“It was indeed my first whale siting,” I said.
“Perfect,” he said in my ear. “So what was that about today being my lucky day?”
The ferry docked, and Toby held my hand as we traveled a length of intersecting wood-planked walkways, one after another, lined with endless walls of tall, wispy perennial beach grass. A “For Sale” sign wedged into the sandy, pine needle-covered ground marked our destination. I followed Toby, climbing the steps of a modest and weathered two-story house. The house’s front deck overlooked a quiet, coniferous landscape filled with scrub pines, waxy-leafed holly trees, and other local flora that had sprouted lustily from the earth during the heat of the summer.
Inside, we put our bags in the kitchen, and Toby left me to explore while he headed outside to work. I meandered through the rooms. The décor was a tad outdated—simplistic, beach rustic. Stressed white molding framed soft, cerulean blue walls in the main room, ceramic seagulls and white-framed beach photos hung on the walls, and an assortment of dried crusty shells and sand dollars lay along a shelf full of worn paperback novels.
Outside, I could hear the sound of the circular saw as it ripped through the wood and the quiet. I stood in front of the fireplace in the family room imaging it how it would look once Toby finished it. Mantels seemed to be his specialty. It was good to be handy, but having a specialty, that was pretty darn hot.
I stepped back out onto the deck where Toby, focused on his task, pulled out a pencil from behind his ear and marked the wood lain across two sawhorses.
“Can I help?” I asked.
“Sure, hold that end while I make this cut.” He tossed me a pair of clear safety glasses like his own.
Again, the spinning blade buzzed and severed the silence. Little bits of sawdust took to the wind as the scent of the new wood filled the air. The wood vibrated in my hands, and I admired the sure set of his body. He emanated confidence in his ability, and I was proud of the way he had honed his craft over the past couple of years. The magnificent fireplace mantels, both here and in the manor in Head of the Harbor, were proof that he didn’t just work his job; he sought to understand the skill and the artistry behind it. He read articles online, and whenever we went someplace new, his eyes were immediately drawn to the design details. The work filled him and rooted him in a way I’d not seen before. It had become an extension of him, and just as I was, I knew his mother was looking down at him, proud of all that he’d accomplished.
His tongue curled into the left corner of his mouth, something he did whenever he was concentrating. My body warmed at the sight. Focused Toby was incredibly sexy.
He finished the cut, and the saw quieted. “What?” He caught me watching him.
“I’m appreciating what you can do with your hands.”
He flipped his safety glasses up and smirked. “I’m beginning to think that you know exactly what saying stuff like that makes me think about, baby.”
“Yet you’re keeping those thoughts to yourself. Don’t look now Toby Faye, but you’re becoming quite a gentleman.”
He took the trimmed wood from the sawhorses and stepped closer. “Don’t give me too much credit. I may not say them, but I’m still thinking them,” he said and dropped a kiss on my lips.
“How are you so good at this?” I watched as he measured and marked the next piece. “Knowing how to cut specific dimensions takes mathematical skill, and if I remember correctly, according to your own confession, you were a terrible student.”
“I wasn’t lying. I had the grades to prove it, but my senior year, I got a job working for a window designer—a woman named Jackie. She made fancy window coverings, not curtains, like fabric covered shades and valances, the kind that interior designers custom-order to match a room’s wallpaper or color scheme.” He zipped through the second piece and carried them both into the house, me in his shadow. “She hired me after school for a few days a week to help her with framing and building the wooden valances. She was patient, worked side-by-side with me, and taught me how to measure properly. Fractions and decimals never made any sense to me on paper, but with a tape measure and wood, I finally understood.”
“Lucky that you met Jackie,” I said.
“Lucky that she hired me. I showed up for my interview after school, unimpressively dressed in T-shirt and jeans, unshaven with my hair too long. I thought she was going to shut the door in my face, but then she invited me in. At first, she kept her distance, like she was nervous, and I think because of that, I tried harder at that job than I had ever worked at anything. After a while, she was noticeably more relaxed around me.”
