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The door was closed and the light went out. Laughter. Sighs. The wet, sucking sounds of passionate kissing. The whisper of clothing being removed. The rasp of a zipper. A low moan.

“You’re a handful,” the woman said.

“You better believe it, baby. Tighter.”

More sighs and smacking sounds, then: “I’m about to bust already,” the man panted. “Come on, let’s—”

“Do we have to get up there?” she asked in her nasal whine. “I hate it up there. I banged my head on the ceiling last time.”

“Okay, okay, just…”

“Wait a minute!” she screeched. “Don’t tear them. I’ll take them off if you’ll wait half a second.”

Apparently the poor bastard was beyond the point of no return. From below came the sounds of bodies knocking against the wall or the floor. Gray couldn’t be sure. He didn’t want to be sure, because knowing for sure what was going on below would conjure up mental images that he was sure he couldn’t handle right now. He tried to think of something, anything, to buffer the unmistakable sounds of sex. He squeezed his eyes shut, wishing he could shut his ears as effectively, wishing he could suspend all his involuntary responses, one in particular.

Barrie was lying perfectly still, hardly breathing, as tense as he. He knew because he was aware of her stillness, and her breathlessness, and her tension. He was aware of every damn thing about her, from the fragrance of her shampoo to the feel of her toes nestled against his knees.

What was happening on the floor of the camper was a scene straight out of a stag film, the kind of movie a bunch of guys get together and watch while polishing off a few six-packs. It was the kind of rendezvous recounted in graphic language in hard-core porno magazines. It was a fantasy with no artistic value. It wasn’t even elegantly erotic. It was juvenile, base, and…

To hell with it. He was burning hotter than a furnace.

He realized that he wasn’t turned on so much by what was going on below as he was from lying entwined with Barrie. She was seminude; he was fully clothed. A turn-on in itself. The danger of discovery was as enticing as it had been when he was six, sneaking off with the eight-year-old preacher’s daughter to play Adam and Eve in her daddy’s peach orchard. And it was one of Nature’s mischievous tricks played on Man that the more helpless he was to satiate his arousal, the more aroused he became.

The man below brayed like a jackass. A moment later, he grunted, “Was it good for you, baby?”

“No, and I’ll be damned before I fake it.”

“Don’t worry, I’m gonna take care of you. I’ve got plenty of rubbers and forty-five minutes before I have to leave for work.”

Forty-five minutes!

Gray couldn’t stand it that long. What about Barrie? Was this having any effect on her? He could feel her breath against his neck. It was rapid and hot. Agitation or arousal?

Seeming to read his mind, she moved slightly. Very slightly. Her knees, which were bent almost to her chest, began to straighten, but so gradually that at first he thought he was imagining it. Eventually they came even with his belt buckle, then moved past it. He held his breath as she painstakingly, moving only a fraction of an inch at a time, eased her knees over his erection. Then her shins slid along his thighs, past his knees, until her legs were aligned with his and they lay belly to belly, male to female.

She tilted her head back slightly. Then a little more. It couldn’t be his imagination because he could no longer feel her breath against his neck, but against his lips. And, although it was dark beneath the quilt, he knew she was looking at him, at his mouth.

You’re a fool if you do, he thought a heartbeat before bending his face closer to hers and kissing her.

Her lips parted beneath his, only slightly, but enough to make him reckless with lust.

Don’t do this, Bondurant.

But no sooner had he thought the words than his tongue was making love to her mouth, her sweet, silky, sassy mouth. Soundlessly, his hand slid down her back until he was palming her bottom, planting her middle solidly against his. Only one ply of silk separated her from the distended fly of his trousers. Without any overt motion, only a subtle undulation of her hips, she rubbed against it.

A guttural sound, more a vibration than an actual noise, issued from his throat. She tensed. He tensed. He pressed his cheek against hers and tried to breathe silently, though it was almost impossible to do since his heart was racing.

But they went unheard and unnoticed, because the couple below was engaged in silly, flirtatious, verbal foreplay, punctuated by her shrill giggles. They could have been revealing the location of Jimmy Hoffa’s body for all Gray cared.

He was focused solely on kissing Barrie, mouth to mouth, wetly and wantonly. He lost count of the number of times he kissed her, of how many times his tongue made forays into her mouth. He never broke contact with her lips, not even when they had to pause to breathe or risk suffocation. But even then, she angled her head up and the tip of her tongue flirted with his upper lip. He indulged her, letting her play and tease and tantalize until he couldn’t take it anymore.

He pressed his tongue deeply into her mouth. He held her tighter, angling himself against the cleft of her thighs. And he stayed there. And stayed. Fucking her in his mind. Sweet heaven and holy hell.

It was the most sustained, most intense, most intimate, most satisfying, most frustrating sexual encounter he had ever experienced. In turns, he wanted it to end with an explosive climax, and to continue into eternity.

The denouement wasn’t left to him, or to Barrie, however, but to the two strangers.

Not until the camper door was opened and the light came on, was Gray jolted back to reality. Then the door was closed and locked from the outside. The couple lingered just beyond the door, planning their next rendezvous. The girl won the argument. He grudgingly agreed to meet her at a motel.