Angel Food and Devil Dogs (26 page)

I gestured silently, inviting her to go on.

"Are you from Fenchester?"

"No, I was born in Western New York and I grew up there." I told her the two-minute version of my personal history.

"Why did you choose art school?"

"My mother was a painter and I guess you could say her other passion was advocating for disenfranchised people. She taught me to find solutions to problems in creative ways. Design, composition, visualization. Studying art and going into law enforcement both seemed natural extensions of those early lessons. Natural to me anyway."

She nodded. "Are those your watercolors? Do you paint regularly?" She motioned toward the big dining table.

"As much as I can. I like to do at least a few drawings a week... keeps me sane. May I do a portrait of you sometime?"

"I'd like that," she said still leaning back, swiveling the chair slightly from side to side. She didn't seem tired any more, she looked so fabulous, eyes bright, skin clear and smooth, her soft dark red hair curving in toward her throat... and the voice. Keep talking to me, I mentally begged.

We both paused, then I said, "Anything else?"

"Uh huh," she said looking directly into my eyes, "I want my massage now. I have to put my laundry in the dryer and use the bathroom first." She drank the last of the wine in her glass, stood up, gave me the enchanting half smile again. I watched her slowly cross the room.

I put our wine glasses in the dishwasher, then followed her into the laundry room, "I need this," I said, pulling a folded sheet off a shelf of linens.

"Wait," she ordered.

I turned to listen.

She'd put her clothes in the dryer and set the dial. Leaning back against the machine, she tilted her chin up and said in a businesslike way, "I have some ground rules. Just two... to begin with. First, I'm not going to take off my clothes." She paused looking at me a little defiantly.

I have to admit, I was a bit disappointed. I'd already begun to imagine the feeling of her skin, but I was undaunted.

"Fine, that's up to you. I can still do a good job. What's the other rule?"

"Um," she hesitated, then said with a wry smile, "no...
surprises
."

"And by way of clarification, you mean no
passes
?"

"Exactly."

"
Surprises
would get in the way of the massage... and so will your sweater vest, it's too thick. You'll have to take that off... and your shoes. You can leave everything else on. Deal?" I could be businesslike too, even while negotiating with a beautiful woman how much clothing she would remove.

She nodded once in agreement.

I went back to the big room to arrange pillows on the platform in front of the fireplace. I put some large flat rectangular ones in a row, then covered them with the sheet. I opened the glass doors of the fireplace and laid a fire. The kindling was burning in no time. Living across the street from a millworks means that I'm set for life with firewood. Culling the dumpster now and then beats chopping logs in the forest anytime.

She came back into the room just as I was lowering the lights. The flames beginning to gather strength in the fireplace made the area inviting and warm. She'd taken off her wool vest. Her flannel shirt wasn't thick fabric. I could see the contour of her breasts pressing against the material. They were a little larger and fuller than I'd imagined. She was also a bit thinner than I'd guessed.

She was slipping out of her shoes, which made her an inch shorter. That, I'd estimated correctly. She seemed a tad self-conscious. For the first time during the evening she was uncomfortable meeting my eyes. She looked instead at the pillows and the fireplace.

"This is for me?"

"Yes, lie down on your stomach."

"Tell me what you're going to do to me," she said quietly as she eased herself a little stiffly onto the pillows.

My mind reeled for a minute. A bouquet of responses came to mine. Oh, yeah, I remembered, she's talking about the massage.

"First I'm going to find out where it hurts." I stroked firmly from her shoulders down to the small of her back, then explored with my fingers. There were several places that were particularly tight. "Then I'm just going to massage all this tension away. You'll like it, it will make you feel better."

I reached under her shoulder to lift it a little, but at the same time she moved to lift it for me. "Kathryn, don't help me," I whispered, "just lie there and relax. Let me move you, otherwise you're working against me."

"I'm not very good at giving up control." She had that quiet growl back in her voice, like distant thunder underscoring her words.

