by A. J. Downey
I couldn’t complain too much, though. When storms bordering on hurricane rolled through, it just wasn’t safe staying aboard my boat. I took up residence in their guest room with the Harley safe in their garage when that shit went down.
I told Claire all of this while she stood, somber and amazed; taking everything in. She drifted past the bed to the open expanse of bedroom floor before the set of doors leading into the sunroom overlooking the back deck. I had a small, wrought iron table and matching chairs up here to take my coffee. Plants on stands and hanging from baskets providing greenery, thriving through the many windows. She passed the armoire that served as my closet and the large dresser that really had nothing in it, and went into the sun room.
“I could do my yoga in here,” she said.
“Plenty of room,” I agreed. “The dresser doesn’t have a lot in it. I think I have two drawers used and that’s mostly for my socks and underwear. The rest of my stuff, including uniforms, are in the armoire. I can rearrange to get you some more hanging space, though.”
“What do you do for laundry facilities?”
I gave a laugh. “This way.”
I led her back downstairs and out the side door at the end of the kitchen, to the back wrap of the deck on the side of the boat facing away from the dock. I used my keys to unlock the shed out there to reveal the washer and dryer stacked one on top of the other.
“Not ideal when the rain sweeps in from the side back here, but the deck provides enough overhang that it’s not too bad.”
“Angel,” she said abruptly, and I turned to her; her dark eyes were luminous despite their color and I couldn’t help but smile.
“What is it, mi alma?”
“I love your house,” she said. “It’s like a fairy-tale home.”
I grinned broadly and said, “Thank you. I’m glad to have you here sharing it with me.”
She bowed her head and said, without looking at me, her voice trembling, “I don’t think I will ever be able to thank you enough for what you did for me.”
I chuckled and pulled her gently into my arms. She felt so good there. Right, like no one else was ever meant to be in them but her. She cuddled close and I told her the truth, at least the way I saw it.
“You’re a strong woman, mi alma. You saved yourself that night. You just didn’t know it yet.”
She laughed a little and shook her head, heaving a deep breath and letting it out slowly, getting some control over her emotions.
“I’m starving,” she said finally, after she’d soaked up enough calm, enough peace from the surrounding waters.
“Let’s get you into a nice bath while I work in the kitchen. You drink?” I asked.
“Yeah, but um, I probably shouldn’t. I just started these new medications…”
“Ah, virgin it is,” I said and closed up the shed around the laundry. She tucked herself back under my arm as we went back into the house and it felt like, for the first time, I was really coming home.
6
Claire…
I knelt in the tub, my back to the kitchen, and washed my hair first. I was a little self-conscious at first and I couldn’t tell you why. I mean, I’d already had sex with Angel, even if it had been three years ago. He’d already seen everything there was to see. I’d even performed nude for the circus before when we’d tried something erotic and adult-themed. I guess there was just something different about the act of bathing, something more intimate. Or maybe I was just projecting because of the fragility of my emotional state.
When my hair was as clean as it was going to be, I switched the faucet to the tub setting and pulled up to stopper the bottom so that it would fill. There was an ample ledge surrounding the bathtub all the way around and Angel had lit candles for me as dusk fell outside the houseboat’s windows.
I arranged my soaps and shampoos in a corner with the intention of taking them back to my suitcase, which Angel had taken upstairs already. I stared at that little pile and ached faintly in the center of my chest with how much I wished they could live there permanently. It had been a long time since I had been in a place mentally and emotionally where I just didn’t know what to do or where to go from here.
Of course, the Night Circus took up residence wherever it did for three months at a time with a week or two off at the beginning of each new location for us to explore, adapt, and settle. I guess I had fouled that up. I was pretty sure I had either missed our first rehearsal or that it was in the next day or two. I leaned back in the tub with a sigh after brushing my hair and clipping it up at the back and Angel glanced over his shoulder. The movement caught the corner of my eye and I met his warm, liquid brown eyes through the strange window cut beside the tub. He came around the kitchen counter and across the little walkway leading to the living room and leaned on the wooden sill.
“Talk to me,” he murmured. “What is it?”
“I don’t know if I missed my first rehearsal since coming here or not,” I said.
“What was the date?” he asked.
“The twenty-first.”
“That’s tomorrow.”
I breathed a sigh of mixed relief and dismay and covered my face with my hands, pressing my fingertips into my eyes.
He sniffed and I lowered my hands back into the water and looked up at him. He smiled down at me and I could tell that he somehow knew, that why I’d tried what I did had to do with the Circus, but it didn’t, really. It had to do with the director more than anything.
I still wasn’t ready to talk about it yet. I loved the Night Circus, I loved my family of performers and I loved performing. No, I lived for performing, and the mere thought that I might have fucked that up had been filling me with a tense anxiety and dread. Especially after Carter…
“I’ve made a mess out of everything,” I said softly, and Angel shook his head.
“Not here,” he said. “Not with me.”
I smiled faintly; it was something to cling to. I couldn’t deny that.
“How long does rehearsal take, and what time do you have to be there?” he asked.
