Now & Forever 3 - Blind love (14 page)

Back in New York City, a young photographer unbandaged his
hand. The cracked finger had finally healed, along with the bruises on the
knuckles he got from beating up his girlfriend. He read about her amnesia,
grateful for the time it gave him to find her and finish her off before she
went to the police. He scoured the newspapers and the Internet, looking for her
but she had vanished. He had to find her, take her out before she remembered
and brought his ideal life to a halt. He wasn’t ready to go to prison.

* * * *

After Peter called a halt to dating, Lara begged him to let
her keep dancing while he played. He relented, unsure of how far his restraint
would hold. She planned to dance in the talent show at Kensington State, a
simple number she choreographed herself and she needed practice.

“Can you play Tchaikovky’s First Piano Concerto for me?” Lara
asked, stretching to limber up her legs.

After an hour and a half of dance, Lara was hot and sweaty.

“I’m going to take a bath,” she said, grabbing her spare
leotard and feeling her way to the bathroom.

Peter remained at the piano practicing the music. When he
heard the bath water stop running, he went to the kitchen to get a glass of
water.

Lara dried off, wrapped the towel around her and stopped.
Something grabbed her attention, it was the silence. No piano. Where was Peter?
She stuck her head out of the bathroom door and called his name. No answer. She
became panicky.

“Peter. Peter? Peter!” she called, anxiety growing with each
repetition of his name.

Still there was no answer. Lara listened. The only sound
breaking the silence was the pounding of her heart. Fear of being alone
escalated. Her breath came quickly, she choked on her saliva. Scared to remain
where she was, she moved too quickly, forgetting about the bathroom door sill,
tripped and fell.

She crawled slowly on all fours, inching her hand along the
wall of the hallway but she lost her bearings and became confused. Frozen with
fear, Lara lay down on the floor in the corner and started crying softly.
Crying escalated to screaming when she made out a dark shadowy figure coming
down the hall toward her.

“Stop! Don’t hurt me! Don’t hurt me! It’s gone. The baby is
gone. Please don’t hurt me anymore!” Lara shielded her face with her arms and
curled into a ball.

“It’s me. It’s me. It’s Peter,” he said taking her into his
arms.

“Peter?”

“It’s me. You’re okay.”

“I couldn’t hear you play. I couldn’t hear you. I didn’t know
where you were. You were gone and I didn’t know where. Then I saw a shadow of a
man coming toward me and I thought…I thought—” she stopped the rush of words
pouring out of her mouth. Seized by panic, she tried to catch her breath.

“You’re safe. I’m here.”

“I was alone and couldn’t find the door and then I tripped
and I didn’t know which wall…I…all turned around…and…and I couldn’t find you,”
she rambled on.

She was still shaking when he picked her up and carried her
to the bedroom. He put her down gently on the bed. She was sobbing.

“Don’t leave me!”

“I’m here. I’ll talk to you as I go,” he said quietly, “I’m
walking to the closet. There it is, the bathrobe. Now I’m walking back. I’m
almost at the bed.”

The sobbing passed and Lara lay curled up, completely still
on the bed. Peter returned with his bathrobe and covered her. She grabbed his
hand and pulled him onto the bed.

“Please, stay…” she said, her hand shaking slightly.

Peter got on the bed with her and took her into his arms,
stroking her hair. She calmed down and cuddled into his shoulder.

“When you were in the tub, I went to the kitchen to get a
drink. I couldn’t hear you because I had to run the water in the sink a while
to get it cold.”

“I’m sorry I got so hysterical…I thought you were him…coming
down the hall.”

“You saw me?” She felt him brush some stray hair out of her
face.

“A shadow.” The warmth of his body sunk into hers calming
her.

“An improvement?”

“I guess.”

“What did you say about a baby?” His hand stopped stroking.

Lara turned away from him.

“Aren’t we good friends? Can’t you tell a good friend
anything?”

She squirmed under the bathrobe.

“You don’t have to tell me,” he said resuming his caress of
her hair.

“You’ll be my friend anyway, right?” She turned back to face
him.

“You know I will.”

“You won’t judge me?”

