Burke had even heard stories of couples- white couples!- being dragged from their cars and flogged in Jackson. They’d beaten an old alcoholic man to death in Georgia. They strung up a Catholic teacher in Arkansas. And Burke watched the seeds of this poison spread to Rickshaw. A town whose black population was already preparing to take flight to those northern cities- Detroit, Chicago, Syracuse, Cleveland. The white men and women were all too happy to give them some more incentive.
As Francis and his goons left to continue their patrol, Burke looked around for Janie again. He called her name softly.
She slid out of the shadows quiet as an owl. Janie could make anything look good, he’d discovered. She once told him that growing up she’d been teased for being so tall and leggy. Well, as a woman it definitely worked in her favor. Burke liked a woman that could look him in the eye- and Janie’s height only added to her beauty.
“I’m here,” she said.
“You alright? Did they see you?”
“Naw- I got out before they did.”
The dress was wet, clinging to her body. She hadn’t dried off; she’d probably pulled the damn thing on and bolted from the spring.
“Come inside, woman.”
She pulled off the wet dress and dried off with the towel. Burk handed her one of his shirts.
“What did they want? I couldn’t hear all of it.”
“Dunno,” said Burke. “I think just the usual. They want to make threats. Make sure I’m not gonna disrupt their plans.”
“Oh.”
He eyed her. “They know about you. Or, they suspect, anyway.”
Janie looked at him nervously. She remembered the man who had seen her leaving the spring. “No one’s seen me comin’ or goin’, Burke. I make sure of that. And we haven’t even been ‘round each other in public much.”
“I know,” he sighed. He had an urge to pull her into his arms, so he did. She nestled the top of her head in the groove of his neck. Janie smelled faintly like the spring, but her hair had a scent of its own, too. Sweet and heavy.
“Listen, Janie,” he said. “If you wanna back out of this-?”
She breathed deeply. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t want to see you hurt.”
“Don’t,” she said fiercely. “Don’t even say it. Don’t speak it into bein’.”
“As long as you’re sure,” he said softly.
She sat down on his bed, the dress riding tantalizingly high on her hips. He did the same and pulled her over his lap so she straddled him.
“I’m sure, Burke. We ain’t hurtin’ nobody. And anyway, I don’t plan to stay long in Rickshaw.”
“What d’you mean? I thought you liked teachin’.” He circled his hands lower, cupping her generous backside through the dress.
“Oh, I don’t mind it. I went to school for it, after all. But you know...I ain’t got much time to set around in the backwoods. I got a dream, Burke. Right now I’m just gettin’ my money right. I took this job ‘cause it was the only one I could get where the livin’ was cheap and easy. This ain’t no permanent thing.”
He drew back from her a little. The thought of Janie leaving Rickshaw, just when he’d found her again, felt like a stab to the gut. But she was right- she had a dream. She had to go after it, and he couldn’t hold her back.
“You shoulda stayed in New Orleans,” he told her. “Money or no. You’da found a way to make it work.”
“I know that...I know that now. Comin’ back here was a mistake.”
“So what are you gonna do about it, Miss Janie?” Burke asked.
She shrugged. “Emmett’s right. The children need me here. But I got myself to think about too. I guess I’m just gonna wait it out and see what comes.”
Burk nodded. “You know what I think?”
“Naw, what?”
“I think I’m gonna take you to New Orleans.”
She scanned his face; was he joking?
“You ain’t serious. What you mean?”
“Look, Janie. I ain’t got much brains or schoolin’, but I got a little money. I make it out off yearly rents. Me and Francis are kin; our grandpa owned about thirty acres of land ‘round the county. Our fathers both got a portion, and the land came to us when they died. I sold some of it to buy this piece in the Blue Woods. The rest I rent out to white farmers.”
“I don’t follow,” said Janie. “What’s that gotta do with you, me, and New Orleans?”
“I mean,” said Burke, squeezing her bottom, “I got enough cash to set us up good in New Orleans for a spell. It’s still Summer, right? You got some time b’fore you gotta teach. Why don’t we head on over there and see what you and your singin’ can do?”
Her mouth hung open. “Burke…”
“You gonna ask me if I’m serious. Well, I’m tellin’ you yes. Serious as the dead.”
“I can’t just leave…”
“Why not? You got some attachment to this old town?”
“The children…”
“If Emmett can hire you, he can hire someone else.”
Janie saw that he was serious, behind the cocky smile. She felt his heart beating hard against her breast; despite his bravado, he feared that she’d say no. She thought about it quickly. Burke was right; she had a while before school started. But New Orleans...well. Things might be looser there, where the rules governing white men and negro women were concerned, but that didn’t mean they could shack up in a hotel for a whole month without drawing attention. And what were they gonna do, anyway? Was she going to stand outside clubs, like she’d done in college, singing for her supper?
She voiced as much to Burke, who shook his head. “You don’t understand, Janie. My mama was from New Orleans, too. She’s got family there- I know people, is what I’m sayin’. Maybe we can swing somethin’.”
