Body Check

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part without express written permission.

S.K. Gray

Body Check Copyright © 2006 S.K.Gray

Chapter One Snow, snow, snow. And then of course, more snow. And on the occasion when there seemed to be a bit of a weather change in the air, there was always...heavier snow. Lillian watched from the opened door of the spa as a Christmas-like, big flaked, fairyland snow fell for the twelfth time in as many days. However, Thanksgiving had yet to descend on the perky little tourist resort town of Kinetka Tok, tucked cozily at the base of a pristine mountain one hour as the crow flies north from Anchorage, Alaska. Already everyone was talking about this being the biggest and best snowfall ever. Everyone that was a tourist was talking, that is. They only made this little haven their home for as long as they could stretch their three day weekend dollar. The stretch seemed to far outlast the more populated and much more glamorous winter watering holes of the rich and famous in the neighboring and not so neighboring Southern states. Of course everything was a Southern state here in Alaska. Lillian had only called this semi-remote section of God's Green Earth home for the last seven months. Green. Hardly. Already she was starting to see things as only shades of white! The only green thing she had seen lately was the fake putting carpet in the 8-hole indoor miniature golf course off the lobby in Morgana Chalet. The 9th hole had fallen victim to Freda Morgan’s obsession with becoming a boutique maven and lay dormant beneath the plush pink and gold carpeting of “Guinevere’s Closet”. However, if one scuffled slowly enough across the flooring, in their mukluks they could still detect the unfilled hole of the green while perusing the shelves of designer seconds in the far back corner. Not that the designer firsts were any more up to date! High fashion reached this corner of the frozen tundra just in time to be three seasons behind New York City’s

2

Body Check latest retro fads. But the lack of pressure to be hip added to that certain charm of Kinetka Tok. She certainly hadn’t picked this location in order to be basking in the focused social light of ultimate cool. She’d come here to get as far away from spotlights as possible. Kine’tok, as it was affectionately labeled by the locals in their Pidgin English, was the perfect temporary hideaway. Far enough

from the brighter lights of Anchorage but still within reach of

borderline new millennium civilization, Kinetka Tok enjoyed a deliciously small elitist standing among resort hideaways in the sprawling wilderness of northern tundra known for Eskimos, Sled dogs and Pin-up Calendars of available brawny, single men with a preference for flannel, scruff, lumberjack suspenders and ice hockey. Ratio 3:1, malefemale. The media-spawned tease from travel brochures for meeting Mr. Nose-Rubbing Right was tempting enough to establish a passable tourist trade that helped keep Kinetka Tok on the AAA maps and skiing guidebooks. Lilly was willing to overlook that particular selling point. She’d just about had it with the male gender. They were supreme for the obvious physical needs, but best kept at heart’s length. It was getting easier to embrace cynicism and just feed the visual needs of seeing testosterone at its basic natural best than deal with the soulless self serving demi-gods of the three piece suit jungle. With pristine ski paths literally within a hockey puck’s throw at the base of the Kialea Mountain, and an oversized frozen pond fit for rough and tumble ice hockey for those weekend warriors who needed a bit more contact sport than downhill’s would provide, the place was an upper middle class magnet for down-home sports fans and Aspen wannabes who had a tad less disposable income than their more glamorous American counterparts down South. The perfect, affordable escape! While thoughts of her own recent escape danced through Lilly’s head, the one and only Mrs. Freda Morgan skittered past her in a bright lime green workout suit. Make that two green things, Lilly corrected herself. She also noticed that Mrs. M's luminous attire had been tested beyond endurance by cramming a perfectly good size twelve body into a size eight leotard. Her matching lime and lemon striped warm ups fairly screamed LOOK AT ME as she giggled and waved at Lillian, wrapped herself in her pink and gold Designer First parka and headed out the door for the relative luxury of the surprisingly

3

S.K. Gray four and a half-star main Chalet located just about a hockey rink away. Almost half way across the common ground, she had to primly avoid the scattered skiers and snow boarders getting their last run down the Big Mountain. The favorite challenge to advanced skiers, it was off limits to the more timid sportsters. It was a dangerous hill, and more than once in the thirty-year-old history of the resort it had spilled a small avalanche into the commons that would keep the crews busy for days. But the tourists loved the idea of being so close to potential mini drama. Ah yes, the tourists, again. The bold, the brave, the not-quite Aspen-wealthy elite. So happily scuffling along the barely passable walkways continually being snow plowed by the resort’s able-bodied male population of an LLBean outfitted ground crew, indistinguishable under their heavy fur lined hats. Even with the hazy threat of an unpredictable Mother Nature looming, the tourists knew they could fly out of here at any given notice and leave the wonderland behind. The local air force of Canuck Bros. Choppers was available to lift off sans runway with the frantic flashing of a fistful of money. Ah, Lilly noted wryly, the third bit of greenery in Kinetka Tok. Tourist money. She’d better not become too cynical. That third bit of greenery kept her in warm fuzzies. Seven months ago she’d taken over the temporary management of Body Check, Kinetka Tok’s first and only social spa. Aching skating muscles and slope-pummeled soft body tissue, had created a need for a pampering retreat that bubbled and steamed away the temporary blues. A small, plush carpeted, Egyptian Cotton-toweled, mosaic tiled retreat with hot tubs and showers and massage rooms, oh my! Body Check was just the answer for a thriving little escape. Following a soul ripping dissolution of dozen year, steeped-in-professionalbusiness-world marriage, a vanishing act was top priority on Lilly’s list. A tip from a friend of a friend of a friend who understood all about the need to hide, had directed her to the snow-weary female owner of this profitable but laid back little health spa as far away from big city bright lights and elitist snobs as moneyed civilization could get. Having put in 10 years of loyal sales acumen plus considerable blood sweat and tears into a fast track Chicago body shop for Type A executive women, Lilly contacted the owner

4

Body Check and offered a handsome little co-op trade A deal was struck, an exchange of positions was secretly sworn to, and with the stubborn loyalty of the silent sisterhood of over thirty-somethings traded for twenty-something hootchie babes firmly behind her, Lillian had trekked off to the Northern tundra with no easily followed trail behind her. Life here was sweeter and slower and relatively simple. The seasons, so far, breathtaking. The surroundings shared with the rough, but honest beasts of the world as opposed to the two-legged, circumcised penis-sporting, big-business variety. And as long as you shielded yourself with warm fuzzies when the snow queen howled, it was also safe. Lawyers just didn’t want to come here. And for the moment, until the call of the CEO overpowered the Call of the Wild, she relished the relief. Out in the commons, the townsfolk stared knowingly up at the sky and ambled towards the shopping center, to make sure they had an extra supply of drinking water and canned goods, just in case Mom Nature got feisty. Speaking of which, Lillian figured she had better hightail it to the local grocery and stock up on a few essentials, and maybe a few non-essentials to help her through the night. She closed up rather quickly, and slipped on her very unfashionable, beat up leather Adirondack coat and fur-lined mukluks that had seen better days but still kept her feet perfectly dry, if not perfectly warm. The well-worn gray sweat pants and oversized chenille sweater she had pulled on after her quick jump in the shower, completed the perfect *woman of Alaska* ensemble. Half way to her car, she noticed Anna Louise, her best Saturday night drinking buddy (when she could dump Eddie, her polar bear of a husband) waving wildly to her. "Hey, I need a quick carton of cancer sticks! Eddie is passed out. Are you headed to the strip?" Lilly nodded and motioned her to the beat up late model Land Rover that had seen better days but what the hell, it was still a Land Rover and had been one very sore point in her win in the divorce settlement. Hey, even a judge could see that a man left with an MG Roadster, a full sized BMW and a vintage Corvette could hardly grouse about losing a Rover to an ex-wife headed for the frozen tundra! Snuggled into the Rover, they dispensed with the polite pleasantries. "Fucking snow."

5

S.K. Gray Lilly laughed. "Well, what the hell Weezer, you live in Alaska." "Yeah, well, not forever. At least I hope not. I envy your temporary status. I wish I were like most of the twenty something runaway hired help here and could go somewhere alive and kicking for the holidays. With, you know, more than say five people within full voice hollering distance. Where high heels aren’t just a fetish playtoy tucked back in the spare bedroom closet beneath the old Moose Hunting in Juneau magazine subscriptions." "It snows where most of those hired hands go, too, you know, I doubt if any of them live more than twenty miles in any direction...and would you really want to be in your twenties and single again?" Anna Louise looked at her as if she had two heads. Then she thought it over and finally shook her own curly mopped head as they pulled into the barely visible parking lot of the A&P. "No, but I certainly wouldn't mind having access to a lot of those twenty year old twinkies that walk around here looking like prime little polar bears just itching for a nice friendly fu....meaningful one night stand." "You are such an unapologetic slut, Weezer. That is what I adore about you." "Oh, my, LOOK! Look at that adorable warm fuzzy!" Anna Louise cooed loudly as Lillian cut the motor. Looking through the already frosted windshield, Lillian spotted the four-legged Malamute puppy gamboling in front of the store window and jumping up in the air to kill falling snowflakes that dared to dance in its path. "Yeah, sweet little thing. I can't get over how big their paws are!" Anna Louise whapped her with a muffled mitten "You dolt, I am talking about the two legged fuzzy with it!" Lilly rolled her eyes and stared back at the small gathering on the sidewalk. Squinting her eyes to focus, she let out a small, and what she thought was undetectable, sigh. "...Johnnie boy" The silence deepened, and she peeked at Anna Louise, who smirked into that silence. "Johnnie boy is it? A friend of yours?" "NOOOO. I’ve spoken to him at the spa a coupla times. He's just out of academy

6

Body Check training, working here with the park system for the season to get a little step ahead experience-wise before he heads back to his hometown lumberjack Mounty patrol. He’s third generation cop. He participates in one of the local weekend hockey teams. Gives lessons, too. Seems he played sports a lot in college a coupla years back and he drops by the spa now and then for a bit of a quick soak after a game and...and...that’s all." Lilly made a huge drama of fumbling with the ignition key to try and divert Weezer’s attention from that fact that she had just run off at the mouth like a pep squad freshman on estrogen speed pills. “Right. That’s all. So, how long have you wanted to jump his bones?” “Everything is always some tawdry little reason for schtooping someone with you isn’t it?” “Schtooping?” Anna Louise let out an incredulous laugh. “Colorful colloquialism” Lilly fiddled with her keys and pulled the emergency break tight. “Maybe in Stuttgart, Germany…schtooping. Boy, I haven’t head that one for a long time.” “Are you finished?” She looked at her friend mustering up the most patronizing glare she could. “No. Not until you tell me about Johnnie boy. So how long? He’s gorgeous. Long distance, looking, anyway. No wonder you have taken up watching those bone chilling hockey games on the weekend.” From past experience Lilly knew that her friend would hound her relentlessly until she got some kind of answer that would satisfy her gossipy hungry mind. “John comes from Deerling originally. He was still at the academy until about a month ago. This is his last season in Kinetka Tok before he steps into a waiting position in the law enforcement department of his hometown. He’s heavily into playing ice hockey and would probably coach as a career if there were any money in it. It’s kind of his last hurrah before giving his life over to a respectable career in something he doesn’t really want to do. He was a regular at the spa before his training and I took over the management. I just let him use the jets whenever he’s in need of a bit of a pampering after a particularly brutal game. Every once in a while, he chats me up a bit.” Lilly’s eyes

7

S.K. Gray casually rested on the man now playfully rough housing with the Malamute puppy. “If I didn’t hate men so much….and…well, you know the routine…that is all.” “You didn’t answer my question…how long? The pregnant pause hung in the air until Lilly shoved open the her driver’s door letting in a blast of cold reality. “Since about ten minutes after I first caught sight of him in that ridiculous hat.” Anna Louise pointedly stared back at the group on the sidewalk with more interest and watched as the rather well put together hunk in a bulky navy parka and the most ridiculously flapped hat separated from the group and turned to go into the store. He sported a rather grown up scruff of dark rugged beard and even from this distance in his gait and manner made the other warm fuzzies seem much like the pup tangling at their feet...gangly and childish. A walking calendar specimen if there ever was one, he looked up and recognizing the Land Rover, took a small clumsy double take and almost stutter walked into the store...totally stricken and totally adorable! She turned to grin at Lilly. "and that’s all....Johnny boy. So, ooo, like, wow, what’s his sign?" Anna Louise mockingly bounced in her seat, raising the level of her voice to high school octave. "Weez, if you even say one frittin’ word when we are in the store I swear to God I will tell Eddie that you confided in me that you have a trembling passion for his beer breath and burps that makes you instantly wet and horny" "....nasty little bitch aren't you?" "Yes, now let's just get the stuff and leave OK?" "Only if you tell me one more thing about John that is totally yummy." “Oh, grow up- you freak.” “Nuh-uh, and it better be realllly yummy, too, I could use the vicarious thrill. I talk about…schtooping…but at least you are in the position to actually do some of it.” Lilly sighed disgustedly but knew she would get nowhere until she rattled off something believable. "OK, he was at the spa the other day after his afternoon shift and partaking of the lovely after hours Jacuzzi. I happened to breeze by the door as he was making a rather

8

Body Check lazy exit from the waters and..." "...AND?" Lillian stopped, then grinned slow and wide, staring out the windshield. "He has the total package one would expect to find on a much more...physically mature gentleman" "....well hung out the wazoo?" Lillian stifled a laugh "Mmmmm...just a tad leaning to the wet-dream perfection side. It was the bulging biceps, actually, that killed me...once I could drag my eyes off his thighs.” Lilly looked at Anna Louise with poignant pause before continuing. “Almost 20 years of ice hockey, practically born on skates." The two ladies both took a deep breath and then in perfect synchronization whispered "Hockey thighs" Lillian broke the reverie with a snort. “He’s a babe. And I mean that in the almost cradle robbing sense.” “Oh, fuck-off! He’s pushing….oh, 25, maybe 26?” “Exactly, which makes him well out of my ‘35, maybe 36 minus five years for the kinky-factor’ range. Youth has its advantages but slow-hand experience isn’t one of them. I need slow bubbling steam heat baby to heat up these Methuselah limbs.” “Some Alaskan bear meat. Not stock market beef jerky” Guffawing, they tumbled out of the Rover. Inside the bustling grocery, Lilly set about to find the deli bread and apricot jelly, milk fruit, veggies and various irresistible snacks and non essential guilty pleasure #1, butterscotch ice cream, that she needed to get her through a craveless evening of gustatory sin. While passing the beer and wine aisle, she reached for guilty pleasure #2, cheap sparkling champagne. Hey, with the weather stacking up the way it was, it would be a long winter night and if the cable went out, she would need a different sleep aid! Anna Louise was already waiting by the end of the line with her cartoon of nicotine and a giant Hershey bar. Her needs were simple. Seems everyone was having the same thoughts about the twelfth day of snow and the wait in the checkout line turned into a small town gathering. Lillian waited patiently but Anna Louise, eagle eyed and still full of sass, pinched her arm and hissed.

9

S.K. Gray "There he is...and he keeps looking over here like he knows something! Girl...have you been holding out on me???" Lilly yelped and with a nasty grimace tried to stomp on her friend’s boot, but Weezer was too fast for her. "I am 35 years old, finally divorced and as I have admitted regularly, rather totally pissed at the male gender...YOU are the one with hot pants for everything with a dick" she growled under her breath."...and you already have one at home!" "Dick is right and oh SHIT. He's HERE" Weezer stomped her own boot. Sure enough, filling the grocery store door was Polar Bear Eddie, Weezer’s longtime high school sweetheart turned husband. Big doofus grin on his face and just finishing an inward belch of mammoth proportions. He spotted his petite wife among the line waiters and waved. "Beer. Gotta get some BEER. You left before I could catch you!" Anna Louise rolled her eyes and pasted on her *OK sweetie pie* smile and elbowed her way over to him, shrugging back at Lilly, mouthing "sorry, Toots, catch you later...” Lillian blew out a relieved sigh and set her groceries on the checkout. A quick glance at the door and she caught sight of the back of a navy parka just leaving. Just as well. She had no business even silently daydreaming about the dashingly hunky academy graduate who ran the seasonal ice rink and gave lessons to the tourist children tripping around on wobbly ankles and dreams of Wayne Gretsky fame in their hearts. Men were like lead poisoning. Silently tainting every innocent breath of everyday life, until your nerves shriveled up, you couldn’t sleep and your IQ went to hell. Insidious, slow death.

10

Body Check

Chapter Two Ten minutes later, with what seemed like a new half foot of snow on the ground and her fingers gripping the Rover’s ignition key as if to strangle it, she tried for the thirtieth time to start the lousy piece of crap she had fought so valiantly for in the divorce settlement. Well, she certainly wouldn't starve to death, but now, she had to worry about frostbite doing her in! With a very loud holler and a rush of expletives she pounded her fists all over the steering wheel and attacked the pedals like a wild woman. “God damn son-of-a-bitch piece of no good shit….! Die, die DIE you wretched bastard scrap of rusting junk-yard crap!” Her wrestling match was interrupted by a hard rapping on the steamed up window. She practically wrenched off the door handle when she realized the automatic window button was non functional. She quickly de-mittened her hand and furiously wiped a big circle on the steamy glass. A soft pair of concerned blue, no, green …oh, gray!...orbs stared in at her from under dagger straight eyebrows and the ragged bangs of snow flaked locks of dark brown hair that blended in with the wild trim of a very fuzzy hat. His whole face seemed wreathed in fur. The scruffy beginnings of a mustache that would probably never fully bloom framed a mouth almost too pretty to fit into the face of an otherwise supremely masculine male. The most attractive feature of all was that the man had no clue just how damn fine a face it was. She stared at him in a bit of a daze, the air still thick with her curses, then shaking herself back into rapidly deteriorating cold reality, opened the door a bit. The mouth and eyes crinkled in amusement and he raised one dark eyebrow. "I

11

S.K. Gray think it is already dead." She laughed, a bit embarrassed at what surely was a most unique display of road rage. Yeah well, she gave the steering wheel one more hard jolt with her palm and screwed up her mouth. A short moment of uncomfortable silence followed until she took a calming breath and gazed up again at the hovering face. “Hey, hi, John. I think I flooded it. Maybe if I let it sit awhile I can bring it back to life.” “And maybe when Hell Freezes Over snowballs will finally have a chance.” Lilly smiled nervously again and thumped out a mitten-handed drumbeat on the steering wheel. “Ba-dum-bum!” "Come on, I can give you a lift. It is way too cold to try and get it started tonight." She was about to say no and thank him, but before she got out the words he was expecting, he raised his eyebrows softly. "Come on, Tiger Lil, make me feel useful, yeah? The savior pickings have been very slim lately and my ego could use the boost. Just be gentle!” She pondered that only for a moment before climbing out of the useless vehicle. She turned to give the tire a quick kick and almost lost her footing, saved only by the quick hands of John Baylor, part time snow crew, security guard, skating instructor, hockey hunk and Warm Fuzzy beyond compare. Even in the icy air of the snowfall, she could feel the warmth of his breath against her face as he righted her to her feet. She quickly looked over at him, afraid the wonderfully liquid hormonal jolt rushing through her veins because of the close proximity of such a stunningly earthy specimen of pure male would somehow show up in big letters across her forehead. Easy Tart. Then she noticed the small mountain of a young man was...blushing! The balance shifted. Lilly chuckled and reached over to grab his arm. "Tiger Lil? My bark is much worse than my bite...actually...my bite can be quite pleasant." John cleared his throat and looked away, then feeling the remarkable heat of his own embarrassment, laughed low and shook his head. He met her gaze with a twinkle.

12

Body Check "You, ah...have groceries?" Lilly pulled the bag across the front seat and they headed away from the Rover....walking up to the sporadically parked cars left in the parking lot, but he motioned her beyond that to the big snow mobile sitting on the side of the lot. "Ohhh ...I...I there's no room for me and the groceries." John pursed his lips, “You’re right, give me the groceries and I will be back for you in about an hour..." he peeked mischievously into the bag then looked back up seeing the bottle of the champagne sticking up. "Maybe an hour and a half." She laughed out loud, throwing her head back. Such a delightful flirt! He took her arm gently "Come on, I will scoot back and you can crawl in front and hold the groceries on your lap, eh?" “Need a windbreaker, do you?” she grinned slowly, throwing a leg over the machine. Now was not a time to be picky about what kind of steed her knight in shining armor rode while rescuing her buns from certain freezer burn. “That’s the only reason. It’s too damn snowy for my delicate complexion.” “I’ll do my best to catch a face full!” In a few minutes Lillian was comfortably straddled over a vibrating warm motor, in-between two even warmer thighs. His bulky arms, braced on either side of her in bigbear effect shielded her from the invading snow. “Just close your eyes and lean back.” He said, nestling his face in her hair, his lips briefly brushing against a chilled ear lobe. The resulting tingles would forever go down in the annals of her sensual mind-blog as being “Baylorfied”. If she died and went to heaven right now, or if the earth opened up and swallowed her to the depths of flaming hell, she would go there with a smile on her face. Nature never felt more perfect! The euphoric, romantic notion lasted a full thirty seconds before the blasting of the air whipping around the windshield slapped her cheeks with a reminder of just how unprotected she really was. The heavy snow picked up even more in the quickly settling dusk and she tried to dip her face down behind the grocery bag to block the hordes of big flakes pitching wildly towards her in the twilight as the snowmobile tooled and bucked over the deepening snow. John playfully grabbed one end of his long scarf and tossed it around her face. She gladly wrapped it over her mouth, breathing in the wonderful scent

13

S.K. Gray of wool and natural male. No wildly aromatic cologne for this one! Just pure clean youthful male. She'd smelled enough Old Spice and Brut wafting from the men's locker room of the spa to deaden every olfactory nerve in her head...but this heady aroma was enough to revive her faith in Mother Nature. For his part, John inhaled a wonderful fragrance as well. Her long dark hair danced wildly in the air smelling of fresh almond and subtle sweet vanilla and he nudged her head to the side, his chin next to her temple as she curled back against him bracing from the cold. She didn’t even mind the normally invasive roar of revved motor. Not when she could muffle the nasty growl in a cold, but soft mass of flapped hat and soft hair that seemed to nudge back cooperatively. The distance beyond Body Check, up to her small storybook cottage beyond the steepest base of Big Mountain took a few minutes longer than normal, and even with John's expertise behind the wide handlebars, the depth of the snow gave him a bit of trouble. More than once the jolting jump of the runners sent her body pressing back against his chest. Even beneath layers of parka and flannel, Lilly could tell, this male was prime warm-fuzzy of the finest Alaskan caliber. By the time the headlights flashed over a familiar mailbox and they roared up next to the small shoveled pathway leading to her doorstep (now entirely covered over by a thick layer of snow), both of them had a layer of sparkling white stuff all over them, resembling the insides of a snow globe. As he turned the motor off, the roar echoed for a bit in the chilled air, as if reverberating back and forth inside her head from ear to ear. She gave her head a playful *whomp*. “That’s quite the echo! I thought they were load from a passing distance but …whew!” John smiled shortly, a bit of a frown crossing his mouth. “Sorry about that, she isn’t usually this loud. Everything must be magnified up here.” With as little clumsiness as possible she dismounted from the treaded beast and hugged her groceries close. John was adjusting his gloves and looking somewhere up in the not so far distant vicinity of the Big Mountain, cloaked in dusk and thick white rain. His brow wrinkled anxiously as he listened into the night. The dying rumble of the motor still bounced high up the side of the nearby mountain.

