by Arlene James
She crossed her legs and shifted slightly away from him. He crossed his own legs and leaned with her. She took a deep breath, shrugging lightly in an attempt to dislodge his hand. He slid his fingertips along her collarbone and up her neck to rest, comfortably splayed, against the curve of her jaw and the sensitive skin below and behind her ear. She imagined he could feel the beat of her pulse, the swift, erratic rush of blood through her veins, that he knew how deeply she was affected by his seemingly casual touch. She wondered if he was taunting her or simply bent on seduction. She knew he had been celibate since they’d been married, probably since Nathan had died, and Parker Sugarman was not a man resigned to celibacy. Nathan had told her once, only half kiddingly, that Parker slept with a different woman every night of the week, and she didn’t doubt it. She didn’t, at that moment, doubt it a bit.
When the movie was over, she was relieved beyond words, wanting only to get out of there and put some distance between them. Unfortunately, the whole darned audience seemed of the same mind, and whoever was at the end of their row didn’t seem inclined to push out into the stream of those rushing for the exits. They were forced to stand between the rows of seats, shuffling their feet in place, waiting for a chance to move. While they did so, Parker rested one hand in the curve of Kendra’s waist and the other on her shoulder, his fingers again resting inside the edge of her wide, ribbed collar. He stepped up close, his chest to her back, and held her against him. His touch was light, caressing and amazingly possessive. It was all she could do not to lay her head back on his shoulder and turn her mouth to his. Finally they began inching forward, and a few seconds later stepped out into the aisle and turned toward the exits. The traffic was lighter now, people strolling rather than pushing and rushing, but Parker took her hand and pulled ahead of her, tugging her behind him as he wove his way through the remaining crowd with unseemly haste.
They reached the corridor, but instead of slowing his pace, Parker picked it up. By the time they made the lobby, they were practically running. He paused and threw her coat over her shoulders, then grabbed her hand and yanked her out onto the sidewalk. Trotting now, he headed down the block toward the car. Within moments, Kendra was winded, the lusty pull on her senses and the pell-mell flight combining to rob her of breath. She called a halt, feeling her toes slide forward in her shoes as she dug her feet in.
“Parker—” she gasped.
He swung back, the expression on his face intense, almost pained. With a muttered curse, he clamped a hand on her arm just above the elbow and pulled her forward. An instant later, he shoved her sideways. She turned slightly, stunned, and he pushed her backward into the dark shadows of a recessed door. She felt the cold, smooth, hardness of polished granite at her back, and then he engulfed her, his hands in her hair, tilting her face, his mouth possessing hers, his body pressing her against the stone. He held her head tightly to his as if fearing she would pull away, and plunged his tongue into her mouth. Her hands were on his shoulders. She could feel him trembling. She could feel the desperate need driving him to plunder. She pushed her hands up and slid them about his neck.
He groaned and relaxed, loosening his hold. His mouth slid from hers and fixed itself just below the curve of her jaw, where his fingertips had rested earlier. “Kendra, you’re making me crazy.” He breathed the hot words against the sensitive skin of her throat, his nose nuzzling her. “I’m losing my mind, wanting you, needing you. It wasn’t supposed to be this way! Damn you, it wasn’t supposed to be this—”
His mouth covered hers again, wet and seeking. He pressed against her, thrusting his hips forward, grinding against her. His hands dropped to her sides, and she felt him gathering great handfuls of her dress, tugging the skirt higher and higher until he could push himself between her legs. One hand slipped under her thigh. Stocking slick, it seemed to shape itself to his hand, then raised effortlessly at his prodding. He slid his hand down her leg, guiding it around him, tucking her foot between his thighs just above the backs of his knees. He thrust against her hot core. Mindlessly, she wound her arms around his neck and hung on for dear life, great waves of desire racking her. His tongue imitated his action, stroking in and out of her mouth, delving deeper and deeper, opening her for his exploration. Automatically, she shaped her mouth to fit his, undulating her own tongue beneath it. His hand slid up her leg and to the inside of her thigh.
