The
gardens of the Magnolia Mansion Bed and Breakfast
2127 Prytania Street - Garden District
New Orleans, Louisiana
2330 ZULU
The
air was balmy that evening, uncommon for weather in D.C this time of
year, but normal fair for weather in the Big Easy.
Mac watched the woman work, delicately on her knees in her garden. She painted a beautiful picture, her skin dark in contrast to her wintery white pants and top, her hair the exact opposite of her matching white straw hat.
What person in their right mind wore white to garden in, Mac mused. But somehow the scene in front of her was perfect, as if this was how simple life should be.
‘Too bad my life isn’t that simple...’ she couldn’t help but think.
"Oh, I don’ know, Cher. I tink you know exactly what you be wantin’ in your life."
Mac started at the sound of Ceilee’s deep, husky voice. "How did you...did I say that out loud?" The woman had yet to turn around, and Mac had been under the impression that she was observing the other woman without her knowledge.
With a glance over her shoulder, and with a sly smile, Ceilee answered. "Come on now, Cher. Gimme a hand here."
Not wanting to but seeing no other recourse than dealing with this woman, Mac made her way over to a shaded spot next to Ceilee. Kneeling down, she rested on her haunches, gently fingering one of the delicate blossoms in front of her.
"You done any gardening, Cher?" Ceilee asked, not looking at her but continuing to pull weeds.
"Not really. I haven’t had...much of a chance to learn before now," Mac replied, quiet and contemplative.
"Ya, I know ‘bout your childhood, you poor ting. You was too busy tryin to survive to worry about dis kind of stuff, weren’t you? ‘Course, you’ve got plenty to worry about now too...don’ chu?"
Mac crossed her arms over her chest defensively. "All right, how in the hell do you know all about me? Or about our case for that matter? I know we’ve never met before. I would remember..."
Ceilee laughed, a full hearty sound. She was genuinely amused, and it irritated Mac. When she was able to bring her amusement down to a low chuckle she patted Mac on the arm.
"Naw, we’ve never met before. But I know all ‘bout you. ‘Bout your childhood, your case here...and your man troubles."
Completely confused, Mac sputtered, "But...but how is that possible? I’ve never...we’ve..."
"I know all ‘bout your gift too, Sarah," Ceilee cut her off.
A flush crept over her shoulders and up her neck to her face. "I don’t..."
"Don’t insult either one of us by denyin’ it. You know, and I know, you got de gift. I knew you had it before you even got here. Now here," Ceilee handed her a pair of gloves, "help me pull deese weeds."
They worked side by side in silence for a while before Ceilee spoke again. "Go ahead, Cher. Ask your question."
"How can you ‘know’ anything about me, or my problems? My gift doesn’t...work like that. I...see things, like visions. But I don’t see inside of people. I don’t see the past." Mac stopped weeding to look at her.
Ceilee stopped, sitting upright and smacking her gloves hands together to dust them, before speaking. "The gift don’ work the same way for everyone. Everybody got somethin’ special inside dem. Now, not everyone listens when it speaks to dem. Some of us, like you, Cher, got the "sight". Dreams, visions. But you also have the "sense". You feel stuff more strongly dan most folks do, vibes, emotions. Don’ chu?"
Mac silently continued to pull the weeds, viciously yanking them out and tossing them to the side.
Ceilee went on, as if the pregnant pause hadn’t existed between them. "You shouldn’t fight it de way you do, Sarah. It’s a part of you, just like bein’ a Marine is a part of who you are."
Mac threw the last of her latest casualties down. "What if I don’t want it, damn it? Any of it? What if I just want to be a normal person?"
Calmly, Ceilee met her troubled gaze. "We can’t chose who we are; dat’s already been done for us, long before we joined the dis world. We just gotta accept it, and do de best we can with what we’ve been given."
"But, Ceilee, sometimes it feels like a gift; other times it feels like a curse. It...it scares me," again Mac fiddled with one of the magnolia blossoms surrounding them, needing to touch it’s simple beauty.
"Most gifts feel like dat, Cher. Embrace what you are. Stop fighting it," Ceilee took her hand, her eyes pleading. "And stop fighting dat man up dere. He want you, he need you, and he’s finally ready. Don’ make him wait too long."
Choked up and not knowing what else to say, Mac rose. "I...I should probably get upstairs."
"Ya, you do. Your man’s waitin for you."
Mac started walking across the yard. She had just reached the top of the porch steps when Ceilee stopped her. "Oh, Cher. Dere’s a great little Cajun place just down the street dat delivers. I tink you’d both enjoy it."
Again Mac was left with her mouth hanging open.
