Lightning Strikes (Hudson 2)

"D.C.," I said. Maybe I shouldn't have. Maybe I should have just laughed and said I was tired and let's go to sleep now, but I closed my eyes and let myself drift into the fiction like someone who had been running frantically, full of terror, through a dark corridor, trying one door of escape and then another and finding them all locked, all except this one that let me out onto a cloud.

"D.C.? I was there once. Didn't like it, but if I knew you were there, I would have stayed longer," he said. He kissed me on the lips again and touched me gently, sending an electric warm sensation through my stomach and into my heart.

Then he peeled away the blanket and gracefully moved my nightgown up my legs, following along with his lips until he was at my breasts, kissing under them, around them and then touching each nipple with the tip of his tongue.

"I'm Roy," he whispered. "Roy Arnold. Pleased to meet you, Rain," he said.

When he kissed me this time, he moved himself onto the bed, slipping his legs between mine. The next kiss was longer, harder. I brought my arms around him and held on to him like someone clinging to a raft. When he entered me, I did feel like I was drowning, drowning in a swirl of unleashed, wild passion. I was a wild animal, collared and flinging itself, about to break free. I heaved myself in one direction and then another until he touched something inside me that shut down all my resistance.

I traveled over that sweet, soft pathway, out of the darkness, out of the fear, out of the loneliness. When it ended, I was like a kite that had lost all the wind and was drifting slowly back to earth, riding the warm air, coasting and then settling softly on a plush green, cool lawn.

Roy moaned his own contentment and then he lifted himself away and lay beside me on the bed, holding on to my hand. I didn't move. I didn't speak. I kept my eyes closed.

"You're a beautiful girl, Rain Arnold," he said. "I'm glad we met. I don't want to ever say good-bye to you. No, ma'am."

He still held on to my hand.

"You all right?" he finally asked.

"I don't know," I said.

"Just like two people who never knew each other before," he preached. "That's all it is. Two people, two strangers, getting to know each other and falling in love. Happens every day someplace," he told me.

Pretend, I thought.

Imagine.

Drive away the truth, shoo it out and slam the door on it.

Don't you come back here, you cruel joke, you. Don't you come knocking on this door, hear? You go plague some other poor soul or go back to hell where you were born, I told the darkness in my mind.

Roy and I held hands until we both grew too tired and then his fingers slipped from mine and fell away like the fingers of someone I was trying to keep from drowning, but in the end, didn't have the strength to hold on to.

Sleep closed over me. I thought I felt fingers in mine again, but this time, when I looked, it was Mama beside me, smiling, telling me not to worry.

"We'll do fine," she was saying. She was always saying. "We'll be-all right. We've got each other and believe me, honey, that's a lot more than most folks have. Most folks, they've got only their poor selves."

She was so right about that. Mama, she was so right.

Morning broke through the window like a stone shattering the glass. I nearly

jumped up. I had slept clear into breakfast. My heart did flip-flops just thinking about all the trouble I was about to be in. Not only would they complain about my oversleeping, but they'd find Roy was here. I looked down at him. He was on his stomach, his long, muscular arm around the pillow, his eyes still tightly shut.

As quietly as I could, I rose and went out to the bathroom. I rushed to get dressed and then I hurried down to the kitchen. Mrs. Chester was sitting at the small table sipping tea with Leo who sat across from her. They both looked up.

"You're the luckiest girl," she said. "I forgot myself that today they were goin' to the church breakfast."

"Oh," I said, releasing my trapped hot breath. My heart stopped pounding.

"What surprises me is Boggs didn't go poundin' yer door down."

Leo nodded his agreement.

"Lucky me. I'll get ready for school then," I said. "Don't you want a cup of tea?" she called after me. "No. I'm late," I shouted and hurried back to my room. Roy had risen and gone to the bathroom. I quickly changed into clothes for school. When he returned, we just looked at each other.

"I overslept," I said. "I've got to hurry."

"Sure. I'll go with you to see where the place is," he said. He threw on his shirt and jacket.