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SHE ARRIVED HOME EARLY Monday morning, feeling sore and restless, to find Lawrence weeding the front walk with a pair of office scissors and a worried expression on his face. Derek had barely backed out of the driveway when Lawrence had pulled her into a hug. Wren sighed. A nice dose of platonic energy was grounding. “Let’s make some tea,” Lawrence said. “Do you need breakfast? Are you rushing off to work? You have to tell me all about it.”
Wren let herself be pulled into his condo. “Were you out there waiting for me to come in?” she asked, as she sat gratefully on his overstuffed couch while he fussed with the water and things. “It’s only eight in the morning.”
“Well, but the walk did need trimming,” he said in a way that made it clear he meant yes, I was waiting for you but couldn’t bring himself to say it outright.
She waited until he joined her, carrying a tray with cups and saucers and a large tea cozy shaped like a cat with one paw upraised, from which the tea poured. He took his own with sugar and milk and left her to treat her own cup as she liked. There were scones, she saw, but she wasn’t hungry.
“Well, we went.” She lifted the cup unadulterated to her nose and breathed deeply, the steam redolent of roses, sending a jolt through her. She took a careful sip. Yes, roses... and the images of her dream seemed very real. “What kind of tea is this?”
“Oh, it’s some rose-scent black from Harrod's. My mother sent it last Christmas,” Lawrence said.
“All right.” She relaxed slightly; it wasn’t a waking dream or her imagination. Now, this would be the real test, wouldn’t it? If she could tell someone, and if they'd believe her. “I think I read his mind last night. And he read mine.”
Lawrence grinned. “So... I take it more than just sleuthing took place?”
Wren blushed. “Oh, well, um, yes. But that’s not what I was getting at. Oh, I better start at the beginning.” She decided to add just a drop of milk, sipped a bit more, and then told him all about meeting Suzanne in the dressing room and all the gossip about sex clubs the older couple told them. Before she could get too shy, she explained the different rooms, how much deeper in there was a room for kinkier things, like using sex toys, and that there were specialty salons after that, one for women only, one for people who liked "messy" sex, whatever that was, and so on. Lawrence drank in every lascivious detail with such happy enthusiasm it was easy to go on.
She described getting turned on, and how she’d asked him to kiss her, "you know, so we’d fit in...” and how it had been all downhill from there. The next thing she knew, he was making her come. “And while that was going on, I had thought he was whispering to me, but he wasn’t. I was hearing his thoughts,” she finished. “Like, we could have a conversation, back and forth, and neither of us move our mouths.”
Lawrence was holding his teacup but he wasn’t paying any attention to it. His gaze was fixed on her face, and when she looked up for his reaction he just blinked. “That’s... wow.” He finally looked down into his tea. “So, he’s amazingly hot, he’s good in bed, he’s the catch of the year, and he’s a mind-reader?”
Wren almost spilled her tea. “What? No. At least, I don’t think so. Lawrence, I’m the mind-reader.”
“Oh!” Lawrence brightened at the idea. “But... had that ever happened to you before?”
She took a steadying sip. Goodness but tea was a good idea. “No. Or, if it did, it was so mild I didn’t notice the effect. None of my... previous boyfriends... made me feel that way.”
Lawrence shrugged. “Maybe it’s love? Oh God, I’m sorry, is it too early to use the L word?”
She let out a long breath. “It’s lust, at the very least. And... you might be right. It might have something to do with him, too, but I’m pretty sure it’s me.” She rubbed her temple with one hand. “But meanwhile, we didn’t find my sister. I kind of... passed out when I came and he took me back to his place quickly after that.”
Lawrence set his cup down and began picking apart a scone on a plate with his fingers. “Well, it is possible to come so hard you black out. For a man, anyway.” He sounded a bit envious.
Wren’s stomach grumbled and she took up a scone, too, nibbling on it. Maybe that was what happened? Hm. Or the combination of the rum and everything... She would need to find out. “Anyway, I guess we have to go back, if we’re going to find Abby, and I just don’t know how this works, now that we've... been together.” She blushed hard, thinking of how shamelessly she’d begged him to take her, only to have him exit after the first thrust because she couldn’t bear it. “I mean... it’s not exactly a secret anymore that we... like each other.”
