four

‘C’mere,’ Rachel growled, as she pulled Kristen’s hips back down to her face.

Her neck was beginning to tighten from thrusting her tongue upward. It seemed that every time she managed to begin a rhythm Kristen would pull herself away, kneeling up until Rachel had to lift her head ever higher to maintain contact. To make matters worse, Rachel was beginning to be annoyed by the girl’s almost desperate gasping.

If only she would stay put! Rachel was sure she was only a few seconds’ consistent work from bringing Kristen to spectacular orgasm, and she was damned if Kim was going to get there first with Susan. She flicked her eyes to the right: to Susan’s extravagantly sculpted shoulders, muscles bunched, arms stock straight behind her, holding herself up off the bed. Her beautiful left breast was riding up and down her chest as she ground her clit against Kim’s, close by Rachel’s shoulder.

Susan had been kissing Kristen when they began their ambitious circle of sex; and Kim still had her head resting inside one of Rachel’s thighs, her tongue or lips occasionally and awkwardly pressing home onto Rachel’s wetness. But by now the only value was the eroticism of the position itself: Kim was too engrossed in thrusting against Susan to pay close attention to Rachel.

Rachel felt Kristen pulling away again, mewling, and she tucked her arms further around her hips, grasping the soft flesh of her thighs with her palms, clamping her elbows inward. In the effort of doing so, Rachel’s own hips straightened from their twisted position and she felt Kim’s head dislodge and fall back onto the mattress. Rachel smiled to herself grimly, looking up at Kristen’s convulsing torso. Now, she thought, it’s just me and you.

When they had first moved into this position Rachel had even used two fingers to expose Kristen’s clit, but that had made her jump away at every touch. The woman was simply too excitable to focus: something that they had not anticipated when they picked her up in a bar earlier. There, she had been confident and sassy, totally un-awed by the three flirtatious women trying to take her home.

Still, she was undoubtedly worth it. Tall and lean like Susan (though not so muscular) and delightfully tanned and freckled, with a vibrant attitude that Rachel had immediately admired. She had hit on Rachel specifically, and not been at all fazed by the discovery that Rachel was there with friends; nor by the slow but inexorable shift in conversation to a foursome.

But it was her breasts that had sealed the deal. She was almost completely flat-chested, with only the faintest bulge over each pectoral supporting the sharply conical aureoles of her nipples. Rachel was fascinated by them, their shape so brazenly on show under Kristen’s tight strappy top; and Kristen had not been blind to Rachel’s attention. In the end, they had found themselves making out enthusiastically in the booth, hands everywhere; and the others were forced to laughingly drag them out of the bar by the elbows.

Now Rachel allowed one of her hands to explore up Kristen’s naked torso, wanting to feel her fingers pushing furrows into that shallow flesh. Kristen was finally accepting the rhythm of her tongue, her hips twitching back and forth involuntarily, sporadically. Her head was thrown back, so Rachel could see the full length of her body like a spire: narrow chest, long neck, and sharp chin. Kristen’s each breath was catching and exploding with a gasp, her vagina leaking warmth onto Rachel’s own chin.

As Rachel’s fingers reached her nipple Kristen cried out hungrily, lifting a hand to clamp Rachel’s palm to her breast. She dropped her head, her teeth clenched; and Rachel knew it was almost over. But Kristen’s uncontrolled impulses were still too strong: her hips suddenly jerked away from Rachel’s tongue; they both reacted awkwardly, desperately, Kristen overcorrecting, coming back down onto Rachel’s nose.

‘Fuck,’ she said tartly. She thought she heard Kim snicker through her extravagant groaning, and sudden annoyance and jealousy quenched Rachel’s fire completely.

She squirmed downward. Kristen made a sound like a wounded animal but Rachel ignored her, twisting to sit on the edge of the bed, cursing. She was cruelly gratified to hear Susan and Kim’s rhythm falter, but too angry to get any satisfaction from it. She paused for a moment, wondering what to do; wondering whether Kristen would try and re-engage her. She felt the slickness on her lips; grasping a handful of crumpled sheets she tetchily wiped her mouth.

