Perfect Strangers

He kisses me again, more hungrily this time, sliding his hand underneath me to squeeze my ass, then groans.

“Christ, this peach.”

I decide to be light and flirtatious instead of weepy and morose at the thought of leaving him in a few months…and what will come after. There will be plenty of time for weepy and morose later, when I’m alone. I say coyly, “Don’t bruise the merchandise, please. The peach is muy delicato.”

He nips my lower lip and squeezes my ass harder. “Yes,” he breathes, “it sure fucking is. And now it’s time to pink it up with my handprints.”Contentt bel0ngs to N0ve/lDrâ/ma.O(r)g!

His words thrill me, as do his eyes, which are darkening the way they do when he’s starting to lose himself to desire.

I don’t have time to dwell on it, though, because he stands, lifts me up, and tosses me over his shoulder, as easily as if I were as light as a feather.

Which, it should be noted, I definitely am not.

My hair hanging down and my eyes level with his magnificent ass—clad in a pair of tight jeans that showcase it to perfection—I pretend to be offended.

“In case you haven’t noticed, sir, I’m not a sack of potatoes.”

Swaggering through the bedroom toward the master bathroom with one big hand squeezed around the back of my thigh, James says, “I don’t get the reference.”

“Because you carry them over your shoulder.”

He scoffs. “Who does? I’ve never once seen anyone carrying around a sack of potatoes like that.”

That makes me laugh. “Me, neither, now that you mention it. I must’ve read it somewhere.”

James stops beside the bathtub, flips me upright, and sets me on my feet. He says, “If you’d read Hemingway enough, you’d know that real men don’t carry around sacks of vegetables on their shoulders.”

He strips off my shirt, tosses it aside, and unhooks my bra. It also gets tossed. Then he pulls me against him and fastens his wonderful mouth around one of my nipples.

I gasp, digging my fingers into his shoulders and arching against him. Dear God, the man is good with his tongue.

“Oh yes. I forgot. Real men are too busy scaling mountains or waving red capes at confused bulls who were just standing around minding their own business before they got thrown into a ring with some idiot in a clown costume.”

James’s chuckle is muffled against my skin. Breaking away from my breast for a moment, he impatiently tugs down the zipper of my jeans, pulls the jeans over my hips, and yanks them down my thighs. I kick out of them, and he pushes them away, kneeling in front of me.

He grabs my ass and shoves his face between my legs, closing his eyes and inhaling deeply against my panties.

I picture Kelly’s face if she were seeing this right now—popped out eyes and a gaping mouth—and suppress a giggle.

James looks up at me, arching an eyebrow. “Something funny?”

“You’re very…” This calls for a big word, but I can’t think of one. “Primitive.”

“Primitive?” he repeats, as if I’ve insulted his intelligence.

“I mean it in a good way. Like a macho, Hemingway-ish way.” Bashfully, I add, “I like it. You make me feel feminine.”

His smile comes on slow and dangerous. “Me, Tarzan,” he says, gazing up at me, his voice low and rough. “You, Jane.”

Then, very deliberately, still staring into my eyes, he bites me between the legs.

I suck in a hard breath, though it doesn’t hurt. It’s just the sheer masculine sexuality of it, the dominance, the way it says this is mine and I want to eat it.

Before I have a chance to unpretzel my brain, James swivels me around so I’m facing the glass shower door. Still on his knees, he sinks his teeth into my ass.

Again, not hard enough to hurt. But again, oh so sexy.

He hooks his thumbs under the elastic of my panties and slides them down my legs, smoothing his hands over my bare flesh until he reaches my ankles. His warm breath fans over my bare bottom. I shiver with anticipation, my heart starting to pound.

I step out of my panties as James moves his mouth to the other side of my behind and bites. Then he commands, “Put your hands against the shower door.”

It’s his dominant voice.

My pulse skyrockets. Heat blooms over my skin. I do as I’m told, leaning forward to flatten my hands against the glass, which makes my back arch and my bottom stick out at an angle. When I hear James’s low oath of pleasure, blood rushes to my cheeks. I’m suddenly breathless.

