Chapter 20 - A Homecoming, a New Beginning, Thanks All Around and Flights of Angels.
*****
As Madison entered the house, she heard the rubble in the cabin shift. Behind her Daniel stood and shambled after her, a huge, bloody, sweaty mountain of emotion. Her man was on his way home, and Madison would be ready when he got there.
She wanted this. She had pushed herself and Daniel to this point. Madison loved Daniel and she could save him. Her love could reach him through all his self-loathing and rage and make him whole again and she wanted that more than anything. She wanted Daniel, all of him, to feel her love down deep in his heart and now was her time. Not like every other time in their relationship, when Madison focused on herself and what she wanted instead of what Daniel needed. She wouldn't let that happen. Not this time.
"Madison," Daniel growled in a low voice from just outside the door, uncertain and swathed in the darkness. Madison felt another low rumble issue from his chest, and she turned and faced him.
"Come in, Daniel," she whispered into the blackness. "I'm here for you. Don't be afraid."
Madison reached over and snapped on the kitchen light. Whatever happened next between them, Madison wanted it to happen in the light where they could see each other. Face to face. Daniel loomed into the kitchen, first one tentative step and then another, so Madison stepped back towards her goal and summoned him.
"Come home, Daniel. Come home to me."
Madison's body fluttered with nervous energy. Her heartbeat quickened, and her skin tightened as Daniel stepped into full view. Muscles strained, his bare chest heaved with each breath, and blood oozed thickly from the wound on his shoulder. He looked wild, immense, and dangerous.
Madison's body tingled as Daniel cautiously advanced toward her. The sight of his body, primal, predatory, streaked with sweat and blood, gave her an electric charge of fear and desire like nothing she had ever experienced. The Faceless man of fantasy was right there in front of her, and the moment she had dreamed of since she first got her period was here at last. Her Little Red Riding Hood fantasy had come true, and she was about to be taken by the Faceless man, only this time, she would not be helplessly ravished from behind. She would look the Faceless man, her Daniel, in his dusky green eyes and love him.
"I'm right here, Daniel, and I love you." Madison intoned in a low sexy purr. "Come to me."
Just a few feet behind her the spot where Steve the Oaf had kissed her waited. Madison backed towards it and willed Daniel to her. It had to happen there so that, together, she and Daniel could reclaim their home from the evil spirit of the party. Madison continued her slow, naked retreat until she felt the cool of the edge of counter-top beneath her fingertips. Daniel followed warily, and his head swung right and left as if he expected some kind of ambush. Despite her fear and sexual excitement, Madison teared up.
"I love you, Daniel," Madison whispered through tears. "I swear I won't hurt you."
To urge him on, Madison beckoned him to her embrace.
"Come to me, Daniel! Come to me! Please!"
Daniel slammed the door shut behind him. He emitted a low uncertain growl and his angry eyes searched Madison's body.
"It's OK, Daniel. I'm here for you. I love you."
Daniel advanced another step towards Madison and her breath caught with fright and longing. She no longer saw a Faceless man full of a lustful that terrified her and then fucked her. She saw only Daniel's face, etched with pain and her heart throbbed like it might burst against her ribs.
"Oh, my God! I'm sorry!"
As Daniel stalked towards her, Madison backed closer to the counter. Trapped between the counter and Daniel, Madison's resolve wavered and fear threatened to engulf her desire. Daniel looked so huge and savage that she feared he might hurt her. His bulk loomed above her like a dark aura of threat. Madison whimpered and shrank away as he menaced closer. He was close now; so close he could reach out and touch her and she winced as if she expected him to strike.
As Madison cringed against the counter, Daniel pounced forward, seized her by the upper arms, and roughly pressed her into the kitchen cabinets. A distressed cry slipped from Madison's lips, and she clenched her eyes shut. There they balanced, Madison frightened and breathless and Daniel, strained and urgent. Madison wept a gasp at the rough electricity from his touch, and she recoiled into herself. Daniel seemed to surround her, big and strong, and Madison wilted, weak and small in his clutches as he sniffed at her scent. The musk of his sweat, the intense heat of his body, the hot slickness of his blood and the possessive growl of his breath, all seemed so wild and out of control, but that was not what terrified her. What terrified her was that Cassidy had been right. This wasn't some ripple of sensation and a make up fuck. It was a consuming and totally committed leap out over a dark, yawning and bottomless maw. A terrifyingly blind leap in the faith that love, her love for Daniel and Daniel's love for her, would catch her before she fell into that dark, yawning and bottomless maw.
On the edge of it Madison was awed by the depth of the unknown of it all. She had thought she had changed and that she was ready for this and wanted this, but on the cusp of this leap she realized a deep and unmitigated terror. For her relationship with Daniel to work, Madison would have to give up control, give up herself, give up everything she was to Daniel and to them. Never in her life had she even considered such selflessness and sacrifice. What would happen? Daniel might hurt her, or worse yet, might Daniel still leave and divorce her? What if she gave herself over to him, opened herself to him, gave her all, and he still abandon her? Could she live with his rejection on that level? It seemed so hideously contrary to everything she knew, had been told, about a relationship. To have a chance with Daniel, to be with him for a life together, she had to risk everything, give up herself, and she couldn't be certain of the result. Fear snatched her breath away.
