chapter Fifteen
AFTER BERLIN, WE flew to Amsterdam and one of the best—and worst—times of our lives.
It was quite different being surrounded around hash cafes and the red light district just a short walk from where we were staying.
I was actually quite glad Colin had suggested we use other people’s apartments because it made the experience of being in each city that much more special. We spent the second day in the city walking around the red light district and visited both the Sex Museum and the Anne Frank House before we rounded out our day at The Grasshopper with yet more lager and some of the best marijuana I’d smoked in my life.
Somewhere between my third lager and my second joint, it hit me and I realized I had more than my fill. I was going to be sick and not in a good way. I rushed to the toilet and thanked God one was available because my lunch and all the lager I drank rushed up before I could bend over all the way.
Someone knocked on my door and inquired in English, “Are you okay in there?”
I braced the toilet seat. “Yes, thank you. I think I overdid the pot and beer, that’s all.”
The female voice laughed. “Yeah, that happens to Yanks a lot. They forget how strong the pot is here and they end up smoking too much.”
I wiped my mouth with toilet paper before I flushed and opened the door to face a tall blonde who looked friendly enough. Her accent was definitely Dutch though it was hardly there and her blue-green eyes shined brightly.
“I’m Carolien. I actually work here but it’s my off night and I’m here with my boyfriend. You want some company?”
I washed out my mouth at the sink before I washed my hands, dried and finally shook her hand. “Deirdre. Sure, I think that would be great but I didn’t expect to be…approached as I have read the Dutch are pretty reserved.”
She laughed out loud. “We are except your boyfriend is a van der Meer and he speaks fluent Dutch like he was born and raised in the middle-class section of The Hague. It turns out his father was, and our families know one another’s. Imagine that. My mother had a huge crush on his father when they were growing up. She knew he moved to America but what are the odds I would run into his son all these years later at The Grasshopper?”
“That is quite the coincidence. I suppose your boyfriend has him cornered and they are having some bullshit conversation in fluent Dutch.”
Carolien nodded. “Yep. When I saw you bolt up the stairs, I knew something was wrong. You two are being careful, aren’t you?”
I stared at her as if she was speaking a foreign language. “What ever do you mean?”
“I mean, you’re on something, right?”
“Oh…that…yeah, we’re cool and it’s taken care of.”
“Okay because when I first got preggers with Maartje, I was the same way. Sick as a dog and you kind of reminded me of that when I heard you in the toilet.”
“No, I think I just drank too much. We’ve only been here for two and half weeks. City hopping and soon, our vacation will be over and it’ll be back to Seattle. I start a new job when we get back and he’s opening his own business so I would hope nothing like that would happen. It would be quite inconvenient.”
Carolien laughed again as we walked out to the patio area. Ironically, marijuana could be smoked indoors but cigarettes couldn’t therefore we had chosen to sit on the patio.
“You Americans and your inconveniences. Do you think a baby gives a shit about you starting a new job? Or him opening a business? Do you plan to be all traditional and get married first before the babies come? I know that is very important in your culture.”
“Well,” I began slowly, “it’s only half my culture like it is Colin’s. My dad was from France and my mother—well, the woman who raised me—is from southern England so although I grew up in the States, my parents’ weren’t exactly conventional. I don’t really think my mom would care if I had a baby out of wedlock, as long as the father and I planned to make a life together.”
“It’s a good attitude to have. Jens and I aren’t married and probably won’t even though we have Maartje. It doesn’t seem like something that has to happen, you know?”
I nodded in reply, not because I didn’t agree but because she had me spooked. I knew I wasn’t pregnant but that whole “P” word was the reason why I was never promiscuous. Everyone knew no form of birth control was one hundred percent accurate and accidents could happen but God knows I didn’t want that to be the case between Colin and I.
The moment I saw him chatting to Jens, Carolien’s boyfriend, the whole thought disappeared from my mind. His Dutch was smooth and definitely that of a native though he’d grown up in the States. It flowed easily from his palate and they seemed to be involved in a very intense conversation.
I sat next to him and he introduced me to Jens, who was obviously mixed race with his café au lait skin and the most gorgeous ice blue eyes I’d ever seen. He switched to English quite easily and the four of us had a great time.
We all agreed to meet up the next morning and they would take us to the countryside so after about an hour, we left The Grasshopper and walked to our apartment.
I wrapped my arms around Colin’s waist and clung to him as he slipped an arm around my shoulders. “Are you sure you’re okay? You had me worried there for a while.”
