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Overview
Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940000115039 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Magic Carpet Books |
| Publication date: | 01/07/2003 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| File size: | 235 KB |
Read an Excerpt
Stoneshire Hospital's Emergency Room was never crowded. State-of-the-art medical facilities were housed inside a Victorian factory that had been gutted, its rotting wooden beams replaced with a less vulnerable metal skeleton. Nevertheless, the centuries-old town refused to outgrow its narrow winding streets and quaint historic buildings.
The hospital's elegant waiting room boasted large chairs upholstered in burgundy leather, softened by years of comforting the stressed bodies of people waiting for news of their loved ones, a far cry from the cold plastic slap to your backside suffered in most modern hospitals. Large potted plants helped soothe eyes strained by the inevitable fluorescent light, and encouragingly hot fragrant tea was brought around by quietly sympathetic nurses wearing traditional white knee-length outfits.
Stoneshire's Chief Resident, Eric Christianson, was personally responsible for the waiting room's aesthetic charm; the furniture had come from his family estate, which he was aching to get rid of. Lately, the endless, lifeless rooms surrounding him at night felt disturbingly like cancer cells threatening his altruistic health, yet for some reason he couldn't bring himself to sell the place.
The thunder-filled night they brought in the old woman and her niece--a strikingly lovely creature in her early twenties--he had just slipped off his lab coat and was reluctantly preparing to drive to his palatial home through the storm. He was almost relieved to be spared another lonely night in his study as the paramedics quickly informed him that a tree had fallen across the victims' car. One of the elderly female's knees was crushed beyond repair. The youngwoman appeared unharmed yet she was unconscious, and Eric immediately suspected she might be suffering from serious internal bleeding. After only a few minutes with her, he was able to staunch the flow of her life's blood, thereby saving her life, but a heavy tree branch had struck her womb with such force no life would ever be able to take root inside her.
Eric had done everything he could for her, but Maia Wilson's vital signs were still fluctuating dangerously. It was a desperate, unorthodox impulse that caused him to dismiss his nurses and to bend over the young woman's unresponsive body. He whispered passionately in her ear like a lover, begging her to hold on to life, pleading with her to let him save her, fervently urging her to stay alive.
Even though he definitely should have been, he was not surprised when her pulse suddenly grew stronger and a warm hint of color returned to her snowy cheeks. Not yet daring to hope, he gently raised one of her marble-white eyelids and shone a light into her deep brown iris, but it was as though a tiny round sun moved instead of the dark cloud obscuring it, because she remained unconscious.
Dr. Christianson was exhausted and frustrated, but at least he had not lost his lovely patient, who uncannily evoked the legend of Sleeping Beauty as she smiled peacefully in her unnatural sleep. Her parents were still out in the waiting room (they had been there for over twenty-four hours) and his smile as he approached them was reassuring if also somewhat abashed. He was feeling just a little guilty about the unorthodox way he was going about the desired end of saving their daughter's life.
"How is she?' Peter Wilson demanded, anxiety making his voice sound uncharacteristically harsh.
"She's still unconscious,' Eric informed Maia's father reluctantly, 'but as I said, she's stopped bleeding internally and all her vital signs have stabilized. She's very weak, naturally, and she's still not responding to stimulus, but her strength seems to be returning gradually. I've done every possible test and there's no evidence at all that she was injured anywhere except...' He glanced at the dark leaf of a plant brushing against his white sleeve. 'She won't be able to have children,' he concluded bluntly, 'but other than that, she should be perfectly healthy.' If she ever decides to wake up, he thought despondently. As a scientist, he both respected and resented mysteries he could not solve if they were ones that thwarted him in some way.
"But then why is she still unconscious?' Stella Wilson pleaded to know, clinging to her husband's arm. They were a strikingly attractive couple; it was easy to see where their daughter had gotten her looks.
