The Foreigner's Caress

“What’s going on, Stevenson?” she asked.

“There’s nothing going on, Mother. I just want to spend some more time here in the States. Look, I know that Dad’s got a lot going on and I understand why you guys need to get back right away. But, Mother, I’ve been working day in and day out since I finished at the university. I need a little break.”

“Isn’t this a little sudden, son? I mean, you haven’t mentioned anything about wanting to take some time off before. Why now?” Janice pressed, wanting her son to confide in her the way he used to.

“There’s no specific reason. We’re here in New York City and it’s a great city. I just thought I could take a few more days…perhaps a week or two to get to see more of it. Take in some shows, a couple of basketball games at the Garden…you know. Look, I’ll be back at home and at work before Dad even misses me. Come on, Mother, what do you say?”

“Well, Stevenson, you’re a grown man. You certainly don’t need my permission,” Janice replied.

“I know that, Mother, but I want it just the same.”

“No, what you want is for me to soften the request to your father,” Janice countered.

She knew her son well and she also knew that like her, he was well aware of his father’s demanding nature.

“All right. I was thinking that Dad would be less likely to flip out if you were on my side,” Steve admitted. “You know that you have a way with him. So what do you say?” Steve said, nudging his mother’s thigh with his leg.

Janice grinned as she looked into her son’s face, never having been able to resist that infectious Elliott smile of either her child or his father. She’d gladly take the brunt of Gregory’s discord if it meant sparing Stevenson the same.

“Oh, all right,” she said. “But you’ll have to make your own arrangements. We’re not paying for you to keep your suite here. It’s an expense that isn’t necessary, considering the amount of time you’ve actually spent indoors. Where will you stay?”

“That’s already taken care of. I got a room at the Crowne Plaza near the United Nations building. It’s right here in the heart of Midtown and it’s a whole lot cheaper than this place.”

“Oh, you have?” Janice said, eyeing her son suspiciously. “Well, I guess you’ve thought this all through. All right, well, make sure you contact the travel agent, Elaine, and have her reissue your return flight ticket. And when exactly will that be?”

“I’ll call you in a few days, Mother, and let you know. Listen, you and Dad have a safe trip and I’ll talk to you soon,” Steve said, kissing his mother swiftly on the cheek before jumping up from the sofa.

“Aren’t you going to wait to speak with your father?” Janice called as he began making his way toward the door.

“Oh, you know he’s going to be on the phone with those Wesco guys for at least another hour. I’ve got to get going…I have plans for tonight. Don’t worry, I’ve already packed my belongings. You can just have the bellhop leave my bags with the concierge and I’ll pick them up tomorrow. Love you, Mother,” Steve said.

With that, he was gone, leaving a puzzled Janice staring after the closed door of the hotel suite, wondering just what had gotten into her son. She also wondered exactly what he meant by a cheaper hotel, hoping that he hadn’t checked in to some economy dive.

She slipped into a reverie of a time that didn’t seem so far away. When she was her son’s age, her life had been difficult at best. She and Gregory struggled to make ends meet while getting his business off the ground. Janice remembered the early days vividly. She’d given birth to her only child when she and Gregory still lived in a tiny two-room flat that lacked indoor plumbing in the rural farmlands of Jamaica. Both she and Gregory had been raised in the countryside of St. Elizabeth. Gregory was a couple of years older than her, but their families had attended the same ramshackle church where they’d played together as children. Both she and her sister Claudia had carried crushes on Gregory Elliott all through grade school, but it was Janice who’d won his heart.

Janice always knew that Gregory would be successful. She would sit and listen to him talk for hours about how he was going to get out of the country, out of Jamaica and live a good life. As the youngest of five children in a Seventh Day Adventist family led by a hardworking but indebted farming couple, Gregory had dreamed of a life far removed from the one he’d known. He was sorely embarrassed by his family’s lack, even though all of their neighbors, and the entire town for that matter, were no better off. Gregory became an exceptional student and a determined young man. He had done whatever was necessary to become the success he always knew he could be, and she’d supported him in every way she knew how. Janice supported him emotionally and physically as he earned, bribed and brown-nosed his way into a successful career after starting out in the natural resources manufacturing and trade business in Jamaica.

