Undulate: A Hot Age Gap, Single Dad Romance (Alchemy)

‘You okay?’ Belle whispers from her mat as I belatedly join her in our Saturday morning power vinyasa class. The warmup sun salutations have begun, and she looks the picture of good health in her pale grey Varley ensemble, her hair in a plait and her skin glowing. Rafe probably orgasmed her into a textbook night’s sleep with, you know, a resting heart rate of fifty and three hours of deep sleep.

No mirror is necessary to tell me I don’t look like that this morning.

I drop to the mat and shake my head ominously. ‘Nope.’

I am indeed Not Okay. For starters, I lay awake half the night, tossing and turning, trying to process what the fuck has gone down (pun intended).

First, I dry-hump my gorgeous boss—or the guy who pays my salary, anyway—in his home, with his kids asleep upstairs and a million photos of his beautiful late wife looking on in disapproval.

Second, he lets slip, because he’s absolutely hammered and far too drunk for me to have taken advantage of him, or allowed him to take advantage of me, that he actually ate me out in Alchemy the previous night.

He came onto me last night because he was wasted.

He let his dirty little secret slip because he was wasted.

But on Thursday night, when he did allll the things to me, he was sober.

Sober.

So, no, between attempting to work out what the hell that means and re-cataloguing every sinful, delicious thing Worshipful Guy did to me the other night as things Zach did to me, I am Not Okay.

That was Zach’s mouth kissing a path down my back.

Zach’s hands kneading my boobs. Sliding up my legs.

Zach’s tongue lapping and laving and flicking at my centre, winding me higher and higher.

And Zach’s fingers twisting and crooking inside of me.

Zach jerking himself off while he touched me. Grunting out his own orgasm while I came.

Zach’s face that I ground my pussy against as I writhed in obscene pleasure.

And Zach refusing to finish the job and fuck me afterwards.

Honestly? That last part is the only bit that makes sense.

Nope.

I’m most definitely Not Okay.

Her eyes widen. ‘You can’t send me a text like that and then not answer. I was worried.’

My text may have said something like I AM DYING. UNALIVE ME NOW. It was also peppered with plentiful Edvard Munch screaming face emojis.

‘I’ll fill you in later,’ I mouth as I get stuck into the sun salutations, swan diving into a forward fold.

She rolls her eyes at me in frustration, and I give her my best upside-down shrug.

The class is challenging enough to demand most of my focus, thank God. It’s an intermediate class, but I’m so knackered this morning that the repeated chaturangas and the more confronting poses like side plank have my muscles fatiguing quickly, and I find myself needing to count down each pose through gritted teeth so I don’t collapse.

Afterwards, Belle tugs me out of the studio in her haste to hear my tale of woe. I stumble down the stairs like Bambi and out into the grey skies of Chelsea’s Kings Road.

‘What the hell is going on?’ she demands, pulling her hoodie on.

I sigh. ‘A few things.’

‘Spit it out.’

‘I babysat for Zach last night,’ I begin.

‘Right.’

‘He had a cancer fundraiser to go to and his nanny had food poisoning, so I stepped in. Anyway, he gets home and he’s totally wasted. And he comes onto me. Pulls me onto his lap and kisses me.’

Belle stops stock-still in the middle of the Kings Road and clamps a hand over my forearm to stop me. Her eyes and mouth are comedically wide.

‘You are kidding me.’

‘Nope. It gets worse.’

‘Oh, God,’ she murmurs. We resume our walk to our usual eatery. ‘You didn’t shag him, did you?’

‘I didn’t shag him, no, but—I know you’ll probably tell Rafe, but I’d really rather you didn’t.’

‘If it’s important to you, my lips are sealed,’ she promises.

This is why I love her. I trust one hundred percent that she means it.

‘We were kind of… getting into it, and I was teasing him, saying he’s much more fun when he’s drunk, and he told me that on Thursday night, when he was at Alchemy and pretty much sober, he’d gone down on me at the club when I was blindfolded.’

Her expression is so priceless I wish I could capture it as a meme.

‘He went in?’ is all she can manage.

‘Apparently.’

‘And… what—how…?’

I shrug. ‘I dunno. I was on that ottoman thingy—there’s an older guy who’s there a lot and he lined a few of us up. Next thing I know, someone’s devouring me—like, really lavishing me with attention—but he wouldn’t fuck me afterwards. And apparently it was Zach. According to him, anyway.’

‘Oh my dear Lord,’ she says from behind the hand clamped over her mouth.

I grab her to avoid her being entangled in the lead of someone’s pug and shove her into the café ahead of me.

‘I have many, many questions,’ she says as we stand in line to order at the counter.

‘You and me both,’ I tell her. ‘He dropped that bombshell and I basically ran out of there.’

Once we’ve ordered our oat-milk cappuccinos and an açai bowl each, we head to a table in the far corner. This place is hip and healthy. No bacon sarnies here. Instead, there are turmeric smoothies and coconut chia seed puddings. The entire back wall is a living wall. I position myself next to its glossy greenery and put my head in my hands.

‘Do you think he meant to tell you?’ Belle asks, shoving her tote bag between her feet.

‘Nope. Think it was the booze talking. As soon as he saw my reaction he realised what he’d said and he clammed up.’

