Tomorrow's Promise Read online

  The pretty blond pouted for an instant, and then flounced away to join her friends.

  “So?” Tanner asked, trying hard to sound alert. In reality she was so tired she thought she might pass out.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Adrienne hissed, her temper boiling. “You could easily have killed someone with that stunt. Including you and your friends.”

  “But I didn’t, did I?” Tanner replied, swaying slightly. “I was just having a little fun. I always know how far to go. Just lucky, I guess.”

  Adrienne felt sick and disgusted and incredibly afraid. “Tanner, for god’s sake, you have to stop this. Look at yourself! You’re a mess!”

  Tanner ran a hand through her hair and pulled her wrinkled shirt into some kind of order. “Am I? I meant to dress for the party.”

  “Get up. You’re coming with me.”

  Tanner stared at her uncomprehendingly. “I can’t do that. I promised to take everyone for a midnight sail later.”

  “Not tonight, you’re not,” Adrienne said with determination. “Say `good night’ to your girlfriend.”

  Tanner called good night in the young blonde's direction. Sally might have heard her, but she didn’t reply. Adrienne reached down and pulled Tanner up by the arm. Tanner didn’t protest, but she had trouble keeping up with Adrienne’s brisk pace down the beach.

  “Couldn’t we just walk instead of flying?” she gasped at one point, stumbling slightly.

  Adrienne looked at her in exasperation and slipped one arm around her waist. “Come on,” she said as she tugged Tanner along. “We’re almost there.”

  She managed to get Tanner up the back stairs and across the porch to a couch. She pushed her firmly down, saying as she turned away, “You can sleep here. I’ll get you some blankets.”

  “But I’m much too high to sleep,” Tanner protested.

  “Bull!” Adrienne said. “You look like you haven’t slept in days.”

  “I don’t think I have. That’s the whole point.”

  “Christ! You’re a bigger idiot than I thought,” Adrienne cursed, slamming the door on her way into the house. She needed to put a little distance between them. If she stayed she would say more than she meant to, and that was pointless considering the condition Tanner was in. She knew it was crazy to bring Tanner home with her, but she had been terribly afraid to leave her alone. Tanner was in no shape to look after herself, at least not that night.

  What in god's name is wrong with her! She wasn't like this that day on the boat. She was kind, and gentle, and considerate.

  She pulled pillows and a light blanket from the top shelf of a closet, trying not to think of Tanner's face the moment after she had slapped her. The shock, and the hurt. Don't be ridiculous. That has nothing to do with this. And if it did, she couldn't change it. Whatever Tanner needed, it was beyond her power to provide. Adrienne sighed. At least Tanner would be safe for the night.

  Tanner lay back on the cushions while waiting for Adrienne, her mind whirling but her body slowly surrendering to exhaustion. She realized for the first time in days how truly tired she was. It was late. She could see the moon beginning to wane beyond the trees. Her body ached all over, and her head was threatening to explode. She wondered vaguely how she had gotten into this condition. She had only sketchy recollections of the past few days.

  It had actually started out as just a lark. She had been bored and restless for days. Time seemed to stretch into endless hours of meaningless activity. She sailed, paid token visits to the firm offices on business, sat out on the deck with her mother, and prowled the mainland bars at night looking for company. More often than not she returned home alone. It wasn't a stranger she wanted in her bed.

  Her mother didn’t encroach on her silence—she wouldn’t. And Tanner had not wanted to talk. What could she possibly tell her? That there was a woman who occupied her thoughts every waking moment, leaving only restless dreams and unfulfilled fantasies in her wake? That this woman was as unapproachable as a night creature on the shore? As soon as Tanner tried to draw near, no matter how gently, Adrienne withdrew into the shell of her silence.

  Tanner was frustrated and angry. She had tried to be sensitive and undemand­ing — she had tried to be patient. She was attracted to her, she admitted that. But she would have waited, as long as it took, for Adrienne to trust her. But Adrienne had not called.

  Finally Tanner had accepted the invitation of some friends to celebrate the holiday weekend with them. She found herself unable to share in the carefree attitude of her friends, and she tried to capture that same feeling of free-spiritedness by returning to her old methods of escape. Even as she slipped further and further away from reality, she still could not stop thinking about Adrienne. Her frustration only grew more pointed.

