The Touch of a Woman (19 page)

With another woman
. Everything new about tonight had that tacked onto the end of it.

“Did you happen to notice any of the shows coming this spring?” Summer asked, a slight tremor in her voice, as though she was nervous about something.

And why wouldn’t she be? Ellis realized she’d hardly spoken on the ride home, and not at all since Summer suggested they do this again. “I saw
The Sound of Music
is next month. Then
West Side Story
. I like both of those.”

“And then
Hair
. I know every word to all the songs.”

“If you go to that one, be sure to wear something tie-dyed in case they rip you out of the audience. ‘You there! Get up here and burn this flag.’”

Summer laughed. “My luck they’d want me for the finale where everybody comes out naked.”

“You could pull that off. You’re so tiny, I don’t think anyone would even see you unless they were on the front row.” The instant the words left her lips, she panicked that Summer might ask where she’d want to sit.

“I’ll look online and see if I can grab tickets for those.”

“You should hold off until I check my budget. Remember, I’ve got two kids in college.”

Ellis noted the dashboard clock as they pulled into River Woods. Twenty after ten. Late enough to call it a night…and early enough not to.

“I know a great little place for coffee,” Summer said as she turned off the engine. “Or we can say goodnight right here and it’ll still be a perfect evening.”

Her instincts favored the latter, but there was something far stronger that compelled her to ignore them. Enticement. Curiosity about how far she was willing to go. There was a powerful aura of taboo, of danger, and yet she felt safe with Summer. In control.

“Coffee would be nice.”

They started for the apartment, but Summer stopped at the edge of the walkway. “Here we are again, all dressed up. If you want to change first, I can wait. Or not. It’s up to you.”

Ellis took a moment to appreciate Summer’s chic look. It was unusual to see her in a dress, but there was no hint she was uncomfortable in it. A change into their casual clothes might shift the whole tenor of the evening, perhaps even signaling the end of their date.

If she were standing out here with a man—like Rex Brenneman—it wouldn’t even be a question. So why was this any different? “No, I like you in that.”

But it
was
different. She would never have gone inside with Rex.

Sitting on the couch with one foot tucked underneath, Ellis tortured her with a bare thigh, courtesy of the stretchy fabric of her black dress. The thought of what lay beneath that fabric, only inches from view, was even more tantalizing.

Summer had bypassed the artificial fireplace in favor of an oldies music channel on her cable TV. It played low in the background, but loud enough they both could recognize songs from their high school and college years.

Ellis moaned. “This one brings back so many memories. My freshman year at Berkeley. We used to hit all the dance clubs. Everybody had fake IDs, but my friends and I were into dancing, not drinking.”

Appropriately, the song was Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody.” As they shimmied and mouthed the words, Summer tried to envision Ellis in a college bar.

“What were you like in college? Let me guess. Long hair. All the latest fashions. Lots of guys hanging around.”

“Skinny as a rail. I’d only been out of braces for a year.” Ellis’s curls had fallen, and she tucked the floppy strands behind her ears. “I wore my hair long until my boys were born. Jeremy was so bad about pulling it, I cut it all the way to my chin so he couldn’t reach it. It’s been like this for the last twenty-two years.”

“It looks great. I’m jealous actually. Every time I see you, every single hair is in place, even in the gym. Mine gets wilder as it grows. It takes me about fifteen minutes with a hot comb to make it stay out of my eyes.”

“Are you kidding me? Your hair is beautiful. You should let it go, let it curl all over.” Ellis leaned over and brushed her bangs from where they’d slid beneath her lenses. “And I love the color.”

“Got a thing for gray hair, eh?”

“It seems I do.”

Subtle but thrilling, since it was Ellis’s first overt admission that she was attracted to her
that
way. She’d shown a few signs, like taking her hand in the theater, but there was nothing quite like hearing it from her lips. From her agreement to come inside instead of returning to her apartment, she clearly wanted more from their evening. But how much more?

“How’d we do on our first date?” Summer asked. “Or to put it another way, will there be more?”

“We did fine.” Ellis smiled softly but the furrow of her brow told a different story. “Except I freaked out about running into Rex and Marcie. I wish that hadn’t happened.”

