Two things happen at once: Emilia thinks she's crushing him - and he wraps his arms around her, pulls her in, and sticks his nose into her neck, behind her ear. He noisily exhales, tickling her, and murmurs, "This is nice."

And then he proceeds to squish her, just as he did earlier on her bed; sort of squeezing her and rubbing her against him.

It is nice, he isn't wrong; but in the millisecond before he started cuddling her, she managed to assume that this was a sexually charged situation, and she even frantically tried to remember what she was expected to do to initiate said sex.

"I'm drunk," Oates says. "Lightly. But I am. Is it alright?"

Oh, that explains it. Paul also couldn't do anything after drinking. He generally needed a lot of time to concentrate 'before' - and a lot of things could break his concentration 'during.' A car alarm, a dog barking, a notification on the phone - all of these have at some point made him 'distracted.' And then it turned out that he had every reason to worry, mostly about the texts, obviously; since it could've been his wife messaging him.

"Em?" Oates calls her softly and gently brushes his finger to her cheek.

"Oh, sorry, I just—" She gives him a forced smile and awkwardly pats his shoulder. "I'm enjoying this."

She's not feeling randy either, anymore.

"Tired?" he asks and strokes her cheek again.

"No! I mean, yes, maybe a bit." Emilia isn't sure what the right answer is here. "But I'm—"

Ooph, why is this so difficult? How do people even do this?

Before she got 'discovered' - meaning rejected 78 times and then picked up to be published by a small agency that, first, botched up her promotion; and then, only thanks to Emilia's decisive efforts, gave her up to the Holyoake Publishing - Emilia used to work in insurance. And in her little struggling firm, with its dusty draughty office, they had SOPs - standard operating procedures. Those documents were out-of-date, contradictory, and contained factual mistakes - but Emilia would still like one of those for her current predicament!

"Let me help you to clean up," Oates offers.

Emilia sees no other way to proceed but to accept his courteous assistance. You should be grateful, you cow, Kate scoffs, while Emilia and Oates gather the plates, pack left-overs, and stack her plates and bowls in a dishwasher.

By the way, Emilia once heard a joke that in each couple - You aren't a couple, Kate doesn't fail to remind her - one person organises washing up in a dishwasher like a Scandinavian architect; while the other one chucks everything in like a racoon on meth. You're the racoon in this scenario, Milly. You're even the same shape. And of course he's brilliant at it. Isn't he at everything he does? Which poses the question of what it is that he's doing here, innit?

"Should I start the kettle?" Emilia asks in a fake cheery voice.

"If you feel like it," he answers.

She doesn't want to but hears 'but I'd rather you didn't' in his response. If she makes tea, he might feel obliged to stay and drink it. The more time they spend in silence, erasing any trace of the lovely dinner - and all the booze and the fun that they've just shared - the more she starts thinking that he just can't wait to escape her flat.

He did say he came to ask her out for dinner and to explain his previous behaviour. And then she sort of muscled him into shagging her - and then she had a crisis, didn't let him have any, ate his food, and quaffed his alcohol.

Oates throws her a questioning look, since she's frozen holding the kettle under her tap without opening it.

"We don't have to," he says and starts drying his hands. His tone is a tad tense. "But there's pudding."

Emilia hurriedly smacks the lever on her tap.

***

"Oh these are adorable!"

The little cakes in the stylish boxed look like a mixture of sticky toffee pud and a bundt cake.

"It's a spin on traditional hwangnam, a rice cake with red bean paste inside," he announces proudly. "Because of the shape, it's sort of a tteok ppang. And the toffee is made with yeot, a Korean confectionery, and brown rice molasses. Yeot is short for gaeng yeot, which is the name of the final product, a sweet. But it can also be used for dipping other—"

He stops abruptly, and suddenly his eyes are fixed onto a cupboard behind Emilia's head. She looks behind her, but can't see anything interesting there.

"Other what?" Emilia asks.

He slowly shifts his gaze to meet hers.

"Sorry, I got too relaxed," he deadpans.

As in... what? Wait... what?

If not for the soju coursing her blood and the delicious food in her stomach - and his rolled-up sleeves, and the white shirt hugging his heavy torso; flustering her beyond measure - the next line wouldn't have burst out of Emilia.

