by Fiona Zedde
“Come. I’m out on the deck.”
What could Rémi do but follow?
“You have to know that you look amazing in that,” she said.
“Of course. I didn’t buy it for warmth.”
The deck flickered with candles. All along the railing and on the low table with its glass of white wine, a small electric lamp, and two uneven stacks of papers. Student papers. Among the flames, Claudia glowed, an iridescent butterfly against the backdrop of the deep green woods surrounding her house on all sides.
She glanced back over her shoulder at Rémi. “Because of your party—” Her mouth, a pretty red bow, opened and closed around the words as Rémi watched. “I didn’t think you’d come.”
“The party is still going on. I just wanted to see you.”
“So now you’ve seen me.” A smile teased her mouth again.
Rémi shrugged off her leather jacket—it scraped her sensitized skin like a cool tongue—and dropped it on the ground behind her. “And now I really, really want to touch.”
Claudia came into her arms like she was meant to be there. No teasing, no coyness. Just her mouth, a hot spark, against Rémi’s.
“I’m so glad you came.”
“Hmm.” Rémi chuckled. “I haven’t come yet, but I was hoping you could help me out with that.”
“Of course. Anything I can do to be of assistance.”
In the aftermath of their kisses, Claudia pushed her into a lawn chair. She crouched over Rémi, quickly unbuckled her pants with its obvious bulge.
“I love it when my darling comes prepared.” She pulled down Rémi’s pants, jerking the denim roughly down her legs. “I’ve been preparing myself for you too.” Biting her lip, she took Rémi’s hand and pushed it under her gown and against her pussy. It was already wet, the curls soaked together and viscous with more than just her excitement from seeing Rémi. Claudia had been touching herself. “I’ve been thinking about you.”
A groan quivered through Rémi’s body. She imagined Claudia touching herself, sprawled on the deck, legs wide open for anyone to see. The vision set her thoughts aflame. Claudia’s nipples scored the thin material of her gown, pressing against it to tempt Rémi’s mouth. Rémi licked the cloth, gasped at the feel of silk over flesh and her lover’s hands tearing away her shirt.
“My darling.” Claudia grabbed the dick in her fist and crouched, slowly lowered herself, her hot and wet pussy, onto it. Her weight against Rémi’s clit was miraculous.
“I love you.” Rémi hissed the words between her teeth, eyes full of Claudia. The pretty breasts under the silk, her snaking weight pressing against the fire in Rémi’s lap.
“Faster,” she begged.
But Claudia ignored her. Took her time. Mouth licked wet as she undulated, her ass swirling in Rémi’s palms. She reached up and pulled down the straps of her nightgown, freed her breasts. They jumped into Rémi’s mouth, and she moaned around the hard nipples. Sucking their hot, hard tips until she was sure, sure she tasted milk. Her clit pounded under her lover’s attentions. The lawn chair squeaked under them.
Claudia was a graceful grunting beast as she rode Rémi. Her breasts leaping in the night air, wet from Rémi’s mouth. The nightgown bunched at her waist. The hot, liquid sounds of their fucking finally shattered Rémi’s control. Heat exploded in her belly, shooting up into her chest and face until she had to close her eyes against it.
“Oh fuck!” she gasped. “Oh fuck!”
She came to herself with Claudia nibbling on her breasts. Her small fingers pulled at Rémi’s nipples, plucking the skin taut and biting wickedly into it. The pain pulled her out of her orgasmic stupor. She gently pushed her lover away.
“Don’t tell me you’re done already?” Claudia’s damp face was lean and hungry.
“If you’re going to eat me alive, yes.”
Claudia looked down at the teeth marks and blushed. But didn’t apologize for them. Rémi’s clit perked up again under the black dildo.
“All right then.” She pulled herself away from Rémi’s lap, the dildo withdrawing from her pussy with a soft liquid slide.
“No. Maybe a little bit more.” Rémi found herself standing up abruptly, one hand grabbing at her pants, the other reaching out for her lover.
Claudia turned in a swirl of silk and sex scent. A smile bared her sharp white teeth. “One day you’ll say no to me and mean it,” she said.
