College Girls Ch. 03

"I'm getting out too," Kate was saying with a self-conscious giggle, probably wondering if anyone had noticed what she and Peter had been up to. "I'm starting to prune up."

Fawn, as ever, kept her own counsel, but there was a shy smile on her lips for the first time. And Luke was grinning, which didn't count for much, since that's what he always did. Except that she noticed now how close he was to her in the tub and how the grin was directed towards her rather than Kate. Susan instinctively looked for Ken, but he had drifted away at some point, or maybe she had moved farther from him. He was three or four feet away now, and he looked … serene, his eyes closed, his breathing regular. Was he really asleep?

Susan's heart stopped. The water in the tub, as warm as it was, suddenly chilled her to her core. It couldn't have been … he wouldn't dare …

"See you guys in the morning," Kate said, standing and turning. The sight of her bare butt, bright pink from the warm water, finally drew Luke's eyes away from Susan.

Susan moved quickly. "Right, me too," she said, pulling herself out of the water and wrapping her robe around her shoulders before anyone could notice. She leaned over to rouse Ken, trying to keep the robe closed at the same time. Luke, damn him, was looking up at her from the tub. God only knew what he could see from his low vantage point. She shook her head. It was pretty dark, and she had other problems. She wasn't feeling all that well.

"Hey," she said. "I'm going upstairs."

Ken finally looked towards her, his serene expressing transforming into his familiar warm smile. "Well, it looks like the party's over then."

With a nod towards Fawn and Luke, Ken lifted himself out of the tub in a single smooth motion. Susan wanted to admire his liquid grace, how the water dripped along his smooth chest and the lean columns of his thighs, but she was just too dizzy and miserable. Ken noticed her stumble and put an arm around her waist, and, still naked, helped her upstairs. He hid his disappointment well when she apologized, wobbled to the bed, and then passed out as if she'd been clubbed.

* * *

Ken was solicitous the next morning, bringing her tea and sitting beside her on the bed. The room took a while to come into focus. Susan hadn't particularly noticed anything about it the night before. There was a ski-run map on one wall and dark, heavy furniture that looked more expensive than stylish. A window looked out onto a white mountainside that bristled with very conical pine trees.

Her head felt as if someone had dropped a piano on it.

Ken was wearing a robe he hadn't bothered to tie. She wanted to admire him, maybe even touch the places that the robe left exposed, but it just wasn't happening this morning. She'd been wondering what it would take to completely purge her mind of all thoughts of sex. Now she knew. A few shots of tequila would do it, apparently.

"I don't think I'll be doing any skiing this morning," she said, trying to sound chipper.

"Not to worry," said Ken. "I'll just stay here and take care of you."

"No, you should go – it looks like a perfect day."

"Wouldn't dream of it. We've got three more days here. What's the hurry?"

She really did smile this time. "Okay."

Ken found some electronica on the radio and refilled her tea cup. A little later, she decided that she could eat some plain toast, and Ken sat beside her again and stroked her arm until she fell asleep.

* * *

When Susan woke up she felt fine. Well, her mouth was a bit gummy and her eyelids were glued shut, but fine otherwise. Ken was sitting in a chair nearby reading a book – something about Byzantine history from what she could make out.

"Hey," she said softly.

Ken looked up. "How are you feeling?"

"Pretty good. Maybe we can get some skiing in today after all."

He smiled. "Can I get you anything?"

She shook her head, something that would have been impossible a few hours earlier. "No, I'm going to take a shower."

Ken nodded. "Okay. I'll see you downstairs."

She shook her head again, really appreciating her ability to do so for the first time in her life. "Give me a few minutes." She smiled shyly. "Then … would you like to join me?"

