Color of Love (23 page)

She was totally open and helpless, but Jason made no move to push into her right away. Gradually Leah began to adjust to the weight and feel of his body on hers. His chest hair was soft. The feel of his thighs and his muscular calves made her feel safely contained. She felt him shift and fumble awkwardly between their bodies, rolling his to the side for a moment. He was putting on a condom.

Her mouth quivered with tears. She couldn’t seem to stop crying. Leah was stunned by his consideration and awareness. She was so far gone that she hadn’t even given a thought to protection. Allen had never used condoms. She’d never asked him to. A sob escaped and Jason began to rub the length of his body against her in an erotic fashion. A spiraling sensation of desire shot through Leah’s groin.

“Please don’t,” Jason pleaded, brushing the tears away.

He looked down at her breasts, fascinated by the dusky aureoles, the milk chocolate of her skin. He bent toward a nipple, closing his eyes. His tongue touched the peak and slowly drew it into his mouth. Leah sighed deeply and arched her hips. She drew Jason’s head closer to her body.

They were color-blind in the dark.

Leah’s head buzzed. She couldn’t believe what was happening. She felt delicious eddies and swirling heat in her body. Hope. She twisted and heaved beneath Jason. Her body rejoiced while her heart hoped that history wasn’t repeating itself.

“Oh, God …” she cried. Jason pulled her closer to his heat, comforting her, his hands moving over her back and sides. He stroked and touched and kissed her gently and loved her all the more. Jason suddenly lifted his hips, balancing his weight on his forearms. He kissed her again and thrust deeply, gently into her.

And she was lost.

It was a summer day.

Her body was propelled through the air, over tree-tops that were full and green. The trees disappeared and fell away to reveal wonderful space, causing her stomach to take a dip. She thought she would fall back to earth in a crash, killing herself for daring to presume she could fly free. But she was perfectly safe, held in place by a magic chair. …

The dream paled and Leah’s eyes fluttered open. For a moment she didn’t know where she was. Something was holding her. She was lying on her side, and realized that Jason’s arm was around her. Her body was curved into his, back to front, and Leah could feel his steady breathing in her hair. She tried to shift position. Her movement caused Jason to roll onto his back away from her. Slowly Leah turned over to find Jason sleeping soundly next to her.

It was a bit chilly in the room, but he’d managed to kick away most of the covers, leaving both of them bare, and giving Leah her first full look at him. His hair was gently tussled, his cheeks and jaw dark with overnight stubble. He was all pale skin, long and nicely built. His body hair was not as dark as his head, and the hair under his arms was almost blond. His chest hair was partially gray. There were a good number of scars, one in particular along his right collarbone running to his throat. There was another down his left thigh. Leah looked at his limp penis, lying curved against his leg. His genital hair was long and also almost blond. She had touched him there and found it soft.

Jason suddenly rolled his head on the pillow in her direction and slowly opened his eyes. They were still red and blurry from sleep, but in a moment he was focused on her face. A half smile lifted one corner of his mouth. His morning beard had gray in it, too.

“Good morning. …”

“Good afternoon,” Leah corrected softly. She no longer felt afraid but suddenly shy. She felt drowsy … and safe.

Jason shifted slightly so he could look at her stretched out next to him. His large hand caressed Leah’s breasts, down her stomach and thighs. He rolled again until he was completely stretched out on top of her once more. He wrapped his arms around her and buried his mouth suddenly in the side of her neck. Jason gently nuzzled, rubbing his nose and mouth on her warm skin. Sleepily he undulated his body against her and moaned quietly.

Leah let her eyes drift closed and her body became soft and pliable again, adjusting and accepting his weight. She stroked his back.

Jason used his index finger and pushed the matted hair off her forehead, finding a scar at the temple.

“Where’d you get that?” he asked, running his thumb over it.

“Cowboys and Indians,” she answered.

He grinned. “Somebody tried to scalp you?”

“Gail.”

“Doesn’t surprise me,” he said with lazy humor.

Leah reached out and touched her finger to the scar at his throat. “Where did you get that?”

