For the Love of His Life (28 page)

“As long as I get you naked also,
señor
. I like to look as much as you do!”

“On the count of three? One…two…three!”

They both stripped and climbed down into the Jacuzzi that was sunken into the tile next to the pool. Raul had put the punch bowl within easy reach, and he ladled some sangria into each of their glasses. They clinked their glasses together.

“A toast. To our first Christmas spent together and to having a whole week of you to myself, with no jobs or family to interrupt.”

Veronica nodded. “I’ve never been away from my family at Christmas before. It would feel weird if I wasn’t so happy to be with you.”

Raul smiled. “You are my family now, Nica.”

She smiled as he moved closer to bruise her lips with his. He reached over to put his own glass up on the tile, then he took her glass from her hand, his lips still possessively covering hers. Their passion flowed easily and naturally from passionate kisses and fondling of favorite places, to Raul kneeling in front of Veronica, holding a breast in each hand, suckling each nipple as he raised it up from the warm, bubbling water.

Veronica sighed and twitched as his mouth excited her senses. She was trembling with the need to come when he abruptly stopped, saying, “Sit up on the side, now, so I can taste your excitement.”

She pushed herself up onto the tile and leaned back, watching as Raul moved up to kneel on the ledge she had been sitting on to caress her thighs. His hands traveled down to each ankle, as he traced a path along her skin, his every touch making her jump and quiver with excitement. He spent some time massaging the tops of her inner thighs, before he leaned his head forward to inhale deeply.

“Ah, Nica, how I’ve missed your smell! Everything about you inspires my lust! You set me on fire! Let me remind you what you’ve been missing…”

His fingers gently spread her labia apart and his tongue dove into her as he licked at her juices flowing freely. He used his thumbs to massage along her inner lips as the tip of his tongue found her tiny bundle of nerves and flicked at it mercilessly. She held out as long as she could, but within a few minutes she moaned as she came.

Raul chuckled softly “Your first California orgasm. Your first orgasm in my house. Your first Christmas present from me…with many, many more to come!”

He continued his assault on her for so long she finally begged him, “More! I want more of you, Raul! I want you inside of me! I need you!”

He stood up and pushed her back along the tile, crawling until he was crouched over her, feverishly tearing at the condom he’d grabbed from the tray that held the sangria. She reached down and took it, grasped him in one hand as she rolled it down onto him, being sure to rub his rock-hard erection, as if it needed any help to grow larger.

He groaned. “Enough! I need to be inside of you now!”

He grabbed her wrists and held them down next to her head as his knees spread her legs apart.

“Wider, woman. You know how big I am…”

“Yes…yes…
yes
!” She screamed out the last word as he pushed into her, his size making him have to force his way in. She felt him bang against her cervix and that image was enough to make her explode into an orgasm that had her trembling so hard, he had to fight himself not to come as quickly as she had. He tried to hold off, but her inner walls squeezed against him so tightly that even sheathed in a condom, he couldn’t control his body’s reaction. With a shout he felt himself throbbing as the hot come shot out of his body. He felt it burn as it ejected, in a rhythm in sync with his rapidly racing pulse.

Veronica’s legs were wrapped around his hips, as they held onto each other, their bodies celebrating becoming one again.

When his arms stopped being locked into holding him upright, Raul slowly lowered his face to kiss his beloved. Her eyes were still closed, but she opened them to stare up into his face.

“I love you,” she said simply, as if that fact was self-evident.

“I love you as no other,” he said in return.

“I’m afraid each time you leave me, that you’ll get caught back up in your life out here and forget about me,” she began, but he shook his head as his hand caressed the side of her face.

“And I’m afraid that you’ll realize just how much I need you, and that will scare you away. Nica, I have found myself through loving you. You made me listen to the voices inside of me that I always ignored. You made me realize that the only thing really important is to love and be loved.”

Veronica smiled. “Then I have everything I want from you. Merry Christmas, Raul…the only man I’ve ever loved.”

He nodded solemnly. “Merry Christmas to you also, Nica, the only woman I’ve ever loved.”

After another long soak in the warm bubbling water, they splashed around for a while in the pool.

“Getting water-logged?”

Veronica nodded. “Yup.”

“Let’s go up to my bedroom and make love until we pass out from exhaustion.”

She giggled. “It’s two hours later for me, you know. I’ll probably wuss out on you long before you’re tired.”

He shrugged. “That’s okay. You just lie there and I’ll try not to wake you when I come again…”

She stuck out her tongue at him and he slapped her butt.

“Upstairs, woman! I have needs! Let’s go indulge them all.”

As they held hands and walked back into the house, Veronica said, “You’ll have to show me around tomorrow, in the daylight.”

“Sure I will. Eventually. Maybe I’ll let you out of my bed in the afternoon sometime. We’ll probably be hungry by then anyway.”

She giggled. “And jogging around this huge mansion will be enough exercise to work off some calories after we eat.”

His eyebrows rose then waggled up and down. “I have other things in mind that will use up lots and lots of calories, my dear…”

The sky was just becoming light with the first pink streaks of dawn, when Veronica’s breathing became regular and she fell into a deep sleep on top of Raul.

I’m still inside of you! My woman holds me securely in her pussy as we both sleep. I can’t get enough you, Nica. I’ll never let you go…

* * * *

“How many bedrooms does this place have?” Veronica asked as they toured yet another room decorated in yet another southwestern color scheme.

Raul shrugged. “Seven or eight…maybe more. I don’t remember, really. I bought it a couple of years ago, but I haven’t spent much time here.”

