Bar.
Natalie hadn’t had a lover in a long time. Three long years. And as much as it depressed her to think about that stretch of time, it was even more depressing to realize that she couldn’t do anything about it.
She sat in her favorite booth at the Pile Driver, the town of Laraby’s only gay bar, and sipped her Long Island iced tea. Her second of the night. Most evenings after work, she drove the twenty-eight miles from the just slightly smaller town of Pushkin, where she lived, to Laraby and the bar. There, she usually ate an early dinner by herself and had one drink. But tonight called for more.
The administrators at the high school were driving her crazy, making it harder and harder to do her job as a physics teacher. It seemed that every rule they instituted, every cut to the budget was designated to short-change the students out of a proper education while stifling the teachers’ ability to do an even halfway decent job in the classroom.
“Just do your job,” the principal had told Natalie, coolly staring at her over the top of her bright blue bifocals. “If you’re as efficient as you claim, then these budget changes won’t matter.”
Natalie took another long sip of her drink. It wasn’t like this was anything new. She’d been dealing with the same thing for the last few years and wanted a change from the school’s poisonous environment, but there weren’t many places she could go. The ice rattled in her nearly empty glass.
Before she could signal the waitress, the brassy haired server appeared beside her with another Long Island iced tea. She put it on Natalie’s table.
“From the stud at the bar.” The waitress walked away, her mini-skirted hips swaying, before Natalie could tell her to send it back.
She’d been coming to the Pile Driver for nearly eight months now, a little hole in the wall she’d stumbled onto online then decided to try out while on a lonely drive back from visiting college friends in Atlanta. Each time she came into the bar, she sat in the dark corner booth as far as possible from nearly everyone in the place. After the first few instances of women, and some men, offering to buy her drinks and her politely refusing, they left her alone.
The bar didn’t generally have many new customers. But, Natalie guessed, tonight it had at least one. Her eyes searched the women at the bar, dismissing the familiar ones who were paying attention to their own business, until she met a dark, intent stare. She took a surprised breath.
The stranger at the bar was hot. Not model-gorgeous like her ex-wife, Rahel, and other women she’d known. But there was something compelling about her strong-jawed face, the unapologetically masculine beauty of her body in black motorcycle leathers, and the lean length of her propped up against the bar. Her skin was the color of pecans, smooth and rich. She wore her hair brushed back from her face in soft waves and braided down to the middle of her back. She oozed sexuality and knew it.
Something deep inside Natalie tightened for a moment as the stranger watched her. Then she remembered what kind of life she led. A sadistic ex-wife she couldn’t escape. A town and a system that were complicit in that imprisonment. Natalie couldn’t afford to bring anyone else into her life. She shook her head and nudged the drink to the edge of the table, signaling that she didn’t want it.
Across the crowded bar, made up of mostly men and women unwinding after a long day at work in offices and factories scattered over a few miles, the stranger smiled faintly at her. She said something to the bartender, then picked up her drink and made her way through the sea of bodies toward Natalie’s table.
She watched the woman come to her. She was tall and the body under the black leather pants and jacket was graceful and muscled. Once upon a time, she had liked tall and powerful women. But not anymore. Now she didn’t like anybody.
“You have to take the drink back,” Natalie said. “I already have one.”
Without being asked, the woman sat down across from her. Natalie sipped the watery remains of her drink, working hard to ignore her strong presence across the table. But the woman was sex in a leather jacket and as hard to ignore as a throbbing clit in a dry spell.
The woman looked Natalie over. Dark eyes sliding over the long-sleeved, green sweater-dress Natalie wore, the flimsy red scarf draped around her throat. The thick, natural hair that framed her face. The stranger’s intent gaze settled on her mouth, lingering. She unconsciously shifted her legs under the table and felt her stockings rub together. Then she forced herself to be still.
“You have an incredible voice, you know that?” The woman leaned back in the booth, unperturbed by her silence. “So husky and deep it makes me want to sit down and listen to you for hours.”
Natalie raised a skeptical eyebrow. “All you want to do is listen to me talk?”
“At first,” the stranger said. A wicked grin lifted the corner of her mouth.
It had been far too long since Natalie had been with a lover. That was the only reason she was drooling over this stranger who she wouldn’t normally give more than a quick greeting in the street. Her eyes swept over the woman again. Long-lashed and mysterious eyes. Full breasts under the jacket. Narrow hips. Well, maybe she’d give her a little more than that.
Natalie bit the inside of her cheek. There was a reason she hadn’t had a lover in over three years. A very good reason. But as the stranger talked, her hands grasping the sweating curve of her whisky glass, bringing the liquor to her mouth, Natalie began to wonder if maybe she wasn’t safe from the thing she feared. Pushkin was nearly thirty miles away. Anyone who knew her was also nearly thirty miles away. This stranger was new and beautiful and the Long Island iced tea had spread a warm and languorous feeling throughout her entire body.
“No,” Natalie said.
“No, what?” the stranger asked.
“I’m not going to sleep with you.”
A soft laugh. “Who says I want to sleep with you?”
“This drink does.” She pointed to the fresh and untouched cocktail.
The vague prickling of familiarity nudged at Natalie’s brain as she looked at the woman. But that was impossible. She didn’t know anybody in Laraby and for sure, no one knew her. If she had been sitting at Francine’s Bar in Pushkin, that would be a whole different story. And Francine’s was a place she’d stopped going a long time ago.
“You are very fuckable,” the stranger murmured, sending a bolt of heat straight to Natalie’s pussy. “A woman like me would be crazy not to want some time with you.” Her wicked mouth moved again. “In bed or out of it.” She put the drink to her lips again.
Natalie watched the movement, the woman’s strong hand around the glass, the kissable mouth that was a mixture of strong lines and soft shapes and was slightly pink in an otherwise deeply brown face. Diamond studs winked from her ears.
“And a woman like you is exactly what?”
“Looking for company. Someone with dimples and big, sexy hair.” The stranger looked like she wanted to grab a handful of Natalie’s hair and sink her face into it. Then use that firm hold to yank Natalie’s head down between her thighs.
