Picture Imperfect

by Lea Santos

  One eyebrow arched, and she took a sip. “Mmm. Thanks. I didn’t realize you knew how I liked it.”

  Deanne eased closer and sat cross-legged beside Paloma, striving to read her body language. She didn’t want to push. “I knew. But I should’ve taken advantage of that knowledge more often.” She paused. “I’m sorry.”

  A tension-wrought chasm of the unsaid stretched between them. Their eyes locked. Deanne couldn’t tear herself away. God help her, she didn’t want to leave. The moment took on a surreal quality that entranced Deanne, as though death had stolen her love, and this was but her filmy ghost come to pay one last visit. She had so much to say, so much regret. She feared if she looked away, Paloma would disappear, and where would Deanne be then? “Paloma…”

  She said nothing at first, but Deanne watched her, unable to take a full breath. As she twisted to set the cup on the saucer, Dee admired the expanse of smooth caramel skin that showed above the deep V-back of her gown, desperately wanting to touch it.

  She faced her again. “Deanne?”

  “Yes?”

  Her hands smoothed the comforter covering her lap in a wide arc. “C-can you do something for me,” she whispered, “without reading too much into it? Three things, actually.” She nibbled the corner of her mouth, clearly uncertain.

  Deanne’s heart leapt. “Anything, baby girl. Absolutely anything.”

  “I want to hold off on mediation for a while. All this with Teddy…it just isn’t practical.”

  Stunned, Deanne almost forgot to answer. “Of course. Yes. Whatever you say.” A pause. “What else?”

  “Will you”—she blinked worriedly—“stay for the week and help me with Teddy?”

  “You don’t even have to ask.” Deanne’s heart began to drum. “Request number three?”

  Looking dubious and needy and morose, she dragged back the covers, exposing her legs, bare beneath the hem of her gown. “Will you hold me?” Her voice faltered. “Just for tonight?”

  Not just for tonight, love. Forever. Deanne wanted to say it, but she didn’t, determined to let Paloma take the lead in this blind man’s bluff game of finding their way back to each other. She crawled up the bedcovers, her motions languid. “I’ll hold you as much as you want me to, Punky. For as long as you want me to.”

  Deanne slid between the sheets and molded her body to the back of Paloma’s, tucking her head closer. Her hair smelled like home and heaven, and her skin slipped against Deanne’s like an elusive memory. She combed Paloma’s tumbled curls back from her forehead and kissed her there, on her ear, and on the side of her neck. “Sleep, P. Teddy’s okay, and I’m here. Everything will be fine, I promise.”

  A sigh shuddered from Paloma as the tension left her body. Then, almost silently, she began to cry.

  “Hey, now,” Deanne soothed, wanting to comfort her, but glad she was finally releasing all that pent-up emotion. She settled for snuggling closer, rocking Paloma gently.

  “D-don’t tell me not to cry.” Her voice was high-pitched, squeaky from the tears.

  “Never crossed my mind.”

  “I’m not some weak, helpless female, but m-my son is h-hurt. My life is a horrible m-mess. Don’t you dare t-tell me.”

  One corner of Deanne’s mouth lifted with acute tenderness. Paloma sounded ready to punch her if she tried to shush the tears. “You go on and cry, P. Nothing weak about that. Let it out.” Dee continued smoothing the curls slowly back from Paloma’s temple and watched them spring back into place beneath her palm. A shot of 100 proof, unadulterated love burned her throat. She would do anything for this woman. Anything. “I’ll just hold you. Okay?”

  Paloma nodded, her chest hiking with quick little inhales. Deanne cradled her tightly. As the tears seeped from the corners of her eyes, she watched Paloma press her lips together in a valiant effort to control them. Her tummy contracted and trembled beneath Deanne’s palm. Every few moments, she blew out air and hiccuped more in.

  “God, I fucking h-hate crying.”

  Deanne chuckled softly. “Yeah, I think I know that about you by now.” The dim room smelled like her perfume and lemony tea, like green apple shampoo and woman. All the details she’d grown so accustomed to in the past fourteen years stood out in brash focus. Paloma—her wife, her life—had never felt more right in Deanne’s arms.

  Paloma reached up and brushed tear trails from her ears, then whipped Deanne a staccato glance before settling her head back into the crook of her shoulder and releasing a miserable sigh. Taking a little gulp of air, she whispered, “Deanne…babe, I’m sorry.”

