by Karen Anders
He sat on his motorcycle with her completely naked straddling his lap. In the painting, stark tenderness ravaged his face as his desire-dark eyes watched her moving over him, savage gentleness outlined in the long smooth fingers of his hands where he clutched her hips. And she could almost hear his words. “I’m hurting for you, darlin’. Give me what I need.”
His naked leg was delineated with heavy thick muscles bunched in seductive male beauty as he used it to anchor both of them on the bike.
Then she looked at herself in the painting. Is this what she looked like in his eyes? This sensuous, breathtaking, wild woman with a mane of blazing hair falling down her back? Her lips were parted as if she was crying out her release into the night sky. The painting stirred intense emotions in her that she hadn’t believed possible. Emotions she couldn’t even begin to name. It aroused her with a rush of heat and honey.
In the portrait her head was back and her eyes closed as she absorbed the sensations he was stroking in her. Her face was rapt with love for him.
Her voice was unsteady and thick with tears when she was finally able to speak. “Corey, my God, it’s beautiful.”
He didn’t know what he expected her to say. Wondered while he was creating this replication of his most erotic fantasy whether she would find it crude, disgusting, dirty. He closed his eyes, realizing that she had found it none of those. In her eyes, he realized he could do no wrong. It pushed the darkness back, the need to destroy evaporated.
She made a little sound so soft he would have missed it if he weren’t in such harmony with her body, with her feelings. “Don’t. Dear God, don’t cry, Jennifer. I’ll come apart.”
She went back to removing his clothes and when his body was bared she pushed him onto the bed, then went into the bathroom and retrieved a bottle of lotion from the medicine cabinet. She returned to find him lying on his back staring up at the ceiling.
“Turn onto your stomach,” she ordered. He complied without any protest and it wrung her heart. She straddled his hips and finally he said, “Jennifer, you don’t have to.”
“Shh,” she scolded, and poured a generous amount of lotion onto her hands. With soft sure strokes she worked out the kinks in his shoulders, kneading his hard muscles, trying to loosen all his aches and pains. She worked her way down his back, her hands gentle and reassuring.
He relaxed into the bed. She could feel every small release of tension, the soft rush of his breath. She worked his lower back, wringing a moan of pleasure from him. Then with infinite tenderness, she stroked over his scar-rough hip. He flinched at first, but then let go, his body once again sinking into the bed. For a long time she massaged his thick hip muscle, trying to show him with her hands that she understood how much it must have hurt. How vulnerable, scared and alone he must have felt.
Then she began on his other hip. When she finished, she got off him and said softly, “Come on, let’s go.”
He turned his head to look at her and understanding lit his eyes with hot turquoise heat. Without a word he got up and pulled on his jeans and boots, grabbing his mackintosh and shrugging into it; following her out of the cottage.
The bike made a sharp rumbling noise and they took off down the road, emerging onto the highway. Her hands were tight around his waist, and she yelled into his ear to turn off. They followed the old rutted road slowly and carefully by the bright light of the full moon.
Finally he stopped the bike, put down the kickstand and turned as she got off. Silence sweet, pure and clean filled the beautiful meadow, the dark mountains silhouetted against the bright backdrop of the sky.
“Back up,” Jennifer coaxed with sugar sweetness in her voice.
“What?”
“Slide that sweet, tight backside backward.” Their eyes met in the semidarkness, a flash of heat, a potent sizzle of electricity, and Jennifer shivered. She threw her leg over his and straddled him.
“Are you cold, darlin’?” he asked in a voice desire-filled and husky-soft.
“No. I’m hot, so hot, Corey.”
His mouth found hers, touching her lips with wonder, with such awe she felt choked up again. “So gentle, so fierce, my sweet warrior. It’s time to lay down your weapons and surrender. Many battles you’ve waged, but now you’ve lost the war.”
“To whom?”
“To me. I claim victory.”
He moaned, the touch of her sweet mouth sending soundless shudders of pleasure down his body. His hands came up to her moon-soaked hair, the strands like living coils of flame against his flesh. He would let her think she had won because nothing had changed. Only that she loves you, you fool. She loves you and you’re going to leave her. She would get over him. She and Ellie would find happiness with someone else. Someone who didn’t have the potential for violence in him.
She looked down at him, at his upturned face and she wanted to see that look that he had painted for himself. She wanted to make his fantasy a reality.
She slid off his lap and grasped the edges of the open mackintosh, pushing the coat off him. Then her hands went to the buttons of her shirt.
Corey surged off the bike with the innate ability of a predatory cat. He caught her in his arms, hugging her fiercely to him. “You’re turning me inside out. I feel raw and vulnerable.”
“And afraid?”
“Terrified.”
“I’ll teach you not to be afraid. Let me teach you.”
“I didn’t know what a relationship could be until you. You’re everything I’ve ever dreamed of. You don’t have to do this.”
“What makes you think I don’t have fantasies of you, Corey?”
“Tell me,” he gasped, his breathing irregular and harsh.
“I know it’s not painted this way, but leave your hat on.”
His eyes blazed and his breath caught, his voice so gruff it was barely audible as he whispered against her mouth, “Jennifer, I’d be so lost without you, darlin’.”