“I’m fine. I just drank too much and did too much marijuana but I’ll live,” I replied. He kissed my forehead and we continued our walk down to our apartment.
My hackles immediately went up as I saw a group of youths ahead. They looked North African or Middle Eastern, certainly not a unique sight in a country or city like Amsterdam. They were loud and rowdy and from a quick glance, I counted at least seven of them.
“Maybe we should do the American thing and cross the street,” I told Colin as he looked up to see the trouble heading our way.
“That is so racist, Deirdre. They’re probably just minding their own business. We leave them alone and we should be fine,” he responded in a good natured way.
“Listen, racist or not, I’m scared and that many youths scare me. You can’t defend both of us and we don’t know what the f*ck they are up to,” I said in a cold voice.
Colin guided us toward the other side of the narrow cobblestone street but just as I expected, they were up to no good. They began shouting to us in Dutch and Colin shouted something back though the bravado in his voice was seriously lacking.
Before I could realize the brevity of the situation, there were seven of the youths in front of us and three or four of them behind us by the sound of voices overlapping.
Several 0f them approached Colin and began shouting at him while he pushed me out of the way. “Go get help,” he told me in English under his breath.
“No f*cking way. I’m not leaving you here on your own.”
“Your little skank whore has a mouth on her,” one of them said in clear English. “If you were one of our women, we’d cut your tongue out and all have a go with you!”
Suddenly one approached Colin and smashed a glass bottle against the side of his head. He went down and I immediately grabbed the sharp edge of the bottle and hovered over him as I pointed the jagged edge of the bottle their way.
“If you don’t get the f*ck out of here, I will use this!” I exclaimed in anger.
Several lights from apartments overhead flicked on and Dutch voices shouted out of the windows, causing the youth to take off in all directions. I threw the bottle to the side and tried to get a look at the cut on the side of Colin’s head but he held his hand there protectively.
A younger Dutch gentleman walked up and began to speak, “I’m a doctor. Do you think I can have a look at that cut, sir?”
Colin nodded and said something to the guy in Dutch. The doctor began ranting in Dutch and what ever he said wasn’t exactly all that great by the tone of his voice.
“I’m leaving this shit country. I finally managed to get a very nice employment package from a hospital in Alberta, Canada. My family and I are out of here by the end of the month. It’s a goddamn shame you can’t even walk home at night without being attacked.” He shined a pin light on the cut. “You’re going to need stitches but you’ll live. My wife and I are up just across the street in the apartment right there. I can do them if your girlfriend isn’t too squeamish.”
I smiled at the doctor. “I’m not. I promise.”
We followed the doctor back to his apartment. Boxes were stacked everywhere and his tall and equally blonde and blue-eyed wife welcomed us. They were both fair-haired and pale eyed, welcoming but a bit reserved until Colin continued to speak Dutch to them.
The doctor’s wife offered me water while Colin had the side of his head stitched up. It was right at the hairline so it turned out he didn’t have to undergo a haircut but he would have a nasty looking bruise there which was already starting to form.
Afterwards, we thanked our hosts and offered money they turned down as they considered it an insult. Colin walked out but I stayed behind. “Thank you for your generosity.” I handed them my mobile number. “If you’re ever in Seattle, please allow us to take you out to dinner.”
Doctor Rutte stared at me with cool pale blue eyes. “This attack—it’s really shaken you up. Are you sure you’re all right?”
I shook my head and began to sob. “My dad was murdered in a hit and run almost seven months ago and tonight just brought it all back. I was so worried I would lose Colin too…thank you for doing what you have done because you didn’t have to do anything and we both know it.”
He smiled at me. “Yeah but people in this country…we do nothing all the time and perhaps that is why we are in the situation we’re in right now. I hope one day to return and live here again but…who knows? Life is a very strange phenomenon, isn’t it? One minute we are here and the next we are gone.”
I grabbed his hand though this startled him and squeezed. “Thank you. I truly believe if you hadn’t come…just know I am very grateful to both of you. Good night Doctor and Mrs. Rutte.”
They said their goodbyes and we waited until the cab we called pulled up. We were only three blocks from our apartment but neither of us wanted to risk walking.
The moment we got back, Colin shed his clothes and walked to the bathroom where he immediately took a shower. I took my clothes off and slipped into a cute white negligee I’d bought in Nice.
Colin walked out of the bathroom twenty minutes later with a towel wrapped around his narrow hips and a hand towel drying his hair. “I hope tonight didn’t spook you.”
