Prohibited

'I need to see you, can we meet?'

A text I was not expecting pinged on my phone Friday morning. Last time I spoke to Liam, almost a week ago, we decided enough was enough. We'd taken too many risks already, we had to cool it before it got too out of hand and people got hurt. We agreed we didn't want to hurt anyone. We hadn't messaged each other as we had started to, all our messages had been on our mutual friends' group chat, the chat that contains our respective spouses. Everything back to normal, inconspicuous, all over. Like we agreed. It's for the best. We need us to be over.

Except, all I have done all week is think about him. Every time he's posted on the group chat, which he has done more often, my heart has pounded and I haven't been able to hold back from engaging with it straight away. I hoped no one else noticed the increase in our posting activity. I hoped I wasn't imagining it. I hoped he was struggling to stop thinking of me as much as I was him.

So yes, we can meet. Of course, we can meet.

'Usual place, usual time?' I replied. To which I received a thumbs up, an aubergine and a tonne of kisses. I sent kisses back and gradually my heart started to return to its normal beat. Then I deleted the texts, as was my habit.

I dragged myself out of bed and went to make a cup of tea. Thanks to that text, I now had an extra hour before I had to go out with the dog. Our usual place was the car park near the entrance to the woods not far from both of our houses. We live in the same street, yet we never meet and walk together. We always meet there, in our cars because it's a nicer walk from the car park than it is from our estate to the woods. Also, our dogs hate being in the back of the car together, we tried it once, never again. It was curled lips and humping the entire five-minute car journey as each dog tried to dominate the boot as their own. The woods open out onto fields, we can get lost for a couple of hours easily over there and barely see another soul. It is the perfect place to talk freely and more importantly, privately. It also allows us plenty of solitary spots where we can kiss each other and wish to God we could take things further.

Me and Liam. Can you hear the audible sigh in my voice? Where do I start? Where exactly is the beginning? We are part of a large group of friends who became friends really by accident. We all live within a five-minute walk of each other, we all have children of differing multiples but one common denominator, the eldest all started our local primary school together. You know what it's like at primary school, every parent there is so desperate to find a social life after years of being stuck in night after night too exhausted to watch TV, unable to drink because your darling child will be up so early the next morning even if they do manage to sleep through the night. To meet a fellow parent with a similarly aged child to your own that you actually get on with, is heaven-sent. My husband and I didn't meet one, we met six. The eight of us have been firm friends for nigh on twelve years.

What started out as play dates for a few hours soon became weekend evenings, with each couple taking turns to host. Then we started having weekends away, hiring cottages, big

Center Parcs

holidays and cheap weekends in caravans from offers in the newspaper. Then we booked villa holidays and started going abroad together. Life is good, as a group, we are like family, our children all like cousins. It gets a little loud, a little manic and a lot crazy but that has just made it easy for Liam and mine's growing closeness to go unnoticed.

We also go unnoticed because to everyone else we have nothing in common. He loves films, I only watch what the kids suggest. He loves music to the point that as hobby he produces his own, I like what reminds me of my student days in the nineties. He is a tech nerd and does something in IT, I am a freelance textile artist, who can barely send an email. He is meticulous, organised, a bit OCD. I am a bit scatty, disorganised and sometimes, far too laid back. We are definitely a case of opposites attract but oh my, the spark that creates, we fizzle. We don't have to touch for the hairs on both of our arms to stand on end as if being pulled together. How no one has noticed, felt it, we cannot fathom. Lucky for us though, they haven't.

Things have built slowly between us over many years. It began with rogue touches here and there, mostly when drunk. We pretended to each other for years that it meant nothing when he would push his leg firmly against mine under the table and keep it there for the duration. That developed into many accidental brushings of hands-on thighs, grabs of knees, which we also pretended meant nothing. It was when both of our families got dogs at the same time that things between me and Liam started to develop. As we both work from home, we could be around for the dogs, we could walk them. It made sense, everyone knew we were going to walk the dogs together. The general consensus from all our friends was that it would be nice for us, the homeworkers, the school run doers, to have that social time. So, when we got closer, everyone just tied it in with the fact we spend more time together because of the dogs and because of the kids with the dogs. The kids got bored with the dogs and our walks got longer the more we walked together on our own. I can't remember the first time he grabbed my hand when we were walking but from that first time, we now always hold hands. Our dogs are now four. It's a good job they can keep secrets.

