by Gina Watson
***
They reached the cabin around two o’clock. He’d called ahead and the rental company had opened all the windows and the fresh ocean breeze moved through the house disturbing the long billowy white curtains. Secluded on the beach, the cabin was ideal and when the tide crawled up close to the house the rush of water was soothing to the ear.
Seated on the couch, Clay couldn’t wait to set his eyes on Eve in the bikini he’d bought.
Damn, his libido was crushed when she emerged from the bathroom in the same clothes she’d been wearing.
“Didn’t the bikini work out?”
She bit her lip. “I don’t know if I would call it a success, but I’m wearing it.”
Walking toward her he saw the white strap peeking out from beneath her tank top. He tugged at it. “Aren’t you going to show it to me?”
She blushed and lowered her chin, her long lashes creating shadows across her face. “I don’t think so. It doesn’t fit very well, so my jiggly parts are hanging out. It needs to be a few sizes larger, and that makes me feel fat.”
He rubbed the velvet skin of her earlobe. “I’m sorry. Except for Clara, I’ve never bought clothes for a woman before. Let me take you into town and we’ll get you something else.”
Of course, he knew it was too small, but he’d chosen the size on purpose. Yet he’d never expected her to feel bad. Until now she’d been pretty indifferent about her nakedness and God, had she let him see every part of her. He bent low and softly touched his lips to hers. “You are aware that I’ve seen every bare inch of your beauty, right?”
“I know, but clothes are supposed to fit a certain way. If not, they accentuate my ugly wiggly parts.”
“You don’t have any ugly wiggly parts.”
“But I do. A doctor showed them to me, drew marks all over my skin. There are a lot.”
She was serious; she believed she was flawed. But every time he saw her naked he’d thought he was in the presence of something divine, spiritual even, that had come from another world.
“Why were you seeing a doctor? What doctor?”
“He was a plastic surgeon Nicolas sent me to so I could look better in the dresses he bought for me. It was part of the reason I left when I did. I was due to have the surgeries the following week.”
Anger burrowed through his body like a bullet. He stopped breathing and reached for her, folding her into his arms to carry her somewhere, anywhere, to reassure her it would have been the eighth deadly sin to change her in any way. He strode to the couch with her in his arms and folded himself into the plush leather. Pulling her upper body to rest at his chest, he whispered into her ear. “You do understand that was all about power and control? It had nothing to do with your body or your looks.”
“But the surgeon found so many flaws with a black marker.”
He pulled her into his chest to stop her lips from moving.
“It’s bullshit, baby. Why would you believe anything that came from that sack of shit and his buddies? You need to let that go. You don’t have to wear the suit, but I need you to hear me, trust me, believe me, take my words into your heart. Forget your past, it was all deception. This is real.” He pulled her hand to his heart and laid it flush against his chest. “Looking at your soft curves has fast become my favorite pastime. Your body haunts me—I can’t get it out of my mind. Say you won’t ever take that away from me.”
She sighed. “I don’t want to. I’m glad you like me.”
“No like about it. I fucking love and worship every inch of you.”
She smiled and kissed him on the side of his mouth. She whispered, “Close your eyes.”
He complied and felt the weight lift off him as she took herself from his lap. “What are you doing?”
“Don’t peek.” Her fingertips brushed across his eyes. He heard the rustle of clothes. “Okay, open.”
The sight before him had his throat going dry and his cock straining against the zipper of his shorts. The string bikini he’d bought covered the crucial parts, but that was it. The triangles covered one third of each breast, and he doubted the back covered much more because he could see the ties extremely low on her hips. He didn’t normally act like a caveman, but he had to reach his hand into his shorts to adjust his erection. Only, his hand started to stroke his painfully engorged cock.%
“Fuck, I’m sorry, but you’re the most erotic vision I’ve ever seen.” He unzipped his pants and pumped his hot flesh in his hand. “I’m going to come from just looking at you. Turn around, let me see the back.” His voice sounded strange. Strained.
