She lay facing him as if she were formed of ice, but he refused to look into her expressive eyes, afraid of what he’d find there. More pain, more frustration, more desperation. He could only hope that once his cock lay deep inside her cunt that she’d realize his deep love for her, that she’d change her mind.
Chapter Two
Kierra squirmed under his deft, experienced hand as his warm palm trailed up the outside of her thigh, sending delicious shivers into her pussy. Need spiraled into sharp-pointed arousal, and despite her misgivings, she relaxed into the pleasure that he offered.
“You’re hot for me.” His statement was matter-of-fact and filled with awe.
This time his earnest, slumberous eyes met hers. His long fingers burned a trail of fire along her skin under the well-worn cotton of her uniform. She marveled at the tenderness with which he not only spoke but also caressed her. She moaned as her pussy clenched in a short, powerful spasm.
“When we were younger, I’d get so horny just thinking about you naked under me, even as we lay under the stars looking up at heaven.” He chuckled lightheartedly. “All I knew, heaven was right beside me and her name was Kierra.”
She couldn’t help herself and smiled. They’d never made love before. “You sound as if you’re a lovesick fool.” His fingers edged between the elastic of her panties and her burning skin. Kierra shifted, longing for him to move faster, to ease the desperate yearning swirling through her body. Her nipples beaded into tight buds and her channel was wet with her juices.
“Don’t put words into my mouth,” he kidded, his eyes lighting up. He jerked aside the elastic. His thumb searched and expertly found her weeping channel. “And you said you didn’t want me.”
Kierra snorted self-derisively, sensing their relationship had taken a major turn. They were no longer children. He was twenty-four to her nineteen, and although they’d never been afraid to touch each other, they were at this moment exploring each other at an intimate level. Her mind urged her to escape the sexual madness in which they were embroiled, but her heart demanded more and her body even more yet.
Her fingers strayed to his nape and to the fine hairs there. As a child, he’d worn his hair shoulder-length, but had acquiesced to society’s pressure that Jaquill men sported it short. She never wore her long hair down anymore, not even to sleep at night. Instead, she twisted it into a braid, then into a tight bun to make herself as featureless as possible as all the other white women did. Kattanee women were not allowed to flaunt any part of their body. It was considered shameful and a punishable offense to wear short-hemmed uniforms or make-up. It was a capital offense to sleep with a Jaquill male.
Kierra groaned as Jamar’s thumb rubbed her clit in tight circles. She could still get up, pull her uniform down to her knees and walk away, couldn’t she?
His chest rose and fell with his ragged breathing. “I’ve wanted you like this for such a long time. It was making me crazy.” His voice was as gentle as a welcome breeze on a humid summer’s day.
She didn’t say anything to spoil the moment, one she’d never have again. After they finished making love and satisfying the demands of their bodies, she’d go out of her way never to see him again. That is, if she wasn’t found with him in his bed and put to death before that. Her heart drummed loudly as he pressed his wrist against the slight curve of her mons.
“Oh,” she murmured, as her muscles tensed and the whole length of her body quivered. She closed her eyes tightly as an orgasm ripped her apart.
Jamar laughed softly. “That’s my girl. Just keep it coming.”
She tried to squeeze her thighs together to deter him from rubbing her hard clit. He edged her legs apart wider with his knee. His rigid cock nestled against her lower thigh, pulsing, aroused and insistent with its own need.
Another orgasm rent through her, mocking her determination never to allow Jamar near her again. As if she’d been able to resist being with him, she admonished herself.
“I want to see all of you,” he said reverently. “Your breasts, your cunt, everything,” he whispered, lifting his thumb from her clit.
“No,” she protested, opening her eyes wide. She couldn’t let him see her naked. Without her clothes, she was much too vulnerable.
His eyebrows shot up in question. “Are you changing your mind?” he asked in a husky baritone.
“You’ve never given me a choice to begin with,” she murmured, fully meeting his hot gaze. Choices for kattanee were strongly discouraged.
