After the Rain (The Twisted Fate Series Book 1) Read online

  “Mmm, not bad!” Stormy replied.

  “You too,” Marcus responded awkwardly. Although what he really wanted to say was, the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen. But as he gazed at her, and she gazed back, as they looked from each other’s eyes to naked body parts and back again, the whole thing started to feel very awkward. The silence stretched between them, and neither one made a move. This thing started to feel like a doctor looking at a patient.

  “Okay,” Stormy said a little less enthusiastically, shuffling from side to side. “So, let’s do it.” She fist pumped the air. “Yee-ha! Lets go!”

  “Yes! Okay. Let’s go for it,” Marcus responded enthusiastically, almost as if he were trying to convince himself.

  Except no-one moved. They both stood dead still.

  “I can’t just do it, just like this. We need to… you know, kiss first or something,” Marcus finally said, painfully aware that although there was a beautiful naked woman in front of him, his body was simply not responding in the way it should have been.

  “Okay.” Stormy moved closer to Marcus. She tilted her head to the left to go in for a kiss – just as Marcus did the same thing.

  “Sorry,” he mumbled as they bumped noses, and tilted his head to the opposite side. But Stormy did the same.

  “Um… you go left, and I’ll go right,” Marcus said, pointing in the different directions.

  “Don’t tell me which way to go, what happens if I like right?”

  “Okay, whatever, then go right and I’ll go left.” Marcus was getting frustrated now. This wasn’t exactly how he’d imagined them having sex. It felt wrong.

  “I didn’t say I wanted to go right, I just said that maybe I wanted to.” Stormy placed her hands on her hips again in that defiant pose that he was becoming quite familiar with. It was her signature move.

  Marcus sighed. “This is not working, is it?”

  He looked her in the eye and he could see the relief. “No, it’s not.”

  Admitting defeat, they both turned away from each other and went back to their wet, sticky clothes.

  After pulling the wet stripper dress back on, Stormy walked over to the bed and sat down. Something about what had just happened left her feeling very uncomfortable.

  She couldn’t put her finger on it. But it hadn’t felt good, offering herself up to him like that and then him not jumping her. Mind you, in that moment, she hadn’t exactly wanted to jump his bones, either. Goddess, that had been a total disaster. Luckily she wasn’t prudish with her body, or she might have been embarrassed about the nudey thing. Despite the awkwardness, she had to admit – he looked good. Better than good. His chest was broad and his stomach was chiseled and lined and rippled in all the places that Stormy had never thought she would find attractive. Muscles and ripped gym physiques had never been her thing, but when she’d gazed upon those two distinctive lines that had run in a ‘V’ all the way down to his…. Well, well, well, her mind had been changed. So why had it not happened, when she’d found him so damn hot?

  When they were trying notto jump each other, they couldn’t control themselves. And when they were trying for mutual jumping, they chickened out. This was strange – to say the least. She felt Marcus sit down next to her and could sense he was thinking the same thing.

  “Maybe we’re over it?” he offered quietly.

  Stormy nodded. “Yeah, maybe we are.”

  “Well that’s good news, isn’t it?”

  “I guess it is.” Stormy turned towards him, and his dark eyes met hers.

  “We need to change into dry clothes or we’ll get sick. Why don’t you go shower first and get into some more dry stripper clothes?”

  Stormy smiled at him. Strange turn of events this was, wasn’t it. Their stars were well and truly crossed and confused and tied in crazy knots.

  The warm water felt amazing as it rushed over her freezing cold, muddy body. She thought about Marcus sitting there in the other room alone, naked just a few minutes ago. What was this thing between them? It was volatile and clearly dangerous, since it had gotten them kicked out of a hotel and caught in a storm. But perhaps Marcus was right; maybe the sexual tension had finally fizzled out. Maybe the incident in the elevator had beaten it out of them.

  Yes, that was probably it!

  They were no longer sexually attracted to each other. Stormy breathed an enormous sigh of relief and hummed happily.

  Marcus was relieved that they were finally over it.

  It had gotten them kicked out of a hotel and into a deadly storm. Imagine what could have happened if they hadn’t found this motel? Mind you, finding it may yet result in catching some dreaded disease, from the look of that bed.

  That bed!

  Another issue.

  One bed.

  Two people and nothing but a dirty carpet to sleep on.

  He looked up as he heard a happy humming coming from the shower. He couldn’t help but smile to himself. Stormy was definitely one of a kind. She was herself, all the time. Uncompromising. Genuine. No pretenses. She was just Stormy.

  In a way, he envied that quality. If he said some of the things that he felt half the time, he’d probably be fired on the spot. Or if he came to work in some of the moods he’d been in recently – definitely fired. Especially since the break-up. Emily hadn’t made it easy; she’d been calling him constantly and had him on one of those guilt trips that women were so good at.

  “Your turn!” Stormy said cheerfully, coming into the room wearing a towel.

  Marcus jumped up fast – he’d never wanted a shower so badly.

  The cascade of hot water was exactly what he needed, and he emerged from the tiny shower cubicle feeling like a new man. They had been traveling for almost twelve hours now, and it had been an exhausting day.