I leaned against the arm of the couch enjoying this new discovery, another piece of the tapestry that made up his colorful past. “I’ll bet you put her at ease. You have a way with people.”
“Well, she made it easy. She was patient with me.” The hydraulic nail gun hissed as he secured the new pieces into place. “She taught me a lot, not just the math stuff, but what it felt like to have pride in something I made. It was the first time in my life I felt empowered by something that wasn’t destructive. I found out later her husband abused her. She took her daughter and left him and started over.”
“That explains her nervousness around you,” I surmised. “It must have been frightening for her to open the door to a young and brooding Toby Faye.”
He extended the metal tape measure, his back to me, as he configured his next cuts. “She probably should’ve never let me in. I turned out to be a horrible employee.”
“You were young. It was your first job,” I said, giving him an out.
“Young and stupid,” he said and cruised past me, mumbling measurements.
I slipped outside and leaned against the simple porch railing, imagining what it might be like to live there. A scraping noise made me turn around. Toby had pushed the table saw under the eave of the house and covered it with a plastic tarp.
“I can do this later. Come on, let’s take a walk on the beach,” he said and held out his hand to me.
Hand in hand, we headed down the maze of wooden walkways in the direction of the ocean. I made him stop to watch two deer, a female and a large, antlered male graze. As we drew closer to the beach, we could hear the roar of the Atlantic pounding the shore.
White capped waves, curling as they rose up, crashed down in a hypnotic rush. From atop the beach access steps, we felt the mist of the salt water on our faces. Toby tugged my hand and led me down the wooden steps to the sand. The sky was still a bit overcast, but the air was warm and crisp with the ocean breeze. We walked along the water’s edge side by side. We passed a few diehard beachgoers, but with the gray skies and the cooling late summer temperatures, attendance on the beach was spotty at best. We had long stretches of sand to ourselves.
“Do you think that whale will find its way out to open waters?” he asked.
“It has to. It won’t survive in the bay. We should check online to see if anyone reports on it,” I said.
We must have walked about a mile down the beach, oblivious to the distance, wrapped up in conversation, when it began to drizzle. We turned around, neither of us seeming to mind the dampness, and we walked back slowly, occasionally laughing as we knocked each other into the shallow waves, saturating our shoes. He stopped at one point to look out at the surf, giving me a spectacular view of his broad shoulders outlined by the scenic horizon of the Atlantic.
I pressed up to him from behind, resting my face to his damp shirt. A love like ours had seemed impossible, but being with him made me feel more alive than I’d ever felt. Every minute together made my life before him helplessly dull in comparison.
“Seeing that whale made me think about all the things there are to do and see.” Turning, he took my hands. “I haven’t even been out of country.”
“I’ve been to Europe twice,” I said. “There’s nothing like traveling abroad. It’s amazing.”
“Let’s do that. Let’s take a trip on your winter break. Someplace exotic�
�the pyramids in Egypt. Or the Great Wall of China.”
His sense of adventure was exciting, but a ball of apprehension spun in my stomach. “That sounds nice, but we haven’t even been dating a full a year. My father won’t go for it.”
He let go my hands with a disparaging snort. “Come on, Claude.”
At a time where most people acted like dogs just let off the leash, hooking up and having sex with multiple partners, without considering love or marriage, people didn’t often understand my father’s old-fashioned ways. Like a scarlet letter, it had always set me apart from my peers.
I pushed back from him and scattered some wet sand with my flip-flop. I was uncomfortable admitting that while I didn’t feel compelled to live up to all my dad’s antiquated ways I had a need to keep up appearances. Certain expectations were ingrained in me, and I didn’t know how to live completely outside them.
“I don’t expect you to understand, but this is how I was raised.” I said.
