From Sand and Ash(18)

Eva made the mistake of lunging too deep and Angelo easily swiped her “sword” away.

“Surrender, knave!” he said with a sneering twist of his lips. His black curls were clinging to his forehead and his blue eyes danced with Eva as she sashayed around him, pretending she was a skilled swordsman. She was laughing and relaxed, the old Eva, and his heart softened as he looked into her grinning face.

She sensed the shift in his attention and she feinted, as if to kneel, only to step forward and grab at his arm, pivoting as if to throw him over her shoulder in a move that was more ancient wrestling than fencing. He dropped his net and pulled her against him aggressively, her back to his chest, his forearm resting firmly beneath her breasts, one large hand wrapped around her rib cage.

He had meant for it to be part of the game. Clearly, he hadn’t thought. His body hugged hers from his chest to his thighs, her hair brushed his face, her female scent tickled his nose, and his mouth was poised at the silky whorl of her ear, ready to demand her surrender.

They stood frozen for several long seconds, locked in the strange embrace, eyes closed, mouths slightly open, trying to breathe without movement, without sound, and growing lightheaded in the attempt. Eva’s hands had risen to Angelo’s arm when he pulled her to him, and she stood motionless against him, her hands gripping the hard length that held her hostage. She didn’t dare say his name, didn’t dare utter a sound. Surely, it would break the spell. Then she felt his lips move ever-so-softly against the lobe of her ear, skim the uppermost edge of her jaw, then travel back again. Eva resisted the sweet shudder that slid down her spine, but Angelo felt the tremor and his lips left her skin. But he didn’t pull away or loosen his arm.

Eva slowly turned her head, feeling his breath mark a path across her cheek as she raised her face and lifted her chin. Then it was her breath tickling his cheek and warming his lips. Again they paused, muscles tensed, straining to feel everything, to miss nothing, and still not cross any lines. Their eyes stayed closed as they neared that line, stood toe-to-toe, and then stepped over it, into each other.

Mouths touched. Pressed. Retreated. Brushed, retreated. Pressed, sought, then slid away. And still their eyes remained closed. Denying everything.

Eva turned as Angelo shifted, and the dance began again, the angle different, more direct, less accidental. Accidental. Innocent. Sweet. The words slipped through Angelo’s foggy mind, and he nodded slightly. Yes. That was it. Innocent.

With his mouth pressed against Eva’s, that slight nod lifted Eva’s full top lip, separating it from the lower one, and Angelo explored the space between them with an unintentional touch of his tongue. Unintentional. Innocent. Sweet. So incredibly sweet. Just like that kiss so long ago.

But the sweetness pulled him under like Camillo’s wine. Then he was drinking deeply, pulling every last drop from Eva’s mouth, unable to stop. It was like nothing he’d ever tasted before, and she cradled his face, letting him sip away, slip away, lost in the flavor, the texture, the heady heat of her mouth on his.

Then they opened their eyes.

Dark and heavy met blue and blazing, and Angelo ached to close his eyes again, even as he lifted his mouth and dropped his hands from her body.

“Eva,” he whispered, and his torment made her tremble.

“Again,” she pleaded, and her eyes begged. “Again, Angelo.”

“Madonna,” he breathed. “Madonna,” he pleaded. But the lovely Madonna, mother of his precious Jesus, couldn’t hold a candle to the madonna before him.

They moved as one, bodies coming back together, the renewed contact so welcome and wondrous that their sighs slid around them like a hushed hallelujah chorus. Then there was only pleasure and pressure, mouths and momentum, as one kiss grew and multiplied and became something new, something neither of them had known before.

Outside the storm abated, welcoming a rainbow of soft pastels reflected in silvery puddles that neither of them saw. Outside, Fabia called for them, telling them to come in for supper. But neither of them heard. Outside, the air chilled with the evening, but neither of them felt the cold. Outside, Camillo Rosselli worried, puffing on his pipe, wondering what the future would hold for the two young people who had always loved the other but didn’t belong together. And as their fires were banked, they both smelled the smoke.



They left the fisherman’s shack with their virginities intact, but they didn’t go inside to safety and sanity. Instead, they drifted up into the fragrant, rain-damp evergreen forest that stood sentry on one side of the vacation home, unwilling to part, unable to stop touching, to stop kissing, to walk away from each other and into the place where separation would surely invite guilt and regret, at least for Angelo.

When they finally parted and Eva tiptoed up to her room, drunk on love and dizzy with desire, smiling against the palm she pressed to her lips to keep from giggling, Angelo sat on the veranda and tried not to think at all. He too kept his hand pressed to his mouth, but it was not to keep from laughing. He could smell Eva on his fingers.

His body tightened all over again and his breaths grew painful. He was in exquisite agony. He had never known such pleasure, and not just in her body and her skin. Not just in her mouth and her sweetness. Not just in the way she touched him and made him tremble. It was more than that. It wasn’t just pleasure, it was joy.

He’d been warned about the dangers of the flesh. Seminarians were counseled extensively, cautioned endlessly, and threatened with their very souls when it came to bridling passions and denying every carnal impulse. But no one had told him he would be filled with this immeasurable joy. He felt close to tears, and it wasn’t simply because he’d just fallen into the snare every seminarian secretly dreads and simultaneously dreams about. It was love that made each touch feel like redemption and each kiss feel like rebirth. Not lust. Not pleasure. It was love that created joy.