Darkest Love (22 page)

Annie saved that line for later. “Right after you slept with him on awards night, you mean?”

“That's not the point.” Mandy's eyes flashed, and her tray wobbled so violently her juice box tipped. It slid with the health bar into a sad huddle in the corner. Annie smirked at the items, then at the perky-nippled breasts doing their own wobbly dance some centimeters higher.
Now that is an improbably large chest.

“Just say it, Mands.” Annie patted the other woman on the shoulder, aware that the best way to infuriate someone is to show simpering faux-concern.
Kill ‘em with kindness.
“You wanted a commitment. But Rain played you for what you were worth.”

“Oh, you slu—“

“Then he leapt on the plane to Sivu. To be with
me
.” Annie was pretty sure her own eyes flashed at that point. She was actually glad to be getting a bit of her aggression out, almost thankful Mandy had started a tiff. “Oh, sorry, I mean… to see the princess. To do some serious journalling. Rain got his pen right in there, he did. Swept it up…” Annie demonstrated with a vigorous thrust. “…then swept it back. Up, and back. Career-first, you know.”

“Ah…hahaha.”

“You know how men are.”

“You are the one who knows all about men.” Mandy raised a finger. Her tray clattered to the floor, meager snacks flying. A terrible stony silence descended in the cafeteria. Annie realized the whole room was watching them.

Mandy was standing like an aggressive bar-brawler. Spines had stiffened in seats. Heads were up and alert. Annie even glimpsed a couple of men in her peripheral vision standing slowly, in case they had to intervene.

“You know, I've done a few interviews about you.” Mandy licked her lips. It seemed to dawn on her suddenly that her arms were free, and she raised one to give Annie a sharp shove. A few people gasped. Annie stayed stiff as a board, heart thumping. She was determined not to react.

The events of the last few days had given Annie a new appreciation for the intricacies of the legal system, and of security procedures. So her only thought when Mandy shoved her was
Good. Now I can sue her for assault.

The other woman was small anyway. Her push did not even cause Annie to shuffle back. “I gave some interviews about you,” Mandy went on. “And I explain you're only in this game because you're desperate…
desperate
…for a boyfriend. After your slutty past. You know?”

Annie felt her stomach dropping. A few of the details in the tabloids had stopped her heart; they hit too close to home. A note about how she loved to stare at the chandelier on Rain's ceiling while he pumped her, for example. And a paragraph about how she believed they had a soul connection, because both of their fathers had been troubled scientists.

It was painful to read your deep feelings described in a tabloid paper, surrounded by unflattering pictures and speculation about the proportions of a foreign princess. Annie stood as strong as she could. Mandy was not going to get her goat.

“Face it…you are addicted to pain.” Mandy's smile slid onto her face like a serpent. “The way you let him treat you. Oh, Annie.”

“What the hell would you know about that?”

“And the way you go crawling back to him every time. Do you really think a man will reward that? That lap-dog, slave-girl, tattooed-slut behavior? And from a fat bitch like you no less. Annie…”

The world closed in around Annie Childs. It was as if the walls of reality were pressing in on her. Something in her ears popped and a point of concentrated anger started to burn in her head, above the eyes, right on the crown, ready to rush straight down through her spine, into her fists. She wanted to pound Mandy's face with a steel rod.

“Annie, it was hilarious. You always provide us with so much entertainment. You know, I don't think people even care about Sola. All this scandal…it was just an excuse to talk about you. Finally we could do it. Annie Childs: Lonely. Pathetic. Dirty fuck toy for a brilliant guy who really couldn't care less.”

“Ha. Sure.”

“He told us he always washed after he slept with you. And he always used a condom.”

“Right. It's good to take precautions.”

“And the saddest thing…” Mandy lowered her voice, “…was the way you like it so violent. Only the most depraved, self-hating woman would enjoy that.”