  Nervous hope jolted inside Dee. She worked hard to tamp down her thundering emotion before speaking. Swallowing once, she planted a kiss on her wife’s bare shoulder. “For what?”

  “For not telling you. Not…t-talking to you. I don’t know.” Paloma shifted in Deanne’s embrace until she could look up into her face, and Deanne read contrition and vulnerability in her expression. “For letting things get worse and worse until there was just no turning back.”

  Deanne smiled, loving Paloma so much, she shook with it. “There’s always a place to turn back, and you don’t have to apologize. I’m sorry I didn’t ask you what was wrong. It’s not my way, but I want to change. I will change. I’ll—” Her words caught on thick emotion, and she clenched her jaw, fighting for control. “I’ll do whatever it takes to be the woman you want, if you’ll just let me.”

  Paloma’s wet eyes searched Deanne’s face for a long time, and then she sighed. “You’ve always been the woman I want, Dee. Don’t change too much.” The words were a husky warble, an admission that had been difficult for her to make, Deanne was sure.

  She didn’t know what to say.

  In slow increments, Paloma stilled, except for her chest above the plunging neckline of her nightgown. It rose and fell, rapidly at first, then gradually shallowing until Deanne could detect small tremors of anticipation on her dusky rose flesh. The diamond pendant Dee had given her when Pep made his squalling entrance into the world lay nestled in her shadowy cleavage. It rolled slightly with each hitched inhale and exhale. The room hummed with the pent-up desire between them, with the need, the sorrow, the desperation, the fear.

  “Whatever you want. Whatever it takes.” Deanne’s body responded to their fiery connection, and she wondered if Paloma felt the throbbing heat against her. Wondered if it excited her, made her want Deanne as much as Deanne wanted her. “It can be okay if we want it to be.”

  Dee waited.

  Paloma didn’t offer up any denials.

  Blood pounded in Deanne’s neck as she marveled at the sheer, promising stillness of the moment. She dipped her head closer, testing, knowing if Paloma pulled back, she’d die inside. Deanne closed the distance with achingly slow movements. Paloma never pulled back.

  Her gaze fluttered from Deanne’s eyes to her mouth just as she raked that plump bottom lip between her teeth. A simple gesture, yet powerful and telling. It completely undid Deanne.

  With a groan from some sheltered feminine well deep inside, Deanne leaned forward and captured Paloma’s lips. Her lemon-scented breath rushed gently forth, and Deanne drank it in, wanting to consume her, to meld with her. She kissed, nipped, loved her mouth and felt a hot stinging at the back of her eyes when Paloma returned the attention with fervor. Her small, capable hands found their way under the T-shirt Deanne had worn only out of respect for her, and her abdominal muscles contracted at the cool touch on her overheated skin. Paloma’s hands slid deftly up Deanne’s torso to cup her breasts, thumbs brushing her nipples with confidence. The reminder of the old Paloma prompted a sharp hiss from Deanne. Desire swelled and burst inside her.

  Paloma explored Deanne’s taut breasts with hungry palms, caressing and pressing, grazing Dee’s flesh with the pads of her fingers. Her hands smoothed around to Deanne’s back, and the embrace pillowed their breasts together. As Dee’s tongue explored Paloma’s mouth, she reveled in the feeling of silk over tightened nipples, Palom
a’s softer curves molding against her firmer, muscular form. Swollen and pulsating, Deanne surrendered to the urge to spread Paloma’s legs with one thigh and thrust. Paloma rewarded Dee with a moan, a suggestive turn toward her, a restless tug of her nightgown so they could be skin-on-skin.

  Astonishment ripped through Deanne. An agreement? Could it be?

  Deanne’s flat palm smoothed a route from shoulder to hip as she lifted her mouth from hers. “Paloma…”

  “No, please.” Her eyelids fluttered shut and she licked her lips. “Don’t talk. Not now.”

  Warning stabbed at Dee, but she was too far gone. She cupped one side of Paloma’s face and delved into her hot, inviting mouth once again, thumb tracing the curve of her cheekbone. Could Paloma only bear to make love to Dee if she didn’t think about it? If they didn’t talk about it?

  No. Deanne couldn’t abide that. She had to know Paloma loved and wanted her as much as she wanted Paloma, and not just physically.

