Sex on the brain.
Nora floated between her bedroom and the bathroom on a cloud of nerves. The door at the end of the hall stood open, a personal challenge. Sunlight on the hardwood turned Rob’s name warm and gleaming amid a dusty sea. Hall-crossings sent hope and panic soaring.
He’d be here soon for their fancy date night. After their relaxing, low-key outings, tonight should be a breeze. They’d done getting-to-know-you talk. She wouldn’t be going in blind or fearing a dating disaster.
Except the sex question loomed. Silly to pretend otherwise. She’d gone out and bought a new bra and panty set, for chrissake. New dress, too. Everything fresh, clean, and new for Rob. Even her.
She stared down the open door. The wedge heels on her sandals echoed. Long, confident strides, same as she’d done every night this week. A careful step across Rob’s name.
Throttling back her distaste for the room and its former occupant, she made a slow turn in the barren space. “I am not a failure.” Not as a woman, a wife, or a sex partner. David’s laughter rippled in the silence of memory. “You don’t get to decide who I am.”
The girls at work damn well didn’t get to decide, either. Once they’d shaken her down for the real reason she hadn’t joined them on the last two Friday nights, they’d teased without mercy.
Oooooh, third date.
Ellie, you’re so old-fashioned.
That’s like the sex date for old people, right?
“I decide.”
Even if the girls were right, and she was old at thirty-one. She hadn’t looked forward to a man’s touch in years. Not until Rob swept in with his sexy smile and his firm abs. His thoughtfulness. His gentle coaxing and his steady, demanding faith in her.
She twirled. Swaying silk tickled her ankles. No laughter. Only blessed silence and the expectation of Rob’s appreciation. He’d clasp her waist and slide free the decorative tie before she guided him to the zipper at the neck.
Mmm. Cloudbank of nerves throwing lightning.
The doorbell sang its two-toned greeting.
Panic jangled at her side, an unwanted companion down the hall to the front door. Could she invite him in for the sex first and enjoy dinner after without the question hanging over her head?
No, he’d probably made a reservation. Besides, if she chickened out during the sex, she wouldn’t get the dinner afterward. She’d be giving up laughter, conversation, and Rob’s sexy smile and gold-flecked eyes.
Third date.
She pulled open the door.
Sweet honeysuckle wafted through the screen. He’d brought a beautiful bouquet of orange, yellow, and white blossoms. “They’re gorgeous.”
“You’re gorgeous.” He swung the screen aside and held the petals under her nose. “The flowers wish they were so beautiful.” He kissed her cheek as she inhaled. “Probably fretting about whether I got the dirt off their stems.”
Wildflowers he’d picked himself, from his own yard, maybe. She accepted the bouquet with a shaky hand. Far better than store-bought roses, the insincere apologies David had always brought her. Inhaling again, she met the intense eyes watching her over sweet honeysuckle, butterfly milkweed, and lemony evening primrose.
“They must not know about your weakness for dirt.” When she’d admitted to playing softball in high school, Rob had tossed her a spare mitt and they’d added her name to the informal roster. He pulled her into his life so easily. “You told me last week I looked beautiful with half the infield ground into my clothes and hair.”
Grinning, he tugged one of the curls spilling from the top of her head. She’d worn the rollers overnight—a dead giveaway of her date plans at work—and swept the curls into a loose bun for tonight.
Rob’s agreement rumbled in his chest. “I like the way you dive for home when the pressure’s on.”
Home plate. Home run. The reason she’d bought sexy panties. Fun with no room for David’s snide remarks in her head. “I should put these in water before we go. I’ll only be a minute.” Three steps, and she turned back. “You can come in. There’s not—I mean, nothing’s off-limits. If you want to come in.”
She scurried into the kitchen without waiting for his answer, but the screen door snapped shut a second later, and his shoes tapped on the hall floor. No vase handy. She half-filled a tall glass and set the bouquet in the center of the table. Rob brought life and color into her house.
And now he stood in the hall to the bedrooms. Gazing at the floor.
Oh Christ.
She paced up behind him, echoing sandals and all.
“I like the redecorating.” Arm outstretched and angled down, he framed an L with his hand as if measuring her progress. “Bold steps on such dainty toes.”
Her feet had left dusty outlines from her nightly ritual. The first part. The second, after she’d told memory-David off and slipped down the hall to her bedroom, involved less writing Rob’s name in the dust and more calling it to her ceiling. No need to tell him.
“Lots of redecorating.” Mostly inside her head. “I’m ready for something new.”
Something like Rob in his charcoal-gray suit and powder-blue shirt with the gold-flecked tie that matched his eyes.
“I’m glad, Nora.” He captured her hand. “C’mon. Let me take you to dinner before your new no-limits policy gets too tempting.”
Be a shame to cut that tie off with scissors. But she’d see him without it tonight. Whether the night ended with sex or more casual fooling around, she wouldn’t deny the heat curling around her spine.
“Dinner first.” She let him lead her out the door, grabbing her clutch along the way. “We can talk policy while we stuff our faces.”
Rob coughed.
She cringed. Lord, let the sun melt her right into the front walk.
No. New policy. Own it.
She dug a teasing elbow into his side. “Could get pretty hot.”
“I’m thinking it’s awfully hot now.” He jiggled the knot in his tie. “Feels like I’m burning up.”
“We should make our next date at the pool.” She waited for him to open the passenger door. Stepping on the running board, she ducked inside. “Be a great way to cool off.” And spend hours staring at the sleek physique hiding under his dressy duds.
“Shucks, Nora, I’ll throw a liner in the truck bed and fill ’er up from the garden hose. Your own private pool.” He closed her door, rounded the truck, and swung in beside her. “I dunno how that dress’ll fare in the water, though.”
Silk? Not well.
He slipped the truck into reverse, his hand landing beside her shoulder as he turned to check the back.
She cleared her throat, drawing his attention. “Poor Robin.” She dared a pat above his knee.
He tightened under her touch.
Lowering her chin, she glanced at her dress and back up at him, trying for a flirtatious smile. “You’ve never been skinny dipping?”
He raised a skeptical eyebrow. “You have?”
Pulling her hand back, she shook her head. Too many things she’d never done. “But I’d try with you. A girl’s gotta have a bucket list.”
* * * *
Sweet Christ. Boldness roamed her eyes and her teasing words and her too-brief caresses. Lust would snap his dick off in his boxer-briefs if she kept on.
Lust and something more tender, the hope flaring in his chest from his name spelled out in thin letters on a dusty floor. Her sweet smile of acceptance at the flowers he’d plucked from his yard with his own hands.
“What else you got on that list, honey girl?” He glued his hands to the wheel. The flowing dress she wore tempted him more than water in the desert.
The dress matched her eyes. The deep blue with embroidered silvering-gray spirals resembled Air Force colors. Ones he’d dressed himself in. She capped hers with tumbling curls flashing hints of honey gold in brown depths. If he took his hands from the wheel, he’d unpin those curls and drag her onto his lap.
