No Strings

Chapter 19

I was only just getting used to the horror that was the Nina and Mo show when two more people joined us. Nina's brother was a pleasant enough bloke, a bit earnest and dull, but with an honest straight forward look about him. His mate, Ollie, was flashy. He thought he was coming over as the salt of the earth type with his no nonsense hair cut and broken nose but I had him clocked from the start - a public school boy pretending to be one of us. He had money. It was obvious when he mentioned going to Hong Kong to see the rugby sevens as if it were something that everyone could do. Nina was laughing too loudly at his jokes. Did she fancy him? I didn't even dare look at Sarah. Thankfully, as she was sitting right next to me, it was hard to look at her without being too obvious so I focussed my attention on working out the interesting dynamics of this weird impromptu get together.

Mo was enjoying himself. Whenever I looked in his direction, he grinned widely and cocked an eyebrow. The fucker wasn't exactly subtle. Shouldn't he be going home? By now his wife had usually texted him asking where he was. But no, he seemed far too intent on asking Sarah personal questions and behaving as if he had her in custody or something.

"So Sarah," he was asking her now. "What's it like living next door to Mr Palmer here? I hope he isn't pestering you for cups of sugar."

I suppressed a groan and tried to deflect from his astounding lack of decorum by asking if anyone wanted another drink. When I turned to Sarah she was looking as uncomfortable as I felt. Giving me a wry little grimace, she necked the dregs of her wine and handed me the glass.

"Get me a large one," she said and I couldn't help smiling back at her in solidarity.

But when I got back to the table she was deep in conversation with Ollie, or Jasper, or Tarquin or whatever the wanker's name was. He was regaling her with the details of his fast paced job in the city and to my disgust, Sarah seemed to be finding him fascinating. At least she wasn't talking to Mo anymore. The more booze Mo necked the nearer he was getting to blurting out how we really knew each other. I had no idea why, but I really didn't want Sarah knowing I was a copper. For some reason, I felt as if it would change things if she knew. It was bad enough that I had spent two bloody nights in her bed and she was sitting here in a pub with my workmate and closest friend. I didn't want her get any closer than she was already. I was pretty damned sure of that. In fact, I couldn't wait to get away from all this polite jollity and shut myself in my own flat and get back to being the man I knew I was. So why was I still here? Fuck only knew.

Closing time came around eventually and I still hadn't left. We poured Mo into a taxi, Nina, Rob and Ollie headed off to the tube and Sarah and I were left standing on the pavement in uncomfortable silence until she pulled her coat tight around herself and said, "I guess you're walking me home."

We made our way towards home, a cold wind blowing cherry blossom through the air as we walked faster. It was as if we both couldn't wait for this night to be over. I had an idea that Sarah too was looking forward to closing her door on the world. And that didn't bother me in the least. We could do with getting back to normality, to having a breather from each other. Spending all that time in her bed had not been a wise idea.

But when I got to the front door of our building, I made the mistake of looking at her. In fact it was the first time I had looked properly at her all night. She was wearing her dark hair down and in natural waves tonight, there was some cherry blossom caught up in one of her curls. Her cheeks were pink and my breath caught. Sometimes, like now, she was incredibly beautiful. Scratch that - she was pretty damned beautiful all of the time, I just did my best to try not to notice. But standing here under the moonlight, too many pints of warm beer slowing my thoughts, I was suddenly struck with how big her eyes were, how beautifully shaped her mouth was, how vibrant her colouring was. My mouth had gone dry. And she was staring back at me with an unreadable expression on her face. Was she a little drunk too?

----

All the time I was walking home, Jake a silent impenetrable presence next to me, I had been simmering with frustration and anger. Anger at myself as much as him. I had finally met Ollie. Ok, the situation hadn't exactly been ideal and I was annoyed with Nina for planning stuff behind my back, but we had got on OK. He was attractive, quite sexy in fact, even sitting next to the dreamboat that was Rob. He had even been quite fun to talk to. But the whole time I was chatting to him, I just couldn't get over Jake's presence right next to me, and the little voice in my head that was wondering what he was thinking and why he was in such a strange mood tonight. Why the hell hadn't I kicked him out of my flat at the first chance? Why the hell had I rung in sick? It seemed like such a stupid idea now, in the cold light of the outside world. But Jake seemed to do this to me - put me into some kind of weird hypnotic state.

And now we were standing outside our building, having barely said a word to each other all night, staring at each other - eye fucking each other, if I'm perfectly honest. His pupils were big and dark in the moonlight, and his lips had parted, as if to remind me of what it felt like when he kissed me. And the last time he had kissed me was less than twenty four hours ago so why was I suddenly desperate for it again?

He reached up and touched my hair.

"Cherry blossom," he said in a quiet voice, the pink petals now held delicately between his fingers.

And I felt a terrible surge of arousal sweep through me. How the hell did he do this to me? How could I be angry with him one minute and the next minute be desperate for him to put his big hands on me?

"Jake," I said quickly before I could think better of it. "What we really ought to do right how is go to our own beds and get a good night's sleep but it doesn't look like that's going to happen."

His hand settled on the back of my neck and pulled me closer to him.

"But before we get naked again," I continued quickly, my lips suddenly very close to his. "We need to talk about what the hell is happening here."

That stopped him. He let go of me and pulled away and took a big breath.

"What's happening here?" he repeated. "What's happening here?" and he dragged his hand through his hair. "What's happening here is I have a raging hard on and major frustration from watching you flirt with some arsehole city boy all night. And now I really need to get you on the other side of that fucking door and have you coming hard around my cock before I completely lose it."

I stared at him. That was the most he had said all night but it wasn't what I had meant when I said we needed to talk and suddenly I felt calm and in control.

"That is not what I meant," I said. "I am not doing this anymore, Jake. Not if you can't talk about it like a human being," and because something had finally broken inside me I decided to be brave for once in my life. "I need more from you." And I knew the reaction I would get from him before I had even said it so I turned my back on him, dug my key out of my bag and left him standing there to go to bed on my own and hopefully wake up in the morning a wiser person.