Lovers and Strangers (The Hollywood Nights Series, Book 1)

by Candace Schuler

  Faith drew in a quick, shuddering breath and held very, very still, her eyes closed while he slowly drew the garment away from her body. She felt the cloth lift away from her breasts, exposing them, felt the straps sliding down her arms and then off over her hands. For a moment, maybe two, there was no sound, no movement. Did he like what he saw? Or didn't he? Was he horrified? Enthralled? Disgusted? Amused?

  Unable to bear it another minute, Faith opened her eyes. And saw him staring down at her as if she were the first, the only woman he had ever seen.

  "You're very beautiful," he said, low. And then he bent his head like a supplicant at prayer, and very solemnly, very seriously, kissed each tightly beaded nipple.

  Faith felt a moment of benediction and thankfulness before the first flicker of lightning streaked through her. She lifted her hands yet again, reaching for him, but he shook his head. Obediently, she let them drop back to the bed. He began to kiss her bared breasts then. Her arms. Her palms and fingertips. Her narrow rib cage. The curve of her waist. The quivering skin of her belly. Soft, seductive butterfly kisses that teased and aroused without satisfying. He ran his hands over her, too, whisper soft caresses that flowed over her curves like water.

  The last of Faith's languor evaporated in the air. The warm sea of sensation began to churn. The warmth turned to fire. She lifted her hands again, unwilling to be denied this time, and curled her fingers into his dark, shaggy hair. He looked up, his mouth still pressed against her lower abdomen, his hands riding the curve of her waist, a question in his eyes.

  "What?" he murmured, and she felt his mouth move against her skin.

  Too shy to say it with words, too aroused to let it go, she tugged on his hair, urging him up her body. It might be wicked but she wanted his mouth on her breasts again, on the very tips where they throbbed and ached.

  Holding her gaze, Jack allowed himself to be drawn slowly—very slowly—up her torso. "Here?" he murmured, stopping just above her belly button.

  Faith made an impatient sound and pulled on his hair.

  "Here?" he asked, letting his lips graze the graceful curve of her ribs. "Here?" He nibbled at the underside of her breast. "Or here?" His mouth hovered over her nipple.

  She could feel his breath, hot and moist against the exquisitely sensitive skin of her areola, but still too far away to ease the ache. He was up on his elbows, his hands bracketing her ribs, his long fingers curved around her back, the thumbs just brushing the sides of her breasts. His long, lean body was between her legs, the weight of his chest on her stomach. So close, so deliriously close, but not nearly close enough.

  She arched like a wanton, touching her nipple to his lips. They parted, then closed around her. The ache increased, becoming sharper and more intense. Faith moaned and pulled at his hair, demanding surcease.

  She felt him smile against her, and then his hands slid beneath her back, lifting her, and his mouth opened wider, taking her breast deeper inside. She felt the heat first, such incredible heat. Then the soft, sliding wetness surrounding her. And then the strong, insistent tug as he applied suction. She felt the pull between her legs, as if there were a special, ultrasensitive nerve running directly from her nipple to her clitoris.

  With a strangled sound, half a gasp, half a cry of need, Faith bent her knees, pressing her heels to the bed, and lifted her pelvis into his. The move was involuntary and visceral, and she might have been horribly embarrassed if she'd realized she'd made it. But her body was reacting to primal impulses now and she responded with the inborn instincts of any female animal seeking her mate. For the first time in her life, Faith wasn't thinking about shoulds and should nots. She wasn't thinking about shame or sin. She wasn't thinking at all. She was alive with feeling. Awash with it. Swamped and going under fast.

  "Jack," she murmured breathlessly, her voice plaintive and demanding at the same time.

  Jack lay very still against her, his hot face pressed into the lushness of her breasts, his body frozen by the conflicting desires she aroused in him. He wanted to ravage and to cherish. He wanted to lead her gently to simmering passion and drive her headlong over the edge into mindless delirium. He wanted to take the long route to pleasure and he wanted to hurtle toward completion at breakneck speed.

  "Jack, please," she begged, hardly knowing what she was begging for, knowing only that she had to have it or die.

