"Yes, really."
"Well why not?"
I laugh. "You're really asking me that?"
She shrugs.
"My heart wasn't in it."
"So where was it?"
I watch the ocean rather than answer her. She doesn't push.
"You remember when you were fifteen and I was seventeen?"
"Yeah."
"Dad told me if he ever caught me fooling around with you, he'd fire your mom and send you away and I'd never see you again."
"When I had the makeup on."
"When you had the makeup on."
She sighs, sadly, raggedly, and sits up.
"I'm not upset about that."
"That's not what I'm working up to confessing."
"Then what is it?" she says, a touch of concern in her voice, one she's trying to smooth over and hide with an amiable, gentle tone, like she's talking to a dangerous animal.
"I think I can walk now. I need to walk."
She hops off my lap and stands. Grabbing my wrist in both hands, she digs in, leans back, and helps pull me to my feet. I have to grab her arm and yank her towards me to keep her from falling ass over teakettle into the sand, and she thumps against my chest with a lazy grin on her face, as if that was all very fun.
"Where do you want to walk to?"
"Anywhere but the reception. Come on."
It's a simple thing, but she takes my hand. Her palm and fingers are cool to my touch, the skin so soft except for those little callous pads on her fingertips. From drawing, I assume. She was always drawing when we were young.
"Did you ever draw a picture of me?" I ask, out of nowhere.
"Of you, sure," she says, "Of you and me, all kinds of things."
She's actually blushing, her cheeks a faint pink in the dark. We're still on the beach but getting away from the touristy areas, the road beginning to curve inland.
"I didn't do you justice," she says, stopping to lean on a low fence and look at the rolling waves.
"Oh yeah, how so?"
Her eyes flick towards my crotch and she grins.
"Now you're just flattering me."
She huffs. "Just accept the compliment."
"Well, I don't draw," I say, curling an arm around her waist, "but my imagination didn't do you justice, either."
She rolls her eyes.
"You have an amazing ass."
"Is this how you do romantic?"
"I just want to bite it like an apple."
"Eww," she says, giggling. "Okay, now you're freaking me out a little. You're also evading my questions. What's so terrible that you think I'll hate you if I hear it?"
I swallow.
"I'm not sure I'm ready to tell you."
"Okay," Julia says and looks out over the ocean.
Looking at her back, I shudder. Laying eyes on her is a delight. My hand moves to flick the tail end of her braid, and she turns and catches my wrist.
"Not here. It's too romantic to talk about here."
"Where, then?"
I sigh. "I don't know."
"Everyone is at the reception. We could slip off back to the hotel."
"No, not yet. Let's just find a spot out of the wind."
A switchback staircase leads down to the sand. I go first, and Julia follows, flowing across the beach in her delicate ballet flats. My own shoes fill up with sand quickly, but the way she moves so lightly is almost ethereal. She's too perfect to be real.
About fifty yards down the beach, there's a flat rock. She swishes her skirts under her legs and sits, and I sit beside her. Above us, cars rumble past on the bridge, throwing brief flashes of rolling light across the sand from their headlamps.
She doesn't push. She looks out at the ocean and waits, hands folded in her lap. I have a distinct feeling that if I don't tell her, she won't push me. She won't ever push me. I could sit here with her until we're stooped and gray and she'd never ask.
If I did that, it would be a lie, because she would also never know, and I can't bear that.
"I was a naval aviator. Flew a strike fighter off of aircraft carriers."
"What's that like?" she asks, open innocence in her voice.
"The flying is surprisingly technical. The planes are incredible. It makes you feel like a god. They're so fast and maneuverable, I can't find the words to describe it, though. It's also terrifying. A catapult throws you off the end of a ship in the middle of the ocean and when you get back from your mission, you have to bring the plane down onto a heaving deck in the middle of the sea and catch a cable with a hook or you'll have to wave off and do it again. Make one kind of mistake and you go flying into the ocean, make another and you'll miss the cable and ram into another plane or the conning tower. Or smash into the stern, or ditch in the ocean."
