After Hours: Black Lace Classics (28 page)

‘So what?’ Venny replaced her shades on her nose and settled back too. She had no worries about the awards now, none at all. She had even bought the dress she was going to wear – a gold glittering sheath that skimmed over her lush curves and made her feel a million dollars.

‘So you think it’s going to be Box of Delights, or Beurre Blanc, right?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘Box of Delights has a lot of ambience. A charming hostess, an excellent Michelin-starred chef, good staff.’

‘All true,’ sighed Venny with a smile.

‘Whereas Beurre Blanc has an even better chef, a cutting-edge ultra-modern atmosphere, and the staff are pretty damned good too.’

‘I expect Terence Conran’s quaking in his shoes right now,’ quipped Venny.

‘Well, he ought to be,’ grinned Micky.

‘Modesty never was a fault of yours, was it?’

‘Can’t say it was, no.’

Venny lifted her shades a fraction and smiled across at him. ‘Oh, come on, Micky,’ she urged him sweetly. ‘Let it go, will you? Let’s just enjoy today, and worry about all that tomorrow.’

Micky’s blue eyes opened wide in mock amazement. ‘Live for the day and worry tomorrow? Who can this person be? Surely not Venny Halliday, all-round control freak and advance worrier extraordinaire?’

‘I’m learning from you,’ said Venny primly, setting her shades back on her nose.

‘You could do worse.’

‘That’s what I thought.’ Venny considered for a moment. ‘Dani says that Jamie’s finished the ice sculpture for tomorrow night’s centrepiece. He’s got it in his local supermarket’s freezer room for now. Imagine it. You and me in a clinch, carved into the ice. Immortalised.’

‘Well it’s hardly immortalised,’ said Micky mildly. ‘We’ll be a puddle of water by the end of tomorrow evening.’

‘Hey, don’t disillusion me.’

Venny snuggled back onto her chair with a sigh of happiness. She didn’t doubt that she was going to win the award, but now it didn’t somehow seem to matter so much as it once had. Even if she lost, she could live with that, shrug her shoulders and just carry on. Maybe even sell Box of Delights, move into some other business. Maybe not. She knew very well that a few weeks ago she could not have been so casual, so adult, about the results of the Blue Ribbon awards ceremony. Micky had been a good influence in her life.

Later, after a lazy lunch out on the deck, they went to bed and made love again, then dozed, entangled,
until mid-afternoon. Micky awoke first. He was a light sleeper, unlike Venny. He was sprawled on his back, and she was glued to his side like a limpet, one of her arms across his chest, her breasts resting against his ribcage, their skin almost welded together by sweat. One of her legs was hitched across both of his. This was a favourite position of hers. And he kind of liked the way she clung to him, her nose burrowing into the curve of his neck, little snuffling noises escaping her as she slept.

Micky glanced down at the disarrayed curls of her blonde head. No doubt about it, Venny Halliday had got to him in a way few women had before. He thought of taking Kate in the alleyway outside Box of Delights, fucking her up against the wall. Thinking that all women were the same, or trying to convince himself that this was so – a cunt was a cunt was a cunt, yes?

As it turned out, no.

And pushing his cock into the luscious Flora at that exciting lunch with Caspar and Venny. He was pleased that Flora and Caspar seemed to have resolved their differences. He liked Flora. And there had been so many others, too many to count. He loved sex. Sex and food, almost – but not quite – in equal measures.

And he guessed that he maybe also loved Venny Halliday.

And he wished that she would wake up so that he could get his rocks off again. He had a hard-on like a steel bar down there. But he was prepared to wait, if he had to.

Later, they swam in the sea. Micky was surprised by just how strong a swimmer Venny was, ploughing a lively breast-stroke back and forth on a line parallel with the beach, then collapsing in a laughing heap in his arms, gasping and panting and splashing him light-heartedly. They played for a while, and then inevitably the play became more serious as they churned and splashed in the chest-high water. Venny’s top was stripped off her. Her breasts were concealed by the water, but she was worried about what would happen when she had to walk up the beach. There were other people about now, walking along the beach, enjoying the sun.

‘So you sunbathe and swim topless,’ said Micky in cavalier fashion. ‘So what?’

