Under His Influence

“Tonight. Will you stay with me?”

She knew she would be unable to leave anyway. “Yes,” she said, without hesitation.

“If you don’t want to…do anything…that’s okay…we can just sleep…it’s okay.”

It’s not okay with me. I want you—really want you tonight.

She touched her finger to his lips. He kissed it.

“I said yes,” she repeated, that word of affirmation giving him permission for everything and anything.

“Right,” he said, and there was a world of purpose behind him now. He stood, helping Anna up and led her, hand closed around her wrist, out of the room and towards the staircase.

“Your room.” The bed was enormous, but the even bigger room contained almost nothing else—just dark wood furnishings so anonymous that they would fit well in any hotel. Had he cleared out all traces of Saskia, she wondered? But she dismissed the idea. Saskia was not going to hang over the bed and watch them make love for the first time. Saskia doesn’t live here anymore.

“My room.” He smiled, throwing off his jacket and spun Anna into him in that dancer’s hold he had first tried out on the shores of the lake. “Your room,” he continued, his voice low. “If you want it to be.”

Anna was blinking, wondering if the implication of his words was as enormous as it seemed when he dashed the breath from her mouth with another kiss.

Her lips were starting to sting now; John needed a shave and he was not one for light kissing—these were devouring, ravishing, hungry kisses, swallowing her up inside them until the burn of his stubble faded into irrelevance beside the answering burn at the pit of her stomach.

“I want to undress you,” he said, and Anna supposed in theory

she could have objected, but something told her his wishes were not negotiable, not when his eyes looked like that. She leaned back against his forearm and tried to keep her breathing steady while he unbuttoned the white cotton work blouse, following his deft fingers with a kiss at each newly revealed part of her—lowering his lips to her throat, her collarbone, the hollow of her breasts between her bra cups, finally exposing her belly and sliding a hand around her hip, stepping back, drinking her in.

“God, Anna,” he moaned, then he was kissing her neck, shoulders, face, while a hand kneaded her lace-covered breasts, finding and circling the nipples with deadly accuracy. His fingers found the zipper of her short, light-tweed skirt and soon it was dropping over her slender hips to the floor, leaving her standing in only her underwear and summer slingbacks. When occasional thought cohered in Anna’s head, it was thankfulness for the Sunday afternoon she and Mimi had spent depilating, moisturising, clipping, trimming and polishing their bodies in front of Dirty Dancing. She was as buff and smooth as she would ever be, so John’s exploring hands would encounter little resistance in their journey. “You’re fucking beautiful.”

She shuffled out of the shoes and stood on tiptoe so she could reach his mouth with hers, longing to have them joined once more. He obliged, running hands down the hollow of her back, cupping her bottom with a squeeze that made her moan. Quick as a flash, his hand was between her thighs, tugging at the knicker elastic, sliding inside, finding her wet.

His other hand unhooked her bra. “Come on,” he ordered, voice gruff. “Bed.”

She lay amidst the puffy peaks of the duvet, watching him avidly while he tore off his shirt and trousers, revealing the extent of his desire for her when his boxers followed suit.

“I’m not waiting for you another minute,” he vowed, diving on the bed at Anna’s side, then leaping astride her, covering her body with his and ravaging her with kisses and caresses.

“Oh please, oh please,” Anna gasped, running her hands all over him, grinding her hips against his in mindless need, opening up for him, offering him everything she had and was. He wrenched down the knickers, rubbing his cock in the juices he found there while she disposed of the inconvenient wisp of fabric with her toes.

“So ready for me,” he rasped in her ear, sounding almost pained by the weight of his longing for her. “Do you want this, Anna?”

“Oh yes, yes.” Her legs curved and curled around his arse, urging him down and forward, until there was nowhere else for him to go but into her. He entered her sleekly and slickly, swarming all the way up until he was fully seated, their two bodies made one flesh at last. They twisted in harmony, his strokes torturously slow to begin, holding her in check, keeping her away from that edge she knew she was skirting too soon.

“Want you to feel me, Anna.” His voice was thick in the shell of her ear, breath hot and moist. “Are you feeling me?”

Yes, yes, she felt him, everything of him, all the power he was keeping in reserve, ready for the moment when they both felt safe enough to lose themselves in each other. It was humming in his chest, behind his eyes, in the crook of his fingers where they raked her hair, all over his skin, crackling with it like electricity. It was almost superhuman, almost scary, if she could be scared of someone she loved so much. Yes, loved. Real love, love that takes you away from everything you ever knew or believed of yourself, and gives you over to him, your lover, your one true love.

“I feel you,” she panted, jiggling beneath him, signalling a hope that he might speed up now. “So much, so deep inside.”

“Good.” The word shuddered, almost like a laugh, against her skin before he reared up and began to thrust in earnest, his hands clamping her down by the shoulders, his face hell-bent on hers. “Deep inside. That’s where I am.”

His knees nudged the backs of her thighs until the angle was perfect and she lay beneath him as he slammed, hitting that sweet spot with every forward drive, watching her face. He would see it crumple, see her eyes screw up, mouth drop open, and then the eyelids fly wide in one wild stare of shock at the enormity of what he was making her feel, and here was the thing she wanted to give him, his real reward, her voice, coming from afar, singing out in ecstasy for him.

“Yes!” he cried in triumph, and he emptied into her, rhythmically pulsing until he was drained and she had taken every drop of his essence.

Amazing, he’s amazing, every bit as good as I thought he would be, better even. The euphoria gushed through Anna’s consciousness as she submitted to his post-orgasmic kisses of victory, her chest heaving and sex still having little spasms around her lover’s softening manhood.

“I think that was good. Wasn’t it? I think that was good for you?” John’s solicitude was a little feverish, but she smiled and rolled her eyes back in reply and he kissed her once more before drawing out and gathering her into his arms.

“I feel I should be smoking a cigarette,” he said with a yawn, stroking her hair as she lay happily burrowed in the crook of his arm. “Perhaps we should get something to eat instead. I’ll order out. What do you fancy? Chinese? Thai? Sushi? You need to keep your strength up, Anna. I’m going to want to do that again. And again. And possibly again.”