‘I can lend you the money.’
‘No! I’m not having my girl lending me money. It wouldn’t be right.’
‘Oh, Dan. That’s so typical of you, but you must let me help you, darling, please. I can’t bear to see you like this. When did you last have something to eat?’
‘Eat? That’s the last thing I feel like doing. Not that I could afford to buy any food, even if I wanted to. That advert I was promised by that ruddy agent hasn’t come through.’
‘But you’re bound to get something better. You are so good.’
‘Good, but out of work and broke, and about to be beaten up by a bunch of heavies over someone else’s debts. Oh God, Janey, I don’t know why you bother with me. You’d be better off without me. The damn world would be better off without me.’
The anguish in his voice had panic clutching at Janey’s tender heart. She desperately wanted to make things right for him.
‘No, Dan, you mustn’t say that. I shall lend you the money.’
Dan gave a short, broken laugh. ‘There’s no point–because I can’t repay it.’
‘Then I shall give it to you,’ she told him firmly, ‘and I warn you now, Dan, I shan’t take no for an answer.’ She opened her handbag and removed twenty-five pounds from her purse–a fortune really, which she only happened to have with her because Amber had given it to her to pay it into her bank account.
‘Here you are,’ she told him, ‘and I don’t want to hear another word about it–ever. In fact, I think we should forget all about it.’
‘Forget your kindness?’ Dan’s voice was thick and raw with emotion. ‘Oh God, but you are so special, Janey, so good and kind and wonderful. Come here, and let me show you how much I love you.’
When he reached for her, Janey went willingly into his arms, wrapping her own around him as he kissed the side of her neck and then just behind her ear, on the spot he knew always made her shiver with delight. She moved closer to him, her heart filled with happiness.
‘You’re so good to me, and for me,’ Dan told her, his voice muffled because he had pushed her top out of the way and was kneading her breasts, freed from the confinement of her bra.
The damp chilliness of the air in the basement flat brought out a rash of goosebumps on her skin and made her nipples pucker.
‘Great tits,’ Dan told her, eyeing them with admiring approval. ‘In fact they’re good enough for Tit-Bits.’
Janey pretended to look shocked at his mention of the well-known magazine, famous for its jokes and pictures of scantily dressed girls, but Dan didn’t notice. He was too busy playing with her breasts, making Janey herself forget her pretend disapproval when he sucked on one of her nipples, causing her belly to cramp up in fierce delight.
Dan was an impatient lover, their sex exciting, hot and very quick, and mostly over before they had got undressed properly.
Afterwards, when Dan said how good it had been, Janey could never bring herself to tell him that it was over too fast for her in case he thought she was one of those silly frigid girls who didn’t properly understand about sex. All the boys in the crowd Janey went around with said that the worst kind of girls were the ones who had sex like virgins and were obviously frigid.
Now, with Dan pushing up her skirt and sliding his hand into her knickers, Janey longed to suggest to him that they got undressed and into bed, instead of Dan pushing her back against the wall.
‘Oh, babe…’ Dan was crooning, which meant Janey knew that it wouldn’t be long now before he lifted her up and thrust into her a couple of times before coming, because ‘Oh, babe’ was what he always said before he did that.
‘Why don’t we do it on the bed?’ Janey suggested, slightly breathlessly.
‘It’s better standing up,’ Dan told her, adding softly, ‘There’s my good little pussy, all wet and ready for me. Want me to give you a finger fuck as a treat first for being so good to me?’
Janey nodded, closing her eyes and concentrating fiercely on the sensation aroused by Dan’s fingers inside her. If she could just concentrate hard enough then surely she could capture that elusive feeling that she knew was there waiting for her, if Dan would just be patient and not so…
She gasped in protest when Dan stopped touching her, telling her, ‘There you are, I’ll bet you enjoyed that, didn’t you?’ before thrusting himself into her.
Janey felt so disappointed that she almost wanted to cry. She could hear Dan panting and groaning as he thrust deeper and harder, but she had preferred what he had been doing before, and she would have liked it even more, she acknowledged, if only she’d felt brave enough to tell him just where she’d really like him to touch her.
Feeling guilty because she wasn’t more grateful, Janey produced an appreciative moan just as Dan came.
She cleaned herself up in the cold, grubby bathroom that Dan shared with the tenants of the other flats. Her handkerchief would have to be thrown away now but she couldn’t bring herself to use the grey towel Dan had offered her. Despite her efforts she still felt sticky and uncomfortable.
‘Shall we go out tonight?’ she asked him. ‘There’s that new coffee bar that’s opened.’
‘I’d love to but I can’t. I’ve promised to help a friend of my sister’s work on her lines. Of course, I’d much rather be with you, but I’ve said I would and I wouldn’t like to let her down.’