The Edge of Always

her fingertips.

“Nothing,” I said and kissed her fingers when her hand made it to my mouth. “I like being alone with you.”

She tilted her head gently to one side and her expression softened. Then she looked out at the park. The trees were full, and the grass was thick and green. It really was a nice day. I wondered why we seemed like the only two outside enjoying it.

“I think tulips are pretty,” she said distantly, staring toward the small, grassy hill on the other side of me.

I looked, too, and saw a single tulip perched on the top of that hill, all alone. I’m not sure why, but ever since that day, whenever I see a tulip anywhere, I think of her.

I’ll never forget the smile on her face as I play and sing the song to her. It’s so warm and bright and endearing, the kind of smile that says I Love You More Than Anything In This World without having to say the words.

21

January 21—my twenty-sixth birthday

I’m having a sweet dream that involves me skydiving (for some odd reason, with actor Christopher Lee) and the sky is as blue as… well, the sky. Christopher Lee, with red goggles plastered over his eyes, gives me a thumbs-up just before the wind whisks him away into the blue ether. Then suddenly my heart stops, and I suck in a sharp, frigid breath. My eyes pop open to the real world. My body jerks upward from the bed so fast that my arm swings out beside me, and I hit the lamp mounted on the wall.

“Ho-ly-shit!” I yell out.

It takes me a second to realize what happened. Between seeing Camryn at the foot of the bed holding an ice bucket and me frantically tossing the cold, wet sheets to the side, I’m still trying to catch my breath.

Camryn cackles loudly. “Happy birthday, baby! Get up!”

I guess I deserved that after what I did to her on the morning of her birthday last month. But the devious little shit really got me good, much worse than I did her. I guess paybacks really are a bitch.

Unable to keep from smiling, I just go with it and slowly ease my naked ass off the bed. Already she’s got that uh-oh look on her face as she begins to back away from me and move toward the door. Knowing it’s her only way out, I watch as she gauges the situation.

“I’m sorry!” she says with a terrified smile, her hand bent behind her feeling her way for the door.

“Uh-huh, I’m sure you are, babe.”

I walk very slowly toward her, my hooded eyes watching her as if I’m a predator toying with its prey.

She cackles again. “Andrew! You better not!” She’s just two feet from the door now. But I take my time, letting her think she might actually make it that far, my grin deepening to the point that I know I must look like a sadistic madman by now.

Suddenly, Camryn squeals, unable to contain it any longer and dashes to the door thrusting it open. “Nooo! Please!” she yells and laughs at the same time as the door swings wide open, smashing into the wall. She runs out into the hallway.

When I come running out after her, the shocked look on her face and the hilarious fact that she actually stopped, is a dead giveaway that she didn’t expect me to go this far with no clothes.

“Oh my God! Andrew, no!” she screams out as she starts running full throttle down the length of the brightly lit hall.

I just keep on running after her, everything I have hanging in the breeze. That girl has a lot to learn if she actually thought I’d be too embarrassed to run out after her, butt naked and with shrinkage. I don’t care. She’s going to regret that bucket of ice.

We run past room 321 just as an elderly couple is stepping out. The man pulls his wide-eyed wife back as the crazy naked man zooms past.

“Oh dear God…,” I hear a voice far behind me say.

Finally, when Camryn makes it to the very end of the long hallway, she stops and faces me, her back arched over, both hands out in front of her as if to put up a shield. Tears are streaming from her eyes from laughing so hard.

“I give up! I give up! Oh my God, you’re naked!” She can’t stop laughing. I laugh too when I hear her snort once.

“You’re really in for it,” I say as I grab her and hoist her over my shoulder.

She doesn’t even try kicking and screaming and flailing this time. One, she still can’t stop laughing long enough to gain that kind of control over her body. And two, she knows better. I just hope she doesn’t pee on me.

I carry her all the way back down the hallway toward our room, and when we come to room 321 I say “Sorry you had to see that. You have a good day now” with a nod as I pass. The couple just stares, the husband shaking his head at me with a revolted look.

I close the door behind us and throw Camryn down on the bed amid the chunks of ice and freezing water. She’s still laughing.

I stand between her legs and take off her shorts and panties at the same time, staring down at her without muttering a word. I’m hard in seconds. Her playful mood shifts in an instant, and she bites down on her bottom lip, looking up at me with those sweetly seductive blue eyes that always bring out the primal in me.

Without any real warning, I lower myself on top of her and bury myself inside her.

“Are you really sorry?” I whisper, moving in and out of her slowly. My chest pressed hard against hers, our tattoos touching, Orpheus and Eurydice becoming whole again as we become one with each other.

“Yes…,” she says, the word shuddering from her lips.

I thrust inside of her a little deeper, pushing one of her thighs up with my hand.

Her eyelids become heavy and she tilts her head back.

I crush my mouth over hers, and her moans reverberate through my throat as I start to fuck her harder.

Then something inside of me grows dark, predatory. I climb onto the bed and grab both of her thighs, digging my fingers into her flesh as I drag her across the bed toward me so fast she doesn’t get a chance to move. Seizing both of her arms, I flip her body over and pin her wrists behind her back and force her on her knees. With my free hand, I touch the soft contours of her ass as it’s raised up in front of me, squeezing each cheek in my hand tight before I smack them so hard her body jerks forward. She whimpers. Then I press my hand against the back of her neck, pushing the side of her face harder against the mattress. I feel the heat coming off her flesh from where my hand has already left red marks.

She whimpers again, and I twist her wrists tighter in my hand. Reaching down with the other, I put two fingers in her mouth and hook her cheek with them while push my cock inside of her from behind.

She cries a little, her thighs beginning to shake, but I don’t stop. I know she really doesn’t want me to.

After I come and my heartbeat slows, I pull her naked body next to mine, her sweating head nestled in the crook of my arm. She kisses my chest and walks her index and middle fingers over my bicep and toward my mouth. I take her hand and kiss her fingers.

“I’m so glad that you’re you again,” she says softly.

“That I’m me?” I ask, and she tilts her head back so she can see my eyes. “Haven’t I always been?”

“No, not always.”

“When have I not been?” I’m truly confused, but I find her coyness over whatever she’s getting at adorable.

“After we lost Lily,” she says, and the playful smile that had been growing at my lips fades. “I don’t blame you for it, but after Lily you treated me like a porcelain doll, afraid you’d break me if you handled me too roughly.”

I squeeze my arm around her a little tighter and her cheek falls back against my chest.