Escape to the Country Read online

  A Total-E-Bound Publication

  www.total-e-bound.com

  Escape to the Country

  ISBN #978-0-85715-333-3

  ©Copyright Lily Harlem 2010

  Cover Art by Natalie Winters ©Copyright November 2010

  Edited by Jess Bimberg

  Total-E-Bound Publishing

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Total-E-Bound Publishing.

  Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Total-E-Bound Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

  The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

  Published in 2010 by Total-E-Bound Publishing, Think Tank, Ruston Way, Lincoln, LN6 7FL, United Kingdom.

  Warning: This book contains sexually explicit content which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has been rated Total-e-melting.

  ESCAPE TO THE COUNTRY

  Lily Harlem

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Burberry: Burberry Limited

  Mercedes: Mercedes Benz LLC

  Harrods: Harrods Limited

  Armani: The Armani Group

  Chapter One

  With Jackie O sunglasses perched on the bridge of my nose and a Burberry scarf around my auburn curls, I chucked my suitcase on the back seat of the car and leapt in.

  “All set?” Tim asked, cracking a grin my way.

  “Absolutely.” I rubbed my hands together in excitement and did a little bounce on the seat. “Can’t wait.”

  He revved the engine twice, hard, and the wheels spun off the gravel driveway, catapulting stones at the grimy brick wall of our London flat. We bumped onto the road and our soft-top Mercedes roared up the gears, showing approval at being taken for a decent ride, and Tim, well, Tim looked more than ready to catch some serious speed after being cooped up in his high-rise office all week. This trip away was all he’d talked about since it had been arranged.

  “You’ll love Matt and Jane, I just know you will,” he shouted over the rush of wind when we hit the M40. “We had such a blast together at Uni. They were always up to something, always the ones with the crazy ideas.”

  I smiled and looked out at the first fields I’d seen in months. He’d told me all this before. “It was kind of them to invite us,” I replied. “It’s just what we need, long walks in the Cotswolds and lazy pub lunches.”

  Tim smiled in that crooked way I loved and reached for my hand. He pulled it to his mouth and his dark stubble scratched my palm as he kissed me. “Lots of long lazy everything,” he said with a naughty boy wink. “And maybe a few quickies too.”

  I felt a twist of optimism in my heart. We could do with some free time to re-connect physically. My shift work and his stress levels had left action in the bedroom infrequent and, when it did happen, unsatisfying—for me at least. An escape to the country would do us good, force us into concentrating on what we could give one another instead of just careering along in the rat race, paddling like mad for the next promotion and pay cheque.

  ****

  Two hours later, at the end of a pot-holed lane, we found ‘Buttercup Cottage’ buried beside a small copse. It had a dense, dusty thatch which lifted like drooping eyebrows over four open upstairs windows and a matching thatched porch which sheltered a red stable door. Bay windows on either side showcased enormous bunches of wild flowers on the inside and, on the outside, held wonky window boxes which tickled the ground with ivy and hit halfway up the panes with overgrown geraniums.

  “It’s beautiful,” I said, instantly captured in a bubble of excitement. “It’s like something from a movie set, or a postcard, or…or a dream.”

  Tim shoved at the rickety wooden gate and I rolled my cerise suitcase onto the cobbled pathway. “Yeah, Matt fell right on his feet with this place when property prices slumped a few years ago.”

  I murmured an agreement and pulled in a deep breath; it was like being at a Harrods perfume counter, only so much better. The heat from the midday sun had warmed all the floral scents and they slipped up my nose and over my tongue like syrup. Jasmine, lavender, rosehip, lilac—it was a cacophony of delight for my smog-ridden senses.

  I was just about to comment on this delight when the front door burst in on itself. Out of the shadows stepped a tall, tanned guy, early thirties, dressed in a pair of aquamarine swim shorts and leather flip flops. He had wide, defined shoulders, a mop of dark blond hair, which looked damp, and the smoothest, broadest chest I’d ever seen, so perfectly silky it must have been freshly shaved and expensively moisturised.

