Making a Scene

by Trudy Doyle

  I raise my coffee, take a sip, swallow. “Thirty-nine,” I finally say.

  He gives my hand a quick tap. “You could be sixty-nine and he’d still be lucky to have had you. Because being the age you are affords you the advantage of one thing he obviously doesn’t have yet—credibility. He still has to prove that after three successful books you’d need to steal from someone like him. The overwhelming burden would be his, and remember, you have your publishing house behind you. So considering all that, why do you think he’d do it?”

  “To get back at me. He’s angry because I threw him out.”

  “And his cushy deal. Did he cheat on you?”

  Who’d want to admit to it? “With my friend.”

  His eyes narrow. “Bastard.”

  “In my own bed.” Which makes it worse.

  His eyes flare. “Stupid bastard. Even animals don’t shit where they eat.” I hear the phone ringing in the back room, and it takes only a couple moments before someone calls him to it. He signals he’ll be right there and then he looks at his watch. “Your five minutes are up, Pamela Flynn, but we’ll continue this analysis later. In the meantime, I suggest you get on with it, whether or not this bastard’s behind your block.”

  “He is, but there’s…” No way can I tell him that.

  “There’s more? Oh man,” he says, standing up. “I can’t wait to hear it. Now get to work.”

  Before he goes, I grab his hand. “Roark,” I say, squeezing it, “thanks for listening.”

  He squeezes mine back. “Get to work,” he says, leaving me and disappearing into the back room.

  Get to work. As if it were that easy. There was a time not so very long ago when my writing mojo had all the jump of a finely tuned machine. I’d pick a scene from the back of my brain and the words would shoot from my fingers like rivets to the screen. But now it seems to wander in only two directions—astray and directly into Roark.

  I lean back in the chair, my computer set to Word and ready to receive my genius, but I can’t look at it now or Roark either. He’s too immediate, too visceral, too in tune with me in such a short amount of time. I can sense him reenter the room more than see it, and it’d be disconcerting if it weren’t so damn intriguing. I turn my gaze to the street, to the traffic flow and the pedestrians, to the light changing from green to yellow then red, to the bus stopping and continuing on, to the parting clouds that shift the sky’s hue from gray to bright blue. But still I feel him behind me, moving, breathing, and I know if I don’t get a grip in the next ten seconds, I may as well go home.

  But I can’t help it, he’s here, his voice rumbling in the background. I can hear his smooth sales patter to the customers like the low rumble of wave to shore, soothing yet equally enticing, recalling my fantasy Roark of the night before. I can still feel his hands on my thighs, his hot breath against me and I wonder, stealing a look at him as he mixes a chai, how his soft mouth would feel against mine. Suddenly he catches my eye and he winks. A burn of embarrassment washes through me and instantly I shift back to my laptop. Obviously, a diversion’s in order.

  Breakfast, ah yes, back to that. I take a cleansing sip of coffee then pick up my croissant, splitting the still-warm, flaky crescent. From the center a rich, chocolaty ooze ekes out and I catch it with my tongue before it drips to my fingers, lowering half of the pastry to my mouth. I take a bite and immediately it reminds me of Roark, dark and deeply sensuous. When I chew, the clash of butter and semi-sweet sends tiny tremors down my spine. I close my eyes. Sigh.

  “Good, huh?” says a poofy blonde at a table catercorner.

  “Mmmmm….” is about all I can muster, lids fluttering.

  The woman’s companion smiles wickedly, his leonine body straining beneath his shirt as he slides me a look deep enough to devour me. He glances to the woman. “Babe, do I have to get you one of those, to get me one of these.” He closes his eyes, flutters his lids, sighs.

  She leans in, her ample breasts nearly tumbling out of their silky hammocks. “What I need you already have right here,” she says, slipping a bare foot from her shoe to press it into his leather-trousered crotch.

  He smiles even wider. And growls. At me.

  Whoa. So here I am, enjoying—reveling in—this glorious paean to chocolate and puff pastry, and all at once that assaults me? Well, perhaps that’s too strong a word, assault, but that’s how it feels right now.

