With January having been freezing and with further heavy snow expected in the part of Germany where we were living, Penny’s suggestion of a week’s tennis course in southern Spain sounded like an excellent idea. We booked with a British company, as she joked that she wasn’t sure she’d manage a whole week with only me to talk to.

At Malaga airport, there was sunshine when we arrived and met up with the people who made up the twenty-strong group. Their ages ranged from late twenties to over sixty. It became obvious the following morning that while I was one of the better players, Penny was way ahead of the field, so much so, that she was pulled out to demonstrate some of the techniques the coaches were trying to teach us. That meant that we were apart for almost the whole day. So as not to get in the way of a little light flirting, if she felt like it, I kept away from her. She knew I’d be doing the same with some attractive course-member, or failing that, with a waitress or two. For both of us, it meant nothing, just a bit of holiday fun. We only met up after dinner each night, in our room. I was happy to take advantage of the buzz she was enjoying from the admiring looks, and our love-making each night was intense. The fact that she played most of the time in bra-top and Lycra shorts made her very popular with all the men. In and around the pool, she also caught the eye. Once her midriff had picked up a tan, she’d abandoned her lime-green one-piece for the white bikini that I’d persuaded her to buy at the airport while waiting for our flight out

On the final evening, there was a gala dinner. The coaches’ choice of venue had bemused me, and it didn’t improve as I sat, feeling rather alone, in a Chinese restaurant, contemplating an underdone lump of squid that looked like the tread on my mountain-bike tyre. Penny was miles away, up at the top end of the table with the coaches. The official reason for that was that she had won the doubles tournament that morning. No matter who she’d partnered, she’d won. She probably would have if she’d played on her own. The other possible explanation was the sun-dress she had bought in the local market. The bright, multi-coloured dress was tennis skirt length and revealed most of her nicely-tanned thighs. The top had a halter-neck and her bare back made it clear that she wasn’t wearing a bra. Such was my appreciation of her outfit and the little white thong under it, that we’d barely made it out of our bedroom in time for the pre-dinner cocktails.

The people to right and left of me were deep in conversation with the people beyond them, so I was wool-gathering when I heard someone speaking German. It was the male half of a couple and he was addressing his wife, who was sitting opposite me. Normally I would have engaged her in light conversation. Her lowered eyes and sideways glance at her husband when I said hello to her, let me know this was a bad idea. His glowering look had confirmed it.

“Well? Get on with it. You said you’d kiss one of them and I’m not going to wait forever,” he grunted. He hadn’t lowered his voice at all. I froze. Why German? Why the big fuss about a kiss? Nobody else had reacted, so I guessed I was the only other person to have understood.

“I suppose so,” she answered.

I looked at them from the corner of my eye. They were a well-heeled couple, from their designer clothes and especially her jewellery. They hadn’t socialised much with the rest of us but had eaten in the hotel’s most upmarket restaurant. Penny had played against this guy Richard and hadn’t liked his surly and condescending attitude to what was supposed to be a fun game. He was tall, well-fed and forty at a guess, his wife early to mid-thirties. Her accent said Russian. I’d noticed that she was an attractive woman, but we hadn’t played in the same group. But we hadn’t played in the same group fortuitously, Richard helped me out with her name.

“Are you listening to me, Natasha? I told you it’s Angie you have to kiss. But I’ll let you choose someone different if you really want. See how nice I am to you, even when you’ve been a bitch?”

I struggled to hide my surprise, and not only at the subject matter. I was expecting him to name one of the coaches, young sportsmen whom Penny regarded as super-sexy, even the one who was ostentatiously gay. Angie was the partner of the lead coach; a very English girl, a pretty brunette, aged no more than maybe twenty-two or three, taller than me and athletic. Easy on the eye, but no match for Penny in the sexiness stakes, in my opinion.

“Not Angie. She is a nice girl and too young. It would shock her. She would not like it.” Natasha answered. There was a pause, then: “Okay. I decided. You say I can choose. I say the American.”

Penny was the only American female in the group. I concentrated on giving nothing away.

“At bloody last! But because I’m letting you choose the woman, you’ll be needing to feel her tits or her cunt.”

“But this morning you said I only had to kiss!”

“Last night, you said you’d rather fuck a woman than me and I haven’t forgotten it.” His tone was only just short of a snarl. He was drunk, but he wouldn’t be a nicer man sober. Natasha ... any woman, come to that ... was wasted on him. He went on:

“I also told you this evening was bare arse time.”

I was almost ready to sympathise with him, until he added:

“Who has the money?”

“You have the money.” Natasha’s response was a mumble. It sounded as if this was a regular ritual.

“Who makes the rules?”

“You make the rules.”

“So who calls the shots?”

“You call the shots.” It was barely audible.

“And don’t you ever forget that. Get them off!”

Natasha blushed.

“Well?”

Natasha picked up her hand bag and started to stand.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Richard asked, grabbing her by the arm. “You do it here and now.”

Trying not to stare, I gazed vaguely past them as if looking at the sea that shimmered in moonlight beyond the tables, but really reminding myself about Natasha, a pleasant-looking blonde woman of average height, with an open, friendly face. They had arrived after me at the restaurant, so I’d already had a chance to admire her long, jungle-pattern dress that was split a long way up on both sides, showing off a nice pair of legs. The neckline left her shoulders bare and hinted at a well-shaped pair of tits that were bigger than Penny’s. She was a well-maintained adult woman rather than the stick-thin, heavily-made-up, mail-order trophy wife I’d have expected to find with a man like Richard, and all the more attractive for that, especially when she smiled.

She wasn’t smiling now. She sat down again with a thump. I felt Richard glaring at me and felt I had to say something. I had to suppress the urge to tell this oaf to fuck off and die somewhere though,.

“Thank goodness the weather has stayed fine,” I began, sounding as English as I could, so as not to give the game away. “It’s lovely to see all the ladies dressed up, don’t you think, after a week in tennis gear, and on such a beautiful evening, too? It must be lovely to speak foreign languages. Was that German?”

“No. It’s fucking Double-Dutch,” Richard grunted and drained his wine glass yet again. Natasha looked grateful for the interruption, until Richard shoved her with his elbow. “Off,” he grunted.

“People are going to notice,” she protested, still in German.

“Your problem. I said bare arse tonight and that’s final,” Richard said.

Natasha’s face was scarlet. She wriggled and squirmed, trying to hide that she was working her knickers down her legs. They were round her ankles and she was reaching down to rescue them when I put my foot between hers, stopping her. She flashed a quick look in my direction, extricated her feet and sat up straight again. Richard hadn’t noticed, too busy calling for another bottle of wine.

“I leave them there. It will make the waiters wonder,” she said to him.

“That’s more like it. Don’t expect me to pay for your next pair though,.”

Natasha rolled her eyes. For the rest of the meal, I sensed that she was trying to catch my eye, but I always managed to be looking elsewhere. Dessert came and went, and people started to drift back towards the bar.

“Right. I’m off to get a proper drink,” Richard announced, still in German. “Remember, I’ll be checking. I’d better be able to smell her on you when you come in tonight, or you’ll be feeling the crop on your arse.” His tone said that he’d enjoy himself either way. It was a struggle not to break a wine bottle on his thick skull.