Reilly trailed Drew into the room and watched as she turned on a soft lamp and took a folded sheet from a nearby shelf. She walked to the head of a sturdy, cushioned massage table that stood in the middle of the room and snapped the sheet out over it, so that the white fabric floated down and covered it. Drew reached under the table for a cushioned ring with two prongs attached to it, and slid it into the table so that the ring extended from the end of the table. She worked with an efficiency that told Reilly that she had done it a few times.
“What other secrets and talents are you hiding?” asked Reilly.
“Wouldn’t you like to know,” replied Drew, her voice was light, but her eyes were serious. She moved toward the wall with built-in shelving where she had found the sheet. She gave Reilly another sheet and nodded toward the table. “Take off your clothes and lie down on your stomach. You can drape this sheet over you.”
“Yes, Mistress,” joked Reilly as a slow roll danced in her belly. Drew had her full attention, and the cold place that she’d gone to while telling Drew about Lydia Traynor started to recede.
Reilly did as she was told while Drew took a few bottles out of a cabinet and mixed the contents into a small bowl. The soothing scents of lavender, lemon, and sage soon filled the air.
On the table, face down in the cushioned ring with the sheet draped over her, Reilly closed her eyes and anticipated Drew’s touch. She had almost left the sheet folded on the end of the table, thinking that they were beyond modesty after what had happened between them before dinner, but she still felt a little exposed by the recent conversation. She sensed Drew’s nearness and shivered as the sheet was pulled down to just below her hips.
“Cold?”
“Just the opposite,” replied Reilly.
Drew chuckled, and her soft hands brushed long slow circles over Reilly’s back, before they began to knead her muscles. Drew’s hands were stronger than she anticipated, and Reilly was soon transported to a place of bliss.
When Drew finished her back, she asked Reilly to roll over and then she worked on Reilly’s upper chest and neck. When Drew cradled Reilly’s head and rolled it from side to side, she was a relaxed woman. And when Drew cracked her neck, Reilly was surprised, but enjoyed the huge release of pressure up and down her back.
“How did you learn to do that?” asked Reilly. “It’s magical.”
“A magician never reveals her secrets,” said Drew cryptically, as she walked to the other end of the table, trailing a hand down the length of Reilly’s body. When she got to the end of the table, she rolled one of Reilly’s legs and then pulled. Reilly felt a pop in her hip and then a feeling of relief where she didn’t know she needed it.
“Don’t get me wrong, that feels like heaven, but aren’t you afraid of doing something like that?” asked Reilly.
“Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing,” said Drew, and Reilly could hear a smile in her voice as Drew adjusted the other side of her hip.
“You could give massages and adjustments for a living,” said Reilly, sighing with the pleasure of relief.
“Yoga is what I do,” replied Drew after a pause, and she moved again to the head of the table and ran her hands through Reilly’s hair.
“Yes. And you do that well, too,” said Reilly. Her eyes were closed, but she sensed Drew’s smile through the hands that were massaging her scalp. “I’m so glad I picked it up while I was—in prison.” She still had a hard time saying it out loud.
“Is that when you first tried it?” asked Drew.
“I’d gone a few times before. And I liked it. But there was something missing. It felt so—plastic,” said Reilly, trying to figure out a way to describe the pretense she had sensed in places where she had hoped to find peace. “When I took my first class in prison, I didn’t expect much. It was just a way to fill the tedium and to stay out of the way of some of the other inmates. But the instructor was amazing. She was one of the guards. To see her in uniform, you would never imagine the grace and poise she possessed when she was teaching a class. She was my favorite instructor until I took your class.”
“I’m flattered,” replied Drew. Reilly opened her eyes to find Drew studying her face. The scrutiny would have felt uncomfortable from anyone else, but not from Drew. She reached up and pulled Drew down by the front of her shirt and kissed her. When they broke for air, Reilly took Drew’s hands and put them on her breasts.
“I think you missed a couple of spots.”
