by Amy Andrews
‘Fran—’
They were interrupted by the door being opened in their faces, forcing them to step away quickly from each other to avoid injury. Glenda did a double-take and then eyed them suspiciously. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t realise you guys were in here.’
‘No problem,’ said David, moving back behind his desk. ‘Is there anything in particular you wanted?’
‘I just wanted to grab a textbook,’ she said, assessing Fran’s pink cheeks. Fran hadn’t had pink cheeks the entire time she had known her. Sure, she wasn’t so pale these days but…something had been going on!
‘I’ll leave you to it,’ said Fran, and beat a hasty retreat. Now the kiss was over her heart was hammering a frantic tattoo. Oh, dear, what was happening? This wasn’t good. It wasn’t good. The first time he had kissed her even though she’d been confused she’d known she hadn’t been ready, but now? Months later? It didn’t seem so preposterous.
She was distracted from her careening thoughts by Fonzie, who barked at her. That was odd, Fonzie never barked inside. ‘Shh, boy,’ she chided gently, getting down on her haunches and giving him a pat. He didn’t drop to the floor and roll on his back like he usually did and she wondered what was wrong. He barked at her again and trotted away.
She followed him because her gut said something was wrong. He picked up the pace periodically looking back at her to check if she was still coming. He disappeared into the lounge and Fran walked in after him.
When she arrived a few seconds later he was sitting at Ethel’s feet, wagging his tail and barking noisily. Luckily everyone else had vacated the room now the soap had finished.
‘What’s up, boy?’ she asked, and knelt in front of Ethel, displacing him slightly. ‘Shh,’ she said, looking down at him. ‘You’ll wake her up.’
Fran looked at Ethel, wondering how on earth she could sleep through the racket. OK, he was a puppy and he had puppy barks, but still…
Then she didn’t have to wonder any more. Ethel wasn’t rubbing worriedly at her handbag, she was still, her eyes closed. She looked asleep, her worried, lined face relaxed and peaceful. Fran felt a block of emotion well in her chest as she grabbed Ethel’s wrinkled old hand and felt for a pulse. The skin was crinkled at the knuckles and was soft but it felt cold and Fran couldn’t feel a pulse. She checked the carotid artery as tears welled in her eyes.
‘Oh, Ethel, no,’ she whispered, and looked down at Fonzie as tears spilled down her face and he whined at her. She scratched behind his ears and he looked at her with a kind of perplexed look on his face. ‘I know, boy, she’s gone. Ethel doesn’t have to worry about her kids any more.’
Fran left Fonzie sitting at Ethel’s feet and shut the door to the lounge. She took deep cleansing breaths as she made her way to David’s office, afraid that the crush of emotion in her chest would bubble out uncontrollably and she’d falter and crumble before she reached her destination.
Glenda and David were still deep in conversation when Fran knocked and David’s voice bade her enter. His quick easy smile died at her distressed look.
‘Fran, what’s happened?’ He stood because he hadn’t seen her look this wretched since she’d first arrived in Ashworth Bay.
Glenda pulled out a chair and Fran sank gratefully into it. ‘Ethel’s dead,’ she said quietly, and battled the urge to let her face crumple and allow the threatening sobs a blessed release. She worked in a nursing home. People died. Even favourites.
Glenda looked at David. Neither of them were surprised but it was still sad when a resident died. ‘You go and see her,’ said Glenda above Fran’s head as she wrapped her arms around Fran’s shoulders and hugged her tight. ‘I’ll stay here.’
No, he wanted to say. You go. I’ll comfort her. He wanted to be the one to hold her, to comfort her. Damn it! Fran needed this now like a hole in the head. She seemed to be finally starting the long journey back to living. Having to face another loss of someone she’d grown close to just wasn’t fair.
But Glenda was right. He had official things to do. Declarations, phone calls and certificates. ‘Is she still in the lounge?’ he asked quietly.
