I Am Eve

by Nicolina Martin

  He’s silent. A sigh. His grip softens. “Show me my scream, then. I want to see.”

  I exhale with relief and have to quell the instinct to throw my arms around him. I thought he was angry with me. I really don’t want this man to be angry with me. Not because I’m afraid of physical pain, but I don’t want him to hurt, and if I made him angry, I surely made him hurt. Tilting my head, I indicate the clay head. “Look.”

  He steps away. Silence.

  “I don’t look like the others. The ones you have on the shelves.”

  I move up next to him, put one hand on his arm, and skim the other over the drying clay. “You’re not like the others,” I mumble, more to myself than to him.

  His hand finds mine, takes it, holds it firm. “How so?”

  “You’re not evil.”

  He scoffs. “You don’t know me.”

  “I don’t need to know you to know. You fight so hard. It’s as if you carry this big old sword, slashing it back and forth as you move across your battlefield. It’s not who you are, and that’s why it’s so heavy. You want to help, to do good, but you don’t know where to begin.”

  “I’m a bad man, Eve.” He turns me toward him, and a light touch along my neck sends a swarm of butterflies through my belly. “I’m selfish.” His fingers trace my collarbone, dip in beneath the neckline of my dress. “I take.” He pushes the dress aside, exposing more skin. “I have needs.” He slides his hand to my nape, grabbing me, pulling me closer. “And I don’t know the word stop.”

  There’s a hunger in me, but it’s not the gnawing hunger for food. He awakens it. With his voice, his skin, his longing that transfers through his touch. And it’s funny and weird, because his hand is on my neck, but I feel it heavy and syrupy between my legs, tingling, swelling, ravenous.

  “Have you ever been with a man?”

  His lips are soft and still rough as they trace the side of my neck. His breaths are rapid and hot.

  I shake my head. My insides coil, tight with concern. I’m not desirable. I’m not someone a man wants to bed. I’m a freak. A witch. A crazy, crippled abomination.

  “No.”

  It’s as if he suddenly has eight arms when he folds himself around me, pulling me to him. His hands are in my hair, caressing my neck, traveling my back.

  “So you’re a virgin,” he breathes. His voice has deepened impossibly, to an almost animalistic growl that reverberates through my chest, to tug at my very core.

  I think about all the times I’ve touched myself, explored, sinned. What is a virgin? A virgin is someone innocent and pure. I’m filth.

  I tell him the truth I’m ready to give him.

  “I’ve never been with a man.”

  Adam groans as he presses me against him. Tight. Tighter.

  “With a woman?”

  His large hands are everywhere, exploring, gripping, kneading. My own hands are getting restless, and I clutch air, wishing I dared to touch him back.

  I exhale shakily. “No.”

  “Mmm.” He grabs under my thighs and back and lifts me with ease, holding me tight. The air changes as we ascend the stairs. Up we go. I don’t have to ask what we’re doing. I’m not stupid. He’s taking me.

  Adam is taking me, and I really am a sinner because I want him more than anything in the world. I don’t care about Heaven or Hell. I don’t want to be good. I want this. I want his touch to erase a lifetime of loneliness.

  Chapter Nine

  Adam

  Her breaths are rapid, like a frightened bunny’s, captured and soon to be made into a meal. My meal. She doesn’t speak, and neither do I. What’s to say, anyway?

  Cradling her lithe form to my chest, the sculpture of my head keeps appearing before me. It looks eerily like me. She’s talented as fuck. She has given me a strain over the eyes, a tension I don’t see when I look in the mirror, but it’s there, ever-present in my mind. That was my ‘scream’ to her.

  I look down on Eve. Her face is turned slightly toward me, pressed against my T-shirt as if she’s sniffing me. Her eyes are closed. She evokes tenderness that I’ve only ever felt toward Toad. She makes me want to do good. She said it – I rejected the notion, but she is right. It’s as if she sees right through me with those non-seeing eyes. How can that be?

