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Chapter Eleven. “Cody! Cody!” Annabel reined in Kahlo close to Hibiscus Villa, tethered the horse, and jumped the steps up to the open door






“Cody! Cody! ” Annabel reined in Kahlo close to Hibiscus Villa, tethered the horse, and jumped the steps up to the open door. “Are you there, Cody? I’ve got something for you.

Cody emerged from the bathroom wearing a towel, her black hair wet and plastered to her head like a seal. Annabel pulled a sharp breath and let her eyes travel over the finely molded form in front of her. It should be illegal for any woman to be so sexy with so little effort, she thought. Water rolled across Cody’s smooth shoulders, following the sinuous contours of her body, to gather in rivulets between her breasts.

Completely distracted, Annabel held out a large paper bag. “Your mail, ” she said, puzzled when Cody’s expression underwent a subtle change.

“Thanks.” She took the bag and dropped it unenthusiastically onto a small table nearby.

Annabel stayed where she was, flexing her whip slightly against one thigh and trying to pretend her muscles weren’t taut with tension. “I’d love a cup of tea, ” she hinted finally.

“I’ll get dressed, ” Cody said and turned back toward the bathroom.

“Look, am I interrupting something? ”

Cody halted. “You know, Annabel, ” she said dully, “life can get very complicated.”

“Indeed it can.” Annabel stared at Cody’s long, beautifully shaped legs, her eyes hovering where the towel began high on those damp thighs. Dryness glued her mouth shut and her shirt seemed too tight at the neck. Easing a couple of buttons undone, she tilted her head back, exposing her throat to the cool air drifting through the verandah.

Cody retreated back into the house. “I’ll put the tea on.”

“I can make it, while you dress, ” Annabel offered and followed her indoors.

As she was stacking their cups onto a tray shortly afterwards, Cody appeared. She had changed into cut-off denim shorts and a sleeveless lavender T-shirt that revealed more than it covered. Annabel had the impression she had been crying.

“Are you all right? ” she asked, realizing with a slight shock how much she actually cared.

Cody made a convincing display of unconcern, shrugging her shoulders and lifting the tray with a flourish. “I’m fine, ” she managed without a tremor. But she still looked everywhere except at Annabel.

Out on the verandah, Annabel pulled off her riding hat and flopped down into a cane chair. They sat in silence performing the tea ritual. It was not a silence like the communion of old friends, or new friends completely at ease with one another. It was dense and clammy, and exaggerated by the piercing birdcalls and persistent drone of insects. It stretched like quicksand, deceptive, treacherous—neither woman willing to take an experimental step lest she sink out of her depth, uncertain of rescue.

Cody wanted to speak, but her throat was tight and her eyes still stung. Annabel looked so cool and somehow certain of the world. She would be shocked if Cody told her, shocked and disgusted to find she was calmly sipping tea with a criminal. Cody knew the secret put a barrier between them and she struggled to find the words to breach it.

“Annabel, ” she finally plunged in. “Have you ever done something you regretted? ”

Annabel’s eyes widened. In the shade of the verandah they looked pansy-blue. She cocked her head to one side as though lost in thought, then said softly, “Something I’ve regretted? Well, that gives me plenty of scope. I guess you don’t mean taking a bath on the Yen either.” Her brow creased and she admitted, “It’s strange you should ask that. Since I came to the island, it’s like I’ve seen my life from a whole new perspective. I realize how miserable and empty it’s been. I feel like I’ve spent years so busy and tired, I haven’t had time to think about what’s missing.”

Responding to an unspoken question in Cody’s eyes, she said, “I didn’t have time for relationships either. I’ve had a few flings. Nothing serious. Maybe I’ve been horse shy.” She said it reflectively as though the idea were new and interesting. “So to answer your question before you fall asleep, yes, I have done something I regret. I wish I had spent the last few years doing something positive. And I wish I had spent more time with my aunt. So… how about you? ”

Cody sipped her tea and shifted in her seat. Watching her, Annabel looked calm, reflective, a little sad. As if sensing Cody’s apprehension, she threw her a reassuring smile. The urge to spill the beans was overwhelming but Cody fought it off anyway. How could she tell Annabel everything? They barely knew each other and it was hardly fair to involve another woman in her guilty secret. Yet it would be such a relief to discuss it. Hardly an hour passed that she did not experience a sinking in her stomach when she thought about that briefcase lurking in Janet’s wardrobe, or of a letter somewhere recording her crime and demanding restitution.

Releasing a breath held too long, she set her cup down with a clatter. “I’m not sure that I have regrets, exactly. But I have done something that’s making me feel very guilty.”

Annabel said nothing at first, but looked across her cup at Cody with eyes that were curious, but also kind. “Sounds serious, ” she commented with a hint of humor.