"You've given up the control of your body to stress, that's why your shoulders hurt. Concentrate on letting go."

"That's going to be hard," she said wearily.

"We'll work on it together."

"Mm, OK."

I worked on the knotted muscles of her shoulders until they began to loosen and ease. I asked, "Am I hurting you? Tell me if I do."

"No, it feels wonderful," she said in a far away voice. "Please... don't stop."

"I've just begun." I'd realized with each stroke that besides her captivating face and bewitching voice she had a fantastic body. Firm and strong muscles, but soft and yielding curves. The last thing I wanted to do was
stop
touching her.

I moved to straddle her hips, repositioning myself above her, so I could concentrate long even strokes in the areas of her back where she needed it most. At one point she sighed spontaneously as though slipping into a warm bath. She seemed more supple now, more able to move freely. In fact, her movements had become catlike. An occasional long stretch, a graceful stirring of her head, the motion of her hand as she shifted it slightly, were all deliciously feline.

She'd been under so much stress, I knew rubbing her head would practically hypnotize her. I began by stroking lightly behind her ears. She was getting an erotic pleasure from it that was pretty satisfying to me too. I could see her smiling unconsciously. Her lips parted. She breathed deeply. I stroked the back of her neck gently, then ran my fingers slowly up through her hair, delicately massaging her head for a long time. She seemed to enjoy every minute of it. I did. She'd drifted off to another plane where there was only my touch and her response to it.

After a while she said lazily, "Please tell me that this is not the last time you'll ever do this to me... It's exquisite."

"Any time you want," I whispered in an undertone, then even more quietly, "but, no clothes next time."

Later, with one of my fingers stroking behind her ear, and my other hand rubbing her shoulder, I asked, "Do you still have a headache?"

A few moments went by. She finally answered softly, "I don't know." By then I'd forgotten the question. I think she had too.

The soft flannel collar of her shirt covered the lower part of her neck, but I reached under the material to touch her skin directly. She shifted slightly, tilting her head, allowing me more access. I drew my fingers slowly along the edge of her collarbone in a careful gesture of exploration. I caressed the side of her throat lightly with my fingertips. Her lips parted again. Her lovely face was showing me just what she enjoyed.

I went back to rubbing her back with long luxurious strokes which made her sigh contentedly again. I traced the waistband of her jeans, acutely aware that her clothes were just plain
in the way
of the kind of more intimate massage I wanted to offer at that moment. I wondered if she was feeling the same way.

After a while I shifted off her and sat to her side. My hands glided down her hips and slipped to the backs of her thighs. I considered parting her legs and stroking their inner surfaces, but I decided it would be too forward.
No surprises,
I'd promised. So I just rubbed slowly down her legs to her calves. They were strong from all the walking she did.

I'd given her back more than an hour of sensuous attention, drawing from her a number of pleasure sighs and grateful comments. It was time for something else. "OK, I'm done with your back. Turn over. I'm going to stoke the fire so you won't be cold. Don't rush, take your time."

She began to move leisurely as I poked up the fire and put more wood on the glowing embers.

"This is better than sex," she said as an involuntary stretch rippled through her from head to toe.

"Nah, it's just different." The fire's glow cast dancing shadows over her beautiful face and frame. The light from the flames in the hearth seemed to lick her breasts and thighs. I watched with envy.

The buzzer on the dryer went off, as unwanted as an alarm clock at 5:00 AM.

"Oh, I'll get that," said Kathryn straining to sit up.

"No, no, I'll do it. Just lie on your back and relax." I walked into the laundry room, took the dry clothes out of the machine, folded them quickly and put them in the basket. The rest were towels that were still damp. I set the dryer for forty minutes more.

When I came back into the big room, Kathryn was lying on her back in front of what was now a blazing fire. She'd raised her arm and had one hand covering her eyes. I sat back down beside her, close to her hip, feeling the warmth of the fire and the warmth of her body at the same time.

"Are you OK?" I asked her.

