DEFENSE (2 page)

I edged myself back onto the table. When Nick turned back, his eyes widened at the sight of me. I couldn’t even remember the last time a man had looked at me like that, with desire and longing.

He came forward and pulled my knees up so they were either side of his body. Then he leaned in for a kiss. The passion had mounted, his lips moving more quickly, his tongue in my mouth licking my own with more thrust. I could feel his erection straining through his pants, right against my crotch.

Nick moved his face away and began pressing kisses into my neck. As he did so, he fumbled with the buttons of my blouse, before shoving it off my shoulders and exposing my lacy, white bra. He leaned back and looked at my body, a pleased expression on his face, then began kissing my chest. His hands roved over my breasts, and I tipped my head back, exhaling with pleasure.

As Nick’s hands worked their way down my body, he began lowering himself to his knees. I felt myself growing hotter and wetter in anticipation of what he was going to do to me. He began rolling my pantyhose down my legs, then hitched up my tight black skirt. With his fingers, he stroked the fabric of my panties, then slid his fingers past them and into me. I let out a gasp of pleasure. The sound of my arousal excited Nick. He pulled my panties down, and then I felt his tongue against my clitoris, licking me slowly, like he was savoring the taste. I gasped, unable to keep in my inhibitions. He’d pushed past my barrier; my body was no longer mine to control. It wanted Nick, more of Nick, all of Nick.

I pushed his head away and guided him back up. His lips glistened with my wetness. I could see his penis straining to be unleashed. I reached forward and unzipped his fly.

“Do you have a condom?” I asked, taking his warm, hard cock in my hands and massaging it.

“Yes,” he said in a strained voice.

He was panting hard as he reached into his pocket and produced a condom. I undid the button of his jeans and pushed them down to the floor, then did the same with his underpants.

I was impressed by what I saw. Nick was pretty well endowed. I bit my lip in anticipation of the sensation of him sliding into me.

He rolled the condom over his cock then positioned himself between my thighs. As he glided into my wet, inviting vagina, I tipped my head back and moaned. Jessica had been right, I’d been missing out on the most important things in life—pleasure and arousal. The thought of experiencing an orgasm after so long suddenly overwhelmed me.

I pulled Nick even closer, gasping with pleasure as he slipped in deeper. Then I slid my hands to his ass, guiding his movements, the speed and amount of him inside of me. It felt incredible, like fireworks were exploding inside of me.

Nick wrapped his arms around me, holding me against his chest. I pressed my ear to his heart, reveling in the grunting noises he made, listening to them through his chest as his movements became faster and harder. I wound my hands up his strong back, clutching on to the flesh as his rocking intensified.

Just as our thrusting was growing strong enough to make the table bang against the wall, the music cut out, and the sound of Jessica and Seb’s ferocious lovemaking filled the air. I glanced over Nick’s shoulder, and my gaze fell to the TV, where a news bulletin had replaced the radio show. The face of the most beautiful man I’d ever seen in my life filled the screen. A name appeared beneath: Harrison Wrexler.

Nick went to pull out of me. “Goddammit, I knew they’d ruin it. I’m so sorry. I’ll change the channel.”

“No,” I said abruptly. “I don’t care. Just don’t stop.”

From the room across the hall, Seb was grunting and Jessica was making screeching noises. It didn’t sound like much fun, but each to their own.

Nick gave me a look. “That doesn’t put you off?”

I just shrugged. But the real reason was that I wanted to keep looking at the sexy man on the news bulletin.

He probably thought I was getting some kinky enjoyment out of listening to Seb and Jessica, but really I was getting kinky enjoyment out of imagining that the man on the TV was fucking me and not Nick. I wasn’t sure which was more shameful.

