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I’ve no idea what to think of Andy, at this point. I mean, he doesn’t seem gay. Or bisexual, even. And what’s even weirder – none of this seems either gay, or bisexual. Andy is just a cocky fuck and Gabe … well. Apparently Gabe will be into anything you order him to be into.

I think. I’m not sure. Someone explain it to me.

‘Go on. What are you waiting for? She’s primed. She’s just waiting to swallow your cock … unless you want her to have a go at me, first?’

Whatever this is, Andy is
very
good at it. Gabe blurts out a
no
before he’s even got to the word
first
. Not only that, but I think he’s been reading my secret Big Book of Horny Fantasies, because I’m sure I’ve imagined something very like this, before.

At the very least, I guessed right. I knew Andy would be like this, do things like this, and I was one hundred per cent correct.

‘No! No – I’ll ask – I’ll
tell
her. I’ll tell her to … do that.’

‘Do what?’

‘S-suck my cock.’

I lick my lips for him, for getting those words out.

‘Come on and do it,’ he says to me. ‘Come on and do it to me.’

He’s shaking and flushed. His hands are clenched into fists at his sides. It’s clear that this is all bothering him in probably weird ways, and yet he
still
sighs disappointedly, when Andy moves his hand away.

Andy just grins – his expression saying
dance, puppets, dance
, very clearly. I’ve no idea how he took the reins so quickly, but I understand this much for sure: my own efforts seem weak and third rate, by comparison.

‘Undo your pants,’ he says, to Gabe. And Gabe obeys, in flustered fumbles. He’s looking right at me, but I don’t think he’d hear me, if I spoke.

‘Get it out, get it ready. You don’t want to make her wait, do you? She’s so horny for it, mate, seriously.’

It’s obvious why his filthy arrogant words have an effect on Gabe, but I’m amazed at the effect they have on me. It feels as though I haven’t come for a week, though in reality it was about five minutes ago. My body’s agitated, restless – Andy’s right. I’m horny for cock. I can hardly wait to taste him.

When Gabe finally,
finally
wrestles himself from his trousers, Andy laughs. Not meanly – just a short bark – before he leans back against my table, arms crossed.

‘No wonder she likes you, hey?’

He glances at Andy, then – more directly than he’s dared to, since this whole weird force-Madison-to-give-you-a-blowjob thing started. He looks confused, I think, though alarmingly not because of the scenario.

It’s clear – he just doesn’t know what Andy means, by
no wonder she likes you
. He just doesn’t get it. Though to his credit, he’s probably not used to guys complimenting his dick.

‘You’re hung like a donkey, mate,’ Andy helpfully fills in, because he apparently picked up on the same clues I did. Gabe wouldn’t know how big his dick was if you put a block of wood in front of him, and told him to chop. He even looks to me, for something like confirmation.

I guess most of his favourite books weren’t really specific on how big “totally hung” was. Though I know some of them go with “he filled her with his full ginormous eight inches”, so perhaps I’m wrong. Perhaps Gabe just thinks he’s some sort of mutant.

I’m up close to him again, now, so I press kiss-reassurances against his mouth, his cheek, and for a moment it’s just us, and I think he understands me real well. There’s nothing wrong with you. Nothing wrong at all. And I won’t let anything happen to you, because apparently you’re turning my insides to goo.

From somewhere off to the side, Andy says, ‘Now put your hand in her hair.’

His voice sounds flatter, more commanding. Not quite as mischievous as before.

‘That’s it – tighten your grip. Like you’re going to pull.’

He glances at Andy, then.

‘I don’t want to do anything that will hurt her.’

Such a sweetheart. Seriously – why aren’t my insides gooier?

‘You won’t hurt her – here, like this.’

I can hear my breath coming high and fast, while my heart pounds in my brain, my clit, the ends of my fingers and toes. This can’t be really happening, and yet I’m sure it is. I can feel Gabe’s heavy erection pressing into my skirt, as Andy stands and gets too close to me. Gabe’s hand has dropped away, and Andy replaces it with his – so that he can get a fistful of my hair, and pull it just pleasantly tight.

I guess he’s had practice. Lots and lots of practice, with other horny sluts.

‘Then you whisper in her ear: go on, baby. Go down on me.’

But Gabe doesn’t have to say the words. I’m on my knees before he’s even processed them. I’m on my knees and my hands are on his thighs and I feel his juddering, desperate moan pass all the way through his body.

