Tasting Fear

by Shannon McKenna

  “I grew up around people who weren’t embarrassed about it,” he said. “The sexual revolution. Let it all hang out.”

  Interesting factoid, that. Vivi pinched off a mint leaf and chewed it, letting the fresh, clean flavor clear her head. Jack dunked his head under the water and smoothed his hair back from his square forehead, and she noticed once again the white streak of the scar that disappeared into his hairline. “How’d you get that scar?”

  He didn’t open his eyes. “Long story.”

  “I’m not in a hurry,” she said.

  His forehead contracted, and then he wiped his face clean of expression once again. “Another time.”

  She plucked another mint sprig. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to pry.”

  “It’s okay. Talk all you want. Just don’t expect me to be scintillating when I respond. Or even coherent.”

  “Why? Is something wrong?”

  He opened his eyes, and looked at her, with that bright, clear timber wolf gaze that made shivers of delicious terror race through her.

  “I can’t concentrate,” he said. “I can barely hear you talk. All I can hear is my own heart pounding.”

  The flat statement hung between them. The force of his gaze burned against her face. She closed her eyes, counted to ten.

  She opened them, and gazed at him. A lock of hair was clinging to his forehead. A drop of water rolled down his cheek. Vivi leaned forward and touched it with her fingertip. His face was so hot, his skin so resiliant, velvety.

  He caught her wrist in his hand and pulled. She floated effortlessly, inevitably closer to him. For a few breathless moments, they were face-to-face, staring at each other. Her breasts brushed his chest. He touched her lips. Slid his finger into her hair. Kissed her, hungrily.

  She went nuts in his arms. An explosion of emotions, sensations, bursting into being from deep inside. Achingly sweet, and tinged with desperation, and something fierce, like anger, but brighter, hungrier. Twisting, twining, growing. She wound her arms around his neck and hung on, digging her fingers into those thick muscles.

  He drew back for a moment, his eyes dilated and full of wonder. “You taste like mint,” he said huskily, and then that huge vortex sucked them right back into another desperate, twining kiss.

  Oh, wow. He was outrageously beautiful close up. His eyes, the incredible length of his wet black eyelashes. Water drops trickling along the crest of the graceful, angled sweep of his eyebrows.

  His lips were hot and soft, as wonderful and kissable as she had imagined, and his breath tasted so sweet. His skin was so supple and beautiful, with that delicate rasp of new beard shadow over strong, graceful bones, over chiseled manly angles. God. So fine.

  She was charged with emotion. She explored his muscular back with her fingers, wound her arms around his neck, and opened to his kiss. An opening from somewhere deep inside her, someplace vast and beautiful. A universe of bright, open space.

  She barely noticed the shoulder straps of her bathing suit being peeled down. She arched back, abandoning herself to his strong grasp, letting her head fall back and her hair float out in the water like a lily pad. She cried out with pleasure as he hungrily suckled her breasts.

  So sweet, so shivering melting hot for him. Her nipples felt like points of glowing light. Her breasts had always felt so deplorably small, insignificant even, but under his hot mouth, they felt plumper, bigger. Swollen with eagerness, alive to pleasure. Her whole chest was melting and soft, as if he drank some magic elixir from her body as he licked her, and the more he took, the more she had to give.

  And the breathless aching pull of want between her legs grew keener every moment.

  Jack pulled her down onto his lap and slipped his finger under her bottom and into the stretchy fabric of her bathing suit, dragging in a sharp breath to find her slick and hot. He slid the tip of his finger slowly inside her. She squirmed, clenched around him, making a keening sound almost too high for herself to hear.

  “Oh, wow,” he muttered. “You’re…”

  “Yes,” she said. “No hair. I do a Brazilian wax whenever I get the chance. I like the way it feels.”

  “Me, too,” he rasped.

  She hid her face against his neck, her breath jerking in and out in short, hard sobs. Her bathing suit was floating away, forgotten. She had to slow this down. “Um, Jack? Wait.”

  “Why? You’re ready. I’ve never seen anyone so ready in my life.” He bent his head to her chest again, pulling her nipple into a wet, silken vortex of sensation, his hot tongue rasping, swirling.