Nick entered me again, but this time the sensation was a thousand times better than it had been before. The man on the TV’s sexy eyes bore into me, and I matched Nick’s thrusting with my own movement, increasing the depth and intensity of our lovemaking. I could feel myself racing towards climax and groaned loudly. The noise seemed to excite Nick. I felt his cock harden even more inside of me. The sensation made me cry out. I pulled my knees up so my heels were hooked over the edge of the table and Nick slid in deeper, his cock growing harder and harder. I focused on the man on TV, watching him being led in handcuffs from the back of a police van with a look of utter despair on his beautiful face. The words on the screen informed me that he was a pro-basketballer and was being charged with murder. A brief thought flashed through me, telling me I was sick for getting off on imagining being fucked by a murderer, but I pushed it away because in that moment everything felt so right that I didn’t care.

Nick gripped the table to steady it and get more purchase. Our thrusting was becoming feverish, desperate, fast and rough. And then the screen showed one last image of the man’s gorgeous face with
Murderer?
appearing beneath, and I screamed out as an orgasm gripped me.

“Oh God,” I cried, suddenly consumed with pleasure, reaching the pinnacle of joy.

“Fuck,” Nick groaned, and then he was coming too. I could feel his cock pulsing inside of me and imagined that it was Harrison Wrexler who I had just pushed over the edge into that state of complete and utter release.

Nick’s thrusts began to lessen. Then he dropped his head onto my shoulder. Harrison’s face disappeared from the screen, and the radio show resumed. My hands were clasped on Nick’s ass, but suddenly I felt awkward, like they shouldn’t be there, like I’d crossed over some kind of line. A million thoughts were swirling in my mind as I froze.

“Are you okay?” Nick said, pulling back.

“Fine,” I said hurriedly, pushing back on his hips so that he slid completely out of me.

Just then, the kitchen door burst open and Jessica raced in. Nick turned away, hiding his nakedness. I pressed my legs together and shoved down my rucked skirt. Jessica looked me up and down, at my bra and discarded shoes and tights. She was half dressed, her shoes in her arms and her jeans half done up. I could tell by her facial expression that something was wrong.

“We’re leaving,” she said.

I leapt down from the table. “Why? Jessica, what’s wrong?”

There was nothing like a distressed friend to sober you up.

In the corner, Nick had slipped his jeans back on and was doing up his fly.

“That sick bastard,” Jessica said. Her voice was shaking with anger.

I took her arm in mine. She was trembling.

Just then, Seb stumbled from his room.

“Baby, come on,” he said. “I was only playing.”

“Get the fuck away from me!” Jessica screamed.

She grabbed my arm and hauled me down the corridor. I glanced back at Nick, confused, my brain muddled from the sudden turn of events. To have gone from intense pleasure to embarrassment to fear in three seconds flat was messing with my head. I drew my eyebrows together and gave him a confused look before Jessica wrenched me out the apartment door and into the hallway. She stomped towards the elevator, still without her shoes on, and slammed her palm against the button.

“What the fuck just happened, Jessica?” I said.

She was shaking violently. “That fucking prick just…he just...” She dissolved into tears. “I just want to get home,” she said, turning her red eyes to me. Mascara was running down her face.

“Okay,” I said, “okay.”

I bundled her into my arms. As the lift doors opened and we went inside, I had the distinct impression that I would never see Nick again.

***

When Jessica and I got home, we found Tim on the sofa mid-blow job. He looked alarmed and pushed away the guy giving him head. It was Jonas.

“Oh, you’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Jessica wailed.

The worst end to her shitty day.

Jonas hurried from the apartment as Jessica thundered in and plonked herself on the sofa next to Tim. Tim wasn’t one for embarrassment. He just zipped up his fly and looked at her.

“Babe, what the hell happened to you?” he said.

“That’s what I’d like to know,” I said.

Jessica had refused to say a word in the elevator or the taxi home. She’d let me help dress her, then had spent the entire journey home in silence, gazing out the window. The whole way I’d been a wreck, imagining what possible scenario could have led to Jessica’s demeanor. All my thoughts were dark and terrible.

Jessica grabbed Tim’s open whisky bottle from the table and took a swig. She’d been more hammered than I had to begin with; a few swigs from the bottle took her right back to her previously inebriated state.