"Sounds hard."
"It is, but that's not what...that wasn't the problem. That only made me feel like more of a badass. I could do this thing that very few people in the world could do. I liked it. I was good at it."
"So, what happened?"
"We were in the gulf, flying sorties. Basically a fire support mission, dropping ordinance on the bad guys."
"Okay," she says.
"I separated myself from that. I pushed a button and launched weapons and I was up there in a plane and didn't see what happened on the ground. What's the word? I dissociated from it."
She rests her hand on top of mine and waits.
"One day I flew a fire mission. A few days later, I saw a report on the news that we hit a caravan of refugees by accident. The brass called it 'collateral damage.'"
She tenses, sucking in a breath as her hand grips mine, hard.
"I don't know that it was me. I wasn't the only one in the air on that day. Law of averages is against it. But..."
My eyes are burning. Am I...?
Julia shifts closer, presses her hip against me, and lightly touches my face, drawing the burning lines away with her fingers.
"I couldn't do it anymore. I got out as soon as I could. I couldn't stop thinking about all the times I pushed the button. What might have happened there that I didn't know about."
I lift my hands and look at them. There's no blood, no damned spot that won't go away, no sinister mark. I haven't sprouted fur or claws, but these are still a monster's hands, too dirty to touch her with.
"I think about it all the time. All the time." I snort. "I only seem to stop thinking about it when you're here. Even then it's in the back of my head, nagging."
I reach in my pocket and close my fingers on the wedding band. My wedding band. I press it into her palm and she takes it, curling her fingers around it, her fist bobbing lightly as if she's testing its weight to make sure that it's real.
"Are you giving this back because you really don't want me?" Her voice is as tight as a snare drum.
"No," I say, my own voice distant, like I'm so far in my own skull I can only hear it echo. "I'm only giving it back to you because you need to make an informed choice. You need to know what kind of person I am, not the kind of person you want me to be."
She starts to say something, then stops.
"It was my fault," I say, shuddering. I shake my head but that doesn't free me of the monstrosity of it. You can't just say sorry for something like this. "Women. Little kids."
Carefully, she pulls my fingers open and touches my hand, her head still on my shoulder.
"Stop," she says.
The ring is cold as she slips it down my finger, but warms quickly when she laces her fingers between mine and closes her hand.
"Look at me."
I do. She sits up, shifts, and touches her lips to mine.
"There, now you kissed the bride. You're stuck with me."
"But—"
"What do you want me to say? You're not the perfect man I always wanted you to be in my childish fantasies?"
I blink a few times.
"I know you're not, but you want to be."
Her eyes. She's so gorgeous. I
run fingers through her thick dark hair and stroke my thumb along the curve of her delicate jaw. When I touch her, she feels like a rare predatory bird, a weird combination of delicate and tough. Her pulse in her neck twitches against my palm. She's so incredibly warm, and her skin is like silk.
It feels like we sit there on the rock for hours, listening to the waves roll in.
"There's something else you need to know."
"What?"
"My father has threatened to cut me off if I become involved with you."
She tenses and sits back.
"Are you saying that you don't...you want to?"
"No," I insist, sharply. "No, not that. You just need to understand that if we do this I might be crashing at your place after we get back."
She blinks.
Then she slaps me.
The blow is not hard, but it knocks my head around and I briefly see stars.
"You jerk," she snaps.
"Wait," I say, turning back to her, "you're pissed about this?"
"I don't give a fuck about your money," she says, angrily. "I grew up in your house but when we went home, I was alone from seven o'clock to eleven while my mom worked a second job serving cocktails at a country club. I didn't own anything that wasn't from a thrift shop or a second-hand store until I was an adult. That hurt, Ryan. That was the only thing you've ever said that really, truly hurt me."
