Call Me Saffron (Greenpoint Pleasures) (11 page)

“But it’s not a relationship.” It came out as a gasp as I levitated my hips against his mouth, an almost-involuntary reaction to the intimate pleasure of his tongue.
 

“Not a relationship. Sex.”

“Sex.” What he was doing felt so good. Like ice cream and ocean waves and all good things.
 

“With me.”
 

“With you.” I was melting, spiraling, tightening against his fingers, his mouth, his earnestness, his determination.
 

“Only with me.” His voice stuttered, dark with passion.
 

“Always with you.” And I came, a sudden sharp spasm of sensation and emotion, overwhelming and abrupt. I sighed into the diminishing contractions. “Always with you.” It was a whisper.
 

Dylan nodded, almost grim in his intensity. He rolled on a condom, then sheathed himself inside me as I opened my body to him. All my nerve endings were still quivering from the aftermath of my orgasm. Taking him inside me was like a continuation, a prolonging of the pleasure, part of the receding waves of pleasure. I was hyperaware of his harsh breaths, the way his hair fell over his eyes, the way his legs rubbed against mine. I wrapped my hands around his hips, relishing the sharp strong movement as he grew sloppy and fast, gasping with the energy gathering in his body.
 

He pulled back. “But you—” Meaning:
you
aren’t ready to come again yet.

“I’m good.” Meaning:
I want you to come, I want to feel your pleasure
. Meaning:
do it.

And he did. A few rotations of his hips and buttocks, then I felt him pulse inside of me, his whole body clenching. “Oh God. Samantha. Ohhh.”
 

And he collapsed on top of me, nuzzling my ear. “Yes. Perfect.” It was a whisper.
 

A whisper that sounded too much like warmth and coziness and comfort. I felt my body tense, losing the lazy boneless feeling too quickly. “It’s just sex, right?”
 

“Just sex.” Dylan sounded drowsy, almost drugged. He kissed my shoulder, then nipped it gently. “Just mind-blowing, awesome sex. What else would it be?”

Chapter Ten

When I got out of the luxe bathroom after freshening up, I expected to see Dylan where I’d left him, extravagantly sprawled across the bed, resting up for round two. Instead, he was struggling into his pants one-handed.
 

“When I said ‘just sex,’ I didn’t mean you should leave after only—”
 

He turned toward me, giving me a shushing gesture, and I saw the phone held to his ear.
 

Deflated, I sat in the armchair, deliberately crushing his suit jacket under my bare bottom. If he was going to slip back into work mode, I’d leave a few telltale creases as a not so subtle reminder of our escapade.
 

Then I caught his words and forgot my pique.
 

“How badly was she hurt? Is she conscious?” He sat on the bed, his pants half-zipped. “I see. No, I understand. Yes, I’ll come over now. I’m downtown, so it could take a while, depending on traffic.” He looked around, clearly searching for a pen. I grabbed one off the spindly desk, and a pad of hotel stationary to go with it.

Dylan nodded his thanks and jotted down some information. A room number and a doctor’s name. “Okay, I’ll be there when I can.”
 

He clicked off and stood, properly fastening his pants. “I have to go. I’m sorry. Can we pick up next week where we left off? After all, you gave me the whole night, right?” His smile was lopsided and strained.

“What’s going on? Someone’s in the hospital?”
 

He hesitated. “It’ll be fine.” But it clearly wasn’t.
 

“Dylan. What’s going on?”

He snagged his shirt and shrugged into it. “Persephone was in a motorcycle accident.” His face twitched, an involuntary wince, and I was thrown back. My grandfather’s serious face.
“I’m so sorry. Your father was rushed to the hospital last night.
Your mom is there with him now.”
He’d winced at my dismayed gasp.
“He’ll be fine,”
he’d said reprovingly.
 

Dylan frowned at me now. “Are you okay?”

I rubbed my face. “Of course. Is she—do you know how bad it is?”

His mouth thinned. “Concussion. Fractures. A broken leg. She got lucky. She wasn’t wearing a helmet. If she hadn’t been thrown into the bushes…” He stared down at his shirt, which he’d buttoned wrong in his haste. “Crap.” He started unbuttoning all those tiny buttons, fumbling with the holes.
 

