Part Ten

Somebody Bring Me Some Water

Thanks again Melissa E.!

…tonight I feel so weak, but all in love is fair. I turn the other cheek and I feel the slap and the sting of the foul night air. And I know you're only human, and I haven't got talking room. But tonight while I'm making excuses, some other woman is making love to you. Somebody bring me some water… can't you see I'm burning alive? Can't you see my baby's got another lover, I don't know how I'm gonna survive…

Truthfully, Sydney was sure Nigel would have called her by now, and she glanced at her watch. It was almost seven-thirty at night, and still nothing at all from him. The bait she laid out for him should have had its desired effect, unless something else had interfered. Sydney let go of a long-suffering sigh. Nigel loved all things ancient, and while he was a brilliant scholar, he was also a typical red-blooded male. She could only imagine what he and Karen had been up to all day, and she felt a shudder pass over her body in torturous, slow moving waves. Oh, they probably went on that nature walk Karen asked about, then maybe out to the beach and possibly along the boardwalk to have lunch at one of those fancy fish and chip places Nigel really liked. Great...

The Catalina night air was warm and sweet, and there was no shortage of things to do and see. Foregoing the nightlife, she decided to concentrate on making this plan of hers come to fruition. She had rented a secluded beach house in Lover’s Cove, the location she gave in the documents she left for Nigel to go over. She was sure he did, but knowing him, he was more than likely easily deterred into a romantic night out than going to work digging up some ostensible hidden cash cow. She could tell by the look on his face that he wasn’t completely convinced this was the real deal, but she was certain that sooner or later Nigel’s curiosity would eventually get the better of him. He’d surely be along after appeasing Karen’s whims and follies.

Okay, there was no Mister Cairo, and certainly no gold, but Sydney was quite proud of her elaborate plan to get his attention back in her court. As much as she didn’t want to ruin Karen’s plans, Sydney had to make him understand that she did love him… a lot. She needed him too, even though she told him to his face that she didn’t. Looking back wasn’t easy, and looking forward was even more difficult. For tonight, however, she would sit back on the beach and wait. Tomorrow was another day.

Sydney must have downed the entire bottle of wine, because now it was empty and she was sure she hadn’t spilled any. It was getting late and a yellow, waxing moon was high in the twilight sky. Leaning back against a beached log, she stared up to the heavens, her head feeling the afteraffects of drinking a little too much too fast. Some things were distorted, others over-enhanced. There were colours she had never before seen. Her mind briefly thought about Nigel and Karen many times during her stay there… It’s not fair, she would tell herself, but then a little voice would quietly whisper, all’s fair in love and war. It galled her to think that another woman had impressed herself upon the man she loved. Ah, but what did she honestly expect, anyway? She should be happy he found someone who could be there for him. He was only human, and he was probably very lonely. She smiled, laughing a little, and yawned. It had been a terribly long day, and now she had the task of picking herself up from the sand and dragging her butt into bed. Oh, was that ever going to be a challenge! She struggled to sit up, let alone stand up, and sort of stumbled down the trail leading to her beach house, giggling all the way.

She certainly didn’t want anyone to see her in such a state, and when she saw the two people coming down the path toward her, she panicked. The last thing she needed was for them to call the police to report a drunk and disorderly woman flailing around the beach in the dead of the night. They were likely to throw her in the local drunk tank! Her eyes skirted around in all directions, but the only way to go was back from where she came. Quickly Sydney backtracked, hoping they had not seen her, and once she broke back out onto the beach, she ducked behind a thick grouping of driftwood and crab grass.

The voices of a man and a woman gradually came into earshot, and then they came into sight. Peeking through the reeds and trying to remain as quiet as possible, Syd looked long and hard at them. Damn that strawberry wine, she thought. It screwed up her focus something awful, but that wasn’t going to matter much once she suddenly realised they were headed straight for her!