“Same here if you want to know the truth. I wanted you all to myself tonight.” She scooted as close as she could given the angle of Ellis’s bent knee. It wasn’t enough for an embrace, but there was something to be said for sitting face to face. She took a hand and brought it to her lips for a gentle kiss. “I’ve got a major crush on you, Ellis Keene. I know I joke around about it, but that’s only because I’ve been too much of a coward to be serious. I think you’re an amazing woman.”

She caressed Summer’s cheek with her knuckles, their hands still joined. “I knew you were joking around, but I always believed you meant what you said.”

“Oh, I did. I want to be at the front of your line. I think about you pretty much all the time. At work, in the car…when I lie down at night.” She gently stroked the inside of Ellis’s forearm, a spot that on herself was especially sensitive.

The gentle notes of an acoustic guitar filled a stretch of silence. Summer recognized it even before she heard Roberta Flack’s sultry voice.
Apropos
, she thought. A “first time” for all the tender moments in their relationship.

“I love this song,” Ellis said quietly.

“Dance with me.” Summer didn’t wait for an answer, tugging her to her feet and into the tight space between the coffee table and the TV.

At barely five feet tall, she was accustomed to being shorter than her dance partner. Her natural inclination was to reach upward, but when Ellis grasped her shoulders, she slid her arms around her waist.

“Which one of us is supposed to lead?” Ellis asked.

“Don’t think about it. Just enjoy the music.” Tucked into Ellis’s neck, her head filled with the muted fragrance she’d noticed earlier. She didn’t know one perfume from another, but this was faintly sweet, distinctly feminine. Delicious.

They tipped from side to side in a clockwise circle with all the deliberateness of a lullaby.

Summer was drowning in sensations. The fragrance, the warm breath against her ear, the subtle contours of Ellis’s back beneath her fingertips. Unable to resist satisfying another sense, she brushed her lips against the supple skin of her neck, and was rewarded by a soft moan and a tilting of the head that exposed a long sinewy muscle.

Arms tightened around her shoulders, bringing their bodies together from thigh to breast.

Roberta sang soulfully of the first trembling kiss, filling Summer with desire she couldn’t control. The moment felt so right for that.

She slithered one hand between them, all the way to the back of Ellis’s neck. With just the slightest pressure, she drew her closer and grazed her lips to the corners of her mouth. Barely touching, then withdrawing. Returning to find a gentle tongue that pried her lips apart.

Who was leading? No one…everyone.

They’d stopped dancing.

As their kiss grew more heated, Summer allowed her other hand to roam. A continuous caress mapping the curve of her waist from her hip to just beneath her breast.

All the while, she followed in her mind’s eye the path of Ellis’s hands. At first her fingers laced through Summer’s hair as if holding her head in place. But then her sculpted nails gently traced behind her ears to her shoulders…before drawing her into a firm embrace.

The romantic ballad raised the stakes dramatically with a reverent, almost aching, tribute to lovemaking.

Summer’s fingertips found their way to the plunge of Ellis’s neckline, and before she knew it, she was delving into her cleavage. Inside the lace of her bra. To the underside of her breast. Suddenly she caught her breath and withdrew to place her hand in the center of Ellis’s chest.

And gently nudged her away.

With her mouth parted and eyes half closed, there was no mistaking Ellis’s look of desire—which quickly turned to confusion.

Summer shook her head. “I’m so sorry. I can’t hurry through this, not with you. It’s too important.” More than that, she needed to know there would be no regrets from Ellis about getting carried away. Not because Summer was noble. Because she needed to guard her feelings. It would crush her for Ellis to have second thoughts after making love.

Ellis took a step back, folding her arms around her own waist as though guarding herself. “Of all the possibilities I imagined for tonight, that one wasn’t even on the list.”

“Don’t get the wrong idea. I’m more than ready to take you down the hall right now.” She ignored the protective stance and hugged her again. “But I don’t want to do that just because it’s getting so warm in here. I need you to think hard about what you want. If we do the wrong thing, it could hurt our friendship, and I’m not willing to give that up if it’s just for a fling.”