  Tanner shook her head, realizing that she was much too befuddled to make sense of any of it. She tugged at the buttons of her shirt in an ineffectual attempt to get it off. Failing that, she managed to get her jeans unzipped, but they ended up twisted around her knees. She gave up.

  When Adrienne returned, she found Tanner lying in a tangle of wet clothes. “It seems like I’m always putting you to bed,” she muttered as she pulled Tanner’s jeans off and tossed them aside.

  Tanner made no protest as Adrienne pulled her upright to unbutton her shirt. As Adrienne slipped the garment down her arms, Tanner grasped Adrienne's shoulders and pulled her close. Her breasts, cool and still damp with sea water, pressed against the light cotton of Adrienne's tee shirt. Before Adrienne could push her away, Tanner kissed her.

  Adrienne responded without thinking, allowing her body to do what her mind had been protesting for weeks. She kissed her back, her arms tightening around Tanner's muscular back.

  Tanner moaned slightly as her tongue probed Adrienne’s parted lips, thrusting her hands into the long hair at Adrienne’s neck, holding her head as her lips roamed over Adrienne’s face and neck. She was mindless of Adrienne’s reluctant efforts to move away—she only pressed closer, the rough fabric of Adrienne’s shirt chafing her tender erect nipples. She wanted to lose herself, finally, in the warm shelter of Adrienne’s mouth and the comfort of Adrienne's body upon her.

  Adrienne managed to break the embrace and held Tanner away at arm’s length. "Stop," Adrienne gasped, tearing here eyes away from Tanner's beautiful face, only to find she couldn't stop looking at her breasts, her strong arms, her flat tight abdomen.

  Tanner shuddered, her dark eyes cloudy with need. “Please,” she whispered, “don’t go away. I want you so much. I have – for so long.”

  God help me, I want you, too.

  Adrienne groaned softly, defeated, and dropped her head against Tanner’s neck. She caressed the soft smooth skin with her lips, tasting the heady mixture of sweat tinged with salt. With one hand she cupped Tanner’s full breast, her thumb brushing the taut nipple, drawing a gasp from Tanner. Adrienne kissed her way slowly down the firm column of Tanner’s neck to her chest. She stroked the full curves of Tanner’s breast with her tongue, working teasingly toward her nipple, finally grasping it between her lips, sucking it into her mouth. She closed her eyes, surrendering to the sweet sensations. She had wanted Tanner this way since that first kiss on the beach. She had longed to feel Tanner yield to her caresses, had ached to run her hands over that golden body. It was useless to deny it now, and she was long past the point of rational thought. She could not have stopped even if she had wanted to. And she most desperately did not want to.

  Adrienne grasped both of Tanner’s breasts in her hands, pressing her face to them with a deep groan, working both nipples around between her fingertips.

  Tanner whimpered, and wrapped her legs around Adrienne's thigh. Adrienne felt Tanner’s pulse pounding there, and her heat and her wet desire. She didn’t think she could possibly feel Tanner enough, and she pressed her hips into her, hard, as her hands traveled up and down the muscular young body beneath her. She leaned up on one elbow and kissed her again,
a deep demanding kiss. She explored the depths of Tanner’s warm mouth, stroking rhythmically with her tongue.

  Tanner’s clutched Adrienne’s buttocks, pulling her closer, rocking her hips erratically along Adrienne's thigh. Suddenly Tanner pulled her head back with a small cry of surprise, breaking their kiss. She stared at Adrienne in a haze of need and desire. “I’m going to come!” she whispered urgently. “I can’t stop it!”

  “Not yet!” Adrienne cried, wrenching herself away from Tanner’s shuddering body with effort.

  Tanner moaned and tried to pull Adrienne down against her again. “I can’t! Please!”

