“Where have you been?” Jenny asked, pulling Kathryn into Luc’s apartment and into her arms.
“Mmm,” Kathryn hummed as her answer was momentarily smothered with a kiss. “Sorry, honey. Rehearsal ran long.”
Jenny looked at her watch. “Kat—”
“I know. I feel terrible about it.” She tightened her embrace. “I’ve missed you so.”
Jenny found it hard to pout with her arms full of beautiful and a mouth about to be occupied with a delicious kiss.
“You’re forgiven,” she said, and then she received her reward.
They hadn’t seen each other in days. Love notes left around the house were the only clue the two cohabitated. Kathryn looked tired and weary, but she sure wasn’t kissing that way.
Sometimes her kisses were slow, seductive, and sensual, a combination that exuded playful danger followed by a smoldering look that confirmed it, which always made Jenny grin from ear to ear as she shrank in gleeful submission, knowing she was helpless to do anything but surrender.
Other times, her kisses were strong and purposeful, more desperate than passionate. The gaze that followed those kisses was intense. Her eyes reflected love, yet they were edged with fear, as if she could never express herself fully and it would become her undoing. It always took Jenny’s breath away, the depth of this beautiful woman’s love for her, and she eagerly accepted her devotion and did everything in her power to let her know it was reciprocated.
This was one of those intense days, and having found her release quickly under Kathryn’s touch, she responded in kind. Kathryn reacted to her intimate kisses and caresses with deep throated moans and sensuous writhing, which always drove Jenny wild. That she could have such an effect on another human being, let alone this one, would never cease to amaze and arouse her.
Kathryn slid her hand up Jenny’s inner thigh, and Jenny almost gave in to it, but it was her turn to show her love, and she would not be distracted.
“Stop, Kat,” she said in between kisses as she tried to work her way down Kathryn’s torso.
“Make me,” Kathryn replied with an evil grin.
“I’m trying—mmph!” Jenny moaned as a hand found her center. “Kat!” She fought against surrendering. “S-stop!”
Kathryn guided her back into her arms and kissed her. “I’m fine, honey, really. But you …” She grinned with that smoldering look.
Jenny sat up abruptly. This is the way it had been for the past few weeks. Every time she tried to make love to Kathryn she would say she was fine and then would distract her by making love to her again. They usually came together, and hard, no matter who instigated the lovemaking, so it didn’t seem out of the ordinary that she was satisfied, but something wasn’t right, and Jenny knew when it started.
Kathryn didn’t get in until after dawn a few weeks ago. It was the first night she’d been out all night since her new assignment began, and Jenny had been worried sick, but she didn’t let on; she just welcomed her home and went about getting ready for work.
When Kathryn stepped out of the shower, Jenny was there with a clean towel and wrapped it around her shoulders. It was then that she saw the trail of fingernail marks on her back, and she hadn’t made them. Kathryn obviously didn’t know they were there, and Jenny tried hard not to react, even though she felt like she’d been kicked in the gut. She used another cup of coffee as an excuse to get out of the room, and no amount of rationalization would ease the pain of the raw truth piercing her heart: Kathryn’s assignment had turned sexual.
She had to get out of there. She felt sick. She mustered all the indifference she could and hurried into the bathroom to say goodbye.
“I’m sorry, baby, but I’ve got to go. Early meeting this morning.”
“Okay.”
Kathryn looked so … normal. Like nothing had happened. Just another day at the office.
“Love you.”
“Love you back. Hey,” Kathryn called out to her, “where’s my kiss?”
Jenny swallowed her nausea, stuck her head back in the doorway, grinned, and planted a hasty one on her lips.
Their schedules were at opposite ends now, and Jenny was almost thankful for the time to get her head together about what had happened. She feared her reaction to the next time they would make love. How could she overcome the image of Kathryn making love to someone else? She agonized about it for days. Every time she thought about it, she felt sick, but when the time came, when she was in Kathryn’s arms like this and her eyes were filled with love and desire for her, all the ugly images faded into oblivion. Someone else may have had her body, but she had her heart and soul, and no one could touch their love. They would do what they had to do.
As promised, she handled it, just as Kathryn handled it, but Jenny wanted to make sure she really was fine—that they were fine—in every way, because she had a feeling Kathryn was struggling with it.
“What?” Kathryn said lazily as she raised herself onto her elbow.
“Let me make love to you.”
Kathryn smiled and gently guided Jenny’s hair behind her ear. “I told you, I’m fine.”
Jenny tried so hard to fight it, but she was hurt, and she couldn’t hide it. “They’ve taken so much from us. You’re my lover. Don’t let them take that away too.”
Kathryn looked as though she was the one kicked in the gut this time.
“They’re not. I promise you, they’re not.”
