Isle of Intrigue

by Ann-Marie Desiree

  "Often enough,” she said. “But I usually don't admit it."

  "I can see that,” he said softly.

  He leaned closer and kissed her on the mouth, their lips brushing once, then parting. It was an instinctive gesture; perhaps, he meant it to be a kiss between friends. But his voice grew husky.

  In a murmur, he said, “I don't want you mixed up in this, Peggy. You don't deserve it."

  "Maybe I could help."

  "You?” He laughed gently. “You're a wild animal in a fight, I'm sure. But this is way beyond your abilities."

  "How do you know?"

  "Don't push it, Peggy."

  "Pushing is my middle name. I could—"

  "The only way you can help me is by doing this.” He unhooked her arms that had somehow found their way around his neck. “I want to keep my hands off you, Peggy. Tomorrow, I'll take you to town. And you can go back to your life in New York. Continue your search for Johnny O'Dawg. Forget about me."

  "I'm not sure that's possible anymore."

  "You're pretty unforgettable yourself.” He touched her face gently. “You're much more exciting than you realize. I want to hold you, feel you against me. I want to teach your body a whole bunch of exciting sensations. But I can't. Not if both of us are going to go on living safe lives. It's a hell of a predicament for a man who's been isolated up here for four years. But it's the way things have to be."

  With a last, longing glance down her scantily clad figure, he shook his head and sighed. “A hell of a predicament."

  He meant to follow his own rules to the letter, Peggy could see. She tried to grin. When she spoke, she was relieved to hear her voice come out sounding almost natural. “I believe you owe me a bread and butter sandwich?"

  He smiled again. Resting a hand on her shoulder, he showed every sign of wanting another kiss. But he restrained himself.

  "I'll make you something to eat,” he said. “But first, I'll go get our clothes from the dock. Maybe your things will be dry by morning if I bring them inside."

  "Thank you."

  When he let himself out of the cabin, Peggy leaned against the fireplace and tried to figure things out. She felt strange, and for a time, she thought the ache was a result of her swim in the lake. But gradually, she became aware of the true source of that new sensation.

  She felt frustrated. Brent had keyed her up somehow, wound her nerves like the spring of a fine watch. And there was no release. Moreover, there was more to it than any kind of clumsy sexual longing. Peggy wanted to be near him, to be held by him and listen to his voice.

  "My God,” she said aloud. “Am I falling for this guy?"

  As if responding to her question, a sudden squawking noise exploded in the cabin. Peggy jumped and whirled around, her heart pounding.

  "What's that? Brent?"

  The squawk sounded again—a grating, metallic noise loud enough to hurt her ears. Peggy realized it was coming from the ham radio on the kitchen counter. Tentatively, she stepped toward the equipment. A red light was flashing above a large switch, so Peggy flipped it. Immediately, a voice filled the cabin.

  "Brent? You there, old buddy? Hey! What's going on over there, big veteran? You having any trouble with that visitor of yours? Brent? Damn it all, where are you? Brent? You want me to come pick her up in the morning?"

  Frightened by how close the man's voice sounded, Peggy cut off the switch, and immediately, Charlie's voice silenced. Then Peggy stood there, not breathing, quaking with nervous tension. Brent was due back in the cabin any second.

  Without thinking, Peggy began to poke and prod all the switches and dials on the radio. Maybe she was going crazy. Or maybe she knew exactly what she was doing. Frantically, she pried the front off the ham radio and saw a maze of wires and chips meshed together. Praying she wouldn't be electrocuted, she grabbed one and yanked. It gave way with a satisfying snap. The red light died. Peggy stared at the wire in her hand.

  "What am I doing? I'm crazy.” She stuffed the wire back into the machine. “I'm really crazy. I could be back in the U.S. making life miserable for an editor!"

  But Peggy didn't want to go home. Not yet. Not until she learned more. About Brent. And about herself. So, she had sabotaged his mode of communication. When Brent returned to the cabin, she had the front of the radio back on and was sitting by the fire, wondering if she had gone completely crazy.