He pulled me close to him. “Close your eyes. Can’t you imagine the two of us discovering the world… and each other? Making love on the sands of some exotic beach? There are so many things I want to do and places I want to see—with you. Live a little, Claude. If you let your father dictate what you do, he’ll hold you back. And us, too.”
Defensiveness stiffened my posture. “He’s not calling the shots. If it feels like we’re moving in slow motion, it’s because it’s what I’m comfortable with. Being with you is like nothing I’ve ever done, and I’m… I’m…”
“Afraid,” he said. “Afraid to trust a future with me.”
The experiences that shaped our lives varied greatly, and being with him paralleled a ride on a rollercoaster: I was never sure where there’d be a quick turn or breathless drop.
A wave crashed over the back of my calves, and I shrieked in surprise. I pulled off my flip-flops, and holding them above the waves, ran a few feet further into the surf. Larger waves crashed into me, testing my balance. He joined me in the water. Together, our bodies were a sturdier brace against the current.
I cupped his cheek with my hand. “Sometimes loving you is a little frightening because it’s new. I’m feeling so many things I’ve never experienced before, but I’m not afraid of you. Wipe that thought from your mind.”
His lips quirked up in a small smile as the rain began to fall harder. Toby scooped me up and ran to the access steps, depositing me on the bottom rung. With the rain battering us, we raced up the stairs and back to the house. The house was warmer than the outdoors, but my teeth still chattered with a chill. Both of us were soaked to the bone.
“Come here,” he said, enclosing me in his arms. His body was a hot furnace, and as I pressed myself against him, I felt the tight, cold tension begin to thaw. Seeking more warmth, I pushed my cold hands under his shirt to press them against his chest. “Holy shit, you nearly sent me into cardiac arrest, ice woman.” Despite the complaint, he didn’t shirk away. He rubbed my back over and over again until warmth spread through my limbs.
“There’s a dryer in the bathroom,” I said, arching an eyebrow at him. “We should get out of these wet clothes, but whatever will we do while they’re drying?”
“I don’t think it’ll be a stretch of the imagination to know what I’m thinking of.” Amusement twinkled in his eyes. “Especially since I distinctly recall someone saying today could possibly be my lucky day.”
Holding his eyes with mine, I stepped back to unzip my shorts, slogging the tight denim down my thighs to let them drop to the floor. “I did say that, didn’t I?” I kicked my shorts aside and wrapped my arms around his neck.
He kissed me gently, his rough hands trailing along the bare skin of my lower back. As his lips dipped to my neck, the final vestiges of my defense crumbled.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s do this.”
“Okay?” He pulled back and shook his head. “Oh, no, after waiting this long, a simple ‘okay’ won’t fly here. We don’t move forward until you’re one hundred percent, shouting-from-the rooftops sure you want to take this next step. Until then, I’ll be patient.”
My heart constricted with a rush of emotion. Maybe this step wasn’t new to him, but his undeniable patience made me even more certain I was making the right decision.
“Toby, I don’t have any doubts. I’m ready.” I pressed myself into him. “Make love to me.”
Dryer forgotten, we discarded our wet outerwear into a heap on the floor, and I led him to the master bedroom. Toby took off his briefs and threw himself across the bed. Tan, long and muscular, he was beautiful and all mine to touch.
“Come here.” He patted the mattress, the lilt of his voice soft and coaxing.
“Do you think Sal will mind if we use the bed? We’ll change the bedding afterwards.” I edged closer, anticipation bubbling in the back of my throat. “We just have to make sure we have enough time to wash and dry them before catching the ferry back.”
“We can burn them afterwards for all I care right now. Burn the whole damn house down, too,” he said. “Now, get naked and come here.”
“Sorry, I just—”
“Chiametti, move it. Now!”
Embarrassment flamed my face, and I scurried to remove my bra and underwear and scoot onto the bed next to him. He was the only person I’d ever been naked with, and unlike that first and only time years ago when we’d made love out in my backyard, it’d been night. There was no darkness to hide in in the middle of a summer day.