I glared at him as if he’d recently smoked crack. “I’m scared, Colin. I could have lost you tonight. I’m thinking the day after tomorrow, we board a plane to Paris, spend a couple of days there and we go home early. My European vacation is officially over as far as I am concerned. Plus, we’ll have some time to spend together in Seattle before the real world comes crashing in.”
“Come on, Deirdre. I’m fine—it’s barely a scratch for God’s sake. I like being away with you and we have had so much fun. Don’t let this one incident wreck anything. Besides, I probably deserved it.”
He sat next to me and I turned his face toward me. “How the hell can you say that? What could you have possibly done to get attacked by a group of feral youth?”
“There you go being racist again—”
“Sorry if I don’t feel like being f*cking politically correct when a pack of f*cking youths decide to play target practice with my boyfriend because they mistaken you for a f*ckin’ native and therefore some weak white boy. No, I don’t find anything about this amusing or cute. And yes, I am pissed the f*ck off!” I exclaimed with enough emotion for the both of us.
Colin slid an arm around my back before he kissed my neck. “Does that make me seem weak to you?”
“No, it doesn’t. There were only four guys during the skinhead incident in Germany but what the hell could you do against ten or eleven guys out there? I have never been so glad you didn’t have that butterfly knife on you because they would have killed you—we both know that.”
“Life is all about risk, baby.”
I immediately closed my eyes and went with the feeling as his hands began to roam my body before he forced me to lie down on the bed. His kiss startled me but in a good way and when our tongues met in unison, the whole world seemed to disappear and all that existed was him and I.
He slipped his towel off before he began to undress me but it was his hard manhood I felt between us and I wanted him so much, I was willing to temporarily forget this evening’s incident. Once I was wearing only a sexy black bra and matching thong, I flipped us over gently and kissed his neck before my lips led lower.
Colin moaned as I licked and bit his nipples before my mouth and tongue worked down lower. I licked his belly button and he began to shake as he was terribly ticklish there but once I grabbed his cock, his breath came fast and hard. I loved everything about him, including the musky yet sexy scent his body gave off and already the mushroom head of his manhood was covered with pre-cum. I licked the tip of his cock and admired the scarlet color of his member. He was very much turned on and I meant to make him beg for me before the night was through.
The head of his manhood slipped easily between my open lips and I sucked on him tenderly at first before I applied more pressure. His fingers wandered through my head and caressed my scalp but he was never aggressive and was always willing to take what I would offer him and nothing more. He was a true gentleman when it came to lovemaking as he was in every aspect of his life. This was a side of him I only saw and I was lucky to witness it because he was mine, my secret Colin no one would ever truly know but me and that was the way it was supposed to be between us.
My lips slid lower as I relaxed my tongue and allowed more and more of his length to enter my mouth until all he felt was my hot, wetness covering the length of him. I loved to deep-throat him and learned to perfect my technique because I knew how much it turned him on. I alternated between taking his cock all the way to the back of my throat before pulling him out and licking up the length of his cock.
“F*ck, Deirdre, I’m gonna come,” he whispered.
I smiled at him in a wicked fashion. “Then I suppose you will have to do something for me to get that hard-on back, won’t you?”
Colin laughed out loud as I deep-throated him again and he interrupted inside my mouth. I pulled back further enough to receive him in my mouth so I could swallow his salty-sweetness as it was something I quite enjoyed.
His breath came hard and fast before he flipped us over and crawled up to me. We were face to face when he kissed me again, tongue included. He wanted to taste himself in my mouth and I allowed myself to surrender to his touch. His hands worked my breasts, playing special attention to my nipples which were on fire for his kiss, his tongue, his mouth.
He undid my bra and exposed my breasts to him and pinched the nipples hard enough to cause the slightest amount of pain but it was more erotic than anything else. I loved the feel of his hands and fingers on my nipples and anywhere else he wanted to put them. My sex had soaked my thong and he ripped it in the process of removing it. His mouth was on my left nipple and I arched my back to allow him full access. His razor sharp teeth bit down lightly and I thought I would pass out from the pleasure.
While his mouth was in complete control of my breasts, his fingers had wandered further below my waist. Two fingers from one hand were caressing my g-spot while the thumb on the other hand massaged my *. I thought I would pass out from all the pleasure alone. The feeling of multiple erogenous zones manipulated at the same time had me in a trance of pleasure and beyond reason.
Colin’s mouth teased my right nipple in the same way he had the left only this time, he’d removed his hand from my * and his right fingers were playing with my left nipple; it was stiff and attentive under his expert touch. God, I loved what this man could do to my body.