“I wish you knew what this does to me,” he whispers harshly, squeezing big handfuls of my bottom. “Seeing you like this. Presenting yourself. Trusting me. I wish I could tell you how much I fucking love it.”

Sliding a hand between my thighs, he opens his mouth over my flesh, sucking and nipping first one cheek, then the other. He slips a finger between my folds and finds the bud of my clitoris, already wet and swollen.

His moan is the barest whisper of breath against my skin. “And this. So sweet and soft. My sweet Olivia. Always so ready for me.”

I’m panting, canting my ass out and rocking against his fingers like the greedy little strumpet I am. He’s made a sex kitten out of me. I might as well be purring.

The slap is a shock. Accompanied by a dangerous, low noise rumbling through James’s chest, it comes without warning and makes me yelp in surprise.

James rises. He stands at my side, grips my hip in his right hand, and slides his left hand around the front of me, between my legs. Gently pinching my labia, he slaps my ass again.

I gasp and sag against him, my palms still flattened against the shower door.

“Give me your mouth.”

I do as I’m told, tilting my head back for his kiss. As his tongue invades my mouth, he spanks me again and again, squeezing his fingers together around my aching pussy. Every collision of his hand against my bare flesh sends a stinging shockwave of pleasure through me until I can stand it no longer and beg.

“Please,” I whisper, opening my eyes to gaze up at him through a fog of heat. “Please.”

He knows what I’m asking, but his eyes are ablaze and his breathing is as ragged as mine. I can tell he’s enjoying this far too much to let it be over so soon. He’s not ready to give me the release I crave just yet.

“Get in the shower and turn on the water.”

He steps away from me, pulls his T-shirt over his head, and waits for me to follow his command with eyes that are like living fire.

Shaking, I open the shower door and step inside. The first blast of water is icy, making me flinch, but it quickly turns warm, then hot. James kicks off his shoes and strips off the rest of his clothing, then joins me in the shower, closing the door behind him.

He kisses me hard and deep, his arms so tight around me it’s borderline painful. The embrace feels desperate. That I can guess why makes a lump form in my throat.

We’re on borrowed time. Even if I wasn’t leaving in September, there’s another clock loudly ticking—a far more doleful clock—though he doesn’t know I know that, which makes it all the more difficult to bear.

A lie of omission is still a lie. The impulse that made me want to confess as soon as I saw him sitting in the chair beside my bed is growing, beating like a trapped hummingbird inside the cage of my chest.

I break away from his mouth and look up into his eyes. “I have to say something,” I blurt, heart hammering. “I need to tell you what I’ve—”

“No.” His head shake is vehement, and so is his voice. “If we’re going to do this, we’re going to abide by your rules. No questions. No strings. You were right: it’s the only way it’ll work.”

Dismayed, I stare at him. “But James—”

“Until September comes and you walk out of my life forever, we’re going to spend every day as if it’s our last. No regrets. No looking back or forward. Just being in the moment. Making every minute count. Making memories we both can treasure after we go back to our real lives.”

His calm and conviction are devastating. Here’s a man who knows he’s dying, and has decided to live what life he has left to the fullest. Without self pity. Without fear.

His courage moves me like nothing has in years.

Hot steam swirls around my face, and I hope it helps hide the tears gathering in my eyes. “Okay,” I say, trying to keep my voice even. “If that’s what you want, then okay.”

“That’s what I want. And this, too.”

He turns me toward the spray, pins me against his wet chest with one arm, then takes my hand and pulls it behind me and between our bodies, curling it around his erection. Into my ear he whispers, “Stroke me.”

He releases his hand from mine and moves it between my legs.

The spray of water is hot and stinging against my sensitive breasts. When James glides his fingers back and forth over my clitoris, lazily rubbing, my nipples harden and start to ache. He flexes his pelvis into my hand. I squeeze his shaft, then slide my hand up to the crown and squeeze there, too.

When I slide my hand back to the base, he flexes his hips again, pumping into my grip. Tugging on my swollen clit, he hisses into my ear, “Feel how hard you make me? Feel how rock hard I am for you, sweetheart?”