This Marking You Have
SHAKING RAIN FROM HER HAIR, Reilly stood on the porch outside of Drew’s yoga studio and watched fat drops splash down into the koi pond, showering the lawn and making the yard glisten and dance among the impossible variations of the shade of green. The smell of earth and vibrant plant life filled her senses, and she cupped her palm to catch a stream of water that ran from the sloped roof above her head. The heavy rain, so rare in Southern California, felt enchanting. She smiled at the cool water that splashed out of her hand and ran in a rivulet over her wrist and down her arm to drip from her elbow onto the wood planks beneath her sandals. The cool air of the summer storm made her thoughts return to waking up that morning, wrapped in blankets, pressed against Drew’s soft body naked against hers, the sound and scent of steady rain coming in through the open window. She wanted to be back in that moment right now and was counting the minutes before she could see Drew again.
It had been raining for two days, forcing the postponement of the scheduled location shoot at Malibu. Reilly was grateful for the unexpected time off, but Drew still had her classes to teach. Reilly was impatient to see her. She wanted to be with her every minute of every day. She wanted to touch her, talk to her, know her, and breathe her. She just wanted her. Reilly had never felt that way before, the constant need, the absolute desire that she felt for Drew.
Taking one last breath of rain-scrubbed air, she went into the studio to wait. The place was deserted, but she was early. She had considered making a detour to Drew’s house before coming to the studio, but she had to prove to herself that she had control—at least over her base desires. She didn’t know about her heart. Her neediness for Drew was so unlike her. By forcing herself to stay away, she was just playing a mind game with herself, but at least she knew it.
She stored her stuff, unrolled her mat in her usual spot, and then, to kill time, she wandered down the hall to examine the framed black-and-white photos that hung on the walls. She’d glanced down the hall at them a few times, but in her preoccupation with Drew, she had never had a chance to really look at them. In each one, Drew stood with someone new. There were individuals, groups of people, celebrities, and public figures. She’d even had a photo taken with the Dalai Lama.
In one picture, Drew stood in a yoga studio between two familiar-looking women. All three of them were glistening with moisture as if they had just completed a hot yoga class. Reilly studied Drew, who was beautiful and toned in a skimpy yoga outfit that consisted of tight running briefs and a sports bra. The abs that Reilly had worshipped during lovemaking stood out in defined symmetry, and Reilly vowed right then to work on her own. She studied the picture, a low thrum of lust rising in her, unbidden but always there these days. Her eyes followed the edges of the skimpy outfit and noticed that a couple of dark lines extended out of the front of Drew’s low-rise shorts on the right side. Reilly squinted to inspect the marks. She smiled when she realized that the scar she often kissed was not a childhood injury as Drew had said, but the results of tattoo removal. She wondered what childhood insanity Drew was embarrassed about enough to remove. An old lover’s name? An outgrown cartoon character? The little mystery titillated Reilly.
The door to the studio opened. Without looking, she already knew who it was. She wondered if Drew felt the same electric charge that always rolled over her skin when they were near each other. In another test of her control, Reilly resisted the urge to go to her.
“Hey, beautiful,” said Drew, moving in behind her. “I saw you walk up.
I was hoping that you’d come up to the house. How was your day?”
Reilly leaned into the embrace that Drew gave her from behind and smiled as warm lips brushed across her neck. Most of her control fled the moment Drew touched her.
“It was good but I missed you,” purred Reilly, closing her eyes, enjoying the warm mouth making its way up her neck. “Mmmm… You feel unbelievable. I didn’t go up to the house because I had to prove to myself that I could survive more than an hour without this.”
“I missed you, too. We have fifteen minutes before class. We could slip into the back room and…” murmured Drew, letting her words trail off as she pressed her lips to Reilly’s sensitive skin and her hands roamed over Reilly’s bare midriff.
“We could,” agreed Reilly, thinking the same thing. “But then your students might hear their favorite yoga instructor screaming out the name of a deity, thus shattering the illusion of their Zen Master.”
“Hmmm… so true. It’s hard to practice the serene art of nothingness when you have your head between my—”
With regret, Reilly moved her neck away from Drew’s searching kisses and playfully slapped at the arms that held her tight.
“Okay, okay! Enough, or I won’t be in a position to protect your reputation,” laughed Reilly.