“’Nam. There are others.”

“I noticed.”

“Can’t be helped. It comes with the job.” Jason wiggled his hips against her. “All the important parts work.” Leah couldn’t be persuaded to smile. Jason shook his head. “It’s not as bad as you think.”

She touched the scar again. She swallowed hard as a sudden realization hit home. Leah gazed seriously into his eyes which, as they returned her gaze, were drowsy with desire. “Jason …”

Jason pressed her back into the bedding and kissed her forehead; he bent lower to her mouth. “Not now,” he mumbled hoarsely.

He began to make love to her again.

Later, when Leah came out of the shower wrapped in her robe, Jason was no longer in the room. Her heart gave a lurch as she immediately thought he’d dressed and left. But his gun and holster were still on the vanity stool, although all their clothing had been picked up from the floor. Leah heard sounds from downstairs and followed them to the kitchen, where she found Jason rummaging in the cabinets and refrigerator. The towel from his shower was wrapped around his waist, not concealing an awful lot, and his hair was damp and spiky. Leah let her fear subside and automatically began the coffee maker.

“I feel like I haven’t eaten in a week,” Jason groaned, his head deep inside the refrigerator.

“What would you like to eat?”

“Everything.”

Leah joined him at the refrigerator, but Jason used his hip to bump her aside. “Get out of the way. I’ll make breakfast.”

It was three o’clock in the afternoon.

Gail called at one point to say she’d be home in the morning, but Leah didn’t even ask her where she was.

Afterward she and Jason returned to the room upstairs, but only to lie in bed talking. They talked about almost everything but what had happened between them. They also did not talk of Leah’s apprehensions because it was nothing they could settle in just one night together. They talked about themselves. They were hungry to know each other in a different way now.

They had passed another barrier.

Leah had given herself up totally to the night, and forced herself not to think about later or tomorrow. She was filled with a nice warmth and quiet happiness at what she’d experienced with Jason, and she was determined that no matter what, it would be enough.

The first time they’d made love she’d been unable to climax. She’d used all her energy vacillating between the joy of Jason’s stimulating touches and the fear of what they were doing together. She had, nonetheless, given herself up to the reality of that moment at least reveling in the feel of his hands and kisses on her body.

And then just a little while ago, all that she’d held in abeyance, combined with a languid acceptance of Jason’s possession of her, had finally released her to fully share in the experience with him.

“Would you like to see what I do?” she asked suddenly.

She climbed off the bed to retrieve her portfolio, leaning against a nightstand. She unzippered it and spread the contents over her lap and Jason’s.

“These are books I’m working on for the summer and fall.”

Leah leafed through the pages slowly, explaining each one. Jason remained silent but interested. He seemed to get a particular charge out of her caricatures of people she worked with. He told her the one of Gail didn’t quite work.

While she was talking, Jason began to stroke her arm and shoulders. Leah looked at him, stopping in mid-sentence. His eyes were soft and caressing, and she sensed that he wanted to hold her. Leah put the portfolio on the floor and he took her into his arms again, sliding them down flat on the bed. They didn’t talk and they didn’t make love. Soon it was Jason’s steady breathing that told Leah he’d fallen back to sleep.

Much, much later, when she was alone, she would think in detail about the last twenty-four hours, what it had given to her and what it had taken away. Jason had taken her within the circle of his life, beyond his being a cop and someone she’d seen in a sad moment. She’d met his friends, danced with him, made love with him. The time they’d spent together more than balanced the incident with the officer at the precinct. When Leah thought about it, it didn’t even hurt so much. Jason had dispelled the surprise and replaced it with tender, loving care.

For Leah, many things would be different in the future from this fresh beginning, which had taken on the dimensions of a surreal fantasy.

T
HE NEXT TIME LEAH
walked into Jason’s precinct it was with trepidation. The incident of New Year’s Eve had been a stupid and unfortunate experience. She had not forgotten the officer named Spano, and she was wary of encountering him again. More than that, however, returning suddenly threw her back to the event of the mugging and her decision at the time not to make a report to the police, or to tell anyone.

