by Mel Sterling
In fact, she didn't want to go home at all. A large part of her wanted to begin tackling the mess right this minute, and work straight through until morning. An even larger part of her wanted to curl up on the pink sofa and have another good cry, but that would solve nothing.
Jack watched her in silence from his usual spot, typing a little every now and then. She was grateful to him for staying with her. It was a heavy class day for Ben, so she couldn't call him for overtime. Seeing the disaster would break his heart. It was enough that she'd have to call him early tomorrow morning and prepare him for the mess and the Main Street gossip. She didn't think she could deal with his distress right now; tomorrow would be soon enough. There'd be overtime pay, too. Getting the store back on its feet would take some doing.
Finally she had done all she could short of reshelving the books from the floor. She and Jack and the adjuster had tried to mitigate damage as they photographed, restacking the books to let their own weight correct a lean to a spine or flatten a bent text block. Nothing was back where it belonged yet, but at least they'd prevented further damage.
When she went to the back room to tuck the store's till bag and bank deposit into her satchel, Jack followed her.
"What happens next?" he asked, lounging against the doorframe. His pose reminded her of that first open mic night, when he'd leaned against a bookcase and teased her for laughing at the terrible poetry being declaimed only a few feet away. He was so lanky, but muscular and fit. She liked the way his crossed arms tightened his shirt across his shoulders and emphasized his biceps. He looked sturdy and reliable.
"I…don't even know. I'll call Ben, but not till the morning. I'm not going to ship these books tonight, either." She nodded toward the table where three lonely orders waited to be wrapped. Even those had been searched by Hazelton and his goons.
"I know what to do, then."
"What?"
"I take you home and cook you some dinner. Eggs all right with you? I don't have a lot of choices at the studio, but I'm a whiz with an omelet and toast."
"Home—with you? To your place?"
"That's right. Did you think I slept at The Cup, or something?" He grinned at her confusion.
"I didn't think that, I just…can't think anymore. I'm sorry. I can't bring Melville with me to your place. I'll have to come back for him if we go there." She thought about taking Jack home with her, but then she'd feel obligated to cook for him herself, and she just didn't have the energy or the ability to make a decision as basic as what kind of sandwich to offer. She didn't feel hungry, just sick, though since breakfast she'd only had the cocoa Gilly snuck in after the agents left.
"He'll be all right here overnight, won't he? He's always got kibble, water, and his litterbox. Let him keep an eye on the place, earn his keep for a change."
"I…" Lexie couldn't think of a reason not to do as Jack suggested, except that she was starting to feel guilty for leaning on him so much. Weeping in his arms. Allowing him to comfort her, be a strong arm and the voice of reason.
"Say yes, Alexia."
She smiled tiredly. "Lexie. All right, yes. Whatever. But I'm not hungry. I'm too tired to be hungry."
He shook his head. "Doesn't matter. You need to eat something. You'll feel better after a walk in the fresh air, too. Come on, it's only a few blocks. I live upstairs from the food co-op. The place smells funny, but it's home."
They slipped out the alley door, avoiding anyone who might still be about on Main Street and curious about the goings-on at Horace's Books. Jack took her hand in a firm grip, interlacing their fingers. He headed west one block off Main. Along the way he pointed out some of the places he'd visited since he moved into his studio. Lexie felt strange not to be going home, but the day had been so surreal, what was one more unusual event in the grand scheme of things? Jack showed her nighttime Camden through his eyes; unusual architectural details, a tree with a damaged bole where a second, different species of tree grew in the wound. The porch where an Irish wolfhound sometimes lounged in the sunlight. The back of the Chinese restaurant where he'd bought take-out for the two of them.
Soon enough they came to an unmarked door in a brick alley wall, between the back entrance to the local food co-op and its loading bay door. Jack unlocked the knob and opened it. Narrow stairs led up into darkness, but he reached inside and turned on a light. The single bulb was high up the stairs, at a tiny landing. The wooden steps had been painted green once, as had the walls, but the stair paint was worn away by years of feet, and the walls had drag marks where armloads had scuffed along.
