Country Pleasures (7 page)

They were level with each other, he still kneeling in front of her, she sitting on the hay bale, chests heaving under their damp summer clothes, and now Janie was wrestling with a ferocious urge to touch him. Her head felt fine now, apart from a slight throbbing where he'd said there was a cut. But she still wondered if she was seeing things. One moment she had been trudging through a field in the middle of a storm, head teeming with images of other people cavorting and having sex, starved of any experience to call her own, her own body fidgeting with that new, unwelcome hunger. The next minute she was being hustled into a dilapidated barn by a stranger who looked as if he might as easily ravish her as kill her. It was as though her restless state of mind had summoned him out of thin air, like an apparition.

The rain drummed, the wind whistled, and the heat
radiated out of the stranger as he took a long strand of her hair, wound it round his fingers and rubbed it under his nose to sniff it. She could see her reflection: two miniature Janies in each lens of his glasses, with huge bug-eyes and tiny chins. Something in her memory stirred. She had stared into someone's glasses like that before, years ago; seen that alarmed, wide-eyed reflection, and in that remembered scenario she had been sitting bolt upright in a barn full of straw, just like this.

‘I used to know someone with hair just like yours,' said the man, as if he could read her mind. ‘Same colour, same smell. Do you mind that I'm touching it?'

He separated his fingers and let the strand of hair unwind and fall back against Janie's breast. Instead of returning his hand to rest on the hay bale, or using it to lever himself upright so that they could both leave, his fingers tangled themselves under her hair. He started to slide his rough hands down her neck, lifting her wet hair away from the clammy skin, and stroking his fingertips where her pulse was hammering. Sparks of electricity seemed to crackle off her. He shifted very slightly back on his haunches, and held her away from him. He stared at her neck, her throat, down at her dark-red shirt. Janie followed his gaze. The shirt, like most of her clothes, was loose, but her march through the rain had made the fine linen cling to her, emphasising the twin curves of her breasts. The man slowly formed a smile as he took in the bulges of soft flesh, and Janie pushed her shoulders back so that the breasts were clearly outlined – two inviting mounds waiting to smother him. It was just as Sally had suggested – some lucky guy was going to press his face in there. And Janie's tits, her whole body, had been tight with longing ever since the remark had been made.

‘All in one piece, doctor?'

The man's fingers pressed harder into the dip at the base of Janie's throat, causing her to catch her breath.

‘All very much in one piece. I was just checking you hadn't hurt your neck as well from that bump. You'll live.'

‘Not if you keep strangling me. I should go,' Janie said again, tilting her head away from him. He had just appeared in the farmyard; crept up on her she thought. Perhaps he had been watching her. Perhaps he had been watching the cottage. He had big hands that were squeezing her neck, for God's sake. They were in a deserted barn in the middle of a rainstorm and, even if she screamed, no one would hear her.

‘Of course you should,' he answered. He took his hands away and rested them on his legs. Now her neck felt cold. ‘Although I'd rather you stayed. It's damn lonely, this place. I'd quite forgotten. But I don't normally wrap my hands round the necks of intruders. Then again, you don't fit the usual description of an intruder.'

‘Which is?'

‘You know, balaclava, hairy, carrying a sawn-off shotgun … Male.' She waited. ‘They're not usually swathed in someone else's anorak, smooth-skinned, carrying a couple of logs … Female. But still I have this weird feeling I've met you before.'

‘That must be the oldest line in the book.'

‘I know it sounds crass, OK. Then I guess you remind me of someone I used to know. And I think I remind
you
of someone. That's the reason that you're not afraid of me, as most people would be. You should be trying to run away. I'm pretty menacing, don't you think? Especially when I catch people breaking the rules. I mean, you've seen my shovel.'

One of his front teeth overlapped the other very slightly, though the others were dead straight. His smile broadened, and the uneven teeth simply made the smile more attractive. His lips were red, and wet where his tongue ran across them while he waited for her to speak. She struggled to keep a straight face.

‘No, I'm not afraid of you. I'm just waiting for my chance. I'm not leaving without my logs.' She didn't want to say ‘I'm not running away because I'm horny as hell.'

‘You're putting it on. You're not a natural-born felon. So why so brazen?'