  “Matt,” Tim called as he dodged round me.

  Matt’s face crinkled into a grin. He took two ground-eating paces up the path, flung his arms around Tim’s shoulders and slapped him heartily on the back. “How you doing, old mate?”

  “Great to see you,” Tim said, giving his friend an equally forceful slap. “Thanks so much for inviting us.”

  “No, no, thank you for coming. We get so bored here on our own weekend after weekend. It’ll be great to have some new blood in the place.” Matt snapped back from Tim and turned his attention to me. “And this must be the delectable Annie.” He stepped up and cupped my face in his big hands, his voice dropped low. “I’ve heard so much about you.”

  “Hi,” I said, looking into eyes so blue they could have been chipped from an ancient glacier. “Nice to meet you, Matt.” I swallowed.

  “The pleasure is all mine.” He bent his head and kissed me full on the mouth. Not a quick peck and not a deep, tongued affair. But a heavy, passion-infused kiss that covered my lips and continued for several long seconds.

  I stood there dumb, in shock, arms hanging at my sides. Matt had so over stepped the mark of a polite greeting. Was I complaining? Hell no, the guy was cute, and like his garden, he smelt divine, sun cream mixed with a tangy fresh male scent. But as he pulled away, it flashed through my mind that my longed-for weekend away could have already finished. If Tim took offence to Matt’s overfriendly greeting, I would be scrambled back into the car and sped up the motorway before I’d seen a single buttercup.

  I glanced nervously at Tim. But he just grinned and pushed a hand through his dark curls. He could occasionally get jealous. In the year we’d been together, there’d been several instances when other men had chatted to me in bars and clubs and he’d warned them off with threats of violence, so this reaction knocked me off kilter. He seemed to almost approve of his old friend cradling my head in his hands, kissing me and gazing into my eyes.

  I looked back up at Matt’s handsome face. He licked his lips, seemingly savouring the fruity flavour of my lip gloss. “Mmm,” he said. “Delicious, Jane is going to love you.”

  The men ducked under the door beams into the cutesy cottage kitchen. I didn’t have to duck—five-foot-two meant you didn’t have to avoid hitting your head very often.

  “Here you go, Annie.” Matt thrust a large glass of white wine into my hand. “I heard wine is your poison.”

  “Thanks,” I said as I looked around. Ornate jugs and bunches of d
ried herbs hung from nails. Chintzy plates circled the room on a thin picture rail. Surfaces were crammed with bowls of citrus fruit, apples and enormous loaves of floury white bread. A basket of earthy, skinny carrots and a punnet of fat strawberries sat at the enamel drainer. A big lead-paned window looked out over a patio, an azure swimming pool and a field dotted with grazing Jersey cows.

  “Wow,” said Tim, walking to the window and popping a beer. “This is fab, Matt.”

  “Yeah, kinda cool, isn’t it?” Matt grabbed a pair of shades from the counter and slipped them on. “I have to pinch myself sometimes to make sure it’s all mine.” He laughed. “Come out and meet Jane. She’s lounging with a Martini, as usual.” He rolled his eyes good-humouredly and headed through a utility room.

  Tim leaned in towards me. “You alright?” he asked quietly, his coal black eyes searching mine.

  “Yeah, great, it’s beautiful.”

  He smiled and gestured for me to follow Matt. “I’m just gonna find the bathroom. Be there in a sec.”

  Stepping back into the harsh light of the day, I squinted uncomfortably. The sun reflecting off the kidney-shaped pool was like a torch beam shining in my eyes.

  “Annie.” Matt’s voice boomed from a under a red parasol attached to the side of the cottage. “Over here.”

  I peered into the glowing red shadows. Rising from a luxurious wooden lounger was a tall, impossibly elegant woman with sinewy, ballerina limbs. She had an enviable fluidness to her movements as she slipped into flat sandals and glided towards me.

