Saving Grace

Sands woke
up the next morning, Grace in his arms.
Well, this is a first. He
nuzzled into her hair for a moment before stopping himself.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Whoa, easy, buddy.style="mso-spacerun: yesHe kissed her cheek, the whispered,
“Gracie? Ready to get up?”

Her voice
was groggy. “Mm…my alarm hasn’t even
gone off yet.”

Sands
smiled. “No alarms here, Gracie.”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> He kissed her shoulder.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “I bet I could really wake you up
though…”

Grace
remembered what had happened and her eyes jolted open.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> She turned to face him, seeing his features
clearly in the morning light. His eyes
were closed, the yellows and purples looking so much more intense than in the
dim light of the night before. She let
her hand caress his face, and it was only then that he realized his glasses
were still off.

“Shit…”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> He tried to pull away, but she wouldn’t let
him.

“Please,
don’t,” she whispered.

His head
was turned. “Gracie…”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> She’ll scream and she’ll leave…then what?

her voice was soothing, “it doesn’t matter.
Believe me, it doesn’t. I mean,
it matters, but it’s not going to change…”

“Fine.”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> He turned his face back in her
direction. If she goes, she
goes. Fuck, why can’t that be O.K. with
me?

“Open
them. Please.”

“So you can
run away and let me bang into every wall here?”

Not sure
I ever want to leave this bed. Grace
smiled. “You would never run into the
walls, Jeffrey. And…”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> She pulled him closer.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “…after last night, I’m certainly not
running.”

Sands let
himself smile. “Want a repeat
performance?”

“Mm…several,
actually. Maybe once with a trapeze.”

A growl
came from deep in Sands’ throat. How
the hell did she end up here with me? “Gonna
let me experience the kinky side of you?”

“You can
experience whatever you want,” she purred.
Ever thought of settling down with someone? Whoa, stop that, Grace!
You absolutely cannot take any of this seriously.

She’s
the most incredible… “Huh…not sure
I want to know that I don’t have to fight for it.”

Grace
laughed. “Oh, I didn’t say anything
about not fighting for it.” She continued
to caress his face. “You don’t need to
hide from me. Whether I ever see you
again after this week’s over or not…you don…”
Almost slipped up there, stupid.

Very
slowly, Sands let his lids open. “Meet
the freak with no eyes.” Grace’s mouth
hung open slightly. Whoever did this
left nothing behind. She was sure that
she should have been disgusted, or if she saw him on the street,
terrified. She wasn’t.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> She looked into the empty caverns before her
and felt tears running from her own eyes.
Not knowing what to say, she put her hands on the back of his neck and
kissed him. He kissed her back,
immensely relieved. Why does it
matter so damn much? He could feel
the moisture on her cheeks. Is she…?

“Jeffrey?”
Grace said, pulling away from him.

“Yeah?”style="mso-spacerun: yes"> You’re crying. Why?

Grace
wanted to ask what last night had meant to him, if anything.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> She wanted to ask if they’d made love, or if
it was only sex. At the last minute,
she decided that she didn’t want to know the answer, so she changed her
question. “Ar goi going to…I mean, do
you want to…about those repeat performances?”

“Still want
them?” he smiled. If you say no, I
just might…

“You?”

“Hell,
yes.”

“I’ll need
to go and buy, um…you know.”

“Oh…Christ,
I didn’t even think about that.”

“I imagine
working for who you do you have good medical and know if you…have
anything…” Grace felt terribly
uncomfortable only now realizing the plethora of consequences she could be
facing.

“I’m clean,
ie. I wasn’t stupid with the bar
wenches.” Grace laughed at his word
choice. “As for the whole, um…you
thing…”

“The pill,”
she confessed. “But if we do, you know,
I’d feel better if…”

“Gracie, it
can’t feel any better than it did that way.”

“There’s
the pig that I’m oddly attracted to.”

“I told you
I’d be back in the morning, sugarbutt.”
His lips found her neck. “Mm,
salty.”

“Wanna take
a shower?”

“Not quite
ready to leave the naked woman.”

“Who said
you had to?”

Sands
kissed Grace much harder than he had before.
“Getting riled up so early, Gracie?”

Grace felt
his growing arousal on her leg. “Makes
two of us.” She began to paw at him,
thoughts of what did and didn’t matter leaving her mind.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “Come on.”
She helped him out of bed and into the bathroom.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> A few minutes later, both of them were under
the water, their bodies sliding together as they kissed.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> Sands kept his eyes closed to keep the water
out, but in the back of his mind, he was still astonished that Grace hadn’t
“freaked out” over what he’d shown her.

He felt
Grace working a lather onto his skin and he moaned. “Gracie…I’m almost eternally horny by nature…”

“I’m very
aware of this,” she interrupted, her hand sliding along his arousal.

“…but you
make me crazy.”

“Is that a
bad thing?” she asked innocently.

“Only if
you want to be able to walk out of his hotel in five days.”

She kissed
him, now desperate with need. “Let them
wheel me out of here.”

Sands
laughed. “I think someone’s secretly a
nympho.”

“Guess it’s
not a secret to you then, hm?” She
gasped as Sands pressed her back to the wall of the shower.

< “I want
you,” he growled. I’m back…

Jeffrey,
you can’t be good for me… She forced the thought away.style="mso-spacerun: yes"> “So
take me.”

“You didn’t
make it out yet to pick up…”

“After…at
the moment, I don’t care.”

Sands let
his body begin to take over; he knew full well that both of them wanted a
rougher pace than the previous night. “You
might want a safety word right now, Gracie.”

She laughed,
then began to nip at his ear. “Banana.”