Page 60 of Nothing More

Thirteen

Raven woke disoriented in the dark.

She hadn’t known she was asleep. Had been revisiting the summer she spent on the French Riviera, in a three-story blue house with a peeling orange door, shutters thrown open each morning to the cry of gulls and the smell of the lemons growing on the tree in the garden. The place was the same, down to the chipped blue china, and the petite, ironwork café table beneath the pergola, jasmine shadows lying like lace across the patio. Chilled wine sweating in stemless glasses, strawberries in a bowl, a fly buzzing past, swatted away by fashion magazines. Her mother was there, and her agent, the two of them arguing in low tones about the moved-up time of the day’s coastal shoot. She spread her hands on her pulled-up knees, and saw the purple nail polish she remembered, soon to be removed and replaced with boring, sophisticated nude for the photos.

It was an exact replica…save the man sitting across from her at the café table. Gone was the foppish blond Frenchman in the linen suit, with his sickly, pencil-thin mustache and his suggestive looks over the orange he peeled suggestively. In his place sat a slouching young man with long black hair falling in his dark eyes, wearing ripped jeans and a black leather jacket. A cigarette dangled off his lip, and when he glanced up at her, it was with directness and intent, nothing so juvenile as flirtation.

“Raven.” When he said her name, he revealed a thick Russian accent, and her stomach fluttered in helpless, girlish delight.He’s cute, she thought, and fluffed her hair. “Raven.”

Then she realized she was dreaming. The vision of the courtyard shattered; she lurched awake, and panic swamped her.

Where…

When…

How…

She blinked the crust of sleep from her eyes and forced herself to take a sequence of deep breaths. Slowly, her vision adjusted, and in the ambient city glow seeping in through her windows, noted the outlines of her furniture, the gleam of her mirror – the same mirror she’d leaned against when Toly–

“Raven.” He was really here, really saying her name.

Her next breath came easier. She was in her bed, still naked, because they’d slept together.

What a delicate way of saying he’d fucked her into the best, deepest sleep of the past two months.

She saw his silhouette outlined against the half-curtained windows across the way. Heard the jangle of his belt buckle and realized, with a sinking feeling in her stomach, that he was getting dressed.

She pushed up onto an elbow and raked her hair off her face, noting the hopeless tangles he’d left in it.You’re leaving?she wanted to ask. Instead, she said, “What time is it?”

“Just after three.” Sound of a zipper. He leaned down, and she heard the twin thumps of him stepping into his boots. “I have to go.”

After three meant he hadn’t cut and run the moment she’d fallen asleep. Maybe he’d stayed for another cigarette. Maybe he’d fallen asleep, too. Maybe he’d laid in the dark staring at the ceiling, feeling regret, or nothing at all, after he’d quite obviously gotten up to turn off the lamps. Whatever the case, he’d been slapped by orgasm, too.

Which reminded her…

She clicked on the bedside lamp, and the room filled with a warm, buttery glow. It became immediately apparent that Toly had showered, or at least dunked his head under her sink, his hair dripping wet and slicked back off his face. His head jerked up, as though startled by the light, and for one gratifying moment, she saw his expression flicker with doubt. He passed his tongue over his lip ring, and that movement made her keenly aware of her own bruised mouth, the feel of that warm metal hoop against her lips when he kissed her. His gaze darted over her, vulnerable and uncertain, before he straightened, composed himself, and looked coolly indifferent once more.

That one glimmer of weakness had given her hope, though. Hope forwhat, she didn’t know: a relationship? Ha. Perhaps just a repeat performance. A good shag was so hard to find.

It was hope all the same, though. A blush of warmth to thaw the forever-chilled cathedral of her heart.

She drew her knees up, just as she’d done in the dream, and wrapped her arms around them, wrapped up in the sheet so was completely covered. “Toly,” she said, in her office voice.

One of his black brows popped up. “Yeah?”

“Are you clean?”

Slowly, he glanced down at himself, then back up to her. Smoothed a hand over the wet crown of his head. “I…showered.”

She swallowed back a snort. “No. I meant, are you clean? Free of venereal disease, that is. You didn’t bother to wrap your little soldier up, and I’m afraid I really must ask.”

His eyes bugged one comical moment. Then he cleared his throat, and offered a curt nod. “Yeah. I’m clean.”

“Are you certain?”

He scowled. “Yes.”

“Good. I’m on the pill, by the way. Not that you bothered to ask beforehand.”