Unexpected Ties

by Gina Dartt

  Kate experienced a sharp thrill at the words and Nikki’s rapid, unsteady breathing. Taking great care, she pushed steadily forward until she felt the warm, flesh of their bellies connect. Groaning, she lowered her body until she was resting on Nikki, breasts against breasts, stomach against stomach, Nikki’s arms around her. She felt strangely connected to the toy buried in her lover. Its lack of sensation was meaningless; her own excitement was tied into the exchange of trust between her and Nikki, and an unfamiliar sense of power. She began to move her hips, tiny strokes knowing Nikki would feel every small movement inside her. “You have no idea how much this is turning me on,” she murmured breathlessly. “It’s so incredible to be inside you like this, Nikki. I mean, I know it’s not really me—”

  “It is you,” Nikki whispered. “It’s you inside me that makes it feel so good to me. Does that make sense?”

  Kate exhaled as she tumbled down into the warm gaze, feeling surrounded by her lover. “Yes, it makes perfect sense.”

  She continued her slow undulation, increasingly aware of a pressure against her center. “I think they designed this so that I could get something out of it, too. There’s some kind of lump protruding inside.” She caught her breath as she felt it bump over her.

  “Sounds like you found the magic bullet.” Nikki regarded her with a slight smile. “There’s a small vibrator built into the harness where it meets your pussy.”

  Kate felt her cheeks grow hot. She always blushed whenever Nikki used that term because it sounded so wonderfully wanton. Nikki smiled and reached down between their bodies, seeking out the tiny switch attached to one of the straps. Kate jerked at the sudden buzzing sound and at the even more immediate sensation of vibration against her.

  “Oh, my.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Nikki hissed. “I feel that, too. We definitely made the right choice.” She shifted beneath Kate. “It’s just…I’m not sure this is enough. Can you play with me a bit?”

  “Of course, darling.” Kate eased over so that her weight was on her left elbow, creating some space so she could reach between them and touch Nikki, fingertips seeking out her clitoris.

  Nikki arched against Kate. “Yes, I like that.” She spread her legs wider. “Sweetie…I need…can you…” She seemed unable to articulate what she wanted. Perhaps she didn’t know. Kate wasn’t completely sure either, but she had a few ideas.

  “Darling, I want you to touch yourself,” she instructed softly, moving back on top of Nikki and lifting up slightly so that she supported herself on her elbows and knees. “I’m going to try something a little more active.”

  Nikki understood instantly what she was doing. “Oh, God, yes.” Reaching down to replace Kate’s fingers with her own, she hooked her legs around her lover’s calves. “Fuck me, Kate.”

  Kate exhaled loudly, excited not only by the sensations she was experiencing, but the expletive that Nikki was not normally in the habit of using. Driven by her obvious pleasure, as well as the rhythmic pulsation against her own clitoris, she began to thrust slowly. She felt powerful yet incredibly humbled, not understanding all the confusing emotions swirling in her mind, but readily accepting the predominant exhilaration.

  With each thrust her clitoris bumped against the tiny vibrator, adding an extra jolt of pleasure through her. She began to wonder if she could hold on long enough to bring Nikki to her own peak.

  “Kate…” Nikki’s voice was almost a growl. “I’m close.”

  “Yes, darling.” Kate moaned softly.

  “Kate…oh, sweetie…faster…”

  Kate obliged, shortening her strokes so that she could increase her own stimulation, bumping over the vibrator with increasing regularity. Then Nikki was abruptly shuddering, a cry ripped from her lips as Kate thrust a final time into her, feeling the orgasm rush through her, taking away the last of her strength and causing her to collapse into Nikki’s welcoming arms and lips. She had barely enough energy left to find the switch and turn off the vibration that was now painful rather than pleasurable as her climax dissipated.

  For long moments both of them tried to catch their breaths between long, deep kisses, connecting on an emotional rather than merely physical level. They were both covered with sweat, and Kate felt so close to her lover, yet strangely distanced as well. She wondered why.