“I dunno yet.” Her quiet wonder floated high as the stars in the seductive, infinite expanse of possibility. “Nobody’s ever asked me.”
A million questions crowded his mind. He’d ask them all, every single one, over a lifetime. “Wild adventures? Trekking to the south pole?” He’d gotten the travel bug out of his system in the service. “Skydiving? Swimming with sharks?” Adrenaline, too.
Her laughter sparkled. “Probably not those. I’m a homebody. Simple is exciting and fancy enough for me.”
He might’ve miscalculated tonight. The restaurant he’d pointed the truck toward was fancy, a rarity without driving her all the way to Des Moines. He’d discarded Plan A soon as he’d found himself surfing hotel room reservations. Too much pressure for his skittish girl. Last thing he wanted was her saying yes because she felt she had to. Like he expected sex in exchange for dinner.
“Hope you’re not offended I wanted to take you on a fancy date.” His Nora got touchy about being bought, but she deserved to shine like a gem. Tough to find new ways to show a woman what she meant to him. A man’s wallet carried the cultural currency for that.
He took advantage of the red light to indulge in shameless appreciation of her fancy state. Probably give himself joint trouble from clutching the wheel so hard.
She shook her head. “Not offended.”
“But you’re not impressed, either.”
“You’ve impressed me a hundred times over, and not one way had to do with the size of your wallet.” She gripped his knee.
God himself wouldn’t put the judgment on him for pouncing if she slipped her hand higher. Her bare neck needed adornment. Dozens of bruising kisses.
She curved her lush lips in a sweetheart smile. “Light’s green.”
Shit, so it was.
“Sorry about that.” He hit the pedal. “Seems a mighty fine distraction in a pretty blue dress took the seat next to me.”
“Good reason for a fancy date.” She drew circles on his knee, her left hand paler below the line on her wrist where his spare mitt had covered her skin Saturday. The sun had warmed the rest of her peachy arm to a pale gold. More reasons to kiss her. Trace every tan line with his tongue.
She sighed. “You look delicious in a suit.”
The urge to make a meal of her in that dress sent him scrambling for a safer topic. Too bad good manners wouldn’t let him take her to bed and then dinner. His folks had taught him better. He had more class and self-control than a sex-crazed teen, didn’t he?
Barely.
He pulled into the parking lot. Stout’s Steakhouse, the only top-notch dining experience in town, with prices to match. Linen napkins. Elegant service and all that, with trendy craft-beer panache. He cut the engine.
“Mmm.” Her low moan plunged into his shorts and made his dick jump. “Their dry-aged rib eye with roasted red potatoes is fantastic.”
Aw hell. Sure she’d eaten here before. Her ex was a lawyer wining and dining the too-good-for-you crowd. The place might be full up on bad memories of playing the dutiful wife and schmoozing with clients.
He laid his hand over hers and squeezed. “If you wanna go somewhere else, I’ll take you anywhere you want, Nora.”
“Nope.” Dangling curls bounced around her face as she shook her head. “New policy. Part of the bucket list, I guess.”
“Yeah?” Whatever she named, she’d have. He’d keep her list safe in his head, bytes and packets tucked away for later retrieval. Make every last item come true. “What’s that?”
“Remind myself the past is done and be thankful for the happiness I have now.” Her gaze darted between his eyes and his lips, her eyelids fluttering with every shift.
Her sweet scent luring him closer, he brushed her lips in a kiss. “This makes you happy?”
“You do.” She kissed him back, her tongue tentative and searching. “Us makes me happy.”
“Me too,” he mumbled into her mouth. Habit-forming addiction, her kisses.
He dragged himself free and escorted her inside. She outshone the rest of the diners by miles, a gleaming beacon of beauty. More than one head turned. He kept a hand on her back as their waiter pulled out her chair.
“Pack of wolves in here.” He ducked his head and nuzzled her ear. “Have to be sure none of them tries to carry off my Nora.”
Her laugh floated atop more than a touch of disbelief. “So long as you want to whisk me away, that’s all I need.”
“We haven’t gotten in our seats yet, and I’m already thinking about how much I’d like to take you home.” Dangerous words, but he refused to hold back. If his boldness encouraged hers, so much the better for them both.
A true burst of laughter escaped her, a little loud, a lot charming. Redness colored her cheeks as she sat and gave the waiter her drink order, a raspberry wheat shandy.
Soon as the waiter departed, she leaned across the table. “I had the same thought, you know. When you rang the bell.”
His dress pants hadn’t been so tight when he’d put them on. “A gentleman is always ready to follow his lady’s lead.”
“What if—” She tilted her head, speculation tinting her eyes. “What if she doesn’t know where she’s going?” Her knuckles tightened around the leather-bound single-sheet menu. “What if she’s never been there before? Or, or thought she’d been, but they turned out to be completely different destinations?”
Places and things she’d thought she had. Good sex? A loving relationship? A solid marriage? Best to start simple. But if she was thinking on marriage with him, he’d set the date whenever she said the word.
He engulfed her hand in his sturdy grasp. Tiny. Impossible to believe she’d whipped a grounder from shortstop to first base with no more than a hop and a scoop last week.
“Then they find their way someplace new together.” He nudged her menu. “You’ve been here before—tell me what I want for dinner.”
She wiggled taller, an S-curve in brilliant blue, even as she ducked her chin and half-hid a slow-growing smile. “You want me to order for both of us?”
“Why not?” Compromise. Sure, handing over the decisions smacked of backward duty-shirking when his responsibilities included seeing her needs got met, but her bright eyes confirmed the rightness of his offer. He’d let her pay for breakfast Saturday. Swallowing manly pride and trusting her to order instead of bulldozing over her preferences with his own wouldn’t hurt him none. “I don’t need a hatful of outdated rules, Nora. I need you.”
Her fingers trembled. “I like that,” she whispered.
Getting down to business, she quizzed him as she narrowed the choices.
Their waiter didn’t bat an eye when Rob directed him to take his marching orders from Nora. Three hours they sat, tasting from each other’s plates and trading little touches. Oddly comfortable for a fancy date. For once, he hadn’t spent half the night searching for an excuse to drop pretenses and cut dinner short.
They ordered a shared dessert, some flourless chocolate torte with an orange sauce. Two bites in, he declared the concoction too rich for himself and started feeding her the rest. Not quite a lie—the dense cake was super-rich—but mainly a ploy to bring the fork to her lips and feast on the pleasure in her face.
She closed her eyes with a graceful sweep of her eyelashes above her cheekbones. Her pink tongue curled around the fork tines. Her cheeks hollowed as she tugged the bite into her mouth, and her tongue cleaned her lips when she’d finished savoring the taste.
God help him, he’d put that look on her face a time or two later tonight minus the cake.
He raised the fork again. “Can I tempt the lady with another?”
“You—” Her gaze drifted, and her smile faded.
Coming on ten o’clock, the restaurant was busy still. A server stood beside an empty table, seating a party of four.
