Chapter Eight

Alex

T he taxi wound its way through some iron gates that already stood open, up a long tree-lined drive to a large detached house standing at the top. It wasn’t a mansion, but it was pretty fucking big. My entire flat could have fit into the parking space outside. And in that space stood a yellow Lamborghini and an electric black Hyundai—I could see it was plugged in, a long lead snaking over the ground towards the house. I stared at the former and ignored the latter.

He paid, got out and held the door open for me. I climbed out and he probably noticed my jaw on the floor looking at the Lambo because he said, “It’s not mine.”

“It’s not?” Oh God, it was his rich boyfriend’s who was waiting inside, expecting to penetrate me doubly.

“No. The showroom lent it me. They want me to do an advert for them. Giving me that for a month is their little bribe.”

“Fuck me, I’d take that,” I said.

He smiled. “I haven’t used it much. It’s a pain in London.”

“Oh, I can imagine,” I said. “Must be really hard to beat off all the fit blokes it attracts.”

He didn’t comment on that. “That’s mine.” He pointed to the electric Hyundai. “Much more practical.”

“But it probably gets you less cock.”

He rolled his eyes. “They’re good cars. And I wanted an electric. That’s why I’m not particularly happy with driving a petrol now.” He gestured to the Lamborghini.

I pondered behind him. Any other man might have bragged about the amount of cock his money and Lamborghini got him. He didn’t seem interested in impressing me. Not that bragging ever impressed me. Shallow men out for one thing didn’t do it for me.

I followed him up some steps to the front door. The roof was decorated with icy white Christmas lights in a fringe that swayed in the light breeze. There were lights on inside and I had a moment’s panic that I would find someone inside, that maybe he really did live with someone and was bringing me back for a ménage. Then I reasoned with myself. He had a nice house. He left lights on so people thought he was in and didn’t burgle him on Christmas Eve.

He opened the front door and I followed him inside. There was a large entrance hall tiled in black and white and a spiral staircase curved upwards. At the bottom tucked beside the stairs was a very tall Christmas tree with red and silver decorations. I noticed it had maybe eight or ten presents underneath it.

He hung his coat on a coat stand and took mine from me. A shoe storage bench was built into the wall and he sat and took off his shoes, putting them on the lower shelf where there was space. I did the same and he toed a pair of black slippers towards me and slipped his feet into some himself.

I followed him down a corridor to the right and into a spacious kitchen. It was all marble and granite and stainless steel surfaces. He went to the fridge. “What can I get you to drink?”

“Anything.”

He filled two glasses with water from the dispenser at the front of the fridge and handed one over.

“Thanks.” I drank thirstily.

“What about some coffee? I have decaff.”

“Okay.”

“Do you want a latte with oat milk?”

“That would be nice.”

I watched him set the fancy machine going on the work-top. He handled the mugs and coffee pods deftly. His hands were pale and long-fingered. He wore a silver ring on his right ring finger and a knotted silver bracelet on his right wrist. Silver engraved cufflinks shone at the cuffs of his black shirt. His suit was immaculate, tailored to his subtly muscled body. I felt my cock start to stir and my spine tingle. God, I wanted him.

As the coffee trickled out, he loosened his tie and unfastened his top button. Then he shrugged out of his jacket and hung it on the back of one of the chairs at the marble island. My mouth went dry. Please carry on.

He glanced at me and I wondered if I’d spoken aloud. “There you go.” He placed a tall glass in front of me.

“Thank you.” I swept my gaze down his back as he turned back to make the other coffee, lingering on the globes of his round, tight arse. Beautiful. The bloke was utterly exquisite. I was desperate to see what he looked like under his suit.

“Do you want to go through?” he asked. “I’ll join you in a minute. To the left of the stairs.”

I nodded and picked up my glass. Wandering down the shiny tiles back towards the front door, I noticed two doors and popped my head in the first to find a comfortable lounge. Three lamps were lit strategically around the room. A large L-shaped sofa and two armchairs were placed around a wall-mounted TV above a log burner. The whole house was cosy and warm although the fire wasn’t lit. My flat would be freezing right about now, because I never left the central heating on when I went to work. I could barely afford to put it on when I was at home.

Thick, dark red velvet curtains covered what I guessed were French doors at the bottom of the large room. I wanted to have a peep through them at his garden but just then he entered the room.

“Sit down,” he said, placing his glass on the coffee table and sitting on the sofa. I followed with my glass and took a sip of coffee before I sat, cradling it, at the other end of the sofa.

I didn’t want to sit there. I wanted to sit on his knee and taste the coffee from his mouth, but I was unaccountably nervous. I wanted him. Did he want me? Who was going to do the fucking? Would he let me fuck him? I doubted that very much. He didn’t look like the sort of guy who got fucked. Was I happy to get fucked tonight? It had been a while. A long while. I wasn’t sure. I wanted to fuck though. I really, really wanted to fuck.

He leaned over to take a few sips of his latte, then sat back and crossed his left ankle over his right knee before he relaxed into the seat. The motion had my gaze dropping down to the bulge in his pants. He didn’t look hard, but he did look ample.

“About the models,” I said, because it was preying on my mind. His look when he’d said he didn’t like models. And then José saying Has he fucked you yet? I wouldn’t bother. It sounded to me like maybe Lucas had once liked models very much but something had happened to sour them for him. Maybe a bad experience with one, like José.

