“You’re not going anywhere.”
Minutes later, Charley found herself shaking with an orgasm she’d never felt before, Joanna’s hand on her back, the other still playing with whichever nipple her mouth wasn’t. Joanna wouldn’t let her pull away until she’d stopped trembling, both of her hands still on Joanna’s breasts.
“You’ve never had a nipple orgasm before, have you?” Joanna asked, pulling Charley to her.
“Oh, my God…” Charley moved her hand between Joanna’s legs but felt Joanna stopping her.
“I just want you to lie here in my arms.”
“I’ll fall asleep if I do that.” Charley felt herself floating, falling, and the last thing she heard was Joanna whispering “Happy New Year” to her.
Charley awoke as the midnight blue of pre-dawn seeped across the sky. Her arm was asleep; she ever so slowly rolled onto her side, rubbing her shoulder. Joanna woke up.
“Everything okay?”
“My arm fell asleep.”
Joanna shifted up against Charley’s back and took over the massage. “I’m sorry, you should’ve woken me up or moved me,” she said as she expertly kneaded Charley’s arm.
“That feels good…so did what you did before.”
Joanna sighed. “I love nipple orgasms. Love getting them, love watching other women have them.”
“Filing that away.” Charley turned toward her, and Joanna put a finger on her lips.
“Red light. Nothing more tonight than sleeping in each other’s arms.”
Charley reached for her T-shirt, but Joanna took it from her and tossed it on the floor. “Hold me.”
Charley obeyed. The next thing she knew, the sun was up, and Madeline was knocking on their door. The aroma of bacon and coffee wafted up to the loft.
“Are you two awake? Everyone’s downstairs having breakfast. Come on down. We’re all still in our pajamas, so grab your robes. We’re deciding what to do today.”
Chapter Thirty-five
“I don’t have a robe.”
“What about a sweater?”
Charley took a navy blue Henley out of her suitcase.
“Good. Go on down. I’ll be down in a minute. I have to put on something a little more presentable.”
Charley giggled “Well, you have to put something on.” The heat of a blush rose at the sight of Joanna in the light of day.
“Oh, God,” Joanna said, “there’s that beautiful blush. I think I fell in love with you the first time I saw that.”
“Say what?” Charley asked.
Joanna balled up her tank top and threw it at her. “Go on, downstairs with you.”
Charley reluctantly headed to the kitchen. “Thank you for last night” was on the tip of her tongue, along with “can we do it again tonight?” But they felt flat and didn’t nearly convey the elation and peace running through her. Did Joanna mean it, what she’d said about love? She didn’t seem like the flippant remark type. Charley floated downstairs on the words.
Madeline had made pancakes, and there was a platter mounded with bacon and sausage sitting on the middle of the table surrounded by pitchers of maple syrup and little ramekins of butter.
“Cardiothoracic surgeon, huh? You trolling for patients here?”
Madeline laughed. “I know, horrible. Roast beef last night, bacon today, and potato leek soup tonight.”
“With grilled salmon, that’s healthy,” Shelley said. “They’re trying to fatten me up again.”
“Let’s talk about what we’re doing today,” Madeline said. “I need some help in town, and I’d really like to get out on the ice for our annual game of hockey this afternoon.”
Madeline’s list of errands didn’t take long to put together, and then they turned to the hockey game.
“Oh, but I don’t skate,” Charley said when she was chosen immediately for Team Madeline. “I could referee. From the sideline. Where’s the rink? In town?”
Shelley started laughing before Charley even finished her sentence.
“It’s broom hockey, on the pond out back. You don’t need skates. You just need to be able to stay upright,” Dana said.
Shelley was still giggling. “And I’m the referee because I can’t play.”
“No, you just play favorites,” Dana said.
