Just for the Rush

by Jane Lark

  He laughed. ‘I’m well enough now.’

  But this little romp had not been about him wanting sex, it had been about him trying to gain control of the world again. He would be okay. I was going to make sure of it. The control would be ours again – to fight over.

  Chapter 36

  End of October

  I held the rope tighter as I watched Ivy looking at the rock face. She glanced back at me.

  ‘You can do it.’

  I knew what was going on in her mind – an urge to say she couldn’t, and I knew her heart was beating like a manic rave beat. But she wouldn’t voice her thoughts; she never did any more. Whatever crazy suggestion I proposed to her, she swallowed her fear and did it, for me. I’d been promised regular doses of sexual adrenaline while I recovered; she’d honoured that. Now I was returning the favour of adrenaline rushes – but not always in bed. I smiled.

  ‘Go on, Ivy. I’ve got you. I promise.’ But today she was facing her worst fear again. Heights. And solid awkward-shaped rock did look very different to perfect designed-to-be-climbed resin.

  She’d climbed this rock face last Christmas, when I’d climbed up beside her. But now she knew I couldn’t get up there, so she had to do it alone.

  I was climbing on the walls again, but I couldn’t do it properly yet. I didn’t have the movement in my joints because of all the scarred muscle tissue, and metal, and my strength had gone. But I was building it up and getting more movement back week by week, and I hadn’t given up on the idea of being able to climb here again. But right now I was living it through Ivy. That was why she never said no, because she did things for me, travelling the thrill ride for me.

  ‘Go on,’ I encouraged again.

  She threw me a look that said, shut up. She was harnessed up and I had a hold of the safety rope.

  ‘Are you sure you’re strong enough to hold me.’

  ‘I told you last time, you can jump off anytime and I’ll lower you down. So just take a step up and then test me if you don’t trust me.’

  ‘I trust you.’

  ‘Well then, why did you even ask? I’ve got you and you aren’t going to fall off anyway.’

  ‘Okay.’ She took a breath.

  I tugged the rope so she felt the pull as she stepped up to the bottom of the rock.

  ‘That’s me,’ she said. I was trying to make her feel like she did at the fake wall.

  ‘Climb when ready.’

  I heard her take a deep breath. ‘Climbing,’ she said, finding a hold with one hand. The first time she’d done this she’d clung on with two hands before lifting her foot; she was definitely more confident.

  ‘Climb on,’ I acknowledged. She started climbing.

  She was slow, but steady and sensible; searching out secure holds before she moved. She was a confident, competent climber – if only she believed in herself.

  She was one of the crowd at the climbing club too. We often went from the walls to the bar; the only thing I’d lost was the ability to get to the top of a wall myself, but I was still aiming for it. And right now I was just glad to be up here in Cumbria again. I could’ve got up here two months ago on the train, but I’d held out because I’d wanted to drive here and I hadn’t wanted to bring Ivy back up while she was playing nurse. I wanted us level. I wanted everything to be as it should’ve been before Rick had smashed me off the bike. The only thing that was missing was me being able to climb.

  Although that was a stupid thing to think. Nothing was completely the same. Ivy had packed up work in the summer. She’d loved the job but it was too awkward when she was spending so much time caring for me for weeks because I hadn’t been able to walk very easily and then keeping an eye on me when I’d started hobbling around with a stick. And she was meant to be on the payroll, although she hadn’t been for weeks – and with both of us out, the business had been working through some tough times. But so had I.

  A month ago I’d got Em to get a loan to buy me out of the business. Phil had taken over my half.

  Ivy and I were going to set up another agency and start from scratch, just the two of us. I had a feeling my customers who weren’t tied to contracts would follow me. Em would probably hate me for it, but the old business would survive. I felt a little guilty for ducking out on Em, but Ivy was more important. I wanted to be with her. The business was not the thing that had got me through the last few months; Ivy had been.

