Revenge of the Black Virgin (10 page)

“Black virgins,” she answered. “They’re the
other reason I’m here.”

“To black virgins, then.
Salut.
”

The wine was sharp and exquisitely cool.
Delicious. Then he pulled out a crusty loaf and small paper bags
spotted with oil. Jo unwrapped a parcel containing paper-thin
slices of cured ham. She found three types of cheese in
another.

“I wanted you to try some local goat’s-milk
cheese, so I bought two types of
Zuheros,
” he said. “And as
a special treat, for our special day,” he said as he flashed her a
wide smile, “I bought a small piece of smoked
Gomera,
made
in the Canary Islands.”

An image of Luc distracted her for a moment.
She remembered how delicious he looked that time in St. Sozy when
he acted as a waiter and served everyone at the dining table from a
big platter of local cheeses. She’d been too full to eat any more
but she found she just couldn’t resist him…

Then she looked at her handsome Spanish
suitor.

“I am quite sure you haven’t eaten cheese
from the Canary Islands, before, have you?” He was prying open a
tub of marinated olives and little red peppers, unfurling paper
napkins and spreading the feast out before them on the blanket. He,
too, looked good enough to eat.

He’ll be sweet and succulent, too. Like Luc,
but a different flavor.

“No, I haven’t. Wow, this looks so good!
Thank you,” she said, watching him tear off a chunk of bread. He
handed it to her and she dipped it into the oily olives and bit
into it greedily.

“My pleasure,” he said. “But wait. I want to
take a picture.” He sprang to his feet.

Jo looked up at him in confusion. He hadn’t
lugged his big camera up this far. But then she saw him pull a slim
little digital out of his pocket and begin to compose a shot.

“For me,” he explained. Snap. Snap. “Just a
little souvenir.”

They ate, they drank, they talked. And, most
importantly, they laughed. By the time the wine was gone Jo had
forgotten all about loss.

He was sitting very close to her, his
graceful body almost touching hers as they shared their meal. Then,
when they were finished with the food, the real touching began. The
grazing of the back of a hand here, the brushing away of a fly
there. Moving a lock of hair. Straightening a collar. It was all
contrived and playful, and made Jo feel younger than her years. She
knew he was working up the nerve to kiss her.

Despite the heat, she shivered as he ran his
warm fingers along the inside of her forearm.

Then slowly, almost casually, he raised his
hand and wiped a spot on her cheek with his thumb. “A bit of oil,”
he said softly. She watched with big eyes as he slowly put the
thumb into his mouth and licked it clean.

The sight of his pink tongue rasping against
his brown thumb was her undoing. She thought about the packet of
condoms in her purse, reached out and grabbed his hand. Then she
pulled it towards her and put his warm, wet thumb into her own
mouth.

Their eyes locked, and she heard his sharp
intake of breath as she bit down lightly. His thumb was warm and
tasted of salty flesh.

Instantly his arms were around her and they
tipped over onto the blanket.

Just as their mouths met the sound of voices
brought them up short. Jo jerked up to a sitting position as a
group of walkers panted their way to the summit of the hill, at
least one of them grinning as he passed near their picnic site.

She and Danny exchanged surprised looks and
broke into laughter.

“That was close,” Jo said, brushing a curl
back from Danny’s forehead. “Maybe we should rethink this.”

Danny groaned in frustration.

She watched the group, German tourists, she
saw now, begin to spread out and take photographs of each other
against the ruins of the fortress. They didn’t seem to be in any
hurry to leave.

Danny ran his fingers down the side of Jo’s
face and said, “So it is. But we have all night, don’t we? And
tomorrow, too?”

Jo leaned into his face and kissed his lips
demurely. “Yes we do. But until the time’s right, I know what else
we can do.”

“Tell me,
la belleza.
I am at your
service.”

“Teach me to tango.”

Danny laughed and kissed her again. “Tango?
Why the tango?”

“Because I like the tango. I think it’s very
sexy. And because I’m such a klutz, I’ve never been able to do it
properly.”