"But I want to know!" she squawks. "What is it used for?! And can we start eating them already?"

She points her finger at the glossy, warm brown-coloured cakes - and his eyebrows jump up.

"Um..." Emilia shrinks away. "I mean, once the kettle is—"

She doesn't get to finish. Oates takes a massive step forward; pushing her to stumble back, and pressing her against the counter. His hands lay on the worktop on two sides of her body, caging her between his arms; and he leans to her face.

"I'm drunk," he repeats, this time in an even more pointed tone. "Are you alright with that?"

Emilia is at loss here. "Um, yeah... I mean— Why?"

"I have less self-control," he says, and she realises that he's looking at her mouth. "In the Top," he continues, his baritone even raspier now, "you were eating, and I— I like how you eat. You looked so happy. And you're up for anything." He groans and drops his head. Emilia is staring at the crown of his wavy mane. "I want you."

Oh.

Oh...

Bloody hell.

She could question pretty much everything he's just said, and ponder, and analyse, etcetera, etcetera - but she is not drunk. Nor is she an idiot.

There's exactly zero guarantee that she's ever getting another chance to just let go and do what she wants. And yes, of course, this is the perfect opportunity for a ridiculous pun. Rephrasing the previous line, this is Emilia Arundel's best chance to do whom she wants.

She stretches her hand and turns off the hob under the kettle.

Oates' face flies up.

"I want you too," she whispers.

Oh sodding hell, that was... hard! It took an actual physical effort: fisting her hands and unclenching her jaw; but she did it!

She has no time to be proud of herself - because he's just dropped down on his knees in front of her! Oh my god, is he— Blimey, he definitely is! He hooks his fingers on the waist of her bottoms - and her knickers - and then he lifts his eyes.

"Please?"

Oh god. An intense shudder runs through her, and she squeezes her thighs together. Did he just as much as begged to— uhem! None of the euphemisms for a cunnilingus comes to her mind. There must be hundreds, mostly borrowed from Victorian pornographic fiction, such as The Pearl: A Magazine of Facetiae and Voluptuous Reading.

There's only one way to find out what he's asking for - and Emilia jerkily nods.

Christ on a bike.

A second later Emilia's bottom half is starkers, and he cups her backside.

Hell's bells!

He dives forward - and, without much ado, runs his tongue up and down her fanny. Shouldn't there be some sort of a prelude to this? Or is this the prelude? And then he draws a tight circle over her clit, and she squeezes her eyes. Stars and sparklers explode behind her lids. Oh god, this is so good! He's pulling her closer and closer; his hands are mashing her buttocks. He's like a cat 'biscuiting' a pillow - while his lips and tongue are dancing on her. And then he groans. It could be considered a moan, but it's also rumbly and coarse; and then his hands slide onto her hips; and he's stroking her, his palms shifting closer and closer to where his mouth is creating some sort of M-rated magic. His thumbs caress her skin for a few seconds, sending excited little zaps through her groin - and then he spreads her. His tongue thrusts into her; Emilia moans loudly - and he grabs her arse, jerks her to him, and shoves his face into her.

"Holy mother of god!" Emilia hollers.

And before she can ask herself whether she's supposed to be doing anything here, he sucks her clit in - and it's just too much! Her hands flail in panic, and she catches hold of generous handfuls of his hair.

"Oh yes," he purrs - and his lips once again close around her most sensitive part.

Emilia has no choice but to tug at his hair, halting him - and a low guttural noise rolls in his throat.

Oh right. She met him in a sex club. He mentioned 'the scene.' Her therapist is his dom. This is just a normal Sunday for him, innit?

"Please..." he murmurs. 

His eyes are closed; and his expression is both endlessly pleased and still hungry. He's savouring her!

Oh wow. Why is this hot? And why is it that hot?

Alright, let's conduct a small experiment, shall we?

She gathers even more of his heavy silky curls in her fists - and guides his mouth.

Yeah, that makes so much sense.

He's where she wants him. She can determine the pressure and the intensity. She doesn't even need to rub herself to him or even arch her back. He start moving; and at some point he's once again a tad too eager - and she yanks him back.

He grunts; and through the haze of her pre-orgasmic state she can see the outline of his massive erection in his trousers - and then she cums.