Deeper

by Ronica Black

  Erin clawed at her scalp. She slammed her head back against the wall, hissing in pleasure. Patricia sucked her so hard she almost came from the feel of the full breast in her mouth. She tore the shirt up over Erin’s head, discarding it with the bra.

  Erin stood breathing heavily, breasts heaving, one wet and red from Patricia’s mouth.

  Patricia stepped into her, kissing her again. She couldn’t get over the taste of her mouth. So luscious and hot and needful. Suddenly, she had to feel the other part of her too. And taste it. She shoved her hand down the front of Erin’s loose-fitting jeans. The cotton of her panties was warm and moist. Patricia eased her fingers farther. She found Erin’s short curls were equally moist and twice as warm. With a groan, she went further, feeling the lips just below the curls.

  “Mmm.” Erin bit on Patricia’s lower lip, taking possession, just as Patricia was.

  She could wait no more. She pulled away and tugged on Erin’s hand. “Come. Now.”

  They hurried down the hallway to Patricia’s bedroom.

  “I can’t.” Erin’s voice was ragged. “Not in here.”

  Patricia understood immediately. Too much had happened in there that night; their very lives had been threatened. She tugged Erin into the spare bedroom. “In here okay?”

  Erin nodded.

  “Good.”

  Patricia pushed her onto the bed and straddled her leg. Erin’s fingertips grazed slowly up Patricia’s sides to her bra, unlatching it in the front, letting her breasts spill.

  “You’re…” Erin started but then stopped.

  “What?” Patricia asked as the bra was tossed aside. Her breath hitched as Erin’s fingers rubbed over her breasts.

  “So…” Erin didn’t finish the sentence but instead tugged her down into another deep kiss.

  Patricia found herself grinding into Erin, rubbing her thigh hard between her legs, needing the pressure. They rocked like that for a few moments, their mouths promising what was to come. They kissed and rocked. Again and again. When the sweet, dark bliss of orgasm began to tunnel her vision, Patricia moved away, her crotch throbbing for release, angry at the loss of contact. Ignoring its fierce pangs, she hurriedly undid Erin’s jeans and yanked them off along with the cotton panties. Breathless, she looked down upon Erin with the hungry desire she’d endured for over a year.

  “I have to have you in my mouth,” she whispered.

  Erin stared up at her, eyes full of raw emotion. “You want me,” she said, not quite a question, not quite a statement.

  “More than anything.”

  “Say it again.”

  “I want you.”

  Erin closed her eyes. “Liz doesn’t want me.” She breathed heavily for a moment. “I need you. I need you to want me.”

  “And I do.”

  “Take off your pants,” Erin said, her voice low with hastening desire.

  Patricia climbed off the bed and stripped.

  Erin was watching. “Your panties too.”

  Patricia removed them. Erin sat up on her elbows, bathed in the moonlight that slanted in through the vertical blinds. Her gaze moved hungrily yet slowly over Patricia’s body. Patricia had never felt her skin so ablaze before. When their eyes met again, no words were needed.

  Patricia crawled onto the bed. Her mouth felt full and plump with saliva and blood, a starving being cradled over the feast of a lifetime. She opened Erin’s legs, pressing gently on her thighs. Erin obliged and the moonlight glistened against her wet flesh.

  Patricia snaked out her tongue and licked up one thigh and then the other. She caught Erin’s scent and her eyes threatened to roll back in her head. Then she kissed where her tongue had been. Full, thick, sucking kisses that fell upon sensitive bare thighs. Erin began to claw at her head again, moving upward beneath her.

  Anticipation shot to Patricia’s lower abdomen in hot, exquisite waves. When she finally came to Erin’s flesh, she closed her eyes and allowed her nose and cheek to feel her first.

  Wet. Hot. Heady with scent.

  She closed her mouth over her and lapped at the folds of flesh. Erin called out and lifted her hips, eager for more, offering herself. Patricia responded, fueled by the slick taste of her, excited by the firm knot of her desire. She swirled her tongue over it, loving how it twitched but did not move as she massaged it. It’s anchored there. Anchored and awaiting the pleasure I am bestowing upon it and around it. It will never move. It is forever mine.

