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Chapter 9

“This sucks,” Nick muttered, tossing his crutches aside and struggling to ease himself down onto the beach towel Claire had spread out for him without falling.

Smoothing her own towel across the sand, Claire sank down next to him. “Well, look on the bright side – at least you can tan your stump.”

He wrinkled his nose at her and looked down at the aforementioned limb in disgust. “Don’t think that’s gonna happen – it’s gonna be black and blue, not tan.” He could already see the bruise forming, and it was tender to the touch. He’d already tried to put on his prosthesis, and it was very uncomfortable, so he was going without for the time being, hopefully he’d be able to wear the leg later. He was not used to having to rely on crutches for long periods of time anymore, and they were a great inconvenience.

Claire grimaced. “I’m sorry, Nick.”

“Don’t start that again,” he said quickly, offering her a crooked smile. “It’s not like you tripped me.”

“No,” she chucked dryly, “only dumped cold water on you in your sleep.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’ll get you back.” He winked. “Besides, the pictures were kinda funny…” When he felt it was safe to come back into Nick’s room, AJ had apologized sincerely… and then showed Nick and Claire the pictures he had taken in the preview window of his camera.

She giggled. “They were. You looked so pretty; too bad I had to ruin it by letting your makeup run!” She reached out and patted his cheek. “Hopefully it didn’t clog your pores.”

He snorted. “Yeah, if I end up with a face full of zits tomorrow morning on top of everything else, you’re gonna pay.”

She stuck out her tongue at him and then reached over to pick up her jumbo bottle of Sunblock. “Will you worry about payback later and rub some of this on me now? Or else I’m gonna end up red and spotty too.”

He laughed and took the bottle from her, opening the cap while she turned so that she was sitting with her back to him. Squirting a heap of the sunscreen into his hand, he started slathering the cream across the fair skin of her back and shoulders, trying not to get any on her yellow two-piece swimsuit. “You want me to do the front too?” he asked eagerly.

She turned around and took the bottle away from him, smirking. “That’s okay, I got it.”

He sighed, watching as she smeared sunscreen onto her neck and collarbone area, descending down to her stomach. When she set to work on her thighs, he asked casually, his hand digging into the sand beside him, “How much longer you think J and Mary will be gone?” The two of them had disappeared before noon, going to “do some sightseeing, maybe some shopping,” as AJ had said. It was now getting to be late afternoon.

“I dunno,” Claire murmured, rubbing the sunscreen in. “AJ’s a pretty big shopper, isn’t he?”

“Yeah, he is,” Nick said, tightening his fingers around the handful of sand he was holding. “Hey, Claire?”

“Wha-?” She looked up, but he made his move before she had a chance to react, grabbing her and pulling her closer to him while he dumped the handful of sand down the top of her bathing suit. He laughed riotously at the expression of shock on her face as she looked down to find her top filled with sand and her chest covered in it, the grains sticking to her sunscreen-slathered skin.

“Payback,” he smirked.

“Ahh, I hate you! I knew you were gonna do that to me!” she exclaimed, pummeling his shoulder. “Ugh, it’s all gritty! And it won’t-“ She brushed off her skin determinedly, without noticeable results. “-come off!” She groaned while Nick laughed, and stood up. “This beach is private, right? As in, no one can see us?” she asked, looking around warily.

“Right…” Nick answered, looking up at her in perplexity.

“Good,” said Claire and without any further explanation, strode off toward the water, walking straight into the waves without a second thought. Nick just watched as she walked out until the water was past her waist. He squinted, wondering what she was doing, but his eyes quickly flew open wide when he realized she was stripping off her swimsuit top. Her back to him, she dipped down into the water and rose back up about a minute later to put her top back on. Then she turned around and back she came, wading through the water and trotting back up the sand to him as if nothing had happened.

“That’s better,” she said with a casual smile as she plopped down next to Nick, running a hand over her wet, but sand-free chest.

He flashed her a half-smile. “Did you get your top all rinsed out too? If not, you could just take it off again, I don’t mind.”

“Ha ha,” she smirked. “Nice try. I’m not gonna go topless if you’re not, buddy.” She tugged at the strap of his white wifebeater.

“So if I take my top off, you’ll take off yours too? Is that how that works?” Nick asked, arching an eyebrow at her.

She grinned. “I dunno, maybe… you said this beach was private, right?”

“That I did.” His half smile grew to a full one. A very wide, full one.

“Well, then…”

With almost barbaric passion, she ripped his shirt from his body, exposing his broad, muscled chest. Beads of sweat glistened tantalizingly on his bronze skin. She ran her hand slowly down his chest, savoring the sensation of his skin against her fingertips. His heart beat strong and steady beneath her hand, as his chest rose and fell with heavy, fervorous pants of ecstasy. He pulled her close, half-sliding off her swimsuit top in the process, and leaned over her, zealously kissing her lips. His mouth traveled down her body, caressing her neck, then her shoulders. As she pulled her top off in one fluid movement, his kisses grew more intense, rapidly descending downward...

