by Diane Saxon
And waited.
Kate narrowed cool blue eyes at her and leaned forward.
“Bill. Did you want to ask me something?”
“Yeah.” Bill’s black eyes bored into Kate’s blue ones as though she could suck out the information she needed through her eyes and leave without Kate being any the wiser.
“What…?”
“You’re a doctor!” she accused.
“Well, yes. Is there something wrong? Do you think you should be going to your own doctor?”
“Hell, no.” Bill reared back, fear making her grip her hands tight around the rungs on the back of the chair. “He’s a hundred and two if he’s a day. He wouldn’t have a clue what to say to me.”
“Well to be honest, Bill, right now, neither do I.”
“Okay.” She rubbed her chin hard and pursed her lips, leaned forward again, and rested her chin on her hands.
“Here goes. The first time you ever had sex, how bad did it hurt?”
Bill wriggled awkwardly in her seat as Kate stared at her for what seemed like an eternity.
“Well. Let me see. That was quite some time ago, Bill. Is there any particular reason you want to know?”
“Well, hell yeah. I mean…the boys, you know.” She rushed on, heat stealing into her cheeks. “They always say how much blood there is and how the girl wailed and cried and how embarrassing it all was.”
“When was this?”
“What?”
“When did the boys discuss this in front of you?”
“Well they didn’t. They never knew I was there most the time. But since I was a kid, I guess I just sat in the corner, listening. I’m the youngest, you know. Mama died when I was born. Mac was only seventeen when daddy died, but he brought me up all the same.”
“Didn’t the authorities have something to say about that?”
“Nope. They never knew. No one asked. We got along just fine. Mac said just to keep our heads down, and it was no one’s business but ours.”
Kate stood up and walked over to the coffee machine, divided Jacks huge mug of coffee into two smaller cups, handed one to Bill and sipped from the other herself as she sat back down.
“So, you were brought up by your brothers, and it sounds like you heard some gruesome stories. Do they still discuss these things in front of you?”
“Hell no! Why do you think I moved out a few years ago? It wasn’t only my brothers, but my cousins. They’re all male, too. Hell, I didn’t know what to do when I had my first period.” She remembered the confusion like it was yesterday. She’d learned all about them in school, from a book, but who the hell knew how to explain raging hormones. “I had to ask a teacher at school. I was seventeen, and she looked at me like I was some kind of freak. Apparently I should have started years before. I didn’t like to ask anything like that again.”
Kate reached out and covered Bill’s hand with her own. Bill stared at it for a moment. She hadn’t come for sympathy.
“I’m sorry, Bill. I had no idea you had been so isolated. Your life seems to buzz, and yet you’ve been alone in so many ways.” She squeezed Bill’s hand gently. “And you’ve never had sex.”
She jerked up out of her seat, slugged down some coffee, and paced across the room to stare out of the window.
“Nope.”
“And you want to know whether what you heard is right.” There was a long pause until Bill met Kate’s honest eyes. “Well, I can tell you it’s not. It’s different for everyone. My first encounter was a little painful, quite messy, and altogether embarrassingly fumbling. But I was eighteen, a late starter by all accounts, and the guy I was with was young and inexperienced too. But you know, I thought myself in love, and so it wasn’t so bad. I learned and I got better. But it wasn’t until I met Jack and truly fell in love that I realized how wonderful sex is.”
“Eeewww, don’t talk about you and Jack. God almighty, I don’t want that picture in my head. I’m screwed up enough as it is.”
Kate chuckled and wandered over to join Bill at the window, putting a sisterly arm around her waist.
“What about protection?”
“I know all about that. You should live in a house with five boys. There were condoms in every crevice in every room. Except mine of course. Mac made sure that was a no-fly zone.” She turned and patted Kate clumsily on the shoulder before she threw the dregs of her coffee down the sink and rinsed her cup.
“’Course, I can’t buy condoms. Everyone in town would know what brand and size I bought.”
