L'Aimant – Chapter 60(M)
(M-rated version of Chapter 60 of "L'Aimant")
Summary:
A group outing to the flickers proves to be a revelation—in more than one sense.
Set after "Broken Souls". November 1944 onwards.
Chapter 60: Foyle presses on with the uncomfortable task of saving Kiefer from himself.
Disclaimer:
The creative rights to the characters and plotlines in "Foyle's War" belong to Anthony Horowitz. This story is a not-for-profit homage to the television series, to the talented actors who bring its characters to life, and to a fascinating era.
Author's Notes:
This is the M-rated version. For the T-rated version of this chapter, (and indeed for all other chapters of this fic), go to the story entitled, simply, "L'Aimant".
...
Glad to be back with my Foyle/Sam epic. Thank you for your patience. Hello? Anybody out there? Now's the time to leave me a review, and keep me on the straight and narrow.
Chronology in this chapter parts company with canon All Clear. There is method in my liberty-taking.
...
The stair scene is for flybybee.
...
dancesabove gave this her usual care. It's always better after dances.
Previously, in "L'Aimant"
Georgie grinned, reached under her seat, and cheerfully pressed a grease-proof paper parcel into his hand.
"Saved you a sandwich, Christopher. In case you didn't have a chance to eat."
Didn't have a chance to...? Foyle shifted miserably inside his overcoat. It seemed that not one corner of his private life was sacrosanct. He chewed his lip, turning the grease-proof package in his fingers, and contemplated what, if anything, to say. On balance, he concluded that there wasn't much he could say, hemmed in as he was by feminine intuition on two sides, not to mention caught with his trousers down by a spaniel who had tooled his Oxfords into brogues. And so he peeled the sandwich open, mumbled "Rright. Thanks," and tucked in.
"Where to, then?" Georgie timed her question perfectly for when his mouth was full of Spam.
Foyle tried to force the mouthful down, but finding it a little heavy on the mustard, coughed back a spray of crumbs into his fist.
He thought a while. He had intended going to the station; now he was toying with a different idea.
"Ummm... make it the Majestic Hotel?"
"Right-oh!" answered Georgie cheerily, and threw the Wolseley into gear.
Christopher cleared his throat, eyes watering, and turned towards her. "Next time you make us lunch, how about less mustard?"
"Oh, dear," she gave him a sly, sidelong glance. "Don't tell me that you're hot enough without..."
Chapter 60
Thursday afternoon, 3rd May, 1945
"Talk amongst yourself." Foyle's tongue darted to his inside cheek. He twisted in his seat and dipped his head to climb out of the Wolseley.
The jibe sailed over Georgie's head, her concentration far too taken in applying the handbrake for any verbal barb to stick. She'd already offered a distracted "Right-oh," when the proper sense of what he'd said hit home.
"Ooh!" she squeaked indignantly, and ducked to glare out through the windscreen after him. "I s'pose if I talk, then it's chattering. But if he talks..." Not that he talks much, she had to own.
The flight of smooth stone steps led up to a broad, stuccoed portico and gave through into the hotel lobby—a space impressive in its airy opulence. The décor: potted palms, and windows with heavy, double-hung draperies extending nearly to the plushly covered floor; rich carpet (recent pre-war, Foyle supposed, and showing little sign of wear); extravagant light fittings voided, for the most part, of their lightbulbs. The Majestic lived up to its name—a patently well-heeled establishment, and one that Foyle had seldom had occasion to approach, let alone enter, in the run-up to the war years. In any case, his dancing days had died with Rosalind.
He strolled up to reception and produced his warrant card.
"Name's Foyle. I'm a policeman. I believe you have a Major Kiefer staying here?"
The girl, he noticed, didn't even glance down at the register.
"We do, Sir. And you'll find him on the second floor. Room 28."
Foyle raised an eyebrow at the crispness of her tone. "Wwell, thank you. Was about to ask if I might go upstairs."
The corridor of Kiefer's floor was deserted; this was, after all, the middle of the afternoon. On Number 28, a 'Do not disturb' sign dangled from the doorknob. Foyle summarily ignored the thing, and knocked unquietly.
He waited. Then he knocked again, at similar volume. After a moment there was movement from within, and the door creaked open to reveal a sleep-befuddled Kiefer, pinching at the inner corners of his eyes.
"Can't you read, goddammit?"
"You... often sleep your afternoons away?"
Kiefer blinked his vision into focus. "Christopher. What the hell do you want?"
Foyle's lips twisted underneath a level gaze. "Well, since you've asked so nicely..."
Kiefer held Foyle's eyes a moment before lowering his.
"Hey... look, I'm sorry. I'm dog-tired. What can I do for ya?"
