Marcus had then proceeded to tease her naked, inner-thighs with the sharp tip, even drawing beads of blood, ever closer to her exposed clitoris, until her sobbing pleas had finally annoyed him into injecting the drugs into the vein of her arm.

The full force of it hit her at the same moment yet another belt snapped across her breasts and belly. The resultant mix of pleasure and pain was both intense and exquisite.

When her whimpering moans incited his cock to full length, he had fucked her until she saw stars. How many times had she come? She couldn't remember. But every time she replayed that episode in her mind, she was instantly wet. Pain and pleasure. Pleasure and pain. That was Marcus Allen, and he had become her entire world.

With a little sigh, Diana Sheldon left a disgruntled Keister alone in the truck bed, curled up in an angry ball against a torn, wool blanket with a Navaho pattern. He knew better than to bother yelping or even initiating an escape attempt by this point in his canine life. The metal Chevy walls were not meant to be scaled by his stubby, dog legs. His toenails found no grip, no purchase at all in the slick fiberglass bed. He turned his head sorrowfully away from the biscuit the woman left as a bribe and stared forlornly at nothing at all.

Brow furrowed as she walked away from the truck toward the old farmhouse, Diana Sheldon knew her task ahead would be even more difficult than appeasing hurt feelings. The intricacies of family drama and relationships in turmoil were not something she relished dipping her nose into unless it was absolutely necessary.

And yet, it was hard not to mother-hen, and to just watch her children walk into the same trouble and mistakes she had seen all before, time and again as was their way. But finding an immediate solution to the Tracey-Alexandra problem was paramount. She wanted her boys to remain a close, loving unit. The alternative was unthinkable.

This was a tricky situation indeed. Death did something rotten to families, and although time surely lessened the aching, sapping pain, a bitter aftermath was left forever in its wake. It remained like poison coiled in the veins, and no matter how much you thought you were over that death, its latent venom could foam up at any given instant and strike, snake-like, wreaking havoc. And if you didn't manage to pull yourselves together, you ultimately pulled apart.

Deep in her heart, Diana sensed that Tracey was a lost cause, and deeply broken from the inside out. The girl had lost her mother at a young age, her infant daughter, and over time since that tragedy, the man she had loved since her teenage years. She had no education, and came from a long line of alcoholics. Her father was abusive, through childhood and beyond. The drink called its siren song to her, and Tracey answered every time, without fail.

Jamie, although hurt and broken from the death himself, had tried to support her. With his own inner will and compassion, he had tried to lift Tracey, and lend her strength. He'd fallen short, though not from lack of trying.

Diana believed he never truly felt real love for Tracey, the kind that brought souls together and bonded them no matter what. Their slow disintegration had been painful for the whole family, her younger son Aaron included.

And now there was Alexandra Winters to consider. She too, had experienced the venomous side of death. She was vulnerable, and unsure of her place here in the untamed mountains of northern Pennsylvania. But one thing was certain; the way in which Alex and her son Jamie looked at one another was breathtaking. It was real. It could be forever.

The back screen-door squealed and Alexandra poked her head out. Her hair was disheveled and her expression was nearly comical a it was obvious that she hadn't expected Diana, and didn't know whether to be gracious, upset, or nonchalant about the visit. When a chilled glass of lemonade appeared and Alex waved at Diana to come on in, it was apparent that she had chosen to go with gracious. Diana was quietly pleased, for she found it a true sign of class and, perhaps more importantly, of a gentle heart.

Diana entered into the coolness of the back kitchen, shaded from the day's heat by several dense hemlocks towering not far beyond the windows. It was a very sweet and fresh kitchen, now that Alex had spruced it up with some country primitives and a few well-chosen antiques left over from the Wilkens family. They had been good people, if a bit reclusive and...a little different.

At Diana's perusal, Alex added, "I plan to replace the tile flooring with something a little more modern, and put in a slate sink. I always wanted a traditional slate sink. Have you ever seen one?"

