Dangerous To Love

by Toni Anderson, Barbara Freethy, Dee Davis, Leslie A. Kelly, Cynthia Eden, J. Kenner, Meli Raine, Gwen Hernandez, Pamela Clare, Rachel Grant

  He runs a shaking hand through his wavy hair, the cords in his wrist as tight as my stomach feels. “Knowing you were alive wasn’t the same as knowing where you were.”

  My eyes take him in. He’s wearing a baby blue t-shirt, stretched tight across his chest, his own nipples straining at the fabric, pecs formed and curving in tight slopes. I’ve touched those muscles. Run my palm against his bare flesh. Slid my hand down the planes of his belly, to where the smattering of hair thickens, to the dark edge of desire.

  To the place where our desire can be quenched.

  We never made love. We played, we teased, we touched at the corners and pushed the boundaries, but I had been young and afraid. Skittish. Hesitant.

  Mark had been gracious and giving, patient and loving, though his need was always there, white-hot and ready to be unleashed, restrained only by his sense of honor.

  My eyes flick over his hands, remembering those on my breasts, roaming the inside of my thighs, daring to dip with a stroke of exploration. How those hands had found the trembling core of me and turned a ripple into a tsunami. I could think about Mark’s touch and come close to release.

  In fact, if I’m not careful, I could do it right now.

  Heat pours into my face and upper chest, the red, creeping flush on display for him. He knows what it means and he smiles. He gives me a look of intimacy I can’t share. I look away.

  We’ve said so much without speaking a word.

  The words I’m sorry are on my tongue now. If he was that worried when I left, maybe I do owe him an apology. Maybe I shouldn’t have left like that, following my dad to his transfer prison. I left in the middle of the night without saying good-bye. I’d texted Amy and told Brian and Elaine where I was going.

  But I hadn’t spoken to Mark since the day he’d arrested my father, so I just left.

  Arrested.

  The I’m sorry dissipates, floating off on a small breeze that makes its way through the trailer’s tiny windows. I don’t owe Mark an apology.

  He owes me one. He owes my dad a big one.

  Mark owes my entire universe the biggest I’m sorry ever.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispers, as if reading my mind. I startle. My skin crawls with alertness. The wind slows. My breathing is in half-time, stretched out like I’m asleep. It feels like a thousand dandelion seed pods rubbing up and down every available bare inch of skin on me.

  I am acutely aware of how close we are.

  And then Mark makes the distance disappear.

  “You’re angry,” he says, his body within six inches of mine. His hands reach out to touch my shoulders, but don’t connect. Mark holds them above me, an inch away, and raises his eyebrows.

  He’s asking permission to touch me.

  And God help me, I give it.

  The feel of those strong, rough palms on my bare shoulders is indescribable. Warmth. Want. Need. Anticipation. I close my eyes because the feeling is too intense. If he looks at me, I won’t hold myself accountable for what I might do next.

  I hate him for what he’s done to me.

  But I still want him. Still crave him.

  Can I pretend he’s just touching me to be nice? To offer a hug and condolences like he tried to when Dad was convicted? The last time I saw him before I moved back he was banging on my front door, at the house that we lost to foreclosure long after dad was transferred to Oklahoma City. Back then, I’d refused to come out and talk to him. I’d had good reason.

  I’ve only been in town for three days and tell myself that’s why I haven’t gone to the old house.

  That’s why, right?

  I can’t unpack the past three years in just three days.

  Just like I can’t unravel whatever is left between me and Mark in these handful of minutes.

  “Carrie.” He says my name with a neutral tone, but it’s really a question. My long hair brushes against the bare spot of skin between my shoulder blades. I remember a time when he traced my spine with the same hands now on my shoulders. When we lay in bed, shirts off, exploring each other. A time when my entire life was before me, ready to be lived to the fullest.

  When the promise of hope remained.

  “I can’t undo what has happened. And if I could save Joe, I would.”

  I choke, his words taking me completely by surprise. Mark had always been direct. He hated people who didn’t say what they meant.

  The look in his eyes tells me he’s sincere. I have to believe him, right?