I stepped forward, brushing his hands out of the way. “Let me.”
 

He fidgeted under my ministrations. “I need to get going.”

“Why did they call you? Aren’t you officially divorced?”
 

“I’m still listed as her next of kin. Probably from the time she broke her arm two years ago. Her parents live in Minnesota, and her brother is in South Dakota.” His body was taut, like a violin string strung too tight, ready to break. “Dammit. I shouldn’t care. We’ve both moved on.”
 

Tentatively, awkward as hell, I put my arms around him. It was the closest I’d come to a real hug in years. Decades. He hugged me back, so fierce I thought I’d lose my ability to breathe.
 

After a moment, he stepped away with a slightly embarrassed look and ran his hands through his hair to smooth it down. “I should get going. I’ll let you know when we can pick this up again.” He grabbed his jacket out of the closet.
 

I crossed my arms over my breasts, a feeble attempt to cover my nudity.
Good-bye
seemed inadequate. So did
I hope it goes well
.
 

I’m sorry
might work better. Or even
I understand
, because I did, at least a little.
 

Instead, I said, “I’ll come with you.” And that, surprisingly, felt exactly right.
 

He paused, his arms halfway into his jacket sleeves. “Why would you do that?”

I grabbed my top and shrugged it on. “Because nobody should go to the hospital solo. Because I’m here. Because I have nothing else planned for tonight.”
 

Dylan slid his arms all the way into his sleeves and grabbed his bag. “Come on, then.”

~*~

We made an odd couple, with Dylan all business in his charcoal gray suit and me all sexual suggestiveness in my leather bustier and diaphanous skirt. The clerk in the hospital lobby didn’t seem to notice, but the nurse behind the counter gave me a sidelong look when Dylan announced himself as Persephone Krause’s husband. I nearly told her I was the slutty mistress but stopped myself in time.
 

When we got to the room, it was empty. Not even a bed. And certainly no ex-wife.
 

“Maybe she’s stepped out.”

Dylan gave me a look.
 

“She’s going to be okay. She’s not in ICU or surgery, or the doctor would have said. She didn’t tell you it was critical, right? It’ll be okay.”
 

I never went to the hospital after my father’s heart attack. I was too young. But the image in my head was this: A sterile room, with monitors and tubes and mysterious machines. An empty room, no patient, the darkness outside like a tangible thing.
 

Beside me, Dylan huffed a sigh and grabbed me, kissing me so fiercely my chin felt bruised and my lips smashed. So fiercely I couldn’t breathe. And even though it wasn’t a remotely sexual kiss, I felt a flame lick up my insides. I was alive. He was alive. And here we were, kissing in a hospital room out of a creepy indie drama. It felt like it meant something.
 

“Dylan! What are you doing here? And who is she?”

We broke apart as a frail blonde waif of a woman was wheeled into the room on a gurney bed. She had a cast on one leg and a big, dark bruise on her cheek. As the orderlies positioned the bed properly in the room, she raised herself up on her elbows, wincing. Her wrists were painfully thin. It didn’t look like they could support her. “Who are you?”
 

“Samantha Lilly. I work with your husband—I mean, ex-husband.” I started to proffer my hand, then rethought it. She must hurt all over. “If you want me to go…”
 

She gave Dylan a reproachful look. “You didn’t need to bring protection from me. I’m hardly going to attack you.” She lay back down against the pillows as the orderlies straightened the pole and adjusted buttons around her, then withdrew. “What are you doing here, anyway?”
 

“I’m your next of kin on the form. The doctor called me.”
 

“You shouldn’t have come. I’m fine.” She coughed, which clearly hurt. “Dammit.” She thumbed a switch that led to her IV drip, which presumably gave her a dose of some heavy-duty painkiller. “My throat is dry. All that poking and prodding and nobody offered me a drink. I missed lunch too. I went straight from the bike shop to the open road.”
 

I poured water into a paper cup and handed it to her. She drank the water, then crumpled the cup in her fist.
 

Dylan frowned at her. “You bought the motorcycle today?”

She nodded. “A real beauty. You should have heard the engine purr. Like a big cat. A tiger or something.”
 

“And you weren’t wearing a helmet?”

“I ditched it.” She grinned. “The feeling of the wind in my hair as I flew down the FDR was
amazing
. You should try it.”
 