  Before Ivy all the women who had been important in my life had been the opposite of me, making up for what I lacked. Ivy was my true partner. She was like me in lots of ways, and yet with her… she made who I was better.

  I watched her complete the climb, her hand reached over the top and gripped the turf and she pulled herself up on to a foothold, then her other hand reached over the top. She tumbled on to the grass on the top, then stood up and unclipped the rope, screaming with excitement and waving down at me.

  I smiled. She didn’t need my safety rope any more. But I needed hers. She had all the control. I waited for Captain Control to yell out in complaint. He didn’t. My inner voice was silent. But Lord he’d had nearly a year to get used to shutting up, since he’d been introduced to me up here last Christmas. ‘Do you want to go for the bigger face? You’ll be okay! If you want to do it, we can get you on a rope?’

  ‘Yes.’ Her expression said she was seeking the adrenaline rush of challenging herself.

  She did it too, a perfect climb, without a fault.

  When we got back to the house I made her a risotto for dinner and we ate it with a bottle of ale, sitting at the long antique oak table in the kitchen.

  I liked being in the house with her. It was becoming our special place. It was making me contemplate living up here. Maybe we could stay in town in the week and come up here every weekend, or every other weekend at least; it would be too awkward for Daisy to travel up here all the time. I was going to bring her up for a holiday soon, though.

  After dinner Ivy came around the table and kissed me. Then whispered over my lips. ‘Did you bring a suit with you?’

  ‘Yes. Why?’

  ‘Did you bring a tie?’

  ‘Yes. Why?’ I was smiling now.

  ‘Because I have a use for it.’

  ‘Well if it’s to tie me up, the answer is no. Neither my arm nor my legs are up to that, but yours…’ It probably wasn’t true, I’d probably be okay with it, but I’d been through enough. I didn’t feel guilty for using my injuries as an excuse when I wanted to.

  ‘Well, maybe I will let you tie me up and maybe not…’ She started backing towards the door.

  I snatched up an ice bucket I’d left some champagne chilling in, ready for the moment. But the moment wasn’t now. It had come and gone again – it kept doing that. There was always a reason not to say the words.

  I wanted to say them during this holiday, though. I was going to find a time.

  We went up to the little double bed we’d had sex in the first time we’d come up here. I was going to christen every bed in the house with her this time around, and every room.

  She started undressing, and I undressed. Then she lay down on the bed, all naked pale skin. I turned and pulled my tie out of the drawer, then made her stand in front of me while I tied her wrists. ‘You can tie the wrist of my good arm to the bed tomorrow night if you want.’

  ‘It’s okay, I enjoy you tying me up too.’

  Laughter rumbled in my chest as I picked up a piece of ice. ‘Lie down.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  I climbed on the bed and knelt beside her, which was awkward because my left knee only bent to about ninety degrees, but I was slowly forcing it into moving more.

  I teased her nipple with the ice.

  ‘Ah, ow. That’s cold.’

  ‘Makes the heart race wondering where I’m going to put it next, though.’

  She laughed, her eyes watching me. It was sunset and the vivid orange-and-red sunlight spilled into the room, gilding her as I ran the ice down her beau
tiful sternum.

  My vision caught the scar on my arm. I was trying not to look at my scars. I hadn’t got used to them. They were memories I didn’t really want. They made me think of her ex. But the cardigan-wearing nutter was in prison, serving out a couple of years for not being able to let her go. And she’d called me Captain Control.

  If she ever decided to leave me, though, I’d probably go as mad as him.

  The ice melted on her rigid stomach, dripping off the sides and then I shifted. Lifting a leg so she could move hers and I could kneel, awkwardly, between her legs.

  I slid the last of the melting ice inside her, then raised her legs so she could lift her hips, and shuffled down the bed then licked the cold melting water out from within her. Her body was like silk, warm silk, compared to the water.

  I messed around with the ice on her body, while I teased her with my teeth, biting then sucking and then her hips rocked up against me searching for the depth of my tongue as shameless as she’d always been, seeking the orgasm she wanted.

