“The same blood runs in my veins.” His eyes were shadowed, dark.
“I know. But it’s just blood, Rusty. It doesn’t mean anything.”
The amusement had completely disappeared from his face, though, and she could feel the way he’d withdrawn from her. Suddenly she wished she hadn’t said anything. Had she spoiled the evening? Was he going to say he had to go now?
Chapter Eight
His gaze fell to her lips and then to her breasts. To her relief, by the time he looked back up at her, he was smiling. “Enough about me. I’m much more interested in discovering how you’ve made it to twenty-two without doing any of your seven sexy sins.”
She clutched the pillow to her, letting the intensity of the moment go, glad he’d decided to move on. “I don’t know. Just never got around to it. I didn’t go out with the two guys I’ve been with for long.”
“You were at university for three years. You must have had other offers. And there was no Dan around to watch over you. I would have thought you’d have gone crazy with all that freedom.”
She shrugged. “Mum wasn’t quite the ‘wait till you’re married’ sort, but she did impress upon me when I was younger that I shouldn’t sleep around. Besides which, I went to uni not long after the accident. I wasn’t ready to share myself with lots of different people. I kept myself to myself and concentrated on my studies. I didn’t want to open my heart. I was quite keen to protect it.”
“Have you ever been in love?”
She thought about it. “No, I don’t think so. I’ve thought I was, several times. But I don’t think it was the real thing. Not like you see in movies, or hear about in songs. The kind of love that means you can’t concentrate on anything, that makes you ache when you’re not with someone. I’ve never had that.” She stopped, thinking about the way she’d felt all week, waiting to see him again. But that wasn’t the same. That was just about looking forward to investigating the next sin, to increasing her sexual experience. Not the same thing at all.
He reached out and started to pull the pillow away from her. She clung onto it for a moment before letting him slide it out of her fingers. He threw it on the floor, took her hand and linked their fingers again. “Well, I, for one, have no idea how you’ve managed to stay relatively innocent for so long.” He pulled her toward him, wrapped his arms around her and rolled so he was leaning over her. He nuzzled her neck, kissing her ear. “You’re obviously a sex kitten deep down.”
“I’ve never thought of myself that way.”
“It’s been obvious to me for a long time.” He lifted his head, running his fingers lightly up her thigh. His green eyes were warm, intense. “Are you ready for your second sexy sin, Ms. Hillman?”
A frisson of excitement and nervousness ran between her shoulder blades, and her mouth went dry. “Um…”
He kissed her, nibbled her bottom lip and ran his tongue across it. “What’s the matter, Faith?” He rubbed his nose against hers.
“I’m nervous.”
“About what? It’s only me.”
“Don’t you see? That’s the problem.”
He brushed a strand of hair away from her face. The amusement faded from his eyes, to be replaced by gentleness. “Sweetheart, I’m so pleased I’m going to be the first to do this for you. I love you, I’m incredibly fond of you and that’s what makes this so special.”
Faith looked into his eyes. She knew he meant he loved her as a friend. But her heart did a little tap dance all the same.
He trailed his hand down from her face and then drew spirals around her breasts, brushing the nipples occasionally, making her catch her breath. He traced light lines across the flat of her stomach before moving into the triangular thatch of curls beneath.
She sighed, and he kissed her while he slid his fingers even lower, into the already hot, wet part of her. They slipped deep inside her to collect the slick moisture, and then returned to begin arousing her even more.
She opened her legs wider, welcoming his touch, and his mouth left hers to kiss her cheeks, her eyelids, her neck, around to her ear.
“You’re so sexy.” He ran his tongue around her ear, making her shiver. “You drive me crazy, do you know that?” His deep voice seemed to ring throughout her, at the right pitch to set her whole body vibrating like a bell. “With your hot little ass and your tight, firm breasts and this incredible mouth…” He kissed it again. “I sat there and watched you talking to Dan and Toby and Eve on Wednesday and all I could think about was picking you up and carrying you off somewhere so I could do bad things to you.”
