Holding The Cards (16 page)

She backed away from Josh's touch and he let her, dropping his hand back to her foot.

"I almost went vanilla. I ran from the truth. I wrote off the whole D/s set-up as destructive. Kinky games had destroyed our relationship, destroyed me. But if your blood runs with it, it's hard to shake." A painful smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. "I got over that. As time passed, I realized it wasn't any different than a failed vanilla relationship. He's the guy who says he'll call and doesn't, the girl who says she loves a guy until she finds out he's borrowed the company BMW rather than owning it himself. Some people just fuck with your heads. Jonathan did that to me. It pissed me off, on about ten different levels, because he destroyed my confidence.

"I cried when I saw you with Thomas," she shifted her attention to Marcus. "Because I realized what the difference was between the two of you, and me and Jonathan. You and Thomas cherished each other.

You could feel it. You, as his Master, adored him, were enthralled by him as much as he was by you.

That's why I had kept hanging in there so long with Jonathan. Like anyone else, I wanted to believe I had
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found that love to last a lifetime and dammit, I thought endurance would manufacture it. But I learned the most important rule of D/s play; if there isn't already a spark of it between you in the mundane world, it ain't going to happen in a dungeon."

She turned her eyes back to Josh, whose hand was now curled around the arch of her foot. "You remember that kiss, last night?" she asked. It flashed through his eyes, and she nodded. "That's what that was all about."

He leaned forward, and touched his lips to her foot, gently, with an overwhelming reverence. Lauren made a soft sound in her throat, a sound of pain and longing at once. He lifted his gaze, looking at her with warm sympathy in his eyes and something else, something that fanned the spark within her into a shower, like firecrackers going off.

"I would have torn his fucking arms off for you," he said calmly.

It pulled at something low in her gut, something primal and right, and made her reach out and touch his face.

"So," she cleared her throat, tossed her head back, and risked a smile. "This is the moment when Obiwan is supposed to rivet us with some words of wisdom."

Marcus chuckled, though his eyes carried some of Josh's heat. "Relationship games always carry a risk,"

he managed lightly. "D/s can be dangerous, because it explores the most primitive sides of ourselves.

Those involved must have a high degree of trust and a very, very healthy devotion to one another. Like religion, it can be a spiritually enlightening experience, or it can be an expression of psychosis. And somewhere in between, it can be tremendously fun." Gathering his composure around him, he lifted his shoulder in a shrug. "Like chocolate."

Lauren looked at him blankly. "I was following until that moment, Obi."

Marcus glanced up as clouds darkened the sun. Lauren could have lifted her sunglasses, but her eyes still felt too vulnerable and open.

"Imagine how it feels to eat one piece of Belgian chocolate," Marcus suggested, moving to pack up the contents of their basket. "You inhale it, savor it on your tongue. The flavor of it is something that you can choose to let linger in your mouth, building your body's reaction to it, for once you swallow it, it's gone.

The pleasure is not in the consumption, but in the sensory experience. To bring it to its fulfilling conclusion, you will eventually swallow it, but the longer you draw it out…ah, the more satisfying that swallow is." He grinned at her expression and pulled a small tin from the cooler. "Bon bon?"

Lauren shook her head at his wicked ways, her mood lightening, and took one. "Okay, is this metaphor going somewhere?"

"Always," Josh predicted.

Marcus shot him a reproachful glance. "Now say you eat another. And another. Somehow, you still want them, you're still cherishing that experience, but the more you stuff in your mouth, the more elusive that sensation gets. But you eat them even faster, without really noticing how they taste anymore. And then, you're sick.

"This is the first piece," he leaned over to Josh, ran a fingertip down the man's throat and along the
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collarbone.

