She looked dazed now, as she lay where he’d placed her, unmoving, just staring up at him as he undressed, almost falling over as he stood on one foot, then another, trying to get out of his damn boots. He loved his cowboy boots, usually, but at times like this, they were . . . inconvenient.
When he was full commando, she continued to study him. No “ooh baby, you are so big,” or anything phony like that. But she didn’t look unhappy, either. Aaron had a good body, and knew it, but he imagined that she’d seen . . .
No, no, no! I am not going there.
He went to the foot of the bed and removed her high heels, then tugged down her panties, exposing a patch of pretty dark curls. Again, no special effort made to entice. No female grooming, like a runway strip. Or glitter, which was the trend for some women today. Vajazzling, they called it. Which he personally considered a bit silly. A waste of crystals. And, man, they were a pain in the ass to get out of the sheets afterward. It was like sleeping on pebbles.
Kneeling on the edge of the mattress, he spread her legs, then moved between them, but not too high. He was still looking. A man liked to look at what he was doing. With an expertise learned as an adolescent on the dress form owned by the grandmother of his friend, Freddie Mack, he flicked his fingers just so, and voilà! The bra was off.
“You are so pretty, Fleur,” he said, feasting on her breasts, in fact, all of her body.
“So are you.”
He tried to smile, but he was in agony. “Fleur, honey, I can’t wait.” He moved up and over her, touching her between her legs. She was thankfully damp. So, without preamble, he rolled on a condom, took himself in hand, and placed the tip of Super Dick at her opening. Then, bracing himself on straightened arms, he eased inside.
She was tight, but there were no welcoming spasms from her inner folds. Damn! She was not as turned on as he’d thought she was. Either that, or her mind might be aroused, but her body was not.
He slid out and then back in again, to satisfy his own need. But then he forced himself to freeze.
She must have sensed his disappointment because she said, “I’m sorry. My body has learned to shut down. It probably can’t respond anymore, not like you want.” Tears filled her eyes.
“Oh, Fleur! I love you. Whatever you give me is enough.” He began to kiss her then. Slow, drugging kisses that went on and on. It felt like starting over again, which was fine. He would do what he had to do to win Fleur.
She put her arms around his shoulders, which he took for a good sign. She was trying.
Still embedded in her, still kissing her, alternating with murmurs of encouragement, he played with her breasts, remembering how sensitive they’d been before. He played with her ears, too. Slowly, he was learning about her body’s erotic spots. His fingers also traveled lower and gently flicked her clit.
She squirmed under his hands, and he felt a quivering spasm against his cock.
His body’s inclination then was to begin the long thrusts that would bring him to completion. But he sensed they would be too soon for her.
With sweat beading his forehead, he rolled over onto his back, taking her with him so that now she sat astride his erection which he could swear was pulsing like a heartbeat. “You call the shots here, darlin’. Move or not. Touch me or not.” Or just sit there like a female Buddha, torturing me to death.
Leaning forward, she explored his face and neck and shoulders with her fingertips.
Little did she know that her position, moving forward, gave him even greater pleasure, and in fact should be putting pressure on that bud of hers that he’d already stimulated.
She moved back to sit her rump on his thighs, and once again the movement gave his cock a jolt of pleasure. “Tell me what you want me to do,” she said.
“It’s not what I want. It’s what you want.”
“I don’t want anything.”
Oh, great! He closed his eyes and tried not to panic. “Does nothing with me please you, Fleur?”
“I like touching you and seeing your response. I like your kisses and I liked when you touched my breasts, but the rest . . .” She shrugged.
Man, oh, man! This was bad. Very bad. With infinite care, he withdrew his swollen cock from her, then rolled over onto his side, tucking her face onto his chest. He kissed the top of her hair. “Do you trust me, Fleur?” he asked.
She nodded against his chest. Even her breath against his nipple was sheer agony.
“Then just let me love you,” he husked out, “and I do love you, Fleur.”
