Nailing Neely Jordan - Part 6a

04/07/10 12:58 GMT

Well Carlotta –

It seems my strategy is about to pay handsome dividends. You may have to make good on every rash promise you’ve made, come Monday 12th. I have before me a text message from the divine Miss J, suggesting an impromptu supper date at my apartment this evening. My lovely Neely has been strangely moved by our recent interaction and desires, I suspect, to take things significantly further. Oh ye of little faith, Lotta. Seems I’m about to bring this one home.

One thing – I thought there was honour amongst debauchers? You’ve always trusted my word in the past and you know I believe in earning my pleasures. So surely there’s no need for photographic evidence. To be quite frank it strikes me as a little tacky. I think we can allow the girl some dignity, don’t you? Let’s just forget the pic.

Ray

04/07/10 09:17 PST

All a tad premature, I think, Raymond. It’s not over till the Jesus-girl comes. On your cock, to be precise. And my ‘tacky’ request – this from a man who bangs freshman students in public shower-stalls for the common entertainment? Give me a break.

Let’s say I do trust your word, Ray. That you’ll be scrupulously honest regarding your degree of success this evening, based in whatever kinked sense of honour you still possess. Maybe I just want the photograph as a memento of our little challenge. The before and after – Neely Jordan, saint to sinner. Or just maybe I want confirmation that your predatory instincts aren’t being blunted by misplaced sentiment. Either way, the photo is a stipulation. I possess it, or you never possess me in this life, and the whole damn thing has been a waste of both our time.

You’ve fucked around too long, Ray. Do this thing tonight and send me proof.

Carlotta.

* * * *

Neely received the phone-calls on top of each other. She heard the incoming-call tone even as she was speaking to Ray.

“Hey, beautiful girl,” her boyfriend said on her answer, and her renewed conflict eased at the warmth of his tone. “I’m in tonight, for you and no one else. You’re… sure about this? If you’re suggesting what I think you are…”

Neely paused. The sacrifice she was contemplating was just too damn huge without an additional confirmation. “Did you mean everything you said last night, Ray? I mean everything?”

He paused as well and when he spoke it was as though he’d held back to show that his response was no reflex. “I’ve never said those things to anyone before you, Neely. And I meant them all.”

She closed her eyes in gratitude. His few words’ reassurance made her decision so much plainer. “Then I’m sure,” she told him softly. “See you around ten?”

“I’ll see you then, Neely J.”

Despite the lowering clouds of guilt there was something luxurious in ceasing to struggle. It was decided and simple. Relatively speaking . She checked the call she had missed and set about dealing with one of the complications.

“Jonas. Hi. You’ll want to talk about tonight then…” The workshop was such immaculate timing, she thought wryly. How had it all come to this?

“Well, yeah…” That same sheepishness in his tone which had replaced the good-humour of old. “Just wanted to check you’re…ehhh…”

“Down with the plan? Well unless it’s changed since we discussed it last…”

“No, no, it’s the same. And I stuck in all in an email if you want to go check it. I’ll rig up all the audio-visual stuff before the service and we’ll be all set. Look, Neely, I appreciate you doing this with me. More than you know. I mean you could have put the kybosh on the whole thing. On me, for that matter.”

“Jonas, I…” She fought for words in the midst of all her spiritual bewilderment. What a pair they were, if only he knew. “You’re a good guy, I haven’t stopped thinking that.”

“Look,” he said warily, “we can still help these kids make good choices, right?”

“Good choices…” Her mind drifted to a recent oily encounter with a certain borderline atheist and of their imminent follow-up liaison. “Yes… Yes Jonas, we can do that. I’m sure. Hey, I’ll see you at the service, okay?”

As she clicked off her phone the weight of her own moral compromise threatened to crush her. “I can’t do this,” she breathed, without properly believing it. She tried again - “This has got to stop…” - and focused hard on her responsibility that evening – to provide the Alton Bridge youngsters with a solid Christian alternative to the doctrine of self-gratification. How could she possibly do that and then freely embrace her own erotic desires? However enticing that prospect. However delectable…

Her hand drifted towards Odyssey of Lust on the bedside table and she let it drift, wanting to feed her burgeoning fantasies, wanting the book to do its work as psychological lubricant one more time. Thumbing through the pages she went beyond the seedy father/son threesome in chapter fourteen and to the section beyond, tantalisingly entitled Sapphire’s Release. There she found the novel’s heroine returned to her luxurious bedroom-prison in the Bavarian Castle Buchenwald, awaiting her next ingenious sexual trial at the hands of the Duke and his debauched guests. Of course Neely was in no prison…

Sapphire sat bolt upright, pulling the silk sheets and heavy quilt around her freshly-bathed naked body. “Who’s there?” she asked, trembling with trepidation and peering into the darkness. “Duke Buchenwald, is that you?”

“Hush my darling,” said a voice she recognised from the few times she had heard it. “The Duke does not know I am here. It is I, Prince Sven.”

Sapphire’s heart leapt. Prince Sven - the rogue member of the Swedish royal family, Neely recalled, renowned for his womanising exploits all over the Western World - had been the one guest of the Duke’s not to lay a finger on her. Each time she had been taken he had stood back and observed with an enigmatic expression on his strong handsome face. “How did you get in here?” she gasped.

“I foiled the Duke’s secret locking mechanism and drugged his guard dogs,” he told her from the shadows beyond the window. “In face I have drugged everyone else in the castle. I have come to rescue you, my Princess.”

This was fast turning into one the daftest passages in the book, but it still gripped Neely’s attention and accelerated her heart.