"Wull, I'm sorry too, John, but you're proving a hard man to pin down. I get the sense that time is running out on us."
"Ain't that the truth." Kiefer ran a hand through his unruly locks.
"Extended you a dinner invite the other day," continued Foyle. "Here to renew the invitation. Aaand... we need to talk."
"We do?"
"Yup."
"I'm outta practice reminiscing. Beats me what there is to talk about."
"Come to dinner and find out."
Kiefer's slid an irritable hand inside his collar. "What is this horseshit, Christopher? You don't take no for an answer?"
"Well, it's like this, John. You come and eat with us tonight, or else"—Foyle's finger hovered at his temple—"my sixth sense tells me... there'll be a repeat of this scene tomorrow. Hhhate to see a man deprived of shut-eye, when he's so obviously in need of it."
Under the twinkling eye, there was a stubborn set to Foyle's jaw that convinced the other man to yield.
"What time," he spat, "goddammit?"
Foyle canted his head. "Thanks for your cordial acceptance. Seven for half past? 31 Steep Lane. Sam and I will be expecting you."
...
The seafront walk was now familiar to Kiefer, and it was not the place to make a phone call unobserved. Therefore he turned off for Foyle's house more than a hundred yards before he needed to, and hunted down a telephone box out of plain view. Eventually, he found one standing empty along West Street, and, looking round to check that he was unobserved, stepped inside the red cast-iron kiosk. There, he dialled, fed his change into the slot, and pushed Button A.
The call lasted less than a minute, after which he exited the box, turned up his collar against the breeze, and set off uphill.
The door of Foyle's house was opened by the attractive young blonde he remembered from his time in Hastings.
"Ma'am," Kiefer touched his cap. Even before he'd registered the noticeable bump of her pregnancy, the loose clothing and the bloom on Samantha Foyle's cheek would have given the game away. "Good to see you again," he nodded. "Sure been a while," he added, in polite acknowledgement of her condition.
"Major Kiefer! Lovely to see you again. Yes, it's been a jolly long time, hasn't it?" Sam beamed winsomely, standing back to let him in.
Her cheer was open and infectious, and Kiefer felt his stony face crease in a smile. Inside the hall, he removed his cap—with the same flourish, Sam recalled, as she remembered from his entry to her husband's office what seemed like an age before.
"Sure has. Three years since I set foot in town."
"Well, you may have noticed that Jerry has given us quite the roughing up."
"Yes, Ma'am. That's true for all of us."
"There's rather less of Hastings than there was."
"Seems to be more of you, Ma'am," he sent her a warm grin. "Congratulations to you both."
Sam blushed charmingly. "Thank you, Major."
She led him down the corridor, then halted, hand on doorknob, as a thought occurred.
"How is Joe? Private Farnetti?"
Kiefer's smile evaporated. "Not part of my unit any more, Ma'am."
"Ah." Sam tried and failed to read his expression. "Oh, what a shame. I'd hoped you might have news." She blinked, unsettled by his stiffness. "Um, do, please, call me Sam. Won't you step into the sitting room?"
Christopher had primed her in tonight's role of hostess—that was to say, that she would welcome their guest, then disappear till dinner. All that Sam understood of things from her husband was that Whitehall were hoping he could smooth some ruffled feathers with a dose of quiet diplomacy.
Sam sensed already a tension in their guest, in contrast to the easy manner she'd experienced from him in the days before the Susan Davies murder, and again once matters were resolved. She let it ride, however. This was no time to play amateur detective.
Instead, she showed Kiefer into the living room where Christopher was waiting.
Foyle rose, hand extended in greeting. "John. Immensely pleased that you could come."
"Yeah, Christopher. I wouldn'a missed it for the world." Kiefer's answer bordered on a growl, and drew a knowing smile from his host.
All in all, thought Sam, their manner with each other jarred; but obediently, she made her hostess-type excuses, and withdrew to leave them to their business, whatever that might be.
"Drink?" Foyle swept his hand round in an arc to indicate three almost-empty bottles on the bookshelf. One of them contained a bilious green liquid. "Bit low on booze, I fear. Can't recommend the witches brew, but either of the other two...?"
"Here. I brought you something." Kiefer dug into his canvas messenger bag and produced a bottle. "Figured your supplies would be running low."
"You're right. Very kind of you." Foyle mouth twitched as he held the bottle tilted to the light. He gave the bourbon an approving glance, even whilst wishing it were scotch. "Wull, that's one problem solved. Just like old times."
"Is it? You tell me."
Kiefer's defensiveness was undiminished, and his host acknowledged to himself that this was going to be a tricky interview.
"Hhhave a seat." Foyle moved around his guest and plucked two whisky glasses from the shelf. "So you've been in Devon?"
