Rebecca’s Cove

Chapter 27

Hobie lay on her back on the soft blankets and raised her arms above her head, stretching like a contented cat. She grinned sheepishly when she caught Baylor smiling at her.

“Never in my wildest dreams would I have ever guessed all this was in here,” Hobie said. “It’s like a different world.”

“You should have seen the look on my face when I first got here. I thought it was the beginning of a bad Twilight Zone episode.”

The women, still in their towels, lounged beside the waterfall, surrounded by oriental grasses and tropical plants with dark glossy leaves.

“Get enough to eat?” Baylor asked as she patted Hobie’s belly.

“Absolutely. How did you know I love Greek food?” “Your mom.”

“Well, these are the best dolmades I’ve had in years,” Hobie said. “Where did you go for them?”

“Oh, hell. I made them,” Baylor said with a satisfied smirk. “You made them? All of this?” Hobie peeked into the wicker

basket, which was still half full of food. “Were you planning on a few more people showing up?”

“Very funny, and yes, I made everything. It’s one of my hobbies.”

“Have I told you lately how much I love you?” “Let me guess. You don’t know how to cook.” “Do peanut butter and jelly sandwiches count?” Baylor dropped her head in false dismay.

“Wait! I can make macaroni and cheese, too—well, the kind that comes in a box—so there. And I can make pancakes. From a mix, though.”

Baylor couldn’t hold in her laughter any longer. She leaned over Hobie and kissed her soundly. “You are as impossible as you are beautiful,” she said after pulling away to look into Hobie’s eyes.

“I try.”

Baylor leaned down for another kiss. This time, Hobie felt an odd sensation. The only way she was able to describe it later was to say that she felt her destiny click into place. The kiss was soft and passionate, tender and hungry all at once. By the time she parted her lips to let Baylor’s inquisitive tongue enter her mouth, their bodies were pressed tightly together. Hobie moaned at the warm softness of Baylor’s tongue. She regretted that they had to come up for air.

“Good Lord, Hobie Lynn. Where did you learn to kiss like that?” Baylor asked breathlessly. She didn’t wait for an answer. “That’s what I remembered, you know. As humiliating and embarrassing as it is to admit that I forgot your face, I remembered that kiss.”

She took Hobie’s face in her hands and kissed her again. She went slower this time, lingering over every subtle nuance of Hobie’s mouth.

“Baylor, touch me.” It wasn’t a command, more like a whispered plea.

“And where would you like me to do this touching?” “Anywhere.” Hobie captured Baylor’s lips with her own.

“Everywhere.”

They kissed for a long time. Eventually, Baylor allowed her hands to roam, and when she cupped Hobie’s breast through the towel and let her thumb brush back and forth across the nipple, Hobie groaned.

“God, Baylor! That feels so—”

Baylor pinched the hardened nipple lightly through the soft cloth.

“God, so...so good!”

Baylor retreated slightly. Hobie pulled her back and nuzzled her neck, kissing the taut skin there. “Baylor...please, don’t stop.”

Baylor looked down at Hobie and gently touched her lips in the lightest of kisses. Lifting her body for a moment, Baylor removed her towel, then reverently opened the towel wrapped around Hobie. She laid her body on top of Hobie, and both women gasped at the feel of skin on skin.

“Hobie, I can’t believe that a woman as beautiful as you would want to be with me. Do you have any idea, my love, how beautiful you are?”

Hobie could feel her skin flush a deep pink.

“It’s true. You are so beautiful,” Baylor continued as she let her hands explore the smooth curves beneath her. “I want to make love to you. I want to be the only person to ever touch you this way. I want mine to be the name you cry out when you come.”

“Oh, yes.”

Baylor moved her hands over Hobie’s skin as she pressed her mouth against Hobie’s lips. She sucked Hobie’s tongue rhythmically, matching it to the tempo of her movements against Hobie’s thigh. She could feel her own wetness as she rubbed her clit harder against the firm muscles.

Hobie enjoyed the feel of Baylor’s body on hers. When Baylor’s kisses turned hungry, Hobie’s passion increased until she was growling with need. Baylor’s kisses ran along Hobie’s jaw, and she pressed her head back into the blanket, giving her entire being over to her lover, instinctively knowing she would be safe and loved within Baylor’s embrace.