A flush rose in Josh's face as he made a visible effort to keep himself still. Lauren's breathing hitched, the chocolate melting on her tongue, as Marcus's touch trailed down the center of Josh's bare chest, stopping just above the heart, where his ribs met the surface of the sand. "That's how the game was meant to be played. Savoring, drawing it out, cherishing, never taking for granted the gift that has been given to your senses. You must appreciate it, worship it, even as you run your tongue over it and melt away the outer casing to get to the cream beneath. You hold it captive as long as you can, intending on bringing out its richest flavors before allowing it to explode, and be consumed.

"Jonathan," his lip curled in a sneer, and his eyes flashed back to Lauren, "had a serious eating disorder."

A drop of rain spattered on Lauren's knee. Thunder rumbled lazily in the distance.

"How about we take
lunch
inside?" Marcus offered. He jerked his head toward Josh, a twinkle in his eye.

They went to the Salerno house. The rain had begun to come down in earnest, their house was closest, and it had the hot water heater the men wanted to check. Isabel came when Josh called, but there were no detours this time. Once depositing them at the Salernos, the elephant vanished into the forest.

According to Josh, she was not likely to be seen again until the rain ceased.

The Salerno home was like Lisette's, built to blend into the forest. However, their house had the air of a medieval period country home. The first and second levels had outdoor walking galleries with open archways, rather than porches. The siding of the first and basement floors was done in stonework. Most charmingly, a creek ran by the front of the house, and the head and coils of a bronze dragon rose out of the water, creating the impression of a guarded moat.

Lauren paused at the stairs and turned back, her eye caught by the creature. She went to the water's edge to get a closer look. The dragon's features had been enhanced with different colored metals, the play of light making it into a living, breathing creature. She eased out one canvas toe into the creek, and laid her fingers on the dragon's face, felt the satin curves of the jaw, the rough texture of the scales on the neck, scales that had some movement to them, for they were separately fused, as scales would be. The neck and jaw connections also had a little play to them, so movements of the wind brought slight motions to the dragon's head, increasing the eerie impression of life.

"You're going to get wet," Marcus said, having followed her.

"It's not too bad yet," she smiled and slanted a glance at him. "Have you ever thought about how absurd it is, the way we run inside from the beach when it starts to rain? I mean, we were swimming, immersed in water, and then it starts to rain, so we hunch our heads and flee. This is incredible."

"We need to get inside," Josh called from the first floor. "Unless you two want to drown."

"It's amazing," Marcus agreed, taking her arm to help her step back onto the bank. "Wait until you see what they have in the house."

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"So which one of the Salernos is the artist?" she asked, moving toward the stairs.

"Neither," Marcus replied. "The Salernos are New York Italians. Mrs. Salerno is a cosmetic company CEO, and Mr. Salerno is a retired police chief. You feel like you're in an Italian restaurant commercial around them. Lots of shouting, quick-to-anger, quick-to-forgive personalities, devoted to each other in a very practical manner. They have three almost-grown children we've never met. I doubt the kiddies have ever been here," Marcus grinned, a look to his eye that suggested there was a reason for that. He pressed her up the stairs and continued his casual dialogue before she could pursue the mystery behind that look.

"They're not artists, but they're an artist's best friend. They're very generous patrons of three of the artists that have homes here. In the house, well, I'll let you see for yourself."

Marcus's words immediately made sense upon entering the Salerno's large foyer. The interior of the house exploded with artwork. Original paintings, sculptures of all mediums, and pottery work lined the wide corridor. Lauren recognized some of the most well known names in the art world in the styles before her.

Yet the art did not appear to be chosen solely for its market value. There was an underlying theme of unique character, of color and interest to the eye, and the way it blended into the country castle atmosphere. A castle crossed with bourgeois comfort, she amended to herself, as she moved into the sunken pit living area and saw that the center piece of this room was a top of the line La-z-boy recliner, complete with baseball arm cover for a remote and TV directory. There was a pair of worn fleece slippers parked at the base, as if the master of the house was just up getting a beer from the fridge.

"We're going to go down and check the water heater," Marcus said, touching her elbow. "Feel free to wander about. It's a great place."

Josh had already disappeared and Lauren lifted a brow. "He's avoiding me, isn't he?"