"Oh, they are gorgeous if you can find the right installer. I'd go shopping with you any day, Alex. Could probably give a few pointers too, if you wish."

At Diana's earnest expression, a smile broke through Alex's attempt at a cool facade without her ability to restrain it. "I would love that. It's just..." Alex shrugged and laughed a little at the trivial path of their conversation. She motioned toward the table, and the women sat together with their frosted glasses of lemonade.

"Well, whatever transpires between you and Jamie, you will still be living here, Alex, and I will still be liking you quite a bit, without a doubt," Diana answered with her own smile. It lit her face as slender glints of sunlight slanted through the window above the sink and hit the chestnut highlights in Diana's hair with a warm glimmer, much like cognac in a snifter.

The tiny lines around the corners of her eyes nearly disappeared in the soft glow, and suddenly, she looked about twenty years old. Alex resisted the abrupt urge to reach across the table and hug the woman, and blinked back the resultant threat of tears back as best she could.

"I am not here to persuade you, but only to offer my perspective," Diana began, taking hold of Alex's hand. The contact was soothing, and Alex realized her own fingers were trembling with suppressed emotion. She managed a nod, and bit down on her lower lip.

"It's a standard story, really... Tracey and Jamie were young, and careless. Dating for awhile... and then suddenly pregnant. Frightened. My son made the decision to support Tracey and the baby. The alternative... abortion...adoption... was just unthinkable to Jamie. He had lost his own father just a few years earlier."

"How many years ago did this...baby... happen?" Alex managed to whisper.

"It's been three already. They lost her at birth. Intrauterine growth restriction and then even steroids couldn't boost the baby's lungs enough to keep her breathing. She was on a respirator but then her other organs began to fail, as well."

"Her," Alex released with a sigh, a tear rolling down her cheek.

Diana realized she was tearing up again herself, as if she hadn't been through the tortuous memory of her granddaughter's death a thousand times. "We got to hold her for a little before she passed. But not long."

"It must have been horrible. I can't imagine."

"It did something to both of them. Tracey never recovered. And let me tell you, she was already a mess before the baby. Her addictions may have even been the reason for the problems... but well, we just don't know." Diana released Alex's hand and drew in a deep breath, then exhaled it with a sigh.

"The reason I came to visit you today was not to do Jamie's apologizing for him. He's an adult and can handle himself just fine. It's just.... This topic is painful and hard to discuss in a coherent manner. There aren't rational emotions involved when it comes to the death of a child.

Or any loved one," Diana added at the sudden welling of additional moisture in Alex's eyes.

Alex shook her head at Diana's knowing look. "I am over Richard's death," she sputtered. "To sum him up in one sentence, he was a cruel and unfeeling man. I don't know why I stayed... I felt so inferior. It's...it's Jamie I can't get past now.... I can't stop thinking of him. I think I love him already."

Diana found herself suddenly smiling. "I had hoped you did," she added, almost shyly. "I can tell you for certain that Jamie is not in love with Tracey. He merely feels responsible for her welfare... it's a typical male thing. A good-hearted male, anyway."

Alex nodded, understanding the reasoning, if somewhat begrudgingly.

"Tracey is a tortured soul, and one we've all been trying to help to no avail. Counseling, rehab, a place to live... nothing has brought her back. She just can't let herself enjoy the good parts of life that remain, and let the past lie."

Diana continued. "And now I fear Aaron has gotten himself swept up in her swirling vortex of drama. There is good to Tracey, but there is something vindictive and a bit hateful as well. I'm so worried about both my boys." She gave a little shuddering laugh. "A curse all mothers face, I suppose."

Alex rounded up a tissue from a box on the window sill, and dabbed at the corners of her eyes. "So what can I do to help with this situation?" she asked. "Everything is such a mess!"

"Just try to find patience and understanding, and most of all, the willingness to listen to Jamie. He wanted to follow you right away, but I stopped him."