  He lifted his head to look at her. "I can't be gentle anymore, Angel," he said raggedly. "Not when you look at me like that. Not when you lift your body into mine that way. I want to, but dammit—" his hands fisted next to her body "—I can't."

  At another time, from another man, Faith might have taken his words as criticism or censure of her behavior. But when she looked at him, at his eyes dark with desire, at his mouth, tight with the effort of restraining himself, she knew there was no censure intended, no blame being assigned. She unclenched her fingers from his hair, sliding them down to cup his face between her hands.

  "You've shown me more gentleness than anyone in my life ever has before, except for my mother," she said softly. "More than I ever knew existed, or could exist, between a man and a woman." Her smile was tremulous, sweet and seductive at the same time. "Now I want you to show me how the rest of it should be."

  Humbled, enthralled, feeling both pity and pride, Jack didn't know what to say. "Faith, I—"

  "I'm empty, Jack. And I ache. Everywhere."

  Jack felt the last vestiges of control vanish at her softly spoken words. He levered himself up her body, taking her mouth in a hungry, eating kiss, filling it with his tongue. Faith returned his kiss as passionately, as mindlessly as he gave it, responding by instinct alone. She wrapped her arms and legs around him, straining to get closer, wanting to feel his very skin meld with hers.

  It took a minute for her to realize that he was still fully clothed. She reached for the buttons on his shirt only to find that he was there ahead of her, ripping them open in his frenzied, frantic need to get closer to what they both craved. She pushed the worn khaki work shirt off of his shoulders, dragging it down his arms as he twisted, first one way, then the other, in his effort to get it off. Before it hit the floor, he was reaching between their bodies for the snap on his jeans. The back of his hand pressed against her mound as he struggled to lower the zipper. Faith gasped and tilted her hips, halting him with the job only half-done, changing his focus. He rolled to his side, pulling her with him, and turned his hand, inserting it between her legs.

  Faith's gasp turned to a whimper; and then a ragged moan as he edged his fingers under the elastic edge of her panties and found her. She jumped as if a live electrode had touched her naked flesh, then started to tremble uncontrollably.

  And Jack abruptly found that the well of gentleness wasn't empty, after all. It was no hardship to go slowly now, stroking her carefully, probing delicately as she lay in his arms, quivering and clinging to him as if he were the only solid thing in a tempestuous sea of unfamiliar sensation. He led her to passion gently, as he'd vowed to do, then kept her there for long delicious moments, hovering on the edge before he pushed her over into delirium. She stiffened and cried out, an inarticulate sound of surprise and startled pleasure. She was still panting, her body damp, her hands shaking as she reached for his zipper.

  "I'm still empty, Jack," she moaned into his chest, struggling to burrow under him. "I still ache."

  With renewed haste now, he peeled off his jeans and briefs, pausing only to remove a foil-wrapped condom from the pocket before dropping them on the floor on top of his shirt. He slipped the condom on quickly and turned back to Faith, intending to slide her panties off. But she had already removed them and was lying back on the bed, waiting to receive him.

  He paused for a moment to drink in the sight of her, all soft and flushed and his, then moved between her thighs. "I'll go slow," he promised as the head of his shaft touched her soft folds. "I won't hurt you."

  "I'm not a virgin," Faith confessed then.

  H
e drew back slightly, looking at her in clear surprise.

  "I wish I were, for you, but I'm not," she said, feeling the old sense of shame begin to knot her up inside. "There was... someone, once before," she started, haltingly, to explain, but he stopped her with a soft kiss.

  "It doesn't matter," he whispered against her lips. She could feel him smile. "I'm not a virgin, either."

  The knot inside her eased at his words, the shame melting away, leaving only a faint sense of regret that she couldn't have been all new for him. She reached out, placing her hands on his hips to bring him down to her. "Come inside me," she invited.

  And he did. He slid into her as easily as if they had made love a thousand times before. They stayed as they were for just a moment after he entered her—Jack braced on his hands above her, Faith with her fingers curved around his narrow hips—staring into each other's eyes as they savored the unequivocal, inexplicable rightness of their physical union. Age didn't matter just then, nor experience or the lack of it. They were just a man and a woman. Joined. Complete.

