A Passionate Understanding: Vignettes Through the Years

Chapter 14

"Naked Longing"

by Lilyjack

Feeling emotional, so I thought maybe dashing out an angsty vignette would help me work through it. And I reckoned the smut biscuit enthusiasts out there would get a kick outta the title. How's that for titillating? This little piece is set quite early in the M/K relationship. They are "just close friends" at the moment. Hope you enjoy, hopelessly romantic Matt & Kitty fans. ~lj

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"Wash my back, Matt?" Kitty Russell attempted to keep her tone light, but the slight tremor in her voice belied her casual manner. It was impossible to appear cavalier when she stood bare-naked before the closest friend and confidant of her lifetime, and he happened to be a six foot seven giant of a lawman with piercing blue eyes. Her tentative request was met with an equally uncertain silence, albeit accompanied by a longing gaze from the virile male invading her bedroom. He stood stock still and seemed to be almost breathless.

Moments earlier, the young marshal had uncharacteristically burst into her room with only a cursory knock, and the wooden door to the connecting water closet lay wide open. Matt had hurriedly begun to announce, "Kitty, I heard you needed to..." His voice had trailed off as his oversized, booted feet rooted to the floor. He audibly swallowed. Kitty Russell stood wet and naked in full view of his startled eyes.

Rose-gold light from the warm, early summer sunset spilled through the lace curtains, burnishing her haphazardly pinned-up hair, small damp curls plastered to her neck. Dust motes lazily floated in the slanting rays, illuminating and shadowing Kitty's curves and valleys, reflecting off the tiny bubbles that slid down her dripping skin and onto the towel spread on the plank floor beneath her feet.

At the untimely interruption of her sponge bath, Kitty's hands hastily flew to cover herself. "Matt!" she breathed in astonishment.

Good manners dictated he should turn away but his suddenly heavy and awkward feet refused to cooperate. Common sense told him he should avert his eyes, but they were inexorably drawn to the girl…the woman, standing at the washbasin before him. His lips tried to form words, syllables, sounds, but exactly what he should say he could not, at the moment, fathom. His head and his heart had been forcibly arrested…captivated by the unclothed vision before him. At last, he managed to utter a faint, "I… I'm sorry, Kitty."

She noticed he wasn't sorry enough to turn around and march out of her room. She quickly gauged his reaction and decided to take a chance. Decided to finally discover what feelings this handsome, affable, steadfast and gentle man held for her. Slowly she lowered her shielding arms and hands, allowing him to see her fully. She watched from beneath her lashes as his Adam's apple bobbed again, once, twice, and his mouth dropped open. Impulsively, instinctively, she offered a quiet invitation. "Wash my back, Matt?"

She tried to hide her hesitancy, her fear and sudden shyness. But her tremulous voice betrayed her when she broke the precarious stillness that lay between them. Yes, she loved this man who stood looking at her, but up until now, they'd been nothing beyond close friends. And, yes, she'd felt the undeniable pull between them, and, at times, the heat, but Matt had never once attempted to lay more than a polite hand on her waist. Matt Dillon was nothing if not a gentleman. Was she wrong trying to shake up the status quo? Had she simply been imagining the attraction between them? Were her feelings not reciprocated? Gingerly, she held out the soft washcloth, threadbare with use and dripping wet, to the big man across the room who stood staring. She shivered at his intense regard, anxious to see what he would do, if he would accept her offer.

Alarm bells were ringing insistently in Matt Dillon's head, but he found himself pulled toward her, his leaden feet taking slow steps as he haltingly closed the space between him and Kitty Russell. His pale blue eyes burned with a strange light as he took the washcloth from her hand. She stood wordlessly facing him, waiting. He tore his eyes away, looking to the ceiling to help compose himself, and gruffly murmured, "Turn around so I can reach it."