Slowly and without pretense, he abandoned my nipples but not before he said, “I want you to pinch and caress your breasts. I love watching you play with them while I go down on you.”
This brought a smile to my face as that was not a tough request to keep. It was true about my limited sex partners but I had a thorough amount of knowledge about sex in general. Without a doubt, there was no man who could eat p-ssy better than Colin and I could think this thought with a straight face because he was an expert.
He had no shortcomings to make up for because he had a decent sized cock. Hell, he wasn’t Dirk Diggler from the infamous film, Boogie Nights, but he was at least eight rock solid inches with a thick girth and that was more than enough for me. As far as I was concerned, his cock size was perfect like the rest of him was and I never felt like I was missing out on anything because he gave me everything I needed, both sexually and emotionally, and more.
The way he approached my soaking sex was a show in itself and I had never been more grateful in my life to have a Brazilian wax. He kissed my * before his tongue flicked over it in a teasing, sensual way and I was his for the taking from that moment on. The way he spread my sex and licked my * again before his mouth surrounded it in a apex of pleasure, sensation and feeling. My hips moved on their own, and ground closer to his mouth as his tongue licked lower and f*cked the entrance of my soaking sex. I continued to play with my breasts for him as his tongue led lower and teased my perineum. That was always as far as he’d gone so it didn’t shock me.
There was so much about Colin to love but I knew he was more of a freak in bed than he’d let on. I didn’t think he was the “whips and chains” type but I knew he wasn’t afraid to experiment and perhaps he was waiting for the okay from me. I was pretty much open to any and everything except sadism and masochism. It wasn’t my scene and I had enough issues without surrendering myself to a man. That wasn’t the type of person I was and I knew I could never be like that. I had nothing wrong with my fellow women who had it in them to do that but I couldn’t and deep down, he already knew this therefore it wasn’t a conversation that would ever happen between us.
However, when his tongue licked my anus, I jumped and sat up in bed. “What are you doing?”
Colin smiled lazily. “Relax. I’m not going to ask you if I can have you back there…not yet at least. I am assuming by your reaction you have never had anal sex?”
I lay down again and closed my eyes. “No, I haven’t. Drew wanted to because he was…well, you know…but I have heard horror stories from Caitlyn and she said it was the worst experience of her life. According to Aubrey, it gets better once you relax and use the right kind of lubricants but…I’ve never been as sexually adventurous as my cousin.”
“She’s right, you know. I picked up a few items since we are here in the legal sex capital of the world. Of course, it would have to be totally cool with you but it won’t be tonight. There is a…cleansing that has to take place. It helps prevent messy accidents you don’t want to know about but yes, it can be very pleasurable for a woman too.”
“Okay, well, if there are cleanses and what not then don’t lick me there because I don’t think it’s all right,” I whispered.
“Fine. Though I know your bowel patterns…we have been traveling together all this time. You actually went this morning before you had a shower so there is nothing wrong with my licking your anus. It isn’t disgusting and I’m not going to get sick by pleasuring you there.”
I leaned up on my elbows and looked down at my lover who was still positioned between my own legs. “I know but can we do it some other time then? Until I’m ready…can we just stick to straight intercourse and you eating me out?”
Colin’s crystal blue eyes stared at me in a devilish way before he nodded. “Of course, sweetheart. It’s no big deal but you should know that eventually, we will explore most of one another’s bodies. I don’t want there to be a place on your body I haven’t explored and I would be quite honored to be your first…when you are ready.”
“Okay,” I replied.
He began to lick my * again before his mouth devoured it and before I knew it, he’d milked an orgasm out of me I was not quite ready to give. I felt cheated because all this talk of experimental sex hadn’t squelched my desire to have him. In fact it turned me on and that said a lot more about me than it did Colin; perhaps I wasn’t the extreme sexual prude I’d always believed myself to be and that was a scary revelation in itself.
Colin crawled up my body, kissing different parts as he slowly reached me and when his face hovered over mine, I grasped my hands around his neck in a possessive manner and our mouths met in a delicious symphony of tastes and sounds. He guided his manhood inside me and I moaned out loud and wrapped my legs around his waist.
My arms clung to his neck while his hands held my hips in a vice-grip. Our sex became frenzied and the harder he thrust into me, the more I became one with him. At once, I felt overwhelmed but at the same moment, I thought I might melt into the bed and thus lose our closeness.
It was a feeling I’d never shared with anyone else but one that always accompanied the sex between us. Perhaps it was my subconscious feeling we could lose one another at any moment and I would be left alone yet again. Or maybe I should have told him I loved him just in case something ever happened to him, he would know what we had was never just sex.