14

Body Check "Come on in for a minute John, I owe you a hot chocolate" Her bright eyes twinkled and she bestowed on him a smile not remotely wholesome yet still bordering on respectable! He was about to mumble a regret, but she impishly leaned close to his face and shook her head to dislodged the sprinkling of snow covering her hair and he sniffed the distinct aroma of Lavender. Suddenly the chance to continue smelling that wonderful scent of her hair was too strong to override the quelling nervousness he felt rumbling low inside his stomach. He wanted to go inside! He had wanted to step across that cottage threshold for months since he had arrived in Kine’tok for his last season at the resort. Before too long he would be returning permanently to his hometown, Deerling, another thirty miles into the interior and a waiting township job earmarked for him by family tradition. Lillian Canavan had caught his eye from the first day he had seen her walking towards him, half hidden behind a huge stack of fluffy white towels at the spa, a tall vision of very feminine curvy legs, her long dark hair haphazardly pulled back and loosely braided, not having a clue the effect she was having on the young athletic skate instructor. As she had passed him with barely a glance, he had watched the rear view; just as curvy, and supremely feminine. Well suited to the climate. A delicious handful, he imagined more than once! Round and full and firm. A woman, not a girl....and from word around town...a newly single woman. An older newly single woman. Experienced. Independent. Oozing a natural feminine glow without even batting an eyelash, literally. A wet dream come true for any warm blooded male mammal from puberty to death! But she would never be interested in a small town hockey fanatic socking away his last season of cash and sport to return home to the life of on the job blue uniform drudgery. Damn straight he wanted in that front door! He nodded shyly and followed her to the door, reaching around from behind her to push it open as she maneuvered with the keys, her groceries balanced on her knee. She turned back to smile up at him and her eyes lingered on his mouth just long enough to send that age old warning shooting through her veins. She hadn't felt urgent lust for a long time. But that was a mouth to savor! He answered her look without consciously realizing it and somehow he knew

15

S.K. Gray walking thorough that door was going to be a journey, not just a step. Lilly reached around and flicked the light switch and a soft glow lit up the small but spacious cottage. The trade-off for her high-rise condo within lake effect spitting distance of the Navy Pier in Chicago suddenly seemed like the best deal of her life. Inside, she purposefully set the groceries down on the counter in the open kitchen and turned an equally purposeful look on her face. John fumbled with his hat and gloves and ran his fingers self-consciously through his hair. She slid the champagne bottle into the fridge and set the rest of the groceries on the end of the long kitchen island. Lilly went over to the fireplace and quietly turned on the gas jets, then shed her heavy coat and tossed it on the pegged coat hanger on the wall next to the door. Keeping her back to John, she tugged off the boots and set them by the hearth to dry. The slow gas flame made no noise as its light flickered heat through the room. She turned and tilted her head, trying hard to grasp some semblance of decorum in spite of the charge running through her. She could tell by his stone silence that the ball was firmly in her court. She felt confident enough to take advantage of home rule. But those eyes. Those incredible eyes practically paralyzed her. They couldn't possibly belong to a twenty six year old whose body hovered in the first few feet of the room as if one more step would somehow sap all his adult strength. She couldn't possibly be thinking of going through with this outrageous urge. Every sane fiber in her body screamed at her to do what she always did. Behave. But what had good behavior earned her in the past? $12,000 in divorce lawyer fees. She stared over at him, looking every place but into those eyes. From heavy boots, to the goofy lumberjack hat jiggling in his hand, to the shoulders of his heavy blue parka, to the still snow coated thighs of his beat up jeans, where her glance lingered for more than civilly acceptable. “So, how do you like your chocolate?” the forced question sounded as if it had come from someone’s mother. Lillian couldn’t help but blanch at bit. He shifted his weight in a gesture that was purely nerves, but somehow, in this smaller arena signaled a decidedly masculine attitude. She could feel his eyes talking across the room; words he just wasn’t going to say without an invitation.

16

Body Check Instead, he cleared his throat and threw his gaze around the room, coming to land on the safe neutrality of the kitchen behind her. “Um, I…like it hot…and pretty sweet”. The moment the words were out, John’s face turned a deeper shade of blush at the double entendre left hanging in the air. Lilly grinned down at his boots again as he fumbled and mumbled and shifted his weight again, running his hand back through his dark hair, and then finally relaxing into a charmingly embarrassed sigh.

He shrugged his shoulders and raised his eyebrows,

suddenly looking for all the world like a tongue-tied high school kid caught ogling his English teacher. “I can manage hot and pretty sweet.” She wasn’t about to let him off the hook. Anything to take the focus away from her own stocking feet that now seemed as heavy as lead boots in cement. He opened his mouth slightly to say something, thought better of it, shifted his legs and once again ran his hand nervously through his hair. An Alaskan standoff. In a moment the opportunity would dissolve into ridiculously civil banter. In the end, it was those mesmerizing eyes that gave her courage to finally move across the short distance and carefully grab his coat and push it back off his shoulders. Those eyes locked onto hers with a vulnerable strength that flashed a dozen emotions in the course of a few seconds. Letting the coat fall to the floor, she placed the flat of her hands on his chest and smiled up at those incredible eyes. Curling her fists into the flannel lapels of his half opened shirt she stepped backwards tugging him with her. When she reached the counter of the island in the kitchen she motioned with to it with a shrug of her shoulders and John reached his arms around her waist and hiked her up on the countertop. With amazing ease, she noted. She opened her thighs and pulled him gently forward, knocking her knees playfully against his wide hips. "Your eyes. They say everything your lips won't." she whispered. His gaze immediately softened and a small embarrassed grin tugged at the corner of his mouth but his hands tightened around her waist. Lilly made a motion to touch his mouth but stopped, battling with the choice that she knew was hers but would put her into dangerous territory.

17

S.K. Gray John watched her expressive eyes struggle with the consequences and his demeanor, much like the power of this flirting dance, suddenly changed. In hockey, an opponent stared you down, and you waited until that one moment of weakness, that one glimmer of doubt flashed through their gaze, and then you moved in for the score before that fraction of a second when they regained their ground. John took away her choice. "I think my mouth has other things it wants to do." his husky growl was no louder than a whisper as he tightened his hands around her waist and leaned hard into her body while pulling her towards him. His mouth thoroughly covered hers and there was no question of who was controlling the game now. His lips took possession and for a few helpless moments her entire body melted under his natural aggression. She folded into his heavy embrace like a small meek kitten, a soft startled purr caught in her throat as her senses focused in on the taste of his warm, sweet insistent lips and then his wonderfully inquisitive tongue searching, probing... His arms closed like a vice around her, squeezing a small breath from her lungs and she pulled back just long enough to drag in another gulp of air and return to the deliciousness of his wet, thorough mouth. She wrapped her legs around his broad hips locking ankles at the base of his spine and her hands tangled in his long thick hair. No, not thick; amazingly fine and masses of it. Silken masses. His arms pushed up under her sweater pulling her harder against him as they got lost in the pure hunger for each other's kiss. There was no age difference between them, no generation barrier. No inhibitions. And no turning back. Lilly's fingers hurriedly fumbled with the remaining buttons of his worn, red flannel shirt and while she concentrated on that he pulled back slightly from her face and systematically placed soft, sucking kisses on her upper lip first, then her lower lip, then her upper lip again. The stubble of his scruffy five-o’clock beard scraped against her chin. She murmured in appreciation, her hands finally pressing beneath his shirt, tugging the white undershirt up out of his jeans. The dark curls of hair covering his chest were no surprise. Her voyeuristic peek at him in the spa had lingered long enough to view the downy condition of his torso. The

18

Body Check fineness of the curls, however, was a pleasant treat to her fingertips and she splayed her hand in the bushy fuzz. Warm. Warm fuzzies. Weezer had nailed it. She sighed into his mouth as her fingers tickled down his chest following the little line of hair pointing the way to what she also knew was fuzz covered terrain. He arched his torso into her palm making it quite clear that her search would not be impeded. Her fingers made quick work of his belt buckle and with an urgency she thought long lost, she popped the snap of the waistband and with her thumb guided the zipper down over the much-defined bulge of his crotch. Her palm eagerly but still with a concerted effort of restraint pressed firmly against his full swelling cock, her fingers spreading wide to gently cover the width of him, running her hand down low to cup his swollen jewels...only imagining how wonderfully warm the flesh would feel when she dipped her hand under the waist of his boxers. And she most certainly would. But she wanted to savor the journey; teasing herself more than him. "Mmmmm" she closed her eyes and arched her head back, lost in the tactile joy. John leaned forward, unwilling to let the texture of her lips escape him for too long, his torso straining against her hand as she clenched gently around him. “Sweet Christ!” Letting out a low, airy grunt, he stopped abruptly for a moment and held her face firmly, his two big hands on either side. His thumbs traced her cheekbones in wonder and she was amazingly taken aback by the intense vulnerability of his eyes. She reassured him with a soft smile and rubbed her fingers over his kissdampened lips. "You are...magnificent, John" Still burrowed underneath his jeans, Lilly’s hands maneuvered around his hips, and unhooked her legs, releasing him from her own tight embrace but making more room to roam. John leaned his forehead down to rest on her shoulder, nuzzling at her shoulder blade and sliding his strong hands from her face, down her body. He slowly pressed them over her hips and under her, cupping her ass, massaging his fingers through the loose knit of her sweat pants. She followed his lead and wriggled her own hands behind him to press hard against his firm muscular cheeks. John moaned into her neck. “Hot…and pretty sweet”

19

S.K. Gray Their breath quickened as they both shifted eagerly. Lilly’s head fell back as her thighs widened further, scrunching her torso forward to bring the heat of his body closer. The layering of clothes still separating them ignited their sweet, repressed need and their hands kicked up the intensity. Lilly’s fingers found the waistband of his boxers at the same time that John moved his hand from her ass to her crotch eliciting a high pitched gasp from her that quickly turned into a throaty giggle. He smiled against her neck, then brushing his stubbled cheek against her face, sought out her mouth again. His fingers pressed further into the folds of her sweats, probing for that sweeter spot Just as she was about to shift her body so that his fingers fell in the right place, the hair on both of their necks and arms raised as if there was sudden electricity in the air. Chills of something quite opposite of passion rippled over their skin as a deep, almost dreamlike thundering sound rumbled and vibrated the walls of the cottage, low at first then amplifying louder. John’s whole body tensed and Lillian froze in fear. Every nerve ending went on instant alert. The countertop beneath her literally buzzed. "Fucking...holy..." "Jesus, what the hell...?" "Shit...avalanche!" John grabbed her roughly and lifted her down from the counter. Briefly making sure she had her balance, then grabbing and fastening his pants, he dashed towards the front door. Lillian grabbed at her mukluks and was on his heels as he flung open the front door and the rolling sound of treacherous fast moving snow bellowed at them, shaking the ground as he raced out of the house looking into the eerily black on white night. Their legs shook as the ground below them vibrated. John quickly gauged the distance of the sound and his knowledge of Big Mountain and turned to push her back towards the house. They were not in the direct path, but it was fucking close. "Turn off the gas, quick" While the horrible sound battered at her ears she did as he said, shoving her feet further into her boots and grabbing her coat, turning to get his, too, as she headed back out towards the sound of destruction.

20

Body Check "John!...John!" she could see the flash of blue plaid flannel running towards his snowmobile. She swallowed the cold air and plunged after him, her feet still shaking as the ground danced under her. "John...wait!" Lillian ran up just as he was revving up the snowmobile. “Take me with you!” "Come on, up" he pulled her up in front of him and shifting the handlebars roughly, plowed off into the rumbling night.

21

S.K. Gray

Chapter Three Lilly tried several times to hold his coat up to shield him from what had to be absolutely biting wind, but for some reason all the energy of the air was drawn elsewhere. In a few nerve-wracking minutes as they pulled around the bend in the path, they could see flashlights and figures ahead of them on the road. A handful of people stood a few dozen yards back from the common, staring into what appeared to be dirty-white sky. The silence now was overwhelmingly loud and the motor of the snowmobile seemed like a loud crack in a frost bitten window. “Stay here, Lilly.” John jumped off the snowmobile almost before it came to a complete stop ignoring Lilly as she held out his parka to him. Several of the senior ground crew were walking around and off to the right Lillian spotted the big hulking Eddie and Anna Louise. She kept one eye on John, who was zeroing in on the commons, and waved her arms at. her partner in lush. “Weezer!” "Lillian, you are ok!!!!" "Yeah...and…you guys, too?” Anna Louise quickly took in the fact that Lilly had ridden up to the commons firmly snuggled on Baylor’s snowmobile and momentarily raised an appreciative eyebrow, then immersed her self in the drama of the moment . "Oh, lord we thought the whole house was going to just disintegrate it shook so hard. This is far worse than the one three years ago. Even Eddie was sufficiently impressed to get out of his chair in front of the TV....but so far no one seems hurt, no one on this side anyway, there aren't very many of us...though it pretty much knocked the lights to Kingdom come. Enough generators over here to keep us from freezing though." Lilly’s eyes were becoming used to the dark, but it seemed quite spooky that the

22

Body Check clearer her vision got, the more she saw was all white. An eye-high wall of white stretched as far as she could see over what once was the commons. In the distance, the curling chimneys of the Chalet were sending out their puffs of smoke like sky writing....but no roof was visible over the sparkling mound of snow, the frozen dust dancing like fairy mist while the ground settled back to sleep. Just a hop skip and a slide from the front door of the Spa, a wall of snow six feet high acted as solid privacy fence stretching far off down the commons and into the dense woods. "God look at that. " "Hmmmm." Anna Louise was looking all right, but she was looking at the navy parka bundled in Lilly’s arms. "Did you lose anything important?" "No, obviously if it didn't hit your house it wouldn't get mine!” “I wasn’t referring to anything permanently inside your house. And I most certainly wasn’t referring to the electricity. I was referring to what belongs inside that coat.” Several more minutes passed as they watched the hustle and bustle and flashlights barely distinguishable from the flashbulbs of hurriedly grabbed cameras. Eddie kept a running commentary about the sports program he would be missing and a few other locals joined them to check on their safety and then scurry down closer to the action. Anna Louise tried to catch Lilly’s eye, but she was pointedly ignoring her friend’s insinuation. Finally Weezer’s patience reached the bursting point. "You sly little puss." Anna Louise fingered the coat. "No wonder you slid in the champagne in your shopping cart....or didn't you have time to get to that stage yet?" "He drove me home from the grocery store when the Rover broke down, trash brain" "Tsk tsk, and he had to take his coat off to carry them in??? He could work up quite the sweat carrying a grocery bag." Lillian was about to knock her buddy on her ass in the closest snow bank, when over the din of the buzz of retreating voices she heard a very familiar one. "Lilly! Where are you?" "Lillian, you’re needed." Anna Louise smirked "Over here Johnnie Boy!"

23

S.K. Gray Lilly glared at her as Weezer waved and bounced at the approaching flannel clad male. Anna Louise sucked on the inside of her cheek." Looks like you may have a house guest for the night...if you need any blankets, just send an S.O.S....I might even have a spare goalie’s mask somewhere in Eddie's closet. Though I am sure you can handle the body checks and any PUCKS he shoots your way. And I want details! With the power down I won’t be able to tune in to my most sordid, crass soap-opera sex fix." Lillian frowned and walked by Anna Louise just close enough to give her shoulder a friendly shove, sending her sprawling ass backwards into the snow. As a high yelp echoed out into the night, John came hurrying up to Lillian. He rubbed his hands over her shoulders, smiling warmly down at her for the moment, forgetting the massive drama going on behind them half a hockey rink away. “Tiger Lil” he softly crooned pushing a stray lock of hair back from her face. “Quite exciting, eh? She actually blushed, though she was quite sure he couldn’t see it in the glow of sporadic flashlight beams. “Yeah…and the avalanche, too!” she mused while casually holding out his coat for him to slip his arms into. “It’s been a long time since the earth moved for me during a first kiss.” He chuckled conspiratorially breathing out and dancing back and forth on his boots. “Kine’tok’s in for some interesting ground swells, then.” Lilly’s flesh flushed all the way down to her toes. He looked over her shoulder. "She OK?" "Shock therapy is always best with approaching hysteria." Lillian linked his arm and turned him away, glancing back with a grin as Eddie pulled Anna Louise to her feet. "Well, it appears that everyone over at the Chalet is already accounted for. The people who were on the commons got out of the way, but the roads are entirely blocked and no one is going to do anything about removal until tomorrow. Some electricity is out, but back up generators..." "...will keep them warm...yesss" she finished his sentence right along with him. He nervously shoved his hands in his pockets and kept looking towards the commons, then back at her, then back at the commons. “Yeah, main road took a big hit.”

24

Body Check She just smiled up at him. He pressed his mouth into a small say nothing grin and nodded. "Yeah, well, ummm....I guess this is all fairly normal for them here, or if not normal, something they can handle, eh?" She just continued smiling until his eyes finally landed on hers. "John." "Uhhh yeah?" "It's cold. Put your coat on, OK?" she held out his coat and he sighed sheepishly and shrugged into it. She broke into a big smile as she leaned forward to close it loosely over his chest. He caught her chin with his big paw, his eyes going all liquid and misty. "I love seeing you smile like that. Makes me feel like it is all for me." She leaned towards him, suddenly rather warm....the dancing of her eyes very clear in their intent. “Speaking of feeling things…” "Uhhhh, better take you back, come on..." John started the snowmobile and sniffed, clearing his throat, looking over at Lilly and raising his eyebrows as if to say...OK ready, hop on. She slowly, rhythmically sauntered over to the edge of the bike and putting a hand on his shoulder, straddled her leg over it so she was sitting on the seat facing him. He shyly grinned as she lifted her thighs up over his lap, wrapping them backward around him like a playful monkey. She snuggled up closely to his body, hugging her arms around him underneath his coat. "I miss your hat" "Yeah well my head fucking misses it too" he exclaimed with a short laugh and shivered. “ It’s colder than a witch’s tit" Lillian nestled up underneath his chin and pressed her mouth over his throat. "John Baylor, what would you know about a witches tit?" she pressed her chest against his and shimmied her shoulders back and forth making exquisite contact even through their layers of cotton and wool. "Well, I know that ain't them!" He turned the gear handle heavily and chuckled as the engine's muffled roar filled their ears and then spirited them back to the cottage.

25

S.K. Gray

Chapter Four The darkness of the living room was counterbalanced by the dull glow of the outside snow. The foggy moonlight shed muted shadows through the windows over the bulky furniture and grey toned walls, like friendly voyeur spirits, but John and Lillian didn't notice. They stood wrapped tightly in each others arms in the center of the room, eyes closed, slowly swaying in a circle while their hungry mouths did all the talking necessary. Unspoken was the permission to spend the night. Unspoken was the question of whether this was the right thing to do. Unspoken was the nonexistent future of the two of them. Chicago and Deerling were on another planet. Boots had been hurriedly kicked off and across the room helter skelter. Hands had begun to discard layers of clothing in tandem, urgently. But somehow, deep into the third breath-threatening kiss, they came up for air, and the world evolved into a slow-mo movie. No rush, no panic, nothing but time to savor. Snuggled under an opened flannel shirt Lilly molded herself to the tall husky *pup* with big paws. Her neck strained back to make the contact with his urgent lips, slow and lingeringly sweet. John's hands had camped at the base of her spine, and every so often he would moan deliciously into her mouth and make huge circles with his palms, up and across her back, and down over her ass, lifting her even closer into his body. For her part, Lilly’s fingers were memorizing his chest and shoulders, tickling over the fuzz of chest hair peeking out over the neck of his singlet undershirt. She stretched the neckline down to expose even more of the dark curls. She playfully tickled the musky mass of downy hair under his arms, until the agony of her touch broke through to his brain and he pulled back with a gasp. "Stop. Torture!"

26

Body Check "The warm fuzzy is ticklish" she quickly kissed his nose and ran her fingers again into the little thatch of hair. John tightened the grip on her bottom. "I would not suggest doing that while my hands are so conveniently positioned" he growled softly into her ear, rubbing his gruff beard over her cheek. "Ah the Alaskan Male Hockey Brute" "I'll give you my best slap shot." he laughed patting her ass. Lilly’s eyes twinkled impishly. "Then this is my only defense, to distract you." She gripped the lapels of his blue flannel shirt and slowly pushed it up and over his broad shoulders. Then she slowly stripped it down his muscular arms, all the while lowering herself as the flannel peeled down his body, until she was comfortably on her knees and her face nuzzling at his waist, belt high. John swallowed and blew out a small breath, wrapping his hands into her soft mass of chestnut hair, carefully clenching a fist full. She waited for a moment as he calmed the rush of adrenalin she could almost hear pumping through his body. His upper arms tightened, and then relaxed, his eyes focusing on the nothingness of the snow lit glow on the walls across the darkened room. Lilly pressed her face against the swelling bulge of his cock beneath his jeans, tracing the outline with her nose and chin, smiling in satisfaction as he rocked towards her and tightened his grip on her hair. Her hands spread around his heavy thighs and gripped his denim-covered ass, pulling him towards her face. She turned her head to the side and opening her mouth wide covered the mound of John's straining cock beneath his jeans and softly closed her teeth around it, running up and down the length, kneading his stiff denim bulge with her jaw. John's knees almost buckled and he quickly moved his hand to rest on her shoulders.".....omigod, Lilly, wait." he groaned. She ignored him, now running her hands up and down the backs of his thighs and tenderly gnawing at his full crotch. "...Lillian" he groaned again more firmly. Her fingers quickly went to his belt and with very little trouble it was history. Yanking open the heavy snap at the waistband and tugging the zipper down, she urgently

27

S.K. Gray reached into the body-sweat dampened opening of his boxers and freed his swelling shaft. She wondrously ran her fingertips over its velvety head, already lightly oozing. She ran her lips over the tip and flicked her tongue under the ridged rim. She moved her hands in to free all of him when his fist tightened in her hair and tugged upward, forcing her to stand. She gave a small cry and his lust-glazed eyes caressed hers. Those fiercely relentless eyes~ betraying all the youth and playfulness of his face. "My turn...me first...if you want to play into overtime that is. I will go the distance." he promised softly raising an eyebrow and running his lips over hers in the barest whisper of a kiss. "I'm game" The gentleness disappeared as he hiked her up into his bear hug. She wrapped her legs around his hips tightly as he walked the two of them the short distance to the end of the island in the kitchen and plunked her down at the edge. Still guiding her by the fistful of hair, he leaned forward and lowered her back carefully. His grip loosened in her hair but his eyes still held her captive while his other hand momentarily brushed over her face, then down her chest, and heavily over her breasts. His fingertips dipped into the top of her sweatpants and panties and lifting her hips and butt up, he stepped back from between her legs and dragged the clothes down the length of her legs catching above her ankles. Running out of arm space and unwilling to step further back from her, he lifted his foot up, hooked it into the bundled fabric and roughly finished the task of stripping her half naked, sending the garments to the floor. He ran his hands over her bared flanks so softly, wondrously; a complete contradiction to the rough-hewn image of a brawny, muscular male. Lillian couldn't have moved if another avalanche suddenly threatened to pulverize her cottage. She lay deliciously paralyzed by the imminent natural force of John Baylor. He gently pressed her legs wider and stepped up to the end of the island. In stark contrast to the rough rub of denim on her shins, Lillian felt the moist, warm tip of his tongue begin just inside her knee and slowly lick upward. Her legs twitched. She slapped her hand on the island and shivered, arching her back as she felt his hands slowly part her legs to make way for his face as he worked his mouth painstakingly up her inner thigh. She felt the involuntary rush of moistness between her legs.

28

Body Check "Torture" she smacked her hand again on the island. "Shall I stop?" he breathed softly onto her licked flesh. "Well, then I would have to kill you..." She joked, but her voice wavered barely above a choked sigh. "Well I don't want to die... not just yet, It would be very… anticlimactic." he chuckled and went back to his pleasure. She could not breathe properly. Her lungs filled with air as every nerve of her body focused on the trickle of his tongue...closer, closer to home. For as chilled as the room had become, a fine sweat broke over her glowing skin. His hands rested on her abdomen as if he were cradling her womb and then he blew softly across the earthy dampness of her exposed sex. He ran his tongue teasingly up the trembling slit and covered her with his mouth. Lilly heard the moan that filled the air and was surprised to realize it was her own. She heard it again and was sure it was from some out of body experience until John's tongue probed hard against the excruciatingly sensitized tip if her clit and she knew exactly where her body was! His lips closed around her mound and sucked. Slow and deep. She bucked on the island and John's hands steadied her, pressing up her sides underneath her sweater and coming to rest at her breasts, cupping them in his palms and running his thumb over the instantly erect nipples straining through the lace of her bra. The air in her lungs burned inside her chest and she realized she was still holding it in. John made one more languid lick of her and them thrust his tongue inside her. "JESUS... H.... CHRIST" she cried out, hitting her head back on the island three times, exhaling explosively as an orgasm ripped through her. Her thighs tensed and spasmed. John grabbed for her hands and entwined his fingers in her intense grip. He raised his head and ran his bearded chin over her deliciously sucked pussy. "No, John Fucking Baylor" he mused in a low raw chuckle. She laughed through her precious agony and with unsteady arms pushed herself up to sitting position. “Well....then...." she gasped for breath and pushed her long snow

29

S.K. Gray dampened hair back from her forehead. Her glazed eyes found his. Her arm reached over to the side of the island and connected with the tall high-backed bar chair and she swung it around to hit against his leg. "Fuck me, John Baylor." Her smile disappeared as she brought his face up to hers and into a passionately hungry kiss that cut off his low laughter. “Have a seat, and fuck me” Her hands fumbled down his back and shoved the jeans and boxers just far enough down over his hips so he could sit down. He stumbled back against the high seat of the swivel chair. The realization of what she wanted washed over his features as if he this was the championship match and had been awarded unlimited penalty shots until he scored the winning goal. Those glorious biceps shifted into gear and placing his hands underneath her arms he lifted her up off the end of the island. She got a glorious moonlight-shadowed glance at his fully erect cock, straining heaven ward. Grinning like the Cheshire Cat, he positioned her above his lap and she quickly shifted her legs to straddle him, her feet resting on the lower bar of the chair. Her eager hips squirmed until her pussy settled into position. She felt the smooth head of his cock just breaking the tips of her lips when he released the hold under her arms and let her drop. She heavily plunged down his thick, stiffened cock relishing every inch until he was deep inside her. My GOD what a perfect FIT. They both groaned as she rode up and down, pumping in perfect rhythm, opening herself to be filled with his powerful hips thrusts upward into her. She rested her head against his as their passion increased in tempo, their skin slick with sweat, hot and cold in the same instant. She closed her eyes tightly and threw her head back as his arms once again tightened around her rib cage and he pushed himself up from the chair with his powerful thighs. Shielding her back from the impact as best he could he flung them both back up on the island. It was time for Baylor to get back on top of things! Clamoring up on the island, knocking everything else out of their way he stretched out on top of her half naked body. His needy body pounded down on top of her as he thrust himself deeper and harder into her, urgently plunging again and again and again. Both were crooning sounds with

30

Body Check no meanings. Lilly tightened her muscles and raised her body to take him even further into her, both of them oblivious to time, reason, age, and future physical injury! She flung her arms back over her head and he grabbed her wrists and held them down. John grunted with each thrust. For this moment in time, this was where he belonged. In the body of this woman. He stroked Lilly' writhing body with his free hand and fastened his mouth to the base of her arched neck where her pulse beat wildly. All the sass and teasing had left her and she was in that faraway female zone, where reason and restraint vanished and pure desire reigned. "Lilly…Tiger Lil...open your eyes. Hey, LOOK at me!" he demanded. With considerable effort and lids heavy with clouded passion, she raised her gaze to focus on his beautiful eyes. Now, not only the bodies were joining, but the souls as well. With the final connection made, there was only one place left to go and abandoning themselves to the ultimate pleasure, they came, first Lil, then a few moments later, John, with a shudder and a moan. When normality started creeping back into their consciousness, they lay quietly for a few moments, listening only to the breathing of the other, and slowly waited while the pounding in their chests calmed from the frenzy. John rolled carefully onto his back, one long leg hanging down over the side of the island and tucked his arm under her neck as if they had been lovers for years and this was their ritual. John watched in somewhat spent awe the flushed face of the woman now resting comfortably on his extended arm. The beauty of her satisfied glow touched him in a way nothing else ever had. She turned her head slowly, a brilliant smile crossing her mouth, and he noticed the tiny crinkle lines at the corners. He would remember that smile forever. He ran the back of his fingers over her cheek and at the exact same moment, they spoke. "Thank you" Giggling, Lilly actually blushed as John raised his eyebrows in self-conscious amusement. “And the earth moved again! Twice in one night.” She mused. "Pretty damn fine trip we took, eh?" John rubbed his hand down his stomach and gently adjusted his genitals as if to make sure they were still attached.

