He swallowed, lowered his gaze to the center of her chest, rose again to kneeling height, and slowly began unbuttoning her jacket. She shuddered as he pushed it from her shoulders, and Rye looked up, startled.
“Are you cold, Laura?”
She hunched her shoulders and gripped the skirts in her lap. “No.”
“Laura, I ... But he gulped to a stop, and she could see it was her turn to make a move.
“Kiss me, Rye,” she said in a voice she’d never heard before, “the way I like it best.” For by this time they had practiced it many ways.
He picked up her hands from her lap, gripping them tightly, and they met halfway, his tongue touching the seam of her lips even before they opened beneath his, her girl’s ignorance clashing with her woman’s intuition.
His hand found her breast across the vast distance that seemed to separate their bodies except for knees and lips. And for the first time ever, her hand nudged his toward the buttons at her throat, verifying that it was time. He hesitated, then shakily, inexpertly, opened the polished whalebone buttons all the way to her waist.
As if suddenly realizing what he’d done, he sat back on his haunches, staring into her eyes now with a frightened look in his own.
“It’s okay, Rye. I want you to.”
“Laura, it’s different than just ... just kissing, you know.”
“How do I know?” she asked, experiencing her first heady recognition of the power of her feminine mystique, wielding it as surely as if she were an experienced woman of the world.
“You sure?” He gulped, still scared of all the unknowns.
“Rye, I didn’t come up here to get any lobster trap. Did you?”
His lips were open, blue eyes wide and not a little frightened as he touched one shoulder inside her open dress, then the other, then carefully pushed the garment back to stare at her chemise.
The dark circles of her nipples showed against the linen cloth, and she followed the movement of his eyes from one to the other, then dropped her gaze to watch his hand reach for the streamer of the satin bow between her breasts. A moment later the cool air touched her bare skin as Rye pushed the chemise to her waist.
She held her breath, waiting for him to touch her, and when he didn’t, her eyelids fluttered up to find his face red to the roots of his hair, while he stared as if struck dumb.
“Golly ... ” he muttered thickly, and she knew he was afraid to touch, now that he’d come this far. “Laura, you’re so ... so pretty.”
Her face was red, too, but it ceased to matter when, a moment later, his scratchy wool sweater was pressed against her bare skin, then within seconds, it drifted back to make way for Rye’s shaking hand.
His palm was damp with nervousness, but warm and already callused hard from working the drawknives. She wondered how it could possibly be wrong to let Rye touch her this way, because for the first time ever, she’d found justification for the growing pains she’d endured during the last year while her breasts had begun developing. At first he only brushed her breasts with callow timidity, but soon he explored the nipple with his fingertips, finding the hard little pebble of growth that would be there yet for some months.
It hurt, and though she only shrugged her shoulder away in response, he reacted as if she’d cried out in pain. He jerked his hand back, a stricken look on his face.
“Did ... did I hurt you, Laura?”
“N ... no, not really ... just ... I don’t know.”
He moved more cautiously after that, experimenting with great care until their kisses became wilder and it seemed their bodies could not press together hard enough, kneeling as they were.
He urged her backward, a little at a time, until she listed beneath the pressure of his chest and tumbled with him to the floor. Her arms twined up around his shoulders as he pressed his length against hers, and they kissed with the all-consuming fire that only first times ignite.
When at last he pulled away, she knew where his lips were headed, but lay very still, very cautious, her shoulder blades pressed solidly against the floor. His breath dampened her neck, stopping there a long, tremulous time before proceeding down, down, by inches, until his lips were at her breast. Once there, they only brushed the nipple, not so much as the dew of his breath dampening it, for his mouth was closed.
Her stomach and chest hurt, tight bands of expectancy and fear binding it strangely. But the urge to know, to understand this thing called growing up, made her touch his hair experimentally. And with that touch, his lips opened and she felt the sleek texture of his tongue stroking the bright rosebud not yet fully blossomed. A sound came from her throat and her shoulders lifted off the canvas as she was overcome with some new compulsion to reach toward him with her breast.
Liquid fire coursed through her veins. Her head fell back as he tasted her other nipple, and she felt her body go all limp and tense at once. His weight felt welcome as Rye lay across her body, and she learned with each new motion of his tongue why he had leaped up angrily and run away when she had brushed that sand from his shoulder the summer before.
Her eyes flew open as Rye suddenly sprang to his knees beside her, reaching for the bottom of his sweater, yanking it viciously over his head, then falling still a moment, again looking down at her for permission.
She had never seen hair on his chest before, but it was there now—a soft shadow of blond, sparkling in the light from the window, across the high square twin muscles of his chest. She reveled in discovery, moving her gaze downward eventually to the spot where his navel made a round, secret shadow, just above his waistline. He knelt before her with his knees apart, each of them satisfying curiosity for a moment before going any farther.
“Rye, you’re all muscly,” she said, amazed.
“And you’re not,” he said, unsmiling.
She could see—actually see!—the way his pulse pounded in the hollow of his throat, and wondered if hers did the same, for it seemed to be thrumming everywhere, in her temples, in her stomach, and in the secret part of her that now seemed the center of all feeling.