Sapphire heard a rustling sound and then he stepped into the moonlight that poured through the huge barred window. She saw his cock first, standing before him like the flagpole that stood proudly outside his father’s palace, then the rest of him. “Ehhh – Prince,” she inquired, staring in awe at his massive erection, “if you’re here to rescue me, then why have you taken off all your clothes?”

“Because first, my darling, I must fuck you,” he answered with fever in his voice. “Claim your body as my own, then take you away from this place forever. Do you like this plan?”

“Very much,” she said, letting the bedclothes fall away and coming to him in the centre of the room so that he could see her naked beauty in the moonlight. “I think it’s a wonderful plan!” She ran a hand through his blond hair, then trailed it down his muscled chest to where his thick staff trembled before his stomach.

“Ohhh heavens,” moaned Neely, her visual of the scene clear like none other had been in all her reading. Blond and beautiful with a huge priapic member all primed. Ready to take Sapphire, then take her away…

“That feels so good,” groaned the Prince, as her fingers fluttered all over his cock. “Now get to your knees, my beauty, and take me in your mouth.”

Sapphire obeyed gladly, kneeling before him with pale moonlight splashing all over her curvaceous body and lighting up the splendour of his. She gripped his firm buttocks with both hands and claimed his splendid tool with her mouth, slavering her tongue all over the salty head and enveloping him completely.

Neely heard herself emit a delirious little moan as all the taste and sensation of the previous night came back to her. To be reading this, now…

“Suck on me, my Princess,” he urged, stretching his fingers through her curls and drawing her further down onto his shaft. “Suck on my royal sceptre, feast on a cock born of kings… Neely would have snorted with laughter on any other afternoon. I will fuck you mightily on this bed, then take you away with me and ream you in all the capitals of Europe.”

She felt herself lifted from his dripping shaft with a slurp and raised to her feet. He seized her gently with one hand on her face and the other gripping her waist and walked her backwards to the great four-poster bed. “However you have been fucked before,” he told her, his stately attachment brushing her soft stomach, “now you shall receive a princely fucking you shall never forget. Tonight, Sapphire, you will be a virgin deflowered all over again…”

Neely set down the book in shock. Okay, didn’t need to read that. Did not need to read that. And she couldn’t bring herself even to look at what came next. What point was there, when she could face up to the reality that night?

“I’m going to do this,” she breathed in terrified wonder, rocking herself back and forth as she perched on the bed. “I really going to do it…” Forgive me, she added vaguely in her thoughts. I don’t think I can help myself…

She set about the practical aspects of the business, commencing with a judicious pruning of her pubic zone. It was the most tormenting part of the whole sequence, for all else could be passed off as her regular ablutions; the trimming and shaping of this thick grove into a neat triangle of red thatch, however, underscored her intentions. She was preparing herself top to bottom for a grand unveiling.

Her shower was perfunctory; no further need to indulge in soapy flights of fantasy. The towelling-down and moisturising of her body was carried through in a similarly functional manner, but the drying and brushing out of those cascading red tresses was done with love. If she really were at last going to be tumbled, she wanted those locks, on which had centred all her Christian struggles with vanity, to look amazing. And then there was the question of what to wear.

Since she would go straight to Ray’s from church – assuming something divinely wrathful didn’t happen on the way – she had to dress for both. A few cosmetic additions could be made after she’d left Alton Bridge, but the thought of having anything sexy tucked away in her purse appalled her. A change from that morning into a different dress – the demure pale-blue one with the pleated skirt – would do. And under it… She opened her bottom drawer, the one where on a nightly basis she secreted her vibrator, and searched out the lilac bra and panty set. Jasmin had presented it to her the previous Christmas and as yet it had not been given a proper airing. Tonight, it seemed, was the night for which her sexiest lingerie had been waiting.

It gave her a dubious thrill to draw the floral-embroidered lace thong up her thighs and feel the snug fit around her tidily-gardened loins. She felt a similar frisson as she encased her breasts in the pretty half-cup brassiere, adorned so tastefully between the cups with a little silk bow. The result, as she checked herself slyly in the mirror, gave her a rush of guilty satisfaction. Surely Ray would be pleased at this. Surely he would relish reversing the manoeuvre she had just performed, whether with slow and tender appreciation or in a sudden burst of wild desire. The thought moistened her in an instant and she broke away to cover up in the modesty of the dress before she felt overcome.

Okay… Brush and floss. Subtly apply mascara and a touch of lipstick. Slip feet into her heeled sandals and check the contents of her purse. The sandwich she had forced herself to eat in the kitchen should sustain her the rest of the day, but she packed a cereal bar just in case light-headedness threatened later. She was all set to leave when she bumped into Jasmin in the kitchen doorway.

“Hey babe, off to church?” Her impishly-proportioned roommate was dressed in lazy-day beachwear, hair tied back showing off her face’s delicate bone-structure. Then the girl’s eyes strayed to what was obviously peeking from beneath the shoulder-straps of Neely’s dress and widened a little. “You’re finally wearing the lilac number? To church?”

“Well…” The waning of Jasmin’s interest in Neely’s love-life these past two weeks had been disconcerting, but she didn’t need it to resurrect now. “Can’t I look pretty to church then?” she ventured.

“Well sure,” admitted Jasmin, slipping past her into the kitchen. “God created ‘sexy’ and all that. But you’re not wearing that lingerie for the Lord, are you?”

“Jaz…” Please don’t do this, I’m begging you…

Jasmin looked around at her from where she was pouring herself a glass of water from the sink, her expression rather more serious – make that probing, concerned - than Neely might have expected. “I’ve got a feeling, to quote the song, that tonight’s gonna to be a good night. Am I wrong, Neely?”