Despite herself, Cody relaxed. “It is. I can’t talk about it right now but it’s on my mind a lot, and I guess I wanted you to know. I don’t want you thinking I’m unfriendly or rude.”

Annabel leaned forward, cupping her chin in one hand and examining Cody’s face with unnerving intensity. “Is it important what I think? ”

Cody blushed and lowered her eyes. It was important, but she found herself wishing it weren’t. Since that kiss on the beach, she had been unable to get Annabel out of her mind. Even now her skin tingled with the imprint of Annabel’s hands and her mouth felt hot with the memory of Annabel’s. Don’t, she ordered herself. The very last thing she needed in her life right now was another complication.

Forcing a lighter note, she said casually, “Of course it is. You’re supposed to be wildly impressed with my good looks, charm and incisive wit. Back home, the girls can’t leave me alone.”

Without missing a beat, Annabel clutched her chest and simpered, “I can sure see why that is. The first time I laid eyes on you, well, I just said to myself, Annabel honey, this is your lucky day.

Cody grinned at the Southern Belle impersonation. “You betcha.” She affected a pose that drew attention to her neatly muscled arms. “They don’t call me hotlips for nothing.”

Annabel groaned. “Hotlips, how original.” She focused blatantly on Cody’s mouth. “I take it you have a reputation? ”

Cody nodded. “Yeah. Ever since a bad moment with a chili taco at the Refuge fundraiser.”

“Cramped your style? ” Annabel’s voice was dry.

“I thought I’d never be the same woman again.”

“And are you? ” Annabel’s gaze traveled warmly across her body.

Not yet, Cody’s mind ordered, but her body was not convinced. Her pulse had quickened and she found herself unable to look away from Annabel’s face—the way the fine stray hairs escaped from her plait and clung damply to her forehead, the way her lips turned up slightly in the corners and her chin dimpled when she laughed.

When Annabel got to her feet, Cody felt a sharp pang of disappointment. “I should be going, ” she said without conviction.

Those bright lavender eyes scanned Cody’s face, a hint of challenge in their gemlike depths. When Cody remained silent, she glanced about, apparently looking for something. “My whip, ” she explained, reaching past her.

Then her hands were on Cody’s shoulders and Cody felt the warmth of her as she leaned over the chair back. Her heart accelerated so sharply she felt winded. Annabel’s fingers lingered possessively, burning her skin. Twisting in her chair, Cody looked up her.

“Annabel…” she began awkwardly, then chickened out. Trying to sound normal, she said, “Um, have a nice day.”

To Cody’s consternation, Annabel bent lower, letting her arms slide from Cody’s shoulders over her breasts. She rested her head against Cody’s, her mouth just inches from her ear.

“Why don’t you come along? ” she invited, her warm breath caressing Cody’s cheek.

Cody inhaled that familiar Annabel fragrance and swallowed with difficulty. Her nipples strained against the thin cotton of her T-shirt, betraying the desperate craving that engulfed her. She tried to steer her thoughts to some common sense destination, but her mind would not co-operate.

“You might even enjoy it, ” Annabel persisted. She moved around the chair to face Cody, and with a broad smile took both her hands and pulled her to her feet.

She was impossibly close and this time Cody let herself stare. At point blank Annabel’s skin was the radiant creamy white of a fine pearl. Cody found herself fascinated by its texture, by the natural red of Annabel’s mouth against it, the denseness of her lashes. She imagined owning it with her fingers, her lips, her tongue, and felt a flowering in her groin.

Annabel was watching her with a frank expression. A trace of indolent humor played across her features, and Cody realized she must be gawking like some star-struck adolescent. Dropping her eyes, trying to concentrate on anything but the wet ache between her thighs, she pulled her hands free. Her heart pounded against her ribs so fast she could barely breathe.

Annabel had to know the effect she was having, Cody thought with a mix of awe and dismay. “I won’t come, ” she said. “But thanks anyway.” Her voice sounded hoarse, unlike her own.

She took a step back, wanting to distance herself from the chaotic emotions the other woman aroused. Her skin clamored for touch, her pulse surged. She felt altogether too exposed, transparent in her yearning.

Annabel picked up her whip and flexed it absently, contemplating her next move. Cody looked to one side, hands tucked defensively into her armpits. Annabel studied the outline of her breasts flattened beneath her folded arms and imagined pulling those hands away, teasing the nipples they guarded. She experienced a powerful urge to reach for her, to seduce away her inhibitions. Conscious of her own heightening arousal, and of Cody’s obvious discomfort, she hesitated.

Cody has just broken up with her lover, she reminded herself. She needs time to heal. Annabel had promised herself she would wait, yet here she was attempting to seduce her. When you were on the rebound, it was all too easy to jump into bed with any woman who came along. That was a class act, the kind she’d become famous for after her breakup with Clare.

