Love Rules (12 page)

‘Gorgeous,’ Thea enthused on Alice's behalf, ‘it's so grown-up!’

‘It really is gorgeous,’ Alice agreed. ‘I'm very lucky.’

‘I love being married,’ Sally enthused with no smugness. ‘Richard is my best friend, my best shag, my confidant.’

‘I love it that to the outside world there's this normal bloke called Saul – but in my eyes I see this knight in shining armour,’ Thea said proudly, ‘a man I burn for. I lavish my love and lust on him and it's reciprocated. That's the best thing – finally with Saul it's this gorgeous two-way rally. Like a ball caught between flingers in a pinball machine – affection, lust, empathy, friendship, love ricocheting between the two of us.’

‘You're a hopeless romantic,’ Alice said fondly, ‘the first person to compare love to a pinball machine, that's for sure. And how many times do I have to tell you there's no magic or mystique in your feeling of “burning” for a man – it's just sudden surges of adrenalin and dopamine released in your brain.’

‘Oh shut up, Alice,’ Thea laughed.

‘Let the girl enjoy her chemical reaction!’ Sally said.

The food arrived and they picked at the salad and polished off the chips. Alice raised her glass and lowered her voice. ‘Look at that gaggle over there at that table.’ Thea and Sally glanced surreptitiously to a table of three women much like themselves. ‘Short of actually eavesdropping or lip-reading, I'll bet you anything they're bemoaning all men are sods and stuff. They look miserable. Down in the doldrums, drowning their discontent.’ Alice replenished their glasses and raised hers, chinking it against Sally's and Thea's.
‘We're bloody lucky, us three. We each have what we want and life ticks along happily because we're blessed with precisely what makes us tick.’

Girls and Boys

Alice sat up in bed; coddled by cloud-plump pillows and finest goose down, bedecked tastefully with Cath Kidston roses, in a waft around her. Her hair tumbled in a breeze-soft fan over her shoulders, glints of spun gold splaying over the creaminess of her skin. She looked like something out of a Merchant Ivory film, Mark thought to himself. Actually, Alice felt playful and horny and was surreptitiously fingering herself lightly as she watched Mark undress. She smiled at how particular his routine was. The order in which he took off his clothes, checked the pockets of his suit jacket before hanging it on a broad wooden hanger, rolled his belt up and put it in his drawer of rolled-up belts and took his dirty laundry through to the basket in their ensuite bathroom. Alice noted her skirt draped over the back of the chair, over jeans she'd worn at the weekend, her jumper strewn on the seat, her knickers scrunched on the floor. She wondered whether she was slovenly or if Mark was particularly fastidious. She wondered if her disregard for end-of-the-day neatness and order irked him.

‘Mark,’ she asked quietly, ‘do you despair of me being a mucky pup?’

‘Mucky pup?’ Mark frowned, slipping cedar shoe horns into his shoes. Alice gestured to her discarded clothes. ‘Don't be daft,’ he smiled, selecting tomorrow's shirt. ‘When I wake up, whichever way I'm facing, I see Alice rumpled. I like that.’ He picked up her jumper. ‘But this is cashmere and you really should fold it.’ He did it for her. ‘Which drawer?’

Alice looked over to the chest of drawers. ‘Middle one,’ she said, suddenly remembering her vibrator was in the drawer beneath. And then she wondered whether perhaps tonight was as good a time as any to introduce Mark to her bright pink, battery-operated friend. ‘Not the middle drawer,’ she announced, ‘I mean the one below.’ Find it! Don't find it!

Mark didn't find it. Alice didn't know whether she was disappointed or relieved. He continued his bedtime routine, inching the curtains back and looking down to the street, up to the sky. ‘Clear night,’ he assessed. It had been cloudy yesterday. Blustery the day before. He flicked his bedside light on, went back to the doorway and switched the main light off, hung his robe on the back of the door, rolled his head to either side while he walked over to the bed. He plumped his pillow, took off his watch and wound it up, checked the alarm clock though he never changed the setting. Though he always awoke moments in advance of the bell, he'd never not set it. He liked the physical act of silencing it just before it trilled so as not to disturb Alice. He reached for his Ian Rankin and skim-read the last paragraph from the night before, settling himself further into his pillow to read a chapter tonight.

He sighed. ‘Long day,’ he said, smiling apologetically at Alice, ‘long day.’

