Bitten: Dark Erotic Stories (22 page)

They both looked away shyly.

“I trust you, okay?” she said. “Don’t you get that?”

“I don’t quite get why. Besides that you think you saw me once five years ago.”

“Not just saw you,” Jade said.

His apartment was sparsely furnished with wood floors and blank white walls. She sat on the mattress that served as a bed and couch, and he offered her a drink. They had another beer. Jade held hers up, and they clinked the cold bottles together.

“You’re a good dancer,” John Grayson said.

“Not really. I kind of suck actually.”

“I didn’t think so. I couldn’t take my eyes off of you.”

“Of course not. You recognize me,” Jade said.

“What’s all this with the ‘recognize’?”

“Do you believe in the past?”

“I don’t think about it much.”

“Like when you see someone and you are just sure.”

He didn’t answer her.

“Or … you have a dream or read about something and it feels too real to not have happened.”

John Grayson’s eyes darted away a little, up and to the right. He knew what she was talking about. He had dreamed about his mother’s death before it happened. He had seen the sunny kitchen, the baby crying in her cradle, the black flash of the gun.

“I had a dream once,” Jade said. “But it didn’t seem like a dream. It was really weird. It was right before the time when I saw you. It was about these three heads floating in our pool. They wanted me to take them out of the water and comb their hair.” She could see the three heads in her mind, bobbing up from the surface, so vivid, completely real.

“Did you do it?”

“No. But I wish I did. They needed me.”

He paused, scanning her face. Her nose was bent slightly as if it had been broken. She had a small crescent-shaped scar on her cheek he hadn’t noticed before.

“Tell me something else about you. Like where you come from and why you left.”

“I come from the desert and I left because my dad was fucked up and wanted to marry me.”

John Grayson shook his head. He wanted to touch her hand. It was so small that he could have covered it entirely with his own.

“What about you?”

“I come from the East Coast and I left because everything was fucked up.”

“How?”

“If I could talk about it I wouldn’t be so fucked up maybe.”

She leaned closer. She smelled sweet, but not like perfume. He gulped down the last sip of beer.

“You have such a great face,” she said. “I bet all the women tell you.”

John Grayson lowered his eyes. He mumbled something. Jade thought she heard the word “hate.”

“What?”

“I have scars. It makes sense that someone with scars wouldn’t like their face.”

Jade said, “You’re really beautiful.”

“No,” said John Grayson. “You are really, really beautiful.”

Jade said, “Actually, John Grayson, I’m a freak. Born of freaks. Owned by a freak. Or, once was owned by a freak.”

“I have no idea what you are talking about,” he said. “But I want to.”

He hadn’t meant to kiss her. He wanted to protect her. Protect her and run away simultaneously. She put her arms around him and kissed his cheek, and he turned his face so that their lips brushed. It wasn’t that shocking kind of feeling they both expected. More like a huge sigh of relief spreading through them. Like your cold, naked body falling into a soft, warm bed, under covers, into arms. The place that you knew you needed but you were afraid to even imagine for fear that it would never come.

Her knees and spine went weak. She nestled down and curled into a little ball, in his big arms, all of her fitting there so easily. Her hand was on his chest and her hip balanced on his groin. She could feel him hard through his jeans and the pounding of his heart. Her hands reached up inside his T-shirt, flickering across his chest and abdomen, the heat of his skin almost burning. Her hair brushed his lips. She turned, unrolling herself on top of him. The metal of his belt buckle clanged against hers. She pulled the end of the belt, pulled it off. She unbuttoned his jeans. His cock was so hard, straining against his briefs. She took it out gently, and he sighed, softly, almost like a girl, and she thought,
Once I was the boy and you were the girl.
He leaned back and she took him in her mouth, gliding over his shaft, her hands cupping him below. He tasted so good to her, and her throat relaxed and opened wider and wider. He sighed again. “You’re so good.”