Claudia grabbed the edges of Rémi’s open shirt. Dragged her close. Sensation tripped through Rémi at their shared kiss. She hoped this feeling never went away. The surge of familiarity and gladness that shook her each time their flesh connected.
Her back met the deck’s railing. Away from the flickering candles, thank god. Claudia chuckled against her mouth as if sensing her fear.
“It’s only fire, darling.”
Only. Rémi groaned. Claudia’s lips burned a trail down her body. The agile tongue licked at her belly and the pale-haired woman shoved the hands away that would unbuckle the harness and make way for her mouth. She pushed Rémi’s pants down.
“Watch carefully, my love. You might never see this again.”
And she took the head of the wet dildo in her mouth. Rémi would have staggered back against the railing if her entire body wasn’t pressed back against it. Claudia licked the smooth black silicone, swirled her tongue around its length, slurping as she sucked her own juices from it, enjoying it.
On her knees in front of Rémi, she enthusiastically worked the dick. She took it deep into her mouth until her cheeks hollowed, her eyes closed. Rémi’s clit pulsed. The diving mouth nudged the base of the cock against her center until she too was groaning. Then Claudia touched her. The groan became a gasp when fingers slid against the soaked lips, trailing the slit of her pussy.
“Claudia.” She grabbed her lover’s hair. Her head fell back.
Rémi didn’t know when Claudia got the harness and dildo off, but they were and she was slurping at Rémi’s naked pussy, crouched in the wide V of Rémi’s thighs, her hands digging into the solid muscles. Her barely muffled moans of delectation dropped like tiny explosions in Rémi’s body. Her hips surged. Her hands fell down to Claudia’s neck and tightened. The mouth hummed between Rémi’s legs, tongue darting over her clit, into her soaking wet pussy.
“Oh my fuck—oh!”
Fingers. Claudia slipped fingers in. Rémi couldn’t tell how many. Only that they were gliding against her inner walls, mouth latched to her clit, tongue beating against the distended bundle of nerves like a drum. The fingers! Rémi staggered. Pussy pulsing. Hips thrusting against Claudia’s face. Her knees buckling like the last of her resistance to whatever Claudia was doing. She imploded. Died. And floated back to the heaven of Claudia’s mouth. Tiny soothing kisses against her cunt gently lowered her back to earth.
“You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting to do that.” Claudia licked her fingers.
Against the railing, Rémi dropped to her knees, her chest rapidly rising and falling. “If you get any better at this, you’re going to kill me,” she gasped.
Claudia kissed her mouth, laughing. “You aren’t the only one allowed to blow minds around here, you know.”
“Shit! Now I do.”
Her lover laughed again.
When she could again, Rémi stood, bringing Claudia up with her. She leaned back against the railing and Claudia pressed against her, lazily nibbled along her throat and collarbone as Rémi pulled up her pants and buttoned her shirt. She left the top two buttons loose to allow Claudia access to her skin. She could be generous. Claudia swayed in her arms to some internal music as she hummed. Her bottom’s tantalizing curve warmed Rémi’s palms.
“I love that your skin smells like Dove, even after all we’ve done.” Claudia chuckled against her throat.
Rémi loved that Claudia knew what brand of soap she used. She pressed her lips to her lover’s forehead. Over Claudia’s shoulder, her eye caught the stack of papers underneath the lapt
op.
“I completely forgot that you’re grading papers. I should go and let you get back to your work.”
“No. You should stay.” Claudia bit Rémi’s lip, sucked it into her mouth. Cool hands moved against her back.
“You need to work,” Rémi murmured against the teasing mouth, trying to mean it.
“I can grade these papers tomorrow. Wouldn’t you like to be with me all night?” She pulled down the straps of her nightgown, baring her breasts. “Wouldn’t that be nice?” The nipples pushed into the night, like Hershey kisses, begging Rémi to take them into her mouth. Her hands tightened on Claudia’s arms. She bent her head, taking the dark nuggets into her mouth, one after the other. Claudia moaned and clutched at the back of Rémi’s head.
“What the fuck is this?”
