Neely forgot Jasmine’s personality-glitch as her own clouds of moral confusion returned to hover over her all the way to the café. She threw herself into work, chattering to customers as distraction from a swarm of thoughts which buzzed like her new toy. Thankfully Leo didn’t ask about the birthday gift. Her other job, her real job was haunting her as well, chiefly the planned lunchtime meet with Jonas. What a frame of mind in which to finalise Sunday week’s premier ‘sexual ethics’ workshop. How could she discuss it with any integrity?

By the time she arrived at The Ship, Jonas’ favourite pub by the harbour, she had turned it all around. This wasn’t a gauntlet to be run, it was a God-sent opportunity—to reinforce her values, to gain strength in solidarity with her partner-in-the-faith.

“Neelers! Club sandwich and a pint of Carlsberg. Your shout.”

She smiled broadly at the familiar laddish grin and gel-spiked hair. Her comrade-in-spiritual-arms, his irreverence masking the seriousness with which he held his beliefs. She loved that. And she loved him, like the brother she’d always wanted. “You ready to whip these young reprobates into shape?” Jonas asked cheekily.

“Sure am.” She hugged him. “And buy your own damn sandwich.”

They had one of their cheerfully productive working-lunches. Ideas were ping-ponged back and forth, Scripture passages and quotations from their favourite spiritual thinkers were sought out, then spliced in their heads with relevant visuals: music videos, film clips and advertisements. Key points and discussion frameworks were scribbled down, as they worked through all that they wanted to cover in each session.

“It’s much better to have broadened it like this,” Neely said. “Looking at relationships as a whole, not simply the sex part. Focus on all the things we can be developing and exploring, rather than the … the … the ones we shouldn’t be doing. Aren’t doing.” Her thoughts recovered from near derailment at the recollection of Ray’s thrashing tongue. Jonas, it appeared, hadn’t noticed.

“Yeah, totally agree. Look, I’ll put all the materials together tonight,” he assured, “in the IT suite.” Neely laughed at the reference—the church’s former junk cupboard, which her colleague had converted into a computer-room-cum-editing-suite. “I’ll have the stuff for the first session really spot-on before the evening’s through.”

“Lonely evening for you,” Neely said.

“No, Leona’s going to come along and help me out.”

“Wow. You really know how to romance a girl. She’s going to sit and watch in wonder at your tech skills. Maybe I should come rescue the poor thing.”

“She loves that stuff. Better at it than I am. It’s a whole section of her media course.”

“Oh, right. I wondered what you two had in common.” Neely was so used to Jonas’ ribbing, she preferred to get her jibes in first. “Cradle-snatcher.”

“Hey!” He dipped his fingers and flicked her own water at her so that she flinched. “I expect that from some of the other guys, that’s why we keep it low-key, but not from you. Leona’s a very mature nineteen.”

“Very pretty nineteen.”

“That too. Anyway, you’re the one dating the heathen hack.”

“All right, all right, touché.” Neely glared at him, but her smile quickly broke through. “Looks like we’re both conducting relationships on the QT.”

“Hey, Neels, don’t sweat it,” he reassured. “You’ll have him converted to the faith in another month.”

“Maybe,” she said quietly, doubt flickering once more. “We’ll see.”

How Neely envied Jonas what he had with Leona. What was a few years’ age-difference when you had a basic Christian compatibility as well as getting along? She envied Jasmine and Leo too, pursuing their respective love-lives free of faith-imposed constraints. Everyone on the same page, whether the book was the Bible or the Kama Sutra. But what of poor souls trying to reconcile conviction with desire, when their partner shared only the former?

She carried the thought away from her lunchtime meet, spent all afternoon steeling her resolve, trying to think her relationship with Ray into similar terms to those she’d be advising the young people. Fit it back into the box marked ‘chaste’. By early evening she’d convinced herself she’d succeeded. Then her work was all but undone.

She met Ray outside Bristol’s Old Vic Theatre. He reverted to his pre-birthday self, greeting her with a brief kiss on the lips. It was enough to make her burn with memory.

“Missed you,” he told her, and the sentiment was mutual. She’d missed his body close to hers and the reined-in passion of his touch. And the deft work of his tongue, holy heavens had she missed that. Walking in with him, flirting in the bar over a pre-show drink, nestling next to him in the stalls—it all made her yearn for more of what she’d had and everything she’d not.

