Melt (26 page)

“That came out wrong,” she quickly blurted.

“I don’t know. I think it came out unexpectedly right.” Sonja tilted her head, looking curious. “So there’s a shortage of lesbians around these parts?”

“A regular drought. Not a one in sight. Other than Kelly, but she’s just visiting. Not that it would matter. She wouldn’t be interested anyway.”

“Really? Why not?”

“She thinks I’m too young.”

“How old are you?”

“Eighteen.”

“Then you’re not too young. Eighteen’s legal.”

“Not here.”

“No?”

“Legal is fourteen here.”

Sonja’s eyes widened. “No shit?”

“No shit.”

“Hmm.” Sonja tilted her head, gazing thoughtfully at Pippa. “I don’t know how it’s possible that Kelly isn’t interested in you. You’re the cutest thing I’ve seen since I got here. I think you’re the bomb, little mama.”

Pippa giggled, glancing sideways at Sonja. “For reals?”

Sonja nodded, leaning closer. “In fact, I think you’re irresistible.”

“Wow! Nobody’s ever said anything like that to me before.”

“Then it’s about time they did. I don’t know what Kelly’s problem is and I don’t care. You’re a little hottie. I mean, just look at that beautiful complexion.” Sonja touched her fingers to Pippa’s cheek. “And those incredible eyes. And those lips, so soft and sexy and…” Sonja’s fingers moved to her lips and ran lightly over them before her hand slipped to the back of her neck and she leaned in for a kiss. It was soft and gentle and thrilling.

“Ummm,” Sonja murmured, pulling back. “Did you like that?”

Pippa gulped, staring into Sonja’s eyes. She was so overwhelmed with wonder, she couldn’t speak, so she simply nodded.

“Me too.”

Pippa closed her eyes as Sonja kissed her again. Sonja’s arm tightened around her and her mouth became more ardent. Pippa returned her kiss awkwardly, overjoyed that a woman was interested in her at last. She let her body mold itself against the soft curves of Sonja’s. They continued kissing, Sonja coaxing Pippa’s mouth to follow her lead until it felt more natural. They sat side by side on the cot kissing for several minutes until Pippa began to understand the rhythm of their mouths and felt the fluttery feelings deep inside that she felt when watching love scenes in movies.

Sonja leaned into her, pushing her back gently on the cot, then lay on top of her. She kissed her neck, then sucked her earlobe and licked the outer curves of her ear, her breath hot and moist on sensitive nerves that seemed to connect to all parts of Pippa’s body.

“I’m going to make you feel so good,” Sonja whispered.

Pippa lay stiffly, flat on her back. “I don’t know what to do,” she squeaked.

“You don’t have to do anything. Just relax. Let your body do what it wants to. Your body knows what to do.”

Sonja ran her hand slowly across Pippa’s clothed body, over her thighs and chest. She kissed her again, probing with her tongue. Pippa was at a loss. What was she supposed to do? She recalled passages from books and thought she was supposed to breathe hard, maybe moan and thrash about. But if she was to do what Sonja said, to let her body do what it wanted to do, it would remain scared stiff, immobile and silent. She began to panic and her limbs started to tremble. She had no idea what Sonja would do to her, she realized. Not that she hadn’t read things. But there were some things she’d read about that she’d rather not do. A lot of things, in fact, and she was beginning to think Sonja intended to do them all.

Pippa attempted to sit up, saying, “I think I should go.”

Sonja leaned more heavily on her, pushing her back down. “No, no, no,” she said softly. “Don’t be scared. I’m not going to hurt you. I’ll be very gentle with you. This is what you’ve wanted for a long time, isn’t it? A woman to make love to you.”

“Uh-huh,” Pippa agreed uncertainly.

“Of course you have.” Sonja took hold of her hand and pressed it against the thin T-shirt over her chest. “Well, I’m a woman and I want to make love to you.”

Sonja kissed her mouth deeply, rousing her body into a state of excitement. Where her hand still lay against Sonja’s breast, she felt the firm lump of a nipple through the cotton T-shirt. She squeezed tentatively, then allowed her fingers to move over the soft curves, mesmerized by the sensation and the sound of Sonja’s murmur of pleasure.

Sonja’s body moving over hers felt so good it was scary. She wanted to stop, but she couldn’t…until she felt Sonja’s hand on the bare skin of her stomach, sliding upward toward her bra. She jumped, startled, and lurched away with an involuntary cry of alarm.

“What’s wrong?” asked Sonja.

