The Necklace - The Dusky Club, June 1962 - Linda S Rice (books to read fiction txt) 📗

and across his shoulders. Both of them were moist with sweat and slightly panting from their exertion.

James pushed her back slightly away from him, holding her by her shoulders, a warm smile on his face.

“That was quite aggressive of you...Have you no shame, My lady?” he asked, teasingly.

She smiled back at him. “Where you’re concerned, sir, none whatsoever...”

She eased herself off him and slipped the dress back on, this time with no undergarments...just in case they decided on more of the same later. She knew all he had to do was crook his finger.

She was, indeed, shameless.

A short time later, after tidying up the cottage, Susan decided to take a bath, ran hot water into the clawfoot tub, and immersed herself in the warmth with a sigh. Buttons had come back, trotted into the bathroom with her, and was sitting on the toilet seat. Susan’s limbs were still like limp rubber after her last intimate encounter, and she sighed deeply as she slid down into the water until it touched her chin. She closed her eyes, feeling as if she could fall asleep in the comfort of the bath. Slowly, she began washing with the rose-scented soap sitting on a small table next to the tub, luxuriating in the slinky feel and wonderful smell of the soap on her skin. When she finished washing, she lowered her head back into the water, wetting her hair, then raised up using the same soap to wash it, as she hadn’t been able to find any shampoo.

“Don’t have shampoo or conditioner here?” she asked Buttons.

“Mrow,” the cat responded.

“I’ll take that as a no...” Susan responded.

After leaning back and rinsing the soap out of her hair, she got out of the tub, wrapped a towel around her, and walked back out into the lounge. James was fast asleep on the couch, his hands pressed together under one cheek. The sight of him took her breath away as she continued to drink him in.

Damn! She was in love. There was no doubt about it. She had felt the emotion creep up on her from the moment she first laid eyes on him three days before. It was a feeling that started in the pit of her stomach and moved up into her chest, making her feel almost faint. Knowing she only had four days left to be with him, near him, holding him...tears stung her eyes, and she rubbed them away quickly.

She turned and went into the bedroom, putting the green dress back on, then went out into the kitchen. It was late afternoon, time to think about dinner. Methodically, she started opening cabinets to see what was there. She then took a quick inventory of the refrigerator, where there were still numerous items left over from their picnic hampers and what they’d bought the day before.

“Ah,” she thought, “Chicken; I can do something with Mel’s leftover roast chicken...” She took it out and began removing the skin and bones, placing the pieces of meat into a large pan she found, saving a few pieces for Buttons, and added some olive oil she’d discovered in one of the cabinets. She looked out the window into the garden and remembered the basil she’d seen that morning. She went out into the garden, snipped several sprigs of basil, then some oregano, and pulled an onion and a garlic bulb out of the ground. Removing the papery skin from the onion and garlic, she chopped them on a cutting board and added them to the pan. With a pair of scissors, she snipped the basil and oregano and sprinkled it on top. She then took the tomatoes James’s dad had given them, diced them, put them on top of everything else, lit the gas burner to low, and put a lid on the pan. She found linguine pasta in another cabinet and set the package on the counter. In the refrigerator, she found some Romano cheese that was already grated and set it on the counter next to the pasta.

“Hmmm...” she thought, “I can turn the rest of the French bread into garlic toast and maybe make a salad. Auntie Annabelle appears to have a taste for Italian food based on her pantry items and garden.”

James came into the kitchen then, just as the chicken and tomatoes were beginning to simmer.

“What are you making?” he asked, still looking a bit sleepy-eyed.

“Italian food,” she replied. “It appears your Aunt must like it. There’s all sorts of stuff in her pantry to make it with.”

He nodded. “Her husband was stationed in Italy during the war, and he came back with all kinds of recipes and a love of Italian food. She learned how to cook it, and even her garden has all the herbs and things like garlic that she uses to cook Italian. My mum and dad used to come here all the time for her famous Italian feasts.”

“Well, that explains it then. Do you like Italian food?”

“Love it...if it’s good...Is yours going to be good?”

She put her hands on her hips, pretending to be insulted. “What do you think? You liked the French toast well enough this morning.”

“That I did. But, I would probably have liked it even you’d burned it.”

They both laughed, then James suddenly became silent. He looked at her standing at the stove. She had one of Auntie Annabelle’s aprons tied around her waist and a spot of tomato juice on her cheek. She lifted the lid on the chicken, gave a quick stir with a large spoon, then put the lid back on and lowered the heat. He came over and wrapped his arms around her from behind, nuzzling the back of her neck. He pulled her tighter against him.

“I love you,” he said into her ear. “I think I’ve loved you from the moment I saw you.”