  As she stepped into the sunlight, her hair remained as scarlet as it had under the parasol. Her poker straight bob was a dynamic, boldly artificial colour chopped a fraction above her shoulders. She wore nothing but a tiny pair of bright yellow bikini bottoms with big looping bows at her hips. I noticed her thighs didn’t touch at all, not even at the top. There was just a neat straight line separating her legs that suggested only a hint of the intimate flesh beneath.

  “So glad you could come, Annie.” Her voice was like milk and honey, rounded and plumy. “I’ve been looking forward to your visit all week.” She stopped right in front of me.

  I smiled. “Thanks for inviting us.” I tried not to stare at her bare breasts, but since they were only a foot from my face and just below my eye level, it was hard not to. They were, like the rest of her, utterly perfect. Unlike mine which were on the large side with darkly tinged nipples, hers were small and pert. There was a solid weight to the under curve but it didn’t drag them down; just made them the perfect size for a palm to cup. Her nipples were the most delicate shade of petal pink I’d ever seen. It was hard to tell where her pale flesh ended and the areola began. They were erect too, hard little points looking up to the sky.

  My mouth went dry. Aware I was studying her a little too closely, I fumbled for words. “Tim, has er…just nipped to the bathroom.”

  She rolled her dove grey eyes. “He always did have a weak bladder.” She laughed then, a delicate tinkle. It was quite contagious and I smiled with her.

  “Isn’t she gorgeous?” Matt said, walking up behind Jane and resting his hand on her waist.

  “Yes.”

  “Yes.”

  Jane and I had answered his question in unison and he tipped his head back and let out a deep rumble of a laugh. “Excellent,” he said. “Couldn’t be better, excellent stuff.”

  I shifted my feet and took a sip of wine. Felt an irritating heat rise on my cheeks.

  “Oh, so sweet,” Jane said, her neat angular features softening in amusement. “She’s blushing.” She tipped her neck down and grazed her lips across first my left then my right cheek. “So sweet,” she murmured. “So, so sweet.”

  My heart beat against my chest like a captive butterfly. I’d never been attracted to a woman before, never been hit by someone’s sexuality the way Jane was hitting me with hers. There was nothing subtle about it, but at the same time, it wasn’t demanding. It just was. It was there.

  “Tim.” Jane suddenly sidestepped round me, halting my examination of the tiny galaxy of freckles sprinkled on the bridge of her nose. “Tim, darling, so great to see you. You look fabulous…as always.”

  I turned to see Tim strolling across the patio minus his t-shirt. Dark coils of chest hair tapered into a neat line which disappeared under the low waistband of his jeans. His torso was wasted in the stock exchange—he should have been earning his millions modelling for Armani. “Jane.” He grinned, holding out his arms. “It’s been too long.”

  They came together in a tight, genuine embrace. Tim went so far as to lift her off the ground in a sweeping three-sixty swing. She squealed daintily and squeezed her arms tighter around his neck. He set her down, and they beamed as they kissed one another’s cheeks and exclaimed how amazingly well the other looked.

  They kept their chests pressed together as they conducted this ritual. I was fascinated. Rather than feeling insanely jealous that my man had a beautiful, practically naked woman attached to him, I felt excited. I felt curious. I wanted to know what it was like to have Jane’s alabaster breasts pressed against my bare skin. I already knew what it was like to be pressed against Tim—I’d done that a million times, I loved it—but what I wanted to know was did her peaked little nipples press hard like pencil points or did they soften and flatten like disks?

  I watched Tim run his hands down her long, graceful back. His fingers dipped into the arch of her spine and rested a whisker above her miniscule behind. I took another slug of wine. Her skin was sheet white, not a blue vein or red blemish in sight. It was flawless, like porcelain. I wanted to touch it.

  Finally, they released one another.

  “I’ve invited Teresa and Carl over tonight,” Jane threw in Matt’s direction.