They argued the merits of lunch at the Bluebird Cafe so they could get right to the hockey game when they got home, and by mid-morning, they were headed into town. Charley found herself in the small IGA supermarket with Dana and Hayden. Afterward, she parted ways with them, having no interest in the art gallery they were going to visit. She wanted to walk around the village square. There was a hardware store there. A bell over the door tinkled when she opened it, and as she’d suspected, it was like stepping into that Norman Rockwell painting she’d described to Joanna. Once the proprietor realized she was a junkie getting a fix, he left her alone.
Joanna texted from the antique shop she’d gone to with Meg and Shelley, asking her to save the seat next to her in the restaurant. The request made Charley smile, and in response to Joanna’s query about where she was, she sent back: In a museum of my own—hardware store.
She got a laughing emoji back and made her way to the restaurant, calling Tricia on the way to check on her. The report wasn’t a good one: she was struggling with simple tasks and getting frustrated, so she wasn’t cooperating with either Ted or the nurse, had stayed in bed, and decided she didn’t want to eat anything. When Joanna slid into the chair beside her at the table, Charley asked her to call Tricia. She left the restaurant, phone in hand, Charley trailing behind her to eavesdrop and as she suspected would happen, Tricia came around after Joanna leveled with her. She handed the phone to Charley and went back inside.
“Are you having a good time?” Tricia asked.
Charley could hear the weariness in her voice. “We’re in the middle of East Bumfuck. What do you think?”
“Oh, c’mon, it must be a quaint upstate town.”
Charley told her about the hardware store but otherwise grumbled about small towns. It felt wrong to admit she was having a great time.
“You’ve become a city snob. All right, get back to Nurse Ratched. She read me the riot acts. I’ll behave now.”
Charley stood outside the café for a minute gathering herself. It felt as though Tricia’s health had reached the top of a roller coaster and she was poised for that harrowing descent. Charley was well aware of the ticking clock. That she couldn’t see the time left on it infuriated her. She couldn’t fight something invisible, and she felt helpless. There was a mound of snow piled near the sidewalk, and Charley grabbed a handful of it. The hard snow was easily packable, and she made a snowball and fired it across the street into the alley between two buildings. She wanted to make twenty more and hurl them right after that first one like an automatic pitching arm set on “Angry.” Instead, she returned to the table and slipped the phone into Joanna’s back pocket, leaving her hand in the pocket just long enough that Joanna gave her a warning look. Which was exactly what Charley wanted, that flash of emerald green that set her on fire. Please promise me you’ll shake up my world like that every day.
“Who wants to wager on today’s game?” Madeline asked as the waiter brought drinks to the table. “You must be pretty competitive, Charley. We saw you pitch that snowball right over the home plate strike zone out there like you were Noah Syndergaard.”
She didn’t realize they’d all been watching, and no explanation swam through the mix of pain and desire fogging her brain.
“Stay out of her way. She’d knock your grandmother down to score a goal,” Joanna replied.
“You were a jock in school, weren’t you?” Dana asked.
Charley nodded. “Guilty. But spoiler alert, I haven’t been on the ice since I was seven. I don’t know if I can stay upright.”
“Well, then, look out. Jo will make sure you spend as much time as possible on your back.” Hayden said. “She takes no prisoners.”
&n
bsp; “Oh, she’s familiar with my hardball tactics. I took an autographed Brett Favre jersey from her on a bet a couple of months ago.” Joanna smirked.
“Ouch. That’s harsh,” Meg remarked.
“Why don’t we try to win that back for Charley?” Madeline suggested.
“You’d better put up something worthwhile against it, then,” Joanna said, nudging Charley, “like that Charles Tyrwhitt gift certificate your neighbor gave you.”
“I’m not giving that to you! You already have my favorite shirt, I’m not giving you the custom-made ones, too!”
“But I rather enjoy taking the shirt off your back.” Joanna taunted her with an innocent girl next-door smile.
“Really?” Charley said, her mood turning. “Well, then,” she leaned forward, invading Joanna’s space, and channeled Margaret Hamilton. “How about a little fire, Scarecrow? We’ll take you, and your little teammates, too!”
