‘Oh my god, don’t,’ Ash laughs. ‘You mean like, selling feet pics?’
‘I’d pay. Look at these toes! Slender, even toes, all in proper size order …’
‘Aren’t all toes in size order?’ Ash asks.
‘No, I mean this one,’ Luis says, wiggling her second toe. ‘Sometimes it can be longer than the big toe. Yours go down in order.’ He hits them, one by one. ‘Boop, boop, boop, boop, boop,’ he says, oddly proud of himself. ‘It’s very sexy, good feet. Clean, no hard skin, nice painted nails …’
‘I didn’t know you were a foot guy.’
‘I’m an everything guy,’ he laughs, and Ash makes a show of sighing and shaking her head, as if such a comment makes her feel less special. He catches on quickly, and so adds, ‘Not aneveryoneguy. But for what it’s worth: I’m definitely a you guy.’
‘I’ll bet you say that to all the girls.’
‘Only the ones with good feet.’
Ash pulls away from him so she can playfully issue a kick, pulling a face for good measure.
‘OK, OK,’ says Luis. ‘No more feet chat. But please, let me keep touching them. Please?’ He gives her puppy dog eyes. ‘I can’t be the only man to have told you your feet are a very big selling point.’
Ash kicks him again and pulls her feet under her, as punishment. ‘They have, as it happens,’ she says. ‘But only after my flexibility, athleticism and general charm.’
‘Of course!’ says Luis. ‘And how wet you get. I don’t think I have been with a woman who gets this wet before.’
Ash covers her face with her hands. ‘Luis!’
‘It’s a good thing!’ he says, moving up the bed to put his face up against hers. He brushes his nose against her cheek and practically purrs, ‘It’s a very good thing.’
He trails kisses down to her mouth until they’re locked in a long, sensual kiss, his hand at the back of her head, all the better to drink her in with. Ash submits more than willingly – ravenously, in fact. From that first kiss on the street outside CoLab, Ash has promised herself that a new rule to Spring Fling with Life is that in sex, she will not play follow the leader. She will not read the mood of her partner and try to match it, perform like a porn star for the sake of his ego and to the detriment of her orgasm. No. Because in Lisbon she tries new things, sex with Luis sees her try a new side of herself, and that self is horny, unselfconscious and self-possessed. This version of herself is not passive, but proactive, and so as Luis kisses her and Ash gets even more turned on, she moves her weight to straddle him, to be the one in control.
‘Olá,’ Luis says, looking up at her from where she sits on top of him.
‘Olá,’ Ash grins.
‘You’re so fucking hot. Do you know how hot you are?’
Ash doesn’t reply, but if she was going to, she’d say shefeelshot, sensing Luis hard underneath her, slowly grinding on him, controlling what happens next. He moves a hand in front of her to softly brush between her legs, forcing her to buckle at the sensation. Maybe she’s not as in control as she thought.
‘You know who else thinks you’re hot?’
‘Who?’ murmurs Ash, reaching for the pack of condoms on her bedside table and opening the packet with her teeth. She needs Luis inside of her now. She can’t be teased any longer, she’s still too sensitive after their first fuck.
‘CJ,’ Luis says, quietly, as Ash pinches the tip of the rubber and uses her other hand to slide the condom down his shaft. He twitches at her grip, throbs.
In another circumstance, Ash might laugh at this, the bringing up of CJ when she’s holding him in her hand, or splutter out a ‘What?!’ But she doesn’t. Something about how he says it lures her into curiosity – she’s a truffle pig happy to roll in the dirt. It’s peculiar, mentioning CJ, but for all her negative feelings about the woman, it does have to be said, Ash is still nosey about her. Why? Who the hell knows. But the fact remains: she is.
‘Oh really?’ Ash asks, voice smooth as honey, the total opposite of what her heart is doing, which is beating erratically and strong.
‘Really,’ whispers Luis. ‘You saw her looking today, you know what I’m talking about …’
‘I think she was looking at you,’ Ash whispers back. She shifts her leg so that she’s wrapped around him again, and as he enters her she gasps. Cheek to cheek, she can feel Luis smile as he rocks his hips towards her, going deep.
‘No, no,’ he insists, Ash slowing the pace of their swaying to unhurried, drawn-out. She circles her pelvis so that Luis glides in and out, in and out, and now it’s his turn to groan. ‘Shit.Isso é bom, Ash.’
‘I like it when you say my name.’
‘Ash. Yes.’
‘Good,’ she utters, breath deepening. And then, because she feels like it, because she doesn’t want to stop talking about CJ, she says, ‘What do you think CJ would say if she could see us right now? Do you think she’d keep staring as we fuck?’
