Jen's Legacy.
Everything has to change.

Claire had fallen in love with a man whose life was almost in shreds, a man still deeply in love with the memory of his late wife, and yet who had been attracted to her in ways that he had been unable to fight, just as she had been attracted to him for so many reasons that she didn't know where to begin on them.

Royce was conflicted; torn between a past life and the one he was now in, with her. Given time, and being in his life as much as she could be, she would always win that conflict.

She knew she was not in competition with Jen, other than in his mind as he wrestled with those inner feelings of torment and guilt, torn first one way then another. He would soon see that there was room in his life for both of them, but it would be a difficult fit at first; the real, with the ephemeral, jostling for position with each other in his mind and in his emotions, and she had to stand back and let it work its own way through.

She would help him make that transition where she could, but she would have to do it slowly, and gently, though time was still against her. They should have made love before now.

To preserve what she had gained, they must never be separated.

If she was rescued, as she knew she eventually would be, and if they were not together, he might slip back into that other mood, feeling that he had lost everything again, as though it had all been a passing dream; more like a nightmare, and she might never see him again. She could not allow that.

If, she was rescued. If, they were separated.

Those thoughts just came out of nowhere. She would have to make sure they were never separated, and she must not be rescued too soon. But what did that mean? Didn't she want to be rescued?

If she were not immediately found and rescued—and ‘rescue’ would be the wrong word for what they would be doing for her at that moment—her family would worry a little longer, grieve a little longer, but they would easily forgive her when she showed up alive, happy, and in good health with this man to thank for it. She had to stay with him and get him to Culver with her, and damn any rescue!

He also had to make love to her as soon as possible so that she could give him something more solid to relate to with her: another inescapable memory, just like those he had of Jen and had been building of that other Claire.

She knew what her priority had to be. He had risked his life to save hers more than once now. A few days lost out of her own life was a small price to pay to save his life in return, and to put her own on a different track at the same time.

She watched everything he was doing while he was unable not to constantly check upon her; seeing to the fire, re-arranging their clothes to dry, then, when they became too warm, moving them away from the most direct heat before he returned to sit with her. The fire could burn lower from here, and they would soon retire

They moved closer together and held each other.

She had socks and sneakers on, but nothing else, and he wore nothing other than a simple chain around his neck with that other wedding band on it. She noticed that there were two gold bands on it now. He’d taken the one off his finger and put it on that chain.

He was slowly letting go of Jen. Claire was not sure that was a wise thing to do. He still needed Jen to guide him, even with her with him. It would be a slow transfer process from Jen to her, but he must never be allowed to let go of Jen. Never.

“We should talk, Royce.” He put his arm around her and pulled her closer into him as they stared into the fire, wondering what she wanted to talk about, feeling her snuggle close into him, trying to get closer to him all of the time as he pulled the sleeping bag closer around her. She could not be cold with that behind her; the fire in front of her, and him beside her.

She reached up to touch his face, then brought his free hand down between her legs where she trapped it, moving his hand to sit openly under her, on her cheek, then reached up to take his other hand from resting on her shoulder, took it down her arm, under it, and brought it around to rest full on her breast.

He sensed that she wanted him to lift her to sit across him and for him to hold her close in his arms like that, and on him, just as he would hold a little girl (another Claire) who needed his help and protection, though she was far from being a little girl as he'd soon found out and was still finding out, and her needs were different and specific.

She was the calm one now, and he, the one who was breathless, even if he didn’t understand why.

They both had too many things on their minds to think of sleeping, especially after those two little adventures since they’d arrived in this place.

When he closed his eyes and just touched her like this, she was Jen, sitting in his arms. But she was not Jen. He was as lost in his thoughts of this woman, Claire, as he had been when he was close to Jen like this. She had always scrambled his brains; as this one did. And here they were, alone, on the roof-of-the-world in the middle of a cold downpour, with nothing and no one to judge them or to see them, and getting ever closer to making love, though it was never sure which of them would have to make that next, initiating move, and then the last one, as they became one.

He waited to see what she wanted to talk about or would do next.

“Were you not afraid, Royce?”

He had to pause to collect his conscious thoughts and wonder what she was referring to, realizing that she was speaking of that cougar, rather than about anything else on his mind.

He was not nearly as scared of that cougar, as he was now, never sure what she would shock him with next. The cougar had at least been predictable.