"I don't know,' Eric admitted softly, studying the plant intently. 'It could be shock, some sort of psychological defense mechanism against the trauma she suffered ... she slipped into the safety of unconsciousness to escape the pain and she's not ready to come out yet.' He was taken aback by his intuitive diagnosis and somewhat concerned by how casually he expressed it, with absolutely no scientific evidence to back him up.
"I see.' Surprisingly, Maia's father apparently found the explanation reasonable and convincing. 'What about my sister, Carol? Is she still in stable condition?'
"Oh yes, no need to worry about Carol. She's heavily sedated, of course, and I'm afraid she'll need a cane to walk from now on, but she will be able to walk, she won't require a wheelchair. Don't worry, please, I fully intend to stay by Maia's side until she comes around. She's not in a coma, not in the traditional sense ... you see, I believe she can hear me. When I spoke to her...' He thrust his hands in his pockets and cleared his throat decisively. 'When I spoke to her, her vital signs responded.'
"You spoke to her and she heard you?' Stella's hand resembled a bird's claw clinging to the solid branch of her husband's arm. 'What did you say to her, doctor?' She sounded fascinated.
"Nothing, really.' He cleared his throat again self-consciously wishing there was something in his pockets he could hold onto. 'I simply urged her not to give up.'
"Please,' Peter slipped a supportive arm around his wife's shoulders, 'tell us what you said to her.'
Eric glanced over at the plant again knowing it wouldn't judge him no matter what he thought or did. 'Well, I said, "I want you to live for me".' Looking back at Maia's parents, he tried very hard to sound as though he was only reciting his grocery list as he went on. 'I said, "don't fight me, you know you want to live, you're so beautiful, you have to hold on", and so on.' Attempting to look innocently relaxed, he ran the fingers of his right hand through his silver-blonde hair even while his other hand clenched into a fist inside his lab coat.
Stella gazed fervently up at her husband. 'Then what Drew said is true, Maia is--'
"Thank you, doctor,' Peter cut her off abruptly. 'We know she's in good hands.'
After two final introspective drags, Drew Landson killed his cigarette and then gazed down at its broken body for a moment before at last meeting the eyes of the man and woman seated before him. 'You both know,' he began quietly, 'that there's no such thing as an accident or a coincidence.'
"This is too much!' Peter struck the table with his fist, but made no impression on the snowy plain of the cloth. Even the candle kept burning steadily in its glass sphere as though mocking the uncontrolled heat of his anger. There was so much pain written on the lines of his face as he focused on the small flame that he might have been watching the distant tower of his castle burn beneath an enemy's torch.
"Please, dear.' Stella spread the soft, pale roots of her fingers over her husband's rock-hard fist. 'You heard what the doctor said, there's no rational explanation for Maia's condition, it's as though she's being held--'
"There's always a rational explanation!' Her husband's chin dug into his chest as he closed his eyes and struggled to gain control of himself.
Drew sat back in his chair holding Stella's eyes, their thoughts in such perfect harmony they might as well have been caressing each other beneath the table. They were meeting in the restaurant where only last Sunday evening he had seen Maia for the first time having dinner with her parents. Their eyes had met, and he had felt the sparks literally fly between them as he tossed his cigarette into the flame. And because of this, because of the desire and longing he had felt her touch him with, he was in the position to reach out to her now, because her beauty had evoked the same intense response in him...
"I am extremely upset,' Peter muttered tightly in an oblique apology for his emotional outburst.
"Your emotions have their roots in the limits of your perceptions,' Drew stated mildly. 'Why don't you try actually thinking about what Maia is experiencing for a change instead of selfishly dwelling on what you're going through? For all we know, she's enjoying herself. In the dream she's living now, she has absolutely no awareness of her body lying in a hospital bed, and you need to stop thinking about her that way, too. Her soul is very much alive and well in another dimension, or another frequency of being, or however you want to think about it, and in whatever adventure she's living out, I suspect it's you, her parents, who are dead. In her psyche, she has to accept the fact of a car crash, but instead of the victims being herself and her aunt, Carol, I imagine she thinks you both were in the crash, and since she can't communicate with you, in her mind it's her parents who were killed in a fatal accident. I'm just speculating here because I haven't gone in yet, but I'm assuming since Carol was involved in the trauma with her that Maia imagines herself living with her aunt now, instead of with you. Her personal history will be slightly different in her subconscious fantasy, but other than that, she'll be completely herself, and I mean completely, much more herself than she is normally in so-called real life.'