"Yeah. And it rained even more there than it does here."
"Do any fishing?"
"Never got the chance."
"Well, listen, I'm going out on Saturday. Interested?"
"No, thanks, Christopher. I'll pass. I kind of lost the taste for fishing over the years." He rubbed bloodshot eyes with an inward pinch of thumb and forefinger. "Lost the taste for a lot of things," he added sotto voce.
"Wull, mmight be time to find the taste again. Before you leave for home?"
"Yeah?" Kiefer's tone was irritated, verging on belligerent. "And how d'you figure that?"
"The river is a quiet place to think. And talk."
"Trying to do less thinking, Christopher. We can talk here."
"Well, suit yourself." Foyle put the glasses down and bent to reach behind his chair, "'Cos what I want to talk about..." he drew out the envelope containing Eunice Griffiths' evidence, and laid it on Kiefer's knees, "... is this."
Kiefer met his host's unwavering look with questioning eyes. He lowered his gaze, and lifted up the flap.
...
"How did you know?"
Two whisky glasses had been charged, and the two men now sat facing each other on each side of the fireplace.
"How do you think? You don't imagine that your digging went unnoticed? There's a vested interest in keeping this thing quiet."
"Still don't get it. They coulda come down on me like a tonna bricks."
Foyle tilted his head, squinting in the firelight.
"Ssstill might. Mmmy hope is, you'll see sense and drop this, now."
A slow shake of the head, and Kiefer stared into his glass.
"No dice, Christopher."
Foyle sighed and shifted in his chair. "What's your specific beef with Griffiths? I wasn't told the details of his involvement."
The major glared up at him darkly. "How long ya got?"
...
Foyle must have been holding his breath for longer than he realised, for when he finally released it, and inhaled again, he found he felt light-headed. He leaned back in his seat and rubbed one eye, abstractedly.
"John... I... understand, believe me. But wwwould urge you... to rethink your methods. "
"My m—?" Kiefer's head snapped up in frustration. "Hell, they gagged me, Christopher. These are all the methods I got left. Those kids deserve some recognition... they're owed that much. I owe it to them."
"You owe them what, John? Sand in envelopes and tigers pinned to doors? Since when is mental torture any way to right a wrong?"
Kiefer shrugged and made a fastening gesture on his lips. "Since I was told to button it and take a hike, I guess. Call me an awkward cuss, but that'd be a case of 'look who's talkin',' wouldn't it, Christopher?" He fixed Foyle eye to eye.
Foyle grimaced, and his chin slid sideways as he weighed his next move.
"If you agitate this matter further, John, you'll be in a barrow-load of trouble. Not with me, I might add. With far worse than me."
"Yeah? Well, let 'em bring it on; I figured as much. But ya know? You're dead right about the methods, Christopher. Time I squared up to that whey-faced stooge and told him, face to face." He stood and jammed his cap onto his head. "Thanks for the advice. Apologies to Sam. I've lost my appetite. See ya round."
...
Foyle stood disconsolately on the doorstep as his friend—his former friend?—strode down the hill.
A wide-eyed Sam came hurrying from the kitchen, alerted by the sudden commotion in the hall.
"What on earth did you say to him? I was about to serve dinner."
"Think I lost that round." Christopher gnawed his lip.
Sam pulled at his elbow.
"Come inside. It's time you told me properly what's going on."
She led him along the hall. "Come on. We might as well eat in the kitchen, and you can tell me all about it."
When they reached the foot of the stairs, Sam turned. "The Major seemed so out of sorts. Oh, and I asked him about Joe as soon as he arrived, you know? He didn't seem to have any news..."
"Sam..." Foyle rocked on his feet uncomfortably. He placed his hands on her upper arms and looked down. "I'm sorry, Love... Joe's... dead. I think he just wanted to spare you."
Sam's lips formed a silent 'no'. Stepping back from his steadying hands, she reached behind her, blindly, for the newel post beneath the handrail. It eluded her. She lost her balance, toppling backwards and, to Foyle's horror, falling hard against the first four rises of the stairs.
"Jeesus—" Christopher lunged after her. In vain. He ended on his knees between her splayed legs, his one hand grasping a baluster, and the other palm down on the tread next to her hip.
Sam let out a single whimper of delayed fright.
"Christ, Sam," he slid a hand behind her upper back, and levered her towards him gingerly. "Does anything hurt? I'll fetch a cushion. Stay put."
She winced. "I'm a disaster, aren't I? Suppose I'll know when I get up."
Her eyes held his with an expression sad and serious. Neither spoke for a while.
"I can't believe he's gone," lamented Sam, sniffing back tears. "He was so lively, full of mischief. And really an awfully sweet lad, Christopher."