“Does Michael know you haven’t had sex before?”
Bill gave her a sharp look and then sighed heavily.
“Yeah, he knows.”
“Are you sure that you want to? Don’t be forced into anything you don’t want to do.”
“Kate, you’re his sister. I can’t give you details here, but if I don’t get him in the sack soon, I swear to God I am going to self-combust. As long as I know I’m not going to bleed to death in writhing agony, I’m good. I just don’t want him to see me cry.”
*
As Bill’s motorbike started up, Jack popped his head around the doorway, his baby girl safely cradled in his arms.
“Who’s going to see her cry?”
“My brother.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Because sometimes it’s not the physical pain that makes you cry.” Kate gently took her baby from her husband and walked into his open arms. “He’s going to break her heart,” she said sadly.
*
Kate sat on the sofa nursing the baby when her brother walked in. The look on her face was enough to freeze him in his tracks.
“What?” he asked warily.
“Sit down. We need to talk.”
His face was the picture of concern as he sat next to her on the sofa. His eyes met hers.
“What’s the matter? What’s happened?”
She blew out a breath and glanced at him before returning her gaze to her daughter.
“I’m really uncomfortable with this, Michael. I have never, ever spoken with you about sex. You’re my brother for God’s sake.” Horrified, he met Kate’s determined blue eyes with his own. “I’m obliged to though.” He sat back, leaned his head on the back of the sofa, and closed his eyes with embarrassment and weariness.
“It’s about Bill.”
“Okay.”
“You do know she has no experience with men.”
“I know,” he ground out. Rolling his head in her direction, he returned his sister’s gaze.
“She seems to think you’re the one man she wouldn’t mind…you know…having sex with.”
He sighed. “I know that too.”
“Of course you know.” Kate stroked her daughter’s downy hair. “You will be careful won’t you?”
“Yes.”
“It’s important to her. Maybe more important than you realize.”
He nodded.
“You don’t want to talk about this, do you?”
“No, Kate. I do not want to talk about this.” He lurched up from the sofa. Turned to face her.
“Look. She’s twenty-four. She’s a big girl now. We want to have sex. That’s all it will be, Kate. I do care for her. It’s not just lust, but she does understand there is no commitment here.” He ran his hands through his thick hair in frustration. “Jeez, this is worse than Mum’s talk on condoms and responsibility when I was a kid.”
He sat down heavily next to Kate again making the baby stir.
“Don’t wake my baby,” she warned.
He patted her knee.
“Kate, did I lecture you when you came back to England heartbroken?”
“No. You didn’t. But I was already pregnant. Too late for a lecture then.” She placed her hand over his, her familiar eyes smiled back at him. “Take care. Be gentle. I don’t mean just physically. I think she’s more tenderhearted than anyone realizes. Got it?”
“Yeah. I got it. Everyone seems to think that woman
is tenderhearted. I don’t think they look close enough.”
He rubbed his hand over his brow, stood up, and walked out of the room, wondering if anything could be more uncomfortable than a sex talk with his younger sister.
Chapter 12
Being confronted by two-dozen boxes of condoms and a wild-eyed woman possibly rated right up there in that uncomfortable zone.
She paced back and forward, walked around the opposite side of the kitchen table, flung her arm out and pointed at the offending items as soon as he walked through the door.
“There you go. Take your pick.”
He didn’t know whether to laugh or run. He thought she might kill him in either case.
He chose to study the boxes on the table instead. “You seem to have pretty high expectations, Bill.”
“They’re all sealed.” She rubbed her hands roughly up and down her thighs. If she did it much harder, she was going to rub a hole in her jeans.
“Why wouldn’t they be sealed? Where did you get them?”
“Well I couldn’t get them from a store in town now could I? There’s not a single soul here I don’t know, haven’t lectured, helped across a road, or arrested.” She wrapped her arms around her body, chewed on her lip as Michael tried desperately not to smile. She looked so serious. “I think my brothers may all be perverts.” She scowled across the table at him.