She shakes her head. ‘I mean, I don’t know him so well, but this seems so out of character.’

‘Agreed.’

‘It’s got to be his first time in the club,’ she muses. ‘Since his wife passed, I mean. Unless he’s been sneaking in all this time and none of us noticed.’

‘I have no bloody clue,’ I say.

She cocks her head, long, golden ponytail swinging. ‘So, how do you feel about it? It’s a lot to process.’

‘Yeah.’ It is a lot. No wonder I’ve been up half the night tossing and turning. Trying to compute not only Drunk, Hot, and Hard Zach kissing me on his sofa but Sober and Secretly Dirty Zach happening upon me bent over an ottoman at Alchemy and anonymously giving me one hell of an orgasm.

‘I could brush off the kiss,’ I tell her. ‘He was hammered and probably pretty emotional after his evening. He said it was awful. So maybe he just needed some comfort. But to actually go into the club the other night and perform oral sex on me? That’s a whole other ball game.’

Belle nods sagely. ‘You’re right. You don’t just accidentally go down on someone. But he was probably dying to do it. You looked unbelievably gorgeous that night. And he always stares at you.’

‘No, he doesn’t,’ I say, but even as I utter the words, I know they’re untrue. Because he does stare, just not in an admiring way.

More like I’m bothering him. Like he disapproves of me. Can’t quite believe I have the nerve to be so open about my sexuality.

He stares all the time, and I’ve been taking it as disdain, but maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s something else. Something more potent.

Like desire. Wondering. Yearning.

‘Yes he does,’ she argues. ‘I remember that first time I introduced you to him at Alchemy. The poor guy’s eyes were on stilts.’

My memory of meeting him that night is, unfortunately, cloudy. I was far too taken by Rafe and Cal in their priestly garb. Far too envious of the delights that awaited my friend and far too excited about getting through those double doors.

‘Whatever,’ I say. ‘He shouldn’t assume that just because I was in there and blindfolded, it meant he could take me for a ride. We have to work together. It was a massive abuse of trust.’

‘I totally agree,’ Belle says, leaning back so the server can put down our coffees and bowls. ‘Remember when Rafe muscled his way into my first session without my having okayed it? A blindfold isn’t a loophole when they know you wouldn’t approve otherwise.’

The server raises a pierced eyebrow and nods approvingly before backing away.

I giggle. She must hear all sorts. ‘Exactly. They’re so fucking dodgy.’

Belle swirls her spoon through the heart shape on the surface of her foam. ’Dodginess aside. Spill.’ Her eyes flick up to find mine. ‘What do you make of the mysterious Zach?’

I can’t help it. I grin. Because this is the crux of the whole bloody issue.

Yes, he’s dodgy, and damaged, and emotionally unavailable, and a whole other level of inappropriate.

But he’s so fucking hot, it was so fucking hot with him last night, that I can’t seem to pull myself together. My restlessness last night was two percent fury that he thought he could pull a stunt like he did on Thursday and ninety-eight percent agonising over the deliciousness of the memory of being astride him.

Of the picture he made beneath me, his bowtie undone, top button open, my fingers raking through that lustrous, thick hair.

The naked hunger on his gorgeous face.

The entrancing drag of my core back and forth against that monstrous erection of his.

The desperation with which he kissed me.

Invaded my mouth.

Sunk his fingertips as deep into my flesh as he could get them.

If he hadn’t shot his mouth off, I suspect we would both have come in our underwear like that.

‘You like him,’ Belle accuses, pointing her spoon at me before licking it clean.

‘I don’t like him,’ I correct her. ‘I find him hot as fuck. There’s something about all that pain and wounded repression that makes him even sexier than he would be otherwise.’

‘He is very broody,’ she agrees. ‘He’s got that whole Heathcliff thing going on.’

‘Exactly.’ I select some toasted coconut shavings and banana slices off the top of my açai bowl. ‘And, obviously, I can now add dirty to the list. So I’m having a tough time dealing with that combo. It’s, you know, pretty fucking effective.’

‘Mmm,’ she agrees. She does a little shoulder shimmy. ‘It’s delicious. Have you heard from him this morning?’

‘God, no.’ I pull my phone out of my bag.

Oops. I have two notifications. From Zach. Both sent around the start of our yoga class.

‘Shit. Make that a yes.’ I click into the messages and read, angling the phone so Belle can see, too.

I’m so sorry about last night… and the night before. Please can we talk about it on Monday?

The girls adored you. Thank you for babysitting. I realise I meant to pay you and forgot. I’ll settle up with you on Monday.

Oh, for fuck’s sake. ‘As if I’d let him pay me,’ I mutter. ‘And why does he have to be so proper? I see someone’s rammed the stick back up his arse.’

For reasons I have no interest dissecting, I’m messed-up enough to wish his apology had been more along the lines of I shouldn’t have eaten you but I refuse to apologise, because I can’t control myself around you. Know I will do it again.

I type a stroppy reply, my fingers jabbing unnecessarily hard at the keyboard.

I think you’ve given me quite enough payment already, don’t you?

Take that, oh Sexy Widower with Impaired Judgement.

The two little ticks turn blue instantly.

I’m not surprised when there’s no response.