Tonight, Amy was determined they would not fall back into that heady chaos. There would be passion, but her way, how she wanted it. And tonight she wanted to make love, and it was damn well going to be on her terms. Tonight they would finally close the door on a painful past and move on, freed from it. So she hung on to Leone’s ears, until those flashing eyes focused on her face.
“I don’t like having my breasts mauled. I like them to be kissed—slowly—all over.” She watched Leone intently to ensure the words were seeping into her lust-puddled brain. Amy took the big, black blink to be an affirmative.
“Then I like my nipples licked with long, swirling strokes until they are rock hard.” This was greeted with a second slow blink. She had all of Leone’s attention now.
“That’s when I love to have them sucked. Not hard, but not too soft either. Suck them just right, and I’ll come for you. All over this couch.” There was no blink this time. It seemed Leone had lost the power to her eyelids; she just stared at Amy, and swallowed hard.
Finally, as if she felt responsible for the thick silence that had wrapped around them, Leone blurted in a choked voice, “They’re bigger than before—your breasts.”
Now it was Amy’s turn to blink.
She responded carefully, with deliberation, “Yes. It’s been a while. I became a woman.”
With Amy’s words the years apart opened up like a chasm for Leone. So much had changed for Amy. So much worldly travel and new experiences. She had gone out and lived, while Leone had sat and brooded. Fear coiled in her guts, freezing her with uncertainty. She felt alone, teetering on the edge of an abyss. For Leone understood the balance, had mastered the tilt of it. She stood on the brink of a life worth living, or an existence alone.
If Amy rejected her there was none other, and it was done with. She would have selected her mate and been refused. A long time ago she’d lost Amy through her own inexperience and lack of courage. What would be her excuse now?
Amy raised her head and gently claimed Leone’s hesitant mouth, remembering another time when she thought of these lips as all her own. The day the teenage Amy lost Leone Garoul, she lost Little Dip, and her home, and a little bit of herself, too. It had taken many years of traveling and living her own adventures to put her wholly and firmly back on the map of her life. And what had she done? Where had she gone? She’d run right back to Little Dip. Straight back to the Garoul valley, to Connie’s cabin, Leone’s arms, this madness, with all the ingenuity of a lemming.
Here was home, here was shelter, here she felt whole and satisfied. And a big part of that, an agonizing part of it, was the woman lying beside her on this skinny little couch, taking up far too much room as usual.
The kiss deepened. Leone tried to be tender, tried to remember. But firm breasts pushed against her own with only her borrowed T-shirt separating their flesh but not their heat. Leone wanted more. She wanted taste, and deep scent, and essence. She wanted all of Amy. Slowly, she began the act of claiming.
Amy squirmed against her, arching into Leone’s belly, rocking on her thigh. They molded to each other, sinuously rolling, caught in an ancient rhythm that at the same time was solely their own. Amy’s nails trailed patterns across Leone’s long, lean back. Leone’s rumbling growl resonated against Amy’s throat, making her skin tingle; she arched her back into the strong body covering hers. Her breasts were lavished with wet, sucking kisses until they flushed pink, their tips hard.
Leone sucked with a delicate passion, sensitive to Amy’s murmurs and the frantic movements beneath her. She was quickly learning Amy’s secrets, a mixture of old and new, marveling at the pleasure the act of loving Amy brought both of them.
When she finally abandoned the breasts they were swollen and firm, glistening with her saliva, the areolas puckering in the cool air. Amy murmured in disappointment and Leone grinned into the soft skin of her stomach. Her hair trailed across Amy’s belly as she dropped kisses all the way down to her navel. Leone crooned happily to herself as she circled Amy’s belly button with wet kisses and dipped her tongue into the salty indent. She teased and played until Amy’s hands caught fistfuls of her hair and guided her on to their joint goal. Amy quickly raised her hips, spreading herself open, offering herself to Leone. Without hesitation Leone plunged onto her sex.
Leone had been patient; she had been careful; she had paced herself to the wishes and rhythm of Amy’s body. Now Amy’s scent was too strong and Leone’s needs too great.