A man with a big-titted blonde in a red dress on his arm shot Nora a contemptuous stare. He made a remark to his dinner companions and headed over. The fancy fella carried himself with the big-swagger importance of a miniature poodle in a pack of full-size mutts. Strutting chin out and arms swinging, he filled the aisle and forced passing waiters to reroute without glancing or slowing.
Rob laid the fork down. He and the glaring ass would be of a size if things came to a standoff, but a quiet exit might suit his woman better. “Nora? You want—”
She shook her head. Her nostrils flared wide like a horse scenting danger.
“Eleanora.” The man poured a five-gallon bucket’s worth of disapproval in those four syllables. “I thought we talked about this.”
After hearing her given name from Pointylips McBlowhard for the last ten years, no wonder Nora would rather a nickname. She spread her hand flat on the table and swallowed. “Did we?”
The intruder leaned in, his shadow falling across Nora’s arm as if he owned the rights to her personal space. To her. “If you enjoy playing the whore at some dive bar, I won’t stop you, but for God’s sake, keep your shenanigans out of my circles.”
Rob pushed back his chair. Nora’s ex couldn’t go eight seconds without bullying someone to make himself bigger. Almost be worth the trouble to smack the shit out of his slick smile.
* * * *
Oh God. David’s name-calling wouldn’t sit well with her shirtless gentleman. She sprang to her feet as he stood. “Rob.”
“Seems introductions are in order.” Rob played calm, smiling at her, his voice smooth, though she’d guess he longed to deck David right about now. His loose posture gave no clues, but her gentleman, well—he championed real civility and good manners, not the fake show her ex put on. “You know this rude yapper, Nora?”
“Such temerity from a jumped-up beer-swiller.” David delivered disdain in his angled brows like he’d been born to it. Small-town kid playing big-city lawyer with fancy words and clipped syllables. “You screw married women in bar bathrooms and I’m the ill-mannered one?”
His reputation around town mattered a hell of a lot to David, but the sharp edge in his voice cut deeper. She’d tortured herself for months imagining him with his mistress. Maybe he’d spent a night chewing over unwanted thoughts of her and Rob. Fuel for his offended martyr act. As if she’d been holding out on him.
Rob raised his chin. “I don’t, actually, though I wouldn’t be surprised if you did.”
The gel slicking David’s hair gleamed like grimy coffee grounds clinging to a filter under the restaurant’s muted lighting. “Is that the plan, Els?”
Using the damned golf nickname he knew she hated. Envy, plain as day. Thinking she’d done sexual favors for Rob she’d never done for him.
David’s sneer cut hard, ugly lines in his cheeks. “You brought your bar boy here to service him in the men’s room?”
It was the ladies’ room. Try to keep up. The retort zipping through her skull nearly tumbled out.
Rob shifted closer, shielding her with his shoulder. “’Bout the only thing from you that’d surprise me is common decency.” He nodded toward the other table. “Your date’s waiting. You sure you wanna do this now? Here? In your circles?”
Bearing a robotic smile, Jennifer the paralegal sashayed over. Now she carried out the wife duties, put on display entertaining David’s business clients and their spouses.
“Is he threatening me, Eleanora?” The three diamond studs on David’s tie clip flashed. Still the same piece she’d bought under his supervision to celebrate him passing the bar exam on the second try. His sidestep ate up the space between them. “Because that sounded like intent to commit slander, if not bodily harm.”
Rob pivoted and raised his hand. A strong hand, a gentle hand, made for cradling her curves and clutching bountiful bouquets of wildflowers. “Take a step back, Davey.”
David’s huffing laugh came through clenched teeth she’d footed the bill for. Sparkling white, all surface perfection. “If you’re going to pick up pets in such low-class places, put them on a leash. I won’t have my wife parading—”
“We’re not married anymore.” She launched forward, shoulder to shoulder with Rob. “We’re over.”
David opened his mouth. “We—”
“No. You threw away our marriage, and the only reason you want to get in a pissing contest over me now is because you think Rob has me. Too bad for you.” No being afraid of a goddamned door or the man she’d pictured behind it every day for the last two years. “If I crawled under this table and gave him a blowjob better than anything I ever gave you, it still wouldn’t be any of your damned business, you pretentious, arrogant ass.”
He’d never taken her for a romantic meal focused solely on her. Never fed her from his fork. Rob’s open, honest beauty made him a man worth keeping.
“Is that how he’s teaching you to talk?” Frame rigid, David eyed the long tablecloth as if she might duck beneath the concealing linen. His arm twitched, primed to drag her away for a private scolding. Denied the chance, he fixed his smirk on Rob, his just-us-boys amusement the same as every time he’d landed a party joke at her expense. “Her mouth is nothing to brag about. She doesn’t know how to use it, and she refuses to learn.”
Rob twisted toward her, kissed her hair and nudged her ear with his nose. “Your ex always that stupid, or am I just that lucky?”
Warm and soft, his words cloaked her like a blanket draped over her shoulders on a chilly night. She muffled her laugh in his arm. “Maybe you inspire me to new heights.” High enough to let her ignore the sideways stares and increasing whispers at the nearby tables.
“I’m warning you, Eleanora.” David snagged his paralegal’s wrist as she cozied up to his side. “I want you to stop this behavior—”
“Guess you should’ve negotiated that in the settlement.” God, not caring elevated their conversation to the best she’d had with him since he’d been a pre-law student flinging charm and compliments. For once, his wasn’t the only voice participating.
“How are you enjoying my house, Els?” Shark grin widening, David threatened to tear her into the manageable, bite-size pieces he’d manipulated for so long. He’d sharpened his teeth on her ever-more-tattered self. “Sometimes I feel like I never left.”
“Lavish but empty, like its former owner.” Holding her tongue hadn’t gained her a damned thing in the last ten years. And honesty grew addictive. “I overpaid for what I got.”
Jennifer sneered. “I always found your furnishings a little cheap.”
“How would you know?” The nerve. Had she gotten the silver service appraised between rounds of David’s monotonous drilling and constant corrections? “The ceiling’s not decorated.”
Rob snorted.
“Maybe the ceiling’s the only thing you ever see.” Jennifer ran her finger down David’s lapel. “I give my man more than that. I bet that’s why—”
“You check the sheets every night to see how many women he’s sharing your bed with?” Rob’s words dropped into sudden silence.
“You told him? I will own you for that.” David glanced at the nearest tables without turning. Air hissed through his teeth and cheek-stretching smile. Always the showman. For a man who loved being the center of attention, he hated being a spectacle.
“I told him the truth. You wanted to force me to live a lie.” Hiding everything about David and his trophy. Letting their dirty secret stain her, too. “I would’ve thought you’d have had your fill after fucking her in our bed for months behind my back. But good for you. Unless you’ve found a replacement and haven’t told her yet. That’s your style.”
A cheat stayed a cheat. He’d use his paralegal the way he’d used her, taking until she had nothing left to give. A sliver of pity slipped under her skin for the woman who’d taken him off her hands. “I hope you’re billing him for the extracurriculars.”