31

S.K. Gray

"It usually is when you know where you are going and how to get there! But I gotta tell you...this wasn't on any road map I ever had" "Well, I just checked out the glove compartment well enough to find it" he teased and giggled himself, brushing the back of his hand lightly over her mound. “I’m not sure my back will ever be the same! I might need a jack to get me up off this countertop.” “Well, there’s a pleasant buzz kill if I ever heard one” He laughed again, amazed at the comfort level between them. She smiled warmly. “The afterglow fades to the awkward glow.” He turned slightly to face her. “Is this awkward for you?” She glanced down at their half–naked state lying flat out sweaty exhausted on her kitchen island in the shadowy light of a utilities-robbed, avalanche-tremored house and had to stifle the giggle. “Not so you would notice!” She stretched her arms above her head and plunked them back firmly on the island. Unexpectedly, they came into contact with a puddle of something very sticky and thick sending a shower of whatever it was over their faces. Her eyes widened in total shock. John blinked, reached his tongue out to a drop of it on his upper lip and paused. "Butterscotch". Her stunned expression bubbled into laughter as she realized she had never put the groceries away from earlier this evening. Shifting and looking back over their heads, there, leaking out of the grocery bag all over the end of the island, was her non-essential guilty pleasure #1, butterscotch ice cream. They pushed themselves up, she gave him a mischievous grin and taking a glob of the melted mess into her hand, plopped it on his nose. "Now you really are the sweetest warm fuzzy I have ever known" The moment had come to make a very intelligent move and rolled off the island and just out of the reach of his swatting paw. "Shower's down the hall...last one in gets the cold water and skinny towel!"

32

Body Check Lilly laughed and dodging a handful of ice cream thrown her way, raced back towards the shower for what could turn out to be the second sweetest warm fuzzy she would ever know. John was only a few steps behind clumsily pulling up his jeans. It was still a long time until morning. Half way down the small hallway John caught up to Lilly. Actually, he ran smack up against her coming back out from the bathroom with a scowl on her face. He smiled down at her, the ice cream starting to dry on his nose. "Come on then, I feel like a creamsicle." “You look rather like one, too!” “Well let’s get in that shower!” Lilly mischievously planted a slurpy kiss on his nose. "The hot water. No heat." "And no skinny towel, " he looked down appreciatively at her lower body lack of attire. "Hmmm" Lilly tugged down on her sweater but not far enough and John reached a hand over and rubbed his fingers and palm through her soft pubic hair peeking out from under the lower edge. "Speaking of warm fuzzies..."John pressed his hand further between her legs and started softly kissing her neck and chin while pressing her back against the wall. Only in his wildest dreams had he imagined Lilly being so responsive. He still felt as though it was a dream, and he was hesitant to let go for fear the last hours would vanish. As he pressed her up against the wall, his hand gently probed more insistently as his body started to respond again to the velvety smooth moisture covering the tips of his fingers. "Lilly..." he breathed faster into her neck, eager to catch up to his pounding pulse racing through his groin. "John...John...hey Baylor, baby!" she watched him begin to slip into the zone a man has when the next stop can only be an out an out wham bam thank you ma'am and she just wasn't ready to be quick about anything, except maybe finding some heat a little more long lasting than the kind starting to radiate from John's mouth and hands and chest and... "Ooohhh" she tried to gain control as he dipped his fingers up inside her and his

33

S.K. Gray hips flattened against her pelvis. "Hey, hey...no!" She gently slid her hand down to his wrist to stop him. John paused a moment as the tragic word penetrated the haze of lust already forming around his head. "No???" "Well, I don't mean no ...*NO*...I mean no ...no..not ...here." John's eyebrows raised in puzzlement. He slipped his hand up from her warm moist pussy and softly cupped her breast, his thumb tracing over the erect nipple through the soft fabric of her sweater "...here?" She thought she would instantly lose all self-control looking up at the sincere inquisition in his eyes and sighed. Why couldn't all men be this incredibly, irresistibly, vulnerably and totally.... desirable? "No no, THERE was just fine!" she assured him and leaned against him almost shyly. Why did this man make her knees so fucking weak? Her hands went around his hips and slid into the back pockets of his hastily pull up jeans, her fingers digging in to the full muscular cheeks of what she thought had to be the most perfect ass she had ever set ...hands... and eyes on. His hands went in both directions as he covered her mouth with a wet searching kiss, plastering her back against the hallway. God he tasted fabulous...even discounting the butterscotch patches her lips were encountering...his mouth and his skin were insatiably sweet. John was thinking the same thing as his fingers once again sought out the warmth of her sex. While he dipped his fingers back inside her and massaged his wide palm over her breast, kneading it, Lilly wiggled and planted her hands firmly on the sides of his face and held him back from the meal he was making of kissing her. "No, this isn't what I mean....argggghhhh" She laid her head back fighting the urge to drop his pants and wrap her legs up around him for a first class wall banging. "Well Jesus, Lilly what the hell do you mean?" "I meant, here, the cottage. It's getting colder and the water is gone and the ice cream is....getting a little ...sticky ...and" her voice got softer and softer as John kept sprinkling little caresses all up and down her face. In a moment she would not be able to resist the curve and pressure of his mouth. As her arms slid up around his neck ready to give in to the delectable temptation and opened her mouth generously, suddenly John stepped back from her. She almost slid

34

Body Check to the floor on her very exposed ass. "Well, sweetheart, my apartment just happens to be on the other side of a rather obtrusive small mountain of white ice right now. Just where were you planning that we go?" his voice was bordering on edgy, the sexual agitation prickling his normally calm nerves. "And between the two of us we have enough on for ONE of us to be dressed...though that shade of rose is just not my color." He motioned to her sweater that had ridden up under her arms and hesitatingly bobbed his head towards her chest, ready to take another taste. She squirmed and tugged the fluffy top down. She could see the building frustration in his jaw, clenching now under the scruffy growth of beard. "Fuck!" he grunted and turned back away from her and tromped into the living room. "How could you have turned into such a fucking tease in one fucking minute? I'm turning blue for Chrissakes." Lilly laughed wickedly and rushed to follow him running up behind him and putting her arms around his jeans, shoving her hands down the front of his pants. "Ohhh, but blue IS your color, shall I check?" He grit his teeth and reached back to pinch what ever he could get his fingers on and she yelped and jumped back with a laugh. "You won't be laughing in a minute" he growled with a hint of laughter in his husky voice and turned to grab her. "Your sweater won't be the only thing rosy if you don't quit. No, even if you don’t quit, it won’t be!" She saw the intent and the direction of the stare of those wet dream inducing eyes and shrieked, jumping out of the way of his arms. She raced over to where her coat had been flung earlier and started digging in the pockets. John came up behind her grabbing her around her waist in a bear hug and dragged her back over to the coach. Making a big production of bending her over his knees, she flutter kicked and laughed and reached both hands around to protect what was now her very bouncing, vulnerable ass, very much in danger of getting spanked thoroughly! And by a future officer of the law as well! The wicked fantasy of millions of well-behaved women! Suddenly realizing he was very serious as he tried to grab her wrists and hold them out of the way, Lilly frantically shook what she had in her hand at him. John looked down at his intended target and saw the fistful of keys being wagged

35

S.K. Gray at him furiously. He took hold of them and pulled them out of her tight grip, laughing. Still covering her ass, Lilly shouted over her shoulder "The Spa The Spa....I have the keys and it has it's own generator!" While John contemplated this, she rolled off his lap and hopped back up to straddle him. She hunkered down, resting her arms around his shoulders. "John Baylor, I could give you the massage of your life, oiled up, naked and spread eagled on a heated table, screaming out for mercy, and then...when I thought your poor, pummeled muscles had had enough, my mouth could take over. Think about it" Johns lap seemed to come alive under her spread thighs and she grinned. He looked up at her, his eyebrow twitching upward and a shit-eating grin finally tugging at his mouth. "Well, it wouldn't exactly be breaking and entering would it?" He shook the keys in his hand. Lilly bit on his earlobe and tugged softly, rocking herself against his protruding *lap*"That all depends on what you are planning on entering." "Well, I would think you have already been broken into, in any case. Many times over." he mused. "You scruffy little bastard !" she bit his ear hard, snatched the spa keys back from his hand and propelled herself off his lap, hiding her grin. She made a beeline for the kitchen and grabbing her pants started to tug them on, keeping her back to John. She continued to make a great fuss and reached for the snowmobile keys that had fallen on the floor next to John's discarded flannel. Horrified, John pushed himself up from the couch, a very serious, stunned look on his face. "Lilly, I am sorry, I was just messing about, I didn't mean it, really" He ran his hands through his hair. What a fucking idiot thing to say! Jesus, Baylor, he thought, when would you ever learn to keep your mouth shut? With her back still to him, Lilly smiled broader but just cleared her throat and went further to the island to pull on her jeans and panties. "Really sweetheart, Jesus, I can't believe I said that, it just popped into my head." John walked over to her and moved his hands towards her shoulders. She shrugged him off casually, turning to the mess that was her grocery bag of food sitting on the end of the island top.

36

Body Check She sighed, then scooping up a glop of almost melted ice cream turned and smashed it right up against his chest, smearing it all the way down and into the waistband of his boxers. Laughing, she bolted towards her coat, mukluks and the door while John's eyes widened in surprise and he gasped. "Last one to the snowmobile has to walk!" she turned and wiggled the keys in front of her face and dashed out the door as she saw John's eyes narrow dangerously and zero in on her for the kill. She didn't hang around while he fumbled into his clothes and boots, she just went hell bent for leather towards the snowmobile, hoping she could remember how to run the damned beast. As she hopped astraddle the machine, she could hear the clunking around of a bear in despair from inside her cottage and of course, couldn't quite control the keys enough to get them in the ignition. Before she could believe it possible, John burst out the door, shoving his arms in his coat, fully dressed. Damn he was fast. She shoved the keys in and kicked it into gear just as the sound of crunching snow behind got too close for comfort and the mobile churned out into the snow. Lilly gave it a good five seconds before she dared turn around, but when she did, she could almost feel the intensity of *the EYES* watching her. John just stood at the end of the walk, staring at her. "Shit" she condemned herself for her stupid, easy soul and made a wide turn on the machine and headed back over towards the man standing in the snow with a now visible cocky grin on his face, clearly defining what he assumed was his easy masculine power. Lilly frowned. This was the same fucking kind of behavior she used to display all the time when she was married! Spineless little weenie, always giving in to make life easier for the all-impressive male. Well, John Baylor was the choicest morsel she had ever had in her life, so far, yes, but she felt the self resentment build in her veins. Her hand on the throttle, she just had time to enjoy seeing his somewhat smug smile fade as he took a step forward, waiting for her to stop, then crank it full up with a defiant twist of her wrist. Roaring off in the direction of the Spa, she didn't look back this time!

37

S.K. Gray

Chapter Five Fifteen minutes and ten frozen toes later, John reached the backdoor of the Spa, where Lilly had conveniently parked the snowmobile just out of the circumference of the circle of the security light's soft glow. Shivering to the bone, he pushed open the slightly ajar door and stepped out of the bluish cold into the dark warmth of the Spa's back hallway. Ahead, he could see the golden flickering of interior lights and the whirring of a generator. His breath now invisible again, he nonetheless blew into his hands and rubbed them together. His calves had tightened in the brisk icy air. He could feel his sticky body heat beneath his flannel shirt mingle with the sweet remnants of the butterscotch ice cream clinging to his undershirt. The combination drifted up to his nose in anything but a pleasant manner. He would deal with her later; right now all he needed was a fast shower! As he turned the corner into the service hallway, he saw the door to the women's locker room was left wide open. He grimaced tightly and trod to the doorway, ready to scowl and pounce at the impish snowmobile thief. However, the scowl vanished quickly when he saw the candlelight flickering around the bubbling spa waters in the Jacuzzi and a pile of fresh plump white towels resting on the edge of the huge hot tub. The soft pipedin music caressed the air as the steam rose up from the tub surface. He glanced left and right and listened. No sign or sound of Lilly, yet. He wiggled his thawing toes inside his boots and in three strides was at the edge of the tub, peeling off his coat and boots quickly for the second time that night. He would not make it to the showers first! Nor would he make it totally out of his clothes! Dropping his flannels and his jeans to the floor, he gripped the sides of the Jacuzzi and he stared into the bubbling cauldron. Death in this steamy pit was infinitely preferable to the frozen assault on his

38

Body Check body he had just experienced. He splashed into the oversized tub without bothering to remove his boxers or singlet. "Ahhhhhhhhhhh" the pulsing rushes of water hammered at his body. Over the deceiving purr of the motor, he could hear the agony of his chilled to the bone muscles weeping in gratitude. Instant relief! He was in good shape from the academy training but damn, life on a hockey pond in Alaska tended to leave one a tad bit achy. It was an ache he preferred. After all the training and hard work of preparation to take over the mantle of Baylor public servant tradition, there was still nothing that gripped his heart and his guts like the playing of hockey. That gut gripping need was why Kinetka Tok called to him so loudly this one last season. His last hurrah. His last year of sheer, ballsy, body checked, high sticking joy. Next year, he’d turn the sticks over for a badge and a billy club. And though Deerling wasn’t exactly on the top 100 dangerous places to live, if he was going to ever have to club something, he’d rather it be an opponent’s goalie. If anyone was ever going to end up incarcerated for shooting a weapon, he’d rather it be him ending up in the penalty box after a well-shot puck. And if he was ever going to walk a beat, he’d rather it be as kick ass coach, not a kick butt cop. He’d put the academy off for as long as family pressure would allow. Time to be *a man*, time to step up to the time honored family tradition of being a cop. Time to forget life-long dreams of black-ice glory. But he could think about that tomorrow. As his muscles released their death grip on his bones, he slid down to let the spurting jets of hot water assault his body. But it wasn't just his walking muscles that ached. Damned that Tiger Lil! Why was she so fucking different than all of the other women he had encountered so far? Why couldn't she be like the rest of the fawning resort crowd...holding him at arms distance with their upper class arrogance but molesting him with their eyes. They were easy to stay away from. He only needed to be civil. Even the rest of the park staff women constantly kept their distance...admiring his athleticism but somewhat disdainful of his rural Deerling upbringing. No one wanted to get involved with a transient man heading back to a small town existence with even less

39

S.K. Gray glamorous potential. They wanted someone who would take them out of the frozen tundra, not winter them in for life! Most of the females his age still were searching for a ticket out of small town. Or simply a ticket to ride. So why had Lilly let him in? Why when there were far more appealing specimens available, would a mildly older, pretty, experienced, divorced, totally self sufficient woman want to have raging hot fuck and an ice cream battle with a younger, scruffy, sport obsessed wannabe going nowhere but back to his roots? He wasn’t smooth or chiseled or the least bit socialized. A playtoy? A belt notch? And why was the thought of being those things to her sending an unmistakably exciting prickly message down his sticky chest and into the core of his loins? The tingling in his gut grew stronger as he envisioned his hands back on those legs, slowly moving up her inviting flesh, coming to rest on her waist. As the massaging bubbles worked their magic on his tensed muscles, he closed his eyes and leaned his head back, sighing. Her waist! The soft curve where hip rounded, the gentle dip where a muscle-flattened abdomen became soft yielding woman. John's mind explored her body's hollows and peaks with a steady pressure of his palm. In his minds eye, they were back on the island in the kitchen. He moved his hands to her back, stroking up and down her spine, cupping her sassy ass that drove him to distraction when she flounced away from him in disgust. And all through this dreaming exploration, Lilly simply smiled.

A lovely, knowing woman's smile across her beautiful life-

weathered face. John envisioned that face as if she stood before him. The diamond eyes, crinkling as she smiled wickedly, thirty some years of life etched along her brow and manifested in the charming laugh lines playing at her lips. Lips he craved to taste. Lioness hair to tangle in his fists. He imagined the resistance she so readily flung at him melting away and her leaning forward to mold her body to his, arching her head back, exposing the whiteness of her throat to float within inches of his mouth...waiting...inviting.... Urges usually suppressed came racing forward and a small moan escaped from his throat. John slightly opened his mouth and could almost feel himself press his mouth to her neck...and at the same instant a splash of water smacked him directly in the face.

40

Body Check He sputtered and shook his head to clear his mind. What the...? Lilly shook the water from her hand that she had just scooped across the surface of the Jacuzzi. She shifted her weight onto one hip and brushed off imaginary lint from the gym shorts and tank top she had changed into after her quick shower. In the other hand she held a glass of ice in water, took a long, slow slurp, smacked her lips and smirked. "Sorry, did I interrupt a good one? Pity...by the way John, spa policy is that you shower and strip before using the hot tub. More sanitary “she winked.”But don’t worry; I can wait till you’re done." John squinted up from dangerously half closed eyes, wiping the water off his face. Lilly smiled lazily and stretched her neck to the side rubbing her hand over her throat and down over her chest, arching her head back, not unaware of the havoc her stretching created between John's thighs. He purposefully pulled himself out of the warm bubbly, not the least interested in suppressing the male vibrations banging through his nerves. The damn little tease! "Why wait?" Lilly wasn't sure she had heard the words, so smoothly were they uttered. John reached a hand out and plucked the glass from her grasp, putting it on the Jacuzzi deck. "HEY" she caught John's devilish expression the instant his hands gripped her arms and had no time to shift her weight as she was unceremoniously pulled up and into the tub. She sputtered as the realization hit her, along with the 103-degree water! "You son of a bitch" she cursed at him, flailing her arms ineffectively, since John clamped his hands on her forearms and dragged her through the water towards him. "Lilly, turn it off." he growled. “You may lift weights and have the stamina of a wrestler, but cursing like a sailor isn’t all that appealing. So just shut the fuck up." "I'll say whatever I please" "Not now, not here" He shook her twice before twisting his fingers through her dark mane, gripping tightly and pulling her face to him. With an anguished urgency he covered her mouth with his. Surprisingly she clung to him, moving her jaw hungrily to accommodate his

41

S.K. Gray assault. Pure female instinct took over, clouding her anger. The very maleness of him intoxicated her....and the bitchy brat totally disappeared... replaced by a woman very eager for his touch. Her hands now raked through his massive, brown unruly locks. John eagerly tasted the soft internal warmth of her mouth, his tongue exploring lips and palate with abandon as the jets pounded against the backs of his thighs. Lilly pulled back to gulp for air and eyes met. Flashing gray and crystal blue, saying volumes in an instant. The smile trickled across her lips and she tenderly leaned up to lick the edge of his mouth and trace the shape of his lips, with hers. "This is highly improper." she softly reprimanded, gently pulling at the hair still wrapped through her fingers. "I highly don't care" John barely finished the words before softly sucking her lip into his mouth and nibbling little bites into the vulnerable flesh. Lilly arched her back, forcing her chest firmly against him. Beneath the thin cotton of the tank top her nipples stiffened and she swayed slightly, rubbing the sensitive peaks over the muscles visible beneath his soaked shirt. His hand slid from her neck, down her chest to massage the soft pliable breast beneath the thin tee. He took the tip beneath his finger and thumb and delicately rolled the swelling nipple back and forth. This caused a muffled moan from Lilly who pressed her abdomen flat against his now swelling hard-on and ardently humped a clear message back to him. When he released her lips she quickly returned the favor by seeking out his nipple and clamping her teeth on him. John clenched his teeth and drew a breath inward. She talked rough and played rough, why would this surprise him? Actually it pleased him and he was a bit surprised that he liked it! The heat, no doubt aided by the rippling water lapping at their hips, rose several degrees when Lilly laced her fingers into smaller curly hairs at the back of his neck and none too gently pulled, forcing his head back, exposing his throat. She ran her fingertips from his lower lip over his whiskered chin and down the expanse of his throat. She pressed her mouth into the hollow of his neck above his collarbone, flicking her tongue at the mixture of salt and sweat and steamy mist. He moaned and pulled back slightly from her, letting his arms go limp to his sides. His eyes sought hers. Would he find anything but a patronizing grin?...or was this

42

Body Check all really a big game for her? For a moment she remained hooded and unreadable...then he saw it. The open vulnerable emotion, baring a soul equally as stunning as the body he had bared earlier. And she smiled. The genuine, brilliant smile of his daydreams just moments before. Her eyes crinkled in pleasure and awe. John raised his eyebrows and let out a *whew*, rolling his eyes almost nervously. In an instant her teasing persona returned and she splashed him again. "Whatsa matter? Can't take the fuckin’ heat? Big bad hockey-cop? All show and no go? Or is this a quick trip to the candy shop. Easy treats and sweets?" She reached down into the water and pressed her palm over his swollen cock. He grabbed the back of her neck instantly and while she thought it meant another luscious round with his incredible mouth, with a twinkle in his eye, and hardly any effort, her pulled her backward into the water, dunking her underneath the surface quickly, barely giving her time to hold her breath. She gasped and sputtered to the surface and would have sputtered out a venomous curse if John hadn't dunked her again. “You little shit!” "You never know when to quit do you?" he pulled her back up to her feet and turned her soaked body away from him. He pressed up behind her, edging his knee under her butt, forcing her over to the side of the Jacuzzi. Wrapping one arm under her breasts, John positioned her directly in front of a streaming jet of water, the brunt of the current hitting her pubic bone. He could play just as rough as she wanted. "There’s nothing little about me. And I can take you to the candy shop, Lilly. How long can you stay?" he challenged in a husky whisper in her ear. "How long? eh?" She squirmed against his arms but he used his body to block her retreat and forced her directly against the jet. She strained back in utter frustration. "Longer than you can, rookie" she grumbled. "Wanna bet?" he sunk his teeth into her shoulder. She winced, closing her eyes tightly. "You're on" John fought her struggles and with his hands on the sides of her hips, positioned her body to the forceful jet, focusing its stream between her legs. She instinctively tried to maneuver away but in doing so, inadvertently opened herself just enough for the water to make contact with the most sensitive private flesh of her body. Even through the layer

43

S.K. Gray of the gym shorts she wore, the sensation of spurting pressure on the tip of her clitoris brought stars of a different variety shooting through her sky. Gasping wildly, she placed her hands against the side of the hot tub and tried to push away, but John would not budge. He planted his powerful thigh behind her buttocks and his hand on the backs of her thigh and held her pelvis firmly in position. "Give up?" he taunted. She bit her lip and shook her head vehemently, sucking in air in quick sharp breaths as the relentless pounding of the water beat in agonizing rhythm against her mound. She could control this! She had to. For a few moments she managed to keep the tingling throb of pleasure from ripping her brains out! Hold on...hold on...hold...but all too soon, the throbbing intensified to an indescribable, glorious torture. She held her breath until her lungs were ready to burst, then cried out his name, fighting that magnificent shock about to overtake her every nerve. "No...not Tiger Lil, not yet" he crooned in her ear. Every square inch of her body shrieked in protest and the searing, frenzied white heat that flashed from the core of her womanhood radiated through the muscles of her calves, thighs, chest, arms...and ultimately her heart. Whether her conscious thought still functioned was immaterial. Every cell of her body tightened in luscious intensity. John's hands splayed out over the back of her thighs and gently, insistently guided her muscleconvulsed legs wider apart. This position shifted the focused force of the water, pushing the flimsy cotton of her shorts into the tender opening of her vagina and created a pocket of relentless throbbing pulsation. The effect sent Lilly careening over the edge, head first. Her arms reached back over her head, grasping for John, for anything to bring her back in control. An exercise in futility...for at that very moment John probed one hand up under her shorts and dipping into the crack between her cheeks, found her tight anus muscle and pressed his finger hard against it. Lilly lost every shred of inhibition...and the bet. Her body erupted in pure, sensual, painful pleasure. The cords of her neck constricted and ripples of moans rolled from her throat over and over again. Throughout the cloud of passion billowing inside her head she felt the urgent pressure of John's lips at the side of her neck where her pulse throbbed wildly. His hands, no longer holding her in

