Hale Maree (22 page)

“
Good girl,” he says,
“Watch.”

His fingers move into the opening between my
legs again, this time cold and slippery with the oily liquid. He
massages my sex, as he bends over me and takes my nipple in his
mouth. With his hand inside me, and his hot mouth against me,
another moan escapes my throat. I press my hips into his hand.

“
Do you want me to stop?” he
asks, pausing his fingers.

“
No,” I pant. There is
nothing left in my vocabulary but the feeling of his fingers, his
tongue, his lips.

“
I’ll go slow,” he says, as
he climbs over my legs and spreads me apart. He kneels again,
between my knees, rolling on a condom before stroking his covered
length with more of the liquid. He bends down to kiss me, and I
feel him tap against the opening of my sex, like a hard, slippery
pole.

“
Open your eyes,” he says.
His face is right over mine, his hand down between our legs,
guiding himself against me. “If it’s too fast, say so.”

I clamp my eyes shut, and he doesn’t ask me
to open them again. Instead, he kisses me, nipping my lip as his
tip enters me. I run my hands up his arms, to his shoulders,
digging my fingernails into him as he pushes a little deeper inside
me. My fingernails don’t stop him, and I panic.

“
I can’t,” I howl. “I
can’t!”

“
Shhh,” he soothes me. He
doesn’t withdraw, but he doesn’t go any further. He strokes my
hair, kisses the corners of my eyes, and he breathes out a whisper,
“Relax.”

“
I can’t!” I yelp, as he
shifts and presses in a little deeper. I dig my fingernails into
the thick muscles across his back, and feel him flinch, but he
doesn’t stop.

“
Relax, Hale,” he says. “It
will hurt if you don’t.”

“
It already hurts,” I
say.

“
I won’t go any deeper,
until you’re ready,” he promises, and he ducks his head down toward
my chest. His hair tickles against my chin, as his mouth settles
over my right breast. All I can concentrate on his the baseball bat
between my legs, until his tongue swivels over my nipple. He sucks
the tiny button, teasing it up to a sharp point. I pull down on his
shoulders, to draw his mouth closer. He moves his head to my other
breast and repeats the agonizingly delicious sequence. When he
finally lifts his mouth from me, I arch my back for more. Oscar
captures my mouth, and bites down on the edge of my lower lip, as
he thrusts deep inside me.

I suck in a breath, and rake my nails down
his back. He grunts with the pain, but he begins a slow, lazy
rhythm, grinding in and out of me. It hurts, but at the same time,
it almost feels good. He stares down at me, and I’m worried I’m
doing it wrong. I still don’t squirm beneath him, because I’m sure
it will hurt.

“
It’s never felt this good
before,” he whispers.

I draw his mouth down to meet mine. Catching
his bottom lip, I suck it into my mouth gently, tugging it, and
rubbing it with my tongue. Oscar groans. He drops onto his elbows
with his release. When he opens his eyes, he’s smiling. He takes my
head in his hands and kisses me.

“
Are you okay?” he asks.
“Did you like it?”

I’m too sore to move my legs, but I still
tell him the truth. “Yes,” I say.

CHAPTER
SIXTEEN

I WAKE UP BESIDE HIM, feeling weird. He is
lying on his back, his face tipped away from me, asleep. The top
sheet is draped just over his waist, but I can tell he’s still
naked.

I want to sneak away, to see how I’ve
changed. I’m worried that the sheets will look like we spilled a
bucket of red paint, but when I slide out and peek at them, there
is only a tiny drop of red in the whole, ocean of white. I
straighten up, realizing two things. One, is that I can’t find my
nightgown and, two, everything from the waist down is a little
stiff and sore. It doesn’t matter. Oscar’s still asleep. I turn and
hobble, naked, toward the stairs.

“
You’re so damn beautiful,”
Oscar says, behind me. I look over one shoulder, feeling the deep
red blush sink into every cheek I have. He’s still lying in bed,
but he’s turned on his side, toward me, and he’s smiling. He
repeats each word, drawing them out. “So. Damn.
Beautiful.”