A cheer went up from the table.
“I will make you pay for that,” Joanna said, her nose an inch from Charley’s.
“Go ahead. Try and melt me, Dorothy.”
Joanna’s eyes opened wide in surprise. “What makes you think I’ll take my revenge on the ice?”
It was Charley’s turn to be surprised, and desire shot straight through her.
The game was bruising. Charley’s face met the ice more times than she could count, but Madeline scored a hat trick for them, on top of Charley’s goal, winning her Favre jersey back, and Charley found out that Dana was right. Shelley played favorites as the referee, calling numerous infractions on her and throwing her into the penalty box, sometimes when it wasn’t even her fault.
She crawled into bed that night with a heating pad on one elbow and an ice pack on her knee. Joanna emerged from the bathroom with a glass of water and several Advil in her hand. Desire heated every corner of Charley’s body as she looked at her in the tank top and snug boi shorts, obliterating the pain for a moment. She wanted to slip the straps off those shoulders and kiss her from her lips down to her breasts again.
“Here, take these and tell me where it hurts.”
For a nanosecond, Charley wanted to name the body part whose current state of inflammation wasn’t a result of the hockey game. Instead, she pointed to her knee.
“Why did I play? I knew this would happen.”
Joanna propped Charley’s leg across her lap and began gently moving the residual fluid up toward her knee. “Because it was fun, and you knew it would be. I think tomorrow we tell Madeline it has to be a snowball war.”
“Oh, sure, I’ll throw my back out or dislocate my shoulder hurling snow grenades.”
“Actually, that was a darn good pitch outside the restaurant today.”
Charley looked away.
“Do you want to tell me what that was about?”
“You know what that was about.”
Joanna moved up to sit next to Charley on the bed and draped her arm around her. “You can’t stop the tide.”
“I just wish I knew when it was coming in. I don’t want to drown.”
“I won’t let you.”
“You can’t save me. I have to figure out how to do that myself.” Impulsively, she kissed her, making sure it was as soft and sweet as Joanna’s opening foray had been the night before.
“You’re in no shape for any shenanigans tonight.”
“I’ll move slowly.”
“You’ll lie in my arms again. I like having you there.” Joanna continued kneading her inflamed knee.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Hmm. This sound serious.”
“No, I think it’s…more clarification. The handcuff necklace…”
Joanna looked up at her.
“You were the submissive in that relationship.”
Joanna nodded. “For the most part.”
“Meaning?”
“I’m a switch. I can fulfill either role.”
Charley thought about this.
“Why? Worried about my bossing you around last night and tonight?” Joanna raised an eyebrow.
“I don’t think so…”
“Good. It was a problem for Georgia. And…you and Tricia?”
“She initiated, although quite frankly, I teased her into it more often than not. I was always the closer, though.”
Joanna ran the back of her hand up Charley’s neck and pulled her in for a kiss. “Well, tonight, no teasing and no closing. I want you in my arms. We can talk about the necklace and what it means. And just to be clear, I still have the promissory note in my possession. Especially after last night.” Joanna’s hand wandered down Charley’s chest to her breasts and she shook her head. “I love these.”
Charley looked down at her body. “Nothing’s where it used to be…”
“You’re a voluptuous tease.” Joanna pointed to the bed. “In.”
When Charley came to in the morning, everything hurt. Joanna stood at the side of the bed with a glass of water and a handful of Tylenol. She handed them to Charley. “Sit up, let me see that knee.”
“I can’t look at it. I’ll scream.”
Joanna gently massaged the whole area. “It doesn’t look bad, actually. The ice helped.”
Her fingers slowly made their way up Charley’s thigh until her breath caught and her leg flexed under Joanna’s fingers, causing her to look up.
Joanna took in a deep breath and swallowed. “Breakfast?”