“You got them from your brothers?” He gave a wary nod; she may not need to kill him. “Brave move, Bill. When are they all arriving with their shotguns?”
She snorted out a laugh, leaned forward, and picked up one of the small packets. Waved it at him.
“I filched them. I went right into their house with a pecan pie I bought in town, put it on the kitchen table, and then trawled the house for their condoms while they were out.”
He closed his eyes and shook his head, and when he opened them again, she was waggling another small box at him.
“Well, I don’t understand. These ones say they’re fruit-flavored. I have no idea what you would be doing putting one of those in your mouth. You could choke to death for the love of God.”
He nearly did. He watched her through narrowed eyes. She could not be serious, could she? Was she really that naive?
“And here…” she picked up another pack, tapped it on the table “…what in hell’s name are you supposed to do with these? They have the American flag emblazoned on them. Does that mean you have to stand to attention when you’re wearing them?” Throwing them back on the table, she picked up another pack, while he hauled in a gasping breath, trying his hardest not to guffaw. Standing at attention was a prerequisite, surely? He could feel gurgles of laughter rushing up through his belly into his chest. The woman was priceless. She wasn’t kidding. She was deadly serious.
“Why in the name of all that’s holy would you want something like this glowing at you in the dark? And these…these are colored, blue, green, purple. Surely to Christ you’re going to look like you have a disease. I’m surprised there’s no polka dots here.” She picked one packet up after another, throwing them back on the table in disgust. “And these warm up, and these ones…well, they’re studded.”
“Do you mean ribbed?”
“Uh, well isn’t that the same thing?”
“No, I’m pretty sure there’s a difference between ribbed and studded.”
She frowned at him, her eyes frenetic and confused. “There’s something wrong with my brothers. There isn’t a single condom here for normal use. I’m sorry. I guess I messed up. I have no condoms to speak of.” She flung her hand frantically across the table, swept half the boxes onto the floor.
“We can’t have sex,” she howled.
Michael’s smile faded fast as his amusement fled.
“It’s okay, Bill.” He found he could speak at last. “I have it covered.” He reached delicately into his back trouser pocket and pulled out a small foil packet.
“Is that it?”
He glanced at the kitchen table, at the floor, and back to his fingers holding a single foil, a smile quirked across his lips.
“Well, what did you expect?”
“Well. More than one. Surely. The boys always say…”
“Bill. How about you forget what your boys have always said. Men lie. A lot.” He leaned across the table and took hold of her wrist to guide her around to his side, still holding the foil packet aloft in his other hand.
“Well, what does it do?” she demanded.
“It protects you from getting pregnant and from sexually transmitted diseases.”
“Is that it? It doesn’t have whistles or bells or lights or anything?”
He chuckled as he drew her in close. “No, it doesn’t.”
He gave her a sharp tug so she stumbled against him. Her breath was hitching in her chest, too fast, too much, and she seemed to be able to breath in but not out again. Her pulse beat fast and thready, and a small tremble vibrated through her entire body. He thought she might be going to hyperventilate. Making love to an inert body, albeit warm, was not his idea of fun.
He raised his hand to her face, caressed it, stroked his thumb over the velvet skin of her cheekbone, and smiled at her, slow and easy. He felt her relax, and her breath expelled from her lungs.
“I’ll take care of it.” He kissed her eyebrow, the end of her nose, touched his lips against hers. “Let me take care of you.”
Cupping her face in his hands he dipped in to caress her mouth with his own, to sip, to taste, his lips smoothed, molded. His tongue sampled, drank. She whimpered into his mouth and returned the tender sensuality of his kiss. He felt her surrender as her arms slid up his chest to link around his neck, her body lax. Her legs gave way beneath her, and with a groan he lifted her, set her on the kitchen table, pushed himself close between her thighs. He held her in his arms as his mouth cruised her jawline, and then farther to trace the silky line of her neck.