  Especially since they’re oblivious to everyone, or maybe they plain don’t care. He’s feeding her bits of bagel through her lipsticked mouth as she grinds away at his bulging package. I can see she looks not only at the downslide of her hottiness but with a window that’s quickly lowering, and he’s the greedy little siphon that’ll suck away the last of those years. And then it hits me. Was that me with Josh? Did I really look that pathetic?

  I know I did. He’s fifteen years younger, for Christ’s sake, and from what I know now, infantile in actuality. So what if the hot new thing is for a Woman of a Certain Age to arm-candy a Hot Young Thing? Not for me to say if it makes them happy. But thinking of it now, after he rolled off me and we lay in the dark, how much did we really have to talk about before we drifted off to sleep?

  Certainly not IRAs or stock dividends. Or mortgages, royalties, the New York Times list, Publisher’s Lunch, Capitol Hill, Maureen Dowd’s, my opinions on world hunger or anything that didn’t involve movies, the latest cocktails, University of Penn, Wii or snorkeling.

  And oh yeah, we certainly never discussed my views on fucking another person in your girlfriend’s bed.

  Damn, I can’t think about that now. I especially can’t think about that here, snug in my temporary sanctuary. And that’s how it feels too. I steal another look at the counter but Roark’s not there, his minions bustling about. Perhaps he’s noticed what a distraction he is to me, and I wonder if I am to him too. I smile to myself. Well, well, so what if I am? He’s certainly been more than kind, and I have to wonder why. Still, I can’t help but think that’s more than a little self-centered. So I diss the thought and place my succulent little pastry to the side. I look back to the screen and prepare to rewrite what I already did twenty times before.

  “Shields?” The pistol slipped from Jack’s hand. “Shields!” He dropped to his knees, crushing her body to his. “Oh God — If you die on me—”

  “Tanaka…?” she said, breath blissfully warm against his neck.

  “Christ! She okay?” Lewis, there in an instant, and Jess, always Jess.

  “Yes,” Jack said, loosening his hold as she stirred. He looked to Mauthern, his face flat on the concrete, arms twisted behind his back, yet still he could sneer. Jack felt his insides rip apart. “Get that fucker out of here before I—”

  “Easy,” said Lewis, his hand on Jack’s shoulder. “He’s going.” He fell to his haunches, intent on Dana, still draped in Jack’s arms. “How’re you doing, Shields?”

  She smiled. “Aces, Lewis. Can’t you tell?”

  “You need the hospital?”

  She stared at him like he was crazy, pushing herself away from Jack to lean against that ridiculous round bed. “You really think I look like a need a hospital?”

  “You need something, Shields, but it sure ain’t balls.”

  When Dana laughed, relief spilled through Jack like a shot of cold gin.

  “That’s what I wanted to hear.” Lewis rose, looking to Jess. “Let’s clean this place up. Get that scum out of here.” Then to Jack. “You okay, Tanaka?”

  It was all he could do to nod. Lewis took it as his cue. “Seal this, then see me back at the station.”

  “Right, Chief.” They left, leaving them alone, and it was then the fear really gripped him.

  “So.” He leaned back, straightened. “You wore the armor after all.”

  “Need proof?” Dana answered, holding his hand to her heart.

  Jack wanted to laugh. Scream. Shake her senseless. Drag her out of the room. But that wasn’t him. So he stretched for normalcy, feelin
g his way back into what she knew best. “You know the rules, precious. Habeas corpus.”

  “Show the body? Mmmm…” she murmured. “You first.”

  He pulled his hand back. Because this time he couldn’t play, this time he wasn’t laughing. All traces of his cockiness were extinguished the second she hit the floor.

  Because this time was one time too many.

  “Tanaka…?” Dana said. “Can you hear me?”

  God, even now, she was beautiful. Not that it wasn’t always there. Dana wore her beauty like an Atlantic sunrise: obviously, consistently, a given. And like so many other things he was feeling for her at that moment, the bare fact of it was

  Was…? Was…? I sit back. I look to the counter, catching Roark at the register, his luscious hair gleaming in the sunlight, his lips pursed in thought, his height a glorious intimidation. Is that how confidently Roark wears his beauty too? Had Josh with his perfect ass, had that leonine man in the now empty table across? And because of that self-consciousness of physical beauty, does it give all these so-called gifted individuals license to toy with our emotions? We, the lesser mortals?