‘Tell her you’re gagging for it. You can’t wait for her hot, wet mouth around your dick. I bet you’re primed, too, right? You’re gonna shoot in about ten seconds.’

Far from making him cringe, as I expect, the words seem to spur him on. He bucks his hips, and the slick tip of his cock slides wetly along my cheek.

‘But don’t worry, mate. After you’ve had your slippery go, I’ll finish her off.’

Jesus, where does he get this stuff? Has he spent the hours in between all those messages he left, plotting what to do with us once he had us cornered? He’s like a fantasy sex villain.

Gabe just makes a sound – a little guttural
ah
right in the back of his throat, that should probably suggest mortification – but it doesn’t quite get there, not entirely. It lingers around aroused, trapped, and I can’t help thinking:

He really
does
enjoy it. He likes being humiliated and ordered around, even in this fantasy sex villain sort of scenario. His balls are drawn tight to his body, and a little strand of liquid has worked its way down the stem of his prick, and whenever Andy touches him he jerks, as though a hand on his arm is going to be the thing that pushes him over the edge.
That’s
what’s going to make him spurt helplessly into the air between us, without anything tugging or sucking him along.

I want it in my mouth, however, and Andy doesn’t have to push or force me – I just stick out my tongue and lick loud and wet from root to tip, catching that thin streamer of pre-come as I go. He tastes like soap, and salt – of course he does – and I lap at him, wanting more. Wanting more of the tensely smooth feel of him against my tongue – the one that I know will be so much sweeter, when he’s filling my mouth.

So I let it happen quite suddenly, sinking down as far as I can go – which isn’t very far at all. He presses at the back of my throat barely halfway in, and then he grunts, and his hips buck forward minutely, and Andy forces me to do what Gabe wants but won’t ask for.

Take more.

I gag and Gabe flinches back, but I think Andy’s hand is pressing against him, somewhere, so it’s not as though he can go far.
No, no
, he moans, until I reach up, and dig my nails into his clenching backside.

Then he surges forward again, whether Andy’s there to force him or not. He fills my mouth, hot and thick, sometimes just a hint too rough and groaning when Andy tells him
yes, go on, fuck her face
.

Just like I knew he would.

I feel what could well be a reassuring hand of Gabe’s, fluttering over my cheek, but it’s sweaty and obviously as wound tight as the rest of him. When I circle all the parts of his dick I can’t quite reach with my fingers, and jerk him off as I suck, I feel his entire body stiffen as though this is going to be it.

But he doesn’t come. And Andy’s kind enough to acknowledge that fact.

‘I’m impressed, mate. You’re really not doing all that bad.’ And then, even worse, ‘Wanna have a go in her pussy?’

Gabe makes this terrific whining sound that somehow sends little jolts of pleasure straight to said place. He’s trying to hold off, I can feel it, and unlike Andy I know that Gabe holding off is akin to concrete holding off a squirt of silly string. But even so, this is a lot to take – and he tells us just that in lovely wavering words.

‘Oh my
God
,’ he says, and there’s a note of delicious contempt in there – as though Andy is just the most disgusting beast to ever walk the earth.

And maybe I am, too. Is that what you’re thinking, Gabe?

‘Come on, babe,’ Andy says. ‘Stand up. Let him get a look at your snatch.’

Apparently I
am
a disgusting beast, because I stand up when Andy tells me to. I clamber up Gabe’s body on wobbly legs, one hand clasped in Andy’s – so thoughtful. And then he leads me back until I’m right up against the table, and watches Gabe watch him as he pushes my skirt up my thighs.

And pulls my knickers down my legs.

I think it’s the part of me that wants to resist Andy, that climbs up on to the table and spreads my legs. It’s definitely that part that makes me tell Gabe, ‘Fuck me, fuck me now.’

Even though that’s technically obeying Andy’s directive. But then, I don’t look at Andy when I say it, and it’s not him who Gabe’s obeying in that moment, and although I seem to like being a dirty whore, ordered around like I’m nothing, I think I liked having the final word, too.

I like it when Gabe steps towards me, and looks down on my bare, glistening cunt. I think about how lewd I must look, and heat strips me down to nothing.
Go on
, I think,
go on
, but he only stands over me, cock pointing at my body, eyes all over me at once.