“That guy was one creepy motherfucker,” she said.

Tim touched her arm. “Did he hurt you, babe?”

“Yes, he fucking hurt me,” she snapped. “And I like being hurt usually. But not like that.”

My stomach was rolling. “Please tell us, Jess,” I said.

Jessica grabbed the smoking joint that Tim had abandoned in the ashtray and took a deep puff.

“He wanted anal,” she said, exhaling. “Which is fine. I like anal.” She took another deep inhalation and filled the room with the stench of weed. “But there’s a way of doing it, right?” She looked at Tim for affirmation.

Tim nodded. I knew nothing about it, having never tried anal myself.

“You need to relax the muscles,” Tim informed me. “Use hella lube, and go in a bit at a time. Maybe some poppers.”

“Right,” Jessica said, waving the spliff. “Only Seb wasn’t waiting for anything. No lube, nothing, he just went straight for it.”

I winced at the thought.

“I told him to slow down, to take it easy, but he wouldn’t. He just kept going until he came. There was nothing I could do. He totally overpowered me.”

Tim and I exchanged a look.

“Jessica,” I said softly, “he raped you. We need to go to the police.”

Her eyes flashed at me angrily. “No we don’t. It wasn’t rape; he just took it too far.”

“You withdrew your consent,” I argued. “That makes it rape.”

“Oh, and that would hold up in a court of law, would it?” she scoffed, cutting me off mid-sentence. “Because ninety percent of cases end up with the guy walking and the woman looking like a psycho bunny boiler.”

I could understand her attitude. My first law work after graduating had been criminal defense at point of arrest. I’d lost count of the number of rape cases that didn’t make it anywhere near a court. But still, I couldn’t let it go.

“I’ll be with you the whole time,” I said. “I’ll make sure you don’t say anything that might be later used against you, and—”

“I don’t need you to be a lawyer right now, Katie,” Jessica said, cutting me off, her eyes blazing with fury. “I need you to be a friend. And don’t you dare turn me into a victim, okay? It’s not like it’s the first time someone’s fucked me harder than I’d like. He was just a creep. I’ll get over it. I always do.”

She stood and strolled out the room, whisky bottle in hand. A second later, I heard her bedroom door slam shut.

I could hardly believe what I’d just heard. I looked at Tim, my mind reeling.

“What do we do?” I stammered.

“Nothing,” Tim replied. “You heard her, she doesn’t want to be considered a victim.”

“But she’s just been raped,” I gasped.

“I know,” he said. “But the police won’t see it that way. There’s no evidence if it started consensually. It’s a classic ‘his word versus hers’ case. You’re the lawyer, Katie, you know it’s un-win-able.”

He was right, and I felt sick to my stomach.

“I should have helped her,” I said guiltily. “I was there in the house.”

I thought back to Nick, to the wonderful sensations that had pulsed through me, and the incredible orgasm I’d experienced as my eyes had locked on to the face of Harrison Wrexler.

“Babe, don’t blame yourself,” Tim said. “Where were you guys, anyway? Jonas tried calling Jessica, and when she didn’t answer I tried calling you.”

“Shit,” I said, reaching for my purse and pulling out my cell phone. “It must have been on silent.”

I looked at my cell and saw I had five missed calls, two from Tim and three from work.

“Oh, shit!” I said.

Tim gave me a quizzical look as I hit redial and pressed the phone against my ear with a panicked expression on my face.

The phone was answered on the third ring.

“Finally,” my boss, Galiema Rook, said.

“I’m sorry,” I stammered. “I missed your call.”

“Yes, I know that,” she said tersely. “You clearly don’t fully understand the meaning of being ‘on call,’ do you?”

“I do, I just—”

“Katie,” she said, cutting me off and clearly not in the mood for hearing my excuses. “I need you down at the station, okay? We’ve had a huge case just come in. The media’s going to be all over it.”