When his fingers first touched her there, a jolt of electricity shot through her, followed by moist, white-hot heat. He stroked her, much as he’d stroked her wrist, through her panties and hose. Her head fell back, and she cried out mindlessly, lights flashing behind her closed eyes. He kissed her cheek, her ear, the curve of her shoulder.
“Go wild for me,” he said, trapping his hand between them as he thrust against her. “Go wild for me, baby, please.” His voice was husky, shaking. His hand closed over her breast, squeezing rhythmically as his other hand stroked, and he thrust against her.
She kneaded his back and shoulders, head thrashing side to side, a pressure building in her. “Parker!”
“Yes, love.”
“Parker! Oh...!”
He seized her mouth with his, inhaled her breath, gave her his own, grinding his palm and hips against her. She closed her hands in his jacket, twisting the fabric as the lights flashed and the pressure within her exploded and radiated. The waves swept through her, each smaller than the last, until she was utterly drained, emptied of all but a lazy warmth. He pressed against her, pulling at her mouth, supporting her with his body. Gradually, little by little, he pulled away from her, his hands traveling up her body to her face. He cupped it gently, his fingers splayed against the sides of her head. She covered them with her own as he sweetly plied her mouth, tongue sweeping its moist cavern and slowly retreating. At last he broke the contact completely, rocking back on his heels. She leaned into him, her head bowed, cheeks flooding with heated color. His arms came around her. He rubbed his chin against the top of her head. She could feel him shuddering still and wrapped her arms around his waist.
“If I survive this,” he told her, chuckling, “it will be a damned miracle.”
She turned her cheek against his chest. “I’m sorry.”
He took a deep breath and pushed it out again. “I’m not.” He dropped a kiss into her hair. “Let’s get our kid and go home.”
She nodded, not wanting to move, not wanting to face what waited for them. He stepped back and turned her within the clasp of his arm, his motions a little awkward, a little stiff. She knew he was far from sated, struggling for control. He seemed to steel himself then stepped out of the shadows and turned down the sidewalk. There were only a few cars left in the parking lot. The silver coupe sat alone beneath a street lamp. He unlocked the door and held her arm as she bent and stepped inside. He didn’t look at her when he got into the car, didn’t speak, just started up and pulled away, tires squealing against the cold pavement. They seemed to fly, catching all the green lights, silent in the night. She closed her eyes, too exhausted to think or even feel. When they pulled up in front of her father’s house, Parker put the transmission into Park but left the engine running.
“Wait here,” he said, and got out of the car.
Long minutes passed, during which Kendra did not lift her head or open her eyes. She began to remember, to relive what had happened in that darkened doorway. Had people walked past them on the sidewalk? Had they snickered behind their hands or moved on into the night, oblivious? Had they heard her cries of ecstasy, peered startled into the black shadows? Shame washed through her. Her face and neck and even her breasts burned with embarrassment. By the time Parker came with the baby and as much of her gear as he could carry, Kendra had entered into the lowest depth of self-loathing and blame. How could she have let him do that? How could she have come to climax there in the shadows, clinging to him, mindlessly allowing her body a response she had not even dreamed was possible? She felt ill, physically nauseated.
When he got ba
ck into the car, the baby safely belted into her seat, Kendra turned her face away. She felt him staring at her, felt him silently pleading for a look, a sign of acceptance, anything. She couldn’t give it to him.
They drove home in silence, more slowly than before, almost ponderously, it seemed to her. Parker turned the car into the alley, the lights bouncing off poles and fences, trash cans and pavement. He shut off the lights as the car rolled into the garage and came to a halt. Kendra pulled her coat closed with one hand and groped for the door handle with the other. Suddenly Parker’s shot out and clasped the back of her neck. He pulled her toward him, leaning close.
“Don’t let’s sleep alone tonight,” he said huskily. “Please, not tonight.”
