Dream Lover (19 page)

“Louisa,” Devlin gasped, then made an inarticulate noise and said her name again, as if he couldn’t form a sentence; he was gripping the counter behind him with deathly force. His body’s response was clear as a sentence sent mind to mind.

Louisa’s thighs felt wet with her own fluids and her belly had turned to molten lava, but she felt more in control than Devlin obviously was. She sat back on her heels, neatly evading his desperate grasp at her cropped hair, and grinned up at him.

“Please don’t stop,” Devlin said, weakly. Louisa leaned forward and nibbled behind his knee, receiving in response the best inarticulate noise he’d yet produced, something between a whimper and a shriek. She followed a path up the back of his leg until her hair brushed his groin, and then she gnawed her way down the front of his taut thigh to his knee, tugging gently at his soft hair with her teeth, before switching to his other calf, using one hand to balance herself and the other to massage.

Devlin growled again, a deep sound nothing like his normal voice. Then, for a shocked moment, Louisa was airborne, before her buttocks landed gently on the counter again. Devlin’s hands seared her waist, but his strong grip was not painful. The pressure of his fingertips radiated luscious little nudges of pleasure
that nevertheless failed to reach inside her deeply enough.

Louisa shoved down his shorts and he thrust up into her hands as if his movements were choreographed, or perhaps even telepathically triggered. A moment later, he staggered back out and away from her, gave several stentorian breaths, then dove forward, seized her face in his hands and kissed her deeply. Louisa rocked forward, pressing her belly against his cock, pushing against him each time their mouths met in crazed abandon, but the pressure was not quite enough. She wrapped her legs around him, and before she had completely adjusted herself, he was inside of her. For a moment, the world seemed to stop. Eyes closed, she shifted gently, admitting his cock more deeply. She’d never felt so close to anyone in her life. Devlin’s hips twitched, then relaxed, and he buried his face in her neck, kissing a line up her throat.

Devlin withdrew slightly, and a faint whimper escaped Louisa’s lips, surprising her. “Let’s try this,” he said in a strained voice, and lifted her almost free of him before letting go, so that she sank onto his cock with delicious force. Louisa grabbed at the counter behind her, then at his shoulders. “I won’t drop you,” he whispered, stepping back until the island counter braced him. “You don’t weigh a damned thing.” As if to demonstrate, he rocked gently forward and back. Tears leaked from the corners of Louisa’s eyes, completely against her will.

“You feel so good,” she said in a small voice, holding on. Everything felt clear and distinct, like words through a magnifying lens.

“Go on?” Devlin asked, shakily.

“If you stop I’ll hurt you.”

He lifted and lowered her again, changing the angle of penetration slightly. “Sweet,” she gasped, pressing forward a little. “That’s so good. It feels—sweet—”

Devlin reached back to the counter, still holding her effortlessly with one arm, then pushed his fingers between her lips. Sweetness and the heady perfume of vanilla flowered in her mouth. She convulsed around him, barely holding herself back from orgasm.

Devlin’s fingers were no longer in her mouth; she glanced down and saw he’d firmly clamped his cock, stopping impending ejaculation.

Neither dared move for several minutes, though Devlin leaned back against the counter to take some of her weight as they breathed carefully.

“Devlin,” Louisa said. “We can’t stay like this forever.”

“Unfortunately,” he replied, breathlessly.

“Please—”

“Right.”

Louisa relaxed, surrendering to Devlin’s manipulations of her body except for occasional kisses that she could not resist. Then, suddenly, their tempo changed, and she rode him with her eyes shut tightly, concentrating, reaching out and finally digging her fingers into his shoulders and grinding her hips until release took her. A moment later, the spasms of her cunt drew out Devlin’s orgasm as well.

Gasping, sweating, he nonetheless managed to set her gently on the counter again and kiss her slowly on her forehead, eyes and mouth. “Umm,” he said, then laughed a little, bracing himself on the counter with his hands.