  He fixed her a sandwich and brought her a dish of home canned fruits, too. Peggy took a few bites, then was seized by a fit of hunger and devoured the meal in minutes. Brent appeared to be uninterested in food.

  He watched her, though, and sipped from a glass of wine. Peggy found his gaze flattering—stimulating, even. But she was disappointed when he didn't join her on the cushions.

  He kept his distance. All evening, he watched and listened to her chatter, but he didn't come any closer. At last, Peggy grew sleepy.

  Her eyelids felt heavy, and she even lost interest in telling Brent about her misadventures with a foreign press agent. He took her dishes away and washed them in the kitchen. When he returned, Peggy was almost dozing by the fire. Brent gathered her up in his arms.

  "Wait,” Peggy grumbled. “I can walk."

  "You can barely keep your eyes open. I'm taking you to bed."

  As he began to mount the steps, Peggy protested drowsily. “You're not planning to give up your bed tonight, are you? Honestly, I feel terrible about putting you out—"

  "Be quiet,” he said, but his voice was gentle.

  Peggy subsided in his arms, reveling in the contented feeling elicited just by the sound of his heartbeat against her ear. She'd never felt so at home with a man. So relaxed.

  When he placed her into the tumble of quilts, she was nearly asleep. But she reached out and stopped him when he started to draw back. “Wait, Brent."

  He hesitated, clearly torn between the urge to climb into the bed with Peggy and running down the stairs to escape her. Peggy smiled and removed her shirt. Her naked body went completely limp where she lay.

  "Please, don't make me feel like a jerk. Stay. Sleep here tonight. I'll keep my hands off you, I promise."

  He laughed, his intense gaze warm upon her. “That's hardly the problem."

  "How about if I vow to fight like hell if you put one finger on me?"

  He sighed. “Peggy—"

  "I mean it,” she coaxed. “If there's one bed, we've got to share it. Otherwise, I'm taking the floor again."

  "Don't be foolish. I'm perfectly happy to sleep downstairs."

  She struggled to sit up. “Then I'm going with you."

  "Lie down!” He braced his hands on her arms, then let go as if she'd burned him. “You need a good night's rest. You've had a bad experience."

  "Then don't give me another one. Stay."

  He bundled her into the bedcovers. “Stubborn little bitch.” He took another look at her face and melted. “I've got things to do before I hit the sack. Go to sleep."

  "You'll come back?"

  "Don't you ever give up, woman?"

  "Never. Promise you won't sleep on the floor."

  He shook his head, bemused by her insistence. “I won't promise anything. Say good night."

  Peggy yawned.

  Then, obediently, she murmured, “Good night."

  Sleep overwhelmed her as she listened to the quiet noises he made, moving around the cabin, taking care of the dogs, adding wood to the fire. She liked the feeling, though, that he was near. She felt increasingly safe and secure with him—this strange, isolated man.

  Peggy didn't remember the moment that she realized he was back, but sometime in the night, Brent did join her. He rolled stealthily in beside her and relaxed on the farthest edge of the bed, trying not to disturb her. Peggy didn't wake. Not exactly. She was only aware that at last she wasn't alone.

  Slipping closer to his nude warmth, she snuggled until her head was tucked under his chin, and she could hear the steady thump of his heart. She heard him groan, too, but that
didn't matter. She breathed a contented sigh across his bare chest and fell back to steep, thoughts scattering like stardust.

  In the morning, she woke to a soft caress. Like a warm breeze, Brent moved his hand on her skin, along the curve of her thigh from hip to knee. Perhaps, he was still asleep, unaware of what he'd done, because his breathing didn't change. But Peggy awoke. She didn't dare open her eyes and turn her head, for fear the dreamy quality of the early morning might be broken.

  She lay very still and wondered if he'd do it again. Her own breathing quickened. A fine perspiration sprang out on her skin. The bed felt so warm that suddenly she wondered if she wasn't feverish. To cool off, she moved her foot to push the quilt off her legs. Brent stirred and shifted, startling Peggy into freezing.

