Curing Erica’s Phobia

Erica was on the last leg of her morning run on the Green Lake Trail. One more curve and then she would head across the grass, run in place at the crosswalk until the light changed, jog across the street, probably cutting the corner just a bit, then past a few shop fronts and up the stairs to her second floor flat. Just like every other morning. Then it was shower, granola and bus downtown to work, with a stop at the coffee shop on the main floor, because it was Seattle and there was a rule that you had to drink coffee.

As she passed the bench under her favorite willow tree, she took note of a jogger taking a breather. He looked familiar, probably a regular; maybe even one of those that did the whole circuit. That was more ambition than she had most days. She continued on around the loop, going over her mental calendar for the day; too many meetings, too few hours to get the real work done. Same as usual. She didn’t pay attention to the runner coming up behind her. Green Lake was so popular, they had to post signs and paint stripes telling people which part of the path they were allowed to use. But then he spoke from just behind her.

“You shouldn’t be so predictable. It’s not safe.” Her pace faltered and he came up beside her. It was the man from the bench. “Every day, same time, same route. You make it really easy for someone with nasty ideas.”

“Like you?” she challenged in her most scathing voice, and lengthened her stride. He easily matched her pace.

“Like anyone.”

She fell to a walk and looked around. There were easily a dozen people in shouting distance if not closer. He turned and jogged backward in front of her. “Change it up,” he suggested. “Run the other direction, hit the gym some days.”

She came to a full stop, hands on hips. “Who the hell are you to tell me what to do?”

He continued to jog in place. “I’m a cop. Detective, actually. Just passing on some good advice.”

“Well find somebody who gives a damn.” She took off across the grass with her longest stride, even though she was winded. He stopped jogging and watched her go. Erica’s straight blonde hair was pulled back in a pony tail. It was being whipped one way by the breeze and swung another by the rhythm of her run. She was built tall and lean, with long legs, although today she was wearing her rain-shedding outfit which was far from flattering. Soon she would be wearing her office uniform of button down blouse and pencil skirt. But right now, she was wearing an annoyed frown. She didn’t like being interrupted on her morning run. She even wore fluorescent ear buds and her phone in an arm band as an additional cue that she wasn’t in the mood to talk to anybody. She just knew that this bad start was going to blow her whole day.

****

The next morning, Erica came down the stairs from her apartment, adjusting her ear buds and looking around for lurking cops. When she reached the street corner, she stretched, waiting for the light to change and eyeing the people that were out bright and early to enjoy the sunshine. In Seattle, you had to take the sun wherever and whenever you could get it. She was wearing shorts and a tank top in celebration. When the light changed, she jogged slowly across the street then down the grassy slope toward the path that circled the lake, warming her muscles. Once she hit the path, she began to speed up. As usual, she passed some joggers and others passed her. About an eighth of a mile in, near a cove frequented by ducks, she always hit her stride and it was as if she was all alone, moving effortlessly, grooving to whichever playlist she had picked that day. Beyonce was singing when she reached her morning nirvana. Beyonce blended into Alicia Keyes. Erica could almost close her eyes and follow her route without looking now. The breeze off the lake smelled slightly of algae, as it always did whenever the sun warmed the water.

After Alicia Keyes, there was an annoying gap before the playlist kicked into her favorite Dido song. It was during that quiet gap that she realized someone was a short way behind her, matching not just her stride, but even her footfalls. She glanced over her shoulder and saw the cop — alleged cop — from yesterday. Swearing, she kicked out her stride. Now the music beat was off and she was really pissed, especially when he matched her stride again, hanging back about six feet. She kicked it up again, doing a fair impression of a eight hundred meter athlete, save of course she didn’t have eight hundred meters in her at that pace, not even close. When he matched stride again, she had to concede, and slowed until she came to a full stop and was leaning on her knees trying to catch her breath. Naturally, he didn’t run on by. Bastard wasn’t even breathing hard. She decided she had pegged him right as a full circuit fanatic, probably even multiple circuits. So why the hell was he following a rank amateur like her?

“You okay?” he asked, when she was breathing a little easier.

“Fuck you,” she replied. He chuckled. “What the hell do you want from me?”

“Seeing as how you won’t keep yourself safe, I figured I’d better hang around. You should keep walking. Don’t want to cramp up.”

“Which way are you going, so I can go the opposite?”