She froze. Those had been her exact thoughts. A shiver went down her spine all the way to her toes. That feeling seemed to happen a lot around him. She turned slowly to face him and lifted a hand to brush the hair off his forehead.

“Oh James,” she murmured, gazing deeply into his eyes, “I love you so much it hurts. It feels like I’ve loved you my whole life.”

Tears welled in her eyes as she laid her head on his shoulder. “I have loved you my whole life,” she thought. “Haven’t I?”

He pushed her back for a moment, wiped the tomato juice off her face, and gathered her closer to him. “I feel that I can’t even hold you close enough...” Gently, he stroked her back as she sighed contentedly. He then slowly inched the skirt of her dress up and squeezed her bare bottom. Her face was buried into his shoulder. “Here we go again,” she smiled.

“Oh my, yes!” giggled her hormones.

It was late morning on Monday when Lynn switched on her iPhone and tapped into the App Marta had installed. James and Susan were in the kitchen in the cottage, Susan standing in front of the stove stirring something in a large pan. She saw James enter the room and come up behind her.

Where were they? It certainly wasn’t Susan’s hotel room, that’s for sure! They must be at James’s house or somebody else's house. She laughed. It figured Susan would be in the kitchen. Lynn knew Susan had a passion for cooking.

Lynn listened to their conversation, a worried expression coming over her face.

“Okay, this is worse than bad,” she thought. “What should I do?...She’s so caught up in the moment; she doesn’t even know what she’s saying. She obviously surrendered to him...but, they’re in love already? Oh, my God!”

After only a few moments of contemplation and another peek into her iPhone that reflected a way too sensual moment between the two new lovers, she flicked off the phone and made her way to Marta and Mika’s cabin. Time to throw a wrench in this before the craziness went any further.

Susan didn’t belong with James! She belonged back home with her husband!

 

Chapter Ten

Lynn Goes Back

“Believe in love at first sight?” asked a very familiar voice, as Lynn was fussing with her iPhone, trying to figure out why it didn’t work anymore.

“Huh...what...” she mumbled, looking up from her lap.

Ian, only a few feet away and leaning one elbow on the table where she was sitting, looked at her questioningly.

If she’d been paying attention for the past five minutes instead of poking at her iPhone, she would have realized that she’d materialized onto the same bar stool that Susan had been on just three nights previous.

She was in the Dusky Club. It was just past midnight on Monday night, and Ian was subbing in for the lead guitarist for “The Stingers,” and there was a break between sets. Right before the end of the last song, one of the other band members had elbowed Ian and motioned over to where Lynn was sitting.

As the music ended, he said, “Looks a bit like that American bird that James went so daft over last Friday and Saturday nights when you were playing. I was back with the bartender, and Sandra was babbling about how the regular girls had fits and starts over his attention to her.”

Ian looked intently over at Lynn.

She was wearing her own June Cleaver-style dress in a pale shade of yellow, which set off her suntan. She stood out like a ray of sunshine in the room, with her golden hair and generously endowed body. She had a yellow ribbon in her hair. Ian felt a familiar stirring in his loins as he took her in from head to toe. Where in the hell had she come from? Was she one of Susan’s fellow students come to meet her for the history tour? Maybe she had just arrived earlier than Susan was expecting her? Susan said the other students would be arriving on Friday, and then they’d all be going off to somewhere else for their tour.

The longer he looked at her, her sandaled foot swinging back and forth as she concentrated on something in her lap, the more he felt drawn to her. What exactly was it about these American girls that made them so desirable?

Ian had been the first one to notice Susan last Friday and was ready to make his move on her when James cut him out. No matter. This girl was much more in his style. Susan looked like some frightened kitten as James made his attempts to pursue her. This girl looked ripe and ready for the plucking. Voluptuous and just waiting to be caressed.

“Wager on?” asked the other Stinger band member.

“For tonight?” Ian asked.

“Of course! That’s always the wager, isn’t it?”

“You’re on then.”

“Good luck, mate. Hope she’s not like that other American bird, flighty as hell and not willing to put out on the first or even second try as I heard.”

Lynn recovered from her initial shock at seeing Ian so close and personal. She quickly shoved her iPhone in her purse and glanced around the club.

“I...I...don’t know what I think of love at first sight,” she said, sounding startled at his question.

“Well...I never really thought much about it either...until now...” Ian said, pulling another stool up to the table and looking at her.

She had the most gorgeous brown eyes. They were like chocolate, and he thought they reflected a deeply passionate nature. He was very intrigued.

Lynn thought, “Oh geez, I wasn’t expecting this! I came here to rescue Susan from her stupid self, and now here I am confronted with...confronted