* * *

Susan brushed her teeth first, which helped a lot. Then she set the shower as hot as it would go and stingingly hard. She stepped under it and let the spray pound her into semi-consciousness. The tingling of her skin stirred up some uncomfortable thoughts. The hot tub. What had really happened there? Who had been touching her? Even at the time she had sensed that it wasn't Ken. And the truth was that she hadn't cared. She'd been watching Peter. Not that she could really see what he was doing; she'd had to infer it from the way his muscles had bunched and relaxed, from the way his breathing deepened. Having to use her imagination made it worse somehow. She'd needed someone to touch her, to make it all real. And Ken had been so out of it – drunk, tired from the trip? She wasn't sure. And what did that say about her? She liked watching Peter with Kate. Peter's sexual energy was so intense, and Kate was so free, so uninhibited. Susan wished she could be more like that. Seeing them together made her feel … she wasn't sure what it made her feel. Whatever it was, it was different than what she had with Ken.

Susan's skin reddened from the impact of the hot water. She really didn't want to think about it. But now that she'd started, she couldn't clear her head of the steam-shrouded image of Kate sitting on Peter's lap, her breasts heaving, her eyes wild.

A foggy shadow materialized on the other side of the glass. The shower door slid open and Ken stepped in, so at ease that Susan almost didn't notice that he was naked. She threw herself against him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. That rattled his savoir faire just a little, Susan noted with satisfaction. Her skin almost sizzled where it touched his. Her breasts flattened against his chest, her nipples stiff despite the heat of the spray. He held her, one hand straying down to that spot just below the small of her back that always made her heart race when he touched it. Then he let go of her and reached for the shower handle.

"Mind if I turn this down a bit?"

Susan tried to locate some soap. "No, go ahead."

The water began to fall less like razor blades and more like warm rain. She stood in front of him and rubbed the soap across the front of his body. She hadn't done anything like this before – she was improvising. But it was fun, and Ken was obviously enjoying it. After a minute, he closed his eyes and lost that faintly amused smile of his. And when she got her hands good and soapy and ran them over his cock, it hardened quickly under her fingers. Once his skin was shiny and slick all over, she spread the soap on herself. Ken watched, and Susan noticed a little twitch starting above his cheek. She hadn't meant to … to make a ceremony out of this. But the way he was watching her, his eyes lingering on her breasts and the outward curve of her hips … it made her want to …well, to reward him a little.

She ran the bar of soap between her breasts, rubbing the inner swells, circling around one, then the other, finally sliding it across a nipple. Her own legs began to feel unsteady.

"Don't stop," Ken said a little tensely.

Susan smiled to herself and slid the soap down to her stomach. She moved closer to the spray, and it pelted against her skin, turning the soap film to glossy bubbles that sheeted over her breasts and dripped from the tips of her nipples. Then she put her arms around Ken and pulled their bodies together. The frictionlessness of his skin against hers felt like … like skating, only warmer, of course, warm and yielding … but with the same sense of barely knowing what was going to happen next. She experimented a little, sliding from side to side, feeling her nipples bump along his ribs and her pubic hair scratching against his scrotum. His cock was very hard now, trapped between them, its tip drawing little circles on her slick stomach. She felt breathless all of a sudden, and she kissed Ken with more urgency than he was prepared for. He held her tightly, driving his cock head against her belly, and he reached down to run soapy fingers across her butt.

"Turn around," he said between kisses. "I'll do your back."

That sounded innocent enough, but she didn't want innocent right now. She reached between them and put her hand back on his cock. She'd just meant to touch it, to offer a little encouragement. But, with the blood hammering inside it, it felt so … it felt like she was holding something alive. Sliding the shaft between her fingers was so effortless. She looked down. The head seemed to pulse, as if it could sense her lust, the nearness of her loins. She ran her thumb over the tip and felt his body jerk. So smooth … the wet, fine-grained skin, a bead of sticky pre-cum leaking from the tiny hole at its center. She circled around the opening with one finger.

Ken shuddered. "Turn around," he said again, an edge in his voice this time.