They relaxed into a performance of David Auburn’s Proof, his clever, moving tale of madness, mathematics, and love. It was erotic as well, disconcertingly so, in the scene where the maths prodigy offered up her cherry to her father’s PhD student. She appeared in the follow-up scene bath-robed and glowing, a girl radiantly popped. This was a dramatic element Neely could have passed on, one which stuck with her till the actors took their bows and beyond. Perched on a stool in the theatre bar, she attempted to steer the conversation and her feelings somewhere safe.

“I was surprised to get your text about church. I didn’t think you were much interested in it for itself.”

Ray looked slightly embarrassed. “Well I’m not sure to what extent I am. But I think I need to establish some balance.” He leaned across the table as he spoke, and she tried to look in his eyes rather than fixate on the light chest-hair visible past the unbuttoned part of his shirt.

“What kind of balance?” His after-shave was a sea-salt tang in her nostrils. She endeavoured to focus on his words.

“The type you always talk about. To remind myself of the whole of you, all your interests and aspects, not just the side I got carried away with on your birthday.”

“I don’t want you to worry about that. Please let’s talk about something—”

“It does worry me. It worries me that something I did to make you feel good on your birthday, to make you feel special and sexy, had the opposite effect.”

“It didn’t.” Emotion for him swelled and she wished that she could reassure fully. “Okay, it … it did make me feel those things.” She couldn’t look at him. “Sexy and special I mean. Only, you know how much of a conflict it is for me. I can’t give in to those … feelings.”

“It’s a conflict for me too.” His voice was low and earnest. The tone arrested her, and she looked at him again. “I wanted you so much, Tuesday night. I’m not apologising for what I did, because I think you deserve to feel how that obviously made you feel. You’re this beautiful passionate girl with a lust for life and I don’t see that God or man could accuse you of doing anything wrong in … in enjoying that gift.” Neely instinctively went to explain how it wasn’t simply a matter of feeling accused by God, it was about adhering to priorities, priorities tied to a whole system of belief, but he stopped her. “Look, Neely, that doesn’t mean I intend to try and push anything else on you. I promise faithfully to myself every day that I won’t. I haven’t forgotten anything you’ve said on the subject, and it doesn’t make less sense than it did. It’s …”

“It’s what?” Neely asked with trepidation. She didn’t need Ray going back on his avowal.

“I’m not sure this is the place to talk about it.” Proximity of other theatre goers was making her self-conscious as well, it was true. “Maybe wait till we’re in the car?” She agreed and tried to relax back into chat, keeping her mind away from all the associations that went with lovers in cars driving their way to secluded places.

They sat in Ray’s BMW shortly after. Neely was shielded from the public, but more exposed to him somehow. “What I was trying to say back there …” Ray continued, and her toes curled in fear and fascination. “It’s why I thought of the church thing. Discover more about why you believe what you believe. Get to know some of your church friends a bit better. Because I need to get a handle on what I’m feeling here.”

“And … what are you feeling?”

“I … Damn, I shouldn’t even tell you this stuff. It’s probably not helpful.”

“No, Ray, you should. We need to be honest with each other. I need to know what you’re thinking.” It scared her, but she was sure this was the right move.

“I’m trying to get some perspective on my feelings, my frustrations. Not only,” he added hastily, “frustrations about the physical aspect of sex. It’s way more than that. I’ve never met anyone like you before, Neely. There’s a difference between wanting to have sex with someone because they’re physically attractive and give you the horn. Which you are and do—” He squeezed her jean-clad knee to reassure. She giggled, scared and flattered. “…And wanting to make love to them because of who they are. Because you want to experience this amazing person in that way.” Neely was as moved as she was aroused. Ray’s expression darkened. “I have such dreams about you.”

“You do?” Against her better judgement Neely wanted to know.

“You have no idea.” He looked away, shamed by his confession. “Crazy dreams. I shouldn’t even be saying this.”

“I …  I…” Neely kind of agreed with the latter comment but didn’t like to stem the thoughts to which he was giving vent. “No, it’s better you say it.”

“I wake up and my head’s full to bursting with images of making love to you. How amazing that would be. With you. Tender, passionate, but not that alone. It’s not like I think you’d break. I see … I sense so much passion in you and I think I know how intense it would be. How wild you would drive me, the things I would … The ways … Jesus … Sorry, shouldn’t swear like that. And shouldn’t be such a … a typically horny guy I suppose.”