Jennifer shot her a look beneath lowered, thin-plucked brows. “You’ve got more moxie than I thought you did.”
More than she’d thought she had, too. No. She’d had courage once. Before she’d let David smother her under the weight of his bullying disapproval. No woman deserved that slow death. “You could do better than him.”
The envious gaze scouring Rob from buzz cut to shoe leather projected the other woman’s assessment. You already have, her look said.
“Better?” David led with his chin, his grand, sweeping headshake an elaborate performance with a toothy veneer. Blasphemy to suggest the world didn’t start and stop spinning on his say-so. No one bested David—not law clerks correcting his exaggerations at parties or waiters who served him meat a hair too pink and not her, never her, because the world would wink out of existence first. “You’ve slandered me in public, Els. You do realize what you’re going to lose?”
The right to stand in this fancy-schmancy restaurant much longer, for one, given the wait staffer hustling into the back and probably fetching the manager. Might as well finish strong before they tossed her on her ass.
“You can have the damned house, David. And the penalty payment.” She’d find the money somewhere. Sell the car. Garnish her paycheck. Borrow from her folks. “I know what I’m gaining—my self-respect.”
He’d made her complicit in his affair. She’d handed him the power to manipulate her, signing his divorce agreement with its penalty clauses and demands for silence.
“My integrity’s worth a lot more to me than upholding your bullshit reputation.” Scraping off the snake oil clinging to her from his frauds left her cleaner. Lighter. She’d rent a motel room by the week before she let him control her again. “You’re a liar and a cheat, and you can’t buy my silence anymore.”
“You goddamned bitch.” An ugly scarlet flush painted his face. He clashed horribly with his wine-dark shirt. The lights added a spotty sheen—sweat.
She’d made him sweat.
“You say one word, and I’ll make sure every person in this town knows you’re a lying bitch.”
She waited for the apologetic urge to swamp her. The cowering agreement as a powerful monster sapped her strength. Not this time. She deserved so much better than an emotionally stunted man with the temperament of a cranky child.
“You’ll lose the house.” He yanked his shirt cuffs. “Your job.” He’d done his best with her, he’d tell the concern vultures, but she just hadn’t been good wife material. “You won’t find another, not here.”
Opportunistic wealth-chaser. She’d thought him ambitious in school. A hard worker. But the work had never mattered to him. Ostentatious appearances and monetary rewards would do fine.
“You’ll lose, too.” She’d see his persecution ended in mutually assured destruction, if their fight came to that. “The difference is I won’t care.”
David reached for her.
Rob growled. “You want to walk away.”
“You think this bar-hopper is better than me, Els?” David’s bite slipped off her tougher skin. His gummy grasping projected as much menace as an infant coating a teething ring in drool. “The minute you take your clothes off, he’ll picture someone with bigger assets and better technique. When you fail to satisfy, he’ll find another.”
Pathetic. Rob witnessing the depression and failure of her marriage didn’t shame her. He’d seen her weakness at the house when she’d thrown him out, and he’d listened to the truth. Now he’d see her strong. Confident. Ready to commit to a relationship with him, not holding pieces of herself back.
“No, Rob is a gentleman. Him, I can trust. You…” So many things to say. Not one mattered. David didn’t matter. “I’d trust a copperhead not to bite me before I’d trust a word out of your mouth again.”
The suit-and-tie employee entering the dining room wore the officious look of a man about to tell them to take the mess outside.
Rob had paid the check while she’d been luxuriating in chocolate dessert heaven. If she’d eaten faster, she’d have avoided David’s petty baiting altogether. But then she’d have missed this freedom. “Rob, I’m ready to go when you are.” Not an escape but a promise. “We have better places to be.”
* * * *
She danced in the parking lot. God love her, under a full moon and twinkling stars and fancy lamppost streetlights, his Nora twirled with abandon. Beautiful. Giddy and laughing.
He popped the locks on the truck without tearing his gaze from her. Independent and free like a wild mare, and her smile. Christ, her smile. So wide her cheeks had to be aching. Stuffing him with the urge to kiss her, to press her against the truck and devour her.
Her dress fluttered as she changed directions and dashed into his arms. Sweeping a woman off her feet had never seemed so natural. Her soft contours settled in all the right places as he raised her up and tipped his head back. “Feeling good, honey girl?”
“Light as a cloud.” She looked it, too, a gorgeous blue sky denying the night its darkness. “Like everything was in shadows.” She scrunched up her nose. “Heavy. Oppressive.” Lowering her forehead to his, she sighed. “And now the shadow’s gone, and I feel your warmth like the sun heating my skin and making my heart race, but more than that.”
“Love,” he whispered, and almost dropped her. Sonuvabitch, he’d thrown everything on the table now.
She squeezed him tight, curling her arms around his shoulders and pressing her breasts flat to his chest. “Love.”
Their lips touched. Impossible to say who’d moved first. Did it matter? If they moved as one for the rest of their lives, he’d be damned happy.
She made his dress pants tighter by the second, and no way she didn’t feel him, not with her body flush against him and her feet dangling.
“Those better places you wanna be,” he murmured between kisses. “Where to, Nora?”
The night gleamed with possibility. She’d gone toe to toe with the pathetic jackhole haunting her and laid him out by TKO. Satisfying as punching the shit out of that sack himself would’ve been, watching Nora hold her own and come out on top, confident and determined, took the prize. A victory on points and one on power both went in the win column.
“Take me home.” She pulled back and gazed at him with wide, dark eyes, the blue-gray rings around her pupils rolling in like a summer storm. Her shining lips begged for more kisses to muss their deep gloss. “Your home.”
His legs moved, carrying her around the truck to the passenger door before his brain relayed the signal. Nora. In his house. Under his protection.
“Anything you want.”
He peeled one hand from the slope of her hip and clutched her tighter with the other. Hell if he’d put her down just to open a damned door. Driving, though, that’d be harder. Not as hard as him, banging at his zipped fly.
“Anytime you want.”
Cool night air slipped between them as he lifted her to the seat and she swung her legs inside. He stole another kiss and ached to touch soft skin instead of flowing silk when he pulled the seatbelt across her stomach.
“Anywhere you want.”
“I want our first time to be in your bed,” she whispered, urgent and fierce. She clutched his jacket, her fingers curling around the lapel, and tugged him in close. “I want to make love with you until the sun comes up.”
First time together. The chance to bury himself inside her heat and show her how right lovemaking could be, what she’d been missing all those years. To be the best lover she’d ever had. To be the only one she’d want from now to the grave. “Same thing I want, honey girl.”
He forced himself to close the door on her smile and hustle around the truck instead of dropping to his knees and spreading hers. Drink up the sweet scent and taste of her while she squirmed in his bench seat and her moans and squeals drowned out the hum of highway traffic behind them. Her damned ex’d be on the phone in two shakes getting the cops out here to cite him for public lewdness. Seen enough through the restaurant windows, likely.
