With all my strength I wrench myself away from him and stepping out of his reach stare at him panting, aroused, and terrified. ‘Right, you’ve had your fun, now let’s get you in,’ I say shakily.
He holds his hand out meekly, and I take it and pull him up. He comes so easily I realize he never needed my help.
‘You OK?’ I ask.
‘Never felt better.’
I help him to the bed. He falls on it and purposely brings me with him. With him on top of me he gazes into my eyes.
‘So you are planning to leave, huh?’
‘I thought you wanted me to anyway,’ I whisper.
‘Yeah, sure. You’re one strange gal, Lily.’
‘Why did you walk out then?’
He gives a bark of laughter. ‘I wanted to see what you would do. I didn’t realize it would take you so long to make your move.’ He rolls off me and lying on his back brings out a packet of cigarettes from his shirt pocket.
I frown. ‘You don’t smoke?’
‘I do…in times of extreme provocation.’ He lights it and inhales deeply. He blows out the smoke and turns to me. ‘I smoked a pack a day until I was nineteen.’
So much I don’t know about him. ‘What did you do when you left here?’
He makes an amused noise. ‘I sat outside the room and called down and got someone to bring me a bottle and some cigarettes. They’re very good here. They wanted to bring me a glass as well, but I told them not to bother.’
There is ash gathering at the end of his cigarette, and I move to find a saucer or something to use as an ashtray, but he immediately tightens his hold on my wrist. ‘Where do you think you’re going, young lady? I haven’t had my way with you yet.’
I put my mouth close to his ear. ‘Isn’t your dick a bit too limp for that?’
He laughs, a lovely deep rumble, then puts his mouth to my ear and whispers, ‘I’m rock hard and hungry for you, babe.’
Suddenly my body feels tight and jittery. ‘Really?’
‘It’s a done deal. All nine inches.’
I can’t help, but smile.
‘Try it and see.’
I lean back and look into his eyes. They are hazy, almost smoky with sensuality and seductive promise. I run my hand over the material of his crotch. Indeed the man is rock hard. My body instantly responds. My mouth is dry. I lick my lips. ‘Let me go get an ashtray first.’
I find a glass on the coffee table and bring it back. Jake has taken his shirt off and is sitting slumped against the pillows. He is holding between his thumb and forefinger the black chip worth ten thousand pounds from Eden and is staring at it reflectively. His hair has fallen over his forehead and he looks up at me slowly. At that moment he doesn’t look drunk. Just devastated. Utterly devastated.
I stand frozen in the doorway.
It is impossible to tell what he is thinking. He takes a drag of his cigarette and blows it out slowly. He puts the chip on the side table and turns toward me. ‘Come in,’ he invites softly. ‘Because I’m dying to fuck you with my tongue.’
‘That’s so dirty,’ I say as I discard my skirt on the way to the four-poster. I climb onto the mattress, take the cigarette out of his mouth, kill it at the bottom of the glass, and position myself with my sex right slap bang on his mouth.
My back arches as he begins to devour me. I come quickly and intensely. When I look down into his eyes, they are almost black with desire. Leaning back I slowly rub my hand over his crotch. I pull my body away from his face and I start to take his trousers off.
‘I need to take a piss. Don’t go anywhere,’ he says.
I listen to the strong splash of his urine hitting the toilet bowl and I remember my nan saying, ‘You can tell a man’s health by the strength of his morning piss.’ Well, it’s confirmed. He’s one healthy man. I hear the tap running and then he comes back. There is still a little sway in his walk, but he seems more sober now.
He stands at the edge of the bed looking at me. ‘Every time I see that sexy little mouth of yours I just want to fuck it. I want to fuck it until it is all red and swollen and then I want to fuck it some more.’
And that is exactly what he does after he picks up the phone and cancels my taxi. He puts the phone down and fucks my mouth long and deep and then he finishes off in my pussy. There is no tenderness given and none asked. This is just lust. Pure lust. Both of us craving each other’s bodies and taking it hard and fast because we can’t have what we really want. At least that is true for me. What I want is shimmering in the distance. Way beyond my reach.