The thought of the woman’s hand in her hair made Natalie squirm in her seat. To distract herself, she frowned at the stranger again. “Have I ever seen you before?”
“You tell me,” she said.
The stranger leaned forward in the booth and Natalie smelled the whiskey on her breath, the tang of leather.
She leaned back from the attractive stranger. “I’m not playing that game with you.”
“What game?” But the woman’s knowing smirk said enough.
And with each moment she lingered at Natalie’s table, the more her body became aware of just how close temptation was. The easy strength of the hands around the whiskey glass made her wonder how they would feel on her pussy. Would she dive into her cunt, eager to fuck, or would she play with her clit, stroke her, get her nice and wet, nearly screaming, before sliding in? But Natalie couldn’t afford to think about those things. The consequences of following through with her desire were…frightening. She stood up and slipped a ten dollar tip under the coaster for the waitress.
She left the bar, disappointed that she wouldn’t get the chance to spend the rest of her allotted time there. The bar was quiet and perfect for the anonymity she sought every week. But this stranger was reminding her of things she’d given up and couldn’t want anymore.
Out in the cool evening, she gathered her scarf more tightly around her neck and headed for her car.
“You shouldn’t be driving in your condition.” The stranger’s soft voice reached her from not very far back.
Natalie didn’t turn around. She headed straight for her gray Honda Accord, deliberately parked in the back of the bar, out of sight from the road. Her boots crunched across the gravel. She took a deep breath of the cool fall air to help clear her head. The scent of wood smoke from a distant fire and a woman’s leathery perfume wove through the air. Heavy footsteps sounded behind her.
As alarming as the idea of the stranger following her should have been, she wasn’t worried. The bar was fairly active on a Friday night. It had a steady stream of vehicular traffic from the paved road and patrons walking the paths leading from the woods to grab a drink before heading back home to the sweet monotony of partner and children.
At her car, Natalie stopped and took out her keys. The footsteps behind her stopped. Despite her earlier feeling of safety, Natalie felt her heart begin to pound heavily in her throat. Why was the woman following her? Was she someone from Pushkin? Had Rahel gotten it into her head to hire this woman to follow her and bring her back home? She unlocked the car with the remote, her hand trembling with unease. No. She shouldn’t run. Running always made things worse.
She turned to face the stranger who stood back in the well-lit parking lot, maintaining a respectful distance.
“I don’t want any trouble,” she said.
“That makes both of us,” the stranger said.
She shoved her hands in her jacket pockets and simply stood in the light from the parking lot, watching her. Outside the bar, the stranger was equally magnificent. The light revealed more of her. Lusciously dark skin, wavy hair pulled back in a long braid. And the woman was taller than Natalie first thought, her sleek muscles even more apparent in the open leather jacket that fit well across her narrow shoulders. She looked capable and sexy. Dangerous.
Not at all like anyone Rahel would associate with.
“What do you want?” Natalie tilted up her chin.
“To have a drink with you,” the woman said with a smile.
That smile tugged at a vague memory. “Do I know you?”
“If you go back inside and have a drink with me, maybe a club soda since you seem so intent on driving home, I’ll tell you all about how you might know me.”
Natalie’s fingers clenched and unclenched around the keys to the important things in her life. The key to her locker at work. Her house keys. The safety deposit box at the bank. “I’m not going to sleep with you,” she said again.
“You don’t have to,” the woman said. “Right now, though, it’s not a good idea for you to be driving after two Long Islands. You’re a lightweight.” Her eyes took in Natalie’s body, her face. “Your footsteps are a little too careful and your eyes are a bit unfocused. I don’t want you to rush out of here on my account and get into an accident.” The woman took a step back. “Come back into the bar with me.”
“No,” Natalie said. “I can sober up just fine out here.”
She took another deep breath of fresh air, realizing in that moment just how stale inside the bar was, or maybe she was just now starting to care. The stranger was impossibly compelling. Natalie was sure she’d have remembered if she’d actually run into someone like her before. She leaned back against her car, nervously toying with a long coil of hair at the back of her neck.
The stranger’s fingers, resting casually on either side of her silver belt buckle, twitched. “You know, I’ve been all over the world, and you’re still the sexiest woman I’ve ever seen.”
Natalie blinked at the abrupt shift in topic. “Where have you seen me before?”
“In Pushkin.” The woman named Natalie’s home town—the place she’d lived all her life except for a brief period of attempted independence in Atlanta—as if she knew it.
“I’ve never seen you before,” Natalie would have remembered a woman like this. She scanned her again from head to foot. Yes, she was unforgettable.
“People change.” The sound of tires across the parking lot’s gravel entrance interrupted their conversation. The driver of a dark Buick poked his head out of the car. He tilted the brim of his cowboy hat away from his eyes.
“You leaving?” he asked both Natalie and the stranger.
“Sorry.” Natalie shook her head.
“Nope.” The stranger walked closer to Natalie.
The driver of the Buick tucked his head back inside the car before driving all the way to the back of the parking lot, nosed around until he confirmed there were no more parking spaces, then reversed, leaving them in silence again.
The warmth of the alcohol spread like a delicious and slow fire through Natalie. This was the point on a drinking night where she’d normally order a club soda with lime and relax even more in her booth to watch the activity in the bar, avoiding any eye contact. She’d slowly sip her water while her alcohol fog lifted and the patrons of the bar moved around her like a calm sea.
Natalie felt the tiniest spark of anger that this woman had ruined her routine. As the taillights of the unlucky Buick disappeared, the stranger moved closer.
“I’m Maya.” She held out her hand to shake.
After a brief hesitation, Natalie responded in kind and offered her own name.
It was a mistake to touch her. That touch brought Maya even closer, warm skin, spicy scent, whiskey breath. Natalie swayed toward her, their hands still clasped, and Maya came closer too until they were suddenly, inexplicably, kissing.
Hot. Maya’s mouth was hot. It moved over hers in easy command, opening over hers, inviting the timid intrusion of her tongue. Natalie flushed from the tips of her toes up to her eyelashes.