  This was my passionate, perfect, Ivy.

  When she came, her tied hands came down from above her head and clasped my hair, as her taste tingled sour on my tongue, and her inner muscle pulsed about the finger I slipped into her, just to feel it.

  I tumbled on to my back. It was not what I wanted to do. I wanted to flip her over and do it that way, but she knew that our sex life was as limited as my climbing – the pain from the scarring in my muscle became too much after my legs had been bent for too long.

  She didn’t say anything about it, just rolled over and knelt up, balancing on her tied-up hands. She smiled at me as she straddled me; I positioned everything. I didn’t untie her and she didn’t ask me to. The side of her hands pressed down on my chest. Then she slid down on to me and took control.

  Yes.

  She had a lot of control in every element our relationship. Most of it. I loved her, regardless. I was over that. A recovered control addict.

  She lifted up a little so I had to push up into her, pressing my heels into the sheets, as I gripped her thighs.

  I held her gaze as the sun set behind her, the sky growing darker and darker.

  I knew where and when I was going to propose. I knew the perfect place, and the perfect hour.

  Chapter 36

  Jack shook my shoulder a little. ‘Wake up. I want to go out.’

  I opened my eyes and blinked. ‘It’s still dark.’

  ‘I want to go somewhere.’

  ‘It’s the middle of the night.’

  ‘It’s dawn in fifty-five minutes and you have fifteen to get up and get some clothes on or I carry you downstairs naked.’

  ‘You’re not strong enough to carry me.’

  ‘Do you have to remind me? At least let me imagine I can do it in a threat.’

  I laughed at him. But then he pressed a quick kiss on my lips. ‘Get up.’

  My hand lifted and grabbed his cotton t-shirt at his side. He was already dressed.

  He turned on the light beside the bed.

  I covered my eyes with my forearm.

  ‘Come on. I made coffee. I’ll go down and pour you one, then you can drink it and wake yourself up before you go.’

  I didn’t know what he was up to, but we’d waited nearly a year to get back up here, and he’d been looking forward to this like it was all he’d lived for over the last few months while he’d been recovering. This was him, clasping the turf on the top of his cliff and hauling himself over the top, with relief and excitement. So if he wanted to do something crazy at dawn, I wouldn’t complain, I’d get up.

  I rolled to my side as he walked out of the room. He had his tight black jeans and a black t-shirt on, and he looked good. Pride lifted my lips into a smile of appreciation. I liked that he was mine. I liked that we had each other. We’d become a team of two, at home and in a business soon.

  Milly kept telling me I was overdosing on him. But I liked the overdose and I felt as if he needed me in an overdose. The last few months I’d been holding him together. He needed to get back to who he used to be, and he couldn’t climb yet, he was too stiff, and he couldn’t have sex how he wanted. He was holding on to his patience and bearing it, but he was not a patient man. In London, I’d thought, if he didn’t see some improvement soon, he was going to break, but this had been the thing he’d been holding on to, climbing towards – coming up here. He’d smiled loads since we’d been up here, and I’d smiled too because it was good to see him happy.

  I hoped this was the turning point. When we went back to London, at least he’d have work again. This was when we got back on the rails of normal life, or life as Jack liked to live it – wonderfully abnormal.

  I pulled my pale-blue jeans on, then a loose t-shirt and stole one of his jumpers out of the cupboard to wear over it. I shoved the sleeves up as I walked downstairs, barefoot on the wooden steps, in the dark, following the light that was on in the kitchen.

  He was leaning against the kitchen table. I walked up, tiptoeing over the freezing stone tiles, and clasped his middle, giving him a squeeze from behind. ‘I love you.’

  He turned around. ‘Drink your coffee and let’s get going.’

  ‘Sure boss.’

  ‘Not your boss, your partner.’ He gave me a grin.

  ‘Sure partner,’ I corrected.

