Edward read Emily's text during a hold-up in the late afternoon London traffic, but he didn't reply. He'd wait until he arrived at the airport hotel. And he wanted to decide if he should mention Paul Henderson's wife.

He could have jumped Lisa Henderson - he should have tumbled her right there across the Henderson kitchen table like she wanted him to. But he didn't. He could hear Emily say near misses don't count and, of course, she'd be right.

The hotel car park was underground and dark, quiet enough for him to hear his cooling engine tick like a hesitant clock.

Emily's message was brief: “All work, no play, sorry! Miss you badly. E xx.”

He smiled to himself at the sorry and replied: “Me too! All love Ed.” The Lisa H. encounter would keep until Em arrived on the next morning flight.

There was no hurry so he opened the window, reclined his seat and closed his eyes. He sipped reluctantly from the bottle of so-called fresh spring water. It tasted warm and stale. He thought about the upcoming icy gin and frosty tonic.

The click of high heels on stone floors always made Edward suspect he might be overly attracted to female footwear. The approaching footsteps were quick and precise and they grabbed his immediate attention.

Instinctively he kept quite still, waiting and listening. Edward was an opportunist who saw eavesdropping and voyeurism as harmless indulgences. If people were dumb enough to be overheard or watched that was tough shit. Suck it up.

A car door opened and closed. A window whirred open. Then the clear, melodic voice of a girl trained to be instantly understood. He wondered if she looked as good as she sounded.

“Hi Roz, it's me... The airport hotel … No, not OK ... The bastard's stood me up… Bullshit excuse about contracts and pissed off clients... Yeah … Oh yeah … He's missing plenty ...Some barely there underwear wrapped around a red hot chick...”

There was a silence while she listened. Then she gave a rueful laugh.

“....Off 'til Wednesday …Early Malaga flight… Yeah, sunny Spain – again.”

She had to be airline crew, he thought. Probably not in the cockpit so she was a flight attendant. Edward preferred air hostess but only with friends who knew he was joking. Sort of.

She went quiet again. Then another laugh that was deeper, almost earthy.

“Excuse me, I never gag for it. Ask for it OK, beg for it, well, maybe…”

She laughed again, flirtatiously this time.“Tonight? Room service, a bottle and a movie … Yep, back to the house midday tomorrow … See you then. Big hug.”

A car door opened and closed. Rapid footsteps echoed away into the distance.

He needed to put a face to a voice and a lot more besides. Anticipation bunched into a knot in his stomach. As well as an opportunist, Edward was an enthusiastic predator. He opened his briefcase and removed a small leather box.

From it he selected a single drop earring; a pearl set in filigree gold. There were others in the box but his intuition went with the pearl. He wrapped it in a silk handkerchief and tucked it in the top pocket of his jacket.

He took a large folded sheet of blue notepaper from a slot in the lid of the case. It still smelled faintly of Emily's scent. He read it through even though he knew what it said. Emily's handwriting was rounded and stylish. It began “My darling Man.” He'd always liked that and told her so.

She signed off as usual with a capital E underlined by a diagonal cross. She had left it on her pillow next to him on the morning she flew to Switzerland in the spring.

Edward sealed the letter inside a matching envelope. He wrote a capital A on the front before slipping it into his inside pocket.

He checked in at Reception. The girl returned his credit card and smiled like he'd suggested a dirty weekend in Rio. Could she do anything else for him?

She surely could, he said. He produced the earring, explaining that it was on the floor by the driver's door of a guest's car. He had the number written down. Could she possibly return the earring to the driver? he asked. If she wasn't too busy.

He gave her a little-boy-lost smile which made her blush. She'd see to it right away. He told her she was a star and asked the way to the bar.

He sat at a table easily visible from the entrance. He ordered a gin and tonic and pulled a folder from his case. Just to appear suitably preoccupied. As he waited he gave the scam a twenty-five percent chance of success, probably less.