She fixed her gaze on the steering wheel, eyes and throat burning, and shook her head. “I can’t!”
His hand tightened on the steering wheel. “Can’t? We’re married, and you can’t? You want it just as badly as I do, and you can’t? What are you afraid of, Kendra? That it’ll feel so good you’ll want it more and more, again and again?”
She closed her eyes. “Don’t...oh, don’t!”
“Don’t?” he echoed roughly. “You didn’t say don’t back there in the shadows, Ken. You didn’t say don’t then!”
“Stop it!”
“Just let me love you. Just let me inside you and—”
“Stop it!” She spoke more sharply, more loudly, than she’d intended. The baby made a tiny sound of surprise and gathered breath for a wavering cry.
Parker dropped his hand from the back of her head and slammed it against the steering wheel. “Damn!”
Kendra recoiled, shrinking away from him. The baby wailed and sobbed brokenly. Parker yanked his keys from the ignition and tossed them into her lap.
“Take the baby into the house,” he groaned out. “I said take the baby into the house!”
She grabbed the keys and yanked the door open. She leapt out and slammed it shut, took one step and yanked the back door open. She gathered up the baby as quickly as she could with shaking hands and limbs, left the bag and backed away from the car.
“Lock your damned door!” he told her harshly. “I mean it, Kendra. Lock it!”
She turned and ran for the house, the baby’s cries muffled against her shoulder. She could hear him cursing, hear the blunt sounds of his fists as they hit the steering wheel. She fumbled the key into the lock, somehow got the door opened and got herself and the baby up and through it. Cradling the baby against her, she stumbled down the hall and turned onto the gallery. She blundered into the darkened bedroom and collapsed on the end of the bed, rocking the baby, jabbering senselessly. The baby thrust her fingers into her mouth, turned her wet face into Kendra’s chest, snuffled and quieted. Kendra held her and rocked her until she was sure that she slept, then lifted her tiredly into the crib.
With trembling fingers, she unzipped the blanket sleeper to check her diaper, found it dry and sagged with relief. After a moment, she zipped the sleeper up again, then pulled the blankets from the crib and dropped them on the floor. Only then did she stumble to the door, close it and lean against it. Her hand pressed to her mouth as the tears fell and the sobs began. She put her head down and tried to stifle the sounds. After a long while, she moved to the bed and fell against it, but she did not lock that door. She would not lock that door. If he came to her, she would throw her arms around him in welcome. She would love him with every fiber of her being, every cell of her body.
It was what she longed to do, what she needed to do, despite the danger. He would break her heart. She knew that as she knew her own anguish. He would make love to her with his knowing touch and his expert ways. He would take her to paradise, fill her with passion, drain her with pleasure. He would make love to her, but he would not love her, and she would die. She would simply die. But she couldn’t lock him out. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t lock him out. He got in with a smile, a soft word, a stroke of his fingertips. He undid all her careful defenses with a look, an insinuation, a kindness.
She sobbed into the pillow, hoping he would come, praying he would come, terrified he would come. After a very long time, the tears stopped. She heard the baby sigh in her sleep, heard the tick of a clock somewhere, heard the central heating unit cycle on and then off again. She heard the rustle of the bushes beneath the window, the faint whistle of wind as it rounded the corner of the house. She heard traffic far away on Central Expressway or maybe Preston Road. She heard a thousand sounds, and none of them were those of Parker entering the house. She listened until sleep stole sound away.
Then, somewhere in the night, dimly, a baby cried. Darla. She struggled toward consciousness, her body drifting upward ahead of her mind. She tried to say that she was coming. Her arms and legs felt like lead weights, but she made them move, dreamlike, the distances and effort required to gain them distorted by the deep-water aura of exhaustion. Her eyes wouldn’t open, and when she tried to make them, tears leaked out. Then there were other hands pushing her down, another voice telling her to stop, to wait. She sighed, and her mind seemed to jump ahead. The baby needed her. It was her turn, her night. Darla would be frightened, wondering why someone didn’t come. Did babies wonder, or were their fears nameless, thoughtless voids of sheer panic? As if in answer, someone said that it was all right, and it was because, miraculously, the baby had stopped crying. A dream, Kendra thought, a bad, bad dream. No, that wasn’t right. It must have been Parker, dear, dear Parker, whom she loved, whom she couldn’t love. She was sure of it a moment later when she felt his arms about her, lifting her.
