Midnight Soul (57 page)

He opened the drawer so violently the lamp on
top tumbled and fell, coins clinked and dropped to the floor,
things I didn’t know what they were came out of the drawer, all
this before Noc straightened us, coming back on his knees and
handing me a condom.

“Fast,” he growled.

I looked into his eyes, shivered in his hold
and nodded my head quickly.

My fingers fumbled but I went fast, finally
rolling it on his beautiful shaft successfully. I barely had it to
the root before Noc shoved my hand aside, wrapping his around his
cock.

He found me and drove inside.

I grasped his shoulders as my spine formed an
arc, my head falling back. The low moan ripping from my throat, he
pummeled me with his thrusts and I did my best to hold on for the
ride.

“God, fuck,
fuck
, my Frannie, so
goddamned
hot
,” Noc rumbled, beginning to lift me and drive
me down to meet his lunges.

I righted my head with a snap and lifted my
hands to the sides of his neck, gripping him there, my forehead
hitting his, my body lurching at his command.

“Fuck me, Noc,” I demanded.

“I am, baby,” he grunted.

I seized his jaw in both hands, my voice
throaty. “Fuck me, my love.”

He stared into my eyes. His flaring, burning,
blazing
, he fell forward so I was on my back in his bed, Noc
covering me. With me stationary and Noc able to center all his
power at his hips, he
fucked
me.

It took no time at all before I came,
dragging my nails down his shoulders, crying out loudly, clenching
my legs around his driving hips, lost in Noc. His filling me,
claiming me, fucking me in a way no one could come after him, no
one could have me again. I was no one but his, he was no one but
mine, destined to be together, connected,
balancing…bloody…
worlds
.

I heard it, felt it, the tension, the
increased rhythm, the shorter strokes.

My climax began to fade and I opened my eyes
just in time to see the beauty of Noc’s head slanting back sharply,
the veins in his corded neck popping, the quick succession of
grunts that led to a low rumble. I watched, fascinated, feeling him
pour this beauty inside me, wishing there was no barrier to keep me
from absorbing it, until his head fell and he buried his face in my
neck.

I held his weight and stroked him while the
tension in his body released, and finally I felt the workings of
his mouth at my neck as he rested himself on a forearm in the bed,
his other arm curved under me, around me, the fingers idly
caressing the skin of my hip.

I turned my lips to his ear. “I want
you.”

For a brief second, Noc grew still then he
lifted his head and looked down at me, smiling.

“Babe, still deep inside you, on top of you,
not sure how much more of me you can get,” he teased.

I moved a hand to his face, mine, I knew, was
serious.

“I hope you feel it as little as me, but even
so, I don’t like it there. I don’t like it between us. When you
give me your seed, I want it. Even if it doesn’t take root, I want
it in my womb. I want it to be a part of me. Thus I need to ask
Valentine to return to my world and acquire some pennyrium for
me.”

Noc said nothing.

But he no longer looked teasing. He was
staring at me in a way I could not decipher but it warmed me to my
toes.

“Noc,” I called when his silence
lengthened.

“I wanna go the distance with you.”

My body around his tightened and I opened my
mouth to speak.

He was not done.

“I wanna make a baby with you.”

I clamped my mouth shut.

Noc did not.

“I wanna make as many as we can as long as
they know we love each of them with everything we are. I don’t give
a fuck if you’ve got my baby growing in you year after year until
your body won’t do it anymore.” He drew his attention to our
continued connection by flexing his hips. “If I could, I’d fuck you
for hours, days, goddamned years, nonstop. I want part of me in you
every breath you take. I can’t do that so I want it that any time
your mind wanders, you think of me inside you however that can be.
My cock taking you. My cum buried deep. My kid growing in your
belly. What that means. What we got. What we made. What we built
between us. The fact that I love you so fuckin’ much, I’d commit
treason for you. I’d perpetrate crimes for you. I’d go to prison
for you. I’d break my back to give you everything you wanted from
cutting the damned tomatoes in your salad and pouring you a glass
of wine to wrestling the world into my arms and laying it at your
feet.”