“It’s okay, it’s okay.” Neely stroked Ray’s arm as she always did when he agonised, but she too felt horribly tormented, and her panties were as soaked as they had been on their birthday date. “You’re not typical.”

“If I care about you, then I need to respect what you believe. Not fixate on that one aspect of our relationship.”

“Yes, I know that. But you’re a guy, you’re allowed to feel frustrated, I need to understand that too.” Flaming hell. Like I’m not frustrated? “We need to be able to talk it out.”

“Yes, well sometimes talking makes it harder.” He smiled ruefully. “Pun intended.” Neely glanced inadvertently at his trouser crotch, which was indeed under considerable duress. “Caught you,” he said, and she looked up to see him grin. She burst into laughter with him, her face flaming at the same time. “Look,” he told her, “let me get you home before I say something even more inappropriate.”

Her brilliant thought occurred as they set off through the dusk. Maybe Ray did need the society of some of her Christian friends to help re-jig his perspective. And Alton Bridge was helpfully on their route. “Ray, is it okay if we stop off at the church? Jonas is round there finishing off some stuff for the workshop we’re doing, and I’d love to have a look at what he’s come up with. If it’s not too late for you.”

Ray looked surprised but went with the flow. “Sure. He seems a good guy. What’s he up to, audio-visuals?”

They chatted off-topic of sex all the way to Alton Bridge—a considerable relief. All the lights were off when they arrived at the church, but she recognised the lone vehicle in the car park as Jonas’ Ford Mondeo. Ray pulled up on the kerbside.

“You can go inside,” Neely pointed out. “You weren’t cooked by a lightning-bolt the last time.”

“I’ll wait here. You go say hello.”

“No, come on, it’d be nice for you to meet some of the guys again.” She hopped out of Ray’s BMW, and he followed her through the gates towards Jonas’ car. Drum-and-bass was pumping out of it. Neely ran up to the Mondeo’s semi-steamed windows and wondered too late if she had stumbled on her colleague and his girlfriend making out.

The “Hey” was out of her mouth the same instant she recognised that much more was going on. Jonas was not set to drive; he was sprawled on the rear seat as good as stripped, his body a streak of lean muscle. Coffee-skinned Leona was straddling him in a crouch, butt-naked and proud, mid-fornication. She wasn’t simply riding Jonas’ cock, she had a double-grip on the back seat and was impaling herself on him repeatedly and hard with the brisk motion of her plump ass. This girl looked determined to take her boy right up inside her on every connection. The slick black frizz of her hair was dancing all over her shoulders and her generously curved young body was glazed with perspiration. Jonas had hold of her waist, but had no need to aid her movement, so committed was she to the fuck. His head was flung back, face stretched in a grin like he couldn’t believe his luck.

Then he saw Neely and his expression turned to one of horror. Leona looked back and squealed, halting mid-slide down her boyfriend’s shaft, and grabbing a blouse with which to cover up her breasts.

“Oh my! Oh God!” Neely recoiled in an embarrassment which mirrored theirs, bumping into Ray who had walked up behind.

“Everything okay?”

“What? Yes! Please, let’s go. Bad timing. Bad timing.”

She spun around and set off at a trot for Ray’s car, face burning and heart beating at an accelerated thump. She did not stop till she got there, then stood frantically waiting for Ray to let her inside.

“You all right?”

“Yes, yes, I’m fine. Just get me home. Please.”

“God,” he said, once they were inside. “You caught them fucking, didn’t you?”

“Yes!” She snapped the word in a fury and looked away, eyes tearing with loneliness and confusion. “Yes. I’m sorry. Ray, can you please take me home?”

The journey was silent. Neely’s mind was numbed by the vision to which she had been privy. When they arrived outside her apartment block, Ray laid a consoling hand on her arm. “There are worse things, sweetheart,” he said. “For a moment back there, I thought the Church Car-park Killer had offed another couple.”

“Don’t joke about it!” She flinched from his touch a moment, then relented, taking his hand. “I’m sorry, it was a shock, that’s all. Look, I can’t deal with this right now. I need to be alone. Thanks … Thanks for a lovely evening.” She deposited a peck on his cheek and got out of there. Somehow the danger had increased in being alone with Ray Archer, and it was nothing to do with any change in him.

Jonas, Lord, not Jonas! Her stand-up fellow soldier in the fight, the guy who always had her back. When all around were falling and fornicating, aside from the smug marrieds and the interminably single self-righteous, they had each other—brother and sister in Christ, funny and cool, however chaste.