She didn’t want to say that she’d learned to
dance from her father, but the tango wasn’t in their
repertoire.

“And I want to surprise Brenda tonight.
Okay?”

“Sure. Okay,” he said as he jumped up,
pulling her to her feet. “But we don’t have any music.”

“We’ll count, or something. Show me where to
start.”

Danny grasped Jo’s hands and began to place
her body in the right position. “Like this. With the
abrazo
,
the embrace.”

“See? It’s sexy already,” Jo said, laughing.
She fell out of his formal embrace and pressed the length of her
body into his.

He kissed her, deeply this time, and her body
began to thrum with anticipation. She broke away first.

“Back to work,” she ordered.

“Okay. Now, concentrate.” And he began his
lesson.

He explained the difference between
traditional tango, which originated in Argentina, and contemporary
versions. “In the original dance, the embrace is usually quite
loose, like this,” he said as he held Jo at a distance from his
body. “But people like you prefer to make it more fun by doing
this.” He pulled her towards him until their bodies were pressed
tightly together again. She could feel his erection and she rotated
her hips suggestively over his.

“Umm,” she agreed.

“We won’t get very far if you don’t
behave.”

“Sorry.”

But she wasn’t.

“Now relax,” he ordered. “And follow my
lead.”

He began counting under his breath—
one,
two, one, two—
guiding her alongside him. “Hold you head level.
Look into my eyes. That’s right.”

One, two.
“Pretend we’re on a dance
floor with a band.”

Half an hour later Jo was thoroughly drenched
with perspiration, her head muddled with rules. She flopped back
down onto the blanket, breathing heavily. Danny had certainly put
her through her paces.

In comparison, he hadn’t even broken a sweat.
He picked up his camera and sat down beside her. The Germans were
nowhere to be seen.

“You look so beautiful right now,” he said,
dark eyes sparkling. “I’d like to take some more photographs of
you. May I, please?”

“More?” Jo said, surprised.

“I mean real photographs. Not souvenir
snapshots.”

“What do you mean
real
?”

“Posed.”

“
Posed
?”

“Yes. Like this. Let me show you.” He leapt
to his feet. He walked around her, examining her as if she was a
zoo animal, then crouched a few feet away, aiming his camera at her
face. “Turn your head to the right. Just a little. That’s enough.
Good.” Snap. Snap.

“Now lift your chin.” Snap snap.

“Don’t smile. Close your eyes.”

He moved around her as he told her to move
this way or that, pout, smile, or simper. At first Jo felt
uncomfortable, but soon she got caught up in the game and began to
enjoy herself. She liked the feeling of his photographer’s eye on
her.

When he was done he showed her the shots he’d
taken. She did look good, head and upper body silhouetted against
the fabulous blue of the lake below. Her simple dress and her
honey-colored skin worked beautifully against the landscape behind
her, she thought.

“See how lovely you are? Do you know what
would be wonderful?” He leaned into her and whispered into her ear.
“If you would take off your dress. It has such a busy pattern. It
interferes with the composition. It would be so much better if the
camera could see only smooth skin against the landscape.”

Jo looked at him carefully. Was he having her
on? The pattern on her dress was too busy?

She looked down at her chest. The little
black and white and brown African motifs suited her coloring, she
knew. And this was the dress she was wearing when Luc fell for her.
But Danny was right, she supposed. It was a domineering
pattern.

Luc was then and this is now. It’s time to
shed my skin.

A
frisson
of excitement sped through
her body as she contemplated undoing her zipper. She looked at him
again and saw two pink spots high on his beautiful cheekbones, but
the look in his eyes was anything but bashful.

“Danny! I don’t even know you!”

“What does that matter? You would make a
perfect study. Especially here,” he added as he swept an arm out
over the view. “And there’s no one around to see.”

The idea didn’t shock Jo as much as arouse
her. She reached her arms behind her head to unzip her dress when
she heard more voices. Another group of sight-seers. Americans,
this time. A lot of them.

Grinning, she exchanged a wide-eyed look with
Danny and began to pack up their picnic.

