Dance of the Rogue

by Cris Anson

  But he’d lied to her once too often, a lie that had changed her life.

  The pain of those memories surprised her. It had been a dozen years ago and she’d survived that horrendous time of her life and moved on.

  She flicked a glance at Don then made a moue. “You don’t play fair. Put your T-shirt on.”

  “Not until you tell me if I have a million-dollar anything else.”

  Fantine couldn’t help it. Her laugh came out deep and hearty. “You’re incorrigible.”

  “So I’ve been told. You know what I learned today?”

  “That I eat little boys like you for lunch and not breakfast?”

  He gave her a look that said if she hadn’t just been well and truly fucked, she knew damn well she would be that very minute, and looking forward to it. That was dangerous.

  He ran his hands from her shoulders to her arms, skimming the tips of her breasts with his outstretched thumbs, then down her waist until his palms came to rest on her ample hips. “I learned it was more fun to play on a luxury mattress than on a park bench.”

  It took her a moment to process his comment. Sounded like he’d always chosen model-thin types and this was his first experience with a plus-size partner.

  “And you are luxurious. Full and ripe and sexy.” He pressed into her, rubbing his naked chest against her suddenly taut nipples.

  She was thinking about capitulating when her stomach rumbled again. With a chuckle she pointed him to the fridge for fresh lemons to squeeze and explained to him how to make a pitcher of lemonade with the simple syrup she always stocked in the RV.

  As she sautéed the veggies and mixed the eggs, Fantine marveled that the two of them danced around each other with a minimum of effort in the tiny kitchen space as she directed him to pull out service for two from various drawers and cabinets.

  “You’re kidding, right? Real cloth,” he said as he set two linen placemats and two linen napkins on the dinette table. “This is really fancy for camping.”

  “No, I always pamper myself when I eat. Even if it’s a snack, I’ll make up the table for a festive atmosphere. It helps the digestion.” She also carried two well-cushioned crystal wineglasses for special occasions, but didn’t consider this occasion to be particularly special.

  Nevertheless, she wondered if he was a decent cook—he seemed no stranger to the workings of a kitchen. Then mentally shook herself. Ships passing in the night, she reminded herself. Even if Mister Gorgeous was roaming bare-chested around her RV, even if she knew he wore no underwear beneath those snug, well-worn jeans. Even if he was the best lover she’d ever known.

  They slid into opposite sides of the dinette booth. As they ate, Don made appreciative noises about the omelet, the lemonade, the seven-grain toast, the salad dressing she’d concocted with fresh herbs.

  “You been to all those places?” he asked, indicating with his fork the decals pasted on the dining-area window.

  “Yes, but I almost deep-sixed the idea on my very first trip.” A small smile played on Fantine’s lips. “When I was granted tenure, I decided to celebrate by buying this RV and taking a trip during summer hiatus. I’ve always loved lighthouses, so for my first adventure, I chose to go to Nova Scotia via the overnight ferry from Portland to Yarmouth and follow their Lighthouse Trail.”

  She took a sip of her lemonade. “Turns out a stalled hurricane a hundred miles out to sea made it a rough crossing. I had booked a room, since we weren’t allowed to stay in the hold where the vehicles were. I spent the entire passage—eight hours of grueling night—in the bunk, groaning and hoping I wouldn’t lose my dinner.”

  Fantine set down her glass and laughed. “There’s a glamorous image for you.”

  “If I’d been with you, I’d have held your head while you heaved.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  He leaned across the table. “Hey, everyone has an Achilles’ heel. But judging from all the mementos, you didn’t let it stop you.”

  “Oh how right you are. Once I got onto terra firma, I was instantly distracted by the spectacular scenery. That hurricane? Talk about silver linings. The surf was so tumultuous that every picture I took was spectacular. You know, waves crashing on those huge rocks, spume bouncing twenty feet into the air.”

  She slid out of the booth. “Here. Look at this.” She pointed to one of the eight-by-ten photos she’d laminated on every door of the kitchen cabinets.