She groaned, the need leaving her mouth in a long, tortured sound. She gripped Maya’s jacket in desperate hands. This felt too good for it to end. She sucked on Maya’s tongue, pulled her closer until the leather-clad body was a big, blasting furnace pressing her into the car. Her nipples tightened under her dress. Arousal flared between her legs as they kissed and kissed.
Natalie’s panties suddenly felt too tight against her clit and pussy lips. She shifted her thighs, searching for friction to relieve the ache between them. She moaned again into Maya’s mouth, overcome by the simple and undeniable pleasure of their kiss, by the desire rolling through her body, uncomplicated and untamed.
Maya touched her back, her hand a warm brand through the dress, and Natalie melted into her. She flattened her hands against Maya’s chest, slowly dragging them down over the lush breasts until hard nipples prodded her palms.
She’d had three years of sexual frustration and fear, but this stranger was her escape from everything, offering fulfillment clothed in black leather. With the help of the alcohol, Natalie took it. She ran her hands over the soft breasts under the leather, squeezed the nipples until Maya was making low and deep sounds in her throat too. Gravel crunched underneath their boots as they shifted against each other.
“Natalie...”
She pulled her mouth from Maya’s. “I don’t normally do this.” She panted softly.
“Do what?” Maya’s voice was low and rough. “We haven’t done anything yet.”
She grabbed Natalie’s ass and lifted her to straddle her thickly muscled thigh. The car shook as it took their weight. Maya grunted, her mouth swooping down again to take Natalie’s. Firm tongue. Soft lips. Breathless arousal.
Natalie worked her pussy against the firm thigh, hunting for more friction. More heat. Maya was teasing her. Natalie slid a hand under the black shirt, raking her short fingernails down the hard stomach. Maya groaned, her hips thrusting in a delicious, serpentine motion designed to get them both closer to what they wanted.
I can’t believe I’m doing this. The thought swam distantly in Natalie’s brain when Maya shoved a hand under her dress, fingers searching between her thighs, pulling aside her panties. They both groaned at what those fingers found.
She was wet. Drenched. Her pussy warm and tingling for more contact. The sound of tires on the gravel jerked her from her lust-spell. But Maya did not move her hand. She only groaned into Natalie’s mouth and fingered her clit. Natalie sank nails into her shoulders. An electric shock of pleasure. She whimpered, forgetting about the car driving closer to where they stood pressed together.
The car’s headlights washed over them and Maya stepped closer, hiding the movement and position of her hand under Natalie’s skirt. But she didn’t stop. She stroked Natalie’s clit in firm, even strokes that made Natalie whimper with delight. Her fingers kept moving, kept pulling hot pleasure from Natalie. She bit her lips, moved her hips to the rhythm Maya set.
At her back, she felt her car jolting with her movements, but she didn’t care. It had been so long since anyone touched her like this. Her body was on fire with need. Natalie bit her lip, trying to stifle her cries.
“Are you leaving?” someone from the slowly passing car called out. A woman.
Maya lifted her head. “No.”
The headlights dipped and bumped around the parking lot as the car drove deeper into the dead end then turned and drove slowly away. Natalie felt eyes from the car on her and Maya. The fingers didn’t stop their steady movements on her clit. Seconds later, she didn’t care about the car anymore or about anyone else finding them. Maya slid two fingers inside her and Natalie made a loud and greedy sound.
“That’s it, baby.” Maya gasped the approval deep in her throat, fucking Natalie with those two fingers, massaging her clit with a firm thumb. Heat rushed under Natalie’s skin, her body flushed bright as a firestorm. She cried out in Maya’s neck as she came.
She panted softly as the other woman lowered her thigh and let her feet touch the ground again. Maya’s eyes were glittering with desire for her, the skin at the corners of her eyes pulled tight. Her mouth was open, breath rushed between them.
“I want to ride your face until I fucking explode.” Maya dug rough fingers into Natalie’s waist.
Despite the echoes of familiarity she felt with Maya, Natalie was convinced that she was indeed a stranger, no one she would see again, no one who would be at risk in Pushkin. She wanted to feel the woman’s pussy in her mouth. The need for it made her wet her lips and slide her hands to the thick leather belt.
Maya gripped her fingers before she could go any further. “No.” She closed her eyes tight and made an incoherent noise. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I don’t want it like this. When I have you between my legs, I want you to know exactly what’s going on. I want you to be aware and sober and ready for me.”
Natalie stared at her in amazement. Why did Maya stop now when she was the one who had chased her from the bar? They could go deeper into the parking lot. Or even in her car. The lights weren’t bright enough to penetrate the tinted windows of her wide sedan. Her fingers curled in Maya’s belt buckle. She licked her lips again, her alcohol fogged brain working in vain trying to figure out how to change the other woman’s mind. She cupped her pussy through the leather pants.
“I want you.” Her voice was almost painfully rough at the back of her throat. “Now.”
“No,” Maya said again. She pulled down the hem of Natalie’s dress and properly settled the red scarf around her neck and shoulders.
“Go back into the bar. Have a club soda. Sober up.” She took a deep breath, muttered something to herself, and then stepped back. “Take care of yourself, Natalie. I’ll see you around.”
This is some bullshit…
The uncharacteristic thought floated through Natalie’s head, but she didn’t say a word. Instead, she only watched, disappointed, as Maya turned, boot heels crunching against the gravel, and walked away. Moments later, a motorcycle engine rumbled to life in the parking lot. The engine revved, then subsided. Natalie couldn’t see the bike or rider but she had a strong suspicion that it was Maya.
She licked her lips and leaned hard against her car. Maya still hadn’t told Natalie where she knew her from. Not really. A cool breeze whispered through the trees and she shivered. Her body had cooled from its passion, allowing common sense, along with a bit of embarrassment, to take over. She headed back to the bar for that club soda, getting more and more sober with each step.
Bike.
