Anything but Vanilla (3 page)

Karen sat hunched in her dressing gown, with her palms curled around her cup. She opened her mouth twice and closed it, before blowing the steam off her tea. ‘Where’d you disappear to last night? You were gone ages.’

‘Was I?’

‘You know you were. Was it that guy you were dancing with?’

Kara shrugged. ‘Dunno what you’re implying. Who was he?’ In God’s honest truth she couldn’t recall his name. Her memories of him were all of raw sensations, but his appearance she could only recall in the loosest sense – broad brushstrokes forming a rudimentary sketch. She probably ought to regret that, since he’d been a damn good lay.

‘Let me have a shower and then I’ll be off,’ she said, leaving her sister to brood over whatever folly she believed Kara had committed. So she’d had a one-night stand. Big deal! Get over it. She was a single girl and as long as her actions didn’t hurt anyone, then what was the problem with her having a little fun? Or even a lot of it.

The sky had turned indigo and the weather gloomy by the time Kara reached the Devon coastline and saw Liddell Island rising like a Titan’s throne from the ocean. A zing of anticipation jigged beneath her skin as she gazed across at its ridge of rocky spires. Karen had once said that their brother had OD’d on Dracula at too young an age and one glance at Liddell Island only confirmed that. It was a little piece of Transylvania stuck out in the ocean.

After two hundred metres of sea spray that necessitated having the windscreen wipers on full, the causeway broadened on to a shingle bay. Kara pulled up and got out of the car. A quick recce showed that the only building was locked up for the night, so she had no choice but to brave the upward trek to the fort. Orange residue stained the looming cliff face as she climbed along a gravel track. To her left a thick rope supported by iron staves formed the only barrier between her and a sheer drop. The situation worsened at the top, where a rope bridge provided the only means of crossing a vast gorge. ‘Bloody hell!’ She was going to kill Chris the next time she saw him. Kara wobbled across the bridge without looking down, only to be greeted by gargoyles and a nearly sheer flight of steps.

By the time she’d staggered to the top, ducked the portcullis, found the bell pull and rung it with all her might, she was out of breath and ready for a nice sit down. Hopefully, the owner might take pity. Then again, considering the old-fashioned iron-pinned door she was facing, she half expected Igor to answer.

Instead, the barking of dogs chorused the arrival of the human inhabitant.

‘Toby! Horace!’ A male voice boomed over the patter of paws on the floor tiles. Kara blinked into the yellow light that shone out of the open door. ‘Good evening. Are you lost?’ A bare-chested man stood before her.

Kara gave a little croak. OK, Christopher was forgiven. Whatever she’d been expecting – crooked little old man – it wasn’t this.

Long blond hair fanned over the top of his shoulders and rested at the top of his tattooed biceps.

‘The causeway’s crossable now, though I’d recommend a torch,’ he remarked without even looking at her. He released one of the huge dogs, whom he had by the collar, in order to plunge his hand into a box of LED keychain lights. He offered one to Kara which she took automatically while warily fending off the freed hound, who danced about her trying to shove its head up her skirt. ‘Um, sorry.’ He dragged the dog off while the second oversized pooch tried to worm its way between his legs.

‘I’m not lost. I’m looking for Alaric Liddell. I’m supposed to pick up some keys,’ she said as she clicked the little purple light on and off. ‘Do you know where I can find him? I was told the fort.’

The hard lines of his face softened into a tentative smile. He had pale grey-blue eyes, which made a sudden appraising sweep of her body. ‘Mrs North? I was told the buyer was a man.’

‘Oh no, I’m not married,’ Kara hastily explained, not wanting him to think she was off limits, considering the rather pleasant sexual frisson that zapped between them as he took in her windblown appearance. ‘He’s gay. My brother, I mean. I’m here on his behalf because he’s gone abroad. I’m Kara North.’ She stuck out a hand, which he declined in favour of grabbing both dogs by the collars and heaving them inside.

‘I’m Ric Liddell. Come on in and I’ll find you those keys.’ He grinned at her showing a few too many lovely white teeth. ‘I think they’re in the study. Toby. Horace.’ He pushed the dogs out of the way to allow her to enter unhindered, then stepped back so that she could walk ahead of him into the hall.

