“So, she around?” said Neville, trying and failing to play it cool.
Brenda opened the door and got out. Despite being nearly a foot shorter, she somehow still managed to loom over Neville. “She’ll be round soon as she’s ready. Thing is, she said we was to start without you. Get you all warmed up like.” She reached out and put a hand on his shoulder.
Neville looked in horror at her hand and then in fear up at the husband sitting up in the van watching. Her relaxed — marginally. The man didn’t seem excited, nor did he seem about to punch his lights out. It was more curiosity, waiting to see if Neville would take the bait. There’d been a time when he wouldn’t have minded being seduced by an older woman, even if Brenda wasn’t exactly fantasy material. She’d was the same age as his mam. They’d were in the same year at school. This seemed tacky. Worse, with Emily on his mind, it seemed flat out wrong.
“I doubt it,” he said, but uncertainly. Was this all a trap? Maybe Emily was miles away, tucked away safely in bed. Maybe this Brenda had called him out here on false pretences, to get her way with him. Why him? Spring chicken or Christmas turkey, the offer of free sex would have men queueing up all the way to the Lancashire border, wouldn’t it? Men a whole lot more masculine than him.
“Now don’t be like that,” she said and her other hand snaked around to trousers. “Why don’t we get you out and ready for when your lass gets here?”
Neville froze and Brenda’s hand lingered. His cock twitched in spite of himself. Not a moment ago, he had been feeling sorry for himself. He’d never been with a woman. It would be so easy to give in — get it done, get it over with. If what Brenda said was true then when Emily turned up they’d be doing exactly what she wanted, and if what she said was false then Emily would never know. But then, if what she said was true, then Emily wasn’t the Emily his soul longed for and if it was false, and, by some miracle, they did get together in the future, he’d always have this lie hanging over him. These mental calculations became all the harder as the testosterone flooded through him and when the harlot leaned up to nibble his ear, he was nearly lost.
“You!” he said pulling back suddenly, “You’re just like what me mam said.”
That stopped the onslaught. Brenda looked genuinely hurt and suddenly the temptress was gone, replaced with a middle age woman acutely aware of her social standing. “What? What did say about me?”
In truth, all his mam had said, once he’d mentioned his encounter in the shoe-shop was ‘That Brenda, she’s no better than she should be’, a common utterance of distain that could mean almost anything. “No, she just…I mean…Leave me alone. I’m saving meself. For her.”
But even as he said the words, he realized that Brenda wasn’t looking at him anymore, but instead looking behind him. He turned.She had arrived.
She wore only the boots he had bought her – from the knee up she was entirely unclad. He’d dreamed about her naked body every night since he had met her. His fantasies barely touched the reality. Her legs, her hips, her breasts, even her shoulders and neckline, were absolutely stunning. Her hair blew free in the wind. She moved toward him. Come to think of it, he’d never seen her move. She’d always been seated there behind the counter. Now she moved like a cat, all confidence and hips. Then, about a hundred meters from them, she stopped.
“Well done. You passed. I’m yours,” she said with an arch smile, but then she turned to face the other direction. “If you can catch me, of course”, she shouted over her shoulder.
Then she was off, running the opposite direction along the road. She started off fast, slowed for a moment as she seemed to realize that chase had not been given, and then dashed forward and away. Neville stood routed to the spot.
Brenda pushed him forward, “Off ye go, ye daft bugger.”
Then Neville found himself running too. The road was little more than a dirt track, stones and pot-holes making it difficult going. She outpaced him initially. She seemed crazy with excitement, while Neville was still getting used to the idea that he was expected to run. As they came out of the tiny wood, she jumped a ditch and was off across the moors. Neville, ever cautious, stopped to check the dimensions of the ditch and, though a good leap would have gotten him across with no problems, he’d lost momentum now and had to gingerly step from bank to bank.
All this meant she had a good head-start on him, but now, on a clear flat section, with the adrenaline starting to flow, he gradually caught up. He had, in fits and starts, made some effort to stay healthy during his university-years, but when final exams had approached, he’d let it slide and not gotten back into the habit. He was regretting that, but still, there was no way he was letting her get away. He considered putting on a burst of speed and trying to end this quickly, but he decided against it. It would be too easy to wind himself. Instead he settled in to a rhythm, playing the longer game. He watched her seeing exactly where she went and where she was slowed by some unseen hindrance beneath the grass.
She suddenly changed direction, thirty degrees to the left, and why wasn’t entirely clear to Neville in the dark. Then he saw it, a hedge up ahead. She’d have to go through the gate. She put one foot on the lower bar, her arms on the top and swung around it in one motion. Neville, being further behind her but able to course-correct at the same time she did, managed to close the distance faster approaching the gate, but then lost these gains as he clumsily tried to scale it.
The moors now descended, initially in a gentle curve and then a steeper drop. The run had to become more of a jog and, on several occasions, nearly became a slide. Even Emily slowed, picking her way down more carefully. Half-way down there was a road. A car was coming and, had Emily stopped, he would have caught her. Instead she bounded across like a gazelle, her naked frame illuminated in its head-lights for an instant and then leapt over the stone wall on the other side of the road. It skidded for a second, stopped, beeped its horn and the driver shouted an angry question. Neville had to wait by the side of the road for it to head on off its way. Valuable seconds lost, but the driver hadn’t seen him and he really didn’t want to have to stay to answer the really rather good question of what the bloody hell they were doing.
He crossed the road and mantled the wall. He couldn’t see Emily, just a cottage with its lights still on up ahead. If he’d lost her then it was game over. Then he found the naked figure, heading east this time, presumably to avoid the habitation. She was moving slower now. Was she tiring or had she deliberately slowed so as not to win?
The car interlude had given him a chance to get his breath back as well and he set off with renewed vigour. With another flat section ahead of him and with Emily nearly knocked down just now, he decided it was time to end this. He lengthened his strides and dipped into his reserves of energy and burst forward with new speed. He was nearly on top of her before she realized, but when she did, she too increased her speed. Nevertheless, they were in the endgame and Neville seemingly had more left than her. He matched her stride for stride just a meter behind.