Marcus inclined his head. "Regrouping. Trying to piece together those defenses you're systematically shattering. I suspect you won't give him time to do that."

"You bet your ass." She said it with conviction, surprising herself with the depth of it. Marcus grinned and left her to her explorations.

Lauren wandered to the wall of windows and admired the sweeping view of forest and ocean, much like Lisette's home provided.

No, she wouldn't give him much time to regroup. She wanted to get down beneath those shields, find out what he was hiding there and maybe help him heal it.

"Ah, God," she closed her eyes, pressed her temple to the cool glass. Nothing more pathetic than a woman trying to heal a brooding man. The cliché of practically every mainstream romance, and something every woman who reached thirty knew almost never happened. Still, those romances sold millions for a reason. There was a germ of hope in them, the hope that, if they did kiss the frog, he really would turn into a prince.
You just had to believe, Tinkerbell
.

She left the living area and prowled the foyer some more. The Salernos obviously had money to spend on any type of art they wanted, and yet she saw no Van Gogh's or Picasso's. Everything she saw was an artist established in the past twenty-five years, talent poised on the brink of inevitable genius. On closer
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scrutiny, she detected another pattern in their choices. Love.

Not in the romance sense, which would likely have been of little interest to Mr. Salerno. No, these pieces reflected the raw soul of love that persisted through every torture the human mind could devise.

Lauren touched the sculpture before her with light fingertips. At a distance, it looked like the twisted trunk of a tree hit by lightning, a few jagged edged branches gnarled and jutting from its sides. But when the observer was close like she was, and could study its features, she discovered a sculpture of a man and woman intertwined. They could have been embracing or fighting; it depended on the angle at which one stood, but the overwhelming message was passionate devotion. There was nothing pretty about love, it seemed to scream, but there was nothing more necessary. There was nothing more vital than fighting your way into the soul of another and claiming it for your own.

Lauren smiled at her thought. The catch was, in order for you to claim the soul of another and be happy with the prize, you had to lay yourself just as bare to them. Her touch lingered on the rough-hewn part that was the shoulder of the woman figure, and then slipped away as she turned to wander further down the hall.

At the end, she had the choice of staircases, one going up, and one going down. The latter was where she presumed Marcus and Josh had gone. To her right was a pair of double doors of carved teakwood, rounded at the top to accommodate an elaborately molded archway. Lauren hesitated, then shrugged, turned the polished pewter handles and pushed the unlocked doors inward.

For a moment, she felt just like Julie Andrews.

It was a ballroom, the walls lined with tall arched windows providing a view out to the surrounding forest on two sides, the now turbulent ocean on the third. On the wall space between the openings were gilt paintings in Baroque style, biblical figures, angels in swirling robes, women and men in shimmering dress.

Three glass chandeliers hung from the domed ceiling, each probably weighing more than her Lexus. The floor was polished oak, inlaid with darker pieces to form a starburst design at the center. Chairs lined the wall; brocade and velvet cushioned of course, antiques with carved mahogany backs.

There was a silence to the room, a hush that she could close her eyes and easily imagine filled with the rustle of skirts, men's voices, the light chime of glasses, and a waltz playing in the background. Now that silence was punctuated by the strike of the rain against the windows.

Lauren moved to the center of the starburst and turned slowly, looking at every painting. She tilted her head to discover the ceiling that held those chandeliers was also painted with an array of angels and romantic figures.

When she lowered her eyes, her neck screaming, her gaze landed on one other piece of furniture. Its face had been painted with a cadre of cherubs and positioned between two windows, camouflaged. A smile tugged at her lips and she went to it, pulling open the doors of the tall cabinet.

No need to import the orchestra when you had a state of the art surround sound system. She glanced around and up, but it took a few moments to locate the speakers. The ceiling and wall murals had been painted over their wire mesh faces, screening them so well that the Salernos probably had to keep a location diagram somewhere in case the stereo guys ever had to come in and work on one.