Her eyes pleaded with him to revise his opinion of Joe Farnetti. Christopher had been irritable and dismissive of Joe as they'd sat on the train out of London. Now she was asking him to make peace with his memories.
It was a plea Foyle understood when he met her gaze.
"Wull, you're right, of course. My, ah, judgement... was skewed by personal considerations. Annd... immensely sad this war has claimed him."
Farnetti and so many others... every one of the young men we met at Saints Preserve Us. For now, though, Foyle could not concern himself with lives lost. Circumstance had just demonstrated yet again how any risk to Sam could clamp a vice around his heart and leave him reeling with concern.
She reached for his hand. "We're so lucky, Christopher, to come out of this unscathed, and with each other."
Foyle pressed her fingers to his lips. "I'll fetch that cushion now. Don't get up."
Reluctantly, he pushed himself out of the ambit of Sam's fragrance. As he rose he felt her move as if to follow him, and applied a light, restraining hand. The familiar waft of Coty, with its overtones of natural woman, filled him with an overpowering instinct to care and protect.
"Don't, Sam. No sudden moves. Sit still a while."
Sam sighed. "In that case, turn the oven off," she bid him, ever-practical.
Such mundane matters. But he did as he was asked as quickly as he could, then fetched two pillows from the sitting room, and joined Sam on the staircase once again. By this time, his protective impulse was consuming him. He tried to swallow down his pounding heartbeat and control his shallow breathing as he bent to Sam and slotted one plumped pillow underneath her spine. A second cushion he slipped underneath her bottom, as gently as he could.
"I don't think I'm bruised or anything," Sam assured him, pushing on his shoulders to reposition herself. "Just shaken."
"All the same, stay still, and let things settle."
He perched beside her on a lower tread. The urge was strong, now, to embrace her, but he was unsure how to accomplish this without creating more discomfort. In the end, he fed an awkward arm across her midriff, taking care not to exert pressure, and let his other hand rest on the bare wood of the tread. He found that, if he propped himself against a higher stair and leant in on his elbow, he could allow himself a kiss without disturbing her.
"You gave me a fright, Sam."
"Poor dear!" She soothed him with her lips, then shifted cautiously to gauge the level of her soreness. Things felt all right, so she pulled back and grinned.
"I haven't felt this off-balance since I was a small girl. At junior school, I was forever coming home with skinned knees. All my woolly tights were full of holes."
The image of a small, dishevelled, tomboy Sam—all scabby-kneed and freckled, her untidy plaits askew—made him smile.
"Those knees," he stroked the smooth back of her calf and let his hand slide up and over to caress her kneecap, "are looking in superb repair, these days."
A snag of skin rasped over the precious silk gauze. Sam stroked a thumb across the sturdy sinews, staying his hand.
"You've been tying flies again, my love. Don't ladder my good stockings—which, incidentally, I put on for your absent guest."
Her eyes sparkled in a mild tease, but his disconsolate expression quashed the humour.
"What a mess, eh?" she offered glumly, squeezing his fingers.
"Yep." Christopher closed his eyes, touching his forehead to hers. This war claimed its victims in so many ways—death, maiming, separation, torture; then there was the mental trauma to survivors, turning brave, well-grounded men into embittered shadows of themselves. Foyle's motivation in this instance was to avert the wrath that Kiefer might bring down upon himself. But, thus far, all his efforts to contain a tiny corner of the damage had been a miserable failure.
"Have you lost a friend?" Sam asked him softly.
"Don't know, Sweetheart. Certainly had to own up to what I'm about. Now he'll have to weigh that in the balance."
"Christopher, am I going to have to guess what's caused this? If you need to thrash this out with him inside our home, the secrecy makes me feel like... oh, I don't know... some sort of servant round you."
He pressed his lips to her forehead. "I'm in a cleft stick, Sam. Please don't judge me harshly. Help me."
"I can't help you if I'm in the dark." She wriggled awkwardly, and fought back a wince. "I think I want to get up now. A staircase is a jolly silly place to have this sort of conversation."
"Stay." He pressed his lips against her neck. "Unless the cushions aren't enough..."
"The dinner..."
"Can go hang..."
She tucked her chin against her chest and gave him a stern look—as best she could when his attention was devoted to the gentle curve where neck met shoulder.
"You can't be serious, Darling. Here?"
"Can't I?"
Sam tutted. "This is rather turning out to be the norm with you when you're upset."
He broke from his sweet meal of Sam-flesh. "Take comfort while one can… Fffairly common reaction, 'would've thought, where opportunity presents."
"Not sure how you'd expect me to know what's 'common', Christopher..."
"Wull, quite." He quirked a sly grin. "Mmight have to take my word f'rit."