“Seriously. You need to…”

“I was being serious,” she snapped and turned back, her morning run totally ruined. She tried to get back into the rhythm set by her playlist, but it eluded her, plus his footfalls right behind her set her teeth on edge. The full-on run, the erratic pace on the way back and the general overall aggravation colluded to wear her out well short of home and she finally slowed to a walk on the final curve. He, again, didn’t have the decency to run on by. He settled into a walk beside her.

“What?” she finally screamed at him. He only looked at her with a cocked eyebrow. “Do I have to get a restraining order to get you to leave me alone?”

“If you’re going to be out here every morning putting yourself at risk, I’m going to be here keeping an eye on you.”

“Why?” she demanded. “Why do you care?”

“Have you looked in a mirror, lately?”

“What? No, wait. Forget that. I have a boyfriend.”

“Really? Where is he?”

“Serbia. Uh, Bosnia. He’s a photojournalist. He travels.”

“And you’re here by yourself. Alone. In danger.”

“Jesus. Look around. The park is full of people. I don’t go to the back side of the lake. I don’t go off the trail. The only one I’m in danger from is you. So just stay the hell away from me.” She began backing away from him, across the grass, toward the street. When he started to follow, she raised both hands. “I’ll scream,” she threatened. “If you really are a cop, you’ll be up shit creek.”

He smiled, reached into a back pocket and pulled out a set of handcuffs. “I’ll just explain that I’m arresting a perp.”

“Fucker,” she spat.

“My, my. Such a mouth on you. If you were mine, we’d have to work on that, for sure.”

“I’m not yours. I’m not anybody’s,” she snarled, continuing to back away and secretly relieved that he was no longer trying to follow her. He was getting more than a few looks as he stood there holding handcuffs. She finally turned and ran for the street, then dodged traffic to cross against the light, and ran all the way to her apartment.

A short time later, when Erica emerged from the shower, she wiped the mirror and peered at herself. She thought of herself as okay looking, but not exceptional in any way. She generally used minimal makeup, except when her boyfriend, Juan, was around. She took extra steps to look good for him, more makeup, clothes that hugged her body tighter, heels that made her legs look good. The kind of things you did for a boyfriend. The rest of the time, she played down her looks. She didn’t want any undue attention; she had a boyfriend, even if he wasn’t around a lot. She shook her head in frustration. She just needed to steer clear of the lake until the weirdo found someone else to obsess about.

****

A few nights later, Erica was on Skype with Juan. It was late, she was tired, but it was when it was convenient for him, so she smiled, and chatted, but mostly listened. He was telling her about a local village where he was documenting everyday life. He threw in a smattering of Bosnian words to impress her, which would have been more impressive if she knew what they meant. But she loved hearing about his excitement for the project. What she mostly wanted to hear was when he would be back, knowing he would use a photo lab like at the University to process his work so it could be published. That usually meant about three months home, before the next project. Then he dropped the bombshell. He was going to Paris, would be processing his work there in a state of the art computer lab with a mentor that he idolized. Erica tried hard not to show her disappointment. He suggested that she visit in Paris, and she would have eagerly agreed, but last year, she had met him in Madrid, at great expense, and he hadn’t offered to help pay any more than he was now. She left it at that she would try. He didn’t seem to be enthused, and she went to bed depressed.

****

The next morning, Erica was sneering at the yoga video, trying to pretzel her body only half-heartedly. There was simply no way that yoga was going to give her that running high. Her half-formed idea about buying a treadmill got shot out of the water with Juan’s wanting her to travel to Paris. Likewise it would put a gym membership out of reach. A moment later, when she fell on her butt trying to imitate a stork or crane or whatever, she shut the video off, put on her running shoes and headed for the door, wearing her yoga pants and sports bra. She didn’t have time to change if she was going to get a decent run in.

As she trotted across the intersection, she considered following the path to the south, instead of circling the north end of the lake like she usually did. But south followed East Green Lake Way and was fraught with tourists, boaters and pedestrians. She turned to her usual route. She was starting later, she wasn’t going to have time to run her full route, so even if her cop friend was out there, he should be happy. Or not. What did she care?

She turned back at the point where she had determined she would still be able to get ready and make her bus. She might have to skip breakfast, but that would give her an excuse to buy a donut with her coffee. Shortly after her turn, she heard someone running behind her, but she had already determined to ignore everything but her running pleasure. If he wanted to follow, fuck him. He wasn’t going to spoil another day for her. Except he didn’t settle for following.