By the time Steve turned five years old, Gregory had relocated to England and brought his family over after a six-month separation, leaving the poverty behind. In doing so, they’d also gladly severed all ties to their shameful beginnings. Gregory made every one of his and Janice’s dreams come true, and she was proud to know that their son would have options and opportunities that they had only dreamed of when they were his age. She’d always reasoned that someday there would be retribution for the things they’d done, but she never let that certainty deter her. One of her greatest joys was the knowledge that her son would never have to work as hard as his father had worked. He would never have to sacrifice the way they’d had to. Most importantly to her, his conscience would never be burdened by sins of the past the way hers was. As heir to the Elliott Corporation, one of the largest import/export companies in England, Stevenson was assured of his future.

Janice smiled again as she thought of her son. She realized that he did deserve a little time off, as he had always worked hard and lived up to every expectation they held for him, even when he was just a little boy. Soon enough it would be time for him to take over more of his father’s operations and settle down to begin a family of his own. She looked forward to the day when she and Gregory could sit back and enjoy the fruits of their labors. She’d already begun planning the trips abroad she’d wanted to take and the extended excursions she’d always dreamed of. Janice could not imagine having a more perfect life and had no doubts that it would continue to just get sweeter.

Chapter 6

“This place reminds me of the nightclubs back home in England,” Steve shouted over the loud, pulsing house music that boomed from every corner of the dimly lit room.

They were on the upper floor of Webster Hall, a trendy dance club located on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. It was housed inside an old warehouse on one of the lower-numbered streets in a diverse neighborhood. The cavernous club contained room after room of eclectic décor and varying musical stylings.

“This is only my second time coming here, and I still can’t get enough. You’ve got every type of person in here from rocker to hip-hop heads and everything in between. It’s wild,” Madison shouted back over the din of the music and voices.

They’d spent the past few days around the city. Steve professed that he wanted to see every inch of New York City and, despite the fact that Madison was a recent transplant herself, he appointed her his personal tour guide. They’d gone to the Empire State Building in midtown Manhattan, Flushing Meadow Park in Queens and various other points of interest in and around the five boroughs. Tonight, Madison had felt like dancing.

The couple made their way to the bar, where Steve ordered two Coronas. They sipped their beers in silence, gazing at the variety of New Yorkers who circled the room. The same-sex couples mixed and mingled with the straight ones, while the preppie college kids shared drinks with the Bohemian old-heads.

When a gorgeous blonde approached them and began chatting Madison up, Steve stared in wide-eyed wonder as the woman made a blatant pass at his companion as if he weren’t standing there. Steve had never considered himself the jealous or insecure type, but he had to acknowledge that the woman was striking and, hey, this was the new millennium. It occurred to him that he didn’t know enough about Madison to know specifically what she was in to and decided he wasn’t about to take any chances. He placed a defensive arm around Madison’s waist and pulled her to the dance floor. Madison’s admirer followed them with burning eyes for a while before moving on in search of a new conquest.

“Well, Mr. Elliott, let’s see what kind of moves you’ve got. Now you know this isn’t ballroom dancing. I hope you can keep up,” Madison teased.

“I’ve got moves, baby, believe that,” he stated with the self-assuredness that she had grown used to hearing from him.

The beat pulsed loudly in their ears, sucking them into it as their bodies moved against one another. They danced through song after song, laughing and teasing as they grew familiar with the movement of each other’s bodies. Steve looked down at Madison, captivated by the sexiness of her frame as much as by the femininity she exuded without even trying. The skirt she wore exposed legs that held a promise that could not be denied. He ran his hands up and down her diminutive waist, settling on her hips, which were swaying against him at a melodic tempo.