The girl took him by surprise, placing the earring carefully on the table. He recognised the voice instantly. “ Not mine,” she said. “Thanks all the same.”

Edward stood up.“ Shame,” he said. “Reception treated me like a stalker.”

“Are you?” she asked.

“I haven't got the patience,” he lied easily.

“Pity,” she said. “ It's a virtue.”

Edward said, “Have a drink - just one - and lecture me some more about virtue.”

She laughed, “OK just one. I have a hot date with a long, deep bath.”

She motioned to the door. “Give me a minute … I need reception. I'll drink what you're drinking.”

She called herself a tart for wondering if he watched her walk away. Whatever - she wouldn't be unhappy if he did.

He had the look of a clever, cynical academic, but much better dressed. The type who messed with the female student mind just for fun. Attractive and interesting she thought. Definitely.

She was back in less than a minute. The uniform was no surprise to him, the familiar dark green and gold livery of Gofly Air. It looked good on her.

At first glance, Edward saw a five feet nothing, petite, green-eyed blonde with good skin and a generous mouth. Then she shrugged off her uniform jacket. The breasts that strained against her blouse were a million miles from being petite.

At a second glance, he took in the tiny waist that flared into shapely hips before tapering into legs that made his palms damp. Emily was going to love this, he thought.

He told her his name was Edward. She said she was christened Chloe but her little brother called her Zoe and it had stuck. He ordered gins and tonic for both of them

“I don't trust aircraft,” he said. “All that metal, fuel and humanity at thirty thousand feet. It's totally unnatural.”

She laughed. “We sedate people like you and put them in the hold.”

He smiled. “I'll stick to boats,” he said.

“Why …? ” she began. “What do you do?”

“I'm a linguist, I translate stuff, ” he told her. “ But you actually want to know what I'm doing here.”

She laughed to cover her embarrassment. Then she nodded. He pretended not to notice. “I'm waiting for my wife,” he said.

Zoe felt a needle of disappointment. “When does she get in?” she asked.

“I'm not exactly sure,” he said.

She raised a curious eyebrow but said nothing.

“ About now she's fucking a third rate Australian actor in a Paris hotel.” Again he lied smoothly and looked directly at her as he spoke. His voice was calm and matter of fact.

What he said and the way he said it gave Zoe the strangest feeling. Despite herself, she was oddly flattered that he spoke like he'd known her for years. And it was way too intimate but somehow that didn't matter either.

She waited for a moment and asked, “Does she know you know?”

“Not at the moment,” he said.

Zoe thought about being fucked in a hotel. Being fucked in this particular hotel. She'd thought about it all week. Wanting tonight and the whole weekend to come.

“Are you going to tell her... What's her name?” she asked.

She wondered what Edward did to his wife in bed. And more importantly what he didn't do that made her fuck someone else.

“Her name is Emily,” he said. “I thought I might leave this under her pillow.” He took the envelope from his jacket pocket and laid it on the table. “ This is from her to him.”

Zoe saw it hadn't been opened. There was a hand-printed capital A on the front. She looked up at him and cocked her head to one side.

“I found it in her car. There've been others. She writes them when she's not sure she'll see him,” he said.

“You haven't opened it,” Zoe said. Then she wished she hadn't. He'd think she was curious. He'd be dead right.

“It'll be pornographic - the others were,” he said. “She could write it for a living.”

Zoe wondered what a man like Edward would describe as pornographic.

“If you were me would you open it?” he asked.

She hesitated just for the sake of appearances. “Definitely,” she nodded.

“Is that because you're curious or because you think I should ?” he asked softly.

“Both,” she said quickly.

He'd seen right through her. She wondered if he would hit on her. At first, she thought he would. Now she wasn't so sure.

“That's very honest,” he said.

He looked up at her. There was an intensity about him that Zoe liked. He probably had no idea, which made him all the more attractive.

She changed the subject. “What does A stand for by the way?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Anthony, maybe, or Action Man. Or Arsehole even,” he said.