Damn! Shit! Don’t do this to me! Oh Lord, that was why he wanted the youth group kids to be all clued-in and ‘street’ about contraception. It was nothing to do with concern for their welfare. It was because he couldn’t look them in the eye and tell them anything else, now he was fucking his hot nineteen-year-old girlfriend!

Hang on though, maybe it was Leona who had lured him into it. Wretched girl. Tempting him away from his Christian lifestyle. Come on, let’s do it in the car right outside the church, it’ll be really hot. She’d want him to have her in the pulpit next, the little tart.

Neely felt instant shame at the thought. So much for her progressive feminist faith. She was back pointing fingers at Eve and Jezebel and Delilah, those temptresses of God-fearing men. It wasn’t like Jonas hadn’t been enjoying the proceedings. He’d been having himself a fine old time. And thinking back on all the occasions she’d seen them together—the closeness, the knowingness—she suddenly knew his enjoyment had been going on for months.

She sat in the kitchen, stewing in her own foolishness. Jasmine was in her room and content to stay there, which right now was fine with Neely. She had too much occupying her mind to deal with her roommate right now. How could Jonas have done this? And with Neely striving so hard to be good with Ray? It took a large glass of Cabernet to slow everything down into a weary bemusement at the whole mess.

When her mobile rang it was no surprise to see Jonas’ name on the display. She hadn’t expected him to stay silent till Sunday. She hurried into the bedroom with the phone so that Jasmine might not overhear. Anger was already flaring, and she could not bring herself to speak first.

“Neely?” No jaunty nicknames. Clearly Jonas had not relished making this call. “Neely, look, I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, me too.” She could not prevent bitterness creeping into her voice.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Well …” She could do nothing else but be frank. “I was kind of hoping for ‘It was a moment of madness, we got carried away, it’s never happened before, and we’ll pray for strength that it doesn’t happen again.’ But I’m guessing you can’t honestly say all of that, am I right?”

The lengthy pause filled her with despair. “We’ve been having sex for the past two months. A lot.” Neely let slip a forlorn moan. “Look,” he said, “I’m sorry you saw what you did. I know this puts you in a difficult position, the workshops and all.”

“Difficult?” She couldn’t fathom what she was hearing. “Impossible, more like! You were going to conduct these evenings and carry on … carrying on? And you couldn’t even tell me? I thought we confided stuff! I thought there was trust between us.”

“Neely, trust is all very well, but this is personal. I don’t ask what goes on with you and Ray.”

“Nothing goes on with me and Ray!” she cried, being freer with the truth than she could ever recall. “I’m trying … I’m trying to lead my life so I can feel some integrity with the members of the youth group.”

“What, and you think I’m not?” Jonas was defensive now. “You think it’s all been a sham?”

“Well no, no I don’t, of course I don’t, not the whole time, but come on—you’re seriously screwing up right now.” Make that seriously screwing. Fuck! “What are you going to do about you and Leona? Tell me you’re not intending to keep on doing what you’re doing.”

Another pause. This time the reply was less hangdog, more direct. “We’ve talked it through. Neely, we’re not intending to change anything.”

She had to fight for words. “But … But you’re a Christian youth leader. Don’t you feel how wrong it is? Don’t you feel any shame?”

“Honestly? I thought I would, but the main emotion I felt was relief. Relief I’d finally done it. That I’d got laid before my twenty-ninth birthday. It’s weird, like a revelation. I can’t lie to you. Look, I care for Leona, we’re committed to each other. I …”

“Jonas, she’s a college student! It’s not even like you’re going to marry the girl next week, at least I hope that’s not on your mind, she’s too damn young.”

“I know that, Neely. It’s part of the point. I guess I got fed up with waiting.”

“She was still in the youth group when you met her, you were her Youth Leader. Now you’re … you’re at it with her in the back of your car! It’s wrong on a bunch of levels.”

“She’s an adult. I’m having sex with my grown-up girlfriend, so shoot me.”

“You’re flouting the teachings of the Bible, Jonas. Everything we believe. All that stuff we planned for the workshops, did that mean nothing?”

“No, Neely, I still hold to that, the basic principles: commitment, respect, monogamy …”

“Chastity? Where did that go? How can you change the rules? How am I supposed to run relationship workshops with you when we’re not even aiming in the same direction?”