Lawrence chuckled. “It wasn’t a secret before, except that you had plausible deniability. But hell, now you’ve even read his mind.” He set aside the plate of crumbs, all that was left of the scone which he’d managed to somehow inhale while Wren had talked. “But don’t you have the perfect tool for what you want, now? If your power works when you’re turned on, and the sex club is where you need to search...?”
She sighed. “Yes, I suppose so.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Still weirded out by the thought of having sex with people watching,” she said. Somehow having an orgasm in a room full of people who were fondling each other seemed okay, whereas what awaited them in the next room still seemed daunting. She added in a halting voice. “We... we didn’t really... do it. Yet. Either.” She finished her scone quickly. “And that’s the last I’m telling you for a while! I better get to my meeting, or make the decision to call in sick.”
Lawrence laughed. “You know with me there’s no such thing as Too Much Information.” He stood, waving a hand vaguely over the tea things. “I’ve got this. You go on.” But as he walked her to the door, he asked, "When are you seeing him next?”
“I don’t know. We didn’t say. I... I figure I'll rest up tonight. And maybe experiment.”
“Experiment?”
“You know. I'll play with myself and see if I can peer into your wicked thoughts...” She tweaked his ear playfully.
“Wren! All right. That was too much information. If you want to order take-out or something, knock on my door.”
She was chuckling as she went up to her own place, took a quick shower, and then went off to work. Talking with Lawrence made everything feel almost normal. That feeling lasted all the way until she reached her desk, where she saw the vase between her keyboard and monitor.
A blood red rose with thorns still on the stem stood alone in the glass.
* * *
SHE WAS DISTRACTED and nervous during the staff meeting. The meetings were fairly pointless for her anyway since she rarely interacted with any of the other library staff in her position. Wren had a feeling the meetings were an excuse to keep coffee and cookies in the department budget. Staying in the back of the room, she nodded without really listening to what they were discussing, then took two chocolate chip cookies in a napkin back to her desk afterward and contemplated what to do with the rose.
After staring at it for so long her fingers went numb where she was sitting on them, she got up and threw the stem into the trash barrel at the end of the hall, then put the vase into the supply closet behind the unopened packages of Post-It Notes.
Out of sight, out of mind. Right? If only it were true. She managed to bury herself for a few hours in manuscript conversion but kept wondering what the reaction of her secret admirer was going to be when he discovered the vase gone. It couldn’t be Steve, could it? It had to be someone else. Unless Steve was like a Jekyll & Hyde type who was all mousy and timid in person, but in his dreams was like... well, was like the lover in her dreams?
She shook her head. It had to be a coincidence, the rose in her dream and the rose on her desk. Had to be.
Just like it was a coincidence that Uncle Herbert had a heart attack? Lawrence believed her when she told him she’d read Derek’s mind. Why couldn’t she believe herself?
Because believing that someone else was coming into her dreams and doing the things they did to her there was too frightening to contemplate, that’s why.
She sighed. Steve himself was about the least threatening person she could imagine, but the unknown was always threatening. Maybe I really should just meet him for coffee. Demystify the whole thing. I'll tell him I’ve got a boyfriend, but we can be friends.
She went out to the lobby to make the call. His number was still in the call log, though she hadn’t saved it under his name. She wondered if she should? Well, maybe if it seemed like a good idea after they met, then she would.
It rang. She wondered what department in the university he worked in.
When he answered he sounded startled to be getting a call. “H-Hello?”
“Steve, it’s Wren.”
“Oh wow, um, how are you?”
“I’m good. Look, I was thinking, do you still want to get together for coffee? I haven’t had lunch yet.”
“Oh!” He was flabbergasted for a few moments. “Um, yes! Except, actually, I can’t get away right now. But I could totally meet you at like 4:30 or five?”
Four-thirty. She could keep from going nuts until then. “Sure. Four-thirty at the Starbucks across from the science center?”
“Yes. Yes, thank you. I mean, see you then.”