His timing was perfect. She laughed out loud and suddenly she wanted to touch his face with the palm of her hand.

For the first time, he gave her a broad open smile. A small hot worm stirred deep in the pit of her stomach.

Edward wrote his name and number on the back of the envelope. He pushed it towards her. “You take it,” he said. “Ring me and read it aloud. If you like.”

He stood up and tapped his briefcase. “Homework,” he smiled. “ If you don't like, leave it at Reception.” Then he said goodbye and walked away.

Again he took her completely by surprise. She watched him disappear and he didn't look back. She picked up the letter and flipped her jacket around her shoulders.

Reception was on her way to the lifts. She hesitated at the counter; the receptionist gave her an electric smile. Zoe nodded hello, put the envelope in her bag and moved quickly to catch the lift doors before they closed.

Her room was cool and the curtains closed. She kicked off her heels and sat on the bed. The letter smelled faintly of a scent she liked but couldn't name - something expensive and sexy.

Her phone said six oh five. She took a deep breath, looked at the door and then at her open suitcase. She flipped the letter over and dialed the number. As she listened to the ring tones she reached for her shoes.

“Edward Dell,” he said.

“It's me, Zoe...”

“Let me hear you open it,” he said.

Zoe didn't hesitate. She opened the letter and began to read aloud.

“My darling Man.

I try so hard not to think about you all the time, but I fail miserably. I can't stop myself. Just a glimpse of you in my mind makes me tremble like a besotted sixteen year old.

Sometimes I can smell you on my skin and in my hair. The sensation is so powerful I'm shocked by the intensity pf my hunger for you.

I hear a scrap of that song - you know the one - and I want it to last forever. My chest goes tight and I can hardly breathe.

I want you more than I have ever wanted anyone or anything. I want you to hold me. I want your fingers in my hair and I want your mouth all over every inch of me.

I dream about you and I'm sure I come in my sleep.

It's fantastic but not like the orgasms I get when you're deep inside me.

When you're filling me up, gliding and thrusting and telling me I'm so special you'd rather die than let me go. That's when I surrender to you utterly and completely.

You know exactly what I love you to do to me. Maybe you can read my mind, often I think you can. I feel so wonderfully vulnerable and defenseless yet at the same time so powerful and so alive.

Tie my wrists above my head and my whole being dissolves into lust. Tie them so I can't move. So I can't stop your magic fingers on the tips of my breasts. I can't bear it - the delicious helplessness makes me want to explode.

I'm getting so wet just thinking about it. Never ever stop telling me how much I turn you on and how much I please you. I'd do absolutely anything you wanted - you know that.

I love to suck your cock 'til you come in my mouth. That drives me totally fucking crazy. Oh my God, does it ever. You sound like an animal just as you jet and spurt hot cum down my throat. I love it. I absolutely love it.

I hope I'm making you hard. God, I hope I am. I'm thinking about you all alone with your wonderful cock. I'm thinking about your hand sliding up and down its whole length. Think of me and move your hand faster and faster.

Imagine I'm on top of you, my hips bucking and grinding like a rodeo rider. Imagine my tits bouncing and jostling. Remember telling me the sight of them makes you want to jizz all over them ? Be my guest!

When I undress myself, I think of you and it excites me. Every clip, every button, every zip and I imagine it's you. I have to stop myself thinking how fast you can make me come.

Sometimes you tease me into a frenzy. But it's a delicious torment that magnifies my orgasms beyond my most erotic dreams.

I think about the tip of your cock nudging at me like little kisses on my cunt. I want to scream at you to fuck me fuck me fuck me. But instead, I get a long slow inch-by-inch fuck that only stops when your belly slaps into mine.

You drive me frantic when you do that. I want to writhe and thrash like a bait worm threaded onto a fish hook. Then you're a thrusting, sliding, gliding fuck machine.

You nail me, impale me and screw me out of my mind. Then you whisper the most wonderful filth in my ear and I come and I scream and I come again.

Now I'm shaking inside and I have to stop.

All my love, E.”

