West-End Boys (Naïve Mistakes) (3 page)

"Anyway, if you must know, your Raphael guy was never the sharpest coke in the crack-pipe. They'll have him soon. I knew they wouldn't need my information anyway."

"And you know this how?"

He shrugged, smirked. "Like I said, I'll be consulting on how to hack."

"You
hacked
the NYPD?"

"I admit to nothing. Although, the correct abbreviation is the NCIC?"

"Huh?"

"National Crime Information Centre. Central US database used to consolidate all data everywhere about every citizen so as to limit that citizen's rights for all his life no matter what steps he or she takes to reform himself from here on out and forever. As they say: Once a criminal, always a criminal. Lovely philosophy."

"Damn, you have it hard against these guys, don't you? I'll be sure to avoid that topic in the future."

"Not the guys, the institution. And, well, maybe one or two of the guys... But I warn you, if you keep me talking about it, the warmness you feel now will be as cold as the snow outside any second." Pause. "If you must know, I hacked no such thing. I'm only taking the piss out of you. I have friends."

I rolled my eyes, answered instantly. "Oh, that I know! And good friends they are! How's Trey?"

"He's good. Has access to lots of useful databases." He smirked.

"You know he and I will be spending lots of time together soon, don't you?"

"I do, which is why I intend on keeping my promise with you and dazzling you with my skills over the next two weeks so that that dark and sexy man's hands on your skin won't ignite your fires..."

Conall had me at 'dazzling.' And my skin was already ignited...

"Where did you take a shower before you arrived here?"

"A man never reveals his secrets."

"I thought that was said of a woman?"

He shrugged. "I just wanted to be ready for you. And I have friends in this town. I stopped by and jumped in their shower."

"You have friends everywhere."

He thought about that. "Yeah, I guess I do. Now, eat quick, baby. I can't explain how much I've missed you. And how much I want you. And you sitting there naked is not helping."

-4-

I did eat quick. And drank quick. Drank three glasses of wine and I was swaying and mellow.

Conall stood, locked his eyes on me while he eased off his boxers behind the counter. He prowled around the kitchen island, sauntered over to me, standing at attention, his cock so hard and shiny that I felt it like a punch to the gut. Thank goodness I was sitting.

He turned me around in my stool. My vag was as slick as a melting ski slope. He eased me off it. It felt like I'd had a whole bottle to drink. But it wasn't the wine. It had been Conall's scent, his look, his pheromones and the sparkling ceiling lights reflecting off his curved body.

My feet landed on the ground but I stood only because Conall's hands held me up by the waist. He eased them up my skin, fingers fanned, then around over my stomach, up to my breasts. He squeezed them, moved down and kissed one. Licked the areola, bit my nipple.

I bit my lip. Gave a squeaky gasp.

He pushed me against the counter. My head fell onto his shoulder. My left leg opened, automatically, my toes grazing the ground as I prepared for him to enter me again. I placed my foot on the stool. He could do me all night, all morning, all of the next day, I thought. I wanted him, wanted all of him inside me. Again and again.

When his fingers grazed my crotch I almost heard the liquid drip onto the ground.

He moved closer to me, grazed my pubis with the tip of his cock, kissed my neck, my shoulder. Bent his knees slightly. The tip of his manhood scraped me.

And then he speared me.

Right there, while I was standing.

My legs gave way. I held onto the counter behind me and he held me up by the waist. He pushed up into me. I didn't know how I was still standing. He was so huge inside me, so warm and powerful. He thrust into me, each stroke weakening me, making me forget, bringing me closer and closer to him.

He slipped himself out. I looked down at him, saw my wetness on his head and the glistening moisture. I eased him back, went onto my knees. He started to hold me up with his hands but I didn't care about tasting myself on him, tasting us. I wanted him, wanted all of him in me. I put him in my mouth, eased down, slid my tongue up and around the length of him. Sucked him. Sucked him until he groaned. I caressed his balls, each one, side to side. Massaging.

I moved my head lower, to his sac, saw him throb and tense. I licked his left ball, caressed it, saw his knee quiver. I pressed his taint, licked his other ball, then flattened my tongue against his cock and laved up, licking all of him, letting my saliva drip down his shaft like honeydew.

And I put him in
my mouth again. He was red, pulsing, veins popping and shiny. His salty pre-come lit the juice-valves in me. My breasts clamped up, tightened and hardened so that it felt like they were exploding out from underneath my skin. My stomach rose to my lungs, knocked at it and I felt myself tighten down below so much that it became an actual ache, needing that
snap
of release right now.