Dez’s unexpected voice snapped into Rémi’s spine and she stiffened, head rocketing up. Claudia’s nipple slid from her mouth with a soft, obscene pop. And she felt more than heard her lover swallow a gasp then tug at the straps of her nightgown until it covered her breasts. Claudia’s eyelashes fluttered rapidly, like butterflies caught in a storm.
“Tell me this is not what I’m seeing!”
With embarrassed heat prickling under her skin, Rémi turned to face Dez. Her best friend stood in the doorway, an intruder in their circle of candles, light flickering over the face tense with fury and disbelief.
“Mama?” Dez staggered a few steps toward Claudia. “What is this?”
This could be nothing other than what she saw. And Rémi saw the denial of it creep over her face. Not her mother, not her best friend. And although she had been dreading this moment, realizing that it would come as surely as the next sunrise, she didn’t know what to say.
“Darling . . .” Claudia reached out to her daughter. “Let’s talk about this inside.”
Dez shrugged off her mother’s hand as if it was unclean. “No. There’s nothing to talk about.” She drew an unsteady breath, then another, as if trying to calm herself down or wake herself up. “Please don’t let there be anything to talk about.”
Beyond her shoulder, still in the shadows of the house, her new wife stood back, eyes wide, hand to her throat.
The breathing apparently didn’t work. “What are you doing?!” Dez’s voice rose, wailing as she spun back to Rémi. “What did you do to my mother?”
Before Rémi could say anything, Claudia clutched her arm, looked at her with a plea in her eyes. “Please go. I’ll talk with you later. Tomorrow.”
Go? Why did she have to go? They had done nothing wrong. Claudia’s hand pressed against her belly. Pushed her gently toward the door. The hand fell away, leaving a cold spot in its place.
“Yeah, go home, you fucking traitor!” Spit flew from Dez’s mouth. “Parasite. Get the fuck out of here!”
More than anyone, Dez knew what Rémi did with her women. Knew what she liked. They’d fucked together enough for Dez to know how Rémi wanted her women to behave, what pleasure and pain she wanted them to take. The things she asked them to do, and how many of them did it without question. Again and again. The knowledge of these things twisted in her friend’s poisonous gaze, in her sneering mouth.
Rémi shook her head. “It’s not like that. I swear. This is different.”
“Bullshit! I can’t believe you’re fucking doing this.” Dez’s mouth hardened then she turned abruptly away as if unable to stand the sight of Rémi’s face. But in the next breath she twisted back, her body in a blur of motion. Rémi felt the pain in her face, the explosion of blood in her mouth, before it registered that Dez punched her.
“Stop!” Victoria ran out from the house but not before Claudia flew in front of her daughter.
She gripped Dez’s tensed arms. “Stop this right now.”
With a hissing sigh, she looked over her shoulder at Rémi. “Tomorrow. Please?”
Rémi looked at her best friend then at her lover. Both stared at each other, leaving her outside their snap-tight circle of family. She nodded once, put one foot carefully ahead of the other and walked out. Images somersaulted through her mind. Claudia’s mouth on her dick. Fingers curved inside her pussy, the hot mouth tugging at her clit. Her lover’s stricken face. Rémi stumbled and nearly fell, catching herself with flattened palms against the paved walkway. The scraping pain in her hands jolted her out of frozen disbelief. She let herself fall, tip over and drop ass-first into the damp grass laying flat next to the walkway.
“Fuck!” She gripped her hair, elbows propped up on her shaking knees. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!”
She didn’t know how long she sat there with the dampness from the grass sinking into her jeans. Very faint sounds came the house, but she wouldn’t go back there. She couldn’t. Rémi pulled herself to her feet and stumbled to her bike. The thick rubber grips of her handlebars felt foreign under her hands, as if she didn’t need to touch them. What she wanted to touch was Claudia’s face. To tell her that everything would work out. For her lover to tell her the same thing. Her hand convulsed on the bike and she let go. She backed away. Away from the bike, from the house. At this time of night, the narrow, tree-lined street was quiet. No dogs barking. No passionate arguments bleeding past the thick walls of foliage and palm trees. Just quiet.