Before she could protest, Micky had dived again. Venny felt something tugging at the bottom half of her bikini, and tried to dart away, but Micky was too fast. He pulled the tiny garment free and surfaced, grinning hugely, pushing his hair back with one hand and holding both parts of her apparel in the other.

‘Micky!’ Venny complained laughingly. It felt very erotic, exceedingly sensual, being naked in the water. She looked more carefully at what he held in his hand. His black briefs were there too. They were both naked.

Micky moved towards her, the current lifting them and brushing their bodies against one another. Venny felt Micky’s erect penis pushing at her belly. Her nipples, rigid from the slight chill of the water, teased at his chest. Micky pulled her closer, and before she knew it he was opening her legs, hitching her higher with his
hands around her buttocks, and nosing his naked cock between her thighs, nuzzling it against her slit, searching for – and suddenly, with a victorious upthrust that lifted her high and drew a muffled shriek of gratification from her – finding her.

The chill of the water and the fact that they had been making love for most of the day slowed Micky down so that the experience was a steady, unhurried one. He pushed into her so slowly but so firmly, then withdrew just a little, and then he was in again, surging up into her with a powerful upthrust, and then back – it was like the ebb and flow of the tide that supported them so that they floated, weightless and enfolded by total bliss, mating like wild sea creatures at full moon. When Micky’s orgasm came, he buried his head in her shoulder and bit her quite hard. Then he slid his hand down between their bodies as the water sucked and pulled at them, and gripped her clit between his thumb and forefinger, tugging it rhythmically until she too came, stifling her cries of pleasure against his waterlogged hair.

They stayed like that, locked together, until Venny started to shiver as the water chilled her; then, giggling like irresponsible teenagers, they struggled back into their swimwear – although Venny didn’t bother with the top; Micky kept hold of that – and climbed up the beach, sprawling out on the shingle to dry off in the sun.

People were walking past, and others were out sunbathing too; the sight of a woman sunbathing topless wasn’t exactly unique, but Venny’s breasts drew quite a
few admiring male glances and caused more than one unexpected erection.

Finally they went back into the hut to shower and change for dinner at the Old Neptune pub; and then they wandered back to the hut, loitering down Squeeze Gut Alley to kiss and fondle each other before home, and bed, and more leisurely lovemaking. Venny thought that it actually
was
lovemaking, what they were doing together now. She fell asleep as blamelessly as a child, snuggled into Micky’s muscular chest, her head tucked into his neck, one of her legs thrown across both of his.

‘So – what do you think?’ Venny asked Micky anxiously when he came to collect her the next evening.

Micky eyed her up and down, and let out a low whistle.

‘Wow,’ he said reverently.

‘Does my bum look big in this?’ asked Venny, turning slightly so that he could see the plunging back of the long red gown. She looked at him nervously over her shoulder.

Micky considered the question. Her bum did look big in the dress, but only in the same way that Jennifer Lopez’s bum looked big: in a voluptuous and decidedly alluring way. He guessed that this was a man thing. Men liked a generous bottom on a woman; but other women decried that same bottom as too big, too prominent, too fat. Which was rubbish in this case. Venny’s bum looked wonderful and he wanted to grope it instantly.

‘No, it doesn’t,’ he lied diplomatically. Venny turned
around with a smile and he thought that she looked gorgeous with her frizzy blonde curls all loose and corkscrewed, her tits obviously naked under the gown. Below the hemline he glimpsed dinky gold sandals and gold-painted toenails. She carried in her hand one of those tiny
pochette
things. What the hell did they keep in a tiny little thing like that, a lace-edged hankie? he wondered.

‘Oh, good,’ said Venny, relaxing, accepting the lie. She looked at Micky as he stood in the doorway. He seemed to suit clothes of any sort. His long, slender frame made him a perfect clothes-horse. She envied him that. He could wear a frock-coat or even a
djellabah
, and look like he was born to it. She, on the other hand, had to be circumspect about what she wore because of her sticking-out bum and her larger-than-strictly-normal boobs. Micky was wearing a very proper DJ tonight, black with a crisp white shirt beneath, and he looked great and smelt even better. His dark hair was still stuck up in gelled spikes in its usual punky fashion, and he still sported that cavalier grin and the laughing blue eyes that seemed to find something terribly funny and enjoyable in every aspect of life.