"What do you mean?' Stella breathed in wonder.
"I mean her deepest self, all her most intense longings and desires, will have full reign in her dream. You say she's an artist?'
"Yes, she's a painter,' her mother said proudly. 'Her work is haunting, full of standing stones and blood-red sunsets and women lying across altars...'
"Jesus!' Peter heaved a deep sigh. 'All right, man, what do we do?' The rational and Christian portions of his brain surrendered abruptly. 'Just tell us what we have to do to help Maia.'
"It's the soul's delicate organs of fear and desire, hope and despair that we're dealing with here,' Drew responded matter-of-factly. 'We have to read the events and come up with a diagnosis. I'm relatively certain Maia has entered the haunting sensual world of her paintings.'
"We trust you, Drew.' Stella handed him the intangible yet infinitely heavy gift of their hope. 'Just tell us what to do.'
"I will try my absolute hardest to help you.' His charismatic smile was broad enough to contain several meanings, but it dimmed almost at once as his face resumed a respectful lack of expression. 'First things first,' he stated briskly, and draining his glass of scotch rose abruptly. 'I have to sleep in her bedroom tonight, in her bed.'
Peter locked himself in the library, to Stella's mingled relief and dismay. She longed for the solace of his presence, but his negative attitude in the face of the unknown was no comfort at all to her. She was grateful Drew had given her the nearly impossible task of digging up an ashtray in a house where no one had smoked cigarettes for years. At least the search kept her from stalking around the telephone, very much like a panther walking on two legs in her form-fitting black dress; she was desperately fighting the hunger she felt for constant news of her daughter. Doctor Christianson would call her as soon as there was any change in Maia's condition.
Stella finally found what she was looking for in the bottom drawer of a wooden cupboard hidden away in a back hallway. She held the round clay object reverently in both hands, treating it like an archaeologist unearthing an ancient relic. Maia had made this ashtray for her father in kindergarten when he still smoked. A crude, heavy little sphere the dark-gray of stone, its entire surface was covered with the mysterious spirals of her childish fingerprints, which had grown as she aged yet never changed. Inevitably, Stella found herself comparing the rough childish art project with a Celtic artifact, and she smiled for the first time in over forty-eight hours as she pressed it against her heart. The object's earthy appearance, combined with the pure love that had shaped it, reassured her that she was doing the right thing with Drew, whom she knew would be very pleased with her discovery.
He was perched at the foot of Maia's single bed looking slowly around him when Stella entered her daughter's bedroom. The sight of his black jacket spread across the blue-and-white quilt made her heart skip for an instant it looked so much like a big black bird with its wings spread wide, and she paused anxiously in the doorway, at once questioning and understanding why she had put her daughter's life in this man's hands. He was wearing a sleeveless black T-shirt that fully exposed his powerful arms, and as she watched him, he abruptly leaned forward as though listening intently to something beyond the range of her own hearing.
"What is it?' she whispered, her heart racing.
He sat up again. 'Nothing.'
The casual smile he tossed her felt like a boomerang momentarily carrying her fears away, but then the desire it hit her with made her feel even worse. 'I found what you wanted,' she told him, thrusting the ashtray towards him as though it was suddenly burning her hand.
He got up and quickly took it from her. 'This is perfect,' he murmured, caressing the rough surface imprinted with Maia's sensual identity in the form of her unique fingerprints. 'She made this for me.'