Drew kissed her neck again, and Reilly, whose restraint was weak already, was a kiss away from dragging Drew to the back room anyway. In a last effort to be strong for both of them, she tried to redirect Drew’s attention. She pointed to the photograph in front of her.
“Who are these women with you in this picture? They look familiar.”
“That’s Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh Jennings, the women’s gold medalists in Olympic beach volleyball,” explained Drew, resting her chin on Reilly’s shoulder.
“Who are they to you?”
“They were my lucky break when I first went into business for myself. The short story is that they found me through a friend of a friend. Because they enjoyed my classes, they spread the word about my studio with the other athletes. And then I was mentioned a couple of times during the Olympic telecast when the announcers commented on their focus and someone mentioned that they’d been using yoga in their training. That was all it took to get some celebrities to come check the studio out. It was all luck.”
“Luck, my ass. You’re good. They provided the advertising, but it was karma. Your energy, your hard work,” said Reilly tracing a finger over Drew’s glistening abs in the photo and landing near the mark that had caught her eye moments earlier. “And what, pray tell, is this marking you have almost covered up here, Miss Oh-that’s-a-childhood-scar? Is it a heart? The Olympic symbol? Boobies? What embarrassing skeleton have I found with my sleuthing skills?”
Reilly laughed, but the arms that stiffened around her told her that the question had hit a nerve. A small stone lodged in Reilly’s gut.
Drew studied the picture, but Reilly got the feeling it was more to buy time than to see what Reilly was pointing at.
“I was just teasing—“ began Reilly, but Drew cut her off.
“It was stupid. I’m sorry that I misled you. I had it removed. It was a scribbled piece of shit.” The shame in Drew’s voice made Reilly wish that she hadn’t brought it up. Reilly turned in her arms and saw that Drew was about to cry.
“Hey. Hey. Don’t be sorry. I was just messing with you,” said Reilly, stroking Drew’s face. “I’m not mad. You can retain some mystery. I don’t need to know everything.”
“It’s not mystery, it’s regret. And it’s not cool that I lied to you,” said Drew, lowering her head. Shame was something that Reilly never would have expected from Drew. She was always open, confident, and serene.
“I know, babe. Don’t worry about it,” said Reilly, squeezing Drew and searching her eyes. She wanted to kiss the uncomfortable moment away. “I still love the scar. It’s one of my favorite places on you, aside from—”
The door opened and they reluctantly stepped apart as two women came in. Reilly had seen a glimmer of the happier Drew come back, though, and she felt a little relief.
What a Small World
“NAMASTE,” SAID DREW, AS THE SESSION came to a close an hour and a half later.
“Namaste,” murmured more than a dozen voices from around the studio.
Reilly stood and stretched like a sated cat, even while her eyes sought out Drew. It wasn’t hard to find her. Her body felt her, could locate her without fail, anytime she was near. She was standing near her mat, talking in a low voice to one of the students. One of her hands rested on his elbow. Reilly took a moment to watch and smiled at the way that Drew always made whomever she was talking to know that they were the center of her attention.
Though anxious to reconnect with Drew after the weirdness between them before class, Reilly was respectful of Drew’s need to nurture her business, so she took her time with stowing her mat in its bag and retrieving her things from the cubby where she had left everything before class.
On most days, the studio cleared within five or ten minutes, as the quiet peace that prevailed in the session held the yoga students’ desire for socializing to a minimum. But on this day, a few students stopped to chat with Drew, and when Reilly turned with all of her belongings in hand, Drew was talking to another one. With a sigh, Reilly decided to wait for Drew on the porch, but something familiar about the person Drew was talking to caused her to pause. Part of her wanted to walk away, but she couldn’t.
“Fergie?” she asked, as she approached the tall woman from behind. When the woman turned around at the sound of her name, Reilly was suddenly standing in an entirely different yoga classroom. Warm wood accents and open windows disappeared, and the ghosts of grey walls and sparse furnishings surrounded her. She immediately wanted to shrink away for approaching her former guard without permission.