But despite the terror in her chest, Madison forced herself to open her eyes. Madison couldn't yield to fear now. This was her Daniel and he needed her, all of her, and she wanted to be with him more than anything else in the world. Slowly, timidly she raised her eyes to meet his gaze. There in Daniel's dusky green eyes brimmed a terrified plea and Madison's heart surged with sympathy. As wild and out of control as it all seemed, her Daniel, her sweet, quiet Daniel, was right there in front of her, with her in this moment of a fearful leap of faith, and that was all she wanted in the world. In that moment she made her choice and gave herself to Daniel completely. To Madison it didn't matter what the future held if she didn't have Daniel, and for him, for them, she would give up everything, herself, for the chance to be with him for the rest of their lives.
In that moment, Madison made her choice. She chose Daniel, her quiet and sweet Daniel, and she chose the warmth of them together against the world of cold and loneliness, and she didn't care what it cost her as long as Daniel was with her. With her choice made, Madison's fear fled before the warmth that surged out of Madison's heart as she chose to sacrifice herself and give and receive love. Cautiously and tenderly, Madison cradled Daniel's face. As Daniel pressed himself closer, Madison looked deep into his eyes and told him what she wanted him to know.
"I'm sorry!" Madison wept to him. "I hate the person I was! I hate what I did to you!
Daniel blinked moist green understanding.
"But since I met you, I want to change, Daniel!" averred Madison passionately. "I will change! I have changed! Changed for you! Since I've met you, I haven't been with anyone else and I'll never be with anyone else! I'll always be here for you! Your safe with me! You can tell me anything, everything, and I'll never leave you! I promise! No matter what, I'll be here! I'm yours forever."
Pained and grateful tears formed in Daniel's eyes.
"I want to be your someone, Daniel, because I love you!"
It took all her dancer's strength and balance to remain poised against the countertop as they locked into a timeless gaze. Daniel's eyes penetrated to Madison's soul, and her eyes penetrated into his. In that moment, naked and vulnerable, Madison and Daniel began to fold into one being, and nothing was hidden between them. Each of them felt the best and worst of the other and the magnitude of it broke over them like a tidal wave.
"Oh, my God!" Daniel and Madison whispered to each other in shocked unison.
Madison gently kissed Daniel's lips and their tongues entwined, and passionate fire spread between their bodies. Eternal seconds later, their lips parted with Madison's sob, and she clutched Daniel's shoulders for support. At her nod of encouragement, Daniel's hands clamped onto Madison's hips. As one, their bodies quivered together in shared tension.
Madison's fingers trembled Daniel's pants open, and they slipped easily off his hips to the floor. With no clothes between them, Daniel's arms surged like pistons and lifted Madison to a narrow seat on the countertop, pinned motionless between his body and cabinets so that her toes dangled above the floor. With an urgent growl, Daniel thrust his hips and his body found its mark like a warm piece of tight skinned iron and filled Madison in a way so huge and stiff that it stunned her. The physical and psychic shock of a complete, naked and unfettered union forced an airless gasp from Madison's lips. With their eyes locked and bodies merged, all pretense and barriers between them crumbled. Alone in that moment, they connected, mind body and soul, and they hovered together on a brink of a shared plunge. Madison's heart thrilled, and she shuddered as pleasures and pains and fears and doubts and loneliness and longing and a thousand other elements of their united beings rushed from each of them to the other like a full moon tide.
"I love you," she whispered to him in a tearfully vulnerable voice of desire. "I love you!"
Daniel surged inside Madison while she cradled his face in her hands, and together they experienced the depths of themselves. Madison moaned her desire and Daniel groaned in response and he thrust forward, harder, deeper, stronger into Madison. The world compressed around them, strung tight with anticipation.
With their bodies and souls yoked together they strained forward, but not in the familiar unhurried rhythm of the woodpile. This was a race, rushed and straining, towards something unknown and expectant. Where they had always been firm and gentle, they became rough and frenzied. Where they had been caring and giving, they became urgent and possessory. Where they had been controlled and restrained, they became crazed and reckless. Daniel hammered his body against Madison, and Madison, unable to move because of her precarious perch, simply and greedily absorbed each impact. Their united bodies worked intuitively together as Daniel braced their weight, and Madison clutched him to lock their embrace. Daniel, corded with strained muscles and slick with a musk of their sweat and blood and effort, slithered and slipped within Madison's grip. Timelessly entwined, they shared air and space and emotion and body and soul.
Previously, Daniel had always been silent when they made love, but now he grunted and moaned in a chorus of effort and pleasure with Madison. Their synchronized breath rasped in raw gulps of shared air. Daniel accelerated again and Madison wailed abject enjoyment at each thrust, and she clung to him, desperate to maintain their connection. Engulfed by such a visceral and intimate connection, Madison felt her sense of herself slip, and she swooned and gave herself over to what had become themself. In answer, Daniel accelerated the pace again and Madison saw in Daniel's eyes that he had surrendered to themself as well. Bound together they strained towards a mutual orgasmic cliff and just when Madison thought they had reached their united pinnacle, their pace accelerated one last time and the fullness and depth of their connection brought shared cries and tears of abject ecstasy. At long last Madison's heart issued a wail that was both bereft yet hopeful, pained yet joyful, hurt but caring, lost but loving, all at the same time and then just as Madison began to lose her grip on Daniel's body and reality, they tumbled across the finish line together.