That was too much. Annie's lip trembled. The other woman's eyes were searing into her, drawing her into a world of harshness and emptiness that seemed to go on forever. It extended behind those eyes and flowed around the campus, around the country, around the world, encircling everyone in its gray, sadistic swirl. The most awful things about human life were in there: the inevitability of pain. The way others love to hear about your failures. The way intentions backfire. The way hurts pile on you, grinding you further and further into the floor.

There was no escaping any of it. A hand touched Annie on the arm, making her jump. She turned finally from Mandy's awful pupils to the concerned face of a man.

“Ladies. Please disperse.”

He did not have to push. Annie turned on a heel and took her tray right out of the cafeteria, ignoring the staring faces of students. She made a beeline for the door. It slammed behind her, closing her mercifully off from the food hall smell and the rapt gazes and tensed backs of the people who had been waiting for her to cry, or fight, or scream.

Maybe people wouldn't even care if she died. And Rain? Maybe he was just another one of them.

His face, so ecstatic when he choked her, said it all.

* * * *

Rain watched Sola picking grasses around Annie's hut, keeping one eye on her body and one eye on the horizon. At any moment a photographer could pop out like a guerilla fighter and snap them. His greatest fear was still that this tryst would get out.

It wasn't that he was worried about his career; he was starting to think seriously about retiring from academia. Writing books from the privacy of his study sounded good to him. He would be happy to do it for the rest of his life, and–hell, a scandal might only serve to boost his sales.

Sola bent over to pick a clump of grass, placing it against her thigh to see how it would look in the skirts she was planning. Rain regarded her fondly, thinking of all the warrior Kaamo who felt as much affection for the princess as he did, and probably just as much lust. They had been forced to suppress it, the poor bastards.

His fear was not that the media would find out about him and Sola. It was that the warriors would. He had seen photographers making awkward attempts to communicate with the friendlier Kaamo men and women. God, what if they started showing photographs? An image of the princess with her lips around his cock would definitely convey a lot of meaning.

“Sola,” he called. “Stay out of sight. There are flashmen around.”

He raised his hands to form a camera shape and clicked his tongue against his cheek. Sola would know what that meant–Rain had shown her his own camera and the noises it produced.

A voice spoke behind him. Rain nearly jumped out of his skin.

“There are definitely cameras everywhere, Mr. Mistern. And you and Sola are hot property.”

* * * *

“So…you
have
had sex with Sola?”

Rain tried to form his response but the heat in the hut was so scorching he could not concentrate. And the fact that Annie's mouth had dropped open into a moist O—just begging for a finger or something a little naughtier to slip inside—made concentrating even harder.

Yup.
Rain's penis stirred at the spectacle. The beast never slept.

“I did…yeah. But it's pure speculation on the part of the magazines…if you know what I mean. There is no way they could actually have found that out.”

“No photographers out there?”

“There are. But let's just say I've been very careful. Don't you think they would have published a picture already, if they had one? Come on, Ann.”

The juice swirled in Annie's glass. The helicopters had dropped a whole carton of new supplies along with his woman: chocolate bars and juice boxes and sugar and powdered coffee. His mouth watered at that almost as much as it did at Annie's rested eyes, big new breasts and flowing locks. She must have had them primped in New York, maybe cut or dyed or re-styled. And her bosoms had expanded back to full size when she escaped from the Sivu lifestyle to one of New York restaurants, buffet breakfasts and ass-in-the-seat editing. It had only taken a couple of weeks. Rain could barely take his eyes off her tits.

By the sounds of it, the only exercise she'd had while she was away had involved scuffles with feminists, run-ins with paps and an escape from the claws of Mandy Paulson.

He felt terrible as he listened to Annie's stories. But angry? No. Rain's mellow new attitude extended to his career. When he returned to New York he was going to throw in the towel.

It was Annie who seemed hurt. Rain bristled at that–one thing he had realized since the Sola affair, and the time alone, was that he wanted Annie by his side during his new life.

She was always there in his fantasies, even the drugged ones, journalling by his side, making them coffee, hitting him playfully when he was vulgar, expanding his thoughts with her careful comments.