44

Body Check that wonderful prison, were caressing and cupping her breasts through the clinging second skin of her t-top. She collapsed back against him as a final, tiny aftershock rippled blissfully over her skin. Her panting echoed into soft controllable purring as John pulled her back into the center of the huge tub. She covered his hands with hers, tilting her head back onto his shoulder. "You win John, you win" Breathless. "No, you won, Lilly. You won." Swaying in his arms for a moment, regaining her sanity, she rubbed her ass up against his crotch, where she could feel, his swollen, straining cock pressing urgently against his boxers. "Mmmmm. I think you should be penalized for butt-ending!” she turned to face him. "That was the most fun I have ever had with clothes on~!" she teased softly and John laughed out loud. "Now let’s see how long it takes you to get to the winner’s circle!" "I can't wait" John spoke matter-of-factly. She mistook his tone for sarcasm and pouted. "Oh, come on, it will be fun" "No, I mean I CAN'T wait" he laughed again, his eyebrows raised. Lilly caught his meaning and grinned down. Straining outward and upward, his cock, outlined graphically in wet boxer cotton, loomed large and needy. "Oh no...come here!" She chuckled and pulled him over to the recessed seat where she plunked down in the water. "Close your eyes" Lilly slipped down into the molded Jacuzzi seat, the hot soothing water cresting at her shoulders. She reached for John's hand and guided him through the water to stand directly before her. With a leg on either side of his knees, she gazed up, saw his eyes close in anticipation and quickly reached a free hand over to the glass of iced water John had set on the deck and grabbed a huge chunk of ice. Seductively cooing his name, she slipped her fingers inside the waistband of his boxers, dipped her fingers lower to make contact with his engorged flesh and dropped the ice directly on the smooth tip, snapping the waistband closed. The reaction was swift as she knew it would be. She howled in laughter. John just howled. "That will slow you down, ‘Tiger"

45

S.K. Gray His eyes flung open and water splashed everywhere. She tried to push past him in the water but John lunged out and wrapped his arm around her hips, bringing her up out of the water. Once the shock receded and he had his wits back, he wrestled her to the deck and none too gently pushed her down on the slippery tile. "Still playing rough? Well two can play this game" He held her down with his hand on her abdomen and dragged his legs out of the water and over hers. He’d never had so much fun off the hockey rink! John stretched her arms above her head and reached down to retrieve the ice, grinning maliciously as he held it in front of her face. "My turn I believe" He put the cube down on her left breast. She squealed as the ice bit her through the thin cotton of her top, bringing her nipple to an instant peak. She squirmed under him, bucking playfully, then in earnest. This madness! This lovely agony! "OK, John, stop.” "Say Uncle" "Never!" she bucked harder, still laughing. He tightened his grip and repositioned his torso over her, realizing that the short-lived *shrinkage* in his groin was fast returning to full bloom. As she tried to take a swipe at his head, he ducked and leaned over to replace the ice on her breast with his mouth. The sudden change of temperature from hard, biting cold to the soft moist warmth of his mouth stopped the laughter in her throat...and when Lilly felt the distinct pressure of his tongue rolling over the erect nipple, she quit bucking. John let go of her arms and the two entwined their bodies together, wordlessly, her hands cupping his head to her breast...insistent on him to continue this sweet torture. He reached up and tugged the t-strap down over her shoulders and raised his mouth only far and long enough to expose her flesh, then hungrily took her deep into his mouth...feasting as though he had been denied sustenance for years. She shifted herself beneath him until her leg nestled up against his groin and carefully massaged his stiffened cock with her knee...deeply satisfied with the guttural moan this evoked from somewhere in John's chest. Slowly the couple inched back over to the edge of the tub and gracefully slid back into the inviting warmth of the water. John relinquished his hold on her and as she slid

46

Body Check down past him into the water, he took her shirt up over her head. This time when she slid into the recessed seat, she tenderly reached forward with both hands and brought his body towards her, nuzzling his erection affectionately with her nose, then nipping playfully up and down the full length of him, through the fabric of his shorts. John sunk beneath the surface and took a dive away from her momentarily, then reappeared, shaking the water out of his bushy hair and flinging the soaked shorts across the room. In a fluid motion his under shirt followed and he strode through the water, dove under and came up inside the circle of her arms. She nestled close to him and the two rubbed noses, grinning guiltily at their utter pleasure to be in each other's arms. She licked at his mouth and sucked his lower lip gently. John reluctantly pulled out of her embrace and slowly rose from his knees, telling her more with his eyes than any words what he wanted her to do. Lilly smiled up and nodded, running her hands up the front of his thighs, over his hipbones and around behind him to cup his sweet cheeks and bring him closer to her. She took him into her mouth quickly and deeply at first, then pulled back, resting her teeth under the rim of his cock-head and ran her tongue over the smooth glistening tip. She sucked softly, confidently, drawing him further into her mouth and pressed his engorged flesh to the roof of her mouth, her teeth carefully gnawing at the pulsing veins. She gently cupped his balls and kneaded them with her fingers. For the next few minutes, Lilly glorified in the taste, the texture, the rough the smooth, the intoxicating fragrance and flesh of this luscious man. John thrust forward and back, with his hands resting on her shoulders, massaging softly. She relaxed her throat and pressed her head down over him, then tightening her lips as she drew back, sucking hard. When she reached the tip of his cock, her tongue flicked hungrily under the rim and over his slit, tasting the first delicious spurt of precum. She lapped softly at his flesh, marveling at his distinctive taste. As he gently bobbed towards her lips, her tongue pressed harder until he shook from a small spasm. John, moaning, reached forward, held her head there briefly then drew himself out of her mouth. He leaned down quickly and placed his lips over her moist mouth for a long lingering kiss. Then he put his hands under her arms and lifted her out of the water to sit back on the edge of the deck, her legs dangling on either side of the jet. He stripped

47

S.K. Gray down her cotton joggers and tossed them aside, pressed his flat stomach up against the stream of water from the jet, leaned her back on her elbows and lowered his head to her lap. He nudged past the V of soaked curls, burrowing his nose until he found the soft, inviting slit of her pussy and slipped his tongue into her. He explored leisurely. Lilly disappeared somewhere into the solar system! Time stood elegantly still The taste, the texture, the thrill. As he shifted his body upward to probe deeper, the jet caught him, as it had Lilly earlier and in moments, he grimaced with an utter eruption of pleasure. Lilly, rousing herself from Neverland, recognized the moment at hand and taking her cue, slid off the deck and slowly carefully positioned herself at the very tip of his cock. Wrapping her legs around him she lowered herself to take him fully into her body, using the buoyancy of the water to heighten the plunge. The moment surpassed exquisite. And as they rocked in rhythm, the water swirling, the sounds of the jets purring, mixing with their exhilarated groans, they thrust, they came, this time, together, in one delicious perfect moment in time. For a long moment they simply held each other, the bubbling water the only sound, enjoying the feeling of flesh against flesh, heart beat with heartbeat, spent. Lilly finally lifted her face from his shoulder and met his gaze. His soft green eyes twinkled and he sweetly kissed her nose. "...and the winner is..." "It's a draw" she smiled. He swirled her back and forth in the water, then as they twinkled like kids at each other, they both spoke at once. "I want a rematch" “Rematch!” After a moment of shared laughter, they both fell silent, the only sounds the persistent bubbling of the jets swirling around them. To speak would break the spell. Yet they both sensed the heaviness of unspoken emotion suspended in the heavy air circling around them. Lilly broke first, following a sweet peck just missing the corner of his mouth. She pulled herself up out of the tub and with as much grace as possible, stood up and reached

48

Body Check for one of the fluffy towels stacked on the wooden bench a few feet away.

Carefully

wrapping it around her with her back still to the tub, she heard the splashing of water as John dragged himself out. Walking up behind her he reached around carefully and took another towel. Without looking back at him, Lilly spoke. “I’m not really sure exactly what happened here tonight. Here. There. Here…” she put her fingers to her head briefly. “And here…” she flattened her palm against her heart. “Do we have to define it?” More heavy silence. “Not yet.” “Not now.” “It’s just…” she sighed deeply and bowed her head forward, running her hands through her straggling hair, trying to make some physical gesture take away the heaviness of the emotion. “….how wonderful...how….just wonderful” “Then let’s keep it there. I’ll go shower.” His lingering closeness was like a body kiss, but he didn’t touch her. Another moment of stalled time. “I’ll…go drain the hot-tub!” she resorted to the joke. “Then I can shower up and join you at the snowmobile for a ride over the sunset to the nearest hot chocolate bar.” “It’s a date, Tiger Lil” She felt the quick kiss on the back of her head then the cool air behind her as he trudged off to the shower room. When she was sure he was gone from the room, Lilly turned back and looked at the now quiet bubbling Jacuzzi. Their recent laughter echoed in the spa and even though she somehow knew that their time together would never be duplicated, would never go the distance, it would forever keep them both warm and fuzzy...and tonight, well loved.

49

S.K. Gray

Chapter Six The powdery snow of earlier evening crunched now under John’s boots as he approached the snowmobile. He knew by the buzz of the hairdryer as he passed the women’s lounge that Lilly would be awhile and the cold air to his brain could only do him good. Shoving his hands in his pockets he walked around to the front of the spa. In the distance the buzzing of generators from Morgana Chalet, hovered in the air. A few brave or totally stupid townsmen, depending on your point of view, were still puttering around the massive wall of snow plopped over the common grounds. Looking like obsessive ants with nothing better to do than contemplate the impossible, they walked back and forth between the same two points as if a second, third and forth view of the icy mound would change the situation. Tomorrow early, the dozers would be out. The electricity would resume. A pathway wide enough for two cars would reconnect east and west and business would go on as usual. Usual with a few camera crews and news helicopters arriving for the day and local stores selling out of disposables cameras. The business lost through fleeing tourists would be balanced by business gained from local gawkers and daredevils pouring in to scope the temporary new slope. Restaurants would conjure up Avalanche Fries and Big Mountain Burger special to feed the influx of new consumers. And this coming weekend, the hockey games would start at nine and last till dusk. And where would he and Lilly be? As if on cue, he heard the long beeping of the snowmobile horn behind Body Check. Just as he was turning to join her, he heard a far off voice calling him from the direction of the mini-mountain of snow. “Hey Baylor” John squinted into the darkness at the figure trotting towards him. Aaron Isaacs,

50

Body Check the young, self-appointed captain of the hockey team waved his arms as he got within talking distance. “No wonder you weren’t answering your phone. When are you going to break down and get a cell phone man, drag your ass into the 21st century.” “When I can be assured people like you won’t ever call me!” he shouted back. “What the fuck are you doing over here? This is not your normal prowling territory. No sleazy bars in sight.” “Funny shit, man.” Aaron came to a stop, sniffing and panting a bit in the night air. “You’re on the wrong side, too. But at least you’re standing. Head count was in a little earlier and as far as we can tell, everyone is accounted for. About half a dozen fourwheeled fatalities, but the insurance companies will be singing those blues.” “How did you get over here? Is there a pass cut through already?” “Nah, man. I crawled over it. Too tempting.” Aaron smacked the back of his hand on John’s chest. “Only took me about a half hour. From what I hear, it only runs south about a half mile. Kind of got caught up at the woods beyond the rink. Damn lucky it wasn’t fifty yards either direction, or we’d have had a serious CNN moment here.” “Pretty damn stupid crawling over it. You could have hit any number of soft pockets and disappeared till spring thaw.” John frowned. As one of the older team members at 26 he felt a certain protective attitude about the rest of the team. “And I wouldn’t appreciate having to round up an official search party to come find you either after the shitty way you played last week.” “Ah, fuck it…go play *almost-a-cop* with someone who’ll listen. Do your enforcing on the rink. That’s where you most needed.” John stared off at nothing for a moment. “Rink’s been spared.” “Yeah. Nothing can stop the game eh? Even Big Mountain didn’t have enough jump to do that. Anyway, it was a piece of cake. Come on, you can make it back over with me, there’s a slew of tourists camping out at the Chalet with complimentary beer and wine flowing.” John looked back over his shoulder, playing nonchalant. “I’ve got the mobile over here, and I’m putting up with a friend overnight. I imagine they’ll have dozers out here at sun up.” “Yup. If they can find enough sober bodies to drive them. They have about ten

51

S.K. Gray lined…” Aaron cut of mid-sentence and from the direction of his gaze, John figured out what he saw behind him. Sure enough, freshly scrubbed and hair flying a bit wildly in the night air, Lilly was slowly, almost shyly walking around the side of the spa. “Jesus, Baylor, is that your friend?” John didn’t have a chance to answer as Lilly crunched through the snow to his side and casually laid her hand on his arm. “Sorry, I didn’t know you were with anyone, I wouldn’t have honked so loud. Hello.” “Aaron Isaacs, Lilly Canavan. Aaron is our local village idiot. He comes from a long line of local idiots, in fact. But he’s fairly competent on blades so we keep him around to humor the Puck Gods.” “You run the spa, don’t you?” Aaron nodded and clumsily put out his hand. “Yeah, for the season. I’ve seen you around town a few times. And at the ice pond of course. Nice to meet you.” She shook the proffered hand with a friendly smile. Aaron’s eyebrows raised almost expectantly and his nose practically flared upon hearing that she recognized him from the hockey rink. “Well, nice to meet you, too. Are you a hockey fan?” His shift in demeanor was so blatant that John found himself clenching his jaw. “More and more by the minute.” Lilly smiled up at John, but the gesture went straight over Aaron’s head. All he heard were the words. “Well, once we get this little mound of drifted snow shifted back to where it belongs, you’ll have to come over to the pond, plop your sweet self on the bleachers and give us a good look.” Without another word, John put his arm around Lilly’s shoulder and moved her closer to his side. “Lilly knows her way to and from the rink. She’s been kind enough to open the spa for me a few times after the games.” Lilly half-grinned into her gloved hand at the masculine game playing out before her. John shifted his hip towards her in what could only be described as alpha wolf pose, leveling his eyes at Aaron in an unmistakable warning. “Oh…well, yeah. Alright, ok…yeah” Aaron got this message loud and clear. He raised his hands to John while backing up a few steps. “Well, um…I should attempt my

52

Body Check climb back over Avalanche Hill here. There’s about ten beers with my name on them waiting on the other side. John scowled after him, the intensity in his eyes just about boring a whole in the back of Aaron’s head. He glanced down at Lilly, and then did a double take realizing he still had his arm wrapped around her. “I know, I know, just don’t tell me how cute that was.” “Nice assist, actually” “He’s a great player but a bit of a loose prick with the ladies. His family has been in Kine’tok for generations. All hockey players. He’s pretty much a fixture around this town” “You are pretty proud of that team. It means a lot to you.” John shrugged, looking again in the direction of the hockey rink beyond what had been the common’s parking lot. “It’s just a game” Lilly chewed on her bottom lip. She knew differently. “Let’s go get warm. While I was closing up shop the electricity flickered back on. We can make that hot chocolate if it’s reached the cottage.” She started to walk back to the spa then noticed that John wasn’t following. Turning to him, he was staring at her almost as if she weren’t really a flesh and blood person a few feet away from him. She smiled shortly at the intense gaze in his eyes. So brooding. So brimming with emotion. “Tell me that you are OK with this.” His voice was barely above a whisper. “I’m totally OK with….this. Come on now, Johnny boy…Tiger Lil is really tuckered out. There is a couch with your name on it a few minutes ride away.” She winked. He had the modesty to blush. Shaking it off rather quickly he jogged up next to her and the two of them crunched over the snow towards their waiting chariot. “I’ll have you know I have a reputation to protect” He mused, his eyes twinkling again as they linked arms and headed around the building. “I don’t want you to think I’m some easy lay. I come from a long line of gentlemen who would never dream of having their virtue impugned at the hands of a sophisticated tart, no matter how tempting her Jacuzzi was.”

53

S.K. Gray “Impugned….ooo, I am impressed, an academy word!” she laughed and held on to his arm teasing him. “You liked that, eh? There is more where that came from!

I never travel

anywhere without my pocket sized academy word dictionary tucked in the seat compartment.” he played along as they climbed onto the snow mobile in tandem. “Is that the same edition that they teach you perpetrator and complainant?” “Don’t push it” He warned, revving up the motor, pulling out of the alley and onward to the cottage. “You mean, like this?” she wiggled herself back hard between his legs straddling the seat. In response he nuzzled his face into her hair until his mouth came in contact with her neck and playfully took a bite. Her shriek got lost in the wind as they sped off over the crunchy snow and back to something really hot and pretty sweet.

54

Body Check

Chapter Seven John’s eyes blinked open and for the moment, he drifted in the la la land of first awakenings; not sure for a few seconds just where he was, but knowing it was someplace warm. Focusing on a flashing glow, he zeroed in on the vision of well-contained fire in a not totally unfamiliar fireplace. Ah, Lilly’s place. The blankets. The couch. The refuge from reality. He cleared his throat and taking a fistful of fleecy coverlet, threw off the layer of comfort and forced himself to sit up. Legs still in jeans, no belt. Flannel gone, singlet on. Feet bare. He sniffed and ran his hand through his sleep-mussed hair. Then the sounds started to filter in. Dishes clanked and the distinct soft suck of a refrigerator door being opened and closed reached his ears. There she was. Slowly moving about across the room, in sweats and a pink sweater, feet a big blur of blue fur. He started to speak but his nose was assailed by the next sense being tweaked to life. Coffee. Coffee so fresh he could now taste it. Sense number four. At that point the fuzzy-slippered kitchen maid turned to him. He could barely wait until the fifth sense kicked in. He titled his head and squinted through sleep stuck eyes. “Morning, Tiger Lil.” “Very, very early morning.” She scuffed across the room to him, first taking a sip from the mug in her hand, then offering it to him as she came within arms reach. He smiled sleepily up at her, taking the cup in hand. “You are an easy drunk!” He frowned, but was still too wuzzed to respond. The first swallow of steamy liquid caffeine rolled down his throat.

55

S.K. Gray Lilly decided his eyes were equally as mesmerizing half shut and hazy and took the advantage of the moment to lean down and place a long lingering non kiss lip touch on the top of his head. “What drink?” “Drink? It was more like three quarters of a bottle of cheap chugged champagne. I think I won’t give you any details of the evening just so I can use it as future blackmail.” He raised his eyebrows, contemplating this. “Well, it’s always good to have some effective blackmail on file. Did I at least try to effective sully your good reputation in the process?” “Repeatedly.”

She slipped down on the couch next to him and pulled her

slippered feet up in front of her, hugging her knees. “Dashing and passionate I hope. If I am going to sully, I always want to sully with a certain gallant flair.” She beamed over at him. “Gallant to the core.” He nodded, continuing to inhale the hot coffee. Pretty soon he would be wide awake. He was almost there already because he had the stomach sinking feeling that reality was going to soon hit him squarely in the heart. “What time is it?” “5:50. All the utilities are working. All the melted food has been mopped up by the anal cleaning fairies and there is a huge mound of displaced snow waiting for able bodies to come displace the displacement. I got a call from the Park Service about a half hour ago. They need your able body down at the commons.” “How did they know…ahhh…Aaron.” “That would be my guess.” She pulled herself up from the couch. “Anyway, you can now use my paltry little shower. You can barely turn around in it, but the water is still wet and the soap, functional.” “Nah, I’ll just splash my face. I’m going to be sweating up again in no time.” “I dare say. It’s still snowing. But they expect a clearing mid-morning.” “Lilly” She gathered his flannel from the nearby chair and brought it over to him. “Not

56

Body Check yet.” He nodded briefly. It was uncanny how she could sense what was on his mind. “Later maybe?” “Come on by if you want. I’ll be opening the spa for freebie showers for the workers for the day. It will undoubtedly give the ladies something new to titter about having to elude pumped male bodies on and off between pedicures and mud facials.” “Dinner?” She bit her lip and nodded shyly. “Afternoon delight?” he shoved his arms into his flannel shirt and stood up. “Go freshen up. Though you are fresh enough already it seems.” She turned back to the kitchen while he lumbered back the hallway towards the bathroom. Lilly turned off the coffee pot and was just about to follow him down the hallway when her front door shook under repeated urgent rapping. As she slowly opened the door, Weezer’s eyes gave her a quick once over look almost to assure herself that she was still in one piece, then darted behind her into the cottage. “Am I not early enough to interrupt something?” “Gawd you are a pain in the ass right off the bat, aren’t you7? Come one in. You aren’t interrupting anything.” Lilly laughed and stepped back while Anna Louise practically barreled into the cottage. “Damn. When I saw the snow mobile out semi-hidden next to your garden wall, I thought maybe I could catch you in delecto fragrantos.” “That’s in flagrante delicto…and no, he fell asleep on the couch.” Anna Louise stopped after shedding her coat quickly and put her hands on her hips. “Oh please. Falling asleep has nothing to do with what made you tired enough to fall asleep in the first place.” “Oh you mean like drinking a six pack of beer and getting exhausted from channel flipping through all the ESPN channels, like Eddie?” “Touché’.” Weezer scooted up onto one of the chairs at the island. “He showering?” Lilly gave her what she hoped was a stony-assed glare. “Well, you know I will find out anyway, and I’m not leaving until you head out

57

S.K. Gray for work. Which will take you a lot longer this morning without wheels so you better give yourself some extra time. Unless of course he will be driving you there.” “I’ll be opening up as usual around 9:00” Lilly plunked down a freshly poured cup of coffee from the last of the pot just as John came waltzing out of the hallway, buttoning up his shirt. “Oh…early bird.” John exclaimed upon seeing Anna Louise settled at the island, her leaning her arms across the counter. “…catching the worm I take it” Anna Louise snapped back. John’s eyebrows raised appreciatively as he headed to the couch again to tug on his socks and boots. He made quick work of it and shrugged into his parka. Unable to pass up the opportunity, John, looked at the island top, then at Lilly, then back to Anna Louise. “You aren’t planning on eating off of that are you?” Lilly practically choked on the coffee in her mouth, then reassuringly shook her head at Weezer as she bolted upright and moved her arms back into her lap. “Um, thanks again, Lilly. I appreciate the hospitality. Maybe I will stop by later on down at the spa. You’ll be able to catch a ride, I take it.” He looked pointedly at Anna Louise and she tipped her head in an acquiescent nod. “I’m sure of it.” Lilly’s sarcasm was not lost on any of them and as he headed towards the door she rushed over to the end table and grabbed his hat. “Don’t forget the crowning glory!” He grinned, gave her a devastatingly effective wink and then nodded again to Anna Louise before bolting out the door. A full ten seconds of silence managed to pass before Weezer could no longer contain herself. “How fucking domestic! And after one night. How precious” “Alright cut the cutesy shit.” Anna Louise laughed. “Alright, alright, I’m sorry. It’s just so…intriguing. A sexy little soap opera being played out right in my own side yard. I mean they happen all the time, just never within my eyesight anyway.” Lilly sighed. “Uh oh. That was more than an *I’m exasperated with you Weezer* sigh.” Anna Louise turned in the chair while Lilly plopped down on the couch, grabbing a pillow, first

58

Body Check for security from the inevitable conversation, but also because John’s scent lingered there. Lilly leaned her head back on the overstuffed pillows. “Give me a minute without the peppering of comments, OK?” Her friend slid off the chair and went into the kitchen, fixing another fresh pot of coffee. Lilly closed her eyes, replaying the events of the last half-day as if she had a remote control DVD player in her mind. They sped by in a jumble of catch phrases, blistering snowy blasts, jet streamed remembrances of hot steamy water and soft, hard, intense, twinkling, smiling gray eyes. After they’d tumbled back into the house the night before, found the electricity purring again and staged a short but sweet , mutual warming of their lips, Lilly had grabbed for two things, the blankets in the closet and the champagne from the fridge. Curled up under the fleece covers on the overstuffed couch, they’d quietly delved into their likes and dislikes. Colors, foods, the ever important merits of flannel versus thermal, down versus synthetic, Pepsi versus Coke, Astrological signs vs. numerology and Mother Nature versus Father Time. Within half an hour John’s head began to bob, the champagne was emptied and sleep seemed the priority over newfound lust. Carefully removing the essentials, she’d tucked him securely on the couch. Only once did she let her hands roam over the deep sleeping figure, and that was to wondrously follow, the bulge of biceps, the curve of hip and the amazingly soft veins on the back of his hand as it was tucked partially between his knees as he lay on his side. Only once had she fiddled with the soft lock of hair falling down over his forehead. Only once did she crawl up next to him, snuggling back against his sleeping torso, to spoon into his sleeping form. “I’m not supposed to care like this. Not so fast, not so deep.” Anna Louise dropped all cutesy pretenses. “Why the hell not?” “Are you kidding? It just isn’t normal.” “For who? The mainstream masses of robot humanoids masquerading as people out there?” “I’m a temporary passing humanoid in his life, as he is mine.”

