High-Risk Fever (5 page)

The imaginary cock stroked faster. Another wave of heat, stronger, more ruthless, charged from the deepest part of her pussy and invaded her stomach. A low moan emitted from her throat, and she shut her mouth.

The need for more stimulation grew, delicious and painful at the same time. Her clit felt ablaze, demanded to be touched. Now.

She slid the other hand behind her ass, between the round cheeks and down to the fleshy folds of her cunt again, replacing the slick, working fingers. She moved the first hand toward her clit and, with the palm flat on the tiny bundle of nerves, circled and pressed in a steady rhythm.

Micaela standing nude and hard before her in the complete blackness of her bedroom while Brian came down the hall was shockingly exciting. But nothing beat the intense effects of the scene downstairs.

She imagined their two hard, glistening lengths playing with her now, one fucking her fast from behind and the other rubbing her clit with long, expert strokes.

That did it. Anne’s inner muscles spasmed around her fingers, sending warm juices along both hands. Intense delight rushed over her like fire, making her jerk back and forth. She held her breath and clenched her teeth for fear of waking Brian.

Oh God, Brian.

His soft snores filled the otherwise silent room.

Trembling, she blew out the air she’d held and concentrated on calming. She removed her hands, found the bundle of clothes on the floor, and dried her sticky fingers on the soft fabric of her sweatpants. Beads of sweat rolled between her breasts and down her spine while she waited out the aftermaths of her orgasm.

Her head spun as if she were drunk. She couldn’t place a thought next to another, but it was fine. All that was expected of the hostess now was to go to sleep. It had been a long day.

She got up and reached for the bed. The sheets had grown cold in her absence. She snuck underneath with the ease and grace of a cat.

Still, the mattress moved. Brian’s snoring stopped for a few seconds then picked up again.

She buried her heavy head in the pillow and took a deep, relaxing breath. Vivid memories of Micaela and Todd arousing each other bombarded her mind, but she didn’t have to wait long before sleep took over and brought her far away, to another world.

In her dream, hard cocks of all sizes, shapes, and colors proceeded before her eyes, as if on display in a store.

Confused, she looked around and found herself naked in a large, white-tiled bathroom with four men standing in a row under shower heads. Instead of water from the nozzles, rain fell through the open roof, enveloping her with icy liquid, clattering on the tiles. Hair dripping, the men stood with the pallor and apathy of mummies, shivering from the cold, water running down their faces, open mouths gasping for air like fish on land.

The lights went out with a terrifying bang. Her heart skipping a beat, she blinked. In the next second, she was kneeling on the same floor. The men stood in a circle around her, their erect cocks poking at her, some straight, some bending sideways. She stared in disbelief and took the nearest one in her hand, stroking it, before looking up to the guy’s face. Oh God, she recognized Todd’s bedazzling emerald eyes. Shocked, she let go of his cock and turned to the guy next to him. As she took his erection in her hand, she realized it was the one she’d previously seen in a mirror. Micaela’s. With a gasp, she dropped it and glanced at the next in the row. This one she knew well, her husband’s, with the familiar purplish color and protruding vein on the underside. She turned to look at the guy standing next to him, an elderly man with white pubic hair and a heavy belly, and Papa stared back, clear, blue eyes wide with shock!

Anne woke from her nightmare with a small cry of terror. For a frightening moment, she gasped, as if on the verge of drowning.

Darkness filled the room, though less black than before. Thin light from cracks in the wooden shutters made the furniture discernable. But the authorities hadn’t fixed the power yet. If they had, the ceiling lamp would be lit.

The storm still raged outside, shaking exposed treetops behind the house. Heavy rain hammered on the shutters, thrown there by gusts of wind.

Exhaustion grounded her to the mattress; she didn’t want to move a limb. Sleep hadn’t done her any good. The images from the dream had already faded, but she knew what was messing with her mind.

Too much sex in one day. I’ve had a sex overdose
.

She would need to take it easy from now on, try to get her life back to normal. And that meant staying the hell away from the handsome bicyclists.