Zoe took a long,deep breath. She had never used such explicit language to a man she barely knew. They weren't her words but that didn't matter. She felt excited and aroused - as if she had screamed fuck right off to a planeload of passengers.

Emily's words and images crackled and dazzled inside her head like an expensive firework display. Tormented and dissolved into lust, that's me Zoe thought.

At last, she said, “I don't know what to say.” Bloody liar, she told herself, you know exactly what: be here now and whisper wonderful filth in my ear.

“Don't even think about it,” he said.

But she was thinking about it. And the more she thought the more she wanted.

“Can I do anything?” she said, immediately thinking how totally dumb she sounded.

“Have dinner with me, nine o'clock, in the restaurant,” he said. “ I'll pick you up in three minutes.”

It took several seconds for the penny to drop. Then something huge and hot somersaulted in her stomach. She wanted to say he didn't know her room number.

Instead, she said, “Four twenty-one.”

“Two minutes,” he said and rang off.

Zoe's mouth was dry. She took a soft drink from the mini bar just as he appeared at the door.

“Talk to me some more,” he said. He was close enough for her to see a tiny scar on his cheek.

She hesitated. Then she said, “What would you like me to say?”

“You'll think of something.”

So she whispered, “Undress me, take me to bed and fuck me.”

She tilted her face up to be kissed. He smelled clean and fresh. She shrugged off her jacket as he unzipped her skirt. He scooped her up like a child and took her to the bed.

He told her to undo her blouse. “Slowly,” he said. “Then take it off.” He watched her watching him, her eyes heavy lidded, fingers lingering on buttons.

He walked to the bathroom. She watched him go, hearing her heart crash against her ribs. She stretched out like a cat in the sunshine.

He was naked when he returned. His erection curved upwards towards his navel. She stared as it swung when he moved towards her. He carried a dressing gown belt. Zoe scissored her legs and lifted her arms over her head.

“Tie me down if you like,” she said.

He sat on the bed. “ I'll tie you down if you like,” he said.

“I like a lot,” she breathed. He kissed her mouth. His tongue pushed deep and she moaned. When he pulled away she was flushed and panting softly.

He explored her breasts with his fingers. She felt them catch the nipples, rigid and stiff through her bra.

She arched her back and said, “ Unwrap me.”

He undid the clasp between her shoulder blades with one hand. Like a magician, she thought and wriggled out of the straps.

She moved against the sheets, flaunting her bare breasts so they shimmied and jostled. She was very proud of her breasts. Fully dressed she loved men to look at them – to want them. Undressed she loved even more for a man to use his fingers and his mouth. After that, he could do whatever he wanted with her.

His warm breath gave her goose bumps. She slid both hands into his hair and said, “Manhandle me, eat me alive.”

She pulled his head down and arched herself up to him. “ Tongue me,” she whispered. “ Lick me ... I love that.”

She groaned with disappointment when he finally pulled away. Her nipples ached for his mouth again. She could feel how wet she was. “Do it again ... please,” she purred.

He knelt over her, one knee each side of her ribcage. She offered her wrists and he tied them with the belt. When he reached over her to fasten her to the bed post, his cock brushed her face.

He moved his hips deliberately so she could take his cock into her mouth. She thought about Emily and what she'd say if she knew.

Zoe closed her lips around his helmet and used her tongue. He grunted and she thought about hot saltiness spurting into her mouth.

Edward thought about Emily too. How her eyes would gleam and her breathing would become ragged as he told her. Told her about the horny little blonde with deliciously sensitive breasts who wanted to be tied down and fucked by a stranger who had charmed his way into her pants in a hotel bar.

He pulled away and told her she had irresistibly fuckable tits. She whispered he could fuck her any place he wanted. He slapped his cock against her nipples and she groaned like a lost soul.

She squirmed her shoulders in a salacious invitation. "Do it,” she panted. Two handed he cupped her breasts together and slithered his cock between them.