  I really want to.

  “You could have told me.” The words pour out. I’ve said them before, except back then I used them like a sword. Now they feel more like an olive branch. My heart is slamming against my ribs, my breasts full and ripe, inches from the warmth of his chest. His hands slide down to my biceps as he moves a little closer.

  But not too close.

  Those eyes. They’re trying to tell me a thousand different truths, and my heart wants to hear them all. I’ve spent three years telling myself Mark was a fake. Three years convincing myself that he was a phony who lied to me and hurt me to the core. He could have told me.

  Honor stops him from lying, even now. “I couldn’t.” He bites his lip, a vicious act that makes his face go grim. His jaw is so tight I worry he’ll draw blood on his lip. A little moan escapes from the back of my throat.

  It’s fear, but he thinks it’s the sound of something else.

  I don’t know what happens in the two seconds after I make that sound, but I’m kissing him now, his hands resting on my ribs, his thumbs under my breasts, the taste of cedar and mint and him in my mouth. He parts my lips and I invite him in again. This invitation is definitely more dangerous.

  And holy.

  I inhale deeply, our mouths connected, telling stories we can’t say in any other way. His tongue teases and tastes, apologizes and mourns. Soft lips turn urgent, then rough. Mark is claiming me.

  Reclaiming me.

  My own hands are unsure, resting on his hips. He moves closer, his arousal clear, the thickness of him pressed against my belly. That sound comes again, unbidden, from the back of my mouth, but this time it really is a moan of pleasure.

  Of want.

  Of need.

  One of his hands reaches up and sinks into my hair, his fingertips at the base of my neck, gripping me. Holding me in place. Rooting me to him. His tongue pins me in place, his own growl of craving making me smile through the kiss.

  That makes him pull back. Desire, playfulness, and a sense of relief are all in those eyes. I touch my lips with my fingertips. They feel stung and raw, yet ready for more.

  “I have missed you so much,” he says, stroking my cheek. His fingers take a long, loose piece of my hair and tuck it behind one ear. Then he dips down and nuzzles me, his teeth nipping my earlobe.

  That sound. I make that sound again.

  “Surrender to it, Carrie,” he says, encouraging me. My body melts against him, my sex warm and wet now, wanting more. The ache deep inside unfurls like a ribbon. It stretches out as a sharp wind appears to carry it on the breeze, unrolling with abandon. Mark’s tongue strokes my teeth, savoring my taste. The warm wetness of his attentions makes my body shiver with anticipation.

  I’m lost, hopelessly falling through a place where all I can do is trust. His palms caress my back, my hips, then slope down to take in my ass. The heat of his skin is like a cure for an illness I didn’t know I had. We are fire and ice, love and hate, lust and fear. We are everything and nothing, me and Mark.

  We are now.

  His arms lift me up and God help me, I wrap my legs around him. I need to be closer to him. I’m throbbing, pulsing under his touch. His mouth turns urgent, eager and bold. He’s taking from me, demanding my submission as our slick tongues dance with a kind of fevered hunger that makes everything else seem so unimportant.

  He’s over me on my bed, his body hovering as his mouth rakes over mine, his lips on my neck, my hands all over his back, his ass, his body. The worn c
loth of his shirt feels like silk under my heightened senses, my fingertips as tender as can be. He steals more kisses, incites more sighs, uses his hands to tell me all the ways he owns me, and soon I’m writhing with the agony of needing him in me.

  I need to give over to Mark. I need to lose myself so deeply in someone else that I forget who I am.

  The heat of his breath against my bare breast feels like some eternal force of nature has taken up residence between us. His mouth dips down and he sucks, slow and teasing, his tongue making electricity zing through me. His hands run up my belly, under my shirt, and find my other breast, my hair, my neck.

  I can’t stop kissing him, can’t stop pressing my hips up in silent invitation. Mark gives me a look of such raw desire that I nearly climax on the spot, my sex blooming with wetness, readying for him.

  And then his groin buzzes.