She moved a hand to Brian’s side of the bed and found it empty. A glance at the battery-driven luminous digital clock on his bed table indicated it was breakfast time. And, now that she thought of it, the bitter-sharp smell of brewed coffee beans drifted into the bedroom. Thank God they had an old cooking stove.

She listened. Muffled voices came through the floor, low pop music from the battery-driven radio—“La Isla Bonita” by Madonna—and coughing.

She wanted to stay in bed, didn’t want to go downstairs and face everyone. But her hostess duties called, as did her grumbling stomach. With much reluctance, she climbed out of bed, felt her way to the closet, and found new clothes.

After a short visit to the bathroom, she went down the stairs, dreading who she would meet.

In the dark room below, a French family of four sat at the dining table, a couple of candles lighting their somber faces. Since the two children, a ten-year-old girl and a seven-year-old boy, still had a month of summer holidays, the parents had planned to spend the next couple of weeks in the Alps, driving from village to village. These mountains were renowned for their severe weather, but the two adults seemed surprised and more than a little annoyed to be stranded here.

As figurehead of the bed and breakfast, it was Anne’s job to make their stay as pleasant as possible, but it seemed Brian had already taken care of that. The delicious scents of fresh baguette, jam, and butter teased her nostrils, increasing her hunger.

At the other end of the long table, Todd and Brian sat next to each other, coffee mugs in hand, features drawn.

A boost of warmth filled her at the sight of her husband. “Hey, sweetheart.” She walked over to him and, when he looked up, she leaned down to peck him on the mouth. “Everything okay?”

He smiled and discreetly patted her butt.

Todd greeted her with a nod, face placid.

Where was Micaela? She scanned the first floor.

Ah. In the back of the living room, lying on a sofa, with a woolen blanket covering him from top to toe. A hard coughing fit shook his torso, making her cringe with pity.

She sighed.

Heavy rain assaulted the windows and the asphalt outside in a steady, monotonous beat. Playful gusts of wind toyed with the open shutters, provoking small creaks. Raindrops zigzagged on the glass panes in a random maze. If she had any time, she would take a pause to go to the window and watch the wet patterns form and change, dreamily losing herself in their dance.

But business waited.

When she gazed back to the tenants, they studied her. Did they have any idea what had happened in this room last night?

The notion of sitting with these moody faces at the table stressed her. She murmured a polite
bonjour
, filled a cup of hot coffee, and grabbed a croissant before going to the kitchen to busy herself cleaning and moving things around. Lit candles made it possible to work in the dark.

She kept one ear focused on the living room, eavesdropping on Todd and Brian’s low conversation. They discussed politics and compared social standards in France and the US.

At one point, Brian raised his voice. “Did you hear what happened last week? Before the French government voted for the new gay marriage law?
One and a half million people
marched in the streets of Paris to protest, and they were pissed. But the elected elite refused to listen. They still passed the law.”

“Oh.”

“Can’t fuckin’ believe it.”

“Believe what?”

“That they made it possible for people of the same sex to marry.”

Images of Todd happily intimate with his lover last night flashed, and she couldn’t help but feel sorry for him in face of her husband’s intolerance. She’d never really given the gay phenomenon much thought, but she had a feeling circumstances would soon force her to take a stand.

“As if they don’t have enough problems to take care of. There are a record three million unemployed people in France. And
nine million
beneath the poverty line. It’s unheard of, never before seen. What are they gonna do about that?”

“I don’t know.”

She opened the fridge. The lamp didn’t turn on.
Merde
. She would have to move the food to the cold cellar in the basement. With a heavy sigh, she grabbed cartons of milk and orange juice and went to an old door at the opposite side of the kitchen.

The guys had stopped talking. Chair legs scraped on the bare floorboards.

She pressed the handle on the cellar door, braced for the humid, chilly air seeping out of the narrow staircase, and climbed down the cement steps. A black void lay before her, but having lived there all her life, she knew the place inside out. Her nose twitched from the sour smell of fungus as she took careful steps across the low-ceilinged basement. She found the wooden shelves against a wall and placed the cartons atop one of them.