“Nick,” she breathed his name; never had it sounded so wonderful to his ears.

“Nick…” Now it sounded almost like…

“Nickay!”

AJ?

Nick blinked and snapped out of his daydream to find himself still sitting on his beach towel, fully-clothed, the wifebeater still hiding the scars on his side, and Claire sitting next to him, her attention drawn up to the house, where someone was calling to them from the deck. AJ. Damn him. Why did he always seem to come back at the worst of times?

“Hey, stop spacing out, AJ’s calling you,” Claire said, poking Nick.

“We’ll be up soon!” he shouted quickly to AJ and then turned to Claire. “Sorry,” he said sheepishly, feeling his cheeks turn slightly pink. If only she knew the scene he had just imagined…

“It’s all good. So much for privacy though, eh?”

He chuckled. “Yeah… so much for that.”

“That’s all right,” she said with a smile and patted his arm. “Later.”

Nick blinked. Later?

***

“Are you having fun?”

Nick looked over at Claire. “What’d you say?”

“I said, are you having fun??” she repeated, raising her voice to be heard about the pounding music. “You don’t look like you’re having much fun!”

He shrugged and looked down into his tall glass of frothy, amber liquid. “The beer’s good,” he replied vaguely and flashed her a quick half-smile. He didn’t want to ruin the night for her, but she had read him right – he wasn’t having much fun at all.

A few years ago, he would have felt right at home here – music pulsing, lights flashing, drinks flowing, hot bodies dancing. But the club scene was no longer something of which he was a part. As sat there now at the bar, the blaring music, which seemed to shake his body from the inside out as it pounded through the club, was too loud. The lights, whose long neon beams cut through the smoky haze as they flickered and twirled over the dance floor, made him dizzy. The drinks were good, but hardly worth the trip into town, and as for the hot bodies on the dance floor… Nick would have given anything to join them. To slip off of his bar stool and stride coolly onto the floor, picking up a hottie or two on the way. To bump and grind between them, their fine, scantily-clad bodies pressed up against him, and maybe lean down to steal a kiss between songs.

But instead, he remained cemented to his stool and only watched, disengaged, as other men danced with the women. In the corner he could see AJ and Mary, dancing so close it almost seemed they were attached, his hand half up her short skirt, her arms in the air. It had been AJ’s idea to check out the nightlife in the city of Lahaina. “I’ve heard they’ve got some kickin' clubs there,” he’d told Nick enthusiastically and somehow convinced Nick to come out with Mary and him that night.

Nick hadn’t taken much convincing. After the kind of day he had, he was itching to go out and do something, and when AJ had suggested clubbing, it didn’t really even occur to him that clubbing now wouldn’t be as much fun as clubbing then had been – “then” being before cancer had ravaged his body and led to the loss of his leg.

It was more than obvious to him by now, as he sat sipping his beer, with nothing else to do but that. Some clubbers they were – AJ went to dance and not to drink, and Nick was the exact opposite, much to his chagrin. Only the two women got the best of both worlds, although Mary seemed to be staying fairly sober, for AJ’s benefit, and Claire had been sitting at Nick’s side all night. Looking at her now, he realized she probably wasn’t having much fun either.

“You know, you can go dance or something if you want to,” he told her. “Don’t feel like you gotta sit here with me all night.”

She shrugged. “It’s okay. I’m not that great of a dancer anyway.”

“It don’t matter how good you are, just that you have fun doing it. You’re probably not having any fun sitting here.”

“Eh…. like you said… the beer’s good.” She smiled, and he gave her a sympathetic look, wishing they hadn’t tagged along with AJ and Mary. He would have much rather been back on the beach with her, alone…

“Hey, I’ll be right back. I’m just gonna hit the ladies room.” She patted his knee as she slid off her barstool, and as she started to weave her way through the crowd toward the restrooms, he realized it had been the prosthetic one she’d touched. He wondered if she had realized that before she did it, or if it had just been instinct.

Smiling to himself, he turned back to his drink and took a long swig, enjoying the buzz he was getting from the alcohol. A few more of these, and he would forget he wasn’t having a good time.

Claire came back to the bar with a funny little smile on her face, but he didn’t ask what had been so amusing in the bathroom. He figured he probably didn’t want to know.

“So… at least the music’s not bad, right?” he commented. The club had been playing mostly Top 40 hits. “I’d prefer a little more rock, but at least it’s not that techno stuff that all sounds the same.”

Claire laughed. “Yeah, the music’s okay.”

