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

her. She reached for her purse sitting next to the couch and pulled out her iPod. She scrolled through the songs, smiling as she passed by her favorite song, the one that James had just finished writing, tempted to play it. She knew she couldn’t.

When she got to the “M’s,” she stopped at the Jim McCrow/Beth Gill song, getting goosebumps all over as she recalled the words to the song. Then she got an idea. She reached for her sketch pad that was lying on the coffee table and grabbed a pencil. She put in her earbuds and hit “play” to listen to the song. As it played, she wrote down the words. She had to listen to the song five times to get it right. She read back the first verse of the song to herself.

“Darlin’, I’ve been dreaming today...

Thinking of nothing but you all day...

Of touching you...kissing you...

Here’s just what I need to do...

Lay down with you...

Pull you close to me...

As close as we can be...

Making love...all through the night...

Feeling you hold me so tight...

Drain my strength away…

Don’t let me go...

I want you now to feel what you know...

Until the night is gone...

Until we see the sun…

Making love...”

She tore the sheets of paper off the pad then put them in the piano bench. Tomorrow would be their last night together. She envisioned them at the piano, her playing the tune and both of them singing...and then...She was going to make it a night he’d never forget...despite what Mika had said about her only being a dim memory once she was gone. He’d most certainly remember the blonde-haired, green-eyed wanton who had graced his bed; she didn’t even doubt it. She smiled to herself wickedly.

Buttons had been sitting on the top of the couch watching her and licking her paws after eating Mel’s can of potted meat that Susan had put out for her.

“So, what do you think of my plan, kitty?” she asked Buttons.

“Mrow,” Buttons responded.

They awoke just as the sun was starting to come up, casting pale threads of light through the open curtains onto the carpeted floor and up the wall. Susan smiled as she reached down under the covers to find James was erect.

“My, my, what’s this?” she asked coyly.

“Something special, just for you,” he said sleepily, nuzzling her neck.

She pulled him on top of her. “I like special things,” she said softly, taking him into her warmth and closing her eyes as he began moving inside her.

Later, in the kitchen, while they were drinking coffee, James suggested they go back into Little Dippington and see if they could beg some pastels off Simon, then head back up the hill under the big tree and do more sketching. They ate some toast, joined hands and headed down the lane towards the village.

Simon was more than pleased to see them again and to provide them each with a box of pastels.

“Enjoy!” he said as they headed out of the studio.

As they passed Emily’s shop, Susan noticed her Granny sitting on a stool outside the door. She was staring so intently at Susan that a shiver went down her spine. Granny smiled a near-toothless grin and began nodding her head. Susan linked her arm with James’s, then looked away, quickened their pace out of Little Dippington, and walked back to the cottage. It was close to noon.

Before heading up the hill to the big tree, Susan took a couple of leftover zucchini pancakes out of the refrigerator and handed one to James.

“They’re good cold, too,” she said.

“But they’re green-looking,” he said.

“Just eat it.” She took a bite of hers. “Mmmmm.”

They grabbed their sketchpads and pastels and headed out the door.

For a half-hour, they worked with their pastels, Susan concentrating on James’s profile again, and James working on a picture of the cottage down the hill below.

James was in a pensive mood. Susan wondered what he was thinking, but before she could ask, he said, “So, I think you need to reconsider going on this history tour of yours.”

He wasn’t looking at her, just concentrating on his sketchpad. He tried to sound nonchalant.

Pastel still in hand, she looked over at him.

“What did you say?”

He put down his pastel to rub his thumb across the paper to blend some of the colors. He still didn’t look over at her.

“I said you should reconsider going on the history tour. I don’t want you to go.”

She placed her pastel back in the box at her side and set down her sketch pad. She turned to face him.

“That’s not possible,” she said. “You know that’s what I came to England for.”

“It doesn’t matter what you came here for. It’s all different now, you know...with us and everything.”

“That might be, but it doesn’t change the fact that I’m leaving tomorrow for the tour.”

“At midnight, too...right?”

“Who told you that?”

“My dad.” He continued to work on his picture. “Odd time to leave...but he said it was a turnaround to London.”

“Yes, it is. What’s so odd about that? Buses come and go twenty-four hours a day all the time.”

“Just odd because it’s in the middle of our gig at the club, and I’ve never heard of any bus leaving Brighton at midnight before.”

“Well, I didn’t know you when the tour arrangements were made...And I don’t run the bus company…”

“Not important, then. I just don’t want you to go on the tour.”

“I know you don’t want me to go. You think I want to go?”

“Then stay here and don’t go.”