They walked beside one another, but not arm in arm like typical lovers would on a moonlit, starry night in paradise. It was more like a bored, lazy wander than a pleasurable stroll with one’s sweetheart. Studying them as they walked, their body language communicated two totally different things. That was when Sydney recognised them…

WARNING: The following segment contains suggestive material and should not be read by minors.

Part Eleven

Like The Way I Do

…tell me does she love you like the way I love you? Does she stimulate you attract and captivate you? Tell me does she miss you existing just to kiss you, like the way I do? Tell me does she want you infatuate and haunt you? Does she know just how to shock and electrify and rock you? Does she inject you seduce you and affect you, like the way I do…

“This is it?” Karen asked, and looked around for mysterious tombs and buried treasure, but all she could see was a long, crescent-shaped beach and a whole lot of brush. “You’d think Sydney would have come up with something more convincing, Nige.”

“Well, I think she’s probably wishing she did, too.” He glanced over to his date and sighed. She was truly extraordinary, if you dismissed the foolish head games and outright tomfoolery. Karen was quite winsome in more ways than just the obvious. She actually paid attention to him, for real, and was interested in every word he uttered. Not something he was accustomed to, for certain. “Just so you know, I'm really enjoying myself tonight. I want to thank you for going along with all that stupidity this morning too. I, uh, I’m really sorry I grabbed you like that. I was trying to make it look believable, you know?”

"Oh, no need for that, I wanted to do it." She smiled and looked straight up, avoiding his curious eyes. "If I didn’t want to, uh, you would have a hell of a black eye right now. Maybe even a very sore groin."

Oh God… he thought, she said groin… He really didn’t want to go there. "Well, what are friends for, I guess, if not for some mild flirtations and fun?”" He laughed, not telling her about the serious implications her advances were starting to create within his body.

"Oh geeze…" Her voice had that same high, excitable pitch that coloured it whenever she was having trouble formulating a coherent sentence. “You ought to know me by now. I don’t do anything unless there’s something in it for me.” She shot him a rather suggestive, lean and hungry look. “What do you say Nige? We’re all alone…"

"Karen?”

"I have this urgent need, and you’re the only one available to satisfy it.” She playfully bit her bottom lip. “You can either kiss me, or I give you that black eye."

He swallowed hard, not sure if this was real.

Without warning Karen caught Nigel’s hand in mid-stride, dragging him to a stop in the sand. "Well, what are you waiting for, Christmas?"

Nigel looked down to Karen’s fingers, now woven tightly between his, then lifted his tempted, dark hazel eyes to hers. Her pouting lips parted and she slowly, intentionally licked them, allowing a quiet purr to escape her throat. It was enough to make his breath catch and his heart stop beating forever. Threading her other hand into his, she invited herself into his personal space.

"I know what it’s like…" Karen leaned over, a mere hairbreadth from his ear, her words no more than desperate, rasping moans. The scent of her so close was enough to drive him clear to insanity in a nanosecond. The throaty sounds she made were haunting, and her white-hot touch… “Tell me, are you lonely, Nigel?” Her lips delicately brushed across his cheek and she brought one of her hands up, anchoring behind his neck and she wantonly melted into him, her curvy body flush against his compact, masculine frame. "I know exactly what you… what we need… let me…"

“Karen…” He breathlessly muttered. "I, I don’t know."

"You know, Nige… You want to touch me, then touch me… please?” Karen almost begged him, and fanned her hands out across his chest and over his shoulders, spiking them through his tousled, light brown hair.

Her smouldering gaze captured his, and her mouth took him prisoner. He didn’t even try to evade her, clearly wanting this as much as she obviously did. Her nimble fingers easily tugged his shirt from his trousers, then she yanked his belt loose and slipped both of her hands up underneath, exploring… The skin was so soft and fuzzy close to his waist, and she ran the tips of her fingers across his navel, feeling his stomach muscles contract at her touch.

