Amanda's Blue Marine

by Doreen Owens Malek

  They had been standing motionless for some time. He wasn't pressing her for more but he wasn't letting her go either. He was taking his cues from her.

  He's trying to end this nicely, Mandy thought. But I don't want to be nice. I want him. In my life, in my bed, in my soul. Why can't I have what I want?

  "The curls at the nape of your neck," she said suddenly, trying to ground herself. "They look so soft and downy." Her breath caught on a sob as she reached up and touched them gently. "They are."

  "Amanda... don't." He sounded hoarse.

  "I'll miss seeing them," she went on, whispering. "And that cowlick over your left ear, how the hair won't lay down flat. I'll miss that too." She was rambling, losing it, very close to tears.

  She felt his fingers tighten on her arms. "Don't talk any more," he said, in a constricted voice she hardly recognized. "Don't say anything else." He held her off and looked down at her, and she was lost in his gaze. It was an enormous effort to look away from him.

  "We can't do this," she murmured.

  "Do what? We haven't done anything!" he burst out in frustration. He seized her by the shoulders suddenly and bent at the knees, putting himself on an eye level with her. His face was inches from hers.

  "I don't want to steal anybody else's lover," he said. "I wouldn't want anybody to do that to me. But I feel like you're MY lover, mine. I have for a while now, almost from the start. In my mind, in my heart, you belong to me."

  Mandy said nothing. Of course he would have the courage to say it first, while she dithered about and cried and couldn't take action. His feelings mirrored hers exactly. He wasn't the most articulate person in the world with anyone else, but he always knew just what to say to get through to her.

  He shook her gently and tipped her chin up with one forefinger, forcing her to look directly at him.

  "Do you love Henderson?" he finally asked, his tone despairing. "Do you?”

  Mandy gestured helplessly. "I've known him for a long time, he and my father were friends, it was easy and comfortable and it seemed right....."

  "Do you love him?" Kelly insisted.

  "I thought I did." She bit her lip as her eyes flooded. "Until I met you."

  His heart leaped. Emboldened, he said more quietly, "Do you love ME, Amanda?" His gaze was fixed on her face. He was barely breathing.

  She closed her eyes and the tears spilled down her cheeks. She covered her mouth with her hand and nodded mutely.

  He pulled her against him tightly and Mandy could hear the pounding of his heart under his uniform blouse, felt the muscles in his arms flex as he embraced her.

  “Don’t cry,” he whispered, as he allowed himself the luxury of burying his face in her neck. "I love you too, so much. I'll make you happy, you'll see." His voice was filled with a mix of emotions - relief, elation, triumph. She loved him. He would hold on to that and forget everything else.

  Mandy clung to him, her confusion fading as the rightness of his embrace enveloped her and soothed her. His mouth moved to her ear, her forehead, and finally to her lips.

  His lips were soft, caressing and gentle at first, then more demanding and forceful as their passion escalated. Mandy opened her mouth and kissed him back, sinking her fingers into his hair, pulling him tighter against her and molding her body to his. The desire to get close to him was so overwhelming that it blocked all other considerations from her mind.

  Kelly's hands slipped down her naked back, his fingers tracing her spine lightly, then came up again to rest at the clasp of her halter top.

  "I want this off," he murmured, undoing the hook at her nape. As the dress fell to her waist she turned in his arms and lay back against his shoulder.

  "Put your hands on me," she whispered, her eyes closing luxuriously.

  He held her loosely and covered one breast with his hand and the other with his mouth. She pressed him closer, gasping as his hot, wet mouth enclosed her nipple and he slipped his hand under her dress caressingly. He kissed her endlessly, relentlessly, changing the pressure of his mouth on her skin and then moving his lips back to hers as he drew her ever tighter. She clung to him, pulling his blouse loose from his waistband and running her hands up his slim, muscled back. She felt her knees go weak and realized that she wanted to lay down with him, to twine her legs with his, to absorb and consume him.

  "I can't stand up any more," she gasped.

  Kelly raised his head and looked around wildly but saw only a sea of tables in the otherwise empty room. He lifted her and set her on the edge of the table nearest them and said to her in an urgent, breathless voice, "Lock your legs around me."

  Mandy obeyed him.

  Sure now of her feelings, he was unstoppable. He ran his hands over the satiny skin of her arms, under the silken weight of her hair. His touch claimed her constantly as she responded wildly, kissing him everywhere she could reach, marveling at the softness of his lips, his lashes, his hair. Drunk on his scents-shampoo, shaving cream, the starch of his shirt, the overwhelming intoxicant of his musky skin- she pushed her nose inside his collar and licked the hollow of his throat. He sighed deeply.

  "Take off your shirt," she said huskily, her voice unrecognizable as the one she knew.

  He released her instantly, yanking on the top two buttons of his blouse and sending the second one flying onto the carpet. Then he pulled the blouse over his head in one gesture, dropping it on the floor.

