a random stranger was almost the law. But taking your clothes off in front of a stranger had never been Kate’s idea of a good time, and imposing the six-date rule had been a relief. However, she hadn’t anticipated that the consequence would be almost no sex at all. The few men she did meet had all melted away by a fruitless date three.
Also, Kate thought as she nestled happily into Tommy’s warm body, she hadn’t expected sex with Tommy to be quite so good. It had been so long since she’d had it, she’d almost forgotten what it was like. She had memories of awkward encounters in squalid bachelor bedrooms; quick, unsatisfying fumbles that ended with her partner spent and snoring and Kate creeping to the bathroom to floss her teeth and smooth down her hair before positioning herself prettily on the pillow and dreaming of being brought breakfast in bed. When morning came, her hung over partner barely remembered where his own kitchen was, let alone served up coffee and croissants.
But tonight, with Tommy, everything felt different. They’d had such a great time at the comedy club. And in the taxi, any thought of going back to her place hadn’t even crossed her mind.
And then there’d been the sex itself. When Tommy had pulled away her shirt she’d felt a succession of tiny electric shocks as his naked skin brushed against hers and her body suddenly ached to be touched again. She’d forgotten just how good skin on skin felt—how dizzyingly erotic. As he gently pulled her half-naked body to his chest, she’d almost lost her breath. She could have let him slowly touch her skin with his all night.
But of course she hadn’t. Things had gone much further than that. And in the candlelit bedroom she’d been unembarrassed about her naked body. Tommy’s own body was so manly and muscular, she hadn’t worried that her hips might be too wide, that her weight might crush him, or that he might change his mind and send her home when he saw the size of her bottom. She actually felt sexy! Tommy ran his hands through her hair and bit at her breasts, his big hands cupping her buttocks and smoothly lifting her up and onto him. His groan of appreciation made Kate feel foxy for the first time in her life. A thought suddenly entered her head. This must be what Lou felt like when she had sex. No wonder she did it so often.
She suddenly fell back to earth with a bang. As Tommy stroked her face and the sweat started to dry on her body, Kate felt something sink within her stomach.
She hadn’t spoken to Lou since their argument. Lying in Tommy’s bed with his arms wrapped around her, Kate suddenly felt lonely. Normally if something great happened she rang Lou straightaway. It was as though it hadn’t really happened until she’d told her every tiny detail.
Kate looked at Tommy, her body still tingling deliciously from their exertions. She knew she wouldn’t be telling Lou about this. Something had changed and there was no going back.
“I don’t normally do this sort of thing,” she heard herself whisper.
“What, have sex?” Tommy joked.
“No! Yes! I mean, I don’t normally, you know, do it so soon.”
Tommy looked confused.
“Not until the sixth date.”
“Why?” he spluttered.
“Because nice girls don’t . . . too soon.”
Tommy threw back his head and roared with laughter. “And that’s what men want, is it? Nice girls?”
“No!” Kate said primly. “They want bad girls who do it on the first night.”
Tommy propped himself up on an elbow and looked at her closely.
“So, you’re saying that your strategy with men has been not to give them what they want?”
“They get it eventually,” Kate reasoned. “Men respect women who make them wait. And besides, things are better if you’ve looked forward to them. It’s delayed gratification.”
“It’s why you’ve stayed single!” Tommy laughed. “Kate, trust me; men aren’t that complicated! We’ve got the attention spans of goldfish. If we wait too long for anything we’ve forgotten what it was we wanted in the first place. It’s why we love our TV remotes so much. Otherwise, by the time we’d got as far as the TV, we’d have forgotten why we got up in the first place.”
Kate felt confused.
“But if you really wanted someone, you wouldn’t forget her,” she insisted. “You’d want her more because you’d had to wait.”
“You’re mad!” Tommy laughed and rolled away. “You do know that, don’t you?”
Kate’s