That whole night after the London trip, unexpectedly all alone together in the huge new loft building, had been so difficult for us both!
I'd been physically hurting and emotionally vulnerable, more so than I had been in years, and I let slip the control I always felt around all women. Especially those that were too damaged to make clear decisions about their futures for themselves. Jenny certainly didn't appear to be the troubled young woman she actually was that night.
Just a little loss of control? Just a little bit? A few moments of enjoyment for myself? It had been enough to put my entire world at risk!
After personally picking her up from the airport as a surprise, because I'd given Billie a rare night off, I'd been expecting to just return Jenny to the Loft and resume our mentor/student relationship.
Instead, once she was safe again behind the four walls of her loft, I found a woman clearly wanting to seduce me. At all costs. Jenny was so changed that first night after the jet had touched down. At least at first, she'd falsely seemed so real and in control, that in my heartbroken loneliness I very nearly gave in and slept with her.
It had been so close a thing! Only the timely return, of some of the Artist's guilt and worry, had stopped me from sliding my cock deep inside of her willing body.
I still hated to think about the Good and the Bad of that missed opportunity.
On the Terrace of the museum complex, my body suddenly shuddered in both my remembered and returning desire for Jenny. So I tried to focus only on the worst side of what had almost happened. Even as my tired muscles tensed up, with my mind's recall of the horrible end of that night, Jenny suddenly moaned and began grinding her clit even harder on my cock.
Confusing me even more was the mystery of something about her more recent trip to New York, with all those days and nights spent sleeping with Emma, and how it had changed Jenny even more drastically. Even just imagining Emma happy, and naked in bed with a woman again, tore open all my old wounds.
Here on the Terrace, back in the real world and present? The woman crushing me so tightly against her damp dress changed again. Jenny must have picked up on my abrupt loss of a strict focus on her well being.
Each one of her specific old memories and deeply ingrained fears? They tormented Jenny so differently! They afflicted her with their own distinct body language. A bizarre catalog of unique responses and reactions, giving me hard won clues on how to best help her. That night after her London trip, and the woman in my arms right now? They both had hunched over in emotional pain in this completely different kind of way.
That was my only clue.
It was something from Jenny's recently endured present, and not her tragic past that had happened so long ago, that was making her almost scream in pain and loss.
During her stay in the penthouse with Emma, something very similar must have occurred there, too.
Whatever had happened near the very end of that New York trip, it was what had to be tearing her apart right now. Jenny suddenly moaned, even louder in shame, as her shaking legs finally began to give out. I gasped in pain, as those very strong arms tried to drag me downwards to the polished ceramic tile floor of the Terrace with her. With almost her full weight around my upper body, I was being contorted at such a horrible angle, that no neck could tolerate it for very long without breaking.
Even I had my limits of physical endurance.
I desperately broke one of my own rules, and began pleading out loud for Jenny to come back too early from a fit this debilitating and serious.
"Jenny! I'm here! Come back! You're hurting me! It's all right! I'm still here! Just tell me this time! Tell me everything! Please? I know that you miss Emma! You've sobbed out her name several times now! Just tell me what happened, the day or night BEFORE you left New York! Em is ok! But she kept all of your secrets from me, too! She wouldn't even tell Avery, why you both rushed back so suddenly the next morning! I would've thought that you would've spent at least a day or two at Emma's farm! A few hours couldn't have been enough time for you to explore everything there! And NO sketches off the house, barn or the pecan groves at all?"
That Jenny wouldn't even come partially back to her senses, to at least discuss her art, was a very bad sign indeed. She always heard whatever I said, even at times like this! It just took a little while for my words to sink in! I rushed on with a few more thoughts, and tensed my neck and shoulders up even tighter as she put almost all of her weight on me.
Trying to drag me downward, physically and emotionally, so we would both drown in her endless pool of depression and despair.
"I can't help you! Not fast enough! Not when you are like this! Not unless you TELL me, finally, exactly what happened in New York! I will piece it all back together, eventually, but doing that MY way takes too much time! TIME is the ONE thing we don't have enough of right now! PLEASE! Let go of me! Your hurting me!"
Something about the real pain I was in finally got thru to Jenny.
I could have easily extricated myself from her unintentional hold. I'd had almost too much training on how to deal with deliberate harm being directed at me. But even the least of my non-lethal choices? They would devastate someone as deeply disturbed as Jenny was right now.
The secret with dealing with both her and Linda's kind of fits... was to slowly ease them out of mental and emotional danger... that if left to their own devices and fears they kept creating for themselves in ever more vicious cycles.