Afterward he lies beside me. I can see that the alcohol is shutting him down. He is valiantly fighting it, but the edge of a deep sleep is less than a blink away.
‘You’re going to have one hell of a hangover when you wake up.’
‘I’ll live,’ he mutters.
‘Go to sleep, Jake,’ I encourage.
‘Will you be here when I wake up?’
I pause. ‘Yeah.’
‘Don’t leave me, Lily, or Jewel, or whatever your real name is.’
‘My real name is Lily Strom,’ I whisper.
His eyes widen. ‘No, your name is Lily Eden,’ he murmurs.
I smile sadly, and he runs his fingertips along the curve of my hip. My body quivers at the delicate touch. My nipples come alive, hardening, darkening, tingling, calling. I stop thinking about anything else but him and the strong sensation that he is touching my very soul. The emotion is unbearably intense, maybe too intense. A tear leaks out of each corner of my eyes.
No matter how many obstacles, our bodies can always find each other. My brain says no, but my body tells me this man has to be part of my future. I have to find a way for us to be together. And staying here while I am confused and vulnerable is not the way. I need time to sort out what I am going to do about Mills, my job and my terrible guilt about the love I have for this man.
He stops stroking my hip and drags his thumb down the path of my tears. I swallow hard and blink. He puts his thumb into his mouth.
‘Salty,’ he pronounces.
I flash a wobbly smile.
‘Did you know that otters hold hands before they go to sleep so they don’t float away?’
I slip my hand into his and he tightens his hold on it.
He smiles and his eyelids droop. He forces them open. It’s a lost battle. Not long to go now.
‘The first time I saw you I thought you were an angel come to save me,’ he mumbles.
I say nothing, I just watch as he slips into a deep drunken stupor. I lie next to him for another few minutes watching him, listening to his even breathing. When his body is totally relaxed and dead to the world I slowly pull my hand out of his grip, but even though his entire body is limp as if passed from this world, his hand is clinging onto me like a claw. Gently, one by one I pry his fingers away. Very gently I kiss his forehead.
Quietly I get out of bed and into my skirt. I retrieve my panties from the pocket of his pants and go into the living room. On hotel stationery I write a note.
I’m not running away.
I just need a bit of time
to think and sort my head
out.
xx Lily
Then I softly close the door. I have a plane to catch. I am in such a daze that it is only when I am high in the sky that I realize I am still wearing both my engagement and wedding rings. I twist them around my finger in horror. I can’t believe I have left him. My body feels hollow where my heart should be.
FOUR
Lily
I clear customs in Heathrow and head straight for the payphones. I find one that is coin operated and lay my coins in a row along the metal ledge. I lift the receiver, pick up a pound, push it into the slot, and dial Robin’s number. His answering service clicks on and for a split second it occurs to me that I have done the wrong thing. In that split second I even consider terminating the call without saying anything, but then I hear myself speak.
‘Hey, Robin. No panic.
Everything is just fine. Just touching base. Saying hello. Call you another day. Byeeee.’
I click the disconnect button quickly and close my eyes, full of regret, wishing I hadn’t called him. That was another mistake. My voice had been normal, cheery even, but while I was talking an announcement had been made. He will know I am calling from an airport and, being the bright button that he is, alarm bells will be going off as to why if all is well I would be calling him from an airport simply to say hello. With every decision I take I seem to be digging myself deeper and deeper into a hole.
On the spur of the moment I decide not to go back to the company flat, and instead take a taxi to my grandmother’s house. Staring unhappily out of the window I fret about whether to call my mother. I know I should, but ever since Luke died, she has become so fragile I have learned to either bear my burdens silently or take them over to Nan.