  “But I…b-b-but I can’t—”

  “Shhhh.” He thrust a finger inside her slick pussy, penetrating, pressing and swirling deep inside as he licked and lapped, and ah…

  She cried out, arching back in his grasp as a totally unexpected climax pumped violently through her.

  When she opened her eyes, she was floating in his arms, staring up into the bright blue sky. Her eyes were awash with tears.

  Jack rose to his feet. Water sloshed and slopped as he hoisted her up and set her on the edge of the pool. The cool air felt delicious on her pink, overheated flesh. Heat steamed off her wet body. She felt poppy red, feverish, weak in the knees. Terribly exposed.

  He pressed her legs apart, and stared down at her. “Oh, yeah,” he whispered. “I knew it.”

  “Knew what?”

  He pushed her gently back, until her back was pressed to the flat rock, her legs wide. Laid out like a sacrifice on the altar of sexual misbehavior. Open to the sky. A warning to foolish, unwary girls.

  But she wasn’t choking up, she wasn’t panicking, like usual. It was magic. She couldn’t stop. At least not yet. It was too wonderful.

  “I knew that your pussy would be like this.” He knelt down in the pool to get closer, and kissed the inside of her thigh. “Those dark red folds, bursting out of your slit like some hothouse flower. Exotic.”

  She laughed, shakily. “You’ve got flowers on the brain, Jack.”

  “No.” His teeth flashed, in one of his rare, gorgeous grins. “I’ve got your pussy on the brain.” He nuzzled her labia, light kisses that promised and teased. “I was half expecting your clit to be pierced.”

  She jerked up onto her elbows. “Hah! You won’t catch me sticking a metal pin through the most nerve-dense part of my entire body!” She peered at him, eyes narrowed. “I bet you’re disappointed, right? I’m not quite as wild as you’d fantasized?”

  He played with her inner pussy lips, spreading them tenderly wide like butterfly wings, and the tickling caresses were driving her mad.

  “Actually, no,” he said. “I’m relieved, to tell the truth. We’re on the same page about how we like to treat those nerve-dense parts of our bodies. That bodes well.”

  “Yeah? For what?”

  “Orgasms,” he said, and leaned down, pressed his lips against her clit. Swirled his tongue. Oh, God. He was so…good.

  She jerked helplessly against his face. She wasn’t ready. It was too intense. She was scared to death. She pushed his face away.

  He rose up, kissing his way up over her mons, the tiny swatch of decorative red pubic hair, over her clit hood. Then over her belly, her rib cage, her breasts.

  “Get comfortable with it,” he said, resolutely. “I’m going to lick your pussy until you’re a lake of lube.”

  “Jack.” She grabbed his hair to hold him there, licked her lips, and dragged in a jerky breath. “I don’t know if this is such a good—”

  “I have to.” He unwound her hands, sank down. “It’s going to be a really tight fit.” He slid his tongue boldly between her pussy lips.

  The rasp of his plunging tongue, his matter-of-fact words, the thought of him inside her, it kicked her over the top and into a powerful orgasm. Her pussy pulsed around his thrusting fingers, throbbed against his swirling tongue. Long, sweet, echoing ripples went on and on.

  He pulled her back down into the pool after the spasms had moved through her, and she sank into his
arms as if she had no bones. He held her so she floated right over the thick, prominent jut of his erect cock against her thigh. In silent pleading.

  She draped herself over his shoulder. Trying to catch her breath.

  “Jack. Um, I hate to say it, but we can’t have sex,” she whispered.

  He stiffened, nuzzling her shoulder. “No?”

  “We have no latex,” she pointed out. “I certainly didn’t bring any.”

  Breath hissed in sharply, between his teeth. “Ah, yes. That.”

  “A small detail, but an important one. I don’t have contraception, either. And we haven’t even discussed our sexual histories yet. I’m sorry. I don’t know how I let things go so far.” She couldn’t stop herself from apologizing, even though the situation was only half her fault. “Just for the record. I’m, ah, fine,” she offered. “No STDs of any kind.”

  “Me neither,” he said.

  “No lovers, either. For a really long time,” she added.