59

S.K. Gray “By whose rules?” “Ours.” “You talked about this?” “Everything else, it seems. Weezer, I’m a runaway from love. I came here to avoid commitment. To easily and adeptly sidestep heartstrings. I knew I wouldn’t fall in love with the land. It’s fucking cold and though I have developed a fairly comfortable layer of insulation that I was consistently trying to shed in Chicago, I knew I would eventually crave the hustle and bustle of corporate voodoo again. It’s all I ever known for any length of time. Alaska is raw and primal and often just kind of crude in its honesty. A complete change from the elitist snobbery of the world I lived in. It’s a healing vacation for me. I don’t need complications of any kind.” “Sweetheart, are you telling me you love this guy?” “I’m telling you I don’t want to.” “That’s quite a leap. That must have been one helluva snowmobile ride. Please tell me it was a helluva ride.” “Hmmm” she smiled, saying nothing but hiding nothing in the soft twinkling of her eyes. “Did you ever just feel so right with someone, I mean, from the moment you met them? So much so that, avoiding all the hackneyed romantic clichés, you just felt ….right? “Once. In high school. The warmth of it has stayed with me all these years.” Lilly smiled up at Anna Louise with sincere admiration. “I had already been out of college and married for a few years by the time John graduated from high school.” “To the totally wrong man.” Lilly had no response in the face of such simple truth. “John is leaving in a few months, heading even further away from the life I lead. The funny thing is he is hiding from himself here as much as I am. That makes it doubly unrealistic. He is built for hockey from the ground up. He loves it. He’s good at it. But he won’t stay either. Just passing through.” Anna Louise pushed herself up and grabbed the coat she had tossed in the chair a few minutes before. “Darling, if the life you lead is so far away and different, you’d go back there, you’d be there now, divorce or no divorce. I think you are your own worst

60

Body Check enemy. He is, too, most likely.” She slipped her arms into the sleeves and turned to the door. “I think you watch too many soap operas” “It doesn’t take much or a brain to figure out what is going on. You intelligent creatures can think yourself right out of what is right in front of your face.” Lilly frowned, borderline patronizing. “Listen, you run a health spa, everything about that place is geared to be in tune with your body. Right?” “Right” she humored her, leaning back in the couch. “Well, then you should be smarter. You should be in tune with things more. You make it too damn complicated. This guy does things to your body.” “Weez!” “Like tingles and shivers and shakes and goosebumps. You should listen to your body” Lilly opened her eyes and stared over at her friend. Weezer looked at her as if to say ‘who’s dumb, now?’. “Give me a call when you are ready for work. I’ll come back and get you. I want to ogle some of those hard working bodies myself.” She paused halfway out the door. “You know, we are all just passing through. What’s so wrong about feeling right? I just don’t know where, when or why we decided that was a bad thing. But we did! Don’t screw it up before it really even gets to the screwing up point.” “Yeah well, that is easy for you to say, you’ve felt ‘right’ about your husband of twenty years.” “I never said it was Eddie.” She raised her eyebrows at Lilly and slipped out the door. Lilly sat quietly on the couch listening to the echo of her friend’s words and breathing in the lingering aroma of John from the pillow she clutched. No. she wouldn’t do that. She was going to feel good about feeling good. For now. She owed herself that much.

61

S.K. Gray

Chapter Eight As it turned out, their day of sexual fantasy played itself out into ten days of plowing and plowing and more plowing as Kine’tok burrowed itself back into a semblance of normal ice-covered existence. The Body Check had remained open for complimentary business until the last scraping shovelful of bulldozed snow had grunted along the ground. Piles of dirty ice and debris had been daily coated with new blankets of sparkling white. The overflow of bored tourists, glad to have access to the steamy spa waters once again, flocked there in newly purchased tights of fantasy fuchsia and key lime and lemony frost from the now depleted stock room of Guinevere’s Closet. “When Deprived, SHOP” seemed to be the motto of the day. And there wasn’t a day that she walked by the busy Jacuzzi that Lilly didn’t feel a special tingle in her crotch. True to their casual words, John and Lilly went about the task of lunch when probable, dinner when possible and commitment free fucking whenever, with great abandoned glee. They hadn’t quite made it to a bonafide bed yet, but the possibilities seemed endless. Weezie went back to wise cracking, Eddie still played with his remote and good hockey was cheered on at the week’s end. There hadn’t even been time to wonder about where it was all going. The messy under rumblings of commitment and permanency were as well hidden beneath their thoughts as the unappealing slush beneath the piles of plowed avalanche snow. On this third Thursday after the second earth rumbling after that first lusty kiss, but still half a week away from the Thanksgiving breaks, Lilly watched out the small steaming window from inside the spa. The appointments were done for the day; the place had emptied out of its last customers. Here inside, warm, enveloped in therapeutic mist lingering in the air, she couldn't feel the biting cold just beyond the frosty pane. She knew

62

Body Check it was there, even in the beauty of the huge flakes catching the glow of the parking lot streetlamp in a display of dancing prisms. The cold permeated everything now. And she was chilled to the bone. Even more. To the core. There was only one true source of warmth for her. John Baylor’s presence. She pressed her face up against the condensation of the window and blew her breath against the glass, rubbing it with her balled up fist. She gazed beyond the parking lot towards the source. There it was! The warmth. In the distance, a darkened moving figure among darker smudged stationary figures bobbed back and forth across her vision. If she squinted, she could distinguish the blot of red woolen scarf as it wove in and out on the skirts of the streetlamps bordering the pond, gliding, changing direction, darting, stopping...all with a grace and flow she had come to appreciate as an art form. John Baylor on ice! The time for lessons with tourist children was past and they were all safely tucked back into the warmth of their hotel rooms or stuffed into the booths of family style restaurants dotted all over town. This was John’s time to just glide and dream and skate to his heart’s content. She rubbed away more of the streaky glass and pressed her palm flat, following the figure with her eyes, over and back, over and back, her fingers caressing much like they would if they were actually on the flesh. Flesh she had come to know well. Now, under layers of heavy flannel and down, there would be a sweaty sheen washed over him. Smelling of musk and exertion and male. Hot beneath his wrappings, cool to the touch of fresh air, salty to her tongue. Alaskan Bear Meat and Champagne! Lilly turned and flattened her ear up against the window, imagining the scraping of shaved ice as the blades raked across the frozen surface each time he stopped and flew off in another direction. Flying off...in another direction. Her eyes briefly looked into the night beyond the dancing snowflakes to the South. Another direction. Chicago. What she knew as home, but where she no longer kept a key under the mat. Not until Wednesday anyway. Then she would be flying home for the holidays following a short and sweet

63

S.K. Gray plea from the Navy Pier friends to get her ass home for turkey and giblets and Long Island Iced Tea at the House of Blues. For two weeks she and John had basked in each other's glory...and the quest to find every position and square foot of fuckable space in Alaska was well within their grasp! They were an excellent match. A decade may have parted them chronologically, but those years were all but washed away mentally and physically and had only raised their specter during a staff Trivial Pursuit Game where she and John had kicked ass against all comers until indignantly and under protest, placed on opposing teams! Opposing teams. Seemed impossible. But too true. Lilly came from comfort. At least the comfort that money could buy if not comfort of one's sensual soul. Ambition wasn't a driving force, but personal independence and success on her own was. At 35 she had freedom, direction and a hefty settlement from a marriage that had collared and controlled her for a dozen years. She kept preaching to herself. No limits now, no boundaries, no foul lines and penalty boxes, no scores to settle. Thinking of scores led her to think of John. Thinking of John led her to think of hockey, and her eyes followed John's motion in the distance. John came from tradition and duty. He had such a planned future. Back home to Deerling, a life of service to the community and most likely creating an ice picket fence around an igloo of domesticity with a permanent cheerleader/homemaker by his side. The instantaneous ache that gripped her chest was so strong it made her step back from the window. She hurriedly grabbed her new, ass covering down jacket that John insisted would keep her warmer than the ducks it came from and shoved her footied feet into her still reliable mukluks. Pulling her knitted floppy hat down over her ears, and grabbing her gloves from her coat pocket, she headed out the back door. With the panting of her breath and the crunching of her boots on the crusty surface of the snow almost drowning out the pounding in her chest, she raced across the expanse of ground separating the commons from the pond. A panic had set in. She needed the source. She couldn’t wait until later when he would show up at her cottage

64

Body Check door, goofy hat in hand and some small token of Kine’tok nature bunched in his hand to serve as a makeshift centerpiece for whatever she served up as dinner. Suddenly, the overwhelming desire inside her to be with John, in his element, shot her towards the black ice like a cannon ball. John heard the sound of footsteps before he saw the running figure. Taking a moment from the echoes to decipher which direction they were coming from, he turned in her direction just before she reached the far edge of the glassy surface of the pond. A brilliant smile crossed his face and he raised his hand high. “Tiger Lilly!” She stopped just short of the ice, the adrenalin pumping inside her so fiercely that she bounced up and down in place. John skated briskly to the side and was about to perform a totally high school show off move of skidding to a sideways halt spraying her with a sheer little covering of ice chips when she stepped right off the solid bank half falling, half flinging herself into his arms. “Whoa! Kristi Yamaguchi, I think you forgot something….like your skates.” “Hold me” she blurted out. “Just hold me!” “Couldn’t help it Sweetie, if I let you go you’d slide all the way across the pond on your very fine kiester.” he laughed low, then recognized the urgency of the arms wrapping around him. “Hey, hey, hey. What is it? Lilly. What?” He dropped his stick and steadied her, his eyes zeroing in on the face beneath the floppy hat. Lilly quickly caught her breath and felt the shivering in her chest immediately calm just by being in his bear hug. “Nothing, nothing…really…it was… just a little colder than I thought it would be and I got a bit carried away trying to stay warm and lost my balance.” He wrapped her tighter in his arms and rocked side to side while she calmed even more. “It’s kind of neat having you out here on the ice.” He gazed down tenderly at her half hidden face behind blowing hair and hat. “I never want to hear again how ugly my hat is.” He pushed her hair back from her face, his heavy glove practically obliterating her features. “Missed me that much, eh?” She nodded. But now that I am out here, I’m thinking I was rather an impetuous

65

S.K. Gray idiot. How can you stand this day in and day out?” “I keep moving. And I relax. Come on, give it a try. Deep breath and then I’ll take you for a ride.” “A ride?” “Those boots you’re wearing are about as skid resistant as a sheet of greased plastic. Now come on, breathe deep, shake out your arms and relax. Then squat.” “I beg your pardon?” John skated around to the back of her while she grasped desperately for his hands. “I’m not getting kinky on you…not yet anyway. Trust me. Breathe and squat down, on your haunches.” He slid his arms under her and rested his head next to hers. Lean back, I’ll support you. You are about to become a human sled.” She giggled while getting her footing and leaned back against his body, bending her knees, then naturally wrapping her arms around them tightly. “Ready? One, two…” he pushed off on the ice with his hands firmly planted on her back. “Hey, what happened to three?” “I like to keep you guessing!” he shouted as they picked up speed. Feeling the rush of frozen pond air blast her in her face, she thought her nose might just crack off. But then the exhilaration set in as they skimmed across the surface off the ice towards the bleachers on the far side of the field. “Woo hooooo!” she screamed out as John picked up a little more speed. Almost too much! Her woo hoo suddenly turned into an *Uh ohhhh* as they zeroed in on the embankment to the left of the bleachers. “Where are my brakes?” she squealed afraid to put her hands down on the slippery ice to slow them down. “Brakes? We don’t need no stinking brakes!” John shouted out as they headed straight for a fresh snow bank. “Noooooooo!” At the very last moment, in a whirl of thigh-powered masculine motion, John pulled a graceful Baylor twirl and spun his body around behind her taking a backward lunge into the mound of snow.

Her arms and legs all akimbo, Lilly’s shriek of

66

Body Check excitement was cut short with a grunt as she was pulled back through the air and landed squarely on John’s sacrificial body. For a stunned moment they both lay there until the little clumps of disturbed snow settled back down around them. From this angle the cold bright man in the moon peeked down at them between a few passing clouds. John wasn’t sure whether he was about to be cussed out in one of her more colorful salty sailor routines or coldly ignored for the rest of his life. She lay like a frozen slug on top of him. In a small voice she hardly recognized as her own Lilly whispered “Body check! Let’s do that again!” John howled in mock outrage and rolled over, putting her carefully beneath him in the snow. Whatever smart-assed retort that was bursting to get out of his mouth was cut short as Lilly planted her hands on the sides of his face and pulled him down to her for a hard, lip smacking kiss. “Warmed up a bit?” he gasped when she finally relinquished the hold on his mouth. “Yeah. Especially with a human polar bear lying on top of me” “Your ass will feel it in a minute. But if I didn’t think it would snap off, I’d give you a decent snow fucking right here and now.” “As opposed to an indecent snow fucking?” “Don’t tempt me with cuteness, I might just risk the disfigurement.” He rubbed his nose down on hers. “Would I get my first taste of a Kine’tok cumscicle?” John roared with laughter, shaking on top of her. “With our luck your mouth would get frozen there and we’d have to call the fire department to blow torch you off.” “Hmmmm. My mouth? Cold? I’ll let my hot to trot mouth be the blowtorch. What a visual.” “Damnit, let’s try” John fumbled at his coat with his bulky gloves reaching underneath to find his zipper. “Are you crazy?” she reached over quickly to clamp down on his hands. “Yeah, and if you take too long to decide, I will freeze my dick off.”

67

S.K. Gray Lilly laughed out loud “We can’t have that! Move your hands. I have something a tad bit hotter than my mouth available.” With a flurry of shifting in the snow bank she straddled him.

Raising her

eyebrows quickly a few times, she reached down and tugged the hood of his parka out from behind his shoulders and carefully positioned it behind his head. For good measure she tugged his hat down a bit further over his ears and pulled off her glove. While he could only gaze up at her in wonder, she tenderly stroked the side of his face, her flesh still warm from the heat inside her glove. “I’ll do the moving for both of us. Just be still.” “Now who is crazy?” She shushed him again and slowly unzipped his parka, making sure the red scarf remained crisscrossed across his chest. Spreading his jacket open at the bottom next to his hips, she stood up, still straddling his body. With a sassy twitch of her hips, a stripper’s twirl of her floppy hat off of her hand, a quick look around the deserted pond, and then one tossed plea of protection to the Goddess of Moonlust in the sky she opened her coat and slid her sweatpants and panties down to her calves. In the vague light from the glow of the nearby lamppost on the bleacher path, John gazed up at the sight of soft pinkish thighs with a thick patch of furry triangle against the backdrop of her dark down coat. The reaction was immediate. His cock came to full, throbbing life beneath his jeans. With a gasp she fell to her knees on either side of the parka spread at his hips dragging her opened coat back around her bared flanks, already tinged a darker shade of pink. The down immediately cast a protective shield around her legs and she let out another slow breath of air. “Jesus, Lilly, you’ll freeze.” “Shhh, if I die it will be with an orgasm on my face! And I want that on my tombstone, by the way. Use those hands of yours to protect my ass! He obliged by grabbing her firmly, holding the protective down flat against her rounded cheeks. She reached for the zipper of his jeans and yanked down. The heat from his encased body rose to surround her face with a musky aura and she leaned forward to

68

Body Check inhale his earthy scent. She playfully rubbed her nose across the gaping slit of his boxers and flicked her tongue on the already swollen veins of his cock. She removed the other glove and with a practiced dip and twist of her fingers, helped his rigid penis out of his pants. She leaned lower to blow on the glistening flesh already creamy with pre cum. Dispensing with the more playful elements of foreplay, she scrunched forward on her knees and held the hard head cupped in her palm. She craved all that luscious heat inside her. “God, Sweetheart.” He grimaced in pleasure. “Are you ready? I don’t want to hurt you.” Lilly wordlessly held his cock head to her clit, applying pressure. Instantly slickened with her own heated juices from her slit, his cock easily slid between her lips and with a guttural moan, she lowered her body down on him deep. Sighing at the exquisite ache, she tilted her head back and dragged in some cold night air. “Darling, I was soaked the minute I heard you call me Tiger Lilly” she gasped. His grip on her ass tightened considerable as he banged his head back on the snow bank in quick succession. His hips raised up to make the penetration sweeter while she began to rock and slowly rotate on him. The sensual extreme of the biting night air and the hot earthy musk of sex wrapped around them, squeezing every ounce of intensity within their bodies to the core of their coupling. It couldn’t last long. Not at this need. With an almost primal cry, Lilly arched sharply and flung her hands back to grab hard at Johns hands clutching her cheeks. She came hard with a spasmic shudder and fell forward on his chest, her hands cushioning her head. His hips pumped upwards greedily to bring his own body to a shuddering climax a few moments later as the long moan of utter release rippled down his throat and the veins on his neck tightened. One arm immediately wrapped around her protectively while the other clenched across her ass. “Lilly….Lilly…I lo” her hand pressed over his mouth to stop the words.. “No. Shhhh.” At this point, he didn’t care. But the reality of the danger of genuine frost biting their tender bits wiped out the remnants of a more leisurely recovery from lust and he

69

S.K. Gray quickly shifted his hands under her coat to get her sweats back up where they belonged. She wrapped her coat around her and rolled off to the side as he fumbled with the quicker task of zipping up. Raising himself on his elbow, John licked a bit of snow off her cheek. “In Deerling we’d have to keep all our more adventurous fuckings inside so we don’t end up a permanent pornographic ice sculpture for the townies to admire.” Lilly rubbed her arms, as a quick shiver raced over her. Not at the chill of the air, but the idea of permanency and Deerling in the same sentence. It wasn't the first time he had casually and comfortably mentioned *back in Deerling*. She wasn’t sure what chilled her more, the idea of her being in Deerling, or John not being in Kinetka Tok. Her eyes focused back up on the moon over his shoulder. “Buzz kill. Way to go Baylor” he sighed, rolling back next to her in the snow. “It was just a comment Lilly, Just a joke.” She softly spoke up into the cold air, watching her breath dance in the breeze. “Not yet. Not now” She was pretty sure she heard him reply “Not ever” but chose to think it was her over active imagination. “Hey, you were right.” She turned her head and looked seriously at his intense face. “My ass is feeling it” Age and reality quickly set in as they clamored to their feet; John rather unsteadily this time, his blades digging further into the snow. She steadied him with her body until he got his bearings. “Thanks for the ride sailor”, he chuckled, keeping his arm tightly around her as the two headed towards the relative warmth of the ragtag, makeshift locker hut under the bleachers. John fairly kicked the door open and tread inside gingerly, plopping himself down on the nearest bench to take off his skates. The room was barely big enough for four grown men to turn around in, but it sufficed for a quick stick repair or ace bandage during the weekend games. Lilly closed the door and headed towards the other bench nearest the propane

70

Body Check heater glowing warm. “God, it feels like a sauna in here. I love it.” Lilly turned and rubbed her backside briskly before sitting Indian style on the bench. “Well, in a few minutes it will feel almost as cold as your ass did earlier!” “Well, for now, I am quite happy, thank-you” As John peeled off his gloves and bent to unlace his skates, the soft smile crossing his lips dimming a bit as he gave her a quick glance. “Why did you stop me?” Lilly misunderstood.

“Stop you? I thought things were progressing quite

naturally and quite well, Iceman!” He grinned, pulling off the second skate. “No, no, I mean why did you stop me from saying….what I was going to say.” He put both feet flat on the floor and rested his elbows on his knees. “Oh” Lilly looked away from his steady gaze. He waited. “John, I don’t think a person should easily believe what is said in the heat of blissful passion. I don’t think a person should say those words then, either.” Looking up and seeing his eyebrows furrow a bit, she raised her knees up, hugging them to her chest and continued. “I would better believe those words when they are said in the heat of anger, because then they actually mean something. That’s when it is very hard to say them. But it’s very believable.” John leaned back and crossed his arms across his chest, rolling the words around in his head. “You really were ripped apart during your divorce weren’t you?” While she squirmed somewhat uncomfortably contemplating a reply, John shed his parka and tossed it across the bench beside him. “It’s the death of something, no matter how you get to that point. No matter how much, at the end, you want it to end, it’s still a death. A death of love.” “But it was freedom for you. You got away from something that obviously was wrong. Look at it as the birth of a chance for new love” She half smiled and stared down at her gloves, avoiding those eyes. “I don’t…I don’t have the heart to love like that.”

71

S.K. Gray “What the fuck does that mean?” he snapped, his words sounding more harsh than he meant them to, but they were tempered as he shifted on the bench, his body language softening the tone. “It means I don’t think I am capable of love again.” “Love …like that” “Love period.” She took off her jacket as her body warmed up to the room and the conversation. Maybe it was the time and place to address what had been hanging over their heads since the first day the earth rumbled. John relaxed a bit. He could handle this conversation if it slipped into the realm of philosophy. “Lilly, if you had the capacity to love in the first place, you still have it. It’s always there.” “Things can change.” “Things change, situations, outside circumstances, yeah, but it can’t change who you are at heart.” He leaned forward with his hands outstretched and a sweet smile crossing his lips. “Everything changes who you are at heart. Every little thing about every little day affects who you are.” “It affects how you view who you are, but not who you ARE, are.” He stopped and wrinkled his nose. “Having sex in an ice mound must make your existentialist brain cells shift into overdrive. It gives the rest of your body parts time to rejuvenate.” She hopped up, laughing and scurried over to plant a kiss on the top of his head. “Your parts rejuvenate fine. And fast. It’s that youth thing.” She rolled her eyes. He put his hands on her hips and twisted her left and right. “Well, sometimes fast is good” She smiled down at him, turning his face up to hers. “Fast. My God, it’s too fast.” “If we’d have taken anymore time, we may have done permanent damage to the workable bits” “No, silly. I wasn’t talking about that. The Iceman Cometh just fine.” She softly mused. “Sometimes the best things can happen fast” John blushed and grinned and pulled her close, nestling his face into her belly.

72

Body Check The gesture was one of established intimacy. The kind of affection a long-term couple practices when they are in the secure comfort of their love. Or at least that was the kind of love she had always imagined for herself. The kind she thought she would have but the kind that had evaded her even after a dozen years of hoping. How could she possibly have this with John so fast? How could it be real? And worse, how could she get over it when they parted? And they would. Good things just didn’t last. “Hey, where did you go?” He gave her a shake again. I know this isn’t exactly the most luxurious of surroundings for pillow talk, but don’t leave me here alone.” “I’m sorry.” She smiled shortly but he could see in her eyes that her mood had shifted into uncharted territory. “John, good things never last, do they?” Swallowing any flip reply, John tried to tell her with his eyes that she was wrong. But the stark reality was that she could be right. She watched the change of expressions flash across his gaze. “I’m scared.” “Sweetheart, what in life isn’t scary?” She clenched the fabric of his flannel shirt in her fists as she rested them on his shoulders. She tried several times to say something, to verbalize what was plaguing her in such a way that she didn’t sound like a frightened child just wanting to run away. But that was what she was when it came to love. She could only repeat it again softer. “I’m scared” He was losing her. He had her right in front of him, warm and alive and still glowing from steamy, passionate lovemaking, his face pressed next to the very spot where her heart steadily beat within her chest, and she was fading away to a place he wasn’t sure he could reach. “At the risk of sounding trite and clichéd, face the fear.” “Trite and clichéd. Pillow talk words.” She chuckled, running her hand over his tousled hair. “Face it, Lilly” This was very uncomfortable territory. Much too risky. She had to turn it around. She had to throw up the defenses. “Face it like you do?” “Like I do?” he was taken aback and in the momentary advantage she pressed

73

S.K. Gray forward. “Like you do. Or more to the point, don’t. You talk about going back to Deerling, about all the things waiting for you there, how the people will react…but you still don’t go. You put it off. You are just like me at heart, it seems.” “Lilly” he sighed. “I have a plan. It’s set to go. I’m just playing out the season. That’s not fear.” “Kinetka Tok is a lovely fantasyland for both of us it seems” She turned and walked back over to the heater, pretending to warm her hands but basically not wanting to watch the reaction in his eyes. “We exist here for a short, temporary time, because we both know nothing good lasts.” John was suddenly too annoyed to let the truth of what she was saying enter the conversation. Tit for tat wasn’t a viable debating point right now. “So what?” “So what??” she spun around. “So maybe the good things do only last a short time. Our time isn’t over. It just isn’t” “Oh, but it will be the moment you decide to follow through with your plan!” “Lilly quit twisting things” he stood up and started over towards her, still a little wobbly making the transition from skating on ice to walking on solid ground. Lilly tensed as if preparing for an inevitable body check. There was a quick rap on the door to the locker hut and it instantly cracked open. Aaron’s head appeared around the edge of the door. “And I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house down!” He laughed, stepping into the room with a flourish of energy. Lilly turned back around to the heater and reached for her coat. “Hope I am not interrupting. I was just walking by the pond and I saw a stick out on the ice, thought I would bring it back in and make sure some tourist kids hadn’t been mucking about.” John nodded quick thanks and reached for the stick as Aaron moved further into the room. “Not a fit night out for man nor beast, but hockey players journey onward!” he clapped his gloved hands together and rubbed them fast, looking over at the propane heater glowing in the corner.