Starting the car, he shook off growling pride. Nora wasn’t some trophy, some frat-boy mascot he’d swiped for a prank. Claiming her didn’t mean putting her beauty on display for her ex-husband and rubbing his nose in it. That fucker got within ten paces of rubbing anything on Nora from now on and he’d be regretting his stupidity.
He drove past the strip of big-box stores with their eye-piercing lights and sanitized, one-size-fits-all design. No challenge to ’em. No love in ’em. Not like his old farmhouse, the one waiting for Nora to help him make a home. Starting tonight.
Office supply store to the left. He’d stowed his gear and put fresh sheets on the bed before picking her up. High hopes. Drugstore to the right. Preparation never hurt a soul.
Nora swiveled toward the window, her curls bouncing. Swinging back, she blurted, “You have condoms, right?”
Same wavelength, same eagerness, a touch more panic on her part. Christ, he loved she’d had the courage and the sense to ask. “If I didn’t, we’d be in the drugstore parking lot right now, that’s for damned sure.”
Giggles greeted his vow. “I don’t think that lot’s as secluded as the drive-in.”
Groaning, he let memory flood in. The boldness she’d wielded only in flashes then ruled her now. No holding back. She’d won the battle. Hadn’t needed him, but wanted him. So strong on her own, and she’d entrusted herself to him.
Traffic thinned out to nothing, his headlights the lone illumination on the asphalt. Passed his near neighbors’ place, the spotter hitting the gravel where their teen had best be getting his clunker back before midnight. Kid wouldn’t be bringing his girl home. Sixteen or thirty-six, didn’t make a spit of difference: dropping the girl off made for a long, lonely drive after.
But tonight he had Nora beside him as he pulled onto the crushed stone drive a half-mile farther on. Had her unashamed curiosity, the way she leaned forward with her hand on the dash and gazed out the windshield.
The tilt of her head exposed the graceful curve of her neck, skin crying for his hard kisses. Would she be pissed if he marked her so often she needed sleeveless turtlenecks for the rest of the summer?
He cut the rumbling engine, and the rolling beat from the radio died alongside the wide front porch. The clicks of seatbelts unfastening snapped like a double-barreled shotgun.
He opened his door. The chorus of crickets chirping from the fields proved he wasn’t the only male engaged in mating rituals tonight. Giving in to impulse, he brushed his knuckles down her bare arm and savored her shiver. “Wait here.”
Long strides brought him ’round to her door.
She reached for him soon as he’d pushed the metal aside. Twined her arms around his neck and slipped into his cradling hands without a prompt. Her dress scurried up her legs when she squeezed his hips between her thighs. Christ, yes, she held on with a tight grip promising to destroy him.
He shoved the door closed and carried her up the porch steps double-time. Pressing her to the butter-yellow siding, he snagged the screen door and jammed his foot in to hold the gap.
She rocked her hips, panties sliding at his waist.
Jesus. Not tonight, but some night soon, they’d finish quick and clothed on the porch, his pants open and her panties pushed aside. His wild, hungry Nora.
“Almost there.” He turned the knob and gave the solid red oak a push. “Last door.”
“Good.” She teased her fingers inside his collar. “I don’t want any doors holding us back.”
“Me neither, Nora.” Stepping over the sill with her in his arms cemented his cock and swelled his heart. “No obstacles in our path.”
Not doors, not fears, and not fabric.
Fusing their lips, she tugged at his tongue and dug her fingers into his shoulders. Her desire battered him with urgency, made his blind shuffling toward the stairs too slow and his bedroom too far.
He backed her to the wall at the foot of the stairs and released his grip.
She clutched at him as she started sliding. “Wha—”
“A brief stop, honey girl, I promise. Can’t wait.” He rubbed her bare thighs, her skin warm and soft under his hands with her dress bunched between their bodies. “Let go for a minute.”
With him holding her dress at her waist, she snaked her feet to the floor.
He dropped to his knees the second she’d steadied herself. “Wanted to do this earlier, but I didn’t figure you’d appreciate it much with an audience.” He hitched his fingers under the sides of her panties. Paler blue than her dress. Lacey patterns over sleek silk. “And some things a man’s gotta keep for himself.”
He peeled the covering away, down her legs, and inhaled pure, honeyed desire.
“The way you taste, how you squirm and call out with my tongue inside you?” Spreading her lips with his thumbs revealed blushing flesh wet and waiting. His new home. “That ain’t something I’m willing to share with anyone.”
He swept her curls aside and dropped a tender kiss on her clit. Her whimper stiffened his cock, jerked him as if strings tied them together.
“Just like that,” he whispered. “Make music for me, Nora.”
* * * *
He devoured her the way she’d inhaled dessert, with deep appreciation and a greedy mouth. Felt but not seen. He blocked her view, his head almost still, his hair bristle-brush short and his knuckles clenched around the folds of her dress. But hidden below, his tongue worked wonders.
Thoughts flitted faster than a filmstrip flapping around and around. Never a movie day like this one. Interactive. Stroking and driving. Curling her toes in shoes too tight for the motion. Lifting her heels.
Pressure behind her knee, and she slammed her hands against the wall to keep her balance.
Rob draped her leg over his shoulder. Her dress tumbled down, a blue waterfall rolling across the solid man beneath.
He squeezed her thighs.
She sucked in a surprised breath.
The tugging rhythm between her legs stopped.
“All right, honey girl?” Her dress rippled, and Rob’s short hair tickled her belly. “Something I do you don’t like, you go on and tell me.”
“Mmmph.” She rolled her neck. Nope. All good. Adding up to a sizeable balance. Ready for a payout.
“Nora?” Lumpy movement under her dress.
“No, don’t stop.” She dropped her hands, scrambling for the back of his head. “Don’t—dangit, sorry, I forgot you can’t see me shaking my head any more than I can see what you’re doing that feels so good.” The silk shrouding his neck and shoulders slipped through her grasp. “Please keep going.”
The breath from his laughter woke shivers in her blood.
“So good, huh?” He nestled closer, his cheek smooth and soft against her inner thigh. “Must be because I’m eating such a delicious meal. Gonna need seconds later.”
“You can—” Oh God, whatever he’d done, let him do it again. “You can have all the servings you want, Rob.”
Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Midnight snack. Afternoon munchies. Mealtimes she’d invent the second her brain started working.
Tension stole up her spine, shoved her shoulders hard to the wall, and tipped her head back. Need choked her, tight and burning, with a welcome invasion, Rob’s tongue thick and thrusting while he rubbed her clit with heavy fingers.
So wrong to believe her body incapable of finding pleasure this way. Wasted years. She clung to the edge with a desperate grip. Too quick for this to be over, not ready, not—
Agonizing bliss seared her, a rush of heat and tremors swallowing her whole.
Long, slow strokes along her thigh shook her loose. Her arms hung slack at her sides, her fingers tingling.
Rob held her dress bunched at her belly in one firm, splayed hand as he rubbed her in slow circles.
“You’re so beautiful, Nora.” His hushed tones belonged in a church pew. Maybe he basked in the same awe kneeling here, at the foot of his staircase. A cocky smile crawled across his face. “And you wail like a five-alarm fire.”