  They came together again in one movement. Kelly put his head back against the wall, his eyes closed, his lips parted, and held her lightly. She closed her arms around his neck and rubbed her face on his bare shoulder, then ran her tongue over his flat nipples, the indentation that bisected his chest. She kissed an old scar on his shoulder and licked the fresher scar on his arm from James Cameron's knife. She could hear his breathing getting harsher as she inched back and ran the palm of her hand over the flat muscles of his abdomen, the line of hair running down to his belt. She looked up at him and saw the flush of excitement on his skin, the bruised lips she had kissed, the haze of passion lowering his lids.

  “I love the scent of your skin,” she whispered, trailing her lips along his collarbone. “Your clothes smell just like this and I do too when you’ve been holding me. I love it.”

  She slipped her hand beneath the buckle of his belt as he groaned and then stepped back, lifting her and pulling her legs closer around him.

  "I want to get so deep inside of you," he said into her ear. She clung to him, her eyes closed, awash in lust, unable to think of anything except what he had just said and what he was going to do next.

  Suddenly the chandelier above them burst into brilliance. The room was illuminated like an operating theater and they sprang apart as if doused with a vat of ice water.

  "There must a be a remote control outside for the lights,” Kelly muttered, recovering instantly and setting her on the floor. "Somebody's coming into this room."

  9

  As if in response to what he had said they heard knocking on the door to the hall.

  He grabbed his shirt from the floor and handed it to Mandy. "Put this on and go in there," he said quickly, pointing to the rest room sign to the left of the bar. "Stay there until I come and get you."

  Mandy shrugged into his shirt and looked at him anxiously.

  "It's all right," he said. "I'll handle it." He pulled her by the hand and opened the rest room door.

  Mandy fled inside, gathering the straps of her halter at her waist, closing the door of the bathroom. Kelly donned his jacket, opened his wallet to expose his badge, looked back to make sure Mandy was out of sight, and then pulled open the door to the hall.

  Mandy tried to listen to what he was saying, something in a laughing tone about "not exactly police business", but she was too mortified by the sight of herself in the bathroom mirror to concentrate. Her hair had been tortured into a Medusa wig by Kelly's seeking hands, her eye makeup was smeared from her tears and his mouth, her lipstick was gone from her lips but visible
on her chin, and there was a giant hickey blooming on the side of her neck.

  She closed her eyes and prayed that she could repair this damage before anyone else saw it. No wonder Kelly had shoved her into the bathroom. She looked well used and felt guilty, like a tenth grader caught in a tryst under the bleachers.

  She listened again and heard him saying that he'd received the award that night and gone into the empty room to clean up and change before his shift. She heard him explaining his dishabille to whoever was there, and then heard more conversation and finally the goodbyes. He appeared seconds later in the doorway and examined her standing before the bathroom mirror. Their eyes met in the glass.

  "You look like I beat you up," he said with mock gravity.

  "It isn't funny. What were we thinking?"

  "I don't remember thinking," he said dryly.

  "This is a public place and we're both officers of the court. We could have been arrested."

  "At least I would have been among friends," he said lightly

  She stared at her image glumly.

  "First, let's fix this," he said, and pulled his shirt off her shoulders. He took her breasts in hand, one at a time, and bent to kiss each nipple gently, then lifted the halter back to her neck and fastened the clasp.

  "That's a shame," he sighed. "I liked the Godiva look." He put his shirt back on, ignoring the missing button, and slipped once more into his jacket.

  "Who was that knocking and what did you say?"

  "Just one of the maids who wanted to check on something for the party in here tomorrow. She had been in the main hall during the awards thing and recognized me, so I was able to talk my way out of it."

  He ran water into the basin and pulled out his handkerchief, handing it to her. She wet it and added a little soap, scrubbing off the mascara and eye liner which had migrated on her face.

  "That's better," he said, when she was finished. "You look less like a wide receiver for the Packers."

  "I'm glad you're finding this so amusing," Mandy said, fishing in her purse for a brush. She located it and began to tame her wild mane with rapid strokes. Her hair responded by erupting into a static halo snapping with electricity.

  "I think that's the best you're going to do tonight, Red," he said. "We'd better get out of here before that maid returns with reinforcements."

  They walked out into the banquet room and he turned to face her.

  "You go first," he said. "Henderson left already, right?"

  She nodded.

  "Just go out to the valet entrance and call for your car like nothing happened," he said.

  "Like nothing happened," she murmured. She reached up and touched his bruised mouth tenderly.

  "Something did," he said, kissing her fingers. "So what are we going to do about it?"

  Mandy looked at him calmly. "I'll go to my parents’ house now. Tom’s expecting me there to review the plans for my father's birthday party. I’ll talk to him tonight."

  “Are you certain that’s what you want?” Kelly asked, not to discourage her but to reassure himself.

  “Yes.” She put her arms around his waist and dropped her head to his shoulder. "I don't want to leave you."

  He pried her off him gently. "Don't start that again or we'll never get out of here," he murmured, kissing the top of her head. “You need to go.” He was afraid that if they lingered she would change her mind.

  She nodded. "I have to settle this now. It isn't fair to Tom to let this go on any longer.

