Scott burst into laughter. “You are some kind of special, Zelda Fitzsimmons,” he said.
“Yeah, last night was a special kind of evening,” she said, broaching the subject of her freak-out.
He turned to his side, leaning on one elbow, his hair still damp from the swim. When it was wet, it was curly. Dark. Black and wavy, just like the hairs on his chest. She lay next to him on her stomach, braced on her elbows looking at him, waiting for some form of recrimination.
“Talk about it when you are ready. Fear is only paralyzing when you don’t have the guts to face it, stare it down, and speak firmly, letting it know it has no power over you,” he said. “You swam today in fresh water. You have nothing to fear in this life, past or present, Zelda.”
“You make it sound so easy,” he said.
“Look at that zany house I live in. This house could have easily become my prison. At one point, I felt it had, but I changed that. It is now my escape from the outside world and the center of my power. My energy. My life force. Who can feel down on life when you have a red living room with a hot pink velvet chair with a life-sized vent doll in it holding a book and a pipe?”
“Yes, you do have that,” she said, frowning. Uncertain if that was something he should be proud of.
“I’m proud of it. I made that damned doll by hand, Zelda. Lathe, hand tools, and all. I made that doll when I was 16 years old. I have sustained Berger Vent since I was but a boy of six years. This is mine. I earned every damned popsicle stick of it all,” he said.
She understood.
She understood what he was telling her.
He was offering her this life.
Fresh eggs every day. Cream pulled directly from the teats of a milk cow that grazed somewhere in a pasture nearby. Daily swims in a private pond in which she could probably catch fish to fry as well.
“I like your energy and life force,” she said.
“I like you,” he responded. Her brown eyes watched him and the desire to kiss her was so strong, he popped to his feet.
“Are we going back in for another swim?” she asked.
“Nope. In my current state, if we get back in that water, I will get you and every fish in Scottie’s Pond pregnant,” he said with a frown.
“Probably with three of your chest hairs,” she said laughing, thinking of Michael’s comment on his virility.
“What?” he asked. “I need to bathe. I smell like pond water.”
“I am surprised you didn’t want to make love to me here on this blanket,” she said. “Speaking of this blanket, somebody in your family really likes colors.
“That blanket is made out of my childhood clothing and shirts. To answer your question, no, I don’t want to make love on this blanket and have mosquitos making blood withdrawals out of my butt cheeks. No, thank you. Carolyn wouldn’t understand me walking around all day scratching my ass. I would prefer a long soak in the tub with you and a mid-morning nap. After that, I need to head into the office,” he said.
“Let’s play hooky today, Scott. You and me, lounging about the house, sharing ideas on what can be changed when I move in next year,” she said with one eye brow arched.
“Really?”
“Really,” she said with a wink.
“It’s my turn to say wow,” he said.
“Say that after our bath and some hot loving. Following a steamy, personal round of loving with Scott, I want to make a pie out of those peaches on the counter,” she said.
“You bake, too?” he asked.
“Scott, I can do all sorts of magical things with food and more,” she said to him.
He bent down and grabbed the end of the blanket and yanked it, sending her tumbling into the grass.
“What the hell?”
“Bath. Hot loving. Peach pie,” he said, rolling up the blanket, stomping his way over to the golf cart, his shoes in his hand. “Come on, Zelda, you can’t promise a man such delights then lie about on a damn blanket in the sun. Let’s get this love fest moving!”
He pulled out his cell phone to call Chandler.
“Chandler, I am going to call the office and take the day off,” he said into the line.
“I have already taken care of it, Sir,” he said. “Enjoy your day off.”
Zelda eyed Scott’s face, a look of satisfaction all over it as he licked his lips. Her interest was piqued. “Scott, did Chandler handle it already?”
“Of course. We are oddly in sync. It’s creepy sometimes that he can see what I need before I ask for it. That is why I say he is my everything,” he said.
