Desire at Dawn

by Fiona Zedde

  But Kylie didn’t want to dwell on the past. She had this moment to experience.

  “I don’t know how to start,” she confessed.

  A smile touched Olivia’s mouth before she uncurled from her lotus position on the blanket and got to her knees to lift the dress up and over her head. She swept off the thin material and dropped it in the grass beside the blanket. Then she sat again, tugged off her panties, and put them with the discarded dress. She didn’t wear a bra.

  Kylie stared at Olivia, her slender frame, the bones delicately carved under her gorgeous mahogany skin, breasts the size of antique teacups. The ruby necklace was a bright red lasso around her slender throat. Her eyes looked up at her through lushly dark lashes, her mouth pink and damp. She licked her lips, lashes fluttering down. Her human body breathed and exhaled its delicious scents. Fear. Longing. Indecision.

  Finally, Olivia made her choice.

  “I want you to touch me,” she said.

  Olivia stretched out against the blanket, propped up on her elbows while the moonlight washed over her brown body. Her nipples were already hard with her want; her breath was quick. The rubies and diamonds of the necklace were restrained fire against her skin. She seemed wholly calm as she contemplated Kylie over her, watching with implacable eyes that from the very beginning, once she’d actually seen Kylie, noticed everything. But it was her hands that gave her away.

  They flexed minutely against the blanket, a light tremor in the delicate fingers that made Kylie want to soothe her, comfort her. These were alien feelings to her for seven long years. She barely knew what to do with those emotions. What was it to soothe a woman like this? What did it mean to comfort her? What would it mean to touch her?

  Kylie must have waited too long.

  “Take off your clothes,” Olivia said.

  Kylie quivered again at the soft authority in her voice, and automatically started to do what Olivia demanded. In seconds, she was naked. Socks and shoes, shirt and jeans discarded on the grass. Bra and panties on top of them. No preliminaries. No seduction of a strip tease. She knelt beside Olivia again, slowly easing into the blanket until her butt rested on the heels of her feet. Grass poked at her legs through the blanket.

  She didn’t know what to do with her hands. Drape them in her lap? Put them on her thighs? On Olivia?

  “Damn….” The word passed from Olivia’s mouth like a sigh. “You’re exquisite.”

  She sat up. Kylie couldn’t help but notice her breasts again, the delicate weight of them that moved as she moved. The firm dark nipples that her mouth watered to taste. Kylie licked her lips.

  The ruby and diamond necklace hung below her collarbones; the lowest cluster of rubies and diamonds dipped between her breasts. The gold and jewels would be warm from Olivia’s body, and the heat of the stones would be intoxicating beneath her fingertips if she touched them in prelude to caressing Olivia. A hunger surged in her.

  She wished she had been curious enough before to ask, to experiment. When all those boys and men had approached her as a child, wanting to lead her to some quiet away place. When the visiting lecturer at her college, a sly girl with lazy-lidded eyes and a suggestive smile, had blown in her ear and invited Kylie to her rooms off campus, even when, in the beginning, Julia had shown an interest in initiating her into the intricacies of sex, she had refused. Now Kylie wished she had said yes. Her inexperience paralyzed her.

  “I—” Kylie stammered. “I don’t know what to do.”

  She bit savagely into her lower lip as the beast inside her battled the inexperienced virgin, simultaneously wanting to ravish and savor, to devour and learn.

  Olivia laughed softly in wonder. She touched Kylie’s face, swept a finger along her jawline and trembling lower lip. Kylie felt her hands clench. She wanted to be better at this. She wanted so badly that it ached.

  “You are so very lovely, Kylie. A part of me can’t even believe this is happening.”

  Under the moonlight, Olivia was a goddess, the jewels gleaming against her throat, the silver light falling over her short black hair. Lashes long and luxurious, created beguiling shadows on her cheeks. Her mouth was lush. Perfectly shaped. The most perfect rose in any garden. Kylie stared at Olivia’s mouth, the top and lower lips that were perfect complements to each other that she wanted so very much to feel beneath her own. But couldn’t. She was frozen.

