Tremors

by Jaid Black

  Fredrik. The man was an enigma. Strange and mysterious, so many secrets, so reclusive and isolated. Marie could only wonder at which of the stories she’d heard of him were true.

  Though one thing was certain: the more time she spent at his side watching him gaze about his garden of all things—such tenderness in his expression, such peace—well, it became more and more difficult to accept Helena Anders’ version of events as the gospel truth.

  What had really happened that night ten years past? She wondered to herself for the thousandth time. Was this man at her side truly capable of such…atrocity? Could he rape a young woman? Then cut her flesh up into pieces and feed it to wild animals to hide the evidence of his crime?

  Perhaps “could he” wasn’t the best question to ask, Marie considered with a shiver. Perhaps “would he” was more apropos. Certainly he harbored the necessary physical strength to commit so heinous an act…but would he?…that was the true question.

  “You are quiet, ängel,” Fredrik stated, breaking the silence between them. “I was telling you that this would be a lovely place to either paint or set up a desk and write.” He chuckled softly. “I’m rambling on and you’ve heard not a word of it.”

  “Sorry.” Marie cleared her throat as she glanced about the gardens. She smiled slightly, amused despite herself. “I’m listening now. You’ve got my full attention.”

  Truly, it was an extraordinarily beautiful place. So many colors, so much life. Beautiful, exotic plants and flowers, lush green trees manicured to perfection. And such a light contrast to the dark man who tended to them.

  “Right here,” Fredrik said, motioning with his hand toward an elegant chair that looked right at home within the massive garden structure. “This is where I typically sit and have coffee every morning. It would be a lovely place to paint.”

  But Marie was paying no attention to the chair amidst the gardens. She was gawking instead at the easel and paints that had already been set up beside it. Her eyes shot up to meet Fredrik’s. “You paint too?”

  “Sometimes.” He shrugged dismissively. “But I’m not very good at it.” He nodded toward the easel. “I suspect you’d be much better at it. Go on. Try it out.”

  Marie’s jaw went slack. It dawned on her, somewhere in the back of her mind, that she probably looked like an idiot, standing there naked in an outdoors garden with a fully clothed man, her mouth hanging open like a simpleton.

  But he’d shocked her. He’d well and truly floored her. She wasn’t used to men taking an interest in anything about her besides her outward appearance and yet here she stood, naked as the day she was born, completely exposed to the man at her side, and he wanted her to…paint.

  “O-Okay,” she said with a bemused grin on her face. “If you insist then I would be more than happy to paint for a while.”

  Fredrik motioned toward the easel as he seated himself in the chair across from her standing position. A coffeepot and two coffee cups had been set on a small table next to him. Marie had no idea how they had gotten there and she was too dumbfounded to think much about it. This man, this oddly mysterious man, wanted her to…paint.

  Shrugging her shoulders, she picked up a brush and did just that. And what’s more, it felt great. She loved this freedom of expression, this outlet for her emotions, and she always had. Ever since she’d been a little girl she’d had the ability to lose herself in the world of art, painting away the ugly parts of life and replacing them with the good.

  When she painted, she felt…alive. So incredibly energized and full of passion. And it showed. She was too absorbed in her work to realize it, but the man sitting across from her could see the vitality in her movements, could feel it in the very air about them.

  Two hours had gone by when at last she’d finished. Marie had set out to recreate Fredrik amongst his gardens and she’d done just that. In painstaking detail. It dawned on her only after the fact that she’d forgotten to include the scar on his forehead, that ugly reminder of the things she’d been told about him.

  Had she unconsciously omitted it on purpose? And if she had, was it because she didn’t want to believe what she’d heard, regardless to whether or not it was the truth? Or was it possible she was beginning not to believe those evil things about him at all?

  “It’s beautiful, ängel,” Fredrik murmured from behind her. Sliding his callused hands around to the front of her, he palmed her breasts, rolling the nipples between thumbs and forefingers, and studied the portrait.

