Poison Flowers (17 page)

Nosy Lucy. I was tired of her nosing in my life and then using what she found out to say rude things to me just to hurt my feelings.

Lucy’s house loomed in the darkness. Luckily she had no dogs. The Grisham family’s hound two blocks over set in to baying, though. I guess he heard me even though I was trying to be as quiet as possible. It was also lucky that Lucy’s place was on a large lot with no neighbors close by who would see me.

Lucy was probably drunk anyway and wouldn’t even hear me come into the house. I just hoped she didn’t have a man with her. I knew she often picked up losers from Smithy’s lounge then brought them home for sex. I’d done it once or twice myself which is how I met Lucy all those years ago.

I crept to the dark side of the house where I’d be hidden from the streetlights on Lawson Avenue. I slowly, patiently rounded the two dark sides feeling each window. Just as I began to fear I’d have to break one, my hand found a screen that was loose over an open window.

Carefully, ever so slowly, I used my fingers as soft pry bars to pull the screen from its frame. I lowered it to the ground and listened at the window. There was no sound. I closed my eyes, trying to remember which room this window let into. After a minute or two it came to me. It was the bathroom. This window was over the bathtub.

Feeling a bit more confident that I wouldn’t be heard from the bedroom, I raised the window and lifted myself onto the wooden sill. I swung one leg over and levered my body over and into the bathtub. A plastic bottle fell with a muffled thud and rolled to and fro in the bottom of the tub. I waited for it to still before I moved again. All was still silent in the house, and I made no sound as I stepped from the tub and onto the pocked linoleum floor. I was worried about floor creaks so I stepped carefully into the hallway. I turned right and made my way into the bedroom.

I could see that she was asleep by the glow of the night- light. She looked almost angelic lying there. I crept close and pushed my shoes off, then lifted the sheet and slid into the bed next to her. She didn’t move.

I listened to her gentle snoring for a moment. Power filled me. She didn’t know I was there. I was in complete control of the situation.

I turned to face her and caught the faint tang of alcohol on her breath. A man had been there recently; I could smell him on the sheets and on her.

How should I wake her?

She was wearing a sheer, very short nightgown. I touched its nylon softness, rubbing the fabric between my fingertips. One spaghetti strap had fallen to the side as she sprawled on her back and the rounded side of one breast gleamed in the dimness. I laid my palm against it, gently, softly. The sleepy warmth of her seeped into me, empowering me further. I teased one finger against the fabric covering that nipple. To my delight, it hardened beneath my touch.

Lucy moaned and stirred so I stilled until she fell into slumber again. I smiled. I was not ugly. I was beautiful, just as beautiful as Lucy. And I could make her body respond to me. I slid my palm along her belly until I reached the end of the short nightgown. My hand found fur and dampness. I laughed silently. Yes, a man had been there.

“Who was he?” I whispered. “Was it Roy? He’s always had the hots for you.”

She didn’t answer, but I could sense her struggling toward wakefulness. I pressed my fingers against the fur and moved them, applying pressure. She moaned and turned toward me, a sleepy smile on her lips. I pressed my mouth to hers. She responded at first, wrapping one arm around my neck, keeping her eyes closed. At some point she must have sensed my difference for she began to push away. I held her as I laughed quietly.

“No,” she said. “No, I don’t want that.”

I pressed my fingers upward and they entered her easily.

“Yes, yes, you do,” I said, even as I pushed harder.

Dorry stood on the porch, gazing into the trees where Denton’s body had been found. When Marya’s door flew wide, she turned and looked at her, eyes filled with pain.

Marya suffered an onslaught of emotions then. Would Dorry hurt her? Was she the killer? She held the candlestick high, wondering if she could defend herself against the master. She was so powerful, so well trained. Did Marya stand a chance?

Dorry looked at the candlestick and dropped her head to her chest, shaking it in disbelief. “I’ve never killed anyone, Marya. Never intend to, if I can help it. You, of all people, should know what I’m about, should feel it in your bones.”

Marya studied Dorry and trusted her own inner knowledge. She dropped the candleholder to the floor, and it rolled noisily toward the table as if going home.

“Dorry, I…”

Dorry came toward her and Marya was in her arms. Dorry held her a long time, then pulled back so she could see her eyes.