“Please tell me we’re not going to get interrupted again,” he murmured against her throat. He felt the vibration of her laughter against his lips.
“I don’t think so.”
“Well, they’re going to die if they do.”
She gurgled as she pulled his head in tighter, tipped her own back to allow him more freedom.
He kneaded her shoulders, allowed his hands to slide down her arms, across to her waist as he smoothed up her rib cage bundling her T-shirt with his fingers, pushing it up her arms, over her breasts. He ducked his head and followed the upward stretch of her body with his mouth, his tongue skimming the line of her black lace bra, the one he had seen not so long ago in her underwear drawer.
He dabbled his tongue along the feminine, lacy edge, dipped inside to tease. He felt her breath quicken as he touched the tip of his tongue to her sweet, hot nipple. He raised his head, reluctantly returned his mouth to hers to slow himself down.
He was trying his best to set a leisurely pace, but he wasn’t sure he could keep himself in check. Bill didn’t seem to be doing anything to slow him down either. Her hands roamed free. He felt her fingers tremble as she unfastened the buttons of his shirt, slid them, freezing, inside to caress his warmth. He sucked his breath in through his teeth and returned his attention to her bra, and unhooking it, he pushed it from her shoulders to expose her breasts, pausing he looked his fill at the dark burgundy nipples, sitting prettily on her pert breasts. He’d never seen such perfection—they were tiny, perfect, beautifully sculpted. He allowed his thumbs to touch her nipples in a slow circular motion.
“Michael…” He raised his head and gazed deep into her soft brown eyes, misted with passion. He leisurely caressed her breasts while he waited, made sure she kept up with him. He brought his head down to join his hand.
He suckled there, pulling her erect nipple deep into his mouth. He rubbed gently with his tongue until he felt her utter compliance. As a husky groan escaped her lips, his mouth trekked further down her body. Coaxing her to lie back on the table, he guided her down, his mouth
trailed a blaze of heat to her navel where her gold belly bar rested. He deftly unfastened the button on her jeans and slid the zipper down. She raised her rear as he pushed her jeans over her slim hips, taut thighs, past her knees, and off the end of her slender feet as she lay supine on the kitchen table, surrounded by boxes of condoms.
He worked his way back up pausing to kiss her knee, skim her thighs with his tongue, tease her belly with his lips, and nip at her underwear with his teeth.
“I see you’re wearing your thong.”
“Hmmm…” He knew from her inability to formulate words she was already lost to her own pleasure. Raising himself above her, his gaze skimmed along her lean, lethargic body laid out on the table in front of him like a feast for the taking. Thinking he could devour her in one gulp, he made a conscious effort to slow it down, take the edge off the intensity, and lighten things up a little for her.
“Jesus, Bill, you’re perfect,” he muttered and once again took possession of her mouth, drawing a weak sound of pleasure from her throat. “But I’m not taking you here on the kitchen table where any one of your brothers could walk in.” He stood upright, took a hold of her arm, and yanked her toward him, throwing her relaxed body neatly over his shoulder.
“Shit, Michael, I swear you just knocked all the breath out of me.”
“You’ve been doing that to me for the last twenty minutes. Let’s go to bed.”
“Okay. Have you got your little condom there?”
“Shut up about the condom, and it’s not so little. It just thin. Really thin so we can feel everything.”
Sprinting up the stairs, he flung open her bedroom door and dumped her on her bed, watching her body bounce. He wanted to leap right on there after her. He thought she might laugh, but her eyes heated as they skimmed across his flesh exposed by his open shirt. Her tongue delicately touched her upper lip, and his blood shot to boiling point.
“Hey, tiger.” Her voice was a slow invitation. “Show me your next move.”
He shed his shirt and trousers without a word, never taking his eyes off her as she propped herself up on her elbows to watch him strip.