Both of those almost too black eyes finally fluttered back open, and after they were positive who my gray ones belonged to, Jenny's other senses began snapping back to life. The strangle hold on my poor neck relaxed, but she still mistakenly used my crouched position to help pull herself back up onto her feet.
The worn sandals skittered on the slick tiles for a moment, before she finally dared to let go, and gently touched my cheek.
"... I'm so sorry... I always seem to be hurting the people that I love and care for... I can't seem to stop myself... or even do the simplest things to protect them... I chickened out in New York... regardless of what happened to make me come home early... I failed you... all I had to do was listen... and Emma would have told me EVERYTHING... about why you two really broke up all those years ago... she NEEDED to tell me the truth... but I wouldn't let her... I ran out of your old bedroom... and begged Emma not to follow me... I forced her to spend a few hours alone at the worst possible moment... Em was hurting so bad... all alone... just because I was afraid to learn any more secrets... even yours... I NEVER want to know something that would hurt YOU... not if I slipped up and told you about it... some secrets... they wouldn't be safe with me... because I would TELL you them right away... Emma didn't really understand that about me... but maybe now she does... "
Clearly something very complicated had happened, to strain how close Emma and Jenny must have gotten, during that next to last stop on the tour. A brief sob, and a small kiss on my lips, was my reward for patient silence.
"When I left your old bedroom, I didn't know that Veronica was back in the kitchen and cleaning up the dishes from dinner. All I wanted was someone to hold me! I swear! I didn't mean for anything else to happen! But it did! Veronica was so lovely! So eager! She didn't want to JUST watch us anymore! Emma said that your old friend loved to see two people make love! I loved doing that for Veronica! I just wasn't prepared for how she would react when I fell into her arms and began crying! I am not like either you OR Emma that way! If I have someone pressed that tightly against my naked body? That NEEDS and WANTS me that badly? I respond! I always have! I just can't help myself!"
Another short sob, and a small flinch from a sudden joyful shout down below in the garden, made Jenny pause for a moment. Then the sound of the orchestra playing music again quieted the noisy crowds enough to let her continue.
"I made sure, right from the very first night out on the couch in front of your fireplace, that Emma knew the risks of being with me. I sort of 'explore' people! Just like I do with places for my art! Veronica was so lovely! So eager! She didn't care who I was or that I was becoming famous! She just wanted to be held and accepted for exactly who SHE was! Emma and I had already talked about doing at least something physical with Veronica! Maybe just letting her touch us, while she watched us in bed? Or having her join us in your shower one morning or night? It's big enough for five or six people! But what I really think that hurt Emma the most? It wasn't when she left your old bedroom, and caught Veronica and me on the couch? It was when I told Veronica what was worrying me the most about my relationship with YOU! I'd hid that from Emma, and me telling someone else about that before I told HER? That's what really caused me to come back so early! Nothing else! I swear! I felt so guilty about betraying OUR trust, between you and me, that I just couldn't bear to see everything at the farm! Burt and Philip? They understood, and they helped convince Emma to let me fly home alone! I'm so sorry! If only I had listened to what Emma had been trying to tell me! All those DAMN secrets! She kept trying to tell me them! Over and over! But I was too stubborn! Too selfish! If I had just opened up and told Em how I really felt about YOU? I still would have gotten to sleep with Veronica, but WITHOUT hurting Em! Then I would been able to spend a few days and see everything at Emma's farm! And YOU would finally know the REAL reason why Em left you! I just got too scared! I'm sorry! I'm so sorry I messed up!"
This time I decided to move Jenny away from the Terrace's overlook, before yet another shout from the huge crowd could disorient her mind again.
On numb feet and legs, Jenny let me move her towards the darkest shadows of the side wall. It actually backed up to the little room that Maureen, Everett, Ellie and Carissa would be coming out of in a few minutes. The little light bulb that was part of our prearranged signal for their visit was still on. That meant the four of them were still down below in the secret room, or maybe just now climbing up the old iron spiral staircase.
When it went out, I would have just a few minutes to fully prepare Jenny to meet three more strangers, all at the same time.
After I tugged back down the wrinkled sundress, I caressed Jenny's neck and face, to get her to reopen up her wonderfully expressive eyes. They were so different from Keeley's, but in the most important ways, they were exactly the same.
Unlike my own eyes right now, there weren't any deliberately buried secrets or shame behind them, so for her no defenses were even necessary.