"She made it for her father,' Stella retorted weakly, for she was already half drugged by his heady aura of leather and male flesh irresistibly blended with his spiritual and physical self-assurance.
"Your daughter is testing your faith, my lady.' He set the ashtray gently down on the nightstand.
"You mean she deliberately chose to almost get herself killed,' she snapped, her husband's attitude inevitably rubbing off on her, 'and to never be able to have children of her own?'
"Stella,' he gently grasped one of her arms and urged her down onto the edge of the bed beside him. 'Without your blessing, it will be impossible for me to reach your daughter,' he trapped both her hands firmly between his while looking earnestly into her eyes, 'and your doubting rational mind is an utterly unacceptable chaperone on this blind date Fate has chosen to set up between Maia and me. So please do your best to relax and trust me. That's the most important thing you can do right now, because if you don't trust me and believe in me, neither will Maia.'
Red hair licked around the waxy pallor of her face as she lowered her head submissively. 'I trust you,' she sighed.
Chapter Two
The evening of May Day, the anniversary of her parents' death in an automobile accident, Maia Wilson drove to the cemetery where they were buried, their bodies lying eternally side-by-side in a single coffin. Another year had passed; the earth had made yet another full turn around the sun like a girl in a country dance, her vulnerable green eyes meeting her partner's penetrating regard as she raised such a lovely skirt of flowers in the Spring you could almost forget her skeletal legs.
Tears streaming down her face, Maia drove slowly along the path between the graves while stars appeared overhead as if in sympathy with her glistening cheeks. The last thing she expected to happen was for her engine to suddenly give a loud metallic cough, shudder ominously, and die.
A deafening silence settled around her as in her rear-view mirror a pair of headlights shone indifferently on their way outside the cemetery gates. She was miles outside of Stoneshire surrounded by a crescent of woodland, all that remained of a once vast ancient forest. She had no way of getting home; it was much too far for her to walk, especially in the dark. She would be forced to take the dangerous option of flagging down a pair of anonymous headlights hoping they would stop for her and that there wouldn't be a rapist or a killer behind the wheel who would have her completely at his mercy...
She switched on her emergency lights. They flashed an urgent rhythm with her pulse, giving the deepening darkness a small, hopeful heart. She doubted, however, that anyone would notice her luminous plea for help, and she knew absolutely nothing about the inner workings of the metal shell that carried her around everywhere.
It seemed an absolute miracle when after only a few minutes a pair of headlights turned off the main road outside the gate and shone her way, effortlessly penetrating the night with sword-like shafts as the modern armor of another car pulled up just behind hers.
Maia gratefully opened her door and leaned out to watch a tall man's silhouette rimmed in gold approaching her, his blond hair catching the glow of his headlights so that his dark face seemed surrounded by a halo.
"What seems to be the trouble, miss?' he asked in a kind, quiet voice that instantly made her feel better.
"I don't know,' she replied, 'the engine just died.'
"I'll take a look at it for you.'
"Oh would you, please?' She stepped out of the car gratefully. 'Thank you so much!'
He walked back to his own vehicle to fetch something from the trunk, and it struck her that his small red sports car looked exactly like the one she had seen parked between the standing stones yesterday evening, its polished body shining beneath the setting sun making her think of a yoke inside the egg-shaped circle. She heard the trunk slam shut, then carefully stepped out of his way so he could walk past her. He lifted her hood, and holding it up with one hand he shone a flashlight into her vehicle's dark bowels. Above the small light his pale features rose out of the darkness like a cresting wave flooding her with feelings. Not only had someone come to her rescue out in the middle of nowhere, that someone was amazingly handsome. 'I think I saw your car parked at the standing stones last night,' she said impulsively, even though she really had no way of knowing if it had actually been his car. 'You know which stones I'm talking about, the small group just outside Stoneshire?'