The driver drops me off outside her ground floor flat, and I go up to her blue door and ring the bell. Her little face appears at the window. I wave and she breaks into a massive grin. At that moment she is no longer a sprightly seventy-two-year-old woman, but a mere child.
In seconds her beaming face is at her open door.
She greets me in the traditional Chinese way, by asking me if I have eaten.
‘Yes,’ I reply automatically, but she bundles me energetically through the door past the Feng Shui cat with its waving arm, and into her small, rather dim kitchen. It has old-fashioned, dark wood furniture and the air smells of incense that has been lit in the red prayer altar of the Kitchen God, Zao Jun. In front of his statue she has left an offering: a blue bowl of oranges.
‘Sit, sit,’ Nan says, and starts filling her electric steamer with water.
‘I’m actually not hungry,’ I protest.
‘You’re never hungry,’ she grumbles. She switches on the appliance and turns around, her hands on her hips. ‘Look at you, as thin as one of those throw-away chopsticks.’ She narrows her eyes. ‘And have you been lying in the sun again?’
‘It’s called a tan, Nan.’
‘Tan, my foot. These unattractive Western traditions that you have picked up. You should have seen your great-grandmother. She was as white as a lotus blossom.’
‘Talking of traditions, didn’t she also have bound feet?’
She stares at me disapprovingly. ‘What’s that got to do with taking care of your skin?’
‘Nan,’ I say tiredly, ‘I haven’t come here to talk about the state of my skin.’
She shakes her head and moves toward her freezer. She rummages around and brings out white buns made of Hong Kong flour with chicken and pork filling. She shows me the packet. ‘See? Your favorite brand.’
‘Thanks,’ I say weakly. The last thing I feel like is food.
While she busies herself placing the buns into the steamer I look around me. Nothing in Nan’s kitchen ever seems to change. From the time Luke and I were kids everything looks and smells the same. We used to love coming here. There was always some kind of celebration—moon cake festival, lanterns, Chinese New Year festivities when we used to eat sticky sweet cakes, get money in red packets, and burn fire crackers to speed the Kitchen God on his journey back to heaven.
Nan wipes her hands and comes to sit beside me.
‘Nan,’ I begin. ‘You know I became an undercover police officer, right?’
‘Of course. You told me this yourself. I’m not senile yet, you know?’
‘Well, anyway, I was sent on this assignment and…er…’
Her sharp dark eyes gaze at me curiously.
‘I think I’ve developed, well, feelings for my target.’
There is no discernible expression in her face. ‘Tell me about him. What kind of man is he?’
‘He is loyal to his family, kind to animals, and… He is fair.’
‘Why do the police want him?’
‘He’s supposed to be a drug dealer.’
I see fear whip into her eyes and she clasps her hands tightly together.
‘But I don’t think he is one, though.’
Her hands unclasp with relief.
I bite my lip. ‘But I am also afraid that my judgment may be colored by the way I feel about him.’
She leans forward. ‘Can it be the police have got it wrong?’
‘Unlikely,’ I admit reluctantly.
She frowns and studies me. ‘So why have you come to see me then?’
For a moment I stare into her familiar eyes. And then I realize that I have come to see her because I trust her. I trust her not to bullshit me about anything. And because I know she is non-judgmental, except about things like getting a tan and modern Western ways. But more importantly because I know that something is wrong. If I put it all out on the table for her to peer at she might pick up what I have missed.
‘I’ve come because I’m feeling confused and guilty. And I know you can’t make it better, but maybe just talking about it all to you will clear it up for me.’
‘What are you feeling guilty about?’
‘I believe I am betraying Luke in the worst possible way by falling in love with a suspected drug dealer. Even if the police are wrong, and that is a very unlikely scenario, it is still all a horrible, horrible mess. I feel as if I have become so steeped in filth and mire that a part of me will never get out of it.’
