It was a wicked East Sussex night, the rain was coming down in sheets and the wind was howling. But I looked at the television programmes and they were rubbish – I wasn't interested in some old black and white movie, or how to buy a villa in Tuscany (dream on!) or a quiz programme about sports. So I decided to put on a shiny black plastic mac on over my dress, pulled on knee-high leather boots and made a dash for our local pub. It was one of the best decisions I've ever made.
I'm 32-years-old, single – well, divorced actually, but I'm "available" as it were – and I have a figure that could be considered "generous" if it weren't for the fact that I'm about four inches short of six feet. Which is just as well, because otherwise my 38-inch breasts would look decidedly like overkill. As it is, they look magnificent. Well, that's my opinion and I suppose you'd have to say I'm biased, but I've now got a girl friend who's of the same opinion, so maybe my bias is accurate.
Anyway, to get back to that miserable April evening – what do they say, April showers? This was more like an April monsoon, if there's such a thing as a monsoon in April.
I made the 200-yard dash to the pub – named, rather strangely The Belligerent Badger – and entered the fuggy snugness of the saloon bar. There was only a handful of people there, which was just as well, because I'm painfully shy. About the only person I talk to in the "Badger" is the landlord, Major Phibbs, who was in the Royal Army Service Corps about 500 years ago – and I have my doubts about the "major", but that's none of my business.
He greeted me, his moustache bristling, the regimental tie superbly knotted at his throat. "Terri, my dear, how nice to see you," he beamed, as I shook my hair in a vain attempt to remove the rain which had soaked it, turning it into a mass of curls – it always gets curly like that in the rain!
"The usual?" asked the major, raising a glass to the gin dispenser. "Personally I blame all that A-bomb testing," he smiled, employing a hugely old-fashioned 1950s joke, as he passed me my gin and tonic.
I muttered something inane, and suddenly felt something firm, yet pliant, brushing against the gleaming wetness of my arm in the plastic mac. And then I heard a voice which sent tremors running from the nape of my neck down to my buttocks, and from my nipples to my pussy, a voice which screamed "Sex"!
And yet it was only one word: "Snap!"
I turned and looked into the dark brown eyes of a woman about my height, perhaps a bit taller, her dark brown hair pulled back into a severe ponytail. But she was wearing a mac, I almost said "just like mine" but the only connection between the two were the colour, black.
Hers was made of a gleaming leather with big lapels, big buttons, belt drawn tightly around her middle and at the top a decolletage which revealed a glimpse of breast globes at least as large as mine, if not larger.
"I, I, er, um, I beg your pardon?" I muttered, not able to take my eyes from her hard but extremely attractive face.
And then
that
voice sent shivers and tremors running through my body once more: "I said 'Snap' – we must have bought our mackintoshes from the same shop. 'Snap' – you know, the card game, you call out before your opponent, you pick up the cards?"
"Oh, yes, I see, oh, of course," I said, my eyes darting to her lower body, past her lush hips and down to her booted feet.
Again, like the raincoat, the only thing her boots and mine had in common was the fact they were both black. Hers looked like you wouldn't get change out of several hundred quid!
"I could say 'snap' as well about our boots," I said, in a quiet voice as the woman next to me handed her glass to the major and said in that super-sexy drawl "Same again, my dear landlord".
The major mixed her a gin and tonic. "Snap," I said, as he passed her glass over.
"Sorry, but I win with the first 'snap'," she said. "The boots and the gin and tonic don't count. Now, come and sit down with me by the fire and tell me what a lovely young woman like you is doing all by herself in a pub on a night such as this."
I walked, as if on air, to the table she indicated, part of me eager to strike up a conversation with her, part eager to drown my drink and dash home because I knew I was trembling with excitement at her presence. She had, oh what's the word? A hauteur about her, a haughtiness which not only screamed money, but also style.
And her "come and sit down with me" had me obeying like a naughty schoolgirl being dressed down by the headmistress. I walked behind her, looking at the glorious folds of the long leather mac swishing against her lush buttocks. If the truth be told, I was already in love!
Seated at the table, I took a nervous sip on my g&t and tried to look confident in the face of her awe-inspiring beauty.
Then she spoke again and her voice was a little lower, and even sexier. "You must think I'm awfully rude," she said, but all I could think was that she was so beautiful.
"Oh no," I stammered, unbelting my mac and allowing it to fall open and reveal the little black dress I was wearing. Her eyes fixed on my breasts and I felt as if a laser was boring into them.
Then she coughed, as if to say "I'm sorry, I was staring" and continued: "No, this is so rude. Allow me to introduce myself," she said. "I'm Barbara Kleinhold, but please call me Barbara."
I looked at her transfixed. Then it all fell into place. "Barbara Kleinhold?" I spluttered, "Barbara Kleinhold? Not
the
Barbara Kleinhold, Lady Barbara, head of Kleinhold Holdings?"
She grinned, glanced around the bar – but the other four patrons were all engaged in some dreary conversation about whether Wembley Stadium would ever be completed in their lifetime, or something equally banal.
"Well, yes, actually," she said. "I'm afraid my fame seems to have preceded me."
"Preceded you?" I grinned, starting to feel more relaxed with this wonder woman of property development. "Your face peers out at us from every financial page of every paper in the country," I spluttered. "What is it they call you? The Distaff Donald Trump, isn't it?"
"Please," she smiled, placing a superbly-manicured hand on my knee, and squeezing it just momentarily. "Don't mention my name in the same breath as that appalling little man. My dahlink, his hair? How can you take a man with hair like that seriously, I ask you?"
I took a far too large swig on my gin and found it was drained! "Allow me," said Lady Barbara, standing, taking my glass and advancing on Major Phibbs again.
When she returned, I already had my next question prepared. "Lady Barbara," I began, but she cut me off.
"It's Barbara, please my dear – and I already know you're Terry – is that with a 'Y' or an 'I'?"
"It's with an 'I'," I replied, and she gave me a smile which warmed my entire body on this wretched April night.
"Good, I prefer it with an 'I', so much more feminine," she said.
"Barbara," I said, although I had to take a deep breath before referring to such a world-famous businesswoman in such familiar terms. "You ask what a woman like me was doing in a pub on a night like this, but what on earth is a multi-millionaire" – and then she interrupted me again.