‘Give it to her,’ Andy says, but I’m not sure Gabe’s really hearing him, any longer. He puts a hand on my body without having to be told or asked or anything, and strokes downwards from collarbone to stomach, skimming my breasts as he goes.

I have to put my head back – the swell of pleasure is too intense.

‘Fuck me, please fuck me,’ I say, but he doesn’t. He shoves my skirt right up with one hand, and jerks himself roughly, with the other.

And when he comes, with a startled gasp that thrills me to the core, he spurts all over my sweet little wet pussy, in thick, heavy ribbons.

H
E DOESN’T SAY
a word about what went on between us and him and what-have-you, when he walks in the next day. His lips are sealed. His face and body and everything else are sealed, too. He couldn’t look more uncomfortable if he donned rubber underwear and did seven hundred lunges.

But I press on.
I
make
him
a cup of coffee. I stay with him in the shop, and make pleasing small talk until he starts to unwind and forget that we did a weird threesome the day before. That Andy jerked off all over the place
he
had jerked off all over, like a dog, marking me.

Then said
see you again
, as though we’d all had a nice tea party with cake and crumpets, and wouldn’t it be wonderful if we repeated the experience some time soon? I don’t think Gabe thinks it would be wonderful if we repeated the experience some time soon. I’m only glad Andy didn’t try to fuck me, because I don’t know where that would have ended up.

I’m not sure how jealous Gabe is. I’m not sure if it’s just the sex that disturbed him, or the humiliation, or some sort of unholy association of all three.

So I go with small talk, and not thinking about how his face looks, when he comes. Works like a charm, every time. Works even better if you start talking to him about his favourite books – though of course by favourite, I don’t mean his
real
favourites.

He’s a big fan of Charles Dickens, apparently. He tells me he used to imagine himself living in those times – well of course! Everything so repressed, and straight-laced! But then he says, quite unexpectedly, ‘I don’t think I’d have lasted five minutes.’

I turn from the window – the trinket shop across the way is still selling those stupid red penis-looking lampshades – and look right at him, for the first time this morning. He’s sitting at the desk, meticulously putting together something that’s probably far below his skill-set – this little bookstand we got from a supplier. Such long, careful fingers. I want to suck them into my mouth, right now.

Though I refrain, of course. I probably wouldn’t, if Andy were here. He could just tell me what to do and I’d obey and humiliate Gabe into oblivion.

God, have I pushed him to oblivion? He seems … OK. I don’t want him to be anything less than OK, even if he had seemed to really, really enjoy a lot of it. Maybe there’s another way he can really, really enjoy it, without seeming much less pleased than he had when we first screwed around.

‘What makes you say that?’ I ask.

He sort of half-glances up from his work, then, as though realising he might have said too much. Though about what, I can’t say.

‘Times were hard,’ he says, finally. ‘I’m not exactly made of stern stuff.’

He turns back to his bookstand, too quickly.

‘I’m not even stern enough for right now.’

I sip my coffee, as though my insides aren’t churning. So
that’s
the issue.

‘Why do you have to be stern?’ I ask, as he slots tab A into opening B. I think he’s considering, but it’s hard to tell.

‘Women generally prefer assertive men.’

‘You don’t think you’re assertive?’

‘No. No – of course I’m not.’ A pause. God I wish a customer would come in. ‘I can’t even ask for what I want.’

‘There are other ways to go about getting something.’

‘Well yes, maybe. But I don’t think that you … I don’t want to be some sort of game.’

I can’t believe how quickly this conversation has turned into sex alley. I’m amazed he’s still talking.

‘You seemed to like it.’

‘No – I … yes. I … enjoy being with you. In that way. But the first time I make love to you, I don’t want it to be something ridiculous.’

That last comes out all in a rush, and he seems embarrassed as he says it. I’m embarrassed, too. I’m so embarrassed that I think I need to lie down for a little while. Did he just use the words make and love? Was the word love there, already?

I don’t love Gabe. We’re just a … thing.

‘I mean, that is, if you want me to make love to you. Or have sex with you or whatever it is that you want to do.’ He pauses. He’s no longer putting together the bookstand, but I can see him piecing together and ordering something in his head, anyway. ‘I realise you might not want those things from me. Like that, you know? Because I’m not assertive. And I can’t ask. Apart from that last bit, I did ask that. About the sex, I mean.’