She's not lying. Tears pool in her eyes, threatening to stream down her cheeks.
"If you don't care, then I don't care," I tell her. "I'm miserable. I never stay anywhere, I spent two-thirds of my waking hours drunk off my ass, my sister hates me, no one respects me, and the only thing I have to look forward to without you is living a soulless, empty existence until I turn around and find out I'm my father."
"I stick by my people," she says. "I'll support you no matter what happens."
"Then my mind is made up," I say. "Come here."
I pull her to me and rest her head on my shoulder, and she slips onto my lap. I lean against the rock behind us and just sit, watching the waves, feeling the slow and steady expansion of her chest against mine as she breathes.
"I want to go back now," she says, after what may have been an hour.
"Yeah," I say.
She stands first and offers me a hand. I take it and walk back up with her, then over the bridge and back towards the resort.
When we reach the lobby of the hotel tower, it's just us. The little shops are closed, and there's a bored clerk at the concierge desk who does not note our passage.
The elevator reaches our floor. My heart is pounding. I pull Julia along, and she tugs me towards her door. After she unlocks it, we tumble inside, and she shoves it shut with a loud slap and a click when it locks. She lets out a slow breath.
"I hate sneaking around," she says.
"Tomorrow we can talk to Karen," I say. "We might as well."
She nods. Then she steps a few feet away, turns, and presents her back to me, looking over the soft feminine curves of her shoulder.
"Would you?"
I almost ask what she means before it hits me, and I carefully slide the zipper down her back. The dress parts, and all she has to do is wriggle and it pools at her feet, now that the tension no longer holds it up. She stands with her back to me, wearing nothing but a garter belt, stockings, and a strapless bra.
Turning to face me, she lifts her hands to the clasp between her breasts and bares them, letting it fall as her hands move to my jacket, pressing it back. I shrug it off and let it hit the floor with a soft thump. She pops the pearl buttons on my shirt next, and I begin to help her, slipping out of suspenders, undoing my cummerbund.
She crouches in front of me as she pulls my pants down, then stands up again. She reaches to unclip the straps from her garter belt.
"Leave that on," I say.
She smirks, her soft lips curling into an adorable little smile as her eyes light up with mischief.
I can't stand it anymore, I yank her in close and kiss her hard. She grabs my head and latches on, kissing back just as hard, molding herself against me. I roam my hands all over her, down her back, gripping her ass. She gasps and rises on the balls of her feet and slides against me, her soft breasts pressed to my chest.
Squeezing her against me, I lift her bodily from the floor. She kicks her feet in the air and giggles and throws her arms around my neck. Easily, I lift her in my arms and carry her through into the bedroom. Riding in my arms, she looks up at me with a strange reverence, drawing her fingers across my skin when I lay her on the bed.
Julia reaches for me, but I grasp her shoulders and press her down, holding her there for a moment until she gets the message. Smirking, she remains still when I move over her, breathing fast as I take hold of her hips and dip to kiss her again. My cock thrums between my legs, hungry to enter her, but a rushed meal cannot be savored.
For a long time, I simply lay on top of her, kissing her, playing with her hair, testing her nipples with my fingers before I finally break from a kiss and move to her throat. She moans softly, as if her skin has suddenly become electric, and gasps at every tiny movement I make, working my way down her body.
She gasps and arches her back when I draw a line of soft wet kisses down her chest, between her breasts. Reading me now, she grabs my head and pushes me down, but I'm stronger than she is, and I control the pace, and her excitement rises with it. As I work my lips down her stomach, she flings her legs apart eagerly and tenses her belly to bring her sex up to me.
I only breathe on it first before taking a few experimental licks. She groans and throws her arms up to grip the pillows on either side of her head, pressing her eyes shut to savor the sensations. She moans and bites her lip as I taste her, still only lightly, just flicks of my tongue. There is nothing as exciting in this world as the way the muscles in her thighs and hips twitch when she feels a faint lick along her sex.