Over the years she had more than proven her devotion. And her depth. The silly tattoo on her wrist, and her tendency to teariness, did not change the fact that the woman was tough. And her desire to plumb the depths of her own psyche—her childhood pain—had moved Rain more than he could fully admit, even to himself.

The one thing he didn't like about her was her level of trust. She trusted too much. After all the ways he had mistreated her, why did she allow him to do the things he did? Why did she open herself so completely?

Would she have done that with any other guy?

The thought of that made Rain's chest clog up. His fists clenched and his stomach tightened in anger.

He knew what he was going to do. He would ask for an open marriage.

* * * *

“Annie? Come sit on my lap?”

“I thought you'd never ask.” The lusty tone in her voice pleased him immensely. He was half-afraid she'd recoil after the Sola story, saying that was all just too much. Even from him.
You've gone too far this time, Rain Mistern!
He had already heard her voice scolding him in his dreams.

Annie planted her buttocks on his lap and sent a fire straight to his crotch. She twisted, giving Rain a view of the neck that stayed slender wherever her figure was at. Her neck was adorned with that silver chain.

Her lips landed on his, prying his mouth open with the sweetest, most yearning kiss he'd ever received. He sighed, almost breaking the play of her tongue, as every one of her curves sank into him. In this state, she was so much more womanly than Sola–busty and lush, just begging to have her legs spread and her tits squeezed. He wanted to sink into her softness. To fill those sweet depths.

“Rain. I want us to do something.”

She pulled away. Rain relished the hearty smack of their lips parting, which she had created with a quick suck of her mouth. It came off as aggressive, hungry. Rain thought of all the sweet drinks she'd sipped through straws, all the yoghurt spoons he'd watched her click against her teeth during nights of journalling, the rice bowl meals and ice cream cones she'd devoured hungrily and–of course–the working of her lips on every part of his body. Not just his penis, but his biceps, which she marveled over; his abs, which she had to restrain herself from licking; and his legs and butt, which she nuzzled and bit, murmuring about how fit he was and how much she wanted him. How good he smelled. He'd missed this horny lady, yes indeed. Having a woman salivate over you to this degree was the ego boost of the century.

The sight of her softness against his hardness turned her on, too. She'd told him that once. She loved the way he made her feel so feminine, the way her breasts were squashed by his chest as he pumped on top of her. The way his abs hovered over her stomach, all six bumps defined, while her waist was a softer, fleshier curve that only looked petite because her boobs were so damn big! Rain had almost missed that Annie when he'd seen her in Sivu last time—all fit and tanned.

Good thing she was back. Annie smacked their lips apart, staring into his eyes, waiting for him to respond.

“Anything you want, goddess.” He stared into the hazel pools of her eyes, examining a hard new edge inside them. Once again, he regretted that he had not been in Sydney and New York to help her deal with the fallout from the paparazzi storm.

“Anything you want,” Rain repeated. “I also have things to tell
you
. And I have a request.”

The hazel eyes were moist. Every green fleck shone under the film of water, reflected in every direction like a star. Annie was so gorgeous it was almost cartoonish.

“Rain, I love you. I can't help it. I want to be with you.”

Rain pulled her into his chest, letting her breasts squash against his pecs with that familiar sensuality. She ran her hands over his back, finding the hard ridges of muscle that ran up his spine. Her fingers played on them, clawing and poking him. Rain listened to her heart for a moment. Then he spoke:

“I love you too. You're going to hate this, but… drugs made me realize it.”

Annie's gasp sounded more like a cry. “Oh, I don't hate it.” She wiped away a tear, sniffling into the side of her hand. “Everything about us has been controversial so far. If we fell in love in lieu of an international sex and drugs and sexism and racism scandal, I would be amazed.”

“Well, this may amaze you: I would like to marry you when we get back to New York.”

Annie's mouth dropped. Rain felt his own face bursting into a beam as she grabbed him again, sinking every finger into that muscle-ridge so tight he almost squeaked. Now
that
would have been an unmanly start to their new commitment.
Beta from the word go.