“I don’t know.” Cavalier as he had been moments before, he now sounded genuinely chagrined. “Look, we’ll talk it through, Neels. We’ll make sense of it.”

“We’ll I’m damned if I know how. You’ve let me down, Jonas, and yourself. And the young people. I’m so mad at you right now, so mad.”

She ended the call still fuming, Jonas insisting they talk more on Sunday when she’d cooled down, which only incensed her more. She hadn’t calmed moments later when she received a text: YOU’RE NOT GOING TO TELL ANYONE ELSE, RIGHT?

She stabbed the reply into her phone: OF COURSE NOT, YOU BLOODY IDIOT, WHAT SORT OF TELL-TALE DO YOU THINK I AM? She wasn’t one of those tattling believers. I think Jonas really needs our prayers right now, he’s really struggling. She had always despised that bullshit. But still she couldn’t see through the mess her friend had created. How was she supposed to work with him? How could she even cope without his support right now?

Her anger was subsiding into tearfulness when her phone buzzed once more. Ray. Oh dear Lord. Add his car-seat declaration to the Jonas/Leona debacle—it was too damn much to cope with. She had no idea what to say to him right now. Nonetheless she answered, swallowing down her sobs before speaking.

“Hey.”

“Hey yourself, Neely J. How’re you doing? I’m not calling too late, I hope.”

“No, no, you’re not. I’m okay, I’m fine.”

“I hope you’re not too upset by what happened.”

“No, really, it’s all right.” Why would I be? Just because you now know my Christian friends buck like bunnies along with everyone else? “Don’t worry about me.”

“’Cos I reckon I know what you’re thinking and if I’m right I don’t want you to feel that way.”

She loved his tenderness but dreaded what tender thing he might say. “And what way’s that?”

“You’re worried I’ll get ideas. That whatever Jonas and his girl were doing in that car tonight, I’ll be hoping we’ll do as well. Because Neely, that’s not necessarily true. I mean, you know I’d love to be doing with you what they were with each other, but not through some seedy seduction. Only if I knew that was truly what you wanted to do.”

It is what I want! That’s not the point!

“But you don’t, and that’s okay.”

Don’t you understand? Don’t you know how much I want you?

“And one more thing I wanted to say. Don’t be too hard on Jonas. He might be a Christian, but he’s also a guy. He’s got …”

Needs, please don’t say ‘needs’.

“… Desires. Passion for his girl. And he wants to express it, that’s all. You sure you’re okay? You’ve gone all quiet.”

“I’m …” God help me, I’m lost. “I’m okay.”

“I think somebody needs the use of those massage oils. You haven’t cracked them open yet?”

“What? Eh, no. No, not yet.”

“God, sweetheart …” She heard apprehension in his voice. “Anytime you get like this, I feel sure you’re going to decide it’s all a bad idea and dump me.”

“No no no.” She rushed to reassure him. Confusion notwithstanding, that was the last thing she wanted. “I won’t, I promise.”

“Well that’s good to know. Look, I think somebody needs sleep. You rest up and I’ll see you next week, okay?”

Care. Concern. Aching sexiness. She basked in melancholy as they signed off and tried to take his consideration to bed with her rather than Jonas’ and Leona’s greedy lust.

Wine and tiredness weighed her down into a shallow sleep which never deepened. She was leading a young adults’ Bible study at Jonas’ house on Christ’s parable of the Horny Goatherd. It must have come from one of the Apocryphal Gospels, she thought, as it was no story of which she had ever heard. Before she could read it properly, however, she became aware of Jonas and Leona making out furiously on a recliner, he in briefs, she clad in scant red-lace lingerie. Then Jonas was upending her, tearing aside both their underwear, and inserting himself roughly inside her, whereupon he embarked on a rear fuck-action that made her soft bits shudder. “So tired waiting,” he informed Neely with fervour, as he slammed himself home inside his moaning girlfriend. “And she’s so fucking hot!”

All around her other Alton Bridge couples were following suit, grappling each other clothing-free and starting to copulate. Deejay Brian, her ex-boyfriend, was groping and licking two naked females from the music group, revelling in all that Neely had denied him. Friends she had known and trusted for years were attacking each other with ravenous lust.

 “We’ve switched denominations!” Jonas yelled in a wild rutting frenzy. “We’ve all joined the church of St Danny. Come with us! Come with us!”

