by Lee Damon
Finally, he asked, "Was that what upset you? Talking to O'Mara? If you've told me all of it, I can't understand why you were crying. I think he's making good sense about concentrating on your need for him to overcome your fears. Does that have something to do with the state you're in?"
Quietly but insistently, he questioned her, coaxing her to talk, patiently waiting while she struggled for words and, eventually, hiding his surprised relief when she told him what had led up to her crying jag. For years, he had tried gently and subtly to bring her around to discussing with him exactly what Darcy had done to her. She had talked to him about the physical abuse—the punching, slapping, biting—which explained her fear of violence, but he had known that there must have been appalling experiences of sexual abuse to account for her terror-stricken reaction to being touched by any man other than himself. Until O'Mara came back into her life. Ez wasn't quite sure why it was different with him; perhaps because O'Mara was her first love, a strong but innocent love in the time before Darcy had brutalized her, and somehow in her subconscious she knew that O'Mara would never have hurt her. However, consciously, after her experiences with Darcy, she was convinced that physical love was a painful, unpleasant act. Ez had long wanted to discuss this part of her marriage with his twin, to try to make her understand that a sexual relationship between two people who loved each other was the ultimate pleasure, and never the ugly act forced on her by Darcy. However, Kitt had never been able to face those memories and put her thoughts and feelings about them into words.
Now, at last, O'Mara had provided the catalyst that was needed to bring down the barriers to memory and allow Kitt to talk openly about Darcy's sexual attacks, his abuse of her body and her deep-rooted fear of ever again being in a physically vulnerable position with a man.
It all spilled out, at first in a jumble of disconnected words and phrases, and then, as the pressure of initial revelation eased, she paused to pull her thoughts together and managed to give him a coherent description of just what Darcy had done and her reactions. Ez heard her out, saying very little, knowing that the very act of verbalizing all the terror and pain was part of a necessary healing process. At last, she stopped speaking and wiped away the tears that had been trickling, unfelt, down her cheeks.
Ez came to his feet and reached for her empty mug. "You need something a bit stronger than tea. I seem to remember seeing a bottle of brandy in the cupboard."
He disappeared into the kitchen, returning a few minutes later with two brandy snifters. Handing one to Kitt, he dropped back down onto his end of the sofa and swirled the deep amber liquid around in his glass, watching her out of the corner of his eye, waiting for her to regain her composure.
"You okay?"
"Mmmm. Sorry about that. I didn't mean to fall apart all over you." She lifted apologetic eyes to meet his understanding gaze.
"Try not to be any more feather-witted than normal," he said in mock-disgust. "Who better than I could you fall apart on?"
"Thank God you're not trying to teach English," she groaned, laughing weakly.
"There's nothing wrong with my English. A little creative usage is what keeps a language alive. And don't think you're going to sidetrack me into a discussion of my syntax. I want to know if you're afraid of O'Mara."
Kitt caught her breath at the suddenness of the question. She had started to relax, and was feeling sleepy after the intense emotionalism of the past couple of hours. The effort of dragging up all those ugly memories and forming them into words had drained her, and she'd had no thought of any further deep discussions right now.
Trying to collect her thoughts, she could only repeat, "Afraid of O'Mara?"
"I don't mean in the normal way of things. I know you're not. Remember, I've seen you kiss him and quite happily let him put his arm around you." He lifted an inquiring eyebrow as he added, "I'm not sure, of course, how much further contact you've accepted, but it's certain sure that you haven't been to bed with him."
Kitt's quick, upward look at him had a hint of rebelliousness in it. "How do you know we haven't... been to bed together? Maybe—"
"Knock it off, Sis. All I've got to do is look at him when he's watching you, and I can practically see a cloud of sexual frustration hanging over his head. And don't bother making any dumb remarks about his being able to get all he wants someplace else. Of course he could. I've seen the way women look at him. If he showed the least bit of interest in any one of them, she'd be all over him like wet wallpaper. However, he's only interested in one woman, and that's you. So, he'll wait you out. Now answer my question—are you afraid of him?"