  “Wow! I see what you mean.” Don was looking at one of her favorites, the Peggy’s Cove lighthouse in the distance, the foreground a shimmering mass of wet boulders, the surf angrily flinging a million sparkling diamonds into the bright sunshine.

  “Here’s another one with a story.” She pointed to a shot of two sleek brown horses inside a white-fenced field of grass green enough to golf on.

  “I looked up Thoroughbred farms in the Lexington, Kentucky area and wrote to all of them, explaining who I was, that I’d be vacationing in the area and wanted permission to take photos on their property. Luckily, one of them responded in the affirmative.”

  “That’s all it took?”

  “You don’t know what you can get until you try.”

  “Do you always just go after what you want?”

  “I don’t know any other way to live.”

  Don looked at her for a long moment, as if trying to work out something in his mind. Then he shrugged. “Those white fences really draw the eye to the horses. But…where were you standing? In a hayloft?”

  “You have a good eye. Yes, the perspective is from above. There’s a ladder on the back of the RV. I climbed to the roof and moved around until I was happy with the composition in the viewfinder.”

  “Think we can take a blanket up there after dark and, you know, try for a different perspective to…” He sidled up behind her and rubbed his hard, seemingly insatiable cock against her ass cheeks.

  She let out another of her hearty laughs. Many of the faculty thought she needed to curb her enthusiasm—they thought her lusty laugh was vulgar—but her philosophy was, you only went this way once, so you might as well grab life with both hands and enjoy it. “You’re presuming that I’ll be interested enough to let you stay that long.”

  “Look outside, sweetcakes. The sun is already setting. Soon it will be dark enough to be daring. And I’d say that taking all these trips alone in an RV is pretty daring in itself, so I know you have it in you.”

  Surprised at how late it really was, Fantine glanced out the window then moved to the small closet for a pair of sneakers. “There’s a pond right beyond the edge of the property. Get dressed. Let’s see how this spectacular sunset reflects in it.”

  A minute later she was herding him down the paved, winding road, past pop-up campers and pull-behinds and bus-sized luxury liners, and onto a dirt path that led to a three-rail fence. Beyond that they could see the pond, its colors slightly darker in mirror image than the original. The sky arced in a kaleidoscope of colors, from blatant reds and yellows to more subdued pinks and mauves and, finally, purples and navy blues. They stood mute, shoulders touching, arms leaning on the top fence rail, until stars began winking against a background of velvety black.

  “Thank you,” Don said quietly. “I’ve been very good at ignoring things like this.”

  “Beauty is everywhere,” Fantine responded. “You just need to take the time to look.”

  He put his arms around her shoulders and turned her to him. “Hey, is that a tear?”

  “I get that way,” Fantine said with a shrug. “I’ve been known to cry at finding a four-leaf clover or a perfect rosebud.”

  He leaned forward and kissed away the tear that had started trickling down her cheek. “You’re something else, you know that?”

  For a moment she basked in the tender gesture. She could hear all the nighttime insects calling to their mates, the steady rhythm of Don’s breath that swept her cheek. The rich smell of the farmland beyond the fence mixed with the green scent of growing things, a lingering
trace of diesel fumes from a late-arriving vehicle, and the unique essence of Don. Earthy, masculine, spicy. Hers.

  Hell, no! He wasn’t hers, not by a long shot. He was just a flash in the pan. An interlude. She’d give him the weekend, no more. She had a job to do.

  “Let’s mosey on back,” she said. “I still have some homemade cookies left.”

  Rolf felt unsettled. He was uncharacteristically quiet as they meandered back to Fantine’s RV, pondering some of her throwaway lines, like not knowing what you can get until you try, or seeing beauty everywhere. The only thing he’d been interested in since he’d had his first hard-on at twelve was gorgeous broads with itchy pussies. This one made him think. Made him want…what?

  What the hell did he want out of his life?

  Damn if he knew.

  It irked him knowing that his oldest brother had worked with wood as long as Rolf could remember, that Magnus had known what he’d wanted to do all his life and was now becoming a name in the art sculpture world. Soren, too, had fallen into bartending right after he’d gotten out of the Marines and had taken to it like it had been his karma.

