Sometimes, he holds her, and they pretend that this is how things are always supposed to be. They know it isn’t quite right; that their relationship isn’t one destined in the stars. She doesn’t mind; neither does he. Their relationship is nothing more than the friction of hips and uttered lies in the highest moments of passion. She can never belong to him, nor he to her. She’s content to take whatever he’s giving, and she knows he feels the same.
Movement IV: When the Levee Breaks
“If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s going to break.”
It was too early in the morning for Zeppelin, he argued in his sleep. He wanted to die in that bed, cease to exist in that bed”preferably without the help of Led Zeppelin. He could manage self-depression fine on his own, thanks.
“Open your eyes.” Her voice lured him from his troubled sleep.
When he opened his eyes, warm blues greeted him. She lay close, too close, her bare skin warming his. Pressing into him, she made it impossible for him to navigate his muddled thoughts. The scent of her arousal was aggressive, overtaking rationality. Her sweet mouth explored his chest, her teeth nipping at his nipples. She was eager and playful, pretending as if nothing had happened.
And he was the victim being reduced to a willing participant in this evil game of seduction. If he didn’t fight her, she would trap him in her web. “What’re ya doin’?” he asked her angrily.
“You, of course.” She laughed her throaty laugh, as if this were all a fun joke, throwing her head back, exposing the delicious curve of her neck. He buried his face there; the scent of wild Watsonia kissed his nose. Logan wondered if she’d shared this secret with her other lover, too.
“Mean ol’ levee taught me how to weep and moan.”
He offered little resistance when she took his hand, guiding his fingers toward a raring nipple. She arched into his touch, and he wondered, again, if she did this with her other lover. “This ain’t right,” he pulled away from her.
“Of course it is,” she purred, hooking her leg around his waist, denying him escape. The heat emanating from her was all-consuming, powerful. She was his phoenix, his death and rebirth.
She nudged him to his back, draping herself over him. Looking down at him, her hair spilling over her shoulders, a nimbus shrouding the goddess from the mortals, she leaned into him, whispering her fantasies into his ear”fantasies that she’d probably whispered a thousand times to the other. He pushed her off him, turning away from her, sitting on the edge of his bed.
“What about him?” he asked without looking at her. “What about the other guy yer fuckin’?”
One arm slithered across his chest, her mouth finding the alcove between his neck and jaw. “There is no one else. You are the sole reason that I breathe.” Bittersweet lies filled his ears like poison.
“When the levee breaks, I’ll have no place to stay...”
Logan woke from his dream unable to breathed; the pillow he’d nuzzled in his sleep, the one that smelled like her, lay tattered to shreds. Alone again with blood blinding his eyes, he tossed the journal at his bedside against the wall. She did this to him. Why couldn’t she have kept her promises? Why couldn’t he have been the only one?
He had to get the fuck away from her before he killed her, before he killed them.
Ororo knocked on the opened door and walked into the room with a nervous smile. She was wearing his favorite dress, a simple, low-cut, apricot-colored dress that molded to her body like an artist’s stroke. The dress flowed and swayed with every move she made, inviting him to rub his hands over her curves to share the artist’s vision. Her fresh, clean scent followed her into the room.
“We have to talk,” she said. The corner of her lips tugged downward, completing a grim expression.
“Sit,” he said, signaling for her to come closer, expecting diplomatic discussion. But this was no friendly visit. Had he done something to upset her? He tried to rack his brain for something he might’ve done, but he came up empty. “Did I do something?”
She shook her head. “No, I just need to speak with you, but I have things to do. Later, okay?” Same time, same place”her eyes said, but there was nothing overt about the caged look she gave him. So, it was about them.
“Is something the matter?” he pressed, standing from his seat on the couch. She floundered a bit, pulling awkwardly at the strap of her dress. Something he didn’t see her do that often. He moved closer to her.
“We will speak after I take care of…” She stopped, watching him carefully. Then, as if reading his intent, she attempted to cut him off at the door. He closed the door before she could escape. She walked around him, putting a wide berth between them. “What are you doing?”
“Closing the door,” he said with an innocuous shrug.
“You know what I meant.” She backed away from him, panic leveling the room between them, and he moved closer to her.