74

Body Check John motioned for him to step in as Lilly slipped quickly into her coat. “Well, this seems like a good exit cue!” she smiled cheerily, zipping up and stepping quickly to the door. “Good to see you again Aaron.” Aaron moved across the small room to the heater, making a bigger drama about it than necessary, whistling an inane tune as he took off his gloves and fanned them before the heater. John held the door open for her to step out and leaned towards her, lowering his voice. “Exits. You’re good at those. Go ahead, run away” She stomped outside and then turned, her eyes flashing. “Running away, we are both good at that, John” His jaw clenched as she lowered her voice and stepped back up to him. Opening her mouth once, then thinking better of it, she purposefully took a bit of a breath and tried again, staring directly up at those accusing eyes. “You love Hockey, John. You don’t want to be a cop. We are both walking wounded. We are both running away from our fears. Plain and simple.” John’s stomach tightened painfully. His hand reached up in a conciliatory gesture when Aaron coughed loudly behind him. “Lilly. Tomorrow. Dinner. It’s…just…well, it’s all… right.” She’d heard those words before. Coming out of her own mouth. It wasn’t a copout or an evasion. Simply a civilized breath of sanity attempting to control emotions that could easily destroy something they both desperately needed. Talk about existential bullshit! She laughed at herself. “Dinner.” She put her head down, relaxed her shoulders. The threat had passed. “Yes, Iceman. I’ll be here tomorrow.” They leaned into a short kiss that was long on feeling and she briskly headed off across the path towards town. The door shut behind John and Aaron checked twice over his shoulder before turning to face his friend. “Sorry about the interruption, but…well…John, I could be risking something here, but…she’s right.” John leveled a dangerous gaze at him that normally worked on the hockey rink,

75

S.K. Gray but somehow lost its potency in the close quarters of a room still fragrant with the remnants of Lilly’s perfume. “Voices travel in this cool night air, even through closed doors.” “You have a point here Aaron?” “Yeah, I do. Some people think I am nothing but a sleazy moron, and they may be right” he laughed shortly and John raised an eyebrow. “But I understand the concept of family. I know you are struggling with this family commitment thing. I know that you think you owe the rest of your life to your family’s plans for you.” John started to interrupt, but Aaron held his ground. “Family is important. You don’t want to upset the family. But with all the talk and importance of family, especially at this time of the year, I don’t know one family that isn’t dysfunctional. I mean utterly fucking lunatic at some point. And you know why? Because people are dysfunctional. They walk around with their own individual baggage no matter where or how they were brought up.” John remained silent as Aaron paced a bit back and forth. “What I am trying to say is, John, at some point in your life, family is right here” He put his fist to his chest. “It’s inside, waiting to be created. I’m not saying this just because I think you are making a huge mistake if you leave the team here. I do, but that isn’t my point. My point is that you are running away from one of the real needs of your life, just as Lilly would be if she left Kine’tok” The air in the hut hung heavy surrounding his words. In a shack usually reserved for bawdy jokes and crass cock- bragging, it seemed tremendously out of whack. But poignantly true. To break the odd spell it had cast, John tossed his hockey stick into the wooden equipment box in the corner, giving both men an *out*. “Jesus Christ, Aaron, where did this come from?” “Some late night bar conversation with a very hot, very sexy and very smart one night stand from Kalamazoo Michigan” Aaron threw his hands out sheepishly. “That’s crazy.” John snorted, but the point had made its way home. “You wanna talk crazy? Talk about making bare assed love in a snow bank in sub-freezing temperatures.”

76

Body Check “You saw?” “I am still an asshole, but I am a passionate asshole” he pulled Lilly’s knit hat out of his pocket and tossed it at John. “Don’t pressure her John. Listen to your own adviceface the fear keeping you from the things you’d really love.” The door closed quietly behind him.

77

S.K. Gray

Chapter Nine Many people were leaving the sparkling resort playground and preparing for the approaching familial festivities of the US Thanksgiving. Up here, in Alaska, so many of the entrenched and revered historical holidays of the far off Northeast and the rest of the States lost a little in translation. Families remained close all year round. However any gathering concerning an abundance of free food, spirits, pie and sports provided in someone else’s home was celebrated with wild abandon...and most certainly not at a resort tucked into the base of a mountain. Lilly was no exception. Her previous invitation back to Chicago was tucked in her desk and the newly printed e-ticket was safely in the pocket of her suitcase already. Now if she could just figure out how to tell John. It was a one-way ticket. She quickly pocketed the room keys she had picked up earlier at the front desk of the Morgana Chalet. As a pre-holiday surprise for John, she had reserved one of the most expensive suites on the highest floors of the resort, with a lovely little discount tossed in from Freda for Lilly’s generosity to the clean-up crew after the big earth rumble. She would miss this place. One her way towards the back door of the spa, she checked out her appearance in one of the large mirrors surrounding the hot tub in the ladies' locker room, trying hard to block out the visions she had of bubbling Baylor from their first night together. It was difficult not to see him everywhere. She patted down the short woolen black skirt, disguising her carefully chosen layer of undergarments. Having discarded the well-worn jeans and jogging pants, she gave her decidedly feminine apparel a cursory glance. Not bad. She could still look highly big city- female when she put her mind to it. She blew herself a kiss, shimmied seductively, laughed out loud. Then she totally ruined the entire effect by throwing on

78

Body Check her oldest parka and shapeless head warmer shouldering the cumbersome overnight bag stuffed with snacks and pop and scurried out the door. Taking one last breath of warm air until she could thaw her lips out under John's kiss, she trudged to the Rover and threw the bag in the backseat. Crunching down through the feathery layer of new fallen snow, Lilly shook at the sticky flakes that attached themselves to her hair and lashes as she tromped down towards the edge of the hockey pond. All had been mostly forgiven, if not forgotten about the previous night’s romp there. It was easy to push aside that which you didn’t want to face. Just as she was making her way across the open spans of park, she took in the wide view of late afternoon Kine’tok magic. Quite like living in a snow globe. Ahead of her, out on the ice, as usual, John had just made one pass at the goalie net with his imaginary puck and spun around behind it, angling his skates as close as he could to a perfect arch. Lightening speed was not his forte, but placement and precision weighed in heavily with his skills. He detected the movement of something other than snow out of the corner of his eyes and looking up, smiled. The unmistakable gait, the long flowing mane of midnight hair...Lilly was off work! He quickly skated over to the side of the black ice just as she reached the boundary and aimed a hastily targeted kiss towards her upturned cheek that landed on the bridge of her nose, before plunging back out onto the ice. Lilly rubbed at the kiss and tucked her hands under the arms of her coat. John was a classic hunk on skates. She could easily overlook his tendency to plow into opposing team players like a moose on speed when she remembered the grace and finesse he had when plowing a different portion of his physique into her! She could envision the twinkle and grin now, even as his face was shadowed by the approaching darkness. John Baylor was a scrumptious, easily rumpled, all male, drop dead appealing, crotch tingling hormone crunching God, totally oblivious to his effect. She watched patiently while he attempted some impressive Scott Hamilton moves that fell ten points and several years shy of that master of the ice. But who the hell was keeping score? At least on ice anyway. John tried one more intricate little reverse twist and catching his blade in a rough piece of ice, flailed out for his balance and ended up

79

S.K. Gray making one spectacular 360 recovery that took even him by surprise. Taking it all in stride, he threw out his arms, bowed, started towards her...and tripped, going down on his very fine ass!! Lilly let out an echoing shoulder-shaking laugh. He quickly was on his feet and streaming towards her, stopping with a sharp shaving of ice spraying up over her. “I meant to do that, you saucy tart.” "Nice work Iceman" Lilly wiped the icy spray off her face and dangled the keys out to him. "Maybe I will just turn these back in.

Someone with your delicate

sensibilities might not want to associate with a saucy tart" He grabbed her up in the air around her thighs and spun her around on the ice, ignoring her shriek. He let her slide slowly down the length of his body and deposited her back on the slippery snow, catching her mouth on the way down in a sloppy, lower lip suck, and grabbing the keys out of her hand at the same time. She righted herself and tugged down on the skirt that was totally ineffective from preventing the icy air from rushing up her thighs and almost freezing the moist rush of sexual excitement soaking the crotch of her panties. John sniffed and examined the keys, raising his eyebrows in recognition of the lofty Chalet logo on the room key. "Going for the Fancy Fuck this weekend are we?" "Two days worth of fancy fucking! It’s my treat. Well, mine and Freda’s. A little thank-you gift for helping the work crew stay relaxed and focused while getting the traffic flow back to her humble boutique. And you better show appropriate appreciation and bow at all the right moments." John paused, gave her a *look* and a smirk then tossed the keys up for her to catch. "Just make sure your legs are positioned well when I bow, Goddess." “Just get your gear” “Does this mean I have to go get in one of my tuxes?” John threw his arms wide and glanced down at his baggy camouflage pants. “No, you wouldn’t be in it long enough to matter! I prefer you scruffy and very underdressed.” she smirked, making a rude gesture. “Gimme five!” he waved, shooting across the ice towards the hut.

80

Body Check Lilly looked the other way. She didn’t want to think about the hut right now. Ten minutes later, they silently fidgeted in the elevator while the busboy attempted to look straight ahead, keeping his eyes off the sparsely filled luggage cart John had insisted on using for his skates, a beat-up shaving kit and Lilly’s small overnight bag. Big spenders! Lilly smirked over at John...who tried vainly to whistle. "Well, I hope the refrigerator is well stocked. I've been working up quite the thirst, eh?" John commented to the back of the head of the bored young man who was now staring at the floor numbers and sighing out loud as they crept by far too slowly. Soon enough the bell clanged and the door slowly opened. Lilly bent down and grabbed their overnight bag, strutting out of the elevator.

She turned with much

affectation. “Take care of the good man for his trouble will you, darling? We’ll take it from here." John sputtered briefly as the busboy looked down at the pair of ice-skates. "AH...I think...I can...ah", fiddling in his camo pockets and coat. Lilly poked her head around the side of the elevator. "Here John, I know how hot and thirsty you must be from your long workout. Here's a little carbonation to help whet that whistle" she ended on a whisper and handed him the can of pop, with a five dollar bill tucked around it. She ended by stroking her finger, wet from handling the pop can, down the side of his throat. John cleared his throat and flashed a thank you at Lilly who turned and made a quick retreat down the hallway. John reached down, grabbed his skates and shaving kit and flung them over his shoulder, reaching the tip out to the bewildered busboy. "Thanks, buddy." As the busboy started to close the doors, John gave him friendly ‘cheers’ with his Pepsi can then reached to pop open the top. The elevator doors hadn't quite closed yet when Lilly put wings on her heels and raced down the hallway towards the room. Behind her, she heard the unmistakable click, fizz, whooooooosh of the can being opened and the instantaneous shriek as Iceman took the brunt of a drenching carbonated shower. A loud guffaw from down the hallway and the sound of running feet clued him in fast enough to what had actually happened with that Pepsi can and he turned and took off

81

S.K. Gray after the retreating figure now hightailing it around the corner. Hearing the thumping feet of a grizzly bear tromping too closely behind her Lilly fumbled for the keys to the room, wishing she had opted for sneakers instead of heels. She would have made it completely down the hall if it hadn't been for the hotel employee lingering near the other suite entrance with a huge arrangement of silk flowers in his arms. In a move sure to make Groucho Marx proud, she twirled twice around the stunned clerk, creating a diversionary obstacle, but helping him briefly maintain the balance she’s disrupted and scurried for the doorknob of their room. John, crashing around the corner, was more from the Three Stooges School of Slapstick. He clipped the gent on the shoulder as he made a direct grab for the fleeing lady...sending the hapless man on another impromptu ballet maneuver and a graceless three point landing on his can. Lilly had the door opened and almost closed behind her but John, putting a good portion of his weight behind him, shouldered the closing door and shoved forward. Laughing, Lilly counted to three, pressing back as hard as she could to try and close the door, then with a perfectly timed flourish jumped back from the door just as John made the hardest contact on the door with his shoulder. In true comedic style, John flew into the room, passed his wide-eyed woman and with the momentum he had built did a leaning 45-degree side step across the room. He came to a jarring stop as his body made contact with the back of the couch, sending him head over large feet, disappearing over the overstuffed furniture. After a moment of stunned silence, Lilly howled and clamped her legs together tightly, sure she was going to wet her pants from laughing so hard! She threw her head back and let the deep laughter roll from her gut. Even with her eyes tightly closed she could still see the vision of John's legs upended over the couch! While she tried desperately to regain her composure and control her weakening bladder, her laughter calmed down to a low roar and she pushed the door shut. She kept her eyes on the back of the couch and was prepared to genuinely be concerned at the lack of activity beyond it when an arm was flung up over the upholstered furniture. She stifled another raucous wave of laughter as a ruffled, dark haired head peeked up over the top...eyes narrowed but brimming with devilish amusement.

82

Body Check "Have a nice....trip?” she burst out, slapping her hands on her knees. With grace and speed that would do a snow leopard proud, John sprang up from the couch and made a wild lunge for the laughing woman across the room. She squealed and raced towards the bathroom but was laughing so hard her knees wouldn't work properly. John wrapped her in a bear hug from behind. "Ewwww yuk, Iceman, you're all sticky" she squirmed and kicked in his arms, turning to face him. "It's about time actually, I am usually the one who ends up the sticky mess! Sloppy seconds included!" "One of these days, Lillyput, I really AM going to put that smart ass of yours over my knee and give your amply cushioned backside one hell of a thrashing. And I don't care who is watching. Actually the more the merrier." "Yeah right, if you live long enough...now let go you're staining my coat!" "I will be staining more than that!" he searched around the room for the overnight bag and dragged her over towards it. "No no, come on, John, Jesus..." "What goes around, comes around" He shifted her into one huge brawny arm and grabbed into the bag with the other paw, coming out with a Pepsi can and shaking it vigorously. She kicked while he reached around her to pop open the tab but just at the perfect moment, Lilly let her legs go weak and slid down from his grip, so another blast of carbonated fizz drenched him right in the face and dripping down his parka. That was more than Lilly could stand and she collapsed into a laughing puddle on the floor, holding her stomach. John nodded his head and tossed the can across the room towards the wastebasket then shook his head wildly, sending a spray of dark cola down over her. Soon his own laughter blended in with hers and he picked her up off the floor. They shed their slick parkas off and let them fall to the floor. He softly swayed back and forth holding her firmly in his arms. His gaze was that of a man studying a fine piece of art. His eyes caressed every wrinkled in her brow, every lash of her eye, her strong wrinkling nose and blushed cheeks. His eyes lingered a long time on her upturned mouth, now pursed in agitation. Then John held her back from

83

S.K. Gray him and cocked his head to the side as if searching for one particular spot. She frowned and pushed back from the layer of glistening Pepsi that would soon be staining her scoop necked sweater. "Hey, this is cashmere!" "Shh" he insisted and dipped his head down and under her chin, tipping her head back. With a slow, easy grace, John lowered his mouth and opened his lips to cover the gently pounding pulse at the base of her throat. He pressed his mouth over her flesh and noisily sucked at the subtle heartbeat; his tongue tasting her salty smooth flesh. "Oh John, don't...not now" she whispered hoarsely. Already the anxious tingling spread across her abdomen and a warm blush of moisture between her legs returned. “Not now. Those words are official banned for the fucking weekend.” John's hands fumbled down the front of her cashmere top, pressing hard and manhandling her full breasts, finally lifting up her sweater. As many times as his palms had pressed and fingers had pinched and mouth had nibbled in the past, each time his fingers and mouth finally came into contact with her naked flesh, it sent the same shock waves coursing through her and the same seismic reaction to her loins. She was now effectively panty-soaked! He traced the edge of lace on her black bra and dipped his fingers down under the stretchy fabric. She jerked and lolled backward against his arm, tilting her head back. John grinned. As predictable as pressing a button. He leaned down and held the edge of lace in his teeth and tugged it down over her protruding nipple, rubbing his nose across the taut pink nub, before sucking the very tip between his lips. "If you are that thirsty, we can always stop and phone room service for some nice cold milk." "Lilly. Shut up" he warned. She did. John made a feast of her breasts. With every suck, Lilly the tension fired all the way to her belly and she spread her thighs as the ache penetrated further. Another button, he smiled to himself. His fingers found their way under the hem of her skirt and reached up between her legs, easily slipping under the warm, wet crotch of her panties. His hand pressed over

84

Body Check slippery lips, the heat warming his palm as he dipped two fingers easily inside her and shoved them deep. “Mmmmm, nice and ripe" he mumbled into her valley between her breasts. Lilly’s head spun from the pressure and probing of his fingers inside her and she wrapped her hand in the mass of tousled hair at the nape of his neck and gripped tight. At the sound of her moans and the grinding of her hips against his palm, his cock hardened so fast he shifted his hips uncomfortably to accommodate the sudden rise. He ached to fuck her. "I can't wait" he exclaimed breathlessly pulling his fingers out of her and lowering them to the floor. Lilly took her cue. Her hands found his waistband and she undid the belt, popping open the button and quickly unzipping them. John sat back with a satisfied groan and stretched his legs out as she straddled him on her knees. John rested back on his hands, sucking in air as her hands released his rock hard cock, straining up in full engorged glory. Already the tip glistened, the veins bulged. Lilly couldn't resist leaning down to flick a lick across the slit, tasting this cum appetizer, sliding her hand under his warm swelling balls and massaging them firmly...smiling in supreme enjoyment as his gasp deepened to a trembling moan. Her own needy ache fired up and she hiked her skirt up to her waist and shimmied her legs up next to his thighs. Reaching down, she impatiently pulled aside the crotch of her panties. Holding onto his shoulders for support, she arched herself above him and positioned herself just so the head of his cock pressed against her stiffened clit and thrust her body forward and back, rubbing the slickened tip hard against her responding flesh. John couldn't take any teasing and pressed his palms against the floor raising his hips roughly, forcing his dick down off her clit and pressing through her lips to claim entry. Lilly spread her legs wider and sat down hard on the impalement. God this man rocked her world inside and out! Now firmly inside her, John wrapped an arm around her and pulled her down hard as he thrust his hips up again. She bit at his shoulder and her arm braced his back,

85

S.K. Gray holding him tightly to her as she humped against his thrusts. The smell of sugary carbonation mingled with woolen sweat, musky perfume and liquid sex. As hard as she would sit down on his thrusts, it wasn't enough for John and he lurched upward, holding himself tightly inside her. Giving a cry of frustration he flipped her over on her back. Now he could ram home his desire. His cock pounded into her and she curled her legs up around him. Each time he thrust, her body shifted across the floor, the rug burning against her ass. She threw her hands back over her head and groaned each time his body filled her, clenching her muscles to feel every luscious inch! Once, twice, three times pounding against the excruciatingly sensitive tip of her cervix. On the forth perfectly aimed thrust she exploded. Her fists flailed back against the floor as her fingers dug into her palms. Every inch of her body rippled with the orgasm. Her senses melted together in one large burning rush and she cried out. John feverishly kept thrusting until finally he bent with a shudder, found her mouth and claimed her lips as his climax claimed her body. His shoulders tightened and his neck strained as he emptied himself into her. In exhaustion, he lay flat over her, both of them heaving, their bodies hot with sweat...yet already cooling down with a misty sheen of afterglow. John grumbled and rolled to her side but draping a possessive leg over her. His mouth traveled back and forth over her swollen lips, playfully tonguing her when she made an attempt to kiss him. "I....I...Lilly, I." he stuttered, contemplating the words that were bursting to come between his lips. But seeing the darkening of her eyes he stopped and let out a long growl. Lilly turned her head away and sighed. John dragged his spent body up and propped himself on his elbows. "One of these days we are going to make love in a proper bed, properly naked, and laze around like a properly fucked couple should." Lilly curled her legs up and wrapped her arms around them hiding all but her eyes behind her knees.

86

Body Check "Well, this way I can always avoid sleeping in the wet spot. Though we do tend to make a mess of everything around us don't we? John growled in a much more predatory fashion and lunged at her, wrestling her to the floor, pinning her arms above her head. He attacked her neck with nuzzles. The laughter in her voice got caught up with an emotion unfamiliar to John and he pulled up from growling into her throat, his grin disappearing instantly as the glistening of tears sparkled at the edge of her eyes and one lone tear overflowed and flittered down her cheek. Immediately John was up on his knees quickly hugging her up into his arms, bracing her with one arm, softly cupping her face with his free hand. "Lilly, did I hurt you?" "No...no...not ever" "I can get carried away...I forget...if I hurt you I'm..." "No John. Hey!" She covered his worried mouth with her fingertips to shush him. "Darlin, you have never hurt me. Our lovemaking is fabulous! You are awesome...just right...you always feel so damn good...." she attempted again to wipe away the sadness slowly catching up to her eyes. "Practically perfect in every way!" she did her best Mary Poppins imitation to lighten the heaviness she felt closing over her heart. John grinned and pretended to blush. Then pouted. "Hey...what do you mean practically???" Lilly again found her burst of laughter caught with a sob. This time John was not to be distracted and he firmly held her face in his hand, insisting that she look at him. "Lil, you have to tell me what is wrong or I can't help make it right" She tried to turn her gaze away but he held her firmly in his grasp and raised an eyebrow inquisitively. She still stalled. “Weezer once asked me what was wrong about being so right. And there is nothing wrong. But, there is something I just have to tell you. I....am...going back to the states on Monday. I didn't want to say it. I've given my notice, and arranged for Anna Louise to take over the running of Body Check. My flight is booked."

87

S.K. Gray The instant disbelief in John's face weakened her knees and if she hadn't already been sitting, she was sure she would have fallen. He got up as if being near her was scorching him. Lilly pushed to her feet adjusted her panties and straightened her skirt down around her hips. "John...listen, please." He fumbled with his trousers, turning his back to her. "Listen???? When have I NOT?" Lilly looked down at her feet guiltily "...you always have. I shouldn't have said anything. I wasn't planning on..." "When the fuck were you planning on telling me?" "In two days. Then you wouldn't have had any time to look at me just like you are looking at me now." John's anger flared across his gray eyes, replaced by utter confusion, then anger then again, then an almost helpless questioning. "How ...how am I supposed to look at you...Lilly...I know we briefly talked about this, but..." "You always acted as though it would never really happen. Well, John, I wanted to think it never would. I am a born procrastinator. But we both knew." "But it doesn't have to happen now...we still have time" "We never did have much time, Iceman." she tried to make light of the moment but when she reached to stroke his scruffy beard he slightly pulled away from her touch and looked down. Lilly caught at the lump rising in her throat. "But we could have more time than what you are giving us. “Wait; is this all just an excuse? Are you bored with us...with...me?" his eyes fastened on to hers. The gray gaze was the only thing she could not resist. It bore into her heart. "John" she reached forward and very gently touched her fingertips to the edge of his mouth. She owed him honesty. "This is self preservation.” Lilly could no longer stand the raw intensity of the eyes piercing hers. Turning, she rested her arms against the mantle and kicked her foot at a non-existent ember. "One of the first things I learned in Alaska was to protect myself from the elements. Nature is very in your face and arrogant here. It doesn't give a shit about you.

88

Body Check It mocks you even. At that time, I needed that challenge. I needed to feel the biting cold wind to remind me that there was still some warmth left inside me after my divorce. I never in my wildest daydreams thought that in the center of this entire giant ice cube I would find ..." she looked in his direction, finally connecting with the open emotion of John's stare. She continued "...I would find the most remarkable glow of my life. Passion and caring and dignity ...and an intensely smoldering fire. All wrapped up in flannel and a funky hat. I am so afraid I can't protect myself from this particular element." The only sound in the room was the intermittent crackle of gas flame from the fireplace. Finally John spoke, softly. "Don't then. Come with me. Left me protect you.” Lilly looked away, trying not to let too much exasperation into her sigh. "I can't afford to lose my heart....and it would be lost, John. You and I know it. The realities of Deerling would deteriorate our dream existence, and there where would I be, all over again." "Then fuck Deerling." "Not in a million years." she smiled. "You are talking romance, not reality." John grabbed for anything else that could be the real reason. "The age difference isn't all that fucking disastrous you know, if that is what is worrying you." He tried looking wise and mature and worldly, tried sounding casual as the panic gripped him. "....he says, a worldly twenty-five old whose never been south of any border, just starting out to build a safe career in a safe town, and whose favorite past time is to play hockey and eventually raise his own little hockey team in domestic frozen bliss." "Jesus Christ, don't patronize me Lilly” John shouted and ran his hands through his hair, looking for something to throw. Lilly needed desperately to gain some kind of control before she told him the whole truth. John continued his rant, pacing back and forth. "Are you trying to make me mad? Mad enough that I won’t care if you leave? Is that the trick?" It might work, she thought. John kicked at the huge overstuffed couch, a dozen battling emotions raging. “Is

89

S.K. Gray this what you think will be the best way to end this? How mature is that? You think you have cornered the market on maturity because you are a thirty five year old divorcee who finally dumped her husband because he was a clueless coldhearted bastard with no concept of how to treat a human let alone a desirable sexpot wife... with the most expressive eyes of any human on the planet ...and who laughs from her soul and doesn't give a damn about convention" he turned and threw out his arms, focusing on her pale face, framed by dark sex-tousled hair and with lips swollen from repeated hard kisses. "....with an incomparable mouth and is a goddamned lousy driver in the snow, can't tell a simple joke without blowing it to hell and can't cook but that doesn't fucking matter because she is easily the most delicious meal ever to be served up on two legs and probably gives the best damn head in the North America continent and drives me absolutely fucking CRAZY...Lilly I cannot let you go!!!" "You will have to” she whispered. The reality of her words sliced his heart. "Not tonight I won't." In a fluid motion he grabbed her shoulders and brought her hard into his embrace, squeezing her tightly and taking her face in the palm of his hand, his fingers, gripping as firmly as he dared. Her eyes caught the fear in his before fluttering shut, her lashes thick with salty tears. She didn't have the strength to fight back now, and would have lost if she had. John's arm enveloped her as his mouth completely possessed her with a fierce, trembling sweetness. Lilly’s arms found their way around his shoulders but it was totally fruitless to even attempt to hang on. He was not about to loosen his grip on her body or her mouth. With barely controlled intensity he groaned from his throat and planted wild hungry kisses all over her face, tasting the salty tears now spilling onto her cheeks. "Don't cry, darlin’, don't cry" his lips brushed over the tears as his arm slid under her legs and he shifted her up into his arms. Suddenly John became the adult. "We have two days. Some people won't even have that in a lifetime" and while she wrapped her arm around his neck and sunk her head onto his shoulder, he carried her towards the bedroom. John took several steps into the massive, elegant bedroom suite and stopped. His elbow found the light switch, bathing the room in shimmering light. White. Everything

90

Body Check was white on white on white. From the billowing draperies framing the huge triple glass panorama windows of the turret to the sateen bedspread perfectly thrown over the king sized bed mounted on a massive platform one step up from the rest of the huge room...soft, clean white. A huge chandelier hung down from the cathedral ceiling, dozens of sparkling crystals twinkling individual patterns over the walls clothed in white striped wallpaper. Huge pieces of cream and gold gilded furniture, that would normally dwarf a smaller room, looked comfortably fitting here. Everywhere, huge overstuffed tasseled pillows lay casually tossed with perfect creases. His feet practically sunk into the thick heavy piled carpet.