The pavement clicked under Natalie’s heels as she cut through the nearly empty parking lot of Pushkin High School, heading home to her place barely a mile away. It was a beautiful fall day in north Georgia, the high wind tugging at her thick, natural curls that just brushed her shoulders. Her bright-orange sweater set was more than adequate for the weather, even with her white, knee-length skirt and bare legs. Although she wore high heels, she didn’t worry about her feet giving out before she got home. She knew what she could take. She knew her own limits.
“Miss Roy!”
The driver side door of one of the few remaining cars in the lot popped open. “Miss Roy!”
A young man emerged from the car, tall with the slenderness of youth, brown skin, and a wide smile. He clutched a fistful of wildflowers against his belly.
“Hello, Kevin.”
She carefully greeted her student, a soccer player and one of the best students in her physics class. He was always eager to learn, but Natalie knew that he also had a massive crush on her. It happened every year. She never got used to it, no matter how many times a student confessed it. These kids needed to hang with people their own age and lose their virginity the perfectly legal way instead of stalking their teachers.
Natalie had seen too many of her fellow teachers get caught up with students, both present and former. Her students were children, even the ones she taught twelve years ago when she first began at the high school. She couldn’t fathom becoming involved with any of them, male or female. The idea of it even disgusted her a little.
“Ms. Roy, I’ve been waiting all evening just so I can give these to you.” He presented the flowers as if they were a treasure he’d been guarding all day.
“You know I can’t accept those from you, Kevin.” She gripped the strap of her purse.
A frown appeared between his straight, black brows. “But why?”
“It’s inappropriate,” she said.
“But they’re just flowers. That’s it.” He looked devastated.
“I’m very sorry, Kevin. I can’t accept those. Give them to a girl your age who’ll appreciate them.”
“But I want to give them to you.”
Natalie was about to say something else when the loud rumbling of a motorcycle interrupted her. A dark figure on an equally dark bike cruised into the school parking lot. Like a bullet in slow motion, it aimed straight for them.
Faced with the bike, an impressive and savage looking thing, Kevin was speechless. So was Natalie.
Who is that?
She didn’t have to wonder long. The bike stopped a few feet from her and the rider, clad in head-to-toe black, parked the loud machine and turned it off. A leather-gloved hand flipped up the visor of the black helmet. Long-lashed dark eyes. Sharp cheekbones in a nut brown face.
“I need to speak to Ms. Roy alone.” The feminine voice was muffled but unmistakable. Maya.
Natalie swallowed a gasp. All weekend, she’d been telling herself that nothing had happened. That she hadn’t practically begged a stranger to fuck her in the back parking lot of a bar. Worse yet, the stranger had said “no.” Even though she had been a little too drunk to fully be aware of it at the time, her pride had been crushed by Maya’s refusal.
Still holding his flowers, Kevin looked ready to sputter in protest. But Natalie was done dealing with him. She touched the boy’s arm.
“Go on home, Kevin. Remember what I said, okay?”
The boy nodded in dumb misery and slunk across the parking lot to his rusted Volvo station wagon, started it, and drove slowly away. She could practically see him craning his neck to see who was on the motorcycle and what business they had with Natalie.
“Still breaking hearts, I see.” Maya sounded amused.
Natalie frowned in irritation. She had a hot bath and glass of red wine waiting for her at home. “What do you want?”
Maya swept off her helmet and held it in her lap. “I was worried that I’d miss you today.”
Natalie’s heart thumped hard in her chest at the sight of the other woman’s compelling face. Daylight was definitely her friend. In the late afternoon sun, Maya’s dramatic features were on full display. The knife-edge cheekbones and full mouth that made Natalie think of sex. Luxurious feminine lashes. Like the night they met, Maya’s wavy hair was braided down her back.
“Why are you here?” Natalie asked.
“To finish that conversation we started at the bar back in Laraby,” she said.
Conversation? Is that what she called it? Even now, Natalie’s pussy clenched with the remembered sensation of firm fingers on her clit, of Maya’s hot breath huffing in her throat. She backed away from Maya, crossed her arms over her chest. Her purse dug into her side. “Our conversation was over.”
“Not by a long shot.” A smile tucked in the corners of the other woman’s cheeks.
“Are you threatening me?”
“Threats? No way. Don’t let the leathers and stud swagger fool you,” she murmured. “I’m really a pussycat. All I want is for you to come play with me.” Maya looked around the nearly empty school parking lot. “Things are a little dead here. You want to go for a ride?”
Absolutely not.”
“Come on.” Maya’s voice deepened to a belly-shivering register. “No one’s here to see you going off with a stranger, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
At Maya’s words, it occurred to Natalie that she was standing in an empty parking lot and talking to a potentially dangerous stranger. She looked around, uneasy. “I don’t even think you’re supposed to be on school property.”
Maya raised an amused eyebrow. “Is that how Pushkin High treats its alums?”
“You went to school here?” Natalie didn’t hide her surprise.
“Didn’t just about everyone in this town?”
In this town. Did that mean Maya had lived in Pushkin at some point?
“Come on, teacher,” Maya murmured. “Come for a ride with me. What do you have to go back home to right now? No kids, right? No husband?” Her voice lowered. “No wife?”
Natalie shook her head twice, although from the way Maya asked the questions, she already knew the answers. Why did she have to remind her of how lonely her life was? As if she didn’t know well enough every day when she awoke in her bed, when she walked around the house that was full of only her things.
“Okay. Let’s go for a ride,” Natalie said. “But it can’t be anywhere in Pushkin.”
Maya looked at her, eyebrow raised as if she would refuse.
This time it was Natalie who had another kind of knowledge. She knew Maya wouldn’t say no to her offer. The other woman had chased her all the way back to Pushkin from Laraby; she’d take whatever Natalie gave.
Maya handed her the helmet. “Get on.”
They rode through the quiet main square of Pushkin where no more than a few people lingered, making their way home after a long day working in the offices or in the shops that served the government buildings. Natalie felt their eyes on her, felt the curious stares she and Maya attracted as they rode through the quaint downtown with its old-fashioned, one-story storefronts, cobble-stoned streets, and columned municipal buildings.
Because of the helmet she wore, Natalie didn’t think anyone knew who she was, but they stared simply because they had never seen this motorcycle before and definitely not the rider. Anomalies were noticed in Pushkin. It was only the everyday occurrences, no matter how fucked up, that never raised any eyebrows.
