The Lustful Gateway (5)

Vanessa rolled her eyes, clearly at herself more than anything else. "Oh, I screwed up a bunch. I'm not sayin' otherwise. But I was in college once, too. Started dating a guy. Thought he was cool. Found out what an asshole he was when we went to Mexico together and he used me as a drug mule without asking me. I'd have dumped his ass right there if I'd known he was into that. But there I was, caught with a shitload of coke in my bag at the airport. My ex-boyfriend figured out the score before I did and started copping pleas. The prosecutor figured he could still get an extra check mark in his conviction column and fuck what anyone's confessions said or how credible his witnesses were, right? My public defender was good, but she wasn't fuckin' Superwoman. I got eighteen months and figured I was lucky.

"My family basically freaked out and disowned me. I couldn't get a job. I figured I needed a clean slate, so I took what I could scrounge up and came out here, but it was 2009 and I couldn't land even fuckin' Wal-Mart or McDonald's, and well..." she shrugged. "I like sex. I like sex a lot. I don't see anything wrong with what I do, really. When I was just operating on my own I could decide to turn guys down if something seemed wrong or if they grossed me out. It wasn't like I couldn't defend myself if one of 'em tried something violent. You learn things in prison, y'know?

"Last year, along came Rudy. I was tired of handling everything on my own. He was slick enough to go easy at first, but one thing led to another and as soon as I trusted him a little too much, bam. He's got all my papers, he's got Chester and he's probably smart enough to find me even if I did run on him. And he'd have to look, too, otherwise his other girls might run, too."

"But with him gone?" Travis asked.

"I don't think Giovanni or Adam are all that clever," she shrugged again. "Besides, once it gets obvious that Rudy isn't coming home, there'll be sharks circling around the guys soon enough. I want to get Illyana out if we can. The rest will know when to bail on their own. I just need to cut all the strings at once and then figure out how to start over again."

Travis stared down the street towards the house. "You worried about Chester?"

"Not really," Vanessa shook her head. "I mean yeah, but he's probably asleep. It's not like he knows what's goin' on around him." She tapped her forehead. "You go through the kind of crap I have, you learn to compartmentalize and prioritize, and not to borrow trouble."

"Wish I could do that. All I can think about right now is prison. Or worse."

"Yeah," she conceded with a somewhat shaky breath. "Yeah, there's that. I'm thinking about all that, too." The two fell silent for a moment and Vanessa ran her hands through her hair. "The waiting is making me crazy. I need to do something."

"Me, too," Travis agreed without really thinking about it.

"Get in the back seat," Vanessa said.

Travis blinked. "What?"

"Just get in the back seat. Trust me."

He considered several things that she might have in mind, but discarded all of them as unlikely. He didn't really know what she was planning. But he had trusted her this far, though, and at this point figured he had nothing to lose. Travis went along with her instructions.

Vanessa came around on the other side, and gestured for him to move in closer. "Sit in the middle," she said.

"What're you doing?" Travis asked, obeying without thinking about it.

"I'm calling it something life-affirming," she said, closing the door behind her before she crawled over Travis and planted a firm, hungry kiss on his mouth. She tasted faintly of strawberries. He hesitated, then kissed back, then realized he was getting carried away with himself. Or maybe she was. Maybe both.

"Vanessa," he grunted, loving the way she felt against him and wishing he could just go with it, "you don't have to do this."

"Yes and no." She kissed him again. Vanessa unzipped his hoodie, spreading it open to run her hands over his abs and chest. Her grin told him she liked what she felt. "I know nobody's forcing me. I know you don't expect anything. But we're both wound up and we've got the time."

Vanessa tugged him forward a bit and then straddled him, pinning him to the seat with her knees slipping down beside his hips. Her short skirt made it very easy to move. Travis glanced down to see how the folds of its fabric pushed up to reveal the black lace barely covering her sex, which pressed up against the hardening flesh between his legs. He was at once grateful and chagrinned to be wearing sweats tonight. When his eyes came back up to hers, she bit her lip in a naughty grin that told him she saw exactly where he was looking.

"You like that?" she breathed, grinding against him.

"Yeah," he whispered hoarsely, then swallowed and repeated, "yeah, I do." Travis slid a bit lower, pushing his legs up against the front seats to offer Vanessa more room and more support.

"Don't be nervous, Travis," she told him, stroking the side of his face. Her fingers turned to lightly brush her nails down his neck. Her hair dangled intimately across the side of his face. "I know it's your first time. Just relax and enjoy it, even if you don't last long. We're both all wound up. It's okay. You can touch me. Don't be shy."

She drew him into another kiss. He became more cooperative, enjoying the feeling of her tongue against his and the invitation in her breath. Travis had never gotten beyond first base before. Vanessa left no ambiguity about how far she wanted to go, sweeping away so many of Travis's usual worries when it came to situations like this... not that he'd ever been in these circumstances.

His hands slid slowly up her legs, coming to a rest upon her hips, underneath her skirt. There wasn't much fabric at all to those panties. His fingers found the strings and small loops tying them together. His touch slipped out again, going over the skirt this time to slide along her sides. Vanessa let out soft little moans of appreciation at his touch. Her lips parted from his, but remained very close as she murmured, "You've got nice hands."

"You've got nice legs," he countered. "Nice everything."

"You haven't even seen nearly everything yet," she grinned. "But I'm happy to show you."

"This wasn't exactly how I expected my first time to be."