I think that’s the longest bit of speech I’ve ever heard him say, all in one go. He talked a lot about
Oliver Twist
when we got on to that, but discussing literature and Nancy’s boobs in the musical really doesn’t count. Even if he had laughed, when I had pointed out how magnificent they were.

The boobs, I mean. Not the long bits of literature.

I mull this over for a moment. In all honesty, I can’t think what to say, in response. There are a number of things that he needs to be told: I don’t care that you’re not assertive, I want to … I want to have sex with you. Have sex, not other ways of describing it that make me feel a little bit weird. I don’t want things to make you feel ridiculous or humiliated.

I need to know how much humiliation you want, in order to get you to that place of shuddery, red-faced excitement, without the uncomfortable self-doubt and awkwardness, afterwards.

But I’m just not practised enough, at any of this. This all seems very dom/sub or something like it, and although I’ve read a great deal of material on the subject, I’ve no idea how to carry myself like Andy.

Though the words that finally come out of me seem very a) Andy-like and b) as though I do actually know what I’m doing, and want this all to continue, immediately.

‘If you find it hard to ask for what you want, then we need to find another way for you to go about that. Don’t we?’

There’s something that definitely clicks into place, in his expression, when I talk a certain way or say a certain thing. His lips part and his eyes meet mine, without a hint of trying to squirm away. I think there’s even something of a smile, playing at the corners of his mouth.

That secret smile – the one that I do think of as ours. Somehow I doubt he’s offered it to too many people.

‘Whatever you think’s best,’ he says, and I like that. I like that a lot.

I park myself on the edge of the desk, one leg crossed over the other. His eyes go immediately to the expanse of thigh I’ve exposed.

‘So, for example. You could try reading to me, again. I did enjoy you reading to me.’

‘Chapter eleven of
Great Expectations
?’

He has such a hidden sense of humour! It’s
fabulous
.

‘How about chapter five of some dirty book you enjoy, that tells me exactly what you really like and how to go about it.’

A crease appears, between his brows.

‘Or we could make a much more fun game of it. I mean – make a game of it that you would appreciate. You circle all your favourite bits in all your
real
favourite books, and I can go out and find them, and surprise you. How about that?’

His shoulders drop a little, and he glances around the shop. Could be that I’ve hit on the wrong sort of thing. But then he says, ‘It would ruin the stock.’

And I have to laugh.
That’s
the first place his mind goes to – ha!

‘I’ll pay for the books you use, personally,’ I say, and maybe it’s the dirty connotations of the word
use
that makes him colour. Maybe it’s something else. He’s fidgeting, now – all the focus on the bookstand drained away. Even as I think he might resist, I can see his eyes darting busily over all my lovely books, searching.

It’s a hungry sort of search. He bites his bottom lip.

‘Go ahead,’ I tell him. ‘I won’t look.’

I slide off the desk and make as though to turn back to the window – though I wait long enough to watch him stand, and wipe his sweaty palms on his trousers. He’s in grey, today – grey pants, grey tank top, checked shirt underneath. Tie so firmly knotted it looks as though it’s about to strangle him.

‘You’re still looking,’ he says, mouth curled up at the corner – and I could eat him up, I really could.

This
. This is it. This is what he needs and what I need, immediately.

I turn and look out of the window, but this time I don’t see the little crooked street beyond.

‘Should I just …’ he begins, but I tell him not to say anything at all. Just do.

And then I can hear him, somewhere behind me, running his fingers over the books. I know that’s what he’s doing – it’s a slick, almost fluttering sound. And I’m so tuned to it, that I can hear him taking one off the shelf, too.

It doesn’t take long for him to apply pencil to paper. I recognise that sound, as much as I recognise any of the others – if not more so. A kind of scratching swoop, like music to my ears.

I’m not Andy
, I think.
Show me who you are, really. Show me the limits
.

When someone comes into the shop, I almost jump right out of this brand new skin I’ve found myself in. And the way he looks at me suggests I seem as though that’s just happened. Like I’m examining him as though he’s an alien from Mars.

‘Hello,’ the customer says, and I remember to reply in English. Not Martian.

‘How are you today?’ I say, which sounds reasonably human, to my ears.

The customer – we’ll call him guy-in-cardigan – nods, and then starts pretending he’s not really looking for what he’s bound to be looking for. Which I suppose wouldn’t be so bad – it’s very unthreatening, after all. Only Jeanette comes in then, too, right after Cardigan, and Gabe is visibly a little more disturbed by that.