“I do not.” She wasn’t a screamer. She’d never moaned and screamed in the bedroom. “Nobody does. They make that up for porn. Like women who wax everything.”
“Nuh-uh.” The kiss he planted made her squirm. “Nope.” Another kiss, this one on her thigh. “Honest-to-God truth in your case.” He squinted up at her. “So, you’re a big porn-watcher, are you?”
“No.” David trying to push the videos on her as educational hadn’t made them appealing. “Girls talk.” Chelsea and the girls at work did sometimes, anyway. “Men like that, don’t they?”
“What, girls talking or watching porn?”
“No, waxing.” She’d meant to ask last week. Now he’d buried his face between her legs twice, and he hadn’t said a word about her grooming habits. “Would you want me to?”
He slid his cheek along her thigh. “You feel plenty smooth to me.”
“Not all over.” A twinge of inadequacy fluttered in her belly.
He raised an eyebrow. “You asking what I like, Nora?”
“I guess so.” Guess? What was that bullshit?
Rob waited on his knees in front of her. The man who loved her confidence and her honesty.
“I mean, yes. I’m asking. I want to know what you like and don’t like.” Not limited to that, either. “And I want to learn what turns me on. I want you to help me figure it out.”
“Tall order.” He gazed at her with eyes deep and true, their every flicker an invitation and a promise. “I tell you what, though. I’m damned good at following orders and not half-bad at taking command.”
Dipping his shoulder, he lowered her leg to the floor. “I like a woman comfortable with how she looks, however she chooses to display herself. There ain’t a thing wrong with the way you look tonight.”
He shrugged off his jacket and stood. “But you wanna shave sometime, you let me know, ’cause I’ll grab a front-row seat for your show.” Leaning in, he nuzzled her ear. “Maybe ask for a little audience participation.”
“You’d like that?” The boring repetition of beauty routines gained new allure. “Really?”
“Absolutely.” He dotted her neck with tiny kisses. “You making a decision because doing something makes you feel sexy or bold or daring? Guaranteed I’ll be harder than a titanium strut.”
She pressed her hand to the front of his pants, and his moan flooded her with heat. Boldness-response guarantee confirmed.
“The lady requested a bed, remember?” He tugged her hand away. “You touch me now, and I won’t make it that far.”
She stepped out of her shoes. Her legs wobbled as she followed him up the stairs. “For the first time.”
The blank walls begged for photos. Every family saved the wall along the stairs for year after year of portraits. Weddings and anniversaries. Birthdays, school pictures, and sports teams. Smiling faces.
“Then all the other rooms.” Maybe she’d finally met the man who’d make those memories with her. “I get a tour of the house, don’t I?”
Groaning, he squeezed her hand with desperate strength. “In the morning, Nora.” Turning at the top of the stairs, he paused and glanced down. “Way I’m feeling tonight, we’ll christen every room in the place by this time tomorrow.”
And every day for the rest of their lives, if her luck held. “Best get started, then.”
Flipping on the light, he led her into his bedroom. Cleaner than hers. She teased him out of his tie and sent the smooth silk sailing to the floor. “You could do with a little mess, Rob.”
“Trying to impress a special gal.” He peeled off her dress and tossed it aside. Unhooked her bra and cupped her breasts with warm, firm pressure. “She’s always impressing me.”
Sincerity poured from his eyes. His intensity flattened her, sucked the air from her lungs while his belief supported her.
She slipped the leather tongue of his belt free and rubbed the button beneath. Smooth face. Raised threads. The slightest push enough to guide the disc through the buttonhole.
Rob built her up without tearing her down. His steady strength made her strong, too. With the last tick of the zipper, his pants dropped to the floor, leaving tented boxers attempting to contain his arousal.
She dipped inside. His cock bounced against the cotton. Much as she enjoyed watching him dance, the view would be better without the shorts. Gone in one fell swoop.
He squeezed his balls, and pre-come beaded at the tip of his cock.
“I gotta apologize.” His tone teased. “I didn’t shave for tonight. It’s like a cover crop down here.”
Giggling, she shoved his chest. He stood firm.
“But I trust you, Nora.” He curved his hands around hers. “You wanna wield the razor on me sometime, I’m all yours.”
Trust. God, she needed that. To trust and be trusted. The currents of honesty and respect, invisible until a twister tore through and shredded them. Swallowing hard, she shook her head and gently scratched his chest. “Another time.”
She wiggled a hand free. Down his oh-so-firm abdominals. She grasped skin softer than men had a right to have and stroked.
He whistled air through clenched teeth.
Her confidence surged, a dizzying swirl of power and pleasure. “I’ve got more important places for this to be right now.”
“Thinking of a few myself.” He backed her to the bed, stepping out of his shoes and over his clothes.
Letting go, she tumbled onto her back and bounced on the mattress. Her feet dangled. She spread her arms wide. “I hope your thoughts all start this way.”
“They surely do.” He bent and opened the nightstand’s top drawer. “With one addition.” He tugged, growled, and tugged harder.
A strip of condoms unfurled with a snap. Long line. Two, four, six—
“Only one missing is the one in my pants pocket, honey girl.” He tore free the top square and let the rest fall.
“You bought a new box for me?” A curious sort of pride filled her.
He winked. “A man can dream.”
So could a woman. Too many nights imagining these moments a hundred ways. Now she’d gorge herself on every variation. “With that much inspiration, guess we will be trying every room this weekend.”
He rolled the latex down his cock. A transparent shield between them. “You’re on.”
Gripping the back of her knees, he pushed her farther across the quilt. She kicked her feet up and tickled his ribs with her toes. “I feel like a wheelbarrow.”
“Squirmiest wheelbarrow I’ve ever handled.” He crawled over her, walking his hands up the bed along her thighs, her hips, her chest. “Prettiest, too.”
The mattress dipped with his weight, rocking her side to side.
“Sweetest.” He pressed in close, his heat warming her as he steadied himself on his forearms.
Every nerve ending in her body clamored for his touch.
“Softest.” He sank down with the welcome scratch of chest hair against her straining nipples. His hard heat pressed to her clit and belly. He kissed her forehead. “Most loved.”
“Most loved.” Too long since her body had melted for those words and the truth behind them. Joy leaked out in a surprising rush, and she choked on her gratitude. “Thank you, Robin.”
“Hey, shhh, easy,” he crooned. He kissed the corners of her eyes. “I love you, Nora.”
He dragged the tip of his nose down her cheek. “Love you.”
Kissed her mouth in a nibbling line. “You’re gonna get tired of hearing me say so.”
Nipped at her jawline and teased her throat with his teeth. “But I’m gonna keep on.”
Rocking his hips, he teased his cock forward and back. “All the time, because I love you.”
He stroked her side and slipped his hand between their bodies. “People everywhere’ll be asking you, ‘Eleanora, who’s that handsome stud following you around and shouting how much he loves you?’”