‘Dani gone already, I suppose?’ he asked, picking his jaw back off the floor.

‘Ages ago,’ nodded Venny. ‘She was still muttering about the flower arrangements and the table placings when she went out the door. And she’s phoned Jamie three times today about the ice sculpture. She’s been driving me crazy.’

‘It’ll all be fine,’ Micky reassured her.

‘I’m getting jittery,’ Venny confessed.

‘I can tell.’

‘How can you tell?’ challenged Venny.

‘There’s a curler still hanging in your hair.’

‘What?’
Venny shrieked, and turned to look for the mirror.

‘Hold still; I can get it out,’ said Micky, trying not to laugh at her panic. As she turned, he studied the back of the gown – or the lack of it. It plunged away to just above her bum. In fact, he thought he could see the little peachlike slit at the centre of her bottom, and the whiter, fatter curves of her buttocks too, just peeping above the gown’s daringly cut back.

‘Don’t laugh,’ warned Venny as he stepped forwards and started to unravel the little yellow cylinder. His breath was brushing her cheek, the front of his jacket was brushing her breasts through the thin fabric of her gown, and her nipples were responding to his closeness in the way they always did. ‘Oh, God,’ she wailed. ‘I can’t go out of here with my nipples sticking out!’

‘Yes, you can,’ said Micky calmly, tossing the curler aside as Venny ran a shaking hand through her hair. ‘It’s expected with a dress like that. Almost obligatory. Every man in the room will be able to see that your nipples are hard, and they’ll think what a hot foxy little number you are, and they’ll envy me like mad. There. All ready now, yes?’

‘Yes,’ said Venny faintly, feeling slightly sick now that the Blue Ribbon awards ceremony was actually upon
her. Of course she was going to win, but even so, it was a nerve-wracking occasion.

They rode down in silence in the lift. No horseplay this time. No cunnilingus and no sudden delicious fucks. Even Micky seemed quiet, and Venny was getting steadily more and more freaked out.

Outside, the evening was coming down very softly like a purple velvet cover over a cage of blue. Lights were winking on all over London, and there was a massive car at the kerb, a uniformed driver holding the door open for her.

‘Micky!’ Venny yelled out in surprise.

It was a limo, a real stretch black limo with heavily tinted windows just like the mobsters used in the movies. Just like the ones the stars stepped out of at the Oscars. She looked at Micky and laughed aloud in delight.

‘Like it?’ he asked, grinning.

‘I love it,’ she enthused, and was handed into the car by a very hunky-looking young chauffeur who was also smiling, because with Venny looking so damned pleased about the whole thing it was impossible not to smile with her.

Micky piled in after her, and the door closed behind them. It was like sitting in someone’s lounge. There was thick white carpet underfoot, and the seats were squashy and obviously covered with the softest, the most supple, real leather. There were two more seats at the side; you could cram eight people into this baby with room to spare, Venny thought. There was a television. There was a little walnut-panelled cupboard which was
probably a fridge. There was a drinks cabinet. There was a soundproof sheet of thick tinted glass between them and the chauffeur. There was everything you could possibly want in here.

As the driver climbed in and the huge eye-pulling car eased out into the traffic, Micky popped open a bottle of Bollinger and let the froth cascade into two flutes.

‘I had no idea you were planning this,’ said Venny, taking a flute from him and sipping blissfully, all but hugging herself with enjoyment.

‘It’s a surprise,’ said Micky. ‘After all, it’s a big occasion. Why not celebrate it?’

‘Whoever wins?’ Her eyes held his with a glimmer of anxiety in their green depths.

‘Whoever,’ said Micky positively; ‘You or me, who cares?’

‘I’ll drink to that,’ said Venny, and clinked her brimming glass against his. They drank, their eyes caressing each other. Finally Micky took the glass from her hand and put both safely aside.

‘Give me a kiss for luck,’ said Micky.

Venny leaned against him and gently touched her lips against his.

‘Not there,’ said Micky. He leaned back against the sumptuous leather and unzipped his fly. ‘Here.’

Venny looked at him in surprise, but her sex was already throbbing treacherously with excitement despite the fact that she was thinking they couldn’t, the driver would see. She glanced over her shoulder at the young man’s impassive head, seen only faintly through
the thick tinted glass between his compartment and theirs.