Charley dished up oatmeal and fruit salad for both her and Joanna as discussion of the day’s plans took hold around the table. Thea proposed a Scrabble tournament for the evening. Joanna suggested a hike to the lake for lunch. Over protests that it was too cold, she pointed out that it would be fifty degrees out by noon, windless and perfect for sitting in the sun in their beach chairs like fat little birds bunched on a telephone wire. “I’ll even make the lunches and the thermoses of soup,” Joanna said.
A couple of hours later, they made their way through snow drifts and frozen crunching leaves along a barely marked path, toting chairs, and canvas bags. They all settled into their chairs up by the beach grass. Charley turned her face to the sun. She’d forgotten the particular pleasure of that kind of warmth against the cold. Mixed with the company of these women, the conversation and laughter, it was a day she wished she could bottle and pull out years from now to look at and relive.
As the group headed back to the cabin afterward, Joanna pulled Charley aside. “We’ll join you guys in a few minutes. I want to show Charley something off the trail.”
“Don’t be too long,” Shelley said. “It’s going to be dark soon.”
Joanna took Charley’s gloved hand in hers and they made their way along a path that only she seemed to know. They came upon a huge white oak in a small clearing. Joanna pointed to the base of the tree. “I hoped it was blooming. I wanted you to see it.”
Nestled in a deep protective notch between two giant roots was a small plant sprouting a riot of red heart-shaped blossoms, the ground around it untouched by snow.
“But how?” She looked at Joanna.
“I don’t know. We think it’s the protection of the tree and the sun at this time of year. See how it slants through the glade, hitting right at the roots? And there’s hardly ever any snow in there. It happens in January and February. And then again in spring.”
“A bleeding heart at the end of a desire line,” Charley said, marveling at the beauty.
“What’s a desire line?”
“When a hiker leaves a known trail and forges a new one that’s just theirs, searching for something different than what’s on that path.”
Joanna took her glove off and ran the back of her hand over Charley’s cheek. Her touch ignited a yearning in Charley she was unable to deny, and she kissed Joanna. “Thank you for showing this to me. Thank you for the last two nights, for giving us a chance.” Joanna’s look of surprise pleased Charley. She put Joanna’s glove on her hand and let her lead them back out of the glen.
Chapter Thirty-six
The drive back to the city on Friday was difficult. Joanna laid out the parameters she needed between them going forward. After last night’s frank discussion of her relationship with Georgia that had lasted well into the night, Charley was crestfallen. She understood that Joanna wasn’t ready to move in any direction, that she couldn’t cap a time frame, that this burgeoning relationship deserved the best possible chance they could give it by allowing for breathing room. She also understood that Tricia’s imminent death was going to resonate in her world, possibly for a long time, and in ways she couldn’t see now; she was no more ready for anything than Joanna was. She understood it intellectually, even emotionally, but something deep inside her wanted to lie in Joanna’s arms every night.
There were several messages on her machine. Two of them were from her mother asking her to pick up items at the market. Charley just shook her head. There was nothing to be done about her mother’s marketing lists, now infamous among her brothers and a source of endless amusement at her expense. She was, by now, used to buying each one and dropping it off on her way to work, keeping her mother happy. Another message was from Robert; he’d done the marketing when her mother had complained that Charley wasn’t shopping for her on a timely basis lately. Had she forgotten Charley would be away? The fourth message was from Neely telling her she’d been hired by a new online magazine as its editor-in-chief, so she wouldn’t be at the Y anymore. And she wanted to have a drink with Charley one night to talk with her about the e-zine. “I might need some stuff from you. To, you know, publish.”
The message from Emily reminded her that she and Terry still wanted to go out to dinner with her and Joanna next week. After the dinner at Per Se, Emily told her they’d had such a good time that they hoped to make it a monthly get-together, which had pleasantly surprised both her and Joanna. The last message, from Brooke and Annie, was a raucous moment of everyone at their party counting down the last three seconds of the ball drop in Times Square and then blowing those ridiculous noisemakers into the phone. She rolled her eyes and erased them all.
Forging a Desire Line Page 28