With a deep growl Leone nuzzled the tender folds. She drew the plump clitoris into her mouth and drove Amy relentlessly toward the precipice. Leone’s hair was pulled, her shoulders scratched as Amy cried out to her for that one, elusive, torturous touch that would shatter her into stardust.
Amy knew this was going to be big. She knew Leone would take her there. Every molecule of her body centered on her lover—and then she came, a tidal wave of pure heat that melted every bone in her body and blew off a dozen pyrotechnics in her skull. Above her shuddering cries she faintly heard a deep panting growl. Amy’s eyes fluttered open and she briefly glimpsed a dark devilish stare shining up at her. Leone’s eyes danced with pride and love. Her tan cheeks and chin glistened in the firelight, damp and pungent with Amy’s essence. The air around them was thick with sweat, and sex, and scullcap.
Leone crawled up her body and kissed her with sweet, salty lips, sharing the joy she had tasted. And as they kissed Amy cradled her in her arms, tightening her thighs around Leone’s waist, and held on to her as if she were drowning.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Amy poked her nose out from under a heap of blankets and knew immediately that she was alone. Leone must have sneaked out early in the morning, leaving her to sleep on peacefully. The fire smoked and crackled, spreading warmth into the room. Leone had relit it without waking her. She was grateful for the heat but would have preferred waking up snug and warm in Leone’s arms. In the kitchen she found a small bunch of wildflowers nestled by the coffeepot, anchoring a note.
Sorry. Something very urgent has come up and I have to go. I wish I could have stayed and watched you wake. Can I see you later tonight? I really am sorry.
L.
PS. You look beautiful when you’re sleeping.
It was an awkward, shy note, emotionally clumsy and a little unsure. The star-pointed flowers were a perfect accompaniment for the sentiment. They were shy and delicate blossoms. Amy knew Leone had hunted these down in some far-off stony area. They did not grow in the rich loam by the river. It was a sweet gesture, a poignant throwback to their teenage years. Again, Amy felt a pang of regret that Leone had gone. She wanted to be with her. She needed Leone’s reassuring presence after their night of lovemaking. From the timbre of the note she knew Leone needed hers, too. Whatever had taken her away had to have been important.
With a sigh, Amy put the flowers in a tumbler of water and started making breakfast. She relaxed on the couch with her coffee and idly flicked through the pages of the Wicca spell book. She wondered who the publishers were. She’d never heard of the Wiccan Wheel before. I must ask Marie. This is her area of expertise. She scanned a few of the love potions and recipes. It was sort of laid out like a cookbook… Amy frowned. She was looking at a potion that included angelica. The gram amounts used were very reasonable, but something jarred her.
She sat back and gazed off into the middle distance, collecting her thoughts. Where had she seen angelica recipes recently? In the almanac. Right beside Connie’s illustration with the weird marks.
Amy went to Connie’s desk, opened the almanac, and found the angelica illustration. The recipe with it was one of Marie’s. An herbal infusion for colic…and curing the bite of wild dogs. Wild dogs? Bloody hell, Marie.
Unlike in the Wicca book, the ingredient measurements in Marie’s recipe were all wrong. This would choke you. Even I know that. The recipe went on to mention another botanical ingredient, lady’s bedstraw, again in bizarrely inaccurate amounts.
Amy flippe
d to the page with the illustration for lady’s bedstraw. The illustration had extraneous markings just like angelica. Amy didn’t have to be overly familiar with the plant to see them. Once she suspected they were there, they practically leapt off the page.
What the hell was going on? The weird measurements she guessed were linked back to the plant illustrations, but in what way? By looking at the recipe amounts she could guess which plant illustrations would have hidden sigils—the ones with the crazy gram measurements had the marks.
Amy checked out other almanacs at random. Her theory worked. Each had a weird recipe among the real ones, and for every strange herb dosage she found the related plant illustration had discreet markings hidden in it.
It was all part of the code she had suspected from the moment she had seen the marks in Connie’s work. But the marks meant nothing on their own. She still needed the missing link. All codes and ciphers had a key. She’d read about it in the library book.