“I am curious about what it will take for me to become your everything,” she said, walking seductively over to him.
“Shit, Baby, right now, you are becoming the only thing,” he said waving his hand, urging her to move faster.
The only thing on his mind was a hot shower, some hotter loving and that peach pie. He also thought of another pie he wanted a mouthful of. He looked Zelda and winked.
Chapter 9
Friday Morning
He watched her twitching in her sleep, afraid to touch her, to wake her, to draw her back into the nightmare which haunted her life. A very bad memory hung about in that beautiful head of hers, dragging his spectacular woman down to a vulnerable moment in her life. Childhood? Based on the blow she gave him to his balls, she wasn’t lacking in self-defense. Whatever man paid late night visits to her room didn’t get very far.
Counting backwards to the number of nights they’d shared a bed, the first night in the hotel, she was wiped out. He’d woken her once, for a second round of love making, but there was no freak-out. Maybe she wasn’t completely asleep.
Maybe it was the Bourbon on my breath which triggered the memory.
In Texas, at her place, exhaustion claimed him the first night and he slept like a rock. Try as he may to recall Monday night of his stay in Texas, outside of the front porch, the details were fuzzy. Tuesday night he’d slept on the couch in her space as she called it.
“You are thinking so loud it woke me up,” she mumbled, turning onto her stomach to face him.
“I need to get up and get to work,” he admitted.
“So do I, Scott. I need to make several final interviews, then the luncheon on Saturday and I will be done,” she told him.
Vulnerable.
I don’t feel vulnerable.
I feel open.
She smiled at him, touching his chest, toying with one nipple.
“Care to share your thoughts?”
“Yes,” she said, sliding her long leg over to rest upon his hairy one. “You make me feel powerful, confident and sexy.”
Scott turned his head slowly to look at her. The gap in the bucked teeth was considerably less as was the overbite. The hair was gone from his ears, and her man was a fine specimen of hunky.
“I want to confess something to you,” she said, shifting a bit, balling up the pillow in her arms, resting her cheek to it. “All of that furniture in my space? I bought it three days before you arrived.”
He smiled at her.
“Fair enough. I had these rooms redone this past two weeks, including the installation of the new tub for two. That includes the new vanity and your closet space in this bedroom,” he said.
Scott waited for her next revelation.
“You were the first man to spend the night at the house,” she told him. A sly grin slipped across her face. “This is also the first time I have spent a week with a man. Since I am counting firsts that was the first time I tried to swim. Last night was the first time I took a bath with a man. A shower, we did that before, but a bath? It was a first.”
“I feel privileged. Are there any more firsts you want to try out on or with me?” he inquired, looking at her with love nearly consuming the whole of him.
Zelda gnawed on her bottom lip.
“Yes, there is something else I want to tell you” she paused, looking at him with doe like eyes. “I love you.”
Her e
yes were misting as she waited for his response.
“I know,” he told her.
“What?” she asked, lifting her head from the pillow. He wasn’t supposed to say that. He was supposed to look me in my eyes, tell me he adores me and loves me as well. Then he was supposed to kiss me, sparking passion and then make hot sexy love to me.
I am an idiot.
I said it too soon.
He’s not ready.
“I knew the moment you leapt into my arms in the pond that only a man that earned something special from you got that kind of trust. Plus, you let me teach you how to swim. It required love to allow me inside the fortress of Zelda,” he said.
“Well, you sucked the entire romantic moment out of that shit,” she said, turning to get up. She kicked off the coverlet taking her frustrations out on the soft sheeting. Scott laughed at her antics, grabbing her arm, pulling her back towards him.
“You didn’t ask me when I knew that I was in love with you, Zelda,” he said.
“I’m listening,” she said sarcastically, sitting up on the side of the bed.