Louisa’s arms tightened in return. “That…that was…” She kissed his neck.

“I can’t believe we did that in the kitchen.” He sounded more dreamy than shocked.

“In the kitchen of a respected research facility.” Louisa paused. “Do you want to do it again?”

 

 

 

 

I
t all starts a week after Faye Crocker’s funeral, when her tenyear-old grandson turns up on my step. He’s holding an enormous birdcage covered with a drape—the sort of red cloth a stage magician would own. “What have you got there?” I ask.

“Grandma said, once she’d died, I should give you this.”

I’m about to say I don’t want anything from Faye—dead or not, she can’t make up for causing trouble—but here’s her grandson, all slumped and sad, and I haven’t the heart to take it out on him. So I ask him in, and while I’m closing the door, he strides straight through and plops the cage on the table. He removes the cover with a flourish and I stare through the bars. That’s when the world goes still.

The creature inside is the size of a parrot, with bright scarlet feathers and a beak the color of an eggshell. But what really gets me is its eyes. The pupils are like ink blots framed by brown irises and whites as pure as pearls. “Hold on,” I say, as the bird tips its head and blinks like
I’m
the odd one. “Its eyes are…human.”

“Yeah,” says the boy, as if it’s obvious. “Grandma bought it from the magic shop down Hickory Lane.”

My ears prick up. I like the idea of magic. “Is there really such a shop?”

He tells me there was, but the owner moved away. “There used to be crystal balls and stuff, but it’s boarded up, now.”

“There’s no such thing as magic,” I say, gazing into the cage. The bird dips its head and preens its red feathers.

“It’s a peace offering,” says the boy. “That’s what Grandma said to tell you.”

“Peace offering or not,” I say, “I can’t keep a pet.” Even as I say it, I’m touching the bars. The bird’s quite enchanting.

“If you don’t want it,” he says, “d’you mind looking after it awhile? We’re clearing out Grandma’s bedroom and…” Well, poor kid, what can you say to that? Besides, when I’m near this bird I get a warm feeling, like I used to with Derek when we were first in love. “What does it need?” I ask. “I’ve never owned a bird.”

He reaches in his pocket and hands me a crumpled paper. On it, in an inky scrawl, is a numbered list:

“That’s ridiculous,” I laugh. “How can you clean him if you don’t open the cage? And as for singing in front of him or, god forbid, smooching him—well, not that it’s likely, but why on earth not?”

“He doesn’t need to eat or shit.”

“Don’t be silly,” I tell him. “Poor thing will want to stretch his wings. And I only follow rules when there are reasons.”

Over the course of the day, I grow fond of this bird. I buy it some seed and a tiny mirror, which I hook inside its cage so it can see itself, but it shows no interest, just keeps gazing my way. I put my face to the bars. “My, you’re a handsome fellow.”

It dances on its perch, ruffling its feathers.

“You big flirt,” I laugh. “If you were a man I’d run a mile.” I give the bird a playful wink, but there’s truth in what I’m saying.

Since Derek left, last summer, I’ve given up sex—deprived myself completely. I mean, how could he make love to me, when, every Wednesday after Quiz Night down the pub, he was rutting the barmaid on the sly? He’d been inside her before he slipped it to me! Why didn’t he dump me as soon as it started? That’d be honest, at least.

“Men get you hurt,” I tell the bird, “but loving a bird—now that’s fine.”

The sweet thing gives a kindly look, as if it’s hoping I’ll confide some more.

“Your owner,” I begin, “wasn’t the sensitive type.”

I tell the bird how three years back, when I’d first moved to the village, eighty-year-old Faye had me round for coffee. She claimed she could tell my fortune using Tarot cards and tea leaves and I’d always been curious about such things. But when she revealed, bluntly, that I couldn’t trust my Derek, I found it hurtful. I said, “When you give hard news, Faye, be kinder about it. What if you’re wrong?”