  I found out some walking socks and my boots, because I guessed we were not going to a restaurant at dawn. He was doubled over lacing his boots, because his knees didn’t bend enough to do it any other way.

  Rick had affected so many small elements of Jack’s life that put together…

  Jack looked up and caught me watching him. I slipped my hands into the back pockets of my jeans. He straightened, then turned and lifted his leather jacket off a hook and put it on, giving me one of his wicked little half-smiles – the pure flirt that he’d always been.

  Rick’s meanness had not changed that.

  Jack opened the back door and his hand settled on my shoulder when we walked out.

  It was still dark mostly, but the sky to the east was a lighter blue and it created a beautiful silhouette of the hills. Autumn was beginning, but it wasn’t too cold. I only had his thick jumper and my t-shirt on. I hadn’t put a coat on.

  I walked around to the passenger side of the car and saw Jack touch his jacket, as if he was checking for something in his inside pocket, but then he pulled his keys out of his pocket on the other side.

  He pressed the button to free the lock and I got in.

  I was half asleep and the world felt fairytale-like as he drove through the valleys between all the hills, while the sky on one side of the car gradually became a lighter and lighter blue.

  He turned off the road at the sign to Keswick, then turned again at the sign to Castlerigg.

  We were going back to the stone circle.

  He parked the car in the roadside layby, then patted my knee. ‘Let’s go and watch the sunrise.’

  He had the most beautiful ideas and the best sense of how to live life. Rick hadn’t taken that from Jack either.

  I climbed out of the car and ran around to where Jack waited for me by the gate. I was wide awake now, and the air was fresh and chilly here.

  He gripped my hand tightly as we walked into the field, but as we climbed the slope, and the sky on the far side blushed with orange, his grip became more out of necessity and less out of an expression of love.

  ‘I can’t walk on fucking slopes,’ he grumbled.

  I turned and walked backwards a pace ahead of him, as he kept his death-grip on my hand.

  He’d been on crutches for six weeks and then got it down to one crutch, then a stick. He’d given up the stick about three weeks ago because he’d refused to come up here walking with a stick. But at times he still needed it, really.

  ‘You’ll be fine.’

  ‘We won’t be able to get up to the tarn, though, and go for a swim like I promised you in the spring, will we?’ His blue eyes asked
me to forgive him for not being the person he used to be.

  ‘We will next summer. I promise. But I don’t think the physiotherapy you’re doing is working well enough. I want you to do yoga with me. It’ll build up your core strength again so you’ll be ready to climb when you can, and it’ll stretch your muscles out – and the heat of Bikram yoga makes it gentler, so if you ever can—’

  ‘If I ever can?’

  ‘So you CAN move your legs more.’

  He’d been walking slowly, holding both of my hands, but then he stopped and laughed. ‘What are you trying to make me do?’

  ‘Be happy.’

  ‘And sit in an inactive yoga class.’

  ‘And be able to climb like Spiderman again. You promised me months ago you’d do yoga if I climbed. I’m climbing.’

  ‘Okay, you’re right. I promised. I’ll go to your yoga class with you when we get back to London. I’ll try anything to get my legs moving more, even lying on floors with you and standing on my head. But don’t tell any of my friends at the climbing club.’

  I laughed at him. He really wasn’t a good patient. ‘I promise not to tell anyone.’

  We reached the level ground the stones stood on, and I let him go when he could walk alone. He touched his chest again as he looked at the view, then slipped his hands into the back pockets of his jeans.

  I turned around and looked – it was amazing. The most beautiful view I’d ever seen.

  ‘It’s dramatic, isn’t it?’ Jack said as he walked ahead of me towards the circle.

  ‘Yes.’ It was. It was like some sort of statement about life, about how beautiful and precious it was. It was as if someone had put the stones here so people would come up here and breathe in life.

  He walked into the centre of the circle, then turned around and watched me. His hands slid out of his pockets. ‘I wanted to say something to you months ago.’ His voice was low and serious, but there was a sweet note in it, like honey melting in coffee.