Chapter 13 #2
One day she was going to meet Anna somewhere and not immediately drag her home, but today was not that day.
They sat as far apart as possible in the back seat of the Uber, resisting the urge to even hold hands. Talk was kept small, simple, happy. Most of the ride, they were content to remain companionably silent.
The back seat of someone else’s car just didn’t seem to be the place for as big a conversation as the one they needed to have, and if Victoria so much as brushed Anna’s pinky finger with her own, she would start kissing her and never, ever stop.
The ride felt interminable, but at last, they got to Anna’s Hancock Park flat.
It did not surprise Victoria to find, as she was ushered through the door, that Anna’s small flat was as cozy and inviting as her office.
There was the same sort of overstuffed furniture, the long sheer draperies, and walls lined with bookshelves, full to the brim of battered paperbacks and assorted knickknacks.
Victoria pulled out a squat, ink-annotated, well-thumbed copy of Sylvia Plat’s The Bell Jar and let out a low whistle. “Heavy stuff, this.”
“I think it should be required reading for every mental health professional,” Anna said from her nook of a kitchen, where she was putting the kettle on and getting down cups for tea. “But it’s not exactly light work, no.” She flashed Victoria a quick smile. “Have you read it?”
“Once, in uni. That was more than enough.” She replaced the book and then sat on the sofa, watching Anna move around to prepare tea for them.
Could I get used to this? she wondered, leaning down to unzip her boots and place them neatly alongside the sofa.
Sitting back, she curled her feet up under her and tried to allow herself to surrender to the feeling of being cared for.
Cherished, perhaps. Supported by someone besides herself.
Victoria closed her eyes and listened to the sounds of a truly peaceful life.
The rustle of a waxed paper bag and the hushed brush of loose-leaf tea being measured into delicate metal strainers.
The click as the spoon was set down on the polished tile countertop.
The burble of the kettle as it boiled. Water streaming into cups.
Anna humming something unidentifiable as she picked up the tray and—
Victoria’s eyes opened as Anna set a tray down on the coffee table.
“We’ll let the tea steep for a bit,” Anna said, sitting down and sliding herself up against the back of the sofa.
Turning, she propped her elbow on the cushions and leaned her head onto her hand, a soft smile lighting up her face as she focused on Victoria at last. “Hi, there.”
“Hi, there,” Victoria echoed, unable to stop her own responding smile. It was so easy, too easy, to imagine coming home to this.
It was less easy to let herself believe that she might be allowed to.
She twisted in her seat to face Anna, letting her fingers spiderwalk along the back of the sofa. “So.”
“So.” Anna reached forward to brush a slender lock of hair out of Victoria’s face. “You were cleared.”
“Provisionally,” Victoria murmured, resisting the urge to grab Anna’s hand and press a kiss into her palm.
“I think the next six months are going to be a walk in the park for you.” Her hand dropped to Victoria’s knee. “I’m proud of you.”
“I’m terrified,” Victoria confessed, the words feeling wrenched out of some sticky, dark pit deep in her soul. “It was always just me. My mother made me so damned independent. So I relied on myself, because I could only trust myself.”
“Until you couldn’t anymore.” Anna’s fingers squeezed around Victoria’s knee.”
“Until then. But even then… you see how hard it is for me to accept any weakness in myself. To accept help.” To even admit to it was still difficult, but she had come too far over the last weeks and months, was feeling too much better after every peaceful night and emotional purge, to go back now.
“To admit I was wrong. I should never have taken Hilary’s case.
But she only trusted me…how could I…” She looked down at her hands and tried to blink back tears.
“She shouldn’t have trusted me. I should have disclosed our relationship.
Maybe she would still be alive if I had… ”
“Stop.” Anna shifted forward and took Victoria’s twisting, tormented hands in hers.
“You can’t change what happened. You have no way of knowing how things might have gone.
We have to live in the here and now.” Her thumb stroked over Victoria’s fingers, soft, soothing, loving.
“And here, now, you’re so amazing. And Victoria, I’m sorry, too.
I shouldn’t have lost my temper. Oh, and…
” Her face was bright, burning red. “I said such awful, nasty things.”
“Usually you’d be the first to say that fear will do that,” Victoria remarked wryly.
“It was fear, I live every day with a fear of crossing ethical lines or causing harm to a patient or doing any number of things so catastrophically wrong that it costs me my career.” The confession tumbled out of Anna in a rush.