Alice put her novel down. She reached for him, ran her fingertips along his forearm, stroked her hand up to his biceps, rested her touch tenderly on his shoulder. She nestled against him. He stretched out his arm and draped it
round her shoulders though this made page-turning a little awkward. He kissed the top of her head. She kissed his chest in reply. Kissed it again, optimistically. Put her mouth over his nipple and changed her kiss to a suck. She looked up at Mark, he looked down from his book. He looked tired.

‘Are you tired?’ she whispered, her fingers tantalizingly tiptoeing a path down his chest and over his stomach.

‘I am a little,’ he admitted, ‘work is a bit of a bitch at the moment. I'm carrying all David's while he's convalescing.’

‘When he's back, why don't we take a week off?’ Alice suggested, her hand resting lightly on his stomach while the conversation remained prosaic.

‘Hopefully,’ said Mark, deciding not to tell her about the imminence of trips to Singapore, Australia and Japan.

Alice decided distraction was good action. She traversed his torso with the palm of her hand. His nipples sprung to attention. ‘Mark,’ she murmured, licking her lips lasciviously, eyes asparkle, ‘are you
tired
tired? Or just tired tired?’

He laughed through his nose. ‘Are you laying claim to your conjugal rights, Mrs Sinclair?’

‘I most certainly am,’ Alice winked and kissed him on the chin, his mouth, nibbling his lower lip, ‘if you're up to it.’

‘I'm tired, but
he
's certainly up to it,’ Mark said as he led Alice's hand down his body, underneath the duvet to his hardening cock. Alice closed her eyes, closed her hand around him, felt him grow and stiffen and felt herself start to melt and moisten.

Mark held her head in his hands and kissed her softly all over her face. Alice rated him a very good kisser but actually, just then, she didn't want lips romantic and gentle, she wanted him to thrust his tongue into her mouth and gorge. Gently and evenly, he fondled each breast in turn before sliding his hand down her stomach, over the undulations of waist and hips, lightly over her bush and as far down her
thigh as he could reach without breaking off from kissing her. She hungered for his mouth to feast on her breasts, she wanted his teeth to rasp against her nipples, she wanted his hands to knead her buttocks, she craved his fingers to delve greedily inside her. She pulled her face away and tried to guide his head down and his hand up. But he buried his face in her neck and nuzzled her there instead, cupped his hand over her sex without exploring further, stroking and stroking the length of her body. Desire for what he wasn't doing was heightening her arousal far more than what he was doing to her. It was as if her body was screaming and he couldn't hear it, so engrossed was he in his slow, tender lovemaking. The deafer he became, the more desperate her longing. It was strangely fantastic and frustrating.

Mark brought his face level with hers and gazed deep into Alice's eyes. ‘You're so beautiful,’ he told her. Gently, he parted her legs with his knee and, without taking his eyes off her, he carefully pushed his way inside her. He was pleasingly hard and Alice could sense her sex wanting to suck him in deeply. Her body tried to buck and grind against him but he had her securely enfolded in his arms and was setting a dignified, rhythmic pace. He moved inside her, gyrating subtly, moved and gyrated intoxicatingly slowly. She wanted to yell out fuck me you bastard but her mouth was plugged with his. She wanted him to thrust into her as if he had no self-control but he maintained his quiet, measured rhythm. He rolled her on top of him, sweeping her long hair from his face, scooping it up behind her head, holding her gaze. ‘You feel so good,’ he murmured. She sat up, the change in angle making her gasp. He stroked the fronts of her thighs whilst marvelling at the sight of her; the dip of her waist, the toned run of her stomach, the soft weight of her breasts, the eagerness of her nipples, the grace of her neck, the beauty of her face. ‘I love you,’ he whispered, ‘God, I love you.’ She
was starting to pick up her pace, rotating and pumping as she straddled him. Mark pulled her down, rolled her over and kissed her and kissed her as he came. Deftly, Alice moved against him, the sudden rush of stickiness within her facilitating her own orgasm.

‘That'll put me to sleep with a smile on my face,’ he grinned at her. She smiled back. She could see how sleepy the orgasm had left him yet it had energized her.

‘Did you know that the national average for sex amongst cohabiting couples is less than twice a week?’ Alice announced, the jollity of her voice, as much as her topic, causing Mark's eyes to spring open.

He had a head for figures. ‘Well, darling, we're above average, then.’

‘Did you know that 50 per cent of women own vibrators?’ Alice said, glancing at her chest of drawers, her heartbeat picking up a little.

‘They must be the ones who are restricted to the national average,’ Mark deduced.

Alice wasn't very good with figures and presumed Mark to have calculated some statistic, so she changed her tack. ‘Have you ever used a vibrator on a woman?’ she asked carefully.