“Are you actually trying to get raped?” he demanded.

She ignored him.

“Why not just come out here in your bra and panties?” he continued. “I should arrest you for indecent exposure.”

“Go watch volleyball. Or soccer. Track. Haven’t you ever seen women’s sports?” she snapped, refusing to look at him. “You get a hard on seeing my navel, do you? Go beat off and leave me alone.”

“That mouth again.”

Erica closed her eyes and reminded herself she was ignoring him. When she opened her eyes again, he was running backwards in front of her. She wanted so bad to shove him on his ass, but just in case he really was a cop, she figured that probably wasn’t a good idea. She tried to speed up to go around him, but he was annoyingly nimble, cutting her off on each attempt. Unfortunately, too, the path ahead was unusually void of obstacles he might run into. She sighed, tried to focus her eyes on the distance, and reached over to turn up the volume on her phone.

“So when is your boyfriend coming home?”

Her vows went out the window and she glared at him. He couldn’t possibly know about her conversation last night, could he? But he laughed. “I hit a sore spot, didn’t I? I wouldn’t be stupid enough to leave a beautiful woman like you for any longer than absolutely necessary. Let me guess. He’s delayed his homecoming how many times? Three? Four?”

Erica broke stride, turning and walking to the bank of the lake, staring out over the calm, early morning water. She yanked her ear buds out and put her hands on her hips. She was breathing hard and not entirely from the run. He stood slightly behind her.

“I told you I was a detective,” he said softly.

“You’ve been spying on me?” she accused.

“Honey, I don’t have to…”

“Don’t call me that!”

“All right,” he agreed after a moment. “I’ve been trained to read micro-expressions, but you are like an open book. I could see the pain in your eyes when you said you had a boyfriend. Just now, your reaction tells me that I probably underestimated how many times he’s put off coming home. In fact, I’d guess he did it again, in just the last week or two. I can see the rawness as if it was a flesh wound.” He paused a long moment. “You deserve better.”

“You,” she scoffed, and realized instantly he would have heard the tiny crack in her voice, betraying the tears she was refusing to shed in his presence. She took off running again, and this time he didn’t follow. She ran for some way, before she wiped at her eyes.

****

The next morning, Erica jogged across the intersection then turned south on the sidewalk along East Green Lake Drive. She looked longingly at the park trail, but figured the sidewalk offered the best chance to run without crossing paths with her shadow. It was pretty much as annoying as she feared. Between clumps of people at bus stops and intersections, she could not stay in the rhythm that led to her running high. But neither was it as annoying as being accosted by some jerk who thought he knew everything about her. She was vaguely aware of people looking at her as if she was crazy to be running on the sidewalk with the trail so near at hand. Oh, well. On the way back, when she reached her own block, she slowed to a walk. Facing the park was a long string of small shops. In the middle of that row, stairs rose up to the apartments on the second floor. At the top of the stairs, a hallway the length of the building gave access to apartments at the front and back of the building. She was blessed with an apartment facing the park, although that was also one of the reasons she didn’t have extra money for random trips to Europe. As she approached the stairs, she pulled the band holding her pony tail free and slipped it over her wrist, then pulled her phone from the arm band to turn off the music. When she looked back up, he was standing in front of her. Apparently he had been waiting for her on the stairs. She gasped and stumbled to a stop. She also noted that he wasn’t dressed for running, wearing jeans and a tee shirt under a light jacket.

“Thank you,” he said.

“Okay. We good now? Will you stop stalking me?” she asked, backing up a couple of steps.

“Stalking,” he repeated, as if the term puzzled him. “There’s a Starbucks down the street. Come have a cup of coffee with me.”

“I have to get to work,” she said, trying to circle around him. He blocked her way.

“It’s Saturday.”

“I have somewhere to be,” she tried again.

“You know, you’re really bad at lying.” He held an arm out, pointing. “It’s that way.”

“I live here. I know where the fucking Starbucks is.” He frowned at her, but simply kept blocking the way to her stairs. “I don’t have any money on me,” she tried one last time.

“My invitation, my dime.”

Erica sighed in exasperation and turned back to head for the Starbucks. At least she knew it would be full of people, even early on a Saturday. “I don’t even know your name,” she pointed out, stuffing her hands in the pockets of her windbreaker.