"...but don't imagine I can't tell a man who's trying to change the subject."
"Mmmaybe." The word was muffled as he kissed below her ear. The spot, he knew, was very sensitive. Indeed, Sam felt him smile around the 'maybe'.
Christopher had straightened his left leg so that he could brace his foot against the floor. Now he felt a tugging at the ankle of his trouser leg. Turning his head, he frowned down at the perpetrator. His jaw tensed.
"'Scuse me for a moment." He reached down and grabbed a scruff of furry neck, then lifted the small body from the floor. Wommel's tail, as usual, was wagging, and the dangling paws swung, unresisting, from his grasp.
He rose and strode into the kitchen, where he planted his charge on the lino.
"You, again." Christopher stooped to push a green enamel tray, containing bowls of food and water, towards his charge. Two saucer eyes blinked quizzically up at him.
"Proper food, tonight." He bent to pat the puppy's rear, encouraging her towards the tray. "No shoe leather on the menu." The timbre of his voice was breathy, light, melodic—a tone he never used in public. "Good girl. Stay."
A parting scratch to Wommel's ears, and he retreated, closed the kitchen door behind him softly, then settled back beside Sam on the stairs.
"Where were we?"
Sam smirked at him. She had strained her ears to listen in.
"You were telling your other girl to stay. And I was explaining how a staircase would be the worst place you could pick for what you have in mind. Even with cushions."
"Rright. Mind-reader, are you?" He rose, and took Sam's hands in his and eased her to her feet, eyes studying her face for any tell-tale signals of discomfort.
"Calm down," she reassured him. "Rattled me a bit, but I'm quite limber now."
His look of desire mingled with relief left no room for misinterpretation.
"Upstairs, then, shall we?" Without letting go of her hand, he started to ascend, and draw her after him.
"The dinner..." Sam mourned briefly. All that effort she'd invested, turning boring staple rations into something vaguely appetising...
But Christopher's mind was on a different course to satisfy his appetite. He climbed a few steps with Sam, then halted her to kiss away her mild objections.
Sam tried to be frustrated with him, but his sweet persistence raised the sorts of feelings that were wrapped up and commingled with the ones she held towards her infant-in-the-making. She found herself enchanted.
Eventually his tugging, punctuated by light, petitioning pecks, brought them via the landing to the bedroom, where the backs of Sam's legs soon felt the soft nudge of the mattress. She cast a nonchalant glance over her shoulder.
"What a surprise to end up here... you're absolutely sure you turned the oven o—"
Foyle's lips claimed hers with less-than-gentle urgency, drawing a small, startled cry-cum-giggle from Samantha.
It wasn't fear of falling—for a strong arm encircled her waist. Rather, it was the force behind the kiss, the greedy ingress of his tongue.
"If you were hungry, there was food downstairs..." she ragged him, when they stopped for breath. "I did a Woolton Pie with Marmite mushrooms."
"Mmind leaving the vegetables out of the bedroom?" This chit-chat was delaying his objective of seducing Sam.
Sam responded to his eagerness, feasting just a little on the power she held over this quiet, controlled, still-waters man who laid his wounds bare for her to salve. Assured of a soft landing, she opted to melt onto the handy bed, and reclined, arms drawn up, wrists next to her ears, legs dangling over the edge of the mattress.
She sent him a lazy glance, eyes dropping to his trousers. "I will if you will. But it's too late for you, I think. You've got a stowaway in there."
Christopher had no need to look. The tightness down there told him what Sam saw.
"You know too much." He knelt between Sam's legs, and held her gaze as he slid both hands under the hem of her smock. There, his fingers skated over the fine silken gauze and garter towards the forbidden fruit of bare thigh. Sam held her breath, arousal growing under the tantalising progress of his fingertips. Christopher's lips parted, savouring each tiny flick of her reaction to his questing hands.
He bent his head and touched a kiss to her bare flesh. The smell of her excitement was a sharp tang in his nostrils; she tasted of Palmolive soap and L'Aimant talc, and heaven.
"You're marvellous, Sweetheart," he breathed. "S'pose you think I'm old rake to want this... now."
"Mother says," sighed Sam, stroking his hair, "that it's the last thing men forget how to do. And she should know."
Christopher's head jerked up beneath her hand. "Ian's barely got eight years on me," he protested in a strangulated tone. "Is this how you and Geraldine dissect us between yourselves?"
"Well, don't blame me, Christopher," she countered pertly, "you're always going on about your age."
"So, my ssseniority's a matter of amusement?" he growled. With a deft flick, he freed the fastening of his waistband, and pressed his thighs against the mattress, parting her knees. His hands delved under her bottom, easing her towards him. "Report for duty."