“But—”
“No buts. We’ll work through this.”
And for the next hour, they did work. Well, he did, harder than he’d ever worked in his life, to arouse his love. Maybe she wouldn’t come from intercourse the first time, but he was going to try his best to make sex at least enjoyable for her.
If he’d been thinking clearly, he would have gone into the bathroom and taken care of business before starting on this venture into unknown territory. But he hadn’t and now . . . pure torture!
He kissed, he stroked, he fluttered, he whispered soft words, he groaned and sighed. He used his mouth, his breath, his fingers and palms, even his hairy legs to excite Fleur’s deadened nerves. Well, not totally deadened or she wouldn’t have climaxed those two other times for him.
After an hour of this torment, more for him than her, obviously, Fleur thrashed her head from side to side and moaned, “Oh . . . please . . . now . . . oh . . .”
That was his cue.
This time when he entered her, his overstimulated cock was met with soft spasms. Thank you, Jesus! he thought, then immediately amended, Oops, sorry, that was not appropriate.
It didn’t last long. How could it, the condition he was in?
He began the long, slow strokes which almost immediately became short and hard. Not too hard, he kept telling himself, when he was able to focus even a little through the fog of his overarousal. Hard might equate to force or assault with Fleur. And God help him, he never wanted her to think of that during sex again.
Still, she seemed to welcome him. Staring up at him in wide-eyed wonder, or surprise, she tried so hard to be accommodating—to please him—when the goal was to please her.
But he couldn’t keep his eyes open. When he could no longer forestall his climax, he squeezed his lids shut, arched his back till the cords in his neck about popped, and came with a wild, hot, ecstatic rush.
Fleur moaned, then cried out as her back bowed in her attempt to meet him in a mutual climax. And she did come! Not in wildly convulsing squeezes of her inner muscles, but gentle waves of spasms.
For a long moment, he lay flat on top of her, unable to breathe. A quick glance at the bedside clock showed him that it had been an hour and a half since he’d brought Fleur to the houseboat. He almost chuckled as he recalled that old song “Sixty Minute Man.” Yep, Aaron had finally joined the club.
When he was able to raise his head, he saw that she was looking up at him with a shy smile on her face. “That was nice,” she said.
Nice? NICE? Whaaat? Is there a man in the world who wants his bedroom skills to be called nice?
Oooh, that was a challenge if he ever heard one.
Rubber duckie, you’re the one . . .
Fleur knew that Aaron was disappointed. She was disappointed. In herself. Not him. He’d been wonderful. Patient. Kind. Teasing. Loving. But she was less than a woman, and it showed. No matter how much she’d tried, Fleur couldn’t be normal. Parts of her were too scarred over to have feelings anymore.
Not that she hadn’t enjoyed his lovemaking. She had. In a mildly pleasant way. But it was not the way women should respond to expert sex play. Not the way Aaron’s partners behaved, she was sure of that.
She’d warned him, but did he listen? No. He thought that love conquered all. Even her broken body. He thought he could work a miracle.
Well, now he knew.
No sense trying to slither out of bed. He had her pinned with a
knee over her thighs and his head on her breast as he took a breather. Or maybe he was asleep. But no, the second she tried to push him off, he was alert and looking down at her.
“Um . . . I think you should take me back to Bayou Rose now.”
“Huh? We have a good six to seven hours yet.”
Since he’d raised his head, she managed to push his knee off her legs and was about to roll away from him.
He caught her with a hand on her hip and turned her on her side to face him. Which was even worse because now her body parts—her nude body parts—were aligned with his nude and growing (Again!) body parts.
“Aaron!” she chided. “I should return while everyone is asleep.”
Nuzzling her neck, he murmured, “I figure if I take you back around three a.m., everyone will still be asleep. Not that we’re fooling anyone, but still we can try to be discreet.”
“Six to seven hours! What would we be doing for all that time?” She realized her mistake immediately. She grabbed at that hand which was wandering where it shouldn’t and arched her head back to glare at him.