“Chemistry?” she asked, her gaze both tender and compelling.

“Chemistry,” Marya answered.

Their first kiss would never leave her. Dorry’s lips branded Marya hers as surely as any commitment ceremony would ever do. Marya found herself pulled into her, her goodness and sweetness, and the coldness of their past relationship evaporated into so much ocean spray.

Marya pulled back to study Dorry with amazement. Perhaps, as the poet Keats had so aptly put it, there was richest juice in this poison flower. Dorry kissed her again and they were inside the cottage, door closed to the night outside. The kiss lasted another lingering eternity and she found herself transported. Dorry’s sinuous lips and tongue nibbled at Marya’s, possessing, releasing, possessing, releasing in a sensual ebb and flow.

Her body began to ache, her limbs grew heavy and sluggish as they swelled with the blood of desire.

Dorry’s lips left hers, breath moist and fragrant across Marya’s skin. They followed a languorous sampling course, tasting her cheeks, her throat, her ear—knowing just the right feather touch whisper Marya needed there—before conquering Marya’s lips again. The sudden possession caused a deep throbbing—a persistent drumbeat—in the center of her being. Moisture welled and her thighs dampened as she pressed them together.

“Oh, Dorry, what’s happening?” she asked in a murmur. She’d never experienced such arousal.

“What is it, what’s wrong?” Dorry searched her face with a worried gaze.

“I feel…here,” Marya let one hand slide across her lower belly.

“You feel what? Desire? Need? Do you want me?”

“Oh yes, all of that,” she answered.

“Then have me, baby. Don’t be afraid. I’m yours.” Passion trembled in Dorry’s voice.

Their eyes met in the dimness, Dorry’s deepening with that ardent energy Marya was becoming so familiar with, and she leapt to return Dorry’s insistent kisses. Prompted by the fire in her body, she slid her hands along Dorry’s solid waist and up to her breasts. Allowed at last to heft their marvelous weight and softness, she was delirious with gratitude. She closed her eyes, focusing on the sensation.

Dorry touched her, under her shirt, hot palms trailing a fiery essence along her skin. Breath hitched in Dorry’s throat and she trembled as her hands reached higher, finding Marya’s nipples erect and needy. Marya lifted apologetic eyes but found Dorry’s gaze steady into hers, demanding. She quaked inside as the lightning in those eyes roused an ionic storm within her. She began to change subtly, her own need rising and taking her over as Dorry’s hands caressed her skin. Dorry
knew
her, knew what she needed, what she wanted. She could read her. Marya had realized, at last, the intricate intimacy she had been craving from a lover. It was here, in Dorry’s full understanding of her need.

Her body entwined with the strong one next to her, Marya listened to the gentle pull of Dorry’s breath. It matched the ocean sighing outside. Dorry’s face was lovely in sleep—more serene than she’d ever seen it. The pale blue sheet draped across her like sky across clouds. Marya reached to run one fingertip across a crease pulled taut across one breast.

“That feels nice,” Dorry said, startling Marya.

“You’re awake,” Marya told her unnecessarily.

Eyes of cornflower blue found and studied her, searching for signs of damage or regret, Marya supposed, or perhaps acceptance. She smiled to show Dorry the way it was.

Dorry pressed heated lips to Marya’s forehead.

“Dorry, last night…I can’t begin to tell you…”

“The sex is good and this thing between us is even better.”

Marya blushed at the candor. “Well, for me, yes.”

Dorry smiled and Marya could see a delicious sense of contentment in her. “And me, as well. I am totally smitten with you and that’s that. I tried not to fall head over heels because I like my life simple and this is complicated.”

Marya mused over the words, realizing she understood what Dorry meant. Relationships implied complication. Two instead of one. Endless compromise and adjustment. But wasn’t that what she had been seeking?

“I can’t pinpoint what it is that draws me to you,” Marya said finally. “It seems I wait for the days I’ll see you, whether at class or the way you keep popping up in my life. At first I was annoyed, but now I’m eager for any glimpse of you. Being in your bed is like prayer.”

Dorry watched Marya with some confusion. “Prayer?” she teased with a grin and drew her finger along Marya’s jawline. “Are you getting religious on me?”

