A MAN accused of sex offences with underage girls was toying with a complainant to get back at his ex, a court heard.

Nicholas Faithfull told jurors the only reason he was messaging one of his accused victims was because he thought his former partner - who was also underage - would be looking at his phone.

He also denied to police knowing that any of the four complainants were underage, but Reading Crown Court heard police found a 15th birthday card addressed to one of the schoolgirls with his fingerprints on.

But Faithfull, 20, remained adamant during cross examination that some of the sexual activity he stands accused of did not take place.

"I knew my ex [who cannot be named for legal reasons] would see it [the message], there was no point behind it," said Mr Faithfull.

"I was always on her phone in the same manor that she was always on my phone, I saw what was on her phone and she what was on my phone."

In the earlier stages of the trial, jurors heard Faithfull had engaged in a sex act with a schoolgirl at a churchyard and took another girl to a wooded area near Earley Station to have sex.

Prosecuting at Reading Crown Court, Isabel Delamere, said: "This is a clear as light picture of you pursuing her, having sex with her and wanting to have sex again in full knowledge that she was only 13.

"On the CCTV shot we have of you you are walking with her and you leave the station with her.

"You walked off together heading over the bridge that goes over the main road and the railway line, where were you going?"

But the 20-year-old denied sex acts took place with either teenager.

"We were going over there [the other side of the station bridge] and then we came back," he added.

"I did not want to go in the direction of my house because my parents would have asked who the girl was.

"We did not go to the wooded area she described and we did not have sex."

Faithfull, of Glebe Gardens, Sonning, formerly of Sevenoaks Road, Earley, denies six counts of sexual activity with a child under 16.

The offences are said to have taken place in 2014 and 2015.