OK, since the whole point of this is to flog
Swallowed, the book I’m hard at work on, I’ll get right to it.
I’m thinking a sample might be a good way of beginning, to illustrate right up front that I can actually finish a sentence. And why not make it a sample containing a smokin' hot sex scene set in New Orleans? That would help to keep it interesting, hmmmm?
Anyway, before I even tell you what this Swallowed is about, here’s that sample, a scene from near the end of Chapter One, “New Orleans Again.” It features our protagonist, Aaron Adler, and the love of his life, Jazny Phelps, on vacation in the pre-Katrina Crescent City, enjoying their accommodations tremendously.
I hope you enjoy this, too.
Love,
Scott
I see the red ember exclamation point of her cigarette first. The door slams behind me and Jaz’s silhouette takes shape against the wall by the balcony. There is a tea candle burning on the nightstand, flickering in the breeze wafting in with the rain. She’s reclining on the bed.
“There you are,” she murmurs. “Why have you kept me waiting?”
I toss my filthy clothes in a corner and walk slowly toward her. She’s topless, in a pair of white cotton panties.
“Funny, darling, coming from you. Of course you realize I’ve scoured the entire city searching for you?”
“Yes, yes, mournfully calling my name.” She’s smirking. “I realize you’ve probably scoured every saloon in a 10-block radius. I can only guess what you were looking for.” She raises a wine glass to her lips. A half-empty bottle of white stands next to the candle. “I came back to the flat directly after Ian’s outburst.” She laughs and puts the glass back on the table. “I thought you’d realize that. I expected you’d turn up much sooner. I’ve been waiting since nearly half-one.” She pulls an exaggerated pout and I feel my remaining anger evaporating.
But I’m not giving in just yet.
“Amazing you’re still conscious.”
She gives a little “Huh!” and turns away.
“Look, last I heard I’d be enjoying this vacation solo.”
I bend down, pull her over and kiss her forehead. She arches her back and shivers. Even if I wanted a fight at that moment any thought of it takes wing out the balcony doors. Jaz opens her eyes.
“Nice towel rack,” she says, taking hold of my all-too-obvious hard-on beneath the terrycloth. “Remember what I promised you at Plank?” She tries to loosen the towel.
“Plank. Wow. Thanks for bringing that up, buzzkill.” I feel my forehead gingerly.
“Come on, Adler. We are far, far from home. And I’d like to make good on my earlier offer. If you don’t mind.”
I push her back into the pillows. “Uh-uh. Nope. Not yet. Your turn first. I insist.”
She holds her hands up in mock surrender. “Mmm. So assertive.”
I scoop her into my arms and kiss her stomach. She giggles again and I drop her on the other side of the bed, climbing in next to her. I keep the towel on.
Our lips brush, light, teasing, slow. Hers are sweet from the wine. I nibble the lower one, tug on it, flick it with my tongue. She meets me and flicks back, and when we touch sparks flutter across the inside of my eyelids. I push my mouth harder into hers, and she gives a little breath, a sigh, and pulls me in.
“I do love you Aaron. I do I do I do.”
I cover her mouth with mine. “Shut up. Shut up for a minute. I’m working here.”
I kiss her cheeks, now blazing, and that beautiful nose, and work my way up to her tightly closed eyelids. I kiss them softly and brush her hair aside to kiss the center of her forehead, blowing warm air on the moist skin. She’s done a lot of yoga and believes in that whole third eye thing, which I think is silly. But there is no denying the profound sense of calm I feel when I put my forehead on hers, eye to eye, as it were. I do it now, and the pain of my mangled brow disappears. Warmth floods into me.
I hold her there for a moment, her breath in my mouth and mine in hers, and I’m not sure I’ve ever been happier. With the rain and the breeze and the smell of her, I have everything I could possibly need, forever. She pushes against me and tries to kiss her way down my throat.
“Please?”
“No. I’m not done yet. I’ve hardly started.”
She falls back, eyes closed, smiling. I trace the outline of her ear with my tongue, slowly, and then move to her neck, taut against the pillow. I pay special attention to the crook of it, to the indentation where her neck meets her shoulder, lightly pecking it over and over. Her breath comes faster. She’s ticklish, especially there, especially kissed like that.
“You’re making me crazy,” she whispers, pulling my hair and mashing my face into her chest. “You have no idea the trouble you’re in.”
“Big talker,” I whisper, my lips drifting over her nipples. “Looks to me like you’re the one with trouble.”
“Oh yeah?” She pushes my chin up with one hand, but I take her fingers in my mouth, sucking them hard at first, then softly.
Before she has a chance to respond I grab her wrist and trace tiny circles around one of her nipples with a wet fingertip.
“Yeah,” I say. I cover the other nipple gently with my mouth, swirling my tongue. “What can you do?” Her breath is shallow and quick. She shivers when I kiss my way down to her stomach.
The candle flickers as the breeze picks up, and our shadows are thrown trembling against the open balcony doors. We are so beautiful. I pull her legs apart and ease between them, my lips never losing contact with the soft skin of her belly.
I’m skimming the edges of her panties with my tongue when I remember the half-empty bottle next to the candle. I work my way down her thighs and at the same time reach for the wine glass. Slowly, carefully, still teasing her thighs, I tilt the glass over her and let the wine dribble out. This is a surprise, and her eyes flicker.
“What are you doing?” she moans. “I’m drinking that!”
“Don’t worry. You’ll enjoy it more this way.”
I refill the glass.
She protests meekly as I trickle more of the sweet liquid over her. Her panties, damp even before I started with the wine, are now soaked through. I pour some into my free hand and reach up to cup a breast, massaging it lightly. I dump the rest on her stomach. She catches her breath. Then I take the panties in my mouth and begin tonguing the wine from them, slowly and deliberately.
“Nice,” she whispers. Her teeth are clenched. “Don’t stop. Don’t.”
I try to push the glass back onto the table but it falls over and breaks in pieces on the floor. I laugh and so does Jaz, her body shaking under my probing tongue.
“It’s good voodoo. Good juju,” I say, my voice muffled as she bucks into me. “Our luck is good.”
She mutters something I can’t understand. And then she’s beyond words.
I drink her in. I work my mouth around the fabric, devouring it, devouring her. I push my face against her hard as she thrashes against me, moaning. The sheets are soaked. When Jaz is almost sobbing, I pull the panties off. My tongue goes deep and she tenses and pushes against me with all her strength, vibrating, thrumming.
I force her legs back hard and send my tongue deeper, in time with her. We lock in sync and bear into each other, and the rest of the world goes away. There is only us, and there is nothing else.
Finally with a great juddering spasm she collapses back onto the bed, gasping for breath. She pulls a pillow over her face.
After a while she’s quiet, breathing heavily, and I put my cheek to her chest, listening.
How I love her then. It is pure and true and all-consuming, and it just radiates out of me. I envision us from above, me wrapped around her as the rain falls on the dirty streets and the dim light floods in through the balcony doors. I clutch her like a child, holding on desperately. I drift off that way, and so does she.
An hour later she wakes me up and keeps the promise she made at Plank.