  I carry her through the large house, through room after room, up the stairs, through the long corridor with all the doors and nudge open her bedroom door with my elbow before setting her down on her bed. The bedspread is white, crocheted, and pure. She’s white. Everything is so fucking bright and untouched, and I can’t wait to ravage her world, turn it upside down, and make her mine.

  The skin on my face feels tight, and I skim my fingers across my cheeks and then touch my hair. I have dried mud all over, and when I take a step back to look over Eve, she’s pretty much covered in it too.

  She licks her lips and makes an adorable face as the tip of her tongue comes away stained.

  “I’m dirty.”

  Her words, whatever she intended, goes straight to my cock. She’s not as dirty now as she’ll be when I’m done playing with her.

  “So am I.” I lay a hand on her head, then caress her wild curls. My touch flattens them temporarily, but they bounce back immediately.

  She tilts her head toward my hand. It’s a barely there movement, but it’s trust. She wants my touch. She wants me. Fuck, if I know why.

  “Yes, you are,” she says.

  “Hey.” I slide my hand to the soft, warm skin on her nape, beneath all the hair, and squeeze. Her full lips part, and a little gasp escapes her. Jesus fucking Christ. So responsive to me. I lean in and press my mouth against hers, parting her lips with my tongue. She obeys, but fumbles, says something I can’t make out and then our teeth collide.

  Eve darts back and gasps. “I’m sorry.”

  I put a knee on the mattress next to her hip and push her down on her back. “Open your mouth for me. But don’t talk.”

  She recoils as if I had hit her and opens her mouth wide. I’m about to laugh but realize my mistake before I make it. I’m not going to laugh at her. That would be savage. Cupping her chin, I trace her lower lip with my thumb while I correct my cock in my pants. It’s getting eager. I have the most delicate flower before me, willing, a little afraid, ready to be made mine and only mine. Ever. She’s never been touched. Taking a virgin has never been a fetish of mine. I like my women wild, uninhibited, and experienced enough to let me be rough. Still, there’s something tantalizing about being her first. Or maybe it’s because she’s who she is? So incredibly talented, artistic, free and still so bound. Unique in every aspect.

  “A little less open, cariña. Follow my command. Do as I do.” I lean in and nibble her lower lip, supporting my weight on my arms. “Kiss me back,” I mumble against her mouth. She responds. Hesitantly at first, then she arches up, meets me, gives more of herself. Her hands clutch the bedspread, crumpling it, as a moan rises from her throat. I stop and pull back a little, grabbing her chin, holding her firmly in place.

  “There you go. Give yourself to me, Eve. Give me all of you. I gave you my scream. What are you willing to give me?”

  “Kiss me again, please,” she whispers. She almost, almost looks at me. I curse her disability to hell as I lean in. I want her strangely light eyes on me. I want her to see me.

  Her mouth is pure heaven. She learns fast, molding her lips against mine, opening for me, letting me taste her, tasting me back. When she grabs my shoulders instead of the bedspread, triumph surges through me. Her eagerness spurs me on, and I take her mouth harder, hungrier, desperate for closeness and to unwrap the secret that is this woman. I trace the side of her neck, drag my fingers along her shoulder, then find the swell of her breast. Soft. A handful that fits just right in my palm.

  “Oh, God,” she groans.

  “That’s it. Let yourself go.” I find her nipple and pinch it. Lightly at first, then firmer, making it peak deliciously before I sit back. There’s too much fabr
ic in the way.

  “All I taste is clay,” she says and licks her lips. Her chest heaves, and her eyes are glossed over.

  I lean in and give her a quick kiss. “All you taste? Really?”

  She swallows. “Maybe not all.”

  Her dress doesn’t have any buttons or a zipper. “How does this thing come off?”

  Eve crosses her arms over her chest in a flash, a look of horror replacing the serene expression.

  I tsk. “Don’t fucking do that.”

  “I’m not pretty,” she whispers. Her shoulders shoot up to her ears, and her whole body tenses. I’ve seen this enough times now to recognize her battered look. As if she’s expecting a beating.

  I don’t know how to comfort anyone. I don’t even know if I should keep on doing this.

  “Eve…” I take her hand and lift it off her chest. “You look like you’re not from this planet.”