The wind tugged at her sweater, burrowed into her throat as they rode through Hale Street, named for her ex-wife’s family that had been in Pushkin as long as it had been a town. She fought a shudder, clinging tightly to the woman navigating the bike through the streets as if she knew them. Which she might since she said she was a former student. Maybe that was how Natalie knew her, from the halls of the high school.
They roared through Pushkin, picking up speed as they left the town limits, flying down a wider road flanked by tall trees blushing in all their fall finery.
Fall was Natalie’s favorite season. The colors were astonishing and the weather, the most perfect it could ever be. She was able to wear her sweaters and boots, even her light dusters and jackets, clothes that lent a touch of elegance that had nothing to do with the indignity of summer flip-flops and sundresses or the confining coats, gloves, and scarves of winter.
Natalie held on tightly to Maya’s back when the bike leaned into a turn. The road was long and winding, the bike passing occasional cars and pick-up trucks, minivans stocked with kids heading to one thing or another. Fallen multicolored leaves littered the sides of the road like confetti. Soon, although they were in the middle of nowhere, the bike slowed. Natalie clutched Maya’s back as the bike coasted to a stop on the side of the long road with nothing around for miles but trees flashing their fall fire, the rolling hills of North Georgia.
“Okay.” Maya stopped the bike. “Hop off.”
While Natalie stood among the leaves tugging down her skirt and straightening her sweater, Maya rolled the bike off the road. She parked it at the foot of a tall cypress, helped Natalie unbuckle the straps of the helmet, and left it with the bike. Natalie plucked off her shoes and straightened in time for Maya to take her hand and lead her up the gradual incline scattered with leaves. The fall flotsam crackled under their feet.
Natalie looked down self-consciously at their joined hands. It had been a long time since a woman had done something as simple as take her hand. She wanted to pull away, tell her to stop teasing her with these small and devastating glimpses of a normal life she couldn’t have. But she kept her hand where it was.
“It’s gorgeous out here,” she said.
There was a simple quiet around them, the wind moving through the trees, the rustle of deer in the near distance. On the breeze came the smell of burning leaves, maybe an outdoor campfire.
She breathed in the crisp air. “This is my favorite time of year.”
“I know,” Maya said.
Natalie glanced at her in suspicion, wondering how she knew that. But she wasn’t curious enough to ask her. It was simply a pleasure to be out in the season, enjoying the fresh air. She had gotten so much into the habit of being at home, in school, or at the bar that she couldn’t remember when last she made time to enjoy the outdoors.
They walked farther and higher in mutual silence until a flash of even more brilliant color stunned Natalie’s eyes. A field of ginkgo, those beautiful and bright yellow trees, at the top of a hill. In the background, the sky was a blinding blue with trailing wisps of clouds. She took a quiet breath of astonishment and appreciation. She’d lived in Pushkin nearly all her life but had never been here. Wherever here was.
“This is the best place to truly experience the fall.” The corners of Maya’s eyes crinkled with her smile. Unexpected youth glowed in her face, a flash of childlike enthusiasm. She was younger than Natalie first thought. “I should have brought a picnic for us,” Maya said. “Maybe next time.”
Natalie ignored that hint of what would never be.
They stopped and leaves drifted around them, floating down to land on their shoulders, heads, and at their feet in a dry and colorful rain. Maya took off her jacket and spread it on the ground for Natalie to sit.
“This is it,” she said. “You wanted out of Pushkin.”
Natalie sat down on the jacket while Maya claimed space beside her on the ground.
“How did you find this place? It’s so peaceful.”
“After I got my first car as a kid, I drove everywhere.” Maya sat close as she spoke, her voice low and intimate. “I had no map and no destination. It was just good to go until I had to go back home or until the gas tank was near empty. On one of those drives, I found this place.”
“I bet you took a lot of girls here.” She looked around, feeling the infinite quiet and peace of the arbor and the hill.
“Not really. You’re the first.”
She looked at Maya in surprise. Leaves drifted down steadily around them, some landing in Maya’s hair, in her lap. Natalie shook her head and dropped back into the soft bed of leaves. Maya looked down at her with an odd expression, like longing and regret both.
“You are incredibly beautiful,” she said.
Natalie’s mouth twisted in a smile. “Are you sure you’re running the right game on the right woman?”
“This is no game.” Maya examined her face, eyes moving over her like a caress. “I’ve always thought you were amazing. You were the first real woman I ever masturbated to.”
“I know you’re not serious.” But Natalie pressed a hand to her blushing cheeks as an unwanted image of a younger Maya, fingers moving frantically between her thighs and plucking at her firm nipples, exploded in her mind. “I hope you know how weird that sounds,” she finally said.
Maya nodded. “I’m learning to own my own eccentricities,” she said with a wry smile.
Then she leaned down and kissed Natalie.
Blissed.
Natalie sighed into the kiss. It wasn’t like she hadn’t known what they had come up here for. Their unfinished business at the bar had left her wanting. Obviously Maya felt the same. She remembered the heat of her pussy through the leather pants, the way Maya had moaned her name when Natalie touched her breasts. She’d wanted her then, and she wanted her now.
Hovering over her, Maya was a beautiful, dark dream. After three years of having no lover in her bed, it seemed strange to even contemplate taking one now with all the things she had lived with. Punishment. Fear. Arousal without the possibility of relief. But this was no time to think about these things. Maya was here and she was ready. Natalie touched her face with light fingertips, inviting the press of the other woman’s tongue in her mouth. Maya made a low sound and Natalie gloried in it. Visceral and feminine. A sound that said she wanted her.
Natalie deepened the kiss, slid her tongue along Maya’s, moved her fingers up to cup her head and draw her closer. The leaves rustled as Maya shifted to lay her long body over Natalie’s. She opened her thighs, inviting Maya to fall between them as her skirt rode up, exposing her skin to the cool air and biting sunlight.