To make sure that no one could draw her back, she stood and walked to the bathroom without a backward glance. Now she could hear that Susan and Kim had stopped completely; Kim was already beginning to make annoyed noises.

Rachel knew that somehow she was being unfair, but the discord only added to her ire. She tugged at the bathroom door as she passed and it banged shut behind her. ‘Fuck,’ she said again, to her reflection, as she leaned her arms onto the sink.

It was Kim’s fault. The beautiful girlfriend of Syn, the biker. She was Rachel’s age, small, fiery, and as innocent as a flick knife. Thinking back, Rachel had known she was trouble the moment they had met: Kim had been totally unashamed of her voyeuristic behaviour, and even tried to turn the tables to position herself as the seductress. Syn’s matriarchal energy had kept them both engaged through the bombastic threesome that had followed, but they had barely acknowledged each other the rest of the day, playing tourists on Sunset Boulevard. And when Susan had met them in the bar later, and Syn had bowed out, Rachel had immediately felt protective of her first lover.

Protective? No. Susan had put them together in the first place, with the words, ‘Trust me.’ If anything, Susan was the puppeteer, playing reckless games with Rachel’s totally virginal love life.

‘What am I doing?’ she mouthed to the mirror. Precisely two days into the first significant sexual experiences of her life, fucking three women at once? Her? The sexually confused and inhibited nerd, who avoided everyone’s gaze in case they saw she was weird?

It was all Susan’s doing: from the moment she had opened her bathrobe, so unexpectedly, so shockingly, the night before last; to her grinning innuendos over drinks less than an hour ago. With hints and tricks she had dragged Rachel, her protégé, through a crash course in lesbian eroticism: from self-love through desperate adoration to outright orgy in forty-eight hours. What right did she have?

It all came into Rachel’s mind like a landslide, and with a jolt, she realised there were tears in the eyes of her reflection. Behind her, there were the sounds of an argument; or at least, one raised voice and firm murmuring in response. But she wasn’t inclined to care; she just wanted to get out, to somehow collect her clothes and get into a dark taxi and hide in her hotel. The old Rachel was asserting itself: and calling her a pervert.

Only moments later the latch clicked on the door to the bathroom; it opened a crack while someone tapped their knuckles on it. ‘Rachel?’ came Susan’s voice. ‘Can I come in?’

Rachel sucked back a sob and wiped the back of her hand across her eyes. When she opened them Susan was standing behind her in her white bathrobe (so mundane; so evocative). Her hands came up and Rachel felt them press gently onto the outside of her shoulders. She shrugged them off, but immediately regretted it. Susan was watching her eyes in the mirror and missed not a thing: her hands returned, even more softly, and stayed.

‘I asked them to go to the spare room,’ she said mildly. ‘I think they’re leaving.’

Rachel was afraid her voice would crack; she hazarded, ‘Why?’

‘You’re tired,’ said Susan, and Rachel was not sure if that was the answer or an avoidance. ‘I’ll knock up a drink. Let’s go to bed.’ She paused slightly and finished with a sliver of a smile, ‘to sleep.’

Rachel felt her brow crease and dropped her head so it didn’t show. ‘I think I should go back to my hotel,’ she said; but it wasn’t the brazen rebellion she had hoped it would be.

Susan did not respond, but turned Rachel to one side with gentle pressure and stepped in front. Rachel crossed her arms reactively, protectively, but Susan ignored the signal and drew her closer into an embrace.

‘Please don’t,’ she said, her voice husky beside Rachel’s ear, and the sudden fragility made Rachel raise her eyebrows. ‘Rachel,’ Susan went on slowly. ‘What’s wrong?’

A part of Rachel wanted to twist her shoulders to dislodge her, to shout at her, to spit out the accusations she had stored up only moments ago. But the greater part had melted at Susan’s touch, at her honest need. For a moment the battle raged in her, and finally, she could only breathe, ‘Are you playing with me?’