Their bodies met, finding a comfortable space to claim as their own. The lights zipped across the dance floor, flashing on her golden skin, now covered with a thin layer of perspiration, and Steve realized that he had never met a woman whom he found more alluring. His arousal as they danced grew from deep inside and by the time it became a physical wanting, it was larger than the room itself. Their eyes locked and held as they both became aware of the desire that was building between them. Steve ran his hand across the soft locks that framed her face, delighting in the texture and feel of them against his skin. Steve’s desire to kiss her, to taste her mouth and tongue, was stronger than any other urge he’d ever felt. Cupping her face in his hands and moving in slow motion, he bent his head toward hers and found a sweet mouth waiting in anticipation for him. His tongue tentatively pried its way in between her lips, making contact with her tongue in an almost timid fashion. She opened her mouth wider, allowing him deeper access, and he responded by giving her all of his tongue. Their kiss engaged every bit of their oral cavities, as they drew one another in to completely discover their essences.

Forgetting time and space, the gyrating bodies around them became a distant memory, they moved to a place in their minds that was far removed from anything recognizable. Their ragged breathing was louder in their ears than the music, and everyone else in the room seemed to disappear at once, leaving them alone within their passion. The probing exploration of their tongues spurred them to greater desire until finally Steve pulled away, unable to take one more second of tortured provocation. He wanted to get her alone, and it was that single thought that drove him silently through the throngs of people and out onto the street.

Leaving the club arm in arm, they maintained the electrifying connection that had exploded between them. Madison settled against Steve’s side as they drove back uptown to her place. With her eyes closed, she replayed the images of the two of them together, still warm from the heat their bodies had generated on the dance floor. When Steve found an empty parking spot right outside Madison’s building, it was she who wordlessly took him by the hand and led him up the stairs to her third-story apartment.

They stood just inside the entryway of her apartment, staring at one another in the thick darkness. They both recognized the importance of their next steps and as they weighed the implications in their minds, they were overwhelmingly aware of the current that connected them. Somehow, Madison found the presence of mind to pause, a task that was equally difficult and unwanted.

“Are we moving too fast?” Madison asked at last, looking into Steve’s eyes.

“Yes, we are,” he answered truthfully, as he moved closer to her, still compelled to be near her.

Steve, like many young men of his age, had had his share of casual affairs. Yet he knew, without fully understanding why, that Madison could not be classified in that way. There would be no way that he could share her bed and just walk away, because she had already infected his heart in a way that no woman had ever managed to do. For her part, Madison was not a virgin and did not possess any virginlike ideals that made her desirous of resisting her sexuality or her body’s longings. However, she was also aware that Steve had gotten under her skin, and sharing her body with him would not come without strings and entanglements. Neither could pretend that the feelings they were caught up in were not incredibly intense and moving.

“We probably should think this through,” she whispered, her lips brushing across his as she spoke.

“Probably,” he agreed, his hand kneading the small of her back softly. “Madison, I want you…badly,” Steve laughed.

“Me, too.”

“This is so difficult!” Steve exclaimed. “Look, I don’t get what’s going on here, but I just feel like it’s too important to mess it up by rushing things.”

“And sometimes sex does just that,” Madison agreed.

As much as they wanted to take their desire to a higher level, the intimacy between them was compelling enough without an act of sexual intercourse. They paused to allow logic to take up a space in the midst of their excitement and found the consolation to be just as sweet as the first place prize when they spent the night fully clothed, snuggled against one another on Madison’s brushed-cotton, oversized sofa. They talked until they feel asleep, and when they awoke in each other’s arms, the satisfaction that washed over them made them both realize that they could not have felt more complete than they did by just being in one another’s presence.

That languid bubble of tranquility was unexpectedly burst the following morning, however, when the New York Post’s gossip column featured a picture of them leaving the club the night before, arm in arm, with a caption beneath it that read, “Has Madison Daniels finally snagged herself a well-appointed Prince Charming?”

