“Hush.” I bent slightly and my mouth found hers.
At first her lips were stiff and unyielding. Her hands pressed lightly against my chest. It wasn’t until I let my arms slide below the small of her back and pulled her tighter against me that her lips relaxed. I let my tongue dart in and out, then moved it lightly back and forth across the roof of her mouth. Her hands moved up to my shoulders, then around my neck. When I moved my tongue between her lips slowly, back and forth, she pushed away from me.
She stood back panting. “I... I think we should...”
“Should what, Tanya?”
She cleared her throat and swallowed. Her green eyes were blinking rapidly. “S-something. We should...”
I smiled at her. “You have a low boiling point,” I said softly. “I could feel the way your body was relaxing. And you were getting warm. Very warm.”
“No. It was just that... I mean...”
“You mean it wasn’t like before, when you were just testing your little panty gun and could concentrate on something else.”
“Yes, I mean, no. You just sort of... took me by surprise.”
I was holding her at arm’s length. “What are we going to do about it?” I asked.
She swallowed again. “Nothing,” she said, but there was no conviction in it. “Packet. Letters.” Her face lit up. “We’re going to look at those letters of Sandee’s.”
I stepped away from her, smiling. “Whatever you say. They’re in the bedroom.”
“Oh. Well, maybe...”
But by that time I had her hand and was leading her through the living room, down the hallway to the bedroom. When we were standing by the foot of the king-size bed, she looked up at me. Her green eyes were curious.
I smiled at her, then nodded toward the bed. “The letters are in that shoebox.”
She spun toward the box on the bed. “Oh.” Then she went around to the side of the bed and sat on the edge. She opened the box and pulled out one packet of letters. They were held together by a pair of rubber bands. With slightly shaking fingers she pulled the first letter out of the envelope and began to read it. She pretended not to notice when I moved to sit beside her and pulled out another packet of letters.
Some of those letters were pretty torrid. A lot of them were from overseas, but mostly they were written by someone named Mike, who, I guessed, had been her boyfriend before Acasano entered the scene.
Twice I caught Tanya blushing as she read. The majority of letters were from Mike. But evidently Sandee had a little trouble being faithful to Mike. From the tone of some of the other letters, she was doing a lot of sleeping around, even after Acasano set her up in this apartment.
And then I found a photo. “Let me see,” Tanya said when she saw it fall out of the letter I was holding.
It was a poor Polaroid showing Sandee coupled with a young man. From the way the man’s arm went out of range, it was obvious he had taken the photo after moving between Sandee’s legs. While he concentrated on her small protruding breasts, she was smiling at the camera.
“Wow!” Tanya said. “I wonder if Mike knew about the others?” She turned the photo over. “There’s writing on the back. Dear Sandee, I wish we could stay in this position all the time. You’re the best I ever had. Mike. So that’s what Mike looks like.” She raised her eyebrows. “Hmmm. Not bad.”
“From the tone of the note, Sandee isn’t bad either,” I said. I took the photo and studied the face of the young man in it.
The quality was poor, but there were enough features to tell what he looked like. He was in his early twenties, with blond hair, high cheekbones, sensuous mouth, no hair on his chest but lots of muscle. He was a good-looking kid. I was struck by the remarkable resemblance Tanya had to the real Sandee. She could have passed for a twin.
I didn’t realize it but Tanya had been staring at me while I looked at the photo. When our eyes met I read something there. She had no more of that embarrassed coyness she had shown in the kitchen.
“Do you think that the real Sandee is that good? As good as Mike says?”
“I wouldn’t know, Tanya.”
I pulled her close to me and pushed her gently down on the bed. My band lightly cupped her breast while I looked at her with my face inches from hers.
“I want you, Nick,” she whispered.
I undressed her slowly, enjoying and savoring each part of her I uncovered. My lips moved softly from the hollow of her throat along the upsweep of her breasts to the plum-colored nipples. I lingered there, letting the tip of my tongue move lightly around each hardened nipple. She was making the sounds of readiness a woman makes when she gives herself completely to emotion.
The sounds increased when my lips moved over the mound of her rib cage and paused along the flatness of her stomach. Her skin was blemish-free and smooth. She was beginning to make movements to match the sounds.
And then I stopped. I pushed myself to the edge of the bed and stood looking down at her. Her body was still moving, only now she knew I was looking at her. There was no more self-conscious embarrassment. Like most women, once she was naked with a man’s eyes watching her, she became shameless and open.
I watched her while I undressed. At her insistence I turned out the light. Then I waited until the total darkness had passed and the room became filled with shapes of things. That was when I joined her.
The first time is always clumsy. The act of love never begins smoothly. There are two fresh and different people unknown to each other. Arms get entwined. Noses get in the way. Smoothness comes with practice.
She was very young and, by her own admission, didn’t have much experience. I led her gently, letting my lips continue the course they had begun. There was a newness about her I hadn’t felt in a long time.
At first she was too eager, overwilling to please. There was so much she wanted to do for me, and she wanted to do it all at once. Only after I convinced her that there would be time, to take it slow, did she relax. She had been apprehensive and unsure of her own ability. I told her in whispers that there would be other times. Everything she had ever thought about would be done. There was much time. And this first one was for her.
Only when she begged and pleaded did I enter her. I felt her close around me with a sigh. She came alive then, moving with an ancient wisdom that was part learned and part instinct.
We were very slow. There was nothing wild or bouncing or screaming. It was a blending of two bodies, kissing, touching, exploring, while we moved a little at a time, together, then apart. And with each movement I tried to make it different for her, never the same.
When it happened for her the first time, it was a stiffening of her limbs, a clutching of my hair, eyes closed, lips slightly parted. And a long, low, lovely groan, ending in a tiny, little-girl whimper.
Then she couldn’t kiss me enough. Her lips moved over my eyes, my cheeks, my mouth, then my own lips. She held onto me tightly as if afraid I would move away.
I held her close and remained quiet for awhile. When she fell back against the pillow, I started moving again. She tossed her head back and forth on the pillow.
Her head stopped. Without opening her eyes she let her hands move to each side of my face. “I... couldn’t... not again...” she sighed.
“Yes,” I said softly. “You can. Let me show you.”
As I started moving again, I felt her body come alive under me. The room was no longer dark. I could see her clearly.
And the second time she gave out little cries and squeals. Her heels dug deep in the mattress. Fingernails raked across my side and back.
The third time we had both totally committed ourselves to the act. When it happened to both of us it was a grinding, mashing, clutching, grabbing at each other, neither of us able to hold enough of the other. The sounds were low groans, and neither of us was aware of noise, the bed, anything except the other, and the draining, blinding pleasure we were feeling.