. He tasted of red wine and smelled of Remus Uomo and he was making voiceless aching noises in the back of his throat which said all about his desire she needed to know. It threatened to combine into an all-consuming sensory experience which blotted out rational thought, but she trusted to the honour of the man who had wooed her these past weeks and simply went with it.

Whatever residual tension there was in Neely’s reclining form, Ray seemed to smooth out of her with long strokes back and forth on the curve of her waist. She was crushed against him now, half-lying across his broad chest, his palm reaching down to caress her hip. Their kiss was endless – passion filtering through his tenderness and slowly, relentlessly filling her up. She was aware as she had not been for some time of his physical strength and the sheer power he could exert over her should he choose to do so. Her dress felt impossibly flimsy, her underwear scant wisps of lace – negligible barriers between this man and her naked flesh. Alcoholic fumes were clouding her thought, obscuring God and morality and Pastor Simmons’ disapproving stare, as her body indulged in a slow-motion wrestle with his, her hand casually exploring the tight swell of his pectoral muscles beneath his shirt, his hand coming to rest on her upper thigh, where it gently massaged.

He struggled for comfort and hauled his upper back up against the sofa, somehow drawing her with him as he moved, so that she ended up stretched out above him. She shifted for her own comfort, so that she ended up straddling his pelvis. With a shock she realised that her dress was splayed all about her, the fork of her crotch resting on his loins with just a thin lacy sheath separating her from that hard denim bulge. It would have been so easy to move, to shift into a position less intimate and vulnerable, but she did not. She did not sufficiently want to. He drew her face to his once more with the velvet touch of his hand and fronds of the red hair in which she took such secret pride draped all over him as they kissed. Their mouths were in rhythmic union and it seemed to transfer to their bodies, so that Neely found herself moving back and forth on him just slightly. She could not think for sure who had initiated the movement or whether it was him alone who sustained it. The soft undulation of their lips seemed to fuel the motion, cause it to build, until she became fully aware of it – the sensation of her wet, fully-budded clitoris rubbing against the swell of his erect cock.

I should stop this, I should stop this, I should stop this… She was thinking it in rhythm with their movement. “I’m… I’m not hurting you?” she asked, her breath shallow.

“Not at all, babe,” he assured her. “You okay?”

“Uh-huh…” On one level she was very okay, on another… not. She went with the part that was okay, tasting his mouth all over again, her new necklace trailing down to tease his bare chest, and the sweet spine-tingling friction continuing between them. A dress strap had fallen free of her shoulder and she let it hang there, allowing him to view just a little more cleavage. When he played with the tresses of her hair and stroked her lips with his thumb, she wanted to push aside the other strap too, to tease him a little, but how could she? Not after the restrictions she had put in place. But she let him brush the upper flesh of her bosom with the back of his hand and tease his finger along the lacy edge of her bra. And all the while she tried not to think of the wet needy hollow between her legs and the means he had to plug it.

“You don’t know what you do to me, Neely.” The breathiness in his voice made her nipples stand out harder than they had already done. “I can hardly stand it…”

“Ray… Ray…” Neely pleaded. She felt like the biggest prick-tease she knew, and hated the thought. “You know I can’t, right?” There was enough regret in her voice, she knew, to convey just how much she wanted what she couldn’t, and enough desire to let him know she did not want the dry-humping to stop.

“I know,” he said, as he rocked her gently on himself, and the sense of his warm understanding made her want to cry a little. “But there’s something I’d like to do for you, Neely. Because it’s your birthday and because you deserve it. If you’ll let me…” He brushed her cheek with his fingertips and stared into her eyes.

“What do you want to do?” She could hear her own words falter and knew that there was less “tell me” in them than “show me”. Ray recognised it as well, because he eased her off him and clambered after, till they were kneeling together. Then he raised her up by the waist and guided her till she was seated giddily on the edge of the sofa. Neely stared at him from her perch confused, scared and wanting. Wanting to know…

“Ray… Ray, what are you…?” The fingers of both his hands were stroking their way up her thighs under cover of her dress. The higher they reached, the more shallow became her breathing. Something very similar to this kept happening to Sapphire, the fictional heroine she derided so much. And here she was, letting it happen in such a similar way. Ray’s eyes were fixed on hers, questioning at every instant whether she wanted him to stop. His fingers arrived at her hips and closed around the band of her panties. Now was the time to speak, but she said nothing – nothing as he tugged the lace slowly apart from her wet sex, nothing as he drew the sodden fabric all the way down her legs, finally to disentangle from her ankles.