  But he simply turned onto his back with a long breath that signified how soundly he still slept. Peggy rolled onto her stomach and propped her chin in her cupped hand to look at Brent in the half-light of early dawn. His face was calmer, and it wasn't quite as solemn in response as it was when he was awake.

  Whatever trouble he was in clearly weighed heavily upon him. But asleep, he looked different. Less tense, of course, but younger, too. Sexier, yes, but that word didn't quite suffice either. He was a sensual male. He used all of his senses to partake of the world around him. Peggy remembered how easily he'd enjoyed the lake, for instance.

  He'd floated in the water with his eyes closed, not fearing, but experiencing the elements around him. When he drank his wine, he'd tasted every subtlety of each and every mouthful.

  When he'd kissed Peggy, she'd felt him drink in everything about her. She touched his bare chest lightly, tracing the shape of his bones and muscles with the tips of her fingers. He was strong, yet vulnerable; a male with a disquieting inner power, but weaknesses, too. And he had been so wonderfully tender with her.

  Gently, she pushed the quilt aside so she could admire his body. The shape of his belly, the way the crisp hair on his chest spiraled downward. With tentative caresses, she passed her fingers down his stomach and under the warm cover of the quilt. Smiling, she discovered he wasn't wearing anything. She found the shape of his hip, the hard strength of his thigh.

  Growing bolder, she slid her hand over and ventured slowly over his genitals. At last, she encountered the masculine heat of him and felt his pulse beating in her hand. The pulse grew stronger, and Peggy wondered at the instinctive nature of men, how easily the mind could be betrayed by flesh.

  His penis wasn't circumcised like those of most American men, and this certainly indicated his foreign origins. His scrotal balls were relaxed, and merely promising his testosterone-driven masculinity and energetic power. She rested her hand, gently, on his penis, waiting to see what would happen.

  But her own body began to react, too, filling with sensations Peggy didn't completely recognize. She felt affection for him. Respect, too. But something stronger also quivered along her nerve endings. She tingled with excitement, but felt a wonderful laziness at the same time. Peggy's legs felt heavy, but acutely alive.

  Deep inside, she experienced a coiling kind of pleasure so strong, she found she could only take in shallow breaths of air. Against the palm of her hand, Brent's large penis began to grow ever so beautifully long, thick, and full.

  Braver still, she began to massage his hardening erection up and down. Wrapping her finger and thumb around the base ring of the uncircumcised head, and gently jerking away. It was all intensely new and exciting! Then she began to kiss and lick it up and down, while finally putting it almost all the way into her hungry mouth.

  Then she cried out in sudden surprise when Brent seized her wrist. Awake, he moved as quick as a lightning flash. He pinned Peggy flat on her back, arms caught over her head on the pillow. She laughed, but he was growling.

  "What the hell are you doing?!"

  "I'm sorry!” She smiled up into his forbidding face. “I was getting curious. I was going to enjoy making you climax. I was exploring a little."

  "Amateur exploring can get you into some serious trouble."

  His voice sounded threatening, but Peggy could see the threat was empty. Different emotions played across Brent's features. His eyes burned with an erotic fire. Deftly, he trapped her right knee and settled provocatively between her thighs.

  Peggy could feel the rigid power of his legs, the easy strength in his hips as he rode against her. But most of all, she felt the unmistakable hardness and power of his aroused erection against her own most vulnerable and moistening pubic place.

  "Quit smiling,” Brent ordered.

  "Why?"

  "Because you're too damn beautiful and I—oh, for God's sake!"

  Full of second thoughts, he started to roll away from her. But Peggy caught him in her arms and held on.

  "Wait.” She laughed again. “I like it."

  "I can see you like it,” he snapped. “I like it, too. Too much! How often do you suppose I wake up like that? Peggy, maybe you don't understand some important facts about the male of the species. In another minute—"

  "Let's not wait another minute."

  He stared at her, his grip slackened. Peggy slid her wrists free and wound her arms around his neck.

  "Listen.” She tugged playfully at his ear. “I heard every word you said last night. Really, I did. You're worried about things I don't understand, and I'm willing to accept that. But we could still—I mean, why not? I like you. It might be fun, and—"

  "It would be more than fun,” Brent said darkly.

