by Kris Buendía
“I thought you didn't want to talk about it.”
“You were wrong. I do want to if not, I'm not going to be able to sleep.”
He comes in and closes the door behind him.
I look at him playfully, he is not good with sarcasm.
“Do you mind if I take a shower first?”
He remains seated with one leg over the other. He takes off his jacket and loosens up his tie. I stay looking at him as a fool imagining him continuing to take off his clothes.
“Is that look an invitation for me to join you in the shower?“ He purrs playfully and I leave the question hanging in the air as I walk to the bathroom. I get there and I start taking off my clothes.
I need to be pretty awake so as to have this conversation with him. Even though the fatigue is not what’s winning me over, it's that look and his words. I could believe every word that he says if my head wasn't so fucked up right now.
I could invite him to have a shower with me, worship his body and fall asleep in his chest, this time, with my five senses, without being sleepy or afraid to wake up with him not being there.
I could get a divorce tomorrow, hire the best lawyer and fly to Apple Valley so he could meet my father and for him to know this new man that wants to be a part of my life, and not only stay in my bed.
I could share my friends with him, help him get out of his loneliness and even forgive him if he needs to be forgiven.
I could fall in love with him.
I could keep dreaming, while the water falls in my head down to my feet, and I wash away every “maybe” away.
I could...but I ignore the glass door sliding open. I ignore the fact that he decided to join me in the shower after all and be part of my reality and not only my thoughts. I ignore the possibility of asking him to leave and for us to forget our conversation.
It's not the conversation I was hoping to have.
Now are bodies are doing the talking and I feel his even more, as he holds me from behind, his stiff and hot erection pressing behind me.
I don't know how long I`m going to be able to ignore this. His hands are coming up my waist and grabbing my breasts, one on each hand and let my head fall back, my eyes still closed, not because the water doesn't let me open them, but because I know he is doing the same also.
He is not going to say anything?
Fine.
Now is my turn to let my body do the talking. Now it's me who is touching him, my left hand accompanies him in one of my breast, while the other goes up to his hair. I invite him to kiss me and he delightedly accepts. He is totally wet and we are one body and soul. It looks like he can't wait any longer, and with one of his legs he quietly orders me to open my legs for him.
Still with my back to him, my lips abandon his, one of his hands reaches my back and I drop down offering myself to him. His other hand is somewhere I know, guiding his erection inside me.
I open my eyes for a second and I see his perfect and hard erection and that makes me close my eyes again and my mouth to open. I moan with each pound that he gives me under water. My hands are glued to the cold mosaic, one of his hands goes from being in my back to taking my hair all in one, while the other grabs my waist harder.
“Ohhh!“ I scream, moving forward and backwards at the same page as him. He wins me over in energy and speed when his grip and penetrations don't allow me to move back.
“Oh God! Duncan!” My hands slip and he lets go of my hair and grabs my waist while he continues lounging harder and harder, in an out again and again.
“I want you to remember one thing clearly, Lana” he starts to tell me and my hands hold his “You`ve never been an option for me…you are the one.”
“No!“ I refuse to believe that “I can't…I don`t believe you. It can't be, Fuck!”
He laughs in my neck, to then get out from inside me and turn me around. He lifts me up like I was a feather and places me against the wall, I hold my legs around his perfect waist. His perfectly shaped chest is in sight again. He touches my chin so I can see him and he kisses me again. I bite his lip, his tongue and he grunts with pleasure.
“You are the one” he whispers agitated, he plays with his manhood grazing my wet spot and that drives me crazy, screaming at him to put it inside me again, where it belongs.
At least for now.
“I refuse to be” his face stays unmoved but his hand keeps moving faster and faster, I restrain myself from screaming and from his demands.
“Baby, you are way out if you want to fight me on this. Can't you see?”
He leans forward and kisses my lower lip and let’s go making a little sound after sucking it and he whispers to me:
“You are dying to be mine.”
Without expectations, but wanting for him to be inside me again.
“Duncan!”
“Fuck” he grunts “do you feel it too?”
What I feel right now is an immense pleasure, a total joy that I have never felt before because I didn't know it existed, with him everything is new. His confessions, his demands, his protection and his attention. He is right, I'm dying to be his, to be the only woman that he makes his and worships in that savage and attentive way. He can be anything he puts his mind to and he won't stop being him. He won't lose that incredible essence of the almost perfect man he has.
“Please, Duncan” I beg him holding his back tightly, kissing him like there is no tomorrow and asking the same of him “Tell me that you are also only mine.”
Tears are running down my cheeks, but he can't see them because they get confused with the hot water of the shower. He can give me all the pleasure that he wants but that won`t cloud my good judgement and it won't make me say things I don't feel. If he is going to ask me something I want to make sure that I'm getting the same thing in return. I don't want his pieces, his deceit or his loneliness, I want the other part of him, the good part. The part that his ex-wife Elaine never knew.