  But himself? What he was, if he wanted to be brutally honest with himself, was a big fat zero. A stud. A boy toy. He snorted softly. No, he wasn’t either of those, or why was he still driving a twelve-year-old car and living in a crappy, three-room walk-up apartment?

  He followed Fantine up the three steps to the RV like a robot, barely hearing her ask if he wanted milk with his cookies. Her voice changed pitch. Lower, more sultry, and he zeroed in on the sexy timbre.

  “Or maybe some chocolate syrup to lick off?”

  Without Rolf’s conscious volition, his cock jumped to attention. What the hell, he thought. He had a willing, lusty, experienced woman at his fingertips. He could do all his deep thinking some other time. Right now he had a rising Magnum to keep happy.

  “Chocolate is always good,” he responded, coming up behind her as she reached to an upper cabinet. As Fantine’s hands closed around a dark brown bottle of Hershey’s syrup, Rolf’s hands did the same to her wondrous breasts. He was unabashedly a tit man and she had a pair of beauties. He cupped them, molded them, felt their resilience as he squeezed. Felt her nipples harden and lengthen.

  “I could play with these all night,” he murmured, his mouth grazing her ear.

  “But I bet you won’t.” Fantine set the bottle on the counter and moved her hands around to cup his ass then nestled her own ass into his now-rampant cock. “I bet I could make you lie back doing absolutely nothing while I finger paint your cock and then lick off all the chocolate.”

  Rolf chuckled. “That might be a sucker bet, but I don’t know how I could stay still if you do that.”

  “Perhaps a pair of handcuffs will keep you immobile?”

  He twirled her around so they faced each other, Fantine trapped between the kitchen counter and his hard body. “Ah, but if I use the handcuffs on you, then I can spend all night sucking on these babies.” He punctuated his statement by untying the wrap of her green dress. The fabric fell open and he leaned forward to nuzzle his face into her luscious cleavage.

  She made a small sound of delight, and Rolf stroked her ample curves with his tongue, around and around in smaller circles, wetting the lacy bra, but not touching her nipples.

  “I think,” she said between moans, “that we can each take a turn, setting a time limit so the other can have the same privilege.”

  “Sorry, I left my wristwatch at home.”

  “Don’t worry, I have a kitchen timer. There’s also an alarm clock in the bedroom.”

  “Then by all means, we should take advantage of everything the bedroom has to offer.” He grabbed the chocolate syrup and steered her down the tiny hall into the rear room where he’d watched her give herself an orgasm.

  And he knew then that he wanted to push her past her limit, to give her more than she thought she could take, to count her orgasms into the double digits until she begged for him to stop, until she was a puddle of melted butter in his arms, until she was barely conscious from an overdose of lust. And only then would he enter her and satisfy himself.

  * * * * *

  “Hey, Fantine, wake up.”

  Fantine rolled over and bumped into a wall of heat. Her eyes flew open in a moment of panic, until she saw, from the dim night-light she always kept lit in the kitchen, the silhouette of Don lying at her side, his torso raised on one elbow, his hair disheveled and so sexy-looking that she wanted to run her fingers through it again.

  “I checked that alarm clock. It’s after three in the morning. I’ll bet we can sneak up to the roof of the RV and use up the rest of the chocolate syrup.”

  Fantine let out a mock groan. “I think I already have a sugar high. I must have licked up a thousand calories in the past five hours.”

  Don leaned over and nuzzled her shoulder. “But think of how many calories we expended. I’m surprised that all that electricity hasn’t blown out the tires on this rig.”

  “Bite your tongue.”

  “Or yours?” He leaned forward and captured her mouth in a kiss so tender, so loving, that Fantine gave herself up to it, relishing the feel of his unshaven jaw on her sensitized mouth. She raised her head enough to catch his lower lip between her teeth and pulled gently. Then settled her mouth against his again, allowing the heat of the kiss to build, opening her mouth so that he could, if he wanted, bite her tongue and she could bite his.

