Well, it was like . . .
Possession.
That’s what it was, like being possessed by blinding light and heat and pain and pleasure and feelings too large for my body. I was momentarily overwhelmed, unable to fully engage my mind, even when my muscles and joints finally unlocked and I could move them. I sucked in my first full breath in what felt like hours, and my body melted into a mass of intensely satisfied bonelessness. I then opened my eyes. I hadn’t realized I’d shut them.
Blinking at the winter sky above me, I listened to my own breaths saw in and out, the rapid drum and thump of my heart. I listened to the sounds of twilight, the wind through the trees, the faint, distant call of a bird. I listened to Deputy James’s slow kisses as he continued to touch me, move his mouth and hands over my body, caressing my hips, sides, arms, stomach, and breasts—like he still wanted to devour me, but slowly. I felt savored.
Swallowing against some foreign rising tide of emotions I couldn’t name, I lifted my head and looked at the top of his. My fingers were still in his hair, and he was presently kissing my right breast, spending an inordinate amount of time tasting me there, giving me the sense he couldn’t get enough. His hair was soft and thick, and I resisted the urge to pet it, sliding my hands down to his neck and into the collar of his jacket, but not into his shirt because he still wore his tie. This frustrated me. I wanted to feel his skin.
Actually, no. I more than wanted to feel his skin. I needed to feel him. I needed to be wrapped up and held tight. This odd urge to be held clogged my throat and made drawing a full breath difficult.
“Hey,” he said, his lips moving from my clavicle to my shoulder. “Are you okay?”
I shivered, because it was cold and an instinct I didn’t understand—and was frantically working to suppress—continued to demand his weight, his skin, his arms around me. But I wasn’t going to ask.
“I am much better than okay,” I said, my voice raspy, my throat hurting a little, and I felt compelled to add, “Sorry about . . .”
He bit the spot where my shoulder met my neck and then lifted his head when I didn’t finish my thought. Dark eyes capturing mine. God, he was handsome. So handsome.
“What?” he asked, and I tried to ignore the heat of his palm where it rested on my hip.
“Sorry about being a screamer,” I said, grimacing.
“I didn’t mind.” He smiled. Not a big one like before. And not that secretive-shy one I enjoyed so much. This one was new, and I didn’t know what it meant because I didn’t really know this guy.
And for whatever reason, this new smile made me feel shy and uncertain. Me. Raquel Ezra. Hollywood starlet and bombshell who had no problem with full-frontal titty close-ups. My heart beat a strange rhythm, slow and thick, and my neck itched, and my chest felt hot, and . . . am I blushing?
Oh God.
I’m blushing.
What did that mean? Am I embarrassed?
Yes. That is what is happening. You are embarrassed. Or you’re self-conscious, which is embarrassment’s irritating little brother.
I—I needed to do something to stop it. DO SOMETHING RAE!
I’ll . . . Give the man a blow job. Good plan.
“Hey. Are you okay? You’re shaking.” His smile had waned by slow degrees as he stared down at me, and now his eyes looked soft and concerned.
Worried that my inner turmoil could be read on my features, I slid a smile in place along with a mask of confidence, and I reached for his belt buckle.
His eyebrows jumped, and the hand on my hip intercepted my fingers before I could make any real progress. “Hey—hey, wait. Wait a minute.”
“Wait?” I moved my eyes up and to the right, like I was debating his request.
He reared back, huffing a laugh and removing himself from the radius of my grasping hands. He also lifted and placed a corner of the fuzzy blanket over my body as he withdrew, covering me.
“You’ve got to be freezing. It’s getting dark. We should—uh, we should go.” He sounded entirely reasonable and even nodded at his own assertion, sparing me a quick, tight smile. “I don’t want you to catch a cold, and you got that early flight.”
Before I could react fully to these statements, he placed my dress and underwear on the tailgate next to my hip. “Here. Let me go pack up.” He picked up the ice cream cooler and pushed his way past branches and shrubs for the cab of the truck, leaving me alone, like I might want privacy to dress.
Staring at my clothes, feeling unsteady and completely confused, I felt and heard the passenger side door open, the rustling of items, and other miscellaneous busy sounds.
Uh. Okay then. I guess he doesn’t want a blow job.
What could I do? I put on my clothes, my brain a mess of confusion. What kind of guy doesn’t want a blow job? My whole post-adolescent life, I’d been working under the assumption that it was a truth universally acknowledged. All men like blow jobs.
Maybe he just doesn’t want a blow job from you. Frowning at the inkling that was quickly becoming a suspicion, I put the black dress on first, then my underwear, then I hunted for my bra, which I now regretted tossing haphazardly in a random direction. But you know what I didn’t regret? That orgasm. Rather, to be more accurate, those orgasms.
If he didn’t want anything in return, fine. I’d have him drop me off at my hotel and I’d take a hot bath and I’d cherish the memory of this evening for a long time. He didn’t have to worry about me trying to make more out of this than a fun memory. I wasn’t going to make demands or expect him to—
Ohhhhh! That’s the problem.
I turned at the sound of him closing a door to the truck and watched him walk along the side, pushing branches out of his way. Waiting until he made it to the tailgate, I stepped forward and said, “You know, tonight, this is totally no strings.”
He’d been reaching for the fuzzy blanket when I started talking, and his movements paused when I said no strings. Sending me a quick look I couldn’t interpret, he nodded and folded the blanket. “Good to know.”
“Okay. Good.” I also nodded, strangely not feeling good. I felt compelled to add, “I just want to be clear. I have no expectations of you. None at all. This can just be two people having a fun time. Like—like fishing. This”—I pointed to the truck bed and then to my body—“you can consider what just happened here to be just as meaningful and recreationally enjoyable as fishing.”
Not looking at me, he finished folding the blanket and hopped up into the bed of the truck. “Gotcha. Message received.”
“So . . .” I glanced at his shoes and legs, still not feeling any better, and blew out an audible breath. “I can’t find my bra.”
He smiled, just a small one. “You, uh, threw it off the cliff.”
“I did?” Setting my hands on my hips, I peered over the edge. “Huh.”
“Yep. Just sling-shotted it right over.”
“Oh. Yeah. Well.” I was nodding again, working to keep my voice conversational. “Hopefully, whoever finds it can put it to good use. My great grandmother used old lace bras to strain her tea. She’d sew them into little tea bags—you know the ones with the fold-over tops? Where you spoon the tea leaves inside? As the song says, ‘Ain’t no party like my Nana’s tea party.’”