"Yes, I know them,' he responded absently, neither denying or confirming her assumption as he concentrated on diagnosing her mechanical problem, lightly touching something here, then something there. In the dim halo of illumination cast by his flashlight, her car's organs were serpentine, evil looking things to her.
"Are you an archaeologist?' she asked him curiously.
He laughed briefly. 'No, I'm just interested in standing stones, that's all.'
"So am I,' she confessed.
"Isn't everyone? Well, I don't see a problem here. Why don't you try starting it again and see what happens.'
She slipped obediently back into the driver's seat, and was paradoxically disappointed when the engine rolled over just like normal, as though there had never been anything wrong with it at all, effectively killing her hopes of getting to know him better. She stepped back out of the car as he slammed the hood closed. 'I can't understand it,' she murmured, somewhat embarrassed and intensely distressed that he was going to drive out of her life again forever. 'I'm sorry to have troubled you.'
"It was no trouble at all,' he assured her, switching off the flashlight and plunging them into a darkness alleviated only by the distant stars. 'Nevertheless, you now owe me a favor.' The mating music of crickets punctuated his statement in a strangely sinister way.
"I do?' she asked both hopefully and anxiously.
"Yes, you do. My name is Christopher Thorn and you are now obliged to grant me whatever I request.'
"With pleasure ... I mean...' But it was too late to slip a proper corset on her naked eagerness. 'My name is Maia Wilson.'
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Maia, and I would be honored if you would join me for dinner.'
It felt very strange being asked out to dinner by a featureless silhouette, yet what she had seen of his face was branded into her brain and there was no way she could pass up the opportunity to get to know him better. 'I would like that,' she replied, and felt wonderfully daring. Stoneshire wasn't exactly full of attractive eligible men and she had already dated (as well as almost immediately discarded) those who were.
"My place isn't far,' he said. 'You can follow me in your car. I'll keep you in sight just in case it stalls again.'
"But ... but we just met...' She had believed they were to dine together in public. It was another thing entirely to enter the home of a man she didn't know at all.
"I understand, Maia, please don't be afraid. You can trust me. I won't do anything you don't want me to, and I mean that.'
She knew perfectly well she should be afraid, but there was something about him she was finding it absolutely impossible to resist. How instantly she had been attracted to him killed all her natural misgivings. She heard herself say, 'Okay, lead the way' even as part of her cringed in dread of what she was daring to do in defiance of everything she had ever been taught by everyone.
Back behind the wheel of her mysteriously moody car, Maia followed Christopher Thorn out of the graveyard. They took the main street for a few miles, then he turned onto a much narrower road flanked on both sides by ancient oak trees. Their headlights washing over the massive trunks turned them a ghostly gray color, illuminating lower branches so the darkness seemed to open its arms for her in a menacing illusion of welcome. She had never felt comfortable around large old trees, not since the accident years ago when an oak tree struck by lightning collapsed across the car she was in with her aunt, permanently crippling Carol in one knee and making it impossible for her niece to ever have children. Fortunately, Maia had never wanted to be a mother; paintings were all she desired to create.
Christopher's turn signal flashed a bright green and she followed him off onto several increasingly narrow roads, until she found herself in a pitch-black tunnel formed by tree branches embracing high above her. By now her nerves were sharp as restless kittens squirming in the basket of her belly. She was regretting having agreed to follow a strange man to his home in the middle of nowhere, but there was literally no going back now; they had made too many turns in a pitch-black darkness unrelieved by a single streetlight for her to be able to find her way home without his direction.
She was nearly breathless with panic when they at last pulled up in front of such a narrow two-story house it might have been made from a hollowed-out tree trunk. It was the only house in sight, the crescent of grass cleared out in front of it surrounded by an impenetrable forest.
Still refusing to really think about the dangerous thing she was doing, Maia got out of her car, then calmly preceded Christopher's silent silhouette onto a miniature porch framed by hanging vines. She stiffened when his hand suddenly reached past her, but it was only to open the unlocked black door.