He grinned and tried to pull her into his embrace again. “Making love, darlin’. That’s what we’ll be doing.”
She sighed at the hopelessness of arguing with a horny man, but still she tried. “Don’t pretend that I was anything but a dud, Aaron.”
“What? Are you kidding? Do you hear me complaining?”
“That’s because you’re too nice.”
“Nice again? We have got to wipe that word from your vocabulary. I am not nice. I am a lean, mean . . . ouch! Stop squirming.”
“Stop putting your hand there.”
“Whatever you say, honey,” he said, batting his eyelashes with innocence. “Fleur, I loved making love to you, and if that was only nice for you, I promise I can do better. With practice.” Now he was not only batting his eyelashes, but waggling his eyebrows at her. “Besides, that was just the appetizer. And speaking of food, maybe we should refuel.” He got up off the bed and disposed of the used condom in a waste basket. “But first, I have something to show you.”
She rolled her eyes and attempted to pull a sheet up to cover her nudity. “I’ve seen it, and it’s very nice.”
“Nice again. I swear, you are going to eat those words.” He yanked the sheet back down and stared at her body with deliberate intensity. “No, this is something else. Sex toys.”
That was her cue to exit, fast. “I have to go to the bathroom,” she lied.
“Good. We’ll go together.”
“We will not!”
He took her hand and yanked her off the bed, forcing her to follow him.
“Are you crazy? I do not share a bathroom. And sex toys are the last thing I—”
He opened the bathroom door and she had to laugh. Even though the room wasn’t large, there was a big shower stall with a dozen or more faucets that would hit the body at different angles.
“I got the idea for the rainforest shower at Bayou Rose from this,” he told her, shoving her into the stall and stepping in after her. After the door was closed, he turned on one of the faucets, and a warm spray hit her square in the face. It was probably a deliberate hit.
“So, a shower is a sex toy?” she sputtered out.
“It can be, but here’s the best sex toy of all.” He handed her a bar of soap. “You can play with me all you want.”
Which she did.
And then he did.
At one point she remarked, “Soap as a sex toy? What next? A rubber duckie?”
“How did you know? That’s one of my nicknames for . . .” He glanced downward at his erection. “When we were kids, and took baths together, Dan and I used to see these little things bobbing in the water and we called them rubber duckies.”
She laughed. “So you name your . . . um, body part? Honestly, I never know when you’re teasing or not.”
“Swear to God,” he said, making the sign of the cross on his wet chest. “He also answers to Super Dick, or just ‘Hey, you!’”
“He?”
“Of course, he!” he answered indignantly.
Afterward, as she ate voraciously of the meal he set before her and drank the wine he continued to replenish in her glass, she began to feel a little more relaxed and womanly. He’d wanted her to sit on his lap while they ate, which she’d declined. But then, he might have been teasing again. Instead, they sat across from each other in the kitchen booth, which was cozy in the candlelight.
He was wearing only boxer shorts, and she wore his blue dress shirt, but she didn’t mind too much. It was either that, or eat naked, which would be way out of her comfort zone.
Barry Manilow music played softly in the background, and to her amazement, she was becoming a fan. As they ate and listened to the music, they talked. Aaron told her of life in Alaska while his mother was still alive and how he and Daniel came to live in Louisiana. Tante Lulu, of course, had a hand in that. Fleur laughed a lot, or smiled as he told stories of the antics he and his twin indulged in growing up, and then as adults. The overly serious Daniel and the wild Aaron.
She found herself talking about her past, too. Some of it. Growing up in poverty with eight siblings in a small stilted cottage on the bayou, but somehow she was recalling some good parts. Catching crawfish, or mudbugs as they called them, with nothing but a leafy branch and a bushel basket. Playing barefoot in the pudding-like mud. Rowing a pirogue through the swamps with her older sister Gloria searching for wild Indians (her brothers Joe Lee and Eustace). Singing in the church choir.