“Never.” Again he stilled his hand while he listened. She
turned back to face him and settled her head on his shoulder as he put his arms
around her and pulled her in close. She felt safe.

“I must have been pregnant when I was attacked because I had
a miscarriage afterward. The police think the man who attacked me did it to
make me miscarry. So he must have been someone I cared a lot about. I don’t
remember being pregnant. But then I don’t remember much, including him. Maybe
when I get my memory back, I’ll know who did this to me,” she said, tears filling
her empty eyes.

“That’s disgusting.” He tightened his grip, pulled her closer
and kissed her hair. “Give me a few minutes alone with the bastard, I’ll teach
him a lesson he’ll never forget,” Peter said, his hand fisted.

Lara relaxed in his arms, relieved to have the secret out.
She closed her eyes.

* * * *

“I’d like to get my hands on him for just one minute…” Peter
said with venom in his voice, but Lara was falling asleep. Her breathing became
steady and Peter drifted off as well.

Fifteen minutes later Sam came home. Peter cracked an eye
open when he heard his bedroom door creak. He spied Sam smile then close the
door before he fell back to sleep.

About an hour later, Lara rolled over away from Peter, who
opened his eyes and reached for her, pulling her back next to him. She cuddled
up to him again, putting her head on his shoulder and snaking her arm around
his waist. Peter bent down and put his mouth on hers in a slow, sweet kiss.

When she responded to the touch of his lips, he leaned over
and gave her a more urgent, more sensual kiss, his tongue possessing her mouth.
He slipped his hand under the bathrobe and touched her breast.

“I want to make love to you…” he whispered.

“I want you,” she breathed in his ear, holding his hand to
her breast, surrendering to her longing for him. He ripped his T-shirt off over
his head. Lara ran her hands through his soft chest hair. She spread her
fingers out over his chest, studying his muscles with her fingertips. She
smiled.

* * * *

Lara felt Peter slowly open the robe, exposing her body to
his eyes. She felt his stare as if a gentle wave of heat rolled across her
body.

“Are you staring at me?”

“You are even more beautiful than I imagined.”

Lara felt warmth in her cheeks and raised her lips to be
captured by his again. He kissed her passionately as she lifted her tongue to
meet his. He slid his hand down to her breast, while he buried his lips against
her neck. She drank in his masculine scent and the hint of lime from the soap
on his skin. She moaned and moved her hands down to his hips.

“Hey, you’re dressed and I’m naked. Unfair.”

Peter stripped off his pants and came back to Lara.

“Take it all off,” she teased.

Peter dropped his boxers. Lara moved her hands over his hips
and his back, seeing his body with her fingertips, feeling the strength of his
muscles and the smoothness of his skin. Peter slid his hands over her breasts
and around to her back, down to her firm bottom, pulling her closer to him,
until she felt his arousal. Every touch of his fingers on her skin was like a
small electric charge, jolting her body, making her ache for him. Love and
passion mixed in her veins to create a potent aphrodisiac.

He followed his hands with his mouth, traveling slowly down
her neck to her breasts, where he created an agony of pleasure inside her with
his lips and tongue. She moaned and writhed under his expert touch. Her
breathing quickened.

“Your breasts are perfect,” he murmured as he caressed her.

“I want you,” she whispered, squirming under his caress.

“I want you too…you’ve no idea…”

He kissed her again, ravaging her mouth while his hand got
lost in the soft tangle of her shiny hair. She arched her back, pressing her
breasts onto his chest. His hand skimmed over the velvety soft skin of her
belly and down further to her slick core, gently exploring, lighting a fire
within her. She gasped, her body aching with desire as he stroked her, his
fingers escalating the intensity of her need. Heat sped through her veins, as
she slid her hand up his thigh to close around his manhood. Peter groaned.

“I can’t…too much…” he muttered, removing her hand, resting
it on his stomach.

Lara grinned, pleased she excited him.

He kissed her deeply as if demanding her surrender. She
pressed her hips up against him in a silent plea.

“Just a sec.” Peter scooted off the bed.

Lara felt him return to bed and heard a slight ripping sound.
When she touched him again, her hand wrapped around latex. Peter eased between
her legs and entered her slowly, gently. Lara wasn’t afraid, she trusted him.
He groaned and increased his pace.