  It wouldn’t be hard. Proof enough is my history of it happening. My own foot’s guilty of grinding that proverbial crotch. Not that I’d succumb so easily now, but good golly, it’s not as though I haven’t been tempted. Or can’t imagine the scenario.

  Like, it’s late afternoon and the streets are filling with early rush hour traffic, but I’m at my table still writing, or at least making the attempt, the last one left in the place. Roark comes out of the back room, his large body backlit, flicking off lights as he makes his way to the front, leaving me illuminated only by a streetlamp. He walks past me, crossing to the front door. He locks it then walks back toward me. When he stops a few feet away, I feel a shiver course through me.

  “Got something for you,” he says.

  His face is awash in shadows, which only makes his body more defined, his muscles hardened, their ridges accentuated, his angles sharper. My pulse quickens.

  “What is it?” I ask.

  He pushes his coat back, slipping a hand into his pocket. “You’ll have to come here to find out.” Without question I rise and he takes my hand, pulling me to him. I’m inches from his chest and he looks down, his breath warm on my cheek as he leans in and whispers, “I hear I have something you like.”

  Something? How about everything? My mouth goes dry. “Such as…?”

  He slides a warm hand behind me and tilts me back, my neck arching as his fingers torturously undo the snaps of my shirt. When he reaches the last, he pulls the tail from my skirt and, spreading the fabric wide, unhooks the front of my bra. It pops open and my breasts spring free. I groan as he scoops one into his hand, weighing its heaviness, his circling thumb hardening my nipple. Then, out of nowhere, something hot and silky and sweetly familiar splashes onto my breast, chocolaty rivulets cascading down to swirl around the areola and over the curve of my skin. He dips his head just as semi-sweet dribbles off the tip of my nipple to plop onto his waiting tongue. He takes a lick.

  “Ohhh…” I moan and he flicks at me, the chocolate swirling around my breast as he sucks, nips. I’m finding it a little hard to breathe as he presses me back to the table, sliding my skirt, my tights, my panties from me. As I lay there naked and trembling, in full view of the evening commute, more chocolaty torture rains down my belly, pausing to puddle in my navel before continuing on to my already-throbbing clit. He pushes his coat back and proceeds straight to cleanup, swirling and licking his way down my skin, sending an erotic message straight to the pleasure center of my brain— Get ready to rumble, girl, ’cause here it—

  “Pam?”

  I look up, and there’s Roark standing over me—really. A quick glance at the time tells me I’ve wasted the entire morning and a good part of the afternoon, because it’s now quarter to three and he’s getting ready to close.

  “Get a lot done today?” he asks.

  Which is a nice way of saying, it’s time to get out, sweetheart. Not that he’d really say that. Especially since he’s been so wonderful. For all of my fantasizing, he hasn’t as much as cast me a glance all day, keeping his distance and sending his workers to discreetly refill my coffee as well as slide me a portobello and red pepper panini for lunch. And how do I repay his patronage? I take a look at my screen.

  And like so many other things he was feeling for her at that moment, the bare fact of it was

  The last of which I typed at least two hours ago. Seems my inspiration’s only going backwards.

  I close my laptop, revealing a smudge of semi-sweet from the croissant. I lick my thumb and whisk it off. “It’s been inspiring, Roark, if nothing else.”

  “Good,” he says, taking a seat, “because now you can answer my question.”

  “Which is…?” I’m totally mystified.

  He folds his arms. “You going to tell me what’s really wrong?”

  Chapter Five

  What’s really wrong? Well, I’ll tell you…

  I look to the creamer and condiment bar. There’s a distinguished-looking man about fifty years old, five-foot-ten, medium built, lawyer type, snapping a sippy lid atop his coffee. Next to him is a very attractive woman half his age, a paralegal maybe, shaking down a sugar packet, a mixed fruit cup next to her purse. They don’t appear to know each other, but maybe that’s only what they want us to think.