"No, not of O'Mara." She wrapped her arms around her upraised knees, bringing one hand up to her mouth and nibbling on her thumbnail. "I can... he can... it's all right between us up to a point. We've come a long way together in just those few days before he left. He makes me... want him... respond to him... but when it's reaching the point where his... arousal is unmistakable and... I have to think... no, I don't really think about it... it's more of a reaction...."
"Stop a minute, Kitt, and get your thoughts together. Slowly, now. Take it one step at a time. It doesn't scare you when you're sexually aroused?"
"No. It's fine. I mean, I like it, and I don't want him to stop touching me." She was slightly flushed, but somehow not really embarrassed. Although she and Ez had never discussed their personal sexual experiences, they had in earlier years talked about sex in general. In fact, Ez had been Kitt's main source of information when she had finally developed her belated interest in men as something more than fellow athletes.
She lifted her head and looked at him, unflinchingly meeting the eyes so like her own, and she felt the tension draining out of her as she received his silent messages. It was time, now, to talk about her most pressing fear. She knew he would tell her the truth and help her to accept it even if it were as bad as she expected.
He started to speak, and she held up a staying hand. "No. Let me tell you. I know what your next question is. Yes, it's O'Mara's arousal that scares me. At least, the... physical evidence of it does. I'm fine now, even with his arms around me, until I feel that against me, and then the panic starts. Not in my mind. That's so fuzzy with wanting him that I don't think. It's some defensive trigger in my system. The minute my body feels that hard ridge pressing against it, all my muscles knot and I start fighting to move away from it. It's a threat. It's going to hurt me."
"I understand what you're saying," Ez said slowly, thinking it through. "To you, it's a weapon, an instrument of pain rather than pleasure, because you've never felt pleasure from that part of a man, thanks to that bastard Darcy. And his repeated raping of you caused so much pain that your system is... programmed... to equate an erection with agony. Damn! I wish to hell O'Mara had taken you all the way that last summer!"
"So does he. So do I. If he had..."
"If he had, your initial experience would have been beautiful, because he cared enough about you to make sure it was. Then, if somehow you'd still had an experience like Darcy, both your mind and your body would have had an existing pleasurable memory to offset the ugliness."
"I think you're right, Ez. I'm not afraid of O'Mara's kisses or his hands on me. He did all that before and I loved it. It hasn't been all that difficult to accept that part of lovemaking again. And I have no trouble in touching him. It's the rest of it. I love him, Ez, but I'm not sure if I can let him hurt me."
"Idiot! Why would he hurt you? He loves you practically to the point of obsession. The last thing in the world he would do would be to hurt you in any way."
"But—" There was a mixture of anguish and pleading in her expression. "How can he help but hurt me if he...?"
There was a waiting silence as Ez groped for the true meaning behind her half-finished question and Kitt watched him with a faint light of hope in her eyes, willing him to have an acceptable answer for her.
Suddenly, it all fell into place, and Ez quickly schooled his expression as he finally unde
rstood the full extent of her fears. At least, he thought he did, but perhaps—
"You know why it hurt so much with Darcy, don't you?" he asked carefully, watching her face closely for every nuance of response. At her hesitantly questioning look, he continued, "It's a very basic fact, Sis, that a woman has to be ready to take a man, or he's going to hurt her. Did Darcy ever... arouse you... make love to you or touch you... before he—" Kitt's hair flew as she violently shook her head, her eyes reflecting remembered anguish.