“And I had been quite deeply fearful of another Hilary situation happening,” Victoria said quietly, briefly pulling one hand free from Anna’s grip so that she could stroke away a tear she saw trickling from one sad green eye.
“When it did, it knocked all the wobbly foundation out from under me. Poor Daniel Jennings.”
“Poor you,” Anna corrected, blinking further tears away.
“Poor you as well,” Victoria said softly. Then she leaned forward to press her forehead against Anna’s.
They sat, heads together, hands entangled, tea cooling in mugs, surrounded by silence for long, dreamlike moments. It felt comforting. Right.
Like the start of something beautiful that, with time, Victoria might come to accept as deserved.
They moved at the same time, lips meeting with a sweet softness and warmth.
Anna’s hands let go of Victoria’s and slid up her arms, to the back of her neck.
As their lips and tongues and breaths mingled, Victoria felt Anna gently tugging the elastic from her hair, letting the blond waves tumble about.
She slid her own hands up into Anna’s soft auburn curls, scented like green apple and silky as French lingerie. Her fingers curled to fit around Anna’s head, thumbs stroking her jawline. Victoria got up on her knees, then to her feet, never ending the kiss, pulling Anna up after her.
Though she’d never been here before, instinct guided her towards Anna’s bedroom as though she’d lived here for years. Backwards, each of them tugging one item of clothing off of the other every step of the way, a Hansel and Gretel trail of textile breadcrumbs left on the hardwood floor.
The bedroom was as white as Victoria’s own, but the puffy, ruffle-edged white of a cloud rather than a sterile, streamlined Scandinavian showroom.
Now fully nude, Victoria tumbled down onto a wide brass-railed canopy bed draped in gauzy white fabric, pushed aside a downy soft duvet, sank into the dreamy cushion of the mattress.
Still tugging Anna in after her, she slid back until she was reclining against a lush pile of pillows.
This room was a palace of sensuality, softness at every turn, no sharp edges.
Like Anna. Like everything she adored about Anna.
Victoria gathered Anna’s warm, pliant body against hers, skin to skin, letting her hands run down lightly freckled arms, moving to cup one full, milky white breast, to brush her thumb over one pink pebbly nipple.
And she couldn’t stop kissing Anna, drinking in the warmth and softness of her mouth as if it could save her from dying of thirst in a desert.
Anna was straddling Victoria’s thigh, her pussy warm and tempting against her skin. Victoria let her hands move down to grab Anna’s ass, relishing each generous handful. “Come up,” she said, tugging Anna up so that she was on her knees. “Here.”
“What?” Anna, off-balance, reached forward to grab the brass rail at the top of the bed. The movement lifted her enough that Victoria could slide down between her thighs, could curl her arms up to grab Anna’s ass again. Eagerly, she opened her mouth and pulled Anna into it.
“Oh,” was all she heard above her head before she focused on the soft wet heat and auburn curls of Anna’s pussy.
Anna was delicious, sweet and clean as Victoria’s tongue stroked and explored each damp fold of velvety skin.
Her clit was a stiff little button that kept trying to elude Victoria’s attentions, but Victoria was determined, driven by lust, by hunger, by a deep need to make the tiny beautiful gasps and whimpers overhead turn into mindless moans and filthy swearing.
Her fingers curled in, dimpling the soft curves of Anna’s hips and butt.
She couldn’t help moaning herself as she licked and sucked, drinking in the taste of Anna, the sound of Anna’s sighs, the tiny clicks as Anna’s fingers clenched and released the brass railing.
Her hips rolled forward as if she could press herself even more deeply into Victoria’s eager mouth.
“Fuck,” she breathed out, a thread of a squeal in her voice.
Victoria looked up to see Anna’s head thrown back, mouth open, auburn hair tumbling down around her shoulders.
Her skin was rosy all over, from her cheeks to her heavy breasts, to her hands gripping the rail. She was close, so close.
“Fuck,” Anna said again, louder now, and Victoria narrowed her focus to Anna’s clit, to sucking it hard, teasing it with the tip of her tongue as Anna rode her face and begged for Victoria to let her come, get her there, she was close, she almost—
Victoria slipped two fingers into Anna’s pussy and curled them just right, pressing down on a soft little spongey swelling of skin.