They were now upstairs in her room, staring at the empty cartons of food that littered the small table in the corner of the elegant space. Ceilee had been dead on in her assessment. Not only had the restaurant met both of their individual tastes, but the food was excellent.
"Well, that was fantastic," Harm sat back in his chair, scratching his full belly through his t-shirt.
It was such a "guy" thing to do Mac had to smile at him. "It certainly was. Ceilee knew what she was talking about."
"Guess she would since she lives here," he tried to hide his own smile.
Mac chucked her wadded up napkin at him. "No, kidding? I never would have guessed from her accent." She resisted the urge to stick her tongue out at him.
"Real mature, Mac," Harm accused, but she could tell he was on the verge of cracking up.
As fast as it came the good mood quickly faded and she looked away before speaking. "I guess we should get this cleaned up so we can get to those tapes."
Chancing a glance at him, she noticed he looked like a man about to face certain death. Mac couldn’t help it, she burst out laughing. She would rather face the firing squad herself before ever seeing Allison Krennick have sex, but the look on Harm’s face was just too much.
"Oh, you think this is funny, do you?" He seemed genuinely offended.
Mac laughed even harder. "Of course I do. The look on your face was priceless."
"Fine, go ahead and laugh. But this isn’t my idea of fun, Mac." He got up, huffy, and began collecting the containers with angry, jerky movements.
Feeling bad, Mac stood and reached out to stop him. "Hey, I’m sorry. I know how hard this is for you and I shouldn’t have made fun."
He was looking away so Mac didn’t see his shifty look right before he turned and grabbed her around the waist.
"Harm!"
Bodily he lifted her and swung her around only to drop her on the bed, falling on top of her to keep her from squirming away. "Make fun of me, will ya?" He punctuated the question by tickling her ribs.
"Stop! Harm, stop," she pleaded in between giggles.
"Not until you apologize. Say it. Say, ‘I’m sorry for making fun of you, Harm’," he demanded, his fingers still digging into her sides.
"I’m...I’m sorry," she replied, breathless.
He stopped abruptly, shocked. "You are?"
Still trying to catch her breath, she readily agreed. "Yeah."
More than a little got by her immediate surrender, Harm slowly released her wrists.
Within seconds she became a wildcat. "Like hell!" Like lightning she struck, starting in on him and doing whatever she possibly could to gain the upper hand. Harm blocked arms and legs as they rolled and tumbled, eventually ending up on the floor with him on top.
The air shifted around them and awareness set in.
Feeling the heavy weight of him on top of her felt entirely too good. Unable to resist, Mac arched just enough to rub her lower body against his. When she felt the solid ridge of his erection biting into her hip, Mac sucked her bottom lip into her mouth to keep from groaning.
Harm was having a similar dilemma keeping himself under control. She was soft and she felt so good underneath him. He was ready to strip her naked and take her right there on the floor. So he did the only thing he could for both of them. "Mac, I really want...I want to kiss you," he said, brushing the hair out of her eyes with the back of his fingers, his knuckles lingering to caress her cheek. "But we’d better get up and watch those tapes, because if we don’t..."
Unable to tramp down her disappointment, Mac sighed and nodded in agreement. "I know. Guess that means you better get off me, huh?"
Reluctantly he moved, standing and holding his hand out to help her up. When she was standing too, he held on to her hand, not quite ready to break their connection. She seemed to understand because she squeezed back, letting him know he wasn’t alone in his feelings.
Not wanting the awkwardness to continue, Harm let go of her hand and pointed toward the bed. "Might as well get comfy, while I put in the first tape. We’re in for a long night."
Mac resisted the urge to laugh again.
After placing the tape in the VCR, Mac was shocked when Harm joined her, sitting on the right side of the bed. She had figured, for sanity’s sake, he would take up on one of the room chairs. She watched him as he propped up some pillows against the high headboard, leaning back and stretching out his long legs.
Her shock must have finally registered with him because he gave her that "What?" face. Snapping her open mouth shut, Mac turned toward the television as he pushed play.
There was no preamble, no lead up. The first thing they saw was Krennick and Miles kissing while he was unbuttoning her shirt, exposing her bare breasts.
"Holy hell," Harm exclaimed sitting bolt upright, wanting to look away but unable to.
"Yeah," Mac agreed, stunned by what she was witnessing on the small screen. "Not much warning."
"No. None." His words were short, clipped. He almost felt like he was choking.
They watched the rest of the scene unfold with muted horror, neither one able to speak. When the moment came to watch the act itself, Harm looked away. "I really don’t think I can do this."