  He wrapped the towel around his waist and walked into the room, where he was almost knocked off his feet. Stormy was wearing his shirt. That part he didn’t mind; but what he did mind was that she looked so damn hot in it. It was way too big and hung off her like a tent. This just made her look even more petite. There was something so intimate about wearing his shirt, like she’d stayed the night and they’d had sex, and she’d woken up and slipped it on.

  “Hey,” she swung around. “Sorry, do you mind?” she asked a little sheepishly, gesturing down at the oversized rugby top.

  Marcus shook his head. “Not at all.” He noticed that the green rugby jersey made the color of her eyes even more intense.

  “I’ve never worn a rugby jersey,” Stormy said, running her hands over it. “In fact, I’ve never even watched a rugby match. It’s such a barbaric sport.”

  Marcus gave her a knowing smile. “Of course you haven’t. What sport do you like?”

  “I don’t believe in sport!” Stormy stated emphatically.

  Marcus laughed out loud – he was starting to get her. Anything that was normal and that most people liked or took part in – she did not. “Why not?”

  “It brings out aggression and competitiveness. Not cool.”

  “Competition and aggression are what helped the human race survive. Imagine if our ancestors had sat around in their caves all day doing nothing.”

  “Maybe. But it’s not okay for now. Our society is already way too agro, there’s far too much competition and capitalism already.”

  Marcus was the epitome of all those things: aggressive in business, fiercely competitive and an unashamed capitalist. He liked making money and he wasn’t embarrassed of that fact – he worked hard for it.

  “So tell me, Stormy, what is it that you actually do? Damien mentioned acting and something with crystals?”

  Stormy shot him a cynical look. “You don’t really want to know what I do, you just want to mock me.”

  “No, seriously, I do. No mocking intended. We have a whole night ahead of us in a pokey mote
l room. Might as well get to know each other, since we may be stuck here for a few days.”

  Stormy looked startled at this. “You think? But the wedding…?”

  Marcus walked over to the window and looked out again. “It will be a miracle if this is over by morning. And I don’t believe in miracles.”

  “Oh, cheese and whiskers! I really wanted to be at the wedding.” She joined him at the window and looked out bleakly.

  “Cheese and wh–?” Marcus stopped himself. “Never mind. We might just make it to the wedding, but I doubt we’ll make it to the wedding rehearsal. Unfortunately, it’s out of our control.”

  “Mmmm. Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference,” Stormy murmured, wiping away some of the condensation that had gathered on the window.

  “Huh?”

  “The serenity prayer from Alcoholics Anonymous,” Stormy explained, making an elaborate drinking gesture. “My dad. He likes a few whiskeys.”

  “Yes. Damien told me.”

  Stormy nodded. “And you? What about your family?”

  “No alcoholics. My parents are workaholics though, I guess.”

  “See, there!” Stormy’s face lit up with a smile and she clapped her hands together. “Finally we have something in common: Parental-holics!”

  Marcus smiled at her. She had such a strange way of talking about and looking at the world. “I suppose we do. That, and we share the same basic human anatomy,” he quipped sarcastically.

  “Ha ha. I bet we’re not all that different. I bet if we got to know each other, we’d find we have lots in common.”

  “Well, it looks like we’ve got a lot of time for that,” Marcus said. “But first, I need to put some clothes on. Can you turn around for a second?”

  Stormy shot him an amused look. “It’s not like I haven’t seen it before.”

  “Exactly, so there’s no reason to see it again. Turn around,” Marcus commanded, making a circle gesture with his hands, and Stormy obliged.

  “Just so you know, if you’re embarrassed, you have no need to be,” she said over her shoulder.

  “Stormy!” Marcus exclaimed loudly. If he wasn’t embarrassed before, he was now. She had an uncanny ability of saying the most inappropriate things.

  “I’m just saying, it’s very attractive.”

  “Jesus! Do you have to say stuff like that?” Marcus felt his face growing hot.

  “But it’s true. Good proportions and a good shape. You know, sometimes they can be a little strange-looking, like a bit too big on the top or –”

  “Stop it, okay!” he cut her off, exasperated. “I can’t believe the stuff that comes out of your mouth sometimes. I’ve never met a person who says the things that you do.”

  “I say what I say and mean what I think,” she replied tartly.

  “I think you mean, you say what you think and mean what you say.”

  “Same thing,” she shrugged.

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Of course it is!”

  “Nope.”

  “Who says?”

  “Um…” Marcus said, pulling on his pants and shirt. “Just about every literature or English teacher in the world.”

  “Well, have you ever thought that maybe they’re all wrong?”

  “I doubt that, Stormy,” he sighed. “You can turn around now.”

  But as she turned around, he saw that she was striking her signature pose, hands on her hips and looking like she was ready for an argument – which she clearly was.

  “I bet you think you’re right a lot,” she accused.

  “I usually am, actually.”

  “Well I actually bet it’s not as often as you actually think it is actually, Marcus!” She seemed to be putting a lot of emphasis on the word ‘actually’, and it wasn’t really making much sense. But still, Marcus felt a bolt of something penetrate him as she spat her words at him. The attraction was back. She looked utterly adorable in his rugby jersey, waggling her angry little finger at him with that disapproving look on her face, and all he could think about was ripping that shirt off.