  Because maybe he’s just getting off of getting her off.

  Maybe it happened about half an hour ago at the office, just before they left for court, the remains of their hastily eaten lunch still on his desk. He was slipping a brief inside his portfolio as she was slipping her hand inside his briefs.

  “Too bad we’re already late,” she cooed, her fingers tightening around his dick.

  “Keep that up and you’re gonna get it,” he warned her, his cock swelling in her hand.

  Her thumb circled its slickening tip. “So late we couldn’t even finish our lunch. So late we won’t even have time to grab coffee. So late I really don’t even have time to grab you,” she said, her hand retreating. “Too bad we have to go.”

  “Oh, but you’re wrong,” he said, swiveling around to face her. “We don’t have to go…” He pushed aside what was left of their meal and hoisted her atop the desk. “Darling, we have to come.” He spread her legs and, stepping between them, leaned her back, sliding his hand up her skirt. “And not realizing that, my girl, was your first mistake,” he said, ripping her panties off.

  “Oh!” she squeaked, her knees instinctively clamping together.

  “Now there’s another one,” he said, easing her stockinged legs apart. He set his hand to her thighs, trailing his fingers to her garters, his palms resting atop the ruby elastic stretch of her garter belt. He twisted his hands until his thumbs reached that happy little juncture where he toyed with the periphery, his index and middle finger just skimming her clit as her bare bottom writhed against the polished wood.

  She blinked at him. “Please kiss me,” she whispered.

  “No,” he said heartlessly.

  “You’re hateful.”

  “Yes, I am,” he agreed, his fingers deftly pinching and flicking, the bulb of her pleasure crimson and swelling rock-hard. She writhed, moaning as he slid a finger inside and pumped with furious abandon, her bottom lifting up as she rose to her release, when all at once he stopped. “And now you’re going to hate me even more.”

  “Hey…” she said, dazed, “what are you doing?”

  “Get up,” he ordered, sliding her to her feet. “And please take off that skirt.” Lust-drunk and swaying, she complied, shimmying it to the floor. “Now turn around and bend over the desk.”

  She did, presenting him the twin mounds of her arching backside, her stiletto heels digging into the carpet.

  He pulled up a chair behind her and sat down, his mouth level with her painfully throbbing clit. He slid one hand across the creamy globes of her bottom as the
other reached to his desk.

  “What are we doing?” she whispered breathlessly.

  “I don’t know about you, but I’m finishing my lunch,” he said and, tipping her bottom ever so slightly, slipped a slice of casaba melon into her slit.

  “Oh m-my…” she said, shuddering when he dipped his head and, nipping her clit, sucked the melon right from her.

  “Ohhhh…” she moaned, shivering.

  Pineapple. Grapes. Honeydew. A raspberry. His mouth licked and sucked and feasted upon her, each fruit a new form of torture. Finally, after interminable minutes of this, as her backside trembled in his hands, as her knees looked ready to buckle, he calmly stood and, letting loose his massive cock, announced, “Brace yourself, darling—I do believe we’re ready for the meat course.”

  “Pam,” Roark says softly, breaking my reverie. “Do you need help with something?”

  I look at him. Oh, you’ll never know. But then again, maybe he would. Yet with the way he looks at me, his eyes rife with concern, I can’t help feeling a little less than honorable. What could I possibly tell him? That I’m using him to fuel my sexual fantasies? That here in his own café I’ve sparked scenarios of titillated and titillating strangers, but I’m blanking on a sex scene for my alter egos because of a hit too close to the bone? And now, with his kindness and sympathy, he’s hitting me in the same tender spot but in a wholly different way?

  “I’m okay, Roark, really,” I finally say, though not very convincingly by the look on his face.

  He sighs. “Look, I know we don’t know each other very well, but if there’s anything I can do…”

  Suddenly lust falls by the wayside as it strikes me how much I would like to know him better. But where should I start? Perhaps with something small. “Can you answer a question for me?”

  He brightens. “Sure.”

  I stand, slide the strap to my shoulder, buy some time. “Roark is such an unusual name, especially tacked on to something as Italian as Carmelli. Your parents—”