She turned and he could see the top of what made up the cleft of her backside. The bottom of her full cheeks were exposed as the cloth could only cover a small portion of her generous curves. She posed with one hip higher than the other and looked coyly over her shoulder.
“Shit, Eve, I’m going to come.” His voice was strangled. Then she knelt between his legs, and he immediately squirted thick streams of seed violently into her mouth. He let out a tortured groan.
“God, seeing all your curves with the most important parts hidden just consumed me with lust. I haven’t come that quickly since I was twelve years old.”
She licked her lips and exhaled a satisfied sigh, the sound colored by her smile. Now he’d whacked off in front of her? There were definitely a lot of firsts with her. He didn’t see the masturbation as such an embarrassing thing—not with Eve. She needed to see how crazed she made him.
“I like it when you lose control.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it’s true.”
But she couldn’t mean it. She didn’t know what she was saying. What she was tempting out of him.
“You’re so beautiful.” He cupped her cheek and rubbed her soft, soft skin. “I need to touch you all the time. I don’t know what I’m going to do from now on.”
“Maybe you never stop touching me.”
*
Clay told Eve the beach was for the most part secluded, and he’d been right. The water was aqua, just like all the pictures she’d seen. The breeze peppered her cheeks with sea spray, and the smell of wet sand and sea foam would be burned into her memory for a lifetime. She’d found a piece of battered plastic on the shore and teased a crab with it. It had come close to pinching her toe until Clay grabbed it and threw it in the water. They played in the water with inner tubes, and Clay pretended to be a shark and attacked her, though she knew he just wanted to fondle her ass.
When they grew tired, Clay brought lounge chairs down to their private beach, and they spent the afternoon lazily napping, reading, talking, and shelling.
Eventually three guys from the house about one hundred yards away came out to play football. They were all barefoot and sand kicked up from their feet when they ran after the ball. As the game progressed, it carried the men closer to where she and Clay were lounging, and she sensed him getting tense.
After about thirty minutes, he said, “Why don’t you go on in; I’ll get the chairs. I’d like to get you a towel, but there’s no way I’m leaving you here alone while I run inside.”
She nodded and stood. He’d reacted so positively to her attire she’d forgotten a cover-up.
Just then the football came sailing through the air and slapped her hard in the thigh before landing on the beach between them. She rubbed at the spot.
Clay was at her side instantly to inspect her leg. “Fuck, are you okay?” He rubbed her leg, even more gingerly than she had.
“Yeah, it just stings a little.”
A shadow fell across the sand, and they looked up at the same time to see one of the young guys staring at her. Big-time staring, like in the cartoons where the eyes pop from the wolf’s head and roll along the ground. Clay stood to his full six feet five, and Eve saw his fists clench as he stepped in front of her.
“Get your fucking eyes off her!” He reached down, picked up the football, and flung it so far into the ocean, she could no longer see it.
The kid just stood frozen in place. Clay yanked off his Wayfarers and glared at him.
“If you want to keep all your teeth, you’ll start running now!”
The guy took off toward the water, and Eve ran to the house. God, would he blame her? Was he mad at her? Did he think she was trying to seduce the football player? Her spine tingled with unrelenting chill. She ripped the suit off and frantically dug through the bags of new clothes looking for anything to cover her skin. She overturned all the packages and packed duffel bags from home, but there were only skimpy clothes—shorts, tank tops, flimsy lingerie, too-small swimwear.
Her hands went to her mouth to stifle a strangled cry as she recalled piercing brown eyes and felt again the spittle on her face from his anger all those years. Then her gaze landed on Clay’s neatly folded clothes atop the dresser. She pulled one of his T-shirts over her body and as her head popped through the neck, she saw him staring back at her. She felt cold as fear took over. Her eyes went blurry, and she involuntarily lowered to a protective crouch as fear clenched her in its fingers the way dark grips the ocean floor.
