Falling (3 page)

Resting beside her in a neat pile were the obligatory traveler's accessories. Suntan lotion, glasses, a visor, and a romance novel. They'd sat there for the last hour, untouched, while Jen let herself slip back into a habit she'd formed during her early teens. She was engaging in a silent inner dialogue with herself.

So why are you here?

For some R and R? An escape from the rat-race?

Liar.

Okay. So I'm here to take a long look at my life. Better?

No. Be honest. It's not your whole life you're looking at, it's your relationship you're looking at. Or trying not to look at.

Yes.

Jen let the soft air soothe her. The pool was empty, the surrounding garden quiet but for the squawks of large birds holding some kind of avian convention in a nearby palm tree.

The filters hissed beneath the waters of the pool, a plane droned in the distance-it was tranquility and peace. A good time to let it all out.

Her relationship. Did she love David?

She didn't know. The answer came back promptly, surprising Jen a little. She'd always thought she loved David. And no, she couldn't imagine her life without him.

So you're not going to leave him
?

No. No, of course not.

There's no "of course" about it. You think you love him and you're not going to leave him, but you're here stretched out on a chaise lounge in the hopes that Mr. Sex-on-a-stick is gonna come back soon.

Yes.

Why?

Because…because…I've lost
me
. I need to find
me
.

"Can I help?"

Chapter 4

The voice shook Jen to her core. She'd been so lost in her inner conversation that she hadn't heard Cris at all.

And yet there he was. He'd changed into shorts and a loose tank top, making Jen sweat even more than the Florida heat.

"Help what?" Her mental chat companion was sitting with its jaw on the floor, huffing and panting with a serious case of the hots.

"You said you'd lost yourself. That you needed to find yourself."

"I said that out loud?"

"Yep."

"The heat is getting to me, isn't it?" Jen sat up. "Do many of your guests turn into blithering idiots after a couple of hours in the sun?"

"A few. Most
arrive
as blithering idiots, so a lot of the time it's hard to tell." He leaned down and touched a fingertip to her temple. "You're sweating. Come on. The sun's getting too hot for you. Sane people head indoors right about now."

Jen desperately wanted to point out that it wasn't the sun making her sweat, but held her tongue, simply gathering her things and standing up. "Where are we going?"

"You said you wanted to find yourself. It's my experience that the first thing to do is to clear away the forest so you can see the trees."

"Huh?"

He smiled. "The spa. A massage. Let's get rid of those knots in your shoulders, and let the blood reach your brain so you can think."

"Oh." Jen blinked. "I suppose that does sound good."

"No 'suppose' about it. It
is
good. I happen to know the best massage therapist in town. And he works right here in our spa."

"Oh really?" Jen walked beside him, her head barely topping his shoulder. She was so aware of him on so many levels, it was astonishing. "Who's that?"

"Me."

*~*~*~*

Cris pushed open the door to the silent spa facility and blessed the air conditioned blast that poured over them. He needed something to cool him down or his cock was going to embarrass the shit out of him by thrusting out into the light of day from beneath his shorts.

There was something about this woman that got to him like no other woman had in a long time. Sure, she was attractive. Sure, she was sexy, and apparently unaware of it. But there was something else. Something deeper inside her, like a hard knot of pain perhaps, that he yearned to ease.

And if he had to go in through her pussy to do it, so much the better.

He turned away towards one of the small massage rooms. "In here, Ms. Hodges."

She followed him. "You should probably call me Jen if you're going to turn me into a relaxed lump of sated muscle tissue."

Cris's eyes nearly crossed. "That's short for Jennifer?"

She was looking around the room. "Yep."

"Jennifer suits you better."

She glanced at him. "It does?"

Cris reached for one of the neatly folded toweling wraps. "Yes.
Jen
is something a little girl is called on the playground.
Jennifer
is for a woman. Here, put this on, please."

She swallowed. "Ah. Nice technique. Stroke the ego before massaging the kinks out, huh?"

He smiled, not trusting himself to respond.