“It isn’t friendship I’m feeling, Summer. I don’t kiss my friends the way I just kissed you.” She lowered her hands and returned the embrace. “If you need to wait till my head’s totally clear, that could be a very long time. I’ve never been in these shoes before. I was trying to let myself be in the moment.”

“And I’m sure that moment would have been amazing. I hope it
will
be amazing. It just…I felt like I might have pushed you into something you weren’t ready for. I guess I need to hear you say you’re sure.” She looked up to find Ellis’s mouth too close to resist and gave her one more peck on the lips. “You probably should go now before I change my mind. Because you are one damn fine kisser. And I am one weak-willed lesbian.”

* * *

“I’m not going anywhere,” Ellis said firmly.

She didn’t want to be protected from her feelings. What she wanted next was as clear to her as any decision she’d ever made. She’d known exactly what she was doing. Every subtle step she’d taken so far—the black dress, the deeper cleavage, showing off her thigh—had readied her for the moment.

Nor did she fear the fallout. So what if it turned out to be a fling? There was no law that said they couldn’t be friends afterward.

“You want to hear me say I’m sure? Fine, I’m sure of what I want right now. I want you.”

This time she initiated the kiss, but it was no simple peck. She backed up her words, covering Summer’s mouth with the force of her desire, leaving no room for doubt.

When their kiss finally broke, Summer met her eyes with a smoldering gaze. “That’s all I needed to know.” She led her to the bedroom, turning out lights along the way.

Her resolve grew along with her excitement as Summer clicked on the bedside lamp and lay her glasses on the table. Then she folded back the light green comforter to reveal yellow cotton sheets with floral pillowcases. It was hardly the den of a seductress, but rather the intimate retreat of a down-to-earth woman.

Ellis turned her back to show her zipper. “Care to do the honors?”

The zipper fell slowly, with warm lips following the trail. She kicked off her shoes and stepped out of her dress, glad she’d chosen the lacy black slip. By the time she turned around, Summer was tossing her own dress on a nearby chair. Her beige bra and panties matched the tone of her skin, making her appear almost nude.

They embraced again, dancing without music in a steady glide to the bed, where they rolled as one to the center. Ellis held on, her body suddenly surging with heat. One hand cradled her back while the other slid beneath her slip, raising it above the curve of her hip. Their lips never parted.

She was ready to be touched. To be ravaged. To have her breasts sucked and bitten. To feel Summer’s tongue between her legs.

With an upward surge, she pushed Summer aside long enough to pull her slip off.

The moment she lay back down, Summer released the clasp on her bra and pulled it away. She cupped a breast but she was too gentle, too cautious. Ellis writhed, gasped and thrust her chest upward until Summer got the message, lowering her lips to draw a nipple into her mouth.

“Yes,” she hissed between clenched teeth. “I love that…I love that…I love that.”

Summer responded to her urgency, shifting lower so she could knead both breasts while raking her nipples with her teeth. She stopped only for a moment so she too could remove her bra.

Ellis caught a glimpse in the brief window their bodies were apart. Summer had small breasts with tight aureoles. And then bare skin that slid smoothly across hers without the prickles of chest hair.

She opened her legs to feel Summer settle her body between them. It was only a matter of moments before the tug on her waistband, and she dug her heels into the bed to raise herself high enough that Summer could remove her panties.

“God, you’re gorgeous.”

Summer slipped out of hers as well and returned to kiss her, dropping a thigh between her legs. Her body…small and light as it rested atop her. So different from Bruce.

Their kiss now was delicate, their skin gliding together like satin. Mesmerizing.

But delicate wasn’t what she needed. She thought at first Summer would make her wait, kiss her slowly again to build up their desire. But then her mouth drifted downward again. To her neck, her shoulder. Back to her breast. And lower.

Summer’s tongue left a cool moist trail across her navel. Then she looped her arms, first one and then the other, around Ellis’s thighs and nuzzled her mound.

Ellis panted with anticipation. Her legs were apart, but Summer hadn’t yet opened her. Hadn’t seen her desire. Hadn’t tasted her want.