  Matt raised his left brow and a ghost of a smile travelled over his lips. “Good.”

  “They’re our friends from the village,” Jane went on. “Carl did some electrical work for us last year.”

  “And Teresa keeps an eye on the place when we’re away,” Matt said, swigging from his beer. “They’re a nice couple, very…er, obliging.”

  Jane looked down at her left breast, brought up a hand and swept it over the entire mound, once, twice, three times. “Pesky insect,” she muttered.

  Lucky insect, I thought.

  ****

  I decided to make the most of the evening sunshine and take a swim as Jane and Matt prepared dinner. I offered to help but was shooed out the kitchen with exclaims of, “Absolutely not, you’re on holiday, Annie. Go and have fun.”

  The water was deliciously cool on my sizzling body and I did several fast laps to use up adrenaline. An afternoon watching Jane’s every move like a starving hawk watched a mouse had done seriously strange things to my thought process, not to mention my libido.

  “Why didn’t you take off your bikini top like Jane did?” Tim asked, swimming up behind me at an Olympic pace. I thought I’d been alone and his presence dragged my thoughts away from Jane sitting with her legs wantonly stretched apart on the lounger.

  I turned, rested my back against the tiles and dragged in a calming breath. The water tickled at my shoulders. “Because my boobs are nothing on hers. Hers are so perfect.”

  Tim glided right up to me in the water, a lusty glint in his eyes. “I think yours are perfect,” he said with the deep huskiness his voice took on when he thought about sex. “I like a decent handful, not just enough to nip between my thumb and finger.” As he spoke, he delved his hand into my bikini top and gently squeezed my generous flesh. I melted into his touch and imagined myself doing the same to Jane. Squeezing and releasing her delicate buds. Catching her nipples between my thumb and index finger and teasing them to puckered twists of skin. Playing with them until they couldn’t get any harder and she groaned in part pain, part ecstasy.

  The erotic image made me sigh and I fluttered my eyelids shut, wishing Tim would treat my nipples with the same roughness I would Jane’s.

  Tim s
tepped between my legs and pressed a steely erection against my stomach. Lightning fast, his other hand travelled over my submerged behind, lifted my right leg and hooked it around his waist.

  “Tim,” I said, opening my eyes.

  “What, baby?”

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m just about to bury myself deep inside you.” His mouth searched for mine and his tongue dipped in.

  I put my hand on his chest and pushed him away. “Not here, not in the pool. They’re in the kitchen, they’ll see us.”

  He grinned. “No, they headed upstairs a few minutes ago, either to get changed or do the same thing we’re going to do.” His mouth found mine again as he shoved his swim shorts down to release his penis. I glanced at the kitchen window. It was dark and I couldn’t see any movement. I looked up at the bedroom windows as Tim pulled aside the crotch on my bikini bottoms. The end window had the curtains drawn and the window was tight shut. Tim was right, they’d gone upstairs. They were no doubt going for it right now, curled around one another, sweaty and urgent, fucking like animals, sating one another, licking one another, trying to hold onto their calls for more because they had guests in the house.

  I felt the smooth head of Tim’s cock slip through my dark pubes towards my pussy. I wondered what colour pubes Jane had. Was she naturally a redhead and enhanced it with the bottle to get a more striking look? Or was she a blonde? Or maybe a brunette? Brunette was unlikely with her paper white skin and amber freckles, but blonde was a possibility.

  Tim groaned as he entered me, the water easing his way. . I didn’t get the usual delicious stretching I normally got when he invaded me. It was just a filling sensation. The friction was missing.

  “Fuck that feels so good,” he said, nibbling my ear. “So fucking good, Annie. You’re so fucking good.”

  I murmured a response, shut my eyes and grabbed hold of his wide biceps, which bulged as his hands gripped the tiles on either side of my head. His hips jerked me upwards and my back jarred against the hard wall of the pool. I let out a groan of discomfort which he took as encouragement and repeated the action.