A deep, guttural groan almost tore its way out of Anna’s mouth, and she pried one hand free to reach down and press Victoria’s face tight against her body as she came, pussy clenching around Victoria’s fingers.
“Fuck,” she said a third time, body arched back in a tight curve for a moment before she let go of the railing completely and slumped down, sliding along Victoria’s body.
Victoria pushed herself back up against the pillows and they lay there, panting and sweaty and entangled in each other. She licked her lips and tasted Anna there.
Anna’s eyes were locked on Victoria’s mouth. And then, sinuously, Anna slid up and over, straddling Victoria’s hips. “Kiss me.” The whisper came out in a low, soft rasp that sent a thrill down Victoria’s spine. “I want to taste myself in your mouth.”
But she didn’t wait for Victoria to lift her mouth to meet hers.
Hungrily, Anna sucked Victoria’s bottom lip into her mouth and tugged with her teeth, sucked until that bottom lip was pouting and full.
Then her tongue dived in, licked around, tasting, tickling, exploring.
Victoria held her breath, closed her eyes, and let herself fall into the pleasure of it all.
She felt Anna’s hand drifting over her breasts, stopping to pinch and tug at Victoria’s nipples until she couldn’t stop her hips from arching up, her moans from spilling louder and more helplessly into Anna’s insistent mouth.
By the time Anna’s fingers had danced down over Victoria’s stomach and slipped into the nest of golden curls between her legs, Victoria was so wet and ready that Anna was able to easily slide two, then three fingers into her pussy, stretching her open in a way that made Victoria want…
“More,” she moaned, her head pressing back into the pillows as she spread her legs wider. “Please…”
She all but whimpered as Anna’s hand withdrew and she rolled away, then Victoria heard a drawer being pulled open on the bedside table.
There was the click of a plastic lid, a liquid squeeze, and the sound of Anna’s hands slowly rubbing together.
When she touched Victoria again, her fingers were warm and slick, sliding easily over her clit and dipping deep inside.
One finger, then two, then back to three, then…
Four fingers, up to the knuckles, filled her up, and Victoria’s eyes flew open. “Oh, God.”
Anna moved carefully to kneel between Victoria’s thighs, propping herself up with her free hand. Slowly, so so so slowly, her hand pumped in and out of Victoria, pressing and stretching, filling and filling and filling and… “Do you trust me, Victoria?”
She thought she might go blind with how good it all felt, Anna’s hand almost entirely inside her, thumb slipping over her clit and sending waves of pure sensual bliss all through her body. “Of course,” she breathed, hardly able to speak. “Anna, please, yes…”
With a few more filling, stretching strokes, she felt open, ready, and then with a slow twist and a push, Anna’s hand was inside of her.
Victoria’s nipples were stiff, her breath trapped in her lungs, and her entire system was overloaded with pleasure signals.
When Anna’s hand began to move carefully within her, Victoria’s mind went blank with static, and all she could think with each slow thrust was, Good, good, good, so good, oh God, so good…
“Come for me, Victoria,” Anna whispered, her breath a warm tickle on Victoria’s inner thigh. “Let go…”
Then her mouth came down on Victoria’s clit, sucking it in and teasing it with her tongue as her hand pushed deep inside, shifted, twisted, pulled back… and again, and again, and again—
No orgasm Victoria had ever had in her life hit her like this one did, a hammer of trust and joy and lusty pleasure and surrender.
It raced through her, her back arching, fingers gripping a handful of the pushed-aside duvet, and Anna stayed there between her thighs, her careful hand and greedy mouth the entire center of Victoria’s electric, shattering world.
She was too wrung out to feel bereft when Anna’s hand slipped out of her, or to make any sound at all as Anna crawled back up to lie down next to her.
Limp and happy, she let herself be gathered up into Anna’s arms, and then Anna threw the cloudlike duvet over them both. A kiss was pressed to her temple.
This was perfect. This was where Victoria wanted to be, forever.
“Thank you,” she mumbled, twisting in Anna’s embrace to nestle her face into the curve of Anna’s neck.
“No, Victoria. Thank you.” Another kiss fluttered against her hair. “Do you need anything?”
Drowsy, content, Victoria looped her arm around Anna’s waist. “You. J’st you.”
I love you, I think, was her last thought as she fell blissfully into sleep, cradled in Anna’s arms.