  “I noticed that,” he replied. “You’re tiny. Like a virgin.”

  “But I’m not, ah…I’m not babyproof,” she said.

  He stared at the river. Wiped water off his face, expressionless. “Forget it.” His voice was remote. “I’m disappointed, but I’ll live.”

  His cool tone made her feel punished, and frustrated. “Besides, it’s just too soon for going all the way,” she rattled on. “Call me silly and old-fashioned if you want, but I barely know you, and things are really weird between us anyway, and I just don’t want to give it all up to you if you just want to…ah, I mean, if the relationship has no future.”

  His eyes narrowed. “I should think you would be good at those.”

  She stiffened, suspicious. “At what?”

  “Relationships with no future. What other kind could your type possibly have?”

  She shoved away from him, her boneless languor gone. A wave of hot water splashed up into Jack’s chest and face.

  “Screw you, Kendrick,” she said savagely, leaping up.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to insult you.”

  “Oh? You want to know a secret? A couple of minutes ago, I truly, sincerely wanted to suck your dick. You want to know something else? I don’t want to suck your dick anymore.” She yanked her jeans up over her bare ass. She couldn’t seem to make her trembling fingers work. He got out of the pool and moved toward her. She kept her face averted. “Don’t touch me,” she snarled.

  “Aw, shit,” he muttered. “What a mess.”

  “Yes. My feelings, exactly. I’ve known you for about one day, and every time you see me, you insult me. Big, nasty, mortal insults. And it’s ten times worse when you seduce me first. Freaking sadist.”

  “I didn’t mean to insult you. Nor did I succeed in seducing you, evidently.” He got up out of the pool, and she whipped her gaze away.

  “Keep your back turned,” he said. “I want to take this wet underwear off before I put on my jeans.”

  “Do as you like. I’m leaving.”

  Vivi made her way up the flower-lined, moss-choked streambed. She could barely see where she was going. Slowly, the path came back into focus. The cleft of rock she had to clamber past. The thicket of posion oak. The tunnel of blackberry brambles to slither through. Then back down to the riverbed, for the rock hopping.

  She was mortified. He melted her down. Turned her into hot goop. And then made her feel cheap and easy for giving in to it.

  Hell with him. It was a mistake she would not make again.

  Her knee-jerk instinct was to gather up her stuff and her dog and get the hell out of there, but her van was still stuck, and the Fiend was still out there, and she had no place to go, except back to New York, to park on her sisters’ lives. Once she’d started planning her hideout in the flower bower, she’d ceased to send in registration fees for upcoming crafts fairs, or to churn out new stock. So she couldn’t even do the circuit, at least not for a while. Working the crafts fairs took a certain amount of lead time and advance planning.

  So even if her van were unstuck, if she left now it would just be for aimless, money-draining, gas-guzzling wandering the road. And she would be too scared to stop. The gas would run out when the money did. And it wouldn’t take very long.

  And there she’d be, a sitting duck.

  No. She was a grown-up. She’d been through hell in her life, and come out battered, but okay. She would not be chased away like a stray cat. Her safety was more important than her hurt feelings.

  But neither would she play the nymphet sex toy for that arrogant prick. Thank God she hadn’t gone down on him. She’d be feeling ten times worse about it all if she had the taste of his come in her mouth.

  And she’d come so close, too. Her mouth had been watering. Bad enough that he’d spent all that time with his face between her legs.

  That took the strength out of her wobbly legs. She sat down heavily on a rock. Clenching her thighs around pulses of remembered pleasure.

  Only the thought of him finding her there on his way back was scary enough to nudge her up off her ass and get her stumbling home.

  Chapter

  5

  “So. Your own store, hmm? What a lovely idea. Jewelry, pottery, art objects, gift items? Pebble River is just right for a place like that, now that the windsurfers found it. Lots of tourism. Windsurfers have money, you see.” Margaret poured Vivi another cup of tea out of a rose-spattered teapot and nudged the plate of pecan puffs toward her. “Come on, dearie! Indulge! Heaven knows, you can afford the calories!”