Lucas tensed. He looked away for a moment, his jaw clenched. Then he reached for another sip of coffee before giving a sigh. “There was an incident. With some models.”

Disquiet prickled down my spine. “What incident?”

He licked his lips. “It’s a story for another time. When I know you better.”

As much as the words worried me, they also made my heart surge. When I know you better. That implied us meeting beyond one night, didn’t it? How could I ever be lucky enough to spend more than a few hours with this man? More to the point, why would he want to spend more than one night with me ? I was hardly a prize catch.

I took a drink of coffee. Our eyes met. I fumbled for conversation. “Can I see your books?”

He smiled and I saw the tension drain from him. “Is that the real reason you came back here?”

I grinned. “Is there another?”

He stood and grasped my hand to pull me up. His palm was warm and soft. He didn’t do manual work. Not that I thought he did. He sat behind a desk and auditioned hot models all day, didn’t he? I wondered if he worked on the designs of his underwear. Designing undies would definitely give me a hard-on.

I put my coffee down and followed him out of the room. He led me out onto the corridor and into the next room along. I stopped and stared on the threshold. Bookcases lined the walls on either side of me from floor almost to ceiling, all crammed with books. In the centre of the room stood a large mahogany desk with two monitors and a wheeled chair. A stack of papers sat next to the computer keyboard, almost spilling to the floor. There was also a log burning fire with an armchair in front of it. I concentrated on the books, moving closer. To the left of me at eye level, a row of books with colourful spines caught my eye and I saw they were all classics, cloth-bound and pretty, probably the special editions you could get in Waterstones . I went closer still, reading the titles. Wuthering Heights, War and Peace, A Tale of Two Cities, Lorna Doone, Dracula . I wanted to touch. The row went on and on, every classic book I could think of and some I hadn’t even heard of.

I glanced at him and he smiled when he saw my face. “Okay, you can just leave me here, thanks,” I said.

He grinned. “I spend a lot of time in here.” He gestured to the armchair and I burned with jealousy. I imagined him sitting here on a winter’s night in front of the fire with a book and a hot chocolate in this secluded house away from the world. Bliss. What more could anyone want?

I read some more titles and noticed his taste among modern works included crime and horror. I had read a lot of the ones he had. I was pleased.

“There’s nothing worth anything,” he said. “I don’t have any first editions or anything like that. Just an addiction to buying books.”

“Me too,” I said. My books were spilling from my one bookcase all over my flat, piled up on the floor, taking over the coffee table, the bedside table and stacked up next to the bed. Reading on my Kindle didn’t stop me browsing charity shops for more books. Hello, my name is Alex and I’m addicted to books.

I sensed him move up behind me and my attention was distracted from the books by my awareness of his warmth, the scent of his aftershave, his solid body. My dick started to fill. Oh God, I wanted him so much it hurt.

I turned around, grasped him by the back of the neck and kissed him. He caught his breath before his mouth opened up to mine and he held my head in one hand, wrapping one arm around me and pulling me against his body. He was hard and so was I. I groaned as our tongues tangled and all my self-control spiralled away. I was more than aware he might have brought me here for a one-night stand to cheer himself up at Christmas. Was I going to accept it for what it was and let him have me anyway?

Almost certainly.

Our breathing was hot and heavy; we devoured each other the way I guessed we’d wanted to do all night and my dick throbbed with urgency, nearly bursting through my clothes. He pulled back and rested his forehead on mine, his lips shining with saliva, holding my face in his hands. “What do you want?” he said in a low voice.

“For you to take me to bed,” I replied without hesitation, staring into his dark blue eyes.

He licked his lips. “I don’t get fucked,” he said.

I was both surprised to hear him say that and yet, not surprised. I was disappointed in a way that he could dismiss the idea out of hand but he wasn’t the first and wouldn’t be the last. I bit back the instant retort of me neither , because I didn’t want to sour the mood by arguing about it. Plus, it wouldn’t have been true because I did, for the right man. It had just been a while since the right man. Had there ever been a right man? Was he the one I would let fuck me? I wasn’t sure but he was welcome to try to persuade me. I liked that idea a lot.

“Okay,” I said.

He searched my eyes with a penetrating gaze. “Do you still want to go to bed?” he asked.

“Very much,” I said.

“All right then,” he replied and he put his arms around me and lifted me under the arse. Shocked, I wrapped my legs around his waist and my arms around his neck as he carried me from the room. He kissed me again as he walked down the corridor and flipped on a light switch before he turned to ascend the stairs. Fuck . I clung on, thinking this was the most romantic thing to ever happen to me. No one had ever carried me to bed before.

When our lips broke, I gasped out, “Watch where you’re going.”

He smiled and ignored me, kissing me again, mounting the stairs with sure, steady steps. He didn’t need to seduce me once he got me to the bedroom. I was already thoroughly seduced, putty in his hands. I was pretty sure I was going to let him fuck me if he wanted to.

He reached the top of the stairs and I saw a long landing stretching around six doors in a square shape. He chose the first. The dark space revealed a massive room with a king size bed and two ornate bedside tables. On the other side of the room was a couch and coffee table but I didn’t take in any more details because I was focused on getting to that bed.

He lowered me down slowly to the mattress and then he climbed onto the bed, covering my body with his and kissed me, and I thought maybe I fell in love at that point.