Page 41 of In A Faraway Land

He held her tightly against him, her panties against his fly, and he was hard between her legs. When he breathed, his pants nudged her clit through the thin cotton of her panties.

The trembling turned to shaking, but she held on around his neck.

He pulled back and kissed hermouth, his tongue warmly wrapping hers between their open lips.

His hands tightened on her clothes, turning into fists.

Dieter’s teeth scraped the skin where her neck met her shoulder, almost biting her. The nip hit a bruise under her skin there, and it hurt.

The pain rattled through her, and the shaking in her bones broke through the thin fog of liquor.

His hands felt too much like he washolding herdown.

His hot mouth was too near the back of her neck, where Pierre had bitten her and then held her down.

And then Pierre’s hands had wrapped around her throat, and she couldn’t scratch them loose and she couldn’t breathe.

Flicka cried out, “Invisible.Invisible!Stop, ohstop!”

Dieter fell backward in the chair, his hands clutching her hips, and his gray eyes looked blank ashe blinked.

“Invisible,”Flicka sobbed.

“I stopped,” Dieter panted. He stroked her hair. “I stopped. Are you okay?”

Flicka shoved at his shoulders, pushing herself backward and off his legs. She tried to balance, but she stumbled, her feet slipping on the linoleum floor. Her knees crashed onto the hard floor, and she scurried backward.

Dieter followed her down, kneeling beside her. His handshovered in the air around her, not touching. “Flicka.Durchlauchtig.You’re all right. Stand up. Please stand up.”

Water weighed in Flicka’s arms and legs and made her weak. “I can’t. Don’t touch me.”

“I’m not. I’m not touching you.” His hands were open and grasping right in front of her face. “Come on. Stand up. You’re killing me.Stand up.”

She forced her arm to push outward and touch hishand.

He held her hand gently and lifted, directing her to her knees. “Come on.”

She reached for his hands with her other one, and he raised her to her feet. “I’m sorry.”

“No, never. Never with me,Durchlauchtig.You’re okay. We’ll figure this out. You need counseling. It’s not as easy as one drunken night.”

Her legs shook under her, and she staggered to a chair. She pushed a hank of hairout of her face. “I’ll be okay.”

“Good,” Dieter said. He crouched beside where she sat, still holding onto her hand. “You need counseling, not alcohol. We’ll find help for you.”

“Yeah,” Flicka said. His words bounced around her unthinking brain. “Okay.”

“Some of my friends in the special forces had seen terrible things, and counseling helped them. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than whiskey.I had to tell them that, too. Everyone tries whiskey first, and then counseling.”

Flicka managed to smile a little at him.

“There,” he said, and a little of the frantic energy left his eyes and shoulders. “Good. Just breathe. And then we’ll go to bed and I’ll tell you a story, and you’ll be okay, right?”

“Yeah,” she said, breathing more easily and wanting to be okay for him. “I’ll be all right.”

It felt like a lie.