The sensation of air on Neely’s pussy was shock enough, without Ray sliding her dress upwards to expose her completely. Her mind was a storm of guilt and desire, fear and need. She could not believe she was being so intimately uncovered before his face. Somewhere in the melee of emotions was relief that she had trimmed the excesses of her red pubic thatch. Ray was reaching under her bottom so he could peel the dress’s skirt away from her tender cheeks and crush it into a band about her waist. He was slowly parting her legs, then gazing avidly on the chaste secret she had kept stored away between them. She seized the arm of the sofa and stared as he moved in, his tongue wetting his lips slightly as though in sweet anticipation. It was so sinfully thrilling to be open before him, nothing between her and his searching tongue but diminishing spacial inches.

The tip flickered on her, right on her scared flowering bud. She gasped fiercely as tendrils of sensation shot all though her body, her free hand shooting out to support herself against the back of the sofa. His expertise as he slithered back and forth over her heated little nub, combining with the shock that he was doing it at all, immobilized her with delicious shock. She clutched the sofa and stared at his intent face as he tongued her, feeling it keenly right through to her engorged nipples as he swirled in circles about her, lashed back and forth, worked her like he had found her controlling mechanism. It seemed like he had. She made no protest, the air apparently trapped in her lungs, as he slid his palms under her bare thighs to clasp and cradle her buttocks, before his tongue dived inside her.

Neely was sure she had cried out at the gorgeous intrusion, but not to halt him. She could not think to do that. He had retracted again before she knew it and was gliding up and down her lipped entrance, teasing her clitoris and keeping her whole body stoked with raging fire. Then he slipped down and plunged inside again, lapping hungrily this time, exploring all her inner walls with a deliberate curling motion, before thrusting deep. He was gripping her hard, staring, his intense beautiful gaze not letting her go. Look at me, Neely, he was telling her, look at me. This is what I can make you feel… The thick muscle of his tongue was flexing and retracting, licking all around her pulsing button again, before resuming its back and forth surge inside her.

Ray was enjoying it, that much was clear – loving her taste and texture, but loving her reaction even more. The excitement building inside her, the way it was overcoming all her trepidation, must be so plain for him to see. He was reading her bodily reactions and surely knew the wave that was building rapidly inside her, the one that would break so soon, so soon… This birthday gift he took particular delight in giving. How he would relish her pleasure as she came for the first time in the presence of any man, as she came all over his driving tongue. That in itself would be a kind of deflowering. She knew instinctively he was hard for her too, primed to thrust his erect maleness where his tongue was now. And if he deflowered her one way, then why not another? If she let him do this, then why not… why not…

Neely’s Christian instincts were deeper-rooted than Ray’s tongue could go. Her most recent thought and the temptation to give in to it kicked her conscience back into full screaming operation. It cut through lust and inebriation and in an instant wrested back control. “No, no, please, Ray, I can’t…” Her hand was on his head, urging him away from her, the need to climax receding like an ebbing flood-tide, leaving her shocked and wildly embarrassed. “I’m sorry, I can’t, I just can’t…” She was pulling down her dress with one hand, trying to drag it back over her naked ass.

Ray withdrew completely, a curling red hair stuck disconcertingly to his tongue. “It’s okay,” he assured, plucking the hair away, and he actually helped her to tug the dress back down into place. “It’s alright. It’s what you want, babe, whatever you want.” He stroked her face and hair.

The concern in his voice endeared him to her all over again, even in her mortified confusion. “Ray… Hold me, just hold me, please…” He did, sitting next to her and wrapping his arms tight, rocking her as she buried her face in the curve of his neck. It was comforting to drink in his affection and know that he did not just want her sexually. That he was able to accept her for all her inner wrangles. “You must think I’m such an awful tease,” she moaned.

“I don’t,” he told her softly. “I think you’re lovely.”

“You do?” She fell for him a little more in that instant.

“Yes – just as long as you don’t get all freaked out and tell me you don’t want to see me again. You’re not too freaked, are you?”

“No, no I’m not,” she lied. “And of course I’ll want to see you again.” That part at least she meant, even if it felt like a betrayal of her conscience. She enjoyed his gentle cradling a little longer, then broached a delicate subject. “Ray… Can I put my knickers back on?” Had that really come out of her mouth? She gave a little hysterical yelping giggle having said it.

Ray diverted his eyes as she wriggled back into her panties. Gosh, he was still a gentleman, fresh from having had his tongue inside her. “Maybe I should call you a taxi,” he suggested. “Bit too much for one evening.” She nodded, relieved that an end was in view that evening to their fraught proximity. They cuddled again while waiting for the cab to arrive. “I’m sorry,” he told her. “I just… wanted you to have an extra present.”

“It was… It was a lovely present.” Maybe the most lovely I’ve ever had… She felt light-headed at confessing this truth to herself and willed the cab to arrive.