“Eve? Are you okay?”
He started walking toward her and she instinctively scuttled away. Her hands went up to protect her face. “Please.” She was trembling as she remembered her first beating. “Please don’t hurt me. Please. I’m sorry.” She closed her eyes tight, waiting for the first blow.
“Oh God, Eve.” His voice was laced with cracks and sorrow. “I could never hurt you. Come back to me. I love you. You didn’t do anything wrong. No one did. You’re safe here with me. Open your eyes.”
She heard his words. His words. Clay’s words. And his rich voice. With her eyes still tightly shut, she whispered, “Clay?”
“Yeah, love, it’s me.”
Her eyes opened slowly and then widened when she saw the intense lines of worry on his face. She lowered her hands, but he kept his distance until she went to him and wrapped her arms around his waist.
“Clay.”
He pulled her in tight and rubbed her back. “Where’d you go?”
Snuggling into the center of his chest, she could smell coconut from the sunblock mixed with his heated skin—the scent she’d come to know and love—and it comforted her.
He carried her to the bed and sat back with her in his arms.
“Eve, we need to talk. You need to tell me what happened back there.”
She clutched his biceps like it was a life raft. “I got scared.”
“Why?”
“I thought you were angry.”
“Not angry. Jealous, obsessive, protective. Not angry.”
She exhaled deeply. “You seemed mad.”
“I know.” He kissed the top of her head and pushed her hair behind her shoulder. “I’ll get angry. I’ll even get mad at you, and you’ll get mad at me. I may yell, you may yell. But I need to know that you trust I will never hit you. Never. I don’t do that.”
She started to pull away, but he held her tight against his chest.
“What is it?” he asked.
She rested her forehead against the muscles of his upper body and rubbed, needing to feel him. “I want to be normal, I do, but sometimes I get so frightened. I feel like I can’t breathe and my mind somehow places me back there—with him.” She gasped and rubbed her tears onto his skin as she burrowed into his chest.
“You don’t have to be frightened any more. You won’t have to face him ever again. I hate that he hurt you, that you carry the memories and the scars. I wish I could give my life for yours so you would never have known that pain. But you do know it and it’s part of who you are. It kills me when you retreat from me in sheer terror. Honestly, I can’t even believe that you can be with me, but you’re strong. You’re a fighter, Eve, and you can fight this. You’re strong enough to fight on your own, but you don’t have to. We can fight this.”
His hand went under her shirt to caress her bare back.
She nodded and exhaled a long sigh while snuggling into him.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you if you need anything. Like counseling or therapy.”
She hated that she was broken. Did he think of her that way? Did he think she was weak?
“I had some therapy, but it wasn’t for me.”
“Okay, but if you want to try again, we can. I’ll support you or go with you, whatever you need.”
His warm hand massaged her shoulder under the shirt, skin on skin, and it felt luxurious. She could stay in his arms forever.
“I wish I could be less intense, or maybe shorter and smaller. I know I’m loud and overgrown. Are you scared now? Are you able to relax at all with me?”
Couldn’t he tell? She was now so relaxed that she felt boneless.
She felt terrible that he thought she was afraid of him, of his size and strength and intensity. Even when he’d loved her so roughly in the truck, she’d felt loved and desired. He was so passionate with her because he wanted her, not because he wanted to hurt her. She knew that. She felt it in his hands and saw it in his eyes. She even heard it in the way he said her name.
Nicolas hadn’t loved her. Not real love. He’d only wanted to use and hurt her.
She needed to make Clay understand. She turned in his arms. Cupping his cheeks in each palm, she bent and kissed lips, tenderly, sweetly. “Clay, it’s not like that. When I retreat, I see him. I hear him.” She frowned and shook her head. “No, when I see him, then I retreat. I try to find a safe place where he can’t follow. Where he won’t follow. My skin pimples from the chill Canadian air. I smell his overly priced cologne. I am a million miles from you, but I’m always trying to find my way back. When the tenor of your voice sings me back, I instantly feel the safety and comfort of your world. You envelop me in protection and love like I’ve never known. I live for the day when I never leave, when my mind… when my mind can stand against the fear.”