The columnist went on to report that this was the second known sighting of Madison and Stevenson Elliott, son of English billionaire Gregory Elliott.

“Do you believe this crap?” Madison spewed angrily.

“Perhaps you want to tell me over breakfast why the press is so fascinated with you?” Steve asked gently after he’d read the article that Madison had dropped on his lap.

Madison slid down onto the sofa beside him. “Look, me and the media have had a little love/hate thing going on for the past couple of years—they love to stay in my business, and I despise the wombs they came out of. Those people are animals and for some reason, they seem to find my little boring life of major interest, go figure.”

“Somehow I doubt there is anything boring about your life,” Steve said.

“Yeah, well, be that as it may, it just kills me that when a man dates and is linked to noteworthy women, he’s this year’s eligible bachelor. When it’s the other way around, the woman’s called every kind of gold-digging whore in the book.”

“I agree. There’s definitely a double standard, and I don’t care what side of the globe you’re on. But, in all fairness, the media only report on what people want to know, so don’t blame them because we live in a society that is nosy and filthy-minded. And speaking of filthy…”

Steve tugged at the top of the tank top Madison wore. She smacked his hand.

“Seriously, Steve. I don’t know if it’s such a good idea that you and I be seen in public again. I mean, if this crap gets back to England, your parents might be a little, well, put off.”

“Put off about what? That I’ve met a beautiful woman and am having the time of my life getting to know her?” Steve asked as he traced Madison’s collarbone with two fingers.

“How about the fact that you’re spending time with a woman who the press likes to spy on and paint to be some sort of strumpet who’s out to trick him out of his family’s fortune?”

“In that case, come here, my little strumpet,” Steve said, pulling Madison across his body. “Let me teach you a lesson about stealing, you naughty girl.”

Steve closed his mouth over hers, cutting off any further protests she could make.

Chapter 7

“This is a nice hotel, but you’ve got a really crappy view,” Madison said as she peered out of the fourteenth-floor window of Steve’s hotel room.

He’d invited her to have dinner in with him that evening in acquiescence to her desire to keep their business out of the papers. A quiet evening indoors and out of the public eye was extremely appealing to both of them.

Steve moved to her side and looked through the glass himself. His room faced a parking garage and an office building. Looking to the left, he was afforded a partial view of the Times Square area, the lights from Broadway already brilliantly lighting up the street.

“Good thing it wasn’t the view of New York City that I stayed in town for,” he mused, having turned his attention away from the window and refocused it on the breathtaking woman standing beside him.

Madison smiled up at him, still amazed to find herself tingling under his gaze. It had been two weeks since they’d met and she was getting to believe that no matter how much time passed, she would still be as flattered by his considerate and charming nature as she was now.

“Are you ready for dinner?” he asked.

“Uh-uh,” Madison answered as she moved closer to him.

She had an irresistible urge to kiss him and dinner would just have to wait until she satisfied that compulsion. She tilted her head, her lips angled a couple of inches away from his. When their mouths met, she felt her body tremble quietly. Her mouth opened to his probing tongue, and warmth spread through her entire body. Tentatively, yet expertly, he explored her mouth, breathing her in until she filled all of his senses. The thickness of his lips as she nibbled and tasted them caused her breath to catch in her throat while the heat of his tongue as it danced with hers sent an electric current straight down to the center of her taut abdomen.

Madison had kissed many men in her lifetime, but could honestly say that she had never been kissed so thoroughly and completely as Steve kissed her. She’d experienced passion and lust, she’d thrown herself with reckless abandoned into physical encounters and, while finding physical satisfaction, she realized now that the intimacy of a simple kiss with Steve far outweighed any of that. She lost herself inside his mouth, sank into his arms and discovered it was a restorative and peaceful place to be.

When their lips finally parted, Steve continued to hold her in his arms, her body resting against his as they stood in front of a window with a partial view of Manhattan. The serenity that settled over them made them both realize that what had begun as a chance meeting and an instant attraction had quickly morphed into something more profound than either had ever experienced before.