“
I was just...”

“
Go,” he says. “I just want
to watch you walk away.”

I escape down the stairs, with a smile on my
own face, but when I hit the bathroom, I’m disappointed. There is
nothing in my reflection that shows how different I feel this
morning. It’s like staring at a stranger in the mirror, because who
I used to be, shouldn’t be there anymore. My regular, old face
should be replaced with a woman who knows what it is like to have
sex.

I climb the stairs back to the bedroom. I
want to strut into the room, confident and womanly, but I don’t
think I could pull it off. Instead, I peek around the corner first,
to see if Oscar is watching. He’s not. His head is on his pillow,
nose toward the ceiling, eyes closed.

I scurry toward the edge of the bed, hoping
to make it before he opens his eyes and turns his head to me. I
don’t. He pops his eyes open and I nearly shriek. A smile spreads
over his face, and his eyes sweep over my naked body.

“
You okay?”

“
Mmm hmm,” I say, diving
between the sheets. He turns toward his bedside table, to check the
time on his phone, and that’s when I see the long, raking cuts in
his back. The sheet beneath him is speckled with his blood, not
mine. I groan. “I wrecked your back.”

“
I know,” he says, laying
back and reaching for me. He doesn’t seem upset at all. Then he
smirks, “It’s only fair. I wrecked your virginity.”

I half-laugh, pushing his face away. When I
lay back on the pillow, there is a lump. Reaching underneath, I
extract my nightgown.

“
Oh, good,” I say, but Oscar
grabs the bunch of fabric and throws it off the end of the
bed.

“
No clothes,” he says. “I
don’t allow clothes in my bed.”

I pull the sheet up over me, but he pulls me
closer. He presses my hips against his, and he groans.

“
No more,” I say. He groans
again.

“
Fine. Not now,” he says.
“But soon.”

A delicious drop of adrenaline races through
me, and I think: maybe the woman I couldn’t see in the mirror is in
here after all. I snuggle closer, replaying last night in my head,
as I inadvertently rub up against him.

“
Last warning,” he
mumbles.

“
Alright, alright,” I say,
and lie still.

“
I was thinking we could go
home today,” he sighs into my hair and I feel an unexpected twinge
of sadness over the idea. I wouldn’t admit it out loud, but last
night was exciting, and I want it to happen again. There won’t be
any hope of that, if I have to pack up, drive back, and get dropped
off at my father’s house. It will be an agonizing wait, to be with
Oscar again, until we are married. The idea of packing exhausts me.
I never want to leave this bed.

“
I don’t want to go,” I
say.

“
No?” he says. “You’re
having second thoughts about marrying me?”

“
No,” I say, surprised that
he’d think that. Especially now. Especially with my naked rear
pressed into his lap. “I just don’t want to go home. I...I don’t
want to be away from you.”

“
That’s what you thought?
You’re not going home, Hale. You’ve got a new home now. With me.
We’ll be staying at my father’s house, until we find our own place.
We’ve got to start house hunting right after we’re married. It’s
going to be busy when we get back.”

“
Let’s just stay here,” I
say, and his laugh is so deep that I feel it roll through my back
and into my stomach.

“
It would be nice,” he says.
“But it will be even better, once you have my last name, and we’re
in our own house, and our own bed. We’ve got a lot to get done
first, though. Where do you want to go for our
honeymoon?”

I blush, but I’m not looking at him, so I
whisper, “To bed.”

Oscar pulls me even closer, his hand moving
like fire over my skin.

#

The second time feels better than the first,
but when I get out of bed, I move so slowly across the floor that
it worries Oscar. I take a shower, and by the time I come out, he’s
packed up our things, emptied a lot of the fridge into garbage
bags, and has everything ready to go. He has a box of donuts on the
table for me, along with his phone, and a glass of milk.

“
Just relax and talk to Sher
while I grab a shower, okay?” he says. I take a seat at the table,
as he goes into the bathroom and turns on the water. The phone
rings, as I finish my donut. The screen says DAD, and I think of
just letting it go to voicemail, but it’s Oscar’s dad, so it could
be important. I pick up.

