“Oh.”
He kept his eyes open, and for once, he needed no scenario. Only this woman, making
him feel this. Wanting it from him, after everything he’d told her. This greedy mouth
didn’t belong to some alien being, or hostage-taker, or sadistic mistress. Only Merry—beautiful,
startling Merry—and he’d obey her.
He held her head gently, following the motions, feeling the pressure and suction,
the
hunger
of her. Her hair against his fingers was silken, cool, and smooth. When he came,
it was no act of obedience. It wasn’t a wailing, shrieking release, but a sweet, deep
ache, feeling ages long and made of pure surrender.
As the pleasure finally let him go, he drew his hands away. Her hair whispered between
his fingers as she drew back, swallowing. Smiling, a touch embarrassed, he thought.
Or perhaps even smug. But not regretful. Not ashamed or disgusted or condemning. Rob
sat up, leaning against the headboard, and hoisted his bottoms to his hips.
She must have read the request in his eyes.
Come here.
She did, sitting beside him on his small bed, twining their arms and fingers. Her
weight felt so perfect, the way she leaned into him. She drew her long hair over her
far shoulder and sighed.
“I ought to say something,” Rob mumbled, feeling drunk. No—feeling so much better
than drunk. So sensate and alive and awake, yet addled. “But nothing I can think of
will be right. Be enough, I mean.”
“Just tell me it felt good.”
He laughed. Just as he’d suspected, words were inadequate to describe this moment.
“It was amazing. It was more than I’ve ever felt.” He blinked. “That doesn’t even
make sense. But that’s what it was. It was more than I’ve ever felt.” Every emotion,
good and bad, wrung from him in so short a time. Fear and shame and guilt, mingled
with pleasure and lust, power and helplessness. Everything, just everything. “Thank
you.”
She squeezed his hand. “Thank you. For sharing yourself.”
“You’re welcome.” He mouthed the words more than he spoke them, so humbled his throat
seized up.
“I wanted you,” she said quietly, turning to look at his chin or mouth. “Almost the
minute I met you.
From
the minute I met you, except I wrote it off, since I was delirious and all.”
He had to smile at that. “Really?”
“Really.”
“I was such a cranky, rubbish host.”
“But you were always in there.” She stroked his palm with her thumb. “I could see
someone in those eyes. Plus you’re very sexy.”
He laughed. “Definitely your head injury talking there.”
“You are. To me. Very strong and rugged and . . . different. Capable. Then there’s
this other man hiding inside that capable act, isn’t there?”
Indeed. The oddest Russian nesting doll ever, Rob was. A gruff and self-sufficient
shell snapped closed to hide a happily spineless wretch. Though inside that wretch,
the gleefully belittled one of his fantasy life, slave to his fetish . . . there was
another man still. The drunk. The outcast. A man too weak and damaged and loathsome
to even inhabit those degrading fantasies. But he’d cracked open quite enough of himself
for Merry to pick through for one afternoon.
“I’ve never let anyone see so much of me.”
She sat up straight and met his eyes squarely. “Promise me something.”
“Anything.” Anything at all.
Take my word. My brain, my heart, every last cell in my body.
“Promise I’m not going to wake up tomorrow and find you’ve gone all cold again. Embarrassed
by everything we’ve done. Or worried I’ve changed my mind and decided I never wanted
to hear and do all that stuff.”
Could he promise that? She’d seen all of him—all but his darkest demons, and those
couldn’t reach him, not out here. There was no reason she’d ever have to meet that
Rob. “I promise.”
“Good.” She relaxed back against him. “Because I like this man, right here.” She squeezed
his arm to her side.
“He likes you.”
“Enough to make me lunch?” she asked.
“Enough to carry you and that whopping great pack of yours to Inverness, so you’ll
never suffer another blister.”
“Just lunch is fine.”
Funny how he’d exposed so much to her, yet it still took a surge of courage to plant
a kiss on her cheek. But it was nice, this nervous feeling.
I fancy her. A lot.
He let her go, leaving the covers, the bed—this space that would never, ever look
the same. He eyed her as he pulled his shirt on. This marvelous woman. Kind. Funny.
Beautiful, inside and out. Powerful beyond reason, for the secrets she knew and hadn’t
shied from, and the masterful way she’d exploited them.
Where were you when I was twenty?