The first time we kissed was on one of our walks. The first time I made him come was on one of our walks. The first time he made me come, you guessed it. If those trees could talk. We were always so careful when the group was together, but we had been taking more risks. As the kids are getting older, we've started going out to local pubs more on Saturday nights, leaving the four seventeen-year-olds in charge. Being away from our homes and our children has made us take risks. Too many stolen kisses outside of pub toilets. My outfits perfectly chose to allow Liam's hands to sneak under my skirt or dress and stroke my thigh under the table, to let his hand ride further and further. Too many back to Liam's house for hot tub nights where it is so easy to hide what our hands are doing under the bubbles with our friends and spouses in the water with us.

Despite all of this, Liam and I are yet to fuck each other but not fucking each other is getting harder and harder to avoid. Last Saturday night we crossed too big a line. We had touched ourselves into a frenzy in the hot tub. He brought me to the brink of orgasm and I can't believe no one noticed. I hoped if they did, they would assume it was a well-positioned jet and be too polite to ask. I made my excuses and practically ran to the toilets to finish myself off. It didn't take me long.

When I came out of the bathroom Liam was waiting outside.

'I wanted to do that,' he whispered putting his hands around my waist and pulling me against his body.

I instantly kissed him, a long breathless kiss. I felt his hard-on pushing easily into my groin, our swimwear giving very little barrier.

'I want to fuck you so badly,' he whispered. 'We need to fuck, Alice. You need to let me know when you're free next week.'

I nodded breathlessly and kissed him again, quickly, before we pulled apart and he went into the bathroom. I rushed away and then stood for a moment at the bottom of the stairs.

'Alice more wine?' a friend shouted from the kitchen.

'Please,' I shouted back, shook the last few minutes off and headed into the kitchen.

We didn't steal any more kisses, we calmed down the touching. We communicated silently when briefly alone with facial gestures. And to be honest, we all drank so much the rest of the night is very blurry.

On Monday morning we met in our usual spot for our dog walk. We walked into the woods talking small talk and then Liam stopped dead, he held both of my hands and looked at me, 'We need to cool things down don't we?' he said.

'I think we do,' I found myself replying despite being consumed with thoughts of fucking him for the last thirty-six hours.

'There are too many people going to get hurt if they find out about us. If we start fucking each other, it's dangerous. We're already taking more risks.'

'I know, we pushed it too far Saturday, but...'

'Don't get me wrong, Alice, I want to, I want you so badly.'

I smiled at him, I want him so badly too. I don't want to lose what we have. 'I can't lose you as a friend and God, we're being horrible people as it is. How bad will we feel if we fuck each other? What if we can't handle the guilt? What if...'

He silenced her with a light, gentle kiss on the lips.

'We've let ourselves develop here, we can take it back a step. I'm going to have to try and control myself. I hate to say this, I think we need to give each other space.'

'How on earth do we do that?'

'I'm not going to walk this week. I'll walk somewhere else. We need to start thinking of ourselves as friends again, I can't risk losing everything we have, we can't destroy all these lives. I'm sorry, Alice, I really am.'

We walked and we talked and I agreed with him. I genuinely agreed with him. I didn't want to lose my life. I love my husband, I love his wife. I love our five kids, his three and my two. When I think of them in context with what we've done I feel sick. We had so much to lose by being together and we didn't want to be a couple together. That wasn't what this was. We'd never work as a couple but as friends who fancy the pants off each other, we work incredibly well. As much as I agreed, I felt like I'd gone through a break up this week. I felt empty, I felt lost. I was tearful and angry which I had to blame on hormones. If we hadn't escalated whatever it was we used to have in the beginning, we could have kept that, that wasn't hurting anyone. By cooling it now, where do we go back to? How do I be his friend? Just his friend? How do I not hold his hand, kiss him, touch him? I don't know how we were as friends, it's too long ago.

Those thoughts plagued me all week. They got worse last night when we were making plans for Saturday night. I was nervous about seeing Liam again and how to behave around him. Now I was nervous to meet him to do something so innocuous, so normal for us. His text suggested he felt the same as me, but I didn't know what he was going to propose.