As though this was the cork in the barrel, she suddenly found herself crying again. Her arms had fallen to her sides and she was limp in Susan’s arms, sobbing into the collar of her bathrobe.

‘Oh god,’ whispered Susan. ‘Oh god, Rachel.’ And she kept repeating her name while Rachel cried.

When Rachel subsided, Susan put her hands back on her upper arms and lifted until they faced each other. ‘I think I understand,’ she said, ducking her head to try and catch Rachel’s downcast eyes. ‘Really, I do.’ She paused, considering. When Rachel glanced up Susan smiled a little. ‘There’s something I want to show you.’

She pushed slightly to balance Rachel fully on her feet. Now her smile was wider, and Rachel groaned inside. Here we go again. ‘I just need to get some things ready. Why don’t you take a shower?’

Something in Rachel snapped. As Susan turned to go, Rachel found herself stamping her foot. ‘No!’ she cried, and this time her voice really did crack. Susan was looking at her, surprised, her smile fading.

‘Don’t show me,’ Rachel said. One of Susan’s dark locks had fallen in front of her face: Rachel lifted a hand, tucked it behind her ear. ‘Tell me. For once, tell me.’ Then, her composure evaporated and she sobbed. She felt like a rebellious teenager; she grasped her hands together in front of herself to try and hide her nakedness, then folded her arms again.

Susan was silent for a long moment, unmoving, and Rachel wondered if she would shout in return; if her riposte would tear Rachel apart, lay bare her ingratitude and insolence. But Susan shuffled past her, turned, and sat on the edge of the bath, her arms folded on her knees, her head bowed.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said at length, with a sigh. The admission seemed to release something in her, and she looked up: Rachel was shocked to see her eyes glistening. ‘I’m so sorry.

‘Yesterday,’ she began, her voice even throatier than usual, ‘at the pool. You said you loved me.’ At the last words, she smiled sadly. ‘I thought I would explode.’

She was looking directly into Rachel’s eyes, beseeching. ‘It was so hard for me to laugh it away. It was hard. Because I was scared.’

Rachel mouthed the word, ‘scared,’ in total confusion. Susan? So strong, so sure of herself. Scared?

‘And I was scared because…’ Now Susan stared into space, seeming to rally; then sighed and locked her gaze back onto Rachel. ‘I was scared because I love you too.’ While Rachel took a physical step backward, she went on rapidly, ‘I love you. I fell in love with you, on the plane. I’ve never felt like this before, with any woman.’

Rachel’s tears were suddenly unquenchable, but Susan did not move from her position on the bath. ‘I know,’ she said, in response to some unaired protest. ‘I have sex. I have so much sex in my life. It’s a game, a game I play, with Syn, and Kim, and a hundred others. Just a game.

‘On the plane, I told myself that if you liked me, I would do everything to make sure you knew me. To make sure you were comfortable with my games. To be able to play them, with me. And to do that, I had to set you free. To find yourself.

‘I think I was too…’ She looked away into space again, corrected herself. ‘I think I fucked it up.’

Then she smiled a little, dropped her head, and seemed to wait. But after a moment her voice went on: ‘So just now, I wanted to show you that I love you. I’m not even sure how; because it’s never happened to me before. I thought maybe some candles.’

It took a moment for the words to register, but then Rachel snorted with sudden laughter. Everything seemed to fall away: her doubts, her anger, her jealousy. She felt newly naked: pure in the face of the woman she had loved for a glorious day, and might yet love again.

She sniffed, wiped her eyes. ‘Fuck the candles,’ she said, and they both laughed. She held up one finger. ‘First, you’re going to hold me. Hold me like you did yesterday. Maybe kiss me.’ Susan smiled, broadly.

Rachel cocked a hip, placed her hand on it, and added another finger. ‘Then, maybe, I might want to know more about these games.’

five

‘Kim!’

Rachel’s eyes flicked open. The dream was right there with her; and so was Susan, lying beside her, eyebrows raised, head on hand, a twinge of a smile.