Maya’s mouth was hot on hers, her tongue a searing brand. Natalie squirmed against the leaves as arousal snaked between her thighs. Now, it was her turn to make a noise, to wordlessly tell Maya of her growing desire. A hand moved up her skirt, warm against her thigh, caressing her as Maya’s mouth moved over hers. Maya made a sudden sound, then pulled away. She was breathing heavily, dark eyes glittering with want.
“There’s something I need to say before we do this,” she said.
Natalie slid her hands down her neck and gripped the thick braid. “You don’t have to tell me anything.” She tugged Maya back down to her.
The want drummed fiercely inside her, shocking her with its insistent beat. She didn’t remember ever wanting someone this much. Ever. She yanked open Maya’s leather belt, unzipped the trousers, and slid her hand down, cupping wet warmth. Christ. It had been so long. The feel of the furred mound and slick labia, the firm clit made Natalie’s eyes roll back in her head. Delicately, she parted the folds of the other woman’s pussy. She was slick and hot, her viscous heat eagerly swallowing Natalie’s fingers.
Maya quivered against her. “Fuck, that feels good.” She buried her face in Natalie’s throat. “You feel so good!” Her fingers dug into Natalie’s side to the rhythm of the fingers stroking her pussy.
Natalie felt the power in her words, the truth in them. Knowing Maya found her so desirable made her throb even more. Being at the mercy of her ex-wife had left her with doubts of her own sexual appeal, of what women saw when they looked at her. Maya’s desire was all the more exotic and delicious because it had been so long since any woman openly showed that she wanted her.
Even in the bar in Laraby, those women, and even some men, had been like children in their approach, not desiring, merely curious. Maya was all hunger and lust. And she made Natalie dizzy with the intensity of her pursuit.
She closed her eyes tight, swimming in the sensation of disorientation, of need burning through her blood. The feel of Maya’s pussy beneath and around her fingers made her mouth water, made her own cunt twitch and squirm with desire. She loved this, loved what they were doing, but she wanted something else.
“Sit up.” Natalie took her hand out of Maya’s pants and pushed at her.
It seemed to take Maya a moment to realize what she wanted. “Huh?”
Her eyes were nearly black with hunger, her lips damp and full as she stared in a daze at Natalie’s mouth. Natalie gently pushed her until they both sat up. The trees steadily shed their bright fall finery around them. The moment felt magical, unreal. It was easy to release every worry that she’d ever had. To believe that she was just like every other woman in Pushkin who could take a lover if she pleased, ride on the back of motorcycles without consequence, even fuck a stranger under the bright rain of autumn leaves.
Maya slid her palms under the back of Natalie’s sweater, drew her close once again, and kissed her. There was desperation in her kiss, a passion that Natalie had never experienced before. The cool and controlled biker babe from the bar was gone. In her place was a woman practically trembling with need, her lips parted from her hectic breaths.
“Why do you want me so much?” Natalie dragged Maya’s shirt up and over her head. The other woman let her, passive, a tiger on Natalie’s flimsy leash. Under the V-neck white T-shirt, she wore a black sports bra that hugged and only slightly flattened her large breasts. Gorgeous warm skin. Sleek muscles moving like water as she moved.
“Because I do.” Maya’s eyes were hot with want.
Slowly, she shoved Maya onto the ground on her back. The other woman licked her lips and watched her. Natalie dragged her pants and underwear down to her knees, loving that she allowed that, lying on her back with her lush bush and clit exposed. She was slender, strong, and magnificently sexy.
The cool breeze brushed over Natalie’s flushed cheeks, but she wanted to feel more. She wanted every sensation to be as sharp as the knife Rahel had once used, in a fit of sexual rage, to slice her thigh. She didn’t want those disastrous memories right then; they haunted her enough during the course of her daily life. Instead, she wanted to feel loved. She wanted to feel good. She tugged off her sweater and blouse. Cool air and warm sunlight touched her collarbones and hardened her nipples through the flimsy black lace bra.
“Damn...” Maya’s eyes darkened even more as she reached for her breasts.
But Natalie moved out of the way to take off her skirt and panties. When she was completely naked, she straddled Maya’s belly, pressing her knees into the leaf-covered ground. “Touch me,” she whispered.
Maya didn’t waste her time. She sat up in the grass and quickly pulled off her sports bra and pulled Natalie against her. Kisses. Tangled tongues and heated breath. Natalie’s skin flushed from Maya’s sure and gentle touches.
Her body was slick with arousal. She felt like she would float away from the incredible wetness between her thighs and was only anchored when Maya put a hand there, settling her in place with a slowly circling finger on her clit. She moaned into Maya’s mouth. Swept away by the pleasure, almost unable to believe that, at last, she was touching another woman for the first time in three years and that it had nothing to do with her ex-wife.
“Fuck me!” she gasped against Maya’s mouth.
“Soon enough, baby.”
Maya caressed Natalie’s clit with magical fingers while her tongue lapped greedily at her breast. She sucked the rigid nipple into her mouth.
Her stroking and pressing and gentle bites made Natalie gasp in the wild woods, the loud and needful noises something that she didn’t recognize as belonging to her. Those fingers yanked her sharply over the edge of orgasm, an abrupt release that caught Natalie by surprise. She shouted her pleasure moments before fingers slid effortlessly into her pussy, falling into a breath-stealing rhythm against her g-spot that drew the cum out until she was screaming Maya’s name again and again.
She wavered on her knees, trembling, when Maya pulled her body down to the ground, switching their positions. Natalie on her back and Maya crouched over her, a huntress at her prey.
Maya latched her mouth to her still twitching pussy, her tongue licking, stroking. Natalie gasped and bucked up into her. She rubbed her pussy in Maya’s face, whimpering in delight as Maya drew her clit in her mouth in a hot suck and lick rhythm that made her damn near crawl across the ground on her back. Her bare foot draped over Maya’s shoulder, her brown skin against the other woman’s lighter pecan. Maya’s naked ass, the black leather pants halfway down her thighs. A visual feast. Maya sucked her clit again and a moaning sound left her. Her head thudded back to the ground.