“I fell truly, deeply, and sadly in love with you when I saw you inhale three pancakes with one bite, then do some acrobatic sex stuff to me on that hotel couch. I say sadly, because I knew that I could get you to love me, but to have you fall in love with me is different. I will take it. I will accept your ‘I love you’ for now, but you have ruined me. My heart, Zelda. My poor heart is in your hands and each time I look at you I have been terrified that you were going to crush it and throw it in my face. However, when we floated in the pond and our heartbeats matched, I knew how much I love you,” he said. “And how much you love me.”
“Aww, that was so sweet,” she said crinkling her nose. “Would you care to show me this morning how much you love this woman?”
“It would be my pleasure,” he said, reaching for her, pulling her back on the bed.
*****
The day drug on for him, and as three-thirty approached, he gathered his things for his monthly Friday night Vent Club meeting. Thinking about how wonderful his morning went, he wanted to cancel it to have a romantic evening with Zelda. Tonight. She was the only thing truly on his mind.
Maybe I will take her to dinner and pop the question.
He fiddled with the new bracelet she’d given him this morning.
She told me she loved me.
Zelda said it first.
No coaxing to get it out of her.
No automated response to me saying it first.
He almost touched himself as he thought of how good it felt making love to that very responsive body. Each touch, she responded. The soft moans in his ear fueled his passion with each stroke inside of her. The friction of his chest hair across her nipples, which made her moan wantonly as he brought her to orgasm replayed over and over again like a favorite porn scene on a continuous loop.
A powerful orgasm which clamped down around him, tightening, milking him, rendering him helpless to do nothing more than fill her with his hot seed. He whimpered through a release so sweet and all-consuming that it rendered him immobile. I can’t wait until we start our family. The idea of his seed implanting itself in an egg and making a little Berger had him grinning alone in the redecorated office as he sat behind his desk.
“Nice to see you smiling, Mr. Berger,” Carolyn said, jolting him back to reality. “I look forward to meeting Ms. Fitzsimmons.”
“Soon,” he said to her.
“Sir, there is a schedule change for you today. Your Vent Club is still meeting at the house, but an hour later.”
“What? Who made that change?”
“Chandler, when he called in for you yesterday,” he said.
Scott was confused. He spoken to Chandler and knew he’d cancelled his time in the office. He wasn’t aware he’d also moved his monthly meeting with his ventriloquist club. Again, he was ahead of him.
“No worries,” he said. I will just end the meeting sooner.
At least that was his intention.
Zelda had a different idea when she left the conference.
*****
The conference, which started out so well, was dying a slow and painful death and dragging Zelda along with it. Initially, she tried to differentiate the various levels of authors believing the more seasoned of the bunch were more professional. However, as the day lumbered to an unsatisfying end, a feeling crawled up her leg indicating that the patients were starting to take over the asylum.
“I am really starting to dislike my job,” she said as she turned off her recorder. An author who claimed to have been in the business for more than fifteen years had taken up more than fifteen minutes of her life. Fifteen minutes she would never get back, wasted on an angry woman who wrote stories about witches who owned cats that shifted into horny, sexually aggressive men that liked to lick their forearms.
“Fifteen years you have been writing?” she asked the author.
“Yes, these young girls running around here think they are hot shit because they have one book that made the Amazon top fifty. Half of the books they gave away to their friends. I have been scratching and clawing my way for fifteen years in this business,” the woman said.
“How many times have you made the Amazon top fifty?” Zelda asked.
The woman hissed at her.
She actually hissed at me and walked the fuck off. Zelda looked around to see if anyone else witnessed the weirdness. Nope. No one saw that freaky shit but me. Enough. I am hungry, tired, and ready to relax with Scott. Nice quiet dinner, some Netflix, a bit of dicking, a good glass of wine, and sleep.
The bracelet she’d purchased for him she’d put on his arm this morning. After a hot shower, she would put the neckpiece on him. Maybe when I leave for the airport on Sunday morning, I can put it on his neck like an engagement necklace or something.