Determined to enjoy himself some more, Nick paid more attention to the music while he drank. A good half hour passed, and he nearly spit out a mouthful of beer when he could have sworn he heard the familiar strains of “Open Arms” by Journey begin to play. Swallowing quickly, he listened and quickly realized that the song was playing. He looked over at Claire, unable to keep himself from smiling. She met his eyes, her smile making hers sparkle in the dim, bluish light.

“Let’s dance,” she said, slipping off of her stool and taking both of his hands. “Come on.”

He let her pull him off of his stool and winced slightly as the foot of his prosthetic leg made contact with the ground, the bruised stump of his real leg aching as it bumped against the socket of the prosthesis. He quickly hid this from her and followed her slowly out onto the dance floor, which had thinned as the groaning hardcore clubbers took the slow song as an opportunity to grab a drink at the bar.

They made their way over to a darkened corner of the floor, and then Claire turned, drifting toward him. He put his arms around her waist, pulling her close, and her arms rose to encircle his neck. Slowly, they rocked back and forth in time to the music, gradually circling round and round. How long had it been since he had slow-danced this way? Nick wondered. Too long, he decided. Bumping and grinding was great, but nothing could beat the intimacy of dancing like this, with the woman he loved in his arms, her head nestled against his chest. He was no longer coordinated enough to manage fancy, fast dancing, but this… this he could do, no problem. Swaying back and forth, shifting his weight between both feet… that had been the first thing he’d learned to do on his prosthetic leg, between a set of parallel bars. He’d come so far since then.

“Now are you having fun?” Claire murmured, smiling up at him as they danced.

“Mm-hm,” he nodded, rocking her back and forth.

The song slowed to a close, and almost instantly, the latest Britney Spears single revved up, and the lights brightened. As herds of people migrated back to the dance floor, Nick and Claire walked hand in hand back to the bar.

“I can’t believe they played that song,” said Nick. “It seems so… out of place, compared to the stuff they’ve been playing.”

“It was perfect though, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah, it- Hey, wait a minute…” Claire was grinning widely, and all of a sudden, he realized. “You did this, didn’t you? You requested this song.”

Her smile grew. “Requested?” She laughed. “More like begged. That DJ did not want to play a slow song, let alone one from the 80’s. I begged, I pleaded, I even flirted, and finally I just had to tell the guy who I was with to get him to agree to play the song.”

“Tell him who you were with? You mean-?”

“Uh, yeah, I pointed you out to him… you might not want to get too drunk cause I kinda promised him you’d take a picture with him or sign something before you left.” She smiled sheepishly. “Sorry.”

He shrugged. “It’s okay. Whatever it takes, right?”

“Right,” she smiled. “And apparently the mere mention of your name is more influential than my female powers of seduction.”

He chuckled and took a swallow of his fresh glass of beer. “Aww, not with me, baby. You can seduce me anytime you want.”

Setting her glass down on the counter, Claire giggled. “I can, huh? I’ll have to remember that.”

***

“So what are you kids up to for the rest of the night?” AJ asked as he walked into the beach house and shut the door behind him. Nick and Claire exchanged glances, but AJ didn’t give them time to answer. “We’re gonna take a little walk on the beach,” he said, grabbing Mary’s hand. “See ya later.” He led his girlfriend through the house and out the sliding glass door on the other side.

As soon as they were gone, Nick snickered. “You know what that means, don’t you?” he said to Claire. “They’re going to have a little sex on the beach.”

Claire smirked. “That sounds about right. Well, I don’t know about you, but I need a shower. I reek like cigarettes and beer.”

“Yeah… I probably do too,” Nick agreed, dipping his head to sniff his shirt sleeve. The stench of smoke and alcohol clung to the fabric, and he wrinkled his nose. “Yeah, I definitely do.”

“So… who wants to go first?”

“I dunno… whaddya say we skip the shower and try out that jacuzzi?”

A slow smile spread over Claire’s face, and she raised her eyebrows. “I could go for that,” she said.

He nodded and took her hand, leading her through the house and into the master bathroom, where the marble jacuzzi awaited them. Nick sat down on the edge of the large tub and turned on the jets, filling the tub with water. Then he stood back up, wincing as he put weight on his left leg.

Claire apparently noticed this time, for a look of sympathy crossed her face, and she asked, “Is it still sore?”

“Yeah,” he admitted with a shrug. “But it’s okay. It’ll be fine once I take this stupid leg off.”

She nodded and came closer to him, sliding her arms around his waist. Rising on tiptoe, she tilted her chin up and kissed his lips gently, then backed away. Eyeing the jacuzzi, she said softly, “I think it’s ready. Are you?”

He smiled. “Whenever you are.”

“Okay,” she whispered and slowly pulled her shirt over her head, exposing a plain black bra. Taking his turn, Nick unbuttoned his own shirt and tossed it aside, then took off the wifebeater he had underneath. Then he just stood there, looking at her, and she looked back. Each seemed to be wondering who was going to make the next move. They had gotten this far before… but not much farther. Nick had a feeling she was waiting to see if he was going to freak out or not.