  Her brain began to rapid fire as she feasted, the neurotransmitters saturated. Erin kept crying out, her body pulsing for more. The sound of her raspy voice, coated in thick pleasure, made Patricia swoon. Caught up in her, nestled between her legs, she was helpless. Tasting her, pleasing her, having her.

  She kissed harder, licking longer and heavier. She slurped her juices, loving the silky hot feel against her tongue.

  When Erin began to buck she ran her tongue all over her, all over her clit, all over every fold of flesh. And then she sucked up the wet tracks.

  Erin thrust up into her, head thrashing from side to side. Her words were clipped and muffled, her stomach muscles tightening and twitching. “I need this,” she kept saying. “I need this.”

  Loud clouds thumped in Patricia’s ears, like buzzing heavy cotton, allowing her to block out everything else and keep going. It wasn’t until she felt Erin tug especially hard on her hair that she paid attention.

  Her mouth left Erin’s flesh in a smack. “What?” She could barely speak, her mouth full of sweet silk and swollen with exertion.

  “Come here.” Erin pulled on her upper arm.

  Patricia crawled to her side, confused.

  Erin kissed her palm, her eyes full of tears. “I need to taste you too. At the same time.”

  Patricia nearly fell over. Her own flesh was beating between her legs, its demands as intense as the thumping in her ears. But the emotion she saw in Erin’s eyes caused her to pause.

  “Hurry.” Erin reached for her.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Please.”

  Patricia swallowed and did as instructed, lifting her leg over Erin, her back to her. She felt Erin’s hot hands on the back of her hips, guiding her. When she felt her hot breath on her inner thighs, she nearly came.

  “Now,” she heard Erin say. And then she felt Erin’s wet mouth tugging on her flesh.

  “Oh!” She pressed back, unable not to. She heard and felt the smacking of her mouth, hot, wet bolts of it shooting up through her body. Erin was starved for her just as much as Patricia was starved for Erin. The overpowering pleasure took over. Her hips began to gyrate. Her eyes drifted closed. It had been so damned long. She bit on her lower lip. Oh, God. Oh, God. She was close. It wouldn’t take long now.

  Hurriedly she lowered her mouth back down to Erin, and they fed off one another, hungrily, desperately. Patricia wrapped her hands around Erin’s thighs for support, moving her mouth heavily against her, sucking her, swirling her tongue all over her. They moaned into one another’s flesh. They thrust together in a groove.

  It couldn’t get any sweeter. It just couldn’t.

  Erin moaned louder. Patricia sucked harder. Oh, God. It was heaven. Yes, this must be heaven. She was sure of it. She felt Erin yank her mouth away. She felt her struggling breath as a cry of raw-sounding emotion escaped her throat. It was deep and throaty. She held her hips up off the bed, her fingers digging into Patricia’s legs. She came long. She came hard. Patricia never stopped trying to drink it all in.

  Erin was coming. Coming beneath her. It kept replaying in her head. She sucked it in. Swallowed it, and sucked some more. She knew deep inside that it would never happen again. So she took in as much as she could, relishing the moment. She could feel Erin warming down her throat and into her chest.

  It was so good, so bittersweet.

  Patricia groaned. Erin was sensitive and bucking. Patricia licked at her while her own flesh was being pulled and sucked, again and again.

  “Come her
e,” she heard Erin say.

  Patricia sat up, her hands on Erin’s slick stomach, her body moving in a rhythm against Erin’s mouth. Erin groaned, enjoying giving. Her tongue was a hot missile, shooting up inside her and then licking back to her clit. Patricia moaned as each bolt of pleasure lit up inside her. She began to pant Erin’s name. Nothing had ever felt this good before.

  Erin gripped her harder, holding her hips firmly as she took Patricia’s flesh in her mouth and sucked hard.

  “Oh my Go…” Patricia cried out.

  Erin kept sucking, harder and faster. It was time. They both knew it. And Erin was insisting.

