But something in his mouth tasted so bitter.
"Let's walk down to the corner and back," Nadine said in a low voice. "Would you do that much?"
"I better go in to her. You picked one hell of a bad time to come here."
"Please? Just down to the corner and back? If you want, I'll get down on my knees and beg. If that's what you want. Here. See?"
And to his horror she did get down on her knees, pulling her skirt up a little so she could do it, showing him her bare legs, making him curiously certain that everything else was bare as well. Why should he think that? He didn't know. Her eyes were on him, making his head spin, and there was a sickening feeling of power involved here someplace, involved with having her on her knees before him, her mouth on a level with -
"Get up!" he said roughly. He took her hands and yanked her to her feet, trying not to see the way the skirt rode up even more before falling back into place; her thighs were the color of cream, that shade of white that is not pale and dead but vigorous and healthy and enticing.
"Come on," he said, almost totally unnerved.
They walked west, in the direction of the mountains, which were a negative presence far ahead, triangular patches of darkness blotting out the stars that had come out after the rain. Walking toward those mountains at night always made him feel queerly uneasy but somehow adventurous, and now, with Nadine by his side, her hand resting lightly in the crook of his elbow, those feelings seemed heightened. He had always had vivid dreams, and three or four nights ago about those mountains; he had dreamed there were trolls in them, hideous creatures with bright green eyes, the oversized heads of hydrocephalic cretins, and short-fingered, powerful hands. Strangler's hands. Idiot trolls, guarding the passes through the mountains. Waiting until his time came around - the time of the dark man.
A soft breeze meandered down the street, blowing papers before it. They passed King Sooper's, a few shopping carts standing in the big parking lot like dead sentinels, making him think of the Lincoln Tunnel. There had been trolls in the Lincoln Tunnel. They had been dead, but that didn't mean all the trolls in their new world were dead.
"It's hard," Nadine said, her voice still low. "She made it hard because she's right. I want you now. And I'm afraid I'm too late. I want to stay here."
"Nadine - "
"No! " she said fiercely. "Let me finish. I want to stay here, can't you understand that? And if we're with each other, I'll be able to. You're my last chance," she said, her voice breaking. "Joe's gone now."
"No, he hasn't," Larry said, feeling slow and stupid and bewildered. "We dropped him off at your place on the way home. Isn't he there?"
"No. There's a boy named Leo Rockway asleep in his bed."
"What are you - "
"Listen," she said. "Listen to me, can't you listen? As long as I had Joe, I was all right. I could... be as strong as I had to be. But he doesn't need me anymore. And I need to be needed."
"He does need you!"
"Of course he does," Nadine said, and Larry felt afraid again. She wasn't talking about Leo anymore; he didn't know who she was talking about. "He needs me. That's what I'm afraid of. That's why I came to you." She stepped in front of him and looked up, her chin tilted. He could smell her secret clean scent, and he wanted her. But part of him turned back toward Lucy. That was the part of him he needed if he was going to make it here in Boulder. If he let it go and went with Nadine, they might as well slink out of Boulder tonight. It would be finished with him. The old Larry triumphant.
"I have to go home," he said. "I'm sorry. You'll have to work it out on your own, Nadine." Work it out on your own - weren't they the words he had been using to people in one form or another all his life? Why did they have to rise up this way when he knew he was right and still catch him, and twist in him, and make him doubt himself?
"Make love to me," she said, and put her arms around his neck. She pressed her body against his and he knew by its looseness, its warmth and springiness, that he had been right, she was wearing the dress and that was all. Buck naked underneath, he thought, and thinking it excited him blackly.
"That's all right, I can feel you," she said, and began to wriggle against him - sideways, up and down, creating a delicious friction. "Make love to me and that will be the end of it. I'll be safe. Safe. I'll be safe."
He reached up, and later he never knew how he was able to do that when he could have been inside her warmth in only three quick movements and one thrust, the way she wanted it, but somehow he reached up and unlocked her hands and pushed her away with such force that she stumbled and almost fell. A low moan came from her.
"Larry, if you knew - "
"Well, I don't. Why don't you try telling me instead of... of raping me?"