The only splashes of color were the three vases of brilliantly

arranged fresh flowers and the bowl of rose petals on the nightstand. "Holy shit...it's like a ...a fuckin' sultans den." Even feeling the warmth pumping through the woman's body he held tightly in his arms, the bizarre fiction of the moment, the entire surroundings, seemed like one huge dream. Unreal. None of this could be happening. Not to him. Not John Baylor. Not Lilly. Neither one of them truly belonged here. No one ever existing in these rooms belonged here. A page out of some fantasy fairy tale. “Maybe this is all just one big lunatic fantasy.” "It's just a room John. It's only magic because you are in it with me" Lilly whispered into his neck. She was right. The true luxury was not in the surroundings. The true luxury was what he held in his arms....for however long he held it. The true luxury was sharing the flesh and blood feelings of someone who loved with passion and no restraints and no rules. It all seemed very controllable now. For two days this dream was theirs. He slipped her gently out of his arms to stand next to him. He was looking at something in the room, but as Lilly turned to see what it was, he took her face in his palm and tilted it up to his. A calm wonder spread across his face as he brushed his thumbs underneath her eyes, catching the remainder of overflow tears. Her eyes seemed afloat in liquid, huge and open. "What?" she smiled softly up at his wonderment. John continued to smile down at her, memorizing her face, caressing every small

91

S.K. Gray wrinkle and nuance...lingering on his favorite spots, bending closer to touch, but pulling back just before contact. For her part, Lilly could not look away from his eyes. Such a direct path to his soul. John Baylor was unlike any other soul she had encountered. She just had to wonder why fate had chosen now to grace her life with this wonderful package of masculine delight. As a reminder that good things could still come in masculine wrappings? As a validation that romance still existed in a very jaded world? As a punishment for all the wicked curses she had gladly cast on men since her own desperately demoralizing divorce? As a nasty joke from Father Time? Well, fuck Father Time with a two by four. She had him here, and now. John's eyes quickly darted across the room to a small intercom on the wall. He firmly held her arms as if planting her in place and tapped a finger on her nose. He crossed the room quickly and started dialing and fiddling with the intercom buttons, shaking his head and frowning until he apparently found what he was searching for. He twisted the knob to the right as soft music from hidden speakers enveloped the room in stereo. Lilly brought her hands to her face and grinned as John turned and flourished a low dramatic bow. Tony Bennett's voice surrounded them as if the piano was in the corner of the room and the man himself were giving them a private audience. "May I have this dance?" "Iceman dances?" John stepped up to her and swept her into his arms and turned her into a perfectly executed dip. "Who the hell do you think you are dealing with here? We are prepared for everything at the academy." "To Protect and Serve?" In best Charles Boyer fashion he raised his eyebrow and brought her into perfect dancing position, his arm gracefully extended cupping her hand in his palm. “For the next two days, I will serve you well, mademoiselle, but I think I will need protection from you. Try and keep up will you?" "Ooo la la! " she laughed as he spun her around in a perfect waltz.

92

Body Check They covered the expanse of the room, bending and turning and dipping. Lilly beamed. There was truly nothing like being held in the arms of a man who knew how to make you walk on clouds. This bear of a man-child, so extraordinarily adept at coursing over ice, now spun about the room as if still on skates. The music washed over them as John guided her around the end of the large bed, past the easy chair, around the desk and ottoman, twirling past the entertainment center and back across the carpet, spinning her like a top. Lilly threw her head back and shook her hair in best Ginger Rogers style, molding herself to the rhythm of his steps. As he drew her back into a tight body embrace she leaned her body in the direction of the doorway and as they passed by she reached out and flicked off the light. The light from the living room still streamed through the doorway, just catching the crystals of the chandelier in a purely Hollywood effect. They whirled back across the room to the window, her low girlish giggle intermingling with the smooth-cool of Tony Bennett. Once in front of the window, John twirled her in a pirouette and brought her cheek to cheek. There, they just stepped back and forth, glancing out the flimsy curtains down onto the dancing snow coating the resort with yet another sparkling blanket. They even fit when dancing. He brought her hands together at his chest and wrapped his free arm around her shoulders, rubbing his hand up and down her back. The step deteriorated into a sensual sway and he rested his chin against her forehead. "John...?" "Yeah" "....Do you know how incredibly sappy we are?" "Yup...disgusting." John kept swaying. She chuckled. "We are going to make me totally ill in another minute, Mr. Astaire. People like us really make me sick" "Well Ginger, I could always do something totally vulgar." His lips brushed over her hairline. "I'll beat you to it" She grinned and slid her hand down his chest coming to rest on his full crotch beneath his camos, spreading her hand and dipping in-between his legs to take a handful and squeeze.

93

S.K. Gray John juked backwards, but her hand remained attached. He took another step but she followed him backward. He howled half-heartedly and spun away from her. She flung around and in the dark and unable to get her true footing in the thick carpet, bumped her hip into the edge of the desk, sending her sprawling, but still not letting go! John went to his knees beside her and flipped over on his back. They both watched in animated horror as the large vase teetered on the desk above them. In inevitable slow motion the vase fell over on its side and rolled across the clear glass desktop, spewing its contents in a direct hit to the astonished faces below. The water and flowers splattered over the edge of the desk with a loud sploosh. Lilly gasped and sputtered "Oh, for FUCK'S SAKE" as her hands went, too late, to shield her face. John winced and closed his eyes getting the brunt of the watery spray. They both lay in stunned silence as the flowers framed and littered their heads and chest, and the final droppings of the vase dripped down over them. Quietly, Lilly began to laugh, her chest shaking. She stared up at the darkened ceiling, lit only by glow cast from the doorway to the outer room. When she thought she had everything under control, she dared a quick side glance to John. He lay perfectly still, his face towards the ceiling, too, with a huge red Mum resting directly across his mouth...and two yellow ones haphazardly covering each eye. Lilly lost it, laughing so hard she almost choked on the rivulet of vase water that fell into her opened mouth. She grabbed the nearest flower and turning on her side, very carefully broke it and balanced it flower side down on the tip of his nose. He blew the flower from his mouth up into the air, scaring Lilly so that she jumped up and once again banged into the desk, sending the last of what was left in the vase, spilling over onto John's face. Lilly HAD to get the bathroom! She pushed up and made a mad dash across the sloppy white carpet, bee lining for the toilet cubicle. A minute later, her dignity barely saved, she came out to the huge double sink and leaned over to splash some fresh water on her face. She stared briefly at her bedraggled reflection in the wall sized mirror spreading across the entire length of the bathroom before burying her face in one of the immensely thick and fluffy perfumed towels left

94

Body Check hanging over the heated towel rack. When she looked up again, John was leaning in the doorway behind her. He took a few steps forward and reached his arm around her with one single red rose. She took it, breathed in the aroma and smiled at the reflected eyes in the mirror. The laughter was all gone as he stepped up behind her and pressed his body against her from behind. Watching their reflection in the mirror, he reached up and cupped her breasts in both hands. He rested his chin onto her shoulder and pushed her head to the side as he continued his massage. Lilly felt the hardened bulge of his crotch press against her ass and she pushed her hips back to intensify the touch. Her hands went to the countertop to support her body as his hands dipped to her hips, moving her back and forth over his hard on. His breath fell heavier on her ear and he licked at her lobe and probed inside her ear. Lilly felt the tingle all the way to her knees and they almost buckled. "Stay put" John went to the huge shower and opening the frosted door, turned on the water full blast. Two shower heads pounded to life. He returned to Lilly and took the flower from her hand, laying it gently on the counter, then turned her face towards him and kissed her thoroughly, sucking on her lips, thrusting his tongue between her teeth and lapping urgently at the inside of her mouth. Just as the steam began to filter over the top of the shower he slowly pulled back from the sloppy warm caress and turned back to the mirror. "Watch" Lilly, her open mouth still warm and wet from his kiss, drifted to the edge of a plateau as she stared at the steam-dazed reflection in the mirror. It couldn't be her, but her eyes hooded over as if she were a drugged voyeur watching in fascination as John's hands massaged and caressed the woman in the mirror. Her sweater was lifted up as his palms traced circles across her stomach and she flung one arm back over her shoulder to rest around his neck. She could see the woman run her fingers through the thick dark hair at the base of his neck but couldn't quite connect it to the silky soft damp strands of hair running past her own fingers. She watched as the hands unfastened the skirt and slowly pushed it down over her

95

S.K. Gray hips, disappearing beyond the bottom of the reflection. She sensed more than felt herself step out of it. She watched his mouth caress the side of her neck as his hands tugged the damp sweater up, up, up. She closed her eyes feeling the heavy wet knit peeled up over her head, and stretched her face upward to catch a quick blind kiss on a stubbled cheek before dragging her eyes back to the mirror. She could see the dark shadows of his large hands cover the lacey black cups of her bra. Lilly arched back against John, pressing her shoulders hard against his chest. In the steamy mist she marveled at the muted reflection of two strong arms and broad shoulders in a dark navy tee-shirt. The lean fingers slipping the straps of her bra over her shoulders, the dark head bending down to nuzzle the curve of her neck. With very little trouble the bra was unfastened and fluttered down her arms to the floor. He took her arms and lifted them behind her and around his neck. "Keep them up Tiger" John wrapped one arm around her torso, under her breasts and pulled her back, rubbing his stiffened cock back and forth across her backside. His sighs got lost in her tousled hair. He gently pressed his thigh between her legs and coaxed her legs apart. He reached his other hand around her waist and slid it down her belly. Watching her in the mirror with dark intense eyes, his fingers slid beneath the top of her panties and his fingers wrapped down into the peach fuzz of soft curling hair, teasing and tugging at the downy nest. A long satisfied sigh was his reward; that, and a warm gush of moisture on his hand as he probed his fingers lower and slid them between her slippery wet lips, his middle finger pressing hard over her clit. Lilly gasped, watching in awe as her senses of sight and touch separated...coexisting in a voyeuristic submission behind a fog of steam. Her eyes closed to almost slits as she gave in to the sensations of his fingers rubbing and stroking over her pussy. She raised up on her toes as his finger , slick with her juices went deep inside her. She cried out in yearning and fell forward, her hands slapping on the mirror as she made contact. Her fingers streaked along the moisture clinging to the mirror; her heart racing. No more watching. Lilly wanted to FEEL.

96

Body Check She turned around abruptly, grabbed the front of his dark blue tee-shirt and yanked him forward to plant her mouth on his, hard. This was not a soft pretty exploration. It was a plunder. John absolutely drugged her. She felt the rasping of his days old beard scrape across the smoothness of her cheeks and she relished the prickly sting of it on her flesh. Her lips throbbed and she went back to the source of her passion again and again until he took a fist of her hair and forced her to stop and look at him. There was no denying the raw hurt in his eyes. But it wasn't from the pain of hungry bruising kisses. He opened his mouth to speak but she shook her head roughly against his hand. "NO NO… don't say anything" she rubbed her face over his cheeks and chin and neck "...just make love with me John." The steam swirled around them, their already wet and sticky bodies made even slicker. No more teasing. No more torment. Time to make love. Lilly discarded her panties, reaching quickly for John's pants...while he took no time in shedding his shirt. She stripped him down quickly, roughly and ran her hands up from his ankles over his finely defined muscular calves, her face brushing against his fully hardened cock. Running her opened mouth erratically around the base and length and tip, her hands pressed up his inner thighs, fingers probing, stroking and cupping the massive swelling balls, kneading them while John moaned and arched into her hands and mouth. She breathed in his most private scent and softly nuzzled her mouth in the hollow where leg met groin. John grabbed her shoulders and lifted her to her feet, guiding her backwards towards the shower, all the while nibbling sharply at her lips. Both of them stepped beneath the needling spray of the hot shower, their skin tingling momentarily as the stinging heat of the water coursed over them. They held each other at arms length as the healing waters flowed over head and shoulders and chest washing away all but their inner heat. After their skin adjusted to the temperature and intensity of the cascading water, they gravitated towards each other, pressing their bodies together, molding curve to bulge.

97

S.K. Gray Lilly opened her mouth wide to gasp in air around the torrents of water streaming down over her face, and slid to her knees. From one side of the shower, the water played over her shoulders and back...a thousand fingers of massage. In front of her, coated in a waterfall of pure clean water was John's thick rigid cock. She pressed her tongue at the base and allowing the water to sputter over her tongue, she licked up the swollen length of him, tasting beneath the cascade, the salty flesh of her lover. John's hands went to her head and pushed back the saturated hair flattening against her skull. He tilted her head back as she closed her eyes and watched as her kiss stung lips covered over the tip of his penis and take the entire head inside her mouth. He gently guided her head forward onto him, and she relaxed her throat. John's breathing came deep, yet in erratic gulps as she moved her mouth forward and back on him, pressing her lips hard to create friction beneath the flood of water spraying over his body. His eyes closed slowly several times at the sensation of her hot mouth rubbing up and down his cock, hard, then soft, then hard....then the rasping of her teeth around the ridge, her tongue lapping at his slit...all the while the mountains of water pouring down. Just when he thought she would free him, she pushed her head down hard on his cock and he leaned back against the shower wall with a deep groan. His eyes squinted tight feeling the tip of his dick rub against the roof of her mouth. He held back. He could feel the pressure of his cum building inside him, but he held back....he wanted more of this excruciating pleasure. His hands again went to her head, stroking her wet hair back from her pale face. His eyes looked down to fasten on hers, blinking up at him through watery lashes. He would never forget the look of yearning in those eyes. Yearning to please him, yearning to see in his face that what she was doing was making him happy. Totally selfless. John gently pulled her head back watching her lips puffed and swollen and dripping from the flow of water, draw back up his cock and drag sensuously over his head. He helped her to her feet and held her face back from the torrent of the shower and watched as the water droplets streaked down her face and she softly smiled up at him. With a sigh, he leaned towards her and oh so gently brushed his lips around the

98

Body Check edges of her mouth. Then he kissed her long and deep and thoroughly, their tongues pressing gently and with hungry familiarity. Lilly loved this man. Without condition, without agenda, without motive. John turned her around and kissing her shoulder pushed her forward. She put her arms at the corners of the shower and dipped her head down under the spout, letting the warm flow course down her back and over her hips. She went up on her toes and spread her feet apart across the bumpy base of the shower, as John pressed his body up behind her, angling her hips with his strong hands. Squatting his knees slightly, he buried his cock between her legs and pressed the tip against her smooth sensitive flesh until he found the pliant opening of her pussy and pushed the full length of him up inside her. Lilly pressed her hands hard against the shower walls and arched her back, raising her hips but adjusting her body to completely accept his thrust. She ground her hips against his groin as he pressed forward, harder and longer. The waterfall from the shower blanketed her body, running in rivulets over her shoulders and around to tickle and trickle at the sides of her breasts. John thrust in and out again, jerking her body forward...and again...and again...faster each time, harder each time. The water danced off her breasts with each plunge, her cunt throbbing for more contact, her feet balancing on tip toe to make the contact sweeter, fuller deeper. The hands on her hips clenched and from the sound of his breathing, she knew, John had waited as long as he could. She wanted the thrusting to last forever, she wanted the pounding sensation filling her to throw her with wild abandoned over that undefined edge. She wanted John inside her forever. But she would settle for this luscious pleasure, this wondrous tantalizing sensation filling her, just so she could hear his pleasure, feel his climax...know she had taken him to his peak. John groaned one more time, driving himself into her and with an uncontrollable spasm, shot himself inside her with a long shudder, gripping his fingers deeply into her curved hips. His submission to pleasure was almost like a growling whimper, and Lilly smiled broadly knowing she had taken him to such physical joy. Once he had emptied himself, he gave another small thrust and keeping himself protectively enveloped inside

99

S.K. Gray her, leaned back against the other end of the shower, wrapping his arm underneath her breasts and pulling her back with him. Lilly tried to tense her muscles around the warm spent flesh inside her as best she could, but the shower now hit directly across her breasts, stinging deliciously, distracting her attention and she relaxed her muscles while he pulled out. Her shoulders leaned heavily back against his chest and she could feel the pounding of his heart beat against her back. She molded herself back against him, luxuriating in the warm wonderfully water slicked muscled arms that encircled her. God, the man had perfect arms! Life enfolding! His lips made a light pass along her neck and nestled into her shoulder. She shrugged her neck and ran her face up against his rough cheek. John tightened his arms around her and leaned his lips up against her ear and voicelessly mouthed the words she didn’t want to hear and he couldn’t speak aloud. Even though the water and steam surrounded her in heat, Lilly felt goosebumps go up her arms as her body naturally let itself down from the edge it had been balancing on. She cuddled closer back against John. Her feet snuggled in-between his and her toes curled up tightly while she impishly wiggled her hips back against him. "Mmmmm Mmmmm" was the only intelligent thing she could think of to say. "Well, we have yet to make love in a fuckin bed." John laughingly whispered. Lilly turned to face him, avoiding the water still pouring from the shower head above them. "It's only day one, Iceman. And if memory serves me correctly, there is one damn fine fucking bed just waiting around the corner for us to totally trash!" She reached for the small papered soap bar, sitting in a mushy puddle in the shower cubbyhole. "Right now, I am gonna soap you up and towel you down. Every, yummy inch of hockey playing, Pepsi spattered, polar bear imitating John Baylor will be squeaky clean ...so I can dirty you up all over again!" John grinned, raising his eyebrows, his eyes twinkling behind water coated lashes. He had one day to make her change her mind! Right now, though, John's mind drifted away from any kind of mental manipulations. Lilly’s thickly lashed eyes fluttered under the splash of shower water while she filled the palms of her hands with a thick coating of creamed soap, but she

100

Body Check didn't take her focused from his face. The open wickedness twinkling in her eyes set him back. She raised her eyebrows theatrically. Pursing her lips and sucking in on her cheeks she held up her cream covered hands. "Dirty Johnny want a bath?" His eyes opened wider as an internal rush of warmth just beneath his skin washed over his face. "John! You're blushing!" she grinned. "I..."he blinked and looked beyond her. "I..the water is pretty hot." "No....you ARE blushing!" she smiled broadly and leaned against him, wriggling her lush breasts against his chest. "The humping polar bear, pink cheeked and embarrassed...imagine!" "Well" he finally succumbed to a shy half grin and draped his arms over her shoulders, "I've hardly had many offers to be bathed by a naked, insatiable horny old broad with Ivory soap oozing down her arms have I?" "If you have, you would be a wise man not to recount them at this particular moment...and..." she leaned up further against him and licked playfully at his earlobe, whispering "... I would be very careful about tossing around the words *horny old broad* to a woman with soapy arms and easy access!" she ran her knee up the inside of his thigh to press it none too gently against his scrotum. He bent forward and protectively closed his thighs. "Truce" he quickly growled and turned his head to try and capture her mouth but she side stepped away and dodged his lips. "Noooo no no no no...I am not about to be sucked into the mind bending pleasures of Baylor lips! Horny old broad am I? Does that make you an easy young cub? A gigolo stud muffin? A boy toy?" "I said Truce, OK?" his eyes flashed just a tad uncomfortably even though a smile still danced at the corner of his mouth. "Oooo...the polar bear has been tweaked! You think I am insatiable? You think I am the one with the thrashing libido?" She smiled broadly, taking even a further step back from him. “Shall we test this theory?" "Lilly, you don't need to make this into a contest. You ARE horny and you fucking well know it. And last time we did a birthday check, you were still OLDER than

101

S.K. Gray I am and ....will be no matter when we check. And I believe you delectably fill the bill when discussing the term broad. Here..."his eyes focused on her full, shiny, wet breasts. "And there" he tilted his head and wrapped his eyes around her curvaceous hip. She ignored his sultry eyes.” You have to stand perfectly still. You will give in before I do." John raised an arrogant eyebrow at her but she could tell by the cocky half smile crossing his rosebud mouth that he was game. "OK? Deal? You can't touch me." She swayed her shoulders teasingly, "I will do all the touching. You touch, you lose. And there is no reward. Just the satisfaction that I was RIGHT and you were wrong" John planted a warning lusty gaze on her that instantly turned her stomach to a quivering mass of jelly, but she firmly swallowed and straightened her shoulders, lifting her chin with just enough superiority to undermine his cocky stance. He continued staring but cleared his throat, stepped away from pounding torrent of water at his back and planted his feet slightly on the shower floor. She twinkled and leaned forward to run her tongue just under his lower lip in the soft space where beard didn't grow, then took three tiny nibbles across his stubbled cleft chin. She palmed the big bar of gooey soap again. Lilly rubbed her frothy hands together and planted them at his collarbone, spreading her fingers wide and slowly running them and the soap bar down his chest as she carefully knelt down in the stall. Her finger tips caught his nipples and flicked the creamy soap foam over them. John's toes curled slightly but he otherwise didn't move. Starting at his ankles her hands went to work. One on each leg. Her fingers sought every muscle and swirled through the soapy film she lathered on his flesh. The hair on his leg sparkled under the glistening froth and her slippery fingers kneaded at the backs of his calves. John swayed slightly at the pressure, but maintained his balance. Lilly closed her eyes, enabling the sensations of her fingers to kick up a notch as she spread them over his muscular legs, imagining the sight of them encompassed in thermals and wool, fiery heat beneath the material as he stroked hard down the length of the cleared pond towards the hockey goal. She inched her way towards his body as she inched her hands up behind his knees. She felt the involuntary jerk as her fingers teased

102

Body Check the hollow where his leg bent and her nose rested playfully above a knee cap. "No fucking tickling Lilly." It was not a request. "Oh shush" she laughed gazing up at him. Mistake. Big mistake. From this angle, some of John Baylor's best charms lay open to her gaze, and at close up range. She rested her temple against his right thigh, letting the small trickle of shower water running down his limb splash against her lashes. Then she lathered up the creamy bar again and almost wistfully placed her hand against the top of his left inner thigh, making circles with the creamy residue, slipping her fingers into the wet warm crease where leg met torso. John clenched his leg as the back of her hand brushed up against the head of his spent cock, but she was no longer in teasing mode. She marveled at him. Her hand spread wide over the hard, bulging muscles of his heavy thigh, still not able to span much more than a quarter of it's girth. Her palms massaged through the slick soap lathered over his skin.