He is. In my hand, his erection feels like a steel pipe sheathed in silk. I make an incoherent noise and stroke the length of his rigid shaft again, stopping on the downstroke to fondle his tight balls. That makes him suck in a hard breath.

He knocks my hand away, positions himself at my entrance, and thrusts inside me.

Groaning, I let my head fall back against his shoulder. He bites me on the neck and starts to pump into me, steadying me with one hand gripped around my hip and an arm clamped around my ribcage. Hot water pulses against my nipples, streaming down my body to funnel between my thighs.

“You’re so big,” I whisper, loving how he stretches me open with every thrust. Loving the way he fills me.

He responds by pulling the shower head off the wall and directing the hot, stinging spray right between my spread thighs.

When I moan and writhe against him, he slides his other hand up and squeezes my breast. “Imagine that’s my mouth,” he says in a guttural voice, holding the shower head inches from my flesh. “Imagine I’m fucking you and licking your pussy at the same time.”

The noise I make is one I’ve never made before, an animal sound, low and carnal, sharp with need. The water streams against my sex, making an exquisite sort of torture as James continues to fuck me from behind with long, deep strokes.

“Would you like that, sweetheart? A hard cock buried deep in your cunt and a wet mouth between your legs, sucking on that sweet little clit?”

Picturing two of him making love to me at the same time, I whimper, clenching around his cock.

His voice hardens. “You like that idea.”

“Only if it’s you,” I say breathlessly. “Nobody else but you.”

He slows the motion of his hips. Breathing raggedly at my ear, he says, “You wouldn’t want a threesome with me and another man?”

I don’t have to think twice before vehemently shaking my head.

James’s voice drops another octave. “Good. Because I’d never share you.”

I’ve pleased him with my answer, but it wasn’t my intention. I was only telling the truth. Letting another person into this moment would cheapen it. Besides, no one else could ever do for me what he does.

No other man could so easily and completely make me fall apart.

He shoves the shower head back into its wall holder, grabs my jaw, forces my head up, and kisses me with an almost frightening hunger, his mouth unyielding as it plunders mine.

Then he releases my jaw and begins to rhythmically slap me between my legs.

He fucks me from behind and slaps my pussy, kissing me hard, holding me tight, until I’m moaning into his mouth, desperate for release. Then he stops and cups my throbbing sex, his fingers reverently exploring the place where we’re joined.

If it weren’t for his arm around me, I’d slide bonelessly to the ground.

Panting and shaking, steam billowing all around me, I say his name. It’s a plea, and he knows it. This time he’s willing to give me what I need.

“How do you want it? Cock or mouth?”

“Like this. Inside me. But my knees aren’t working anymore.”

“They don’t have to.”

He slides out of my body and turns me around. His face is intent. His eyes are blazing. He commands, “Wrap your legs around my waist,” and picks me up.

When he pushes my back against the shower wall and grips my bottom in both his hands, I understand that he’s going to fuck me standing up.

He kisses me, his mouth hot against mine. “Help me in,” he pants, bracing his legs apart.

I wrap an arm around the mass of his shoulders and reach between us with my free hand. Then I guide him into where he belongs, until he’s seated fully inside me, his slick chest pressed against mine so tight I feel every pounding beat of his heart.

He starts to fuck me again, his thrusts as hard as his eyes are soft.

Water sprays everywhere. All over our bodies, the ceiling, the tiled walls. Steam curls and billows. The sounds of my helpless moans and his harsh breathing echo around us until I’m dizzy, until I’m so close to orgasm my focus narrows to the brilliant white burn inside me, coiling tighter and tighter, poised to snap.

When I finally do, it’s with a scream and a series of violent, full-body jerks. But James doesn’t stagger. His arms stay strong and his balance holds steady as he continues to relentlessly drive into me through my convulsions until I’m spent.

Then he pulls out, kisses me hard, and groans deeply into my mouth. He releases himself into the swirling steam and hot water, all the while managing to support my weight without faltering. His arms aren’t even shaking. He’s as solid as a redwood’s trunk.

Through the tangled and pleasure-soaked haze of my mind, a single, crystal clear thought emerges:

How can a dying man be so strong?