“I told you that’s not possible.”

“But it is, you know. You just have to decide to stay.”

He set down his sketchpad and turned to look at her. “Tell me you’ll stay,” he pleaded, reaching out for her.

“This is ridiculous!” she yelled at him, grabbing her sketchpad and box of pastels, then abruptly standing up. She looked down at him. “You have to stop this!”

She ran down the hill and into the cottage. When she reached the kitchen, she tossed the sketchpad and box of pastels on the kitchen table. The box went over the edge and opened, spilling all the pastels out onto the floor. She didn’t care and raced out the back door into the garden where she stood, arms crossed, with her back to the door. She was shaking.

She heard James come out the back door. He came to stand behind her and ran his hands up and down the sides of her upper arms. Slowly, he pulled her back into him and leaned around the side of her neck to softly nibble her ear, then trailed kisses up and down the side of her neck. She could feel his stiffness pressing urgently into her bottom.

She was certain he’d be angry. They couldn’t seem to go a day without arguing about something, but he wasn’t. All her defenses crumbled, and a shiver of pleasure went through her as he cupped her breasts in his hands and rubbed her nipples through the fabric of her dress. What in the hell did he think he was doing? She wouldn’t...she couldn’t...change her mind about leaving tomorrow. She had no choice, and even if she’d had the choice, she now didn’t think she would decide to stay anyway.

She didn’t belong with him. He’d have another Susan at another place and time, the right time in his life for him and for her. And she had someone in the future that she suddenly realized she didn’t appreciate enough and missed terribly.

Staying here would be a disaster. He’d feel obligated to “do the right thing” by her. She’d end up having a baby and living with his dad while his career blossomed and he enjoyed a bevy of beautiful girls and groupies. He’d divorce her, just like Derek would divorce Mindy, and where would she be then? She, Mel, and a James junior hustled off to some remote place to live anonymously.

She blanched at the thought. No! It was unthinkable!

One of his hands reached down in front of her dress and inched the skirt part up to her waist, then he reached down her panties and began rubbing her most intimate and sensitive part. She squirmed against the pleasure he was bringing her. He held her close and quietly for a moment before saying softly into her ear, “I’m not going to let you go, you know. I’ve been thinking about what’s best for us, and especially for you. I’m not taking you back to Brighton until Saturday morning after I’m sure your bus has already left. You won’t be on it.”

She stiffened. Her blood turned to ice in her veins. She was stunned and not even sure if she’d heard him right. She squirmed again as he inserted a finger into her wetness.

Was he kidnapping her? Was he going to keep her here against her will? Is that what he was saying?

While her seventeen-year-old body and happy hormones responded to his caresses, her sixty-two-year-old brain kicked into gear at his incredible statement. Throwing a fit or tantrum now would get her nowhere. Would he tie her up? How would he stop her from just walking out the door, going into Little Dippington, and taking a bus to Brighton? She assumed buses came out this way. It wasn’t all that far from the city.

No, he would never physically restrain her; she was sure of that. She could just tell him right now that it was over, that she didn’t love him, that this was all a big mistake, and he would let her go. She could even, if she dared, try to tell him the truth, show him her iPod, get confirmation from Lynn, who had probably told Ian and Mindy anyway.

But she didn’t want to hurt him. And, she did love him. She did! She did! Despite everything, she did love him. Just for this one week, for this brief space in time, she did love him with all of her being.

And, at this point in her life in her real past, she’d only dated Donald, who was to become her future mate, once. She wasn’t in love with him yet; she barely knew him. So, this was all okay, right? Loving James like this wasn’t like cheating, was it?

Her thoughts became muddled and confused as James began to stroke her toward a climax. He stopped and turned her around to face him. For a moment, she thought she saw tears in his eyes, but then he lowered his head to hers and kissed her teasingly and gently, savoring the taste of her. He took his time with the kiss, probing her mouth with his tongue, exploring and tantalizing all of her senses until she became weak in the knees. Her arms twined around his neck in an attempt to pull him closer into her, and her breath became soft sighs, her eyes fluttering open then closed again.

He scooped her up in his arms and carried her back into the cottage and into the bedroom, where he gently laid her on the bed. Their eyes were locked together. She reached her arms up and pulled him down on top of her in surrender. Buttons was on the bottom of the bed and stayed there.

 

Chapter Nineteen

Susan Escapes

James had been insatiable, loving her over and over, as if trying to prove to her that leaving him would be impossible. They were both exhausted. James fell into a deep sleep, but although her body felt like rubber and her eyes yearned to close, she knew that this was her opportunity to