This was the power behind the skates. This was the

tremulous strength of the wide, sure stroke as Baylor chewed up the ice, thundering down the rink. This was the tightened power behind the thrust of his magnificent love making....as he held his torso above her so as not to crush, but deliver a punishing thrust all the same. As her hand explored, her own torso twisted inside remembering the pressure of these thighs on her own...a powerful heavy blanket of sensual security as he lay over her. Her free hand slid up the back of his thigh and mingling with the trickling water, pressed into the curve of his ass. Her slick coated fingers dipped into the crack of his cheeks and slithered down over his vulnerable anus and rimmed quickly, then traveled beyond to meet her other fingers and form a cup around his full heavy balls. Caress. Knead. Mold. Press. Stroke. John slapped his hands up against the side of the shower stall and let out a low throaty gasp. Keeping her head rested against the tightening muscles of his thigh, Lilly spread the white film of soap over the very base of his penis, finding the narrow, ridged vein pulsing there and softly tracing its length with her fingertip, while her other fingers methodically pressed over his ass. The tip of his resting cock reacted in a spasm to her stroke and without undo

103

S.K. Gray pressure or prodding, she ran her hand over its head, pressing the center of her palm over the soft slit and rubbing back and forth. John put his head back so the water coursed down over his face momentarily. It trickled down his chest, leaving a trail in the soapy film covering his torso. The water splashed down over Lilly’s fingers and she watched as if handing a piece of moving art, tracing the rim, running her fingers back up the length of it to bury the tips in the curling soapy mass of hair at his groin. He faltered against her touch, but steadied himself, arching his back, pressing his body into the massage. She spread her hand open and caught his shaft in the web between

two fingers and stroked the length of him several times, softly, without

tightening, just to marvel at the sensation of slippery smooth veined flesh. John’s hands slapped against the stall again, sending a loud splash above and beyond the steady stream of water around them. But still he did not reach to touch her Lilly shifted on her knees and raised herself up as high as she could without standing. One arm wrapped around his hip and braced wide against the base of his spine. The other arm nestled between his legs gently holding his heavy sex. She pressed her face against his abdomen and closing her eyes and mouth tightly she ran her face across his body. Even so the tart taste of the soap on his stomach spread over her lips and she pulled her head back to let the shower wash her mouth of the tangy bubbles. Then she pressed drenched open lips against the flatness of his stomach just above the soft bush of hair and kissed him. Beyond the temperature of the water she could feel the heat of John's crotch pressed against her chest and neck. Such a rough smoothness defied notion! She blinked up at him through the sprinkling of droplets and caught his hooded, almost tortured eyes. "John. You are so beautiful." Shifting again, she carefully maneuvered to her feet and brought her arms up around his back and chest resting her head just beneath his chin. John opened his mouth several times to speak something, anything...but couldn't. While wrapping her arm up around his neck and shoulder, her free hand rubbed away the soapy residue on his chest. His arms, pressing hard against the shower stall bulged and she couldn't resist rubbing her hand up and down the length of it. She shook her head in wonderment, sighing to herself. His arms matched his legs in massive, gentle strength.

104

Body Check Some men blossomed in their thirties. This man had a wicked head start! Some woman of his own generation would be insanely lucky to lay claim to him, to be youthful enough to dance through his twenties and to carry his children, to mold her life to his lifestyle, and dwell happily in that Alaskan home...to love him through aging and ice and snow and hockey and... Lilly quickly clung to him, turning her head to bury it in his broad shoulder. A whimper caught in her throat. John instantly forgot the challenge and wrapped two bear-like arms around her drawing her protectively into his grasp. He held her tightly and began to sway, totally stunned by her sudden collapse, but refusing to discount it. "Sweetheart....?" he crooned low, hesitantly as his lips found her ear beneath the mass of dark wet hair falling around her face and shoulders. "...John...it's....ummm...soap. I got soap in my eyes....that's all." she lied quite easily. John breathed a sigh of relief. "Well, then, we need to get out of this shower before we are both permanently wrinkled beyond recognition, eh? We can call it a draw." He two stepped them backward into a final sputtering rinse of the shower. "Serves you right for being such a damned arrogant smart ass." he mumbled right as he planted a possessive hungry kiss across her mouth. "mmm MMM MMM!" he grumbled from his throat. "You go ahead and towel off...I'll give a quick rinse to my hair. Just save the fluffiest towel for me" she smacked her lips and gave him a tiny push against the shoulders. As he playfully shook the excess water out of his shaggy hair, he stepped over and out of the shower door, giving Lilly plenty of time to rinse the salty tears away that had started to course from her eyes. He must never see her cry. In a few moments, John flicked on the overhead fan, squeegied off a circle in the steamed mirror with the side of his hand and towel dried his mop of hair. His stomach grumbled. Damn, he needed fed! As he headed out into the bedroom, he expertly rolled his towel and snapped it at Lilly’s hind quarters as she stepped from the shower, then quickly drawing himself out of retaliatory reach, he headed for the bedside phone and room service menu.

105

S.K. Gray Twenty minutes later and four complete cycles of the fancy remote control television mounted in the wall across the room from the bed, John sat Indian style against the mound of pillows at the top of the bed, comfortably draped in his favorite sweat pants and sleeveless T shirt. His long hair swept back from his forehead, his body squeaky clean and refreshed, he sensed more than saw her at the bathroom door. She'd wrapped herself in the huge fluffy bathrobe supplied by the hotel. Her hair, compliments of the numerous sample bottles piled in little color coordinated baskets all over the sink and countertops, fell around her shoulders freshly conditioned, dried and scented. She leaned in the doorframe with her hands comfortably shoved in the pockets of the oversized robe. "A body could get used to this" John smiled patting the bed beside him and turning his attention back to the TV while he studiously pressed the next channel button. "Amazing stuff, technology." Lilly grinned and took three running steps and leaped up onto the King sized bed next to him. With a few scrunches she was plunked beside him, planting a quick, noisy kiss on his neck. "Well if you didn't live in the frozen Tundra you may catch a few of the newer ones before they become obsolete. You would be amazed at what is out there in the unfrozen world" John's small smile disappeared and a frown crossed his brow. He looked everywhere but at Lilly’s face. The unfrozen world.

He knew she meant it simply in

jest, but he couldn't get over the implied put down. "It's not always frozen Lilly. And in spite of the temperature, the hearts of the people here make it a very warm and loving place. It's the people that make a town a home, not the location." he dragged his eyes back up to hers. Instead of seeing defiance, or worse yet, mockery, he saw open fear. Her cheeks had somewhat paled and he knew it wasn't from the fresh scrubbed make-up free face. Her eyes seemed huge framed by the masses of hair falling down over them as she looked down at her hands nervously fidgeting in her lap. He reached a tentative hand out and brushed the hair back over her shoulder. "What are you afraid of?" She scowled. This was not the territory she wished to explore. The pain was

106

Body Check much to close to the surface and one tiny scratch would cause it to bleed all over this nice white fantasy room. The only sound that bounced off the walls now was the droning voice of a sportscaster reminiscing about some distant far off league of sluggers in the land of green grass hot summer nights. The boys of summer having put away their cleats and eyes now turning to ...hockey. Prophetic. John watched her face for a moment more, but then his eyes caught the screen. Lilly knew if she stayed quiet, the moment would pass. The words could be postponed. But John , not being the average man in any way, clicked off the sound button and put the remote down on the bed quietly. "What Lil? What are you afraid of?" "It isn't fear John, not really." she sighed. "It is knowledge. I know myself...but I know what I would be afraid of." "Our age difference? I'm too young?" "No. you are just the right age...for YOU. And I am just the right age for ME." John smiled and reached over to caress her foot sticking out of the end of the robe. "Sweetheart, men marry women a lot younger than they are, all the time. It's actually more common here in Alaska than most of the rest of the states. So that is no problem." "You've made a major jump there, Johnny. Men do it. Old fart, aging men with no self esteem do it. Not women. They have far too much sense. Men marry women a lot younger than they are when they reach an age where they want to start families and settle. When young women have the bodies and patience and unselfish motives and are walking Disney heroines clueless about their own sexuality. When perhaps they see youth fleetingly and by becoming involved with someone younger they think they can recapture it somehow. Women are different. And society is different towards women who fall in love with younger men. Women are different towards other women who fall in love with...." Lilly stopped mid sentence. Twice she had repeated the phrase. Women who fall in love with younger men. She could see the hope. She could sense that he would soon go off on some wild tangent in his heart and mind...that she was speaking about herself.

107

S.K. Gray ...and indeed she might have been. John smirked “I hope you didn't hurt yourself tripping over that soap box getting up on the bed" and glanced back over at the TV. Finally he reached for the remote and turned to picture off as well. He shifted his body around to face her. "You know damn well I am going to ask you." "No, don't."...she pulled back slightly, then stopped , seeing first the hope, expectation, the glee in his eyes, then sudden apprehension, uncertainty, resignation and finally a wicked twinkle all in the matter of a few seconds. ".....what?" He cleared his throat. "No...don't" He tilted his head sideways and waited. "No go ahead" she drew her knees up to her chest as if to ward off what she thought he might say. He raised his eyebrows and she began to open her mouth again, then thought better of it. "Are you ready?" he mused. "No, but I don't think that is going to stop you. You can be an annoying bugger when you want to be" John grinned, then took her hand. “Lil...would you...would you..." She bit her bottom lip and quickly reached over to cover his mouth. "Don't!!!" She almost lunged at him so the words wouldn't get out but he juked backwards and pulled her around so that they ended up wrestling all arms and legs on the massive bed. Lilly was trying to reach to her hand to cover his mouth and like batting away a fly he was deflecting her arm. The harder she tried, the more they wrestled, the easier it got to pin her under his legs. "You can mortally wound me with your wit, but there is no fucking way, Sweetheart, that you are gonna win a wrestling match." he laughed down at her, finally pinning both arms at her side firmly with his knees. She thrashed her head back and forth, her hair tangling in a mass around her face. "No no no nononono!" He reached his hands down and planted them on the side of her cheeks, forcing

108

Body Check her to look up at him. "La la laaaa la LAALAAAAA" she started wildly singing to block out the low, gravelly smooth voice she can come to react to as habitually as one of Pavlov's dogs. As she opened her mouth for one long Laaaaaaa, John bent down and covered her lips, cutting off her tune in mid kiss. The tune died in her throat and she caught her breath as he totally commandeered her mouth. After a long luscious moment of noisy search and seizure, he stopped. Gazing down at her freshly swollen mouth and passion clouded eyes, framed by small laugh lines and crinkling into a beautiful enchanted smile he nuzzled her nose. "Now...shut up. Would you..." The loud knock on the door and announcement of ROOM SERVICE interrupted. John growled at the door, then quickly held down his squirming lady. "Would you... prefer chocolate or whipped cream with your strawberries?" Lilly burst out laughing as John bounded off the bed towards the door. "Actually I would prefer Champagne!" She rolled over and sat up on the huge bed as she watched John roll the tray into the room and fumble for a tip in a nonexistent wallet in the back pocket of his sweat pants. He looked back over his shoulder, stricken. Lilly pantomimed writing his name on a piece of paper and he turned back to the door briefly, taking care of business. She reached down and flicked at the remote control, eager to have anything further interrupt the awkward moment of facing the truth. The familiar scrapings and head butts of a hockey game filled the screen. Praise the Moose Gods of Deerling! She smiled as John returned from the door with a shit eating grin and wheeling the scrumptious tray with a bowl of strawberries, freshly whipped crème, gooey chocolate, two wine glasses and a bottle of still bubbling champagne! He had covered all the bases. She crawled down to the end of the bed and planted herself right in front of the TV. John laughed and crawled up on the bed dragging the bowls across the bedspread. She reached for the top strawberry and immediately took a huge bite, slurping noisily at the tart pleasure of the fresh fruit. "A purist eh?" he laughed, dipping his choice in a glob of whipped cream before

109

S.K. Gray devouring all but the stem. He reached for the bottle of Champagne and filled the two glasses precariously to the brim. Lilly sipped the first half inch down, then dipped her tongue into the sweet sparkling bubbly like a cat. John grinned and reached for another juicy pick, only this time scooping it in the chocolate sauce. Lilly quietly downed the glass of liquid, much to John's amazement. "Did you even taste that?" Lilly flopped on her tummy and shook her head. "Just coating my throat so this will feel so much better" She dipped her finger in the chocolate and sucked it off her finger, spreading it haphazardly across her lips, then tonguing it off slowly. "You really are a borderline tramp you know that?" he pronounced reaching for another strawberry. Trying to ignore the rise in his sweat pants. "Uh huh and you love it" "Actually, I would love to see this" his eyes suddenly caught the action of the hockey game on the small screen behind her head. Lilly looked over her shoulder and sighed. DAMN! Foiled by her own trap! Hmmm. She careful crawled over bowls and bottle and rearranging herself plopped right down on his lap, wrapping her long bare legs around his waist. She reached back around behind her and scooped a bit of whipped cream in her fingers. She waved it in front of his eyes and when he moved his mouth towards it, while still glancing over her shoulder to the TV, she pointedly wiped it across his lips. "Hey! I'm trying to watch the bloody game here. Improve your aim, next time!" She looked startled at first, then threw her head back and laughed. John was all hockey male....and she knew when she had met her match. Deliciously and quite quickly she kissed and licked the cream from his lips and fielding a few puckers from him, she sighed. Alright. Hockey game it was! With one final lap dance wiggle that at least elicited a mouth munch for the length of the next commercial, she resigned herself to being the sports widow and curled up next to him, pouring another full glass of champagne. Somewhere during the second period, Lilly, her stomach satiated with sweet and tangy dessert, some stolen ear, neck and whiskered chin kisses, and lulled into a semi champagne stupor, lay back on the fluffed mound of pillows. In the presence of warm

110

Body Check strong thighs, brawny biceps, the aroma of chocolate, John, and the sound of skates shaving on ice....she fell asleep. Champagne always made her dream. Heavy dreams where her arms and legs seemed leaden. Her eyes opened warily, in that mystic realm of semi sleep so hard to shake off in the first moments of consciousness. No sound, no TV. Yet a faint rustling somewhere. Maybe in her alcohol fuzzed brain? But no, there was no pounding in her head, no tell tale dryness in her mouth....still the lingering taste of...chocolate! The darkness enveloped the room except for the moonlight glow filtering around the edges of the drawn shade at the large window. She became aware of one of her arms nestled behind her head and the other out to her side. She wiggled her fingers. All present and accounted for. So far so good. But when she tried to move her legs, the process didn't go quite as smoothly. It was then the voice reached through to her slightly buzzed ears. It came from the same heavy mass pressing down on her lower legs. "A bed....I am finally going to make love to you in a bed." the familiar deep drawl caressed her ears as she felt movement. John had gently tugged at the sash of her robe and flipped the fuzzy cotton covering wide open. He'd stretched himself out towards the bottom of the bed. "Mmmmm" Lilly murmured as she felt familiar long fingered hands brush over her thighs and gently enforce pressure, pushing them open slightly. The heaviness on her legs shifted and she felt the shape of shoulders and soft hair tickle her inner thighs. Two palms slid under her derriere and she arched in her sleep still foggy with bubbly and dreams. John slid his hands up under her sleep warmed ass and nestled his shoulders further between her compliant legs. He realized he had been holding his breath and softly let it out, tickling over the flesh of her inner thighs and softly ruffling the tight gentle curls of the dark triangle between her legs. As she subconsciously shifted her ass to fit the grip of his hands, he guided her closer and pulled his hands down so his thumbs could tickle over the soft layer of hair covering her pussy. Then leaning his head forward, he used his thumbs to tenderly part her lips, exposing her clit to his warm, stroking tongue. Lilly moaned herself further out of semi sleep. John's mouth opened over her exposed, pink mound and he softly sucked. She

111

S.K. Gray arched her pelvis upward and his hands cradled her a few inches off the bed while he again lapped his tongue over her peaked hardening clit. A natural moisture surged to her pussy and John shifted his hands out from under her and clutching the sheets on either side of her body he dragged himself up her legs, his mouth following a path up her abdomen, and navel, the hollow of her stomach. Her legs widened again as his hips replaced where his shoulders had lain and she realized the wondrous sensation of flesh against flesh, relishing the feel of his naked body between her thighs. Rolling her head back on the pillows, she felt his hand around her wrist and he dragged her arm up over her head. His lips hungrily sucked over a nipple and her nose breathed in the scent of his hair tickling just below her chin as he nuzzled and caressed her breast. He raised his head slightly, and eyes, accustomed to darkness, made out the shape of her face, the angle of her eyes, now half open and shining up at him even in the moonlight. The inviting smile on her lips, the slightly excited breath of chocolate flavored champagne brushing against his forehead told John the answer to the question his body was promising. With a fluid movement, he pressed the hard tip of his cock against her opened lips, his mouth over her parted lips and thrust upward and inward, sliding his full thick dick deeply into her welcoming body as his urgent tongue pressed into her mouth. She pulled her arm out from under her neck and he caught at it, holding both her arms up over her head. After the primary lunge, John clenched his thighs and pulled back half way out of her, feeling her muscles grab at him, and the inner rush of moisture lubricate his throbbing cock. He brought the tip to the very edge of her lips, threatening removal...then pushed it longingly back inside her. Again, thrusting, pulling back, holding. John's soft growls and Lilly’s purring blended with the natural sounds of their bodies joining. He undulated firmly, in and out, gently at first, then anxious to probe even deeper as he felt the wet heat rush to her loins. He thrust again, steady, sure, deeper . Her mouth enclosed around his probing tongue and sucked briefly before he thrust again, harder and she gasped for air, her entrapped hands straining against his grip clawing for the headboard.

112

Body Check Her legs flung further apart and she arched her hips up...anything to open herself to let this man further into her body. John took the hint and thrust repeatedly, the smacking of their flesh driving them to a higher urgency. Lilly arched wildly as the tip of his cock banged into the most volatile knob of flesh deep inside her and she cried out at the pure intensity of the contact. The nerve endings shot wild sparks to her brain and she shifted under him trying to evade and yet prolong the wondrous pain. "Ohmigod JOHN." she cried out just as he felt the surge of his cum rush through his engorged head and spill into her. His moan overpowered her prolonged whimper as he clenched and jerked again, emptying the last spurt deep within her. His hands tightening like a vice around her wrists and her legs thrashed ineffectively on the smooth sheets. After several moments of pure sexual blackout, they both felt the blood rush back into the rest of their body. They sucked in air to still the pounding of their chests. "Fuckin’ hell" John finally exclaimed. "No...no...fucking heaven" she giggled and playfully nibbled at the rim of his ear. The coolness of the sweat of their passion sent a little chill over their flesh and shifting her body under the almost dead weight of his exhausted torso, Lilly managed to tug the sheets down far enough and nudged his legs till he dragged them underneath. Pulling the luxuriously soft cotton up over them, he turned onto his side. Lilly wiggled the thick robe off her body and kicked it out under the covers off the side of the bed. John wrapped a proprietary leg over her hip and pulled her into the safety of the curve of his body. "Lilly...I..." She nudged back against him with her shoulder and turned her head to silence him with a soft kiss on his lower lip. "I know, John Baylor. I know." When she was sure the rhythm of his breath on her shoulder signified sleep, she softly brought his fingers to her lips and mouthed the words she would not allow him to say, and joined him in deep sleep. It was the sun of the mid afternoon that woke Lilly first, and after a sweet wake

113

S.K. Gray up call of afternoon delight to the groggy eyed hockey hunk who was just as good a ride flat on his back as he was in the driver's seat, Lilly dragged herself and her sore thighs into a very quick shower. She passed John briefly at the bathroom door, giving his cheek a smooch while he gave her cheek a playful swat. “There’s a hockey game on in half an hour!” Humming to herself, she didn't think twice about the phone ringing. Most likely the front desk wondering about housekeeping. But it was not the front desk. Time hadn't weighed heavily on her mind until she heard the clear crisp voice of the airline employee informing her that her flight out tomorrow had been cancelled but there was an available seat on the last flight out in four hours. They might as well have kicked her in the stomach. Lilly closed her eyes and willed the panic creeping up her spine to go away as she heard her own voice agree to the change of plans. There was no other choice to make her connecting flight back home the following day. Her hand fumbled for the pen in the drawer and she couldn't recognize her own writing as it scribbled the new details and flight number down on the hotel's stationary. As she was placing the phone back on its hook, John spoke from the doorway. "You really are leaving me, then" If she could have breathed, she might have blurted out that she couldn't, she wouldn't. But the momentary fighting for breath was just enough for her brain to kick in. "For the moment...for now, just...for....yes. Yes, I am leaving you" John slumped against the doorframe, not saying a word, but leveling his gaze at her. Not speaking a word, his eyes nonetheless reached down her throat and tore out her heart. She was not going to insult him by telling him the obvious truth. That she was not meant for hockey towns, and he was not meant for luxury suites on the edge of the beach. That he was meant for babies and picket fences, and she was meant for lofts and dinner out. John picked up the long stemmed champagne glass and twisting it in his fingers, put it up to his nose and sniffed the stale, but still heady scent before flinging it across the room to smash against the wall. Twenty minutes of silence later, their belongings were gathered. Lilly had called down to the front desk to explain their early departure. John had flung on his tee-shirt

114

Body Check and camos. He was going to go down to the rink at the pond. And she would walk him there before heading up over the hill to her cottage to finish packing. The civility with which they checked out seemed surreal. But they both were breathing through their perspective masks quite well. And when John flung his skates over one shoulder then authoritatively took her hand, holding it firmly in his grasp., Lilly was certain that she wouldn't let it go. The airplane out was the dream. The flight away from this crystal paradise was the fantasy. But in the end, as their footsteps crunched over the snow and they approached the sparkling cleared ice of the hockey pond, she did let go. John sat down on the bench and methodically put on his skates, the only sign of his inner turmoil the brutal motions as he tightened the laces. Finally, she shoved her hands in her pockets and looked out over the white paradise. "I'd like to see this place when it is green." John smiled, the gesture almost reaching his eyes, but not quite. He stood and shook out his arms and breathed in the cold air, then reached into his own pocket and took out a folded piece of paper. "My, um....address in Deerling. My family's place. Where they live. A phone number where I can be reached." he held it out to her. She took it as if it were a treasure map. "I'll call you with my new phone number when I get it." John almost smirked. Lilly stepped up and took his face in her hands. "I'm not lying John. I won't lose touch. I know how to get to Deerling. I...I...looked it up on my map the day after the avalanche. It's got a big red heart around it." she laughed but he just shook his head and looked over her shoulder. "We both know the reality. And we know that there is a space in time that is filled with nothing else but you and me...and this" she passed her gaze over the resort village behind them. "And maybe when you get tired of all that bull shit you will inhale daily, you'll come looking for the clean air to fill your lungs...and smooth skating on some pond" "No, I'll just come looking for You" she stepped forward and leaned up to kiss

115

S.K. Gray him softly, but he wrapped a burly arm around her and pulled her roughly into his embrace. “I’m here now.” She breathed in his scent, she memorized his taste. “See ya Johnny" she whispered as she gave his chin a tweak and he turned and stepped out on to the ice, skating towards the other side. “I guess there is something wrong to it being so right” he said to no one in particular. She felt the icy tears already brimming over her lids, and if she had anything in her stomach she was sure she would have lost it on the spot. Just as she felt the scream building up in her throat, half way across the pond he sheared to an abrupt halt and turned. He stared back at her. She was somewhat startled, but didn't dare raise her hand to wipe the tears or she knew he would come back and she wouldn't have the strength to go. But he didn't move. It was as if he were saying to her *I'm not going to be the one turning my back on you...you are leaving me, you will have to walk away*. They stood staring for another moment. Then Lilly realized the stubborn polar bear was not going to budge. She filled her lungs with pond air and smiled, almost shaking her head at his determined stance. She turned and started to walk away, up over the small mound of hill to the resort parking lot. She willed her feet to crunch forward and was finally up and over the crest of the hill and walking down to where the Rover was parked, waiting. "Tiger Lil!!" the voice echoed deeply across the ice behind her. She stopped dead in her tracks. Even out of his distance she could envision the defiant stance, the baggy camo pants, the dark blue shirt, and opened parka, and those gray piercing eyes. "I LOVE YOU.” The words echoed. “I am mad as hell, and I LOVE you.” The breath caught in Lilly’s throat. She turned her head for more sounds, for another word. But nothing. Her feet wouldn’t move her forward. In her head she could

116

Body Check hear the words over and over. He’d be on the other side of the pond now, perhaps off the ice. The vision of an empty pond flashed through her brain. No. The same wretched fear that had been squeezing her brain for weeks now ripped through her heart. A snowy evening without the pond. Unimaginable. The pond without John. Unthinkable. Lilly without John. Unbearable. She found the strength in her legs to move, but it wasn’t in the direction of her Rover. She spun around and began crashing wildly across the crusty snow. By the time she approached the crest of the hill, the air burned her lungs. Just as she reached the top her eyes took in the wide open expanse of the pond. He wasn’t there! No. In a panic she was about to start racing down the hill when the voice from a short distance to her side, changed her life, again. “Tiger Lil” John has been rushing up the hill from the other side and stood a few yards away, sucking is the same cold air. His legs shook slightly from the effort of running in skates, but he held out an arm to her. She went trippingly into his embrace. “I’m so mad at you” he breathed into her ear. “I’m so mad at you, but I love you. And I love hockey, and I love this town, and I love this pond and I’m not leaving. I’m not running away. I’m staying in Kine’tok.” She couldn’t speak through the sobs choking in her throat, so she just nodded her head into his shoulder, agreeing with him in body language until she could find the words to speak. “I’m not going anywhere away from you. Not now. Not now. Not now.”

She

looked around them. Snow, snow, snow and more snow. “Come on, let’s go get your boots. I have a plane to miss and we have a hockey game to watch.” “Can we walk?” He chuckled, putting his arm around her …for balance as they started back down the hill towards the pond.

117

S.K. Gray

S.K. Gray has been an Internet Goddess of Nothing Important since she plugged in her first barely-there hard drive and teased her ticklish keyboard over twelve years ago. For most of those years, S.K. has been publishing online erotica and encouraging women to passionately embrace their creative talents. A Devoted Mom to two mostly grown children who are the Masterpieces of her Life, Ms. Gray resides in Ohio, where she runs a household and a website, plans adventures with her crazy friends and is slave to two felines with serious attitude!

Please visit Aphrodite Unlaced on the web for more sultry sensual adventures by S.K. Gray and our talented authors!

www.AphroditeUnlaced.com

118