Hand-in-hand, Jo and Danny walked down to the
hot car to stash their things and unload his gear. The sun was
threatening to sink behind the mountains, so they had no time to
waste as they quickly toured the little town of Zahara.

As before, Danny took pictures of the best
street views and the insides of the churches. But this time he
included Jo in some of his shots. She didn’t mind, and was, in
fact, getting used to his measuring eye.

After they lost the best of the light, Danny
turned his camera to the views of the countryside spread out before
them, again playfully chiding Jo for being too slow to take off her
dress.

“Now we’ll never see the beauty of your skin
against this glorious landscape.” He frowned.

“But there’ll be other mountains,” she said.
“Other chances, perhaps. Maybe tomorrow, before we leave
Ronda?”

“With your friend?”

Jo noticed how his eyes lit up when he asked
the question.

She shook her head. “No. Not with
Brenda.”

I love her, but…No. Too weird.

They had plenty of time to get back to the
hotel and have a siesta before dinner. Or that was the plan,
anyway. All the way they flirted and laughed, Jo plotting how she’d
be able to duck Brenda so she and Danny could have as much quality
time together as possible over the next two days. Feeling faintly
guilty, she had to remind herself that having sex with Danny was
Brenda’s idea in the first place. Brenda would probably not only
give Jo space, she’d give her blessings to the union, fleeting as
it would be.

Jo was excited as they arrived back at the
hotel and unloaded the car, and she knew Danny was excited too. She
helped carry his things up to his room and set the picnic basket
down on a chair. “Thanks for a great day.” She put her arms around
his neck and leaned up to kiss him. “You were a perfect gentleman,
and an excellent teacher. I can’t wait to show Brenda how I can
tango.” She rocked her body suggestively against his. His smile was
absolutely charming and his young flesh felt marvelous��lean and
hard and warm and increasingly receptive to her touch.

All of a sudden she heard the door slam
behind her and found herself pulled down onto the bed. His lips
were hard and soft at the same time, his kisses urgent, sweet, hot,
arousing her instantly.

“And I can hardly wait to get you out of this
dress,” he breathed heavily into her ear, hands already conquering
the zip and pulling her free. Obviously adept at undressing women,
he had Jo stark naked before she could wrestle his shirt over his
head.

His chest was completely smooth, his soft
brown skin hugging the contour of lean muscles. She ran her hands
over his sun-warmed arms, his shoulders, his back, all the while
kissing his face, his neck, her tongue probing deep, deep inside
his mouth. He shucked off the rest of his clothes effortlessly and
lay down beside her.

Slowly, with confidence, he moved his hands
all over her. His caresses were sensual, exploring and arousing her
at the same time. She felt her body rising to his touch, catching
flame as her juices began to flow.

Her skin grew damp with perspiration, her
mouth filled with sweet saliva.

When she felt the familiar gush between her
legs, she knew she was ready.

She moved a hand across his flat belly and
downwards to caress his cock, which was standing as stiffly at
attention as any guardsman. He was a beautiful, beautiful boy, and
she was ready to fuck him.

“Now, Danny.
Now
. Let me get a
condom.”

“Not yet. Let me love you this way first,” he
said as he slipped down in the bed and buried his face in her pubic
hair.

Well…if you insist. I won’t complain…

He kissed her delta, the insides of her
thighs as she spread them wider, and everything else he could find.
Then he put his tongue to work on her, gently, like an older woman
must had taught him, Jo suspected. He knew exactly what to do.

He licked, he lapped, he sucked, he kissed,
he blew air and he pushed her over the edge in about ninety
seconds. She came so fast and so hard she yanked on his hair as she
cried out in surprise and ecstasy.

Gulping air, she started to giggle and
apologize at the same time. He moved up to her face and silenced
her with his mouth, tasting of her come.

“Put it on me,” he panted into her neck.
“Now!”

As soon as she’d sheathed him he dove into
her like a drowning man lunging for land. He wasn’t large, but he
was strong, and his urgency pushed Jo into a deeper arousal. She
opened her entire body to him then, and matched his thrusts with
all the strength she had.