Jen disappeared into the little changing cubicle. "So how did you get to be a masseur as well as a concierge?" Her voice came through the slats on the closed door.

"Simple story, really." Cris tried hard to keep his mind on the task before him, not the woman behind him slipping out of her bathing suit. "I took a couple of semesters of sports therapy in college. Had to satisfy a science requirement and I hated science."

There it was again. That laugh that rocked his balls. Cris gritted his teeth and nearly dropped a bottle of oil. "Anyway, the massage teacher was very good, and I liked it. Not enough to pick it up as a career, but the basics stuck with me."

The door opened, the vision it revealed nearly taking his breath away. Jen had tucked her hair up into an untidy knot, letting small fronds dangle around her face.

The rest of her was barely covered by the white toweling wrap that fastened with Velcro just above her breasts. Dear God, she had great legs too. They'd looked just fine in a bathing suit, but now-with just the towel brushing their tops…

Cris heaved in a shuddering breath. "Uh, what was I saying?"

She laughed. "Cut it out. I'm sure it's nothing you haven't seen before." She settled herself onto the long raised table. "Face down?"

Any way you want, querida. Any way at all
.

"Yes please."

Her contortions with towel and body brought Cris rapidly to a state of full and painful arousal. She was modest, polite, and ready to be massaged. And he was hard enough to nail her to the table. In spite of the air-conditioning, he broke out in a sweat.

Grabbing hold of his urges and hanging on with both hands, he reached for the oil. "I think we'll start with the shoulders. That's where a lot of everyday tension settles. And perhaps it's a good place to begin our search."

She turned her head more comfortably on the pillow. "Our search?"

"For you."

*~*~*~*

He would never know the courage it had taken for Jen to calmly walk out of that cubicle and face him wearing nothing but a towel and a smile. Nor would he have a clue about the nerves that shuddered deep in her belly when she looked at the expression on his face.

He likes what he sees. He finds me attractive
.

He probably had noticed the fact that she'd jumped what felt like a foot off the table when he'd put his hands on her.

"Relax."

Easy for you to say, big boy
. "I'm trying. I've never had a massage before. This is all new to me."
And I ain't just talking about the massage, either.

"You don't have to do a thing. Just lie there. Let me do the work. You can simply think-talk-whatever you want."

Jen closed her eyes and surrendered to his hands. Gentle, deep kneading around the base of her neck and her shoulders immediately brought a sigh of pleasure. "Oh God, Cris…that feels good." The lightest touch of lavender swirled in the air, and she sniffed appreciatively.

"You are very tight here, Jennifer. Your worries, your tension…it's all knotted up in your spine."

There's something else that's knotting up too. But you can't quite see it from there.

"It is? I mean, they are?"

"What troubles you,
querida?
"

The endearment fell so naturally between them, Jen scarcely realized what he'd said. She was comfortable with this man, which was surprising, since he was also turning her on like a volcano. And the lava was about to erupt in a serious pyroclastic flow between her thighs.

"I'm
afraid
, Cris." Jen blinked. Why had she said that?

"Of what?" His hands kept moving on her back, a little lower now, unlocking new places between her shoulder blades. Christ above. This wasn't massage to her, it was goddamned foreplay!

"Of-of-I don't know."

"Yes you do. Afraid of what? Tell me." Cris paused for a moment then returned, palms slick with something smooth.

Fuck.
This was unbelievably wonderful. Jen felt her body ease beneath his touch. And her mind loosened too. "I'm afraid…" She paused, gathering her thoughts. "I'm afraid I'm not
me
anymore. That the me I
am
isn't the me I could
be
." She lifted her head a little. "Does that make any sense at all?"

He gently pushed her head back down onto the pillow. "Yes. Go on."

"I have a good man in my life. We've been together going on four years, shared an apartment for the last two. We started talking about marriage. We both have our careers, a settled life, but somewhere along the line…"

"Along the line?" Cris's hands never stopped moving on her body, stroking, soothing, then pressing hard, finding new and interesting places to massage, a few of them almost painfully deep, but satisfyingly relaxed as he worked his magic.