  “Margaret, I’ve eaten five already, and they’re not small.” Vivi gazed appreciatively at the heap of sugar-glazed cookies.

  “I could help you find a place, you know,” Margaret offered. “I ran a cross-stitch shop in Pebble River for thirty-five years. We can get started right away.”

  “I would, but my van’s still stuck,” Vivi explained. “Dwayne keeps putting me off because of the rain, but it’s been sunny for days, so—”

  “Well, now! Speak of the devil. Look what’s coming up the road!”

  Vivi peered through the floral print swags of Margaret’s window. A tractor chugged up the road. A big, round man with a cowboy hat was behind the wheel. “Is that Dwayne?”

  Margaret hobbled to the window and lifted her spectacles. “It is. I told him all about you. He runs the gas station at the exit for Pebble River. Put some cookies in a napkin for him, would you, dear?”

  Vivi soon found herself on the road, shaking the hand of a smiling guy with several chins. “You’re the artist? Good to meet you.”

  “Same here.” She handed him the cookies with a smile.

  “I thought you might be coming by, Dwayne, so I baked your favorite,” Margaret said. “Vivi, let me know when you want to go to Pebble River. Maybe we should all go together.”

  “All? All meaning who?” Vivi asked.

  “You, me, and Jack,” Margaret said brightly. “I’m sure Jack will have wonderful ideas.”

  “Oh, no. I don’t want to bother Jack,” Vivi said hastily.

  “Bother me about what?”

  Her heart jumped up, to her throat. She turned. Oh, boy.

  She’d managed to avoid him since the hot springs incident, and she’d been fondly imagining that her feelings were back under control. Nope. Vivid images of the hot springs incident blazed through her body.

  Her face turned pink. No. Her whole body was turning pink.

  “Hi.” Jack nodded to Dwayne and Margaret. “Heard the tractor.”

  “I figured it was dry enough by now,” Dwayne said.

  “I’ll walk down with you,” Jack said.

  Oh, God. All she needed. Vivi swallowed her dismay. “Okay.”

  Fortunately, the rumble of the tractor chugging ahead of them made their silence less embarrassing on the walk. Vivi had been using the quiet days while the weather dried up to hang pictures, write down goals, make shopping wish lists for some future when she had money to spend.
She’d set up her portable studio on the floor, and had made several trips back and forth to the van to haul back her work supplies.

  It was a new artistic era. She had to beef up her stock, dream up new designs. Scrounge for pretty rubbish. She liked to incorporate what people thought of as garbage into her work. Part of her artistic philosophy. Making garbage beautiful. All in the attitude.

  Her first investment would be a big worktable. Then some metalworking equipment. Big pieces of stained glass to play with. She was eager to spread out. Everything in her life for the past six years had been miniature; from her income to her camper-van home all the way to her artistic ambitions. She was sick of being miniature. She wanted to sprawl. Take up space. Breathe big breaths.

  Not that she regretted the choices she’d made. Her back straightened up at the thought. The traveling jewelry business had been good to her. Her jewelry sideline had started one day when Nancy admired a sculpture Vivi was making out of beads, wire, and glass.

  “This is beautiful,” Nancy had said. “If it were jewelry, I would wear it.”

  The comment had given her an idea, and for each of her sisters’ and Lucia’s next birthdays, she’d made personalized earrings. Then necklaces to match. Then she’d tried a couple of brooches. It was fun. Ideas for designs flowed easily.

  Her art school buddy Rafael had persuaded her to try selling them in his booth at the open-air market down on Sixth Avenue. She had sold several, to her surprise and Rafael’s glee. The profit had almost paid her rent that month.

  Brian had been disdainful of her “craftsy hobby,” and resentful of the time it took from the work he demanded from her, but she’d kept quietly on with her sideline. And after things exploded with Brian, the jewelry gave her something to fall back on. Not what she’d dreamed of, but it was creative, and it paid for her gas, her car insurance, her food.

  She’d been trying to use some of these long, silent days to churn out some more work, but she’d had no luck. She’d chalked it up to exhaustion, worry, and unsatisfied lust. And Haupt, and John the Fiend, of course. That zesty pinch of mortal dread, just to liven things up.