Each Step Like Knives Read online

  Helena closed the rickety screen door, then the solid door behind it. Night wouldn't fall for another few hours, but she was tired. Francine wasn't used to the quiet island life. She was more accustomed to late-night cappuccinos and caviar than warmed milk and a piece of toast. They'd stayed up late playing cards and reminiscing, which had been wonderful at the time but left Helena with a headache from too much wine and too little sleep.

  Napping was out of the question. She had enough trouble getting to sleep at night. She'd take a long, warm bath instead. Not even the summer heat could keep her from enjoying that.

  She ran the water in the claw-foot tub and added bubbles. She lit a lavender-scented candle, shed her clothes and stepped into the water with a sigh. There was nothing like a long soak in a hot tub to put things to rights.

  For a little while, she just drifted, floated, let her mind follow one thought after another like a butterfly flitting through a field. The phone rang discordantly, and her eyes flew open, while her hands banged against the tub's metal sides. After two rings, the machine picked up and Helena lay back in the water. She'd check it later. It would probably be Howard, begging for another chance to prove to her how much he loved her.

  Helena made a face and resolved to put him from her mind. There was nothing he could do to prove anything to her other than what a complete and utter asshole he was. She slipped back into the water, eyes closed again, and sighed.

  If she'd been the one caught with her pantyhose around her ankles, she had no doubts about how quickly Howard would have forgiven her. She grimaced. How about never? However, no matter how tempted she might have been to take up the few offers she'd had, she'd remained faithful to her fiancé. She couldn't regret doing the right thing, but looking back and recalling the body and face of the man who'd asked her out to dinner after spending an hour on the subway with her, well.... She sighed again. Missed opportunity, that's all.

  She hadn't had any such luck since coming to Virginia. The local population consisted mostly of families on vacation and some long-term residents she knew on a nodding acquaintance from the summers she'd spent here as a kid with her grandparents. She hadn't met any eligible bachelors, but then, she had hardly "hit the town" either.

  Helena let her fingers drift along her belly, then down to her thighs. It had been a long time since she'd made love. She'd grown suspicious of Howard's fidelity when the marathon lovemaking sessions they used to have had dried up and become once-every-other-week, perfunctory, passionless fucking. By the end, they'd barely had sex at all, and when they did, he'd had zero interest in making sure he'd pleased her.

  She'd learned to take care of her own needs, but in the aftermath of the flight from New York, Helena hadn't done more than think about sex for months. Now, her nipples puckered in the hot water as she imagined a man's mouth on them. She touched them, rolled them gently between her fingertips. The soft buds of flesh stiffened under her touch. She tweaked them both again and felt her body's response between her thighs.

  The oiled water had made her skin supple and slick, but the moisture her questing fingers discovered between her legs had its own source. Helena slid a finger along her folds, then dipped inside. Heat covered her finger, and the pressure on her sensitive inner flesh made her bite her lip and roll her head on her shoulders. God, it felt good to be touched, even if it was her own fingers doing the touching.

  She circled her clit, already plump and straining with arousal, then slid back inside her heat. The heel of her palm pressed her button as she slowly moved first one finger, then another, in and out. Then up again to put the pressure on the spot where she craved it most.

  Helena teased herself to the edge of orgasm in minutes, something no man had ever seemed able to do as well for her as she could do for herself. Her past lovers had varied in skill, desire and physical accomplishments, but they'd all had the same thing in common. They could make her come, sometimes even more than once, but not one of them had mastered the art of slow, torturous arousal that could turn a mildly pleasing orgasm into a climax so mind-blowing it nearly stopped her heart.

  She didn't let herself slide over the edge into oblivion--not yet. She had all afternoon and all night to please herself, if she wanted. The porcelain tub had a smoothly curving back that cradled her in perfect comfort. With an inflatable bath pillow beneath her neck, Helena could float here for hours. She intended to just that.

  Now she pinched her clit lightly between her thumb and middle finger and moved the small, hard button of flesh slowly. She concentrated on the feelings radiating through her body while her other hand caressed each of her nipples in time to the stroking of her clit. Her legs fell open and she arched her pelvis against her hand.

  The perfect man would know how to do this.

  The thought startled her enough to make her open her eyes and stop her fingers in their delicate circle. Where did that come from? Perfect man? There was no such thing. Helena wasn't foolish enough to think she'd never date again, but open up her heart? Not bloody likely.

  Her clit pulsed under her touch and she let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding. Perfect men simply didn't exist, and even if one did, she wouldn't want him. How hard would it be to live with someone who was perfect?

  The thought made her laugh, which came out more like a gasp. So the perfect man for her wouldn't have to actually be perfect. She let her hands start up their exploration again. He'd touch her like this, softly, then more fiercely as her arousal grew. He'd know how to do it without being told. Hell, without even being shown. He'd just know.