He pursed his lips into a thin line. “How inconsiderate of me.”
His hands traveled to her throat. He didn’t bother with buttons, grasped the fabric of her collar and tore the material down her front in half.
“Jamar,” Kierra chided softly, “look what you’ve done.” Without any effort, they were back to the easy camaraderie they’d shared when they were young.
His adoring smile twisted her heart. “Well, I’ll be,” but there was no contrition in his tone. His gaze focused on her barely covered breasts. With a tender finger, he tossed the cotton toward her arm where it fluttered then he did the same with the other side, exposing each soft globe to his admiring eyes.
She beheld his face, his full lips slightly parted, his concentration intense, and his nostrils flaring. She realized he’d all but shut her out emotionally, which was new to her and terrifying. He’d never done that before. Sadly, they had changed, even though they were still perfectly suited to each other in the same way night and day were perfect complements but never meant to meld. Night and day, Jaquill and kattanee, there was no mixing the two.
Tears blurred Kierra’s eyes and rather than let Jamar see her cloying fear, she closed them.
* * * *
Jamar watched as her nipples puckered into even tighter pebbles. His heart roared in his ears as he’d heard the waves pounding furiously at the side of the jagged cliff on the far side of Becutan near the ocean. His groan reverberated around them.
He’d waited for Kierra for so long. He’d sought the right opportunity and persuaded his mother, the house overseer, to assign Kierra to clean his rooms. Like an awestruck teenager, he didn’t know what to do now that Kierra was in his arms. He could only stare as his balls hardened painfully. Swallowing hard, he lowered his head and slipped a tiny bud into his mouth to savor it with his hot tongue.
She moaned. Her fingers dug into his shoulders, flexing and un-flexing with turbulent passion. Blinded by his need, he shakily unbuckled his belt and tugged his pants down his legs. His breathing was raspy and his pulse was tattooed.
“Kierra,” he ground out with great effort, his mind momentarily drawing a blank to any other thought than that she was here with him.
Her hair! He’d loosen her golden tresses and rake his fingers through the silken strands. When his hand touched the tight knot on top of her head, she batted her eyes open, her gaze inquiring.
“Your beautiful hair,” he said softly. “You never wear it down like you used to.”
She did nothing to stop him as he twisted the elastic of her hair band and the lustrous strands unraveled and fell across the pillow. He combed through the tangles and when her hair flowed on the stark white of the pillow, he said, “Why don’t you wear your hair down when you’re with me?”
She was so very beautiful. Why did society have to make such stupid rules about keeping Jaquill and kattanee Manitee-ans apart?
“I can’t be with you again,” she murmured before averting her gaze.
The gaping chasm between them, not through any fault of their own, was still there. He would attempt to rectify that though as soon as his father passed away. Jamar wanted far-reaching change whereas his father wouldn’t even think of them. The kattanee would have more freedom, and the Jaquill would have fewer powers over them.
“I will have power over the villa kattanee,” he whispered against her ear. “I’ll change their circumstances. None will have to wear white, and everyone can make friends with those who appeal
to them. And I’ll do away with the death penalty.”
She shook her head. “Becutan are resistant to change of any type, especially the black-skinned ones,” she whispered.
He turned her chin toward him and forced her to look at the determination etched on his face. “When we were children, we never had to think twice about running outside and playing with each other. Everything came easily to us. I want it to be the same always, for everyone, no matter what age they are.”
“You’re a dreamer. You can’t change those things.” She moistened her bottom lip and the small action drove him wild.
“You’ve said that before, too many times to count. I may not be able to change them all at once, but gradually I can. We’ll worry about that later. Right now, I’ve got more important things to do. Like fuck you out of your mind.”
“Hmm?”
He didn’t think she expected a reply and gave her none. His cock was about to explode in a burst of heat and arcing fireworks. He lifted his knee and settled between her thighs. Cool air washed over his damp, perspiring back. Her fingers, exerting pressure, silently urged him on.