“Parker,” she said.
He told her to shut up. She was going to the other bedroom. He would take care of the baby.
“Sleeping,” she mumbled. If he replied, she didn’t hear it, but somehow she thought the baby must be sleeping. That wasn’t the important thing, though. He had come, and somehow she had to make him understand. Nothing was more important than that he understand. She tried to lift her head, but only her eyelids would move. Her gaze drifted painfully over floating walls and columns and lights until it found his face. He needed a shave. His jaw looked hard as steel beneath the shadow of his beard.
“Parker,” she said. He seemed not to hear, but she couldn’t stop the words, even though they were slurred and garbled. “It’s because I have to leave. Six months, and I have to go. I couldn’t bear it. I couldn’t bear it if it was good.”
His nostrils flared. A muscle worked in the hollow of his jaw. “I know,” he said. It came again on a sigh. “I know.”
She closed her eyes and felt the bed undulate gently beneath her, felt cool, cool sheets. It was heaven, and it was agony. She wanted to tell him that she would bear it anyway, that not having him was too hard, too painful. She wanted to tell him that he was her husband, that in her heart he would always be her husband. But the deep, warm waters were closing over her, and she couldn’t find him. She was adrift, alone. Lost. All lost.
Chapter Ten
She hadn’t locked the door.
Parker put down his mechanical pencil, hooked his elbows on the rim of the tilted board and bowed his head. She hadn’t locked the door, but she was still going.
Six months, and not a day longer.
It had seemed like such a long time, all the time in the world. It had seemed that way, and now... He straightened and looked down at the little mischief-maker in her playpen. Somehow he couldn’t seem to get any work done unless she was sleeping or right here with him, and even then it was a pretty iffy situation. She was up on all fours, urrring like a motorcar, swaying back and forth as if building momentum for that first real gain of ground. She’d get it figured out pretty soon, and then he wouldn’t dare put her down without first throwing up barricades and stashing away everything she could possibly lift, reach or knock over. As it was he spent all his time wiping her chin and taking things out of her mouth or putting them in, that or changing her diaper, and from the smell of things, it was time
to repeat that one now.
He got down off the tall chair, bent and lifted her, his hands under her arms. She threw her head back and squealed, her fist going straight to her mouth to be slurped and smeared. She had seemed so sick that night after the movie that he’d called the doctor. Gas, he’d said, a hot water bottle for her tummy, liquid analgesic, and call him on Monday. When Kendra had awakened that Sunday morning to find them on the couch, Darla asleep on his chest, she’d been angry beyond any reason. It had been her night, she’d insisted, but he’d listened to Darla scream for long seconds before he’d gone in to find Kendra trying to get up, eyes swollen, tears still in her eyes.
He’d quieted the baby momentarily and carried Kendra to his bed so she could get some real rest, but she must have thought he’d still had other things in mind because she’d roused enough to tell him again that she couldn’t make love with him. She was going to leave him when the six months were up, and apparently nothing he could say or do would change that, certainly nothing he’d come up with in the two weeks since. He had to laugh when he remembered that he’d married her because she wasn’t in love with him. He had to laugh, but he wanted to cry, only he had no right to the tears.
He popped Darla into her crib. He’d had to lower the mattress a few days ago when she’d started trying to pull up on things, so he had to put the side down now in order to change the diaper. She flopped over on her belly the instant she hit the sheet and reared up on all fours.
“Lay down, scamp,” he told her, gathering the things he’d need from the bedside table.