Jack led the way. Behind them, the door swung shut, and the two of them were alone in the shadowy staircase. At the landing, the stairs bent back on themselves, and they climbed a few more steps to a second door. Jack used his key again and ushered her inside.
The place did have an odor, just as Jack had mentioned, like a produce stand and bakery combined, but without being as inviting as either. The air had a sharp, citrusy tang with a fermented edge.
"I think the co-op must have a shipment of oranges in the warehouse," Jack said. He took Lexie's satchel and set it with his own on the floor next to the room's only table, then returned to take her jacket and put it on a hook beside the door. He locked the knob. Lexie didn't even have to spin to take in the whole room; it was all there to see, kitchenette on the left, what passed for a combination desk and dining room directly ahead, and a utilitarian double bed, lacking so much as a headboard, on the right. A doorway near the bed revealed the studio's bathroom, which was as minimalist as any in a cheap motel room: shower stall, toilet, pedestal sink, mirror, towel rack. A narrow dresser stood near the bed and held a lamp, which was lit. A sagging, short sofa upholstered in neutral plaid waited under one of the room's two windows.
No wonder Jack preferred to write at the bookstore and take his meals elsewhere. The place wasn't a dump, but it was far from inviting. There was hardly any color in the room. No pictures on the walls. The faded blue comforter doubled as a bedspread. The curtains were frosty white sheers that screened the view but didn't cut the glow from the streetlamps or the bright alley light mounted on the wall below one of the windows.
"Not very homey," he said. He sounded a little nervous, as if he were afraid she was judging the room harshly. "I don't need much."
"You travel light." She turned to watch him hang up his own jacket and fleece vest.
There was a long pause, and she studied the expressions that flitted across his face in the silence. "I have, yes," he said at last.
One more reason not to get more deeply involved with Jack, she told herself. He was a traveler. He was here, for now, and she liked him a lot, maybe more than a lot, but he'd be moving on soon enough, and she had sunk deep roots in Camden when she agreed to take care of Uncle Horace and his house and his cat and his bookstore. Even though she had only been here a couple of months, already she felt like pulling up stakes would take more energy than fully settling in.
Besides, she wanted to settle in. Chicago had never really felt like home, her apartment there nearly as sterile as Jack's studio, though more modern and considerably more comfortable. Her corporate job paid well, but she could close the desk drawers at the end of each day and walk away from it, never thinking about it again until she got on the train into the city each morning. Until she came to Camden, she had simply been marking time, squirreling money away for that someday. Just looking around this tiny room made Lexie realize that "someday" had become "now." It was why she was so devastated by the accusations of the postal inspector and FBI—this was her life they were talking about, her home, her work.
She had nearly made the mistake of thinking Jack would fit into that life. The anonymity of this room, the complete absence of Jack's strong personality, told her everything she needed to know about him.
Very well. He was passing through because that was who he was. And she would let him, but she'd take a little something for herself in the meantime. The precious time sh
e'd spent with Uncle Horace had taught her the value of living in the present, no matter how unnatural that felt to her accountant's mind.
Jack moved to the kitchenette—stove, not even an oven—small dormitory refrigerator and microwave, a sink, and a few cupboards capped by a Formica countertop. He took a frying pan from one of the cupboards and opened the fridge, taking out a carton of eggs and a block of cheese, an opened package of bacon. The sight of food made her unutterably weary, yet she didn't want rest. She felt too strung up to sleep, or even to settle.
"Jack."
He paused, an egg in each hand ready to crack on the edge of the pan. His dark eyes were steady and calm.
"I…" She heard the words she was about to say, echoing in her own head, and they astonished her, but she said them anyway, voice shaky, heat burning in her cheeks. "I don't want any food. I want…" She had to stop and swallow. This was harder than it should be. "I was hoping…" She folded her hands in front of her like a good little girl and took a deep breath. "I mean, could the eggs wait a little? Until we've…" Lexie looked over at the bed, then back at Jack. He fumbled the eggs into the carton again and moved very slowly toward her, an expression of confounded astonishment on his face.