Her body had been waiting for so long that it took what she offered and ran with it. Another orgasm raced through her like wildfire as Maya sucked hard on her clit and slid two fingers, then three, inside her.
“Please. No more.” She grabbed Maya’s head with trembling hands.
The mouth slowed on her, gentled until Maya was only licking her opening in light, even strokes, tongue fluttering at the entrance to her pussy, not penetrating, simply a tender knocking at her door. She was almost too weak to push Maya away. But if she tried to make her cum again, Natalie was convinced she’d completely lose her mind.
Slowly, Maya lifted her head. Her mouth was damp with Natalie’s juices, eyes heavy with lust. “I could eat your pussy all day.”
Natalie licked her lips, very tempted to take her up on the offer. Her body had been so starved for sex that even now with the tremors of orgasm still moving through her and exhaustion wearing her into the ground, she wanted to feel that sensual joy again. A cool breeze came through the trees and brushed over her nakedness. She shivered.
“You’re cold.” Maya brushed a tender hand over the goose bumps rippling over Natalie’s thighs “Let me get you home.” She started to pull up her underwear and pants.
Natalie languidly got to her knees and touched the other woman’s thigh. “Not yet. I want to…” She licked her lips and glanced at Maya’s pussy, already anticipating the way the soft, salty flesh would welcome her tongue.
Maya’s cheeks creased with a smile. “We can save that for next time.” She pulled on her bra. “I don’t want you to catch cold.”
Natalie was about to protest when she shivered again.
Damn.
She slowly stood on unsteady legs. Within moments, she was dressed in everything but the panties that were too twisted and damp to put back on. She stuffed them in her purse. Maya brushed the grass and crushed leaves from the leather jacket and offered it for her to wear.
“I’m fine now,” Natalie said. “You put it on. It’s getting colder.” And it was getting dark.
The sun had begun to set while they had enjoyed each other. The sky that had once been beyond blue now blushed a deep orange. Streaks of amber lit up the heavens. The scent of night hovered above them in the trees and the breeze had a sharper bite to it.
Maya draped the jacket over Natalie’s shoulders and plucked a few errant leaves from her hair. “Let’s get you home and into a warm bed.”
She shivered at the soft voice, imagining what Maya meant, what they could continue doing into all hours of the night and into the morning. Then, just as suddenly, she remembered who she was and the kind of life she had. Her footsteps faltered.
“I—you can’t spend the night with me.”
The barest smile touched Maya’s mouth. “Don’t worry. I already have a bed for the night.”
Natalie nodded, heat rising in her face. To detract from her embarrassment, she took off the jacket draped over her shoulders and put it on properly, shoved her arms into the silk-lined leather that smelled of leaves and sex and perfume.
“All right, let’s go then.”
The ride back to Pushkin seemed to take a much shorter time. All too soon, the bike was coasting onto the main street and slowing down. Although the helmet covered her face, Natalie felt as if a thousand eyes were watching her, judging her as she clung to Maya’s back. She dipped her head. At the stoplight, Maya asked her where in town she lived, shouting so she could hear her through the helmet.
“It’s okay,” Natalie shouted back. “You can just drop me off in the school parking lot. I’m not far from there.”
The look on Maya’s face told her what she thought of that idea.
The light turned green, but she did not put the bike back in gear. She only asked again where Natalie lived, waiting quietly with the muscles of her back easy and relaxed. A car behind them honked but Maya didn’t move the bike. Natalie bit the inside of her cheek. Night had fallen securely around them, blanketing the town in a comforting darkness. Maybe it would be okay for her to get dropped off at home.
“All right!” she muttered. She told Maya where she lived and the bike pulled away from the light, heading slowly toward her house.
Soon enough, they pulled into her small neighborhood of modest houses, tree lined streets, and bright streetlights. She pointed as they drew close to her house, a one-story cottage painted pale lavender that looked like it belonged in an English village, not in Pushkin, Georgia, population 3,815. It had been her Aunt Keisha’s place until she died nearly five years before and willed it to Natalie. She’d lived in that same house before her marriage. Every day she thanked the stars that she hadn’t given in to Rahel’s pressure to sell.
The bike pulled into the small driveway, its headlight flashing over Natalie’s car parked in the carport. The automatic light in the living room, set to go on at sunset, was already glowing through the curtained window.
“You live at your Aunt Keisha’s.” Maya brought the bike to a halt. “I guess in small towns, things never really change that much.”
Natalie climbed off the back of the bike, unsnapped the helmet and gave it to Maya. She stared at the other woman, her brow furrowed. “How did you know about my auntie?”
“Doesn’t everybody?” Maya held the helmet in her hand, the lamp from the street blazing at the tail end of the driveway but leaving them in relative darkness. But Natalie could still make out her unique and sensual features, the flash of the diamonds in her ears.
“Everybody in this town knows where I live, not strangers.”
Maya sat straddling the bike. “And I keep telling you, I’m not a stranger.”
“I don’t—”
“Natalie, is that you?”
Natalie drew a breath of annoyance and fought the urge to roll her eyes at the sound of her neighbor’s voice. Busybody Mrs. Johnson seemed to know and see everything that happened in their small neighborhood, maybe even in all of Pushkin.
Sometimes Natalie was glad for the old woman’s vigilance. But mostly, she wished she’d mind her own business. She didn’t know who Mrs. Johnson shared information with, but she didn’t want to take a chance that her nighttime comings and goings—especially on the back of a stranger’s bike—would get back to her ex-wife.
“Yes, Mrs. Johnson. It’s just me.”
She heard the faint tap of a woman’s shoes coming closer, up from the street and up into her driveway.
Shit.
“You don’t have to hang around here,” she said quickly and quietly to Maya. “Thanks for giving me the lift home. I’ll see you around.”
“Why do I get the feeling you’re trying to get rid of me?” Maya tipped an eyebrow at Natalie.
Mrs. Johnson came up the driveway, her sports sandals slapping against the cement. Just then, the automatic porch light flickered on, illuminating the three of them in the driveway. Natalie felt caught in a spotlight.