“It’ll be… fun, you know…” the cornered redhead replied weakly. Jasmin was so obviously picking up the evening’s significance on her well-tried radar, but Neely tried to play innocent nonetheless. “Hanging out with Ray, want to look nice for him.”

“Oh you will do,” assured Jasmin, smiling but without her traditional tease. She gave one of those new lengthy paused of hers. “Well… you have a nice evening…”

“Thanks, Jaz, I will.” Neely made a break for it, before the situation could become more excruciating, but Jasmin was too quick for her.

“You don’t have to do this.”

She froze in the doorway and turned, face flushing. “Sorry? Do what?”

“What you’re thinking of doing tonight. With Ray. Neely, you don’t have to do it.”

She stared at her friend, perplexed on a couple of levels. “What makes you think I’m… I’m planning on doing anything?”

“Because you’re terrified.” Well that was no surprise, Neely supposed, gripping the door handle for support and staring at the linoleum. She hadn’t really managed to bury her intentions deep. “And,” pointed out Jasmin, “all that extra preparation.”

“Well if I am,” said Neely, feeling peculiarly defiant as she looked back at her friend, “it’s my choice, right? Same as it’s always been. I wasn’t expecting you to try and talk me out of it. I’ll see you later.” She went to go a second time.

“Neely… Neely I’m sorry!” The words alone arrested her, let alone the urgency with which they were blurted out. She stared around at her friend with a vague foreboding.

“What for, Jaz?”

Jasmin looked even more flushed than Neely felt. She was twisting one foot against the other in her unease. “I… shouldn’t have kept pushing you.”

“What?” Neely was quite amazed at her friend.

“Teasing you and trying to push you into something against your will. Saying Ray would expect to sleep with you…” The words were now rushing out. “I mean, who the hell am I to go telling you to sleep with anyone? What good’s it ever done to me? My relationships are rubbish, they always get messed up one way or another… Look, maybe your way’s better! Are you sure Ray’s right for you? I mean he seems a nice guy and everything, but… Maybe you should wait to meet somebody in the church! Somebody who gets you, who’ll wait. I don’t want you to get all messed up on my stupid account, or because he puts some kind of pressure on you…”

Neely rushed to her friend, trying to stanch the flow of words along with the tears which threatened to accompany. “Jaz, Jaz, Jaz…” She gripped the petite brunette by the shoulders. “Just stop, okay? Wow, whoever that guy was, he really messed up your head! I’m not doing anything because you’ve pushed me or because Ray’s pressurizing me… I am capable of making my own decisions, you know that?”

“Yeah, yeah, I know…” Jasmin mumbled, still looking terribly forlorn.

Neely hugged her friend close, surprised to find herself being the strong one in this situation. “Look… There are things I have to work out for myself, you know? And… maybe I am scared, maybe I hardly know what’s going on in my life right now… But I make my own choices and I’m the one who’ll take responsibility for them. I won’t expect anyone else to, I promise.” She planted a kiss on Jasmin’s forehead and smiled at her bravely. “Now wish me luck. Kind of figured you’d be cheering me on here.”

“I am,” said Jasmin, trying to smile through her glumness. “Just be careful, okay?”

“Careful?” Neely almost laughed. “Listen to you… You sound like my dad.” Then a care-related issue clouded her thoughts, something about which she’d worried but had yet to act on. She imagined Ray would be prepared, but she shouldn’t assume. And ducking into a pharmacy on the way to church felt like a nightmare too far. “Jaz… Jaz, you haven’t got any… any…”

“In my purse. Got a packet unopened.”

“Wow. Modern woman.”

“Yup. Much good it does me. Shall I fetch them?”

“Would you? That would be… helpful.”

Her roommate returned a moment later and pressed the little cellophane-wrapped packet into Neely’s hand, a moment of girlish conspiracy uniting them. Neely looked at her friend in gratitude. It was nice to have this moment minus the sly humour. “You sure you’re doing the right thing?” Jasmin asked simply.

“No,” she replied, squeezing her friend’s hand. “Not remotely. Bye.”

Prophylactically equipped for the first time in her life, Neely made her long-seeming way to Alton Bridge. The embarrassing item she had zipped safely into a compartment within her purse, to avoid a rerun of the birthday vibrator incident. Her sinful plans she locked away in a similarly safe mental compartment. She had used the same tactic on her Disney World trip, when older sister Layla had insisted they ride Space Mountain. All terror regarding the forthcoming ordeal she had shut away, focusing on Goofy, Caribbean pirates and candyfloss, anything else, only facing up to her fear once she was on board the ride. Thus she would get through her evening at church. If only she didn’t have to be quite so proactively involved. And dealing with the topic she wanted most to avoid…

“Hey, you got the email, right? All set for later?” Jonas approached her in the entrance hall, as chattering worshippers filtered past them into the mail part of the church. His discomfort with her seemed to have increased.

“Yeah, I got it,” she told him softly. “Same as what we discussed. It’s all fine.”

“Look,” he said confidentially, “if we just approach it as – well – providing them with a bit of guidance… We’re still on the same page about that, right?”

“Sure we are,” she said, trying to smile reassurance through her unease. Who was she that night to make her co-worker feel any more awkward than he already did? “Really, Jonas, I’m okay about the workshop. We’ll just do it like we planned. It’ll be great, I’m sure. I’m cool with everything.”

“Good. Right.” He went off somewhat bemused to sit with Leona, and Neely managed to find space beside some church newbies, with whom she didn’t especially have to chat. The Alton Bridge worship band kicked in and she let the service happen around her. She mumbled her way through the songs, forced a smile any time the Pastor made a joke and bowed her head for prayers in which she suddenly felt no right to join. She had to swallow a cringe when called on to stand up where she was and remind the teens about the after-service workshop.