Baylor ran her tongue in a random design along Hobie’s shoulders and down to her chest. She took nips of skin, and Hobie gasped in pleasure and surprise with each tiny bite. By the time Baylor’s lips wrapped around an aroused pierced nipple, Hobie felt every pull directly between her legs.

The first touch was exquisite, enough to send both women out of their minds with lust. Baylor used her lips, tongue, and teeth to drive Hobie higher and higher. She alternated between breasts, and when she had her mouth on one, she used her hand to knead and massage the other. Slipping the tip of her tongue into the small gold hoop, Baylor tugged gently, pulling harder once Hobie’s breathless moans encouraged her.

Hobie’s body trembled constantly. “Baylor...please. Please, don’t stop. Don’t ever stop.”

“I don’t think you need to fear that, love.” Baylor smiled down at her lover. Once she’d touched every inch of Hobie’s skin with her lips, tongue, or fingers, Baylor ran the tip of her tongue down Hobie’s belly. She slid between Hobie’s legs, which parted instantly.

The sweet, musky scent of her lover aroused Baylor even more. “Perfect,” she whispered, kissing the soft skin of each inner thigh until she reached her reddish curls. She laid numerous kisses on the soft triangle of hair.

“Oh, God!” Hobie cried out, thrusting her hips up to meet the mouth that lingered so close to her center. “Oh, Baylor,” she groaned, spreading her legs wider still.

Hobie almost climaxed at the moment she felt Baylor’s tongue press against her needy flesh. She lifted her hips again so she wouldn’t break contact. Her excitement increased as Baylor moved her tongue slowly, but relentlessly, sometimes teasing the folds with the tip of her tongue, other times pressing against the slick opening.

Hobie rotated her hips in a counter-rhythm to the persistent caresses. She pressed her clit as hard as she could against Baylor’s tongue as Baylor picked up speed. Baylor’s moans as she went about her pleasurable task did nothing to quench the roaring fire in Hobie’s belly.

Feeling her lover’s increased wetness and the quick shudders of her muscles, Baylor eased one finger inside her, never slowing the movement of her tongue.

“Yes. Just like that.” Hobie relaxed into the exquisite touch, letting the flames of their passion carry her to her destination. After a moment, grasping Baylor’s shoulders, then her hair, Hobie forced her to increase the pressure of her tongue. “Baylor...Oh, Baylor, yes...please...more.” She moaned.

In one fluid movement, Baylor slid another finger inside. Hobie’s hips froze for a few interminable seconds, and Hobie tried to catch her breath at the sensation of penetration as, at the same time, Baylor wrapped her mouth around the sensitive area of nerves and sucked it in gently.

Hobie’s hips resumed their motion, now with an intensity that surprised her. Baylor slid her fingers almost all of the way out and moved them in again. She repeated the action as she sucked harder on the bit of flesh between her lips. Finally, Hobie shivered and her legs parted as wide as they could go. Baylor sucked harder and flicked her tongue quickly across the tiny area that would bring her lover the most pleasure. Hobie’s back arched and she took in a deep breath. One shout of pleasure escaped her lips.

“Baylor!”

Suddenly, Hobie saw stars. She opened her eyes and looked through the ceiling of the greenhouse. Stars surrounded her. The two brightest were the stars that had come together during their ceremony, but this time, she was flying with them. Surrounded by shooting stars and the blue-black night, the two stars raced toward each other. At the most intense moment of her pleasure, as her release shot through her entire being, the two stars collided. The resulting explosion caused rings of color to burst forth.

She gasped. When she opened her eyes, the vision was gone. She cried out again as one orgasm blended into another. She felt Baylor’s tongue replace her fingers and slide deep into her. Just when Hobie thought she could take no more, Baylor pulled away and once more entered her with two fingers, causing more waves of pleasure. Slowly, she came back to reality. She felt the gentle touches of Baylor’s tongue as she lapped up the juices Hobie’s excitement had created.