"What are you asking me?"
She said it in a rush, graceless, tactless, breathless, lacking any eloquence. "I was hoping you would make love to me, instead."
At Lexie's words, Jack's heart gave a hard thump before settling into a rapid rhythm. His dick responded instantly, ready, willing. Able. The responsible part of him knew she was confusing desire with a need for comfort and simple human contact after the awfulness of the day.
The rest of him didn't care. She was here in his room, uninviting as it was, and she'd stated her request in no uncertain terms. The bed was only a few strides away. They could be on it in mere moments. He felt sure he could satisfy her; the kisses they'd exchanged in the bookstore had showed him more plainly than words that there was combustible chemistry between them.
Honor won, even though his body was urging him to take her at her word. "You're upset. I can't let you do something you'll regret."
"Of course I'm upset. But that's beside the point. Or—is it that you don't want me, after all? Did I misread—"
"Alexia."
She turned her head aside, groping for her jacket on the peg. Jack wasn't sure his feet touched the floor as he reached her, pulling her hand back from the jacket to pin her wrist against the wall. He caught her chin in his other hand and tilted her face up. "Don't. Don't go. Don't talk. Don't ever think I don't want you."
The makings of omelets were forgotten as he stared down into her eyes.
She didn't talk, but she reached for the light switch and turned off the harsh overhead fixture, leaving them in the gauzy blue-white and salmon glow through the sheers. It was as close to the romance of moonlight as they were likely to find in a Camden alley. The dim light allowed him to forget the starkness of the little room, and as Lexie continued to look up at him, he pulled her wrist away from the wall and drew her arm around his neck. This brought their bodies into full contact, and for a moment he pressed his face into the soft, floppy curls of her hair and simply breathed. Then he ran his hand down her arm, bunching the sleeve of her top and feeling her skin.
"Be sure," he whispered into her ear. "I will walk away right now if you're not sure, but in a few minutes that offer will be firmly rescinded."
For answer she put a finger on his lips, shushing him. Her lips took the place of her finger, and her fingers slid up into his hair. This time it was Jack who kept his eyes open, and he watched her heavy lids sink, dark lashes a trembling, blurred shadow on her cheeks. The image of her beneath him in the bed flashed into his mind, and his hands shook as he wrested her top from the waistband of her skirt.
That skirt, dear heaven. How her skirts drove him insane. She was so feminine, and yet all business every single day at the bookstore. Now here she was, mouth parted and hungry, seeking, finding, exploring until his body burned with want. His hands slid down her back to her buttocks and snugged her hips against him, getting one hand under that skirt and lifting her thigh. She gave a small moan and complied, bringing her knee up the outside of his jeans and letting him take her weight in his hands. He swayed with her, bending her backwards to kiss her, dancing dirty there in the impersonal, anonymous room.
Behind his eyes his brain was ablaze with a thousand sensations, sights and sounds he had experienced elsewhere, all the tension of his arousal bringing to fresh life the memories of gunshots and artillery, hurricane winds, the fury of forest fires and stinging rain. It was all there tangling with the taste and smell of Lexie, the urgency he felt driving rational thought from his mind. He could not explain why kissing her felt as dangerous as riding in the back of a pickup down a logging road, fire rampaging through the treetops, hanging on for dear life with one hand and trying to keep the camera focused on the burning monster above while praying no fiery limbs skewered him.
When his palm found the warmth of her bare breast after pushing her bra aside, he stopped trying to explain it to himself, and simply accepted the fact of the danger, the force of nature, that was his need for Lexie. His hands were swift and sure as they pulled away one piece of her clothing after another. His feet—suddenly bare—found the way to the bed and brought her with him. He dimly registered the trail of clothing on the floor, but the heated urgency of Lexie's fingers as they pushed inside the waistband of his briefs flared full and bright in his consciousness.
There were no words, but no words were needed. That was good, because Jack was too busy chasing her mouth and throat with his lips to find adequate vocabulary for the softness, the sweetness, the heat and the hunger.
