THE APPRENTICE GIGOLO

Chapters 13&14

[designed by Lizzy Ashard]

Copyright © by Christopher Lloyd King, 2025

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage of retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

CHAPTER 13

Friday finally arrived.

With butterflies in his belly, Tom waited outside Agnès’s front door, clutching a bunch of stargazer lilies. The buzzer sounded, and the door opened.

She greeted him on the landing. ‘Are those for me?’ she said, burying her face in the blooms, ‘my favourite, how did you know?’

‘They’re a peace offering.’

‘For what?’

‘I upset you the other day.’

‘Did you? I don’t remember. Thank you anyway. Come in.’ She crossed to the sink and filled it with water. ‘These can’t have been cheap.’

‘I had a windfall during the week.’ He didn’t elaborate.

‘You can afford to eat, then?’

‘And pay my rent.’

‘Some windfall.’ She put the flowers in the water. ‘Let’s get to work; the light’s perfect now.’ Pointed to the zip at the back of her dress. ‘Would you mind?’

He obliged.

Shrugging her arms forward, the dress fell to her waist. She eased it over her hips and stepped out of it. She was wearing no underwear. ‘Where would you like me?’

Keep it purely business, he told himself. ‘Same pose as Monday. Then we’ll be able to compare like with like.’ As she walked to the chair, he felt warmth spreading across his groin. She was tiny and perfectly proportioned – not an ounce of subcutaneous fat. The play of the tiny muscles in her back and buttocks was mesmerising.

Straddling the chair, she draped her arms over its back, Christine Keeler fashion from five years earlier. His erection was now full-blown, pushing against the fabric of his jeans; he pulled the other chair towards him.

‘Hair up or down?’ As she reached for the hairgrip, he saw her breasts reflected in the mirror – full and well-shaped, with dark nipples. She stared back into his eyes, which were also reflected.

‘No, it’s fine as it is.’ He reached into his satchel for his drawing materials. There was no hiding the lump in his jeans; she was bound to have seen it. ‘Can you turn the chair anti-clockwise. Two centimetres, please?’

She frowned. Remembering that she didn’t like being teased, he resolved not to do it again. As he drew, the pressure behind his fly buttons eased. ‘What made you come to France?’

‘My mother’s influence. Because I was home-schooled, she thought I should widen my experience and come to Europe.’

‘You didn’t go to school?’

‘Where we lived, there wasn’t a school for two hundred kilometres, but she didn’t want to send me away, so she taught me at home.’

‘You live in the country?’

‘My stepfather’s a cattle-rancher. He has three thousand hectares in the Mato Grosso.’

‘Is that big?’

‘Average. He works hard. Five thousand head of cattle is a big responsibility. And he does a lot of it on horseback. Of course, he has Land Rovers, but he prefers to farm traditionally. He was originally from Scotland.’

‘Scotland? You speak English, then?’

‘Yes, but I prefer to speak Portuguese.’

The conversation stopped. The sun had moved round and was shining directly on her. The light turned her brown skin golden, gilding the wisps of hair resting on her shoulders. His pencil transcribed the detail. She was the perfect model. The absence of body fat meant he could see the muscle anatomy under her skin. He was pleased with the drawing but wished he’d brought his pastels. The colour of her skin deserved to be recorded. It was a moment he’d remember – full of promise, of opportunity yet to be grasped.

‘My mother’s a poet. Speaks perfect English and perfect French, but writes in Portuguese. Her poems rely on sound, and our language contains many beautiful sounds. Amor é um fogo que arde sem se ver; É ferida que dói, e não se sent; É um contentamento descontente; É dor que desatina sem doer.’

‘She wrote that?’

She shook her head. ‘Luís de Camões, the greatest Portuguese poet. It’s from the sixteenth century. It’s about love, naturally. Means something like… love is a fire that burns unseen; A wound that aches but isn’t felt; An always discontent contentment; A pain that rages without hurting.’