I lay under him, frozen.

Then I burst into tears.

Loud, obnoxious tears.

Noc pulled out (alas) and rolled us to our
sides, gathering me into his arms, holding me close, his hand
stroking deep at my back, his other arm tight around my waist as I
sobbed against his chest, my body shaking uncontrollably with the
power of emotion sweeping through me.

And with deep regret, this happened for a
long time.

And with even deeper regret, when it began to
subside, I started hiccoughing with the wealth of emotion still
needing to be expressed.

I loathed crying.

And worse,
hiccoughing
.

Ulk.

The mortification.

“So, to end,” Noc said, and I kept my face
buried in his chest, feeling his voice rumble even as I heard it,
“I don’t know what this pennyrium stuff is but an easier fix is to
get your ass on the Pill so I can be inside you without a condom.
In other words, I’m down with that until we decide no birth control
is needed and whenever that happens, I’m down with that too.”

I tipped my head back and gazed upon him with
watery eyes.

“I love you,” I whispered.

“Thank fuck,” he whispered back.

“I’ll cut tomatoes for you,” I shared.

I watched his wavy mouth smile as he stopped
stroking my back and tightened both his arms around me.

“No need to make that great a sacrifice,
sweetheart,” he muttered.

“I have a golden soul,” I told him
softly.

His arms flexed so powerfully they pushed all
the air out of me before it seemed he forced them to relax.

“Yeah you do,” he finally replied.

“I have a golden soul,” I repeated.

“I know, baby.”

“I have a golden soul,” I said again, and he
opened his mouth to speak but I carried on. “I know this because
the gods in my world and the God in yours would never tether a soul
that was anything less than golden to the perfection that is
you.”

“Fuck,” he growled, rolling me again to my
back with him on me.

“I love you, Noc,” I breathed as his weight
pressed it out of me.

“Fuck,” he growled again.

And then he kissed me.

We had need of several condoms that night for
our avowals commenced the belated sexual marathon Noc had promised
days before.

And dawn was kissing the sky when, exhausted,
sated and deliriously happy, I let all my weight settle into the
man who lay under me, holding me close, taking my weight, my
worries, my demons, my dreams.

The man who showed me my golden soul in a way
I knew truly I carried it inside me.

The man who loved me.

* * * * *

The next evening, I stood at the back of
Valentine’s foyer, arms crossed on my chest, giving my best
forbidding stare to the intensely handsome (I had to admit) Glover
as he put a hand to the small of Josette’s back to start to lead
her out the door.

He smiled at me and shared, “She’ll be in
good hands.”

“She better,” I retorted, moving forward and
catching the door before he could close it so I could continue to
glare at them as they moved down Valentine’s walk in order to be
absolutely certain I’d made my point.

He nodded, his lips now just quirking, and I
moved my gaze, my face softening, when Josette looked back and
said, “’Night, Frannie.”

“Good night, my sweet,” I bid.

She looked ahead as Glover moved them both
forward.

I knew he did not intend for me to hear it
but I had honed exceptional eavesdropping skills in my lifetime so
I heard it when he spoke after he had her halfway down the
walk.

“Your sister’s kinda protective, yeah?” he
asked.

“Er, well…we’ve been through a lot together,”
Josette replied quietly. “And she loves me.”

“Right,” Glover returned, not sounding
disgruntled, sounding pleased.

Although I quite liked the fact that Josette
understood my feelings for her, and the fact that Glover was not
put off by a protective family member, I harrumphed.

“Shut the door, sugarlips,” came from behind
me.

I turned to see Noc leaned against the wall
at the side of the entry to the hall appearing like he didn’t know
whether to come fetch me or let loose his hilarity.

“I’ll see them safe in his car,” I
returned.

“Shut the door, baby,” he said softly.

I liked his soft so I stepped out of the door
and shut it.