He rolled atop me, skin to skin, radiating bountiful heat, like a hot blanket over my body and chased the last of my chills away.
“Look at you.” Toby leaned back, his eyes wandering over my body. “You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
The tender look of admiration made me unafraid.
His gaze followed his fingertips like an artist’s brush, painting over the curves of my hip to my waist to the underside of my breast. He laid aside me, his hard male body strange and beautiful, so different from my own that I was overcome by my irresistible longing to have it pressed against me and inside me.
I reached out to touch him, my fingers starting at the tight, smooth muscles of his chest, trailing down the flat plane of his stomach to his erection. He was thick and hard, and his eyes flashed as I stroked him.
“Jesus, I want you so much I’m shaking.” And he was. His body trembled before he smashed his lips down onto mine, one last drugging kiss, before he leaned over to the night table and snagged his wallet. He shook the leather bifold, and in his haste, dumped all its contents out until he dislodged a string of condom packets within.
He leaned back to roll the transparent sheath over his rigid erection, and I stared, caught immobile between my desire and panic over what was about to happen. It looked so big. It wasn’t like I hadn’t seen it and handled it before, but its size hadn’t fazed me until now. Would it hurt like it did the first time? I had little time to consider it as Toby lowered a hand between my legs.
“Don’t worry, baby. I’ll go easy,” he said, recognizing my fear. “Trust me.”
He caught my left nipple between his lips, lashing it with warm, wet strokes of his tongue while his hand slipped low and his fingers drew tiny circles over the most sensitive spot between my legs. Months spent on prolonged foreplay made our motions like dance steps. His touch had me arching back and clutching his shoulders.
“Claudia, I need to be inside you.” His voice was filled with aching want as he moved between my legs, aligning his hips with mine. The direct pressure of his hardness against my sex made the thrumming in my lower belly return with a vengeance. Fixated on the necessity to slake the torturous fire, worries of pain faded. I felt his need for me, like mine for him. It had grown substantial and now felt as essential as air.
He pressed into me, my softness giving way to his hardness as he slowly filled my body. I gripped his upper arms, holding my breath until he was fully inside me. My memory of this moment in the past did no
justice to the actual fusion of our bodies now. There was nothing to compare it to. I felt completely connected to him in a way I’d never experienced with anyone else.
He caught my face in his hands, and stroking the underside of my jaw with his thumbs, his lips feathered mine. “I love you so much.”
His words set off a tempest of emotions. We had always been moving towards this moment—a time where we could once again love each other with everything we had. I felt validated. The waiting had been worth it. We had not only succeeded in getting back what we once had. We had surpassed it.
“I never knew being with someone could feel like this—so beautiful, so powerful.” Choking back a sob, I lifted my hands to his face. Overcome with emotion, tears spilled from my eyes, gravity pulling them downward to merge into my hairline. “I love you, too.”
The muted, guttural rumble from the back of his throat told me he was too overcome to respond. He threaded his fingers into my rain-dampened tresses to cup the back of my head. Thumbing the tracks of my tears from the sides of my face, he lowered his mouth to mine.
We moved together without words, our kiss conveying the hunger we felt for each other. With slow and deliberate motion, he rose up on his forearms to watch me, to watch us, move together. His gaze alternated, visibly torn between looking at my face and at the space where our bodies were joined, but the sensation was too overpowering for both of us.
His stillness caused me to look up at him and witness his desire so transparent in his softened facial features.
“Claudia, you feel like silk.” He dropped his head back and moaned.
From out of nowhere, I suddenly needed him to move—like really move. And fast.
I grabbed his butt with both hands. A noise of approval vibrated in the back of his throat, and in return, he rounded his hips forward, penetrating me deeply. I had to shut my eyes. His motion stopped, and my eyes fluttered open. The storm brewing in his eyes had grown in proportions—serious and urgent.
Keeping Claudia (Toby & Claudia Book 2) Page 8