He closed his eyes. Whether summoning patience or emotionally wrought, it was hard to know. “You’re lucky to be alive.”

For the first time, something like reality seemed to creep into her awareness. “I know. The EMTs told me.” She blinked hard. “But then, I’ve always been lucky, haven’t I?” She gave him a wan smile. “I met you. That was my first lucky break. I didn’t take good enough care of you. I took you for granted, messed around, and now you’re gone. Like everything good in my life.” She gestured for him to come over.
 

He glanced toward me as if asking for my understanding. I nodded. What else could I do? She needed him. He needed to be here for her.
 

Persephone hadn’t even glanced at me. As if she knew I was no threat. Unexpectedly, the thought made my chest hurt.
 

When he got close enough, Persephone raised his hand to her lips. “My sweet Dylan, always looking out for me. You told me not to buy that motorcycle, didn’t you? If we were still together, I’d still be whole.”
 

“You are. Or you will be. It’ll take time, that’s all.” He withdrew his hand, but gently. “You should ask your family to come stay with you for a while, until you heal.”
 

“Family? I don’t need them. I have Laurent. Laurent understands me. He says I’m a Pre-Raphaelite angel, that I was born in the wrong century. Can you call him? He should know. He should come be with me.” She looked around. “Where’s my phone? They brought my things into the room, didn’t they?”

I cleared my throat. “Your phone might not have survived the accident.”

She gave me an irritated look. “Who are you again?”

“Samantha.”

“Are you Dylan’s girlfriend? Or, no, his fuck buddy, right? The one who talked to me on the phone that time.” Her voice grated, her tone such a contrast to her porcelain fragility, but the woman had been pummeled enough today. I clenched my fists against my sides and remained silent.
 

Dylan pulled away from her. “Samantha is a friend. Don’t talk about her like that.”

“Sorry.” She gave me a glance under hooded eyes, clearly not sorry at all. She clung to his jacket. “I’m so glad you came. I missed you.”
 

Seriously? Laurent one breath and Dylan the next? There was an easy solution, thankfully. “Give me your boyfriend’s phone number. I’ll call him for you.”
 

And indeed, Persephone let go of Dylan’s jacket. Her face brightened. “Yes. Laurent will come for me. He’ll want to be here to help me through this. He’ll change his mind. He didn’t mean it. I know he didn’t. My beautiful Laurent. He’s a poet, did you know that? His words are so exquisite.” She sounded dreamy. Drugged. The meds must be kicking in. “Yes, do that. He’ll come for me and leave that crazy lady he’s taken up with.”

Which was how I ended up pacing past the nurse’s station with my phone to my ear, explaining patiently to a man I’d never met that his ex-girlfriend—no, not his ex? A short-term fling? Well, she didn’t know that—had gone on a mad motorcycle escapade and crashed into a sidewall off the FDR Drive, and would he come visit the hospital? “Yes, on the ninth floor. Tell the desk it’s room 914. Sure, bring flowers. That sounds nice. No, she doesn’t look terrible. Still pretty. Yes, like sunshine and the promise of spring. Exactly like.”
 

I got off the phone feeling vaguely mournful. He’d sounded baffled at first, like he hadn’t known what role he was supposed to play, but his light French accent had become thicker by the end of the conversation, as if in preparation for his hospital visit. Was anything in Persephone’s life real?
 

When I went back into the room, Dylan had broken free of Persephone. She dozed in her nest of tubes and monitors. The pulse-ox on her finger glowed red. Dylan had his back to the door and seemed to be staring moodily out at the 59
^th
Street Bridge and the Roosevelt Island tram half a mile south of us. The night was illuminated by clouds catching and reflecting the city lights. I wished I could see his face. I wished I could touch him, comfort him. I wished—

I wished I didn’t care.
 

I turned away. “I should go.”

“Don’t.” Dylan turned toward me. “Please.”

So I stayed with him looking out at the nearby skyscrapers and town houses and the low-rise warehouses across the river in Queens for what felt like forever. At one point, Dylan wrapped his arms around me and pulled me close. I stiffened briefly. This was sex, this wasn’t anything like love; I shouldn’t let him get the two confused, shouldn’t let him blur the lines…