“So why don’t you tell me your fantasy,” she whispered back.
“I dream of you doing to me only what a woman can. Only what she wants to do. What a man would give his heart for.”
His bare chest, smooth and sleek under the moon, drew her hands. “Are you willing to pay the price of your heart, Corey?”
“Jennifer, you already have my soul. I lost it the moment I looked into your eyes.”
“I love you, Corey. Tell me what you want me to do.”
“Touch me, Jennifer. My chest, my body, anywhere you want.”
Slowly she smoothed her hands over his chest, massaging his hardening nipples first with her fingertips then her tongue, biting him gently and suckling his hot sensitive skin.
Her hand went to the hard ridge of flesh beneath his jeans. She caressed him through the fabric, liking the small anguished moan that rumbled in his chest. She felt as if she were holding sheer power, controlling formidable strength beneath her hands.
“Now what, Corey?”
“Take my pants off.”
She did, easing his zipper down and pushing the denim and cotton briefs over his lean hips, careful of his damaged one.
“Jennifer,” he moaned.
She pushed him backward until his backside rested on the bike. Then as quickly as she could, she stripped. He reached out for her, but she slipped out of his grasp to kneel in the fragrant grass.
His maleness jutted forward, so great was his need for her. She cupped him, taking the smooth soft skin between her palms, causing his whole body to buck forward straining, begging, demanding. She kissed the hollow of his hips with her lips and tongue.
His hands went into her hair, kneading her scalp with his strong artist’s hands.
Unable to restrain her desire any longer, she gave him his most erotic fantasy. He cried out, his hands turning to fists in her hair, his pleasure building with each movement of her mouth. When he couldn’t stand any more of the torturous pleasure, he reached down and grasped her upper arms, jerking her to her feet.
Swiftly he straddled the bike and pulled her over him. This was what he dreamed about late at night in his private torture, her straddling him in the dark of night, trusting him, holding him, loving him.
Jennifer got her wish as she peered into his face and saw the look she’d been craving. “Corey, love me, please.”
His hands came up to cup her breasts, taking first one hardened nipple into his mouth then the other. Her hands dug into his shoulders, the only thing that kept her anchored to the ground. He worshiped her with his mouth, sensations strong and hot pouring through her body. She squirmed on his lap. Her head fell back and her lips parted, unable to bear the fire he was building inside her.
He buried his face between her breasts and his hands traveled like liquid flame down her body to wrap around her waist. With a guttural groan of sheer carnal desire, he lowered her. His arms bunched as he lifted and lowered her. She felt as if she’d lost control of her body—as she accepted the savagery of his lovemaking, merging and meeting him on the same plane.
She could feel his back muscles flex as he held them both on the bike and thrust his hips while lifting her in the delicious up-and-down motion. He was so powerful and so thoroughly male, taking her higher and higher with quick, wild thrusts. The scalding pleasure detonated in them suddenly with a powerful backlash of force. He poured himself into her as she spasmed around the slick heat of his arousal and they knew pure rapture.
They held on to each other in the aftermath, enjoying the soft warm breeze against their bodies and the glorious feel of each other.
Jennifer held on to him, knowing this was a night she would never forget as long as she lived. She would never forget the fierce rush of emotions, the aching need that only he could assuage. The sheer power of their joining. A union of two parts to make a whole.
They dressed quietly and rode back to her house in silence. She took his hand, not sure whether he wanted to come into the house with her, but after a moment’s hesitation, he followed her.
The house felt chilled to her after the heat of their lovemaking. She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself, more for comfort than for cold. She needed to be prepared to hear that he wasn’t staying. She knew it, but it wasn’t the same as accepting it.
“Are you cold? Let me get you a blanket,” he said.
“In the chest under the window in my room,” she said distractedly, wondering when he left whether she would ever be warm again. She walked over to the counter, opened the cupboard and pulled out the coffee. Suddenly she remembered the book. Dear God. The book.
He ran upstairs and pulled the blanket out of the chest. Something heavy fell to the floor with a thud. Confused, he knelt down and picked up the heavy object. It was a book. He turned it over and his heart froze in his chest. The silence shattered with a roaring, tearing sound, shaking his already crumbling foundations. His breathing stuttered and stopped. With a hard gasping sound, he drew in a ragged breath as if it would be his last.
She knew.
Chapter 14
Like a haunting litany, the words reverberated in his head. He touched the title of the book and a harsh strangled sound escaped his throat.
No one knew. No one. He’d managed to keep his secret from teachers, doctors, social workers and friends at great personal cost.
He went downstairs slowly. He’d kept it from everyone, but not Jennifer. Sweet, beautiful Jennifer knew his shameful, horrible secret. He wasn’t normal.
He’d had no reference point for what it was like to be normal, which frightened him because he was always so afraid he would do something wrong. He’d tried as a child. Tried comparing his family with others, but all he got was confused because other families didn’t seem to be quite so chaotic.
Jennifer was standing at the sink when he finally reached the kitchen. “How did you know?” he said hoarsely, his voice breaking with disbelief. He hated it. His knees gave way and he collapsed into the nearest chair, his body feeling numb and distant, as if his brain were displaced.