But Fergie returned her greeting with a smile, an expression that Reilly had never witnessed from the woman. Dressed in a tight tee-shirt and yoga pants, her demeanor was unexpectedly informal, but the loose hang of her shoulders conveyed a lightness that made the moment almost surreal. Reilly realized that seeing a reminder of the lowest time in her life wasn’t as bad as she would have predicted. Running into the guard out in her real life was like seeing a teacher at the grocery store when you were in elementary school. The realization told her more about herself than anything else ever had.
“Hi,” breathed Reilly, unable to think of anything else to say. She was surprised even more for the urge she had to hug the woman. She stopped a respectful foot away, though. Some things were too hard to unlearn in a moment.
“I thought that was you in the back of the class when I came in,” said Fergie. “How are you?” Reilly remembered the deep voice well, but it now held a new degree of warmth.
“Fine. Great, actually,” said Reilly. “I always set up in the back. I didn’t see you until now. I’m oblivious once class starts. Drew is a phenomenal instructor.”
Reilly rambled, surprise stealing her poise.
“Drew is one of the best,” agreed Fergie, glancing at Drew with a smile.
Reilly switched focus from Fergie to Drew and saw that some of the tension from before class was still there. And though it was an unexpected pleasure to run into her guard and protector from prison, she was anxious to be alone with Drew to make sure things were right between them. Whatever had transpired between them before the class was deeper than she had imagined if Drew was still so tense after an hour and a half of yoga. She didn’t want to be rude to Fergie, though.
“So, you know each other? I haven’t seen you here before,” said Reilly.
“She’s somewhat of a regular,” offered Drew, answering for Fergie, who just smiled and nodded.
“Oh,” responded Reilly. She struggled for words, absorbing the fact that Drew knew Fergie. “Um, I guess it really is a small world.”
Fergie nodded her agreement and the three women looked at each other for a minute and Reilly felt the
need to break the silence.
“Fergie is the instructor I told you about,” she said to Drew. “No wonder she’s so good if she learned it from you.”
Reilly hoped her smile and the compliment would help Drew relax. It didn’t. In fact, it seemed to worsen it. She turned to Fergie, hoping that the insecurity she felt, causing her to second-guess everything she did, didn’t show. Between Drew’s unfamiliar tension and how Fergie’s presence brought up so many old and uncomfortable memories, Reilly struggled to find confidence. Facing it directly was all she could do. “This is so weird. I feel like I’m supposed to be careful about what I say, how I should talk to you. Is it okay if I ask you what you’re doing so far from… home?”
Fergie smiled like she understood and Reilly wondered how many prisoners she ran into outside of work. “Home is close by. I live in Venice Beach when I’m not working. I commute.”
“That makes sense. I always wondered how anyone could live out there in the desert full-time,” said Reilly.
“Me too,” Fergie laughed. “But few of us do. There isn’t much housing out there, and what there is is pretty dismal. I grew up in the house I live in. When my shift is over, I can’t wait to get out of there and get back to the beach.”
Reilly felt her uneasiness begin to abate, even as it felt strange to find out that Fergie was a real person. Aside from hearing the guard bark out orders, calling out yoga poses during class, or the one time they had talked about the prison library, Reilly had never heard Fergie speak more than a few words at a time.
The feelings and memories that played in the back of Reilly’s mind as they spoke coalesced into one particular memory that was more vivid than the rest.
While at Ral-Rutherford, Reilly had fast learned that the guard schedule was forty-eight hours on, forty-eight hours off, and that the guards slept in dorms in prescribed rotations during their shifts. The schedule had been disorienting at first, as Reilly had tried to predict which guards she had to be wary of and which were more laid back. The interesting thing was, at first, she had been most wary of Fergie. The Amazonian guard had always been the one to catch Reilly doing something wrong—the time she had sneaked food into her cell, the handful of times that she had more than the allowed number of books in her cell, every time she tried to go barefoot through the dayroom to go to the latrine. Any time Reilly caught eye of the towering guard, it had seemed the intense blue eyes were on her. And for a while there, Reilly had been sure that Fergie had been gunning for her. But soon enough, Reilly realized that the same eagle eye that caught all of her screw-ups had also been the thing to save Reilly from many of Twist’s sick games. For that, she had come to value the guard’s unwavering attention to detail.
Life in High Def Page 27