Her eagerness drives me wild. She bucks her hips up at me, and I grasp her by her flanks and hold her down, then deepen my kisses to her pussy, pressing my tongue into her, only lightly at first, deeper with each lick until she's moaning and pushing her heels into the bed. She shudders all over and whimpers, covering her face with her wrists and hands, and I stop. She's shivering.
"Shit, don't stop," she purrs, "I just do that when I'm...just don't stop."
Grinning, I return to savoring her, the heat and taste of her, the unique scent that flares through me and hardens me and makes my muscles quiver with anticipation. My dick is so hard it hurts, but I hold myself back. Not yet, not yet.
Julia lets out a low groan that rises into a higher pitched moan as my finger slides inside her. She shudders as I curl my finger inside her, the wet heat gripping me hard. I caress my thumb lightly over her clit as I begin kissing my way back up.
Her hands grip the back of my neck as I meet her lips again, and, grasping my cock, guide it into her. There's a moment of tense resistance, then the pure bliss of feeling her open for me, the heat enveloping me. I fight my twitching eyelids so I can watch her face twist and her expression slacken as I take her. She growls out a low groan as I enter her, rising to a keening cry as I thrust in to the hilt and stay there.
Now I finally rest my weight on her and feel us both sink into the bed. The first thing she does when I'm inside her is lock onto me with her arms and legs as if she's afraid I'll disappear and press her face into my shoulder.
She murmurs my name as I begin working in long, slow thrusts, savoring everything. The taste of her sweat on my tongue, the feeling of her around my cock, the way she twitches and quivers and moans my name and digs her fingers into my back.
I have to slow to hold myself back, to prolong things for both of us.
Then she says, "harder," and I almost lose control.
I slow almost to a stop, then give her an experimental thrust. She moans and rolls her hips to urge me on, digging her heels in where they push against my thighs, and soon the whole bed is rocki
ng with our rhythm. Everything else falls away and there is only her, only Julia, and her spectacular, flushed, sweaty beauty.
I shudder and slow again, but she's having none of that and bucks under me, refusing my attempts to slow it down. So I cut loose, and she cries out, arching under me as every muscle in her body tenses. The muscles in my legs and loins pull steel cable tight and I hold back and back.
When she screams and her body crushes my shaft inside her, I can hold back no longer and lose it, an animal grunt escaping me breathily, drowned out in her cries as she thrashes wildly, raking her hot nails down my back in painful lines that are forgotten in the throes of raw passion. Coming inside her is like leaving the world behind.
She goes limp under me, breathing hard, but musters the strength to use her legs to lock me against her when I try to pull back. She smiles softly to herself and stretches her arms, her back popping as she tenses.
She did this before. It's almost greedy the way she doesn't want me to pull out when we're done. Finally, she lets me go and I flop onto my back, heaving for breath, a little dizzy.
I can't help but stare at her, stretched out on the bed, her braid now a mess with loose strands everywhere and one of her stockings torn, the garter belt clip snapped off while we were making love. She rests one hand on her stomach and tucks the other arm beneath the pillow behind her head and looks like a wood nymph in a renaissance painting, innocence and sexuality all turned up together in one.
"Wow," she breathes, panting.
"Yeah," I say.
"You're a stallion."
"Me? You're the one that likes to bite and scratch."
She looks at me with lidded eyes, and then, faster than I thought she could, whips her leg and rolls on top of me.
Chomp! She bites my shoulder, not hard enough to really hurt me but enough for me to yelp and, in pure reflex, spank her right on the ass. Hard.
Her head lifts up and the look in her face shifts quickly from confusion to wonder to wicked understanding, teeming with possibility.
"Oh," she says, "I liked that."
I have no objection, and if I did, I couldn't put it into words. My mind is melting as she sits up and grinds her wet pussy on my shaft, bringing me to hardness again.
"I sweat, you're a vampire," I murmur.
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