The Englishman (59 page)

“I knew you’d never consider an affair with me for one second if I’d accepted the chair.”

All I can do is stare at him as the penny drops.

“I don’t believe that! You—refused—”

“Yeah.” He nods, still grinning. “I admit it was a gamble. Not that it was such a big sacrifice. I have no desire at all to be involved in any capacity whatsoever in Nick’s crimes and misdemeanors. But I thought I had a very slim chance with you as a colleague, and no chance at all as chair.” He wraps his arms around me and squeezes hard till I cry out. “I wanted this. Want.”

Our eyes meet, and expectation sends a shiver over my skin. All the things we haven’t done yet.

“What about your plane?” he asks. “Weren’t you off to New York tomorrow morning? Or are you thinking of doing a runner again?”

“I told my mother I’d met someone and couldn’t leave right now.”

“Oh, the truth. Did you tell her it’s me?”

“Good grief, no. She worries enough about me as it is, in her own way. No proper job, no husband, no children.”

“Do you want children?”

This is one question I did not expect. I sit up and look at him.

“I don’t know what your plans are,” he goes on, blushing, “but maybe it’ll help you to make up your mind about…all this, me, if I tell you straightaway that I can’t have any children. I’m sorry, this is really presumptuous of me. I shouldn’t even—”

“You just told me that we can’t have an affair, and now you’re talking about why we can’t have a family?” Maybe I should pretend to be more surprised, but I am too glad to pretend.

“No! Look, I just want to be straight with you, that’s all—”

“And I appreciate that.” I cup his face in my hand and kiss him on the lips, very tenderly. “Thank you for telling me. Why can’t you?”

He flushes with embarrassment; I can actually feel his body heating up.

“Lazy sperm. During my last year at school I had mumps, and that seems to have permanently damaged the—Christ. I can’t believe I’m making you listen to this!”

“No, go on!”

“Well, it all counts against me, doesn’t it? I should look for a woman my own age, past child-bearing, not one young enough to be my—”

“Don’t say it!” I warn him. “And I’m not!”

“It’s all so bloody wrong!”

“It doesn’t feel wrong,” I point out.

He looks at me, his face open and his eyes alert.

“No, that’s the problem.”

“I think I need another sip of that there firewater.” I sit up on his lap and reach across for our glasses of whisky. “What am I drinking?”

“Talisker. It’s made on the Isle of Skye. Do you like it?”

“I do. I can’t think of anything I’d rather have right now. It’s suitably overpowering.”

We laugh together, and the laughter—and the alcohol—clears the air a little.

“I think you should take one of those layers off.”

So much for his qualms. Relieved that I haven’t lost him, I scramble out of my thick woolen pullover.

“Doctor Lieberman!”

“What?”

“You’re wearing a Columbia sweater!”

“Oh. Ah. Yes.”

“Now, for that show of disloyalty you forfeit that same sweater.”

“Oh, okay.” Meekly I lose the sweatshirt, too. When I reappear, I nudge him with my elbow. “Go on then.”

“Doctor Lieberman! You’re wearing a very cute t-shirt with a little…let me see, sunflower on it.”

“No! I mean—I’m zero for two here.”

“What, this?” He tugs at his Norwegian sweater. Hesitates.

“M-hm. Yes, this.”

Reluctantly he pulls it over his head. He’s wearing his white Ashley Wilkes shirt underneath, and I don’t really see what the fuss was about.

“This is nice…why were you so—oh.”

I am enjoying the feel of his lean chest underneath the shirt and had just wrapped my arms around him again when a certain female odor reaches my nostrils.

He smiles and raises his eyebrows in self-mockery. The rosy tinge in his cheeks is so adorable that I could
eat
him; at the same time I remember the crumpled underwear in my washing machine and feel ashamed.

“Giles, that is…”

“Pathetic?”

“…so sweet!”

