He leaned forward and kissed me again, but this time harder, as if he meant business and wasn’t about to stop anytime soon. He darted his tongue into my mouth and his chest pressed against mine. Scooping me into the crook of his arm, he dragged me into a lying position, then flopped on top of me. My head sank in the pillow. I felt the hardness in his jeans press onto my bare legs as his body stretched out over mine. “I think we should put some music on,” he whispered into my mouth. “To cover up the squeals of delight you’re gonna be making in a minute.”

Utterly convinced of his plan, I muffled a giggle and smoothed my palms over the beautiful planes of his shoulders. “Okay, hit shuffle and see what comes on.”

He jumped up, clicked on the iPod and then shoved off his jeans and boxers as he walked back to the bed.

He dropped on top of me, gave a lopsided grin then set about kissing his way down my neck.

“Oh God,” Ian groaned, flopping his forehead against my collarbone. “The words work but this guy’s sappy voice really gets on my nerves.”

“I like James Blunt,” I said, reaching for a condom and thinking You’re Beautiful was a sweet choice of song after what he’d just said about me being perfect.

“Let’s hit shuffle again,” he bargained. “Get something with a bit more pace, a bit more rhythm.”

“Okay.” I shrugged.

He jumped up again, flicked the iPod with a definite impatience to his movement and then was hovering back over me.

I traced my finger over the tattoo on his inner arm. It was like Chinese writing or something, but more intricate, more curly and pretty. I liked it but it must have hurt like hell on that sensitive patch of flesh. “You’re not allowed to change the next one,” I said. “Whatever it is, it stays.” I was impatient to get down to business now.

“Suits me,” he said as he ducked to suckle my nipple. I arched into him, delighting in the suction he was creating and the gentle nipping of his teeth. He really was getting it just right, just how I liked it.

The iPod howled like a wolf. The eerie sound echoed around my four walls.

I ran my hands through his hair and shut my eyes. Perhaps Thriller could be sexy and it was certainly sonically dense enough to mask our noise.

His hands were wandering, sliding up my thighs toward the juncture of my legs. He ruffled through my tuft of coppery pubes and nudged my thighs apart with his knee.

An annoying zombie with outstretched, dangling arms loomed toward me, face ashen, dirty fingernails bloody.

Damn it!

I wished I had earplugs. I wished my flatmates had earplugs so I had no need for cover-up music. It was messing with my mind and my body.

“Where’s the condom?” Ian asked, sitting back on his heels, his breathing coming fast and hard. I stared at the neat row of bricked abs running down his stomach, visible now I was seeing him in daylight.

“Here.” I opened the wrapper and passed it to him. The blood that had been rushing to my clit was running scared, beating away at a hundred miles an hour, being chased by the bass of the music. He rolled the condom down his impressive erection.

I tried to suppress the image of creatures crawling from the mud in the graveyard, eyes wide and ratty black teeth grinning manically at me.

Ian looked hungrily at my waiting body, swallowed hard and then lay back over me. His weight was delicious, just right, half supported on his elbows, half pressed onto me. I squirmed, dragged in a breath full of his divine scent—man and musk, a lazy morning body infused with testosterone and coffee. I spread my legs wider. He kissed me again as he slid expertly into my hot flesh.

I gasped. His cock was long and thick and so hard it was like steel. He tunneled to the hilt on that first push. I felt impaled, possessed by him—it was glorious. I gripped him with my vaginal muscles and he groaned appreciatively in my ear.

The song blasted on. I could visualize the cheerleader with her frizzy hair, wide eyes and hands shaking at her screaming mouth.

I broke the kiss and stared at the dusty floral lampshade to rid my mind of the doomed girl in the Thriller video.

Ian thrust harder and began to rotate his pelvis against my clit. Any other situation, any other time, back in my old room, I’d have been clawing the ceiling, trembling with the imminent arrival of a fantastic climax. He palmed my right breast and nuzzled my neck. I tried to catch a spark as the song thumped out the chorus.

“What’s up?” he asked, suddenly stilling all movements.

“Nothing.”

He muttered something and began to pull away. I saw a flash of disappointment cross his eyes.

“It’s okay.” I wrapped my legs around his thighs and clasped his taut biceps. “Carry on, you’re doing great.” I tried to reach for a kiss. He was a cute guy, even cuter in the light of day and I really hadn’t lived up to his expectations. It wasn’t his fault my mind was being overtaken by zombies.

“Yeah, but you’re not.” He dodged my lips and slipped from me, swiveled to sit on the side of the bed and fisted his cock. His beautiful golden shoulders hunched and his head hung low. He was breathing hard.

“Ian,” I said, laying my hand on his back, keen to make it up to him.

“Don’t touch me.” He shivered, a trickle of spasms that seemed to rattle up his entire spinal column. “I can’t handle it. If you’re not into it, what’s the point?”

“I am into it.”

“No, you’re not. It’s obvious you’re trying to think of something else, anything except me.”

“That’s not true.”

“You’re staring at the ceiling, eyes glazed, groaning randomly, expecting me to believe you’re getting ready to climax.”

“But—”

“No buts.” He stood and turned to face me, his engorged erection jutted forward, the swollen head an angry burgundy. It looked painful. “Get dressed.” He snapped off the condom and aimed it at the bin. “We’re going out.”

“But—”

“No buts. I don’t give a damn what else you had planned for today.” His eyes narrowed and his jaw set. “Cancel it.”