I want it all.
“You have me” he slows down the rhythm of his hips and that doesn`t help, I'm about to explode any second now” Now I want to hear you. And don`t tell me what I want to hear just because I`m fucking you better than your ex-husband ever did. I want to hear the truth from those exquisite lips.
Every time he pounds in faster, regaining control and taking me beyond pleasure. Just when I'm about to explode, I'm expecting my mouth to open and to scream his name, but I fail and my lips say what I'm really feeling.
“Yes! Oh shit! Yes…I want to be yours!”
A grunt accompanies my screaming confession and his penis slipping from inside me is the signal that we both have climaxed at the same time. His hands look for my face and caress it, I remain hugging his waist when my shaky feet reach the wet floor. A tender kiss is deposited in my head, which makes me look up and see him.
He smiles at me. A real smile. It's contagious and I do the same when he tells me:
“You already are.”
I am.
CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN
This morning Duncan is having breakfast in front of me without saying a word.
Last night we took our conversation up to my room and we “conversed” for hour until we fell asleep.
There is no point in saying that I told him I was his multiple times as did he told me he was mine.
It can be so crazy. But Duncan doesn`t know about timing and I will have to get used to it. In fact, it feels better this way. Without second guessing myself and asking so many questions, but we still have to have the real conversation. That one that none of us want to be the first to remember.
“I can see that you don't know where to start” he points out as he takes a zip of his coffee “Do you want me to start?”
I nod yes.
“Please do, I don't know what to say.”
He sighs and looks away from me. Like he is about to say things that are
not easy for him.
“I was born in Canada. My father was an important architect in Toronto.”
“Was? “ I have a knot in my throat.
“Yes. My father killed himself when I was eight years old. My mom couldn't handle living in Canada after that. Every building and museum reminded her of him” he finds something funny in his thoughts because he smiles a little “He had technically build all of them.”
“Despite being just a kid, I understood her and I agreed to leave Toronto and come to live in the US. It was tough for my mom to raise me the first two years, and I didn't make things easy on her. I was very rebellious and I even blamed her for my father's death one night. I told it to her face that she should have been the one that died, not him.”
“Oh God, that is so cruel.”
“I`m sorry” I reach out to grab his hand “that must have been really hard for both of you.”
“When I said those words to her she just told me that she loved me and that she missed my father too. I didn't apologize, I asked her to go for a drive instead, it was already midnight. She agreed and I always remember that moment and I curse to myself for being so irresponsible as to listen to a ten year old kid.”
“Why? “ the moment I pop the question he lets go of my hand and takes another zip of coffee, he takes a few moments before continuing.
“A drunk driver lost control of his car and hit us” my eyes fill with tears “the worst part was on her side if the car, killing her instantly. I remember waking up in the hospital with a doctor, a nurse, a police officer and a woman from child services.”
I remember the order he gave me yesterday morning and now I realize that the night he lost his mother still haunts him. I wipe away a tear and he smiles at me.
“How can you smile at me?“ I tell him, still feeling the knot in my throat. I know what it's like to lose a parent.
The word “irresponsible” now has a deeper meaning for me. He can`t stop scolding me for every little thing I do and now I feel bad for it. He was just trying to protect me and to teach me the value of my own life.
He, this strange and not so strange neighbor of mine has lost more than me, he has protected me without him even knowing and I have just brought trouble into his life. And in return the only thing he has asked of me is for me to be his.
“It wasn`t all sad for me. Losing both my parents in a short time wasn't easy for me, but I had the best biological and adoptive parents you can imagine.”
“Please tell me they are still alive” I beg him, I couldn't bear the thought of him being alone in this world.”
“My adoptive mom died seven years ago from a heart attack. She was older than my adoptive dad, so she was called first.”
“I`m sorry, and your dad?”
“He lives in a retirement home for ex marines. After losing his wife and seeing his two children become man and mend for themselves, he didn't want to be a load on us and I can understand him. The retirement home is incredible and we have never seen him sad again. We respected his decision.”
“We? Sorry it's just that you continue to talk about you and somebody else. Do you have a brother?”
“Yes. He is also adopted.”
Come on, you are going to have to give me more detail than that.
I would have never guessed it. I thought it was just him. But it never crossed my mind either that he had lost his parents or that he was adopted.
“His name is Dorian” he tells me “he is a genius about technology and also a lawyer.”
“And where is he?”
I'm excited that he has a brother and I wonder how he is. If they grew up together they must have the same habits. Physically they won't look alike, but it would be fun to see them together. I always imagined what it would be like to have siblings. Arguing, making fun of each other and being there for each other.
“He lives in the city. He doesn't visit me much but we sometimes go and visit Dad together.”