For a second Rachel was paralysed, filled with the image of Kim’s perfectly taut body that had been above her: the mound bridging the tendons of her thighs, the blown-glass curves of her abdomen, the slight outward hang of her nipples.

She felt her face flushing. Had she cried Kim’s name out loud? Were Susan’s eyes narrowed faintly in jealousy? Rachel tried to smile back, and let her eyelids droop to suggest the sleepiness that in reality had vanished.

‘Good morning beautiful,’ said Susan warmly. Rachel allowed her half-lidded gaze to take in the length of Susan’s bronzed and toned body, and she sighed with adoration. The dream was fading into an even more numinous reality.

‘You,’ she managed, her voice throaty. She wanted to be still, to extend the moment; but her body was already restless, and when she shifted slightly she felt slickness between her legs. To hide her tiny start of guilt she croaked on lamely: ‘You can’t call me that.’

Susan rocked forward on her elbow to bring her mouth to Rachel, who accepted it lightly with her own. The kiss was brief but exquisitely familiar, and it occurred to Rachel that she might be content with such a kiss every morning of her life.

Susan inspected her eyes. ‘I love you,’ she said simply, but with a brutal sincerity that sent a shivering wave of pleasure through Rachel, like the gentlest but deepest orgasm. Her lips parted, but something defensive stirred deep within her. She recalled their conversation in the bathroom the night before, when Susan had admitted both her love and the way it had translated into a strange hidden agenda. Rachel had resolved then to forgive, but also to protect herself.

Strangely, the evening after that was a blank. They had gone back to the bed, hand in hand. Then what? Rachel’s only recollection was blundering to the bathroom in the stillness of the night. She had returned to the sight of Susan’s body sprawled atop the covers, skin softly glowing in the ethereal mauve of early dawn; she had laid down beside her, letting herself fall into sleep-confused feelings.

Some were still colouring this moment: love, lust, anger. Fear, at what may yet be hidden. Again she tried to smile, seeing the faintest question in Susan’s eyes. Susan smiled in return, the simple open honesty of it like a wicked riposte to Rachel’s lazy insincerity.

Susan's hand came forward; fingers rested lightly on Rachel’s cheek. ‘Let’s not get too deep,’ she said, as though she was reading Rachel’s mind again. ‘I’m taking the day off. What do you want to do?’

A tiny chuckle found its way up to Rachel’s throat, but no higher. All they had ever done together was have sex: uproarious, outrageous sex. Even the sex with others had been arranged, owned by Susan: a tandem skydive into Susan’s weird erotic world from Rachel’s colourless sky.

‘I don’t know,’ she said, looking at Susan’s chin, then letting her gaze wander aimlessly downward. ‘Fuck?’

She started again. The word had come unbidden, passing her mouth like a vent from her thoughts. It was too loaded. It could not be meant lightly. Not any more. She cut short her reflexive grin and saw Susan’s head incline slightly in query.

Susan’s voice was soft. ‘I’d like that,’ she said.

Rachel stared, a little surprised to feel her loins responding. The image of Kim was back, melding into the reality of Susan’s nakedness. But was it possible? Could she protect herself from love but still let lust flow?

Susan’s fingers had flipped over, traced backwards along Rachel’s jaw; now they were under her ear, barely touching, catching the light hairs of her neck. Rachel was paralysed. How could she allow this? How could she not?

Susan was leaning in again, looking at Rachel’s lips. Kim was on all fours over her. Rachel’s fingers were in wetness, Kim’s eyes narrowing with each sharply truncated movement of her breasts. In a flash, Rachel knew that Kim was giving her an answer.

With a growl she thrust her body up from the tousled sheets, reaching over Susan with her leg and arm, straddling her. Susan rocked away in surprise, her arm splaying upward, her head dropping onto it to regard Rachel with fiery eyes. But Rachel was not done with her surprises: she came down like the fall of a house and clamped her mouth over Susan’s, her tongue reaching hungrily.