  Startled, Marie jumped a bit in reaction, not having realized he had moved to stand behind her until she’d felt his hands massaging her breasts. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, arousal swamping her senses. “Thank-you.”

  “You’re welcome,” he said in low tones, plucking at the tight points, making them lengthen further. “In fact, very welcome. You recreated the gardens to perfection. It’s breathtaking.”

  “So are you,” she whispered.

  Fredrik’s hands stilled. He grew quiet, giving Marie time to regret what she’d just admitted aloud.

  And yet…she didn’t. She didn’t regret saying it at all.

  At last Fredrik’s fingers resumed their lazy exploration of her nipples. “No need to tell me lies, ängel. We agreed on a week. Words won’t change that.” His voice was harsh, stark. Like he had expected more from her than falsehoods and was disappointed when he’d been given them.

  Only she wasn’t lying. He was breathtaking to her. Physically, she reminded herself. Physically, he was breathtaking. She refused to think beyond the physical, didn’t want to let a man get behind the emotional barricades that had taken so long to erect. Especially not him.

  But Marie’s reasons for not wanting him under her skin no longer revolved around the mysterious death of Sophie Anders. They revolved instead around the fact that this man was able to see into her soul without being invited in, he was able to second guess her motivations, comprehend what made her tick. That reality frightened her as much as any malicious gossip. Perhaps even more so.

  Fredrik Sörebo wasn’t the only person standing in the garden with stone walls erected about their emotions. And, Marie thought somewhat sadly, he wasn’t the only one that thought himself unworthy, and for that reason incapable of letting those walls fall to the ground.

  Shrugging his hands from off of her breasts, she whirled around to confront him. “I didn’t lie.” Meeting his gaze, she allowed him in just far enough to see that she was telling the truth as she saw it. Perhaps other women didn’t find him visually appealing…she didn’t know. But she did. And that’s all that mattered. “I didn’t lie,” she whispered, her eyes shuttering.

  “Marie—”

  She quickly placed a palm over his mouth then closed her eyes altogether. The anguish she saw in his icy blue gaze was very real…and she didn’t want to be moved by it. And yet…

  “I didn’t lie.” Taking his hand, she led him back toward the chair he’d been occupying while she had painted. Nudging him toward it, she went down to her knees in front of him after he’d sat and slowly unzipped his pants.

  Fredrik sucked in his breath. The erection he’d sustained all afternoon long became impossibly harder, so torturous it was painful. The feel of Marie’s hands wrapped around his flesh coupled with the knowledge that she had come to him without coaxing was enough to make him shudder. “What are you doing to me, beautiful ängel?” he said hoarsely. “My god, what are you doing to me?”

  He hadn’t meant literally, of course, and they both knew it.

  Marie’s green eyes clashed with Fredrik’s pained blue ones. He needed her right now. Whatever had happened ten years ago had affected this man as greatly as it had affected Helena Anders. When she gazed into his eyes, she didn’t see a monster. She saw just a man. An ordinary, vulnerable man.

  He needed her. And strange as it was, she needed him too. She simply didn’t care about anything else right now.

  “Fredrik?”

  “Yes?” he
asked quietly.

  “You are worthy.”

  His fathomless eyes widened a bit, surprised and moved as he was by her heartfelt proclamation. And then he thought of nothing else as Marie’s lips found his manhood, her tongue coiling around its head, reeling his erection into the warmth of her mouth. “Christ.”

  Marie took him all of the way in, from crown to root, sucking up and down the length of him, again and again. She felt his muscles bunch and tense from the pleasure as his steel-hard cock disappeared into the depths of her throat. “Mmmm,” she purred in the back of her throat, feeling his pleasure as though it were her own. “Mmmmm.”

  “Christ, Marie.” Fredrik’s breathing grew heavy and labored as he watched her full lips devour him. Sucking sounds rose up, mingling with and overpowering the faint sound of birds chirping in the gardens.

  He reached out for her face, brushing her long honey-colored hair over her shoulder, wanting to watch her love him with her mouth. Her eyes were closed, her breathing dense, the expression on her face one of carnal rapture. It was enough to shatter any remnants of control he’d once held onto.

