by Radclyffe
*
“I’m sorry we missed breakfast,” Jude said. She poured her first cup of coffee from the pot that Maddy had thoughtfully brewed and left on the counter.
Sax, finally giving in to restlessness, had preceded her downstairs by five minutes and was now nowhere in sight. However, Jude didn’t feel the least bit self-conscious, probably because she was just too damn happy to feel shy.
“Don’t give it another thought.” Maddy smiled up from the kitchen table where she sat reading the morning paper. “There isn’t any timetable to keep to when you’re here. And like it says at the old-fashioned diners, I serve breakfast twenty-four hours a day.”
“I’d like to help.”
“There’s not much to do, really. And besides, I enjoy it.”
“If you’re sure...” Jude acquiesced. “Did Sax get her coffee?”
“She took a cup with her out to the barn. She said to tell you she’d be right back. Apparently, there was something she wanted to finish.”
Jude laughed. “Well, at least she managed to wait until daylight.”
“That’s rare for her,” Maddy remarked, regarding Jude astutely. She didn’t need a script to read this scene. She knew where the two of them had slept. Much more importantly, she knew that her granddaughter had slept, and when Sax had appeared in the kitchen, smiling and clear-eyed, Maddy could have wept. “She doesn’t usually pay attention to the time.”
“So I understand,” Jude replied carefully. She didn’t want to infringe on Sax’s privacy or betray her confidences, but she could see how much Maddy loved her. “She never stops going.”
“She’s never been able to tell when she’s exhausted. She doesn’t feel it. She’ll run on empty until she drops.”
“I’ll remember.”
“That’s fine, then,” Maddy said with a nod, briskly rising to begin breakfast. “So...tell me how the film project’s going.”
“I can do better than that,” Jude announced with a smile. “I have a tape in my bag, and I can show you what we’re doing.”
Maddy turned, her face alive with delight. “Oh, Saxon has done well finding you.”
“Thank you,” Sax said with a smug grin from the doorway. “I think so, too.”
Jude blushed and sent Sax a look that promised she would make her pay for that remark later. When Sax just gave her a supremely self-satisfied smile, Jude was afraid everything she was feeling must show on her face. And as much as she liked Maddy, there were some things Sax’s grandmother did not need to know.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“Do be careful, you two.”
“Absolutely,” Sax responded as Jude climbed onto the bike behind her and then encircled her with both arms. It still gave her a pleasant jolt every time Jude did that. Covering one of Jude’s hands with her own where it had settled possessively in the bend of her thigh, she grinned at her grandmother. “We’ll be fine.”
“Yes, I can see that.” To Maddy’s knowledge, her granddaughter had never had a relationship of consequence, but given Saxon’s volatile nature, she very much doubted that she was inexperienced. But what was happening with Jude seemed to be something different altogether. It was clear to Maddy that they were both seriously smitten. She’d observed the way the two of them had looked at each other all day, and even though they didn’t seem entirely aware of it yet, it was still a lovely thing to see. “I’ll expect you both to visit again soon.”
“We’ll be back the day after tomorrow to pick up Jude’s car,” Sax said. Jude had wanted to ride back with Sax on the motorcycle, which was fine with her; she didn’t want them to part quite so soon.
“I wasn’t talking about a pit stop, Saxon. I had something more civilized in mind.”
“Don’t worry, Maddy,” Jude said, smiling at the woman for whom she was quickly developing real affection. “I’ll make sure of it.”
For Jude, the afternoon had passed in easy conversation with Maddy, while Sax busied herself with a number of odd jobs around the grounds. When it had gotten too hot for Sax to work, she’d joined them, and they talked of current films and other news. Finally, after dinner, she and Sax had reluctantly prepared to leave.
“Good, because Saxon tends to lose track of such simple things as time, and weeks between visits is too long.” Although this time she would worry less about Saxon’s well-being while she was gone, knowing that Jude would be nearby.