  They stared at each other, communicating silently through their looks and dilated pupils.

  They both knew what was going on here.

  They both wanted the same thing, and there was no stopping them now.

  8

  The gentle flower whisper

  “Oops,” Stormy said when they finally got their bearings and caught their breath. She was naked and bent over the bed, and Marcus was lying on top of her, his breath coming rapidly.

  “Big oops,” she said again, with a huge sigh.

  Marcus shifted against her. Her hair was wet and strands were sticking to his face and chest. He was almost in shock from the sex they’d just had – it had been mind-blowing. It had all happened so quickly that the details were a blur, but he could see flashes of it.

  At one stage she’d been dangling off him – literally. One minute, he was standing and she was wrapped around him, and the next she’d bent over backwards and hanging. She was so light and flexible that he’d been able to do exactly what he wanted with her – and he had. No woman had been so uninhibited. Mind you, no woman had hung from him upside down like a bat, either. Thank God this pay-by-the-hour dive did have condoms next to the bed.

  She was small and delicate-looking. But her fragile build was deceptive – she was a fucking wild demon-woman. That thing she did with her leg twisted like that – he’d never seen it before. Perhaps she’d just invented it.

  They lay there. Not moving. Not talking. Just catching their breaths.

  Marcus eventually got up. He didn’t know quite what to do now – most women wanted to be held and cuddled at this stage, but Stormy was not like most women. And despite their sexual gymnastics, they didn’t really know each other. There’d been nothing emotional or intimate about what had just happed – it had been nothing more than lust. Pure, unadulterated lust.

  He got it now – why it hadn’t happened earlier when she’d offered herself to him on a virtual platter. They had to be arguing. They’d been arguing or irritated with each other when it had happened on the other two occasions, too.

  He got off and walked away. He wasn’t really sure what else to do. He needed a moment alone to think. Hopefully his rational brain would soon return from the time-out it seemed to be on.

  Stormy was shaking from head to toe and finding it hard to breathe under the weight of his body, but she didn’t care.She was still shell-shocked. It had been the wildest sex she’d ever had. Crazy-manic. Normally she was into burning candles and incense, listening to Malayan chanting, setting out crystals and doing some slow tantric breathing vibes, followed by intricate poses called “The gentle flower whisper” and “Two lilies blow in the warm breeze”. But this had not been like that at all. He’d been like an animal; she’d been like an animal.

  And when he’d thrown her onto the bed face first and grabbed her hair, she’d nearly died.

  To tell you the truth, she wasn’t exactly sure how it had happened. There had been some intense staring across the hotel room and then all of a sudden she had been on the floor, against the wall and bent over the bed. She remembered ripping his clothes off as quickly as possible and tearing the neck of his shirt as she had tugged at it. He’d thrown her rugby jersey across the room and he’d taken charge. And it had been amazing – the best sex of her entire life.

  The stars were right – they were very sexually compatible. Oh yes indeedio.

  Now what? What the hell were they meant to do after sex like that? Cuddling was out of the question. Some pillow talk and bedroom chatter seemed totally inappropriate. Maybe she should bite his head off and eat him – praying mantis style. She heard the bathroom door shut and Marcus disappe
ared from the room.

  She got up and looked for her clothes, eventually finding them strewn on opposite sides of the room. She rubbed her hip and looked down, seeing a red mark. It looked like it was going to leave a bruise. How had she gotten that?

  Oh yes, when he’d pushed her against the wall…

  She bit her lip thinking about it. The wall. The hard, cold wall against her hot, sweaty body, against his hard, hot, big sweaty body…

  She sat down on the bed and waited for Marcus to come out of the bathroom. They needed to talk about this. But the minutes passed and he didn’t reappear. It felt like he’d been in their for ages. Eventually, she got up and approached the closed door.

  “Marcus,” Stormy called softly, knocking on the door.

  “Mmm,” a quiet moan of acknowledgement issued from the tiny bathroom.

  “Are you okay in there?”

  A pause.

  “I’m not sure… are you okay?”

  “Ummm, I think so.”

  Another long pause. Stormy tentatively opened the door and peeked round. Marcus was sitting naked and morose on the floor, looking like some kind of abuse victim.

  Stormy sat down on the other side of the door and peered at him through the crack.

  “What was that?” he finally asked, looking at her.

  She shook her head. “I don’t quite know.”

  “Did I hurt you, with the wall and all that…?” he sounded agitated.

  “A little bit.”

  Marcus sighed loudly and put his head in his hands. “Shit. Sorry!”

  “No, no!” Stormy pushed the door open wider. “In a good way… a very good way.”

  An awkward silence fell over them as they both thought about how good it had actually been.

  “It can’t happen again, though,” Marcus finally said. “I mean, you and I… it would never work.”

  “Goddess, Mary and Joseph, no!” Stormy exclaimed. “Never. Remember what the stars said. Sexually compatible, but not good in relationships.”

  “So we agree this should never happen again, and we should just try and forget about it?”