The Awakening of Poppy Edwards (2 page)

Even though it was past two in the morning, the Ambassador’s huge neon front entrance was lit up. It looks like a flying saucer. Poppy looked as if she might run, then she just tossed her head back and walked in, as if she didn’t care who saw her. I admired that. Furtive, now
that
would have got her noticed. In the lobby that reminded me a bit of Grand Central, she waited, leaning careless as you like by the elevator while I claimed my key. The night clerk gave her barely a second glance; he was too busy trying not to embarrass me.

In the suite, though, she looked nervous. If she’d said something then, I would have had second thoughts. I hope. ‘You want a drink?’ I asked her.

She shook her head and wandered over to the window, which looked out over the Ambassador’s Crystal Plunge swimming pool.

‘You want to go home?’ I said, joining her.

‘I’ve thought about it.’ She looked up at me, all big eyes and white face, and smiled, a soft smile that made her look lost. ‘But so much has changed, it wouldn’t be home any more.’

‘I didn’t mean England, I meant…’

‘I know what you meant.’ She turned away from the window. ‘I’m in a strange mood.’

Any other woman, I’d assume she was looking for reassurance. The usual compliments. This one—she wasn’t any other woman. ‘I’m in a bit of a strange mood myself,’ I told her. ‘I didn’t exactly plan this when I went to that club tonight.’

‘Would you have sent me one of those little notes backstage if I hadn’t come over and talked to you?’

‘I doubt it.’ Which was the truth. ‘I’m glad you did,’ I added, ignoring the sneaky little voice that asked me if I’d think so in the morning, when there was business to be done.

She nodded, giving me a lop-sided smile. ‘I hope you will be.’

I pulled her up tight then. She was slighter than I thought, under that suit. There was hardly anything of her. ‘I hope you will be, too.’

And then her smile changed, as though she’d switched it for someone else’s. ‘The only reason I’m here is that I don’t doubt it.’

Poppy

I wasn’t acting. At least, it didn’t feel like acting. Yes, okay, when I smiled at him just before he kissed me, that wasn’t my smile, but I’m not sure I have a smile to call my own any more. It’s second nature to me to cover up. I’ve always done it, from when I was a child. Daisy, too. At the orphanage, we learned pretty quickly that it was a mistake to show how you really felt, what you really thought. That’s not acting. That’s just one of the rules of survival.

And even if I was acting at first, when he kissed me, I soon stopped. It was a gentle kiss. That surprised me. Cautious? A bit. He wasn’t showing it, but maybe he was nervous, too. He didn’t seem to me to be the type of man to be nervous—quite the opposite. But when he kissed me—like I said, he seemed on edge.

How to describe a kiss? I can say it was perfect, and it was, but my idea of perfect probably isn’t yours. His mouth fit mine. It felt—right. He kissed just right. Not stagy. Not a screen kiss, all posture and fluttering hands. Gentle, like I said. But not reassuring, you know, not the kind of kiss where you think there’s nothing else. I was very sure there was more—and I wanted more. That kiss had an edge to it. An appetizer of a kiss.

He slid his hands under my dinner jacket. He didn’t grab, he stroked, as though he was trying to find out my shape under my shapeless clothes. I liked that. I liked the way we were both wearing the same thing, but he looked so different in his. His suit fit him. An expensive, made-to-measure job. Mine wasn’t even off-the-peg; it was out of the prop department. And it didn’t fit at all. What it did, though, was make me feel so much more female beside him. A real cliché, I know that, but there’s a reason why such things become clichés.

He liked it, too, the way we looked. And he liked looking. I didn’t usually. I see far too much of myself on-screen to want to look when I don’t have to. There was a mirror on the wall. One of those fancy ones, all jagged edges decorated with coloured glass. He stood me in front of it and put his arms around me, opening my jacket. My body was pressed back against his. I could feel he was hard. He was much taller than me. Much broader. The contrast between the two of us and the way were dressed the same—it was arousing. Odd, but arousing.

He slid my jacket off and began to unbutton my waistcoat. I watched his hands on me in the mirror. His mouth on my neck. His breath on my cheek. My waistcoat slid to the floor. He opened his palms and cupped my breasts through the starched front of my shirt. Tanned hands. White shirt. My nipples were as hard as he was. Throbbing like he was. As he stroked them, I rubbed my behind against the ridge of him, and watched his eyes close in response.