“Oh,” she said faintly.
His lips hovered a millimetre above hers, teasing, just out of reach. His fingers were firm, stroking her insistently. “I want to bury my mouth in you. I want to taste you, Faith. Are you going to let me taste you?”
“Yes.” Her nervousness had vanished, to be replaced by a hungry desire for this sexy, provocative man.
He reached behind him and threw all but one pillow onto the floor, lay on his back and placed the last pillow under his head lengthways. The room was subsiding into twilight, and somebody had lit a barbecue on the beach somewhere—the subtle smoky smell complementing the sweet scent of the jasmine that was rising again. Music also filtered through with the aromas, either from one of the other motel rooms or from the beach, slow ballads and lazy acoustic guitar, Jack Johnson, maybe, or John Mayer, the notes spiralling with her thoughts.
His eyes were dark, intense. He was no longer the friend she’d known for millennia, replaced instead by the lover she was beginning to adore. She moved up the bed, manoeuvring herself astride the pillow, and his hands guided her down onto his mouth.
Faith leaned her arms on the headboard of the bed, her heart thumping. She closed her eyes as he kissed the soft, sensitive skin of her inner thigh. He brushed his lips against her hair, sending a tingle through her. Then he swept his tongue right through the hot centre of her.
“Fuck!” She inhaled sharply, tensing at the unfamiliar feeling. He gave a short, brief laugh, and his hand stroked the outside of her thigh in response, but he didn’t stop. Forcing herself to relax, she gave herself over to him as he began to arouse her slowly with his lips, teeth and tongue.
She rested her forehead on her arms. The sensations he was creating were incredible. He caressed her thighs and hips and brought a hand underneath to stroke her, parting her lips with his fingers to access the heart of her sensitivity. He slipped his fingers inside her, deep inside, his thumb joining his lips and tongue in teasing the responsive spot at the top so that she groaned and widened her hips, begging him to take her further.
So he did, slowly, making it last as long as he could. He drew out her pleasure until in the end he was barely touching her, each little brush of his tongue, graze of his teeth or sucking of his lips making her teeter on the edge of the chasm, until eventually she pleaded for him to let her fall. And so he covered her sweet spot with his warm tongue, slid his fingers back inside her, and held her tightly across the thighs with his other arm as her orgasm exploded within her like fireworks.
Rusty let her lift herself off him and collapse onto the bed. He looked across at the sliding doors to see the twilight settling, and watched a moth hover around the lamp outside, although it didn’t come in. There were no lights on, but the full moon that hung low in the sky like a Christmas bauble lit the room, and as he turned his head to look at Faith, he saw her skin glowing, luminescent like an oyster shell. She looked as if she were made of marble, each muscle delineated by light and shadow, like a Greek statue of a gracefully reclining woman, sculpted with a careful hand.
She took his breath away, and for the first time since they’d slept together, Rusty forgot she was his friend, forgot she was Dan’s sister. She was beautiful and exotic, and he felt an unfamiliar rush of his blood, a thump of his heart. Not just desire, although there was that as well. But a kind of awe, of wonderment and admiration.
“Don’t move,” he said
as she stirred, lifting her arm from her face. She stopped, arms above her head, and he lifted himself onto his elbow to look down at her, shivering at the way her pupils were so large her eyes seemed entirely black. He let his gaze skim over her, noting her sudden intake of breath, her unnatural stillness. He followed with his hand, tracing light fingers along the swells and valleys of her womanly figure, across the hills of her breasts, into the dip of her navel, the small hollows beneath her hipbones.
He moved his fingers where his mouth had been, just a light brush, revelling in the way she was so wet and swollen, rich and velvet, before continuing up her body once again. Her eyes glittered in the darkness, reflecting the moonlight, and he shuddered as he lowered his lips to hers. He knew she wasn’t religious, but he’d also seen the books on the shelf in her flat on pagan rituals and goddess celebrations, the strength and compassion of womankind. He felt an intense awareness of the difference of her sex, sensing the power of fertility and creation lying dormant within her, and the cycle of the moon reflected in her body.