He fell toward her, one hand on each side of her head, and kneeling over her that way, kissed her before easing his bare, golden chest onto hers, their hearts thundering uncontrollably while hard muscle flattened soft.
There was wonder and astonishment then, feeling the difference between their textures, experimentally grinding those textures against one another in a touch that somehow proved silken.
Again he caressed her breasts. Again he kissed them, his tongue already dancing more masterfully on the puckered tips. She threaded her fingers through his hair, and she writhed in unknowing invitation, begging him to lay his full length over hers, for without it she felt incomplete and searching.
He bent a knee, lifted it, and pressed it on her leg while she sucked in a breath and held it. The knee passed heavily up her thigh, across the juncture of her legs, to her stomach, making her skirts whisper alluringly against her legs. The weight of that knee seemed to anchor her to earth, from which her body wanted to soar. Then, before long, a greater weight pressed her to the sail bed, for Rye shifted his hips to cover hers, lying flat on her now with not so much as a muscle moving while she marveled at how good it felt to know the curves and warmth of another this closely.
Then, somehow, her legs had parted and made a space where his knee fit securely, and he moved it against her in an altogether satisfying way that made her press and lift rhythmically against it.
When Rye’s knee moved back and his weight slipped to one side, she felt his hand skimming along her skirt, raising layers of petticoats as he searched along the length of her leg. Her heart clamored crazily, and his breath beat like wild waves against her ear. His fingers touched the legband of her pantaloons, then moved higher ... higher ... until his palm covered the gentle swell between her legs, and she realized, horrified, that the linen fabric there was damp. She felt his hesitant surprise when he encountered the dampness, but when he pressed her hard, i
t felt wonderful and right and relieved some inner yearning even while Laura waited for the hand of Providence to reach out and smite her dead.
Instead, the hand of Rye Dalton explored her through the last barrier of linen, but when it ventured to the buttoned waist of her pantaloons, caution intruded. She caught his wrist and whispered shakily, “No more, Rye. I ... I think we’d better get dressed. I have to go.”
For a moment his eyes blazed down at her with an untamed intensity she’d never seen there before. She hadn’t known he was holding his breath until it came out in a mighty gust that seemed to leave him weak. Immediately, he rolled to his knees, turning his back on her while yanking his sweater over his head. She pulled up her chemise, smoothed her skirts, and slipped her arms into her sleeves. He smoothed his hair, and his blue eyes met hers as he looked over his shoulder to find her buttoning her dress. His glance skittered away in self-consciousness. She studied his back a long time.
“Rye?”
“What?”
When she said nothing for a long moment, he looked over his shoulder again.
“Are we gonna go to hell now?”
They stared at each other, wide-eyed, for some seconds.
“I suppose so.”
“Both of us, or just me?”
“Both of us, I think.”
She experienced a sick feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach, for she didn’t want Rye suffering in hell because of her.
“M ... maybe if we don’t ever do it again and if we pray real hard, we won’t.”
“Maybe.” But his morose tone held little hope. He got to his feet. “I think we’d better go, Laura, and we’d better not come up here together anymore. I’ll get those traps, and ... and ... ” He half turned to find her sitting on her haunches, a look of dread on her face.
His words faded away. Below them, the old pilings of the boathouse creaked as the tide came in, while above them gulls reeled and screeched. Then suddenly they pitched together, holding each other tightly, their hearts hammering with this new awareness they didn’t yet know how to handle.
“Oh, Rye, I don’t want you to go to hell.”
“Shh ... maybe ... maybe you don’t for just one time.”
Chapter 6
THE NEXT DAY in church, Rye avoided her eye all through services. Guilt was evident on his face, and it filled Laura with an awesome fear of retribution even while her mind was dominated by memories of what they’d done together. Furthermore, whenever she relived those moments, that liquid sensation began to build in her body and she was certain it alone was sinful. He avoided her in the churchyard, leaving her feeling bereft and abandoned while he walked off toward home without so much as a hello.
He kept away for nine days, but on the tenth, she went to Market Square to buy fresh haddock for her mother and was wending her way through the carts and drays when she saw Rye approaching. As he glanced up and saw her, his step faltered, but he continued in her direction until they met and he was forced to stop.
“Hi, Rye.” She gave him her brightest smile.
“Hi.”
Her heart fell to her feet, for he neither said her name nor met her eyes. “I haven’t seen you for over a week,” she said.
“I’ve been busy helping the old man.” He studied something across the square.
“Oh.” He seemed impatient, and she searched for something to keep him a minute longer. “Did you catch any lobsters in those traps?”
His gaze met hers fleetingly, then skittered away. “A few.”
“You take the traps back yet?”
“No, I set ’em every morning and haul ’em at the end of the day.”
“You gonna haul ’em today?”
His mouth pursed slightly, and he seemed reluctant to answer, but finally grunted, “Yeah.”
“What time?”
“Four o’clock or so.”
“You ... you want some help?”
He looked at her from the corner of his eye, then turned his gaze toward Nantucket Bay. But instead of his usual bright invitation, he only shrugged. “I gotta go, Laura.”