  What would he look like? The man from the subway flashed into her mind's eye again, but then faded. Dark hair. She'd always loved dark hair on a man. Dark eyes, too. Dark like night. A man who looked like he wasn't afraid to get dirty. Ahhh.... Her clit thrummed and she thrust upward in the water. She left her nipples to slide her fingers inside herself while the other hand kept up its circular motion on her clitoris.

  Tall, dark and handsome. Oh, and silent. Helena let out a low moan that echoed in the tiny bathroom. She didn't want a talker. Let him use his hands to tell her anything he needed her to know.

  "Yes." The word bubbled from her throat and past her lips in a pure burst of pleasure. She said it again and again while her clit turned to fire under her touch and her tunnel clamped down in fluttery ripples on her fingers.

  She lifted her hand from her clit but kept the other one locked deep inside. For another moment, she pumped her fingers in and out, slowly, just enough to keep her on the edge, but not enough to send herself over. The water washed over her bud and sent shivers of ecstasy shuddering through her. My perfect man would use his tongue to do this, she thought, and her pussy contracted in a spasm of climax that made her cry out.

  She withdrew her hand and settled herself deeper into the water. This is how it would feel for my perfect man to go down on me. The thought was slightly incoherent, but what could she expect this close to the first orgasm she'd had in she couldn't remember how long? He'd bend his face between her legs, and he'd lick her, and lick her....

  "Yes!"

  Helena rolled her hips to make the water slosh across her clit, which now felt the size of her thumb. The water rolled over her heated flesh, caressed her, teased her, and brought her even closer to climax. A fingertip touched to her button would have made her splinter, but oh, doing it this way was so...much...nicer....

  She couldn't hold on any longer. The delicious pleasure-pain had built up in her center to the point she could no longer stop it. She was coming in a rush, a flood, a hurricane of ecstasy washing over her in waves so strong she felt as though she were going to lift right out of the tub and ride them to the stars. Her body convulsed, making the water push that much harder on her clit. She came again, hard on the heels of the first climax, which hadn't quite ended.

  Helena flew. She gasped. Her cunt and clit spasmed and rippled, and each contraction made another burst of sensation tear through her. Then, final
ly, her body's movements slowed and faded, gentled to nothing, and she lay back in the water, trying to catch her breath.

  If I could find a man who could do that, she thought, I'd follow him to the bottom of the sea, if I had to.

  He rose again through the water's blackness toward the blackness above. He burst from the surface, this time not fearing the air's sting. Maybe he was getting used to it. His gill slits fluttered, open and closed, but couldn't process the air they way they could filter it from the water. He opened his mouth to take in a gulp of the stuff, but it was flavorless as well as without color, and he felt only an uncomfortable heaviness in his chest when he did.

  She was singing again. He heard her voice even over the crashing of the waves against the shore. Her voice was lovelier than anything he'd ever heard, even if he understand only a little of what she was saying.

  Jeenai floated in the shallow water for a while, listening. She likes to walk along the beach at night. He liked to watch her move with the twin supports he knew were called legs moving with such swift efficiency over the sand. In the water, she would flounder where he is strong, but there on land, she had the advantage over him.

  His heart thudded in his chest at the sight of her pale hair, caught and tangled by the night breeze. A wave lifted and took him closer to her. Now he saw the flash of her bare skin as she waded in the froth of sea foam at the edge of the waves. She had breasts, like a fem, but her center was exposed for the world to see instead of being tucked away inside her. The dark triangle between her legs advertised the pleasure to be had there. His cock thickened and grew longer in response.

  She was beautiful. He longed for her in a way he had never longed for anything else. The ache inside him was a hunger that could not be assuaged by food, or by sex play. Not even by battle. He'd tried all those things: stuffing himself to nausea, fucking his way through every revel two and three times over, heading out to fight the neighboring pod of Carrageenai. Nothing satisfied him like the sight of her.

  He'd seen her first by accident. A skirmish had left him wounded, far from home, and he'd floated to the surface, delirious with pain. He'd come out against the nighttime sky and heard the sound of her singing.

  Now, he swam the great distance back and forth from his territory to hers as often as he could.

  Seeing and hearing her was no longer enough. He wanted to touch her. He wanted to mate with her, stay with her, which was ludicrous and should make him feel ashamed for even desiring such perversion.

  Yet as he floated and heard her voice across the water, Jeenai didn't feel ludicrous or perverse. He only felt sorrow he couldn't reveal himself to her. He let the tide sweep him uncomfortably close to shore, just beyond the edge of breaking waves. Sand scraped at his tail, but he barely noticed the abrasion, so caught was he by the sound of her voice.