Mac nodded in agreement, feeling a little green. "I don’t think I want to do this."
There was another beat of silence before he said, "Damn it, Mac, we have to," trying to convince her as well as himself.
"I know."
Jumping up off of the bed, Harm grabbed the remote off of the top of the television then jabbed the pause button, stopping the tape in mid action. "All right, here’s what we’re going to do. We’ll just skim through them, check out anything that catches our eye. We’ll focus on anything suspicious and not the actual act itself."
"Sounds like a great idea," Mac agreed whole heartedly. "In theory," she added as he sat back on the bed again.
Glaring at her he asked, "Okay, so what do you suggest we do?"
Mac swallowed hard, knowing exactly what she wanted to do, with him, but not having the courage to suggest it. Shaking her head, Mac spoke softly, "I think we should go with your idea. Really."
Kind of thrown off his groove by her quick agreement, he just nodded. "Well, all right then. We’ll do that."
Both moved back against the headboard at the same time, sitting shoulder to shoulder, their legs outstretched.
Taking a deep breath, Harm pointed the remote at the player and pressed start. Again, sounds from the tryst on the screen filled the room. Harm couldn’t push fast forward fast enough.
They watched in silence for awhile, with only the occasional grunt of disgust from Harm when he’d seen just a little too much of Allison Krennick.
By the fourth video both of them had relaxed and the ‘novelty’ of watching two people, seemingly in the throws of passion and not leaving much to the imagination, had worn off.
Both were tremendously relieved.
An hour later and halfway through the eighth movie Harm suddenly became aware of how close Mac was sitting. He had paused it, thinking he had saw something, but when Mac asked he realized it was a false alarm. But in the process he’d realized something else; he was starting to get turned on. He was semi-aroused and for the first time he didn’t consider that a bad thing. He was watching people have sex after all. And wasn’t that what erotic films were designed to do? To make people think about, or want, sex? Even if it was Allison Krennick.
Well, he very much wanted to have sex with the woman next to him. Her perfume was teasing his senses and he sniffed, taking the heady scent deeper into his lungs. It was enough to drive him crazy.
"Harm? What are you doing?" she mumbled, not looking at him but still looking at the screen.
"Smelling you," he answered honestly, the tape forgotten. "God, you smell incredible." He punctuated the statement by taking another deep breath, his nose nuzzling the soft skin where her shoulder and neck met.
Startled by the delicate touch to her skin, Mac drew back to look at him, noticing his lips were now only mere inches from hers. "Harm, what...?"
The rest of her sentence was cut off by the brush of his lips on hers. With her mouth slightly open it was so easy for his tongue to slip past her lips to tangle with hers. When her tongue boldly met his, Harm was sunk.
Their bodies seemed to melt together as both slid down the pillows to lay flat on the bed. Unable to keep his hands to himself any longer he planted one on her waist, the other snaking into her hair and holding her in place while he kissed the daylights out of her. His fingers flexed, squeezing her hip, wanting to go a little further and tug at the fabric of her cotton sleep pants to get to the skin beneath.
Their legs were tangled together, their bodies straining to get closer. When Mac felt Harm take that next step and slide his hand under the hem of her shirt she broke away.
"Harm, what about the movies? We can’t watch them if we’re..." she gasped as he licked her neck, "oh God, if we’re doing this."
"I don’t care. I’d rather do this," he punctuated the statement with a nip at the curve of her breast.
"But...what about...the case?" she asked, her back bowing as he pushed her shirt up and began placing kisses on her flat stomach.
"Mmmm...what case?" he murmured against her skin, moving higher and higher.
"Harm..."
The sounds of sex from the television filled the air but neither noticed as he reached her lacy bra. Without being asked Mac raised her arms so that he could get rid of her t-shirt. When it was gone he was back immediately, placing soft kisses on her collar bone.
Mac, needing more, brought his face to hers, sealing their lips together once more. The kisses were growing in passion, becoming more frantic. Mac tugged at his shirt needing to feel skin against skin.
It was gone in a flash, sent flying in the general direction of the television. They moaned at the contact, the heavenly feel of hot flesh moving together. He needed more of her, he wanted to feel it all.
Just as he was going for the clasp of her bra, something on the screen, out of the corner of his eye, caught his attention. He slowed, wondering if what he had seen was really real. When the image flashed again, Harm pulled back abruptly, sitting up.
Disoriented and a little hurt at his withdrawal, Mac sat up reaching out to place a hand on his back. "Harm? What..?"
Grabbing for the remote on the bed where he’d dropped it, he rewound the tape. "Look, Mac."
When Mac saw what he had seen she sighed. "Aw, hell."