Baylor slid her fingers from her lover’s satiny warmth and felt Hobie tremble with aftershocks of desire. She licked at Hobie’s sweet juices, taking care to avoid the too sensitive area at the top of her cleft.

It was gentle and relaxed, and Hobie couldn’t help becoming aroused again. Almost unconsciously, and with the vision of the stars still floating before her, she gently rolled her hips in an easy rhythm against the strokes from Baylor’s tongue.

“Oh, yes,” she soon murmured as Baylor feasted again on her willing flesh. Hobie felt Baylor’s strong arms wrap around her parted thighs, and Baylor’s tongue replaced her fingers. There was less of a rush for Hobie this time; instead of racing toward her climax, she waited for it to come to her. It was slow, almost luxurious, and she cried out as another release engulfed her.

Baylor moved up and wrapped her arms around her still-trembling lover. She whispered her love as Hobie cried. Baylor understood the tears, as well as Hobie’s inability to articulate the reason behind them. She couldn’t explain them any better than Hobie could.

“Okay.” Hobie wiped the tears away. “It’s official. We’re both pathetic.”

Baylor laughed and held Hobie tighter. “You okay?” She didn’t know quite how to phrase it. How did one ask if one’s partner just had the most mind-numbing sex of her life or if it was just a “that was very nice” on the sex-o-meter?

As with most of Baylor’s abbreviated language, Hobie understood exactly what she meant. “It and you were and are incredible.”

“Really?” Baylor brightened considerably.

“I wouldn’t have thought you, of all people, would have doubts about your abilities in that area.”

“Well,” Baylor’s cheeks showed an uncharacteristic flush, “we’re going to be doing this for the next fifty or sixty years. It would really suck if we’d waited till now to find out that we’re no good together in bed.”

Hobie laughed and shook her head, then pulled away from Baylor and leaned on one elbow. “The things you find to worry about scare me. And what do you mean fifty or sixty years? You sure do plan to be an active old broad, don’t you?” She laughed again. “That will put us pushing a hundred.”

“Funny you say that,” Baylor said as she settled comfortably on her back.

“Say what?” Hobie sat up and reached for the picnic basket, having worked up an appetite. She grinned in embarrassment when she saw Baylor smiling at her.

“Can I get you any more?”

“No. These are fine.” Hobie popped a piece of cheese into her mouth. “So what was so funny?”

“Actually, it was something Jules mentioned today. Then you just made the comment about how old we’ll be in fifty years.” “And?”

“Did you know that Tanti and Aimee were the last—well, I don’t know what to call it, but the supposed saviors of Ana Lia? Like we did tonight. They had their ceremony fifty years ago.”

“I had no idea. Is it significant in some way?”

“That part isn’t, but I found out about it before we left Rebecca’s and forgot to tell you. No, what Jules pointed out was the average age of the members of the Ladies Guild. I know Tanti’s ninety-two, and I think JoJo said Rebecca was, what? A hundred?”

“Ninety-five.”

Together they came up with a half-dozen names of women in their nineties.

“Now let me ask you the same question Jules hit me with,” Baylor continued. “Do any of these chicks look over seventy or even eighty to you?”

“I’m not sure, but once you’re that age, I guess it gets harder to tell, right?”

“You’re the doc. You tell me. Do any of these gals get sick much? Aside from Tanti’s hip, has she ever had anything wrong with her?”

Hobie stopped eating to seriously think about Baylor’s question. With the possible exception of childbirth, she could hardly recall any of the local women being ill. Doc Elston had spent more days in his fishing boat than in his office. There was the usual kid stuff and accidents, but the women of the island were a surprisingly healthy bunch.

Hobie sobered until she realized that she was acting as paranoid as Baylor. She laughed and shook her head to dispel the niggling doubts. “Oh, please. I’m sure there’s some rational explanation for it.”

“Weirder things have happened.”

“Oh, come on. You don’t seriously think that the women of this island have some special power that keeps them young or from ever getting sick, do you?”