He pulled my shirt out of my trousers. They call them pants over here. Even after five years, that still sounds terrifically rude to me. He touched me, with just the silk of my chemise between us now. His hands sliding flat over it, spanning my waist, up to my breasts again, teasing them into such an agonising delight. Then one hand down, sliding past the wide waistband of my trousers, under the silk of my knickers, and it was my turn to close my eyes. Just for a second. Then I opened them. I wanted to watch.

I was amazed at how wet I was. He slid into me so easily. Stupid, but my knees really did buckle. His hand on my breast supported me. Then the assault began. On my nipple and inside me, sliding, stroking and teasing. And I watched, fascinated, as if it wasn’t me. My face was flushed; my eyes seemed huge. His were fixed on me, watching, intent, as he touched me, as if he knew exactly how to touch me, just as he’d known exactly how to kiss me.

I wanted it to go on forever, that hot wet slide, that mesmerising stroking, so soft, so sweet, such a contrast with the sharper tightening when he teased my nipple, and the spark seemed to run all the way down through my belly to the spot between my legs, which started to throb. More insistent now. Did he read it in my face, that I wanted that? I don’t know. I was watching, but I wasn’t thinking as he touched me, stroked me, making me pant and clench and heat, as though I was melting around the hot core of me that he touched, and when I came my eyes closed and I heard myself, a harsh cry, and I felt him picking me up, and I clung onto him like some helpless maiden, the kind that’s always getting rescued from train tracks in the movies.

He set me down on the bed. ‘Have you got…?’ I asked, and he nodded, leaving me briefly to get the preservative from the bathroom.

‘You sure?’ His face was set. Flushed like mine.

‘Yes.’

His hands were shaking as he dragged off his clothes. Mine, too, as I fumbled with what was left of my own, kicking off my trousers, my shoes, my stockings, my underwear, shivering, my fingers icy, all of me icy except inside.

Naked, he looked even more impressive than with clothes on. Hard-packed muscles that rippled under the skin. I’d remember that later, when I replayed it all in my head. The contrast of tanned arms and pale shoulders. The rough hairs on his chest. I touched all of him. Ran fevered hands over all of him. I must have, or I wouldn’t have remembered. But at the time it was all hot skin and rough and smooth textures. Hard, and silky soft. I wrapped my fingers around his erection. Stroked. But only for a moment. I wanted him inside me. Same as he did.

‘Ready?’ he asked, and I smiled, or laughed or something, because he smiled or laughed, too, and it made my insides clench again, that smiling-laughing thing, and made me realise that it wasn’t over, far from over, and he must have seen that in my face.

I fell back on the bed. He entered me slowly, but not too slow. Sliding. Opening me up. Making me cling to him, and my clinging making him groan. In and in he slid, and when he thought he was done, I wrapped my legs around his waist and he slid in farther, his eyes widening, his mouth curling. Not smiling. Curling. He held me like that and I held him, just looking at him, for seconds. Then he began to rock. The smallest movement, just rocking, and I began to clench, and I didn’t want it to be over, so I dug my fingers into his shoulders.

‘You like that,’ he said, and it wasn’t a question.

I tilted under him. ‘You like that,’ I said, and that wasn’t a question, either.

He kissed me, his tongue sliding into my mouth, and he thrust at the same time. A tiny movement, but almost enough. Almost. I dug my fingers in farther. ‘Yes,’ I said, though he hadn’t asked me anything.

‘Yes,’ he said, and I knew what he meant.

Another kiss. His tongue. The hard, hot thickness of him thrusting. And ‘Yes,’ I said again. And ‘Yes,’ this time the words a hiss of pleasure as he thrust harder. ‘Now.’

It wasn’t an order—it was a plea. He ignored it. ‘Wait,’ he said, and that was an order, his hands sliding under my behind, tilting me higher. ‘Not yet.’

I moaned. I clung. I tensed. I could feel it and I didn’t want to resist it, though I didn’t want it to happen. ‘Not yet,’ I echoed, like a prayer.

He kissed me again. There was sweat on his chest. His eyes were so dark, his face strained. He tasted of salt. Of heat. Of sex. I kissed him back, touching my tongue to his, and he gave a long groan. ‘Now,’ I whispered, insistent.