I bobbed up and down, each time wanting it more and more for myself. I pumped him, started touching and rubbing myself below with my fingers, desperate for release and freedom.

Conall groaned. "Oh, Leora. Oh, fuck."

He snapped his arms under my armpits, virtually
flung
me onto the bed! I moved back, eased my head onto the pillow and widened completely for him.

He'd hardly landed on the bed when he was immediately inside me.

And there we were again. Fresh as if it were the first time. And he rode me. He wasn't soft. He wasn't gentle. He was mad and wild.
Doing
me like the man he was, slamming into me so hard and yet so perfectly that every thrust felt like sugared candy melting on my tongue.

I started to moan in blissful ecstasy, felt my hands scratch his back, dig into his skin. He slammed and pumped and raised the rhythm so that the ceiling moved, the bed moved, the fire moved and the whole goddamned
floor
moved as his cock reached my furthest regions and I—

There was a pause. An indistinct, ethereal, somewhere-else-but-here-at-the-same-time pause. I remember this: Silence, total and utter silence, as if our breaths had been sucked in together at the same infinitesimally small moment, as if our thrusts had moved in the same direction at that precise instant of time. There was no sound, no movement.

Until there was.

It detonated like the mountains themselves had been TNT'ed from the ground up and all the sound travelled around the earth twice and then back.

It was all I heard, nothing else, no breathing, no sighing, no crying, no moaning—just thundering growls, animalistic roars as he devoured me and I devoured him and we became, again, one. Completely one. Totally and utterly united.

He pulsed inside me, filled me with his seed. I squeezed him, bit him, slammed my fists against him and clutched his pelvis with my legs.

When we finished, it felt like a new beginning.

-5-

We did it in the shower, rainwater drizzling down my brown hair as well as beading on his magnificent chest. We did it against the wall of the bathroom after that, on the couch in the lounge, on the kitchen counter. We slept on that couch, once I even slept on the counter. We ordered out, ate the leftover roast, drank the wine and got the chalet staff to bring us more. We did it on the rug, the one-seater, again on the rug, the bed, missionary, from behind, me on top, then underneath.

All of it was different, and all of it the same. Beautifully the same. It was love, unadulterated love. Like you hear about in the movies, in all the books you've ever read.

It was Conall and me. Leora and Conall. Conall and Leora.

Us.

He was my mine. We were each other's. He would forever be my first. No matter what happened, that would never change.

-1-

"Motherfuck, look who rose from the fiery depths of the dead!" Kayla sat at a wrought-iron table outside a coffee shop, Brad at her side and Alex on the other. They were clothed in painfully lurid parkas and snow-shades and furry hats, all sipping on espressos or cappuccinos.

"Hello to you, too," I said.

Kayla lowered her silver shades, looked up at me. "
Three
days? All I can say is...congratu-fuckin-lations!" Kayla stood up and hugged me like I was the prodigal son, embarrassing the shit out of me in the process.

"Conall," she said, tipping her head to him. She shook his hand like a father congratulating the man who'd just married his daughter.

Yeah, Kayla always had my back.

"Could we make this any more embarrassing?" I asked.

"Oh, yes we could. Waiter!" she shouted. "Champagne for the deflower—"

"Kay!" I slapped her knee. She grinned mischievously.

"Hey Leora, how ya doin?" Brad tipped his chin up at me, shook my hand. "Conall, we got a little business to talk about when you got da time." He and Conall shook hands. Conall sat back in a chair, closed his jacket to protect himself from the biting wind.

"Is there a reason we're all sitting outside in the middle of winter?" said Conall.

"It's not the middle of winter, it's Spring," Alex replied.

"It's the Alps! Spring only starts here in late July!"

"Well, it's a clear sky, so we decided to catch some of the sun. Besides, it gives us a good excuse to load up on the hard rum because we're cold." Alex winked at me, looked at Conall.

We all caught Conall up on our escapades. It was the first time the five of us had sat together and chatted like the cast of
Friends
or
Sex and the City
. Brad and Conall had spoken privately in the UK before, of course. Brad had jumped at the opportunity to work for him. It had only taken one statement from Kayla saying she was gonna stay in the UK with me for a while for Brad to come following her. The man was in love. And he was good for her. That much was clear.

Of course, Brad, Kayla and I had also hung around at Conall's place after they'd moved into the unused cottage. And then Kayla, Alex and I hung out in London a lot. But this was the first time all five of us sat back, chilled, sipped coffee, rubbed our hands and started forming a history
together
. A history I wanted to keep going. These were my friends, my closest friends. My life was with them.

