Bring on the Rain (33 page)

“
Enough of that, time is
ticking. I got pictures to take.” Ruby took over, getting pictures
of Brook pinning on his white rose bud. And, him slipping on her
wrist corsage over the long silk gloves.

“
Karla,” Madeline said, “A
guy I work with bought this for you.” She pulled out a box with red
rose buds and baby breath. “Do you know Rafael?”

Karl’s mouth fell open. She blinked as
she slid the band on her wrist. “Do I, he’s a hunk and then some.
Why would he do this?”

“
He’s like that, probably
thinking he’ll score points with you,” Madeline laughed, telling
her of his flirting ways.

“
Oh, that’s
sweet.”

Snapping pictures, Ruby took many on
the porch, some on the steps, a few by the cars, as Karla got in
hers to follow them.

“
Mom, don't be sitting on
the sofa when I come in.” Brook’s eyes pleaded with her over the
hood of the car. “Go do something fun with Ruby.”

“
Okay, honey.” Nevertheless,
she was crying.

Brook was bent because Madeline was
acting sappy. Then they were off, shiny red and black waxed cars,
going down the two-lane road.

Ruby let the camera fall and catch by
the strap around her neck. She put her arm around Madeline. “My van
is completely stocked. Wine, cheese, fruit…and five of the funniest
movies I could scare up.”

“
Oh, Ruby.”

Ruby sighed and led her back to the
house. “Let’s clean up the house, we’ll work on taking your mind
off things.”

Chapter 18

The Senior
Prom…

The hotel was a newly built Marriott.
The room chosen barely held the crowd of teenagers and faculty. The
band was a hard one to book, a popular one. Everyone was in high
gear by the time Brook, Coy, and Karla arrived.

They were swamped by friends, having
found a table for Brook to put her wrap and purse on. The
decorations were classic, silver, and black with faux fountains and
Greek columns. For a while Brook and Karla were separated from Coy,
as they hooked up with girlfriends and he talked to some guys he
knew.

Eventually Coy asked Brook to waltz.
They were holding each other to the strains of a sensual song. Heat
expanded between them, his hands low on her back, hers around his
broad shoulders. His hardness brushed her barely covered thigh.
Their breathing was shallow. They looked into each other’s eyes
often.

When the song ended, Coy kept her in
front of him to hide his arousal. They made it to the table, held
hands, and played with each other’s fingers and palms. They talked
to other people, but were so aware of each other, that it seemed as
if they were talking nonsense.

They danced four or five more times,
each time painful because of the tension they felt. Each time
rubbing hips in ways that was turning them on more and more, until
they were trembling coming off the floor.

Brook wanted it to be perfect. She
wanted to be perfect for him, and the best lover he had ever had.
All week they had talked about it in some manner, and Brook had
gotten silly and totally unlike her usual confident self. The
closer it got, the more vulnerable she’d become. She had caught
herself blabbing to him all her fantasies and romantic hopes. The
perfect night, with the perfect guy to bring her out of girlhood
into womanhood.

The talk, the feelings, it made them
super excited, nervous and eager, unable to stop touching. She’d
let him get a little farther in the feeling-up sessions. She had
finally told him she loved him. Everything was so perfect in her
life now. It was incredibly awesome to be in love.

“
I’m going out to smoke,” he
said, half way through the night. After a dance, that was more like
rubbing and touching, sex with clothing on.

“
I thought you’d
quit.”

“
I did. I need air, baby.”
He looked at her, eyes intense and face taut.

Brook smiled. She was feeling sexual,
womanly. “Okay. I’d better calm down too.”

“
Oh, hell no.” He laughed,
strained. “You’re sexy as hell like this, Brook. It’s just been a
tough week, ya know...”

“
Go on.” She leaned and
kissed him, wiped the lipstick off his mouth, catching her breath
when he bit her finger.

~*~

Coy walked outside, feeling as if his
balls were wrapped with bands. He had been waiting a long time,
fooling around too much with Brook too. He made himself stop short
of below the waist, but hell, it didn’t help much. She let him feel
through her clothing and he spent plenty of time kissing her pert
breasts.

Brook looked like some dream he’d
weaved in his most erotic fantasies. She was the best kisser, the
sexiest and classy girl he had ever been with in his life. In fact,
she was more woman than the girl’s he had gone to bed with. He’d
experience enough to feel smug, and was... Until he realized he
would be her first. He wanted to be a man about it. Not some high
school hunk. He wanted to be the kind of lover who gave her an
orgasm—which he’d never bothered to do for a girl.

He’d been reading everything he could
about it, skulking around his female relatives houses, reading
women’s magazines, even a romance novel or two. He thought maybe he
could hold back long enough to give her one before he broke
through. Another first for him.

He had tended to date older girls, who
wanted it hard, fast, and nasty. They wanted to screw the jock, or
Copper Creek bad boy. It wasn’t like that for Brook. They had
conversation. She had a sharp mind, and was talented. Brook had a
whole maturity level that made him drop the hunk/player
attitude.

Hell, she liked his wild side, but she
made him talk to her about things. Brook made him think about his
future plans, and education and stuff.

She didn’t swill beer with him and get
wild. She drank a bottle of wine with him at the lake. She got
teary eyed and sweet, told him she thought he was selling himself
short, he would do great things with his life. Aw, hell, she was
more than he deserved. He was in love with her, absolute
love.

It made him want to do everything
right. Brook was the most popular girl in school, and in town, but
far from a snob. She was, he thought, because of her mom’s down
home attitude and background, a mature and caring person. Hell, he
could listen to her talk forever. He could look at her perfectly
sleek body and ask himself, why she was bothering with him, when
she could have her pick of better guys.