He looked at her with a quick frown. ‘Why?’

She gave him a sly smile. ‘Just wondered.’ Again, he frowned. ‘You have!’ she exclaimed, triumphantly. ‘You have! Who? Tell me who!’

‘No,’ he said quite sternly, ‘I assure you I haven't.’ Because Alice believed him, she suddenly wasn't sure how to progress the conversation.

‘Anyway,’ Mark said, ‘aren't vibrators used in lieu of the real thing?’ Alice was about to suggest they needn't be restricted to such times and would you like me to show you mine; but she sensed that Mark was mid-sentence. ‘Or ridiculous props in dodgy vids,’ he remarked.

‘Have you ever filmed yourself?’ Alice probed with a mischievous glint to her voice and eye.

‘Christ, Alice!’ Mark exclaimed, looking at her as if she was suffering sudden manic insanity.

‘Might be fun?’ Alice prompted coyly.

‘Vibrators?’ Mark said. ‘Camcorders? Do I not satisfy you?’ He regarded her with a flicker of suspicion to his gaze. Actually, he looked hurt and it shocked her. ‘Do you find our sex life lacking?’ he asked.

‘No!’ she protested. ‘Not at all.’

‘Am I travelling too much? Is that what's brought on this talk of vibrators? Were you faking your orgasm just now?’

‘No,’ Alice said, ‘no. I was just— For an article. I was just editing out loud. Thinking.’

‘I can't see how a shuddering lump of rubber could possibly better what's great as it is,’ Mark said defensively. ‘Wouldn't it detract from the intensity and meaning of our lovemaking – cheapen it?’

Alice felt badly. She hadn't anticipated Mark's hurt. She'd thought, at most, he'd be endearingly embarrassed and grateful for her dominance and initiative. Or else regard her as harmlessly kinky without taking offence. ‘I was just editing an article,’ she lied again, ‘that's why I brought it up. That's all.’

He nodded. Full of surprises, his wife. He kissed her. ‘Goodnight, Alice,’ he said, ‘I love you.’

‘If you peel onions under a running tap, your eyes don't water.’

Saul watched Thea peeling onions under a running tap. ‘How do you want the aubergine?’ he asked. ‘Sliced or diced?’

‘Sliced, please.’

‘Under running water?’

‘No need. But spread them out then sprinkle salt over them to take away any bitterness.’

Saul sliced the aubergine. He reached up to take the salt from the cupboard. Thea sensed the closeness of his body just behind her. His shirtsleeves were rolled to the elbow. Just a glance at his forearm, the soft hairs spattering down to his wrist, the delineation of muscle, shot desire through to her stomach. She could smell him and the pleasure of it flickered her eyes shut. Saul brushed his hand fleetingly between her shoulder blades and then set about salting his sliced aubergine. Pass the butter, please. Fingertips touched and electrical impulses charged. Eye contact. Adrenalin. You have flour on your cheek. I'll just brush it away for you. Thank you – here, let me feed you a fingerful of home-made mayonnaise. I need to reach up for that casserole dish. Yes, and when you do, I get to see your stomach lengthen and tauten and when you bring your arms down, your breasts swell.

‘Saul, can you pass me that tea towel? Thanks.’

‘Glass of wine? Red? Budge over – the corkscrew is in that drawer.’

Saul gently moved Thea to one side, his hands either side of her hips. She leant back lightly against his body and the proximity of his bulk sent a shiver of anticipatory pleasure through her. Suddenly Saul forgot about corkscrews. It seemed his reason for being there, behind Thea, was expressly to have his hands on her hips, his lips at the ultra-sensitive kiss of skin behind her ear. She pressed back against his chest and turned her cheek quickly; his lips leaving her neck and travelling over her jaw line to her mouth, her lips parted and her tongue tip was eager to dance with his. Behind her, rocking against her, her neck twisted round to reach his face, Saul gorged on her mouth. Something clanged down to the floor but they only half heard it. Thea whipped herself around
so that she was facing him, her arms now thrown around his neck, her fingers enmeshed in his hair, urging his face against hers. He had a hand in the small of her back, his other clasping her right buttock. He pressed against her and she pulled herself up at him. The seam of her jeans was catching the swell of her sex and she parted her legs to find Saul's thigh for further friction. He backed her up against the fridge, his leg wedged between both of hers, his hands now in her hair, over her breasts, pulling and grabbing; the smattering of his evening bristles rasping against her cheeks, her chin, her neck.