“Yes,” she said, voice wobbling slightly along with her legs, “I’m sure you all know about it by now – you’ll have seen the posters and you know what we’ll be discussing in the coffee bar at eight o’clock.” Every eye in the church was upon her and she felt sure the evening sunshine would somehow cut through her thoroughly opaque dress, exposing her sluttish lingerie along with her intentions. “It – eh – promises to be interesting and hopefully very valuable… for us all.”

“We’re very blessed,” announced Pastor Simmons once she had hastily resumed her seat, “to have two such likeable and hard-working young Christian leaders as Neely and Jonas at Alton Bridge, each of them committed to upholding a vibrant witness and holy lifestyle. I hope you’ll all stick around afterwards as they lead you in what I’m sure will be a lively presentation and discussion on the vital subject of human sexuality.”

Sheesh , thought Neely, I wonder who’s coping better here, Jonas or me…

The church’s purpose-built coffee bar was crammed with young people post-worship. Either, she and Jonas were as popular as the Pastor believed, or the roomful of buzzing teens just wanted the opportunity to talk about sex. The interaction between her and her co-worker was business-like from the start, manifestly lacking, she would have thought, in the kind of jaunty banter they had until recently enjoyed. Leona, who was used to tagging along at anything involving her boyfriend, had tactfully absented herself.

“Hi everybody, welcome to the first of our ‘sexuality workshops’,” Jonas began, once the impressive montage of music and subject-related film clips, which he had put together, had played out on the flat-screen TV above the bar. (Neely could not even look at the footage of the JLS guys, Rhianna et al writhing sexily on the screen. She felt sure she should be up there as well, with Whore of Babylon emblazoned on her shimmying ass.) “We hope the film hasn’t got you too excited…” There was a burst of appreciative laughter from the room. It was the sort of comment Jonas could only get away with when the Pastor wasn’t present. “Of course the whole point of showing it is that you’re all well-used to such images, isn’t that right, Neely?”

“Yes,” Neely affirmed, working from the loose script she and Jonas had put together during their working lunch almost two weeks previously. “We’re all bombarded with sexual images in the media…” not to mention when we look inside co-workers’ cars “and there’s a great deal of pressure on us to adopt the attitudes and… and practices which we see in the world around us.” Like getting naked with our boyfriend and playing with his beautiful erect cock.” We’re all human and naturally we want to…” get ridden senseless “…to express our God-given sexuality. To enter into a... a full expression of that sexuality.”

“Yeah, like Danny Woodward did, in the room next door,” snickered Luke Simmons from a nearby table, to the girl seated next to him. The odious little shit, it had already occurred to Neely, was taking a particularly prurient interest in the proceedings. A responsive ripple to his comment spread through the room.

“What we’re not here to do is to judge other people,” she said rather defensively. She wasn’t having the Pastor’s idiot son bad-mouth Danny. “Especially when we don’t know the whole story.”

“I saw the whole story,” grinned Luke, looking around to gain a reaction from his peers.

“Yes, well we don’t need to hear…”

“It was eighteen certificate. He left the church and went off to start a career in porn.”

“Alright, shut up you little prick, or Jonas and I will kick your ass out that door.” There was a stunned hush. Luke was staring at Neely, slack-jawed. So were quite a few others, come to that. “Won’t we, Jonas?” She looked to her co-worker for back-up.

“Ehhh – yes, yes we will,” he replied, struggling free of his own awed silence. “Another word, Luke, and you’re gone, okay? Right…” He still looked rather confounded, although she was sure it was partly with amusement. “You were saying, Neely?”

“I was saying…” She succeeded in recovering from her outburst. “…That we’re going to be… trying to look at sex in a kind of wider context and to… see how we can best cope with our sexuality as Christians in the modern world. Okay, Jonas, over to you…”

It was already a contender for the weirdest evening Neely had ever experienced. Jonas introduced the Adam and Eve story and together they rallied back and forth about the nature of the Bible’s premier male/female relationship. Why God had considered that type of companionship and long-term sexual commitment a good idea in the first place. A sliver of trust seemed restored between Neely and her church colleague, just enough to make the evening manageable.

The teens broke into groups, each with a set of discussion points, and Neely circulated, avoiding the now rather taciturn Luke Simmons. She talked with the youngsters about partnership, gender-roles, divisiveness and blame, all the facets of the Eden story (she was not quite daring enough to use the word ‘myth’) which were not directly connected to sex. It should have been food and drink to her, fuelling debate in this type of setting, but tonight she was treading warily around the material, trying to avoid anything that referenced her own treacherous intentions. And always the hour was coming nearer, when she would submit herself to the same desires of which she should be warning the church’s youth. But she had to stay focused. She wasn’t locked into the roller coaster yet…

The workshop went surprisingly well, on a purely practical level. She might have relaxed a little, had it not been for the imminence of her liaison. Then Pastor Simmons showed up just as she and Jonas were wrapping the event and hijacked everything. “It’s so important,” he said, earnestly addressing the whole assembly, “that we embrace the Bible’s precepts when it comes to our sexual behaviour. There’s such temptation for you young people to succumb to your urges, but you must resist at every turn. Resist in the name of Christ, or you’ll fall victim to your own lusts and the wiles of the Devil…”

“I can’t stand it,” Neely mumbled to herself, subsiding into gloom as the Pastor continued his impromptu sermon.

“You must think I’m the biggest hypocrite in Christendom right now,” Jonas muttered to her with a sheepish grimace.