“Let me make love to you.”
Kathryn hesitated, and Jenny got the picture. She got out of bed, but Kathryn was right there with her, corralling her in her arms. “Jenny—”
“It’s fine, Kat.” She tried to escape before she started to cry.
“Jenny, please …” She had her back in her arms. “I’m sorry.” She kissed her. “I love you.” She kissed her again. “I need you.” She sought her eyes. “I want you.”
Jenny looked away but didn’t try to run.
Kathryn took Jenny’s hand and slid it up her side until she cupped her breast.
Jenny’s raised eyes were filled with hope and healing.
“I want you,” Kathryn repeated huskily, as she guided Jenny’s other hand between her legs and into her wetness. “Make love to me.”
Kathryn sat on the edge of the bed and mindlessly smoothed her nylon from her ankle to her thigh before snapping the garter welt into its belt. For the first time in her relationship with Jenny, she had faked her orgasm.
“Will I see you tonight?” Jenny asked from behind a thinly-veiled mask of expected disappointment as she came out of the bathroom buttoning her blouse.
Kathryn could tell that the waiting, the wondering, and the interrupted sleep because of her unpredictable schedule was taking its toll on her. She couldn’t subject Jenny to that way of life any longer, nor herself to the guilt of being the cause of it. She could only think of one solution, and while she knew this day would come, there was no preparing for it and no easy way to impart her decision.
“Listen—” she began.
“You’re moving back to your place.”
Kathryn raised her eyes. Jenny’s intuition was astounding sometimes, much to her great relief.
“You don’t sound surprised.” Or upset.
Jenny shrugged off her disappointment. “I’ve been expecting it ever since your assignment began.”
How well she hid it. “Sorry, honey.”
“I’m grateful for the extra time we had together.”
Kathryn nodded in silence.
Jenny sat beside her and took her hand. “My house is still your home, Kat.”
Kathryn smiled. “I’ll be sure to leave a few white shirts and a hat box or two.”
“You can leave the shirts, but I’m afraid those hat boxes have got to go. They take up too much room.”
The two women laughed wearily, with Kathryn clearly taking it the harder of the two.
Jenny tugged on her hand. “Hey, we still have this place.”
Kathryn nodded.
Jenny tugged on her hand again. “This is not the beginning of the end, Kat.”
“I didn’t say that.”
Jenny smiled. “I know you, baby. I know how you think. We’re going to be okay. We’re going to make it. This war won’t last forever, and we’re going to be standing together at the end, giving der Führer and his brown clad lads a big up yours.” She made the gesture.
Kathryn chuckled and gazed at her with admiration. “You’re a saint.”
“And don’t you forget it.”
“I won’t.” She would never forget. The love and devotion in Jenny’s eyes whenever she looked at her told her so, and she would remember it always.
Jenny kissed her and then slapped her on the knee as she got up. “Come on. Help me make the bed.”
Kathryn captured her hand and pulled her back down beside her. “Tell me again we’re going to make it.”
Jenny must have seen the hopelessness in her eyes.
“What is it?”
Kathryn shook her head, on the verge of tears. Everything seemed held together with the frailest of threads, and she felt the frailest of all. What could she say? She settled on “Long day.”
Long day. Long night. Long life.
Jenny enveloped her in her arms, and Kathryn melted into them, safe for the moment. They were the only truth she knew, and she would hang on for dear life, for as long as she could.
“We’re going to make it, baby,” Jenny whispered. “I promise. Do you hear me? I promise.”
Jenny was in an exceptionally good mood as she bounded up the backstage stairs at The Grotto on her way to Kathryn’s dressing room. It was early afternoon in the mostly empty club, and she’d switched shifts with a friend down at headquarters, intending to make the most of the extra time with Kathryn. Things had been much better for them emotionally and physically for the past two weeks. It seemed Kathryn finally started to believe things were going to work out for them.
Their time situation hadn’t gotten any better though, especially with Kathryn living back at her place, but she would show up at the house often, leaving yellow roses in a vase on the kitchen table or a sweet note on her pillow, to let her know she still considered it home.
Jenny hated to admit it, but the move had made things easier to handle. She still worried, but it was just a general worry and not a specific anxiety about what Kathryn was doing at any particular time when they weren’t together. Kathryn knew when the hard choices had to be made, and she had the courage to make them. Jenny had never been prouder of her strength or loved her more for it than now.
She entered Kathryn’s dressing room as she always did, with a quick rap and a cheerful, “Knock knock.”
What she saw inside threw her back against the doorjamb like a prizefighter’s knockout blow. She wanted to run, but she couldn’t move. She wanted to close her eyes, but she couldn’t believe they were open and burning the image before her into her brain—the image of Kathryn fucking her ex, Satan herself, Marcella.