  Then Olivia kissed her. Thawed her. A light brush of mouth against mouth that left Kylie trembling even more. Her hands jerked up to grasp Olivia’s arms, the beast taking its due, to clutch and drag her abruptly closer. Warmth to coolness. Olivia’s divine breasts against hers. Olivia’s fragile breath in her chest, the beating heart that thumped wildly. Kylie wanted it all. Totally. Completely.

  She opened her mouth and accepted, no demanded, more of the kiss, going by instinct and from the bits and pieces of what she’d seen of kissing, of intimate touching. She shuddered under Olivia’s touch.

  Kylie got to her knees on the blanket and pulled Olivia closer. Olivia came to her with a joyous cry, her body exhaling its delicious feminine scent, the nectar between her legs making Kylie’s mouth water. They knelt together on the blanket, kissing while Kylie thought she would die from the feelings rocketing through her body. Olivia touched Kylie’s skin, her ass, her thighs, while her mouth devoured.

  Kylie wanted to yield to the experience of Olivia, but the beast inside would not let her. She lifted Olivia abruptly into her arms, dangling her over the blanket before she dropped her onto the thick cotton and fell on her, her hips falling between Olivia’s parted thighs. She pinned Olivia’s hands to the ground. Growling, she licked the small breasts, marveling at their salt taste and silken texture, ran her tongue along the scarred tissue of her left breast. Her ribs, the delicate cage that held her heart and other organs, her belly that trembled beneath Kylie’s touch. The lower Kylie went, the stronger the scent between Olivia’s legs became. Her head swam with it. Her mouth longed to taste. Her teeth flashed out, and she heard Olivia gasp in fear. Or was it excitement?

  Olivia’s hands tangled in her hair, urging her lower. The devil inside Kylie stopped her descent. She slowly licked her way back up Olivia’s stomach to tease her breasts again, licking the firm nipples, biting gently on the delicate flesh as she’d seen other women do. Olivia’s slender body writhed against the blanket. Her pussy, slick and hot, pressed to Kylie’s stomach. She instinctively moved on top of Olivia as she suckled the delectable breasts, pulling at the fat nipples and drawing soft cries from her open mouth. Kylie’s stomach muscles gliding over the hard button that was the source of Olivia’s pleasure.

  “Touch me.” Olivia’s nails bit into her shoulder. “Please.”

  Feeling truly impish now, Kylie grazed a nipple with her fang. “Where should I touch you?”

  Breath hiccupped in Olivia’s throat. She gasped. Her hips circled on the blanket, pressed up into Kylie’s belly. “Touch my—”

  “Do you mean here?”

  Olivia released a trembling groan as Kylie touched her cunt, floating her fingers delicately along the damp flesh. She ignored the immediate urge to engulf her sensitive fingers into Olivia’s viscous warmth. Kylie knew even more delight waited there for her.

  “So good.” Olivia moaned. “So good.” She grabbed her own knees and pulled them wide to give Kylie the fullest access to her wet pussy.

  The sensitive pads of her fingers felt every twitch and movement of Olivia’s intimate flesh, felt the rise of arousal, the rush of moisture, the writhing need in her. Kylie pressed her palm hard against her pussy, agitating the fevered flesh while Olivia moaned and begged for more. She lifted her head to watch Olivia’s face.

  Olivia clutched at Kylie’s shoulder, her nails sinking deeply into flesh. She gasped and bucked against the blanket. “Are—are you sure you’ve never—ah!―done this before?”

  “You’re the only one.” Kylie watched the pleasure transform and soften her features. Beads of sweat popped to the su
rface of her skin. Her tongue flicked out to dampen the already glistening lips. Her eyelashes fluttered down to shield her eyes from Kylie’s gaze.

  “Look at me,” Kylie said.

  A single breath. Then two. Olivia’s lashes lifted with difficulty, unshading the passion-dark eyes as Kylie lavished her wet flesh with alternating firm and delicate strokes of her hand.

  “Oh.” Olivia licked her lips again and latched the lower lip between her teeth. She stared down at Kylie.

  She felt powerful. More than when she had some human on his knees pleading for his life. There was nothing like being the key to a woman’s pleasure. Because in that moment, she felt that she was the only one who could bring Olivia the sensations that were transforming her face, that made her lose her breath and call out her name.