“Eric,” he replied.

“No, it’s not,” she claimed with a shake of her head.

“Yes, actually, it is.” He smiled over at her. Erica rolled her eyes, walking the rest of the way in silence.

At the Starbucks, she ordered a venti Mocha, since he was paying, to his tall Americano. He led her to a corner table. She removed the cap from her drink, dipped the straw into the whip cream and sucked it clean. Eric watched every motion she made, saying nothing. When she finally looked up at him from swirling designs in the melting whipped cream, he was watching her so intently, she had to put the straw back in her coffee and put her hands in her lap to hide their shaking.

“So why are we here?” she asked, avoiding his intense gaze.

“To talk.”

“You have a peculiar way of getting around to that,” she risked a glance at him; he was watching her over the rim of his coffee now. She laced the fingers of both hands about her cup and sipped through the straw. “So you haven’t asked my name. I assume you know it, being a detective, and all.”

“Yes, I do.” He fell silent again and she was beginning to feel exasperated with the non-conversation.

“How about you show me your badge?”

He put his coffee down with a faint smile. “Good girl,” he congratulated her as he reached into a back pocket. She rolled her eyes again. He laid his badge case down on the table in front of her.

She opened the case, and studied the ID, returning her shaking hand to her lap. Sure enough, his name was Eric and he was a detective; first class, whatever that meant. She memorized the badge number before pushing it back toward him.

“So, am I under arrest?” she said in an attempt at a joke.

She expected him to laugh, and when he didn’t, her gut twisted in a knot. “There’s something you need to know,” he said, returning the badge case to his pocket. He reached inside his jacket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. He pushed it across the table to her. She didn’t want to touch it. “What is it?”

Read it,” he commanded, and just like that she was unfolding the paper. It turned out to be three sheets. At the top was the green ink and seal of official Washington State documents. And it was about Juan. She read through the document, then read the first page again. Then she carefully folded it all up again and laid her hands on it as if to prevent it from unfolding of its own volition. She didn’t care anymore if he saw that her hands were shaking.

“I don’t understand,” she whispered.

“Yes you do,” he said, pulling the paper back from her and hiding it away in his jacket again. “It’s a background check. You’ve seen those where you work. You know how to read them.” It was true. In her capacity in the HR department, there were some employees she had to run checks on. She straightened.

“You could get in trouble for showing me that,” she pointed out.

“Yes. I could,” he agreed.

“It doesn’t mean anything. It just says there’s an arrest warrant out.”

“It means he’s not coming back, Erica.”

Like a light turning on, she suddenly made a connection. “So you’ve been following me around because… because you think I was involved. Is there an arrest warrant out for me? Is that why you’re here?”

“We had to be sure…”

“Oh, God! You can’t possibly think I…” She gestured wildly, threatening her coffee cup.

He grabbed her hands. “Listen to me! We cleared you some time ago. It was obvious you didn’t know what he was doing.”

“Then why?” she exclaimed, desperately trying to free her hands from his grip.

“Because I can’t get you out of my mind. We did follow you. We did subpoena cell phone records, other things. We couldn’t let you know, at the time; let you disappear like he did. But once you were cleared… You’ve haunted me ever since.”

She shook her head, finally pulling her hands away from him. “I have to go. I have to…” Then she was scrambling for the door, one hand over her mouth. Half a block away, she stumbled to a stop and threw up at the curb, just somewhat relieved that the only thing in her stomach was what little she had drunk of the coffee.

****

There was a knocking on her door that gradually became a pounding. Erica ignored it. She was lying on her bed, still wearing her windbreaker and jogging shorts from that morning, staring at the wall. She hadn’t moved since that morning, didn’t really remember getting back home. She knew she should be thinking, planning on how to move forward with her life. But all she could think about was the past. How had she not known what Juan was doing? Wasn’t her willful ignorance abetting his crimes? Her cell phone was lying on the bed somewhere with her, and she was vaguely aware of the two-toned announcement of a new email. She couldn’t bear to look, to see if it was from him. How would she answer, how could she possibly Skype with him ever again? She wanted to cease to exist, if just for a while.