  Finally, Nikki let out her breath gustily and started to chuckle. “Well, that was fun.”

  “It certainly was.” Kate withdrew slowly, taking care not to be too abrupt. Rolling over onto her back, she managed to unfasten the straps and put the entire contraption, still glistening with Nikki’s moisture, onto the nightstand beside the box. She looked over at Nikki, who was sitting up. “How do you feel?”

  “Like a beautiful woman has just thoroughly fucked me.” Nikki seemed energized by the encounter, her eyes dancing with enjoyment. “I feel terrific! Maybe a little sore.” She shifted slightly, looking rueful but completely unrepentant. “Not because of you, darling. You were fantastic. It’s just because it was something new, you know?”

  Kate smiled. “I know. You were wonderful, too.” She was surprised when Nikki reached out and took the vibrator from the box. “Nikki?”

  “You’re not tired, are you?”

  “Not at all,” Kate did think she might be a little overwhelmed. “What exactly do you have in mind now?”

  Nikki kissed her, parting Kate’s lips with her tongue and deepening the kiss, until Kate felt a renewed surge of desire. When they finally parted, Nikki’s expression was wanton.

  “I was thinking that I’d just slip this inside you,” she explained throatily as she held up the slim vibrator with the rounded base where a black button was located. “And while I do that, I’d be licking your clit.”

  Kate’s eyes widened. “God, Nikki.”

  “Is that a yes?”

  Kate swallowed hard. “What would I be doing?”

  Nikki grinned evilly. “You’ll just lie back and enjoy it,” she said, echoing Kate’s words from earlier. “Let me do all the work this time.”

  Kate felt a rush of moisture between her legs. “I think I could manage that.”

  Nikki lifted her brow as she pushed the button with no result. “Uh, I think the harness came with batteries. This didn’t. Did you put any in?”

  “Of course not. It didn’t occur to me.”

  “Hmm.” Nikki tilted her head as she opened the battery compartment. “I don’t suppose you have a couple of double-A’s lying around.”

  “I can take the ones out of the remote control.” Kate scrambled from the bed.

  Nikki’s chuckles followed her as she went out into the living room. But instead of finding the remote, she went into the kitchen, switched on the overhead light and pulled out one of the drawers by the sink where she kept all her odds and ends. Nikki called it her “crap drawer,” but it was actually fairly well organized. As she rummaged through it searching for the package of batteries she remembered picking up some weeks earlier, it suddenly occurred to her how much she’d changed in the past few years. While married to David, what they’d considered daring in the bedroom consisted of her occasionally getting on top of him. That was a far cry from standing naked in her kitchen as she scrounged up batteries for a vibrator to be utilized by her lesbian lover while performing oral sex on her.

  The thought made her pause briefly, but only briefly, and with a mental shrug, she dived back into the drawer, seizing the black and copper package with a heady sense of triumph. Flipping off the light, she headed back to the bedroom, eager to return to Nikki as quickly as possible.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Nikki drove down Prince Street with the sort of cocky pleasure that came from owning a new car, even if it wasn’t particularly new, in fact a six-year-old Honda Civic. The bank hadn’t been eager to loan her the money, but Kate had co-signed. Nikki liked that. Watching her sign the papers, she felt as if they were buying the car together, as if they were truly and officially a couple now in the eyes of the
authorities, whoever those might be.

  The payments would take a chunk of her monthly salary, but not as much as she had feared. Being with Kate had taught her a little more about managing money, and she was starting to feel more like a grownup—a slow process, she admitted to herself ruefully, but an inescapable one.

  She parked in the lot reserved for police station employees and carefully locked the car before she strode into the office. Sandy Wright, the dispatch supervisor, offered a nod and smile. A rawboned woman in her early thirties, she was rumored to really run the police station, and everyone else just worked for her, including the chief. Experience had taught Nikki just how accurate that rumor really was.

  “New wheels?”

  “Yeah,” Nikki said proudly, unsurprised that her supervisor knew all about it. “I just registered it this afternoon.”

