Burn (27 page)

Gritting his teeth, Gian forced himself to move
slowly, to give her the same pleasure her slippery sheath
gave him.

Cinder had no desire for generosity, nor patience. She
reached back and grabbed his bum, urging him deeper,
faster. His thighs hard, Gian supported her weight in an
incredible show of strength when he pulled her to his
chest, allowing their snuggest fit possible. His left hand
went to her breast while his right middle finger targeted the sweating kernel hidden within her damp folds.

A few quick, light strokes of his finger was all it took
to send bullets of carnal rapture shooting through her. Her fingers clenched, her nails digging into the meat of
his buttocks. She threw her head back, nearly butting
him in the mouth. Her warmth constricted around him over and over, wringing everything he had from him.

“You leave me weak,” he gasped, his thigh muscles
burning and shaking.

Cinder released him and turned in his arms to face
him. With the pads of her thumbs, she swiped perspira
tion from his temples. “That’s odd,” she said. “Because
you give me such strength.”

“It doesn’t come from me,” he said softly. “It was always right in here.” He laid his fingers over her heart.

T
hey righted their clothing and went into Cinder’s
apartment. Gian, stroking her back, followed her into the
bathroom. Cinder started the taps in the bathtub, sprin
kling a handful of Epsom salts into the running water.
Gian sat on the edge of the tub as it filled. He took
Cinder by her waist and tugged her between his widespread knees. For the second time that night, he took
Cinder’s skirt off her.

“Gian,” Cinder started as Gian helped her out of her
bike shorts and sports tank, “why do you like fighting so
much?”

“I don’t,” he said, his tone and expression solemn. “I
hate fighting.”

“Then . . . why Sheng Li and the capoeira—”

“I’ve experienced enough combat to last three life
times. I hate it. Unfortunately, it’s something I’m really
good at. When I was in the service, I needed to know
how to defend myself. I do what I do with the hope that by teaching people to fight, they won’t ever have to.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Sure, it does. If you have the same or better weapons
than an opponent, they’re less likely to attack you.”

“That just means that everyone will be walking
around with the ability to kill anyone they want.”

“I hope that people use what they have up here,”
Gian said, touching his temple, “to avoid using what they have here.” He held up his fist, which opened to cup her
face. “Some people need the weapons I can provide.”

She nodded in full agreement.

H
e smiled, breaking the tension. “Your tub is so small
compared to mine.”

“This is an antique. I love the lion’s paw feet.”

Gian hugged her close, pushing his face between her
breasts. He inhaled her scent, enjoying the sweet organic
aroma of her sweaty skin. Tempted to flick out his tongue
to taste her, he stood to remove his clothing. Gian settled
into the tub first, then welcomed Cinder. She slipped
into the cradle of his legs, resting her back on his chest with her knees poking out of the water, which sloshed
over the edge of the tub every time Gian moved.

“You could seat seven in the tub in my master bath,”
Gian told her. He lathered his hands with a bar of
apricot-scented soap. “Your whole bathroom could fit in
it.”

“Gian,” Cinder began, “are you rich?”

“Why do you ask?”

She almost forgot as he moved his soapy hands over
her shoulders and chest, paying special attention to her
breasts and their tips, which hardened under his touch.

“The guys at Sheng Li talk about your house as
though it were a palace,” she said. “And if you have a tub
big enough to seat seven, I’m thinking your house must
be pretty fancy.”

“It’s a green house and it cost me next to nothing,”
Gian said softly, his lips so near her ear, his words
caressed its sensitive lobe. “My brother Pio is the family
moneybags. He builds ecologically friendly homes called
green houses. I bought one of his displays. He sold it to me for an eighth of the market price.”

“
What’s the market price for one of his green homes?”
Cinder asked, her eyes slowly drowsing shut. Gian
pinched her nipples just hard enough to trigger urgent
pulses between her legs.

“In Webster Groves? A little over three-quarters of a
million.”

Cinder gasped. Gian wasn’t sure if was because of the
price he’d named or the busy work of his fingers.

“He recently sold one in Santa Monica for six million,” Gian said.

“I suppose it all comes down to location.” Cinder
tilted her head back and turned her face to Gian,
catching his mouth with hers. They shared a deep, pene
trating kiss that harmonized with the action of Gian’s
right hand, which had found the heat between Cinder’s legs. Two of his long fingers filled her while his thumb
mined her hard, extended jewel. She reached back to
thread her fingers through the hair at his nape, her back
side grinding against his stiffened length.

Still kissing him, Cinder braced her toes against the
front of the tub. Her shoulders bore her weight as she slid
her wet, soapy body upward until the rigid tool at her
back popped out between her opened legs.

Cinder maneuvered herself into position to receive
the instrument Gian now guided lightly with his finger
tips. He aimed it toward Cinder’s yearning darkness and
she did the rest, lowering herself until she was filled.

Gian’s head fell back, his body trembling. Thoughts
of Heaven and eternity swirling through his mind,
Cinder’s thighs began working once more, allowing her t
o rise and fall in long, deep strokes countering the rapid,
feathery flicks of Gian’s fingers at her eager pink pearl.