‘Now,’ he said, and pushed high into me. I started to come. He thrust again, harder. I cried out. I pushed, arched, clung, and he thrust again, harder, faster, urgent now, and when he came, he cried out, too, his chest heaving, his arms straining as he pulled me up, tight against him, so that I felt him pulsing not just inside me but against me, our skin sticking, our breath harsh, our eyes glazed but still watching, wide. Still seeing.

Lewis

I thought my heart might actually break out of my chest, it was hammering so much.
Sensational
. A very overused word, but that’s what it was. I told her so, when I came back from the bathroom. I don’t usually. I mean, I say all the right things, you know, but I don’t usually mean them. That makes me sound like a jerk. I’m not a jerk, but I’m careful not to give the wrong impression. I think about what I say, what I do, how it will sound. And that makes me sound manipulative, contriving, unfeeling. I’m not any of those things either, except maybe I don’t feel much, but I am—like I said, I’m careful.

The fact is, I’m not so easily moved. You’ll say it’s hardly surprising, after what I saw in the war. Most probably everyone who was in France is the same, you’ll say. Maybe, but it’s not an excuse I like to use. I wasn’t even fighting. Sure, driving those ambulances you see things you never want to see again. My point is, I won’t make excuses. It happened, it’s over, you learn, you move on, which is what I’ve done. I told you, I know I’m lucky. Was I like this before? Heck, how do I know? Am I cold? If that means do I know not to let anyone get too close, the answer’s yes. Another thing I learned in France. People die, even people who aren’t supposed to. Even when they don’t carry guns, but stretchers. People die, and they leave behind lots of people who think they can’t get by without them. You don’t just see the mangled mess that guns and shells make of men in the trenches. In the hospitals, you see the mangled mess the war makes of the ones they left behind. So no, I don’t think I’m cold, just pragmatic. I’m focused. Independent. I know what I want. I know what I
don’t
want, too. Uncomplicated—a big yes to that. Involved, needy—big no. But great sex? Who doesn’t want that? If only it was easier to find without all the strings. That night I’d found it, though, and I told her. ‘That was goddamn amazing,’ I said.

She laughed, though it was more like a kind of low growly noise. ‘Yes, it was.’

I sat down on the bed beside her. She was still sprawled on her back, the sheet only just covering her. She was so slim, she could have—what is it they say—yeah, she could have walked through rain.

‘Really, I mean it,’ I said, running my hand down the outline of her leg, my body already recovering, already thinking that it might be an idea to start again.

But she rolled away from me. ‘I have an early start. In fact, I really should be going.’

She was already out of bed, already pulling on her underwear, picking up her shirt. I watched her for a moment, enjoying the view, my mind still sluggish, too concerned with what we’d done, what I’d like to try next, to realise what was happening until she was pulling on her pants, sitting back down on the bed to tie her shoes. I got up, began to look about for my own clothes.

‘What are you doing?’ she said.

‘I’ll come with you.’

‘I’m perfectly capable of getting home on my own, thank you very much.’

The way she said it kicked off alarm bells. Defensive. Very defensive. Funny, I didn’t think about it at the time, but I should have been pleased, not—hurt’s too big a word, but it will do. ‘I’ll come down with you,’ I said. ‘At least let me make sure you get a cab.’

She stood up, shrugging into her jacket and waistcoat at the same time. ‘There’s really no need. I can make a far more discreet exit on my own.’ She smiled a tight little smile and held out her hand. ‘Goodbye, Lewis.’

Goodbye
, not
good night
. Her accent had become decidedly English. Her expression decidedly cool. And that’s when it finally hit me, the full stupidity of what I’d done—as she was holding out her hand, making it perfectly clear that however amazing the sex had been between us, there would be no more. I stared at her, speechless for a few endless seconds, as I tried to work out what to do, and more importantly, what I should be feeling. Because what I should have been worried about was business, and what I was actually thinking about was pleasure.

Her smile became a frown. She withdrew her hand, tucking it behind her back. ‘What’s wrong?’

What was wrong was that I never mixed business with pleasure. What was wrong was that she had no idea who I was, and absolutely no idea that I knew who she was. What was wrong was that tomorrow—strike that, today—I planned to make her an offer she couldn’t refuse, but she most likely would refuse it now, because she’d think it came with all sorts of conditions. And what was really, really wrong was that despite all this, I still wanted her. What had I done?