How different might his life have been, if he’d known someone like Merry before he’d
met his wife? But at twenty he’d never have shared what he wanted, not even with an
eager ear such as Merry’s listening. She’d have been wasted on him back then.
“I ought to tie you up myself,” he teased, tugging his jumper over his head. “Keep
you here forever.”
She smirked. “You won’t, though. That wouldn’t do a thing for you.”
“No, perhaps not.” Goodness, he was grinning. He couldn’t
stop
grinning. Extraordinary.
“Go make me some lunch, slave boy,” Merry commanded, and whipped a pillow at him.
Rob jogged out the door, calling, “Yes, ma’am.”
He smiled as he fed the stove, positively giddy.
Bloody marvelous.
Chapter Ten
After lunch, they spent the entire afternoon in bed. Napping, waking, kissing, nodding
off until the sky grew dark.
Merry was marinating in sexual spices, feeling alternately awed and evil from the
things they’d done. The way she’d made him quake and beg and moan. The things he’d
let her see, and the things she’d found herself saying. And just how completely she’d
given herself over to the role he’d needed her to embody, let the script flow from
some shameless well she’d never tapped before. Just surrendered to it. And found so
much power in the core of that surrender.
Rob joined her under the covers, his skin cool from a brief absence spent stoking
the fire. She rubbed his arms, trying to give him warmth.
He turned her onto her side, facing the wall, and held her tightly, burying his face
in her hair. She rubbed the back of his hand at her navel. She wasn’t the only one
who’d been changed by the sex.
Who is this man?
Yesterday she’d been plotting to seduce him. Two days ago he’d been a grumpy stranger—some
handsome, angsty man standing wide-eyed in the threshold of this home. Now here he
was, pacified by their sex, made affectionate and warm by what she’d done to him.
She felt closer to Rob than she ever had with any guy. She’d rounded her first boyfriend
up to
love
in the service of relinquishing her virginity just shy of her twenty-second birthday . . .
but she’d never been with someone and felt
this
—a haze of such perfect, decadent, smug laziness—post-sex. She wanted to wallow this
way with him forever. No rush to get her clothes back on. No wondering if he’d noticed
how slack and puckered her belly was. Who fucking cared? How
could
Merry care, after she’d seen the way he watched her during sex, his eyes burning
with rapt disbelief? This body was worthy. This body was incredible, for all the things
it felt, and all the things it could make Rob feel.
She did some math.
When she’d gotten sick, she’d still had three days’ hiking to reach Inverness. Uncertain
if her timeline would prove realistic, she’d not booked any lodging in advance, but
had planned to spend several nights there before taking a train south to catch her
flight home out of Heathrow.
Her cushion was dwindling. She’d been looking forward to the luxury of a hotel or
bed-and-breakfast, and to exploring her mom’s hometown, one café and pub and leisurely
autumn riverside stroll at a time. The visit had been intended to teach her something
about herself, about her mother. About where that woman had come from, a facsimile
of what her world had looked like before she’d listened to Joni Mitchell’s
Blue
and rewritten her own destiny.
But it felt so good here in this modest little home beyond Great Glen.
Rob
felt so good. And surely she was learning from this experience, too—this sex and
this connection easily as enlightening as a few days spent wandering around the city,
searching for . . . for she didn’t even know what. A connection to the place her mom
had been only too eager to leave behind?
But Merry
did
know what she felt here. Powerful. And alive. Plugged in. She felt at peace in her
skin in a way she hadn’t anticipated.
She sensed Rob nodding off behind her, and her stomach rumbled in protest.
“Hey,” she murmured, wriggling in his arms.
“Mmm?”
“Don’t fall asleep. Your guest needs feeding again.” She turned around, smiling at
him nose-to-nose.
“I’m a horrible host.”
“Nah. A horrible host would’ve made me sleep on the floor. And only a horrible
guest
would’ve seduced her way into a man’s nice warm bed.”
The oil lantern still glowed, and she detected only a hint of Rob’s former bashfulness
when he smiled back. They’d nearly banished that man for good, replacing him with
this warm and accessible creature.
“I’d planned to make a roast,” he said, “but it’s far too late for that. Are just
potatoes on their own too sad?”
“Works for me.”
He rolled over and untangled himself from the sheets. “Then it shall be done.”