Nan leans forward. ‘When you were born I wanted your mother to name you Lotus, but she refused. She said that name was too old-fashioned. In an attempt at compromise she named you Lily, but she didn’t understand. She thought because my name, Lan, means orchid, I wanted you to be named after a flower too. I didn’t. I wanted to call you Lotus because I looked into your big blue eyes and I felt the sheer strength and purity of your personality. My granddaughter is going to grow up to be strong and pure. Like the Lotus she can remain in filth and mire all her life but she will rise out of it clean and pure. Not a tiny drop of mud or slime can stick to her.’
Tears fill my eyes. I blink them away quickly. ‘I don’t feel very pure, Nan. In fact I feel as if my feelings for Jake and my guilt about betraying Luke are clouding my instincts and intellect, and making me miss something. Something very important.’
She covers my hand with one of hers. ‘When you were a baby, not even two years old, I would sit you on that cabinet.’ She points to the high, lacquered cabinet where she stores her odds and ends. ‘And I would tell you not to move. And you wouldn’t. You wouldn’t move at all. You’d sit there with your legs dangling down.’
I look at the cabinet. It does seem a high perch to put a small child on.
‘It was amazing how you were aware of the danger, but unafraid. I could even leave the room. I did a few times too. But I could never do that with Luke. I could never trust him. I always knew he didn’t know what was good for him. You have to trust your instincts. If you think he is a good man, then I trust you. If your instincts are telling you something is not right then I would trust them implicitly.’
I nod gratefully. I know Nan is right. The only times I have gone wrong in my life are when I have not followed my instincts.
‘There is something else, too, that is really bothering me. I am so in love with him I can’t imagine my life without him, but I don’t know whether he really cares about me, or if it’s just sex for him.’
Nan’s eyes flash. ‘A man can find sex anywhere.’
‘Yes, but not the kind of sex we have. We can’t keep our hands off each other.’
‘Intimacy is the flesh clearing the path for hearts and souls,’ she says primly.
‘What happens if the lust goes and there is no love?’
‘Wait here,’ Nan commands, and goes into the hallway. I hear her enter her bedroom and open her armoire. She comes back with a small box. Seashells have been crudely stuck all around it. She puts it on the table in front of me, sits down and looks at me.
‘Go on, open it,’ she invites.
I do and it is full of an assortment of small, worthless objects
, a yellow button, a bit of shiny foil, a bright orange earring, a screw… I raise my eyes back to her. ‘What are all these things?’
‘Don’t you remember them at all?’
I frown. Vaguely. Something…almost dream-like breaks into my memory. I pick up the orange earring. It is smooth and old. I look up at her. ‘I remember this. I know it’s mine, but I don’t remember where it came from or how it slots into my past.’
She smiles.
‘Yes, these are all yours. From the time you were about three years old until you were five you lived with Granddad and me in a rented house close to an abandoned factory. Many crows lived there. At first they would swoop down and eat the food that you accidentally dropped. But then you began to feed them, nuts, breadcrumbs, dry dog food. And they began to bring you presents. All these were brought to you by the crows. They were showing you their love.’
‘I don’t remember,’ I say with a frown.
‘It was a long time ago.’
And suddenly I have a memory, of a flock of crows on the ground beside me. They are all busy feeding. I smile at Nan full of wonder. ‘I remember them now. Why did you show me this today?’
‘Bright shiny things are given to us by people who love us.’ She looks at my rings. ‘Like those.’
‘You noticed?’
‘I’m old. I’m not blind,’ she says, and goes to take the buns out of the steamer.
I sigh. ‘Yeah, we got married. I’m afraid it’s all a huge mess.’
‘Never mind. Let’s eat now. What is this thing the British are always saying? It will all come out in the wash.’
‘Nan, why did Luke and I come to live with you?’
Nan doesn’t turn to look at me. ‘Your mother was ill at that time.’
‘She didn’t want us, did she?’
She whirls around suddenly, her face as fierce as I have ever seen it. ‘She wanted both of you, but she was ill, Lily. She was ill, the same way Luke was.’
Crystal Jake: The Complete EDEN Series Box Set Page 21