One of Rachel’s hands grasped Susan’s up-flung arm, the other a pillow above her head, and she pressed in with her elbows, her breasts pouring over Susan’s chest. She let loose all of her emotions in that kiss, not distinguishing the fear from the love from the confusion. Susan would know what she had created, would feel it turn on her, before Rachel would let her free.

But Susan’s unpinned hand was everywhere, a loose cannon, grasping and caressing with an abandon equal to Rachel’s passion. It infuriated Rachel; she tried to clamp it down with her elbow, but Susan’s shoulder was too strong to pin; she tried to catch the wrist, but it flitted around her back out of reach.

Susan was laughing into the kiss, Kim was laughing; though Rachel knew that she was no match for them she fought like a demon. When she pushed her breasts higher, her chin almost tucking between them, trying to smother Susan’s exquisite collarbone and long neck, Susan’s hand was behind her own neck, pulling her even closer. When she lifted her hand to grasp at Susan’s breast, to own it, Susan found it and held it there. And when Rachel groaned with a longing over which she had no control at all, Susan met it with her fingers, fulfilled it, overwhelmed it.

Was it with final rebellion that Rachel began to chant Kim’s name, as she fell defeated into the rhythm of Susan’s fingers, her head flopped beside and above her lover’s? Was Susan’s voice jealous or victorious when she whispered, ‘She’s fucking you. She wants you. All of her wants you; her mouth, her tits, her fingers.’

Rachel groaned again as the image wound around her body. She was lost in a greater depth of lust than ever, the thrusting against her vulva like the rising and falling of waves in a deep-sea storm. Her vagina felt heavy with pressure, of a new and unbridled kind. Susan’s voice hissed on in a background monotone, ‘Give her what she wants. Give it to her.’

And under the mounting of the storm, there was a tiny edge of pain. Susan had always been so gentle with her, so respectful of her virginity; but now something was different, something so carefully balanced that Rachel could deny it no more than the beating of her own heart. She was filled, complete, and the encompassing clench of Susan’s hand was driving sensations deep inside her body and mind.

Susan’s other hand was now stroking her hair gently. Rachel opened her eyes: Susan had twisted partly out from under her and was watching her, eyes gently questioning, imploring. But Rachel had no answer to the throb of her loins, the power that was bursting from her, her own power. She answered Susan’s gaze with open bewilderment.

Kim faded. Susan: beautiful, exquisite Susan, was holding her, cupping her each end; shoulder flexing with each inexorable rise of her love. Rachel groaned, lifted herself up onto her hands, pressing back at each twist of Susan’s wrist. One sensation was coming to the fore: every time Susan’s finger, or fingers, curled inward, they made Rachel catch her breath. She had to have more: her hips were flexing, trying to draw Susan ever inward; her right hand came up to curl around Susan’s wrist, willing her deeper. Her vulva was so slick that no other sensations were resolved: only throbbing pressure, tightness, and those unidentifiable rises of bliss.

Some kind of threshold was being reached, slowly, surely. Rachel’s every breath was exploding out with a moan; Susan was sighing too; her other hand carelessly caressing and pushing up against Rachel’s hanging, swaying breasts.

‘M-more,’ Rachel’s moaning resolved. ‘Fuck me. Uhh. Fuck me more.’ Somehow the words carried a power of their own, an affirmative power, their rawness a resonant counterpoint to the working of Susan’s fingers. And once she began, it was like a drug. ‘I want you. I want you. Fuck me. Fuck. Me. More!’

‘Fuck!’

Something had changed. Suddenly she wanted to let go, release something; but she was afraid. Susan whispered, ‘Yes, my love. Yes. I will. I’ll fuck you forever.’

For an incredible moment, Rachel was poised, tipping backward into nothingness. Her eyes were pressed tightly closed, her lips snarling around the emptiness of her held breath. Then Susan’s hand moved; so fractionally that it was barely a movement at all. But it was enough.

The world seemed to collapse into Rachel’s vagina. It was convulsing against Susan’s finger, each pulse building on the last. For a moment Rachel rode the wave, higher, higher until she was thrust into the sky, and she screamed at the blue emptiness.