‘It's concussion, probably, or too much wine. My friend and I have been carousing all afternoon.' Janie raised her chin. ‘You probably recognise me because you spotted us arriving at the cottage over the field. Difficult to miss us, with all our bags and stuff.'

‘That's not it. I only arrived here myself this afternoon, and I've been up here all that time. Too wet to go out spying on the neighbours. Didn't even know I
had
neighbours.'

‘Well, you're wrong about one thing. I haven't a clue who you are. All I know is that you're not the cross-eyed Maddock, which is a relief. We both know what I was doing here, but what were you doing, prowling about in the rain as if you own the place?'

She gripped the hay bale, but it scratched her hands. Too much conversation. Her horny mood was ebbing. Sally would be ashamed of her. Ensconced in a lovely warm barn, inches away from a red-blooded male, and talking about head injuries and cross-eyed farmers instead of getting down to some serious seduction? Sally would have had his trousers down by now. But then again, Sally wasn't here, was she?

Her other voice told her that talking was a good
thing. This was a man-free holiday, she remembered. Anyway, Janie wouldn't know how to set about getting his trousers off. On the other hand, if she didn't keep talking she might just grab him and start shouting, ‘My friend says I'm frustrated. So fuck me!'

Shards of excitement jabbed at her again, daring her, urging her on. Different parts of her were desperate for him to carry on touching her, even if it was only on her neck. She was starving, she was frigid, and her cunt had closed up. Having felt him touch her once, her whole body was clamouring to feel one flick of his fingertips.

He was so close she could count every bristle pushing through the dark skin on his chin. She focused on his mouth.

‘I'm the four-eyed farmer, if you must know.' He pushed his specs up his nose, putting on a sheepish expression. ‘And I do own the place.'

Janie tore her eyes away from his mouth. ‘And I'm Old Macdonald.'

‘Seriously, Miss Marigold. I've bought this farm. I should have told you at the beginning. So, you see, I'm allowed to be in this barn, because this is my barn, and those are my logs. Whereas you are a trespasser.' He jabbed a finger towards her nose. ‘So it's me who should be asking the questions.'

‘I thought it was all going to be pulled down.'

‘Once you'd nicked the logs?'

‘Look, I never dreamed anyone would actually want to
live
here.'

‘And I never dreamed it would have so much potential,' he grinned, rubbing a hand through his hair. ‘Particularly with such a luscious new neighbour.'

‘Two – there's two of us,' she corrected him, mentally kicking herself as soon as she'd said it.

‘Two luscious neighbours, eh? I'll be round for a cup of sugar, you can count on that. Two of you. What a bonus.'

‘Well, now that we're neighbours, perhaps I should tell you my name,' Janie offered.

‘If you did that, I'd have to punish you for trespassing, wouldn't I?' he said. ‘But then again, I don't want you suing me for personal injury. Lord knows the entire farmyard is a health hazard.'

‘Best if we just remain anonymous, then,' said Janie, ever the practical one.

‘Let me just check you over, then, once more just to be safe, before I escort you from the premises,' said the farmer, sounding suspiciously like he had an ulterior motive.

‘I think you'd better,' she agreed, suddenly realising this was an open invitation for this rough-looking stranger to continue touching her.

His hands came back to her shoulders, and he started to massage the bones so that she was forced to relax.

‘So you don't mind?' he asked.

Her neck went limp. She ought to stand up; she ought to leave. But she was glad his hands had come back. She wanted them to move down her body. He was promising, not threatening, and he was only inches away. She gave a shiver of impatience. Maybe whatever he was promising, punishment perhaps, was the one thing that would knock this confusion out of her. Sally would say that all Janie needed was a damn good rogering. That was her remedy for everything. But that was hardly a punishment, was it? More of a reward.

One of the farmer's fingers hooked under her collar and started to stroke the white skin beneath. There
was something exquisite in the way that solitary finger finding its way under her shirt made Janie feel totally naked. The tiny spot that he caressed sent sexual messages throughout her entire body. Already the backs of her knees were buzzing, and a tiny pulse had started up in the one corner of her groin which hadn't already been twitching. Her sensitive breasts tightened and started to swell, rising up like dough, as if offering themselves on a plate. Her nipples now screeched to be seen as they hardened and poked against the cloth of her damp shirt.