“I want to make love to you, Madison,” Steve said, breaking the silence that had enveloped them.

“I hear a but in your voice,” she responded.

Madison’s heart raced because she’d already expected this moment, anticipated it, even. She felt the same way, a desire to share on a physical level what was developing on an emotional level. However, for the first time, she’d met someone and sexual curiosity was not the most pressing thing for her.

“But I’m not sure if we should. I mean, I want to. Don’t get me wrong, I really, really want to,” Steve laughed.

“Really?” Madison joked.

“Really, really,” Steve reiterated. “I just…I’ve got to be honest with you.”

“About what? Please don’t tell me you’ve got a wife and three kids back in England, ’ cause that’s the last thing I need to hear in my life at this point,” she said half-jokingly.

“Of course not. I’m single and unattached…no girlfriend, wife. Nothing like that. Actually, I haven’t even been on a date in the past couple of months. It’s just that, well, Madison, I’ve never felt like this before. I mean, these past two weeks have been incredible. Being here with you, it just totally caught me off guard, and I feel like I don’t know whether I’m coming or going.”

“I know what you mean.”

“Do you?”

“Of course. Steve, you’re definitely not out here on your own. I wasn’t expecting this and after the last crazy couple of years I had, I certainly wasn’t looking to hook up with anyone. But this is so different. With you I feel like I can just be myself and be however crazy, goofy or silly I feel like being. I don’t have to be what my parents expect, I don’t have to live up to what the media think about me and I don’t have to give a damn about what my friends or anyone else asks of me. This has been so nice, but…” Madison’s voice trailed off.

“But you think it has to end,” Steve finished for her.

“Doesn’t it? I mean, you have a life in England. I’m here trying to get my life together. You have obligations to keep. I mean, we just met. We’re practically strangers.”

Madison moved away from Steve, needing to distance herself from feelings that had come on too strong too soon. She stopped in front of the television, where some ridiculous commercial about a goat and a soft drink was playing.

“You don’t feel like a stranger to me,” Steve said as he watched her from his vantage point by the window.

The sincerity in his voice forced Madison to turn to face him. His face was an open book, free for her to read in his warm-brown eyes and sensual lips an emotion that was greater than lust and infatuation.

“You feel like home to me,” he added softly.

Steve walked across the room to Madison, taking both of her hands in his. She allowed him to guide her to the top of the double bed, her body at his command as he lay down and pulled her with him. He leaned his back against the pillows, his arms around her, and she laid her head on his chest, listening to the sound of his breathing. Wrapped in a cocoon isolated from the outside world, they felt free to be real with each other.

“I don’t know how to explain what I am feeling right now and I don’t even really understand it, but it’s like I was looking for something or needing something and all of a sudden I don’t feel that need anymore,” Steve said softly.

“It’s scary how connected I feel to you already, Steve,” Madison admitted. “I think I’ve been looking for something, too, without even knowing it.”

They fell silent, alone with their thoughts yet sharing an emotion that was bigger than both of them. A long while later Steve spoke, his meditation having taken him to a place deep inside in his soul.

“When I was a little boy, maybe four or five, I remember sitting on my grandmother’s rocker on the veranda of her house. Grandma’s house was old like most of the houses in the countryside of Jamaica where we lived. You know, outhouses and open-air cooking.”

“Hmm,” Madison said.

“Grandma was standing over the cooking fire making cornmeal porridge in a big metal pot that was situated on a metal grate and held up on a pile of big rocks. She had on a floral house dress and these tattered brown sandals. I had been helping Grandpa tie the livestock out in the hills like we did every morning and was sitting down to catch my breath. I started telling her how Uncle Nevel had promised to take me fishing at Alligator Pond early the next morning. I bragged and bragged about how I was going to catch the biggest fish of all, bigger even than the one Uncle Nevel had caught the week before, and I was going to bring it back to her to cook it up for dinner.”