Every Touch (21 page)

   Groans vibrated through his chest, passing into her as his body crushed her beneath him, humming into her mouth as his lips claimed hers, trembling through her hands when he rose above her and she held onto him. 

   Their movements intensified, the strength of his thrusts urging each and every breath from her.  The friction, the tension, the heat, everything spiralled out of control, winding her tighter and tighter, the sounds of her pleasure intensifying, until she was crying out, burning, shattering, her body pulsing around him as he erupted inside her.

   As he mended the fractures in her heart as if they had never been there.

*

   Denny dropped his head to her shoulder, eyes squeezing closed, breathing heavily, the burning echoes of their climax just beginning to abate.

   “Laila,” he breathed against her skin.

   Her legs were still wound tightly around his hips and he didn’t want to move, didn’t want to pull out, didn’t want to lose the intense intimacy of being inside her.  But when his arms began to tremble from the exertion of holding his weight up, he had to roll onto his side, taking her with him.  They lay wrapped around each other and he could feel her tears on his chest.  He lifted her face to him, brushing his fingers gently across her cheek. 

   “Thank you,” she said.

   He stared at her in disbelief.  She was thanking
him
?  After possibly the best orgasm he’d ever had, he should have been the one doing the thanking.  He took her hand in his and drew a question mark onto her palm and she smiled.

   “Thank you for giving me back something I thought I’d lost,” she said.  “Thank you for showing me how incredible real love is.”  She put one hand on his face and kissed him, then lay her head against his chest.  “I love you so much.”

   He put his finger beneath her chin and lifted her face again.  Placing his lips against hers, he said, “I love you.”

   She gasped, her eyes lighting up.  “Say it again.”

   He touched his lips to hers again.  “I love you, Laila.”

   She laughed and wrapped her arms tighter around him.  “It feels like you’re breathing the words into me.”

   After lying wrapped around each other for a while, he felt Laila fall asleep.  He continued to hold her, listening to the sound of her breathing as she slept.  Her head was resting on his shoulder, her naked body pressed against his side with his arm around her.  He could feel her arm around his waist beneath the covers and her leg entwined with his. 

   He was drowsy, but he didn’t want to fall asleep just yet.  He wanted to lie still and hold onto this incredible feeling, this feeling of
life
.  He felt more alive than he ever had, even when he was still living. 

   Making love to Laila had been more invigorating, more satisfying, more fulfilling than he had ever felt before.  He’d had many girlfriends and an extremely full sex life when he was alive, but he had never felt anything like what he felt with her.  She was what he had been waiting for his whole life, and it had taken dying to reach her. 

   For the first time since his death, he was glad it had happened.  There was no doubt in his mind that it was all worth it, everything he’d been through, everything he’d lost, to find her.

   She had breathed life into his soul.

   She stirred, moving restlessly against him in her sleep, and he stroked her hair gently until she was calm again.  He didn’t know what future they could have, how he could make any of it work, and the thought that he would one day have to leave her was devastating. But he had no choice.  When she had held out her hand to him, pleading with him to reveal his presence, from the moment she had wrapped her fingers around his, he had been lost.  She might as well have been wrapping her fingers around his heart.  He could no more leave her than he could stop the world from turning. 

   He looked down at her slumbering face pressed to his chest and said something he had never said to any other woman in his life.

  “I belong to you.”

It was Friday. 

   Denny loved Fridays because Laila always had the day off from the library.  He loved this Friday even more because it was the first one on which he’d woken up late in bed with Laila asleep in his arms.  For the first time in the four days since they had first made love, she didn’t have to go to work.  He had her for the whole day, all to himself.  He was hoping a large part of that time would be spent right where they were now.

   He took a deep breath in, filling his non-existent lungs with the wonderful scent of her hair as she slept, facing away from him, her body curled into his.  He propped himself up on one elbow so he could see her face and her body stretched against him as she woke.

   He kissed her bare shoulder and she smiled, opening her eyes.

   “Good morning,” she said, turning over to face him.

   Their lips met and she slid her arms around him.

   “So,” she said, brushing her nose lazily against his, “what should we do today?”

   He smiled and grabbed the pen and pad next to him. 
Each other?

   She laughed instantly.  “I’m happy to go along with that,” she said, nuzzling her face against his chest. 

   He relaxed back on the pillows, sighing in contentment as she snuggled into his side and slid her arm around his waist.  In his entire life, he couldn’t remember ever feeling as good as when Laila was lying next to him.

   “Can I ask you something?” she said.

   He tapped her hand lying on his chest once.

   “Before I met you, did you ever watch me?  You know, when I was naked?”

   Denny stilled, holding his breath. 
Just once.

  
“Only once?  In the entire time since I moved in?”

   He had often wondered if he should tell her what he’d done that night.  Now, it seemed, the decision was out of his hands.  There was no way he could lie to her. 

  
Yes.  Just once.  I never did with anyone else in the building.  I always respected people’s privacy.  But the night you had your first date with Avery I was so frustrated and scared I was losing you.  I wanted you so much.  When you got home and went in the shower I 

   He stopped writing, too ashamed to tell her what he’d done.    

   “You what?” she said quietly.

  
I followed you into the bathroom and while I watched you I  

  
He couldn’t say it.  He clutched the pen in his hand, unable to write any more.

   Laila put her hand over his.  “It’s okay,” she said.  “I don’t mind at all.  To be honest, I’m so impressed you didn’t do it more.  If our situations were reversed, I don’t think I would have been so strong.”