“So good, so good,” Leona urged, as her boyfriend filled her up. “You want this, Neely, you fucking want this. You fucking want some fucking cock.”

Fornication everywhere she looked. There was Danny Woodward himself, shafting the comely older woman he had bent over the dining-table. He grinned and dragged his conquest up by the hair so Neely could see her face. Eleanor Simmons, the Pastor’s wife, pounded into delirium by her husband’s one-time junior associate.

Then it wasn’t Jonas’ living-room, but the dining-hall of a great Gothic castle, torches blazing in wall-brackets and animal-skin rugs on the floor, on which the orgiastic congregants continued their carnal pursuits. A figure loomed beside her and turning she saw Ray, tuxedoed with bowtie removed and shirt ripped open, the crotch of his trousers full to bursting with the dramatic swell beneath. She felt exposed before him and realised with a start that she was utterly naked, seated on the end of the long dining-table.

“The things I vant to do to you, Neely,” he growled, advancing on her slowly. His erection was threatening to pop the buttons on his fly, and he was reaching across the table for a Lemongrass café white chocolate-chip cheesecake. “I’m going to spread zis all over you, all over you, then I’m going to lick it off you and out of you, till you scream vis pleasure.” He shovelled up the melting fondant with one large hand and slapped it onto her stomach, spreading it around, thickly over her breasts and down between her legs as she groaned with helpless excitement. “And zen,” he said, plastering cheesecake down the crack of her cunt and fingering it inside, “ven I haff licked you clean, you know vat I vill do next.”

“Yes, yes,” she panted, “I know.”

“You know vat I vill put inside you, Neely, you know how hard I vill take you.”

“Yes, I know.”

He continued to feed dessert inside her intimate wet hole with his fingers, as she propped herself up and stared. “Tell me how much you vant it. Tell me how much, Neely.”

“I want it … I want it …”

“How much?” Filling her up, with sticky, sugary mess. “Tell me.”

“So bad, I want it so bad. God help me please, help me please, help me please …”

She woke, slick with perspiration, her own fingers inside her rather those of the Germanic Ray. Her heart was thumping, and erotic dread galloped through her.

“Neely, you okay?”

She started, gathering the bed-sheet closer, before she recognised Jasmine silhouetted by the landing light in her doorway. Her housemate was dressed in scarcely more than a tee-shirt and appeared as sleep-rumpled as Neely. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”

“I heard you cry out. You scared me.”

“I had a weird dream. That’s all.” She tried to regain her breath. “What about you? Feeling better than this morning?”

“Hmm? Yeah, yeah, I’m better.” Jasmine hovered at the threshold, uncertain whether or not to come in, whether or not to speak again. She paused an inordinately long time, mouth gaping slightly as though words were trying to make their way out. Then: “See you tomorrow, Neely. Hope you sleep better.”

And she was gone, leaving Neely bemused - along with forlorn, guilty, and throbbing-for-Ray.

~~~~

26/6/10  01:15

(excerpt)

So—roomie Jasmine is keeping a low profile, it seems, and the serendipitous timing of the ‘Jonas’ incident has only served to push Neely closer. I’m expecting to earn your forgiveness very soon indeed. The tension was palpable all through the evening and when I called her later … Well let me assure you that she’ll be ripe for the plucking within a few short days. Take massage, add soft lighting, ambient music and a liquid loosener, and watch how far I get.

—Ray

25/6/10  21:22 PST

Ray—

My forgiveness isn’t won quite as easily as the Christian type, let me warn you. Today may have provided you with a lucky break, but you’re still on the clock, depending on how good a friend this Jasmine turns out to be. Perhaps her guilty secret is festering away inside her, till she feels desperate to disinfect. Assuming she’ll spill, you’d better work at the height of your powers. As things stand, you can’t finish this soon enough.

Which is a shame. A cocktail of wine and massage oil should give you a fifty-fifty shot, so it strikes me. But what a tawdry way to finish off the business. Prising her virginity from her under alcohol’s treacherous influence. If time were a luxury you still possessed, I’d say wait for her to ask. Make her come to you fresh from church begging for your cock. Let her embrace her slut-nature in the cold light of day, with no excuse to give to her God short of her own undiluted lust. Now that is a seduction of a higher order.

No matter. I’ll settle for a basic debauching. Just don’t fuck up again. Do what you need to short of outright force and do it soon. Fuck the Jesus-girl, Ray, whatever it takes.

—Carlotta.

TO BE CONTINUED