Fran nodded and he came round the desk, knelt beside her and squeezed her hand. He noticed how cold it was before she quickly withdrew it, her face taut with unshed tears. He glanced at Glenda and she nodded at him to go.
He came back a few minutes later with a forlorn-looking Fonzie. Glenda moved and he plonked the black puppy in Fran’s lap. She automatically stroked his thick coat, hugging him to her, and Fonzie licked her face.
‘Why don’t you go home, Fran?’ suggested Glenda. ‘There’s only another half hour anyway.’ Glenda looked at David for approval of his suggestion and he nodded at her.
‘Good idea, Fran. Take Fonzie home. I’ll call in on you later.’
She didn’t argue with him. It was taking all her willpower to keep herself together. She drove straight home. The waves were calling her as she alighted from the car and she and Fonzie went directly to the beach. It was overcast, big dark clouds rolled in from the ocean, and Fran wondered if they were going to get some rain. The wind was quite cool and the brooding conditions shortened the time of available daylight.
Either Fonzie sensed something was up or was sad about Ethel, too, because for the first time he stuck close, rather than dashing about like a mad thing. He flopped on his stomach beside her, his arms and legs outstretched, his head between his front paws resting on the sand. They watched the flow and ebb of the waves that crashed in big rolling dumps against the beach. The sea was unsettled, white foam capping the choppy peaks, reflecting Fran’s mood perfectly.
The wind picked up a notch as visibility worsened and the first sprinkle of rain chilled Fran’s skin further. The sand beneath her felt cold and damp. Still she sat in the drizzle listening to the pounding rhythm of the sea, fighting back the emotion that roared like the waves inside her.
David found them there in the last dying light of the day, wet and shivering.
‘Fran,’ he whispered, crouching beside her.
She heard him but his voice sounded far away and she daren’t stop concentrating on the rhythm of the waves because it was the only thing keeping her together.
David felt how cold she was and Fonzie whimpered at him, obviously concerned about his mistress. ‘Fran,’ he said firmly, and shook her shoulder. ‘Come on, we’re going back to the house.’
Fran turned to him then, his voice breaking into the almost hypnotic state she’d been in. ‘I’m cold,’ she said, her teeth chattering.
He picked her up in his arms and she huddled in the shelter of his warm body, absorbing his body heat gratefully. Fonzie followed them up the beach and straight into David’s house. He wrapped a rug around her shoulders and sat her on a big old comfortable leather chair in front of the fireplace. He got a fire going until it roared around the room almost as loudly as the waves on the beach. Fonzie plonked himself near the hearth and promptly went to sleep.
David made her a cup of sweet milky tea and held it out for her to take. She was staring at the fire and he knew she was like a dam wall ready to burst. Her fingers accepted the hot drink and he watched her wrap her chilled hands around the mug and draw it close to her chest.
She shivered and David saw her pain and grief in the slump of her shoulders and the shine of unshed tears in her blue eyes. Her hair was damp, hanging scraggily in dark, limp strips around her face.
They sat in silence for a while and drank their tea. David sat on the Persian rug on the floor beside her chair and when he’d finished his drink he put his cup on the coffee-table beside the chair.
He turned to her, sitting on his haunches in front of her. He noticed she’d barely touched her drink. ‘You know you can let it out, Fran. It’s just me.’
She shook her head from side to side, continuing her hypnotic gaze at the fire. ‘I can’t’ she whispered.
‘Yes, you can,’ he said gently. ‘I don’t mind.’
Fran
switched her gaze from the fire to his earnest face. ‘I’m afraid I won’t be able to stop.’
Her big blue eyes were large with fear. He prised the mug away from her stiff fingers and took both of her hands in his, rubbing them gently. ‘Would that be such a bad thing?’
‘I don’t want to feel this way again.’
He nodded and brought her hands to his mouth and kissed each one gently. She was reminded of the fleeting kiss he had given her earlier that day.
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I know.’
And Fran realised that he did know. He knew the gut-wrenching depths of grief and the first flutterings of hope as you began to see your way out of it. He knew how stepping back into the dark was too frightening for words.
