by Nara Malone
“When I was small I liked to pretend I was a kitten. I even dreamed I was a kitten who could squeeze under doors and hide under furniture, disappear and reappear anywhere I wanted.” She laughed. “I was an exceptionally talented dreamer. The places I dreamed I went looked exactly the way I imagined when I was finally allowed to go there.”
“Tell me about those places.”
“Eddie’s club? It was all you’d imagine that sort of place to be. Tacky décor in pink and black. Exotic rooms where men paid women to be their fantasy.”
“You weren’t making that story about the bordello up? Your father took you into his club? Sold you to his customers?”
She frowned, confused. “No. He didn’t sell me. He took me downstairs when he went to work, more to bring an end to the sleepwalking than anything else. He tried everything to keep me in my bedroom at night—locking the door, putting a guard on it. But I always found a way out. Someone would find me sleepwalking and call him to collect me. Having me tucked in his office wasn’t as dangerous as having a naked toddler roaming the club.”
Marcus scooted his chair around the table until he was knee to knee, elbow to elbow with her. It was easier to talk with him beside her instead of across from her.
“Naked?” he asked.
She shook her head, as puzzled by that part as everyone else had been by that aspect of her nighttime adventures. “I don’t know what the nudity was about. Kids, right? For some reason, the first thing I did when I got out of bed at night was abandon my clothes.”
What she did know was that something she said jarred Marcus. He was staring at her with a look that was like being lost and found all at once. She tried to make sense of that impression. His reaction resonated in her, a fluttering high in her stomach that quickly settled into a calm that rippled outward, as if something important had found the place it belonged.
His fingers were in her hair, at first just a brush of fingertips, pushing a lock back from her face, but then curling in the soft depths and a fist followed. The tug of it went past the roots of her hair and into her belly, deeper than that, into a place she couldn’t acknowledge. She had to bite her lip to hold in an answering moan.
“Who are you?” he murmured, as if he was asking himself instead of her.
His gaze fastened on her lips. She realized she was chewing her bottom lip and stopped. His attention flicked up to a spot over her right shoulder. He pulled back, releasing then smoothing her hair. She shivered with the loss.
In a clatter of china, the waiter was there, sliding salads from tray to table, topping off water glasses they’d barely touched. Allie doubted Marcus had concealed the muss he’d made of her hair. Even if he had, he couldn’t erase the flush tingeing her skin, tingling in her cheeks, or the barely banked blaze burning in his eyes.
The waiter took the hint and kept his presence minimal. Marcus’ fingers trailed down her arm, over her hand, and then gently maneuvered the fork from between her wrist and the plate. She watched, mesmerized, as he speared a grape tomato and lifted it to her lips rather than his. The red fruit glistened, moisture clinging to its skin. His swallow mirrored hers. Was that a tremor in his hand when he lowered the fork?
They fed each other salads. Maybe it didn’t qualify as indecent behavior, but feeding Marcus felt like sex in public. Could you be tossed out of a restaurant for feeding your lover? She didn’t know if anyone noticed. She was too caught up in the spell, watching his teeth close on the greens, then his lips closing around the fork, the glide of silver between his lips as she pulled the fork back. He licked his lips after every swallow. It happened so quick, like a reflex, she doubted he was aware. She was. Every time those lips parted, his tongue sliding between them, she had to fight back a shiver.
The main course was a blur. They had eggplant parmesan that was a sensual delight unto itself. They didn’t feed each other, but their eyes stayed locked in a lovers’ embrace she couldn’t control.
“So you’re from Russia,” she said, hoping to pull her brain out of its lust-induced fog. “I wouldn’t have thought that based on your accent. You sound more southern European.”
“I lived in Siberia as a child. Your awareness of the nuances of tone and accent is unusually acute. This is one of the ways you tell people apart?”
“Doesn’t everyone recognize the voices of people they know?”