‘Thanks.’ Kara stepped warily over the threshold. Stranger-danger warnings pushed to the back of her mind in favour of the upswing in her lustometer. Ric Liddell was far too hot to be mouldering away on a fleabitten rock. She prayed he wasn’t gay and that Chris hadn’t sent her to a heterosexual woman’s idea of purgatory.

‘Have you come far?’

‘Not really. Although it’s taken a couple of hours because I had to wait for the tide.’ Kara turned to face him again only to be blessed with a glimpse of his back as he bolted the door. Strong shoulders gave way to a trim waist. His black jeans rode low over his hips, held in place by a studded belt, while a huge tattoo of an ankh, entwined within a coil of roses, decorated the length of his spine and shoulder blades.

‘Wow!’

He turned his head to look at her, his eyebrows raised in question. Now in the light, with fewer shadows to mask his features, she realised he was slightly older than she’d first assumed, perhaps five or six years her senior. Not old, but no spring lamb either. Somehow that added to his appeal.

‘Your back … it’s – wow … It must have hurt.’

He shrugged as if to suggest it was no big deal, and then took the lead again, his bare feet making a soft patter on the tiles as he crossed the hall and opened the door on to what she assumed was a study. Two of the walls were lined with books, locked way in old-fashioned wood and glass cabinets. A couple of leather armchairs sat cosily before an open fireplace and a big 38mm camera lay on one of the seats. The two Dalmatians immediately pattered over to slouch before the blaze.

Kara dutifully trooped into the room, in awe of the money that had created this place. His family had probably owned it for generations and ruled over the local populace.

Ric headed over to a bureau on the far side of the fireplace. He rummaged through a few drawers but didn’t appear to turn up anything.

‘Can I help?’ Kara asked, though she was quite enjoying watching his bum wiggle inside those low-slung jeans. Her palms were near itching to cop a good feel of him.

She hadn’t thought herself repressed in any way, but the world seemed a whole lot more attractive since her split with Gavin. Maybe that’s what being single did to you. Turned you into a compulsive flirt and left you hankering after sex any way you could get it. She’d certainly become ridiculously horny over the last few days. That guy last night – damned if she could remember more about him than how good he felt – and now she was gawping at the arse of a man she’d only just met. Chris would no doubt tell her she was overcompensating for being dumped, only she hadn’t been. Quite the opposite: she’d been coddled until she couldn’t stand it any more. Although maybe there was something to the notion of her trying to prove that guys still found her attractive.

‘No – it’s fine. They’re around here somewhere.’ Ric lifted his head and looked straight at her. For a fleeting moment Kara remained pinned by his gaze while she imagined some indulgent scene of them colliding in a sexual frenzy rather than in any romantic way. His gaze swept over her and then he gave a disarming grin. ‘Actually, maybe I left them in the studio.’ He swooped past her back into the hall. ‘Come on up.’

‘Up’ was a tightly wound spiral staircase. Kara chased him to the top, where she emerged into a vast white space that she guessed lay over the entryway. Here, blank walls loomed over her, seeming disproportionately high in the absence of decoration. At floor level, all around the perimeter, picture frames leant against the wall in piles. An impressive array of photographic equipment occupied the centre space. Ric stood raking through the pockets of a leather coat that hung on the back of a folding metal chair.

‘You’re a photographer.’

‘Yeah.’

Good one, Kara. Why don’t you state the obvious?

‘Are you the Liddell family equivalent of Lord Lichfield?’ This was some serious set-up he had here, way beyond any kind of hobby studio.

‘Nah – I think the only thing I have in common with Patrick Lichfield is that we’ve both done
Harpers
covers. A-list celebs don’t really do it for me.’

So, he didn’t like skinny models and glitterati. Probably explained why he chose to live out here on this godforsaken rock of an island. ‘No – what do you like?’ Kara inched towards him.

‘Porn,’ he muttered, blowing away her expectation of coastal landscapes and wildlife photography. She stuck a finger in her ear and wiggled, thinking maybe she’d misheard. Mr blond and sexy couldn’t possibly have said anything so crude. Only he had. He most certainly had and, what’s more, he didn’t even look guilty about it. ‘Here, take a look.’ He picked up a nearby picture frame and swung it round.