“Oh, I think that prize is still up for grabs,” she replied solemnly, and he shot her a questioning glance in response. She was sure he wanted to talk further once the Pastor had taken it on himself to close in prayer, but she excused herself with a quick “Gotta run, bye,” and made for the door, slightly more desperate to flee the church than she was scared to go to the evening’s final destination.

“Rushing off, Neely?” It seemed Pastor Simmons also wanted to bend her ear and that was more than she could cope with.

“Yes, sorry, I’d love to stay but I’ve got to see a friend about…” being divested of my virginity “…about ten o’clock.”

“Well thanks again, Neely, it’s a wonderful example you’re setting here. I…”

“Well - you know, I try.” Tried. “Gotta go.”

She went through the church and ducked into the ladies’, where that morning she had dealt so urgently with her frustration. There she brushed back her hair, giving it added flounce around her shoulders, and applied a little extra lipstick. Her phone buzzed a text and her heart jumped in response. Of course it was Ray. I’M ALL READY FOR YOU SWEETHEART. Her stomach and chest were seized with galloping scared excitement, which she could scarcely control. It took several moments to regulate her breathing and send the reply: JUST LEAVING. THERE IN HALF AN HOUR. She watched the words blip from her phone on their way to his.

Before leaving she caught her own glance in the mirror and stood for a moment, trying to recognise the pale red-haired beauty before her. Prayer just didn’t seem an option now that her decision was made, so mirror-girl was her only companion. “I can’t believe you’re doing this,” she breathed. “Me neither,” responded her sorrowful reflection. And with that Neely left the sanctity of the church before it could condemn her any further.

She flagged down a taxi, inveterate bus-user though she was, relieved that one had shown up before the youth group emptied from Alton Bridge en masse. “Where to, love?” asked the cabbie, and a sense of approaching doom enveloped her as she gave Ray’s address. They set off and wove through the streets towards Clifton village. Funny how she had stopped being able to imagine the evening ahead, as the taxi carried her to her deflowering. All those weeks when she had clung to her chastity, her mind had been an erotic carnival. Now that she was on the verge of succumbing to desire, however, it was a screaming blank. Wasn’t she supposed to be on course for a thrilling, ecstatic event, however sinful? The anticipation was more nervous dread than awaited ecstasy. This really was Space Mountain all over again.

Then destination was achieved, taxi-ride paid for, and Neely stood orphan-like, clutching her purse, before Ray’s suddenly foreboding black-lacquered door. She rang the bell and waited, feeling suddenly like a harlot-for-hire, imagining the curtains’ twitch all along this tree-lined terrace, as residents checked which strumpet was calling on the well-known ladies’ man at number forty-four. Her boyfriend had made no secret of his amorous past; could he even have told her which number she was in his string of conquests? Shouldn’t she have chosen a paramour with a more notch-free belt before offering up her chastity? Oh God, what in suffering hell was she doing there?

The door opened and Ray stood before her, gorgeous in dark jeans and a white cotton shirt, welcoming her in with a smile that melted away her fears like sunshine on wax. She glided into his hallway in a sudden thrill of happiness and he shut the door behind her, sealing them both away from prying eyes. Even God would deflect his sorrowful gaze, she felt, from what might go on within those walls. Not a happy thought, but enough consolation for her guilty soul to be going on with. After all, I can repent later, right?

She turned to say “Hi,” and he gathered her to himself in a tight embrace, sealing his mouth to hers and tonguing her in extravagant greeting. Instantly she reciprocated, letting her tongue glide all around his, while her arms linked about his strong neck. His touch was warm and sensuous, but different from before. He was taking her boldly in that opening hug and she was freely giving; there was such luxury in no longer holding back. His hands were clutching the snug-fitting bodice of her dress and pulling her tight to him, so that she could feel his maleness thicken against her as desire pumped it hard. Ray’s hold on her tonight was territorial and she knew, pressed close against him, how literally he would stake his claim. Her loins were already juicing in preparation.

The kiss extended and softened into a lingering dance of their tongues, before Ray broke away and smiled, still holding her languidly. “Yes, hi,” he answered her, and she laughed a little through her haze of tremulous desire. “Come into the living-room with me. I’ve something we can relax with.”

His hand slid around hers without their bodies ever breaking contact and he led her into the room’s ambient lighting, where two fluted glasses and a Moet and Chandon champagne bottle awaited her on the table. It gratified Neely that he wasn’t simply going to haul her into the bedroom and throw her flailing onto his mattress, that he deemed some chill-out time appropriate. Yet as she sat down, she was troubled by the significance of the beverage her boyfriend was uncorking before her - whether or not it was just a touch self-congratulatory and presumptuous. As he had done on dates past, Ray appeared to read her mind.

“You’re wondering exactly what we’re celebrating,” he said, easing out the cork with a hearty pop, then catching the frothing translucent liquid neatly in one glass after the other. She looked at him solemnly as he passed her a crystal goblet. “Whatever happens this evening, beautiful girl, I’m drinking to us.”

A fizz of warmth ran through Neely before the bubbles had even landed on her tongue. He did have a knack, her guy, of saying exactly the right thing. “Me too,” she said, beaming at him. “To us.” They clinked their glasses and drank, the classy drink fizzing down her throat like a kind of liquid reassurance. “It’s delicious,” she said, giggling a little at the unfamiliar sensation and pondering what a down-market life she must have led up till now.

“You’re delicious,” he responded, and his sudden intensity suggested he was planning to enjoy her to the full. Her gaze faltered as she sipped again from the glass, and she felt silly and girlish before him, all her womanly flourishes from the previous night having apparently deserted her. “Pretty dress, don’t think I’ve seen it before,” he said as though to rescue her from her embarrassment. It didn’t work.

“It’s one I… wear to church.” She had hoped they could somehow negotiate their way clear of that particular C-word and trembled a little at the mention.