Alex found a surprising pleasure in those words. She managed a nod, and drew a tremulous breath. The sudden pang she felt to look at Jamie's face, and to hear his voice was purely overwhelming. The pain she had felt when she thought Tracey and Jamie had still been seeing each other was a fiery knife to her insides like nothing she had ever before experienced.

Not even Richard's death had cut to the core like that. His death had frightened her, took her breath, overwhelmed her, but it had not sliced in such a burning manner.

And after she got home from the incident at the Sheldon's, sitting here alone at this table, absorbing the pain, she had come to know what love really was. The sudden knowledge that she was truly feeling it, and was swept up in its grip, had nearly bowled her over.

The mere thought that Jamie could have similar thoughts about her was something she hadn't allowed herself to contemplate before now. Did he love her? For real? Yet again, she felt a swift and burgeoning hope blossom forth.

Tracey could hear the purr of the BMW's engine even before it appeared around the pine-shaded bend down the road. Antonio had answered his cell on the third ring, and he had even remembered who she was right away. Right away!

He had thanked her profusely for deciding to provide him with this critical information necessary to complete in his investigation, and he wanted to discuss it further, but not over the phone. So here she was, standing along Route 6 feeling a bit silly as she waited nervously for Antonio's arrival like a teenage girl expecting the car horn of her date to sound at any moment.

A few minutes earlier, she had decided to leave a cryptic message on Jamie's voicemail, since THAT shithead didn't answer her call. She wanted to make him sweat a little about his new girlfriend, and where her path just might be headed. Tracey couldn't wait to find out the details from Antonio. Revenge would be so sweet.

The sleek black vehicle appeared, and slowed as it approached where she stood. Tracey's nerves weren't the greatest at the moment, but the beers had helped to put a little swag in her step. Hopefully, the breath mints covered up the scent. She cocked her hip and smiled. Thank God she was dressed adequately, and she had repaired her hair and makeup in the bathroom. She knew her curves were kickin'.

The car windows were blacked out, but the driver's side slid down with a hum and Antonio was smiling up at her. God, she forgot how hot that cat was. Instinctively, she knew he would never go for someone like her a for real - but it was fun to pretend. She grinned back in a feline way.

"You hopping in?" Antonio asked, gesturing over his shoulder to the passenger seat. "Let's go somewhere... nicer." He rolled his eyes at the line of Harley's in the left side parking lot.

"Awesome, this place is not always the greatest," she admitted with a laugh. She walked around his car, making sure her bottom swung just so. The lock clicked open and she slid into the cool leather seat, adjusting her skirt while making sure the correct amount of thigh was showing, but without being too obvious. "I know a nicer little place a few miles north of here in Roulette."

"Sounds perfect," Tony smiled over at her. "I was actually very glad it was you who called me. There's nothing like mixing pleasure with business."

Tracey's heart accelerated in time with the car as they drove away into the afternoon sun.

Aaron turned his baseball cap around backwards, planting it firmly on his head, and gritted his teeth as he began the trek up the cracked and decayed remains of what once had been a stone walkway through a neatly trimmed yard. The trailer in the distance seemed to be listing to one side, and a piece of the roof had blown off during the last good thunderstorm. Had to be leaking somewhere inside.

It was obvious that Stan hadn't mowed the grass yet this season, as the lush green tips licked against the hairs on his legs as he strode through the yard.

As he contemplated seeing Tracey's father yet again, he could hardly keep the snarl from his face. What a waste of a human being. He surely brought the trash to the trailer, and gave country folk a bad name. Alexandra Winters would have peed her little, lacy panties in yuppie disgust, just looking at the man Tracey had to live with every day.

Yet Tracey had been through it all and survived. Barely, but she did. She was beautiful, brave, and sorely injured. It tore at Aaron's heart. All he wanted was to save her, and be there for her, but she never really looked his way.