He groans at my delight, and when I shift on his lap to be able to sit astride him, unbutton his shirt, and plant slow, lingering kisses on his throat and chest, he groans again, but differently. Undressing him is like undressing a girl. He watches me with that slight blush on his face, his eyes move from my face down to my hands on his shirt buttons, on the smooth skin of his chest, with just a small nest of gray curls in the hollow of his ribcage, around the dark pink nipples…then back up to my eyes. He’s watching me like a girl who feels the touch of a man for the first time, and under the flat of my palm I feel his heart beat hard, and his breath quicken. Blood pulses in my lips, and I lean in to kiss him. I want to make him
beg
for it. I clasp his wrists and pin them to the back of the chair above his head; he crooks his elbows willingly and watches me, waiting, his eyes a dark, moist green.

“I wish I was strong enough to hold you like you held me,” I whisper into his ear.

“You do? What would you do?”

I drive his wrists into the upholstery with both hands and swoop down to bite his neck. The odd thing is, I can’t. My jaw seems to lock just before my teeth would begin to pinch his flesh; it’s as if I lost control over my muscles. I can’t bite him. I can’t.

“I wouldn’t hurt you…I couldn’t.”

“Did I? Hurt you?” He’s serious, troubled, underneath his arousal. I don’t want to make him feel bad, but I don’t want to lie, either.

“No, but you almost frightened me.”

He nods. Lowers his arms to draw me against himself. “I was so lonely. And you were so…lovely.” His hands slide under my t-shirt and up my naked back. “Did I leave any marks?” His fingers inch upward to caress my shoulders.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Actually, I don’t know.”

“I think I should have a look.” He clasps my waist and pushes up my t-shirt with the backs of his hands. Is there anything better in this world than slowly undressing with an appreciative partner? I wriggle out of his arms and slide onto my knees on the rug on the floor.

“You did notice, didn’t you, that I’m not circumcised?” The corners of his mouth lift on half a grin when he says this, my hands on his zipper. “European
and
Gentile.”

“Yes, I noticed that. Not to worry,” I reply solemnly, but his stomach erupts in a spurt of laughter when I say this, because as I’m freeing his cock from the confines of his jeans and the shorts underneath, I have to swallow. Hard.

“Hard” being the operative word here.

He wraps his fingers, his beautiful, hard, strong fingers, around his beautiful, hard shaft and strokes it lightly.

“What you see is what you get…”

I inhale for a quip.

“…but it won’t behave like the meat of the striplings you’ve been fucking.”

That word, uttered calmly in clipped English accents by this silver-haired gentleman, sends another wave of blood into my belly.

“So far it has been behaving rather better,” I murmur, leaning in. “Let’s see if it stays that way.”

I replace his hand with mine and shuffle closer until my knees touch the bottom of the chair; with my other hand I spread his thighs a little wider. Ignoring Giles’s sharp intake of breath, I run the tips of my fingers along its hard, silky length and gently squeeze it between the balls of my hands. I smooth down the soft wiry hairs, some dark, some gray, and run my fingers deep along the clefts of skin between thigh and groin, teasing the tightening, fleshy sac with my knuckles, as if by the way.

“I wish I could dance around it.” My voice is husky with anticipation. I run my thumbs up and down its curved belly, pull back the foreskin from the head and tenderly chafe the snake’s throat and chin. “Like dancing around a sacred tree…or a maypole…”

Giles stares down at me as I kneel between his thighs and worship his cock, and he’s so turned on by my words that he looks almost scared, with a deep crease between his brows. I smile up at him and run my hands across his white loins and flat belly. His penis arches up from its nest of hair, and without taking my eyes off his face I lean in and kiss the shiny dark pink head.

“Oh,
God
…”

I can’t help grinning at his wide-eyed alarm, and the velvety shaft brushes my flaming cheek.

“‘Like woman wailing for her demon-lover,’” I quote. Nibbling and licking my way down to the fuzzy base and up to the tender head again. “Her demon god…this phallic god…I totally see why people adored it. It’s so beautiful.”