What was wrong with him? Had she cast a spell on him? His lips hovered above hers, caught in a brief second of time. Her arms were above her head, her hair wild and mussed, and she was breathing heavily, even though her body should be calming down by now. He brushed her lips with his own and watched her breathe in, knowing she would be able to smell her own arousal on him, feeling himself harden at the thought. She opened her mouth, and he dipped his tongue in and kissed her deeply. His hand cradled her head, his other arm tucking underneath her to bring her closer to him. For maybe the first time, he let the full force of his passion, his desire for her, show in the kiss, and when he finally released her, she was gasping, her chest heaving, her mouth bruised and red.
He felt a fleeting surge of guilt. He had to remember this was Faith in his bed, Dan’s sister, the young girl he’d fancied for so long but, in spite of her two partners, was still innocent, still fresh. He had to remember to treat her tenderly, to respect her. To let her lead the way.
She didn’t say anything. She pushed herself up and climbed off the bed, then reached out a hand to bring him to sit facing her. Keeping her dark eyes fixed on his, she sank between his legs onto her knees. He was so turned on he couldn’t have got any harder. Breathing heavily, leaning back on his hands, he watched as she studied his erection with interest. He swallowed as she closed a hand around him and gently revealed the swollen tip, casting him one final, hot glance before lowering her mouth onto him.
He tipped back his head and held his breath as she began to move her head up and down. Her mouth was warm and wet, her tongue tantalisingly rough on his sensitive skin. He looked down, watching her release her hair from its clip so it fell around her face, then sweep it to one side so it brushed against his thigh, silky soft.
He groaned aloud, gasping as she began to take him deeper and deeper inside her mouth. He moved his hand to rest against her head and slid his fingers through her hair, unable to stop moving his hips forward with each dip of her mouth. But she didn’t seem to mind and gave a deep sigh low in her throat, lifting herself up slightly so she almost swallowed him whole.
It didn’t take long, only minutes, before he’d reached the end of his self-control. “Faith…” His hand tightened in her hair, and heat flooded through him, focussing in his groin. She hadn’t lifted her head, and he hoped she was ready, because he couldn’t hold back. He came in her hot mouth, totally unprepared for the way she took everything he had to give. As he cried out, she stroked his thigh as he had hers, and only lifted her head when he finally collapsed back on the bed, eyes closed, completely spent.
He felt her lift herself up onto the bed to sit astride him. He opened one eye and saw her studying him with a flicker of a smile.
He opened the other eye and blinked, staring as she lowered her head a little more so he could see her expression in the moonlight. “Now,” she told him huskily, “whenever we’re in public, sitting with Dan and Eve and Toby, and I do this—” she licked her lips, “—you won’t see me as Dan’s little sister, or the skinny girl with braces you used to torture with crickets and cockroaches. You’ll think of my lips around you, and me taking you deep inside my mouth, swallowing as you come. Okay?”
He nodded, wide eyed, not trusting himself to speak.
She looked into space, considering. “Tastes salty,” she said. “Nice.” She licked her lips again. “Want a bit of chocolate?”
Chapter Nine
On Tuesday, Faith turned up at Rusty’s high school, carrying two trim lattes in takeaway cardboard cups. She knew he had a free period just before lunch, and she hoped to catch him in his classroom.
She hadn’t spoken to him since Sunday morning. After their intense exploration of oral sex on the Saturday evening, he’d curled up around her and they’d watched the moths play outside around the lamp and the moon rise slowly in the night sky, yellow and heavy, like a bowl of cream. He hadn’t said much. She’d tried to lighten his mood, but he’d been unresponsive and monosyllabic, and eventually she’d let him pull her tightly to him, content to drift off to sleep in his arms.
