Chapter Thirteen

Adam

The apartment is dark when I get home. I drove up and down the coast for hours, trying to figure out what the hell I could say to Genevieve to make her understand that I’m not looking to change her, but I do want what’s best for her, especially considering I grapple daily with guilt over the fact that she got the short end of the stick in our marriage of convenience. I just don’t think spending her time waiting on me—or any man for that matter—is what will make her life as fulfilling as it can be.

I open the door, and my hopes fall when I realize Genevieve must be in bed, since she isn’t parked in front of the TV watching Dancing with Whoever like she normally would be on a Tuesday night. The kitchen is spotless, except for the dish on top of the stove that’s covered in foil. I flip the shiny aluminum back and see that it’s a plate of food, likely for me.

After every shitty thing we said to each other tonight, Genevieve was still thoughtful enough to set aside a plate for me.

I debate for a minute whether or not to just crash on the couch. I silently push the door to our bedroom open and curse the creaky floor as I make my way to the closet to get something clean to wear to bed.

I shower and change, and though I’m pretty sure it’s fucking presumptuous as hell, I slowly slide into bed next to Genevieve. Her back is to me and her breathing is slow and steady. I shouldn’t disturb her—that fiery temper may be even scarier if I wake her out of a peaceful sleep—but I can’t fight back the need to touch her. She’s wearing a tissue thin nightdress thing and her long hair is pulled back into a ponytail.

I love seeing her like this, without the glitter and push-up bras. I love when it’s just Genevieve stripped of all the glamor that only distracts from how naturally gorgeous she is. I reach over and run my palm along the length of her arm and a smile tugs at the edge of my mouth as I watch her skin prick up with goose bumps.

“You awake?” I whisper.

She gives a small, silent nod.

“I’m sorry for waking you. If I did…wake you. And I’m sorry for walking out like that. I just felt like things were getting really out of control, and maybe if you talked to Whit for a little and I drove around for a while, then maybe we wouldn’t…hurt each other. Because I don’t ever want to say or do anything that hurts you, Genevieve. I honestly just want what’s best for you. I want you to be happy. And you deserve to be so, so happy. You’re amazing. And bright. And so, so damn sexy. I don’t deserve to know you, much less get to call you my wife for however long this lasts. I know this situation is crazy. And I know you put a lot on the line so that I could stay here. And now I’m at this point where I wouldn’t even really want to stay if you weren’t…”

I sigh. She hasn’t moved or said a word, and I feel like a total asshole. “I wouldn’t even want to stay here anymore if you weren’t in my life, Genevieve.”

Her body shifts under the hand I still have on her arm, and she rolls to face me. Those eyes. God, those eyes.

“Really?” she says, her voice raspy with sleep.

“Really. A big part of the reason I was so bummed to get deported was that I’d miss you. You’ve made this country feel like home for me, Gen. You feel like…home.”

“Thank you. Thank you for saying that,” she says, reaching up to stroke my cheek. “I love that you think of me that way.”

I scoop her up in my arms and roll her on top of me. I knot my fingers into her hair and pull her face to mine. “You’re my best friend. I only want to protect you, to make you happy,” I say against her lips.

She kisses me deeper, harder, and I roll her under me, grabbing at the hem of her dress, dragging the fabric up over her thighs. I try to pull the top down, but the straps don’t go further than halfway, and all I wind up doing is binding her arms. I press up and tug the cloth off. She giggles in the middle of my attempts.

“Why are you always giggling during sex, Mrs. Abramowitz?” I ask, kissing the tip of her nose.

“Because you always turn into a crazy man during sex.”

“Not crazy. Just a man,” I say, tugging hard at the fabric that’s keeping me from getting Genevieve naked.

Maybe I am going a little crazy, but who could blame me? With a wife this hot, not being able to get her naked would drive any sane guy nuts.

“You’re going to shred my nightgown,” she says, catching my bottom lip between her teeth and biting down with a wild nip. “How can a man who unravels the scientific mysteries of the universe have no clue how to take off a simple dress? Watch and learn.”

She rolls out from under me and hops off the bed. I lean back, my arms folded behind my head as she pulls the dress over her head, stretching her arms high. She walks slowly into the hall to turn off the lamp I left on before I came to bed, and her gorgeous, naked body is silhouetted in the golden light.

“Leave it,” I say, my voice suddenly tight.

“You like the light?” She takes her time coming back to bed and topples onto me, all long limbs and silky hair everywhere.