  "Then let's do it,” she whispered, managing a smile.

  A shade of a smile began to tease the corners of his mouth, too. “What's gotten into you this morning?"

  "I don't know,” she admitted, her voice trembling a little. “I feel almost like this is a dream, something that's not quite real. Inside there's—I feel different, relaxed, I guess—happy. You're a damn good man, Brent. I wish you could have been the first for me."

  "Peggy..."

  "I know; sex isn't a sport for you. I don't want gymnastics. But I've got something to share, something to give. And I know you'd know what to do with it."

  Brent moved against her, a deliberate thrust that hinted at how much sexual power and energy boiled inside of him. “How much do you want to give?"

  Peggy gasped. “I don't know. I—"

  "I want everything, Peggy. Not just your body. Everything."

  "Then take it,” she whispered. “I want someone to know me. Everything about me. Not just the face I put on."

  He touched her face, forcing Peggy to open her eyes and look at him.

  Seriously, he said, “I thought you didn't like looking inside yourself."

  "I don't. At least, I haven't in the past.” She chewed her lip for a moment, then decided to explain. “I haven't led the best life, Brent, I know. I've done things I should be ashamed of."

  He stroked her through the shirt, tantalizing her with a touch that promised more. “Like what?"

  She swallowed. She knew he was extracting a price. Before he could make love, he needed to understand her. Before there was physical closeness, there had to be emotional closeness, and Peggy knew she would have to open up.

  "Like writing stories when I haven't double-checked my facts,” she said. “Like stretching the truth to make it sound better."

  Softly, his mouth began skimming the skin of her neck and chest, just above the curve of her breasts. “Why?"

  "To make my stories better. To earn more money. To have some prestige. I need those things, Brent..."

  "Do you?"

  She was trembling, but the words spilled out anyway. “I came from a terrible place, Brent."

  He lifted his head and looked her in the eye. “What place could there be that was so bad?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "Usually, it's just the specific people who make the difference between a place being good or bad, anywhere."

  "Oh. You mean you're asking about my family, my father."

&nb
sp; "You want to tell me about him?"

  She shook her head convulsively. “No, I—things are pretty messed up, where he's concerned."

  Brent rolled up onto his elbow. Slowly, he caressed Peggy. “Talk to me."

  "You wouldn't understand. You're very different from my father."

  "How?"

  "Oh, in a hundred ways!"

  "You said before that he used to hit you."

  So this was what Brent meant by giving. Peggy felt uneasy, but for once, she thought she might be able to verbalize what had happened long ago.

  "Well, he—yeah. We lived in the poorest part of Brooklyn. He did hit me. It started when I was twelve, when my sister left home."

  "You have a sister? What's her name?"

  "Kathleen. She was my father's favorite—the pretty one, the smart one.” Peggy smiled nervously, but couldn't maintain it. “My father adored her. But she—she went into the kind of life most of the girls in our neighborhood went into. You probably don't have any idea."

  "I can guess.” He settled beside her, abandoning seduction to hold her and listen.

  Peggy rested her head against his shoulder. The story of her youth was something she'd never before shared with anyone. In fact, she'd spent a great many hours of her adult life trying to eradicate every memory of her early years.

  But suddenly, the images were alive in her mind. She could remember the scenes as clearly as if they'd just occurred. She continued slowly. “Kath started sneaking out at night when she was fifteen. We shared a bedroom, and she'd go out the window. I never said a word, not even when our mother found out.

  "We all kept quiet, for fear of what our father would do. Then, he figured it out for himself, even though he was drunk most of the time. Kath had money all of a sudden, nice clothes, and—"

  She stumbled on the next words. Brent kissed her face, and Peggy realized that he was kissing her tears. He did not try to stop the flow, but rather to ease them from her. She held Brent tightly against her body, arms hugging his shoulders.

  "My father found five thousand dollars in Kath's purse. That was a fortune for us! It happened a few days after Christmas, I remember. He beat Kath, broke her nose, and threw her out of the apartment. He'd never hit her before."