“
Hello?” I say, and the
voice that greets me is accusatory.

“
Who is this?”

“
Hale,” I say.

“
Oh,” Mr. Maree says. His
voice drops to a pleasant tone. “Hello, Hale. How are
you?”

“
Fine,” I say.

“
Where’s Oscar?”

“
Oh, um,” I stammer. How can
I say his son’s in the shower? My entire face burns what is
probably a fuschia color. Mr. Maree probably hears it in my voice.
My new, woman voice. I stumble for what to say and come up with
nothing but the truth. I frown as I tell Oscar’s dad, “He’s in the
shower.”

“
Oh.” It’s Mr. Maree’s turn
to stammer. “Well, could you have his call me when
he’s—through?”

“
I will,” I say, wincing
hard once the words are out.

“
Alright then. It was nice
talking with you, Hale.”

“
You too. Bye!” I wince
again and hang up. I drop Oscar’s phone on the table and a sqwerky
shiver rolls through me. It’s not like Mr. Maree wouldn’t expect
any of this. He practically insisted on it. But knowing that we all
share a secret, which we are never going to discuss openly, is
weird too.

Oscar emerges from the bathroom, his black
hair still wet, although he’s fully dressed. And now, when I look
at him, I see so much more than just the way his shirt hugs his
arms and chest, or the way his shorts fit him. Now I know just how
powerful and gorgeous his body is, under all those clothes. And I
flush, thinking about what a crime it is to ever cover that body
up.

“
Ready to go?” he
says.

“
Sure. Your father
called.”

“
You talked to
him?”

“
Yeah. He just said to have
you call him.”

“
Then I’ll do that,” he
says, landing a kiss on my sugared lips. “Mmm. Cinnamon
sugar.”

He slips his phone from his pocket, and
calls his father.

“
Hey, Dad,” he says, pacing
closer to the windows facing the beach. I trace the width of his
shoulders, appreciating how his back plunges into his narrow waist.
I remember how I laid on the bed, watching his incredible backside
in the mirror overhead, as he pushed himself into me.

“
We’re coming back today,”
he says, turning, and I snap out of my daydream. He grins at me as
he continues talking to his father. “Yes, that would be fine. I
think we’re only looking for an intimate gathering though. Well,
that’s not intimate. I don’t know, I could ask her.”

Oscar presses
mute
and says, “My father
wants to throw us a reception, Hale. What do you think?”

“
I don’t have many people to
invite,” I shrug. “My dad, Sher’s family, that’s about
it.”

“
That’s fine. My father
would like us to have the wedding ceremony on our grounds, followed
by an outdoor reception. What do you think?”

I shrug. I have no idea. I’ve never been to
a wedding, not even my mother’s. “Good, I guess.”

“
She said that’s fine, Dad,”
Oscar says into the phone. He laughs. “Don’t get too outrageous,
okay?...No, Dad...that’s outrageous...that too...we’ll talk when we
get back, alright?”

#

I sleep too long. I miss the ride home, and
feel bad when I wake up just as Oscar’s arms slide around me from
the open, truck door. We’re only feet from the Maree’s front
entrance.

“
What are you
doing?”

“
I didn’t think you were
going to wake up.”

“
I’m awake,” I say, sliding
out onto the driveway beside him, but when I wobble on the ground,
Oscar takes me up into his arms anyway.

“
I should carry you over the
threshold,” he grins. I am surprised at how easy it is to relax in
his arms, breathing in the deep scent of the cologne I gave
him.

The door opens just as we reach it, and I
recognize Mr. Maree from the night in my kitchen. He is in a suit,
his body held stiffly, the whites of his eyes are white instead of
bloodshot. He steps aside, so Oscar can carry me in and set me down
in the enormous entryway. Oscar stays close, his arm around my
waist.

“
Good trip?” Mr. Maree asks,
and Oscar nods.

“
I slept all the way back,”
I say. I don’t know why I needed to say that. Mr. Maree takes it in
stride.