She entered a room of highly polished wooden walls illuminated by a chandelier, and the ceiling was so high the black wrought iron chain from which it hung vanished into darkness. She caught her breath gazing up at the light fixture, for it was beautifully carved to resemble a winter-bare bush glimmering with dozens of warm golden lights. 'What a beautiful chandelier!' she exclaimed, for a moment forgetting all her fears. 'It looks like a bush covered with dew drops shining beneath the light of the rising sun. It's exquisite. Where on earth did you get it?'
He closed the door behind them. 'I made it,' he replied. Brushing past her, he walked over to a small wooden cabinet with doors carved in an intricate bas-relief of intertwined grapevines. He sank to one knee before it. 'Perhaps it's a little too obvious that I'm a carpenter.'
Above his kneeling form, elegant in a long-sleeved button-down burgundy shirt and black slacks, Maia spotted a steep, narrow stairway carved straight into the wall and suffered the impression that it led up into the darkly powerful branches of a tree. She could not shake the impression of being inside a hollowed out trunk as she walked over to a loveseat made from the slender barks of a silver birch tree, and covered with thick, sky-blue cushions impossible to resist. She hadn't meant to sink all the way back in the loveseat, but the way it was constructed made it impossible to merely perch tensely on its edge. She hadn't realized before how short her sleeveless white dress was, and she quickly covered her half bare thighs now with her red purse. Too small for all the things she was carrying, it sat in an awkward heart-shaped lump on her lap as her host approached her holding a bottle of red wine in one hand and two sparkling crystal glasses in the other. 'Does that mean you made everything in here yourself?' she asked in anxious wonder.
"Yes, it does.' He set the bottle down on a coffee table carved from a thick slab of wood that seemed to be floating just above the floor; she had to look to catch sight of the delicate black wrought iron legs actually holding it up. He seated himself beside her and handed her one of the empty glasses. 'What do you do for a living, Maia?' He reached for the bottle and poured wine for them both, politely beginning with her.
"I paint,' she said at once. 'But unfortunately that's not what I do to make ends meet. I work as a receptionist for a solicitor to pay the bills. What I love to do is paint though.'
"That's wonderful,' he stated earnestly. 'Money is inconsequential.' He held her eyes as he took a sip of wine. 'May I see your work sometime? I have a feeling I'd like it.'
"I think you would, especially if you're interested in standing stones. They're in most of my paintings.'
"Is that so? Would you care to describe one to me?'
"I don't know...' She bought herself some time by taking a long sip of wine, then gazed shyly down into her glass. His features were so perfectly proportioned it almost hurt her to look at them, maybe because she knew she would never be able to capture them on paper; she could never do justice to the haunting poetry of his bone structure. And his eyes ... his eyes were such a clear blue she almost experienced a strange vertigo looking into them, as though the sky was falling in on her...
"Please, Maia,' he urged quietly, 'I would very much like to hear you describe one of your paintings.'
"Well, they're a bit strange,' she admitted, glancing up at him, and his seriously attentive expression encouraged her to go on. 'I haven't shown them to anyone, not even Carol ... she's my aunt. I live with her.' She shifted anxiously against the deep cushion she was sinking into in such a way she was afraid she wouldn't ever want to get up ... yet she absolutely had to go home later, she couldn't possibly stay here all night with a total stranger ... 'I should call her and tell her I won't be home for supper tonight. She'll be expecting me.'
"I'm sorry, Maia, I don't have a phone.'
"Oh.'
"Don't worry about it, just drink your wine, she'll understand. And I promise you won't go hungry. In fact, you can have anything you like here.'
"Except a phone,' she pointed out.
He smiled as he took another sip of wine, apparently waiting for her to comply with his request and describe one of her paintings to him.
She bit her lip, but curiosity was too much for her. 'What I really want is for you to tell me what you were doing at the standing stones last night,' she blurted.