Ray was equal to the moment. “You could wear that anywhere. Maybe we could take it on a day-trip next week. Somewhere outdoorsy if the weather holds.” She leaped on the topic and they swapped potential destinations, Neely throwing out places she had never been, to which Ray could spirit her. It was reassuring – not so much to avoid sex, but to envisage a world beyond it. She imagined the two of them closer, all the more tightly-bonded, exploring their new lives together. And as they chatted, the champagne levels slowly sank, till the glasses were finally drained. Somehow she did not envisage a refill. Not till much later in the evening at any rate.

The conversation lulled significantly and Ray reached to brush back a strand of her hair with his fingers, lightly cradling her jaw with his palm. Neely leaned her face into the caress of his hand. “I know how huge this is for you,” he told her gently. “And I don’t take it lightly.” She met his eyes again and drew comfort from how his charged stare had simmered down into something more understanding. “I need something, Neely. I need to hear from your lips what it is you want this evening. What you meant when you asked to come around. I don’t want to be in any doubt.”

She knew that he knew, but it was sweet that he made show of assuming nothing. Although maybe he simply found it hot that she offer herself. “I… I…” She couldn’t quite force out the words.

“Tell me, Neely, I want to hear you say it.”

So it did make him hot. She could hear it in the huskiness of his lowered voice. He wanted her to articulate the enormous step she intended to make. Well so what if it aroused him to play this game with her precious chastity? She had made him wait long enough and it was causing her to soak her knickers. She looked into him and summoned up a little courage – played the game once more, the crazy-sexy game of giving him exactly what he craved.

“I want…” It was real. She was doing this thing. Whatever guilt might come crashing down on her next day, tonight somehow it couldn’t touch her. “I want you to do with me whatever you want. Whatever you’ve been dreaming of. Don’t censor yourself.” She had used the same words with Danny one week prior. “Be what you want to be with me. I won’t back off.”

“You change your mind at any point,” he told her, brushing her lips with his thumb, “I’ll understand.”

“I know,” she said, and she returned his penetrating blue-eyed stare. “But I won’t.”

There it was. She had committed herself. Like once she had committed so solemnly to her faith. Fleetingly she recalled the promise she had made to God as she walked away after lunch with Danny – I won’t go there – and a wave of dread rushed upon her. But Ray was already taking her at her word. The champagne flute he prized gently from her hand, setting it with his own on the table, then his mouth was on hers once more, fingers plunging into her thick hair to draw their lips tighter together. He released her from a hard urgent kiss that left her gasping, then his lips were caressing her ear, neck, collar bone, as she fought for breath. His fingers clutched her through her thin dress and she knew that this scary, blissful, sensual assault had no brakes to it. She had ventured down this road before, so tentatively, but tonight there was no returning.

He kissed her again, firm on the mouth, and told her: “My room, let’s go there.”

“Mmhmm…” She was agreeing almost desperately, then broke from him so that she could dig into her purse. “Ray… Please…” She plucked the condom packet from within and pressed it into his hand, feeling stupid for not having broached already the subject of protection.

He smiled and kissed her more softly. “Clever girl. I have my own, but these’ll do just fine. Not that we’ll need them yet a while. Come with me…” and she let him take her by the hand, raise her from the sofa and lead her lamb-like into his bedroom.

The curtains were drawn, a shaded bedside lamp casting a pale glow about his dark-sheeted double-bed. Candles on the dresser were already flickering, suffusing the room with the scent of – she was sure it was frankincense. A Biblical fragrance, how choice. “Wait here,” he urged, setting her onto the edge of the duvet. She perched there, fingers knotted together, heart drumming, vaguely studying the Parisian and Venetian cityscapes hung about the walls of his room, trying to make out the titles of his book collection on the tall case’s many shelves. There would be other less distracting occasions on which to take in the trappings of his room, she thought. Right now she was more taken up with Ray as he darted about the bed, lighting further candles which had stood prepared on either side. Nice touch, she thought weakly… She had left him in no doubt, it seemed, that she would follow through on her intentions. Tonight was incontrovertibly Fuck Night.

“I resisted the urge to play R and B,” he told her, as the final candle ignited.

“Classy, not cheesy – you’re good at that,” Neely’s nervous smile could not quell her rising panic.

“And that,” said Ray, drawing her with restrained manliness from the bed and pulling her body tight to his, “is the only urge I’m going to resist tonight.”

She gasped to be closed against him by his encircling arms, his terrifying sexy promise lingering in her ears. His mouth resumed its soft undulation on her neck and she let her head drop back so that the tresses of her hair swung free behind her, her hands clinging in near-despair to his muscular back. She felt his hands’ gradual slide down to the small of her own back, then beyond, spreading outwards to claim the tender flesh of her buttocks and pulling their loins into tight proximity. The amazing sex-organ she had explored so brazenly one night ago was pumped for her – she could feel it, robust and ready through a few inconsequential layers of clothing, straining as though it sensed the time had come.

Ray drew a hand from where it cradled her ass all the way up to the back of her neck; he guided her head to where he could speak lightly in her ear, words that shuddered her to her centre. “You make my cock so fucking hard, sweet girl…” Like she didn’t already know it, “You’ve done it all this time and tonight you’re going to feel it.” As his tongue flickered in her ear, she felt sure she was going to pass out, all the more when it trailing silkily down the curve of her neck till his teeth bit lightly at the apex with her shoulder.

She uttered a moan she was sure sounded inhuman, by the end of which he was unhooking the back of her dress and drawing down the zipper. He introduced enough space between them, so that the garment would have an easy passage from her body. Just a slight drawing aside of the shoulder straps and the blue cotton fabric rustled all the way to the bedroom floor, leaving her trembling in her scraps of pretty lingerie.