On leaving she hugged Ray hard, as though that could resolve the broil of emotions within her. In the back of the taxi, now that she was out of immediate danger, she allowed the memory of that wild rude intimacy to come rushing back. Her brand new boyfriend – so tender and so skilled, so hot for her. Pushing nothing on her, yet taking so ravenously what she had found herself offering up. No, that was wrong – she hadn’t offered, had she? She had just gone along with what suddenly seemed so natural. And a boundary had collapsed like the wall of a child’s sand fortress on the beach.

He called her mobile when she’d scarcely got through the door and she answered like she were suffering withdrawal. “Ray?”

“Hey babe, just wanted to check you were okay.”

“Yes, yes I’m fine.” She could feel herself flush with gratitude along with very recent memories. “I’m good. I’m…”

“You have a good birthday?”

“I had… the best birthday. I had a really really lovely birthday.” God help her, she had.

“Don’t forget that first present, Neely J.”

The one he had forbidden her from opening in his presence. Like she could have forgotten that for an instant. “I won’t, babe. I’ll open it in my room.” Call having ended, she settled on her mattress, unwrapped it of its gold coverings and pored over the scented oils within – vanilla and musk, sandalwood, orange and freesia. Images were summoned instantly into her fevered mind of hands on naked flesh, massaging, smoothing, skating over slippery surfaces. Her hands on him, exploring that hard-muscled body, the one she had still properly to see, in lingering strokes. His hands on her, easing and squeezing away all her tension before gripping tight and claiming her heated flesh…

Neely’s nipples were hard once more, her pussy aching for the relief she had denied herself less than an hour earlier. Casting away restraint, she fell back onto the bed, plucking up her dress and squirming her hand down into her panties to supply what her throbbing clitoris needed. She was already at work on herself when she remembered it – her other present. The unexpected one from that morning. Maybe exactly what she needed right now.

She rushed to her chest of drawers on that impulse and foraged in the bottom drawer until she found it, the purple and white play-toy which came to unnerving life at the touch of a button. For a moment she sat on the bed staring at its vibrating surface, listening to its steady thrum, then she did what that morning she’d been sure she would never do – tear down her panties and place the blunt tip of the vibrator to her swollen clitoris.

Neely knew she wasn’t using it right and she didn’t care. She just wanted those vibrations to buzz her own little button into a frenzy of sensation, spreading it throughout all her feminine parts and thence to the rest of her body. Helping her relive the thrill of Ray’s furiously lapping tongue on her and in her. Ohhh myyyyy… Jasmin’s sex-toy worked well – the merest touch set her aflame, brought it all back to her so vividly. The wet thrash of his muscle upon her, the clutch of his strong hands on her ass. That hot breath searing the lips of her pussy…

It brought her to the crisis-point fast, and this time, without the wild intimacy of Ray’s face thrust between her legs, she let it happen. Her whole body ignited as though paraffin ran through her veins. She blazed with glorious sinful orgasm, fierce and long, her body shuddering on the bed all the while, and in that moment she felt like she were giving herself, in her mind at least, to her gorgeous boy. She imagined him taking her any way he damn-well wanted. When the fire had burned itself out she lay on the bed delirious and despairing, the sex-device still buzzing on the duvet beside her. A tear trickled from the corner of her eye down towards the bed’s surface.

“Sorry Lord,” she moaned, sinking into a post-coital mire of guilty failure. “Sorry, so sorry… What am I going to do? Please Lord, what am I going to do? I think… I think I love him…”

There was a knocking on the door and she panicked, straightening her clothing and sitting up on the bed. “Yes?” She thought she had managed an ‘indisposed’ sort of tone, but Jasmin opened up and peered around anyway.

“Hey Neely…” Her pretty Anglo-Thai friend surveyed her and her surroundings with the eye of a practised detective. It occurred to Neely too late that the vibrator was still busy next to her on the bed. Jasmin shook her head with a sad frown. She appeared to have worked out much about the evening just past.

“God, girl, I don’t know who’s going to go mad first. You or him…”

* * * *

24/06/10 22:23 GMT

Okay. How do I tell you this? I appear to have followed up Tuesday night’s tour de force with something of a blunder. The tongue-action hadn’t scared her off, there’d been calls and texts between us, so tonight I decided to capitalise with a surprise visit. I figured if I caught her off-guard, this could be the night. Long-shot, but worth the try. And on one level, the move paid off handsomely. I got unequivocally laid.

Thing is, it wasn’t with Neely. As it worked out, I fucked her roommate instead. For all the breadth of my vocabulary, ‘oops’ is the word that springs to mind.

Look, it may not be a total disaster. It may not be a disaster at all, so it’s not time to panic. Hell, I’m on my Blackberry here, I’ll tell you the rest when I get home.

Later, Ray.

24/06/10 15:27 PST

You did - WHAT?????