At the side of the bed, he yanked back the blanket and sheet. Lexie sat, her breasts as high and full as he'd imagined them, nipples so hard they cast sharp-edged shadows on the wall. She watched as he fumbled in the top dresser drawer for the condom, then took the packet from him and tore away one edge. He sucked in a harsh breath when she grasped hold of his erection. The rubber was chilly for an instant at the head of his cock, bringing goosebumps to his skin. Then her swift fingers rolled it down, and she fell back on the bed, drawing his hand to where he most wanted it to be. She was slippery silk on his fingers, warmer than anything he'd ever touched, electric and alive.
Jack stretched at her side on the bed, wishing it were softer or at least less noisy. The mattress wasn't all that thin, but it lay atop a wooden frame that creaked with every movement. He studied the expressions on her face as his fingers moved slowly, gently, between her legs. He knew when a particular touch ratcheted up the tension in her body and made her bite her lower lip. A low-pitched groan escaped her, her eyes closed, and her knees fell open and drew up. The glow from the lights outside changed her skin to a gleaming, pearly pink-blue, and frosted her soft, dark curls. Her hands flailed for a moment as her back bowed upward, then she found his biceps and held on while she trembled and gasped again, helpless in her pleasure. At the sight of her, climaxing there at the touch of his hand, a feeling of sexual power thrummed through Jack, culminating at his groin and hardening him even more.
He settled between her thighs as her trembling stilled. She opened her eyes and looked up at him with a half-sated smile. Her eyes were dark in the low light, not the rich blue he was used to seeing, but they gazed at him knowingly. He waited, poised there, making sure this was still what she wanted, though he knew if she stopped him now he would explode from the disappointment.
Lexie folded first one leg around his waist and buttocks, then the other. Jack, propped on his extended arms, lowered his pelvis and found her there. It was perfect in the way that first sex never was—no fumbling, no awkward nudges trying to find the right place, the right angle. He slid home, welcomed into her body with a sweet undulation of her hips and a tightening of her legs to lock him against her, and after that there was only sensation, hot and sweet, wordless and deep as dreams
.
Each slow stroke made Lexie toss her head and arch her neck. Jack gritted his teeth to keep his pace deliberate and measured, letting sensation build as gradually as he could. He wanted to make the sex last, push the day's misery away from Lexie. She was snug around him and getting tighter. He learned her path to pleasure, found an angle that seemed to work best, leaving her trembling and crying out.
Her climax stole upon her and took her by surprise—he watched her mouth drop open, lips quivering, eyelids lowering to half-mast as if she were seeing something inside herself. Her nails pricked the skin at his hips and back. A long wail of satisfaction came from her throat, and with it, Jack's own climax burst through his control. He thrust hard into her and picked up the pace until she ground against him, rocking and helpless with the pleasure he gave her. They clung together, shuddering and taut. The aftermath left them boneless and limp. Jack wanted to stay joined with her, but instead he withdrew slowly to deal with the condom before returning to spoon with her in the creaking bed.
Neither of them spoke.
Sleep took Lexie almost immediately. Jack lay listening to her breathing, his hand spread over her ribcage, his mouth against her bare shoulder. He slid into sleep himself without even knowing he was drowsy.
When the nightmare came later, he woke them both with his hoarse shouts. Lexie sat up behind him, pulling him into the bed from where he had half scrambled out of the blankets, dreaming of fire and the smell of gasoline and cordite and a gaping gut-wound in which a hurricane twirled redly. She stroked his sweaty hair from his forehead and frowned.
"Bad dream?" was all she said, and when he nodded, trying to steady his breathing and rid himself of the skin-crawling terror, she cuddled in close and pulled the blanket up over them. Her arm stretched across his chest, and for a while he dozed fitfully, angry that he'd embarrassed himself by shouting out his fear. He half-woke twice, and both times she was already there, eyes open, her chin propped on her hand where it lay open on his chest, her earnest gaze fixed on his. The third time he woke, grunting and still feeling the after-effects of the bad dream, Lexie slid a hand down his chest to his belly, and then farther.