"I could show you,' he offered quietly. 'We could drive there after we finish our wine if you like, it's going to be a full moon tonight.'
His response to her query was so unexpected she started in surprise and embarrassingly bloodied the front of her dress with the delicious vintage. 'Oh my God!' she cried, so upset by the sight of the red stain spreading fatally across the pure white fabric that she didn't realize she had dropped her glass until she heard the fine crystal shatter against the floorboards. 'Oh my God,' she repeated helplessly and closed her eyes, unable to face the disaster she had made of such a promising evening. When she felt him gently grasp both her arms, part of her stiffened in dread, not so much of his intentions as of her own humiliating lack of self control.
"It's all right,' he whispered soothingly, 'I'm here, Maia.'
She sank willingly back against the cloud-deep cushions, knowing that her breathless whimpers as he lifted her dress sounded more like soft exclamations of pleasure than modest protests, and so did the way she moaned when he grasped both her slender thighs with his strong craftsman's hands and quickly spread her legs wide.
"I want you to live for me, Maia,' he whispered passionately in her ear, 'Don't fight me. You're so beautiful!'
She was shocked that he didn't bother to kiss her first. He simply ripped off her panties with a violent skill that dazed her, and swiftly slipped two fingers up inside her. For an instant his sudden penetration hurt so much she wanted to cry out in protest, but almost at once the firm, knowledgeable way he began exploring her as his thumb pressed on her mound just below her clitoris made her breathless with pleasure. It almost felt too good to believe the way his fingers flicked gently back and forth deep inside her sex.
"You're so beautiful, Maia. I want you to live for me, sweetheart, do it for me...'
She wanted to tell him that the slow, exploratory penetration of his fingers felt almost too good to bear, but she couldn't seem to find her voice. It had been wonderfully obvious to her from the moment he lifted her dress up out of his way that she was in a real man's hands at last. He was saving her from the crude pawing of the mere boys she had dated whom she had known from the beginning could never handle the depth and intensity of her feelings and win her heart or even her desire. Finally, she felt her body being used as it had always longed to be, and she was so excited she had to keep her eyes closed to endure it.
"Come on, baby...' He thrust his hard fingers even deeper into her tender, clinging pussy.
She felt her inner juices flowing shamelessly into his hand as she gasped and moaned and writhed against the cushion, shifting her hips as if compelled to escape the excruciating delight, but the actual effect of her sensual squirming was to shove her sex willingly up into his hand. He hadn't even kissed her and yet already he was finger-fucking her. She couldn't believe it, this wasn't the way a gentleman behaved on the first date, and yet the truth was his rough possessiveness aroused her like nothing else ever had. Then he gave the mysterious seal of approval to her budding ecstasy by pressing his mouth lightly against hers. He kissed her chastely at first, keeping his lips sealed as her tender pussy lips bloomed open around the digging stamens of his fingers, then at last his tongue reached for hers and began dancing with it, leading hers around and around and making her aware of the climax forming like a whirlpool deep in her hole. Her clitoris had found a magical harbor between his thumb and forefinger and a hot joy was flooding her body as it never had before, much more intensely than it did when she played with herself in the privacy of her bedroom. She had been afraid no man would ever know how to touch her the way she knew how to touch herself, and she was thrilled to experience him killing this fear inside her once and for all. The orgasm cresting between her thighs had all the devastating power of a tidal wave about to wash away everything she knew about sex like a frustratingly small town as it exposed the wildly beautiful landscape of all her fantasies. But right now it was too much for her the way his tongue kept playing with hers while his fingers plunged relentlessly in and out of her wet pussy, cradling her clitoris in the caressing folds of skin between his thumb and forefinger as he thrust his rigid digits up inside her body as far as they would go. She wanted to wait for his cock to come, but she couldn't take anymore; she had to surrender to the pleasure and climax in his hand, moaning breathlessly and gratefully up into his mouth thinking that at last she had found a real man, or rather that at last he had found her.