  Maneuvering over Paloma’s small body, Dee raised her thigh higher, until her flesh met searing wetness. She rocked, and Paloma writhed, arching higher to the taunting pressure Deanne knew she loved. She pulled her head back and watched Paloma’s passion, her heart thudding. Let me please you, she thought as her thigh muscle flexed with the rhythm against Paloma’s body. She wanted to make Paloma come, needed to know she still could.

  Eyes closed, Paloma arched her head back and released a small moan. The wellspring of raw need inside Deanne gushed. She propped herself on one elbow and hooked her other hand under the hem of her T-shirt, yanking it over her head.

  “Take your clothes off, baby,” Deanne said, in a purr.

  Paloma didn’t hesitate.

  Deanne’s eyes devoured Paloma as she tossed the shirt across the room, then shed her sleep boxers just as unceremoniously. Before she had the chance to settle back against her wife’s body, Paloma’s hand snaked between them and slid into Deanne’s wet, hot desire.

  Dee groaned, leaning her head on the pillow next to Paloma’s temple as Paloma pushed into her. Again. And again. And again.

  Confident.

  Hungry.

  Demanding.

  A ragged moan broke loose from Deanne’s chest and she undulated her body in sync with Paloma’s rhythm.

  “More.”

  Another finger. A deeper push.

  “No, more.”

  Paloma gave her exactly what she wanted, what she hadn’t even realized she needed, until she felt so full, so tight around Paloma’s hand, she’d never experience that aching emptiness again. Dee thought she might die from the acute pleasure, but damn, what a way to go.

  Paloma reached her free arm around Deanne’s hips and held her tightly against the thrusting, expertly using her thumb to caress Deanne’s deepest throb. Their moans and gasps and scent filled the room. It wasn’t humanly possible to get as close to Paloma as Deanne wanted, but she wanted her so fully inside. All the way.

  “Harder.”

  “Roll over.”

  “No,” Dee gasped. “Like this. Just like…this.” She rose up and lifted her hips into Paloma’s hand hard, harder, until she knew she was going to explode, until she knew she couldn’t hold on. “Jesus, baby—”

  “Let go, Dee. Let me love you like this.”

  Deanne folded over Paloma as her body spasmed inside, clenching and releasing, so utterly wet. Her thighs trembled, her breaths stalled. The tears she’d held back for so long came forth, and she buried her face in Paloma’s neck and did exactly as she was told. She let go.

  Paloma sighed, her body relaxing in barely perceptible increments.

  Several heartbeats passed. Deanne sighed. “Don’t even think about it.”

  “What?” Paloma asked, sliding her hand out of Deanne’s body and massaging the moisture over her center.

  “I am nowhere near done with you.”

  Paloma’s husky laugh resonated against Deanne’s chest, stoking the fire again. Dee rained kisses on her collarbone and chest, tugging Paloma’s nipples into her mouth with her lips and tongue and teeth as she cupped her breasts, lifting them like a starving woman. Paloma arched into Deanne’s mouth, groaning and twisting. Her musky, sexually aroused scent wafted up to tease and entice Deanne lower. Deanne kissed the salty perspiration from between Paloma’s breasts as her thumbs brushed and teased her pearled nipples. She could scarcely think for the throbbing urgency to taste Paloma, to be inside her, to feel her come against her tongue and around her hand. It was a pure, singular need that eclipsed the rest of the world.

  Smoothing her way up the insides of Paloma’s arms, Deanne guided her wife’s hands to the bars of the headboard and curved them around the posts, covering them with her own. Deanne gazed into Paloma’s eyes, then forced herself to stop touching, kissing, moving. She went completely still until Paloma’s eyes opened. She blinked up with a sweet combination of trepidation, vulnerability and drugging desire.

  “I’m going to make love to you,” Deanne half whispered, half growled. “Tell me now if that isn’t what you want, P, and I’ll stop.”

  Paloma didn’t answer, but Dee saw her shudder and felt the goose bumps on her skin. She slid her hands from Paloma’s shoulders, over her breasts, down her stomach, and around to the soft, round flesh of her ass. Paloma’s eyes drifted closed again as Deanne gently raised her, kissing and nipping and licking at her inner thighs, her tummy—everywhere except where she knew Paloma wanted her mouth most. Paloma was ready for her; she could see it, could feel the heat of her. Deanne’s mouth tingled with desire. But she wanted Paloma’s mind and heart ready as well as her body.

