Read The Color of Heaven - 09 - The Color of Time for Free Online Page B

emerged onto a clearing surrounded by evergreens. Having lost all sense of direction, I stopped and turned around.
    Suddenly Ethan was there, grabbing hold of my arm, forcing me to look at him.
    He was breathing hard. His eyes gleamed with raging intensity, his body glistened with perspiration. “Don’t do this,” he said. “You can’t.”
    “Yes, I can,” I replied, wiping my cheek with the back of my hand. “I can do whatever I want. Unlike you .”
    A muscle twitched at his jaw and he shook his head. “I’m not letting you go.”
    “Why not? You don’t care.”
    “Yes, I do!” He pulled me into his arms and held me so tightly, I could barely breathe. “I love you. Please …Sylvie, I’ll do whatever you want. Just don’t break it off.”
    Shocked by the anguish I heard in his voice, and desperate just to be with him, I felt the anger seep out of me. My body melted into his. Quickly, I reached up to wrap my arms around his neck. The next thing I knew we were kissing fiercely, groping at each other in the cool shade of the quiet forest, our salty tears mingling wetly where our lips were joined.
    “I love you,” he whispered again as he dropped a trail of passionate kisses down the side of my neck. “I don’t ever want to lose you.”
    I was still crying… Maybe because I knew he would be gone soon, no matter what happened today or with his parents in the future. We had less than a week together, and of course I had no intention of breaking up with him. I was just angry. I couldn’t possibly leave Ethan. How would I ever live?
    He drew back and our eyes met. His chest heaved with ragged breaths while my heart pounded riotously.
    I lifted my arms and reached up so he could pull my sundress off over my head. Then I tugged at the hem of his cotton T-shirt, pulled it off him and threw it onto the ground.
    The sight of his bare, muscular chest filled me with desire, and soon we were sinking to our knees on the soft, cool moss of the forest floor. His lips found mine as we lay down together, wrapped in each other’s arms.
    “I love you so much,” he whispered in my ear as he covered my body with his. “I want to be with you forever.”
    “I want that, too,” I replied, cupping the back of his neck, running my fingers through his hair.
    “I don’t even want my father’s money,” he said. “Not if it means I can’t have you .”
    Our lips met and I reveled in the heavenly sensation of his body on top of mine. Yet it was bitter-sweet, for I couldn’t escape the ever-present agony of knowing we would soon have to say good-bye. How would I survive it?
    And so, unwilling to consider holding anything back from him, I gave myself over to him completely—physically and soulfully—with no notion of how it would change both our lives, in the worst possible way.

Chapter Twelve

    After Ethan and I returned home from the lake that day—drunk with passion and love for each other—he convinced me that it would be best to keep our relationship a secret from his parents, at least for the time being. He said if they knew, they would tighten the rules and keep a closer eye on his comings and goings from university, his expenditures and the friends he kept.
    And so, together in his car at the curb outside my grandparents’ home, we plotted how we would each save up money to pool so he could fly back and forth to visit me in Montana during the school year.
    That didn’t make it any easier, however, to say good-bye on Labor Day weekend. My grandmother drove me to see Ethan one last time and we met on the lawn in front of his parents’ Cape Elizabeth mansion overlooking the sea.
    Still, I had never set foot inside the house. And though his parents weren’t home, Ethan couldn’t take me inside that day either because the housekeeper and cook were lurking about.
    We kissed near the ancient stone sundial on his lawn, down by the water, and held each other as if the world were coming to an end.
    He promised to love