“I’ve never met anyone who responds to changes in my tone the way you do. It’s as if my words are physical things.” He lowered his voice then, to a sensual whisper, an I’m-going-to-fuck-you-senseless whisper. Goose bumps rose on her skin. He ran one finger lightly over her forearm. “It‘s almost as if you hear sound with your skin. Perhaps you developed the sensitivity to compensate for the face blindness.”
“I’m not blind.”
“No, you are prosopagnosic. It isn’t that you don’t see, but that you don’t recognize the unique features of faces.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Nerves knotted her stomach. No one had ever figured out that she couldn’t recognize others. She’d never met anyone, like herself, who couldn’t recognize people, had thought it merely due to inattentiveness on her part. “I see your features just fine.”
“Allie, I have been to the newspaper twice a week for a month. You and I have had long conversations. Every time we meet it is like the first time to you.”
Suddenly the air in the room seemed too thin. She felt dizzy. She didn’t remember meeting him before that morning. Who else could be following that she didn’t notice? He knew her from work. It made sense. Sometimes after completing a complex design, she’d discover a stack of ad request forms in her inbox. Her handwriting clear proof she’d taken the orders, but she couldn’t recall any details of the interactions. It was as if a part of her ran on autopilot, handling the mundane details of her job, while a creative task—making a funeral home’s ad a work of art—held her awareness captive in an altered state.
Marcus put his hand over hers, squeezed, and she felt the reassuring presence of the moonstone.
“It’s not a well-publicized condition. Many people who suffer from it don’t know they have it. They develop a set of coping skills and assume everyone sees faces the same way they do.”
“So what? There’s a pill to take to recognize people?” Would it help her pay attention? She wasn’t admitting anything, but if there was a pill…
He shook his head. Something in his eyes warned her she didn’t want to know what he was about to say. She had to hear it. She squeezed the rock so tight her fingers went numb.
“There’s no pill, no operation, no cure. Science doesn’t have an answer for you, little cat. But I do.”
She waited a beat, tried to convince herself she didn’t need whatever he offered. But she did. That he knew it was evidence enough that she did. “What is your answer?”
“You need to learn to see with more than your eyes. I could train you.”
“I’m sure. Why do I get the feeling there’s a catch, something about this training you don’t want to tell me upfront?”
“As I said before, we won’t do anything you don’t want to do, Allie. The technique is somewhat…unconventional.”
“Uncoventional how?”
“It’s easier to show you than explain.”
They agreed to skip dessert.
* * * * *
“I know it’s not very big, but—”
Marcus cut Allie off when she flipped on her light switch.
“Not big? Sweetheart, my bedroom closet is bigger than this apartment.”
“On the upside, it takes five minutes to tidy it up.” Allie tossed her keys on the desk. Marcus inched her forward and closed the door behind them.
“Come here,” he said, catching her wrist, pulling her against his chest. Fingers tangled in her hair, tipping her head back to expose her neck. His teeth scraped her collarbone, nibbled their way up her neck, and at last his mouth opened over hers. He tasted electric, energy
sparked across the meeting of tongues, and she sighed. Kissing Marcus was like turning back the covers on the bed. It made her want to strip her clothes off, immerse herself in the warmth and fantasy waiting for her.
When he pulled back, she drew a breath and held it, the room slowly stopped spinning.
“It’s too hot for all these clothes,” he said. She had slipped her hand in her coat pocket, the little stone he’d given her tucked tight in her fist. He unbuttoned her coat with long, nimble fingers, and her mind ran off with visions of just where she’d like those fingers to be. When he hung their coats on the hook attached to the back of her door, smoothed the material with his hands, she felt it physically as if it were her skin his palms skimmed over. She wanted it to be her skin.
There were a lot of reasons why sex with Marcus was a bad idea. She couldn’t remember one of them. She tried to concentrate on what he was saying to her. Most of it didn’t make sense.