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she said, stopping, gazing up at him. “I’m just … I’m just wanting you so much. It makes it easy.” She went back to him again. It was all she wanted, to consume him like this, to feel him come for her. All her pleasure was in her mouth, just waiting for him to release. He got harder, moving against her lips. His free hand went to his face, his throat. He sighed. “Is it okay if I come?” She nodded so slightly, but he felt it. He said, “Are you sure? Inside?” She moaned, pressing up, the space between her legs opening like her throat. His hands went to her hair, grabbing it gently, and pulling her face down more. She tightened and then relaxed into his hand, and he sighed and came in her mouth. It didn’t startle her. It slid so smoothly. Like some kind of elixir. Her hand reached up, and he took it and pressed her wrist to his lips as if he were telling secrets to her blood.

“You don’t believe in magic, do you, John Grayson?”

“No,” he said, kissing her hair. “But I don’t really believe in much.”

* * *

The next time, John Grayson picked her up in front of the apartment and drove her to a tiny Japanese restaurant that Ben Washington had told him about. Ben had said it was a great prelude to getting laid, but John hadn’t taken a girl out in so long that he’d almost forgotten the recommendation.

She had on jeans, and her face was scrubbed clean of makeup like the first time they’d gone to the bar. But now she wore light pink lip-gloss and the high red shoes she’d danced in.

He wanted to kiss her mouth so badly. As soon as he’d smelled her up close the whole night rushed back to him like a dream you remember when you see the face of a person who was in it.

She said, “Where are we going? I’m starved!”

The restaurant had two white cloth banners hanging over the door and statues of fat cats above the sushi bar. The waitress led them to a tiny private room with a booth. John Grayson had to stoop to fit inside, and his knees touched the bottom of the table. There was a watercolor of a butterfly on the wall.

“I love it here,” said Jade. “It’s like a playhouse.” She was trying not to laugh at him crunched into the booth.

“Oh, great. As long as I don’t crack a hole in the ceiling when I stand up.”

“You look cute,” she said. “Like my own private giant.”

It was impossible to create much space between their bodies. They both knew they’d better not touch in this small space or they’d be kissing again, harder this time, their hands down each other’s pants with only a thin curtain to separate them from the rest of the crowded restaurant.

The waitress brought them miso soup, shrimp spring rolls, sizzling rice cakes with mushroom sauce, lobster sushi rolls, lotus root, pumpkin and spinach with sesame. John watched Jade eat, hungrily. He could tell she was trying to go slow, but it was hard for her.

“I’m such a pig,” she said. “Sorry.”

“No. It’s good. You need it after all that dancing.”

“It’s been kind of slim since my mom died.”

“What happened?” he asked her.

“She died when I was thirteen. We owned a spa, and business kept getting worse. When I turned eighteen my dad freaked out and I had to leave.”

“How’d you end up dancing?”

“My friend Bell got me the job. I needed any work I could get.”

“I don’t like the idea of you working there after what happened to those girls.”

“It’s not that bad. They have better security now. And I have to take care of Shadow.”

“Who’s that? Your pet?”

She laughed. “No, but he’d think that was funny. He’s a boy I met when I got to the city. He’s the best.” Jade took a small sketch out of her wallet and handed it to John Grayson. “He won’t let me take his picture,” she said. “He’s afraid someone will see it and send him back to a foster home. He’s a little sensitive. His life’s been really hard.”

“Did you do this?”

“Yeah,” she said. “I’m an
artiste
. Didn’t you know?”

“It’s really good.”

“Why thank you, John Grayson. Maybe I’ll draw you sometime.”

“Only if I can take your picture.” He surprised himself by saying it. He never thought of using his camera for anything but work anymore. But he could see how he would photograph her, up so close she looked more like a flower than a girl, or wearing his shirt and nothing else, her legs draped across his bed.

The waitress brought them a green tea ice cream parfait with whipped cream and nuts on top and an apple pastry that she caramelized at the table with a blast of blue gas flame. The flame also scorched a sprig of rosemary on the side, and the whole booth smelled like sweet, green pine smoke.

“Rosemary for remembrance,” he said.

“That’s appropriate. I remember you.”

“It means dew of the sea.”

“How pretty. With the burning, it smells so sexy.”

“I thought that was you.”

She laughed. “Lucky we didn’t have pizza.”

“What?”