When I drove onto the car park he was already there, stood leaning against his car. His dog, Bailey, rummaging in the bushes until he sensed my arrival and bolted to greet my car. I laughed as Liam jumped to attention and frantically tried to call him to heel. Once I pulled up, I popped my boot so Derby, my dog, could get out, start playing and stop whimpering. We were on our own on the car park. We always parked in a secluded spot but it made no difference as we were nearly always the only people ever there. Liam was at the driver's side of my car as soon as I climbed out of it. He instantly pulled me into him and kissed me before we could even say hello. It felt better than I could have imagined to kiss him again. Five whole days of missing each other had not helped quell our mutual desire.

'I have not stopped thinking about you all fucking week,' he said. 'I know what I said Monday, but I was a dick, how can we go back, this week's been hell. I couldn't spend tomorrow night with you and not...' he kissed me again.

'I have not stopped thinking of you either, I've gone to sleep dreaming of all the different ways we could have first fucked, I've dreamt about you, I've woke up and immediately started to think of ways we can get time to fuck and where we can fuck and how we can fuck.'

Liam grinned, 'Did any of those involve either of our cars?' he asked.

'They did but even in my fantasies, the muddy wellies got in the way. And there was no way I was walking the dog in the outfit I'd like to be wearing when we first fuck.'

'I just want you naked, I've never seen you naked. I've felt all your bits but I've never seen them,' he said in between nibbles of my neck.

His cock was hard and pushing into my thigh. I didn't want to walk the dogs, wellies or no wellies I wanted Liam but, I would have control.

'C'mon,' I said pushing him slightly away. 'We need to walk, let's walk, talk and come up with a plan. I need to talk to you. We need to talk. I don't want Monday again. I want this.'

Liam hung his head and repositioned his cock to a more comfortable position.

'I might have this till you do something about it though,' he half-joked.

'That's up to you, I ain't touching it till we've talked,' I said and then called the dogs to follow me toward the woods.

Liam jogged after me as I had stridden off quite quickly.

'I'm sorry about Monday, I got scared. I felt sick with guilt on Sunday and paranoid someone had seen, or at least we'd raised suspicions, that the game was up and I thought, if we fuck, this is how I'm going to feel all the time. But not being with you felt worse. We can't win here can we?'

'No, we should have called a stop to things way before now. It would have been easier to stop nothing than something.'

'We haven't wanted to stop have we?'

'No.'

'So how do we make this work? How can we make sure we don't get caught?'

'We can't. If we carry on, we take that risk.'

'I want to take that risk.'

'Are you sure?'

'Are you sure?'

'No. It scares me. When I let myself think about all the people's lives that will be affected if we get found out. And if we get found out there's no happy ending whereby, we get to carry on and everyone just accepts it. I don't want to hurt anyone but...'

'We've already crossed so many lines, we could already hurt those people if they knew what we get up to already.'

'Exactly, so, why not carry on? We've managed discretion so far, we're taking more risks because we're desperate to take it to the next stage. Do you feel guilty now?'

'No. It's when we sneak around when we're all together. I almost feel like this is accepted as our time so we're free to do what we want in it. That's wrong though I know.'

'I'm sure I need to fuck you, I know I need that. I desperately need that. That's all I'm sure about, that and the fact I don't want to fuck you in these woods. At least, not all the time.'

I looked up at Liam smiling and pulled his hand to make him stop walking. We wrapped our hands around each other's waists, I rested my head on his chest for a moment and let him hug me.

'I can't walk away from you, Alice,' he said and kissed the top of my head.

'I don't want you to. I don't want to walk away from you. I want more time with you, not less.'

'How much work you got on today?'

'Nothing I can't put off till another day.'

'Good, neither have I. I know we could have planned this better if I hadn't have freaked on Monday but let's spend the day together. How free is your house today? I'm on my own till the kids get in.'

'Me too.'

'Definitely?'

'One hundred per cent, failing an emergency.'

'Should I come over?'

'My bum or my tits?'

'Both, I have a lot of come built up for you.'

We laughed, relieved to have the conversation lightened. Talking about what we were doing, where it was going was not something we did often. It suited us both to separate our two existences and live for the moment rather than dwelling on the potential consequences of our actions.