This quiet was thick enough for her to hear her pounding heartbeat. To feel the tightening in her chest as the world she’d known for the past fourteen years collapsed around her. She should’ve expected it, but no amount of preparation could have steeled her against this. Breath ran ragged in her chest.
She walked until she was too tired to walk anymore. She walked until the swaying Spanish moss and night-blooming jasmine guided her across a wide expanse of grass, a jogging path, and the salt-sour scent of the bay. Tired. She was so tired. Heart sounds still blinded her ears to everything but her own pain. Claudia told her to go. Dez called her a parasite. This was worse than anything she could have expected. Was it so wrong to want someone to love her?
In the dark she found a park bench to ease her tired body onto. The jasmine scent pressed into her, distracted her nose from the drip of tears.
“Looks like you’re in a bad way, cousin.”
“You think?” The words squeezed without bite past Rémi’s dry lips. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the bench, not even wanting to know how Wynne knew she was here. Air shifted beside her and Rémi felt the brush of cloth against her leg as her cousin sat in the grass at her feet.
“I should have warned you. Sorry.”
Rémi laughed, a dead, rusted sound. “It wasn’t your business to warn me. I was careless, end of story.”
“This isn’t the worst thing that could happen.”
“Is this your way of cheering me up?”
“You mean it’s not working?” The laughter in Wynne’s voice was strangely comforting. “I think your friend will forgive you.”
“She won’t. I knew it before I started this.” Some part of her had known.
Wynne was silent. Rémi sighed and put her feet up on the bench, stretched out as much as it would allow.
“I’m so fucking stupid sometimes.” She dropped a tired arm over her eyes and prayed for sleep.
Chapter 37
“You look like you slept in your clothes.”
Rémi glanced up at Nuria as she threw her keys into the bowl by the door. Her friend sat up on the couch, the blanket over her falling down to reveal bare shoulders.
“I did.” The words croaked from between Rémi’s dry lips, surprising her with the pain they carried. “Now I’m going upstairs for a proper night’s sleep.”
Her body ached from the night spent on the park bench in Coconut Grove. She remembered huddling into her jacket to keep warm, shivering at the memory of Claudia’s cool touch against her skin, her dismissal. Facing her friends who were sure to still be at her apartment wasn’t an option, and so she’d huddled in her own misery. Rémi was lucky that cops didn’t wander by and cart her ass off to jail. But maybe that was w
hy Wynne had spent the night by her side, only wandering off after Rémi had opened her eyes to a piercing sun. She sighed and walked past her friend, ignoring the curious eyes that followed her across the living room and up the stairs.
Merciful blackness came with the closing of her bedroom door. But it didn’t last long. A knock came, then Nuria with the blanket wrapped around her like a sarong.
“I was worried,” she said.
“No need. I’m fine.”
Rémi pulled off the jacket, her shirt, shoes, pants, all without looking at her friend and climbed between the cool sheets. She felt filthy and used up, but the comfort of her bed took precedence over a shower. All she wanted to do was lay down and rest.
“Bullshit. You look like something the leper’s dog squeezed out of its asshole.” She climbed into the bed next to Rémi. “What’s wrong, amiga? Were you at the club last night?”
Rémi shook her head. “I don’t feel like talking right now, Ria. Let’s do this later, okay?”
She felt the shadowy brush of a hand over her hair. Then a warm touch at the back of her neck.
“Okay. When you’re ready, just know you can talk to me.”
“I know.”
She drifted into sleep with Nuria’s presence beside her in the bed. Unusual, but comforting. In what felt like moments later, the sound of her cell phone jolted Rémi out of her uneasy slumber. With a low groan, she fumbled for it on the bedside table, but another hand met hers, pushed the phone in her palm.
“Here.” Nuria’s voice was rough from sleep.
Grunting her thanks, Rémi answered the phone.
“Sorry to wake you. I didn’t think you’d still be asleep.”
Rémi pushed aside the sense of déjà vu and sat up in the bed. “I’m not. What happened after I left? Is everything all right?”
“No.” Claudia sighed. “Yes. It’s good to hear your voice.”
“You don’t sound like everything is all right.”