Conall told Brad they'd catch up on business later. Brad sat quietly, his burly arm around wild-haired Kayla. She'd dyed her shaved-on-one-side hair orange for our trip "because the Swiss like orange." (She knew very well that was the Dutch, but she would just fight me on it if I mentioned it, so I kept quiet.)

The champagne came and we popped it open, toasted to my nights and days of 'deflowering,' although Kay was kind enough to toast to friendship aloud, but I knew what she was really toasting to. At the end of it Conall told us he had meetings all day and I,
whoopee
, had another day of skiing instruction planned.

Alex looked about as excited as me about it and we only had a few days left here so we decided to face the facts—we were never going to win the Snow Olympics Ski Jumping event—and opted to have our money stolen by all the overpriced tourist stores in the area instead. I kissed Conall goodbye
—it felt so good to be able to do that with someone—and Alex and I headed off to
Swarovski
and other over-priced gems in the tourist shopping street.

Being May, the air was crisp but the sky clear. Flowers were popping up in some spots, the grass showing where slush had melted, but snow still covered the shaded areas. We took a stroll along the gushing Matter Vispa River, got creeped out by the Climbers' Cemetery (a lot of people died climbing that damned mountain!) and finally chilled out for drinks in the mid-afternoon when we couldn't walk anymore.

Alex looked better, happier, calmer.

We sat at a coffee place called
Matt's
. Inside. The place smelled of cake and was full of tourists, even at this time of year.

"I met someone," said Alex. She smiled, her face glowing so much that the scar on the side of it almost disappeared.

"Really?"

She nodded, looked around shyly like she was fifteen. "And he's hot!" Her eyes bulged.

"Who?"

"We met about a week ago. He works at the hotel. Bartender. I got a lot of free drinks by the way. Really hot. Anyway, I found myself gravitating there every night after
Chillout
. We chatted a lot, regularly. And we also
didn't
chat." She raised a knowing eyebrow. "Then, with you and Conall being, um, you know, busy, and Kayla and Brad being together up that damned mountain all the time, well, I took some time off for myself. Pedro noticed and took some days off himself and spent them with me."

"Pedro?"

She grinned, saw my interest. "He's Portuguese. Dark. Dimpled smile." She chuckled. "Anyway, at my age, that's all bullshit anyway. And I've been through so much crap in my life that I don't just need some sexy boy to keep me happy. But it's a bonus. He's more than that, so much more. He listens, talks to me, seems really interested in who I am..."

She looked outside, wistful, taken away by the romance of the mountains surrounding us, the conifers, the log cabins.

"Damn, you look smitten."

Her cheeks rouged. She shrugged. "I might stay here for a bit after you guys leave. He can't leave because of work. I'm not even sure if I'll ever go back to the UK."

My stomach sank. "You like it here?"

"Who wouldn't?" She blew down on her hot Gluehwein. My cappuccino had also arrived. "So, he's got like that permanently tanned look of someone who's lived
his entire life under the sun."

"Tall?"

"I said he's Portuguese, not Norwegian!"

I chuckled. "Who'd have thought you'd meet a Portuguese guy up here of all places?"

"Girl, half this fucking town is Portuguese! It's like the second-largest community up here. They're the ones speaking that language that sounds like a mix between Italian and Russian."

"Ahh!"

I felt a sudden pang of loss in my chest. I put my hand on hers, smiled. She could see the fear in my eyes. "Thank you," she said.

I frowned, confused, then I understood. I remembered the day she'd collapsed in her hotel room in London, the ensuing night we'd spent together. "And thank you," I told her. She'd returned the favor to me many times over since then.

"You've become like a younger sister to me, Leora. Although, I think you're far more mature than I am! But at least age-wise, you're my little sister. We'll never lose touch. I promise."

I looked down, felt my eyes prickle. I felt more for Alex than I had for anyone in New York. The only two people I'd missed after leaving the states had been Kayla and my nanny, Maria. And Kayla was now here with me!

It amazed he how I'd formed friendships in only a few months on this side of the pond that seemed stronger and more powerful than anything I'd ever felt in the states in all my eighteen years that I'd lived there.

"I don't think I would've gotten through these last few weeks without you," I told her.

"Oh, bullshit."

"It's true. Kayla's always been a sister to me. But now you, too. And also how you've known Conall and helped me understand him... All of it."

She rubbed the back of my hand in acknowledgment. "Speaking of Conall, I'll have to introduce him to Pedro." She sighed heavily, looked at the cake-stand.

"Why?"

"If you're like my sister, he's the mean brother, ready to beat up all my boyfriends."

