Zeroing In (Kit Tolliver #11) (The Kit Tolliver Stories) (2 page)

“No?”

“It’s a little more complicated than that,” she said. “See, I had this boyfriend, and we were really deeply in love.”

“Oh?”

“We were meant to be together forever, I know we were. But he was married to somebody else.”

“Oh.”

“He filed for divorce, and the legal proceedings were underway. And he and I weren’t living together, but we had, you know, a full relationship. And then—”

“Yes?”

“He died.”

“I’m so sorry.”

She reached across the table, put her hand on top of his. “It was very sudden,” she said, “and completely unexpected. We were making love, and what we were doing—I don’t know, maybe I shouldn’t go into detail. Would I be embarrassing you?”

“It’s all right.”

“Well, I think they call it the Reverse Cowgirl position. He was lying on his back, like, and I was sitting astride him, but facing toward his feet. That was always a very effective position for us, because his dick hit my G-spot perfectly that way, and—is it okay to talk like this to a Mormon?”

He nodded.

“Well, that made it super good, and I could regulate the depth and everything, and he could just lie there and enjoy it. Plus I could use one hand for balance and use the other on my clit, just to, you know, help things along. Like.”

“I see.”

“So it was really great, and I had this super orgasm with bells and whistles, one of those long rolling things that just goes on forever, and when it finally stopped I said something, I don’t know what, telling him I loved him, that kind of thing, and he didn’t say anything. And the one thing I
don’t
like about the Reverse Cowgirl is you don’t get to see his face, and I didn’t even know if he came or not, or much of anything. And he wasn’t moving or making any sound, so I swung around to get a look at him, and, well, he was dead.”

“How awful.”

“They said he had a congenital heart condition, that it had just been there all his life and remained asymptomatic all that time, so nobody ever knew about it. And then it popped up and killed him. It could have happened while he was playing basketball or hurrying to catch a bus, or it could have happened in the middle of a night’s sleep. It was going to happen sooner or later, and the time it picked was right when I was squirming around on his dick in the throes of an amazing orgasm.”

She touched his hand again. “Anyway,” she said, “that’s what I thought of when I learned about proxy baptism.”

“You want him baptized, so that he’s guaranteed eternal life in Christ everlasting.”

“No.”

“No?”

“He was baptized as an infant. I don’t remember which denomination his parents were, and I know he’d lost his faith over the years, especially when his marriage went sour, but he was definitely baptized. Now maybe a Mormon proxy baptism would still do him some good, I don’t know about that, but if you want to put his name on the list, well, I’d have no objection to that. But it’s not what I came to Provo for.”

“Then—”

“We were meant to be together,” she said, “and I knew that from the moment I met him. And I still know it. I’ve been with other men since then, because I’m a healthy woman with healthy appetites.” Her hand brushed his. “You probably sensed that much.”

“Well, the way you were talking about the Backwards Cowboy.”

“Reverse Cowgirl. But that’s an interesting idea—someday we’ll have to work out just what the Backwards Cowboy might entail.”

A perfect blush this time, a really deep reddening of those pink cheeks.

“But here’s what I’m getting at,” she went on. “We would have been married. We were supposed to be married, and it’s what we would have done the minute his divorce became finalized. And then we’d be together forever.” She took a deep breath. “So what I want,” she said, “is a proxy marriage. I want you to stand in for him, as his proxy, and we’ll be married.”

He had a whole batch of objections. There was no such thing as proxy marriage in the LDS church, and she wasn’t a Mormon, and the person she wanted to marry hadn’t been a Mormon, so how could they go through an LDS sacrament, let alone by proxy?

“I know all that,” she said. “It wouldn’t have to have anything to do with the church, or with any church. Or with the government, either, and there wouldn’t need to be any clergy involved.”

“I’m not sure I understand.”

“It would be a private exchange of vows,” she said. “Without witnesses. Just the two of us, just you and I, except you’d more or less become him during the ceremony, using his name and standing in for him. As his proxy—that’s what it would come down to.”

“And this ceremony—”

She reached into her purse. “Actually,” she said, “I’ve written it out. See what you think.”

He unfolded the sheet of paper, read it through. “ ‘I, Sidney Teibel’—that was his name?”

“Yes, but it’s not TEE-bel. It’s TIE-bel, rhymes with bible.”

She’d made up the surname. Read it somewhere, couldn’t even remember where, and had no idea how its original owner may have pronounced it. So why was she correcting Kellen’s pronunciation?

“ ‘I, Sidney Teibel, do hereby take you, Marsha Anne Whitlock, to be my wife in the eyes of God and man . . .’ ”

The vows were lengthy ones, and on the flowery side. She realized as she heard Kellen read them out that she might have gotten the least bit carried away.

“Ever since I met you on Race Street in Philadelphia, there has been no one in my heart but you. Your lips, your breasts, your thighs, your private parts . . .”