She obliged him slowly while he watched. Big hands that had remained rock steady during gunfights now shook as he smoothed the thin cloth over her creamy-skinned shoulders and back, leaving a trail of small bubbles in its wake. The heady scent of soap with rose oil and wet female skin was a powerful combination that fairly made his head reel. From his vantage point, he could see Kitty's full breasts with tight rose-colored peaks jutting forward. His fingers flexed and fisted as he squeezed out the cloth, and a familiar ache, one he hadn't felt in a long while, began to take hold of him. It hotly filled his loins and his chest until he imagined he couldn't breathe.

"Kitty…" he strangled out, and she turned her head to look over her shoulder at him. Her brilliant blue eyes cast against the whiteness of her soft, naked skin was his undoing. Self-consciously, he cleared his throat as she turned to face him. Then, hurriedly, he reached to grab the towel beside the washbasin. He was trembling and she could see it. She herself was weak with desire and anticipation and even fear. What the hell were they doing, complicating a perfectly good friendship?

She watched him release a shuddering sigh, his face torn with emotion, and finally he wrapped the towel around her shoulders, gripping it closed in front with his big fist. He breathed, "We can't do this."

Taken aback, she whispered, "What do you mean?

"I mean, we shouldn't be doing this. It won't work."

Hesitancy gone, she met his gaze squarely. "Kiss me, Matt. Just once. Let's see how we really feel about it."

"Kitty, honey, don'tcha see I can't kiss you just once? If I kiss you I won't be able to stop."

"Would that be a bad thing?" Her gaze shifted to the death grip he held on the towel covering her body. She placed her damp hand gently over his. "Matt, how can we continue to live like this—pretending that we're only friends? Acting as though we aren't drawn to one another?"

His tone became urgent. "With the way I live, day to day… The uncertainty of my job… I just can't put you through that. Hell, Kitty, death looms around every corner in a wild city like Dodge when you're the law. It's dangerous being close to a man like me. You want to get involved in that?"

Her reply was simple, quiet and heartfelt. "It's too late, Matt. I'm already involved. Don't you know that?"

He silently placed a warm palm against her flushed cheek, heavy brows knitted in consternation. He pressed his lips tightly together as his thumb stroked her impossibly soft skin and his mind whirled.

She continued earnestly, "Don't you think it already tears my heart out every time you're hurt or in danger? I'm already in deep, Matt Dillon. There's no turning back for me. Don't you see?"

He shook his head again in frustration, and his fingers reached to tenderly touch her hair, heretofore a forbidden intimate gesture on his part, until now, alone in her room with the air sizzling around them. He roughly asserted, "I'm not good for you, Kitty."

"Matt, I've never felt this way about a man before. How can that not be good?"

She touched his white-knuckled fist, tugged the towel from his grip, dropped it unceremoniously to the floor. "You make me feel good, Matt Dillon, about myself. And I haven't felt that way in a very long time. You can't expect me to walk away from that."

"Kitty, you… You're a one-of-a-kind woman. I don't know what I'd do if… Aw, Kitty, I…" He trailed off helplessly, his long-lashed eyes stricken.

"I know, Matt. I know," she soothed as she tiptoed, sliding lithe arms around his neck, pressing her body against his until he groaned in painful pleasure. She murmured softly, her breath brushing his neck. "Now kiss me so we'll both know how we feel."

A shuddering sigh reverberated from his wide chest, and he circled long arms around her small waist, caressing that sweet spot in the small of her back, now bared to him, warm and smooth and scented with roses, a wildly intoxicating sensation for the stalwart young lawman.

Her breath brushed his flushed face then, her deep blue eyes the only thing he could see, the only thing in the room…the only thing in the world. She whispered, "Just kiss me once, Matt."

"You know damn well I won't be able to kiss you just once, honey." His voice was thick with emotion as his hands languorously caressed her silky skin.

His tantalizing touch made her arch her back and press her soft, bare breasts to his hard chest. She soothed, "I know, Matt… I kn-"

end

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And the rest is history, Gunsmoke fans. Thanks for reading. ~lj