“Oh God.” She hadn’t told her hips to thrust like that. Instinctive reaction to his fingers on her clit. Must be. Her brain contributed a whole lot of nothing to this discussion. Girly bits operated alone. Clit, lips, pussy, and heart. All of them talking to him.
“Nope. Just your Robin.” He rolled, taking her with him. Now she straddled him, her legs hugging his hips and her hair falling in curls around their faces, shutting out all but their intimate nest for two. He cradled her in his broad hands. “Your choice, honey girl.”
No, not her choice alone.
She pushed herself up and snagged his hand. Guiding him, she wrapped both of their hands around the base of his cock. Raised her hips. Nudged him between her lips, seeking the perfect alignment.
“Our choice.” She sank.
He groaned and blinked, his mouth wide and his gold-flecked eyes dancing. His cock lodged deep. Sturdy. Strong. Rob. He flexed his hips.
She shuddered. “I love you.”
* * * *
Home. Tight and trembling above and around him, soaking his balls and his thighs. Been a while for her. Him too, but his dry spell just made him quicker off the draw. He’d wanted her good and relaxed, orgasmic and laughing, so he wouldn’t hurt her.
“Love you right back.” With a fierceness and a certainty he’d never found before.
After a deep breath, she caught her lower lip between her teeth. Moans poured forth anyway. She’d deny them later. Thought herself quiet as a church mouse, his unrestrained screamer. His Nora.
Eyelids drifting, lip slipping as her mouth opened and her curls swung free, she ground her hips and clamped down on his cock. On purpose or couldn’t help herself, either way, goddamned hot.
He surged beneath her. Near lifted her off the bed.
Rocking forward, she slapped her hands down on his pecs. Fuck, the sting upped the urge to grab her waist and drive himself into her until neither of them had thought enough to take a breath.
No need. She found the rhythm herself, bouncing on his cock with sudden speed.
Unhh, Christ, he oughta look anywhere but where he disappeared inside her. Too close to unloading every time she pulled him deep.
The flare of her hips and the ripple in her stomach proved no safer. Nor the hypnotic jouncing of her breasts or her fingers kneading his chest or the brilliant smile on her face.
Jesus, turn her on and let her loose, and her instincts and eagerness promised him heaven. Land of milk and honey. Moans, laughter, and mind-blowing pleasure.
“Love the way you ride, too.” He inched toward her center. He’d give her a hand, push her over the edge before she took him. “Not gonna last long like this.” He thrust up as she slammed down. Fuck, her fingers’d leave divots in his chest in another minute. “You feel how hard I get for you?”
She gasped and groaned. Her clit jumped under his fingertips.
“That’s all you, Nora, taking me inside your slick, sweet pussy.”
She spasmed. Victory for them both. Her feet beat an incoherent rhythm on the mattress beside his knees as she milked him.
Pinning her thighs beneath his palms, he emptied with a shout.
Lungs heaving, she sagged.
He wrapped her tight and pulled her to his chest. Her breath gusted past his ear as he kissed her cheek.
“Mmm, take a breather.” Soft, warm skin with a hint of salt under his lips. “You more than earned one.” Her heartbeat raced below her jaw. “My turn to do all the work next time, hey?”
She shivered and wormed her arms around his back. “Promises, promises.”
The smile in her voice didn’t dispel the flicker of a question. Bunching her straying curls in his hand, he turned her head and kissed her with firm, crushing lips. “I keep my promises.”
Supple arms and legs crushed him in return. “I believe you do, Shirtless Gentleman.” She nuzzled him like a kitten, bumping his nose and cheeks. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.” Lifting her head, she giggled. “Definitely wouldn’t be naked. In your bed. Holding you inside me.”
She tightened already-tight muscles. Deliberate this time, for certain.
He exaggerated his groan. “It’ll be a sweet death when your appetite kills me.”
“Am I too much for you?” His woman teased him with a bold tone and a smile verging on smug.
She’d shed so much shyness since their night at the drive-in. The night his fingers had ventured where his cock rested now.
“Just right.” And how. He’d have to pull out soon, before he lost the firmness gluing the condom tight to his cock. All well and good to imagine Nora with his ring on her finger and his child in her belly, but spooking her with a pregnancy scare their first night sure as hell wasn’t the way to go about getting there. “You are right on the button for me, Eleanora Howard.”
Her satisfied hum rumbled against his neck. They lay together in growing quiet. Not the awkward, empty silence of a bad first date but the filling silence of comfort, of summer evenings on the porch swing.
The smooth expanse of her back flowed under his hand. Stopping himself from petting and stroking her would take more effort than he cared to muster. ’Til he softened, leastwise.
He rolled her with a growl, pulled his hips back, and made a quick grab for his cock. Missed her tight heat soon as he’d left her. With the latex pinched between his fingers at the base, he twisted to sit up. He tied off the condom and pitched it in the trash. Now he had a sticky dick and a girl waiting. Boxers. Perfect cleanup. He bent over and snagged them.
A slow wolf whistle sounded behind him, followed by a giggle.
He wiped off his cock, dropped the undershorts, and shook his ass. “I hope you have dollar bills. I’m a stripper with standards. No free shows.”
“Aren’t you supposed to wear a g-string?” She sported a less than innocent smile and a goddamned gorgeous body, all sprawling and relaxed like she understood she belonged in his bed. A cat claiming her territory. “I can’t wait to see how you hold those dollars.”
“Shooting down my bright ideas with your accountant logic?” He launched himself at the bed. Every angle calculated for a safe landing. “Must be consequences for that.” He laid out flat on top of her and kissed her nose. “Big, hard ramifications.”
“I like these outcomes.” Squirming, she wrapped her legs around the backs of his thighs and squeezed. “How do I get more?”
“Keep doing that and you’ll find out.” Soon, he hoped. Of course, the longer his dick took to stand up again, the more time he had to tease and explore his woman. “I might be persuaded to let you run a tab.” For the rest of their lives.
“Could be dangerous.” She rolled her hips, ocean swells fit to drown in. “I’m feeling like a big spender.”
“I know you’re good for it.” He filled his lungs with the sweet musk of her arousal. His inhalation flattened the roundness of her tits to his chest. He hadn’t dined on a mouthful of them yet. Fix that in a minute, sure enough. “And I’ll cut you a deal.”
“A markdown?” She gripped his shoulders and stroked his arms. “Don’t undervalue yourself, Rob. You’ve got great selling points.”
“So do you.” He waited for her to still, her eyes dark and confident. “I’ll respect my value if you’ll respect yours. Deal?”
“I don’t think that’s gonna be a problem anymore.” Smile spreading across her face, she wiggled her hips. “What does this deal get me?”
Natural curiosity. Eager interest. No backing down, no shaming herself for sharing herself with him. She’d dropped the weight of her ex-husband’s expectations. They’d cracked open the defective code, however deep the fuckwit’s spiteful words and selfish desires had invaded, and yanked out the virus that had overrun her system for so long.
“Let me show you all the features.” His cock pushed toward half-mast, sluggish but responding to signals again. He’d have more stamina for a second go. Stay inside her longer, take his time, look her in the eyes while she rolled through her orgasm with him buried deep. “I think you’ll wanna spring for the top of the line model.”