Back then, she had adopted a love ’em and leave ’em approach and had spent a year proving she could fuck any woman she liked, whenever she liked, and feel nothing. To whom she was proving it was a moot point. When she finally made the switch from banking to commodities trading, she had been secretly relieved. The long hours and exhausting routine soon provided the excuse she needed to slide out of any kind of commitment, and before long, hanging over a screen and shouting into a phone in each hand gave her a bigger rush than an orgasm.

At the time she had been delighted—cheap thrills without the emotional hassles of relationships. Now she felt sick at the thought of the women she must have hurt along the way. Tempting though it was, she decided it would be wrong to draw Cody into some kind of consolation fling. With a flash of self-awareness, she knew she wanted more than that. Certainly she recognized the sexual current that ran between them, but there was something else, too. Cody aroused in her an unaccustomed tenderness, an urge to find out more about her—feelings she would have run a mile from only months ago.

Impulsively Annabel closed the distance between them, her hand straying to Cody’s cheek. With tantalizing softness, she brushed her lips against Cody’s, intending simply to say farewell. But Cody’s mouth felt so welcoming, parting against hers, the tips of their tongues fluid against one another. Coaxing her lips further apart, Annabel moved her hand over Cody’s jaw to rest against the wild flutter of her pulse.

Cody might be able to persuade herself she was not ready for this, Annabel thought, but her body sent quite different signals. Her defensive arms had dropped to her sides. There was no reserve in the sway of her body against Annabel’s, the press of her thighs, the telltale hardness of her nipples. She worked a caressing hand beneath Cody’s T-shirt, thrilling to the feel of her, so lithe and responsive.

“I could stay, ” Annabel murmured against her mouth.

Cody’s arms wrapped hard around her, returning her sensuous embrace. This time it was she who kissed Annabel, urgently and deeply, making the demands Annabel ached to meet.

Barely able to catch her breath, Annabel said, “Is that a yes? ”

Their eyes locked and the world around them seemed very still in the sultry languor of the afternoon. Annabel was conscious only of Cody: her soft shallow breathing, the undisguised need in her eyes.

But something was tugging at her. She gave a slight, bemused start, looked around and groaned. “Oh, no.”

A pair of dark liquid eyes surveyed her inquisitively, and Kahlo prised the whip she was still holding from her fingers.

Cody’s face was a study in dismay. “I thought she was tied up.”

“I’m sorry.” Annabel shook her head, disbelieving. “I’ll put her in the lean-to around the back.” She touched Cody’s cheek. “Don’t go away.”

 

It was a tragic piece of timing, Cody decided as she went into the villa. In more ways than one. It would have been so easy to fall into bed with Annabel right then and there. But, like a bucket of cold water, reality had intervened and stopped her short of a choice she would probably regret.

It was for the best, Cody convinced herself. Not only was she fresh out of a broken relationship, but she was also a fugitive from justice. The last thing she needed was another complication.

Raking a despondent hand through her hair, she paced the sitting room. Her mind seethed with conflicting emotions. She wanted to make love with Annabel—her body was unmistakably clear about that. But her life was a mess. She was a mess; a walking rebound disaster. How could she even contemplate getting involved with another woman? And that’s exactly what would happen. Annabel already meant more to her than any stranger should. She was kidding herself if she thought she could keep things on a purely physical footing.

Lamenting her folly, she crept onto the sofa and buried her face in a cushion. A moment later someone touched her shoulder.

“Have you changed your mind? ” Annabel sat down beside her.

Embarrassed, Cody straightened up. “No...I mean...yes.”

“It’s okay. I understand.”

“No.” Cody caught at Annabel’s hand. She felt trapped, beached on the disorienting sands of her own insecurity. She knew she should tell her to leave, but instead she begged, “Please. Don’t go.”

Annabel took her in her arms and gently caressed her cheek. “We don’t have to do anything, you know.” There was a hint of amusement in her voice. “I’d like to, of course.” She tilted Cody’s chin and stared at her intently. Then she bent forward and delicately kissed her.

They sat very still, mouths just touching. Cody closed her eyes. Annabel’s breath was warm on her face. She moved against her, placing her hands behind her neck and responding to her kisses in kind. By some unspoken consensus, they moved to Cody’s bedroom and stood there kissing until Cody felt so weak she could barely stand. Annabel’s mouth moved from her face to her throat, licking and kissing as her hands unfastened Cody’s shorts. Panic fluttered along with desire in the pit of Cody’s stomach and her breath came in short, shallow gasps. She turned her attention to Annabel’s shirt, unbuttoning it and sliding it off her shoulders.

Annabel’s skin glowed with the richness of ivory silk and begged to be touched. Cody stared, wanting at the same time to taste and smell and feel her.