  “Yes, ängel,” he ground out, “your mouth feels so good on me.”

  And then he was gritting his teeth and closing his eyes as she sped up the pace of her sucking, smacking sounds from flesh meeting saliva growing prominent.

  He had thought to make love to her, to empty himself deep inside of her womb, but she wasn’t stopping, wasn’t relenting, wasn’t letting go. Up and down her mouth went, faster and faster, latched onto him as though it belonged there. “Christ.”

  On a groan of ecstasy, Fredrik’s entire body shuddered and convulsed as he ejaculated into her mouth and throat. The pleasure was so intense it bordered on the painful. Emotions of the heart mingled with sexual hedonism of the body. Lust coupled with affection.

  He wasn’t given time to come down from one high before Marie sent him climbing toward another. Fingers opened up the buttons on his shirt and ran through the crisp hair on his chest, over his nipples. Her mouth enveloped the flesh of his scrotum, sucking leisurely on him. “Jesus,” he groaned.

  Marie sat before him, naked and vulnerable, yet feeling very powerful. His cock was growing thick and erect…because of her. His breathing was rapid and raspy…because of her. Perhaps he even felt worthy…and perhaps it was because of her.

  The wetness between her legs intensified as she once again wrapped her lips and tongue around his manhood. His moans of pleasure further aroused her, causing her to suck faster and harder, wanting to hear him moan louder, needing to feel the proof of his desire for her.

  She sat on her knees between his legs and sucked on him, getting lost in the sounds of his guttural groans, growing moist from his obvious pleasure. She continued to suck for at least ten minutes more, ten long pleasurous minutes, until he was once again close to bursting and her jaw had gone numb from maintaining the same open-mouthed position for so long.

  “Marie,” he panted, his breathing harsh. “Climb onto my lap, ängel. Come sit on my lap.”

  She did as she was bade, rising up from her knees to straddle her legs around Fredrik’s hips. Clutching at either side of his face, she covered his mouth with her own as she sank down onto his erection and seated him fully within her.

  “Oh god,” she moaned, breaking the kiss as she began to ride him, “you feel so good, Fredrik. Your cock feels so good.”

  “So does your tight pussy, ängel.” He grabbed her hips and slammed her down on top of him with deep, fast thrusts. “I want this pussy forever, Marie,” he said with clenched jaws. “When I wake up in the morning, I want to feel it fucking me. When I take lunch in the afternoons, I want it for dessert. When I get hungry at night, I want it at my beck and call, always ready to pleasure me.”

  Marie groaned as she threw her head back, baring her throat to him, riding him fast and wantonly. He bit down on her neck, holding her there, his fingers digging into the flesh of her hips.

  And then she was coming, groaning, the intensity of her orgasm overpowering her. Her flesh contracted around his, coaxing out his own release, causing him to erupt within her. “Fredrik.”

  Clutching her hips tightly, he met her flesh with thrusts of his own, ramming into her as his manhood spurted. With a shout of completion, he emptied himself into her body, shuddering from the intensity of it.

  And when they came down, their bodies still joined together, they held each other without speaking, cuddled together in mutual exhaustion. They stayed like that, clutching one another as the sun sank below the horizon, illuminating the gardens with shades of vibrant color.

  Chapter 9

  “Check mate.”

  “Damn.”

  Marie giggled as she glanced from the chessboard towards Fredrik’s disgruntled expression. “Oh come on, you won one time out of three.” She batted her eyelashes teasingly. “One out of three isn’t so bad.”

  He mumbled something under his breath, but winked at her good-naturedly. “The thing about beautiful angels, I’m discovering, is that when it comes to winning, they are vicious devils.”

  Marie smiled, but said nothing.

  Silence ensued, the only sound that of the flames crackling in the gaming parlor’s fireplace…a sound Marie was quickly growing accustomed to. There were no televisions in this old stone fortress, no modern appliances, not even a single clock so far as she could tell. It was easy to lose oneself in the past here, to forget they were living in the twenty-first century, rather than in a time far removed.