“It takes as long as it takes for Milo to be happy with it, and it’s the Night Circus, so usually we start in the afternoon.”
“I have a shift tomorrow,” he said, hesitantly.
“It’s fine. I can have a car pick me up and take me, and bring me back here.”
“It’s a sixteen hour shift for me tomorrow. I’m pulling a double.”
“When to when?”
“Gotta be at the house at eight in the morning...”
“House?” I asked before he could finish.
“Firehouse. Indigo City runs on kind of a hybrid system. If it’s quiet and there aren’t a bunch of calls, we hang around the firehouse with the hose boys until we get something. It conserves fuel.” I laughed at ‘hose boys’ and he smiled. “I love that laugh,” he said and I couldn’t help but smile, too.
“What time will you be home, then?” I asked and the word ‘home’ felt foreign but nice on my tongue.
“Probably around midnight.”
“Make you a deal,” I said softly.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“First one home makes dinner.”
“That’s fair enough.”
He leaned way over and I met him part-way. We kissed and he kept his hands to himself, even though I ached for him to touch me. I felt like I was dying to feel something pleasant, and the feel of being wrapped in Angel’s arms was really high up there when it came to pleasant things to feel.
“Smells good,” I whispered.
“Enchiladas, just like mama used to make.” He grinned.
“How long?”
“You have a while yet. Relax.”
He went around back into the kitchen and made me something cool to drink. I raised an eyebrow, questioning what it was silently, and he handed it over saying, “Just some ginger ale with a squeeze of fresh lime.”
“You’re spoiling me.”
“You
’ve had a hard week.”
I couldn’t argue with him there.
I finished my bath and dressed in something comfortable before returning to the table downstairs.
Dinner was amazing, the food so good. We talked quietly and I learned more about him and his family. He had left high school and gone to further his education to immediately become a medic. His brother, on the other hand, had joined the military and had served a few tours. He’d come home, had become a police officer, and then had gotten shot in the leg in the line of duty while serving a warrant on a house somewhere in the city.
He had a younger sister, who by all accounts was sort of a spoiled brat. They'd been raised by his mother and his paternal grandmother after his father died when he was seven. It was fascinating hearing where he had come from and there were a few parallels between his upbringing and mine.
I told him about myself and Carter. My absentee father, how I was raised by a single mother. How dance and athletics had become a sort of babysitter for my brother and I, while my mom worked every job she could to keep us in them and a roof over our heads.
“And you ran away and joined the circus?” he asked, a twinkle in his eye as he gently teased me.
“Yep.” I smiled and helped him wash the dishes.
“What was that like?”
“A dream come true,” I said softly. “I’ve been all over the world. England, France, Spain, Romania, Russia, China, India. I really hated it, though, when we spent the three months in the United Arab Emirates.” I shuddered.
“Why is that?”
“I’m a woman,” I answered succinctly. “While it was beautiful and exotic, it was also dangerous. I didn’t feel comfortable going out. If I’d been raped, and reported it? I could and would have been jailed for having sex outside of marriage. I had to be hyper-vigilant at all times. It ruined the whole experience.”
“I can imagine,” he said, and loaded the last plate into the dishwasher.
I leaned back against the counter in my deep blue silk robe and looked at him. He smiled and shut the dishwasher and started it up.
“I still can’t quite believe you’re here,” he murmured and I almost missed it with the dishwasher starting.
“I almost can’t believe it myself,” I said, taking his hand in both of mine. I led him toward the stairs and he followed.
“Whatever shall we do?” he asked, with a wink.
“Mm, I was sort of hoping you would show me the finer points of that bed of yours.”
He switched out the lights down here on the way past the switch plate and took my hands in his. We went up to the second floor with its barn-like ceiling and he took over, leading me from the stairs to the bed.
“Ah!” He stopped me before I could sit down.
“What?” I asked softly, and without warning, he was by my side and had me up in his arms. I shrieked in surprise and laughed, but the serious look in his eyes stopped me. He slowly and carefully lowered me to the bed and I swallowed hard.
“Couldn’t carry you over the threshold; I guess this is the next best thing,” he murmured, voice husky with emotion and desire.
“Why does it feel like we’ve known each other forever?” I whispered.
“I don’t know,” he replied, pulling his shirt over his head. I had a lot less to do when it came to getting naked, so I just enjoyed the show for now while I smoothed my hands over the quilt he had on his bed.
“Why does it feel like no time has passed from that night until now?” I asked.
“Don’t know that, either.”
I smiled wickedly, “What do you know?”
He grinned like the Cheshire Cat and said, “I know I’m going to make you feel so good…”
He dropped his pants and boxer-briefs in one swift single motion and I bit my bottom lip. Desire washed through me, stronger than it had that first night when I’d kissed him not knowing what I’d been doing, figuring, if anything, I could take his mind off his troubles and make him feel good for a little while, get him through to the next day and hopefully a better outlook on life.