She watched his back flex as he dressed, and the muscles that defined his arms. What
a fantastic animal this man was. The simplest package hiding the most fascinating
jumble of needs and wants. How sad that he’d kept himself a secret for so long, let
his desires drive him to extremes. Such a shame, when plenty of women would be okay
with them. Some even delighted.
But Merry was naive when it came to these sorts of things. Growing up where she had,
it absolutely blew her mind that any gay person felt they had to stay closeted in
this day and age, and yet millions surely did.
Still, she understood the shame of feeling . . . defective. Her overeating had for
years felt like something she had no power over, just a curse she’d been born with.
Rob surely felt the same about his fetish . . . though, of course, sexual wiring wasn’t
behavioral, not like overeating. It couldn’t be treated as a compulsion. He might
choose not to indulge, but he surely couldn’t will himself into a more typical sexuality,
no more than her dad might will himself to be straight.
She left the comfort of the covers and dressed while Rob clattered around in the kitchen.
Wandering through the den, she took in every little detail. He’d lit a larger oil
lantern. It hung from the room’s central beam, gilding everything in its warm light.
Such a fine vacation this had become. Merry had imagined things as silly as spying
the Loch Ness Monster, but not this. If it weren’t for Rob’s clothes, she could believe
she’d wandered into another century and wound up having ye olde kinky flinge with
a grumpy tenant farmer.
She turned to find him smiling at her, cubing potatoes at the kitchen table.
She smiled back. “Yes?”
“Just trying to figure out how it is you’re actually here.”
“I was just trying to figure out how on earth my vacation wound up changing shape
so drastically.”
Still smiling, he looked to his task. “I hesitate to say I’m glad you got sick . . .”
Merry laughed. “It’s okay. Go ahead and say it.” A couple days’ intestinal drama and
the fading ache at her temple were a pittance. In exchange for this afternoon, and
perhaps tomorrow as well, if she chose to cut things close, getting to Inverness . . .
a tiny price to pay, to keep exploring this way, with this peculiar, intriguing, heartbreakingly
handsome man.
“I’d thump my head on a rock again, if this is the payoff.” She wandered to him, and
wholly without thinking, she wrapped her arms around his waist from behind, feeling
his muscles twitch as he sliced.
Strange that she could hazard this kind of affection with Rob. She never would have
tried this with Jason, and they’d hooked up for close to a year . . . though they’d
never once gone on a real date. God, what a prick. How annoying that it’d taken her
so long to admit it to herself. How sad, the things she’d let herself settle for,
and for so long.
No more.
She gave Rob a squeeze, stood on tiptoe, and kissed the back of his neck before letting
him go. She told him, “I think you’re wonderful.”
He glanced over his shoulder, brows rising. “Do you?”
She nodded.
He blinked, playing up his puzzlement, and Merry took a seat on the chair, hugging
one knee. She could sit here all night, just studying him.
“I think you’re rather marvelous, yourself,” he announced, tossing chunks of potato
into a wide cast-iron pan. “Though I also suspect you’re a hallucination.”
“Oh?”
He grabbed the jar of lard from his shelf and dropped a spoonful into the pan. “I
half expect I’ll wake tomorrow in a field with a hunk of strange mushroom in my hand
and discover I dreamed all this.”
She had to smile, hearing him say these things. This from the man who’d hesitated
to even offer his name. Sex sure was powerful, the way it could change a person. Or
perhaps Rob was high on his confession and the resulting liberation.
He sprinkled the potatoes with salt and pepper and some herbs, then stirred it all
around in the tallow with a wooden spoon.
“I’d never eat this way back home,” Merry said, stomach gurgling with anticipation.
“No, I suppose this wouldn’t pass muster in California. You’ll find the North still
loves its chips and lard, for better or worse. I’m sure you’ll have more worldly options
in Inverness.”
“It’s not that. I used to eat terribly. I actually . . .”
Tell him. He exposed far darker things to you.
She took a deep breath. “I used a weigh a lot more than I do now. A
lot
more.”
He made a quizzical face.
“Like, a hundred pounds more.”
“Yeah?” He looked surprised, but not put off. “And here I assumed you were one of
those pathologically sporty types.”
“Did you?” She grinned, delighted to think she’d passed for the sort of girl she’d
always ached to be. The sort she
was
now, she realized, sudden as a bolt from the blue. “Really?”
“Why wouldn’t I? You’re hiking across Scotland.”