“All I’m doing is bringing up the possibility that there are, I don’t know, forces on this island. Look at you and me. I drank like a fish before I got here. I think I’ve had a few beers and two margaritas all summer. That’s not counting the champagne I had tonight. Didn’t you have the same problem before you came back home? I’ve never even wanted a drink since I’ve been here. Okay, there was the party at the library, but I consider that an extreme time. How about you?”

“Oh, Baylor, that’s just—” It was too crazy a scenario to consider. Wasn’t it? “What? You think we have the fountain of youth on Ana Lia? That Ponce de León was right all along?”

“I was thinking more along the lines of, you know...spells and...stuff.”

“Excuse me?” Hobie asked with laughter in her eyes. “Oh, you heard what I said, Miss Smarty-pants.”

“I heard it, I just don’t believe you said it.” Hobie chuckled. “Look, whatever they’re doing, it’s working, and I, for one, am not about to question how they do it. Besides, we’re a part it now. What with our ceremony and the stars coming together, I expect that if they live to be five hundred, so will we.”

“Oh, my God,” Baylor cried out. “We’re witches, too!” “Baylor!”

“Sorry. Wiccans.”

“Being politically correct wasn’t why I was yelling at you.” Hobie laughed harder. She didn’t mean to make light of her lover’s worries, but Baylor’s paranoia exceeded anything Hobie had known. “I’m yelling at you because it doesn’t work that way. It’s like any other religion, so to speak. You have to make a conscious decision to follow it. You can’t just become one of them without knowing it. I’m pretty positive there are no such things as Wiccan pods that they slip under your bed at night.”

“Right. Okay, I know that.” Baylor pouted, embarrassed at having the thought in the first place.

“Can we move on to something else that will probably freak you out?”

“I’m glad you’re so amused with your own wit.” Baylor stole a piece of cheese from Hobie. She popped it into her mouth and lay back down, munching contentedly.

“I am, thanks and—hey, that was mine!” “Ya snooze, ya lose.”

“Okay, can I be serious for a second?” “I don’t know, can you?”

Hobie arched an eyebrow. “Sorry. Go ahead.”

Hobie pushed the basket away, lay beside Baylor, and leaned her head in the palm of one hand.

“Something...well, odd happened to me while we were making love. Not so much during, but right when...you know. The moment when I...”

Baylor appeared amused. “Climaxed.”

“Yeah. Geez, talking about it and doing it are really different, huh?”

Baylor chuckled. “I don’t know. You didn’t seem to have too much trouble verbalizing while we were doing it.”

Hobie slapped Baylor’s stomach.

“What was this odd thing that happened?” Suddenly, Baylor appeared interested.

“Okay, now remember that I had champagne, I was in the throes of great sex, and I was probably oxygen deprived. Okay?”

“Check.”

“I saw stars.”

“It’s all just part of the service, my love,” Baylor said smugly. She looked at Hobie and realized she was serious. “What kind of stars?”

“Well, it was like right before our stars came together tonight. They—”

“Slammed into each other.” “Yes! But—”

“You were right there—”

“Surrounded by them,” Hobie finished.

They looked at each other for a long, silent moment, just staring into each other’s eyes.

“You?” Hobie asked. Baylor nodded.

Hobie explained further. “When they exploded into one, there were all these—”

“Colors, and they spread out in big circles.” They lay in silence.

“Okay, I’m pretty freaked out right about now. How about you?” Hobie finally asked.

“Oh, yeah.”

“Is that even possible? For that to happen to both of us?” “Maybe there’s one of those rational explanations you’re so

fond of.”

“Very funny.”

Hobie chuckled aloud, then her laughter grew louder. “You’re not losing it on me, are you?” Baylor asked.

“No, sweetheart. Ironically enough, I think I’m finding it.” Baylor rolled to her side to look at Hobie. “I’m afraid to, but I have to ask. What in the hell are you talking about?”

“It’s just some thoughts that struck me. First, what weird things are going to happen to us now, and I’m not saying they ever will, but what if they did? What if we only age every other year from this point on? What if Rebecca Ashby has the fountain of youth buried in her backyard? What if the witches of Ana Lia live down the block from us, or if we see visions of stars every time we have sex? Does any of it really matter?”

“Of course it matters,” Baylor quickly said. “Why?”