Pippa shook her head, embarrassed. “I don’t think I’m ready for this,” she said, her knees bent up between them and clamped tightly together. “I…I’m sorry.”

Sonja eyed her over her knees, looking seriously displeased. After a moment of silent contemplation, she sighed and moved aside. “Get out of here, you little squirt,” she said in exasperation.

* * *

Jordan was on her way to the clothesline to hang up her towel when she saw Pippa half crawl, half hop out of Sonja’s tent and take off running toward the fjord like a jackrabbit.

“Pippa!” she hollered, bringing the girl to a sudden and total stop.

She approached her, observing her state of breathlessness and the wild-eyed look of a hunted animal.

“I didn’t know you were still here.”

“Just leaving.”

“Are you okay?”

Pippa nodded vigorously.

“What were you doing in Sonja’s tent?”

Pippa’s eyes widened even more. “She wanted to show me a trilobite fossil.”

“Uh-huh.” Jordan inspected her wordlessly, waiting to see if she would volunteer anything more, but she stood mute and resolute like a soldier at attention. Jordan decided not to press her any further, for it was obvious there was more to it than a fossil, and she was clearly embarrassed.

Pippa still stood stiffly, looking like she was expecting a dressing down.

“Dr. Lund has agreed to come look at your cave,” Jordan informed her.

The girl visibly relaxed. “Awesome!”

“I’ll let you know exactly when.”

Once she understood they were finished, Pippa took off at a sprint to the dock. In a few minutes, her boat was speeding away.

Jordan strode purposefully to Sonja’s tent. She entered without announcing herself, startling Sonja where she lay on her cot reading a magazine.

“Jordan!” She put down the magazine and sat up.

“What did you do to that girl?”

“Pippa? Why? What did she say I did?”

“No games!”

Sonja swung her legs over the edge of the cot, recovering her defiance. “Whatever I did, it’s a private matter between me and Pippa.”

“My God!” Jordan fumed. “Are you really that depraved?”

Sonja frowned. “Are you really that big of a prude? Make whatever rules you want for yourself, Jordan, but this is none of your business!”

Jordan made a conscious effort to stifle her rage, but she could sense it was futile.

Sonja got to her feet and appeared to relax. “Look,” she said, dropping the antagonism, “nothing happened. I admit I tried to seduce her, but she chickened out. All I did was kiss her. So it’s official. I have now struck out with every lesbian within five hundred miles. But even if we’d finished the job, I don’t know what you’re so upset about. She’s an adult.”

“You don’t know what I’m upset about?” Jordan was flabbergasted. “This is all just a joke to you, isn’t it? Do you really think it’s okay to seduce a girl who’s in a relationship with another woman? You don’t have any qualms about that?”

Sonja looked confused. “Huh? Pippa? She’s not in any relationship. She’s never even been kissed if I can judge by what happened here a few minutes ago.”

Jordan balked, shaking her head. “But you told me she and Kelly—”

Looking suddenly enlightened, Sonja sucked in a breath. “Oh, right!”

The contrite look on Sonja’s face gave Jordan her first clue that she had been misled about Kelly and Pippa. Oh, my God! she thought. Pippa has a crush, but Kelly… It all made so much more sense now. Suddenly her head was whirling.

“They’re not in a relationship, are they?” she asked evenly.

Sonja shook her head. “Just friends.”

“Then why the hell did you say they were?”

Sonja winced at the volume and tone of Jordan’s voice. “I…I just…” She shuffled her feet. “Aren’t you glad I wasn’t trying to steal Kelly’s girl? Pippa just wanted her cherry popped and I was happy to oblige. Just doing a good deed. Or trying to. So no harm done.”

“No harm done?” Jordan sputtered, her body shaking with rage. “Pack your stuff! I’m sending you home!”

“What? Why? I didn’t do anything! So I told a tiny lie. What difference did it make?”

Jordan turned to leave.

“Jordan!” Sonja begged, grabbing at her arm. “I don’t understand.”

Jordan wrenched herself free and ducked through the flap to emerge in front of the others who stood gathered around, all three of them looking stricken with disbelief. They had heard every word.

She brushed past them and took refuge in her tent where she fell onto her cot and lay on her back staring at the green fabric above her, distraught and embarrassed at her behavior. She had behaved like a lunatic. She’d let her emotions overwhelm her, something rare and terrifying that took her back all those years to those disastrous days at Cornell.