Clay’s hand went to her head and lightly fisted her hair. He turned his nose into her neck. “I live for that day too.”
His hot breath on her neck made her long for that warmth on her breasts, her stomach, and between her thighs. She wanted to feel his love and comfort wash over her, as it did every time they came together.
Breathy, she said, “I’m sorry, I never meant to cause you pain. It’s involuntary, you know, the cowering.”
They were forehead to forehead now. “You don’t cower, Eve, that implies weakness. You’re anything but weak.”
A phone buzzed. It was the burner phone.
Clay reached for it on the nightstand, where he’d dropped it when they arrived.
“It’s Augie. He’s got your sister. She’s safe, but we were right to think Renaud was going to use her to get to you. Looks like he got to her just in time.”
She grabbed his wrists, reading the text message. She tried to take control of the phone, but he wouldn’t let her. “Give it to me. I have to talk to her.”
“You can’t.”
“Give me the phone!”
“No, it’s for your safety. Communication must remain minimal. No one can know who’s at the other end of the line. It’s too risky.”
She was frantic to speak to her sister, hear her voice even. She pleaded, “I have to. Please.” She pulled at his forearm, pinching when he wouldn’t release the phone, but it was no use; he was made of concrete. She scratched at his arms, and he just stared intently into her eyes, the blue in his seeking to soothe her against her will.
“Please, Clay, I have to talk to her.”
His head shook. “No. Augie’s already offline anyway. I guarantee it. We can’t risk it.”
Tears blurred her vision and fell from her eyes. She was so unbelievably frustrated. She had to speak to her sister. What if this was her last chance? What if she never saw her again? She needed to explain why she’d left. “I don’t care about my safety, I just need to talk to Mia.” She was begging and crying and drawing blood with her nails.
When he swapped the pho
ne to his other hand, she jumped on him and the phone fell to the tile floor. The glass front shattered. Clay picked it up and pressed several buttons. He shook his head as he inhaled deeply and clicked his tongue. “It’s broken.”
She crumpled to the floor. Clay followed her down.
“What’s this about? Your sister will be with you soon enough, and you’ll talk to her then. You wouldn’t want to put her rescue at risk to satisfy this selfish urge to talk now, would you?”
Now she was selfish. He reached for her, but she didn’t move into him. He sighed heavily.
“I’m sorry. It kills me to tell you no. I know you’re worried, but Augie will keep your sister safe.”
He picked her up and took her to bed. His grip was strong and implacable, but she wasn’t scared. She felt only comfort. He spooned behind her and held her in his arms as she cried.
“You have no idea how your tears cripple me,” he said.
She pushed back against him, and he wrapped one arm around her, resting his hands on hers.
She felt his erection in the curve of her buttocks, but he held her in a nonsexual, comforting hold. He was right, she was being selfish. Growing up apart, she had never been close with Mia, but over the last few years they seemed to understand one another. It was just that she’d left without a trace six months ago, and she knew her sister had been hurt when she’d walked out. Vanished, really. It had been the only way.
Snuggled in Clay’s arms, her eyelids grew heavy, to match her heart, and she closed her eyes.
She woke to the sounds of soft foamy waves washing against the shore and the gulf breeze coming in through the open French doors. She knew instantly that Clay was not in bed or even in the room. The sun was setting, and his absence plucked at the ease sleep had brought her.
As her eyes adjusted to the lamp-lit room, she saw something that hadn’t been there before—a blue dress draped across the rocking chair in the corner. The dress was cocktail length and strapless, with white material over a shimmery blue leaf pattern in lace. There were so many leaves, the dress was more blue than white. There were sandals to match.