"Damn him!" Ez's fist thudding onto the arm of the sofa shook the room. "It's all right, Kitt," he said quietly on an indrawn breath. "I know this is hard for you to talk about, but I can't help you to understand... Well, I have to know a few basics before I can explain—"
"Ez," she interrupted, husky-voiced, "I do know about... the need for... being aroused and... and... ready before... Well, he never did that. He never even tried. He just... sl-slammed into m-m-me." Her arms were wrapped tightly around her knees, and she rocked back and forth in pain, slow tears seeping from under her closed eyelids. "Oh, God, it hurt so. It hur—"
The raw, hoarse words were smothered against Ez's shoulder as he pulled her into his arms, his muscles flexing in a crushing hold as he tried, desperately, to absorb some of her pain. He leaned his head against hers, his thick chestnut hair falling forward to blend with hers, and muttered a litany of basic Anglo-Saxon under his breath. He didn't stop until he felt her hands patting his shoulders and heard her hiccupping laugh in his ear.
"Ez, good grief, you really did learn some new words from O'Mara," she choked, struggling for a light tone and almost making it. His arms loosened as she pushed back slightly to look at him, rubbing her hands across her cheeks to wipe away the last tears.
"Never mind my vocabulary." He brushed his fingers across her face and pushed her hair back, leaving his hand resting at the back of her neck. "Kitt, you know that O'Mara would never, never do anything remotely like that to you. He's a gentle man and he loves you. He would take great care that you would be more than ready for him before he'd even try to join with you. Don't you know that?"
"Oh, yes. At least, I know that he would try to be careful, but..."
"But what?" Ez watched her intently, knowing that there was something beyond the fear of rape, since it was clear that she knew O'Mara would never do that to her. He suspected what her real fear was, and willed her to put it into words. It wasn't going to help her for him to say it. She had to dig it out, face it and talk about it before she could accept his explanations and reassurances.
Still sitting in the curve of his arm, facing him with her legs curled up under her, she fixed her eyes on her hands as they abstractedly toyed with the top buttons on his shirt while she tried to pull together her drifting thoughts. Her mind felt sluggish, as if it were resisting her efforts to delve into its deepest recesses and uncover its hidden fears. She groped for the words to explain an apprehension that, in this day and age, should not even exist. Theoretically, she knew it was stupid. But in her experience—and that was the problem. It was her experience that had thrown her back into this state of primitive, visceral, female fear of—
"He's much bigger than Leon." It was a thready whisper.
Ez waited a moment to see if she were going to add anything. He brought his big hand down from her neck to clasp and still her agitated fingers, watching the gilded lashes come down to hide her eyes, while he interpreted her slightly ambiguous statement. Nibbling on his lower lip, he rapidly considered his options. It was obvious that this was no time for either clinical discussions or locker-room terminology. Plain speaking was going to sound too insensitive to her in her overwrought state. It was a time for indirection and a very, very careful choice of terms.
"O'Mara?" She nodded, and he said, faintly questioning, "I take it we're not talking about height or muscular development?"
"No." It was still a whisper, but perhaps a bit stronger. "It... he... Leon wasn't entirely... in proportion. I mean, for such a big man he was... uh... not as big as you might expect... or as he wanted to be, but he said...."
He saw her lashes flicker and felt the clenching of her fingers within his clasp. Soft-voiced, he helped her out, phrasing his questions carefully. "Are you saying that he was... built on the small side where it usually counts with a man?" She nodded. "And that seemed to bother him?" Another nod. "And he said that it's not how much you've got that counts but how you use it?"
Her head came up, her eyes opening wide in surprise. "How did you know?"
The corners of his mouth twitched as he answered, "It's a typical boast of an insecure male. As an educated guess, I'd say that sometime in his early years, perhaps in his first attempt at a sexual experience, a girl laughed at him or ridiculed him, which could have made him so self-conscious that he fumbled his next attempts and gained some more negative comments. Add to that some of the crude teasing that goes on in locker rooms, and you've got all the ingredients for turning a basically insecure adolescent boy into an insecure man with a highly developed, but well hidden, sense of sexual inadequacy and a desire to 'get even' with all those girls who laughed at him."
"Why me? I never laughed at him."
"You were the prize, a woman whom all his friends admired and liked. He scored points by winning you. But then he made damn sure you would never have any desire to laugh at him. That's probably only part of the story. It would have taken a psychiatrist to dig out all the causes and effects. It's no good raking over the ashes now. You were originally making some point about O'Mara."