God, he sounded like a nervous wreck. Wren hated the thought that she was going to ruin his day, but she just didn’t want this hanging over her any more. She forced herself to concentrate on her work for another few hours, then gave up and surfed the web for cute cartoons to email to Derek. At 4:15 she slipped her jacket on and headed out the door.
A crisp autumn wind was blowing the leaves off the trees and she looked around, wishing she had a hat but grateful her hair was too short to blow in her eyes. I'll be lazy, she thought, and drive around to that side of the campus.
She got in the car, the wind cutting off as she shut the door, her ears ringing slightly. It took almost as long to drive there as to walk, of course, because instead of walking straight across the campus she had to drive around the edge, but ten minutes later she was circling the block looking for a place to park. There were people sitting in the window of the coffee shop, students working on their laptops and taking notes. A musician-type in leather jacket and long waves of auburn hair was just going in. She wondered which one was Steve, or if he was even there yet.
She went around the block once more, nervousness rising.
The jangle in her nerves suddenly lifted, though, as she realized with a certainty that she should not go in. She blinked, stopping the car at a stop sign, but just sitting there a moment. She couldn’t see what would happen if she did go through with the meeting, but she knew she shouldn’t. Something... wasn’t right.
The car behind her honked and she jumped. No, she wasn’t going in there. She’d go home. And call Derek. And then maybe Steve to apologize, but, Derek first. In fact, halfway home she pulled over and called him.
“I’m worried,” was all she said.
“Do you want to come here, or should I meet you somewhere?”
“I'll come there.”
Finding his house was not that difficult, and in no time she found herself ringing his doorbell. He opened it quickly, as if he’d been waiting near the door. “Hey.”
“I feel like I’m being stalked,” she blurted out.
His smile was reassuring rather than condescending. “Probably best to talk about that inside instead of on the stoop,” he said gently. “Have you eaten?”
“No, but I’m not hungry,” she said as she followed him into the living room. Wren hadn’t taken much notice of the room that morning. The furniture was bland, but new-looking, as if had been hardly used. He steered her to the couch and took her hand as they sat. “There was a rose,” she began.
“In your dream?”
“Yes. And on my desk this morning.”
His eyes narrowed. “And you don’t think this is a coincidence. Couldn’t you have just had a prophetic dream, though? How does that lead to you being stalked?”
“Let me tell you about Steve.” She explained the halting phone calls, the fake one first, then the one asking her to coffee, then the feeling she had today when driving to meet him. “That alone would be weird enough, but then there are these flowers. Someone’s been leaving them for me at my desk, and then they kept showing up in my dreams. I thought... I thought seeing them in my dreams was just my subconscious telling me to, you know, stop waiting around. But this time there was the rose first, in the dream I had at the club last night, and it looked... a lot like it could be the same rose I found on my desk today. I suppose it could be my ability to see the future, that instead of seeing yesterday's flower, I see tomorrow's...”
Derek let out a long breath.
“You think I’m crazy,” she said, but it didn’t look like he did. She just had to say that.
He shook his head. “You remember I told you I’m working on a missing person besides your sister? One of the things her husband found that made him think she was cheating on him before she disappeared was a collection of flowers. She told him they came from a secret admirer.”
Wren squeezed his fingers. “Do you think she was kidnapped? And Abby, too? And I’m next?”
He folded her hand inside both of his. “Slow down, slow down. Jumping to conclusions isn’t always best, unless your intuition is telling you something special.”
She took a deep breath, trying to feel whether it was. “Hm, no, I don’t think so. It just seemed... well... so what do you think the connection is?”
He thought for a moment. “Well, the one connection is that I went to the club looking for the other missing woman, and I thought I saw Abby there. Tenuous at best, and nothing at all if it turns out I was wrong. As for you and the other woman, there are the flowers, but we don’t know if she was having dreams. Maybe you are somehow connecting with the dreams of the person who is sending the flowers in a way that’s unique to your power?”
“Could be.” She relaxed a little. Not only did Derek make a lot of sense, just being with him made her feel safe. And now she was sitting here close enough to smell his soap, with her hand going damp inside his. “I wish... I wish I knew more about it.”
“About what?”