Lifetime warranty included.
“I think I will, too.”
* * * *
Nora jerked awake in darkness, fragments of a half-remembered dream fading with each blink. A weight across her collarbone pinned her to the soft bed at her back. Heat warmed her in uneven measure, greater to her left and absent on her right.
Rob. He lay beside her because this bed belonged to him and she hadn’t left it yet. He slept on his side, his face bared to her and his arm draped over her. Years since she’d fallen asleep so close to a man, back when she and David were newlyweds. The distance between them had grown every year since.
Keeping this closeness demanded a commitment from two. One alone would never be enough. Reaching for something always beyond their fingers. For someone who raced a few steps ahead, who commanded her to follow like a dog. Not so now. She’d done as she pleased and the world hadn’t ended.
The dating police weren’t barreling down the drive with lights flashing and sirens blaring to brand her a slut. Rob hadn’t laughed at her or berated her. He hadn’t stopped to “correct” her position or her speed or any of the dozens of faults David had found with her.
Desires she’d shut down and shied away from, afraid to chance raising the subject with David, floated around her in a slow-moving dance. She could trust Rob. She could talk to Rob. She could try things with Rob she’d never let herself imagine before. Terrifying and liberating, all at once.
She inched to her right. His palm, heavy and warm, rolled across her breasts as she slipped free of his hold. Their clothes littered the bedroom floor. Rob curled his fingers into the space she’d left behind.
Beautiful man. The comforter lay unused beneath his nudity. The August heat made their bodies enough. Odd, how he revealed power and vulnerability in the same skin. His broad chest and thick thighs delighted whether as a sturdy platform to ride or a shield to rest under. Draped on his thigh, his cock hung soft and smaller than when he’d helped her roll the condom down his shaft. When he’d laid her back on the bed, risen above her, and entered her with patient strength.
Stepping around the clothes, she tiptoed out of the bedroom and down the hall to the bathroom. She flipped the switch, and invasive light plastered her eyes shut on instinct. Well, the light and the colors.
His bathroom brought to life a pink-drenched nightmare with stately black trim. Somebody’d rebooted this room in the 1950s. Even the toilet and the pedestal sink resembled Pepto-Bismol piggies. At least both worked fine.
The mirror didn’t. Couldn’t. It reflected an unrecognizable woman. One who stood tall. One whose gaze flicked past the dwindling curls, half matted and flat, without a wince. One who smiled with pride and remembered pleasure at the purpling ovals dotting her neck and breasts. A woman wide-awake at two in the morning and reveling in the thrill of tiptoeing naked around her lover’s house.
He’d invited her to make herself at home. “Stay with me, Nora.” Lying drowsy and sated after making love the second time, he’d kissed her forehead and cuddled her close. “What’s mine is yours.”
Her panties hugged the floor at the base of the stairs beside her shoes. She trailed her fingers along the wall. First stop on her house tour. Maybe he’d repeat that stop in the morning as part of a complete breakfast.
The kitchen stood at the back of the house, beyond a dining room set up like a home office. Rob didn’t do a lot of entertaining. Or if he did, he served up meals at the homey trestle table in the kitchen. He owned a well-stocked fridge for a bachelor. The glass-front upper cabinets made finding a glass for her orange juice easy.
The window above the sink overlooked a neatly maintained yard with close-cropped grass giving way to wild prairie. Posts supported an empty laundry line. A lone oak’s leafy arms waved. A yard for children. Waiting for a swing set and a back porch with a heap of bikes and sports gear.
Condensation dripped from her glass to her chest. Chilly. No wandering bare-breasted in a home full of kids. Enticingly decadent for now, though.
“To everything, there is a season.”
If Rob felt the same, they’d see them all together.
* * * *
She hadn’t come back.
He’d noticed the minute she left the bed. Impossible to sleep through his woman slipping out of his arms. The creak of the bathroom door, the flush of the toilet, and the sink running alerted him to her purpose. But she had yet to return.
God forbid she gave in to doubts and fears. His Nora, standing in the bathroom, regretting their night together. Crying or worrying how she’d leave without her car here.
He rolled to his feet at the speed of the adrenaline coursing through him. Panic subsided in a puddle of blue silk. He fell back on training. Assessed the environment for what the clues told him.
His Nora, comfortable wandering naked in his house. Staking her claim. Starting her tour without him.
Palming a condom from the nightstand, he began his hunt. Past the empty bathroom, avoiding creaky boards with the ease of long practice, he hugged the wall down the stairs. Her panties greeted him at the bottom. Definitely naked.
No blood left for panic, what with the full volume converging on his cock. He slipped through the living and dining rooms. Stopped.
Moonlight streaming in the kitchen window washed her nude beauty in ghostly white. He’d stood on the same spot the night they’d met. Speckled that window with his own brand of whitewash. Then he’d had his hand and his imagination. Tonight, she stood before him, a vision of soft, warm flesh, the woman he loved tender and needy or wild and greedy.
Crossing the floor, he hummed so as not to startle her. She tipped her head but didn’t turn from the window. He settled behind her, relaxation and arousal mingling when she allowed him to wrap his arms across her shoulders and chest. Pinned her in tight. His woman.
She gripped his forearms. Her man. A silent agreement taking him to full hardness. The corners of the condom packet dug into his palm.
“Thinking good thoughts?” He kept his voice low in a fervent hope for truth.
She bumped his chin with her nod. “You’ve got a strong oak out there.” Her fingers fluttered against his arm. “It should have a tree house.”
Thank God for bringing this woman to him. Thank him for her ex’s stupidity and Lucas’s inability to hold his drink. For all his years of searching and not settling for less than perfection.
He kissed the side of her head. “House like that needs children to play in it.”
“Three or four, I think,” she whispered, sweet and wistful.
“I think so too. They say practice makes perfect.” He dotted her neck with kisses, light and playful, circling the tiny bruises his mouth had left earlier. Those made his cock twitch. Mine.
“Mm-hmm. We’ll get the most benefit—”
She gasped and shivered. Sensitive spot half an inch below her right ear.
“—from two-a-days.”
Three or four, I think.
He pressed into her, aching relief as the soft skin of her backside caressed his cock. “Whatever the lady wants.”
“Upstairs?” A touch of uncertainty. A hint of disappointment, maybe.
“You said you wanted to try other rooms.” He unfurled his fingers and presented the condom packet.
“I did say that.” She plucked the wrapper free and tore the corner. “And I’ve never…”
“Not in the kitchen?” Taking the latex circle from her fingers, he nipped her ear. “That’s a shame, Nora.” An ain’t-he-a-lucky-bastard shame. A make-her-first-time-memorable shame. “We’ll fix that right now.”
He rolled on the condom and roused her with stroking fingers and wandering kisses. Teased his tip inside and groaned at her suction. Pressed her hands to the counter and entwined their fingers.
They’d fix the rest day by day. All the time in the world.