Coy went to the car and got a cigarette
out of the glove box. They were bad for him, but he wouldn’t need
one after they were lovers. He had to do something right now
though, so he wouldn’t be rushing her off from the Prom to make
love, or feeling her up the whole time, like some junior-high geek.
This was grown up stuff, man, and woman love.

He wanted to be what she had described
to him this week, the man she thought he was already.

He had taken off his jacket and rolled
his sleeves up. Was wishing he’d taken the vest off too, the
embroidered brocade was boss. However, it was a sultry
night.

Coy smiled, recalling how his dad had
looked at him for spending a chunk of savings on the perfect
expensive cologne and the tuxedo. Jude was no fool. He had dumped a
whole box of condoms in Coy’s sock drawer. He’d looked as if he
wanted to lecture him, so Coy had avoided him before leaving the
house.

His dad had a rep for sleeping with
women in the next town—never in Copper Creek or Diamond Back—and
Coy figured that had been going on since his mother first took
separate rooms, when he’d been about five or six. Jude didn’t talk
about it. He didn’t even joke about it. So Coy had no idea if the
rumors were true or not.

He sat on the hood of the car, smoking
and looking around. He was half way through when he saw Karla by
her car. She was drinking something and had a long cigarette in her
hand. She looked over to him and waved absently.

He sighed and shook his head, wiped a
bead of sweat away. In the distance, he could hear the crowd, the
music, somewhere to his back, the zoom of cars passing down the
highway.

Karla put something in her car. The
door slammed. She walked over to him and leaned her side against
his car, next to his leg. “Drink?” She held up the can.

“
What’s in it?”

“
Rum and coke.”

“
You shouldn’t be drinking.”
He took it, sniffed, took a sip, and shook his head. “Don’t get
drunk tonight, okay. You should be in there dancing. James Collier
was looking for you.”

“
Yeah, I danced with
him.”

“
He’s a good guy. Going to
Yale, you know.”

“
Yes. I heard.” She tossed
the can somewhere among the cars and straightened. Her art painted,
white nails raked up his leg, the material taut where he sat on the
car. Her eyes glittered, her lips wet, she husked. “I’ve always
wanted to go down on you.”

He looked at her, stunned and turned on
at the same time. “Karla, you know how it is. I like you. You’re
sexy as hell, built like a bitch. But I’m crazy about
Brook.”

“
She’s been holding out on
you.” Karla leaned in, her breasts squeezed up more, and against
his knee. She laid her hand over his crotch and squeezed a bit.
“She told me about it. She’s not giving you anything but teasing. I
want to blow you, Coy. One time. It’s not as if you’d be cheating
or anything. After tonight, we won’t see each other.”

She rubbed him, her tongue licking her
lips. “I saw you at your uncles that day, when your ankle was still
in a cast. I wanted to do it…right there on the sofa.”

He muttered a curse, tried to dislodge
her hand. Coy slid off the car, but she was up against him. She had
a good hold on his aroused sex.

“
I’m good at it. I’d do it
quick, and you’d go right in there, like nothing happened,” she
purred. “I’m hungry for you, Coy. Give me this one thing. It’s not
like anyone would know. Let me make you relax and enjoy the rest of
the night.”

Coy’s legs were shaking. He protested.
He cussed. She slid down his body, hidden by the cars. They were
totally alone. His zipper was down, even when he was pushing her
off, trying to side step. “Friggen, stop it, Karla! I mean it.” But
her hot mouth went over him, all the way down and her jaws sucked
inward. She was doing it fast.

He closed his eyes gasping, still
having his hand on her head, where he was trying to push at
it.

She grabbed his thighs, worked him
quick, and with enough noise to remind him of the first porno flick
he’d watched as a freshmen, with some of his buddies at a birthday
party. She knew how to make the sounds, how to act
hungry.

His senses were shrinking into one
center point, and that was where her mouth was. He didn’t care if
she was faking it, she was doing it, and eating him up… he couldn’t
think.

He was in a daze of lust when she
pulled off him. She was parting her gown from the slit on the
thigh, pulling it until he saw she was nude beneath. She leaned
back on the opposite car, offering herself to him. He could see
everything and then some. It wasn’t even debatable. He went forward
and sank in her. He was pumping automatically, holding her thighs
were he needed, because of the low-slung car.

It was burning and feral, lust and
nothing else. She touched her breasts, bit her finger, and looked
at him in ways that turned him into a haze-drunk mess. Coy heard
her little, yes, yes, groans. He was coming, and his legs were
nothing but spasms from the release of tension.

He fell back from her. He was still
hard and glistening with come when he reached in his back pocket
for a hanky and noticed something out the corner of his
eye.

Brook was standing only a few feet
away. Her face raked with hot tears, her nostrils trembling. Arms
wrapped around her stomach, and face so white, it looked like a
ghost.

“
Brook,” he rasped,
adjusting his clothing. Face dreadful, eyes stark, and body
suddenly ice cold. “Brook.” His hand was reaching out.

She looked down, as if it were
something ghastly. Her aching violet eyes moved to Karla, who was
now standing beside Coy. Then she looked between them once more
before she turned and hurried inside.

Coy cussed, explicit and loud. He
turned, thumping his fist over and over on the car top, leaving
dents in it that bruised his hands.

Karla made the mistake of touching his
back.

Face a mask of enraged coldness, he
grit, “Get out of my face, you stupid bitch.”

She flinched, eyes huge and oblivious.
“I’ll go talk to her.”

He laughed and glared at her, as if she
was the most clueless person on earth. “What the hell are you
thinking? Don’t you see what’s happened! What I have done! Get away
from me!” He snarled pushing her toward the other car.