He smiled as she talked and took one of her hands in his, as if sensing that she was giving him a rare gift. A peek into a painful past. He never asked about the day she was kidnapped or the months and years afterward. Nor did he ask what happened when she tried to go home after being rescued.
He didn’t say the words, but she saw them in his eyes. The eyes did not lie. He loved her.
And she was pretty sure she was falling in love, too.
When they went back to the bedroom, they continued their soft conversation and finished off the bottle of wine. She let him caress her body, everywhere, while they continued to exchange memories. She knew that it was a deliberate ploy to distract her while he attempted to arouse her body for more lovemaking, but she allowed it. At first, she allowed it because she owed him. Later, she allowed it because it felt so good to go from mellow to a thrumming awareness of her skin and heightened senses. Still later, she turned the tables and worked diligently to examine his body, which was so different from hers, and remarkably alike in its erotic spots.
To her surprise, Fleur didn’t find these things she did with Aaron as repugnant as she’d imagined they would be. They didn’t trigger memories of other things she’d done with men because there were no similarities. This was lovemaking.
When Aaron entered her this time, it was still not wild, screaming sex, but it was good. Very good. And when she whispered, at the end, “I think I love you,” there were tears in Aaron’s eyes.
Family ties . . .
Aaron had no time the next day to be with Fleur, in private. Just a look exchanged, or a passing touch. Fleur had told him last night that she thought she loved him. That was enough. For now.
Soon after dawn, the Brothers Jake and Snake said Mass in the library for all those currently at Bayou Rose, including a bevy of miraculously quiet and well-behaved animals in front of the altar/library table. When it was time for Communion, Snake arched a brow at Aaron and Fleur as if questioning whether they were in a state of grace to receive the host, but he gave it to them anyway.
For some reason, Aaron couldn’t think of what they’d done as sinful. Aaron knew what sex-as-sin was, the kind that made the parish priest blush and inflict a humongous penance on a randy youth. This wasn’t it.
Another breakfast feast followed the services. Aaron would have to resume his jogging routine soon. They all would if they continued to eat like this.
After that, it was nothing
but organized mayhem at Bayou Rose. Ed drove Mother Jacinta to the airport and took Lily Beth and the kids to one of her friends, just to keep them out of the way. A physician’s assistant arrived and was up at one of the cottages setting up a makeshift examining room for the girls when they arrived.
Aaron helped Aunt Mel carry a folding table and chairs up to another cottage, along with a laptop, a phone and its charger, and some office supplies so she could work with the social worker when he arrived in processing the girl’s histories.
“You seem happy,” Aunt Mel commented.
“I am.” I’ve got to stop grinning, or everyone will know . . . if they don’t already.
“Your dinner went well?”
And what came before and after. “Perfect.”
“Should I be making plans?”
If I’m lucky. But wait, I better cross my fingers, knock on wood, toss salt over my shoulder, and all that crap, just in case. “Not yet.” Changing the subject, he said, “I’m sorry to have mixed you up in all this mess. And the danger.”
“Pfff! What else would I be doing back in Alaska? I never was much for knitting. At least I feel useful here. And I still say you should have let me fly tonight. I keep my license up to date.”
Oh, Lord! “Maybe some other time. If you decide to stick around here.” The last he said with a question in his voice.
“It all depends.”
“On what?”
“Whether I’m needed.”
He noticed that she hadn’t said “wanted.” That went without saying. “We will always need you.”
She nodded, with tears in her eyes.
He hugged her, and might have had a tear in his eye, too.
“Of course I could always join one of those Internet dating sites. But, no. I tried eLesbo.com one time and what showed up at my door was a sixty-year-old woman with purple hair on a Harley with so many piercings she probably ran like a sieve whenever she took a drink of water. Not that she drank water. Oh, no! She asked me if I had any vodka in the house. She liked it straight up. Preferably Smirnoff.”