She started to become aware of David’s thumbs rubbing rhythmically against the skin of her hands. Her nipples hardened and her skin broke out in goose-bumps even though she was now actually quite warm. She shrugged off the rug he had put around her shoulders.
It had been a long time since she’d felt any reaction to a man. Jeremy had tried to reach out to her physically after Daisy’s death. He had been grieving, too, and had needed solace and comfort. But she hadn’t been emotionally equipped to give it to him. She had been too blind-sided by her own grief to give even a moment’s thought to his needs. So he’d stopped trying and had let her push him away and it had been the beginning of the end.
She looked at David’s beautiful long fingers, the nails clean and clipped short, the skin lightly tanned. She wondered what it would feel like to have them stroking other places. Touching, caressing, exploring. She shivered at the direction of her thoughts. For goodness’ sake, the ink was hardly dry on her divorce papers.
But as the silence between them stretched, the need to just forget that day’s unexpected whammy intensified. Forget about Ethel. Feel something other than the sadness. Feel alive deep inside instead of dead. Feel pleasure and desire instead of grief and loss.
The memory of their first kiss, months ago, in this very house returned. He had been patient and OK with crawling alongside her at her snail’s pace but she had always known he desired her, wanted her. The thought was tantalisingly attractive and she heard her breath roughen and felt her lips part in anticipation.
David felt the change almost as soon as it happened. The silence between them became charged rather than companionable. He felt himself start to harden as her breathing stuttered and he felt the slight tremble of her hands. She looked directly at him, her eyes asking the question.
‘David?’ she said, her voice husky.
‘No, Fran,’ he said, his fingers stopping their caress. ‘I don’t think this is a good idea.’
‘Please, David,’ she whispered, ‘kiss me. Help me feel something other than this horrible void.’
David felt his stomach lurch at her request. He shut his eyes. God knew, he wanted to. He sighed as he opened them again. Fran had moved closer, her face, her lips temptingly close.
‘David,’ she groaned.
He felt her warm breath on his face and when her lips pressed lightly against his he knew he didn’t want to say no any more. Couldn’t say no any more.
He opened his mouth and deepened the kiss. Her little sigh of satisfaction went straight to his groin and he ached suddenly to be inside her.
Still he took it slow. He kissed her, long, slow, deep, explorative kisses as his fingers stroked her hair and her face and the back of her neck. They came to rest against her thighs as she opened her legs so he could position himself between them. He gently stroked the skin there, inching the material of her uniform slowly upwards.
Fran felt as if she was drowning in sensation. His kisses were making her hot and she didn’t ever want him to stop. She pressed her lips against him harder, accepted his tongue into her mouth deeper. She wanted it all, everything he could give her. At last she was feeling something stronger, more potent than her grief.
His fingers as they stroked and swirled in gentle circles on her bare flesh were causing a tingling between her legs that she welcomed greedily. He was making her ready and she felt as if she would surely self-combust if he didn’t touch her there soon.
He broke away from her lips and Fran mewed her disappointment. ‘Hush,’ he whispered against her lips as he rose from his knees and gently pulled her upright with him, their bodies pressed intimately together. Fran felt his hardness pushing into her belly and the tingle between her legs intensified.
He stroked her face, pushing escaped tendrils of hair behind her ear, and gave her another slow, scorching kiss. She clung to his damp shirt, her knees almost buckling. Every time she thought she couldn’t take another kiss without begging him to take her, his lips would move slowly, languidly against hers again and she wanted it go on for ever.
He broke away and stepped back slightly. He wanted to take it real slow. Make it easy and gentle, soothing to her battered soul. There would be plenty of time for frenzy. Right now, she needed a little tenderness.
Fran watched him through feverish eyes and wondered what he was doing. He was staring at her, his eyes roving over every inch of her body. She felt her nipples stiffen under his scrutiny and her breath catch at his blatant male appreciation.