Janie doubted that a posh New Orleans family would welcome some Mississippi country boy into their midst with open arms. No matter how handsome Burke was. She doubted even more that they’d receive him when he came bearing a young black girl on his arm.
Janie’s resolve hardened at the thought. She could stand to take Burke’s charity, but no one else’s. “We don’t need your family, Burke. We can make it just fine.”
“So you’re sayin’ yes?”
“I- I guess so,” Janie laughed. “Though I think I’m crazy for it.”
Burke bent his head and kissed her. His mouth was warm, melting against hers. She felt her muscles, so relaxed from her bath in the springs, turn to putty in his arms. Her tongue fluttered against his; he sucked on it, breaking the kiss to touch his lips to the slim plane of her throat. Janie sighed as he lifted her, carrying her through to the wide four-poster bed. She already felt desire budding inside her. She wanted him tonight. She wanted the feeling of his weight on her, of his hands, his lips, his tongue…
He surprised her by lifting the hem of the shirt and moving down the bed to plant kisses on her thigh. When his tongue lapped at her inner moistness, she gasped. He kissed the button of her clitoris, spreading apart her pussy lips to see the gorgeous pink of her inner folds. Janie arched her back under him. His tongue pushed inside her; with rhythmic strokes he began fucking her with it. One hand played with her most sensitive spot, sending pleasure shooting through every nerve and vein in her body. She cried his name; he didn’t stop. He couldn’t.
Then he was over her, his shoulders blocking out the dim light from the oil lantern. He pulled her on top of him.
Chapter 4
My Fears and Desires
Janie yielded her body to Burke. In the low light the contrast of their skin showed sharply; hers a deep chocolate brown, his a golden tan. His gray eyes shone like lanterns as he swept a palm over her body, touching her smooth skin everywhere. She felt limp and heavy. He kissed her. His lips felt soft, melting against hers, tracing a path down to her throat and breast.
Burke caught a brown nipple in his mouth and suckled. Janie’s breasts were full and glossy, riding high on her chest. He
liked a big-breasted woman. She arched her back under him. Her nipples changed their shape, pushing out and swelling against his tongue. His teeth worried at them until she cried out; he brought his lips over hers again, tasting her, silencing her whimpers. Burke took a hand and cupped the fork of her legs. Janie was slick and ready. His fingers slid into her easily, feeling for the barrier of her virginity.
At the same time her hand came to his legs, cupping the length of him. He was struck with a wicked idea.
“Janie,” he said. “Can you do for me- what I did for you? With your mouth?”
Those luxuriant brown eyes blinked up at him, wide and unassuming. “You mean…”
“Yes. I’ll show you.”
She sat up and he peeled off his trousers. His manhood sprung out, hard and thick between them. She touched it gently first, then wound her fingers around it. Burke shuddered. Her lips came down over him, then her mouth, hot, hot, and drenching. He nearly cried out when she took him past her tongue all the way to the back of her throat.
“Janie!” he moaned. Where on earth had she learned that?! But it felt too good; and she kept going anyway, bringing him to the edge of everything. He thought his heart might burst. His hands fisted in her fluffy dark hair, driving his cock deep into her mouth. Her tongue laved at the base of it.
“Your hands,” he choked. “Try- it with your hands.”
Janie obeyed him, wrapping her hands around it to stroke with fingers and tongue. The feeling built inside Burke like an earthquake, shaking the foundations of his self-control. God damn it, the woman was a natural.
He erupted in the sweet heat of her mouth, coating the back of her throat with his seed. Janie gagged, but swallowed every drop of it, releasing his throbbing hardness with a gasp and a sharp intake of breath.
Some of his semen was still on her soft lips; he wiped it away with a finger and fed her the rest.
Janie looked up at Burke, hardly believing she had just done such an act with a man. Arousal surged in her groin. Her eyes met Burke’s.
He pushed her gently on her back then rolled her over. The twin globes of her ass jutted out from the flute of her waist in perfect proportion. Almost instinctively Burke brought the palm of his hand down over it, the other hand holding her to the bed. Janie shrieked and jumped but didn’t move away. The inner muscles of her thighs trembled. Burke slapped her buttocks again, then again, moving up to bite the soft skin of her throat gently. He alternated the harsh spanks with insistent, soft bites at her throat, her ears, laying claim on her with pleasure and pain until her body went soft and flexible under him. The more he did so the wetter she became.
Janie sobbed with pleasure as his hands stopped their assault on her posterior to plump the inner depths of her pussy. Her wetness was the color and texture of smooth cream on Burke’s fingers. He imagine what it would be like to slide his cock in there, take her from behind, feel her hot creaminess on the length of his cock and bring her pleasure that way…
As if reading his mind, Janie cried out for him to take her. “Please, Burke,” she said into the softness of his bed. He laid his whole length over her, his cock nestled in the crevice of her ass-cheeks, a thrust away from claiming her virginity.