She folded her arms and said she wasn’t ever wrong. “You’ve chosen a no-good man. Not my problem.”

On my way home to Derek, I decided not to believe her.
She can’t be trusted
, I told myself.
Besides, Derek’s not the cheating type
. All the same, I felt this twisting in my belly, as if my gut
knew better. Then, one Wednesday, I caught him outside the Queen’s Head, his hand up Bev the barmaid’s skirt.

Later, at home, pacing the kitchen with a brandy, he told me, “I didn’t want to hurt you, Hetts. It’s just I find you so closed off.”

He went on and on about the things I hadn’t told him, like the fact I didn’t like my job at the bank and the time I found that breast lump and went to the hospital alone. “What if it had been cancer?” asked Derek, knocking back a swig of brandy. “Would you have told me then?”

I said, “Not if I’d known you were screwing the barmaid.” I mean, Jesus, he’d been at it with Bev for a year. “You could have come to me, honey.”

He paused in front of me, softened, took my hand. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I felt like I’d already lost you.” He reminded me how he’d first fallen for me because I was so fearless, speaking my mind, always looking on the bright side. “You made me more outgoing,” he said, “but since your father died…”

I knew what he was getting at. I’d never had a mum—she didn’t make it through childbirth—but Dad always seemed better than two adults put together. I suppose I moved in with Derek because he was similar to Dad, a good-time guy who liked to party. The two men got on well—in fact, on my twentysecond birthday, they schemed together to plan a dinner for me. Dad was on his way to our place when the heart attack hit him. By the time the hospital called, he was dead.

After that, it was as if my inner flame had been dampened. Derek always said, “You’ll pick yourself up.” We’d been living together, in our city flat, for three whole years and I knew he wanted the old me back—but with Dad in the ground, I couldn’t face fun.

Using my inheritance, I bought this lovely village cottage,
determined to escape the memories of Dad; the bank I worked for transferred me to a nearby town, and Derek, who was selfemployed and could work wherever he liked, came with me in the hope that the change would do me good. We were fine for a year or so, though I guess we grew apart. Derek didn’t enjoy walking in the woods, and I didn’t like drinking with his mates, and when big things happened, like the breast lump I found, it wasn’t that I didn’t trust him with the crisis—I just thought he was there if I needed him. See, these days we loved each other in a quiet way, watching films on TV, buying plants for the garden. And the sex was great—we’d always been lively in the sack.

Now, swigging his brandy, with my hand in his, Derek said, “I loved you, but where did you get to?”

I opened my mouth, but I didn’t have an answer.

He put down his glass and left.

As if it wasn’t enough that I’d lost my man, Faye told everyone she’d tried to warn me about Derek, but I’d told her she was wrong. Now, each time I went to the village shop, the women glared. “That Hettie,” they snipped. “She brought it on herself.”

“Faye did try to warn me,” I tell the bird. “Maybe I’m too hard on her.”

And blow me down, if it doesn’t shake its head, lowering its eyes like it’s sorry.

 

Later that night, I take the bird up to my bedroom and set its cage on my dresser. I leave the window ajar so we can hear the trees—the whisper of leaves on the air. When Derek first left, I’d walk through those woods, listening to the birdsong, inhaling the pine. Some say there are bird men who live there—old wives’ tales, I know—and after Derek had left I’d imagine these winged beings flying between the treetops as I took my evening walk.

I’d also find comfort in music. That’s why, before I go to bed, I still play CDs. Now, with the bird watching, I play “Achy Breaky Heart”—my own personal favorite. As the music rises, I open the cage, wondering if my little guest would like to stretch his wings, but he sits where he is like he’s waiting, and while I undress, he gazes right at me, blinking really slow as if he likes the view. Once I’m in my pajamas, I blow him a good-night kiss. Only then do I remember the boy’s instructions:
Don’t open his cage; don’t sing in front of him; never, ever kiss him
.