"Aah! A lesson... in respect?" Sam twinkled, offering all the firm resistance of a pink marshmallow.
Christopher was completely hard now, and freed himself with practised skill, pushing the blue serge trousers from his hips and sweeping aside the barrier of his shirt tails. The feel of flesh and silk against his hips took command of his body. Sam's loose-crotched satin offered only token hindrance, and the dampness of her gusset told him there was every reason to press on without delay.
His breathing shallowed as he nudged against her, offering himself. His voice was quietly serious.
"Tell me how this feels."
Every time they shared this moment, it resolved into exquisite pleasure for them both; still, he held back, ashamed of his insistence and his need.
"Darling." Sam reached for his hands. "Come inside," she whispered, fingers weaving with his, and locking round his broader knuckles in a tight and urgent grip.
Christopher fixed his eyes on Sam's, and entered her. The fluttering of her eyelids told him that the moment was for her every bit as intense as it was for him. A sharp breath hissed inwards past his teeth, his instinct to stay buried in her warmth duelling with the equal and opposing instinct to withdraw and plunge again.
Their posture lent itself especially to Sam's comfort—easy and unharmful to the child. No reason to hold back. He slid inside her, bending slightly forwards, squeezing eyes tight shut as Sam closed round him like a velvet vice.
"Your body's so... " he tried and failed to find the words. Now, once again, Sam felt the power of having struck him dumb.
"Do I look 'umm'?" Sam teased, and steered his hands up to her breasts, luxuriating in his touch, and in the feel of his invading warmth below.
"You look... you feel... you are." He pulled his fingers free, and eased apart the buttons of her smock top, pulled taut by her position on the bed. Across Sam's bust the second button strained under the full swell of her breasts.
His lip curled upwards at the side—"We'd better stop this one from popping..."—and freed the pearl disc from its buttonhole, gliding a hand inside her slip to claim his spoils.
His fingertips sank deep into soft, cushioning flesh. From Sam's now gaping blouse there rose her soft, clean, powdery signature aroma. Christopher squeezed her breasts together, sinking his nose into the tantalising mound of cleavage.
"Christ, Sam," his muffled voice emerged from the warm valley. "'Want to die like this, buried in you, top and bottom."
Sam gave him a bright smile. "You very likely will, you poor old thing."
With a huff of amusement, Christopher continued browsing the creamy landscape under his lips, meandering from peak to vale, and back to peak, while Sam luxuriated in the piquant emery sensation of his evening beard against her skin. She let him graze, imagining those lips at their most mobile, demolishing a criminal, calmly pressing his advantage over lesser men. Sam squirmed; the movements that were pinkening her flesh above the waist began to drive a throb and pulsing down below. The strength of her arousal had her moaning soon, and threatened to unravel things for both of them.
Sam coaxed his head up from between her breasts.
"Oh, my," she panted, as her thumb traced down the fold that linked the corners of his nose and mouth, "you have to stop that, or you're going to undo me."
She felt rather than heard him chuckle as he turned his face into her hand, and trapped the digit with his teeth. His tongue began a string of tiny lizard-licks against the soft pad of her thumb. Samantha shivered—snatching a breath sharply as his lower body pulled away, then pushed home in another surge of confident possession. Each time he slid from her, she felt an anxious emptiness that craved his next delicious thrust.
"How can you do this to me every time, so effortlessly?" she groaned.
"What... this old business?" Another energetic lunge provoked a satisfying gasp from Sam, which he was proud to stifle with a deep, slow, greedy kiss.
His hands possessed her breasts, caressing and exploring; stroking, pinching the pert, darkened nipples, wandering over sweet familiar curves.
"My delicious girl," he whispered. Knowing that her breasts, the luscious objects of his worship, hid fragile bones, he planted his palms each side of Sam's torso to keep his weight from pressing on her, and stepped up the pace of his thrusts. Sam met him with strong counter-pushes from beneath, and powerful shocks travelled along the bedframe as they rode towards the precipice together.
"Sweet girl... Darling... oh, bliss... come now..." he coaxed, taking his full weight on one arm. Lips parted, he read her eyes from under hooded lids, attending to Sam's every blink and flutter. His other hand slid down between them, granting the same stroking touch he used to feed a fishing line into the river's current. Though pinned beneath him, Sam was swept away under the slick, firm circling movements of his fingertips.
"Don't st— ohgod, don't stop!" Sam panted, racked beneath his pistoning attentions. She need not have spoken: Christopher's body was already wound tight as a catapult sprung for release.
Sam's fingers grazed his nape and he was gone; a hot spill of completion, sobbing ecstasy into her neck.