The pounding on her door stopped, but the pounding in her head didn’t. She welcomed the pain of the headache as penance.She heard steps inside her apartment. She didn’t care. It was removed from her, from where she was now. Even when the steps entered her bedroom, she just lay still, staring at the wall, and when the steps moved away, it only confirmed what she suspected. She was well on her way to non-existence. Then there were noises from her kitchen, cupboards banging and pans rattling. Those noises were harder to ignore, but she was working on it; concentrating more deeply on the wall she was studying. After a while, even those noises diminished.

Erica wanted to close her eyes, to sleep, but her eyes wouldn’t cooperate. They weren’t through studying the wall. And her bladder was becoming more insistent, an annoying connection with reality that she hadn’t been able to shed yet. Then the footsteps were back, and a hand was shaking her shoulder. She yanked her shoulder out of his grip and squeezed her eyes tight shut, trying to recover her non-existence. “Get up,” Eric said. Her bladder seized the opportunity to ratchet up the urgency. But still, she resisted.

“No. Go away.”

She felt his breath on her cheek. “Get up or I will take you over my knee and spank you.” Her eyes flew open. When she didn’t move, she felt the mattress shift and she leapt up and off the bed, her back to the wall she had been studying. Eric was kneeling on the bed, looking for all the world like he meant to carry out his threat. And he was smiling at her with undisguised humor.

“I made you some soup and my world famous grilled cheese sandwich. Come and eat.”

“What are you doing here?” she said, shaking her head and trying to cope with the sudden full frontal assault of reality.

“I came to check on you after my shift. You didn’t answer your door.”

“How did you get in?”

“Lock pick. Took it off a lowlife.” He stood and picked up her cell phone. “I tried to call. You didn’t answer.”

She shook her head. “I don’t want to talk to anybody.”

“Fine. Then don’t. But come and eat. I’m not leaving until you do.”

She took a deep breath. “I’m pretty sure you’re exceeding your authority.”

He chuckled. “Call 911.”

She eyed her cell phone in his hand, watched as he tucked it into his jacket pocket. When she still didn’t move, he started around the bed toward her. Erica raised her hands defensively. “All right, all right. I’m coming. I need to go to the bathroom first.”

“Don’t be too long. It’s getting cold. And Erica, lock picks work on bathrooms, too.”

She rolled her eyes as he backed away, clearing her route to the bathroom.

When she emerged she had shed the windbreaker, but the apartment had warmed once the sun came out. She kept the shorts and tank she had run in that morning. She saw he had set a place at the island counter for her. He stood from the stool where he sat, and pulled one out for her. She paused. His stool was so close to hers, too close. But maybe he didn’t mean to sit. He still had his jacket on. Maybe if she started to eat, he would go. She forced her feet to move again, finished crossing the room and sat on the stool. The smell of the tomato basil soup and even the greasy cheese sandwich stirred her stomach back to life.

He picked up a coffee cup and went around to the far side of the counter to pour more. “I hope you don’t mind. I made some coffee. I’m addicted to the damn stuff. Do you want some?”

She shook her head. “It keeps me awake at night.” She took a sip of the soup. “I’m eating. You don’t need to stay.”

He leaned on the island counter across from her. “I just poured some coffee. Hate to see it go to waste.” She could feel his eyes on her, but she kept her own eyes lowered, focused on the food in front of her. After a few minutes, he refilled his coffee cup again, then came around the counter and sat on that stool so close to hers. He was sitting, facing her and he had to spread his knees, one to each side of her stool, he was so close. One of her hands gripped the counter. She was determined not to let him know how tense his proximity made her, but perhaps his detective’s sense had told him already, because he leaned even closer and his knee brushed her knee. Erica gasped, scooting to the edge of the stool.

“What’s the matter?” he asked softly. She could smell mint and coffee on his breath.

“You’re too close,” she blurted out, leaping to her feet.

“Sit,” he commanded, but he backed his stool away slightly. She forced herself to sit, kicking herself for confessing too much. She concentrated on eating the soup, ignoring his eyes that were studying her so exactingly. She finished the soup and had started on the sandwich before he spoke again. “This morning, in front of your stairs. I left you room. You could have brushed by me, but you didn’t. Now I understand why. It would have been too close. I would have been too close. Here, I thought it was my charm that won you over.” He paused, noting that she had stopped eating, was holding the sandwich midway between her mouth and the counter. “Eat,” he said sternly.

After she took another bite, he said, “So, is it just me? Anybody? Any guy?”