Kara carefully averted her gaze, having no wish to gawp at a naked woman’s pussy. Only it was hard not to catch even a teensy glimpse considering the size of the image, plus she didn’t want to appear rude, or worse prudish.

As it turned out, the picture was of a man not a woman, and was far too arty to be considered porn, though the black and white image was certainly lewd.

The model looked vaguely familiar too. Not that you could see a lot of his face.

Ric grinned at her and gave a low chuckle. He put the print down and waved her towards the stacks of framed photographs. ‘Go ahead. Take a look while I hunt these keys. If you find anything you like we can negotiate a discount, seeing as how we’re going to be neighbours. That barn needs something to brighten it up. You’ve seen it, right?’

‘No.’

‘OK.’

‘OK,’ she agreed, her voice a little dry. It felt too intimate to be going through this stuff after such a short acquaintance. That, and it seemed her apprehensions about Christopher’s impulse purchase might be on the mark.

The photos weren’t all of men. There were women and groups too, but the emphasis was definitely adult, and, more often than not, kinky. They reminded her of the bacchanalian scenes you sometimes found in old houses and castles, painted before Victorian prudery took hold. Back when people were a little more honest about sex, in the way she absolutely intended to be from now on.

The one-night stand she’d had with – Jack? – was the most honest thing she’d done in years. Ever, perhaps.

‘Do you sell much?’ Kara asked.

‘You’d be surprised.’

Maybe not. She could see the appeal of it. It wasn’t coy. It was what it was without making a pretence of being anything else, and it was beautiful because of that forthrightness and aggression. Nor did it take much imagining to envisage the response he got from buyers and gallery owners, considering how lovely he was with his strong jaw and Scandinavian pallor.

She understood his honesty in describing it as porn a little better after fanning through the images. Its intended purpose was to arouse, something it was certainly succeeding in doing to her. If Ric’s presence had a dynamic effect upon her libido, then his artwork threatened to push that to the max.

Realising that she was growing uncomfortably aroused, Kara squirmed her legs together. ‘Here’s a good one.’ Ric moved up close behind her, so that she could feel his heat even though they weren’t touching. His hand shot out to reveal the contents of another frame.

This one featured a very beautiful and liberated young woman, with masses of long hair that flowed over her shoulders and gently caressed the points of her nipples. One man bent before her in a position of submission, one hand reaching out to her beseechingly. His other hand was already clasped firmly behind his back encased in a handcuff held by another man whose erection was angled suggestively towards the submissive man’s arse. Another male figure stood behind the woman. His big hands squeezed tight her breasts, as he ploughed her from the rear. It was impossible to look upon the group and not to become caught up in the situation that had created the scene. Kara felt its power deep in her sex. It tugged at that part of her psyche that fantasised about sex with multiple men. She’d never done it. Who had? No one she’d ever spoken to, though among her friends they mostly agreed the idea was hot. Two cocks giving you pleasure instead of one, two erections to play with, so that you could suck upon one while the other satisfied the ache in your cunt.

OK, not all of her friends agreed with her on that. Some of them considered coping with one man hell enough.

Lucky girl, though, whoever the model was. As if Ric sensed he’d hit upon her fantasy, he drew her attention to another image. In this one the same four figures nestled together, their loins and bottoms all perfectly aligned so that they were joined in a lewd chain. ‘Are they?’ she asked. The men were clearly pleasuring the female model from front and back, while the third man also penetrated the arse of the handcuffed man. Kara gave a low groan. She didn’t think she’d ever been so turned on by an image before, but something about it combined with Ric’s nearness grabbed her by the guts and rode her for all its erotic worth. This one she’d definitely like to hang over her bed. Sadly, whatever bed there was in the barn, it didn’t belong to her, and Christopher didn’t share her tastes.

Ric nudged against her as he returned the picture to the floor. For just a moment she swore she felt the ridge of his cock pressing up against the seam of her buttocks. Was he turned on? Did he grow erect looking over his own work? How did he maintain his composure while working? For several seconds she literally ached with the desire to push back against him and discover the truth. If she turned around, would she see the evidence lying trapped behind his fly – would she see it in his eyes? Fleetingly, she wondered if Ric ever photographed himself and, if he did, what parts he bared to the camera.