Okay, so she could link the confusing recipes doses to certain illustrations, but that wasn’t enough. A key, she had to figure out the key.
Amy knew this had nothing to do with the anniversary almanac idea Marie tried to sell her last night. Connie would have talked to her about that. They shared their ideas and swapped opinions. They had always worked like that. Pooling knowledge, sharing research. Connie would not have kept information about an anniversary almanac from her. But would she have withheld a code?
Amy chewed her lip. Maybe this was something Connie didn’t know she was involved in? She wished Connie was available, even on the end of a telephone. Amy wanted to reassure herself that all this strange, mysterious stuff had nothing to do with Connie being ill. She desperately wanted Connie to let her in on the secret. If Connie was part of it, that was.
Amy doubted either Leone or Marie would tell her the truth. The code was there for a reason. This was secret knowledge, and only the almanac’s exclusive readership would know it was embedded in the books at all. Amy would have to solve the mystery by herself.
A tapping on the roof shook her out of her reverie. Was Leone up there fixing it, as promised? What about the urgent business that took her away so early?
Amy stepped outside. The wind had risen and snatched her hair, whipping it around her shoulders. She looked up at the shingles, concerned Leone was looking for snake holes in such blustery weather.
“Leone? Are you up there? Be careful. It’s too windy.”
Leone was nowhere in sight. The overhanging tree branches dipped and swayed, knocking on the cabin roof. That had been the tapping noise.
She wandered around to the rear of the cabin, hoping Leone might be back there doing some other repairs. Amy missed her already, and wished— She jarred to a halt, looking in horror at the back wall of Connie’s cabin. It was completely lacerated. The surface wood hung in gouged-out tatters. The surround and sills of the small bathroom window were splintered apart. No wonder she could barely open it. It was ruined, and it wasn’t recent damage either; it was sustained.
Amy slowly backed away to the front of the cabin where she felt safer.
“Okay.” She took a dry swallow. “I’ve got to tell Claude and Marie there’s something in the valley damaging property as well as trees.”
She went back indoors and dragged on her coat. She wasn’t exactly sure what the Garouls could do, but it wasn’t acceptable for whatever it was to get this close to the cabin. Especially Connie’s cabin, which was farther out than the compound ones. Was that why she kept a gun?
The wind had died away by the time Amy arrived at the compound. She rounded the corner of Claude’s cabin and came to an abrupt halt. Before her on a huge A-frame an adult deer hung by its hind legs. Its body cavity was opened and gutted. The carcass was headless and the stump of a neck was totally mangled, as if the head had literally been ripped off. A fly-infested bucket sat to the side. She assumed it held the entrails.
“Hi, Amy.”
The soft voice came from behind her. Spinning around she saw Paulie approach, an impressively wicked knife dangled from his hand. He smiled at her before blushing fiercely. Amy wondered if he had perhaps developed a little crush on her. He seemed very awkward around her.
“Hi, Paulie. Is this the deer Claude and Leone hit with the truck last night?”
Paulie blinked before burning an even brighter shade of red. “Um, they brought it in last night. Claude dressed it, but left the rest for me to practice skinning on. Do you want to watch?” he asked eagerly.
“Mmm. Sure.”
Amy wasn’t at all sure if she wanted to watch, but she didn’t want to dilute his obvious enthusiasm for the chore left to him. He moved to the carcass, and with great concentration drew the blade around the tethered hooves before slitting the inside of each leg down toward the pelvis. Slowly, he began to peel back the hide from the fetlocks, scrubbing at stubborn patches with the blade. Amy winced.
“You’ve got to make sure the hide doesn’t touch the meat,” he said. “No one wants a hairy steak, do they?”
His casual words broke Amy out of her horrified trance.
“Yeah, that would be yuck,” she said, vowing herself back to vegetarianism. “Paulie, why’s the head missing and the neck so mashed up? Is that where the truck hit it?”
“Maybe,” he said, concentrating on the job in hand. But even with his back to her she could see his ears glow. He was finding her questions difficult, and she wasn’t sure why. “The head’s in Claude’s freezer. He’s taking it to a friend who’s a taxidermist. He wants to get it mounted as a gift for Leone’s birthday. Don’t tell her. It’s a surprise,” he added hastily.