His climax echoed through the empty house along with Sam's. Their breaths ceased in the same short, teetering instant as they held each other's gaze and tumbled from the pinnacle into a softly pulsing valley of fulfilment. Between hitching breaths, Sam's powerful inner throbs caressed and milked his last warm, vital drop.
Sated, they lay spent, Christopher's head half-pillowed on her pregnant belly, supported by Sam's hand beneath his ear.
Blissful silence. Then there was a muffled thud as something heavy hit the carpet.
When Christopher betrayed no sign of budging, Sam craned her neck in the direction that the thud had come from, only to cram a fist into her mouth to muffle laughter.
The shaking movement of her belly brought him back to consciousness.
"You were too vigorous," Sam whispered.
"Mmm?" He roused himself against a prickle of alarm. "I didn't hurt you?"
"Ohnono!" she chuckled. "Only that the knob's dropped off, Dear."
Foyle pushed upwards with a startled grunt, and cast a nervous look towards his groin as he pulled out of her.
Sam tutted. "I do think your equipment's in a better state than this old bedstead."
He tried to stand, but found his legs had partly gone to sleep. Sam giggled at his swaying.
"Oh, come here, let's cuddle for a while." She twisted, trying to read the clock. "What time does Georgie's film turn out?"
Christopher settled next to Sam and drew her to his chest. "Doubt it'll be before half nine. Slipped her two bob to buy fish and chips when she gets out."
"That is another thing you need to stop," Sam sighed into his armpit.
Foyle tucked his chin against his collarbone and studied her. "Stop giving her two bob?"
"Stop patting Georgie on the head. She's a grown woman!"
He yawned. "I couldn't even raise an argument, not just now."
He felt the snuffle of her laughter tickling his shoulder. "That's my girl," he murmured, wrapped her in his arms, and stroked her hair until she fell into a doze. Soon he was dozing with her.
When Christopher woke, Sam was still slumbering, jaw slightly slack, her soft breaths ruffling the hair around his nipples. He slid a hand into her hair, and with light touches of his lips against her brow, cajoled her back to sensibility. This was the closest he had ever been to peace. He conjured lazy images of fishing flies kissing the river surface. Good fortune. Blessed contentment. Mastery; possession; joy; release; fulfilment. All his, thanks to this lovely girl.
Sam squeezed his fingers sleepily. "Mmm. Darling... how d'you feel? A little easier?"
"Luckiest man alive," he pressed his lips to hers. Sheer gratitude suffused him... and a creeping guilt.
"Oh, well," Sam sighed, resigned. "If it's the only way that I can help, so be it. Wish you'd trust me, though... confide in me."
A lump rose in his throat. He swallowed back. Sam felt the movement underneath her ear. "Just tell me," she whispered. "We're one person, aren't we, Christopher?"
Foyle closed his eyes. There would be many such moments in his life—Samantha moments—moments when she cut through their dilemmas with her simple, unfussed insights, while he struggled with complexities that need not exist. This was one of those.
"John..." he began carefully, "Major Kiefer... he's seen a thing—a tragic secret, if you like—that any man would find it hard to come to terms with. What's worse, he's been denied the right to speak about it and see justice done."
"A military secret?"
"Yep."
"And where do you come in?"
"I'm meant to stop him bringing those responsible to task."
Sam propped herself up on her elbow and gaped. "Oh, I say!" No wonder this was giving Christopher the pip!
"It goes against your sense of—" Sam stopped herself, for fear of rubbing salt into the wound. "Well, anyway, it's not your style. Whyever did you agree to take it on?"
"If I hadn't, they'd've found someone less friendly. Took the job because it matters to me what becomes of him, Sam. And that's why Hilda Pierce involved me."
Sam bridled. "So Miss Pierce is using your regard for him? I find that very shabby."
"Yep," breathed Christopher wearily. "Shabby's a good word to start with. And just how despicable this business gets, depends on me."
"Hello, house!" Georgie's voice carried up the stairs. "Is anybody in?"
Christopher groaned and laid a forearm over his eyes.
"I'll go." Sam patted him reassuringly and tried to sit up to adjust her clothing, only to find herself beached by her expanding midriff. Christopher rolled against her and levered her into a sitting position.
"'Appreciate it, Love." He dropped a kiss onto the back of Sam's shoulder, relieved not to have to face Georgie's inquisitive intelligence.
"Don't be drawn..." he warned her, as she left the bedroom.
Sam grinned, hastily tucking some stray blond strands into her updo. Then she called downstairs, "Be right with you, Darling!"
She found Georgie in the kitchen, Wommel at her heels, peering curiously into the oven, a raw carrot brandished in her right hand.
"You chaps didn't eat your dinner," she accused as Sam entered.
"Hello, Dear. No. Our guest had to leave early; then I had a headache..."