I started laughing.

"Anyway, the more I think about it, the more I see mine and Conall's relationship as having always been just that. You know, siblings. I was never interested in him. It was weird. And it wasn't because I was into all my shit—you know, the drugs and stuff. I just... At one stage I thought maybe I was even gay—"

"He also thought that," I said, not even thinking. "Oh, sorry."

"No, it's fine. That's funny! Yeah, I mean, he's
hot
. So hot. And rich. And even though he makes his own money now, you know, he was rich already when I knew him. But there was never anything there for me. I guess what I'm saying is: I've always wanted to believe in that shit, you know, 'the one.' I always thought it was a load of crap. But it's the only thing that makes sense to me now. At least now it does... I'm rambling, sorry, whatever." She waved her hand.

I noticed my mouth was slightly agape. "You. Are. So. In Love!"

She shook her head, put her hand to her forehead. "Fuck it. I'm screwed."

"So, this Pedro, you think he's 'the one'?"

She paused, thought. "Well, that's what I'm not sure of. Maybe he is. Maybe he isn't. I mean, he's sweet. And he makes me feel cared for. He's also
really good
in—" She stopped abruptly, smiled embarrassedly. "I don't know. But I just feel like I'm getting somewhere now. Maybe he's the one, maybe not. But he makes me happy. I need happy. I need to get my feet wet again. Try and live a 'normal' life. And this is a good place to do it.

"I haven't been happy in so long."

Her brown eyes gleamed with hope, bright and wide and liquid fresh. Her dirty-blonde hair look suddenly golden.

"I invited him to
Chillout
tonight," she said.

-2-

Chillout
was Kayla's favorite Après Ski. I'd never heard of that shit before Switzerland.
Après Ski
is just a friggin fancy word that ski-freaks like to use for nightlife! We'd all hung out there after skiing most nights—or not skiing, as the case may be.
It
had style, real style. Some of it was typical club, some of it not: Loud, thumping music; muscled waiters in bow-ties; tall waitresses in bikinis—also with bow-ties. The place was a furnace from all the body-heat. Rainbow strobe-lighting cut the dance-floor and lit up faces and sweating skin.

We were standing at a table—Brad, Kayla, me and Conall—when Alex sashayed in, donned in a glittering dress, Pedro's arm looped around her waist. Yes, he was dark—including dark eyes and dark hair—and absolutely handsome. He was taller than me. Everyone's taller than me. But he was a little shorter than Alex, just a little.

Alex did the intros and I could see after some time that Conall liked him. That was important.

Kayla was pissing it up and urging Brad to go on and dance with her. But Brad looked concerned. He whispered in Conall's ear and Conall made a barely noticeable nod, then gestured ever-so-casually with his eyes for them to stroll on over to the bar and talk shop.

Because of course they'd be talking shop, what else would it be?

Kayla took her long drink under the strobe lights of the dance floor and partied it up. Pedro nuzzled Alex's neck and teased her with his dimpled smile. Smoke from the smoke machines scratched at my nose.

And Conall and Brad continued to speak at the bar.

Conall stood with drink in hand, looking deadly in a black trench coat he hadn't taken off despite the heat. His mind was elsewhere.

Brad leaned forward on the counter with both elbows. He looked over at Kayla once, then at me. My straw was stuck to my mouth, paying little attention to what I was drinking and complete attention to what it might be that the boys were talking about. A bartender asked Brad what he wanted to drink, Brad didn't even hear him. The bartender walked away to serve a frizzy red-head with a skirt so high I thought it was gonna strangle her.

Brad looked again at me, chewed on a matchstick, then nodded at Conall.

It was like watching a meeting between Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci in
Casino
!

They returned.

"Everything OK?" I asked Conall once he was back at my side.

"Of course, love." He smiled, and there was all manner of deception in that smile. By now I knew one thing clearly about Conall. I could trust him with all my soul. I could do what he said with no questions regarding his loyalty. But I also knew that, if he did lie to me, it would be because of some idea he had that he needed to protect me, or to protect someone else he cared for.

I didn't want to be shut out of that world anymore. I wanted to be a part of it. I wanted him to tell me and involve me. What good is love if you don't risk things
together
?

I laced my fingers in his and put my head on his shoulder, swung his arm back and forth. "Sit," I whispered in his ear, moving a stool over to him. He barely noticed it when I got it under him.

I slid his coat off, watched him as his eyes lingered on another side of the club, but actually on nothing at all.

Brad picked up his beer from earlier and raised it up, "To Switzerland!" he shouted.