Her heart felt broken as she watched him walk off.
But she was waiting at the dory at four o’clock. When Rye spotted her, he came up short, but she stubbornly stood her ground. Neither said a word while she stooped to release the bow line and he the stern line. Neither did they talk while they headed out to collect the traps and haul them in. He had two good-sized lobsters, which he put in a burlap sack before heading again for shore.
When the dory bumped against the pilings, Rye hefted one of the traps up onto the wharf.
Laura looked up, surprised. “What you gonna do with that?”
He reached for the second trap and thumped it down beside the first, avoiding her eyes. “I’ve had ’em long enough. Time I return ’em to old man Hardesty’s boathouse.”
Her heart careened with a mixture of joy and foreboding.
Together they secured the dory, then each picked up a trap and they walked wordlessly side by side past old Cap’n Silas, who nodded and puffed his pipe without saying a word. When they’d passed him, they peered at each other guiltily but continued in the direction of the boathouse.
Inside, the boathouse was just as they’d left it, except today, with a shroud of fog at the windows, it seemed more secret and forbidden. Just inside the door Laura came to an abrupt halt, her fingers clinging to a bar of her lobster trap as it rested against her knees. She jumped and spun around when Rye dropped his trap with a clatter. He took hers and set it down, too, but when he straightened, neither of them seemed to know where to look. He slipped his hands inside the back waistline of his pants while she folded hers tightly together before her skirts.
“I gotta go,” he announced abruptly. “My ma said to bring the lobsters home for supper.” But the burlap bag lay forgotten near the door.
“I gotta go, too. My ma likes me to come and help her with supper.”
He turned toward the door but had taken only three steps before she dared to speak the word that stopped him.
“Rye?”
He spun around and gave her a searching look that revealed what had possessed his thoughts for ten days now. “What?”
“Are ... are you mad at me?”
His Adam’s apple bobbed. “No.”
“Well then, what’s wrong?”
“I ... I don’t know.”
Laura felt her chin tremble, and suddenly Rye’s image seemed to grow wavery while she tried her hardest to keep the tears from showing. But Rye saw the glisten, and suddenly his lanky legs were covering the space between them, and a minute later she was crushed against his chest. The strength of his not-yet-adult arms was as powerful as that of any full-grown man as he pulled her hard against him, and she clung to his neck. Their kiss, too, held an adult intensity, and a wondrous letting go happened inside Laura when his tongue came into her mouth and circled hers, then licked the insides of her cheeks and made her own tongue arch so sharply that it ached sweetly.
Their lips broke apart and he hugged her close, rocking back and forth and dropping his face into the lee of her neck. Standing on tiptoe, she clung to him; he’d grown so tall in the past winter, they no longer matched in height.
“Rye, I was so scared when you wouldn’t look at me in the square today.” Her words were muffled against his thick brown sweater as he continued rocking her in a motion meant to pacify but that only inflamed. Laura pulled back to look at him. “Why did you act that way?”
“I don’t know.” His blue eyes appeared haunted.
“Don’t ever do that again, Rye.”
He only swallowed, then spoke her name in a strange, adult way. “Laura ...”
Then she was pulled roughly against him again while they kissed and kissed, frightened of the needs of their bodies, yet hearkening to them nonetheless, for soon they were moving, hardly aware of their action, toward the canvas where they’d lain once before. By some unspoken agreement they went do
wn on their knees, still kissing, then fell to their hips, then elbows, seeking that closeness they’d experienced and could not forget.
And this time when his hand slid beneath her skirts, Laura’s limbs opened readily, anticipating the thrill of his intimate touch. As before, her body craved his exploration and blossomed at his caress. When his hand moved to the button of her pantaloons, she knew she should stop him, but was incapable. His palm slipped inside, exploring the warm surface of her stomach, then gingerly encountering the nest of new-sprung hair, hesitating at the threshold of femininity until she moved restlessly and made a soft sound in her throat.
Her heart felt as if it would explode with anxiety as she waited on the brink of the forbidden. But when at last his fingers slipped those final inches to discover the wherefore of her silken femininity, she jumped.
Immediately, he recoiled and withdrew. “Did I hurt you?” His blue eyes were wide with fright while carnality and morality waged war within her.
“N ... no. Do it again.”
“But what if..
“I don’t know ... do it again.”
When his inexperienced fingers plumbed her for a second time she did not jump, but closed her eyes and knew a great wonder. Naively he went on, far from mastering the touch yet, but needing not to master, only to explore.
“Rye,” she whispered after some moments, “we’re sure going to hell now.”
“No we’re not. I asked somebody about it, and it takes a lot more than this before you go to hell.”
She pulled back sharply and shoved his hand away. “You ... you asked somebody?” she repeated, horrified. “Who?”
“Charles.”
She sighed with relief when he named an older, married cousin of his whom she scarcely knew.
“What did you ask him?”
“I asked him if he thought a man would go to hell for touching a woman.”
“And what did he say?”
“He laughed.”
“He laughed?” she parroted, amazed.