It was a slow descent, at first, the momentum increasing with every passing second as she backed herself against the wall. He didn’t touch her; he placed his hands on the wall on either side of her, leaving nothing but the brush of clothes between them. Imploringly, he delved in for a kiss, but she turned her head and placed one hand securely over his mouth.
“Are you crazy?” she asked him. Blue eyes looked at him fearfully. Temptation made him caress the curves of her neck. Placing his free hand over her hand, he pulled her hand from his mouth, letting his lips brush the tip of her fingers.
“Just one kiss.” She relented and moved in a bit closer, soft lips tempting. He moved back slightly as she continued to strain forward”just a bit. Come to me, he goaded her wordlessly. Then, she placed her hand back over his mouth, trying to push him away from her, but he refused her.
“Someone might catch us,” she whispered between futile shoves. They rarely made contact”well, anything that could be considered more than friendly”when there was chance that one of the others might find them in a compromising position.
“Just one, I promise.” Their heads tilted at just the right ungainly angle to clash and make a kiss work. All they had to do was lean into it.
“You do not know how to keep your promises. I have heard that before, remember? If I let you kiss me, it will never stop there,” she said with a smirk, slapping his hands when he tried to run a finger over her exposed collarbone. She had better discipline of her self-control, and she never let him forget it. “Look, we’ll talk later,” she repeated, kissing him on the cheek. Then, she slipped under his arms and was gone.
The journal lay on the bed when Ororo returned to her room”almost like she’d left it there before leaving the room. She walked toward it cautiously, as if expecting him to jump from the shadows somewhere, but there was no sign of him. She hadn’t expected him to return it. At the very least, she expected to find it ripped to shreds, waiting for her outside her door.
She opened the journal, flipping through the pages, noting the smeared words”tears, though not her own. She wished he’d waited for her, told her exactly what was on his mind”screamed at her, if that’s what he wanted. She hated not knowing; she hated being left to her own imagination. How had he reacted when he read the words? Would she ever know? Did she really care to know?
She knew he’d thought the gesture”her giving him the journal”was an arrogant display of her infidelity. She hadn’t given it to him to rub it in his face. She’d given it to him because she was unable to voice the things that needed to be said, but her written words would always resound loudly where her own voice faltered. It was her confession, one that he needed to know, even if he didn’t understand it. She didn’t understand it herself.
She pressed the journal close to her heart. What have you done? A silent voice questioned her. She didn’t know how to answer herself, fearing that anything she said would sound false coming from her lips. She warred with herself”should she seek him out or should she let him be. She didn’t know how effective her words would be now. She thought that she would attempt to restore what they’d lost. She wouldn’t continue to let their relationship fester in lies and deception.
She tired of the cruel games her mind played on her, melding and meshing two men in her thoughts, in her dreams, in her fantasies. She needed to be free of this burden. She was determined to break off the affair. She didn’t know what she would do beyond that point.
Perhaps she could throw herself at Logan’s feet and beg his forgiveness, if her pride would allow it. She knew she shouldn’t give precedence to such things as her pride when it came to Logan. Love should make her humble, willing to do whatever she had to do, but the damage was irreparable. He would never listen to what she had to say. She didn’t think she could stand to face him”not now.
Logan held trust in high regards. A relationship that took years to build was destroyed in a matter of days. What had she thrown it all away for? For impromptu trysts in unknown hotels”for nothing at all. Her body went into auto-drive, giving way to whims of the flesh. It was hardly an excuse. Even if he did take her back, he didn’t deserve the memory of her betrayal to riddle his mind. He didn’t deserve the constant worry of wondering if she was being faithful. That’s what would happen; she had to be honest with herself.
He would be miserable with her, and she’d rather not have him at all than to destroy him.
Ororo often joked the rooms he picked looked like something out of an Arabesque romance novel, a Bedouin warrior’s bedroom, a room for a harem. She’d once showed up in low-slung harem pants and gold bracelets that ran up her arm. Barefooted, she danced for him”hips undulating, summoning”and told him to call her Mata Hari, saying that she played both sides.
But now, as she closed the door to the room softly, she was reserved, lacking in passion where there had always been plenty. She barely looked him in the eye, as she walked soundlessly across the floor toward him. Kicking her shoes off”Jimmy Choos, she’d told him once or twice”she straddled his hips while his fingers sought out the hem of her dress.