But he wasn’t going to. Not this time.

This time, he felt looser, more at ease, more comfortable around her. Maybe her actions that day had changed something inside him. Maybe it was just the buzz from the alcohol. But even if it was, he wasn’t too drunk to know exactly what was going on… exactly what was going to happen… exactly what he wanted to happen…

His hands drifted to the waistband of his pants, his fingers fumbling with the button. He loosened the pants and slid them down his hips, letting them drop to his ankles. He easily stepped out of them with his good leg and then lifted the artificial one to slide off the other pant leg. He discarded the pants and stood before her in nothing but his boxers. He saw her hands move to the button on her pants, and she followed his lead, unfastening the button and pulling the stretchy capris down and off, leaving her in just her bra and panties.

Nick sucked in a breath, fully aware of the fact that the next piece of clothing one of them removed would expose brand new territory, a place they had never been before. He had to admit, he was nervous – it had been well over a year since he had been in this position with a woman, and the last time he had, things had been very different. But he felt like he was ready. He wanted to be with Claire, and right then, his devotion to her overpowered his lack of confidence in himself.

“I’m, uh… I’m gonna take this off now,” he mumbled, touching his prosthesis. Somehow, he always felt the need to let her know before he took it off, as if the stump concealed inside it was something so gruesome and hideous it would scare her off if he didn’t properly warn her first.

She simply nodded wordlessly and waited while he expertly slid off the metal leg and the woolen prosthetic sock that covered his stump. While he stood balanced on his one leg, wondering who was going to be the first to expose themselves, Claire reached around to her back and unfastened the clasps on her bra. She let the satiny material loosen and the straps slide down her shoulders until the garment was all the way off. He took a moment to just gaze at her, drinking in the rich sight of a part of her body he’d never seen before. And then he knew it was his turn. Giving her a quick smirk to mask his embarrassment, he dutifully grabbed the elastic waistband of his boxers and slowly guided them down. As he did so, she did the same with her panties, and a moment later, all was revealed.

At first, he was self-conscious, but once they had both climbed into the tub and sank down into the steamy, bubbling water, those feelings faded, and he actually began to feel quite comfortable. The jets of hot water massaging his body were relaxing, and the sight of her sitting there with him, the water lapping at her shoulders, was gratifying.

“This is nice,” she sighed, leaning her head back against the tub’s rim. “This is very nice.”

“You’ve never been in the one in my bathroom at home,” he murmured.

She chuckled. “No… I definitely haven’t.”

“We’ll have to go in it sometime then when we get home,” he said lightly and leaned over to place a tender kiss on her cheek. Smiling, she turned and returned the kiss, pressing her lips against his while her arms rose out of the water and slid around his neck, sending drips of warm water running down his back. Beneath the water, his hands found the small of her back, and he pulled her closer to him, moaning softly as he felt her body press up against his.

“Nick…” she breathed. “… are you… are you ready for this?”

Letting out a shaky breath, he replied without hesitation. “Yes.”

“Here?”

He considered this for a moment and then said, “No. Can we get out?”

“Yeah,” Claire replied and sat up quickly. “Yeah, let’s get out.”

***

Nick was already sitting on the bed, wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist, when Claire came back into the bedroom, dressed in a huge t-shirt that he recognized as one of his own. While he was trying to remember when she’d gotten her hands on that one, she smiled sheepishly and said, “Sorry, I don’t really have any sexy lingerie to put on for you.”

He grinned. “Well, that’s a damn shame. I’ll have to fix that for next time.”

Giggling, she climbed onto the bed and wasted no time in capturing his mouth in a kiss, continuing what they had started in the jacuzzi. Her tongue slid into his mouth, and he massaged it with his, but it was not long before his body was craving more.

“Claire,” he said breathlessly, breaking the kiss, “we’ve waited long enough. I don’t think I can wait anymore.”

She smiled. “Then let’s go for it.”

She took hold of his shoulders and started to ease him down against the pillows when he said, “Wait. Do you, um… should we… use some kind of protection?”

Her eyes met his. “Are you clean?”

“Yeah… but-“

“Then it’s okay. I trust you… and you know you can trust me too.”

“But, what about-“

“It’s okay,” she said again. “Trust me.”

He didn’t fully understand, but looking deep into her eyes, he knew he could trust her. He took a breath and nodded.

“Okay.”


Love is such a sweet emotion
I want to share it all with you
Your trust and this devotion
There ain’t nothing in this world we can’t do
Tonight, I wanna thank, thank you baby
And you make my life complete

Soul to soul, fire to fire
Nothing’s like this heart’s desire
Love is a beautiful thing
One to one, you and me
Maybe it’s our destiny
Cause love is a beautiful thing

- “Love is a Beautiful Thing” by Krystal Harris


***