“I noticed hints. The way you wanted to be touched, but were so terrified of it. Your fervent protective instincts. And when you said you hated your father, I had to wonder why. I already knew that you were running from something painful. At the time, I thought it was the bull, but then I realized later that it was so much more. I wanted so desperately to understand. But I couldn’t find anything in that pathetic excuse for a library, so I called a friend in Houston. She sent me the book and I read every damn sentence and I ached, Corey. Please don’t be angry.”
He couldn’t speak for a moment. She cared enough to ask someone all the way in Houston to send her a book because she suspected that he had been abused. She had cared enough to go to great lengths to understand him. It was too much. Too much for him to take in. “Angry?” His voice came out broken. “Angry?” he said again. “I’m not angry, Jennifer. I’m stunned, ashamed, so many emotions I can’t even begin to tell you about them all.”
“I’ll sit here all night if you want to tell me about each one in detail.”
“Oh God, Jennifer.” It was too much for him to take in at one sitting. He got up and bolted across the kitchen, his hand on the doorknob, so close to breaking down in front of her. That would be the ultimate humiliation. The silence that had been so carefully maintained was now gone and he had to face it. But he feared that he could not.
“Don’t go. Please, Corey, don’t go,” she pleaded.
Her voice was like a glass fetter to his legs. So easily he could break the fragile bonds, jump onto his bike and escape into the night. Ride until the fierce emotions eating at him like acid were blown away by the wind. Ah, but he could never forget. He would never forget her or her caring love.
Jennifer leaned forward. “I wanted to talk to you about this, but I didn’t know how. I didn’t know the right questions to ask... I went into town specifically to get a book, so that I could understand. I remember that first day I met you. There was such pain in your eyes. Such loneliness and sorrow.”
He leaned back, closing his eyes trying to sort all this out. He felt naked and exposed and at the same time so unbearably safe he didn’t know how to react. He’d expected to feel vulnerable and alone when the silence finally broke, not this warm place in his heart that radiated heat to all the dark, lonely parts of his body.
“I’m not the type of woman that trusts easily, since Sonny. But there was something about you that reached out to me. I just couldn’t ignore it. My heart is yours now, and I want to know everything there is to know about you. Your past is part of you. What made you who you are today. I really want to know.”
“I remember lying on my bed as a small child trying to understand why my father hit me,” he told her. “I can remember the stinging pain, the bruises, the swollen faces and blackened eyes I’d suffered. I remember hurting on the outside and dying on the inside. Hundreds of lonely nights that increased the emptiness and the anger inside me.”
“And you thought it was all your fault?” she prompted. She moved forward, pressing her body against his back, gathering him to her.
His eyes opened, his breathing ragged. With an intensity that broke the sudden tense silence, he demanded, “How did you know?”
“You’re not alone, Corey. Ellie and I love you. We love you very much.” She held on to him. “Why don’t you tell me why you were going to slash that painting. Why you slashed all the others.”
He broke away from her, rounding on her with a growl, “I don’t want to be like my father!”
“What does slashing those paintings have to do with that?” she demanded in a tense voice, not flinching or budging an inch.
Corey felt sudden and glad relief. There was no pity in her eyes, just a savage protectiveness and unrelenting need to know. “He painted, Jennifer. I think he hated me for my talent. He used to tell me I was better than him. I haven’t painted for years, but when I came here, I so desperately wanted...”
“What?” she said softly when h
e didn’t continue, caressing his jaw with her fingers.
“To be normal. To have you. God, you scared the living daylights out of me.”
“You would have left if it wasn’t for Jay?”
“Yes,” he hissed. “I’ve been running a long time, darlin’. I was running fast so that I wouldn’t stop long enough to fall in love. How did I know it would only take a split second and hair so red it defined the word? And a precocious child so like her mother.”
Jennifer smiled and it hurt so bad. “The book says that people react to abuse in different ways, Corey. It says that some people abuse substances and others look for what they need in activities. When you lost the rodeo, you did feel like you lost yourself.”
How could she know? How could she understand him so well? “I couldn’t save my mother and sister and when I was gored I totally lost my balance.”
“And after the goring?” Her words rushed out on a note of understanding.
“Everything came crashing down like a house of cards. After I got gored, I felt like I was starting from square one again. Then the news came. They told me my mother and little sister were dead. I didn’t give a damn about my father.”
“While you were in the hospital?” she prompted.
“Yes,” he whispered. “My father was a drunken bastard. He blamed everything on the Anglos. And every one of his failures he battered into my skin, and my mother’s, and when she had Marigold, hers, as well. I tried to stop him, but I was too young, and then, as I grew older, I saw that she wouldn’t leave. No matter how much I pleaded with her. No matter how much money I sent her. She wouldn’t go.”
She touched his face lightly. “What happened?”
“He fell asleep with a lit cigarette and they all died.”
“Oh God, Corey. I’m so sorry. I’m so very, very sorry. You blame yourself, don’t you?”.
“I should have made her go, but she wouldn’t leave him. I failed her and Marigold.”