Crystal Grader - Tag Cavello (reading women .TXT) 📗

A second, less stable smile surfaced on his face.

“I’m not working on anything right now, Crystal. Not even a short story.”

“That’s okay.”

“Tell that to my agent.”

“Get him on the phone and I will. But first I want my birthday kiss.”

He laughed. Crystal let him do it, standing her ground. Earlier in the day she’d gone over with herself a number of possible reactions in regard to this matter. One of them had been laughter. In fact she’d placed that one as the most likely to occur. Yes, of course he would laugh, try to fob the request—demand—off as a joke on her part. It was a desperate defense mechanism…and it stood about as much chance with her as a trailer park in a tornado.

“Now I know you’re not afraid,” she goaded, raising an eyebrow. “You write romance books for a living. And it’s not like I’m asking for an arrow through the heart. I just want a birthday kiss.”

“I’m not afraid. But Crystal, wouldn’t you rather have something like that from a boy your own age?”

“I like men, dear, not boys,” she rejoined instantly.

Jarett took a step in reverse. His butt bumped the accessory rack. Crystal moved forward, her lip curving into a serpentine smile. On the radio Don McClean reflected that perhaps it was time for the world to pay closer attention to messages hidden in lines of beauty. Crystal thought she’d never heard anything more wise.

She moved in closer, standing on tip-toe to put her hands on his shoulders. This gesture of physical contact appeared to relax Jarett a little. The cowering stopped. His broad chest came forward. Opening her lips, Crystal drew a deep breath. It brought her own, far more petite chest close enough to touch the fabric of his shirt.

“I can’t,” he whispered.

But Crystal could see the fire reflected in his eyes, showing a different truth.

“Sure you can. You just open your mouth and say Happy birthday, Crystal, here’s your kiss.”

“I haven’t kissed a girl in I don’t know how long.”

“I’ve never once been kissed by a boy. Let’s put an end to two dry spells. And hurry up because I can’t stand on tip-toe forever.”

She expected the remark to instigate another laugh. It didn’t. Instead, Jarett put his hands on her hips and lifted gently, easing some of the pressure from her legs.

“Oh, better,” she told him, grinning. Her fingers scurried around his neck. “We’re almost there.”

“I still don’t know if I can do it,” he said.

“Look at me, Jarett.”

His eyes, which had strayed to the window, returned to her face.

“Good boy. Now then.” Her head tilted, and she showed him the smallest, prettiest smile she had. “Happy birthday, Crystal. Say it.”

“Happy birthday, Crystal.”

“Yeah,” she whispered. “Lift me up just a little more.” She felt her toes lose contact with where they’d been, and her heart, now that she was fully in the arms of the only man in this world she would ever want, began to race with excitement. When she next spoke it was as much to herself as it was to him. “There you go, sweetheart, that’s it. Just relax. We can do this.”

“Crystal…”

“Shh. Shh.”

“…with eyes that watch the world and can’t forget…like the strangers that you’ve met…”

Though her eyes were closed, Crystal could sense his kiss was only centimeters away. Her lungs expanded with a faint, musky breath of aftershave. Hairs on the nape of his neck brushed her soft fingers. She bent her knee, bringing her toe away from the floor like a ballerina. It shifted her weight…

And their lips came together for the very first time.

The musky breath plumed out through her nose and was immediately dragged back in. Getting enough air to remain in the moment became an endeavor. All at once the room seemed to lack an adequate supply. Her chest heaved. A moan escaped her throat. Jarett responded to this with an appetite that was not surprising, given her retained knowledge of the fetish he kept. Crystal felt her body lifted even higher from the floor. Enjoying the ride, she smiled between gasps, digging her red nails into his hair. Her other knee bent. Now both of her feet were pointed at the opposite end of the room, as if to distract undesirables from witnessing their exchange. And indeed Crystal knew from someplace far away that what they were doing was forbidden, that it must never be seen, or even alluded to beyond the confines of this secret realm—fiery, snowy—that they’d created and would now share for all eternity.

Tragic, that. For it would have been a joy to describe how it was to tread the water in this typhoon, to huff for air between the waves of Jarett Powell’s virility. She tasted his lips with an appetite for being enveloped that matched and even overcame the beast for breathless girls he kept on his leash. Drawing another chestful of air, Crystal let her eyes flutter open. She was surprised to find that his, too, were open, yet took advantage of the coincidence by seizing them with her blue gaze, so as to dare with an arched brow further advancement into the storm, or better yet, invite a dangerous plunge to whatever beckoned from below.

Jarett was not ready for it.

He let her down with a flushed look that suggested he’d just come awake from a fever dream. Crystal decided to give him a few moments. Her hands had slid down to his chest, and there they remained while the fire in the grate danced on, and the radio played another song.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

He let her go before answering with eyes that had lost their courage. “Yes. But I think the lesson’s over.”

“Only for today I hope.”

She went to the couch, put the manuscript back in her bag. A rather interesting discovery awaited her upon turning around. There was a bulge in Jarett’s pants. Seeing it froze Crystal on the spot. She dropped her bag and stared like a starving girl set before a banquet.