“I like the light when it means I can see you looking so damn sexy.” I run my hands over her, loving the way she tangles herself around me and twists me into her warmth.

“I’m sorry we fought,” she whispers. “Can I make it up to you?”

My mouth goes dry and every attempt I make to swallow fails, so I just nod. I can tell by her voice that whatever she has in mind is going to make me go totally mad.

She gets up in a flash, rifles around in the closet, then darts into the bathroom. A few minutes later, she peeks out the bathroom door.

“Adam?”

I roll onto my stomach and look at her face, pink with embarrassment. I put my head down on my arms, eyes closed, and try to control my raging hard-on. “What do you need, Genevieve?”

“I feel silly.” I can hear her worry, but I have no idea what to say.

The thought of what she might look like in the lingerie I know she has on is giving me serious wood. I need to see this.

But she says, “I think I’m going to just take it off.”

“Please don’t!” I yell into the mattress.

A few seconds pass before she calls out, “You really want to see?”

I groan and look up. “Genevieve, are you seriously asking me if I really want to see you in lingerie? Seriously? You’re killing me. Slowly. Torturously. I—”

I stop because my brain is splicing. She’s standing in the hallway in a bustier top and a tiny pair of lace panties. Fishnet stockings hug her never-ending legs, tied at the top of her thighs with little bows.

Like the best presents imaginable.

I sit straight up on the bed.

“Come here. Right now.”

She follows the sound of my voice and stands in front of me, her fingers nervously adjusting the fishnets. “I know, right? It’s silly. They went kind of over the top and—”

“Are you crazy?” I grab her hand, and press it between my legs. Her gasp makes me screw my eyes closed and grit my teeth to avoid throwing her on the mattress and having my way with her right then. “Do you feel that?”

“Yes.” Her voice wobbles.

“That’s how hard I got in the three seconds since you stepped into that hall. No girl ever made that happen before. You are so damn sexy.” I tug her closer, and fold down the cups of her bustier, pulling one nipple, then the other, into my mouth, running my tongue over each one and sucking until her breaths turn to pants. “And you’re mine,” I growl, my hands going around her thighs and grabbing tight onto her ass. “Tell me.”

She straddles my lap and kisses my mouth hard, rubbing her body against mine in one long, slow slide. “I’m yours,” she declares between broken moans. “I’m yours, Adam.”

“Yes, you are.” I push the little strip of lace between her legs aside and slide my fingers deep into her, but it isn’t enough. I turn her over and lay her on her back, spreading her legs and kissing her thighs. “I’m going to eat you out now.”

“I… Adam, no, I…it’s not something I really l-l-l-like—” She stutters as I suck her clit into my mouth. I move my lips lower, loving the salty-sweet taste of her that overwhelms my taste buds. I let my tongue work in slow, deliberate circles and strokes, moving faster when she bucks and pumps, slowing down when she draws back.

“Do you like this?” I ask, licking her clit as I slide my fingers into her.

“Yes.” She has her face turned to the side, so her voice is muffled by the pillows.

“And this?” I spread her legs wide and lick up and down the length of her. I know by the way she shivers, and the goose bumps on her legs, that she likes what I’m doing, but I want to hear her say it.

“Mmm. I love it.” She fists her hands in the sheets and turns her head from side to side. “More. Please, more.”

“This?”

I brush my lips over the sensitive skin on the insides of her thighs, barely kissing her, barely breathing on her. She squirms and presses close for more.

“Or this?”

I move my fingers down and wait for her to hold her breath. She does, expectant, but I don’t give her exactly what she wants. I hardly touch her, actually, and she tries to wiggle in a way that will make my fingers slide deeper, press harder.

“Not so fast. We don’t need to rush. We have all night.”

“Why are you torturing me?” she whimpers.

“Trust me. You’ll be thanking me later.”

My instinct is to not let up at all, to do exactly what she asks, but we’ve tried it this way before, and she always winds up getting me caught in a moment where I can’t say no to her. And then she manages to get me to use my dick instead of my mouth.

It’s a point of pride for me. I want her to come from the way I lick her, the way I kiss her. She told me no guy ever got her off that way before, and I’m burning to be the first, to be the one who exposes her to new ways of feeling pleasure. After the stupid fight we had this evening, after the way I threw her generosity and sweetness in her face—no matter how noble my intentions—I owe her this.