“Well, because...in order to...I mean, they...” Baylor looked blankly at Hobie.

“See what I mean? We know none of it will hurt us. Frankly, the benefits have helped us more than anything else. It reminds me of something Evelyn said to you when you first got here. It was right after you met Albert at the Dilby sisters’ shop. Remember?”

“There’s not much chance I’ll ever forget that day. I’m not sure what Tanti said, though.”

“She said that we continue some things in life because we’ve grown comfortable with them that way. She said that change was hard on the soul and that sometimes you just accept things and people the way they are.”

“My Tanti said that?”

“Baylor Warren, you were sitting right next to me.” “I was in my pre-Ana Lia selfish phase. Sorry.”

“No need for you to be sorry. I was just as thick about it all, or self-involved, whatever you want to call it. That’s the second point I wanted to make. I’ve lived here all my life and all these subtle things were just as invisible to me. I don’t know how, but they were. It’s almost as if I couldn’t see them because I wasn’t ready. Does that make sense?”

“Sometimes people tell us all sorts of things, and it’s not that we’re not listening, just that we’re not quite ready to hear,” Baylor said, a faraway look in her eyes.

“Wow, that’s pretty profound.”

“Don’t get too excited.” Baylor smiled affectionately. “Rebecca Ashby said it to me when she was doing my tarot reading.”

“That’s kind of what I mean. If you think about it—now, I could be reaching here—but I get the oddest feeling they were trying to tell us about all of this way back then. I know hindsight is 20/20, but I think of the things these ladies said to us and it’s as if they know a whole lot more about life, and us, than we realize.”

“You know,” Baylor grinned, “that all of this sounds like something Harriet Teasley would say.”

“I see an easy book out of this.”

“Now that you bring it up, I already started a new novel. As a matter of fact, I’m about halfway through the first draft.”

“That’s wonderful. My mother will be thrilled to death. You know how she loves those—”

“It’s not a Harriet Teasley novel,” Baylor said softly, avoiding Hobie’s eyes.

“Not by Harriet Teasley? Then who?”

“Um...Baylor Warren. It’s a romance, but I decided not to hide behind the nom de plume anymore. I also decided not to hide behind straight romance. It’s the story of two women.”

Hobie smiled brightly. “Good for you. Whatever and however you decide to write, though, you know I’m behind you one hundred percent.”

“It’s been so many years that I have grown rather fond of old Harriet. I may have to write one once in a while to make the fans happy.”

“As long as you’re doing what you want to do, Baylor. I think if you do that, you can’t go wrong. So what’s the name of this new novel?”

“I was thinking about Rebecca’s Cove. I asked Rebecca Ashby and she thought it was a hoot.”

Hobie laughed and settled back against the blankets. “Go figure.” She snuggled against Baylor. Baylor pulled a blanket over them and they lay there, looking up to the sky. The blackness had changed to the pale pre-dawn color that heralded sunrise.

“We’ve been up all night and I’m tired, but not that tired,” Hobie said.

“Probably Ana Lia’s fountain of youth at work.”

“More likely is the fact that I’m happier than I’ve ever been in my entire life. I love you, Baylor, and I promise to spend the rest of my life proving that to you.”

Baylor looked down and stroked Hobie’s cheek. “In my whole life, I never thought I’d be able to make anyone that happy. What surprises me even more,” she said softly, “is that I never thought I’d be that happy, either. I am, though, Hobie Lynn. I’m in love for the first time in my life and I promise that I’ll try never to do anything to mess that up.”

They lay together, winding down and waiting for sleep to come. Suddenly, Baylor chuckled.

“Hmm?” Hobie asked sleepily. “I was just thinking...” “Mmm, always dangerous.”

“Very funny. I was thinking about the Cove. More to the point, the sign outside the restaurant. ‘Rebecca’s Cove, the Golden Key of the Gulf.’” Baylor yawned and her eyes felt too heavy to keep open. “Who would’ve thought that a restaurant could be the key to so much of my happiness?”

She listened to Hobie’s deep even breathing and realized that she was already asleep. With an easy smile on her face, she gave up her own struggle to remain awake and slipped into the land of dreams.