At first Jarett took no notice—his gaze had fallen to the floor and seemed incapable of finding the strength to rise. But Crystal’s fascination was stubborn. It held her bewitched, until at last Jarett did look up…and caught her gawking.

He muttered something incomprehensible while his hands jumped at the radio, almost knocking it off the mantle. Steven Tyler was cut off mid-whoop: “Aieeeee--!”

“Oh come on,” Crystal said. Now that the discovery was no longer in view she could talk again. “I made you feel good. Don’t be ashamed of that. You made me feel good, too.”

“I’m not ashamed.”

He was, though. His body was still facing the mantle.

“Jarett?”

She waited, and when nothing happened, called his name again. This time he turned around. The bulge had wilted. Jarett Powell stood regarding her the way a man regards a poisonous snake. He was afraid of her.

Why? The age difference? Ridiculous! In both mind and body Crystal felt ready to escape her childhood, to set aside the plastic palette of water-colors she’d thus far been using to illustrate her ideals and explore richer, more complex mediums of the craft. Couldn’t Jarett see that, simply by the way she looked at him, or the buttered, beckoning tone of voice she used whilst in his company?

A frustrated part of her wanted to leap over the table at that very moment and strike like the hissing cobra he feared. But of course that would never do. That was painting with water-colors again—all chaos and fun. And Jarett, like herself, needed more. More time, more convincing. Most of all, more knowledge of who exactly Crystal Genesio was.

One vital piece of information in that last regard needed sending right away.

“I could be your girlfriend, Jarett,” she said, hoping he wouldn’t cringe. If he cringed she really would jump over the table, probably to slap him. “Yes,” she went on, confirming the offer. “I’d be happy to. More than happy.”

“I’m forty years old, Crystal.”

It was something to say—something to fill the void of awkwardness between them—so he said it. Good boy. There were a lot of things about him she could tolerate, but not his silence. It gave her nothing to swing at, to hit back onto his side of the court.

“I’m twelve,” she nodded, flashing an elfish smile that asked what’s your point? “At least that’s how many candles were on my last birthday cake.”

“I know how old you are. That’s the problem.”

“You see a problem. All I see are colors.”

She returned to where he stood and placed a hand on his cheek. It was a reach—she had to crane her neck and stand on tip-toe—but he was the one still climbing. His head turned away. Gently, Crystal tugged it back.

“I could give you all the things you need from a girl,” she whispered, “all the things you need.”

“You don’t know what I need.”

She stroked his stubble. “Yes I do. And I know you think I’m pretty, Jarett. I know you liked kissing me just now.”

“Yes.”

“Then don’t be afraid. I just want to make you happy.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s how it is when a girl falls in love.”

His eyes widened in shock. Crystal only nodded again, then eased his face down lower to plant one final kiss on his mouth before stepping away to pick up her bag.

“Ready to take me home?” she asked.

Several seconds went by before Jarett answered with a vague nod and a shrug.

“Good.” A giggle fluttered from her lips. “But wipe off the Maybelline first, dear. I got some of it on ya.”

11

 

“Crystal Antoinette Genesio,” the judge intoned moodily from his bench, “please stand up.”

Her lawyer flashed another one of his shifty-eyed, shark grins before nodding that she should do as commanded. By now the expression, which he had shown over and over during the two consultations that came after her arrest, no longer disgusted Crystal. Now they only made her weary. Today it seemed to harbor a new ingredient; there was something sheepish as well as sharkish lurking within the greasy concoction on his face. What it signified was plain: They had lost the fight.

“Of the possession of tobacco on school property,” the judge went on, “this court finds you guilty.”

Sighs rose from the audience behind her. Sounds of shifting feet. From somewhere Crystal felt the tip of an icicle draw a slow, lazy line down her back. This, she knew, was the stare coming from her mother. They’d been fighting since the middle of May. That was when the contraband had turned up in her locker. Cigarettes—an entire carton of Marlboro Lights.

“You will not be charged with theft, since the tobacco in question does not appear to be stolen. However, as you are reluctant to name the establishment where you chose to make your purchase—“

“I cannot name the establishment, your honor,” Crystal broke in, “because as I said, the cigarettes are not mine—“

“Be quiet!” the judge snapped.

He was old. Did young judges even exist? Crystal didn’t think so. This one looked like an ex circus performer: bald on top with salt and pepper fluffs of hair around his ears. Black-framed glasses like the ones Drew Carey used to wear rested on a nose that bobbed up and down as he spoke.

“This is a sentencing, young lady!” that nose—for it really seemed the words were coming more from his nostrils than his lips—told her. “Your time for rebuttals is expired! Do you understand?”

Crystal nodded. “Yes.”

“Yes, what?”

Now she blinked at the man. What more did he need? “Um…yes, thank you?” she tried.

It wasn’t even close. “Yes, your honor!” the clown bellowed, making Crystal jump high enough to bump her knee on the table.

“Of course, of course. Yes, your honor.”

“Oh fuck me,” the lawyer muttered from his chair.

The judge’s next words were spoken loudly and in sarcastic chords that must’ve sounded very sweet to his own ears. “Crystal Genesio, this court finds you guilty of unlawful