  “Erin…Erin…” Eyes squeezed shut, Patricia came, pushing up with her arms, her spine a straight, hard, hot bolt of lightning. “Ahh…ahhhh…ahhhh!” she cried, rocking, rocking, rocking.

  Her voice vanished but her body continued to move involuntarily, desperate for every last ounce of pleasure. After what felt like an eternity, Erin let up and Patricia slowly stopped moving. They were still and silent then, their skin lit up and slick with sweat.

  Patricia stared hazily at the streetlight coming through the blinds. Lazy, tiny particles of dust floated down upon them. Her heart beat warm, heavy blood throughout her body. Her bones had melted. She eased off Erin, moving carefully, fearing she might collapse. Erin watched her with heavy-lidded eyes. Patricia crawled up next to her and nuzzled into her neck. She could feel Erin’s heart beat, smell both their scents mixed with sweat. She thought she could die at that very moment and be happy.

  When she looked up she found Erin’s eyes glazed over and full of tears.

  “It’s going to be okay,” Patricia said.

  Erin didn’t respond. She merely curled into her, sobbing uncontrollably. Patricia stared up at the ceiling fan. She kissed the top of Erin’s head.

  “Shh, it’s all right. It’s going to be all right.”

  As she said the words, she didn’t quite believe them. Erin’s future was unknown. But their future together was minimal.

  Her few moments of bliss had passed.

  Never to return.

  *

  Erin buried herself in Patricia’s neck, feeling safe nestled in the soft skin. She didn’t want to move away from her, afraid of what lurked beyond Patricia’s scent and softness. She didn’t want to face what she’d just done. She wished it would disappear into the darkness of the night.

  She thought she needed the sex, needed the connection. But she was wrong. What she needed was love. What she needed was Liz.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “You’ll plead no contest to the charges,” Cynthia said with a self-assurance Liz usually took solace in. But at the present, she felt nothing but fear. And fear, Liz despised.

  She pressed her thumb against the long lip of her plastic pen cap. Bent it until the blue plastic whitened and then snapped. She glanced at the door and imagined Erin there, walking seductively toward her, inching her shirt up as she moved. The thought made her throat tighten, and her mind flashed to a few days before, when Erin had stood at her desk looking lost and alone and betrayed. Then she recalled how she’d confirmed those feelings.

  “I’ll do my best to ensure the judge hears of the situation and the claims of officer harassment,” Cynthia continued. “But honestly, I don’t think it’ll do any good. You might be looking at some jail time here.”

  “They set me up. Taunted me.” Liz hated them. They had ruined her life with their accusations and pursuit of Jay.

  “They taunt suspects all the time,” Cynthia said. “It’s called interrogation.”

  Liz squeezed the phone until her hand hurt. “I’m not a fucking suspect. I’ve done nothing.” She pounded the desk with her fist.

  “I know. I know. Listen to me.” Cynthia paused and Liz could almost picture her lipsticked lips pressed to the receiver. “You have got to remain under control. No more temper tantrums. Lay low and do as you’re told. Cooperate and be polite. I want you to be the best damned citizen in Valle Luna. Understood?”

  Weak with fatigue, Liz conceded. “Yes.”

  “Good. I’ll call you next week. And you call me if they so much as glance your way, okay?”

  “Yes.”

  “And be careful. No stunts. They’re most likely watching you.”

  Liz heard the click and lowered the phone, lifting another handset immediately. The bulk of the satellite phone was somewhat comforting. She spun in her chair and peeled back the blinds to search the parking lot for anyone sitting in a vehicle. Cynthia was probably right. The cops were most likely watching her. Liz had done her best at countersurveillance for the past few days, switching lanes, driving fast, exiting the freeway at the last second. She’d also checked her vehicle for GPS tracking devices, but she couldn’t be sure.

  She left the office, her pace determined. The back door declared Emergency Exit Only, but she pushed through it just as she’d done countless times before. The sunshine warmed her head and shoulders. The blacktop behind the building was vast and empty save for a cement cylinder filled with sand and dozens of short standing cigarette butts.