She did. She looked demurely over her shoulder at him while the water dripped down her hair and along the curve of her back. She felt like a nude statue from a fountain. She tilted her hip a little, bent one knee slightly to heighten the illusion. She'd never felt so sexy in her life. Ken moved closer, began to spread soap across her back. She closed her eyes and surrendered herself to the syrupy smoothness of his touch, and then she could feel the closeness of his body, so near that the steam coming off of his skin warmed her own and the head of his cock brushed her butt. A little jolt of electricity flowed from the place where his flesh rubbed against hers. Ken must have noticed the way she reacted. He began to move his hips almost imperceptibly, so that his cock skimmed over her skin, the touch so light that she barely knew it was happening. But there was that spot, the place he could always find, where her butt began to curve away from the small of her back. She shifted a little until the tip of his cock was touching her right there and its heat flowed through her. She had to put her hands against the wall on the far side of the stall to keep herself from falling. She thought vaguely that he might see that as an invitation, her legs a little apart, leaning forward, the muscles along the backs of her thighs taut, her pussy exposed and its lips swollen and wet from the spray and from her arousal.

She looked down and closed her eyes. She felt Ken's cock against the top of one thigh, leaving a trail of warm fluid, and suddenly she didn't want to think anymore, she just wanted to feel him inside her, in the one place that really mattered. She pushed her hips back, tempting him, imploring him. And she felt tears running down her cheeks, almost indistinguishable from the spray of the shower, but salty and hot, and she realized that she didn't have to wait, to just hope that Ken would know what she wanted. She'd been modest, discreet. But she was naked now, alone with her lover. She didn't have to be shy or ashamed.

"What are you waiting for?" she asked.

She looked back over her shoulder again. Now Ken's eyes held the look she'd seen when she opened her robe that evening in his living room. The look that said that he was transparent, stripped of all his pretenses. That look was private, it was just for her. She felt a connection, a special closeness, a feeling that fused with the pressure of his flesh against hers, his cock sliding between her thighs, the head probing her outer lips and the sensitive folds. Her legs began to tremble again and she tilted her hips back until his shaft lay along her furrow, the tip bumping against her clit.

He put his hands on her slippery flanks, digging his fingers into the wet skin of her butt.

"Please, Ken …"

She couldn't control her body. It molded itself to him, trying to draw everything it could from the limited contact, rubbing brazenly against him. She just couldn't wait any longer; she reached between them and nudged the tip of his cock into the entrance to her pussy and pushed back.

Her body remembered his dimensions, and she swallowed him in one smooth motion. She let out a long sigh as he sank all the way in. She felt complete, joined to him as if some part of her had been missing until just now. Her legs steadied and they flowed together in an innate rhythm, as if they'd never been apart. He reached around her, stroking her stomach. The touch made her drive her hips back, holding him still for a moment. The familiar warm, liquid feeling washed over her, flowing outward from her pussy until it filled her up and everything turned soft and indistinct. Ken was holding her tightly and she could feel spasms rocking his body. Then he wasn't inside her anymore; his cock lay against her butt and he was coming, the hot liquid falling in ropes on her back and dripping between her cheeks, mixing with the spray from the shower. She turned, sliding in his arms, until they were face to face. She kissed him hard, rubbing her belly against his still rigid cock, drawing a groan from him and one more spurt of cum that lubricated the place where their bellies touched.

After a long time Ken let go of her and leaned back against the tile wall, his eyes closed, water splashing against his body. Hi s expression was unreadable.

"I'm afraid of you," he said.

* * *

"The cabin actually belongs to my aunt," Ken explained. "She tried to teach me to play the piano years ago. I think she lets me use the place now in gratitude for my abandoning my musical ambitions after the third or fourth lesson."

That was typical of Ken, Susan decided. His self-deprecation was his way of defining himself. All he ever talked about was what he hadn't accomplished, of talents he lacked or projects that had gone comically awry. She had to understand him from the spaces he left between his anecdotes, like those pictures they show you in psychology, where there are two faces looking towards each other, but if you blink you can see a vase instead. So he revealed himself, but you almost had to look away to really see him.

Susan watched the rest of their group while Ken spoke. Kate sparkled – there was no other word for it. She laughed musically when Ken told them about a cross-country ski trip rife with misadventure and featuring encounters with hungry bears, incompletely frozen lakes, and irate land-owners. Kate looked very beautiful when she laughed, her teeth gleaming and her blond hair flying. She was at her best in company, especially if there was alcohol (and there was plenty, not that Susan was having any, thank you). Fawn listened worshipfully. Luke would occasionally whisper something to her and she would respond briefly, then turn her attention back to Ken. Susan could tell that Luke was getting annoyed. Peter listened too, but he seemed brooding and pensive.