  
I’m so sorry.

  
“Oh Denny,” she lifted her head and reached up to kiss his cheek, smiling.  “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

  
I didn’t come back to the flat for three days.  I felt like I’d violated you. 

  
He had never been able to shake the guilt he felt. 

   “No,” she said firmly, “what you did wasn’t remotely like violation.  I know...”  She stopped and pressed her face against his bare shoulder, closing her eyes.  “I wish... I wish we’d met sooner,” she said.

   He stroked her hair and kissed the top of her head. 

  
When I was alive?

   She shook her head.  “No.  Then I would have lost you.  I wish I had met you before I met him.”

   He didn’t move. 

   She sighed.  “I never told you about him.”

   She was quiet for a while and Denny lifted his arm to put it around her.  She rested her head against his chest and ran her hand along his other arm to find his hand, entwining their fingers together.

   “Gary was the only other man I ever fell in love with,” she said, “although maybe infatuation would be a better description than love.  I suppose that’s why I was so blinded to what was happening.  Everything was great to begin with and I was so happy.  But I moved in with him really quickly, only a couple of months after we began dating.” 

   She paused and he could feel her tensing.  He leaned his head against hers, tightening his arm around her to let her know he was there for her. 

   “And it wasn’t long after that he began to show who he really was,” she continued.  “He started to tell me what to do, what to wear.  At first I didn’t see it for what it was. I thought he was just being possessive and I liked that.  I thought it meant he loved me.  But when I didn’t do what he said, he would get irritable, at first.  Then it changed to anger.  Then after about four months, that was when he hit me for the first time.”

   Denny froze.  He’d hit her.  The bastard had hit her. 

   At the feel of him tensing, Laila lifted her head. 

   “Are you sure you want to hear this?” she said. 

   He wasn’t sure, but he did want her to tell him, to do whatever she needed to.  She was more important than his comfort.  He tapped her hand once and she nodded and laid her head back down on his chest.

   “He was very apologetic later and I forgave him.  I thought I loved him.  I convinced myself I had been in some way responsible.  So I began to try to obey him more, make him happy.  And it was okay for a while.  Then a few weeks later, he hit me again.  After that, it became more and more frequent.  I tried so hard to please him, but it was never enough.  Kelly saw the bruises after a while and she guessed what was happening and begged me to leave, but I thought I couldn’t live without him.  By that time I’d lost so much of my confidence.  I didn’t even notice it happening, but he’d made me afraid all the time.  Of everything.”

   She was quiet again.  Denny held himself very still, seething inside.

   “Then, one night,” she said, her voice very soft, “he wanted to have sex and I wasn’t feeling well.  He wouldn’t listen when I said no.  He kept on and on, pushing and cajoling and then getting angry and...” she stopped and he could feel her trembling, “and before I knew it, he was inside me and I couldn’t remember saying yes.”

   Denny felt like he’d been punched in the chest.  He couldn’t stop himself from shaking.  He was so angry he couldn’t breathe.  Rage more intense than he’d ever experienced before darkened the edges of his vision and he had to stop himself from leaping from the bed.  If he had been able, he would have got up and marched out and found the pathetic excuse for a man who had raped Laila and torn him to pieces. 

   But then he heard her quiet sob, felt her tears on the bare skin of his chest, and all his fury drained away.  He wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight against him.

   “Laila,” he whispered, tears creeping down his face, “I am so sorry.  I’m so sorry.”

   “The next day,” she said after a while, “when he was at work, I called Kelly and she helped me to move out.  He came to her house a few times, begging me to go back.  He didn’t even seem to think he’d done anything wrong.”  She shook her head.  “I just wanted him to leave me alone, and eventually he did.  I stayed with Kelly for four months, then I came here.”  She looked up and smiled.  “And found you.  The best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

   He wiped her tears away gently with his fingertips and kissed her lips softly.

   “I love you so much,” she said.  “What I felt for him doesn’t even come close to what I feel for you.  I know what you did came from love and that you would never hurt me.”  She lay her head back down onto his chest.  “Ever since I left Gary I’ve been afraid of everything.  You must have seen how scared I was.  I couldn’t even leave the flat on my own.  Until I met you.  From the moment we held hands that first time, I felt safe.”

   He held onto her, feeling like he could never let go.  All he wanted to do was keep her safe and make her happy and not allow anything to ever hurt her again. 

 
I was there when you cried.  Every time, right from when you moved in.  I would sit on the floor by your bed and stay with you until you fell asleep.  I didn’t want you to be alone.

   She was silent and still as he stopped writing and Denny looked at her, worried he’d said the wrong thing.  And then she sobbed, once.  He rolled toward her, wrapping her in his arms and she clung to him tighter than anyone ever had, repeating, “I love you,” over and over again until she pulled him onto her and they made love.

   And the bond between them became like steel.

   Unbreakable. Complete. Forever.

“Every time he comes in he tries it,” Laila said, feeling the trembling of Denny’s body against her as he laughed.  “He knows he can’t get past the filters on the library computers, but every time he goes and sits at the one in the corner where he thinks no-one will see him and tries to get on the porn sites for the whole half hour.  Today when Pauline snuck up behind him and then asked him if he needed any help he just about jumped out of his skin.”  She giggled.  “He was clutching his chest.  We couldn’t stop laughing!”