Mrs. Johnson, in her favorite baby blue housecoat and her pressed hair in rollers covered in a dark sleep cap, came even closer. “Oh, I didn’t know you had company.” Mrs. Johnson looked Maya up and down, her eyes missing nothing.
Bullshit you didn’t know I was standing here with someone else in my own damn driveway. Natalie clenched her teeth in annoyance.
“Oh, it’s just little Maya Collins.”
“Hello, Mrs. Johnson. It’s good to see you again.” Maya greeted the woman with gentle politeness, nodding in her direction.
“Well, I guess you’re not so little anymore.” Mrs. Johnson touched the back of her neck, stroking flyaway hairs as she appraised Maya from eyebrows to boots. “You’re not even company. You just visiting your old teacher? I remember when you used to ride by here all the time on your bicycle when you went to the high school.”
Natalie hissed softly in shock. One of her old students? She felt the bottom drop out of her stomach.
“Why, you look just the same,” Mrs. Johnson said. “It’s like you haven’t changed a single bit.”
Her neighbor kept prattling on while Natalie stared in horror. As the woman kept talking, the name clicked in her head. Maya Collins. A student from her second year teaching at Pushkin High School. A painfully thin girl of medium height with serious eyes, thick hair always hanging in her face, and a tough exterior she always presented to her friends. But in the classroom, she had been eager to please and was one of Natalie’s best students. A former student. Also the woman she had just fucked.
“I—I have to go inside now. It’s been a long night. I’ll see you later on, Mrs. Johnson.” She stepped away from Maya. “Thank you for the ride, Maya. It was nice to see you again.” She swallowed.
Maya took a single step in her direction, her boot heel ringing against the cement. “Natalie. Don’t.”
She shook her head. “I can’t.”
Natalie turned and walked quickly up the driveway, fumbled her keys from her purse and opened her front door. Inside, she slammed the door behind her and dropped her purse at her feet. Her face burned with embarrassment as she remembered all the things she and Maya had done together. On Friday night and today. When Mrs. Johnson said who Maya was, she’d recognized the truth of it almost immediately. How could she have been so blind?
Maya had grown at least a foot since high school, now combed her hair properly, put on weight and muscle, and added about ten years’ worth of confidence. A woman instead of a girl. But Natalie should have been able to see that it was her former student. She should have.
Natalie leaned back against the door, a trembling hand held tight over her mouth. She felt sick. Not only had she broken her own rule about fraternizing with former students but Maya was someone from Pushkin. Someone who lived there and had ties to the town. Abruptly, she thought of her ex-wife and her irrational jealousy. Natalie savagely bit down on her lip as she thought of all the things that could happen as a result of her careless lust.
Oh God...
“I take it your impromptu date went well.”
She jumped when she heard the familiar voice from inside her apartment. Natalie snapped on the light with cold fingers, shocked to see Rahel sitting in her living room. Her ex-wife sat on the sofa facing the door, one elegant leg crossed over the other, a black stiletto hanging from her narrow foot. Her pale brown eyes glinted in the light.
Natalie was vaguely aware of Maya’s motorcycle starting up and pulling out of her driveway. The sound made her sad, made her yearn.
“Please get out.”
Rahel smiled without amusement, baring sharp teeth. “You don’t tell me what to do, remember?” She stood up with feline grace to her full height of five feet eleven inches. Her straightened waist-length hair swayed as she walked toward Natalie. Hers was a breath-stealing beauty that made Natalie sick with fear. “I tell you what to do, not the other way around.”
They had been divorced for three years. But most of that time had been spent under Rahel’s fist. She didn’t want Natalie, but she didn’t want anyone else to have her either. She had turned the small town where they had both grown up into a prison. And, Rahel’s parents, who essentially owned the most profitable businesses in Pushkin, allowed her to do it.
In the beginning of their relationship it had been flattering. This beautiful and powerful woman who couldn’t get enough of her, who had to track her every moment, keep other suitors at bay, command her body day and night. But after their divorce, a version of that continued. Only with threats if she ever thought of leaving Pushkin for good, if she ever took a lover. And the sex games that had been so fulfilling before Natalie had dared to leave Rahel, now only yielded satisfaction for one of them.
Her breath brushed against Natalie’s face. Sweet, with a hint of the clove cigarette she must have smoked on Natalie’s patio while waiting for her to get home. Her dark red lips parted as she coolly assessed Natalie. Cat-quick, Rahel grabbed the back of Natalie’s hair and jerked her close. Pain stabbed through Natalie’s scalp and she stumbled back. Her heart pounded in fear, in anger.
Even with the fear rushing through her, Natalie couldn’t help but remember the night at the bar when she’d thought Maya would grip her hair like that, would be rough with her the way that Rahel always had been. But Maya, contrary to her rugged looks and growling voice, was gentle. She shielded Natalie from her strength even in the midst of her passion the way that her ex-wife never did.
Rahel sniffed her throat, the slightly damp edges of her hair.
“You fucked her, didn’t you?” Her hand tightened in Natalie’s hair bringing more pain and a humiliating jolt of arousal between her thighs. It was arousal that would never be satisfied. That would only be used to torment and punish Natalie even more. Rahel hissed. “That’s the first and last time you do that shit!”
Without releasing her hold on Natalie’s hair, she reached into the pocket of her slacks for steel handcuffs. They rattled ominously in the room’s silence. “Get on your knees.” She looked down at Natalie, her eyes glittering with malice and a familiar need. “Show me just how sorry you are.”
Natalie locked her knees and shook her head.
No. This couldn’t be happening. Not now.
Rahel abruptly released her hair and took a step back. Her heels clicked against the floor. “Don’t fuck with me, Natalie. I’m not in the mood. You already know what to do.”
Natalie trembled with the knowledge of what was to come. She clenched her teeth, fighting her fear and shame. But her knees unlocked. And slowly, slowly, she sank down in front of the woman who’d always known how to control and torment her.
“Yes, mistress.”
Pain on her flesh soon joined the agony she already felt inside, washing away the pleasure and peace Maya had shared with her as if those things had never been.
This was her prison.
Why did she ever think she could escape it?