Cinder took her neglected right breast in hand and
raised the firm round of flesh as high as she could.
Awkwardly, desperately, Gian craned his head over her
shoulder to take the straining nipple into his mouth.
Cinder kissed him as he suckled her, her own tongue
laving her flesh along with his.

Sensation overloaded her, and her orgasm ripped
through her with enough force to make her cry out. She
clamped around Gian so tight that he came suddenly, his jaw locking. His teeth fastened around Cinder’s nipple,
adding another dimension of pleasure to her carnal
response. Breathing hard, her jaw clenched and she rode
out each rapturous pulse, her hips moving on their own
in an ancient rhythm meant to draw everything Gian
had.

Her abdominal muscles ached by the time Gian’s soft
kisses to her head and tender caresses to her torso and legs
brought her back to her tub and the man withdrawing from her.

“I’d like you to come to my place for dinner
tomorrow night,” Gian told her.

Cinder sat up, her hips still wedged between his legs.
Methodically, she lathered a washcloth and stroked it
across her shoulders and chest.

“You don’t want to?” Gian asked.

She ran the washcloth over his left knee, making
soapy patterns in the whorls of dark hair covering his
skin.

Gian took the towel to wash her back. “Why won’t
you come to my house? You don’t have a problem having
me over here, so I know it’s not me.”

“It’s me.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m safe here.” She relaxed into the weight and
warmth of Gian’s hands on her shoulders.

“You don’t feel safe with me?”

She bowed her head. “None of this is about you.” “I understand.”

Her head popped up. Had there been room to do so,
she would have turned to face him. “Do you?”

“Your apartment is a controlled environment. You
know your security, you know your neighbors, you know
the building and when the mailman comes, when the
meter reader drops by. There aren’t that many unknowns.
My place is a whole new world. You’re not ready for it yet. I get it.”

“How is it that you can explain it so well when I
can’t?”

“Experience, I guess. I know a few things about fear
and what it can do to you.”

“Lucia?”

“She hardly ever leaves my mother’s house. We don’t
know what to do. You can’t reason with fear, you know?”
“Yes,” she sighed. “I know.”

“This is the last time we draw cards to pick costumes,
and the very last time we have a theme.” Gian’s testy dec
laration echoed through the empty dojo. The soft plastic
soles of his stretchy red boots stuck to the bamboo floor with each step he took around the big vinyl mat. He sur
veyed his instructors, his shame growing. “Look at your
selves. Sionne, you look like a parade float.”

Sionne spread his arms wide. The top to his
Spiderman costume was stretched so tight over his belly,
it rolled itself up like a window shade every time he
moved. Pulled so far out of shape, the spider emblem on
his chest looked like an overfed waterbug. The skin-tight
pants worked themselves up to Sionne’s knees. The back
seam appeared to be on a suicide mission as it struggled
to contain the considerable dimensions of Sionne’s butt.

Gian swung his gaze to Cory, who kneeled beside
Sionne at the edge of the mat. Like a sail, Cory’s tattered
white shirt flapped in the breeze from the open lobby
door. His ripped brown breeches, which were supposed
to go to his knees, instead reached his skinny green
ankles. The brilliant idea of going to a tanning salon had
been too effective. Instead of having his own brown skin
coated an unnatural shade of gold or orange, Cory had
paid the technician to spray him with green vegetable
d
ye. Cory’s natural nut-brown complexion was now as
green as the Busch Stadium infield.

“This is the perfect example of why drawing cards is
dangerous,” Gian complained. “Why are you Spider-
man?” He indicated Sionne with one hand, while ges
turing toward Cory with the other. “And why is he The
Incredible Hulk?”

“We traded cards,” Cory explained simply.

“He wanted to be the Hulk,” Sionne stated indiffer
ently.

“Hulk
SMASH
,” Cory grunted, hunching over and
flexing his biceps. Which were the approximate size and shape of baseballs.

“Honest to God, you guys need your heads examined.” Gian turned to Chip. “Speaking of heads . . .”

Chip looked down at himself. “What’s wrong with
my costume?”

“Red underpants.” Gian plucked the leg band of part
of his own costume. “I never wore red underpants even
when I was a kid. Last year I had to be Optimus Prime,
this year it’s Superman. Why do I leave it up to you
knuckleheads to pick the costumes?”

Chip snickered.

“Laugh it up, Blondie,” Gian growled. “You’re not
even wearing underpants.”

Chip looked down again. “You can tell?”

“Can we tell?” Cory laughed. “Man, we can tell that
your mom and pop didn’t believe in circumcision. You
can’t hand out candy with that thing starin’ the kids in
the eyes.”

“
I’m gonna go change,” Chip decided. He got to his
feet and started for the locker room. Before he disap
peared around the corner, he turned back to the dojo, the
tall black ears of his headgear standing like daggers.
“Gian, you want these briefs? Batman doesn’t wear red,
but I don’t think the kids will mind.”