  And then he smiled.

  And she smiled.

  And he lowered his chest to her breasts, sliding his arms under her to hold her close as she reached out to twine her arms around his back. They began to move together. Gently at first, so gently and slowly, savoring the sublime feelings their bodies created for each other. And then faster as their need grew, and faster still, until they were hurtling, headlong and heedless, toward the fiery edge of fulfillment. They went over together this time, holding tight to each other as the world exploded around them.

  * * *

  "I used to spend all my study hours in the school library, reading," Faith said as she lay with her head cradled on Jack's shoulder, idly combing her fingers through the mat of hair on his chest. Unlike the hair on his head, it was crinkly and frosted with gray. "My father thinks almost everything except the Bible and Reader's Digest is immoral, especially novels, so I wasn't allowed to set foot in the public library. But I read nearly every book they had at Pine Hollow High School. I'd always hoped the authors were right, that they weren't just making it all up. And tonight I found out they weren't."

  Jack reached behind him and punched the pillows up beneath his head. "Right about what?"

  "Making love," she said simply. "I think I always knew, deep down inside of me, that it could be beautiful."

  Jack stroked his hand down her upper arm, wondering how she'd known. He certainly hadn't. Sex could be exciting, yes. Passionate, certainly. Even mind-blowing at times. But it had never been beautiful before. Not until tonight. With her. The thought made him vaguely uneasy.

  "It isn't always like that," he said, feeling compelled to warn her. Or maybe it was himself he was warning. He hadn't felt this good in... He couldn't remember when the last time had been. Years? Decades? Never? "It can be a lot—" he hesitated, looking for the right word and wishing, suddenly, for a cigarette "—different."

  "Oh, I know that."

  Jack wondered if she did. She hadn't been a virgin before today, true, but she hadn't been far removed from that state, either. What had her experience been? Did she know that sex could be friendly or comfortable or merely convenient? Did she have any idea that it was often lonely and sometimes downright sleazy? He wanted to ask but didn't. It wasn't any of his business. He told himself he didn't want it to be.

  Faith levered herself up onto her elbow to look at him. "I really do know that it's not always this way," she said seriously, thinking he hadn't believed her. "And I want you to know that I..." She shrugged and bit her lip, reaching out to touch her fingertips to the eagle tattooed on his bicep. "Where did you get this?"

  "At a tattoo parlor in Saigon." It had been next door to the brothel he and his buddies had patronized on an all too regular basis.

  "Did it hurt?"

  "I have no idea. I was stinking drunk at the time." He curled a finger under her chin to make her look at him. "Come on, Angel, talk to me. What do you want me to know?"

  "That I understand about—" she peeked up at him from under her lashes "—this."

  Jack's eyebrow slid upward. "What about 'this'?"

  "That even though it was beautiful, it doesn't mean there are any strings attached. I don't expect a commitment, or anything."

  "Don't you?" he said carefully, wondering why the hell it bothered him to hear her say it. It should be music to his ears.

  "No. I understand that sex doesn't automatically mean there's anything, well, serious between two people. I mean, I know you think I'm too young for you, for one thing." Too unsophisticated. Too naive. "And I probably am. But mostly..."

  "Mostly?"

  "Mostly I want you to know that I'm grateful. To you." She looked him straight in the eyes. "For taking the time to make it beautiful for me. You didn't have to do that but you did, and I, well... I appreciate it."

  What would she say, he wondered, if he told her he hadn't had any choice? That the way he'd made love to her was the way he'd been compelled to make love to her?

  "Just exactly how grateful are you feeling toward me, Angel?" he said instead, giving her a suggestive smile to go with the words.

  Faith felt her pulse leap. Her answering smile was shy but willing. "Very grateful?"

  Jack curled his hand around the back of her neck. "We've got a couple of hours until you have to be at work," he said, as he pulled her on top of him. "Why don't you show me?"

  Chapter 8

  "You're late," the Flynn's short-order cook said, looking up as Faith rushed in the back door.

  "I know. I know. I'm sorry. Time just got away from me today," she mumbled, hoping she wasn't blushing.