  I lift my hips so high it catches him by surprise and he falls off the bed onto the floor, scrambling to shove his hand in his pocket to find his phone.

  “You have got to be kidding me,” he groans, reading the glowing screen.

  “You’re on duty?” I gasp.

  “Something like that.” I swear he mutters the word chase. Must be some kind of car chase going on involving the police department.

  This reminds me of the time my dad walked in on us in the family room, making out and hot and sweaty, Mark’s fingers smelling like my musk, our faces flushed with embarrassment. I was so close to giving over my maidenhood. Dad had turned bright red and left.

  I’m not that girl now. Still a virgin, but not the halting innocent from three years ago.

  But this still isn’t right. Just because you want something so badly your whole body vibrates as if it lives in its own frequency doesn’t mean you give in to it.

  Sometimes doing what is right competes with doing what feels right.

  Mark shoves the phone back in his pocket and climbs back on the bed, above me, kissing my collarbone.

  Breaking away from him, I look down. A long, slow sigh of air forces its way through me, like a balloon deflating. My mind is racing, my body is one hot electric wire, and I can’t stop thinking about being naked with him, skin-to-skin.

  Heat to enormous heat.

  “I thought you came here just to talk,” I say evenly, standing. He doesn’t stop me. I walk five steps to my kitchen, reaching for a glass and turning on the faucet. My skin hums.

  As the glass fills, my eyes flick over the empty pizza boxes and the trash. Mine and Amy’s empty pints of ice cream sit on their sides.

  Amy was here minutes ago.

  How can time collapse like that?

  “I’ll go,” he says, his eyes clearing suddenly. The dark, intense look of desire drains out of them like he can do it at will.

  No! No! screams a voice inside me. But I don’t open my mouth. My lips are buzzing with our kisses. Taut nipples tease me as they push out toward him, wanting more. Rational, practical Carrie needs to step up to the plate right now.

  No-holds-barred Carrie is dangerously close to doing something she’ll regret.

  Mark clears his throat and tilts his head, giving me a confident smile. “Thank you.” He opens his arms for a hug, and I square my shoulders, standing in place.

  This I can manage, though. The step into his arms is like crossing a threshold. He is warm and spicy, like the smell of woodsmoke and comfort. Moments ago passion ruled, but right now we’re just friends.

  Right?

  We both linger in the embrace, and my mind races. What does this mean? Too many secrets and lies separate us. He doesn’t know what Dad told me. I don’t know what the District Attorney told him. A huge drug conviction and a death separate us, too.

  And yet my choice has brought us closer. I chose to interview for the job. Chose to move back.

  Chose to let him in. Practically begged him to kiss me.

  All of that swirls in my mind as he plants his lips on the top of my head for a gentle kiss. Without a word Mark steps out into the inky night. He pauses, staring at my door.

  “Hang on,” he says, jogging to Brian’s tool shed. I hear the sound of metal on metal and wonder what on earth he’s doing.

  He comes back with a bike lock. The green ropy kind with two loops at either end, plus a padlock.

  “Here. This is the lock I use for my bike. It’ll hold you through the night. The combination is my birthdate.”

  Click.

  He locks me in.

  As he jogs off, I realize the numbers came to me in a flash. They’re embedded in me.

  He disappears into the dark within three steps and I’m left to go to bed and face my dreams.

  Dreams of a man I can still taste.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Day two at work and no Claudia by lunch time. Whew. Not that I’m afraid of her. She’s not exactly the type to inspire fear. Disgust? Sure. But fear is too strong an emotion.

  While the information technology folks set me up with all my different permissions to access the different systems for accounting, student records, and office supply orders, I play with my email.

  My signature line reads:

  Carrie Myerson

  Project Coordinator

  Dean of Arts & Sciences

  IT told me to set it up that way. I notice as I read the emails that start to trickle in that everyone else has initials after their name. B.A. or B.S. for the administrative workers, like me. M.A. or M.S. for the higher-level administrators. Ph.D. and M.D. and J.D. for professors and deans.