The following morning he’d been pleasant and affectionate, kissing her deeply before he left, but still quiet, and she’d puzzled about his frame of mind for the next couple of days. He’d never been a particularly moody man, and she was unsure what had made him so reserved. To be honest, she was worried she’d shocked him. She knew he found it difficult to think of her as anything other than Dan’s little sister, whatever he said to the contrary. Was it possible he really had been helping her out of a kind of twisted, familial desire to look after her? Perhaps her dirty talk had made him realise she thought about sex with him in a different way from, for example, him giving her driving lessons or teaching her how to play the guitar. If he thought of himself as an alternative big brother, she could only imagine how much she’d freaked him out. Surely, that couldn’t be the case, though? It would be pretty warped if it were.
After two days of worrying about it, she’d decided to confront him, and that was why she was bringing coffee to his classroom. She’d been to the school before, and she’d popped into the reception to pick up her visitor’s sticker before circling the edge of the main buildings. His room was right at the end of a new block, the classrooms still smelling of fresh paint and carpet glue, which Rusty worried would make the kids high as kites if they spent too long with the windows shut. The new rooms had air conditioning and data projectors fixed into the ceilings, and she knew he loved the muted blue carpets and light blue walls, and the way he could see through the glass partition to make faces at his colleague in the next classroom when the students had their backs turned.
She ran lightly up the steps and along the pathway, opened the door to his room and walked in. She stopped abruptly. Crap. He was in there, but so were half a dozen students. “Oh I’m sorry, I thought you were on a free.”
“I am.” He was sitting back in his swivel chair, his feet on his desk, amused at her horrified face. “These nuisances won’t leave me alone.”
The six girls looked over at her, interested in seeing Mr. Thorne’s guest. They weren’t wearing uniform, which put them in year thirteen. “Hello,” said one cheekily, and the others giggled.
“Hi.” Faith backed toward the door. “I’ll come back later.”
“No, come in.” He beckoned her forward and sat up. “Actually you’re the perfect person. Andrea here was just talking about taking journalism at uni.” He indicated the girl nearest to him, a pretty, earnest-looking blonde, and then pointed at Faith. “Miss Hillman’s a journalist.”
“Oh?” Andrea’s eyes widened.
Faith hesitated before walking into the room. She twisted one of the cups out of the cardboard carry tray and handed it to him. He met her eyes briefly, smiling. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” She took out her own cup and perched on the edge of his desk, facing the girls. “So you fancy it as a profession?”
&nb
sp; Andrea shrugged, tucking her hair behind her ears. “Maybe. I write for the school magazine, and Miss Chapman lets me help out with the press releases. And I’ve had a couple of pieces in the local paper.”
Faith nodded, impressed. “That’s a great start, at your age. Are you good at English?”
“It’s my best subject.”
“And history?”
Andrea grinned at Rusty. “Well, obviously.”
Faith smiled. “History is a great subject to study if you want to be a journalist. The essay skills, the analysis of social events and primary sources, the politics, the general background… They’re all invaluable for anyone who wants to work in the field.”
“I keep telling them,” said Rusty. “I don’t think they take me seriously.”
“‘You have to know the past to understand the present.’”
“Dr. Carl Sagan had a point. Listen to Miss Hillman, girls. She knows what she’s talking about.”
One of the girls was frowning at her. She turned and whispered to her friend, who looked over at her, wide-eyed. Faith felt a sudden surge of concern.
“Oh my God,” said the first girl. “You’re Faith Hillman. The one with the website.”
“Ah…” Faith stared at her, panic rising. “What are you doing reading that? It’s R16.”
“I’m seventeen,” said the girl. Her friend elbowed her and whispered something else. They both looked across at Rusty, and giggled.
“No, no, no,” said Faith hurriedly.
“Are you Beau?” one of them asked him, looking thrilled, ignoring her.
“No,” Faith said, more sharply, her cheeks flushing at the thought that these teenagers knew she’d had oral sex over the weekend, and had a pretty good idea with whom. “He’s not. Rusty and I are just friends.”
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