  The swinging doors into the bar burst open. "Two orders of potato skins. A plate of nachos, hold the sour cream. Chicken wings, extra spicy. And an onion flower." Sammie-Jo ripped four sheets off of her order pad and reached up to clip them to the cook's order wheel, then quickly loaded her tray with the order already sitting under the heat lamps on the metal counter. "You're late," she said, catching sight of Faith.

  "I know," Faith said again. "I'm sorry."

  "We'll talk about it later," Sammie-Jo warned, already heading back out to the bar with a heavily laden tray balanced against her shoulder. "After the Happy Hour crowd thins out some." She gave Faith a quick once-over. "Fix your blouse before you show yourself out front, honey," she advised drily. "You've got it buttoned up wrong."

  Faith gasped and looked down, turning her back on the cook as she rebuttoned and retucked her white tuxedo blouse. She'd run from Jack's apartment in a pelter, rushed through a quick shower, jumped into her uniform and then raced over to Flynn's. She'd been in such a hurry, fumble-fingered and clumsy, it was a wonder she'd managed to get her clothes on right side out. She checked her reflection in the mirror next to the employee washroom, just to make sure nothing else was wrong. Everything looked okay. She was a bit flushed and her hair wasn't as neat as it could have been but, all in all, it wasn't too bad. She didn't think anyone would guess she'd spent the afternoon making love.

  She tugged on the hem of her black satin vest, straightening it, then did the same for her red bow tie. With as much dignity as she could muster, she turned and picked up her tray and order pad, pretending not to see the knowing smirk the cook aimed her way. She paused in front of the swinging doors, going up on tiptoe for a quick peek out at the crowd before she entered the fray.

  The bar was busy, unusually so for a midweek Happy Hour. Businesspeople in tailored suits, clerical workers in less formal clothing, more creatively attired sales clerks from some of the local boutiques, plus the occasional tourist were lined up at the polished wooden bar or gathered around the tiny tables set out on the shiny black-tiled floor. Taking a deep breath to fortify herself, Faith pushed the doors open and began threading her way through the crowd, heading straight to where she least wanted to be. Penance—or so she'd been told all her life—was supposed to be good for the soul.

  "Good evening, M
r. Brown," she said, tacking on a smile as she reached the booth. "What can I get for you this evening?"

  "You can bring me my usual Chardonnay, sweetheart."

  "One Chardonnay." She looked at his companion. "And you, sir?"

  "Scotch and soda."

  "Scotch and soda," she repeated. "Can I get you gentlemen something to munch on with those drinks?"

  "You might offer that delectable neck of yours," Freddie Bowen said with a smile, reaching up as if to pull her down to him.

  Faith avoided his touch by the simple expedient of stepping back and shifting her tray. "I'm afraid my neck's not on the menu," she said, trying for levity, "but I'd be happy to bring you an order of chicken wings to gnaw on."

  Freddie Bowen laughed, accepting defeat with good grace.

  And Faith was amazed at how easy it was. You've been making mountains out of molehills, she thought, pleased with the way she'd handled the situation. Nobody had been humiliated and nobody's ego had been hurt. It was a good feeling. Empowering, she thought, using a word she'd heard a lot since she'd moved to California.

  "Good going," Sammie-Jo congratulated her as they simultaneously approached the cocktail waitress's station at the bar. "Two Miller Lites, two frozen Margaritas, a club soda and a Tequila Sunrise," she said to Tim before turning to smile at Faith. "You handled that really well. And without resorting to Miz Griffen's disapproving stare."

  Faith smiled back. "Thanks. I guess I'm getting the hang of it." She gave her order to Tim. "And you were right, Freddie Bowen is harmless."

  Sammie-Jo raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really?" she said, busy placing slim plastic straws and wedges of lime in the drinks Tim set in front of her. "In comparison to who, I wonder?"

  "Whom," Tim said as he added the two light beers to her order. "In comparison to whom."

  Sammie-Jo rolled her eyes at him and picked up her tray. "Writers." She turned and disappeared into the crowd.

  Tim switched his attention to his other waitress. "You were late," he said as he assembled the drinks she'd ordered. "Is everything okay?"