Funny, when you looked at his face, you mostly came away with the memory of the scar running vertically near his eyes. But he had a few other cuts and divots marring his beautiful skin. She knew plenty of women who would have spent fortunes for that skin. They were like two collections of scars talking to each other, the scars masking what lay beneath.
She wasn’t sure she could even form an honest answer into words, so she put him off. “I’m not ready to talk about it yet. Give me some time.”
Valentine’s upper lip twitched as he patted her hand. “Sorry. I thought this trip would give both of us a rest. Let’s talk more when you’re up to it.”
“Don’t go,” she said. How many times had she wanted to say those words to him? But to do so would make her sound vulnerable. Needy. “Nice to have you here. Don’t mean to be a burden. Do you have somewhere you need to be?”
He sat. “Need? My need’s in this room. I don’t think you know how much I need you. How much the Cause needs you. Every time you’ve been at my side, we’ve had success. All my screwups seem to happen when you’re not around to kick me in the butt and set me straight. Damn it, woman, you’re my oldest and best friend.”
“What about Ahn-Kha?”
“He’s like a brother to me. We’re bound up in this together, in some way I can’t explain. Maybe he can, with his philosophies. He’s family. You’re the person I want to have around. You’re the person whose absence leaves me, well, lonely. I can’t ever pay back what you’ve given for me.
“You pulled me out of darkness once. I’d like to return the favor. If I have to, I’ll attach tow chains to Ahn-Kha and have him haul you up back into the sun.”
She had no doubt he cared for her. They were family; they’d been through too much together. She spent the rest of the day quietly in her cabin eating, mostly easy-to-digest soups. Potatoes and ham and summer vegetables. It wasn’t great, but it was better than most travel food she’d eaten.
That night, she asked Valentine to bring her something to read.
She ambushed him right away so his defenses would be down.
“I want a real night with you. In my bed, in the biblical sense. It won’t change anything between us,” she said, and she hoped it would be true. She’d been able to turn off her emotions for sex in the past, out of necessity.
“Aren’t we a little beyond that sort of thing?”
“I just want to feel good for one night. You know I don’t get many guys. I don’t like most of ’em, and the ones I do like get scared. You’re not scared.”
“I used to be, a little.”
She’d thought so. This conversation was more interesting than anything that had happened since everything went to crap in Kokkola. “Well, it’s been years since I scared you.”
“True.”
“Be mine, just for a few nights on this trip. I need to clear away the cobwebs.”
“I don’t think it’s been that long for you. What about—”
“The cobwebs in my head, buster.”
They’d come close a couple of times. When he first knew her, he made a few halfhearted, half-joking attempts to get into her pants. When they were posing as husband and wife on the Gulf Coast, at night he’d hang up his Quisling Coastal Marine uniform and give her a friendly kiss on the cheek.
She grew to like those kisses, look forward to them. She was actually a little sorry when he was posted to command the Coastal Marines on the gunboat Thunderbolt and the time came for the real operation to commence.
One hot night, bored and unable to sleep, rather than crawl out onto the roof of the neighbor’s apartment and sleep, they’d stayed in on their sweat-soaked bed and rather groggily groped each other. It had started out as a few good-natured elbows thrown, and then matters escalated. They’d both satisfied each ot
her enough to fall asleep, exhausted, but you couldn’t say they’d been lovers—more like kids messing around.
Still, the night stayed with her for months after. She could still feel his youthful, hard cock in her imagination. It featured in a few of her fantasies.
He sat, staring at her.
“I know you’re not afraid,” she said. “I’m curious, and I can’t believe you aren’t.”
“Once an old tent mate of mine tried to argue me into trying sex with him,” Valentine said. “Strangely, this feels a little like that conversation. Not sure it would feel natural to me.”
“I’ve always found unnatural a lot more exciting,” she said. She leaned over and grabbed him, pulled him to her by the front of his shirt.
They found themselves kissing. Impossible to say who started it. As for the disrobing, he took the initiative, with increasing excitement as she explored him for the second time in their lives.