  Kylie slowly slid her middle finger into the dripping opening. She hissed in reaction. The hot and wet canal slid millimeter by millimeter up her finger, encasing her cool flesh in heat. Her own pussy slid wet and swollen between her thighs, begging to be touched. But now was about Olivia. Kylie touched, caressed, stroked until Olivia was whimpering from her lust, body dripping with sweat. She shuddered again and again as Kylie stroked her clitoris.

  For a moment, sharply, Kylie felt alive again. Blood rushing, cunt streaming, tears rushing down her face, pulse racing out of control. Then she realized it was Olivia whom she felt, Olivia and her vivid emotions pressing in at her from all sides.

  The realization startled her, lurched what felt like a pulse in her throat, made her dive into Olivia even deeper to get more of the wild storm of sensation. She slipped down Olivia’s body, latched on to the juicy clit and suckled it, slid her tongue under the hood to stroke the deliciously sensitive flesh. Olivia’s hands dug even more into her shoulders, drawing blood. She quivered, calling Kylie’s name.

  Kylie fumbled up for the slight breasts, the hard nipples above her, stroking them the way she wished for hers to be stroked. She twisted the hard points, tugging on them, rolling the eager nubs between her fingers. A gush of wetness dripped down her chin.

  “Oh God!” Olivia surged up on the blanket. “Oh my God!”

  Her voice rose up in the night like music, threatening to reveal their secret tryst to anyone who would listen. But Kylie didn’t care. She only continued pleasing the woman who writhed and gasped beneath her. The woman who raked her fingers over her naked shoulders, hissing her bliss, undulating her dripping wet center against Kylie’s mouth.

  Her nectar was like blood. Nourishing and necessary. The delicate flesh pulsed against her mouth like a little heartbeat, and Kylie opened her mouth wider for it, gulping down the hot flood. In sudden inspiration, she beat her tongue against Olivia’s clit, fast and faster, moaning her lust into the damp flesh.

  Olivia screamed her name, her body arching up into a bow. Her pussy fluttered against Kylie’s mouth, dripping. Kylie drank more.

  “Yes.” Olivia pulled her hair. “That’s—so good—yes!” Another moan left her throat as Kylie pressed her mouth even more into the dripping pussy, licking lower, then slid her tongue into the heated wetness.

  Oh, heavens above! So good.

  She touched Olivia’s clit, stroked it, pinched it. Kylie trembled. She was nearly split in two from her pleasure. Waves of sensation rippled through her.

  She gripped Olivia’s waist, holding her fast as she drank from the source, plunging her tongue deeply into the wet center. She tasted so good, a hint of blood deep inside her body. Hunger flashed higher inside Kylie’s body, a desperation to possess what she’d only known from bloodlust. It was almost Olivia’s time of the month. She shoved her tongue deeper, faster, lapping at the vaginal walls, harder, more, as if she could call the blood up. It smelled so close.

  Kylie shoved her hips into the blanket-covered ground, pushing her swollen and wet clit against the hardness beneath her, searching for any form of stimulation she could get. She pinched the clit again, gentler this time, milking the exquisite, slippery length between her thumb and forefinger.

  Olivia bucked against her face. Gasping.

  Kylie moaned with relief. Glorying in the river of lust running between her legs, the whimpering sounds that Olivia made as she shoved her pussy again and again into her face. The organ between her fingers swelled even more. Olivia screamed again, a long and luxurious sound, her pussy clutching tight around Kylie’s tongue, a muscular pulsing that set off Kylie’s own explosive reaction.

  “Oh! Fu—!”

  It was even better than the first time with just Olivia’s hand on her. It felt incredible. As if her entire body was engulfed in healing flames, as if she were human again and every fiber of her was alive and wanting and giving and pulsing with possibility and sensation. Her entire body went immobile with the shock of it, an overwhelming feeling that stopped time. Blocked out all sound. Everything was sweetness pouring out from her pulsating center.

  Then her surroundings came rushing back. Olivia’s gasping breath. The crickets chirping nearby. The prick of the grass through the blanket. The soft pussy throbbed once, then twice beneath her mouth. Hands clutched and released in her hair.

  Kylie licked her lips and slowly raised her eyes. Her head felt heavy, her body slack. Like she was waking from a long dream. She blinked up at Olivia, her lashes like great wings laboring through thick air. Olivia laughed, and it was the loveliest sound.