His hips were no longer unhurried. They moved faster and he grunted with each thrust. After a while he laughed breathlessly, “I could easily...” he began.

“Easily what?” she breathed. “Come all over me? Yum.”

He laughed again,“Ladies first,” he said. She swivelled her hips urgently as he coaxed her pants down to her knees and beyond. Zoe knew they were soaking and so did he. Then he was between her thighs spreading them wide with his.

“Now fuck me,” she moaned. “Fuck me”

“Persuade me,”he said, pulling her just close enough for her to felt him hard as bone.

“ You're a bastard,” she panted and wrapped her legs around his waist. Her heels drummed into his back like a jockey on a racehorse.

He rocked his hips, slipping the tip of his cock inside her and out again. She was so wet he could smell the hot, musky scent of her excitement. He reached above her head and freed her wrists and immediately nails raked into his back.

He tangled his fingers in her hair and turned her ear to his mouth.

“I'm going to fuck you senseless,” he growled.

He pushed his cock deeper, making her twist and squirm underneath him. “ And you're going to scream for me to make you come,” he said.

Then he pushed right up inside her and her mind turned to mush. For a second she wondered why a man so good at driving a girl crazy had a cheating wife. Nail me and impale me she thought, fucking right. He knelt with the back of her thighs propped on his.

His hand trailed south down her belly. She snapped her head right back and clutched the sheet with both hands. His fingertips barely touched her as they caressed along the length of her clit.

She heard herself squeal softly, “Again … don't stop, please don't stop...”

She couldn't stop herself shaking. A warm, glowing balloon grew and grew inside her. She writhed and shuddered like she was trying to wriggle away from him.

Already she was on the brink of orgasm. She didn't try to stop herself; she knew she couldn't even if she tried.

“Don'stopnow … Goddon'stop.” Her words tumbled over themselves.

“I'm going to come …” she sobbed, “I'gonnacome ...”

He knew and all of him moved faster – faster and harder.

The balloon burst inside her and she screamed, “I'm there … I'm there … Oh God I'm coming.”

Hot, delicious pulses of near unbearable ecstasy flooded through her. Like a puppet on strings her body jerked and convulsed as wave after wave of back-breaking delight shivered through her.

In a while, she stopped trembling but the heat remained. Like a Buddha he sat cross legged at the end of the bed and watched her. His erection was still huge and it glistened with her own juices.

She couldn't remember a man who had fucked her like he had fucked her without coming himself.

He slapped her lightly on the foot and said, “Turn over.” She obeyed without a word.

Then he kissed the soles of her feet, pushing his tongue between her toes until she was ready for him again.

“Like a bitch, be a slut for me,” he rasped. He slapped her arse just hard enough to make her squeak.

Zoe liked to be bitch-fucked from behind on her hands and knees. She liked it a whole lot and she told him so. Then he did it to her - just as she wanted.

If he was easy on her before, he was harder and rougher this time. She liked that a lot too.

The hot rush came quicker and sharper. She whispered “ Oh my God … OhmyGod … Ohyes ...”

At exactly the right moment his fingers found her clit and his thumb pushed deep into her anus. Instantly she climaxed, screaming and screaming her orgasm into the pillow. With a long, gut wrenching groan he let himself go. He slammed and thrusted and pumped hot, thick and deep right up inside her until he was done.

Later, as she slept the sleep of the dead, Edward saw untroubled innocence in her face. For a moment he listened to her slow regular breathing. Then he dressed quietly and let himself out of the room.

The early morning flight from Paris was ten minutes late. Edward smiled at the turning heads as Emily strutted across the concourse towards him.

After they had embraced she pulled away, looked carefully into his face and she knew. He smiled back at her.

“You've got a story for me,” she said and those violet eyes sparkled with delight. It wasn't a question.

He nodded and she grinned wickedly at him. “Take me home, take me to bed and tell me what you did to her,” she said. “ Then you can show me what you did to her - and don't leave anything out.” She slipped her arm through his and rested her head against his shoulder.