Shuffling in the stairwell made her jump. She turned and squinted as a blinding flashlight pointed in her direction. The person approached, hard shoe soles grazing the stone floor. The shining-white beam revealed Todd’s face.

“Oh, it’s you.” She let out a breath. What the hell was he doing here? Maybe he wanted to scold her for peeping last night. She tried to make up a quick excuse.

He stopped in front of her, the flashlight in his hand making him look like a ghost, and took a deep breath. “Forgive me for coming down here. I know it’s off limits.” His voice sounded hesitant. “But I have to ask you a favor, and it’s important that your husband doesn’t hear me.”

How did Todd manage to sneak past him? Maybe the facteur brought the mail at that moment and held Brian’s attention at the front door.

Nevertheless, Todd hadn’t come here to scold her. Relief washed over her. “Sure.”

“It’s about what you saw last night.”

“Oh yeah, well, I’m sorry—”

“No, it’s okay. Just please don’t tell your husband.”

“Oh.” Considering their recent conversation, his plea made sense.

“Please.”

“Oh, of course. You don’t need to worry about that.”

“If he found out, he’d kick us out. And now that Micaela is sick….”

Her heart tightened with worry. “How bad is he?”

“He’s caught a cold. I think he has a fever. So please—”

“I won’t tell anyone. It’s your private business.”

He nodded. “It is, but not everybody is as understanding as you are.”

“I know.”

He paused. The luminous beam from the flashlight trembled. “Listen. I feel bad about last night. Micaela and me, we just.... We were tired. We’d had a long day. We needed to chill.”

She shook her head. “You don’t have to excuse it.”

“We would never do this in public, you know. But we didn’t have a room. We thought everybody was asleep.”

“It’s all right. I’m glad you’re happy together.”

It was a small lie; Micaela’s deceit still annoyed the hell out of her. But she would work to get over it.

Todd’s voice warmed, and his eyes sparkled in the dark. “We
love
each other.”

“How long have you been together?”

“Well, we met about six months ago, on the Net. I saw his picture, and it was like...he was
so
beautiful, I mean really incredibly gorgeous. He’s a dancer.”

“Oh….” That explained his perfectly sculpted body and feline agility.

Todd nodded. “I kept his photo in my wallet, and I was so sad that he was in Italy and we couldn’t meet in person. I really wanted to see him, you know.”

She smiled at his enthusiasm. “So you stayed in touch?”

“Yeah, constantly. And then he invited me to visit during the summer holidays! I couldn’t believe it.”

“So how was it, to meet him for real? Sometimes these things don’t….” She heaved her shoulders.

“Oh, it was...whoa, amazing, so perfect. We hit it off immediately. Couldn’t keep our hands off each other. You know that feeling, when all you think about is that other person, and everything else sorta fades? You’re living a
dream
, every single minute of the day, and you couldn’t be happier. You want it to last, like, forever.”

“Yeah.” She thought of Brian and the first time they met. His warm hazel eyes staring at her, flirting. The heat rushing through her every time she heard his voice, and the desperate desire for him to touch her.

“Well.” Todd sighed. “I’d better get back. Would you by any chance have some aspirin for him?”

“Sure. Let me finish here, and I’ll bring you some.”

“Okay, thanks.”

Footsteps on the stairs made them both suck in a breath. Todd’s flash beam shook. A second beam of intense whiteness searched the black, low-roofed space, blinding them.

“Anne, are you there?” Brian’s bear voice boomed between cellar walls.

“Yes, by the shelves.” For the second time in a few hours, she felt caught in the act, and hoped to God he wouldn’t ask too many questions.

When he joined them, suspicion marred his features, and he moved the light from one face to the other.

Squinting, Todd gave a sheepish smile, turned, and left them alone.

Brian pointed his flashlight to the stone floor. He stood immobile in the dark, a few feet from her, until the grazing footsteps on the cement stairs vanished.

No more sounds but his faint, controlled breathing. Her instincts told her to wait.

“Making friends, are we?” He cocked his head.

Ah
. An ugly feeling squeezed her throat. “W-we were talking, Brian.”