  Dee would taste her…but first—

  She sat back on her knees. “Paloma. Baby girl, look at me.”

  Paloma’s eyelids raised to half-mast, and she leaned her cheek against her upstretched arm, hands white-knuckled on the iron slats above her head.

  Deanne smiled gently, then reached up and placed her fingers in Paloma’s mouth. Paloma groaned and sucked, bucking her body up toward Deanne.

  Slipping her wet fingers from Paloma’s hot mouth, Deanne positioned them just at the opening between her legs. “Look at me when I make love to you, P. I need you to see the love in my eyes. I have to know you want it, too.”

  Paloma’s chest rose and fell, her mouth slightly parted. After a moment, she moistened her lips with a flick of her tongue, and her eyelids drooped with provocative shyness. “I’m watching, lover.”

  A tangled blast of pain and desire and connection and loss ripped through Deanne’s chest, blurring the moment. Paloma hadn’t called her that in forever. With one solid thrust of desire and possession and need, Deanne drive into Paloma until her thighs strained. She cried out, and Dee leaned forward to cover Paloma’s small body, bracing her forearm beneath Paloma’s back as she fucked her—confident, fervent, so…so in love. Deanne wanted to leave no doubt in Paloma’s mind—they belonged together. Paloma began to clench and spasm around her, and Deanne’s breath caught. She looked up. Paloma’s eyes were closed. No. Not yet. “Look at me,” Dee rasped through labored breaths. “Baby, open your eyes.”

  She did.

  Locking their gazes, Deanne leveraged into Paloma’s body, hard, harder, faster. Through passion-clenched teeth, she grunted, “I won’t let you go, Paloma. I can’t. No one else will ever be inside you like this—” Hot tears blurred Deanne’s eyes as Paloma’s body gripped fiercely. The power of her impending release nearly blinded Dee.

  “Not yet.”

  “Dee, please…”

  “No.”

  Paloma gritted her teeth, shuddering against Deanne’s thrusts again and again. Dee drank in the sight of Paloma’s chest flushing almost purple with tension, her nipples puckering pebble hard as the goose bumps washed down her body. So hot. So tight.

  Her tears fell in glistening splatters on Paloma’s heated flesh. When that internal quake began to peak, Deanne pulled out and took Paloma into her mouth, giving into Paloma’s sensual dem
ands, sucking her center until—shaking and gasping—Paloma came against her tongue, and Deanne felt as if her heart had disintegrated into a trillion glittering pieces and poured into Paloma’s body in long, pulsating blasts. An illusion, she knew. Paloma already had her heart and always would.

  But Paloma felt like heaven.

  Like being reborn.

  Like…home. Yeah, just like home.

  When the intensity waned, Deanne crawled up Paloma’s body and lay panting and sweat-sheened above her, hands frozen around the bars above their heads, shaken by the sheer emotional force of their joining. The bedclothes lay rumpled and twined around their ankles, but neither seemed inclined to move. Dee rested her forehead against Paloma’s, unmindful of her own tears coursing down Paloma’s temples.

  They stayed in that position until their chests stopped heaving, until Paloma stirred and moaned. Dee’s grip on the bars relaxed and she let her hands slide down and cover Paloma’s. All at once Deanne felt it, and her heart jolted. Paloma’s ring was back on her finger, where it belonged. Forever. There is hope.

  Dee raised her face, kissing the moisture from Paloma’s cheeks. Paloma stared up, her smile tremulous. Like a flash, Deanne saw them back in high school, steaming her car windows opaque, loving each other with the ferocity and eagerness of pure, raw discovery. A sweet ache filled Deanne, and she said the only words that came to mind, the only appropriate statement for this moment.

  “I love you, Paloma Vargas. Forever and a day.”

  Chapter Seven

  From Paloma Vargas’s journal, Tuesday, September 25

  Holy crap. What was I thinking?

  After the languorous, post-orgasmic warmth had cooled in the wee morning hours, reality slammed down on Paloma like a guillotine. Thwack! Heck yeah, she’d lost her head. She didn’t regret making love with Deanne—far from it. It had been the hottest, most intense sensory and emotional smorgasbord she’d gorged upon in forever, and she’d needed it desperately, especially last night. Every time she flashed back to it, her tummy flopped like a hooked and landed trout. One would think she and Deanne were brand-new lovers, not longtime married folks.