“My ability.” She turned the pieces over in her mind, Abby, herself, the missing woman... “Doesn’t it seem like... kind of a big coincidence, that you thought you saw my sister in the place you were already looking for your other missing person?”
“I admit, it does.”
“But it makes sense if... well...” She hoped he wouldn’t take this the wrong way. “What if my intuition led me to you in the first place? To the person who was already looking where the person I wanted found could be found. Then it’s not a coincidence at all.”
He was grinning. “That is... if that really was your sister I saw. But you’ve pretty much convinced me now that it had to be.”
She smiled back. “So we were fated to meet, then.”
“Must be.” He looked so happy. He always seemed so open, so ready for anything.
She decided to make a suggestion. “We might need to, um, you know.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I’m not the mind-reader.”
“Experiment,” she blurted. “Especially, I mean, so I don’t, you know, pass out every time.”
Now he smiled in spite of himself. “You know, it’s okay to just ask. We don’t... I don’t need an excuse to be with you, Wren.”
“Okay. But don’t you agree? I... I really like you, Derek, and I really... want you.” Just saying it sent a deep throb of desire through her. “But, we need to know. Especially if we’re going to go back to that place.”
“All right, you’re right,” he said, running the tips of his fingers around the curve of her ear. “Would now be a good time?”
She swallowed. “Now would be an excellent time.”
He tilted her chin up to kiss her, just brushing his lips past hers at first, warming them. He spoke in a half-whisper, lips touching hers as he did. “First, we'll find out if it works without the rum.”
He kissed her breathless, her desire mounting with each passing moment, but so far, his thoughts seemed inaccessible to her. “The bedroom,” she whispered. “Can we go in there?”
“Of course.” He held her hand as they climbed the stairs and went into the room. She took a deep breath, his scent everywhere in the air here.
He sat her on the bed, slipping the cardigan sweater from her shoulders and then undoing the buttons of her shirt one by one, pausing to caress each newly exposed bit of flesh, until he urged her to lie back and let his hands slip over her already taut nipples. She was still wearing the shirt, and it somehow made her feel even more exposed to his touch than just being naked. She rubbed her knees together and made a hungry sound. “Want you.”
He clucked his tongue. “I’m trying to be scientific here. One thing at a time.”
“Ohhhh.” Her answer was both plaintive and rapturous, as he caught one of her nipples between his lips and rasped his tongue over it. He repeated the treatment on the other side and she gasped. It almost felt as if she could come from just that, if he kept going.
But still no thoughts. “Maybe...” She had to catch her breath. “Maybe you have to be aroused, too.”
He chuckled, lifting his head so she could see the amused look on his face. “Oh, trust me, I’m plenty aroused.” He licked his lips. “Was that a fantasy of yours I saw last night, or was it just wishful thinking on my part, that you’d like it if I licked you?”
Her eyes were round. “I imagined it. And then you did it...”
“Was it your first time being licked like that?” He undid her fly and slid her trousers down her legs, then returned to slip her panties off.
“Not my first time being licked,” she answered, breathily. “But first time being licked like that.”
As she parted her thighs, he settled carefully between them. “For science,” he said seriously, and then dipped his mouth toward her crotch, his eyes still looking up at her.
They closed as Wren felt the first velvet-soft sweep, and her eyes closed, too. The next touch exposed her clit more, and she moaned as a gentle, moist touch made her legs tremble.
She forgot to listen for his thoughts as he lapped at her, his slow, teasing licks giving way to quicker movements. His fingers spread her more, and the tip of his tongue was wicked as it flickered over that nub, making her cry out.
Wren could feel how wet she was, too, and before she had quite realized it, she was thinking she wanted him to put a finger inside her, just to see, but she couldn’t quite ask for that.
She didn’t have to. He slipped an index finger in slowly, and it moved easily and without pain. She was sore, but the penetration was soothing as he moved it in and out of her. Oh, God, that feels good.
Do you want a second one? I’m thinking of just keeping it to one for now. No need to rush.
Her answer was to cry out again as she leaped up to another level of arousal. Maybe he was right, and they should take it slow. If nothing else, she should trust him. Trust him to take it slow, when she wanted to rush.