His right hand surely moved from her hip, sliding up underneath a peach-coloured teeshirt, gliding over her now heaving breast and lingering there, gently kneading in slow, rhythmic movements. The lacy material of her bra couldn’t hide her excitement, nothing could at that point, and she felt her loins start to burn… Both of his hands had now snaked under her top and around to her back, and she shivered when he removed her last lacy line of defence… Gooseflesh tripped across her smooth, white skin as his hot, wet mouth trailed a flutter of feathery butterfly kisses along her slender throat and shoulders, sending her so close to the edge she released a series of tiny, needful cries that only intensified under his artful manipulations. Buckling to his knees, he dragged her down to the damp, grainy sand, his mouth still locked against hers in a long forgotten, primitive dance…

Part Twelve

The Things We Do For Love

It was too late. Karen knew she was well past the point of no return, and Nigel was way ahead of her. They were both on their nees facing each other, their lips still sealed with heated desire. When she suddenly pulled away, it was for no other reason than a reprieve from the lack of oxygen getting to her brain… the dizzying heights that she had reached threatened to redefine her sexual doctrine, and that was by no means a simple task.

Nigel touched her hair again, gently drawing her golden tendrils across her cheek, nose and mouth. Settling his beguiling, hazel eyes on hers, he sighed. "Karen, you are so beautiful…" he observed aloud. The exotic essence of her filled his head and mingled with the distant echoes of the ocean calmly lapping onto the beach around them. He forgot about Mister Cairo and the imaginary gold… and he forgot about Sydney. With a renewed determination that drove him forward, he circled his arms around Karen’s neck as she tossed her head back in wild abandon. She tasted so sweet and innocent, and he hungrily explored her for more.

"Wait! Nigel…" she murmured. Reaching behind her she could feel him shift him to the side. In one fluid movement he had successfully eased her tremulous body onto a soft, sandy bed under the stars.

"For-for what?" He asked her, his voice hoarse and ragged.

"I just wanted to tell you how I feel…"

"You don’t have to say anything, Karen, I’m okay with this if you are," he answered, and closed his eyes before trailing more soft, leisurely kisses across the top of her forehead. She surely didn’t have to explain to him that this was just for fun, no strings attached. He understood and accepted that. This was about being lonely, and loving the one you’re with. She needn’t worry about hurting his feelings later, because he knew there were no real genuine feelings between them in the first place. Oh God… she was so sweet.

Karen promptly put what she was going to admit to Nigel out of her thoughts as her needful body continued to respond to his touch. Dotting a line of fiery kisses from her ear in a southerly spiral, his salty lips caressed her bare skin and wisps of his soft hair tickled at her throat until meeting the neckline of her top. She let go of a soft, desperate moan, arching against him even closer. Then there were his hands, those cleverly practised hands… Holding her firmly beneath him, his mouth again assaulted hers with an overwhelming desire to claim her completely, utterly.

The flurry of movement that followed saw the hasty removal of her top, skirt, his shirt and watch, the bandanna she had in her hair, and the loosening of a certain pair of corduroy pants. He finished by playfully pulling Karen on top of him, and her soft, wavy hair fell forward, framing her face like an angel’s. He was, he figured, in heaven.

Solicitously dragging one hand down the side of Karen’s trembling body, he appreciated every crevice and curve before coming to rest at her hip, molding her to him. She groaned softly at the sensation, shivering beneath his touch, now helpless to do anything more than to follow.

He cupped her face, and the brush of his thumb eased her lips apart. Her mouth moved eagerly across his, opening fully to his warmth and gentleness. He consumed her, the thoroughness of his exploration a startling, yet humbling experience. Nigel’s abilities left no reasonable doubt in her mind as to what she was feeling.

Not long after, she opened her eyes and looked down at him, pleased to see the remnants of passion marking his handsome face. Colour rode high on his cheeks and his dark eyes glittered with contentment, and he reached up, tracing the arch of her brow with his finger.

"I've never seen your eyes so blue…"