"I feel wonderful, but aren't you getting tired of doing this?" she said taking her hand away from her eyes and turning her head slowly to look at me.

"I'm not tired... are you getting bored? I still have more to do, but would you rather I stop now?" I asked, willing that she'd let me continue. She didn't disappoint.

She searched my eyes for a long moment. I wondered what she was looking for. Then she said slowly with the firelight in her eyes, "No, I'm not bored. I was hoping you'd say you still had more to do. This is really glorious. In fact, I can't think of a time in my life when someone made so much effort to... to make my body feel this good."

"Really? Wait a minute, I thought you said you went to Smith. I bet you had women lining up for a chance to,
make your body feel good
."

She snorted softly, "Well, it
was
kind of like a candy store, but college students don't... well, most students always seem to be in a hurry."

"Hmm, what a shame. You said in your
life
though..."

"It may have more to do with me than... it may have been I who was always in too much of a hurry. I haven't given myself much time to,
smell the roses
." She turned her head toward the fire and said, "I haven't lain next to a wood fireplace since I was a kid. I grew up in Maine. We had a vacation cabin with only a fireplace for heat. We'd go there during the summer. Sometimes the nights were cold, so we'd lie by the fire all night. It was... comforting."

I laid my hand on her stomach and began to rub slowly back and forth. It was an affectionate intimate gesture. Like petting a cat or maybe taming a panther?

She looked back up at me and said with that hint of panther growl, "Tell me what you're going to do to me... now."

Oh man, she'd said it again. There was nothing tame about Kathryn Anthony.

"I'm going to stretch you."

I moved around to her head, then I lifted her arms, extending them toward me. I grasped each of her wrists and slowly leaned back, stretching the entire length of her body.

She groaned sensually as I did it. When I stopped she demanded in a low voice, "Do that again."

I pulled a little harder this time using my own body weight to coax her to her fullest reach. She responded with a growling moan of pleasure. It's hard to express what she looked like extended that way, on her back, moaning. But the sound made me tingle from head to toe.

I replaced her arms by her sides as she said with pleasant surprise, "Umm, that was satisfying,"

I moved to her side, touching her throat with just my fingertips then let them trail out to her shoulders. Placing my palms on each shoulder, I evenly pressed her back into the pillow, holding her there for several long moments.

She groaned again, but in a more sultry way this time. "This might be too good," she said in a throaty voice.

I moved down to the end of the platform and massaged her calves for a few minutes. I pulled gently on her legs one at a time and then together.

"Feel a little taller?"

"Mmm, that all felt wonderful..."

"You should have someone do that to you every day," I said massaging her left shoulder, then stroking down to her hand.

"Would you do it to me... every day?" she murmured.

"Shhh... be still." I lifted her wrist, resting her forearm in my lap. I held her hand with both of mine and said seriously, "You know, the way your computer is set up you're buying yourself a one way ticket down the carpal tunnel."

"I know it's all wrong, I've put in a request to the computer tech department to make my typing station ergonomic. They said they'd do it, but I have a feeling I'm on a two-year waiting list."

I began on her hand. I was more than willing to give her a massage without any kind of return on my investment other than the discussion of the case, but she must have been aware that I was doing my best to put her in the mood for something more than muscle relaxing.

Massaging someone's hands can be extremely intimate. Years ago, when I was in high school, I had a boyfriend who was a little older than I and who had a full-time job and a lot of disposable income. I was becoming aware of my true sexual orientation and not very interested in having sex with him, which was what he wanted to do all the time.

Instead we would go to the movies. Which was fine by me, I like movies. To keep him at bay, I'd hold his hand in my lap and trace pictures in his palm. It wasn't very taxing on me, but frankly, that kind of stimulation can be a direct conduit to areas below the belt. Much later he got in touch with me to say he was still in love with me. Unfortunately for him I'd been a confirmed and committed and contented lesbian for years. I really think it was the hand massages that made him remember me more than all the girls he'd slept with.