“Maddy,” Sax said ruefully. “You’re going to give Jude a bad impression.”
“Nothing she doesn’t already know, I’m sure,” Maddy said sharply. As she leaned forward to kiss Sax on the cheek, she stroked her arm absently, thinking how much she loved the happiness glinting in her granddaughter’s normally guarded eyes. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” Sax replied firmly, disengaging the kickstand with the heel of her boot. “We’ll see you soon.”
Maddy waved once as she watched Sax wheel the large motorcycle around in the center of the lane. As the engine roared and the powerful machine leapt into motion, she saw Jude tighten her hold on Sax, leaning against her, at once protected and sheltering. Maddy had often wondered if ever a person would come along who could match Saxon for drive and strength and tenderness. Jude did all that, and more. Oh, what a marvelous pair they make.
*
Sax pulled to the side of the road as they entered Manhattan. It was a little after 9:00 p.m.
“Where to?” she asked, turning on the seat to look at Jude. She knew what she wanted, but she was a little reluctant to make assumptions.
The last thirty-six hours had been like a dream. After Jude had declined her offer for lunch the day before, she had driven to Maddy’s in a fury of temper and pain, certain that Jude’s refusal had been because she was seriously involved with another woman. Sax had wanted her so much, but it wasn’t just the physical frustration that had made her wild with rejection and aching loneliness; when they were together, she was happy. More than happy, she was soothed in some primal part of herself that never truly rested. Once that longing had been unleashed, it tormented her, her heart crying out for the peace that only Jude seemed able to bring.
Then, miraculously, Jude had come to her and claimed her—every inch of her, body and soul.
Now, as she contemplated their separation, the night loomed longer and lonelier than any she could recall. More barren even than those desolate nights when she had lain awake in the still, hushed dark of the hospital praying that Maddy would come for her. Maddy had ended her isolation then, but as the years had passed, her needs had changed, and Maddy could no longer banish her demons. But Jude had. Jude had. And she wondered, now, how she would make it through the night alone.
Jude sensed Sax waiting for an answer, but she had already taken enough risks. She’d followed her to Maddy’s and practically—hell, not practically—wantonly seduced her. She’d made clear her desires. Deliberately, she countered, “What do you want to do?”
Sax glanced down once at Jude’s hand still resting on her thigh, considering whether she could afford to let these feelings loose. She wasn’t certain she could contain them, wasn’t certain she could ever stop the wanting if she set it free. She looked into Jude’s eyes, knowing she had been headed for this moment since the first day they had met. “At 6:30 tomorrow morning, I have to go to work. Then, for thirty hours or so, my life won’t be my own. Until then, I want to be with you.”
“You know the way to my place.” Jude didn’t realize she’d been holding her breath.
Ten minutes later, they pulled up in front. Once inside the door, Sax dropped her bag on the floor and waited while Jude walked around turning on lights in an apartment that was a perfect reflection of its occupant.
“What?” Jude asked hesitantly, watching Sax look around with a faint smile on her face.
“It’s you,” Sax observed, glancing at the array of recording and other electronic equipment fitted into the niches of an antique apothecary bench along the far wall. Beneat
h the warmth of color manifest in the paintings on the walls, the textured fabrics of rugs and throws, and the lush greenery of living foliage, there was a sense of order and utility. Sensuality and reason, creativity and intent, form and function—the artist revealed.
“It’s passionate and purposeful,” Sax continued, moving deeper into the room, indicating the space with a sweep of her arm. “You work here, and you live here, and they’re the same thing for you, aren’t they?”
Jude stared at the woman in the tight black T-shirt and faded black jeans, a handsome, dangerous stranger who knew things she shouldn’t and touched her in ways no one ever had. “You scare me.”
Sax cocked her head, stood still, studied Jude’s eyes. Green—they were deep, deep green verging on black. They looked like that when she was aroused or angry, and now, Sax knew, when she was frightened. “I think it’s too late for safety.”