  And now, what was she doing? She was entering the water. He heard the splash of her inadequate fins --her legs--as she moved them in the sea. She stopped singing, and after a moment, Jeenai realized he could no longer hear her at all. She had gone beneath the water.

  The wine had made her warm and the water had looked so appealing, Helena had no compunctions about diving in. She hadn't counted on a riptide. The forceful water had grabbed her legs and pulled her under. She'd come up, spluttering and coughing, and when she put her feet down, she felt nothing but water beneath her.

  Stupid! she berated herself. Stupid for swimming alone, at night, without even a bathing suit. She'd seen the movie Jaws. Naked, drunk swimmers always got eaten at night.

  She kicked as powerfully as she could and tried to find the shore. There...a glint of light, left from a burning candle on her deck. She focused on it. How far out was she? The light seemed as far away as a star.

  The water closed over her head again and this time she didn't fight it. She drifted. She was drowning, but wasn't afraid. Funny. She'd always thought she'd fight death when it came.

  Something bumped against her trailing legs and Helena screamed. Thoughts of sharp teeth and giant dorsal fins filled her as the water rushed into her throat and lungs. She was under the water! She pumped her feet, moved her hands, but which way was up? Drowning hadn't frightened her, but being chomped by a shark did.

  Hands. She felt hands on her waist. Arms curled around her and she was pressed against a bare, male chest. A face swam before her. A human face. Lips pressed to hers and gave her air to breathe. She didn't know how, but could only be grateful for the breath. They surged to the surface, where she gasped in a breath that burned like fire. She caught a glimpse of streaming dark hair, dark, fathomless eyes, and strong, broad shoulders.

  He pulled her toward the shore. In the back of her sea-soaked brain, Helena waited for him to carry her onto the sand like the hero from a romance novel. Kiss her back to life, then perhaps make passionate love to her on the sand without either one of them getting chafed.

  Instead, she felt his muscles bunch and roll as he lifted and tossed her as hard as he could. She didn't quite make it all the way to the land. Helena landed with a thud in the shallow waves. She sucked in air, not water, and she turned to look with bleary eyes for her savior.

  He wasn't there.

  "You stink of split-tail." Krall made a rude gesture to emphasize what he'd just said.

  Jeenai was too tired to care. He shoved past his brother and went to his chambers, where he curled on his bed of cultured seaweed and tried to rest. He had touched her. Her skin had been smooth, like a fem's, but suppler. More tender somehow. Her scent had been liked nothing he'd ever smelled.

  "You've been to the surface." Krall had followed him. Jeenai made no reply. His brother swam closer and lay down next to him. "You're failing, oh, my brother."

  Jeenai rolled onto his back and unfurled the length of his tail. "Leave me alone."

  Krall made the hand signs for laughter. Jeenai looked up. His brother was no longer mocking him.

  "If your desires lay on the surface, oh, my brother, maybe that's where you should go."

  Jeenai lifted his upper body. "You can't be serious."

  Again, Krall made the laughing motion. "I'm serious. You're pale. You're getting thin. You take no joy in the hunt, in the feast. Not even in the fuck, oh, my brother."

  Jeenai nodded. All of that was true. "So what can I do about it? She's captured me as surely as a net or a hook."

  "Carageenai don't mate like the split-tails do." Krall made a grimace as he cast his gaze upwards. "You'd have to stay with her for the rest of your life...which, fortunately, wouldn't be very long."

  Jeenai thought back to the eight ten-seasons he'd already passed. "My life would drag out infinitely longer feeling the way I do."

  Krall let a stream of silver bubbles filter out from his nose and mouth. It was a gesture of commiseration, and one Jeenai would not have guessed his brother capable of. Krall reached out a hand and grabbed Jeenai's.

  "Oh, my brother, I did not tell you of the time I spent during my youthquest." Krall shrugged. "When I was gone, I did more than hunt and fight and sow my seed in other territories. I also went to the surface."

  Jeenai had never heard this story. "My brother?"

  Krall's gaze had gone far away. "I met a split-tail. A handsome split-tail. One of their mals. I came across him in a lagoon. He was swimming. I was so taken by the way his...what are they called?"

  "Legs."

  "His legs churned the water with twice as many movements as a tail does, yet he could move only half as fast. I caught him with no effort. I held him in my arms. He seemed so much smaller than I, though his sex equipment was the same."

  Jeenai laughed. "You didn't, oh, my brother."

  Krall's grin emphasized his sharp teeth. "I did. Why not? The mating wasn't like anything I'd ever done before, I can tell you that."

  "He didn't fight you?"

  "Oh, no. He embraced me. He put his mouth on mine, which was odd, as we were both above the surface, and I had no need to give him the lifekiss."

/>   "That's how split-tails show affection. Passion." Jeenai thought for a moment. "She would have drowned tonight, if I had not been there. If I had not put my mouth to hers."