Wildwood by Janine Ashbless Read Free Book Online Page B

windthrow I’d wangled an early departure and I got to Scott’s place a couple of hours early. When no one answered the doorbell I wandered through into the overgrown back garden, where I half-expected to find him and Alex and Stacy knocking back beers and contemplating the algae scum on their pond. No one was there, but I did notice that lights were on in the high windows of the detached garage where they all kept the wetsuits and boards ready for the weekend. The side door was unlocked. They’d be packing the car, I assumed, and called, ‘Scott?’ as I entered.
    No one replied. The smell of board wax and seaweed was strong and comfortable. I looked down the garage and there was Scott all right – about two-thirds of the way down, stark naked, his arms and legs spread wide. His wrists were roped to the metal brackets on either wall that held the surfboards. His ankles were held apart by the broom pole taped between them.
    My first thought was that he hadn’t got himself into that position.
    Scott hadn’t seen me; he was wearing a blindfold. He hadn’t heard me either, though I’d made quite a bit of noise getting the swollen old door open, because there was an MP3 player clipped to a bracket too, the earplugs pumping out what sounded to me like a tinny wasp buzz of music. Old school metal, I’d have guessed; it was what he liked to drive to when he got use of Alex’s car, or mine. It was what he’d been listening to when he totalled his own, the idiot. But he must have felt the draught from the door, because he said ‘Stacy?’ in that loud voice people use when they can’t hear themselves properly. ‘We’d better hurry up; Av will be here soon.’
    My second thought wasn’t really a thought at first, just a wave of relief that it was all over. No more insane drives on a weekend down some of the most choked motorways in Britain trying to snatch a few hours with a boyfriend on the other side of the bloody country. No more waiting in Penrith station for his train. No more half-assed explanations on the phone that he’d been forced to stay on too late at the office and that he wouldn’t be with me until tomorrow morning – make that lunchtime, probably. It was over. At least I’d be able to use my vibrator and fantasise about other men with a clear conscience from now on.
    ‘Stace? Come on.’
    I walked down towards him, fists bunched, wondering what exactly I was going to do now. He looked very vulnerable, spreadeagled like that. And just a little bit silly. The black hair beneath his arms stuck out in wild tufts. His nipples were hard from the chill of the concrete garage and I could see the gooseflesh around them. His cock stuck straight out like a short peg, stiff but not distended. His balls were bunched up high. I put out my hand and stroked that fat pouch, stirring the hairs. He did have really hairy balls, did Scott, even though years of wearing a neoprene suit had rubbed the hair off his arse and legs where you’d expect to find it.
    He reacted to my touch, squirming in his bonds and making appreciative noises. The headphones pulsed: zing, zing, zing. I tickled his fancy a moment longer then passed under his arm to take at look at him from behind. Lines of dark hair marched up the unguarded nape of his neck. His back was narrow and strong, his hips lithe. Those familiar buttocks, muscular yet bald as a baby’s, sported a red mark like the imprint of a bar across their fullest swell. I didn’t understand what it was until I looked down. Arrayed on the beach blanket on which he stood – and he was still wearing his socks, I noted, with a contemptuous wrinkle of my nose – was a ruler, a table-tennis bat and a bright-yellow kitchen glove.
    I couldn’t really be sure what the rubber glove was intended for – Flicking him? Wanking him off? Sticking a finger up his butt? – but the other two seemed pretty obvious. I picked up the ruler, twelve inches of transparent plastic of the sort we used to