  “Nice.”

  Nikki grinned as she dropped by the staff room to put her lunch in the fridge and check the bulletin board for upcoming events. Rick Johnson, still in uniform, was leaning back on the battered couch, his feet up on the coffee table, flipping through a magazine. He glanced up as Nikki entered, giving her a lazy smile.

  “Keeping busy, Nik?” He worked the day shift, and they usually only saw each other in passing. This was her first chance to ask her favor.

  “You could say that.” Nikki dug into her jeans for the slip of paper she had been carrying around with her. “Listen, could you run these numbers for me?”

  “What’s this about?” He eyed the writing on the paper suspiciously.

  Nikki considered her answer. “It might be nothing, but if it turns out to be something, I’ll tell you everything I’ve got so far. Otherwise, there’s nothing to tell.”

  “I don’t like this.” Rick eyed her sternly. “You’re playing detective again, aren’t you?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that I’m not doing anything too…intrusive,” Nikki floundered. “I’m just researching what information I come across, purely by coincidence.”

  “Running a license plate is research?”

  “Something like that.”

  Rick hesitated, then glowered at her. “For me to do this, you have to tell me why you want it, and what you’re mixed up in.”

  “It might not fit with what I already have.”

  “That’s the deal, take it or leave it.” He crossed his arms over his chest.

  “All right.” Defeated, she told him everything she knew, including her tailing Martin and Tiffany to the Tideview Motel.

  His jaw was clenched by the time she finished. “I can’t believe you. You just don’t know when to quit. Why can’t you leave this to the professionals?”

  “I’m more than willing to do that,” Nikki protested, “but I can’t help it if I come across information in the run of the day. I told you I’d let you know if it turns out to be important.”

  “You don’t know what’s important and what isn’t.”

  “That’s why I wanted to wait before telling you. I want to put it all together before I bring you the evidence.”

  “That’s not your job.”

  She stared at him, her face set into stubborn lines. “Are you going to run the plates?”

  “Yes,” he said, tucking the paper into his chest pocket.

  “Are you going to tell me what you find?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Damn it, Rick—”

  “No, Nikki.” He held up a hand. “This is serious stuff. A man was murdered.”

  She raised her head. “So it was murder.”

  “Nikki—”

  “Come on, Rick, what’s the harm?”

  “The harm is that you’re not a professional, and if you blunder around, as you have a habit of doing, you’re going to find yourself in a boatload of trouble, just like last time.” He tilted his head. “Or don’t you remember having to haul your ass out of a fire arranged just for you?”

  “I remember,” Nikki said sullenly. “That’s why I’m being careful. Rick, we’re just going around in circles. How many times do I have to tell you and Kate that I’m not doing anything dangerous?”

  “I’m glad to hear that Kate doesn’t like this behavior any more than I do. At least one of you is thinking clearly.”

  “Rick, I came to you in good faith,” Nikki protested. “I’m not going to trust you with anything else if this is your attitude.”

  “That’s the point I’m trying to get through your head.” His tone was increasingly exasperated. “I don’t want you to come to me for anything like this, nor will you if you just keep your damned nose out of things.”

  “That’s your last word on the subject?” Nikki glared at him.

  “It is.”

  “Then I guess there’s nothing else to say.”

  Fuming, she turned and left the staff room, stomping down the stairs leading to the room in the basement where the dispatchers worked. Julia Watson, who covered days, and Dennis Langille, who was Nikki’s partner at night, both looked up at her arrival.

  “About time you got here,” Julia grumbled good-naturedly.

  Nikki glanced at the clock and saw that it was five minutes past. “Oh, Julia, I’m sorry,” she said, honestly contrite. It was procedure to show up at five before the hour to replace the day shift, and a courtesy to show up ten minutes early to make sure the person being replaced could leave on time rather than spend ten minutes catching their relief up. “I started talking to Rick and lost track of time. It won’t happen again.”

