Vamp Pt. 04

She pulled away and went to the bed. Together, they sank down, for a long moment laying side by side, simply enjoying the pleasure of being close and just looking at each other.

He rose on his elbow and slowly swept his hand over her hair. "I love your hands on me," she said, taking his hand across her face and pressed her lips to his palm.

Giovanni smiled and lowered his mouth to her breasts. With everything in him, he was aware of the yielding in her and he licked her swollen nipples, first one and then the other, lovingly, tenderly.

She was dazed and overwhelmed by her own fiercely rising passion and she was swept away by a rising tide of emotion. Never had she wanted him as much as at that moment. She eagerly reached for him and he immediately covered her with his weight.

Her hands stroked over his body and she thrilled to the perfect form and texture of him, each muscle seemed to her the perfection of masculinity.

He groaned her name, working his way up to kiss her throat. Her heart, for the first time since she had become what she was, was beating faster. She was his.

Jade cradled his face between her hands and kissed his nose and each corner of his mouth, then trailed kisses along his jawline to his ear. "I love you," she wanted to say but couldn't find herself able to speak but he heard it, nonetheless, in his heart.

The gentle smile he gave her caught her heart and she smiled in return. "Marry me, Jade. We belong together."

"We have to talk. I have to tell you something..." she started to say.

..........

He lay on his back, his hands beneath his head, staring at the ceiling. What his love had told him was past anything he had ever imagined when she said "We have to talk," the last words any man wanted to hear.

Somehow, though, her wild tale somehow made sense, if he could believe any of it he had to believe all of it... including the killings that Jade and Lorelei had committed.

Oh, my God, he thought, the killings... and yet, not for one second did he feel any regret at what they had done, only that they might have been caught. Somehow, though, he doubted that would ever happen.

He remembered looking into the mirror and seeing his hair grow whiter every day. That could have been proof enough but he noticed how he felt chilled more and more each day, even for San Francisco... and where had the money come from to renovate the market?

It was all true. His love was so much older than she looked, so much older than he was.

"Giovanni, I want you so much now. If you want me to stop, please, let me know."

"Don't stop," was all he could say as she moved her legs against him. "Don't ever stop. I trust you completely."

"I'll take good care of you. We'll take good care of each other," she vowed with all her being.

"I love you, Jade," he whispered, for the first time realizing that neither had actually spoken, every word had gone straight to the soul, as he settled into the warmth between her legs.

He heard her gasp and felt her beneath him. "I'm very much in love with you." The tenderness of her voice rippled over him, giving him a pleasure unlike any he had ever known before.

He moved against her and she arched her hips in response. He closed his eyes, feeling as though he had been transformed into something better and more powerful as he slipped inside her. They began to move together in a rhythm so fluid and sinuous, it was unlike anything he had ever known before, even with her and he lost himself in the soft, silken heat of her body.

Each stroke Giovanni took within her was so explosive with astonishing pleasure, pleasure that filled her completely and drove out every thought until she clung mindlessly to him. Finally, they lay in absolute stillness, their gazes locked together as firmly as their bodies and as one, their thoughts combined.

..........

The next morning, while Giovanni was at the market training a new employee, Lorelei and Jade went trolling again for members of the Wah Ching gang. Some days, they came home disappointed. Other days, the exhilaration of the hunt was incredible although they both realized that once their quarry was sighted, it was a foregone conclusion that the chase would end in their favor. The hatred they had for the gang was only matched by the violence they committed.

It was well into the third week when their activities came to the attention of the police. The homicide detectives were of mixed opinions on what to do. On the one hand, they had taken an oath to relentlessly track down killers in the city. On the other, none of them felt there was any rush to find out who was eliminating gang members on the north side of the city.

Giovanni's mother, with nudging from Lorelei, had accepted that fact that Jade was going to be her daughter-in-law, however strange that might have seemed when she first met her.

One thing she found gratifying was the quickness that Jade was able to copy her recipes for lasagna, among other things. Jade, unknown to Mrs. Ragucci, gently listening to her mind, had been able to learn directly from the woman how to prepare her son's favorite dishes. Each time, though, she was polite enough, savvy enough to let her future mother-in-law feel she was teaching her to cook.

