Kissed by Ms. Carla Krae

said, his voice rough with passion.
    She
shook her head.   “Not yet.”
    He
nodded, and the next kiss was slower.   The rhythm he intended to cool things down with backfired on her,
though.   Her heart pounded in her chest
and heat suffused her body, focusing deep in her belly.
    He
broke away.   “Beth, you keep rubbin ’ on me like that and I’m not going to be responsible
for the consequences.”
    “Huh?”   This must be what they meant by “lust-addled
brain”.   He placed one of her hands on
his fly.   Whoa.   That was, um …
    “I’m
hard enough to hammer nails, love, to borrow a phrase.”
    There’s no way that’s fitting in —   “ Oh, um…sorry. I
should go, um…”   She gestured toward the
house.
    “Maybe. Yeah.”
    It’d work better if you got off the boy’s
lap, Beth .   They stared at each
other, breathing in unison.   “I’m gonna
leave. Any second now.”
    “Uh-huh.”   He leaned closer, his reply touching her lips
as well as her ears.
    “Yep.”   Speaking with
their mouths touching might’ve been the most erotic thing she’d experienced
this weekend.
    Sighing,
she made full contact again, a junkie for his kisses.   He moaned and pressed her closer with a hand
on her low back.   If she could crawl
inside him, maybe she could satisfy this ache…
    She
sucked in a breath.   He dipped his head
to bite her neck where it met her shoulder.   “I need…”
    “Tell
me, baby.”
    Baby…I liked that .   “Unh… I can’t think with you this close.”
    He
rolled her onto her back.   “Thinking’s
overrated.”
    Okay…wait, I was going to do something…I
needed to …   “Go. I mean, I should
go.”
    He
lifted his head to stare at her.   “ Now? ”
    She
nodded.   This was about to go where she
couldn’t come back from.
    Rolling
onto the mattress, he said, “Better run, then.”
    Scrambling
to her feet, she glanced at him.   His
blue eyes were dilated black and naked longing was written on his gorgeous
face.   Part of her wanted to throw sense
to the wind and learn what he could teach her.
    She
ran out, not slowing down until she reached the other side of the maze.
    When
she woke up the next morning, his motorcycle was gone.   She and Vivian had a light breakfast, then set out for more sightseeing.   They took the tour of the Tower, Beth shot
photos of the Bridge, then they explored the British Museum.
    “Tomorrow,
we can drive over to Stratford-upon-Avon, and
perhaps Jacob can take you on one of those ghost tours this week.”
    “I’m
all for the Shakespeare. Not so much with the scary stuff.”
    Vivian
shrugged.   “Merely a
thought. Really, there’s more to do around London than you’ll have time for, so I’m sure
we can keep you entertained.”
    “That’s
why I packed a guidebook.”
    She
put a hand on Beth’s arm.   “Would you
rather go off alone? I don’t want to…crimp your style?”
    “You’re
not,” she assured his mother.   “I might
take a day before I leave, but I love spending time with you. My mother would
be wandering the parks taking pictures of strangers, Dad would drag me to every
war museum, and Jacob would be bored to tears looking at old books. You like
what I like.”
    She
smiled.   “Lucky for us, then, isn’t it.”
    “Absolutely.”
    As
the day went on and she was so nice, Beth felt guilty about kissing her son
behind her back.   “Can I ask you a
hypothetical question?” she asked at lunch.
    Vivian
set her fork on her plate.   “Of course.”
    “Say
you had feelings, and even kissed someone, but you’re not sure if it can work.
How do you know?”
    “Hmm,
does the hypothetical object of that affection share those feelings?”
    Stirring
the straw in her soda, she watched the ice float in circles.   “I don’t know. Maybe.”
    “Well,
you would only know if you tried, but the effort would have to be equal from
both sides. If you want different things, that’s something that has to