“All my life I’ve been looking for this touch. The intimacy is so powerful.” Marya’s eyes found hers.

“How does it make you feel?”

“Embarrassed when our eyes meet like this, because I know you see the depth of my passion.”

“And the intricacies of what pleases you,” Dorry added, causing Marya to flame in acute embarrassment. She remembered the arousal she had felt in Dorry’s arms, the insanity of her desire.

“Yes. I can be honest with you. I can reveal myself.” She rolled onto her stomach and looked across at Dorry. “My question is why? Why is it so much easier with you?”

It was hard to believe Dorry’s eyes had ever seemed cold to her. They were fond, even tender, as she pondered the question. “Have you ever been in a relationship with an older woman, one, say, twenty years older?”

“No. What does that have to do with anything?”

“Maybe it’s maternal. It’s often said the best thing about a lesbian partner is that she’s not just your lover but your mother and sister as well. Have we come so far in so little time that we can be all that to one another?”

Marya snorted with laughter. “Oh right, I can see you as my mother.”

Dorry chuckled thoughtfully. “I do feel motherly toward you—even though you’re such a newshound. As for you, perhaps being with an older woman implies safety and security and you can relax—be more yourself.”

Marya rested an arm along the firm expanse of Dorry’s abdomen.

“Maybe,” Marya mused quietly, “but I certainly don’t feel childlike in your arms. Just the opposite.” She pressed her mouth to Dorry’s and whispered, “You make me insatiable.”

Dorry placed her strong hand over Marya’s and guided it to where she wanted it. Their gazes found one another and locked as they became one. Dorry moaned and arched her body into Marya’s.

***

When Marya arrived at The Way of Hand and Foot
dojang
later that day, Dorry had closed for the day and left. Rob was waiting for her outside, sitting on the sidewalk next to the side door. He had earbuds in his ears and was joyfully bebopping to music only he could hear. She pulled the Trooper into a parking slot next to the side door. He noticed her and stood. He was still in street clothes, his uniform in the duffel he carried. He pulled out his earbuds as she grabbed her own bag from the car and locked its doors.

“Hey, Rob, how have you been?” Marya asked as she unlocked the
dojang’s
side entrance. “Any more bullying?”

He shrugged. “No, not this week. I’ve been avoiding him though.”

“Good idea. So, what? You work with this guy?”

“Yeah.” Rob followed her into the
dojang
. “We’re both mail handlers for Conners Electric. He likes to show off, prove that he’s a badass to all the other guys in the break room. So he picks fights or throws heavy crap at me. Stuff like that.”

“Wow, that sucks,” Marya said as she flicked on the overhead lights in the mat area. “The moves you’ll learn here will help defuse any situation like that.”

“Is it hard to learn?
Hapkido
, I mean?”

Marya studied him as they stood next to the changing rooms. “I won’t lie and say it’s easy or something you can learn overnight,” she said. “Anything good takes true dedication.”

Rob nodded. “I know. That’s what my mama says all the time.”

Marya smiled and laid one hand on the changing room door. “Smart woman. Well, let’s get changed and I’ll see you on the mats.”

The session went well. Rob was a good, focused student and quickly learned the basic grapple holds and a few takedowns. Marya stressed to him the importance of knowing when to stop applying bone-breaking pressure. She was satisfied that he understood the danger.

“You only respond this way when an opponent lunges for you. Anything else and you break the unwritten code of
hapkido
. This discipline is not for offense. It’s defense only.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Rob said. He was panting and sweating heavily. After two hours of intense work, they were both exhausted.

“Okay, let’s call it a night, what do you say?” Marya asked as she patted him on the shoulder. “I don’t know about you, but I bet I’m going to have a sore muscle or two tomorrow.”

Rob laughed and nodded. “Yeah, I think we both will. Thanks a lot for working with me like this. I feel much better already about dealing with that jerk at work.”

In the changing room, Marya’s thoughts turned to Dorry and the late supper they had planned for that evening. She was able to release the excitement she’d held at bay all during her class with Rob. Rushing through a shower and donning clothing, she emerged back into the
dojang
in record time. Even so, Rob was waiting for her.