That Filthy Book (17 page)

My cheeks heated. “It’s a bloody sex stall!” I whispered, eyes wide.

“Fucking hell! Really? On a market?”

“Yes!” I hissed. “I’m going to take a look!”

“Jesus, Karen!” He glanced about nervously.

“What? We don’t
know
anyone here. Come on, it’ll be funny.”

Spotting a break in the crowd, I surged forward and yanked Jacob along behind me. The deep tented area was large, rows of tables set out horizontally, the aisles between them packed with people. I gripped Jacob’s hand so I wouldn’t lose him. It was slow going, shuffling one step at a time to view the items for sale, but God, it was worth it. I wanted to buy everything, but with no room in my case I’d have to buy all these things over the internet once we got home.

“Will you look at
that?
” Jacob said, pointing to a long, thick butt plug with bobbles all over it. “Pleasure or pain?” he whispered.

I thought about it. “Pain, until you got used to it. Those balls would rub your—”

“All right, all right,” he said, darting his gaze about again.

“Oh, stop being so paranoid. No one here gives a shit!”

As the butt plugs gave way to love balls and clitoral stimulators, further up I spied piles of books. It took a couple of minutes to reach them, but they left me in no doubt as to what they contained. Their covers were explicit, and just the sight of men and women in various sexual poses made my cunt clench. I wanted one of the books so badly, just to look at when Jacob was away at work, and, if I was honest, to give me ideas.

I shuffled through them, soaking up the sexiness, my face heated by a hot blush. Not of embarrassment, but of arousal. Thank God the bus would be leaving soon. I couldn’t wait to get back to our hotel. I glanced sideways at Jacob, whose eyes were wide, his mouth curved into a secret smile, then continued my perusal. I found one that was just pictures, a
Karma Sutra
using real people, cocks and cunts on show. I studied them, aroused by the sight of the large erections and glistening labia, and glanced at Jacob’s midsection. It left me in no doubt that he was aroused too. Once I’d reached the last page, I searched for other, similar books. My assault on them was so vigorous, I knocked one pile over. They fanned out over the others, the corner of one making my mouth go dry and my heartbeat flutter erratically. It couldn’t be, could it?

I reached out, slid the book free.

“Oh my God, it’s that filthy book!” I shrieked, clamping my mouth shut as people turned to stare my way. I clutched the book to my chest, memories of having read it steam-rolling into my mind.

“Filthy book?” Jacob asked.

“Um, yes. I read it a long time ago. Before I met you.”

“Let me see.”

He reached out to take it, but with an odd, fiercely protective streak, I wouldn’t let him have it. It remained pinned against me, both my arms crossed over it.

“Karen?”

“Just…just give me a minute, will you?”

I was being irrational, I knew that, but with shame and embarrassment consuming me, I had to have a few seconds to process my feelings. That book, that deliciously filthy book, had been my first introduction to the more adventurous side of sex all those years ago. And now, these last few months, it had been where I’d got my fantasies from. The talking dirty, the rape scenario, being tied up. When those ideas had come to me, when we’d acted one of them out on our first weekend away, it had taken me a while to figure out where the hell they’d come from, but deep down I’d known damn well. I remembered feeling dirty after I’d read this book; that it was wrong somehow to be turned on by such things. The contents of those pages had followed me for days, weeks, months, years it seemed, and being as young as I was, when my friends still giggled at the idea of a boyfriend fumbling inside their knickers, that new knowledge had burnt.

Back then I’d vowed never to read it again, never even to think of it again.

When I’d left home to move in with Jacob, packing up my things had brought the book right to the forefront of my mind again. As I’d taken it out from under my mattress, my cheeks had grown hot, my stomach had bunched, and God, my cunt had flooded. I’d dared to look at it one last time, then shoved it into the bottom of a cardboard box, other books on top of it as if them being there would disguise it, and sealed the sod up tight with wide brown packing tape.

At Jacob’s I’d climbed into the attic, hefting the box up there with me, and stowed it in a dark, far corner. By the time we’d moved again, to where we lived now, I’d forgotten all about it. Jacob had been in charge of shifting boxes around, while I’d made sure our girls, small as they were then, hadn’t got into any mischief amongst the chaos.

Where the hell is that box now?

I slowly prised the book away from my body and stared down at it. The title was in Dutch, but I knew it said
My Erotic Fantasies
. Knew every damn word inside it. Knew that one fantasy had yet to be played out. It filled my mind, and my pussy throbbed, clit aching. I wondered if Jacob would be up for it, considering it was so out of the norm. Most people didn’t do such things, did they? But then, we’d discovered lately we weren’t most people…

Reluctantly I put the book down, took Jacob’s hand, and despite his questioning look, pulled him over to a stall designed to look like a cafe. It was relatively empty, considering the number of people here, and I found us a table at the back, away from eavesdroppers. I had to explain—and find out where that cardboard box was.

I left him seated and went up to the steel counter. I ordered two coffees and a pastry each. Eating would give me something to do with my hands if I grew nervous. And I would be, because I’d never shared my reading that book with Jacob. Hell, I’d buried it deep inside my mind, forgotten about it, but as we’d begun to share things about ourselves we’d previously kept hidden, I’d begun to acknowledge where my ideas had come from. I felt I owed it to him to tell him I hadn’t thought of them on my own.

Back at the table, I placed the scarred wooden tray down and sat opposite him on a white plastic patio chair, my stomach in knots. He wouldn’t think me dirty, would he? Not after the things we’d been doing. Yet the old insecurities came back just the same. This was something I’d read when he wasn’t in my life, and although I knew we couldn’t help our pasts, it felt all kinds of wrong that I hadn’t told him about it. I felt
guilty
, for God’s sake!