  “You can,” Adrienne soothed, running her tongue lightly down Tanner’s neck to her breast again. “You can. Just a little longer. I want so much more of you!” Her tongue made lazy circles of fire on Tanner’s abdomen as she shifted her own legs down onto the floor. She rested her head gently against Tanner’s thigh and parted the damp hair between Tanner’s legs with her fingers. Tanner cried out and thrust herself against Adrienne’s hand, trying to rub her swollen clitoris against Adrienne’s fingers. That motion finally broke Adrienne’s control. She moaned, deep in her throat, and brought her lips down around Tanner’s clitoris. Tanner sobbed incoherently as Adrienne stroked her lightly with her tongue.

  “You’ll make me come,” Tanner panted. “So close – I’m so close already—“

  Adrienne felt Tanner throb and grow harder. Tanner’s need was so clear she could not deny her. She licked her faster as she slipped her fingers inside Tanner’s warm depths, pressing gently forward as Tanner’s muscles spasmed around her. She held Tanner against her mouth as the sweet torture of her caress pushed Tanner over the edge.

  “Uh huh – oh god, yes – that’s itohright there – don’tstop—“

  Adrienne moved with the contractions of Tanner’s body until Tanner finally lay still, sobbing softly, exhausted, satiated. Adrienne gently withdrew her hand and stretched out beside Tanner on the couch, gathering Tanner's limp body into her arms. She kissed her tenderly on the forehead and brushed the damp hair from her eyes. They lay silently for a long time.

  Finally Tanner stirred and turned to kiss Adrienne softly on the lips. Her hand caressed Adrienne’s face and pushed under the collar of her shirt. “I want you,” she whispered huskily.

  Adrienne caught Tanner’s hand in her own, stopping her explorations, as she kissed her again. “Not now,” she said gently.

  “When?”

  “I don’t know. Just rest now.”

  Tanner sighed and pressed against Adrienne, want warring with supreme contentment. She meant to protest, but sleep claimed her first.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  WHEN TANNER AWOKE, she was alone. The sun was streaming in through the screens, directly into her face. She shielded her eyes with her forearm and waited for her head to clear. She had a pounding headache, but otherwise, she seemed to be in one piece. She opened her eyes tentatively and winced at the bright light. She took note of her clothes spread out over a chair, and when she saw them, all the events of the past evening rushed back to her. Suddenly she felt Adrienne’s hands upon her just as they had been a few short hours before, and she knew it had not been a dream. She sat up quickly, ignoring the flash of pain in her head, and looked around.

  “Adrienne?” she called. Even as she did so, she knew instinctively that Adrienne was not there. Of course she wasn’t. Everything Tanner knew of Adrienne convinced her that what had happened last night would have shaken Adrienne’s carefully constructed world to the core. Adrienne would have gone off somewhere, thinking, searching for an explanation.

  Something rational, no doubt. As if there is anything rational about this. And when she gets back she‘ll probably try to convince me that last night was some kind of fluke—an accident that should not have happened. Yeah, right.

  Tanner swung her legs to the floor, ignoring the sudden lurching in her stomach. “Well, it won’t work,” Tanner muttered to herself as she got up unsteadily to search for the bathroom. “Not this time, it won’t.”

  She turned the shower on full blast and stepped into it, shivering at the cold pinpoints of water that struck her. The feelings that Adrienne had aroused in her were too intense to be shrugged off. The desire still too fresh. She recalled vividly how much she had wanted Adrienne to touch her, and how much she longed to return that passion. Tanner was far from a passive lover—she wanted to excite, to please, to satisfy in return for the breathtaking pleasure she had received. She would not be denied that desire. She pulled an old shirt of Adrienne’s off a hook behind the bathroom door and went back out on the deck to wait.

  Adrienne walked slowly up the beach toward the house. She had left when the sun came up, gently disengaging herself from Tanner so as not to awaken her. Tanner had looked so lovely asleep that Adrienne had hated to leave her, but she knew she needed some time out of reach of this woman. When she was near her she couldn't seem to think straight, and to her dismay her body seemed to want to continue the activities of the previous evening. She had looked at Tanner and grown heavy with desire.

