In my head, Vann says, ‘Let’s not wake the neighbors.’
Twenty
It feels strange to be taking an overnight bag to a man’s home. When I think about it¸ he has practically invited me to move in. When I arrive at Vann’s he is already out of his work clothes. I have made a point of not using any perfume.
‘It has turned out to be a glorious spring evening, too beautiful to be staying indoors. I thought we could go out to eat.’
‘OK.’
‘I know a fantastic Indian restaurant.’
Indian food. No way. Not only is it extremely fattening, but it burns all the way up and out. ‘Poo on a plate? No thanks,’ I say very firmly.
‘What?’
‘That’s what Indian food looks like to me. Diarrhea on rice.’
He looks incredulous. ‘You lump all Indian food as poo on a plate?’
‘Yeah.’
He shakes his head. ‘You need re-education badly, Sugar.’
Nothing I say moves him. He takes me to his friend’s restaurant on a side street off Piccadilly Circus and orders half a portion of what seems to me to be almost everything on the menu. And I am told I have to taste at least one bite of everything. He does not order any alcohol.
‘It dulls the senses,’ he says. ‘And tonight you are going to have a sensory overload.’
I take a sip of still mineral water. ‘So where did you learn all the stuff you did to me the other day?’
‘Conversation is not allowed either.’
I smile. I’m game if it ends up the way of the other night.
A beautiful waitress passes by and he doesn’t even glance.
I raise my eyebrows. He raises his back. I smile. His smile is polite but mocking.
All kinds of dishes are placed in front of us—chicken marinated in tamarind, fiery pork with kachampuli, succulent lamb in a full-bodied black sesame seed curry, tandoori prawns laden with clarified butter and lime. Silently, I take a bite of the cubes of fried bones in an orangey-red Amritsari sauce. I follow that with fish marinated in yogurt and pungent potatoes in an old ancient Kashmiri recipe.
Sometimes I close my eyes to fully appreciate the foreign flavors. When the tiger prawns marinated in green chilies and mustard paste and cooked inside a green coconut until tender and bursting with flavors causes my eyes to water a glass of hot water is given to me. An old Indian trick. Only hot water will stop the burning. It works. What’s left on my tongue is ginger, garlic, lime, red chilies, ajwain, Indian sorrel and a silence pregnant with erotic intent.
‘Dessert?’
I shake my head. I’ve had enough.
‘Mango kulfi,’ Vann says.
When it comes, he spoons it into my mouth. Our eyes meet, lock. For the first time that night I swallow without tasting.
In the end I have to confess that none of it is poo on a plate.
‘Never dismiss an entire culture like that again,’ he says.
He has not turned on the light but the illumination from the moon turns him bronze as he pulls his shirt off. I drink in the sight of the powerful arms and shoulders, the broad chest, the taut stomach. Rising to my knees I reach and touch his stomach with my fingertips. His eyes are hooded and burning with desire. My fingers move to the waistband of his jeans. I undo the button and grasp the zip.
And then I lose my nerve and pull my hand back, but he catches the edge of my T-shirt, tugs it over my head and, swiftly and with unnerving expertise unhooks my bra. He unzips my jeans, pushes me back onto the bed and tugs the jeans off by pulling the material at the ankles. He throws them behind him and hooking two fingers on either side of my knickers, pulls them down.
‘And that is how it is done,’ I whisper throatily.
He chuckles and, turning away from me, crosses the room and opens the door to one of the built-in cupboards. I get on my elbows and watch him curiously. He brings out what looks like a wooden object. It is about nine inches long, thick on one end and pointed on the other. I sit up in alarm.
‘You’re not going to put that in me, are you?’
He laughs. ‘By the time I am finished you’re going to be wishing I had.’
‘I’m not into kinky things.’ My voice is very sharp, although I am disturbed to note that I am actually secretly turned on. ‘I’m here purely to learn how to seduce Jack.’
‘Very altruistic of you,’ he says drily. ‘This…instrument…is for a foot massage.’
I lie back down. The mattress depresses and he sits cross-legged before the soles of my feet. ‘The first few massages will be painful, but eventually you will come to crave it. In ancient times only the concubine that is chosen to spend the night with the wealthy warlord would be given a foot massage. It made all the girls long to be chosen for the night.’
He grasps my foot by the ankle and, raising it to his lips, kisses the sole. The gesture is incredibly sexual and I feel myself instantly respond. Slowly, he drags the blunt end over my feet. That’s not bad. Quite nice actually. I change my mind fast when the sharpened end meets my skin and sharp blots of pain go up my leg. I try to withdraw my leg, but he holds on tight.
‘You want to bind the man to you?’
Reluctantly I nod.
‘Then you must learn the method. If you cannot bear it yourself, how will you dispense it?’
I bite my lips and agree to go all the way.
‘Even if you beg me to stop?’
‘Even if.’
But the pain is so horrible I stop squirming and start shouting and finally beg him to stop.
He says nothing. Simply works that torture instrument until finally he stops. Relieved, I take in my first full breath. Then he grasps the other ankle.
But eventually it is over. I am bathed in a film of perspiration, but strangely alive. All my nerve endings are so sensitive that when he takes my tender, throbbing big toe in his mouth and sucks it the pleasure is so intense my back becomes a tightly drawn bow, and I simply don’t want it to stop. Ever.
He makes short work of getting out of his jeans and briefs, unrolls a condom on his erection and crawls on top of me.
‘How do you feel?’
‘Tingly and silky all over, but mostly just relieved.’
He laughs softly. ‘That’s what l like to see: a damp and glowing but precocious woman.’ He bends down and kisses one breast peak. ‘Ready?’
‘Yes.’
‘This one is called the Flying Dragon—you probably know it as the missionary position.’ He puts his hands under my knees and lifts them until the soles of my feet are flat on the mattress. That opens my pussy. I raise my thighs, eager for him to plunge into me. He lays the palms of his hands on either side of me.
‘Two deep, eight shallow. Enter softly,’ he says, and feeds his hard flesh slowly into me until he is buried deep inside. I suck at him with my muscles, trying to pull him even deeper into me. ‘Withdraw hard,’ he says, and pulls out so suddenly, I yell. He thrusts from the hips, the rhythm relentless.
Two deep, eight shallow, enter softly, withdraw hard. Together we delve deeper and deeper into a place I have never been to, but desperately want to explore. It is dark and throbbing and warm, and wild with ecstasy.
I feel large but gentle hands on my body. I am eased to my knees, brought to my elbows, face down, ass up high. My thighs are parted. ‘This position is called the Tiger’s Walk. Not every woman can enjoy this—the thrusts are deep.’
And indeed they are—the first plunge is so deep it feels as though he will come out of my throat. But I like it. I love the feeling of being so filled up, so stretched. I can feel his dick wading thickly through my juices. Again and again he hammers into me, with a definite but different rhythm from the last position. Five short, eight deep. When my own syrupy liquids start running down my thighs, he stops and turns me over.