“So do I,” Jude murmured, walking to within inches of her. “What do you want?” she asked again. How long will it be before I can stand this close to you and not want my hands on your skin?
Sax searched desperately for some way to explain how Jude had changed everything. “I want to do to you what you do to me,” she said fervently.
“What?” Jude’s voice was low and husky. “What is it you want?”
Sax put a gentle hand on Jude’s cheek. “I want to abide in your secret places and catch your tears before they fall.”
“I should make you leave,” Jude breathed. You can’t know what you’re asking. You can’t.
“Why?”
“You could hurt me.”
“I won’t.”
“You can’t know that.”
“Yes. I can.”
“What if I don’t want you in those places?”
“Then you should make me leave.” Sax dropped her hand. Eyes riveted on Jude’s, she waited.
Jude ran her fingers lightly over Sax’s face, tracing her eyebrows, the steep slope of her cheekbones, the rich curve of her lips. “It’s too late.”
“Yes. For me, too.”
For a moment, they didn’t speak, they didn’t move. Then Jude took Sax’s hand and led her across the room and through a doorway. Once inside her bedroom, Jude lit a candle by her bedside. They undressed wordlessly, unhurriedly—eyes locked on one another as each slowly revealed herself in measured, mesmerizing glimpses, denim and cotton falling from candlelit flesh. When they were naked, Jude turned down the covers and slid between the sheets, beckoning to Sax.
Sax stretched out on her side facing Jude, her palm lightly resting on the arch of Jude’s hip. Amazed at how much she desired her, Sax was surprised even more by how exciting it was to wait. She was wet, she was hard, and she wished the wanting never to end.
“You know, I hated to leave Maddy’s,” Jude whispered in the flickering light, raising a hand to brush along the curve of Sax’s breast. There was a wistful, almost sad note in her voice.
“Why?” Sax leaned forward enough to press her lips to the hollow below Jude’s collarbone. “We can go back.”
Jude wondered if she was foolish to say these things out loud, yet she was unable to stop. “Because I was afraid something would change when we got back to the city.”
Instinctively, Sax moved her hand to Jude’s back, pulling her closer until their breasts met and melded. Her body hummed, electrified. She held Jude, giving her the chance to speak, wanting her to know it was safe to tell her anything.
“I was afraid you’d disappear.” It took all Jude’s strength to say those words, because admitting how very much she wanted Sax was terrifying. She slipped her fingers into Sax’s hair, pulled her head near, and sought her mouth. You are real; I can touch you.
“I won’t disappear,” Sax said deliberately when Jude released her. “I couldn’t.” She ignored the thunder of arousal as Jude’s hand stole lower over her stomach, fingers seeking to claim her. She caught Jude’s wrist before those sensitive fingers could touch her, because she knew she would be beyond words then. Raising the hand to her lips, she kissed the palm tenderly and placed it over her own heart. “Do you feel that?”
“Yes,” Jude whispered, her eyes searching Sax’s face. In the yellow glow of the candle, her blue eyes were black.
“It’s yours.”
“Why hasn’t someone else claimed it before this?” Jude’s throat was tight with desire and tears. “It’s so precious.”
“No one ever wanted it before,” Sax murmured, her lips caressing the fine hair at Jude’s temple. Carefully, she skimmed her palm up the inside of Jude’s leg to the vee between her thighs, catching her breath at the slick, welcoming heat.
“I can’t believe that,” Jude said throatily. Her hand still rested on Sax’s chest. “You’re handsome and brilliant and sexy as hell.”
“And arrogant and stubborn and secretive,” Sax added with a tremulous laugh. God, she wanted to take her, just take her. Her arm trembled with the effort it took to go slowly.
“Yes, true,” Jude agreed softly. She turned onto her back, drawing Sax with her. “But it balances out...in the end.”