  "To Tom?" Kelly said, looking at her.

  "To either one of you."

  "Promise me you'll do it tonight."

  "I promise."

  His gaze was filled with love, and hope, and anticipation. "My brother's at my place with his poker buddies. We can't go there later."

  “Wait for me at my condo. I’ll give you the keys.”

  He shook his head. “The security people know me from the Cameron episode. I don’t think I should be letting myself into your place. Do you want this to be public just yet?”

  Amanda sighed. “You’re right. Just wait for me in the parking lot, okay? We’ll go somewhere else.”

  They gazed at one another. She took his hand again and kissed it lingeringly.

  "Amanda, you're not helping me to let you go," he said patiently. "Leave now. I love you."

  She released his hand and walked away without looking back at him.

  * * * * *

  Kelly killed some time calming himself down after Mandy left him and then he drove away from the reception at about 9:30. He didn’t know how long it would take for Mandy to talk to Henderson and her parents. They were all together tonight so she might be able to get through it quickly, but he assumed there would be arguments and it would consume some time. He couldn’t just sit in his apartment and wait. He felt as jittery as he had when waiting for the kickoff in a big game in high school, except this wasn’t a sports event, it was a turning point in his life. He finally drove to the parking lot at Amanda’s condo complex and, after nodding to the security guard who knew him by now, pulled into one of the visitor’s spaces.

  She had to come home sometime, and when she did he would be waiting for her.

  The night was quiet and he was amazed at how little traffic noise there was in this prosperous, well groomed part of town. Every once in a while an expensive car drove past him and the driver looked in at him as if he suspected Kelly of casing the development. Kelly smiled to himself at the expressions he might provoke when he produced a detective’s badge and flashed it at one of these jokers, but he was in too good a mood to let residential snobbery ruin his evening.

  He settled back and lit a cigarette, vowing once more to quit. Now he had a real reason to do it.

  Amanda loved him. She had said so.

  His mind kept returning to how she had felt in his arms, melting, passionate, so weak with longing she was unable to stand. They had gotten so carried away that he could not credit his own behavior when he thought about it. When he recalled what they’d done in that empty ballroom he could feel his face warming. What if someone had walked in on them? Amanda would have been mortified. Despite her individual response to him he knew that she was pretty straitlaced in general and would have been paralyzed with embarrassment at being discovered in such a situation. He realized that only once before in his life had he come that close to losing his grip entirely and that was when he was a sophomore in high school. The captain of the cheerleaders, a senior girl with an eye for the cute younger players coming up, had singled him out for attention. On a snowy afternoon when her Neanderthal boyfriend was home recuperating from an injury she had taken Kelly’s hand and led him down to the boiler room. There they could spend a free period undisturbed and get to know one another. They got to know one another so well that when the janitor arrived with his bucket they were both naked. They had to dive under a pile of discarded gym mats to hide until the old man, who fortunately couldn’t see too well, finally finished wringing out his mop. Hearts pounding, they listened to him drag his burdens across the basement floor and go out of the room, closing the door behind him. Kelly had dreams about it for months afterward, imagining himself expelled or at the very least kicked off the football team, reliving the custodian’s arrival and the sound of the door opening as he and the girl froze, not daring to breathe. When the janitor finally left they fell back on the floor and resumed their exploration of each other’s bodies until the last bell rang.

  Of course, he had been only a kid then. What was his excuse now?

  He had none. He was a mature adult who had taken another mature adult into an empty room in a public building filled with people and made love to her. They would have completed the act if not for the circumstances but the inappropriate choice of location would have remained the same.

  She was an assistant district attorney and he was a detective. Had they both lost their minds?

  He felt like he was losing his. Nothing mattered to him any more except his
relationship with Amanda, and the prospect of consummating it consumed him. He looked at his watch and saw that only ten minutes had passed since his arrival.

  He sighed heavily and took a deep drag on his cigarette.

  He had a feeling he would be smoking a lot while he waited.

  * * * * *

  Amanda drove straight to her parents home in a plush suburb ten miles out of downtown, so pumped from her time with Kelly that her hands were shaking as she gripped the steering wheel. She knew she had to face this showdown, and she had to do it now. She had delayed long enough. Her confusion was leaving Kelly off balance and uncertain where he stood, which wasn’t fair, and keeping Tom in the dark, which was deceptive. She planned to talk to Tom alone first and then share the news with her parents.

  At the gate which surrounded the estate she pressed a panel on the monitor clipped to her car visor. The wrought iron gate swung open as she approached it and she steered the newly repaired sports car down the long paved driveway flanked by poplar trees. The imposing colonial was not just a mansion but rather part of a small compound which featured servants’ quarters and a guest house along with a pool and tennis courts. The brick front two story colonial was set back from a grove of evergreens and flowering shrubs, fronted by a circular entrance leading to a carport at the side of the main house.

  Mandy pulled her car under the overhang behind Tom’s Mercedes. No one else appeared to be at the house, which was good since this promised to be a confrontation and she didn’t want an audience for the conversation.