“Everything that touches the mind speaks to a person at the heart of who they are. Everything outside the body is a metaphor for what’s within. We can use the metaphor of undressing as a tool to see into who and what you need to become.”
Desire, a glowing coal in her belly all evening, flared to full flame now. It was, indeed, incredibly hot. Too hot for clothes. But for the same reason she slipped her hand into a quilted mitt before picking up a hot pan, she was reluctant to peel away the shields between her body and his.
“I don’t know that taking off clothes will help,” she said, when he unhooked the dress, slid it down her arms. She hugged herself, trying to keep it in place, looked longingly at the doorknob. How angry would he be if she fled right now? Not that she didn’t want sex. If he only wanted sex, she could handle that. “Stripping me naked only feeds the flames,” she told him.
“Flames. Mmm,” he said. “Fire. Perfect. That’s the next element we will wake in you. A perfect sequel to water and the drenching this morning.” His finger slid down the length of her spine. She surrendered the dress. He draped it over the back of her desk chair. Again she watched his fingers caress the fabric, felt it in the sticky heat of her pussy, sensation so real that she cupped her hand over her sex to shield it. The black silk was slippery with moist heat. Control over the situation was slipping away from her. She grasped at the last thread.
“Is it possible for you to teach me this thing you know, without the sex? Would you tell me if it were?”
He brushed hair back from her eyes, cupped her face between his hands. “I don’t have to resort to silly tricks to get a woman, or you, into bed.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? You don’t think of me as a woman?”
Something flashed just behind his eyes and was quickly shuttered. “I think of you as so much more than a mere woman. A mystery, an answer, a promise. But let’s not get off track.”
He pushed hair off the back of her neck, his tongue warm and wet made a swipe. Followed by teeth—a nip, a scrape. And then he covered the back of her neck with his mouth, his teeth pressed lightly against the skin on either side of her spinal column.
She had to clutch fistfuls of his shirt to stay upright. That fast, he owned her, as if every cell, every nerve had disconnected from her own will and now served his. Worse, an infernal humming tremor vibrated from a bone-deep place, a buzzing that rippled out and ran along the surface of her skin. It was so strong that she imagined it moved through Marcus too and turned back on her magnified.
He pulled back then and she pulled away, backed up against the door into the coats—wishing she could sink into the layers of heavy fabric and disappear. She hugged herself hard until the humming sensation receded. He planted both hands against the door, one on either side of her head, as he gathered himself. Shock, she supposed, a reaction he was fighting to conceal.
She couldn’t look at his face, lowered her eyes as all reasons this was a mistake came back to her. She listed them for him.
“I am such a mental wreck, Marcus. I know it. You know it. My brain won’t recognize a face. I have these humming seizures. Next thing you know I’ll be back to sleepwalking naked. There are no answers or promises in me. I’m not a more than. I’m less than your average girl.”
His reciprocal hum lingered, a tingling vibration against her lips when he kissed her.
“Hush,” Marcus said. “There’s nothing happening to you but a perfectly normal response to something I did.”
“My seizures aren’t a normal response. I’ve suffered with them since I was a teenager.”
“That was not a seizure. That was simply the mesmeric force, energy that rises in response to primal stimulus. Animal magnetism is a natural gift for you. A gift I intend to help you channel and master.”
She tried to smile and it quivered briefly before slipping away. “You’re calling me an animal?”
His smile showed his teeth. “The potential is there, sweetheart. And it’s bringing out the animal in me. So, let’s do what we can to keep it in check while I answer your first question.”
She couldn’t remember what her first question was.
He turned, and with only two options for sitting—the chair or the bed—he chose the bed and pulled her to sit beside him. He hooked one arm around her waist, while reaching to pluck something from his jacket coat pocket with his free hand.