  “My poor baby,” she crooned and propped herself up on her elbows, watching Kylie with her eyes swimming with the remnants of her bliss.

  The wind moved through the trees, whispering a soft seduction while Olivia seemed to sway to the same rhythm as the branches overhead. Out in the woods, away from the cell of her apartment, she seemed to grow into her power, a strength that Kylie had no idea she possessed. Olivia almost seemed like a different person. Her eyes were large and luminous in the light of the moon, long-lashed and wicked under the distantly winking stars.

  She swept her thumb along the sensitive line of Kylie’s lips still smeared with her juices. She put the thumb in her mouth and, with her eyes locked with Kylie’s, sucked off the nectar she found there. Kylie’s belly clenched fiercely at the sight of Olivia’s tongue and the sly and dangerous smile.

  The heat of it, the humanness of it, was almost too much for Kylie to bear. But she withstood the touch, her body weighed down by the aftermath of release.

  “I think you just took me to heaven,” Kylie murmured with wonder.

  Olivia’s smile widened. “Not yet, baby.” She sat up completely on the blanket, all luscious flesh, intoxicating scent, and more beautiful than Kylie deserved. “But I will.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Olivia was in the shower when Kylie climbed the balcony the next night. She heard the hypnotic sound from the street, water falling on flesh, on tile, and underneath, quiet sobs.

  She froze between the whisper of night at her back and the sadness pouring from the apartment. Did it have something to do with what she and Olivia had done together the night before? Did Olivia regret making love with her? The thought made Kylie pause longer, made her stomach ache.

  Their night of sexual discovery had ended at dawn when, chased from the park and their comfortable blanket by the shadowy bruise of morning, they had raced back to Olivia’s apartment. Kylie, afraid that her sexual craving would turn to bloodlust, kissed Olivia good morning then dashed off to the hotel where Violet was already asleep.

  She had one more day until Silvija’s time clock for her stay in Atlanta ran out.

  A night breeze rippled the curtains, stirring the deep orange fabric that concealed Olivia’s apartment from the street. Kylie stood clasped between the window and the curtains, listening to the water and the tears. Finally, she moved deeper into the apartment, deliberately making noise, bumping into the edge of the sofa before sitting in it. She didn’t have to wait long.

  “You’re late.” Olivia came out smelling like coconut and mint soap. A thick orange robe nearly swallowed her body,
and the collar of a gray T-shirt peeked from beneath the terrycloth. Olivia drew a towel carefully over her short hair, drying it.

  “I didn’t know we had an appointment,” Kylie said. But they did.

  She’d gotten distracted talking with Violet about what Silvija would do if Kylie didn’t come back home by the end of the seven-day grace period. Violet was worried for her.

  Olivia sat beside her on the sofa and reached for the remote to turn on the stereo mounted on the wall like a piece of art. She turned it to National Public Radio and turned the volume low.

  “You normally come just before dinner,” she said matter-of-factly. “It’s already time for the late news.”

  “Will you make me dinner then and pretend that I’m on time?”

  Olivia’s mouth briefly held a smile. She shook her head. “No pretending tonight.”

  She rubbed the towel through her hair again then brought the white cotton close to her face. “I’m already losing my hair,” she said, peering at the small curls scattered across the towel.

  Kylie had noticed the rain of black follicles, more plentiful than usual, at the collar of her dress a couple of days before.

  “It’s only hair. It will grow back.”

  Olivia looked at her. “Why do people say such stupid and obvious things like that and ignore the larger meaning of what I’m trying to say? Even you.” Something like contempt flickered across her face.

  Kylie felt it like a lash. “Your life won’t ever be the same again. Your cancer changed you in ways that you probably don’t even know yet. But you already know that.” She looked carefully at Olivia. “Do you want me to state the obvious?”

  “I want you to care about my hair!”

  The towel hit Kylie in the face. She flinched although she’d seen it coming. She gripped the towel in a fist and dropped it on the couch between her and Olivia. “I thought you said no pretending tonight.”

  Olivia turned away in disgust but not before Kylie saw the tears hovering at the downward sweep of her eyelashes. She felt a flicker of alarm, of helplessness. What had happened in the last few hours to transform her smiling, seductive lover from last night into this?