Dust Devil (18 page)

“
You
know what I believe, Sarah. So you’re asking me questions to
which I haven’t any answers. And this is really too heavy a
discussion for such a hot, humid afternoon. So what do you say we
just forget the rest of the world for today, concentrate on each
other, have a couple of beers and go swimming or something?”
His eyes roamed over her slowly, appraisingly, love and desire
gleaming in their depths. Then he grinned at her insolently.

“
Well,
I guess that depends on just what the ‘something’ you
have in mind is,” she teased, vastly relieved that his earlier
dark mood appeared to have dissipated.

“
Let’s
go swimming first, and then I’ll show you.”

They
swam. They drank a few beers. They ate a couple of hot dogs. Then
they swam some more—and drank some more, until Sarah realized
dimly that she was more than just a little tipsy when Renzo at last
pulled her from the cool water, wrapped her beach towel around her
and led her toward the shelter of the woods, away from prying eyes.
There, drawing the towel from her slowly, trailing it over her
shoulder and down her arm, he spread it on the grass. Then he pressed
her down upon it, amid the wildflowers, honeysuckle vines and
cattails beneath the green canopy of the trees.

In
that moment, as she gazed up at Renzo, it seemed to Sarah as though
all her senses suddenly, strangely, metamorphosed, expanding in some
directions, contracting in others. All the clamor surrounding the
quarry faded so she could no longer hear the shouts and laughter, not
even a single note of the blaring music. The place where she lay was
hushed, as though it had been enshrouded by a cocoon—and she
was the caterpillar inside it, on the brink of transforming into a
gossamer butterfly and breaking free of her confines. She was vividly
conscious of the white clouds in the sky, of the sunlight slanting
down through the boughs of the trees, weaving delicate patterns amid
the leaves and dappling the earth so it seemed magical, a fairyland.
In her dazed, lethargic mind, the droning bluebottles flitting among
the wildflowers were, in reality, fairies who danced and sang in the
summer stillness. The summer heat upon her body, soaking into her
skin, made her feel as though she were on fire, bathed in a golden
glow. The sweet fragrance of the green, cool woods, tinged with the
tang of still water, filled her nostrils. Most of all, she was aware
of Renzo kneeling over her, his thighs imprisoning her own, the
butterfly tattoo on his forearm appearing to flutter its fragile
wings. He had never told her why he had got the tattoo, only that it
meant something special to him. He stretched out his hands, tugged
the band from her French braid. His fingers worked patiently, as
though he had all the time in the world to loosen and untangle her
damp hair, to spread it like a fan beneath her head. His palms cupped
her face tenderly.

Slowly,
inexorably, he lowered his mouth to hers.

A
soft sigh escaped from Sarah’s parted lips before she closed
her eyes and drank him in. Her mouth was an unfurling bud, his tongue
a hummingbird that tasted the nectar at the heart of her—so
quick, so light that she instinctively hungered for more. She reached
up, her hands tightening in his hair, drawing him down to her. She
opened her lips wider to his, pliant, yielding, eager for the taste
of him. Her own tongue darted forth to twine with his, a dance like
that of the bluebottle-fairies, wings brushing, flicking, lingering,
a mating ritual as old as time.

“
Oh,
Sarah,” Renzo breathed against her mouth before he lay down
beside her, his body half covering her own, his hand at her breast,
one leg riding between hers.

They
had never before lain together like this, nearly naked, flesh
pressing against flesh. The heat that suffused Sarah’s body
deepened, spread. It was as though the touch of him seared her very
being, melted her as the sun melted ice. He licked her throat, a
feathery stroke so delicate that she would have thought she imagined
it, if not for the shiver that ran through her, the sudden tautening
of her nipples, so they strained against the fabric of her bikini
top. Renzo’s palm glided across them; his fingertips circled
them, teased the sensitive tips before sliding sensuously down her
belly. His hand slipped between her thighs, rubbing her lightly, as
though he sensed the painful tightening that gripped her there, that
made her arch against him as she instinctively sought easement.

Of
their own accord, her palms glided down his back, stroking, kneading,
tracing the strong planes and angles, the hard curve of muscle and
sinew, so very different from her own softness. Male.
Forbidden.
And
so, like the quarry, dangerous and exciting. At the thought, alarm
bells rang in Sarah’s mind. She ignored them, pushed them away,
told herself dizzily that they were only wind chimes hung in the
trees by the fairies whose place this was, stirring faintly in the
sultry air. Renzo kissed her mouth again, this time more deeply, more
demandingly, his tongue questing, stabbing her with its heat. Her
breasts swelled against him, aching to burst free of their
constraints, to press against his naked chest, to feel the fine mat
of dark hair that covered him there. Her fingertips stroked
the
soft
pelt,
drew tiny circles amid the curls, outlined his own nipples, as hard
as hers.

The
clasp of her bikini top gave way at his swift, sudden yank; the
spaghetti straps brushed her arms. And then the scrap of material was
no more than a splash of bright color upon the grass, and her breasts
were bare, full and upthrusting, begging to be fondled, imprisoned by
his hands and lips, seized by his teeth and tongue. Groaning, he
captured them without a struggle, pressed them high, buried his face
between them. His mouth caught one dusky nipple, sucked fervently,
until it was distended and engorged, and waves of electric shocks
were radiating through her body. After what seemed an eternity—an
eternity in which she could no longer think, could only feel—Renzo
released her nipple, lifted his head. His eyes, dark with desire,
pierced hers so intensely that Sarah could not bear to go on meeting
his gaze, but shyly turned her face away, flushing. One hand ensnared
her hair, compelling her to look at him; the other found the nipple
he had teased, thumb and forefinger taking hold of it, rolling and
tugging gently. Tightening his grasp in her hair, holding her still,
deliberately watching her all the while, he slowly lowered his head
again, took her nipple between his teeth, laved it with his tongue
until she whimpered pleadingly, writhed beneath him, burning, aching,
desperately wanting something more.