“Ohhhh… just sublime,” breathed Ray, taking time to absorb the subtleties of her slender form. He caught the fingers of both her hands in his and she stood with her eyes dropped, her whole body heating under his shameless gaze. “Look at me.” It was the gentlest of commands and she stared, finding herself trapped by the piercing blue of his pupils, as he raised a hand to brush her shallow cleavage with his fingertips and trace the lacy border of one brassiere cup. “You’re exquisite, Neely J,” he said, “beautiful in every way.” She felt her panty-crotch bloom once more with moisture, as her pussy melted along with her heart. “Now am I going to have to take my own shirt off as well?”

Neely gave a faltering little laugh. He made her feel girlish and womanly, cherished and terribly silly at the same time. Shakily she reached out and began to undo his buttons from the top, gaining confidence as she descended, holding his gaze and rediscovering in herself a little of last night’s tease. She paused a little each time she tugged apart each new section of shirt-front, admiring his torso all over again. Finally she arrived at the tails and pulled them wide apart to expose him in the flickering candlelight. Boldness rose within her as she swept the shirt right off his back and ran her hands all over his gorgeously-defined upper body, chest, shoulders and arms. She felt like she were illicitly touching a Michaelangelo sculpture and that any second the museum attendant would bark at her. Or maybe the divine, omniscient museum curator…

“You’re so beautiful too,” she said, her voice aching with guilty awe. “I want you so much, I can’t take it any more…”

“I knew, the night I saw you standing in the church…” Ray brushed her cheekbone with the back of his hand and slid fingers through her hair, so that their tips grazed the back of her neck.

“What did you know?” she asked, dreading any mention of church.

“How much passion there was stored inside you. How privileged any man would be to see that passion come flooding out.”

She shivered again under his touch and his words and wondered suddenly how much seduction there had been from the start. Whether his pursuit of her sexually had stemmed from mounting passion as they had dated, or whether on some level, regardless of all his promises and protestations, he had planned to bed her from the day they had met. A scary thought, maybe an unworthy one, but she could not shake it. Nor was she sure, at that point, if it mattered. Right now she wanted him too damn much. “I don’t know if I’ll be all you expect…”

“You’ll be everything,” he said with quiet assurance, drawing her barely clothed form to his naked chest. “I know women, Neely, but I’ve never known any woman like you.” His mouth descended on hers and claimed it like a prize. She responded fully, wrapping her tongue around his in a coiling dance, as though the passion he suspected were starting to leak out of her along with her juice.

They kissed for an age, the muscles of his back flexing under her grip, his arms gently crushing her to him. The sense of skin on skin thrilled her and she could not help but crave more. Hence she throbbed with excitement to feel his fingers deftly unclipping her at the back. He brushed the lilac brassiere from her shoulders and free of her body like it were a mild encumbrance and then she stood with him, meek in just heels and panties. She loved the time he was taking with her, but kept reverting to shyness. Now that she had given herself to him to do with as he pleased, she wondered exactly what form that pleasure would take.

Ray touched her face again and looked at her as though to reassure. Then he drew the trimmed nails of both his hands over her neat exposed mounds, across nipples which stood proud even as the rest of her quailed. His fingers stretched out, hands flexing to palm the pliant flesh which mere boys from Alton Bridge had never been allowed to touch. “Such pretty handfuls,” he said, his voice playful, and he massaged her gently, brushing teasing thumbs over her pointed areolae. He could achieve possession of her body, it seemed, through the lightest of contact. “You’ve made me wait so long to touch there…”

“I’m sorry,” she moaned, hardly believing that she was apologizing to him for clinging to her Christian convictions.

“Don’t be,” he told her, squeezing a little more concertedly on her tits. “It makes this all the sweeter.” He shifted a hand and seized strongly behind her, tipping her back, so his mouth could drop hungrily onto her right breast.

Neely cried out as he closed on her nipple and kissed her there, rotating his tongue on her engorged bud. Then he sucked hard, just to the point of pain, making her start and squeal. He transferred to the swollen hub of her other breast and provided similar exquisite treatment, his free hand steadily kneading the mound he had left unattended. She could scarcely catch her breath at having her bosom so freely molested by a boyfriend who was casting off all restraint. “Oh God, oh God…” If this was a prayer, it wasn’t one for him to stop. Her head was too full of wild excitement for that, her knickers far too sodden. The latter would not be about her loins much longer, she sensed, and Ray’s next move showed her prescience.

Her lover eased her backwards, laying her down onto the bed, and dropped to his knees before her. She sat up, propping herself on her elbows and breathing hard, needing to see his next move. He was panting in his own desire, staring at her levelly as he raised her leg and cradled her sandal-clad foot. “I want you naked, Neely. Not a stitch on your beautiful body. Okay?” Already she was nearly nude, the sheer lilac V of her knickers providing little modesty; still, however, there was a shock at the thought of her final uncovering before him. Yet she nodded, and watched with stilled breath as he undid one sandal after the other, slipping each from her foot with loving attention. Then he ran his palms about her thighs, poring over her supine body as though mapping her svelte contours in his mind. She was sure he smiled a little as he registered the steady leak of her arousal into her panties’ saturated fabric.

Neely realised she was holding her breath as Ray slid both hands upwards to her hips and wriggled his fingers under the waistband of her final paltry garment. He balled his fists to claim it and paused a moment, relishing the eroticism of the moment. “Baby…” he breathed, as though honoured, then he drew the panties smoothly, insistently away from her ass and pussy, guiding them around the junction of her knees and free of her ankles in virtually a single move. Then she lay, stripped bare before him, as she had never been with any other man.