‘Do you think that’s an accurate description? I wouldn’t know – I’ve never been in love.’

‘Nor have I.’

‘Beautiful sounds, as you say. Can you remember any of your mother’s?’

She thought for a moment. ‘This is one of my favourites.’ Turned her head in profile so he could follow her lip movements. ‘Os olhos do meu amante são pesados com o desejo. Ele respira em min sua doce essência perfumada. My lover’s eyes are heavy with desire. He breathes into me his sweet-scented essence.’

‘Now that I understand completely.’

‘Have you finished the drawing?’

‘It’s as finished as it ever will be. Want to see it?’ She nodded. He handed her the sketchpad. ‘Wish I’d brought some colours. This doesn’t do you justice.’

She stared at it. Then up at him, eyes brimming with tears. ‘Do I really look like that?’

Was she flattered or disappointed? It was hard to tell. ‘I don’t know. To me, you do.’

She reached out and wrapped her arms around him, hugging him tightly. He held her, uncertain what to do next. The decision was made for him. She tilted her head back, eyes closed, and lips searching for his. He kissed her and felt her body moulding itself into him. With her hands resting on his shoulders, she pulled herself onto tiptoe, so their faces were on the same plane. Feeling her muscles straining to bring their bodies closer, he shifted the position of his hands onto the small of her back so he could draw her hips into his.

Eyes glistening, she broke away. A single tear tipped over the lower lid and ran down her cheek. Stretching out his fingers to wipe it away, he was surprised how much his hand was trembling.

He wanted her, not just as a release for his immediate desire, but as someone to explore, to devote his energies to discovering. She was a mystery to be unravelled. Drawing her back to him, he pressed his lips against her wet cheek, kissing away the tears.

She murmured in his ear, ‘I want you inside me.’

He lifted her onto his hips. Their need became irresistible. Carrying her to the bed, he laid her on the sheets, his weight pressing down on her. They kissed with open mouths, their tongues intertwined. Her hands reached for the top button of his jeans between their bodies. He pushed himself away and, propping himself on his hands, allowed her to unbutton him. Her breath caught in her throat, and she arched to receive him, her hands on his lower back pulling him into her. They climaxed simultaneously.

For several minutes afterwards, their bodies moved together as their breathing returned to normal. She caressed his face. With the release of sexual energy, they laughed spontaneously. Soon they were convulsed. So much so that it became impossible for him to stay on top of her. Flopping over to lie by her side, he reached for her hand. As their laughter subsided, he murmured, ‘I don’t know what that was about.’

‘Don’t you?’

Turning to face each other, they stared deeply into each other’s eyes.

‘It was all so quick,’ he said. ‘Hope I didn’t disappoint you.’

Holding his face in her hands, she smiled. There was no need for words.

For the rest of the afternoon, they floated in a bubble of euphoria, losing all sense of time. They posed for each other again and made love again, this time exploring every sensation and every detail of each other’s body. Through it all, they didn’t stop talking. She wanted to know everything about him: family, background, home in Newcastle.

His powers of description were stretched to the limits. The rows of backs-to-back running up from the Tyne and the coal-blackened municipal buildings around the Central Station were hardly the image of modernity that her description of Brazilia, with its gleaming futuristic structures and wide-open spaces, seemed to offer. The tiny rooms of his mother’s terraced house in Heaton drew an unfair comparison with her family’s ranch with its three thousand acres. Everything in Agnès’s life seemed so much more alluring, so much more exotic. He imagined the conversation around the table in Agnès’s house. There’d be none of his mam’s ever-present concerns, scrimping and saving – a war widow struggling to make ends meet.

Whether deliberately or not, she made no mention of her life before her mother married the Scottish ranch-owner or the identity of the birthfather from whom she took her name. An oil portrait of a young man hung on the wall above the bedhead. Agnès had similar facial characteristics. Her aquiline nose was an exact copy of his, and she had the same skin tones. Was that her father? Tom had no time to study the picture in any depth, but even a cursory glance revealed the haunted expression in the man’s eyes.