Her eyebrows rose as she looked at him in surprise. “N0? Why not?”

“Well, I spend months at a time on location, as you well know,” he defended himself,” and that means living in a trailer. Then when I’m back in town, until recently I’d be out partying until all hours of the night, crashing wherever I passed out.”

“And with whomever?” she asked, trying unsuccessfully not to sound jealous.

He nodded. “Yup. I’ve thrown a few parties here, which usually meant there was such a huge mess the next day that I had to hire a service to come in and clean up. It was too much to expect Edilberto and Laura to take care of, even though they insisted they didn’t need help. And of course, some of the guests had to be forcibly ejected when they tried to more or less move into one of the spare bedrooms.”

“Really?”

“Um-hm. There are a lot of hangers-on and sycophants out here in L.A. Some have aspirations of becoming famous someday…others know they have no talent, but they don’t mind mooching off of anyone who will let them.”

“Is that why you didn’t answer your phone when it rang repeatedly last night and this afternoon?”

“Uh-huh. I should have just turned it off, but in my excitement over your arrival, I forgot. It might have been people wanting to wish me a Merry Christmas, but I doubt it. My Mom will wait for me to call her, but I saw her last weekend when I had dinner with them at one of the country clubs her husband belongs to. He likes to introduce me to everyone as his step-son. I only met him five years ago when he married Mom and I only see him once or twice a year…but he makes her happy so I let him act as if we have a personal relationship. But we don’t.”

“So who was trying to call you?”

“Probably the dealers who are pissed because I’m not using anymore. Some of the sycophants are dealers who depend on their relationship with someone famous to make them famous also. They brag about who they have on speed-dial, and who calls them for a fix. They only get to go to the best parties when they are with a celebrity. So they worm their way into your confidence by supplying you with the drugs they have. They find out what you like to smoke or snort or shoot, then they make sure to have the best of stuff whenever they’re with you. That way they can be sure to be seen with you.”

Veronica’s brow wrinkled in confusion. “But what do they get out of it? Do they charge outrageous prices for their drugs? Do they make money off of you?”

Raul shook his head. “No, and that’s the best part for the celebrity. Anything you want from them is free. No charge for what you do with them…they might charge you for any extra you want to bring home with you, but not always. But they get to party with you in public, they get into clubs that otherwise wouldn’t let them in. The women who want to fuck a celebrity will sometimes have sex with them first, or at least blow them, just for an introduction. Or they might get the
extras
, when there are just too many women for the famous guy to take on by himself. Sometimes it was just a big pile of bodies, fucking whoever happened to be close enough to aim into.”

“Ew! And may I say, ew again!”

They were in the billiards room in the basement now and Raul walked over to one of the padded stools by the bar and sat down, gesturing for Veronica to sit too.

He smiled sadly. “I used to think it was a great arrangement. I got all the drugs I could handle for free and all of the women I could want in exchange for having a crew of guys who were always up for partying with me. Like I said, the only time it got hairy was when we partied here, and it was damned near impossible to get them to leave. That’s why I tried not to do much in my own house. Much easier to trash up someone else’s house, pass out there or nearby, then crawl back here to sleep in someplace quiet, to kill my hang-over. Then I’d wake up to the sound of the phone ringing, and find out where the party was that night, and it would be
same-shit-different-night
all over again.”

“So that’s why you haven’t answered the phone…”

He nodded. “Yea. I have no interest in finding out where tonight’s hot-spot is going to be. I don’t care anymore. Even when you’re not here with me, I’ve been either ignoring the phone or taking it off the hook. I turn my cell phone to vibrate. I don’t want to turn it off in case it’s you calling.”

He leaned over to kiss her gently. “But when you’re here with me, I have everything I need already. There’s no reason to leave.”

“But why did you buy such a big house if you’re almost never in it?”

He shrugged. “Tax deduction, mostly. My accountant told me I had to put some money into real estate of some kind and I didn’t want a condo. I wanted more privacy, with a pool and Jacuzzi. I looked for something smaller, but believe me, I wasn’t kidding when I said this is one of the smaller places in this area. I bought it already furnished. Edilberto and Laura had been the caretakers while it was on the market, so I kept them on, but changed their hours so they could spend more time home with their kids.”

He kissed her again. “I’d love to fill all of the bedrooms upstairs with our children,
cara mia
.”

Veronica looked at him in alarm. “Out here? In California? I can’t live out here! I’ve got jobs back in Grand Marais. My family is back there. I can’t just up and move out here to live with you. What on earth would I do with my time? Take up knitting?”

He choked with laughter. “Knitting? You know, somehow I could see you doing that! And liking it too.”

“Well, actually I
do
know how to knit, but I don’t do it much except for in the winter, when it’s nice to have a warm afghan on your lap while you’re working on it. I don’t know how to make much else. But my point is the same. I’d be lost out here, with no nearby lake, nowhere to fish, and no back-country trails to jog along. I don’t belong out here.”

“Then neither do I. I want to live where you are and if that’s back in Grand Marais, then that’s where I’ll be also.”

“What about your career? How will you act?”

“Maybe I can do it from a distance. That’s what Jared does. He lives up on his vineyard year-round, and only comes here to L.A. when he’s got a movie to shop around, or to work on. He keeps a condo here for when he’s in town, but he’s not here all that much. Maybe I can live like that also, and have my agent send me scripts to consider.”

“I thought you said that your agent told you that you have to be seen partying around to stay famous…that your career depends on that.”

Raul sighed heavily as he got up to get them both a beer out of the fridge behind the bar. He twisted the tops off of both of them and handed one across the bar.