“I heard that the smell of cheese pizza is one of the biggest erotic stimulants for men.” She wasn’t looking at him. Her eyes and mouth focused on the spoonful of pale green ice cream she was eating. “I mean, I think we are going to tear each other apart with just dew of the sea.”

“I think maybe you’re right,” he said.

* * *

When they got to the car he said, “Do you want me to take you home now?” He was thinking about how she hadn’t come for him the first time, how he wanted to make her come so badly, more than anything else at that moment. She shook her head, staring at him. “What do you want to do?” “What do you want to do?” “Do you want to go out?” She shook her head. “Do you want to come home with me and tell me a bedtime story?” She nodded, and fell against him, laughing, fell against his broad chest and sharp hip bones. His heartbeat was so strong she thought she could hear it, but maybe it was her own, echoing in her ears. Then she pulled away again, and he let her into the car.

At his apartment they grabbed each other as soon as the door closed behind them. She wrapped one leg around his hip and he cradled her calf on his forearm. She slid her wetness up over the fly of his jeans. She nuzzled him like an animal, grabbing at his hair. His giant hands hoisted her up onto his hips, and he carried her to the bed. He laid her down softly and pressed a button on the stereo.

“Is this your ‘make-out mix’?” she asked when she heard the first chords of an old song she loved.

“Let’s do some living, after we die …”

“It just happened to be in there,” he said.

“What are we going to do?” she asked. “While that not-a-make-out mix plays?”

“What do you want to do?”

“I want to make you come with my hands.”

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“What can I do for you?”

“You can let me make you come in my hands. That’s what I want.”

He looked into her eyes. His irises and pupils were so big and deep they gave her vertigo.

He said, “I want to make you come. Three times in a row. Once from the outside and once from the inside and once from both at the same time. And then I’ll come.”

“I want you to. Some day. Not yet, though. And I want you to make me cry.”

“Is that what you want?”

“Yes. I want you to make me cry with joy. I want you to pound the tears out of me until we are both soaking wet like we’ve been swimming.”

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You can’t hurt me, John Grayson,” she said. “You’ve already done that. Just like I hurt you. It’s time for us to get it right.”

Jade passed out on top of John Grayson. She slept deeply, her muscles relaxing so much it was like they were trying to melt into his. John Grayson had no such peace. After a couple of hours he pushed her body off and grabbed the pillow, punching it with his fists in his sleep. Jade half-woke to see him pummeling the bedding; she reached out and stroked his bare shoulder, at the indentation of muscle, and he moaned and pulled the quilt over his face. In the morning neither of them spoke of it. With the sunlight through the window they were just relieved to wake to each other’s faces. He pulled her back onto him, and she felt him hard already.

“Sorry,” he said.

“No sorries.”

“Can’t I do anything for you? I want … “

She pulled the covers over them, wriggled down his body into a dark cave, and put him in her mouth again.

She stopped for a moment and rested her cheek on his hip. “My God, I’ve missed you for ages, John Grayson,” she said.

They got up and showered together, soaping and rinsing each other’s bodies, hands sliding over the curves, the flat, hard surfaces, though she still wouldn’t let him touch her between her legs. He seemed even bigger to her, standing there in the old-fashioned tub under the showerhead, and she seemed more fragile to him. She came just to his armpit. The hair on his body was black against white skin. His muscles were hard and defined, bunched with tension. She was almost entirely shaved, lithe, and only a little darker than he was; she tanned easily, but since she’d left the desert she hadn’t been out in the sun much. She closed her eyes and let the water hit him first, then trickle onto her, lengthening her eyelashes into black points like fake ones. He poured shampoo in his palm and lathered her small head, making her hair stand up. She laughed. She said, “Don’t you read the magazines? Don’t you know you shouldn’t shampoo a woman’s head unless you plan on spending a lot more time with her?”

“I am not afraid,” John Grayson said. “Do I look like someone who gets scared?”

Jade didn’t want to tell him the truth; he did. She had already seen him run away from her at least once.

She got out first and held the towel for him.

“You need bigger towels,” she said, trying to wrap him up in it the way Clarissa used to do when she was little. She dried him off and tied it around his hips.