  Instead, their tongues stroked and danced as their fervor increased. Fantine couldn’t believe she wanted him again. She’d lost count of the number of orgasms he’d given her, yet she was ready for more.

  “Okay,” he said, giving her bruised and swollen lips some respite. “No syrup. We should have a quickie out under the stars just for the principle of the thing. How about it?”

  He slipped out of bed, magnificently naked, and bent over to grab his jeans.

  “It’s a shame to cover that ass of yours,” she murmured as she slid out as well.

  With the boyish grin she’d already come to adore, he waggled said ass in her face. “Don’t worry, you’ll get another chance to see it.”

  Dismissing the thought of a bra, Fantine reached for her green wraparound dress again. What the hell, it was so wrinkled already, and they were only going ten feet away.

  “No, wait, before you cover them up, I need another taste of those babies.” Don bent forward, squeezed her breasts together, and tried to get both nipples into his mouth at the same time. “Mmm,” he said. “Luscious.”

  Fantine could remember a time, one of the many times during the disintegration of her marriage, when her ex called her a cow. In a way, she wished he was here to witness how much another man loved her abundant breasts. She mentally thumbed her nose at him as she pulled Don’s head closer to her and slid her fingers through his thick black hair.

  “Mmm, baby, if we don’t get our shoes on right now, we probably won’t get up there before sunrise. But with that timing, we’d put on a show for everyone.”

  With a sultry laugh, Fantine tucked her feet into a pair of gel clogs then opened a bin to retrieve a thin foam mat of approximately single-bed size. “I’ll be on top,” she announced, “since it’s my RV and my mat and…”

  “And my back,” Don interjected then laughed. “Baby, you can lie on me anytime you want. I’m ready.”

  Happily, no vehicle occupied the campsite on their right, so Fantine opened the middle door and scooted to the ladder. Having done it dozens of times, she climbed it swiftly and silently. Don, carrying the mat, scampered up behind her.

  “Wow,” he said quietly, “look at all the stars.”

  “I’m glad it’s so clear tonight. I like to go to places with minimum light fallout, because it’s hard to see much where I live with all the electric lights making a haze. But here, the constellations are popping right out. See that lopsided W? That’s Cassiopeia. And there’s the Little Dipper. That shiny star at the tip of its han
dle is…”

  “How about I show you the Big Dipper instead?”

  Mindful of their location, Fantine suppressed the big laugh bubbling out of her and settled for a quiet giggle. With a motion of her hand, she gestured where he should unroll the mat. They shucked their minimal clothing and snuggled together on the mat like spoons, Fantine’s head resting on Don’s outstretched arm as they silently absorbed the grandeur of the stars scattered like dewdrops on black velvet.

  Moments passed. Fantine felt an occasional breeze wafting over her bare skin. Heard Don’s breathing become harsher, more choppy. Heard the rip of a foil packet. Felt the erection pressing into her cleft from behind.

  He began to stroke her, from shoulder to arm to fingertip, down her hip and thigh then back up her inner thigh, skirting the edge of her pubic hair, up her rib cage to her breast. His fingers raised goose bumps every place he touched. It was all she could do to remain still while she reveled in the delicious sensations.

  “You’re addictive,” he murmured as he moved her long hair aside to nibble on the skin at the juncture of her neck and shoulder. His hips began to move rhythmically, stroking the edges of her slit, her labia, and she felt herself rocking back into him in counterpoint. Slowly and deliciously building the sensation. Almost reverent. Not frenetic, as was everything that had gone before. When he slipped his cock into her, she felt as one with the universe and the boundless stars above, sweet, gentle, loving, giving, timeless. She slung her free arm behind her to embrace his hip, to better feel the slow swing of his pelvis, the lubricated sizzle of his strokes, until they both reached quiet peaks of bliss and whispered each other’s name like a prayer.

  It was unlike anything Fantine had ever experienced. The last thing she saw before her eyes drooped closed was a shooting star streaking toward the horizon.