“Drop it,” she snapped.

“Oh, no. This is far too enticing a puzzle for a detective,” he said with a chuckle.

She tossed down the remnants of the sandwich and wiped her hands, sliding off the stool. “It’s a phobia, okay? People have phobias.”

She went around the island into the kitchen and took an open bottle of wine out of the refrigerator. He followed her, reaching to take a wine glass from the rack. “So how close can I get before it kicks in, hmm?” He put the glass down next to the bottle she was holding, gauging her reaction with every motion he made. She grabbed for the glass and pulled away from him but he held on to it, pulling her back against the counter, then wrapping around her from behind to grasp the wine bottle with his other hand and fill the glass. Through his chest at her back, he felt her sharp intake of breath, then the trembling that seemed to spread from her center outward. He released the glass, then ran his hands from her shoulders down her arms. Curiously, she stretched her head back, toward him, rather than away, though the trembling became even stronger. He bent his head near her ear. “Talk to me, or I will have to keep exploring on my own.”

“Please,” she whispered, hating the sound of weakness in her voice. After a beat, he backed away to lean against the island counter. She took a deep drink of wine.

“Liquid courage?” he taunted.

She set the wine glass down and gripped the edge of the counter. “Why are you here?”

“You’re a puzzle I need to solve. I’m fascinated with the picture that’s beginning to emerge. I have to see more. Did you let Juan touch you?”

She spun around. “That’s what this is about? You just have some prurient interest in my love life?”

“Prurient?” he said with a smile and cock of his eyebrow. He suddenly stepped up against her, his hands on her shoulders. She leaned back as far as the counter would allow. “Maybe I just want what he had. Tell me how he got this close.” He leaned in and his lips brushed the corner of her shoulder and neck. She let go of the counter edge and planted her hands against his chest, pushing futilely. She could feel him smile against her neck. “Tell me,” he repeated.

She gave a final hard push, and he backed up a step, but his hands went to the counter on either side of her, trapping her, but not touching her. “We have ways of making you talk,” he said with his best comic leer. “Were you intimate with him, or just a front for his real interests?”

She shoved angrily at him again, with no effect. Her ragged breaths were close to becoming sobs. “He forced me, okay.”

“What?” he demanded.

“He forced me to face my fears.”

“How?” His voice was sharp, an interrogator’s voice.

Now she was sobbing. She slid to the floor, between his arms, and he went to his knees in front of her. “How?” he repeated, somewhat more gently.

“He tied me to the bed, and then he… just… kept… touching me. His fingers, his hands, his lips, his…”

“Like torture,” he stated, not quite a question but with just a slight rising inflection.

“At first,” she nodded miserably, her breath catching in sup-sups.

His brow furrowed. “At first?” She didn’t answer, holding her breath until he became concerned. “Erica, what happened then?”

Her words came very slowly. Her eyes were tightly shut. “And then it became torture when he wasn’t touching me.”

“Was that just the first time? After that was it more… normal?”

She gave a shrug of sorts, but her head was shaking, and then she said, “Please leave. I can’t do this anymore. I can’t…” Her head was rolling from side to side against the cupboard behind her, but she seemed to have forgotten the incomplete sentence.

“Nope. Not leaving you tonight.”

Her eyes flew open. “What?” she asked, as much in confusion as objection.

“Consider yourself a hostile witness. I’m obliged to protect the evidence in the case.” A moment later she was in his arms, hyperventilating from the intense contact and lack of connection with the ground.

“Eric, I can’t breathe. Please,” she begged.

“Yes, you can. You are. Funny thing. If you can’t breathe, you can’t talk.” He carried her in to the bedroom and tossed her onto the bed. She bounced gently then started to roll to the far side of the bed, away from him. He reached out and grabbed her wrist, pulled her back and snapped his handcuffs about her wrist and headboard before she even realized what he had done. She kept trying to pull away to the far side of the bed despite the handcuffs, as if she just couldn’t process what was happening. He disappeared into her closet, and re-emerged with scarves. A moment later, he had her spread-eagled on the bed.

“Was this how he did it?” he asked, not touching her. She was gasping too hard to answer, as if the air had been sucked from the room. “Slow down and breathe,” he said, removing her shoes.

She stared at the ceiling, trying to calm herself, so she could reason with him. “Please,” she whispered.