I hadn’t expected him to so thoroughly rock my world. Somehow, knowing just what I had in store made this time even hotter. He pulled the sash on my robe, unwrapping me like a present, and I stopped breathing for the nonce. I slipped my arms out of the sleeves and reached for him and he came to me, willingly, laying over the top of me but holding himself off of me just enough so I wouldn’t feel crushed.
I’d forgotten how big he was, and the three or so years we’d been separated had been kind to him. He was in fantastic shape, and I didn’t know how much of that was due to his job. He kissed me and I kissed back, letting my hands roam over his heated skin, fluttering over his shoulders and down his obliques.
“God, I missed you, Claire,” he breathed against the side of my neck, and I shivered at the hot wash of breath over my skin.
“I missed you, too,” I murmured, and I meant it. I had missed him so much. It was why, when I’d found the stray bullet in my pocket, I’d kept it. I’d wound copper wire around its base and threaded the black cord through it to wear it next to my heart as a necklace.
My circus family knew the meaning behind it. They’d been excited about our return to the US and Indigo City. We’d spent an evening in the bar in Prague laughing and imagining what it would be like to see my Angel again, making up stories about how we would be reunited.
They would be so disappointed when they found out how this had come to be.
I couldn’t be sure they didn’t know already, about my hospital stay. I didn’t know how they would, unless Carter had told them but Carter had already made it pretty clear he didn’t want to associate with ‘those people’. That had hurt me deeply, compounding the stress, hurt, and heartache that I’d already been feeling. I mean, I was one of ‘those people’.
I quickly refocused on Angel and left those thoughts to fall away, basking in the warmth of his body on mine as he kissed me, concentrating on all the sensations he woke in me. I reveled in his embrace as we made out like teens under the bleachers. His shaft pressed against me, at the wrong angle for penetration, but that didn’t stop me from lifting and dropping my hips in a sultry rhythm to excite and entice him further.
He moaned into my mouth and I liked that about him. He wasn’t afraid to be vocal, to let me know with sound, without words, that I was doing it for him. I wanted him inside me so badly, but I’d had my birth control interrupted…
“Condom?” I asked, breathy. “My birth control was interrupted.”
“Mm, yeah, shit. Hang on.” He jerked open the drawer by my head in the little night stand and rooted around it by feel. He cursed and dragged himself up so he could see and I laughed and giggled as he pressed down over the top of me.
“Sorry!”
“Don’t be,” I laughed, and he came back down to me.
“Got lucky, I had one from Lil’s last thing.”
“Lil?” I asked, remembering the name from dinner, but not placing it immediately.
“My buddy, Backdraft, the firefighter’s girl. She writes the romance novels.”
“Right! Sorry. I know I shouldn’t be jealous.”
He chuckled and unwrapped the condom, rolling it on, and my desire shot up a notch from where it’d cooled into a low simmer. What was it about watching a man make himself ready to take you that was so exponentially hot?
“You don’t have anything to worry about,” he said gently. “Been on a few dates, that’s it, never made it further than a kiss at the door.”
“What?” I asked speechless.
“They weren’t you, mi alma.”
Holy. Shit.
He hadn’t been with anyone in the three years since our one night together? I stared at him speechless, mouth agape.
“What?” he asked.
“I…”
He leaned forward and kissed me and whatever I’d been about to say went clean out of my head. I pulled him down to me with arms and
legs and he groaned into my mouth, lining himself up with my entrance.
I’d forgotten how big he was, but he was careful with me, easing his way into me slowly, letting my body adjust.
“Good?” he asked, his voice low and soft, carefully controlled, as he strained against becoming too passionate and hurting me.
“God, yeah,” I whispered back and kissed him. He started to move again, slowly, like I was fragile and prone to breaking, and it was something I loved about him. He was so considerate, so gentle with me despite his sheer size and I couldn’t ever remember anyone being that way with me before.
He made love to me. A slow burning passion sweeping through my body, turning up the heat incrementally, until I came to a slow simmer with pleasure. The euphoria swirled through my blood, starting somewhere at my back and rising slowly to burst over the surface of my skin in wave after wave of goosebumps.
I wrapped my arms around him, sheltered beneath him, clung to him as my last hope that there was hope for me and it was beautiful, touching, one of the most profound things I had ever felt.
I had been living my dream but that dream had been so lonely, and for the first time in a long time, I didn’t feel alone anymore. I could reach out and touch Angel and that he was real, genuine in a way that anybody else hadn’t been, or couldn’t be, around me.
He worked his way in and out of my body and I climbed him like the silk I so loved performing with, wrapping myself in the comfort his body and soul provided.
He stared me in the eyes from inches away, and I felt like I was home.
I woke briefly the next morning when he kissed me good-bye, a brief and gentle press of lips against my cheek. I breathed in his clean, masculine scent and opened my eyes to see his back as he retreated down the stairs.
His jacket had a large grey shield emblazoned across it, a knight chess piece picked out on it in darker blue thread; above it a ribbon emblazoned with Indigo Knights; beneath it, another ribbon with Indigo City; and below that, Nomad. I didn’t know what it all meant, but the visual was powerful and I would try to remember to ask him about it later.