She didn’t like the way she’d been feeling since the night Kelly first showed up in camp. She was distracted and on edge and she wasn’t sure why. So what if there was a good-looking, sexy woman around? It wasn’t like that hadn’t happened before. But it had never affected her like this.

Now she had to ask herself the same question Sonja had asked her. What difference did it make if Kelly was seeing Pippa or not? She had to get hold of herself. Thankfully, Kelly’s business here was done. She wouldn’t be showing up anymore with her big soulful eyes and her disarming smile.

Then everything could get back to normal.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Kelly peered at the black-and-white photo in her hands, blown up to an 8 x 10 but still inscrutable. At least to her. This was the clearest of the photos Pippa had shot of the strange markings in the cave. Thin, angular lines formed characters arranged in two rows. Maybe they were words, if she could believe Pippa’s conclusion that these were runic letters. In the enhanced photo, the marks looked less like random scratches than they had before. They were still faint and imprecise, but it was harder to dismiss them now.

“What’ve you got there?”

Kelly jerked her head toward the doorway to see Chuck walking toward her in shorts and a short-sleeved T-shirt.

She handed him the photo. “What does that look like?”

He stared at it, squinting to correct a mild astigmatism. “Runes,” he said at last.

She sat at attention. “No doubt?”

“I’m no expert, but it looks like others I’ve seen.”

“Can you tell me what it says?”

“No. It’s like Arabic or Chinese. I can recognize it without being able to read it.” He handed the photo back. “Where’d this come from?”

“The cave Pippa fell into.”

“No shit?” Chuck looked suddenly interested.

“She’s trying to get an archaeologist to come take a look. I wish I knew what this said…if anything.”

“Why don’t you have Elsa look at it?”

“Huh?”

He responded to her confusion with a look of mild disapproval. “To you she may just be a sour old landlady who doesn’t know how to boil a potato. But before she retired she had a long and not completely obscure career as a museum historian. In Nuuk. She’s an expert in Viking culture. I’m sure she’d leap at the chance to solve your puzzle here.”

Kelly was stunned. How superficial of her, she chided herself, to know nothing of her landlady’s life.

“I’ll ask her!” she said decisively.

A few minutes later she was in Mrs. Arensen’s small sitting room. She sat in a threadbare easy chair listening to classical music with her cat Paluaq sprawled on the arm beside her, sleeping. When Kelly handed her the photo, she put on her reading glasses and scrutinized it closely for a long, silent minute. When she looked up, she said, “This is interesting. They are not deep or uniform. Seems like a…how do you say…quickie?”

“I think you mean a rush job.”

“Ja, seems like a rush job.”

“Can you read it?” Kelly asked anxiously.

Mrs. Arensen nodded, pressing her lips tightly together. “Some of these letters you could take two ways. But, ja, I think so.”

“Do you think this is authentic? Do you think it’s old, I mean?”

“Old like Viking age? I do not know. Not from a photo. You have to see the original, see what mold or dirt is in the grooves. And see if you can tell what kind of tool was used. You look in a microscope. It is a complex matter to determine if it is authentic.”

“But you can decipher the message at least.”

“Ja. It looks like Younger Futhark period.” Mrs. Arensen’s eyes lit up as she said, “Bring me some paper.”

Kelly brought a tablet of lined paper and sat on the floor next to Mrs. Arensen’s chair while she unhurriedly drew the symbols on the pad. Paluaq, now awake and curious about what was going on, butted her head into the back of the photo. Kelly distracted her by petting her.

“Mrs. Arensen,” Kelly said, “I’d be interested in your opinion about what happened to the Viking colonists.”

“Ja,” said Mrs. Arensen, not looking up from her work.

“I heard they were assimilated into the native population.”

“Ja, sure, that is one hypothesis.”

“Do you think it happened?”

Mrs. Arensen looked up. “There is not much evidence. But there is not much evidence to support
any
hypothesis, so it is okay. It is a possibility. I would not discount it.” She waved her pen. “The Norse who were left would have been a tiny number compared to the native people. If they joined them, it is possible they left no mark.”

“Left no mark? Not even in the DNA of their descendants?”

“Ah, well, sure, what do I know about DNA?” She rolled her eyes dismissively. “I am talking about culture. Language and customs. Inuit culture shows nothing of the Vikings. But what would they want of Viking life anyway? They would have no use in the Arctic for wool clothing and wooden houses. If they had taken those things, they would have died out too.” She laughed abruptly. “There are a few old Inuit stories told of white people, but they are legends. Some are for sure fiction, so these stories cannot be used as evidence.” She shrugged and returned her attention to the runes.