He reached out and slowly undid the front zipper of her uniform. He used his two index fingers to push the dress up and off her shoulders and she shivered at his light touch on her skin. The garment fell to the floor and she stepped out of it.
She stayed very still as he walked slowly around her body, trailing his fingers around her middle as he went. She felt her abdominal muscles contract in turn as the fleeting touch of his fingers stimulated a response. He came back to stand in front of her and slowly knelt, pressing his face into her stomach and circling his arms around her, pulling her close.
Fran ran her fingers through his hair. He looked up at her and smiled. ‘You are so beautiful,’ he said in a low husky voice. He kissed her stomach and ran his tongue around her navel, dipping into it. She sucked in a harsh breath and her hand clenched a handful of his hair involuntarily.
He unclipped her bra and it fell down her arms. She tossed it away. He stroked the swell of her breasts with his long fingers, and smiled as her nipples stiffened beneath his touch. He raised himself higher and sucked one deep into his hot, wet mouth. Fran called his name out loud because it was so sweetly erotic she thought she was going to climax from that alone.
He rose slowly to his feet, releasing one breast and quickly claiming the other. Fran stretched her neck back and let her head loll as pleasure washed over her. He kissed his way up her neck, freeing her breasts from their sweet torture, and found her mouth again.
David thought he was going to explode at any second. Things were getting painfully tight in his trousers and he knew it was time to lay her in front of the fire and love her like she’d asked him to. He pulled away and felt a surge of pleasure at the drugged glaze to her eyes and her mournful ‘No’.
‘It’s OK,’ he whispered, and gave her another deep kiss. ‘I’m just getting undressed.’
She nodded and swayed slightly as he let her go to do just that. He was very beautiful. His body was lean, his muscles nicely toned, perfectly delineated. He had the body of a distance athlete, the muscle fibres long and fine, not bulky like an iron-pumping gym junkie.
His erection stood out proudly and she liked it that he wasn’t embarrassed by his nakedness or state of arousal. She put out her hand and traced the outline of his abdominal muscles and watched his erection twitch and bounce at each stroke of her fingers.
‘Fran,’ he growled in a low, deep voice, taking her hand and slowly lowering them to their knees. He kissed her, long and deep and slow, pushing her gently backwards until she was lying on the rug. He took a moment to look at her, the fire casting a warm orange glow across her pale skin.
He kissed her then—everywhere. Slowly and thoroughly.
And it was inevitable that the release that had been building slowly and sur
ely since she’d first kissed him would arrive quickly and be all-consuming. As his hardness stretched and filled her and he ever so gently pulled out and re-entered, she orgasmed within seconds so intensely that it tipped him over the edge also.
They clung to each other as their bodies shuddered and surrendered to the flux of sensations. David could hear her crying out his name and he responded with hers, his face pressed into her neck as the last waves undulated through him.
Fran felt the damn walls burst as her climax broke over her. A jolt of intense pleasure swept through her, building and building until it erupted into a potent inferno of suppressed sexuality and sorrow. Every part of her was laid bare and in the moment of her most intense pleasure the floodgates to her grief were opened too and she wept.
She cried out in pleasure and pain, sobbing as she came down from the high. The tears that she hadn’t allowed for Ethel earlier that day found their release. And tears also for Jeremy and Daisy and Jenny and all the things that were unfair in life. And for herself, too. Because, for a brief moment, she’d actually felt something other than her grief and it had felt wonderful.
CHAPTER SIX
DAVID DIDN’T MOVE but held Fran cocooned against him as her body heaved with the sobs that consumed her. Not even the crackling of the fire could be heard over her gut-wrenching cries. Her intense sexual release had obviously been the key to her built-up emotions.
He gently eased himself off her a while later when she moved under him, realising that he must be heavy on her slight frame. He gathered her close to his chest and stroked her hair as her sorrow slowly abated.
Fran took some deep breaths as the last of her tears dried up. She felt completely exhausted. Like she’d been put through a wringer. From the dizzy, intensely passionate heights of making love with David to the shock of her uncontrollable outpouring of emotion.