Off Season - Jack Ketchum [35]
But sexually Jim came on aggressive and even slightly cruel. She didn’t think it was particularly healthy, but what the hell—it excited her. Rape fantasy, naturally. For her, next to masturbation it was the best way to fly. Suddenly she felt in a bit of a hurry to get back to bed.
She poured herself a second glass of apple juice. Let him wait, she thought. Let us both wait and work up an appetite. She thought about him lying on the pullout bed, naked on top of the covers, getting just a little bit angry over the delay. His flesh would be smooth and soft when she touched it, especially over his neck and shoulders and his small, boyish ass.
This is ridiculous! she thought. What am I standing here for? She closed the refrigerator door and paused a moment while her eyes grew accustomed to the dark. There was only a slight flickering now from the fire in the living room. It had nearly burned away.
Once again there was a moment to enjoy that incredible darkness of country nights; nights so dark they seemed to fill her with a sort of vertigo. Even with the moon out, the inside of the house was dark, with a darkness that thickened until every corner, every geometric slope of wall and furniture melted into a single sheet of opaque shadow. A Stygian darkness, she thought. She’d always liked that phrase. The darkness of dreams.
She moved toward the light. Outside she heard gulls calling. In the doorway to the living room she could see again. He was on the bed just as she had pictured him, naked and watching her. Was he smiling? She couldn’t tell. It was just like Jim not to smile now.
She saw his head turn to follow her as she stooped before the fireplace and put their last piece of wood on the grate. The fire leaped to taste the dry bark and warmed her.
She turned to face him where he lay framed against the window, pale in the moonlight. She slipped the nightgown slowly off her shoulders and let it drop. She stood a moment posed against the fireplace, knowing he would like that and knowing how good she’d look, her body burnished by the same light. She felt the heat of her own narcissism flush her skin. And then another heat—his.
She moved to the bed. They said nothing. She reached for his cock and held it in her hand, warming it and feeling it throb and engorge with blood. Then she released him and climbed on top of him, beginning to ease him inside her.
“No,” he said.
He lifted her up and withdrew his penis and lay there propped on one elbow. They stared at each other for a moment. Then he pushed her roughly onto her back and smiled. His hands went to her wrists, pinning them against the bed. She saw how serious his face was and she began to laugh. It was not always the same each time between them, but close enough.
The game had begun.
PART III
SEPT. 14, 1981
12:02 A.M.
Except for the room in which the man and woman had their fire, the house was dark. They knew how the moon would illuminate them should anyone glance out the window. So they kept close to the house where they could not be seen. They moved silently from front to back until they had located all the people inside. They saw two asleep in one room—Dan and Marjie—and a man, Nick, still awake in the bedroom next door. In the room with the fire the man and woman were fucking. With the fire burning, these two would be blind to them, and for them there was plenty of light. They watched. It was good to watch.
They saw the man take her nipples between thumb and forefinger and twist them, and then lift his fingers away and use only his thumbs to press the nipples back into her flesh. The man was cruel to her. Through the glass they heard her moan and saw her move over him to straddle him, putting him inside her and thrusting against him while he raised himself up, his arms around her, and bit down on the flesh of her arms, her neck, and her breasts.
Now they watched him come out of her, glistening, and roll her over on her back, spreading her legs wide and kneading the flesh of her inner thighs with his hands, and they saw her arch her back as he put