Page 12 of In Love With a Master (Interview With a Master 2)

“Ann had never had a man give himself to her for her pleasure alone. She didn’t know what it could possibly feel like to be selfish about sex and experience the ecstasy of a lover who wanted only to please her. I told Ann that I wanted to trail my tongue across the hard jutting nub of her clit. ‘I want to taste you,’ I told her. ‘Ann, I want you to come in my mouth. I want the taste of you on my tongue, and I want to watch your beautiful face as it twists and contorts in an orgasm.’”

“At the last moment, I eased my hand back from within her pants and instead massaged the top of her thighs. I felt Ann strain as though desperately trying to bring herself in contact with my touch – but that wasn’t my intention. She groaned her frustration and her breathing became shorter and sharper and faster. I spun Ann around and pushed her back against the kitchen wall. Her eyes were wide and hungry. I closed on her, cupped her face within my hands and kissed her savagely.”

I stopped pacing. I stood in the silence. Finally Leticia could contain herself no longer.

“And then what?”

“And then nothing,” I said. “I left Ann like that and walked out her door.”

“You are kidding?”

I shook my head. “I most certainly am not. I wanted Ann to get the message that I was in control and from that moment on her expectations could no longer be relied upon. Instead, I wanted her to understand the art of anticipation… the unexpected, because that is truly erotic.”

The silence stretched out and then suddenly Leticia’s voice broke my line of concentration.

“Jonah…?” she began uncertainly. “How many women have you slept with before me?”

I stopped pacing, stood perfectly still, and turned my head slowly until I was gazing into Leticia’s eyes.

“We haven’t slept together – yet,” I reminded Leticia gently.

She nodded jerkily then looked down at the floor. She bit her lip, and then looked back up at me. “But how many others have…?”

I prowled across the room to her. I pressed my finger to her lips and the rest of hers words stilled before she could utter them.

I stared down into her wide eyes. “A gentleman never tells,” I said, “and a real man never boasts.” I let the words hang in the air for long moments, and then shook my head in a sudden gesture of distain.

“Leticia, sex should not be a race, nor a contest. It shouldn’t be a challenge or measured like notches on a gunslinger’s belt. Bedding numerous women is not a measure of a man’s virility, nor his prowess. It is far better to love one woman all night long and leave her panting and breathless in a twist of damp love-tangled sheets, than to leap from one bed to another every night never truly satisfying anyone.”

Leticia looked thoughtful, then nodded in slow understanding.

I went on. “The first time a man makes love to a new woman is something very special and very precious,” I said. “You can never get that moment again. Undressing that woman is like opening a rare bottle of 1811 French Napoleon brandy – it is a moment to be savored. You must enjoy the bouquet, the scent, and admire the exquisite color, flavor, and eventually the taste. A woman’s body is a delicacy to be sipped and coveted, not swilled away in a few fumbling moments of haste.”

Leticia looked to me expecting more, but there was no more. I had said all needed to be said about anticipation.

Leticia must have sensed something different in my silence. She flipped over the cover of her notebook and set it back down on the coffee table. She got to her feet and shivered like some magical spell had suddenly been broken. There was a wistful smile on her lips, and a sudden expression of anxiety.

“Would you like a drink?”

I nodded, warily. “As long as you’re not going to offer me water.”

Leticia smiled. She shook her head. “I bought a bottle of whisky,” she said, and walked towards a wall cabinet in the living room. Behind a small door was a bottle and a couple of small glasses.

I nodded again. “Very thoughtful of you.”

“I figured it was the least I could do,” she unscrewed the cap from the bottle and I watched the delicate movement of her fingers as she poured half a glass of alcohol. “Would you like ice?”

I shook my head. “No, neat is fine.” I took the glass from her and stared down into the amber fluid, swirling the contents and studying the way the light changed its color. I took a sip and nodded my appreciation.

Leticia looked overcome with relief. Her smile broadened and we stood staring at each other.

I let the silence draw out until it was almost agonizing. I happened to like silence – I don’t feel the need to talk if I have nothing worth saying, but I could tell Leticia was growing uncomfortable. She looked at me with an air of brittle expectation.

“Is there more you can tell me about anticipation?” She made a hapless gesture with her hands.

“Do you need more? Do you not have enough for you article?”

Leticia looked pained. “I’m not sure,” she confessed. “The way the editor was talking, he expects this first article to be quite extensive. I would rather give him more than he needs and have it edited… if possible.”

I stared at the ceiling, closed my eyes, then sighed. I nodded. “Do it once, do it well,” I said softly, reminding myself of slogan from the Jonah Noble big book of rules, then looked to Leticia. “Sit back down and start writing.”

Leticia settled herself back on the sofa, but I didn’t wait. I started pacing the room, stepping between the apartment door and the hallway like a soldier on sentry duty. “One of the most amazing, unforgettable things that a man can do for a woman is to give her an orgasm with no expectation other than to please her,” I said. “I have done this, and it works. I have made love to a woman and concentrated all my efforts on arousing her and satisfying her. I have been deep inside her, our bodies intertwined, watching her eyes until the moment she began to come. I have held myself rigid inside her while she groaned and cried out and rode the waves of her release until she was heaving and gasping for breath beneath me. And then – when she was breathless and contented, I simply got up from the bed and began to get dressed,” I said. “After several moments the lady I was with realized I wasn’t coming back to bed. She sat upright and stared at me, first with a look of horror, and then one of bewilderment. You see, she thought she had done something wrong. She thought she had been a bad lover for me and that I was leaving because I was disappointed. When I sat back on the edge of the bed and held her hand, I explained that I didn’t need my own orgasm – all I wanted that night was to pleasure her.”

Leticia stopped writing as my voice trailed away. She shifted herself on the sofa. “What happened then?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “The lady began to cry,” I said. “She finally understood the enormity of the gesture and she began to weep. No man had ever cared enough about her pleasure before without expecting their own relief in return.”

Leticia made some frantic notes and I saw her underline several passages. Then she looked up at me again. “What you did that night for her… did that change the relationship?”

I nodded. “What I did won her heart,” I said. “In a single instant, I transformed in her eyes from being just another man to someone extraordinary – a man that was set apart from her other lovers because of their selfishness.”

Leticia looked pensive and thoughtful. Her voice became softer and more cautious. “This lady, Jonah… was she one of the women that you told me about in the first interviews we did?”

I shook my head. “No, Leticia. This lady was just someone from my past that I knew for a brief time.” I finished the whisky and set the glass down on the edge of the coffee table.

Leticia looked as though she was deep in thought, and once again the silence in the room stretched out. I unbuttoned the cuffs of my shirt and roll the sleeves up to my forearms.

“You have a lot of stories about women,” Leticia tried to pry gently.

I nodded. “The

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