Something rustled over by the door. Janie heard the shovel scrape slightly and the door rattle as if the handle was being tried. She stiffened and turned her head to listen.

‘It's the wind,' said the farmer, turning Janie's head back to face him. ‘We're quite alone.'

He held her chin in one hand, and took his glasses off with the other, folding them and tossing them on top of his jacket. His eyes looked even darker without their disguise, his face younger but even more determined.

‘Some horrible animal, more like, about to attack us,' said Janie. ‘One of those big cats one reads about.'

‘Not on my farm.'

Janie felt she was chickening out again. He had referred to her as ‘luscious', for goodness sake. Surely it was worth being a little bolder, just this once. ‘Before I go …' she hesitated, ‘perhaps you could … check that cut once more? I'm starting to feel a little dizzy again.'

‘Look,' he said, touching her forehead again. ‘The blood has dried.'

She tried to put her hand up to the cut, but he took hold of her wrist.

‘Does it still hurt?' he asked.

She hesitated, but only for a second. Her game of seduction had begun.

‘Yes. Here,' she said, bending her neck so that more of her shoulder was exposed. He flicked her hair away and touched her neck. She bit her lip, undid a button and pulled at the shirt again. Her head was spinning with this new daring. There could be no mistaking the signals she was giving out.

‘And here.'

He pushed her shirt further down her shoulder and traced the ridge of her collarbone, treading his fingertips across the exposed skin and under the shirt again, threatening, no, promising, to creep down towards her breasts. Janie's breath was coming in uneven gasps of longing.

His features became blurred and fused in front of her. She closed her eyes, letting her head droop backwards as the soft caresses lulled her. There was some scuffling in the straw as she started to slide forwards off the hay bale, while at the same time he came closer, and their legs collided. He bent towards her shoulder and she could feel his breath hot on her skin. She moved her head round to meet him until their mouths met. They both waited, mouths barely touching. Her breath stopped totally then. She couldn't move away. Her lips softened and parted, but he didn't respond. She started to breathe into his mouth. She slid her hands round and up his back, and felt a quiver run down between his shoulderblades. Her hands pressed harder against him. She was as desperate to touch as to be touched. She flicked the tip of her tongue against his teeth, and then around the inside of his lips; he tasted of tobacco and coffee, masculine, salty, sweet, wet, warm. She pushed her tongue further in, waiting for him to rebuff her, but now his lips closed around it,
trapping it, sucking it in between his teeth, so that her face was moulded into his and her breasts and body were pressed against the length of him.

This was why she had come out in the rain, fizzing and burning with unresolved longing. She had needed to walk out into the fresh air, in search of some kind of relief, and here it was, in the big warm shape of a strange farmer, and they were kissing in this barn like teenagers. Janie willed the stranger to carry on kissing her, sucking her tongue. It was like setting a taper to a candle; she was smouldering from her feet upwards.

‘What am I doing?' he groaned, his mouth sliding sideways. ‘I only meant to bring you out of the rain, I only meant to look at you, then send you on your way. Tell me to stop, and I'll –'

‘Don't stop. Don't dare stop,' she hissed, nuzzling against his mouth. ‘It's been too long, and it's only a kiss. We're adults, and we're enjoying it. Pretend it's your
droit de seigneur
if it makes you feel better.'

He rubbed his lips across hers. ‘It does. Though I'm not exactly the Lord of the Manor, and you're not exactly Little Bo-Peep. I mean, look at you.'

‘I'm not Bo-Peep, I'm a brazen hussy, caught stealing by the master.' Janie grinned. ‘You have to touch me, and see.'

They were enclosed in the darkness. Everything suddenly felt wicked and dangerous. She wasn't sure she'd be able to find her way out of the rickety barn even if she wanted to. His face was a pale oval in front of her. Hers must look the same to him, thought Janie, especially as he had taken off his glasses. There was no point wasting time staring at each other in the dark. When he didn't reply, or move, she wriggled backwards onto the hay bale and lay down. He remained kneeling, so she reached up and pulled him down on top of her.
He hesitated, then let himself sink down. He took her arms, and held them above her head. The hay tickled and dug through her shirt, so she raised her spine off the bale to escape the prickles. Her breasts arched towards him in an open invitation.