And she cried out again, orgasm suddenly upon her as he sucked her clit between his teeth and flicked it hard with his tongue. Oh, but wouldn’t it feel good to... She cried out again as he read that thought almost before it formed into words, biting her there, but gently, just a nip of teeth sending her into a second orgasm even stronger than the first, while his tongue did not let up.
A third orgasm hit as he crooked the finger inside her, tongue still lapping, but more softly now, and then he pulled his hand free and just lapped more and more slowly until every trace of tension or spasm was gone from her body.
He climbed up to the pillow and cradled her close. Doesn’t look like you passed out this time.
Hm, no, and so far, no dream or vision either. Although I am a bit sleepy now.
Sleep, then. I'll hold you. We can... experiment more when you wake up.
All right. And she slipped into a lovely, dreamless sleep.
* * *
DEREK’S KITCHEN WAS larger than hers, but then the whole house was. She drifted out of the kitchen and through the dining room and into the living room. The place was large enough for a family of four, but as far as Wren could tell he lived there alone. On the mantel she found a photo of him and a woman on a mountainside, dressed for hiking. He looked younger in the picture, maybe college-age? There was one that had to be his parents, standing together on the front steps of a house. She couldn’t quite tell if it was this house, but it looked like it certainly could be.
She smiled. He was humming to himself while he cooked, accompanied by the sound of steak sizzling in a hot pan. She went back in to see if she could help with anything.
Soon she had the table set in the dining room, the two places set at one corner of the table, and rummaging through the sideboard had even found a lone candlestick, with a taper and some matches. She lit the candle and then went back to the kitchen to find him covering the steak under a pot lid and throwing washed spinach into the pan the steak had just come out of. The water on the spinach popped like firecrackers as it met the hot fat in the pan and she stepped back. The microwave beeped.
“Do you like your potato with butter or sour cream?” he asked, turning the spinach with two wooden spoons. “I have both, I think. Well, check and make sure the sour cream is still good...”
She checked, looking into his fridge with curiosity. A lot of jars of condiments, but it looked like he had some actual food, cheese and cold cuts, a few eggs, half a head of lettuce. Normal stuff. Not that she expected anything else, but she felt that learning what was in someone’s cupboards was part of getting to really know them. Pretty soon she’d find out how (or if) he folded his socks.
“Looks like butter,” she said, when the sour cream container proved to be more colorful on the inside than it ought to have been. “I like butter better, anyway. The sour cream is always too cold on the hot potato.”
He had pulled the potatoes out of the microwave and set them on plates. He apportioned the spinach, now wilted down to what seemed like just two spoonfuls, and then cut the steak in half, putting one chunk on each. “There we go.”
She carried the plates in, and he brought in a bottle of wine she hadn’t noticed him opening. Too busy snooping around, she thought with a smile at herself. He poured a little into each glass. It was a rich, ruby red in the candlelight, and she lifted her glass and tinked it against his. “To... dinner,” she said.
“I'll drink to that.” He took a sip.
Wren did, too. “I don’t know anything about wine.”
“Me either.” He laughed. “A client gave me this bottle and said it would go good with steak, though. But I really haven’t wanted to open it alone. The whole drinking alone being pathetic thing.”
She wasn’t sure what to say to that, only that it seemed impossible that this sweet, good-looking man wasn’t already taken. “You live here all by yourself?”
“Yeah.” He cut off a piece of steak and chewed it while glancing around as if looking at the place for the first time. “I had a roommate for a while, but he moved in with a girlfriend about two months ago. I should really move to a smaller place, but...” He shrugged. “The place is all paid off, and the taxes aren’t that bad.”
“And moving is a pain in the butt,” Wren said, cutting open her potato and slathering butter in. “It’s nice, though. A pretty big house, quiet street, but you’re still so close to downtown.”
“I know. Not that I really use the office all that much. It’s mostly just a place to meet clients since I don’t want most of them to know where I live. My real office is downstairs, my files and everything. But it’s nice to be close, easy to get to.” He looked up suddenly. “Which reminds me.”
“What?” She paused, a forkful of spinach stuck in mid-air.