The precinct was busy, and there were cops and civilians everywhere. Leah was a bit stunned at the number of people who seemed to need the intervention of police in their lives. For a moment she saw the rituals of law enforcement, and the dealings that went on with individuals. But all those years ago she had believed that there would be no help for her beyond a written and filed statement, and certainly no one who would understand how her sense of self had been stripped away. She hadn’t wanted to be a statistic. Leah had only wanted the fear and humiliation to go away.

Leah walked into the dreary interior and approached the officer at the front desk. Seeing so many men and women in blue made her feel that she’d entered a private club. Indeed, she drew so many curious glances that she felt she didn’t belong here. But she had been the one to ask Jason if she could come again. He’d seemed hesitant at first, making her feel that somehow she was invading his territory. Leah quickly guessed that he, too, was remembering the last time she’d been there.

She had research to do. Her latest freelance assignment was a book by a retired cop about gay officers on the force. She wanted to look around the station house, observe the officers on duty, how they interacted with one another and with the public. Leah didn’t need to talk to any of them. That’s what the manuscript was for. But she needed to get a handle on the environment that the author had portrayed in order to conceive of a design for the book and its cover.

Leah told the desk officer she was there to see Jason Horn. She tried to sound professional and detached, but he seemed so interested in her, even while he was dialing Jason on his line, that for a moment Leah wondered how much he, or anyone else at the precinct, knew of their relationship. She suddenly felt conspicuous, as if all her secrets were on display. For an awful moment Leah remembered the accusation she’d thrown at Jason the night they’d first made love, that she was just a curiosity to him, but her fears had proven to be groundless.

Yet when Jason appeared several minutes later, Leah didn’t recognize him. He was in uniform. Who is this man? she wondered. She barely recognized Jason in the dark slacks and blue shirt with its black and silver accents. He appeared unexpectedly formal, and it made him seem even more a stranger. Even when he smiled at her it was not truly personal. When he led her away from the front desk, Leah realized that she still had not connected Jason with his job. They’d spent all their time together when he was off duty, a civilian. Just a man. Her lover. Had Jason returned to meet her back in November dressed as he was this moment, they might never have gotten beyond the initial encounter.

Maybe he’d known that, too.

“I had to be in court this morning,” he said to her.

Leah nodded, accepting the explanation, but it did nothing to remove her sense of disorientation. She kept giving him covert glances. The uniform made Jason seem intimidating, authoritative.

Jason glanced quickly around. He took Leah’s arm and pulled her into a small office off a narrow corridor. She turned to face him, but he didn’t touch her. Jason’s eyes were serious and bright as he gazed at her startled expression.

“Leah, it’s me. It’s
me.”

Leah gnawed her lip, feeling heat rush to her face. “I know,” she said quietly.

Jason shook his head. “No, you don’t.” He took a quick look out the door and closed it. “I’m not supposed to be doing this …”

“Doing what?” Leah asked, watching him with a frown.

Jason’s grin was boyish. “Fraternizing with the public.”

He cupped her face and brought his mouth to hers. The kiss was soft. Leah closed her eyes and let him kiss her until she recognized the touch and the taste of him. The distinct movements of his lips and the thrust of his tongue. She sighed. Jason briefly deepened the kiss before releasing her. He stepped back.

Leah opened her eyes. She saw Jason. She began to smile in relief. “I—I’m sorry.”

“I’ve seen the same reaction from lawyers I’ve met in court who don’t know me if I run into them off hours. Some of the guys I coach freak when they see me in my blues.”

“Do they all get a kiss to make it better?”

Jason chuckled silently as he opened the door. “Not a chance. I’m selective.”

He led her back to the central area and asked what she needed for her research.

“A seat somewhere out of the way where I can just watch. Will anyone mind?”

Jason shrugged and shook his head. “They know who you are, Leah.”

She stared at him.

“Does that bother you?”

She glanced around at people going about their routine. She looked back to Jason, back to the man she’d known before he dressed in a blue uniform. “Not if it doesn’t bother you. You work here.”