  Too much had happened too quickly, and she needed to sort it out. Now as she returned, she was no closer to understanding any of it. Oh, she understood her desire. How could she not? Tanner was impossible to resist with her sensual body and passionate demands. But Adrienne was too old to believe that desire was an end in itself. She had known desire, infatuation, lust—whatever one called it—many times in her life, but had rarely acted upon it. For some reason Tanner had been able to overcome all of Adrienne’s resistance with the force of one simple kiss. She had been powerless to stop, and at this point in her precarious life, she needed all of her control. She wasn’t at all sure what she would say if Tanner were still there when she returned. She wasn’t even sure what she wanted to say. She only knew that she was very frightened.

  Tanner, waiting patiently on the deck, was in her own way just as frightened. She knew that somehow she must convince Adrienne to let her in, and she was at a loss as to how to begin. There was so much she wanted to say to her, but every time she tried, she was met with the cold wall of Adrienne’s fear. Tanner realized that Adrienne had lost more in the last year than Tanner had ever had—a lover, a career, a lifetime of plans. The thought was staggering, and Tanner was overcome with feelings of inadequacy. How could she ever hope to replace any of those things?

  “Maybe I can’t,” Tanner sighed to herself, “but, I know what I feel for her. And I’m going to make her listen to me, finally.”

  She must have dozed for a while because she was startled by the sounds of footsteps on the stairs. She looked up to see Adrienne crossing the deck towards her. She smiled shyly and said, “Hi.”

  Adrienne smiled back. “Hi, yourself. How are you feeling?”

  Tanner shrugged and replied, “Depends on how you mean it. Stupid, embar­rassed, grateful and crazy.”

  Adrienne laughed, throwing her hands up at the same time. “What on earth are you talking about?”

  “Well, I feel stupid about my behavior the last three or four days—I’m not sure of the exact count because I’m not sure what day it is today. And very embarrassed that you saw me when I was so completely wrecked. Grateful that you dragged me away.” She took a deep breath and looked directly at Adrienne, and continued in a tumble of words, “And crazy about you.”

  Adrienne looked away uncomfortably. She walked over to the rail and stood staring down at the dunes. When she turned back, her expression was impossible to read. “I can’t tell you how angry you make me when you do those things to yourself. You could injure yourself, or someone else, and I can’t believe that it does you any good emotionally. But I also know that no one can stop you, or change you. You’ll have to do that yourself. But I won’t pretend I can tolerate it for a minute. I can’t.”

  Tanner looked at her thoughtfully, knowing that Adrienne was completely serious. She knew Adrienne was right, had always known it – but she just hadn't ha
d enough reason to care before this. “I understand,” she said quietly. “I’ll clean up my act.”

  Adrienne did smile at that. “You are so lovely, Tanner.” She shrugged helplessly. “I hate to say it, but I find you quite impossibly irresistible. But…”

  Tanner raised an eyebrow. “But?”

  “I don’t want a repeat of last night’s events,” Adrienne said flatly. “I won’t pretend I didn’t enjoy it. You know better than that. I was swept away, or off my feet, or whatever. I couldn’t say `no’ to you—I didn’t want to. But I want that to be the end of it.”

  Tanner studied her, taking calm measure of the situation. She had no doubt that Adrienne meant what she was saying. She even thought she understood some of the reasons. Understanding didn't mean she had to accept it. “I don’t want it to end.”

  “Oh, Tanner!” Adrienne cried in exasperation. “Don’t make this any more difficult than it already is!”

  Tanner approached Adrienne where she leaned against the deck rail until they were almost touching. They were so close that she could see the tiny beads of sweat on Adrienne’s forehead.

  “Tell me that you don’t want me,” she said softly, her dark eyes searching Adrienne’s face.

  Adrienne’s gaze grew gentle as she looked at Tanner’s ruffled hair, liquid eyes, and full lush mouth. She took a deep breath, determined to remain resolute. “That’s not the point. Not for me at least. Lust has nothing to do with it—I don’t have room for this sort of thing in my life. You are a desirable woman. I’d have to be dead not to notice. But I still don’t want to be involved with this.”

  Tanner rested her hand on Adrienne’s waist. “I want you, Adrienne.” Her lips were only inches away.

  Adrienne stood absolutely still. “I don’t want you to want me. It doesn’t work for me anymore. I really don’t have the need for it anymore. Can’t you see how one sided it would be?”