“That is great. You have two people close to you, you do have a family after all.”
Duncan looks at me nostalgic, like he could read me through my words.
“You have your father” he reminds me” He is your family and you should talk to him. You need his support.”
How does he know?
“Ok, this is not about me.”
I change the subject without caring that I`m obvious about it. The last thing I want now is to remember my life right now.
“What did he mean when he threatened you?”
He doesn`t need to be more detailed in his question. He is talking about Gabe`s threat. I hadn't thought about it again until now.
I don't want to remember. But I feel I need to get it off my chest. I curse the moment that I trusted Gabe with my deepest darkest secret.
I feel a thin cold layer of guilt separating us as I look into his eyes. I might be crazy.
Or maybe he is going to hate me for this.
If he needs to run, then I hope he does, even though I don't want him to.
I'm going to tell him either way:
“I killed someone.”
I've confessed.
I've told him I killed someone and he doesn't even blink, it's like he is not surprised by having a murderer in front of him, or maybe he is just not afraid of death.
“I`m sorry” he says, looking like the air just got to his lungs” I find it impossible to believe such a thing, so as to ask you to please explain it to me.
Our conversation looks like it has two parts to play right now.
He is the detective and I a victim -killer.
“I don't…I don't know how…”
My chair shoots back, the clock marks the time in my head of that day still rumbling in my thoughts. I was over this.
Over this?
How can I be over being a Killer?
Shit.
I think I'm about to faint. I start walking in circles, feeling my hands shake and the sweat coming down from my forehead. It's real, very real and Duncan can't defend me from this.
“Lana” he walks over to me and I ignore him” Relax baby. Just breathe.”
“I just…just, I don`t know who I…I don`t know…how…”
“I`m sure that whatever happened was an accident, Lana. You couldn't have done such a thing. You are a doctor that saves lives baby. Don't punish yourself like that.”
Stop!
“Stop! “ I yell not only to myself.
I hear his voice, his vague excuses are ridiculous. At last I have his attention. He remains silent and I look for a lie, a possible truth, and alibi, but everything throws me to the same thing at the end.
I`m a murderer.
“I`m the one that finds all of this impossible. Starting with why I`ve spurred it out just like that. You don`t know me and even so you find it impossible for someone like me to be able to keep a secret like that. But it's the truth, Duncan. I killed someone. I can still hear his voice in my head, his threats. The diagnostic said he was going to die in a few months, two or three, at the most four. What would you do if you only had three months to live?”
Duncan doesn't answer. And I don't blame him. I don't have an answer for that either.
“I don't know” he answers anyway.
“It`s curious that afterwards, one finds the same answer.”
I realize that we are close. Our breakfast is almost intact on the table. I can still feel the fresh coffee smell, but I can also feel the stench of guilt and egoism.
“If this person was going to die, why do you say you killed him?”
My big eyes pierce him coldly.
“Because I didn't give him the chance to live those months. I ended his life before…he asked me to, he threatened me to do it. He threaten me that if I didn`t end his life first he would end my career. I had to choose between his life and my career. What kind of person does that mak
e me?”
His hand reaches my face and I look at him. He wipes away a tear that I hadn't realized had fallen from my eye and he kisses me. His final embrace is what finally makes me break down.
“Ending someone's pain doesn`t make you a monster Lana. When did this happen?”
“Three years ago. It's funny, three years ago I was happily married and trusting the wrong person. I couldn't handle that by myself and I told Gabe. I never thought that he would threaten me with it. What am I supposed to do now?”
My body steps away from his. Now the fear is bigger. If this ever reaches the light of day I will not only lose my career, but also my life, I would be locked up for a long time.
“Euthanasia is legal since last year in the state of Washington” he lets me know, trying to make me feel less guilty, but the result is the same “If that son of a bitch`s threat is real, I won't let anything happen to you.”
“How? “ I grunt “How can you protect me from a crime like that? Mr. Fitz threat had already taken the careers of other doctors that refused to operate on him. His heart condition was very critical. I gave him the chance to live three more months. It was the furthest he would be able to go. But he was tired, part of me wanted to end his suffering and the other half wanted to save my career.”
Now more than ever I want him to get out running, but he doesn't. In exchange he holds me, kisses me and wants to protect me.
“I don't want Gabe to end your life too.”
“Your life is not going to end, Lana. I`m not afraid of Senator Miller. And you shouldn`t be afraid of him either. I can talk to Dorian if you`d like, he could help you.”
“No, I can`t involve you in this more. This shouldn't be like this, you don't have to be my guardian angel for everything. You are making me look bad.”
I've managed to make him smile. I feel ashamed. Guilty and the list goes on and on.
“That’s why…”
“If you tell me I deserve somebody better than you I`m going to gag you and then fuck you” he threatens me. “Trust me, it's not the punishment you want.”