Sliding his fingers along legs like silk, he cupped her butt, pulling her closer into him. She held his face between her hands, denying him access to haven of her neck. “He knows,” she said before releasing his face. She kept an even tone, one that didn’t allow him to measure her feelings. Her expression was stagnant, revealing nothing at all. He knew she meant to end it.
For one teasing moment, he started to ask her about this “he” she never named, but he knew that she would never take kindly to that sort of joking. She never did. Her relationship with Logan was sacred. It was never to be mentioned (unless she initiated the conversation), never to be sullied by whatever happened between them underneath the sheets.
“Oh?” he said, placing a kiss on a jutting collarbone, not wanting her to mention “him” again.
He searched her eyes for the appropriate response. He once made the mistake of asking her what was he giving her that the Wolverine wasn’t. She slapped him so hard that he carried around an imprint of her hand for days. He thought after that they were finished, but a near-missed kiss in the kitchen and the graze of fingers against his zipper told him otherwise.
“He always knew,” she added with a wry smile, her voice was barely a whisper as if “he” were in the room that very instance, “I never could hide anything from him.” She sounded apologetic, slightly regretful. Her smile slipped from her face like a memory as her fingers fidgeted with a lock of his hair.
“If he knows, what’s stopped him from confronting me?” He didn’t want to talk about Logan or what he might or might not know, but he’d known this day was coming. He laid his head against her chest, feeling the hard throb of her heart against his cheek as she cradled his head closer to her.
Limber fingers traced his jaw, making all his senses vibrate with each stroke, but when his hands resumed exploring the depths of her dress, she stopped him. “I asked him not to. I told him whatever justice he wanted would best be settled with me.”
He had no reason to doubt that, but he did have reason to doubt that was the sole reason he hadn’t already tasted Logan’s fist. Logan’s anger was almost legendary. He wasn’t a thinking man. He let his emotions guide him. “That’s not the truth and you know it,” he said.
“Maybe you know me too well, too,” she said with an empty half-chuckle. “The truth is that I am not quite sure he knows it is you.”
That would explain Logan’s piercing stares that silently threatened him. He’d almost taken it personally until he saw Logan giving someone else the same glare. He hadn’t known how to react, so he hadn’t reacted at all. It wasn’t exactly unusual for Logan to be surly toward someone just because they were breathing the same air as he was. He hadn’t given it much more thought after that.
“Do you think he’ll figure it out?” Her heart throbbed harder in response to his question; perhaps they were sharing the same vision”none of it happy. He turned his face, placing his lips right over the spot that throbbed, wanting to breathe that feeling right into himself.
“Yes, I do.” He loved her brute honesty. She wasn’t the type of lover who’d lie to you to feign a safety net. “He thinks I love you,” she continued as if that was the stupidest notion she’d ever heard.
He pulled away from her suddenly, slightly burned from her remark. “Do you?” he asked, suppressing anything that could be interpreted as hopeful.
“It is not fair for you to ask me that,” she chided gently.
“Is that right?” he snapped back at her, pushing her from his lap more roughly than he’d intended.
He kicked off his shoes and lay back on the bed, picking up the remote from the nightstand. Flipping on the television, he scanned through the channels until he found the first baseball game. He replaced the remote back on the stand and put his hands behind his head, as if he were home in his own room, alone.
She sat on the bed close to him. “Do not be like that.” She reached to touch his arm, and he moved it without looking at her.
“I’m not being like that.” He couldn’t come up with a better retort; though one boiled on the tip of his tongue. Impenetrable silence from her made him angry for reasons unknown. “What’s wrong with loving me?”
“There is nothing wrong with loving you,” she answered. Then, why don’t you love me, he almost asked. Wrong question. “I love you””
“But not like you love him.”
“We have been friends a long time. I love and respect you, as someone I have come to know as a good friend, but I am afraid that I cannot give you more than that. And…” She trailed, averting her eyes.
“This was never about love,” he finished for her. No need for her to think she’d hurt his feelings with the obvious. It was always about what they could wantonly take from one another”no strings. Always. From that first time in Vientiane where he let her drag him to a temple, the Wat Pha Kaew. “Do you ever wish that night hadn’t happened?”
“Maybe,” she said. She crawled across the bed toward him, resting in the crook between his legs. She placed her head against his thigh. “Things would be much easier for both of us.” The trip had been a mix of business and pleasure. It started as a recon mission that took them deep into the destitute Lao villages. They hadn’t found the threat they’d feared; they’d only found each other.