“
You
like that, don’t you, Sarah?” Renzo muttered hoarsely.

“
Yes,”
she whispered helplessly. “Yes...”

His
hand crept downward once more, this time finding its way beneath the
elastic band of her bikini bottoms, his lips and tongue stilling her
demurring. She was soft and hot and wet, and not just from swimming,
either. He stroked her, fingers parting the trembling, burgeoning
petals of her, rhythmically sliding up and down the mellifluous seam
of her, finding the hard little bud she had not until this moment
known existed, but that now seemed to be the very center of her
being. Sarah had never before felt the sensations that assailed her
as he rubbed her there, lightly at first, then harder and faster as
she opened to him, pushed exigently against his hand, straining
toward whatever it was she suddenly knew with certainty that she must
find or die. She clutched Renzo fiercely, her nails digging into his
back as she sobbed against his mouth, at once terrified and
tantalized by the terrible, unbearable thing that had seized her with
sharp, inescapable talons, that squeezed at her determinedly,
relentlessly, until she was certain she would explode.

And
then she did, the waves of pain turning abruptly into a flood of
pleasure that was so agonizingly intense that she thought she would
faint from it. She stiffened, gasping and crying out, not
understanding that the magnitude of her delight could be heightened
still more until, without warning, Renzo drove his fingers deep
inside her, thrusting them in and out of her frantically as she rode
the tide of ecstasy.

She
wasn’t even aware of how, with his free hand, he fumbled at his
zipper, jerked his cutoffs down and impatiently kicked them away to
free himself. Her head still spun, her body still pulsed with the
aftermath of her climax as he grabbed hold of her bikini bottoms,
swiftly hauled them from her, so that before Sarah even realized what
was happening, she lay sprawled and naked before him, his hands at
her thighs, spreading her wide. Her eyes flew open to see him
kneeling over her, as naked as she, his sex hard and heavy, poised to
pierce her. His own eyes were open, too, dark with passion,
glittering with hunger and triumph. She wanted to protest. But as
though he sensed that, Renzo bent over her, his hand around his
turgid member, guiding it to her, pushing it against her, rubbing and
exciting the key to her pleasure again, so her objection died,
unuttered, on her lips.

Moments
later, with a low groan, a calling of her name, he plunged into her,
swift and hard and deep, conquering the frail guardian of her
innocence, penetrating and invading her. Sarah’s breath caught
in her throat at the shock and pain of it, and then she cried out.
But with his mouth, Renzo swallowed the soft, stricken wail, his
tongue silencing her, mimicking the movements of his body as he
withdrew, then thrust into her deeply once more. His hand was upon
her mound, kneading her as he took her, so the unendurable pressure
built within her again and she knew nothing but him, the feel of him
throbbing inside her, stretching and molding her as his body
quickened urgently, feverishly, against her own. She clung to him
tightly, instinctively wrapping her legs around his, arching her hips
to meet each powerful stroke as he once more drove her over the edge
of consciousness into the brilliant, bursting abyss of blind
sensation. As she fell, Renzo, unable to hold back any
longer—surprised he had managed to contain himself as long as
he had—shuddered convulsively against her, his head buried
against her shoulder, his breath coming in harsh rasps, his heart
hammering against her own as he spilled himself inside her.

Afterward,
although he half expected Sarah to cry, she didn’t—not
even when he abruptly realized that in his uncontrollable desire to
have her, he had forgotten to protect her, had, in fact, left his
package of condoms in the pocket of his jeans, which he had earlier
rolled up and stuffed into one pouch of the saddlebags on his bike.

“
What
if I’m... What if I’m pregnant now, Renzo?” she
asked quietly, tremulously, as they lay together in the afterglow of
their lovemaking, he kissing and stroking her, already wanting her
again, she utterly overwhelmed by her mixture of emotions, what she
had just experienced in his arms.

“
You
aren’t,” he murmured reassuringly. “So don’t
worry about it. You have to do it a lot for that to happen. You’re
safe if it’s only a couple of times, especially in the
beginning, when you were a virgin.” He kissed her mouth,
silencing her fears. “Christ, but you’re beautiful! You
don’t know how badly I’ve wanted to see you naked like
this, to make love to you, to be a part of you.” His eyes and
hands roamed over her boldly, possessively, as though he had every
right now to look at her, to touch her whenever and however he
pleased. The effects of the beer she had drunk earlier were beginning
to fade, and she was shy of him, but Renzo only laughed softly at
that. “We’re going to be married, Sarah, and I’m
not going to be the kind of husband who lets his wife hide from him
under the cover of a nightgown, bedsheets and darkness.” He
took her hand in his, wrapped it around his sex, taught her the
motion. “Open your legs for me, Sarah,” he demanded
huskily. “You’re mine now, and I love you. I want

you...
like this... and this... yes, my love, yes....”

He
enfolded her, sank into her, urgent in his desire and need as he once
more hurtled them both into the kaleidoscopic void.