“You’re beautiful, ” she whispered and lowered her head to plant devotional kisses along Annabel’s shoulders, slowly working her way down to the perfect slope of her breasts and those nipples, the same astounding dark pink as her mouth.

She pulled off her T-shirt, longing to press her flesh against Annabel’s, to remove the final layers between them. Annabel unzipped her jeans and Cody helped tug them over her hips, impatience making her a little rough.

With a soft laugh, Annabel stepped out of them and reached for Cody’s hands, raising them to her mouth and kissing the palms tenderly. “Not so fast, ” she said and twisted Cody’s arms playfully behind her back, grazing her mouth with teasing kisses.

Cody drew a ragged breath and broke free of Annabel’s grip. Catching hold of her, she pulled her determinedly toward the bed, throwing back the covers and drawing her down. She felt sick with passion. She wanted Annabel inside her, around her, close and hot.

Annabel knelt across Cody’s body, astride one thigh. Cody could feel her wetness, the hands pinning her shoulders down, the hot crush of their flesh. Her breasts ached. Her mouth felt full and trembling. She opened heavy eyes and met Annabel’s bright, intense stare. Transfixed by what she saw there, she twisted her fingers into Annabel’s hair and pulled her down hard, kissing her passionately, reveling in the foreign textures of her body. Her breasts felt firm, the nipples hard. She was hot and smooth, as supple as a cat.

Murmuring Annabel’s name, Cody gasped as fingers found her throbbing clitoris, slid down to explore her wetness, moved casually back again. With her hips, she begged for more than the slow, teasing strokes. She was almost crying with desire as Annabel slid her hands beneath her shoulders and pulled her upright so they were both on their knees, each free to explore the newness of the other’s body. Cody pressed hard against her, loving the way their stomachs, their mounds, connected. She dug her fingers into Annabel’s ass, kneading the firm flesh, drawing her forward, sighing with pleasure as the pressure against her groin increased.

Annabel’s sure fingers left her clitoris to work new magic, stroking and caressing her breasts, rolling her nipples into tense arousal. They were followed by her mouth, and Cody’s skin shocked and tightened as tantalizing licks rapidly gave way to hard urgent bites.

“Don’t stop, ” she moaned as Annabel’s attention moved further down her body, her mouth tracing circles around her stomach and down into the join of her thighs.

As she felt herself parted, Annabel’s arm locked around her to keep her from sinking back onto the bed. Swaying, she clutched Annabel’s shoulders as she felt the head of her clitoris enveloped slowly, wetly. Beads of perspiration clustered on her forehead and between her breasts. She wanted to say something but her mouth was dry with passion.

“Please, ” she croaked, an exquisite tension swamping her limbs.

Annabel pulled back a little and straightened. Aligning her body with Cody’s, she placed one hand firmly behind her head and kissed her hard, entering her at the same time. Releasing a sharp whimper, Cody bit down on Annabel’s shoulder and felt the pressure inside her ease slightly.

“Did I hurt you, baby? ” Annabel’s voice shook.

Cody could only mumble a denial.

“You feel so good.” Annabel’s mouth was on hers once more, and Cody could taste her own juices, salty and sharp.

She wanted to touch Annabel, too, make her cry out with pleasure, but instead she grasped hold of her more tightly, steadying herself as her arousal climbed. Legs shaking, Cody felt herself pass that final threshold of resistance, surrendering to sensation, giving herself completely to this woman.

Finally, mercifully, Annabel lowered Cody onto her back and slid a hand beneath her hips, angling her so she could move deeper inside. Cody felt a strange heat roll beneath her skin as if a layer of super-sensitive new flesh had just unfolded. She was sweating freely now, her body open and compliant. Annabel’s tongue circled her clitoris once more and Cody rocked against the voluptuous rhythm of fingers and mouth.

She tried to speak, but could only make small animal sounds as the tension in her body climbed to breaking point. She no longer had any sense of what Annabel was doing, only that she was lost to the irresistible. A pulsing swell of pleasure rose from her engorged center, and she bit down hard on her lip as a series of powerful shudders claimed her. She was barely aware of her own fierce cries of release, when a final startling burst of moisture swamped every pore and saturated her thighs.

Then Annabel was kissing her tenderly and Cody realized she was crying. Suddenly self-conscious, she half-turned her head aside but Annabel gently drew her back.

With shaky tenderness, she said, “You’re fine, Cody, ” and pushed the damp hair off her forehead to plant a kiss there.

When Cody attempted to part Annabel’s thighs her hand was caught and guided resolutely away.

“Later, ” Annabel murmured. “I’m not going anywhere.”

And as the hours passed and a full moon swam placidly across Passion Bay, they made love again and again until exhaustion overtook them and, curling into one another, they slept.

 






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