Georgie collected Wommel from the floor and leant against the draining board, eyeing Sam's dishevelled hairdo. "Any better now?"
Sam saw fit to busy herself with the good dinner plates stacked on the dresser.
"Mmm. Much," she replied offhandedly. "I think I'll put these back inside the cupboard. Shan't be needing them tonight, after all."
More strands of hair hung down around Sam's collar. Georgie sank her teeth contemplatively into the carrot and began to chew.
"Rabbits love these," she observed in an arch tone, bending round to cast a pointed look upstairs. "Would Christopher enjoy a carrot, d'you think? Should I run upstairs with one, and stroke his bunny ears?"
The game was up. Sam turned and fanned the air around her in alarm.
"Ssshhh!" she hissed. "He'll hear you."
"Oh… stuff!" retorted Georgie, crunching on her carrot and nuzzling the puppy. "If you've been up to what I think (and if he's anything like his offspring), he'll be fast asleep."
She pulled out a chair and slumped down at the kitchen table. "Roll on, Victory Day, say I. It can't come soon enough for me. Cod'n'chips and sitting in the pictures on my own is a sad old life."
Sam crossed the kitchen and laid a hand on her shoulder.
"I'm so sorry, Dear."
Georgie tossed the carrot away in frustration and threaded her fingertips through Wommel's fur. "I want my husband back. Living here reminds me all too vividly that I married into thoroughbred stock. But what good's that when my horse is stuck in Uxbridge? Most unfair."
...
Friday 4th May, 1945
Eunice Griffiths jiggled the plungers in the telephone cradle. The line stayed resolutely silent. She gave the receiver an impatient shake and put it to her ear. No joy. This would not do. One could hardly be expected to muster the WVS troops entirely on foot. Gertrude Johnson lived an uphill mile away, and Muriel Warren was almost—mercifully not quite—in Bexhill.
"Mark!" she called. "The telephone is broken. Kindly come and wave your wand. I need to speak to Mrs Johnson."
Griffiths plucked the breakfast napkin from his lap and dabbed at the corners of his mouth. His mother had been playing bridge with neighbours last evening, when the call had come in from his anonymous persecutor. Mark had not hung up when the caller rang off. Instead, the receiver had fallen from his limp fingers onto the hard tiles of the vestibule. Stunned moments later, he had screwed his courage and retrieved the fallen object, lifting it gingerly to his ear, and noting with some small relief that the line was dead. At least, his distressed mind had reasoned, there would now be no more intrusions from faceless tormentors.
He found his mother in the hall, peering closely at the receiver, head back, reading glasses perched on the end of her nose.
"A large piece of Bakelite has broken off the earpiece. I can see the wires inside. How do you suppose...?"
Mark rubbed his thumbs across his palms to wipe away the sweat. "I dropped it, Mother. I apologise."
Eunice widened her eyes at him and replaced the receiver. "You could have warned me. It might have given me an electric shock."
"Hardly. The voltage is too low. Unless, of course, a bolt of lightning strikes the wire outside, in which case," Mark paused to clean his specacles, "the entire house would probably go up in smoke."
Eunice gaped at her son. His delivery was deadpan, almost mechanical, without a flicker of emotion.
"I despair of you," she told him. "What on earth is the matter with you, Mark? How can you joke about such things?"
"I'm perfectly serious," Griffiths answered dully. "The current travels down the wire, and..."
"Oh, for heaven's sake!" Eunice bustled irritably past him and unhooked her coat. "I am going to find a kind neighbour who will let me use her telephone. There's too much to organise before the celebrations. We both need the phone. Would you please get the contraption repaired?"
Griffiths glanced dispassionately after her. "It will have to be next week... resources..."
"Next week?" His mother rounded on him. "My son manages the Hastings Exchange, and can't muster an engineer? Really, Mark. You're making a mountain out of a molehill. Bring another telephone and connect the wires yourself. Unless," she glared at him, "you're expecting a thunderstorm? Not," she added darkly, "that a shot of energy down the wire wouldn't do you a world of good these days."
Her son fought his corner like a sulky child. "Replacements aren't easy to come by."
"Don't be absurd, Mark. Of course they'll find you another one. You have to be contactable."
When his mother had left, Griffiths lowered himself onto the staircase, planted his elbows on his knees and dragged both hands down his face. He sat staring blankly at the closed front door for several minutes. Eventually he rose, reached into his inside pocket, and produced a screwdriver. He stooped, silently detached the heavy Bakelite instrument at the wall, and dropped it into the canvas messenger bag—a relic from his Signals days.
Then he walked back into the kitchen, sat down at the table, rested his wrists either side of his breakfast plate, and began to weep.
****** TBC ******
More soon. Honest!
GiuC