  She glanced around to make sure she was alone, then extended the antenna on the phone and dialed the three-digit code. At the prompt she dialed the remaining twelve digits. She knew them by heart. They were her lifeline.

  She paced. Then she heard background noise when someone answered.

  “Elvira,” she said into the phone.

  She heard more noise, then a voice. “Hey, Lizzie.”

  The Oak Ridge Boys sang loud, only their voices were low and distorted. Like they were a chorus of demons underwater.

  “El…vi…raaaaaa” played in warped slow motion.

  Lizzie hated it. She used to think it funny, but now it was evil.

  The screen door banged over the drone and Lizzie jumped, shoving her fingers in her ears, unable to take the noise anymore. Jerry came storming in, equally annoyed, his eyes ablaze. He grabbed her arm, popping her finger from her ear. He lowered it quickly, mindful suddenly of the cast.

  “Turn that shit off!” he screamed at her.

  Lizzie could smell the beer on his breath. She knew he meant business.

  He shot a look to the large chair by the window. The room was dim but they could just make out Jay, who sat curled up there, rocking back and forth, lost in the world of “Elvira.” Jerry shook his head in frustration. When he spoke, though, his voice softened a bit. “Turn it off.”

  He left the room, leaving Jay to her. They’d all been doing that. Leaving Jay to her. They were too afraid to say much to her, so they let her be. When something needed to be said, they said it to Lizzie.

  She rose from the couch and approached the record player. It was sitting on an old end table, the volume all the way up, the speed on the wrong setting. Jay played it like that for hours every day. Talking to no one. Just sitting and rocking.

  Ever since that day in the woods.

  Lizzie switched it off. Jay stopped rocking but she didn’t look away from the window.

  “Hey,” Lizzie said, walking up to her.

  Jay stole a glance at her but said nothing. Lizzie opened the thin curtains. If Jay was going to stare out the window, she might as well have a good view. The afternoon light spilled in and Lizzie gasped. From somewhere in the house she heard Dayne scream.

  “What the hell?” Jerry called out.

  Lizzie hurried into the hallway. The light was on in the small bathroom and her aunt was on the floor crying hysterically, her knees in a dark pool. She reached down and grabbed fistfuls of the darkness, raising it up.

  Lizzie stared. It was Jay’s hair.

  “Why?” Dayne cried. “Why would she cut her hair all off? What’s happenin’ to her, Jerry? What’s happenin’ to her?”

  Lizzie returned to Jay and sat on the armrest of her chair. Jay was still staring out the window. One hand was up and tugging on a short strand of hair. She’d cut almost all of it off, leaving only a few patches here and th
ere, no more than a couple of inches.

  Lizzie reached out and took her hand. Jay’s blue eyes seemed endless. A void. And Jay was somewhere, lost in their depths. Lizzie leaned into her.

  Jay began to hum “Elvira.”

  Lizzie hummed with her.

  Both of them staring out the window.

  *

  Erin came in through the back door, little Jack hot on her heels. She’d been sitting outside for hours, staring into the pool. She’d been doing that for the past few days, thinking about her life, about Liz, and about Patricia. They hadn’t spoken much since the night they’d been intimate. Erin really didn’t know what to say; so many different emotions swam through her when she thought about it, guilt being the most prominent.

  Her heart belonged to Liz, whether Liz wanted it or not.

  Patricia seemed to know this and even accept it, and that only made things all the more confusing. Erin knew she’d have to talk to her at some point. The gentle hand squeezing her shoulder while she sat in the morning sun would soon need to elicit a response.

  She walked into the living room, turned on the TV, and sat on the couch, wanting to see if there were any news updates on the murders. As if on cue, she heard, “A sixth body has now been added to the Highway Murder list. Police released the information today at a press conference where many more questions were raised than answered.”

  Erin thumbed up the volume on the remote control as Sergeant Ruiz came on screen. He stood gripping a podium, his face and eyes stern. His glasses glinted as he angled his head to speak, reflecting light at the numerous reporters gathered in front of him.

  “At this time we are only able to say that the latest bodies found have been positively linked to the other bodies, bringing the total death count to six.”