Their main courses arrived and Susan picked at her chicken breast. Luke took the opportunity to interrupt Ken's narrative.

"Peter," he asked, "did you do any of those double black diamond runs?"

Peter smiled ruefully. Susan appreciated the break in his dark mood. His tension had been making it hard for her to enjoy herself.

"I'm working up to it," he said. "How about you?"

Susan had been feeling well enough by late afternoon to try a couple of the bunny slopes. Everyone else had been more ambitious. She visualized Peter slicing down the steep runs at the top of the mountain, his athletic body under razor-sharp control. She felt a little twinge.

"Tried a couple of them," Luke answered.

He sounded awfully self-satisfied to Susan, but that may just have been because she wanted to dislike him.

"That Twin Pines run, you just have to close your eyes and hang on. It would be too scary if you looked."

Now Susan imagined Luke wobbling down Twin Pines with his eyes closed and slamming into a tree. She sighed. She just wanted dinner to be over. She felt badly about that. She should enjoy being with her friends, the way Kate obviously did. But right now she just wished she were alone with Ken.

No such luck. Dessert and coffee went on endlessly, and then Ken wanted a glass of port, naturally. She half-expected him to suggest cigars next. But, finally, the bill arrived and they piled into the SUV for the trip to the cabin.

It was still fairly early in the evening when they got back. Dinner had only seemed to last forever, Susan decided. The hot tub was the unspoken next phase of the evening. Ken went to the kitchen to organize a bottle of wine and some glasses, and everyone else went headed upstairs to get ready. With the coast clear, Susan saw an opportunity to get into the tub before the rest of the crowd showed up. She still felt reticent, but she decided that modesty in front of this group was getting to be a little silly.

Susan had been soaking by herself for a few minutes when Peter joined her. She had her eyes closed and didn't see him get in. She felt a brief frustration that she'd once again missed the opportunity to see him naked.

"Where's Kate?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Helping Ken with something."

When Susan didn't respond, Peter said: "Ken seems like a good fellow."

"Yes." She kept her voice as neutral as possible.

"But I have to ask, when you go to a restaurant, does he order in French?"

Susan just glared at him. As much as she wanted to reply with some sort of cutting remark, she couldn't quite. The thing was, he did order in French. But it wasn't an affectation or anything, it was just what he did.

Peter looked smug. It didn't suit him.

She leaned forward and snapped: "At least I know that he won't lie to me."

Peter held up both hands. "Hey, sorry." And he really was. "No offence intended."

Susan stared hard at him for another moment while she fought to control all the feelings tangled up inside her head. She was half out of the water, she realized, her breasts very much on display. Her emotion drained out of her as suddenly as it had gathered. She felt foolish.

But Peter was looking into her eyes, not at her chest. That bothered her at a level she didn't even want to think about. She leaned closer to him. The deck lights reflecting off of the snow washed the color from his face, made him seem abstract, like one of those impossibly handsome men in an old photograph. She closed the distance between them, sending ripples splashing around the tub. She put her hand behind his head, pulled him closer, and kissed him quickly.

"You're right. I'm not handling this very well. I want us to be friends."

There was a lot more she wanted to say, but she was pretty sure it wouldn't come out right. She looked down and moved back to her side of the tub. But her bare breasts were still floating on the pale foam.

"You're beautiful," Peter said.

Susan felt herself blushing. She couldn't look at him.

"You know …" Peter's voice trailed off. "You know how these weekends usually go …"

She shook her head. "Not really."

"Well … if everybody's feeling … friendly and they're drunk enough, sometimes, you know, they'll end up switching partners."

"So I've heard," Susan said, suddenly cold again. It had felt so good for a minute, and now he was ruining it. She hated having the same conversation with Peter that she'd had with Luke.

"If that happened, well, then we wouldn't be lying to anyone."

Susan looked down, her face burning. "I couldn't do anything like that." But she sounded tentative, even to herself.

"Let's just see how it goes, okay?"

"I'll think about it."