  The president of the university, J. Roth Murchison, has a D.Phil and an SJD, whatever that means. Something about graduating from Oxford University in Britain for the D.Phil and Harvard Law School for the SJD. Someday I’ll know what that means, though.

  Meanwhile, I need my little B.A. Two more years. Just two more years.

  So far, my only contact with Dean Landau has been through email today. He left me a long list of places to schedule meetings and luncheons, and some receipts to file for reimbursement. The person who used to work at this job, Carol, left me an enormous binder of instructions.

  I don’t need to figure anything out, because Carol is a goddess. Everything is color-coded tabs and printed details. She left me copies of every form you could imagine, with specific steps for how to complete everything.

  I find the expense reimbursement form, make a copy, complete it for the dean, and make another copy for our office’s records. Then I check Carol’s handbook and send it to Accounts Payable.

  Done. I own this job.

  I got this.

  Dean Landau told me in one of his emails to feel free to take time to hand-deliver paperwork I would normally send through inter-office mail, so I can meet people. Match faces to names. Snatching the expense form out of the mail box, I decide to walk it over. Might as well meet whoever processes the expense reports.

  This is boring already. I like boring. Boring feels great. As I walk out of the building’s doors and into the bright sunshine, I smile. My sunglasses slide on and I’m walking. A quick glance to the grass to watch out for stray football games. None. Coast is clear.

  I’m getting paid to walk freely between the buildings in the late-August sunshine.

  Now this is the life. Not sitting in front of a three-hundred-per-hour check processing computer for eight hours every night, back hurting, body out of sync because of midnight shift. I work eight to five with an hour lunch. I earn vacation time. Yates University pays my health and dental insurance.

  I even have a retirement account.

  And those golden tuition benefits. After I drop off the form at Accounts Payable, I’ll wander over to Human Resources to see if I can take classes in a couple weeks. My smile widens.

  I’ve made the right decision coming here.

  Mark be damned.

  Accounts Payable is in a brick building on the other side of campus, right next to an enormous building shaped like half a football coming out of the ground. Facil
ities. I remember it well. That’s where Dad worked. I can see the old bar in the distance, not far from the Facilities Department.

  Now it’s The Coffee Freak.

  Everything has changed.

  No one is in to meet me at the Accounts Payable office. A small sign taped to the door says they’re out to lunch. I slide the envelope in their incoming mail slot and feel a bit foolish. Ah, well. I’ll just head over to Human Resources now.

  My eyes adjust to the bright day and I pause to take it all in. I’m doing my job. No one is at my office yelling at me to move faster. Supervisors don’t pull me aside to tell me my hourly rate of production slipped eleven percent, so the rest of the week has to be at peak. Blinking fluorescent lights at three a.m. aren’t my only companions during my fifteen minute scheduled breaks.

  People get paid to work jobs like mine. It’s a revelation. My red cotton shirt and grey slacks feel womanly. Professional and organized. I’m really on my way.

  As if in agreement, a flock of starlings floats out of a large, green bush and flies away, chirping happily. I begin to walk to HR and am humming to myself, arms swinging, mind blank when I hear a shout.

  “Carrie!” It’s Eric, jogging up behind me, carrying a beat-up old leather satchel. He’s wearing glasses and a green polo shirt that suits him well. When I’d known him as my TA he was so thin. Gaunt. Pale and hollow. The man smiling at me now definitely is the picture of health, tanned and athletic.

  I wonder what changed. Whatever it was, it’s a good change.

  He’s handsome.

  Mark, a voice inside me barks, the word like a thunderclap. I start to argue back and feel like an idiot as I open my mouth and Eric looks at me. He’s expecting me to talk to him.

  Not to the stupid voice in my head.

  “Eric! You look great!” The words come out and wow. Could I get any stupider? Damn.

  His eyes widen and he grins back. “You do too, Carrie. How’s the new job treating you?” Lost in his delicious Irish accent, I realize I’m headed in the wrong direction. Human Resources is to the left of us. I pivot, and he follows.

  “Fine. Just delivering paperwork and visiting HR today,” I say. His eyes take me in and I know that look. Mark gave me the same look last night.