The wave crashed down, gushing, pouring around Susan’s hand. Rachel flew on. She had never known anything so incredible. Every breath was coming with a scream. She fell from heaven, like an angel, plummeting.

~~~

The next thing Rachel knew she was on her side again, cool slickness all over her loins, opening her eyes to Susan lying beside her, deja vu hazing the scene like a dream. Susan’s smile was even wider than before, her eyes so full of love that it was as though she had declared it aloud again. And this time Rachel wanted to answer, felt it well up inside her, undeniable.

Her mouth was formed around the letter ‘I’ when something else intruded, made her hesitate, surprised and uncertain. Voices. Muffled, in another room, but close by.

Susan saw her glancing away and explained, ‘Kim and Kristen.’ She grinned. ‘We must have woken them up.’

‘What?’ said Rachel querulously. ‘I thought they’d gone!’

‘They stayed,’ said Susan with a slight shrug. Then she added, ‘They were at it for a while after you passed out. Made it awfully hard for me to sleep.’

She chuckled, but Rachel felt suddenly awkward. Would she have let herself go so much, screamed with such abandon if she had known she was overheard? Inevitably, she wondered if this was another of Susan’s machinations and though she tried to quash the thought, its stain remained.

Her hand had strayed downward unbidden, and the wetness everywhere was next to intrude on her balance. She looked down, incredulous, confused, and everything together was too much. Her sight blurred; she sucked a breath, knowing that the next would bring a sob, not knowing why.

But Susan lifted her hand gently away. ‘Hey,’ she said. ‘Stay with me. We were doing some beautiful fucking, remember?’

Rachel sniffed, nodded girlishly; and Susan added, ‘I also recall you mentioning Kim a few times.’ When Rachel started and looked at her guiltily Susan went on: ‘That’s one hundred percent cool with me, and I know exactly where you’re coming from. Now.’ She hoisted herself up until she was kneeling beside Rachel, and Rachel could not help notice the beautiful way her breasts hung as she leaned forward. ‘Let’s clean you up.’

Rachel followed her, bleary and timid, to the bathroom. Wetness squeezed and dripped down her thighs. She was fascinated by what her body had done, and a little frightened, but buoyed by Susan’s mature presence. The voices in the next room had stopped: and Rachel was vaguely aware that while one had faded into silence, the other had snapped shut.

Susan guided her to the sink, propped her in front of it. Rachel gazed at her own reflection: so familiar, so different: long blonde hair trailing haphazardly over curves. Susan was behind her now and hugged her around the stomach. The press of her hands raised shallow mounds of flesh, not unattractive, but so different to Susan’s body, and Kim’s.

‘You’re beautiful,’ Susan whispered beside her ear, her eyes roving up and down in the mirror. Then she kissed her neck, and Rachel shivered. Oh my god, she thought. How can I resist this? She can play me like a puppet, and my god, I want her to. She turned her head and their lips came together briefly, playfully.

Susan was coming around her, caressing. They kissed again, and their tongues touched, tip to tip. Then Susan was looking at her through her lashes, a grin forming. ‘Time to mop up,’ she said wickedly, and then her tongue was working down Rachel’s front: dabbing and trailing over her breasts, and then onto her stomach, though one hand remained behind to cup and squeeze. Her other hand briefly strayed aside to the wall, did something there that made a click.

The dream was back, right there, real, as powerful and unstoppable as an express train. The mirror in front of Rachel had shimmered and changed: and instead of her own reflection, she was seeing Kim, naked and sexy in semi-darkness. She was posing, pouting and arching her back, her hands teasing herself, touching a breast here, trailing over muscle there. Behind her was the prone, sleeping form of Kristen; and Rachel knew intuitively that Kim was using what she thought was a mirror on the spare room wall to do for herself what Kristen had been too tired to give.

And just at the moment that Kim’s fingers began to work in earnest, Susan’s tongue reached out to Rachel’s clitoris. Dream or reality, Rachel no longer cared; and she fell helplessly and deeply into ecstasy again.