Lovely chipper Jeanette, whom he knows works next door.

I glance back at him, and he’s just stood, open book and pencil in hand, eyes wide. As though we were caught having sex, rather than caught reading. But I guess I’m a little bit of the harsh taskmaster, because as I’m saying hello to Jeanette and oh yes isn’t it
bitter
out and so on, I raise my eyebrows at him.

He understands me perfectly, and shakes his head, minutely.

Bad boy.

‘Oh, hello there, Gabriel,’ Jeanette says, as she shakes out her brolly and puts it in the helpful little stand I provide for customers. Mainly so they don’t get a ton of York rain on all of my books.

That I want Gabe to deface, with his dirty pencil.

‘Hi,’ he replies, because he’s a genial sort. It’s not his fault that his
hi
sounds like a balloon, deflating.

‘You look a little stressed. Is she working you hard?’

I grin, and he tries not to.

‘Oh, very hard,’ I say, and take a step towards him. ‘You can keep doing what you’re doing, by the way … unless you have any objections?’

His tongue peeps out – just briefly – to wet his lips. He glances down at the book, still open in his hands. God knows what page it’s open at. Or what I’m expecting him to circle while Jeanette and I chit-chat inanely and Cardigan shops for porn.

“She made him figure out what he wanted, sexually, while people stared at him”, probably.

‘No,’ he says. ‘No, that’s fine.’

He turns his back to us, though. I think he even makes to walk into the little alcove, until he realises Cardigan is there. Ha!
Trapped
. And he must look it, too, because Jeanette’s face is a picture. I guess we’re not being as sly as I think we’re being. Some of the undertones are definitely leaking out to become overtures. Our text is not sub. Maybe it was the up and down wavering of his voice, or
dammit
– I didn’t check. Did he have a hard-on?

Fabulous.

‘What are you having him do?’ she whispers, leaning right in as though that’s going to stop Gabe hearing. I don’t think there’s anything sexual in her implication, however. She probably
imagines
sexual, but she’s not the sort to come out and say it.

Unless I’m hearing it through our bedroom walls. Then she says all sorts.

‘Ah …’ I say, while I try to imagine what pencil-circling tasks there are for book store assistants to complete. ‘Some errors in some of the stock we got in. He’s finding them, for me.’

She doesn’t look convinced – though she still takes a seat, when I offer it. And pulls it right up to the desk, when I sit down behind.

‘I just thought I’d pop in,’ she says. ‘I haven’t spoken to you in a while.’

I think it’s been about a day, but I don’t say anything. She keeps just popping in to see how Gabriel is doing, and by this point I’m fairly certain that either a) she has taken a shine to him, b) she’s desperate for the filthy gossip I’m not sharing or c) both.

After all, he is attractive. He might not think so, but he’s really not a reliable witness. He seems surprised when people comment on his huge cock, for God’s sake.

‘The shop seems busy,’ she says, just as another customer walks in. Unfortunately, Gabe has pressed himself into a corner with his back to everybody in the world, so I can’t see how mortified he is.

He’s definitely still circling, however.

‘Yes – it’s been a good week. Hasn’t it, Gabe?’

He doesn’t hear me. He’s engrossed in
Demon Seed
.

Jeanette leans in, again.

‘He’s very odd, isn’t he,’ she says, but she’s making pointed eyebrows and licking her lips as she does so. She has this very expressive, chipmunk-y face, with all this bubbly red hair, so when she’s trying to squeeze information out of you, it’s really obvious she’s doing so. Like a cartoon character, trying to do said same thing.

I think about Gabe, getting to that bit in chapter twenty-two – or is it chapter twenty-three? – where the two guys fuck both the girl’s holes. Is he hard, yet? Is he making himself read it, until he stiffens in his grey trousers and wonders how he’s going to hide it?

‘You think so?’ I reply, but I leave a gap. So that perhaps she might think I’m suspicious, too, of odd Gabriel Kauffman.

‘I think he fancies you.’

She’s as subtle as a brick through the window.

‘Do you? No – I don’t think so. I think he likes men, anyway.’

Her eyes get even wider, at that little fake-revelation. Though in relation to the so-called fake part of that revelation, my mind
does
go to Andy’s hand, over his groin.