I draw my hands over her lightly, lick softly, kiss so that my lips barely brush her skin. She lies with her limbs thrown out, back arched tight, hips slightly off the bed, breathing shallow and quick. I can feel the impatience and passion building in her, and that’s exactly what I want.

“Adam,” she begs, but I tune her out.

I’m not going to get distracted tonight.

Especially not after the head she gave me a few afternoons ago. I was on my way to a presentation. I’d prepared my slides and I’d practiced my speech in front of the mirror, then in front of Genevieve, until I had every single phrase and gesture down. I was ready to go, but nervous as hell when she offered to take the edge off.

I thought she may have been talking about a massage or a shot of some hard liquor, but then she sank to her knees, tugged my fly down, folded my boxers back, and took me deep in her mouth, all the way until I was pressed to the back of her throat, moaning against me and rubbing my thighs with her hands the entire time. She sucked hard, swirled her tongue along the length of my dick, used her hands to twist and pull at it and then cradle and cup my balls. She took my hands and buried them in her hair, and the last scrap of controlled man flew out the window.

I was an animal, and all I could do was feel the hot, wet slide of my wife’s mouth as I sank my fingers into her hair and pulsed against her, coming harder than I ever had before.

I’d never felt anything better than that orgasm, and I wanted to do that for her.

I lick her with more pressure, and she tugs on my hair.

“Please, Adam, I want you in me. Now.”

I stop and ask, “Do you touch yourself?”

“W-w-what?” Her voice stutters out and I smile and lick at her again.

“Do you touch yourself? Masturbate?”

“Sometimes. Not as often anymore.” She smiles and inches her hand down. “Why? Do you want to watch me?”

I shake my head, wrapping my arms around her thighs and sucking her clit. She relaxes for a few seconds, pressing hard against my mouth, then she tries to get me to come to her.

“Why don’t you want me to do this?” I ask, kissing and nuzzling her thighs. She squeezes them together slightly and moans.

She stays flat on her back and answers to the ceiling. “I don’t…I don’t like to feel out of control while you’re down there so calm.”

I pull away. “Do you enjoy sucking me off?”

She giggles nervously. “Yes. But that’s different.”

“How?” I ask, flicking my tongue slowly over her.

A single shiver shakes her, and she answers, “Because you like it. You’re comfortable with it.”

“It’s trust, Genevieve.” I kiss her lightly, inhaling the salty damp smell of her. “I want to experience everything with you. I don’t want to be greedy. I don’t want to let you do all the work. This is a partnership, right? Fifty-fifty?”

“You really want to?” she asks, her voice small. “It might take a while.”

“Trust me. That’s no problem,” I promise, sliding my thumbs along the lips of her pussy. “Will you do me a favor?”

“Okay.” She takes a deep breath.

“Think about whatever you think when you touch yourself.”

She moans and shakes her head.

“What is it?” I ask.

“It’s just…that’s when I’m alone. It’s embarrassing with you here.”

“Genevieve, I can’t see what you’re thinking,” I point out, licking her with more pressure, more quickly. I know she’s doing what I asked because her hips find that trance-like rhythm that’s elemental. I could keep this going, but there’s a question burning in my brain, and I break my mouth away for quick second to ask it. “Do you think about me?”

“Huh?” Her voice is pleasure-soaked.

“What do you think about?” I go back to licking her, this time wildly focused while I wait for an answer.

“That’s private, Adam.” Her voice is dreamy.

I pinpoint my focus, trying not to fly off the handle when it occurs to me that I asked a question I expected a certain answer to. If I didn’t like the possibility that her exes might play a main role in her private fantasies, I shouldn’t have asked.

Instead of obsessing about things that are none of my business, I go back to touching her, tasting her, bringing her as much pleasure as I possibly can while I listen to the high, breathy gasps and shaky, loosened moans spilling out of her lush mouth.

Whatever she’s thinking about, it’s working. She forgets to be self-conscious and spreads her legs, reaches down to press her hands to the back of my head so my mouth is closer, rather than pulling me away. She twists and whimpers excitedly when I smooth my tongue over the peaked swell of her clit.

“Mmm, do you think I could ever give you head in your lab?” she asks, her voice a raw whisper.

I pull back for a single second, my brain fuzzy with the incredibly appealing prospect of Genevieve and her hot, wet mouth sucking me off in the lab—

“Of course,” I say, my words ragged.