“I intend to please you. But unlike him, I won’t torture you. I’m only about pleasure. Unless you misbehave,” he added as an afterthought.

He pulled a flick knife from his pocket and opened it, keeping it from her line of sight. “I owe you a jogging outfit,” he told her, studying her shorts and tank top. “A more discrete outfit that doesn’t show your ass every time you bend over to stretch.”

“What?” she said, craning her neck to look at him. Her confusion was breaking through her fear, until she saw the flash of the knife and felt her shorts falling away. Her eyes were wide as the knife was slicing through her top, up the center of her chest. He pulled the halves aside, taking care not to touch her skin. He closed the knife and returned it to his pocket.

“Now see, I know you have a sports bra because you were parading around in it and nothing else the other day. Yet here you are not wearing any. Why not just wear a tee shirt saying come and get me.”

“I had a windbreaker on,” she snapped.

He smiled faintly at her flash of anger, then he openly admired her body, now covered only by a pair of panties. “If this was mine, I wouldn’t be able to stay away from it,” he said with awe.

“Untie me, damn it! You’ve made your point, whatever the hell it was.”

He chuckled. “I must not have made it very well.” He removed his jacket and tossed it into a chair, then turned sharply at her gasp. He followed her gaze to the gun in his shoulder holster. “I’m sorry. I’ll put it in the other room.” When he returned to the bedroom, he remained in the doorway, looking chastised. “Another phobia?” he asked quietly.

She wanted to rail at him, but she only closed her eyes and nodded. After a moment, she said, “You don’t have any spiders on you, do you?”

He burst out laughing, then moved cautiously to sit on the edge of the bed. She took a deep breath, but seemed to control her reactions beyond that. He was watching her closely, studying her again. “I want you to be angry at me, not afraid of me.”

“Congratulations. You’ve succeeded. Now will you untie me?”

“Not yet. Because I want to turn your anger into something else, something healthier.”

She glared at him. “Now you’re a psychologist?”

“I prefer sex therapist.” Then he was moving to the end of the bed, stretching out between her legs, careful not to touch her.

“Oh, no,” she objected, trying to squirm away from him, but she only succeeded in rubbing her thigh against his shoulder, which led to a sharp intake of breath and an attempt to spread her legs even wider.

Eric blew softly on the crotch of her panties, noting the hint of moisture with pleasure. He began teasing with his breath alone, focusing on the joining of her inner thighs just below the edge of the panties, coming ever closer to her pussy lips outlined beneath the damp cotton. She was squirming again, but now, her thighs were against his shoulders, pressing as much as the bindings allowed. He began blowing against her slit moving slowly from top and bottom and back again. Her breathing was becoming ragged again, but in a substantially different way than before. When her back arched and her hips flexed, trying to come closer, he grinned and edged forward. Her thighs remained in contact. She was trying to scoot further down the bed when his tongue reached out and sampled the damp cotton. After a moment of more squirming, his tongue again tickled her lips through the cotton, longer and closer to where her clit lay in hiding. She moaned ever so softly.

Taking that as a cue, he ran his tongue along her skin where thigh met the outermost edges of her pussy and was rewarded with a powerful, involuntary arch of her back. Enthused, he kept at it, pushing at the edges of the cloth with his tongue until he had her outer lips exposed and the crotch of the panties embedded between those lips. He teased those lips with the tip of his tongue, watching them swell in anticipation. When she moaned again, he backed off slightly and whispered, “Erica, I need to touch you.” She moaned softly and stretched toward him. “I need you to give me permission,” he coaxed.

For a moment she didn’t respond, and he wondered if he had pushed too hard too fast, but then she answered. “Please. Touch me.” Instantly, he was on his knees between her legs, reaching for her panties. Her eyes were closed and she jumped when his fingers grasped the waistband and tore the material away. She jumped again when his hands came to rest on her hips, her breath catching, but she made no attempt to pull away. He slid his hands across her belly and ever so slowly downward, fingers splayed to cover as much of her pussy and the joining of her thighs as possible. Then he pushed his hands underneath to cup the cheeks of her tight, lean ass as he laid back down to let his tongue explore all the new wonders he had uncovered. As long as his hands maintained contact with her skin while they moved, she seemed comfortable, even welcoming of his touch, given the way she had writhed as this fingers slid along her pussy.