“I guess I still feel fat on the inside. I feel like everyone must be able to tell.”
Like a fraud.
He stared at her a long moment, then set the pan on the stove. “I’m happy to take
you at face value,” he said quietly. “Since you seem so determined to do the same
for me.”
She remembered what he’d said about his erstwhile life as an asshole, the one he’d
allegedly cocked up so badly. It was true—she didn’t care about who he had been, only
who he was with her, right now. Here, together, they were in a unique position. A
magical bubble containing exactly two inhabitants, with no past and no future. No
witnesses to their former selves, only the people they’d become. Who they
were
.
“That’s why I haven’t . . . you know,” she said, chickening out.
He covered the pan with an enamel lid. “No, I don’t know. Why you haven’t what?”
“Taken my bra off.”
“Oh.” His expression said he didn’t follow this logic.
Men.
“My boobs aren’t as perky as they might have been before I lost all the weight. I
haven’t really made peace with them.”
“I’m sure they’re lovely,” Rob said, turning to her fully. After a pause, he took
her hand and coaxed her to stand. He touched her waist, rubbing playfully with his
thumbs. “I can’t imagine any part of you not being absolutely perfect.”
Oh my. Who
was
this man?
She must have looked visibly shocked, as Rob smirked.
He came even closer, wrapping his arms around her, pressing his lips to her forehead.
Tremble.
“You liked all those things I told you. About my . . . fantasies. Or you said you
did.”
She looked up so quick, she bonked her nose on his chin. “Sorry. And yes, I meant
everything I said. I love your fantasies. And your imagination.”
“Those aren’t parts of me I’ve ever felt at home with. Ugly things, I’ve always thought.”
“I beg to differ.”
He dipped his face, lips brushing her temple. Soft as a whisper, he slid one palm
up her ribs to cup her breast. “I love your body. And for so much more than how it
looks.” He laughed faintly. “Though it looks gorgeous, I have to confess.”
She blushed. “Thank you.”
He let her breast go, his hand rising to cradle her jaw, angling her face so their
eyes met. Goodness, those blue eyes. When had they ever looked cold, or hard? How?
All she saw now was welcoming warmth.
“I love your body, for everything it’s given to me,” he murmured. “For letting me . . .
letting me inside you. After all that time. And your hands, for touching me, and your
soft skin, for letting me touch you. For your mouth. And kissing you, and for the
things you asked me. For your ears, for being willing to hear my answers.” He held
her stare with his, steady.
For once, Merry had no words. Her lips had nothing to offer but a kiss, which she
pressed gratefully to Rob’s throat, burying her face against his wonderful, good-smelling
skin.
I love your body. I love your body.
She let the words dance around her brain and make her dizzy.
Then maybe I ought to love it, too.
She stepped back, the foot between them feeling like the coldest, widest chasm.
“I’d love to stay another day,” she said, heart sticking in her throat.
“I’d love to have you. As long as you need.”
“Not because my head really hurts much anymore,” she added. “Just to be with you . . . ?”
If you want that, too? Please, please tell me you want that, too.
“As long as you want, then.” He eyes crinkled. Adorable. So fucking adorable.
She took his hands, squeezing his fingers. “I wish I could stay a week, frankly. But
I’m pushing it, staying more than another night.”
“We’ll have to make the most of it, then.”
“More target practice?” she asked hopefully.
“If you wish. Or fishing. Anything you fancy.”
“Fishing?”
“Fly fishing,” he said, releasing her hands to mime casting. “There’s a smaller loch,
maybe forty minutes’ hike. Hardly anyone else bothers with it. I usually have luck
there.”
“Sounds good.”
“Then maybe a swim? If you promise not to swallow any loch water,” he teased. “Picnic
lunch?”
“It’s a date,” Merry said with a curtsy.
“Excellent.”
Heading for the rocker, she added, “I’ll be expecting strawberries and champagne.”
She heard the clank of the lid, the scrape of the spoon against the bottom of the
pan. “I’d kill for fresh strawberries in September,” he said.
“And I’d kill for some champagne.” Merry sank into the rocker and pulled the throw
over her legs. Champagne . . . and damn the sugar. Champagne savored straight from
Rob’s lips.
Cheers to that.
***
Rob woke the next morning scarcely knowing where he was. Though he’d dozed through
the previous day’s storm with Merry in this bed, waking up beside a woman was still
quite the revelation.