Who would know they hadn’t spent all their time deep in the trenches”that the “threat” was barely worth the bother? Let’s enjoy the break, she’d said in her conspiratorial .voice, the same one she used to use when they helped Bobby play pranks on one of their unsuspecting teammates. That day they’d gone to see the sights, including the temple. At dinner that night, they’d drank too much Lao-Lao whiskey and sang in a language they didn’t speak, making merry with the locals, who referred to them as the nice American couple. They hadn’t corrected them.
She’d sat in his lap and fed him sweet sticky rice with her fingers. He steadied her wrist, wrapping his lips around her nimble fingers. She laughed at the way his tongue explored her fingers. That tickles, she’d said as his tongue curled around her fingers. Her eyes shone with excitement, and he’d caught the enticing sight of her nipples straining against her tank. They’d laughed and pretended it was just fun, even as he held to her waist and positioned her so she rubbed against his erection just right.
And when lips replaced fingers, well, what was a harmless kiss between old friends? His mouthed covered hers, wholly, and he savored the contrasting tastes of bitter and sweet her lips offered. He never meant for it to last more than a few seconds, but her kiss made him feel like a teenage boy who’d slipped his hands past a girl’s waistband for the first time.
He remembered how they ran around his room partially clothed, chasing each other, tripping over furniture and shoes. She’d wrapped her bra around his wrists. She was the victor, and he was her captive. “Me, Jane,” she’d said, one strong hand pushing him back on the floor. Her fingers roamed his body uninhibited, eyes full of wicked curiosity. Then, she was pulling away from him suddenly.
He remembered her muttered apologies as she unwrapped his wrists, pulling the bra to her chest like a shield. She was still talking”lecturing, really”as she walked around his room trying to locate her clothing. He should’ve let her go. They could’ve taken that night to the grave with them, but his mind rationed they’d already taken it too far. He’d grabbed her just as she put on her simple v-neck shirt. “I am going to fuck you,” he’d told her, ripping the shirt from her body, seizing her lips with his own.
“Maybe,” he repeated, pulling himself away from the memory, watching the way she walked her fingers up and down his thigh.
“Remember this?” she asked, reaching up to tweak his nose between her forefinger and her middle finger.
“Nothing changes.” That’s what he’d told her that night when he tweaked her nose. Nothing changes. After that, he’d teased her about her squeaky voice, mimicking the impossible swell of her voice, garnering a laugh from her. Then, she’d rounded her spine and curled so tightly into herself while she slept that he thought she might disappear.
“You lied,” she said. Then, she planted her fingers firmly into his thighs, lifting herself again.
She started her slow trek up his body, her mouth lingering far too long near the zipper of his jeans, hot breath penetrating the thick material. She looked up at him, smiled, and continued upward until they were face to face, mouth to mouth, her lithe body stretched over his. “I didn’t mean to,” he lied into her mouth.
“Of course you did.” She nibbled on his bottom lip, prompting him to part his lips. He ran a tongue over her lips, tasting the last remnants of peppermint, lemon, and amaretto. The amaretto had grown on her. He wondered if she ever figured out that it was him who kept spiking her drinks. He took another deep taste of her mouth, languishing in her spell.
“I’m sorry about what happened between you and Logan,” he said feebly, wishing he didn’t lose his mind every time her soft hands caressed him.
“More lies.” She bit down on his bottom lip hard enough for it to tingle.
“But”” She pressed her fingers to his lips, and he wasn’t sure if she was showing the proper amount of sadness. “I thought Logan was your life,” he continued despite her protest.
“He is, but there is no need for excuses and regrets now. Nothing you can say or do will change what has happened. I am already destroyed. Just finish me off.”
Author’s notes: Borrowed a line from Nicole Blackman’s “Metal Eye.” Yeah, there will be a story that’s the flipside of this called “I Never Promised You a Rose Garden,” after a song with the same name. (There’s a book out there with the same title. Excellent read”it deals with mental illness.) It may be a while before I get that one out, though. I have to do some thinking on it before I start writing it. I promise there is an “Odalisque” and a “Codename: Storm” update coming in the midst of all this. Next chapter is the last chapter, entitled “Six Underground.”