He explored every nook and cranny, following every twist and shudder as she seemed to alternately crave, then be overwhelmed by the sensations he was delivering. She was far more sensitive to his touch, even his breath, than any woman he had ever been with. He couldn’t help but wonder if that heightened sensitivity was related to her phobia. He watched her closely as he freed one hand and slid it up toward her entrance; letting her feel his finger, guess where it was headed. When he reached her very wet opening, he slid the finger inside with the utmost caution. She had stilled and shuddered slightly at his penetration. She was breathing hard but not erratically. He curled the tip of his finger, searching for that special spot as his tongue reached for her clit, now mostly hidden by its protective hood. His finger and tongue connected with their targets at the same moment and she exploded, screaming “Fuck!” He resisted the temptation to try and draw out the orgasm, marveling again at her hypersensitivity. When she had calmed somewhat, he slowly withdrew his finger and knelt again, peeling his tee shirt off.

He gazed in wonder at the woman spread out before him. Her head was thrown back, her skin was covered with a sheen of sweat. She was breathing even harder now, but deep and evenly. He wanted to kiss that skin, taste the salty sweat, nip at the neck that thrust up so exposed and trusting. It took all of his will power not to devour her in adoration. “Erica,” he called to her softly. Slowly, her head turned back to him. Her eyes, open now, drifted down taking in his chest and his abs and the beginning of the vee leading down under the waistband of his jeans. He knew he wasn’t ripped like some of the men in the squad, but no woman had ever complained, either. Her expression remained unreadable, though, as her eyes slowly drifted back up to his face.

“I want to touch your breasts,” he said, when he had her attention. She nodded slightly and he reached forward, resting his weight on his elbows as his hands moved to gently cup her breasts. Again, she jumped slightly; he felt it more than saw the tremor, but then she stilled and sighed softly. His fingers traced their way to her nipples, and he discovered them to be every bit as hypersensitive as the rest of her. He gently applied his tongue and then his lips to one breast and she writhed under him, making contact with his chest. When she didn’t shrink from that contact, he slowly lowered himself until he was resting some of his weight on her.

He began sucking at her nipple, flicking it with his tongue, and she arched, writhing and moaning underneath him in a most gratifying way. When he moved to the other breast, he did so with a trail of kisses, maintaining that contact that seemed to help her cope with the intensity of his nearness. When that nipple too had become impossibly hard under his ministrations, he slid further up, finally savoring the column of her neck and trailing his kisses near her ear. “I want to make love to you. I want to be inside you. Tell me that’s what you want, too.” He whispered, his lips never breaking contact with her skin. He felt a shudder go through her, but then she whispered, “Yes.”

He was off the bed in a flash, pulling his jeans off even as he pulled a condom from the pocket. He rolled it on, aware of her eyes on him. He took a deep breath and forced himself to slow down. He crawled onto the bed between her legs, and leaned over her, not touching. “Do you want me to untie you?” he asked, holding her gaze. After a long moment, she shook her head and he couldn’t help but smile. “Too intense?” he asked softly. She nodded. “Tell me how to do it right.”

She closed her eyes and trembled. “No one has ever asked before,” she said.

“I’m asking now. Open your eyes and tell me, Erica. ‘Cause I’m liking this and I want it to happen again.”

She looked up at him, but then quickly away, almost shyly. “Slow,” she said, “But…”

“But what? Tell me everything you need,” he prodded.

“I need you to hold me tight,” she answered, her voice strained. “Real tight, because it makes me feel like I’m going to fly apart.”

“I won’t let that happen,” he assured her. “I’m going to touch you now. All over.”

She nodded, closing her eyes. He sank down on top of her, staying just far back enough that his cock didn’t make contact. He wanted that to be the last touch. He caressed her breasts and kissed them gently. He ran his hands down her back, cupping her ass tenderly. He rolled slightly to the side and slid a hand down her belly to delve between her lips and into the depths of her pussy. His lips kissed her neck and her shoulders. Her breathing was becoming erratic but when he tried to pull away and relieve her of his weight, she strained toward him until he settled back. He slowly worked his way forward until his sheathed cock was touching her, finding her entrance, bathing in her juices. His lips found hers and he kissed her softly as he eased inside her ever so slowly. When she gasped softly, his tongue plunged to meet hers and his kiss became more urgent. After the briefest pause, she responded. He wrapped his arms around her, one clinging to her ribs and waist, the other at the back of her neck.