“Because that’s what I think about. When I touch myself. For the last few months. I’ve thought about you and me, in the lab, closing the damn books and you telling me that you’re sick and tired of tutoring me. That you want to spread me out on the lab counter and peel my clothes off and kiss every inch of me. That you want to feel how wet I am and that you want—oh! Adam! Adam!”

The entire time she told the story, I kept pace, waiting to feel her changed rhythm under me, sliding my fingers deep inside her while my tongue stroked her over and over right where she was almost ready. And then, as her story got more vivid, her body started to shake and jerk against me, until her hands were fisted hard in my hair and she was pressed against my mouth with persistent need, convulsing and crying out my name.

I’m dizzy with a sense of triumph. She’s gone slack on the bed, her breathing so hard her chest rises and falls visibly.

“Holy. Damn. Amazing,” she wheezes. “That was so incredible, Adam. That felt so…hmmm. Thank you.”

I am perfectly willing to end the night with her taken care of and the two of us snuggled close. But—

“Are you good, or do you want more?”

She rolls onto her stomach and smiles over her shoulder. “Do you have any more to give?”

“Genevieve,” I groan, my hands already running over her legs, along her smooth calves, to the edge of the fishnets where her thighs are so soft and so damn sensitive. I hook the waistband of the lacy thong I pushed to the side when I licked her until she came in a sweet torrent against my mouth and drag it down, leaving it tangled at her ankles.

I spread her legs apart and slide a hand under her, pressing up on her stomach so her hips lift. She stretches her arms wide on the bed and then presses her ass back at me. I slide into her, so hard I have to keep one hand at the base to control it.

Her hips pull and pump in time with my thrusts, and it’s a whole new feel, a whole new way to sink into my wife. I pump into her quick and hard, keeping my hands firmly on her hips.

“Adam,” she moans. “Adam, I feel like…”

But she doesn’t need to finish that thought because she goes slicker and tighter around my dick, and her moans echo in my ears.

“Genevieve, baby, I can’t…”

And then I’m completely out of control. I couldn’t stop myself if I wanted to, and I don’t. I know Gen has been satisfied every way I’m capable of satisfying a woman, so I let everything go. I come hard and let my chest press down over her back, my mouth planted next to her ear. “Thank you. That was so damn good.”

She rolls underneath me and traces her fingers over my face. “Thank you. I can’t believe I’ve been telling guys not to do that all these years.”

Thoughts of other guys—one in particular—cloud my brain and make jealousy buck up hard and wild in me. I feel a moment of triumph knowing that I’m the first, that there was no one before me.

And a moment of pure frustration knowing I won’t be her last.

I decide not to dwell on that thought. It’s too damn depressing.

I pull her to me. “Shh. C’mon, woman, don’t ruin my moment of glory.”

She pulls her legs up and rolls her fishnets down, tossing them on the floor, and yanks at my hand. “Get me out of this corset.”

I press the hooks together and manage to pop it open. She runs her hands over her naked body and makes me close my eyes and grit my teeth to stop myself from pulling her hard against me and starting all over again.

“Are you sleeping naked?” I ask when she rolls to the side without making any attempt to put her nightgown back on.

“Is that a problem?” Her voice drips with sexiness even when she’s completely drowsy.

“You’d turn me on if you slept in a flannel nightgown. With puffy sleeves and a turtleneck.” I pull her close, my hands on warm, soft skin no matter where I put them. “Do you have any idea what it’s going to be like trying to sleep with a raging hard-on all night?”

She giggles and wiggles her bare ass against my dick. Unbelievably hot.

“Will you be turned on…all night?” she asks around a yawn.

“I’m always turned on when I’m around you.” I kiss along the back of her neck and down the dip of her spine.

“Always?” she sighs.

“You can’t even imagine…” I’m about to say how much I love you, but I stop myself short. “How much I want you. I’ve always wanted you.”

Genevieve tenses in my arms. “Oh.”

“Oh?” I nuzzle behind her ears.

“You’ve never said…if, in the beginning…before, if you…” She holds her breath. I can feel her go totally still.

I want to tell her. That I always will. That I do. That there’s no doubt. That I always have. No question, since the beginning.

But I hold her hard against me and say, “Good night, wife.”

Because I’m a coward. She fits herself against me anyway, and we fall into a fitful sleep, but not before I realize fully that I’m way luckier than I deserve.

If only I were the guy she actually chose, rather than the one she settled for temporarily.