In truth, he put too much of the blame on his older brother. Aaron knew that he had over-reacted today. Even Alex wasn't that bad of a person... she was just different from anyone he knew. It was the whole, shitty situation causing the root problem. Aaron had blown up like a kid, and had embarrassed himself again in front of Tracey. The one thing he didn't want to do.

Aaron rapped on the back screen door twice and waited. There were holes in it, large enough to grant any decent-sized mosquito an easy entrance. He sighed and stuck his thumbs in the belt loops of his shorts. A plane flew overhead and he blew a breath of air out audibly until, at last, he heard a grunt and a shuffle.

"What you want?"

"Where's Tracey? She went missing."

"Who knows? Who the hell are you?"

"It's Aaron Sheldon."

"Eh. She's at some bar I *pose."

"I checked The Northern."

Stan's stubble-lined face appeared at the door, mottled grayish by the screen. "What the hell you need her for, boy? A screw?"

"I told you, she went missing. She was upset about the baby again," muttered Aaron.

Booze wafted through the holes in the screen. "Who the fuck cares," croaked Stan.

Aaron's hand shot hard and straight into the feeble netting, palm up, squarely into Stan's red and bulbous nose. The man went backwards like a stone, spurting blood in an arc along the way.

"I do," returned Aaron, and walked away down the shattered pathway. The only place left to try that he could think of was the Cherryville pub.

Waiting for Eden ~*~*~*~*~*~.

Chapter 19.

It was a hot, dry afternoon, and his red Nikes were now pink with a shroud of yellowed dust. The particles had stirred, whirling in lazy plumes about his bare ankles, as he strode determinedly along the dirt lane.

Mouse waved a palm at the fat and lazy flies that buzzed by his ears every ten seconds. He had counted their fly-bys many times, and it was always ten seconds exactly. He marveled at the precision. Could insects tell time? Mouse didn't know, but he sure didn't want to swat those special lazy flies hard and squish them, *cause they weren't really biters.

Jamie had told him the fat hairy ones that buzzed so loud didn't actually hurt, didn't bite at all, and even ate the greedy gypsy moths that killed the trees in the forest. Mouse loved the trees, just like Jamie did. Mouse loved Jamie too.

And now... well he kind of loved Alex as well. She just felt like family, like Jamie's family. He felt very warm inside today from all these special feelings.

Mouse bit his lower lip in consternation as he made his way along Stoney Run, torn by his decision to go back to the ranch without real work to do, and without asking Alex first. But it had been so long. And he used to visit almost every day, before Alex came, and it was always okay then. Now that Alex liked him, Mouse figured it would be okay again. He loved his visits to that place, they gave him special feelings too.

Every time Mouse would climb onto the old rickety back porch, he would find a flower from the grey-haired lady in the window. She never gave him lemonade, like Alex did now, but she smiled so nice. So warm, it was just like hugging.

And the flowers she picked him from the Garden of her Eden... the flowers were always so lovely. Each time was a different color and shape, but they always smelled the same. Like a perfect mixture of rose, peony, and lilac, all blended together and delicious each and every time he took in a deep breath. The petals were soft and velvety and they smelled so very good for hours.

Mouse would cherish those flowers like treasure; he hid them in his room and sniffed and sniffed as long as he could. They reminded him of his Mum. Mouse couldn't actually remember his Mum like a picture in his mind, but her smell was that of the flowers. He sure remembered her smell, and it was more vivid than a picture ever could be. He dried each flower carefully, and placed them in a fancy album he got at the Dollar General.

Today, when Mouse opened his eyes to the morning, he felt the pull strong in his stomach. He wanted to visit again. He wondered if Alex knew about the grey-haired lady in the window, with her long pretty braids, but somehow he didn't think so. He wanted to ask Jamie and Alex about her but he was just plain too scared.