That was an easy question. “Yes, I was afraid. Only fools fear nothing, and fools don’t live long out here.”

He raised his hand from under her, to stroke her face, looking into her eyes, knowing what he was seeing; what she was letting him see. He had to close his eyes to recover.

She knew that as a man; a certain kind of man, he would always interpose himself between her and danger. It had been the same when he’d jumped into the river to get to her before he even knew her, or who she was, seeing only someone who needed his help to survive, and then rushing at that cougar as naked as he had been and with only a flaming piece of wood in his hand. He had been a white knight in shining armor one minute, and the next had helped her with that damned embarrassing problem as she'd peed, being so gentle and even mischievous about it.

If she pressed him, he would laugh and say something flippant about... how could he have explained to her parents how he had let her drown, or how he had let a cougar snatch their daughter from under his nose because he was too concerned for his own safety to protect her, but here he was, alive, and happy enough to tell them about it? It would have been better if he had died protecting her than to have to do that, with that shame following him for the rest of his life. That was the kind of man that he was.

And how could he not have stayed with her at such a difficult time as when she'd needed to pee and he had to protect her from the weather, that more dangerous of all entities out here? Although that little episode would be one more embarrassing thing that no one else would ever find out about.

He was overcome by her closeness, her yielding softness, knowing that, like Jen, she would not object to whatever he did to her. He reacted to everything about her; her warmth, her scent, the memories she was evoking in his mind, jumbled memories of Jen and of her; that name, Claire, constantly confusing him; by the disturbances and changes she caused to his body, and that she could feel, knowing what they meant. But when...?

She needed to say more.

“You asked me, earlier, Royce--to distract me when I was trying to… you know…out there…after that cougar--to think of my first kiss; my first date and attending the high school prom…, to think of the first time I fell in love; had fallen in love.”

“I remember.”

“Before I met you, I had known none of those things.” He had already gleaned that from the way she had remained silent and blushed.

He had been the first. He would also be the first as well as the last for other things with her... one... other thing with her. There was only one major thing that they still had to do together.

“I have never been properly kissed; been on a date, and I avoided my high school prom, and I had never fallen in love (past tense), nor expected to, until I met you. You were my first for each of those things.”

He was also the first man she had seen aroused, or had touched that way, or had let touch her down there or upon her breasts, as he was doing now, or that she had encouraged and had wanted to do more. But he hadn't.

“Royce?”

“Yes, my love?”

He was dreamy, and being very patient with her.

“Would you kiss me, please? Properly? As a man should kiss a woman he is holding in his arms as you are holding me, and as a man would kiss the woman he is very soon going to make love to.”

She turned her face up to be kissed as his hand landed upon her breast--a natural thing to do. She met him half way, her lips parted slightly as though she knew all about what she was doing in this strange new game, and moved closer to him, moving her arm around him to pull herself even closer into him, almost facing him now.

He felt her breasts pushing into his chest as he pulled her closer to him.

He must be able to feel her heart beating against his chest; she could feel his; sense the excitement in every fiber of her body and feel how she responded to him.

She could feel much more of him too, but there was lots of time to get to that.

No one she knew would ever believe that this could be happening to her so quickly, or that she was the one inviting it, guiding it, or even provoking it, but parents never did find out those kinds of things about their daughters until long after they’d happened, and the damage had been done to their darling's most vulnerable parts. Sometimes they never did find out, ever, though it soon became obvious.

It took him another few minutes to realize that she was asleep.

She’d had a difficult day, but it would improve from here. He didn’t move for another ten minutes, just happy to be holding her, and feeling that he could now relax. She had been too ready to rush things forward, but he had been little better, earlier, until that cougar had come into the picture. That, had sobered him up. First, protect. Make love, second. He was still in protective mode.

He moved, with her lying against him, pulled the sleeping bag to lie open in the sand not far from the fire, and slid out slowly from under her, placing her into it as he maintained contact with her.

He rolled everything that was dry, to make a pillow for them and repositioned the life-jacket under the edge of the sleeping bag, before he slid into it with her, taking her into his arms, kissing her, hearing her sigh and move closer to him.

It had been a difficult few days for her, but it would get easier from here, especially once they got to Badger’s Crossing, tomorrow, and about the same time the expected rescue party might get to Badger's too, to use that as a base of operations.

Unless the bad weather of last night and now, had closed everything down.

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