  “What are you thinking?” Fredrik asked quietly from the chair across from hers. He picked up his glass of wine and sipped from it. “You’ve grown quiet.”

  “I was just thinking how much of a relic this old place is,” she admitted on a shrug. “Not that it isn’t beautiful because it’s the most wonderfully unique home I’ve ever seen. But why is it you never had the castle modernized?”

  His crystalline gaze bore right into her, never blinking. “Because when you try to change something that’s perfect already the result always becomes rather ugly.”

  Marie nibbled on her lower lip as she studied him. He was speaking in double entendres, she knew, but wasn’t quite certain if she understood exactly what he’d meant by it.

  “Are you cold, ängel?” Fredrik asked, setting his glass of wine back down on the tabletop beside him. “I can throw another log onto the fire if that’s the case.”

  “No.” Marie shook her head slightly. “I’m quite warm, thank-you.”

  “Then why are your nipples so hard?” he said thickly.

  Marie’s head shot up. She glanced toward Fredrik’s lap and instantly noticed he had a large and impressive arousal bulging inside of his pants. The lids of his eyes were heavy, his gaze glazed over with desire.

  She grew immediately wet in reaction, her nipples hardening even further.

  “What’s this?” she asked playfully, her own voice lower in tone than normal. “You don’t want to play another game of chess?”

  He ignored her teasing banter and held out a hand to her. “Come to me, Marie.”

  It didn’t take an Einstein to figure out why Fredrik wanted her there, nor did one need a high IQ to realize that Marie desired to give him what he craved. Every moment that they spent in each other’s company strengthened the mutual bond they shared that was at once emotional and fundamentally sexual.

  Never, not once, had Marie dared give her heart to a man. And now she feared that the very thing she’d so long dreaded was coming to pass against her will. She was becoming vulnerable to Fredrik Sörebo, to a man many called a monster.

  “Alright,” she replied as she stood, “I’m coming.”

  When she reached his side, she dropped to her knees before him and settled her naked body between his legs. Unzipping his slacks, she freed his erection and swirled her tongue around the pre-ejaculate covered tip until she felt him tense beneath her.

  “This is what you want, isn’t it Fredri
k?” She licked at him again, toying with him a bit. “You like it when I suck you off, don’t you?” she whispered seductively.

  “I don’t like it,” he amended, “I love it.” His callused fingers ran through her hair, brushing it back. “Same as I love your willingness and desire to please me,” he murmured.

  She smiled, running the steel velvet tip across her cheek, brushing it across her lips. “Do you really want me to stay here forever, Fredrik?”

  “Forever and a day,” he countered softly, meaningfully. “Forever and a day.”

  Marie closed her eyes, lowered her mouth onto his shaft, and sucked him until he fell asleep in the chair, replete and content.

  * * * * *

  “What are you looking at?”

  Surprised he’d woken back up, Marie gestured toward the album of photographs sitting in Fredrik’s lap as she sat down on the arm of the chair he was seated in. She’d only been gone long enough to get a drink. His pants were still unzipped from when she’d had him in her mouth a few hours ago, the black hair on his hard belly disappearing into a thin line out of sight inside of the expensive material.

  His clear blue eyes flicked over her nude flesh and hovered at her breasts, inducing her nipples to harden.

  “Pictures, ängel.”

  She rolled her eyes and grinned. “I figured out that much, Fredrik.” She threw a hand absently toward the photographs in question. “But what, or who rather, are they of?”

  He shrugged. “A little of everybody. My parents before they died, my older brother before he died, and me…” He glanced away and cleared his throat.

  …before I died.

  The thought hovered there between them, those unspoken words. Marie knew instinctively that he would have said them aloud had he not thought better of it first.

  She decided against pressing him for more information, realizing instead that he needed to be drawn out of his black mood before it devoured him. “Your mother was lovely,” she said cheerfully. “You have her eyes.”