Mouse knew he was different and....odd even. Weird. His Dad told him that every day, and his Dad never kidded around. But boy, he really missed the smell of his Mum.

Mouse was determined to get an Eden flower today. The fat flies buzzed, Mouse sweated, and he continued his stoic, yet hopeful, journey down the Stoney Run Road.

Tracey was dizzy, and Jesus Christ it was an awe-inspiring kind of buzz. Several glasses of Finger Lakes Chardonnay paired with aged smoked cheddar and piled next to sweet piles of Catawba grapes had left an incredible taste on the tip of her tongue. It made her giggle, and lean in to lightly lick the warm skin of Marcus's neck. He tasted of sweat and influential man, mixed with the slightly acrid tingle of fine cologne.

He dipped his head to her ear as she touched her cheek against his impossibly hard shoulder. "I booked us a room at the Bed and Breakfast next door, Tracey," Marcus murmured quietly. Oh yes, she thought wickedly, she had turned him on.

A sudden tingle of doubt assailed her, but only for a moment. Why shouldn't she? Jamie had cheated on her with Alexandra Winters, and Tracey was her own woman. With a rich, gorgeous man at her side, buying her drinks, and one who obviously couldn't keep his eyes off the swell of her creamy cleavage.

He smelled so damned good, too. Just the dominantly male aroma he exuded made her weak and dewy under her sleek, new skirt. Thank God she was blessed with the tits of Venus. This afternoon, she felt invincible.

With a smile of invitation, Tracey stood up, feeling slightly wobbly in her wedge sandals. Wine and four-inch heels didn't mix well, but they would soon be off of her feet entirely, judging from the gleaming look in Marcus's eye. He took her elbow sedately. And like a gentleman, he led her from the wooden deck on which they had been seated, overlooking vineyards surrounded by farmland and rolling mountaintops.

The air was warm and sweet with the scent of summer fields and hemlock in the distance. The slight breeze lifted her long, blond locks, caressing the back of her neck exquisitely. It was a fairytale. One she intended to live every moment of to the fullest.

Her dizziness increased on their stroll next door, but she covered it well. That was one thing she was very accomplished at. Tracey knew the tipsy feeling would pass soon, it always did.

Their room was a little bungalow, detached from the main farmhouse, with whitewashed walls, burgundy shutters, and lovely landscaping about the cottage. A slim brick path lined the way to the door. The air was now scented with the cloying, heady mix of newly blossomed honeysuckle.

Briefly, she glanced upward at the turquoise of the heavens above, dotted only by the feathery wisps of an occasional cloud. The palpable excitement that brimmed in her mind made her pulse escalate.

When the door was opened for her, Tracey entered the room quite willingly.

As Alexandra tightened her calves against Bold Venture's sides, the stallion moved off in a smooth, ground-eating canter. Yet the strength contained within the robust stallion's frame was much more akin with that of a machine. Riding him was like navigating a kick-ass muscle car that lived, breathed and thought.

It never failed to put her in a good mood. An exalted mood, in fact. Petty little things no longer mattered. The day that rained down upon them was perfection, with low humidity, and ribbons of plentiful sunshine that smattered through the trees to brush warm fingers on her shoulders, and gilded the stallion's already shimmering coat. Her hair lifted off of her neck with each stride, the animal breathed rhythmically, and all was good.

She was going to talk to Jamie. Her stomach fluttered a bit at the thought, and the importance of the moment, of what he would say, and how she would counter. But that bitter fear that had coiled like a snake in her gut for so long was gone. Vanquished. The guilt that had eaten away at her insides was fading away as well, drifting off into the currents of warm fresh mountain air they left in their wake.

The Sheldon ranch appeared in the distance and she slowed Bold to a walk, in order to allow the stallion some time to cool off before reaching their destination. He arched his neck and insisted on prancing if, indeed, he must walk. He was a stud, and knew there was a mare about. A simple walk would not suffice, no matter what his rider thought. She chuckled at his grandeur.