“Look, if you don’t want to tell me, it’s okay,” he said, sipping coffee from a polystyrene cup that became distorted in his grip, the rim squashed like a flat smile. “Bound to be things we did before we met that neither of us have talked about.”

I broke my pastry in two. “Have you got any?”

“No, love, but I’m trying to make you feel better.” He popped a sultana in his mouth.

“Oh.” I felt worse. “I want to tell you because, well, it’s a part of me I forgot about for many years, but it all makes sense—why I wanted to do the things we’ve done lately. It makes me feel better to tell you because I don’t want you thinking I made the fantasies up. At first, I thought I had no idea where they’d come from, so I thought I was a raging pervert, but now I know I’m not because I got the ideas from that book and—”

“It’s perfectly normal, love.”

Jacob appeared unfazed, sipping again from his out-of-shape cup and eyeing me over the lip. Once again I was thankful I had him in my life. He understood absolutely everything.

“Men watch porn, right?” he said. “As a teenager I watched it whenever I could, I told you that. Doesn’t make me weird, just your average kid. You giving me a blowjob,” he lowered his voice a fraction after glancing around, “with me directing the pace—I saw that in a porno film and it stuck in my head. Turned me the fuck on, if I’m honest. But I never wanted to bring it up with you because most women don’t like that kind of thing. And I didn’t want you thinking I was some nasty bastard, know what I mean?” He paused to look at me, face flushed, eyes rapidly blinking. “And you reading that book doesn’t make you weird either. It’s natural.”

“But at the time, those things were considered
not
normal. I never would have known people did that kind of thing if I hadn’t read it. And now we’re doing those things, I know they’re not bad, but seeing that book again…”

“Has it brought the shame back?”

“It did at first, but now…” I took a deep breath. “Did you take everything out of the attic when we moved to our house?”

“Yes, love.”

“Everything? I mean, even from the back corners?”

“Yes…”

“So, do you remember a red box of books kept closed with brown tape?”

“No, but I took everything to the new house, so if it was in the old attic, it’ll be in ours now.”

“Right. Good.”

He widened his eyes. “Ah, that filthy book is in our attic, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “Do you want to read it?”

“Damn right I do.”

A frisson of excitement nipped my insides. “See, once I saw the book again, I remembered something. There’s this thing, something we could do. I used to think it was filthy, but these days… God, I want to try it out. I want to experience it. Even if it’s only once.”

“What is it?”

I glanced around the stall. No one was taking any notice of us, but I leant forward anyway. Whispered in Jacob’s ear. Once I’d finished, he sat back, looking at me with the glint I’d so hoped would be there.

“You’d be willing to try that? In a place like that?”

“Would you?”

“Fuck, yes!”

“Shall we…”

“Yes. Yes.”

* * * *

At the hotel, with Jacob lounging on the bed, I sat beside him, muddling through the telephone book at adverts for various places. I had no idea what most of them were for, the language being a huge barrier. Those that had pictures of tools or cups, scissors or houses were easy to work out, but I didn’t think the kind of place we were after would have images beside them to help a person out. Maybe they weren’t even
in
the telephone book.

I sighed, tapped my lower lip with a finger, and walked over to a sideboard similar to the one with the kettle on it. The hotel provided internet access, and a netbook sat waiting for me to boot it up. Okay, it was firmly fixed onto the sideboard with some metal struts so no one could steal it, and I preferred browsing online in comfort, but I wasn’t about to complain. I hunched over it and Googled, finding the information we needed in an instant. A place like the one we sought was only two streets away, and I wondered if it would look seedy on the outside or be nondescript, hiding the delights it offered inside.

“I’ve found one,” I said, looking over my shoulder.

Jacob shot off the bed and stood behind me, peering at the screen over my shoulder. “Fuck, we’re really going to do it, aren’t we?”

I craned my neck to look at him. “We can always back out. Think about it some more. Plan the evening and find a similar place when we get home.”

“No.” He shook his head. “We’re anonymous here. It’s better this way.”

“All right,” I said, scribbling down the telephone number, logging off then snapping the netbook shut. “Are you ringing them or shall I? We’ve got to hope they’re not booked up.” My stomach rolled so violently I thought I might be sick.

“You do it. It’s your fantasy.” He scrubbed his chin, the day’s growth of stubble rasping, and winked.

“Okay.” I picked up the phone and dialled the fetish sex club.

Chapter Twelve

We stood, hand in hand, outside Club Nirvana, staring at the glossy black door and the wide window drawn with red velvet curtains. It said on the website that the exclusive venue was for sexually curious individuals and broad-minded couples—we guessed we fell into both those categories by now.

“You still up for it?” Jacob asked, his voice and face animated by both apprehension and excitement.

“Yes, absolutely.”

And I was, but God, my heart was beating wildly. I was up for the exhilaration, of doing something I’d never thought I would do in my wildest dreams, yet needle jabs of anxiety brought goosebumps out all over my body.

Think of the book, what the author said it feels like…

I took a deep breath and stepped forward, my silver spiked heels loud on the cold pavement. There was no reason not to go in. This was something we both wanted. It was risk free, as far as we could tell, and fate seemed to have once again blown circumstances our way.

When I’d spoken to a lady on the phone, who’d had perfect English, she’d said that as a rule it was a members only club, but for the entire month they were having a special discounted ‘one night only’ offer. Not only that, but when I’d enquired about the
kamer voyeuristische
—oh my bloody good God, a voyeuristic room!—she’d announced it was free at nine o’clock that very evening, our last night in Amsterdam, and the only rule was that we had to be attired in fetish wear.

I was fine with the rule after my shopping spree the day before, but we’d been stuck for Jacob. In the end we’d had no choice but to splurge some cash on a pair of black leather trousers. Hardly hardcore fetish, but I figured with his top off and another addition I was hoping to find in the club shop, he would look the part.