“I don’t know if you’ve been wondering, how does it work professionally versus personally. I mean, now that we’re...” A flush crept up his cheeks that had nothing to do with the wine. She could see him struggling to describe their relationship without rushing things ahead merely by invoking words like "girlfriend" or even "relationship.”
“Now that we've kind of shifted from professional to personal,” he finally said.
“Yeah, I did kind of wonder.” She set her fork back down. “Though it’s far from at the front of my mind. Or it was, until you brought it up.”
He smiled, laughing softly at himself. “Well, anyway, it doesn’t have to be a complicated ethical issue. Just don’t pay me.”
“Oh.” She thought about that. Was it really that simple? "Are you sure?”
“If things had happened the other way around, if we’d met some other way, there’s nothing I’ve done to search for Abby that I wouldn’t have gladly done for a... anyone I cared about, right? And I’d certainly never charge family or friends for helping them.” He took a deep breath as if he might need to steel himself for her reaction.
“Okay.” She found herself smiling. She didn’t want to pin words on it either, this new fragile thing that was blossoming between them. But he cared about her. That was nice to hear. Even if she already knew it, knew it beyond any doubt since, after all, she’d been in his mind. “So you don’t have to stop trying to find Abby, and we don’t have to stop... doing what we’re doing.”
“No.”
“Good.” She started to eat again, a thrill twisting through her gut as she wondered when they'd finally do it. She nearly opened her mouth to say something, then decided to let the fire simmer in her belly a bit longer. They still had practice to do, after all, didn’t they? And there were still several days before the next night they could visit the club, plenty of time to work on it. She had some ideas, some definite ideas, but she could tell Derek about them in bed.
She ran one foot up his leg, though, as they were coming close to finishing eating, something she’d never done to anyone before. He groaned as if hungry, and she knew it wasn’t for steak. What would it be like for him to just grab her now and take her, there on the table, both of their desires stoked so high it would be like two thunderclouds meeting and exploding in a strike of undeniable power?
Her foot, clad only in a cotton sock, worked its way to his crotch and she massaged the hardening length of him. The ridge of his erection filled the whole arch of her foot, her toes curling around the head.
She felt suddenly ashamed. “You didn’t come yet.” She had drifted off to sleep in his arms after he’d brought her to orgasm after orgasm this afternoon, and only realized now that he must be aching to come himself.
“It’s... all right...” he said, with some difficulty, as her foot had not stopped moving. He gripped the arms of his chair, though. “I figure... my patience will be rewarded.”
She slipped out of her own chair and urged him to move his back from the table as she knelt between his knees. She tugged at the button on his jeans for a while before he finally reached up, his hands covering hers for a moment as he undid it for her.
The zipper she handled herself, revealing the shape of his cock molded in cotton by his briefs, one shiny spot there where fluid from the tip had soaked through the fabric. She leaned down to suck on that spot and found it enticingly salty. Soon, a much larger area of cloth was soaked as she licked and sucked the whole head of his cock through his underwear, until his groans took on an edge of desperation. She eased the elastic waistband up and over to reveal the dark red flesh.
She lapped at him with long, slow licks, drawing longer groans out of him. Long, slow licks like the ones he’d used on her. She wondered, would he respond the way she did if she got faster, and flicked her tongue back and forth more quickly, and maybe used just a little bit of teeth to...?
The sudden bitter spurt made her cry out in surprise. The second squirt streaked her forehead and went into her hair. As she rocked back on her heels, she let go the edge of his waistband and the rest of his load ended up in his shorts. “Oh, God, I’m sorry!” She put a hand over her mouth. “I didn’t mean...”
“To give me the most amazing blowjob I’ve ever had? Sure you did.” He pulled her up into a kiss, and she could taste the mingled flavors on her tongue, smell that crackled ozone scent of his breath. “God, Wren, the things you do to me.”
“How long... how long...” But her throat tightened up and she couldn’t finish the question. She felt his arms tighten around her.
“When you’re ready,” he whispered. “I'll be inside you when you’re ready.”
She nodded, breathless, wanting the time to be now but knowing it wasn’t.
“Let’s get in the shower,” he whispered back. “I think we both need one now.”