The entire room was a work of art. Lauren had no doubt that masters of the craft had created this fantasy. It was a room that begged for dancing, for music that would flood the room and transport the
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dancers to whatever mood or mode they chose to embrace. The room's style suggested a sweeping Wagner piece, a light Chopin waltz, or an elaborate Fred and Ginger number, but that wasn't really her style. She wondered what Josh's style would be. At the thought, her lip curved. Lord in Heaven, she was gone over the man.

She squatted in front of the CD player, and looked through the selections in the partition below it. Her finger alighted on a favorite, and a smile crept across her features. She decided she liked the Salernos.

She opened the player; laid her choice in it, and then keyed up the track she wanted, setting it for random choice after that. Then she turned up the volume.

The first hard guitar licks vibrated through the room up through the soles of her feet. She turned from the player as John Cougar Mellencamp began to expostulate about his days as a young boy.

She wasn't surprised to find him there, watching her from the arched doorway. Josh leaned against the frame, his arms crossed over his bare chest, his eye glinting with amusement. She twirled, shimmied toward him and back, put in a couple hip-hop moves, flashed a daring smile at him.

The beat picked up and offered the chance to be with a girl just like her.

She worked her way over to him and extended a hand. She wondered if he was one of those men who steadfastly avoided the dance floor, or who had learned just enough to clumsily guide a date through a few obligatory steps and increase his chances of getting laid. She got a quick answer.

He took her offered hand and yanked, spinning her in a tight turn that brought her up hard against him.

Before she could get a breath, or her fill of the way his body felt against hers, he twirled her back out again, moving them both into a smooth shag step. She missed her cue on the first round, but when he cycled back to the beginning, she was ready for him. She slid under his arm and flowed along his touch on her neck, as she turned outward, then came back to him again, so that both hands were clasped in his.

It might have been falling in lust up to this point, but at that moment her heart took a tumble in a little more serious direction. She felt the fall, the vertigo. The grin on his face, the sheer enjoyment of playing off each other, the ease with which they moved together. He moved into a Latin step and she was turned so her back was brought up against his front, her hips tucked into the angle of his. His palm pressed into her stomach, and her arm curled around his neck as he rocked and twisted them down and then back up again. She pressed her nose briefly against the warmth of his throat as Mellencamp invited her to sink her teeth in.

She spun out again, laughing, and then he had her by the waist facing him, revolving them around the room in an impromptu Fred and Ginger waltz at a beat that the couple themselves would have enjoyed if they had had Mellencamp's talent at their fingertips. She caught hold of his bicep for balance, and he gathered her closer, his hand dipping low on her back so she was firmly against him.

Lauren looked up into his face. His grin had faded at the corners, the curve of his mouth now more tense, underscored by something in his eyes that stopped her breath and elevated her heart higher than was warranted, even for such stimulating aerobic exercise.

His grip was gentle, but strong enough to tell her he had her captured if he was of a mind to hold her.

They were still moving together over the dance floor, the line of his thigh insinuated between both of hers as he switched back into the sensuous steps of the Latin dance, to the mean tempo that called for recklessness and sexual heat. To lyrics that insisted love could hurt in a way that would make you welcome the pain and ask for more.

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The kiss was easy, a slight movement to put his lips on hers, but the fire swept through her like the churn of the electric guitars. Somehow, he kept moving, and the sinuous roll of his body against hers, the turn, the steady cradle of his palm against the side of her neck and back of her head, made her totally his for a moment, incapable of balance without him.

The song ended, and the patter of the rain returned. He eased her down and in a finish turn that left some unwanted space between them, but he kept hold of her hand, caressing her fingers and gazing into her confused face. As if on cue, John Cougar eased into the poignant
Ain't Even Done With The Night
.

Josh drew her closer, and she took the step, staring up into his face, aware of only him.

"Joshua?"

Marcus's voice wafted up from somewhere beneath them, calling from within the house.

Josh cleared his throat. "Yeah?"