Her hips moved with him, her fingers dug into his strong
shoulders as low moans escaped her throat. He pumped harder and faster, sweat
beaded on his chest, forming a thin film between them. She cried out his name
when passion dominated her senses and he took her over the top, melting her
into ecstasy. He followed her, with a powerful release.

Afterward, they lay back, breathing heavily. Peter pulled
Lara into his arms while she floated in the bliss of longing satisfied. His
long fingers combed her dark hair, feeling the softness of it as it fell across
her shoulders and breasts. He pulled the robe over her and kissed the top of
her head. She reached up and stroked his rough face as they lay quietly in each
other’s arms.

He took Lara to a new intensity of pleasure with a tenderness
she hadn’t known from other men in her life. A sense of being loved washed over
her, a new feeling, as she lay with her head on his shoulder and her arm around
his waist. Tears of joy came to her eyes. One spilled over onto his chest
causing Peter to pull her chin up gently to see her face.

“You’re crying. What’s wrong?”

“Tears of happiness,” she confessed, embarrassed.

Peter propped himself up against the headboard, his fingers
touched her hair, then her neck and came to rest on her shoulders as he looked
into her blank eyes.

“I love you,” slipped out of his mouth. Words he hadn’t
uttered to any woman in eight years glided off his tongue to Lara.

She put her arms around his neck.

“Oh, my darling, I love you too,” she whispered, kissing him
sweetly.

* * * *

Thirst drove the lovers from the coziness of their bed.
Holding hands, they padded into the kitchen seeking cold drinks, Lara wore
Peter’s robe and he, only boxers. Sam joined them and Peter poured a cold drink
for him too.

“Lara saw a shadow today,” Peter said, handing a glass of
iced tea to Lara.

“You did?” Sam asked.

“Dr. Weiss said seeing shapes would be the first step back to
full sight.” Lara took the glass from Peter and gripped it with both hands.

“Did she say how long it would take to get full sight back?”
Peter ran his hand over her hair.

“Nobody knows. But it shows I am healing inside.” She leaned
against Peter’s shoulder.

“What do you want to see first when you get your sight back?”
Sam asked, putting onions, chopped meat and tomato sauce on the counter for a
spaghetti dinner.

“Peter’s face,” she said, “I take that back. Peter’s eyes.”

Lara helped by setting the table and tearing lettuce for a
salad. Peter fixed the rest of the salad and Sam made the spaghetti. After
dinner Lara mentioned
Pride and Prejudice
which she had been listening to on tape.

“I’m in love with Mr. Darcy,” Lara cooed, clasping her hands
together.

“What’s so great about him? A stuffed shirt, if you ask me,”
Peter sniffed.

“What do you mean, Pete? He’s one of the great male
characters in literature,” Sam said, twirling some pasta on his fork.

“I think he’s sexy.”

“You do? You think Mr. Darcy’s sexy? I’ll show you sexy.”
Forgetting his father was there, he grabbed Lara around the middle, tickling
her. She screamed and struggled, breathless with laughter. Peter plopped her in
his lap and gave her a hard kiss on the mouth.

“Stay the night. Call the evil Fran, tell her you’re not
coming home,” he said, closing his arms around her.

“Young lovers need to be alone. We can talk about books
tomorrow,” Sam said, rising from his chair.

Lara turned her face away to hide her embarrassment.

“Goodnight, Lara,” he said, leaning over and kissing the top
of her head. “Night, Pete.”

While Lara was on the phone, it was obvious Fran didn’t
approve but Lara didn’t care. Peter picked her up in his arms.

“Now it’s time for bed, my little honeybee,” he said, moving
toward the bedroom.

“Why do you call me that?” she asked.

“Because,” he said, kissing her, “your mouth is sweet like
honey to me.”

He moved through the bedroom door and sat Lara down on the
bed.

“You’re cuddly and furry, like a big teddy bear,” she said,
refusing to unlock her arms from around his neck, dragging him down on the bed.

“A teddy bear?” he asked, his eyebrows raised.

“Warm and reassuring. You make me feel safe.”