  “No problem.” Julia logged off the computer and rose from her chair. Stocky, with salt and pepper hair, she had two kids and a husband who worked for the Department of Transportation. She handed over the headphone and tapped the clipboard on the counter. “Upstairs wants us to keep a close eye on Brunswick Street. If any calls come in, regardless of what they’re for, we’re to dispatch a squad car immediately, in addition to whatever else is required.”

  “Are they expecting some particular trouble from there?” Nikki sat down and logged in with her password.

  “They always expect trouble from there. I think there’s a dealer living in the area that they’re keeping an eye on, just waiting for a chance to bust him for something big. Other than that, it’s a typical Wednesday. Have a good night, Nik. I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”

  “You, too.”

  Nikki scanned the calls that had come in over the dayshift and settled in for the night. Above her computer, a large, detailed map of Truro dominated the room, and behind her, on the other counter, stood a sparkling clean coffee pot. Since Julia knew Nikki didn’t imbibe, she had washed it before her arrival. Nikki, on the other hand, knowing her counterpart would set up an IV with the stuff if it were feasible, usually made a pot around quarter to six in the morning so it would be ready for Julia. She was thankful that Kate’s love of the bean was more reasonable.

  Dennis looked over from his desk. “What did Rick want? To make you late, I mean.”

  “Nothing,” Nikki grumbled. “Sometimes he just frosts me, though.”

  Dennis grinned, showing oversized teeth. Sandy hair fell boyishly over his forehead; he didn’t look old enough to vote, let alone work as a dispatcher, but he was actually older than Nikki. “He has only the nicest things to say about you.”

  Nikki shot him a look before turning her attention back to her screen, feeling vaguely guilty both at Dennis’s comment and because of her annoyance at the police constable. She knew Rick liked her. In fact, he treated her much as an older brother would, and with a great deal more compassion and kindness than her own blood relatives did. She knew that the police didn’t like amateurs interfering with ongoing investigations, but she wasn’t doing that. She just happened to find out useful bits of information now and again. Was she just supposed to ignore what she learned?

  She had plenty of time to muse over the situation as the evening progressed. It turned out to be just
as quiet as Julia predicted. It was raining, preventing the young people from hanging out around town, a source of many calls, and it was the third week of the month, which meant the trouble government cheques generated was at its lowest ebb. People didn’t have the money to go out drinking, and the moon wasn’t full, so the police didn’t have that craziness to deal with either.

  Nikki sometimes wondered what it would be like to cover the phones during a weekend. If things worked out and there were openings, she would eventually be promoted to weekdays and then to weekends. The most crucial shifts occurred on Friday and Saturday nights, which also paid the most. Nikki wasn’t sure if she wanted to sign up for the stress, but she couldn’t deny that working at the police station was a great deal more intriguing and challenging than her previous job at the hardware store. Even on quiet nights, something interesting usually happened, and she often felt like she was contributing something important to society, particularly after a 911 call where she was able to calm the caller as she dispatched the required emergency personnel. She had been involved in helping save more than one life during her short time on the job, and that provided a satisfaction that few other positions could offer.

  She was in a much better mood by the time Julia arrived to relieve her the next morning, and she whistled quietly as she climbed the stairs to the main floor, stopping by the staff room to pick up her jacket and her thermal lunch bag. To her surprise, Rick was already there and handed her a piece of paper with a name on it.

  Uncomprehending, Nikki looked at it. “Who’s Monica Henderson?”

  “I can tell you who she isn’t. She isn’t the guy who was supposedly driving her car, and she doesn’t have anything to do with the Elliots. Are you sure you got the right license number?”

  She stared at him. “Kim wrote it down.”

  “Then I guess she wrote it down wrong.” He flashed her a slightly smug grin. “You need to leave this to the professionals, Nikki. You don’t have the skills to conduct a proper investigation.”

  With an airy wave, he strolled out, leaving Nikki steaming. Kim surely hadn’t written the license plate down wrong, so she was left with the burning question that she mumbled out loud to the empty room. “Who the hell is Monica Henderson?”