“You want me to?” he whispered huskily. “Tell me what you want.”
“Do it to me,” she whispered back. “I can’t stand it anymore. I want to feel you- I wanna feel all of you…”
He placed himself at her entrance. He would enter her from behind. He drew the tip of his cock around the entrance of her, gathering some of her creamy wetness to ease his passage. It would be so easy to thrust into her all at once, feel her shriek of pain turn to pleasure in a moment, to watch her bottom jiggle and push back along the length of his cock. But that would come later. With agonizing slowness he began to enter her, feeling the tight walls of her pussy clench along him, guiding him to a conclusion. Janie gasped and shuddered at his largeness. She was tight- impossibly tight. He was not a small man. He filled her halfway, then stopped.
“Go on,” she moaned.
“Don’t rush,” he told her softly. “This might hurt…”
She urged him on; he made one powerful thrust and broke into her, Janie crying out for a moment in pain, then quickly feeling pleasure overwhelm her at the sensation of Burke so completely wedged inside her. Burke started with slow, powerful strokes. Janie responded with a deep, long cry of contentment. He moved inside her and she felt every inch of his cock pummel at a deep, sensitive spot inside her that ushered her to the edge of everything. Burke’s body was large, warm, slick with his perspiration and hers. The sharp, herbal smell of him mingled with their shuddering breaths to create a perfume in the air that filled Janie’s lungs as she cried and laughed her way to orgasm.
Burke’s arousal came to a head and caught him by surprise. He burst within her with a loud groan, feeling the warm slippery semen fill Janie and spill out around the base of his cock. He withdrew from her. She turned over on her back, her eyes soft at the corners and hazy with the knowledge of what had just happened. His gray ones met her brown. They looked at each other- beyond each other.
Burke’s breath caught. Cum was still beading at the tip of his cock, and dripping on the smooth brown plane of Janie’s stomach.
Her long arms came up around him and pulled him to her. He would be aroused again soon, and they would make love in a hundred new ways. They stayed there for a long time, saying not a word.
Janie left sometime early in the morning, her heart glowing, the secret of what had passed between her and Burke vanishing with the rising sun.
***
The knock came on Betty Young’s door, sometime after 8 o’ clock. She peered through the little eye-hole that her beloved Samuel had carved in there, a week before he died. Her eyes met the concerned, leaf-green stare of Emmett Freeman.
“Mister Freeman?” She said, opening the door. The man burst through. Betty didn’t need to ask to discern that something was the matter.
“Betty,” he greeted. “Sorry to disturb.” His accent always jarred her. Betty hadn’t met any northern black folks in all her years. Their clipped voices sounded suspicious to her, though of course Emmett Freeman could hardly be called suspicious.
“What’s the matter?” She said, peeping out the window. It would be dark soon. There was a curfew…
“Have you seen Little Curtis? The brat keeps running from his lessons. Thought he might have come out this way.”
Betty hadn’t. The boy was a rare sight in Rickshaw now, spending most of his time holed up with Emmett getting his education. He had an uncle that lives two doors down from Betty.
“Hmph. I guess he’s gone back to the house. I wish he’d tell me where he keeps running off to.”
“Children do that,” Betty said knowledgeably, with the barest hint of disapproval. “You oughta keep a tighter rein on him, though. Times bein’ what they are.”
Emmett waved a hand, as if dismissing her. “There’s something else, Betty.”
“Well, what is it?”
“It’s your cousin. Janie.”
A thrill of anxiety shot up Betty’s spine. She looked at Emmett sharply. “What you mean?”
“She’s not in the schoolhouse.”
“So? She always goes for walks.”
“No, no. She’s going over to visit that white man. Burke.”
Betty frowned. Loyalty burned in her breast; she opened her mouth to deny any such thing. But then she stopped. There had been rumors...
“You don’t have proof,” she said finally.
“I do. I do. I’ve seen her sneaking out that way.”
“Well, like I said, she goes for walks…”
“I’m not here to argue,” Emmett snapped. Betty’s frown turned to a scowl. She didn’t appreciate this high-yellow man busting in on her house to cause trouble.
“Well, so what if she is?” She said. “It ain’t my business. Janie’s a grown woman.”
Emmett paused
at her tone. His eyes met hers. “Well, I suppose you’re right.”
“Mister Freeman, you wastin’ time comin’ here to tell me my cousin’s business when you could be findin’ that little boy. Look how dark it’s gettin’.”
“You’re right,” he muttered. “I’m just- concerned. With how it will look.”
Betty’s eyes narrowed. The man’s hair was tousled, his clothes unkempt. She sniffed. Women’s perfume- the barest hint of it, clinging to his jacket.
“You better leave, Mister Freeman. Find that little boy.”
Emmett swept out of her house. The night was coming thick and fast. He jammed his hat on his head and strode off down the row of houses. He’d tan that little bastard’s hide!
Race Traitor: BWWM Romance Novel for Adults Page 8