  She inhales as if to say something, and I put a finger to her mouth, making her press her lips closed.

  “You’re weak, and still so fucking strong. You’re Black, but white. You see with your fingers clearer than the rest of us see with our eyes. You carry yourself like a queen, and I’m so fucking awed, you have no idea. I came here to check out your funky neighbors who are meddling with things they shouldn’t, and I found a mysterious gem hidden away inside this wicked old castle. I don’t know what to do with you, but I don’t think I can let you go. Sit up.”

  I hold her hand as she sits, her other arm still held tight across her chest. I shake my head and pull her to her feet.

  “Don’t move. I’m extracting you from this dress somehow, then you’re going to lie down again so I can look at you.”

  “Just look?” she asks, a hint of mischief playing over her face.

  I grin. Cheeky girl. “No. Not just look.”

  She opens her mouth, licks her lips, closes it again. A whole slew of emotions passes across her face. Something is changing inside her – between us – and definitely for the better. That’s not fear I’m seeing. She’s lit from within. I swear, if I turned off the lamp, she’d still light up the room.

  “You just…pull it over my head.” Her voice is a little deeper, huskier.

  I put my hands on the sides of her shoulders and pull her into my arms, stroking down along her back until I find the curve of her ass, firm and soft at the same time. Eve gives out a little gasp, tenses and then lets me mold her to me.

  “Good girl,” I mumble, burying my face against her neck, inhaling her scent. Bunching the dress in my hands, I tug. “Arms up.” In one move, I pull it up and above her head, dropping it on the floor. I’m met with a shock of pale skin on a lean body. Small but perfectly rounded breasts with light pink nipples that stiffen as I look at them. She has white simple cotton panties on, practical, definitely never intended to make anyone drool, and still I do.

  Eve tries to shield herself with her arms, but I’m not having it. Her hands keep flying up to cover her delicious breasts. I keep moving them away. Her body calls for me. My cock strains in my pants, desperate to be freed of its restraints, to feel her soft heat, to explore her scream.

  “Lie back. Now.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Are you afraid?”

  She is silent, but she’s trembling, so I think I have my answer.

  “Yes, and oddly enough, no. Does that make sense?”

  “It shouldn’t, because I don’t know why the fuck I’m so pulled to you, Eve, but it does make sense. Everything about this is ‘hell yes, but fuck no’, isn’t it?”

  “I feel it too,” she says as she shuffles back and finally lies before me, almost naked, mine to explore and devour. “And I can’t explain it either.”

  The air in the space between us thickens infinitely as I move in on her. I drag my shirt over my head and toss it, wishing she could see my tattoos, wishing she could see me.

  As I lean in and plant a kiss on her hip, I realize that’s exactly what has happened. She has seen me. Our few short hours together have been cathartic. I’ve rarely experienced such a sense of peace with anyone.

  “It is what it is,” I say as I move up along her shivering body, nibbling her skin, covering her in kisses.

  Eve

  It is what it is.

  And what it is, is beautiful.

  The air in the room is chilly on my naked skin, but Adam’s large hands are warm and strong as they follow my thighs up, past my hips, dangerously close to my most secret parts, the womanly parts of me I have never presented to anyone, that have never been asked for, yearned for.

  Now I yearn. Everything in me begs for his touch. I have given him my soul. He has given me his agony. He has watched me work. No one has watched me work before, except for the occasional glance. Adam has delved into the depths of my creative space. He has been so curious, so interested. He got me in a way I’ve never felt anyone do before. Not even Kiki. He hasn’t recoiled and called me freaky. At least not to my face.

  I wasn’t saving myself for anyone. My ‘virginity’ wasn’t protected to be given away at the right time. I was a filthy secret to be hidden away. Adam snuck in, tore down my walls, and whenever he’s close, he electrifies my skin, charges it with billions of tiny bolts that explode as soon as he touches me.

  My heart slams in my chest, my blood roars in my ears. All I sense is him. His scent surrounds me. His palms stroke heat into my flesh, plowing a sweet warmth I’ve never felt before deep into my longing core.