She dropped her eyes to study his chin, murmuring, "He's... bigger. Much."
"Well... it's been some years since I've seen him stripped. Not since the last time a gang of us went for a midnight swim at Crofts Pond. Remember it?"
"Sure. You guys always chased all the girls away so you could go skinny dipping. What about it?"
"Just that, as I recall, O'Mara was pretty much built to scale—all over—and since he was already twenty-two at the time, I don't imagine he's changed."
"No." She looked at him uncertainly. "If...."
"Say it," he coaxed softly. "I can't answer you until you ask me the question."
She stiffened her back, took a deep breath, closed her eyes and let the words tumble out. "If Leon was so small and he hurt me so badly, how can O'Mara help but hurt me even more since he's much larger even if he's as careful as he can be because I must be small too or Leon wouldn't have hurt so much and it won't do any good to be sure I'm ready if—"
"Whoa, Kitt. All right, I've got the question."
"Yeah. But do you have an answer?"
"Oh, yes," he said thoughtfully. He shifted into a slightly more comfortable position, but still facing her, and took her hands in a firm clasp with both of his.
"Out of idle curiosity, Sis, if this size business has been bothering you, why didn't you ask your doctor about it on one of those annual checkups you have?"
"It wasn't. Before, I mean. I never thought about it until... until O'Mara... I took him by surprise a couple of times. Oh, that sounds... what I mean is that I got carried away and... sort of pressed up against him when he wasn't expecting it and... he reacted. Just for a minute, and then he moved us apart before I panicked or anything. But for those few seconds I could... feel him against me... you know?... and I... Well, later, when I was remembering how he felt, I realized suddenly that he was much bigger than Leon, and then I... remembered some basic biology and things I'd heard some of the girls in the dorm back in college joking about and...." Her voice trailed off and she looked at him hopefully. "So what do we do?"
"You stop worrying, for one thing." Ez smiled at her, shaking his head slowly. "Really, Kitt, the things that pop into your head sometimes. Listen to me carefully, you noodle. First, the question of size is easily resolved. If you were thinking with your usual efficiency, you'd have figured it out for yourself. We're twins. Right? As close to identical as male and female can be. Right? Same hair, same eye
s, same facial structure, same coordination, same long bones. I'm tall for a man; you're proportionately tall for a woman. Right? Right?" He waited for her wide-eyed nod of agreement, noting the dawning of understanding deep in the smoky eyes.
"Yes. Well, like O'Mara, all of me is definitely in proportion. Understand? Therefore, it's logical to assume that all of you is in proportion, too. Hmmm?"
"Ohhhh."
"Indeedy."
"I never thought of that, Ez." Her mouth widened in a delighted smile. "How could I have been so dense?"
"Hah! Because you've been walking around mush-minded ever since O'Mara strolled into the shop that first day."
Kitt's smile suddenly faded. "Wait a minute. If you're right about this, how come it was so painful with Leon?"
"Just what I told you before. Size wouldn't matter if you were... dry... and your muscles were tight with fear. Which leads us to the second point I want to make. O'Mara has undoubtedly had considerable experience. He's not the celibate type."
"I know that," Kitt said hastily. "He used to take out a sandpiper now and then during those summers, and I know he's had a number of casual relationships over the years. He told me. It doesn't bother me, Ez. After all, one of us should know what we're doing."
"True. And knowing the type of man he is, I'd say he does it very well. He'll be very careful with you, and he's got enough control and experience to know how to judge your pace and match it. He won't try to hurry you. It would help both of you, I think, if you could tell him beforehand just what you've been telling me about your fears. Especially about this size thing. I doubt if he's guessed that one; I didn't. He can reassure you about that in ways that a brother can't. Do you understand?"
"I think so," she said slowly. "At least, I've got the drift of what you're talking about. Enough so I'll leave it to him to explain the rest."