“I’ll remind you of that one of these days when I’ve aggravated you too much.” Leaning on one elbow, Sax was stroking languorously now, fingers gliding over engorged flesh, parting her gently.
“Good idea,” Jude agreed. Her voice shook. She was losing focus.
“Jude,” Sax said tenderly when she caught the faint whisper of uncertainty, “you make it safe for me to be myself. I am not afraid when I’m with you.”
Slowly, watching Jude’s countenance dissolve as her lids fluttered, Sax moved inside her.
“Thank you,” Jude whispered, laying her head where her hand had just been, against Sax’s heart. With closed eyes, listening to the sure, steady beat, she yielded all her secrets.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Personal Project Log—Castle
August 31, 9:45 a.m.
[Note: Episode title: “Call to Battle.”] Holiday weekends are even more difficult than normal, because when people party, they get into trouble. Trouble comes in many forms—bar brawls, car accidents, domestic disturbances, robberies, gang altercations. What it means in practical terms for the trauma team is that there is more work, fewer people to do it because of vacation schedules, and a general sense of stress and anxiety about what might be coming next.
I should qualify that statement—Sinclair and Stein don’t seem particularly worried. The two of them are almost unnaturally calm, as if they know that they’ll deal with whatever fate may deliver. Confidence? Self-assurance? Maybe just simple experience, at least on Sinclair’s part.
The rest of the staff are keyed up—from the nurses to the ancillary personal to the security guards at the front doors—you can see it in their faces and hear it in their voices. Excitement mixed with dread, like the kind of ambivalent anticipation you feel looking at one of those ridiculously large amusement park rides, wondering if you’ll vomit or laugh halfway down.
Labor Day weekend is the end of summer, and underneath the gaiety is a thread of anger and sadness.
Today’s Saturday, the first full day of the long weekend, and the team just finished rounds in the TICU a few minutes ago. Stein and Sinclair are already in the operating room doing emergency exploratory surgery on a patient who was shot three days ago. Apparently, she is having episodic spiking fevers and they suspect an abscess somewhere in her abdomen. Because Sax and Deb are also the admitting surgeons for the day, the backup team—all of whom have been here since six o’clock yesterday morning—has to stay until this surgery is over and the two of them are free.
Jude turned off her recorder and randomly selected a tape from the pile on the desk. She slid it into the VCR and pushed play, then leaned back in the swivel desk chair and propped her feet on the wastepaper basket. It only took a few minutes to recognize the scene as the one in which Sax and Deb had been working on a New York City police officer who had been injured in a high-speed c
rash while pursuing a suspected dope dealer up the West Side Highway. Parts of the tape were dizzyingly shaky because Mel had been jostled by the clutch of police crowding into the trauma bay trying to find out how their fallen comrade was faring.
She muted the volume. Not interested in the conversations, she was only interested in the dark-haired surgeon whose face was a study in fierce concentration and whose hands moved like magic over the landscape of flesh and bone.
As she watched, images unexpectedly fused and blurred; her memory transcended time. Sax leaning over the officer became Sax leaning over her in the trauma bay at Bellevue. And then suddenly, it was Sax leaning over her in bed last night—hands playing over her skin with unerring certainty, finding all her tender places, making her molten, making her scream, making her come.
She caught her breath at the swift stab of pleasure that accompanied the memory. Watching the tape had been a bad idea. She’d only wanted to see Sax’s face for an instant, because she missed her, and now she ached in a way she knew was going to torment her for hours.
“Jude?” a curious voice behind her inquired. “You okay?”
Swinging around, she grinned ruefully at Melissa. “Yeah. Fine...just woolgathering. Waiting for Deb and Sax to finish up.”
“And the silent movie?” Melissa pulled over a chair and nodded toward the tape that still ran on the monitor.
“Oh...that. Nothing. I was just...” She stopped, unable to think of an explanation that wasn’t ridiculous, as if the truth weren’t ridiculous enough. Sighing, she admitted, “I wanted to look at her.”
