The Trouble With Eden - Lawrence Block [79]
“Uh-huh.”
“I thought it would throw him off, you know? Not being able to get it out of his head. I mean, we went upstairs to his bedroom. And a couple doors down the hall is her bedroom, and she’s in there with the black, and he’s her father and how can he get this out of his head? But I guess I took his mind off it.”
“Uh-huh.”
“See, I really got him hot necking. With our clothes on and everything like kids in a drive-in. And by the time we were upstairs we were so hot for each other that nothing else mattered. Do you want to know what we did?”
“You know what I want.”
“Yeah. And I know what I want, too.”
“Tell me about it.”
His expression did not change while she spoke. Her eyes on him, she constructed her description of what had taken place at Hugh Markarian’s house, constructed it skillfully and deliberately. From time to time she was purposely vague, forcing him to ask questions. She never invented, never exaggerated, but stayed strictly with the exact truth as she perceived it.
After about a quarter of an hour she had finished. She thought there would be more questions from him, he seemed on the point of asking something, but he remained silent, and they sat together for several minutes without talking.
Then he said, “I guess I’ll get some sleep.”
“I’ll go with you.”
“Uh-huh.”
He got heavily to his feet. She followed him up the stairs. Her hands were trembling, she noticed, and her mouth was dry. She recognized both anticipation and fear within herself, anticipation of his lovemaking, fear that what had worked before might by now have lost its magic. She had read nothing in his face but defeat and exhaustion, both of them now echoed the slump of his shoulders as he mounted the stairs.
It might not work this time. Worse, it might provoke not lust but loathing. And that could be very dangerous for her. She looked at the size of him and remembered his strength. He had never struck her, but if he ever did—God, he was strong. It would be so easy for him to kill her with his hands.
She shivered at that thought. And wondered, fleetingly, whether there was more than fear in what she felt. The possibility was a shade more frightening than the fear which had occasioned it, and she made herself stop thinking about it.
In bed beside him, both fear and anticipation mounted while she waited to see if it would work. She wanted to reach for him but knew not to. It would be he who would reach for her. Or not reach for her.
When his hand settled on her thigh, her entire body sighed. Breath drained from her lungs and tension from her muscles. She had not realized that she had been holding her breath, nor had she been aware of the taut knots in her calves and forearms. She closed her eyes against the glow of false dawn and surrendered to the hand upon her thigh. Her mind filled with a picture of that hand. She could see it so clearly, the hairs on its back, the fading scar on the index finger. The hand moved to touch between her legs, and she gasped. Her arousal was instant and total.
He played with her for a long time. Idly, undemandingly, using only his hands. Once, as he reached for her breasts, she felt his cock press like a bar of hot iron against her leg. She wanted it in her. She felt it against her leg and saw it in her mind and ached with her own emptiness. But her hand did not reach for him. She waited.
And when he took her—and who knew how long it was, seconds or minutes or hours, who knew, who cared?—When he took her it was with strength and fury and power that took her completely out of herself. It was frightening to be fucked like this. And more frightening to think of living without it. All the women he had had, and none of them had ever been possessed as he possessed her. Oh, it was worth it. It was worth anything she had to do, anything at all.
She woke around noon, showered, dressed, put up a pot of coffee. While it was perking she heard him upstairs in the bathroom. She set two places at the breakfast room table, broke eggs into a frying pan. Then she remembered