CHAPTER 14

Twelve hours – one thousand, four hundred long minutes – passed before he saw her again. Every minute, a minute wasted. He steeled himself not to rush round, reminding himself not to push his luck. She needed breathing space, time to herself.

Then she was in his arms again. Dispensing with the preliminaries, she pulled off his clothes and dragged him to the bed. Anticipation, created by being apart overnight, intensified their desire, but instead of a frenzied abandon, they were measured in their caresses. The pace was set by her. As she felt he was about to climax, she gently slowed down, prolonging the moment until they were equally ready for release. When it came, they surrendered in slow, extended ecstasy.

Lying in each other’s arms, they rested until their breathing returned to normal. She propped herself up on one hand and stared down at him. Stroked his face, wiped away the film of sweat on his forehead. ‘Querido,’ she whispered, brushing his lips with hers.

The physical sensation, the delicious tingling on the skin, the pulsing waves were still subsiding as she broke away. ‘I need to pee.’ She walked across the room to the bathroom. From the bed, he had a direct line of sight. She sat on the pan. She could have easily protected her privacy by closing the door, but chose not to. As she peed, she locked eyes with his. For him, it was a moment more intimate than he could ever have imagined. It was so un-English. Reticent about his bodily functions, he found it difficult, for instance, to empty his bladder next to another bloke in a public urinal. She clearly felt no such inhibition. Tearing off a handful of toilet paper, she dried herself, flushing the cistern behind her. The sound prompted a sympathetic reaction; he found he needed to empty his bladder.

Running across the floor, she jumped into his arms. ‘You make me happy.’

He returned her kiss. ‘Hold that thought. I won’t be a moment.’

Old habits die hard, and as he entered the bathroom, he automatically kicked the door shut.

On his way back, he noticed she’d slipped on his T-shirt. She was on the bed waiting. He nuzzled her hair, eyes on the oil painting above the bedhead. ‘Who is that?’

‘Amédée Toussaint, my biological father.’

‘French?’

‘Creole. From Guadeloupe. It’s a self-portrait from when he was a student in Paris. When he and my mother were together.’

‘What brilliant technique.’

‘He had real talent.’ She looked at it. ‘He was my age when he painted it, right at the start of his career.’

There was no mistaking the likeness between father and daughter – the colour of the skin, the shape of the nose, the direct, open gaze of the eyes.

‘He’s still painting?’

‘He died when I was ten. Never really fulfilled his promise. His addiction got in the way.’ Answering Tom’s unspoken question, she explained, ‘My mother says he was a drinker even before they met. When they returned to Buenos Aires, it gradually got worse. There was nothing she could do. He became violent and, even though she was pregnant, she had to leave him. That’s when she met my stepfather. It wasn’t a love match – Amédée was the love of her life – but she had no choice. Her parents disowned her when I was born; they couldn’t accept the shame of an illegitimate grandchild. Very conventional, my grandparents. Strict Catholics. They preferred to lose their daughter than explain to their priest why there’d be no christening. My mother had no money of her own, so when my stepfather offered marriage, she accepted him. They have always been affectionate to each other, but she never stopped loving Amédée. I always knew he was my father.’

‘Did you meet him?’

‘When I was ten, my mother took me to a hospital – well, a place for the dying. She took me into a room. He was lying on a bed hooked up to a drip. A sheet covered his chest and stomach, but his feet were exposed. They were so swollen they didn’t seem to belong to him. The whites of his eyes were a horrible yellow colour and were sunk into their sockets, staring at me when my mother told him who I was. I knew I should kiss him, but I couldn’t, even though I felt it would be the only opportunity I would have. I was right – he died the next day. We didn’t attend the funeral.’

‘You’ve inherited his talent,’ was all Tom could think to say.