'Are we really going to do this?' I asked. My heart was pounding.

'I think we need to. And why wait?'

'I agree why wait, we've waited long enough.'

Liam kissed me hard and moved his hands to squeeze my bum.

'Are you sure you don't just want me to push you up against that tree over there and fuck you rotten right now?'

'I'm sure,' I giggled. 'I want us to be naked first time but I'll be open to that suggestion some other day.'

'Every day, I'm going to fuck you up against that tree, every morning, rain or shine.'

'Even in the snow?'

'In the snow, we're going to make two shagging snow angels.'

We were laughing as we kissed again.

'We need to get walking, can I suggest we just do a quick lap of the woods today?' Liam said.

'Definitely just a quick lap, in fact, if we head this way, there's a bit of a shortcut.'

Liam nodded his approval and we walked off hand in hand.

After the quickest shower of my life, I was sat on my stairs wrapped just in a long kimono, impatiently staring at the front door. I knew Liam would knock and just walk in because that's what we all do when we pop round to each other's houses. We had a back story worked out, that he'd come to help me with a computer emergency. He was IT support for our whole friend group, so this was more than feasible. Not that we were going to get caught but at least we had a cover, just in case.

When the door finally opened, I stood up and rushed towards him. My kimono fell open as I half jogged across my hallway. Liam's eyes went wide, he bit his lower lip and devoured my body.

'Fuck, I need you,' he said.

He kissed me hard and pushed me back against the nearest wall. His hands went straight for my tits and started to gently squeeze them.

'We shouldn't do this here,' he said between mouthfuls of nipple.

He dropped to his knees without waiting for a response and buried his face between my legs. His nose pushed against my clit first as his tongue licked and explored inside me. I gasped. And then I moaned as he sucked my clit and sucked and sucked.

'Oh God, fuck,' I whimpered.

My legs were weak.

'Fuck, Liam, I...'

He carried on licking and sucking, it felt amazing. He'd only ever made me come with his fingers before, logistical reasons.

I wanted to scream out but I kept my moans low, I didn't want the street to hear us but my God I wanted to scream out. I grabbed his hair in my fist and gripped his shoulder tight with my other hand as he continued. Oh God did I want to come.

I whimpered again and then, 'Oh, oh, oh, oh, fuck, yes, oh fuck...' I shouted involuntarily. I couldn't silence myself as I came, a powerful force erupting from my pussy and engulfing my whole body. I hung my head breathing heavy, my eyes shut tight. My body shuddered, my legs shook. I felt Liam's hands on my bum, holding me tight. He gently kissed my thighs, my electrified skin sending more tingles rushing through me.

'Upstairs,' I uttered eventually.

He scooped me up in his arms and carried me to the stairs. Dropping me, giggling, on the fourth step.

I held out my hand.

He took it and squeezed my bum with his free hand. 'You OK, yours and Pete's bed?' he asked.

'I have to be, but yeah, I'm OK with it. And I get to lie in it tonight and remember.'

'Will you fuck him, later and think of us?' Liam asked as we bundled through the bedroom door.

'Do you want me to?'

I'd turned to face him now, he held me tight against him, his hand pushing in the small of my back.

'Yes, and tomorrow night, he'll tell me and I'll know it's me you were thinking of.'

'What about Caroline?'

'Alice, I'm not going to have any come left to give her once I'm finished with you.'

He kissed me hard. I lifted up his t-shirt, we briefly stopped kissing to pull it over his head. I let it fall to the floor. His hands were busy undoing his jeans as we continued to kiss. I love that sound, belt buckles and buttons undoing, his zip being pulled down. I shut my eyes momentarily and opened them as his shorts fell to the floor. And there he was for the first time in all his naked glory. He slid my kimono off my shoulders and let it fall to the floor as he edged me closer to the bed.

He lay me back on the bed I share with my unsuspecting husband. Pete doesn't deserve this. I should feel bad. I don't feel bad. I want him inside me, I've wanted him inside me for so long. I want to savour this moment, every second in case it never happens again. I...Oh my God yes. Liam pushed his cock easily inside me, he rocked his hips moving his cock in and out a few times and then he lowered down to kiss me. And we lay, kissing, with him inside me. And then he fucked me, he fucked me harder than I think I've ever been fucked.