  I should object. I should demand my dress back and that he leaves me a thread of decency. I am diving headfirst into everything I’ve been told is wrong and dangerous throughout my entire life. But Mother left. She left and took everything. Since Grandmother died, I have lived in limbo, here, but a mere shadow, alive, but not living.

  “What is it like, Adam? Making love?”

  His hand on my breast, brushing lightly, makes my nipple tingle and reach for him, for more. He moves, sinks down on me, plants kisses over my belly.

  “You’ll love it. It’s emotion incarnate. It’s flesh and soul in one.” His mouth finds my nipple, and I hiss as he sucks it in between his teeth. There’s so much of him. He’s everywhere. He’s in my hair. He seems to love playing with my hair. He nuzzles my jawline, along my throat. One hand wanders downward, down my ribcage, belly, strokes my panties.

  I shiver beneath him. “Will you be careful with me?”

  Adam slides his fingers beneath the waistline of my panties and curls them, bunching the fabric, tugging it. “Always, Eve.”

  Putting my hands on his, I stop his movement. For a moment, my mind tilts. Life is suddenly more surreal than it ever was. I didn’t expect to feel a human touch again in my life, and here I unexpectedly find myself in bed with a man.

  I gasp as he takes my wrists in his hands and pushes my arms up over my head, holding them tight to the mattress. His breathing is ragged, and his heart thuds in rhythm with my own.

  “I want you, Eve. Since I got here, I’ve forgotten everything that is bad and wrong in my life. I want your body and your soul. I want to lick and kiss every square inch of your skin. I have never felt like this before. You make me fucking talk like someone who isn’t me. I thought I was lost when I got here, but I realize I’m finally found. Now, hold your arms above your head and don’t move them. I need you naked, and then I’ll make you mine.”

  A whimper escapes me, but it’s not fear, it’s want. I want Adam. It’s liberating to realize it and admit it. I want Adam. I can repeat it again and again. I don’t know much about him, and still it feels as if I’ve always known him, as if this was destined to be.

  He moves, his heavy body making the mattress sink and rise. A rustle of fabric from somewhere above makes me imagine he’s undressing. I want to know.

  “Can I touch you?”

  “No.” His answer is clipped, leaving no room for misunderstandings.

  “But I want to.” I surprise myself with the words. Then joy soa
rs through my chest, and I smile. I want this. Him.

  “Well, I’m a selfish bastard, and I want to take off your panties—” He grips the waistband again and pulls, straight off, all the way to my ankles, and I’m naked. “And I want to bury my face between your legs.”

  He plants a kiss on my stomach, between my mons and my belly button. I arch and try to hide my pubes with my hands. Adam tsks and pushes my arms back up.

  “Don’t move.”

  “But—”

  His hands are large and strong, one on my breast, the other on my hip, sliding in between my legs. I squeeze my thighs together on instinct. He tuts.

  “Let me see you. Spread your legs for me.”

  “I’m… I’m not pretty,” I whisper.

  Adam groans. “Have you seen yourself?”

  I shake my head. Obviously, I haven’t.

  “I don’t know what to tell you other than that you look like an angel. And cake. An angel cake. You look absolutely edible.”

  His warm voice penetrates deep into my broken center. Piece by piece, he puts me back together. Mending thirty-eight long years of hurt might not be possible, but he finds my ragged edges with his crazy, funny, beautiful words and puts glue where there was once only an empty void.

  “Angel cake.” I shake my head, amused, and then I do it. For him. For me. As a giant flip-off to Mother. I spread my legs for Adam, knowing he will take me, take care of me, make me feel wanted and normal, even if it’s just for a few moments.

  Adam growls, a sound that makes me hum. He puts his lips to the inside of my knee, while his hand finds my other thigh. He is everywhere and everything as he kisses and caresses his way up to where my thighs meet. When he kisses me there, I’m hot and cold at the same time. My flesh pulsates, tingles and burns.

  “Your pussy is fucking heaven, Eve.” He spreads my nether lips and licks a path between them, making me quiver.

  Pussy.

  My cheeks burn with equal parts embarrassment and excitement.