His own joy knew no bounds. The tip of his rock-hard shaft nuzzled her slick entrance. Very slowly, he slid into her channel. She was so wet and ready for him. Sucking her other nipple, he began to thrust with long, even strokes. Her vagina convulsed around his cock, and once more, he heard her groan as her tension heightened then dissipated as she climbed another mountain on her way to an orgasm.
Jamar had wanted this first time with Kierra to be special, to savor their joining, but he couldn’t hold on any longer.
“Kierra!” he cried out and lost himself in a flurry of bliss and exuberant whirlwinds that picked him up and tossed him in every direction.
* * * *
Jamar’s arm lay across the flat of her stomach as he slept, his breathing light and even. Their lovemaking had been explosive, but the ever-present fear reared its rotting head again. Dreading she’d be discovered, Kierra had to get up without disturbing him.
She watched his long lashes flutter and, for a brief moment, thought her chance to escape was gone. But maybe he was dreaming. He continued to sleep.
What goes on in your beautiful head, Jamar? Is it fanciful dreams of changing the way things are? Of making promises you simply can’t keep because most on this plantation and elsewhere are resistant to change, those stuffy ones who won’t let you? You must know the danger you put me in, but as ever, you think you can whisk a magic wand and make everything all better, don’t you? You are a dreamer, Jamar Q’ellan. I knew that the first time I set eyes on you as you paddled a makeshift raft that couldn’t possibly stay afloat. And even though I was ten years old, I fell inexplicably and madly in love with you. But I’m kattanee and you’re not, sweet Jamar. There is a deep division between us that can’t be forded no matter how we try or what we do.
She remembered the time they’d strolled into an ice cream shop to cool themselves with a sweet treat. The kattanee would not serve her but he was only too happy to serve Jamar, whose skin was black and which made him better than her.
She was very nearly ready to walk out when Jamar had called her back, offered her the strawberry ice cream he’d just bought and turned to the slave behind the counter and purchased one for himself. Tongues had wagged for days after that. Jamar has the hots for Kierra Vonne, a lowly kattanee. Ha! She didn’t even know what the ‘hots’ were, to tell the truth.
She never did tell him that her father had whipped her for that while her poor mother had watched with a horrified expression. After her father had finished and he’d gone, her mother rubbed salve on Kierra’s bruised back and told her that black and white had no place together. None at all. Hadn’t anyone ever taught Jamar that lesson, too?
No, I suppose not. He was black, he was Jaquill and they were never taught to abase themselves. Why would they be? But the kattanee continually had reinforced for them that they were nobody, that they couldn’t do the same things or own the same type of luxurious possessions as the Jaquill did. Soon they wouldn’t be able to breathe the same air.
Tears streamed down Kierra’s cheeks. Why was she so fatalistic? She swallowed hard on a ball of sheer, rising terror. He was the man of her dreams, but they were too far apart to share the same bed repeatedly as man and wife. A marriage between black and slave was unheard of.
“What are you thinking?” Jamar asked in a trace of a whisper.
He startled her so badly she began shaking and, unable to speak, rested her palm over her thumping heart.
“Nothing good, I imagine.” He sighed heavily and tenderly caressed the cheek nearest him.
She didn’t dare meet his eyes and pursed her lips, wondering what she should tell him. However, no matter how her mind raged, silence was best and didn’t get her into trouble.
“I know of a man who knows a captain of a spaceship. He could find us a way out of here,” Jamar told her quietly.
She turned to him, her lips trembling, her mind rushing from one thought to another at a mile a minute.
“We might get caught.” Then she’d face death without flinching, knowing she’d had no choice but to accept her fate because she loved Jamar.
His thumb feathered up to her lower lip and trailed across the dry skin. “But then, we might not. Do you still read?” he continued in a voice that caressed her whole body with its soft timbre.
Speechless, she nodded. Kierra didn’t have much time after cleaning the villa from morning ‘til night and only read when she wasn’t exhausted, which wasn’t often.