He surveyed her some more in apparent reverence, then rose onto the bed with her, slithering his hands over thighs, stomach and breasts, till he loomed above her and kissed her gasping mouth. “I want you so badly,” he spoke into her ear, “but I’m going to take my time.” She reached with her mouth, needing to kiss him again, but he receded back down her body, till he knelt at her thighs once more, this time parting them gently, opening her up before him as he had done at her birthday. “You know what’s coming now,” he breathed, mouth homing in on her so that she felt its heat on her naked pussy. She did know, and her nipples peaked a little more at the memory of the previous time. “Only as I recall…” His lips were almost brushing hers as he spoke. “…You ran scared before I’d finished with you. Well not this time.”

Nothing tentative tonight – his hands slid under her upper thighs to scoop themselves around her buttocks, just as he put his mouth to her and plunged. She cried and fell flat onto the bedcover, shocked to be lustily tongue-fucked with no warning. He was gripping her ass, thrusting his muscle urgently in and out of her like a sudden statement of intent. Then he withdrew and flickered rapidly on her clitoris, making her moan all the more loudly. Ohhh God, ohhhhhh yessss… There it was, just like the time before – hot threads of sensation shooting out from her loins as though to net her whole body in ecstasy. Only on this occasion she submitted to it completely, let herself arch and writhe on the bed, with nothing left to restrain her. His moist tongue was working her expertly, it seemed, darting on the hot swollen focal-point of her clitoris, slithering deftly up and down her slit and then diving once more to penetrate her as deep as he could thrust, flexing to lap all around her inner walls.

So good, so good I can’t stand it. Don’t stop, please don’t stop, please… She joyed in the crazed sense of riding on her lover’s tongue, all inhibition draining from her and lust filling her up in its place. Her body was in control now, like it had never been before. Her hands were clutching at the bedspread, as though to earth the wild electricity which was loose within her. One palm strayed to her breast to massage it, to tug on her hard nipple and relieve the passion with which she was charged. When she glimpsed up at him, the sight of his sweating face crammed between her legs overwhelmed her. His eyes were boring into hers as his tongue persisted in its thrashing. There was fierce intent there, to get her off – to make her explode as he continued to feast on her.

Her head fell back and rolled on the bed as her pleasure mounted. She was shifting and bucking spontaneously, but Ray just gripped her ass harder and locked into her with his vigorously working mouth, never letting up with his wet friction. Then one of his hands reached up and seized her by the tit she had left unsqueezed, kneading her firmly, bracing her with a joint hold on her bosom and her shunting rear, while his tongue continued to savour her cunt - like he were enjoying all the parts of her which she had kept wrapped up these past weeks. She felt deliciously controlled - naked for him now way more than physically. Groans were issuing freely from her throat, bouncing off his high ceiling. She was at the mercy of his desire, to say nothing of her own, and now she could feel herself surging dramatically towards a peak of excitement. Oh God, I’m going to come… I’m going to come all over his damn face!

There was a flash of mortification at this thought, of total terrifying exposure before him, but somehow it only served to augment her excitement and send her into thrashing orgasmic ecstasy. His hands clamped fast and his mouth sealed itself to her cunt as she came hard, flowing, she knew, all over his tongue. In the throes of her wild excitement she knew that he could feel, smell and taste her, hear her screams – hell, he could see her body shudder under the power of his talented oral endeavours. Neely – the total sensory experience. Her climax was long and shuddering, intensified by his boldly intimate presence. And when it tailed off, she felt the tide of vulnerability rushing in on her once more, like she were Eve in the Garden, realising her nakedness afresh.

The moment did not last. Ray relinquished her tender spasming pussy and drew himself up beside her on the bed, rolling her off her back to himself and embracing her gently. “Sweetheart…” he whispered, clutching her to himself. “It’s okay… It’s okay…” His words and their tone made it so. When he kissed her, she responded instantly before she caught the exotic tang and remembered where he had been. His fingers gently entrapped her curling tresses, however, and held her mouth to his, so that she had no choice but to explore her own sharp-sweet flavour on his tongue. His mouth broke from hers and he stroked her face, their lips brushing. “See how sweet you taste?” he said, and she could not help but admire his erotic daring. “Everything about you is beautiful.”

He made her feel sexy and desirable, and it was no huge shock to realise that his trousers were unbuttoned, his cock bulging tight against the fabric of his briefs. Her sneaky guy had been unfastening himself, eager to realise that great pulsing beast of his from its prison. It made her heart thud against her ribcage, but something kittenish had been released in her akin to that during the massage and she reached down, running her hand over him, feeling his bold erection through the briefs, while looking meekly into his eyes. See how playful I’m being? I’m not frightened of you, not frightened at all… Then his expression intensified into a clear challenge and she almost gulped. Who was she trying to kid? Trepidation raged within her, but she did it anyway – thrust her hand under the band and felt all the way down the thick throbbing dimensions of his naked cock.

It made her gasp, the exploits of the previous night notwithstanding, for tonight she knew for where this beautiful potent length of manhood was destined. Ray looked at her almost tauntingly and clapped his own hand to hers, trapping it on his hard shaft. He guided it down to the base and all over his heavy shaved balls, cupping her fingers there, then brought her slithering back, up over all his inches to the perfectly-defined swollen head. He kissed her mid-gasp and she succumbed to the leisurely caress of his mouth as he gently drew her palm up and down his length. Then their lips parted and he toyed with a strand of hair that lay across her cheek. “It’s going to be amazing, Neely,” he assured softly, his gaze regulating her breath, calming her. “For both of us.”

TO BE CONTINUED