Several evenings, when she would rather being making love with Giovanni, she was with the old woman rolling out homemade spaghetti and mixing the filling for cannoli. She was content, happier than she had been in a long while and wondered if that was why she had turned to him rather than Lorelei. What had caused the change? She still did not know.

What was she going to do with Lorelei? Would her lover for half a century still love her as much as she had all these years? Would she be willing to wait until she had been satiated with Giovanni or some other arrangement had been decided? She knew it would eventually come about, she only wondered when. She hoped so. She looked at her love affair with Giovanni as an 'extension' of her life, not a 'change', not a 'leaving behind'. She loved Lorelei and always would.

.........

"My God, these are delicious! Molto delizioso!" Giovanni took another bite of ravioli. "I've never had..." He looked at his mother, standing behind Jade. "These are almost as good as my mother's." He laughed, carefully, before finishing the bowl.

"Grazie, Giovanni, mi amore." Jade took a finger, wiped his lip of the sauce and put it into her mouth. "Mmmmm. Tu gusta delizioso."

He pulled her into his arms and wrapped her into a kiss, a deep and probing kiss, forgetting that his mother was standing just a few feet away.

"Quando saremo sposati?" he asked, again, wondering when they would be married.

"Soon," she said, putting her lips to his once again. "Very soon."

..........

Enlai Xuan pounded the table in front of him. "This has to stop!" he exclaimed in Chinese. "We have lost eleven now and no reason for it. There is supposed to be a truce between us and the Mexicans. I don't understand what is happening."

"Maybe the truce is over?" asked his second-in-command.

"Call for a talk. We need to stop this before it gets out of hand and we have a full-scale war on our hands. Make the call."

..........

"...and I'm telling you that we don't know anything about it besides what you've just told us. We have nothing to do with it." Javier Gonzales looked at the Wah Ching leader.

"I find that hard to believe," said Xuan. "I know your fingers are in this city as much as are mine."

"Yeah, well, fine... but, when it comes to this, no. War is bad business, for both of us. When did this start? There must have been something to set this off. Look to your own people and see what they did. I cannot help you."

"If I find out..."

"But you won't. We're through here."

..........

The Chinese gang members began to walk in groups. For the first time, the hunters had become the hunted and they were afraid. Who was preying on them? Some, less sure of themselves than others, stayed home, afraid to go out day or night. Several were beat down by their own gang for cowardice and the neighborhood was beginning to lose the fear of the gang as word spread of the killings and desertions. Xuan felt his control slipping away as each day passed and more and more of his followers left the city. They were not used to dealing with someone who fought back.

A week later, two more of the Wah Ching gang were found stuffed into a dumpster behind a car wash in Daly City. They had been killed in broad daylight as far as anyone could tell for they went missing just after lunch and were found before evening. More Wah Ching left San Francisco, convinced they were next to die.

That night, Jade prepared ravioli stuffed with spinach and roasted peppers. Giovanni thought he had died and gone to heaven, they food was so good. Even Mamma Ragucci, as she how insisted both Jade and Lorelei call her, complimented her on their taste.

..........

"I would like to stop, now," Jade said to Lorelei. "I think it's been enough. I am tired of all this. I just want to be married and love you and Giovanni. I miss us, Lorelei, I miss us very much but the only time we've had together is when we're out looking for those bastards. I'm through."

Lorelei took Jade into her arms and held her closely. A gentle kiss, at first, led to a more emphatic one as the two women embraced in the living room. Without a word, Jade led Lorelei upstairs to the bedroom.

..........

Jade took the long, slow walk up the center aisle, knelt down next to Giovanni at the communion railing and then took his hand. The priest began the age-old marriage ceremony in Latin; "In nómine Patris et Fílii et Spíritus Sancti. Amen."

As the Mass continued, Jade couldn't help but look at Lorelei kneeling next to her as her maid of honor. She gave a shy smile to her as she held Giovanni's hand tighter.

"Io, Jade, prendo te, Giovanni, come mio sposo e prometto di esserti fedele sempre, nella gioia e nel dolore, nella salute e nella malattia, e di amarti e onorarti tutti i giorni della mia vita."

She put the ring, held by Lorelei, onto Giovanni's finger and kissed his palm. "I love you," she said, "now and forever." Giovanni looked back at her, now knowing how long forever was going to be.