Colin continued to thrust in and out of me and the orgasm washed over me like a gentle wave on a beach but I still clung to him and rode it out as my vaginal muscles clung around him like a vice. He gripped my waist tighter and buried his face in my neck as he came with a long moan and sigh crushed into one.
We lay there together for a while. He pulled out once he had gone soft but he still clung to me, resting his head on my chest as I stroked his silky flaxen strands.
“Maybe we should leave tomorrow after we meet up with Carolien and Jens. We can take the train to Brussels and from there get a train to Paris. How about it? Let’s just live fast and loose for the next couple of days. No rules—just you and me, how about it?” I explained in clipped sentences.
“Yeah, that sounds like a plan. I would go anywhere with you, baby. We can do what ever you want and I would be game, you know that?”
“Seriously? You aren’t angry with me? Earlier, you told me I was overreacting and I just assumed you would feel the same now.”
He clicked his tongue before he sat up and crossed his legs Indian-style. I sat up as well and leaned against the headboard. “I was a fool but I did say one true thing…I’m not convinced I didn’t bring tonight on myself. I have done some real bad shit, Deirdre. Illegal stuff and probably the only reason why I got away with it was because I was a rich white boy. At least I was at the time…I think we can both agree that turning thirty no longer makes me a ‘boy’ in any sense of the word.”
I stared at him for a long time, unsure about what to say in response. “Do you want to tell me about it?”
Colin swung his legs around on the bed before he stood and slipped on a pair of jeans, commando-style. I slipped on one of his white oversized tee shirts that barely covered the top of my thighs and we both walked out to the small balcony. He pulled a cigarette out and lit it before he inhaled hungrily.
“I don’t know if you’re ready for all that crap. I mean, Liam and I aren’t some poor ass white trash that had to fight for what we got in life but…it didn’t stop us from actin’ like we had something to prove. We were a couple of pain in the asses for our parents’ and I can’t help but think of all the shit we did because Liam wanted to do something fun and exciting.” His glare turned my way. “I wonder if he decided to tell Caitlyn about all of that and I know the answer because I know him.”
I took the cigarette from him and slipped it between my lips before I dragged on it hungrily. “Then why are you telling me about all this if it can just stay hidden? You know I would never say anything to anyone about it.”
He took the cigarette back from me and dragged long and leisurely before he flicked it over the balcony. “Because I’m not Liam. I have a conscience and I am not suggesting my brother doesn’t but he’s not me. I have worshipped him since we were kids, Deirdre. He was this hero, this amazing, larger than life character and I was so proud to have him as my brother. You don’t know what that’s like because you’re the oldest, like he is.”
I slipped my arms around his waist and held on to him as we looked into one another’s eyes. “That might be true but I do know what it’s like to live in another person’s shadow. I’ve done it my whole life with Cait being the perfect one and me being the ‘Wendy’ of the family. You know, from Peter Pan. I was the one who didn’t want to grow up or become an adult—Mom used to tease me and tell me I was what was wrong with Western Civilization. People like me who only wanted to acquire knowledge for knowledge’s sake and nothing else.
“‘What do you think you are preserving, exactly? The world doesn’t run on knowledge alone. You need to be useful—isn’t that why people go to college in the first place?’ It became a running mantra in our home and I just stopped coming home. I spent more and more time with Drew back in Boston. His family was there—his mom at least—and we would travel between Massachusetts and Washington D.C. It became fun, something to do because his parents were so different than mine. They seemed to get it and besides, he would eventually take his father’s position in Washington so spending a lot of time in the world of Academia didn’t bother them.”
“So, what are you trying to say?”
“Well, we’re not so different—you and I. You think because you were a bad boy and trying to live up to your brother’s expectations makes you any different than me burying my head in the sand by hiding behind Drew and his family because he was safe?
“Caitlyn’s right, you know,” I whispered. “Perhaps I did lead him on all these years. Why didn’t I just tell him we would never be together like that but I gave him a false sense of security…and I made him believe there could one day be a ‘him and I’. That’s not right and I shouldn’t have done that.”
“Come on, let’s go back inside. Neither one of us have the answers but we sure as hell aren’t going to find them out here.”
He followed me back inside and we both undressed and snuggled in bed together. I loved sleeping in the nude with him. We didn’t have to do this talk tonight and for some reason, I knew in my heart I wasn’t ready to hear what ever it was he had to say. It was best to go to sleep with the words left unsaid.