What the fuck had she been saying? For a moment her thoughts had deviated into a variety of places they really shouldn't go.

"Uh…yes, um…somewhere along the line, things changed."

"What things?" He loosened the Velcro fastener beneath her arm and exposed the length of her spine. She felt the cool air against her back, although he'd left her buttocks covered with the courtesy sheet. Thank God he had. They probably would have blushed like hell if he'd simply tugged the whole damn towel away.

She sighed, shifting slightly as he began to walk his fingertips up and down her vertebrae. "Our relationship changed, I guess."

"How?"

"Little ways. Nothing major. He talked more, I talked less. Instead of sharing our day over dinner, I became an audience for his recital. I didn't mind, honestly, Cris, I'm not complaining…"

"Sssh. I know."

Warm palms slid down either side of her body, to swing up and back to beneath her shoulders. Shit, this guy could really give one helluva massage.

"Go on."

"We were still a couple, but I was losing any sense of myself. I was becoming half of him, the lesser half, drowning in some ways, I suppose. Submerging my need to tell him, share stuff with him, in favor of letting him tell me."

"Why did you do that?"

"I don't know. It seemed…the thing to do. The supportive partner bit, you know? He had a very challenging job, and he worked damned hard to get where he is. I'm proud of his achievements."

"But you'd also like him to be proud of yours?" His hands found something beneath one shoulder and dug, working it, soothing it, easing it.

"Oh
yessss
." Jen sighed out the truth along with an exhalation of physical pleasure.

Just once, to hear David say "Hey Jen, that's fabulous. Well done." He'd probably forgotten the words even existed. And yet she said them to
him
all the time.

Something popped into her mind. "You know, about six months ago, I went through a very difficult time in my job. I fought long and hard for a project I believed in, and finally it all came together. I was so happy-dancing on air-I couldn't wait to get home and tell him about it."

She turned her face away from Cris. "You know what happened?"

"No. Tell me." Cris's hands were slowing, the massage turning gentle and soothing.

"He
wasn't there
. Just a message that he'd been re-scheduled for a trip at the last minute, and would I forward a couple of files to his phone. He knew, Cris. He
knew
it was the day that would make or break my job-I'd told him that very morning." She sighed. "He didn't even ask."

There was silence for a moment as Cris worked even further down her back, reaching that tender spot at the base of her spine.

"I…I'm plagued with demons sometimes." Jen closed her eyes.

"What kinds of demons?"

She laughed. "Silly ones. Ones that only show up in the wee dark hours of the night."

"What kinds of demons?" Cris asked again, quietly, continuing to knead her muscles with rhythmic pressure.

"A lot of them are demons of age. Demons of not being attractive any more." Jen bit her lip. "Nasty little critters that tell me nobody's going to ever look at me as a desirable woman again. They point out that David doesn't look at me as if I'm a desirable woman. He looks at me like I'm just there. And there's a big difference."

"There is?"

"Yep." Jen sighed as Cris dug his fingers into a spot next to her spine and loosened some knots. "There's something in a man's eye when he wants a woman. Something…appealing, that makes you feel alive and tingling. Something arousing. Something that makes you want to explore the possibilities. Something-ah, I don't know how to describe it."

"But you don't get it from David?"

Jen chuckled wryly. "After all this time, he knows what he's getting. What to expect. He has nothing to prove to me or himself. He's living with me. I guess he's committed to making a life with me and that should say it all. But it doesn't replace that
look
…"

"That's one hell of a big demon."

"Yeah."
And it sits on my chest night after night.
"There are others, of course."

"Oh?" Cris kneaded her vertebrae, firmly but comfortingly. "Tell me."

And to her surprise, she did. "Demons of wondering if this is what it's going to be for the rest of my life. Demons that smirk at me, point the remote control at me and turn to the
Do It Yourself
channel. And then say 'This is it, Jen. Your life. This is
all
there is.'. They're the ones that particularly suck." She tried for humor. "They delight in showing me the rest of my existence. Slowly disintegrating into boredom and futility."