Grinning, she made her way to the sports car, thinking she needed to get herself something more up to date versus her mother’s old Honda. She loved that car but the Porsche was growing on her. The power in her hands gave her new vitality.
Meanwhile, back at the Berger Estate, the guys in the Vent Club were not growing on Scott. They knew he was trying to get rid of them but didn’t know why.
Jo-Jo asked first, “Why are you trying to get rid of us?”
“No, I’m not trying to get rid of you. It’s just time for you to go home,” Scott said. “We met later than usual today and it is already 5:45.”
“No, you want to get rid of us,” Dwayne said.
Scott tried to look innocent, “Why would I want to do that?”
Chandler entered the room with fresh glasses of beverages as the sound of the garage door went up. The six men in the room all turned to look at Scott and then Chandler. Keys could be heard jangling in the back door as it opened, the creak that said it had been missing a much needed oiling, telling the guests in the room that someone was coming into the house. Listening carefully as if a horror scene was unfolding, the sound of the key being hung in the cabinet made them all stop. Clicking of heels could be heard on the wooden floor, coming their way. The footsteps stopped as the sound of a glass being sat upon the table, the ice cubes clinking in protest.
“Baby?” Zelda called as she turned toward the sound.
“In here, Sweetie,” he said. The footsteps quickening, coming towards the creepy red front room.
Zelda entered the living room to a room full of eyes and opened mouths.
“Oh! Hey guys,” she said as if they were people she saw every other day. There was no reaction to a room full of grown men sitting there holding various types of ventriloquist dolls. Scott rose when she entered the room, meeting her in the doorway to kiss her good evening. “I’m sorry, Baby, I didn’t know you had company.”
“Zelda, these are my friends and members of the Berger Vent Club,” he said. “That is Dwayne, my longtime friend, that’s Jo-Jo, Ralphie, Mark and Chris,” he said as he pointed to each man.
She
remained at his side.
“Pleasure to meet you all, but Jo-Jo, you need to stop staring and close the mouth of your little wooden friend. He needs to stop staring, too,” she told him as the doll’s eyes rolled back and forth.
“Zee, as soon as I get these guys out of my house, I will take you out to dinner,” Scott said to her.
“Hmmm..., I don’t want to go out. Let’s stay in and I’ll cook us something,” she offered.
It was Mark’s turn to open his mouth and gawk at her.
“You sure?” Scott asked.
“It’s getting late. By the time we get to town and get a table, I can have something done and we never even have to leave the house,” she said. Looking at the men, she asked, “Would your friends like to stay for dinner as well?”
Chris stood up, “I would!”
Ralphie piped up, “Me too!” Rubbing his round belly, imagining the good food the nice black woman was going to make, he immediately thought of his favorite soul food restaurant.
Dwayne smiled adding, “I can’t. Sheila would have a fit.” The expression on his face was one bordering on disappointment at being unable to join in on the fun. Zelda casually offered a solution.
“Invite her to join us,” Zelda offered. “Is that okay, Baby?”
“Sure. Chandler, what do we have that we can throw on the grill?” Scott asked, looking to his manservant for an answer.
“I went to the butcher’s today, Sir, so we are fully stocked,” Chandler added.
Jo-Jo held a confused expression on his face which was mimicked by his little doll. “You said grill. Who is going to grill? You Scott?”
“Yep. Sure am,” he said with pride.
“Do any of you guys need to invite your spouses or significant others?” Zelda asked, looking at Jo-Jo questionably. The pink tie he wore with the seersucker pinkish suit and bright red shoes made him the perfect tenant for the Berger house. He was just as bright as the red living room. His perfect hair, shiny, lacquer glossed nails and lightly tinted lips were cover shoot ready.
Everyone burst into laughter.
“I’m not gay. I’m just really handsome,” Jo-Jo said in defense, giving off a look of annoyance. “And extremely well dressed.”
A Frickin' Fantastic Friday (The Zelda Dairies Book 3) Page 7