“Have you read about the scientific experiments on Praadar?”
She shook her head. The kattanee didn’t have much access to information from other worlds. Jamar, however, was well read, and he could use his galaxy communication device, a GCD, that fit in his pocket for information he wanted. Kattanee were forbidden to own them.
“Men and women on Praadar are changing their skin color the same way they change their hair color. It’s fascinating.” Jamar continued to caress her cheek, but with the back of his knuckles.
“How do they do it? Do they paint themselves?” Kierra ventured to ask. They probably had to take a pill, and the transformation had to have some lasting effect, maybe an irreversible one.
She closed her eyes, enjoying the sensation of his soothing hand on her face.
“Nothing like that. They do it with a self-administered injection.”
“On Praadar they don’t have much in the line of restrictions?” The Pradaarians were a free people, as free as the soaring eagle, she thought as the walls of Jamar’s room began to close in on her. On Praadar, there were no kattanee, no Jaquill and each person was free to choose how they lived. Such a contrast to Manitee-a and Becutan.
“Not many that I know of. Men and women change their skin color to make a statement or for fun. I’ve seen it.”
“To make a statement? But why?”
“Principally the teenagers are doing that, to show their parents they can be different. It’s the latest rage there to change the color of your skin.” He paused and heaved a deep sigh. “Here,” he waved his hand at the room and beyond, “we’re stuck in the dark ages, and the war between Jaquill and kattanee continues.”
“It’s not a war,” Kierra interjected, her voice sounding strained. “It’s the way things are. The past is finished. There’s no going back to undo what our forbearers began.”
“But that’s my point,” he said, his voice suddenly laced with excitement.
She instantly missed his gentle touch.
“Skin color doesn’t matter. After all, the same red blood runs through our veins. We have the same illnesses, the same joys, the same sorrows. We are born and die exactly the same way. Do you see what I mean?”
She did see. Only too clearly but she wouldn’t admit that to her friend, now her one-time lover.
“No.” Abrupt fear overrode her curiosity. It was much safer not to know, to pretend that bein
g a kattanee was all right because she’d been born to it, just as Jamar had been born Jaquill.
His sexy mouth turned down. His gaze pleaded with her.
She gave him a disapproving frown.
“You have to see,” he protested. “You’re my soul mate.”
Her heart broke in two. She began to roll over to the other side of the bed to get up. “I’ve got work to do, Jamar. I’m a kattanee.”
He reached out and seized her upper arm in an unrelenting grip. “Stay with me. Please.”
She turned her head and let her gaze rest on him as she pondered his statement. Too bad he was naked. His cock was no longer flaccid but rigid and long. There was no mistaking he wanted her again.
Tugging on her arm, she said, “No. You treat me as your equal when it suits you, but when you want something from me, then you look down your nose at me.”
His gaze followed hers before he eyed her face. “Kierra, I love you. There is no other woman in this world or any other who’s quite like you or ever will be. Don’t you understand?” With lightning speed, he sat up and pushed her sideways across the bed.
“No,” she groaned. “I don’t understand.”
He canted his head to one side, evidently thinking. His eyes glazed over, and the sweet strains of a classical piece began. The emotion evident in the music haunted Kierra. It was as if Jamar could change her mind with its ethereal beauty.
“Remember how we used to dance, our thighs close, my head bent to your cheek? Do you remember how the stars would bless us and twinkle? Even the waterfall would slow to a trickle as if in awe.”
Not wanting to be reminded of the only good times she’d known in her life, she shoved at him to catch him off balance then she’d run. He straddled her thighs and lifted his ass over her stomach, imprisoning her in one quick movement. His shaft bobbed toward her.
“You can make love to me, Jamar Q’ellan,” Kierra vowed, “ and you can own me, but I won’t let you toy with my life. I won’t let you touch that.” She had no idea how she could enforce her warning, but she’d do everything in her power to try.
Soul Dancer Page 2