Only then did Noc come to me.

Putting his hands to my hips, he pulled me
close and tipped his head down.

“So, my guess, we’re hanging here until you
know she’s home all right,” he noted.

“Yes,” I confirmed.

He grinned and murmured, “Momma bear.”

“You say this as a tease you think might get
a rise out of me when I have no issue you think this way at
all.”

“Just to say, not teaching you how to use a
gun considering you’re like this with Josette, it’ll be you and not
me the boys will have a problem with when our daughters start
dating.”

I could actually feel myself blanch.

Noc burst out laughing, hauling me into his
embrace as he did it and putting his mouth to mine.

“Christ, I love you,” he said there through
his mirth.

“Thank fuck,” I replied and lost Noc’s
dancing, happy eyes.

I did for he was kissing me.

Obviously, I kissed him back.

Creative

Franka

“We have little time, Josette,” I warned as
Josette handed over money to the friendly gentleman with the odd
accent he said he had because he was from “Ay-tee.” A gentleman who
was the driver of what Josette had told me was a taxi.

A boon.

While I was spending time learning the
fullness of my love for Noc, and his love for me, Josette had been
watching the television and fiddling with her telephone.

Noc had been correct three days previous. I
knew little of this world.

But Josette was a quick study.

“Just a minute, Frannie,” Josette replied,
sounding like she was concentrating. “I need to work out the
tip.”

“The what?” I queried.

“I’ll explain later,” she muttered.

I looked to the watch on my wrist that I had
purchased the day before when Noc had been driving Josette and I to
a vacant parking lot where he could safely begin to teach us how to
drive, and through the window of his Suburban I’d seen a jewelry
store.

Of course, I’d demanded he stop immediately
for I had not seen an entire store in that world devoted to jewelry
(that wasn’t in a mall displaying paltry offerings) and obviously
this was something we needed to experience without delay.

My watch was thin, with a black strap and
what the sales lady explained was an “art deco,” white gold and
diamond face. Whatever “art deco” meant. I simply thought it
elegant.

Josette’s was white and rose gold with a
mother of pearl face. It was not trim but quite big, almost like
men’s watches, but even so, it was most attractive.

Both watches cost over fifty thousand
dollars, at which Noc shook his head and said (not to anyone,
certainly not me), “Way she’s going, she’ll be out of treasure in a
month.”

“No I won’t,” I declared. “Valentine says the
this-world value of my treasure equals nearly half a billion of
your American dollars. If this is so, I could buy Josette and me
ten watches and not run out of treasure.”

Noc gave me a look that said without words I
should cease speaking.

The sales lady made a noise that sounded like
she was choking.

I thought my best play at that juncture was
to smile at her, and, of course, hand over my credit card.

Our driving lesson was not as successful as
our trip to the jewelry store.

It was not me who was having difficulty
mastering the controls of the car. In fact, it all seemed quite
intuitive. Noc had even given me a pleased kiss after my lesson and
declared me a “natural.”

No, Josette was quite erratic, went too fast
and her turns, even watching while standing outside the big vehicle
and well away, were terrifying.

Noc said I could probably start practicing on
real streets after a few more goes “behind the wheel.”

“Sorry, Jo, but it’s gonna be the parking lot
for you for a while,” he’d told her.

She didn’t seem to mind. She was just happy
to be learning.

And regardless, her head was in the clouds
due to the fact that Glover was attentive and amusing and “oh so
clever, Frannie, you wouldn’t believe!”

I didn’t believe.

I would have to see for myself. Something, I
noted, I had not been invited to have the opportunity to do as yet
even though they’d had their second date last night, dinner and
Josette’s first movie.

So I wouldn’t feel left out, Noc took me to
my first movie as well (though he had not, as I requested, taken me
to the same exact movie as Josette and Glover’s movie).

It was insanely loud, the sound seeming to
beat into my body.

Regardless, it was a rather interesting way
to tell a tale, inflating images so they were humongous and all you
could pay attention to.