“Now, could I teach you to channel the ethereal medium without sex? Possibly. It would be much harder because we are talking about opening all your senses to a degree few manage to achieve. It takes years to achieve that level of focus. Sexual stimulation puts you down that path much faster, advances your control to a greater degree than anything I know—save drugs, and I’m not going to drug you to teach you this.”
“I don’t see what any of this has to do with me recognizing people.”
“Humans rely too heavily on sight to give them the information they need to survive. Think of how animals use their senses. Cats cannot tell one face from another, but they can tell a beloved human companion is coming home before they are close enough to be heard or scented. When a human companion is about to have a seizure, a pet can sense the oncoming electrical disturbance. When there is a tsunami or hurricane approaching, animals need no weather forecaster or siren system to tell them to take cover. You’ve heard of these things?”
Allie shrugged. “Yes. I don’t know there’s not some exaggeration involved.”
“That’s good. Always trust your instincts rather than just swallow what you are told to believe. Test the truth yourself.”
“And how, exactly, will we test truth? Me having sex with you?”
He tucked a stray lock behind her ear and withdrew his hand from the coat pocket. He held what looked like a wooden box, most of it stayed hidden in his grasp. He let his hand rest over it in his lap.
“What’s about to happen here is more than sex. Sensual stimulation is a better word. Multidimensional sensory stimulation is probably more exact—a bleeding of one sense into the other, tasting colors, visualizing sound, seeing with your skin. You already exhibit those abilities to some degree. I want to help you gain some control over how and when that happens.”
He gave her hand a squeeze. “It’s a temptation to have you. Don’t doubt that. But the lessons go much faster when sex is denied.”
“Denied? But I thought you said—”
He touched her lips with his finger again. The vibration was still there, but stronger.
“Patience. All will be clear soon. But know this, I will not use you, sweetheart. I will not take advantage of the vulnerability I demand. For now, I am not a lover, but a teacher. After the goal is accomplished…that is another matter. We can work that out when the time comes. Understand?”
“No.”
“You will.”
He nodded toward the light switch by the door. “You’ll want the lights out for this, I think.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re feeling shy yet and you’ll be completely naked.”
&
nbsp; “No I won’t.”
He repeated the same trick, sliding a finger down her back, right along the ridge of her spine. “Yes, you will,” he murmured in a voice that brought back her complete loss of control in the park, lured her with its rich tones.
She turned off the light.
“Stand here,” he said, guiding her to the center of the little rag rug next to her bed.
Allie might not be able to tell one face from another, but her ability to see in the dark was exceptional. Only bra, panties, stockings and shoes remained. She chose to remove them herself, hands trembling when she bent to undo the straps at her ankles. Marcus’ breath was an audible intake. More due to his imagination, she was sure, than anything he could see.
She pushed her shoes under the chair and set her foot on the seat while she rolled down a stocking, wondered if he really meant what he’d said about sex. She didn’t believe it, and that was fine, because she wanted him tonight. She needed him connected skin to skin, penetrating her, taking her past the frantic teen fumblings that had left her unsatisfied, to what she believed with him would be satisfying beyond her ability to imagine. He had the air of a man who knew how to satisfy, even though he’d not carried that air of promise through to fulfillment. Yet.
He was in his shirtsleeves and slacks, his tie, shoes and socks the only additional items of clothing he parted with. His shirt was unbuttoned, tiny beads of sweat glistened in the sparse hairs framed by white linen.
“Kneel,” he said when she was naked—before she said she was ready.
She knelt on the rug, sitting back on her heels. He sat on the bed, his knees wide to make some room for her in the small space left between desk and bed. He leaned over and pulled open the curtain above her bed. Moonlight spilled through the slatted blind, striping her body. He liberated the stone from her grasp and set it on the window sill.
“Trust me? I want an honest answer now. One that comes from what your body tells you. Not what your brain thinks you should say.” He touched fingers to a spot just above her navel. “You should feel it here.”
She considered. A high, fluttering sensation, like the soft beat of butterfly wings slowed and then settled to quiet.