“Nope. The secret’s safe with me. Hey, thanks for the demo, but I need to go find Marie. I’ll catch you later.”
“Okay, I’ll save you a couple of loin steaks.” Again he blushed furiously, and again Amy was uncertain what it was that made him so awkward around her.
“Amy,” he called after her. “There’s no one over at Aunt Marie’s. They’ve all headed out.”
It had occurred to Amy that the compound was very quiet for the time of day.
“Who’s they? And where have they gone?”
“Most everyone. Claude told me to stay here and finish skinning the buck. I’m not sure where they went. They took off very sudden. Elicia just left a minute or two ago. She looked upset. I called but she just kept walking. Didn’t hear me.” He shrugged in a typical teenage fashion.
“Do you know which way Elicia went?”
He waved his knife toward one of the exit routes. “Maybe the parking lot?”
Amy turned to follow his directions. “Thanks, Paulie.”
He turned back to his deer. Amy ran curious eyes over the headless carcass one last time. If the head was intact enough for mounting, and the body was intact enough to butcher for meat, then the only real damage to the animal was to its throat. How the hell did a Toyota truck manage to hit an adult deer bang on the neck? And apparently hard enough to rip its throat clean out?
Nothing was adding up this morning. Amy’s frown deepened.
She jogged down the to the parking lot hoping she could catch Elicia. Maybe she knew where all the Garoul adults had gone? This had to be the urgent business Leone had been called away on. Had the Garouls cornered the tree ripper?
A flash of red caught her eye; it was set back in the woods. She squinted. Someone was out walking in the forest. Was it Elicia? Elicia had a red coat.
“Elicia,” she called.
The figure didn’t stop and was soon swallowed up by the trees. Was it Elicia? Amy was indecisive; should she follow or head down to the parking lot? Maybe Elicia wasn’t going to the car. Maybe she was looking for Jori.
It had to be Elicia; Paulie said she’d come this way, and she had a bright red coat. Yes, it was probably Elicia. Another splash of red moved between the firs, and Amy made up her mind.
“Elicia. Wait up.” Amy plunged into the forest after her.
No matter how well I think I know this valley, I always find a track I’ve never seen before. She was angry with herself for acting impulsively and following the elusive red coat. Amy had no real idea if it was Elicia or not. It could be Santa for all she knew. Glimpses of red had popped up here and there, flashing at her through the trees. Always a little too far ahead for her calls to be heard. Amy was well and truly pissed off.
She decided to keep pushing on in the hopes of finding a path home. In fact, any path would do at this point. In her haste that morning, she had forgotten to bring her backpack with her water flask, hand compass, trail mix, and all the other things that made getting lost in the woods semi-tolerable.
Finally her bad luck broke and she crested a small rise to find she had doubled back on the Silverthread river. It wasn’t a section she recognized, but she knew all she had to do was follow it northeast and she’d pick up a trail soon enough. She skirted around fireweed and goat’s beard, noting a licorice fern, which was on her to-do list and not the easiest plant to find either. Better remember the way back here. Damn, I wish I had my backpack. I could have sketched this one.
Amy was so busy berating herself she almost missed the squat cabin sitting amongst the trees on the opposite bank. She clambered down to the riverbank and stared across at it. It seemed uninhabited. The windows were barred, like a prison, or a secured store. That was all she could make out from this distance. Curiosity got the better of her. She might as well explore while she was this close.
With boots and socks in hand, and pants rolled up well past her knees, she waded across a relatively shallow part of the river.
“Goddamnit.” It’s bleedin’ freezing! Safely on the other side, she hastily laced up her boots before approaching the little shack.
The closer she got, the less abandoned it looked. Wood was neatly stockpiled by a side wall. It was a seasonal collection, not a damp, mossy heap leftover from previous years. This was good firewood. Yet the chimney wasn’t smoking. The windows had iron bars on the outside, but the glass was smashed and shards lay all over the ground. Pretty gingham curtains fluttered in the breeze, incongruous with the damage surrounding them.
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