She’d composed their vows a few days before she got to Provo, at a computer terminal in an Internet café, and that third cup of coffee had put her one caffeinated toke over the line.

That wouldn’t have happened if she’d been an observant Mormon. Maybe they were on to something, keeping their distance from coffee. But when their alarm clocks went off, how did they keep their eyes open?

“. . . to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, to have earthshaking sex with . . .”

They were in Kellen’s apartment. Over their glasses of lemonade, she’d said they would need someplace quiet and private for their exchange of vows, and he’d only hesitated for a moment before suggesting his apartment. She found this reassuring, along with the way his eyes kept dropping to her breasts.

“. . . as long as we both shall live.”

Her turn now. She took a breath, lowered her eyes to the piece of paper with her vows all printed out. “I, Marsha Anne Whitlock . . .”

Good thing she looked at the script. She’d almost said Whitcomb instead of Whitlock. A hell of a thing if she got her own name wrong in the recitation of her marriage vows.

“. . . to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, to suck and to swallow, to admit and to welcome into all the openings of my body . . .”

Fucking coffee. That third cup was murder.

She’d brought the rings, matching unadorned wedding bands, gold-plated rather than solid gold, and probably a good bet to turn their fingers green if they wore them for any length of time. But they’d do for now, and he’d placed one on her ring finger, and she’d done the same for him. And now, their vows concluded, it would have been time for someone to tell him that he could kiss the bride, but in the absence of clergy he’d have to figure that out for himself.

And damned if he didn’t manage to do just that. He took a step toward her, and she picked up her cue and moved at once into the circle of his arms, and raised her mouth to his.

Lips that had never touched liquor—or tobacco or coffee or Coca-Cola, or, God help us, pussy—now touched hers, and the depth of her own response surprised her. Without any conscious thought she opened to his kiss, and put a little tongue into it, and when his hand cupped her bottom and drew her in closer, she let a moan escape her lips even as she pressed her loins into his.

“Oh, Sidney,” she said. “Sid, my darling. My beloved husband.”

He looked uncertain what to say, so she spared him the need to say anything. “We have to consummate our marriage, my darling.” And when it looked as though he might hesitate, she said, “You’re Sidney now, you’re his proxy, you’re my husband in the sight of God. So it’s not only right for us to go to bed, it’s essential.”

He nodded, swallowed, said he’d be back in a minute. He went into the bathroom, and she used his absence to get something from her purse. She tucked it between the mattress and the frame, where she could each it easily.

Then she shed her clothes. A white wedding gown would have been nice, but she’d exchanged vows in the skirt and sweater she’d worn to meet him at Dragon’s Keep, and she took them off now, took off everything, and when he emerged from the bathroom with a towel wrapped discreetly around his middle she met him wearing nothing but a smile.

His eyes widened at the sight of her, and his mouth fell open. And did the towel suddenly protrude a little in front, or was that her imagination?

Well, that was a question she could answer readily enough. She went to him, unhooked the towel, let it fall to the floor. He was tumescent but not fully erect, and she was pleased to note that his penis was large and nicely shaped. And circumcised, which was always a plus, but she’d known it would be. Mormons circumcised their male infants, it said so all over the Internet. They didn’t throw a party to celebrate it, the way the Jews did, but they got the job done.

“Oh, Sid,” she said, sinking to her knees before him. “I know how much you like this.” And she took his dick in her mouth.

He liked it, all right. He liked it so much that she thought he was going to consummate their marriage on the spot, and she herself was into it, and had to force herself to draw away before he could finish.

“Oh, Sid, my darling,” she said, getting to her feet, holding him by his dick. “Now, my love, I want you to do what you love to do so much.”

She led him to the bed, arranged herself upon it, and managed to indicate by gestures what she wanted him to do.

It wasn’t what he had in mind.

“I can’t,” he said. “Not until I’m married.”

“But you
are
married, silly. What do you think we just did?”

He shook his head, held up a hand as if to ward off Satan. “I’m engaged to be married,” he said, “and when my fiancée and I are man and wife in the eyes of the Church, then I will, uh, perform oral sex on her. But I’ve never done that with her, or with anyone else. I can’t, I won’t, I—”

“That’s why you wouldn’t go down on Rita.”

He gaped.

“Yeah, she told me. ‘This gorgeous guy, he’s got a beautiful dick, plus he’s a really great kisser, but he wouldn’t kiss me where it counts.’ But you wanted to, didn’t you?”

“If circumstances had been different—”

“They are. Look, it’s fine for Kellen Kimball to save the tip of his tongue for the girl he’s going to marry. But that’s got nothing to do with you right now, because you’re not Kellen Kimball anymore. Right now you’re Sidney Teibel, and you’re married to me, so you get to have your cake and eat me, too.”

“But—”

She touched herself, dipped her fingers into her wetness, then held her hand to his face. “Can you smell how hot I am for you?”

What was he going to do, hold his breath? He hesitated, then took hold of her wrist, brought her moist fingers to his nose, inhaled her essence.