And I raise myself up on my knees and slowly slide my mouth over the first four inches.

The sound that fills the air is surprisingly close to a wail, but it didn’t come from my throat.

“L-Listen, I—” His fingers grope for my arms, my hands. “I should say that it’s been a while since I’ve done this…had this done to me, rather, and…”

“It’s been a while since I did this, too.”

“It has?” His gaze is like a pool of green water with gray clouds chasing across it.

“Well, you wouldn’t let me, remember?”

“Mm-hmm.” But he tugs at my shoulders, urgently, and lifts me up so that I lie on his naked chest. “I have to kiss you. Come and kiss me.”

Kissing Giles Cleveland is like going to the fun fair in the morning, knowing that in the afternoon your best friend is having a big birthday party and you’ll be allowed to stay the night at her house. An endless series of pleasures, after which I get to make love to him. When I push his shirt over his shoulders, he leans forward willingly enough, but because he is still wearing the cufflinks, he can’t pull the sleeves off over his hands. I watch his efforts for a couple of seconds, and a hot rush of inspiration runs through my body.

“Wait, I’ll help…stand up.”

Because now I shall be horribly revenged for what he did to me in the observatory. I step round him, ostensibly to undo his cuffs. There is a small scuffle; he’s impatient to be rid of this encumbrance, but I grab his shirt tails and quickly tie them in as tight a knot as I can, and another on top, to make sure.

“Now, look here, young woman!” The look on his face is priceless.

He tugs at his manacles more violently, and then with as much force as he can. The muscles in his arms and shoulders ripple most beautifully, but the cotton shackles hold fast. I exhale slowly. Had the shirt torn under his struggles to free himself, I’m sure he would have given me the hiding of my life. I’m almost frightened of him for a moment, because for a moment he seems frightened of me.

The dogs, who lie curled up in front of the fire, lift their heads, and Toby warns me off with a deep, chesty growl.

“It’s all right, Toby,” I say confidently. “It’s only a game.” Another growl, but more quietly; the big head sinks back onto his paws. “That’s a good boy, Toby. Only playing.”

“Listen, my girl, this is not how we play this game!”

It is an effort to ignore his resentment, but I manage to bat my lashes at him, all limpid innocence.

“But it’s you, professor, who taught me this game!”

He thinks, and then, on an unwilling crack of laughter, he relaxes. The tension eases up a little. Was he really worried that I might hurt him?

“You didn’t mind that.”

“No.” I put my flat hand against his chest and push him down onto the sofa.

“Hey!”

“And I promise you, you won’t mind this.” He lies sprawled helplessly across the three-seater, one leg up, one down, his hips raised a little in the air because he’s lying on his shackled hands.

“No, but, Anna—aah…”

“Hush, you’ll frighten the dogs.”

The strangled sound that came from his throat when I slowly sucked him into my mouth turns into a choked laugh.

“Toby…Andrew…help!” he wheezes, but quietly, so as not to alarm the animals snoring in front of the fire. With my fingers ringed around the base of his shaft, I hold him in my mouth, suck on the head in fast, short movements, and wiggle my tongue around its slithery smoothness. Giles’s irregular gasps for breath are punctuated by the most gratifying moans of pleasure, and when I gently knead his tensing balls in my hand, he arches his hips in a convulsion of response that stabs his cock deep into my throat. He cries out, I gag, and the dogs woof their irritation.

“Giles, I fully intend to make you come loud and long, but I won’t if it means I’ll have the dogs at my throat because they think I’m killing you.”

“You
are
killing me.”

“My dear boy, I haven’t even started. And I’d prefer it if you didn’t stick your cock between my tonsils.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to.” He raises his head from the sofa and looks his contrition past his naked chest and stomach down at my face between his legs. “Really, I didn’t. I mean, I wouldn’t.”