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IT WOULD HAVE BEEN difficult, if not impossible, to say what Nelson liked best about Johanna. She was beautiful, of course, and she was a wonderful cook, but there were plenty of pretty girls who knew their way around the kitchen. He wouldn’t have needed an ad to find a girl like that; as far as he was concerned, those were just the side benefits.
Johanna, however, had something more. She was kind to everybody, for one. Nelson had to fight sometimes to keep himself from becoming a cynical, suspicious person, but Johanna approached everybody with a giving heart and an open mind. She was an interested, interesting conversationalist, as well. Working at the paper had given her an education well beyond Nelson’s; he had learned early on that she was better informed than he was about...well, everything. And she listened. He couldn’t have guessed how much he needed somebody to talk to, as if he’d been saving up everything he had to say for the last five years, and she actually paid attention to what he had to say.
And, of course, no man would be able to forget what she had done to him in bed, and Nelson was no different. Hell, it was impossible to go more than an hour or two before his mind turned back to the way she touched him. The way she kissed him. The way she let him—encouraged him, even—to empty himself in her mouth. Even now, out here in the cornfield, he felt himself stiffen slightly at the memory.
In short, Johanna was just about perfect. And It was destroying him on the inside.
He stopped walking through the corn and knelt in the dirt. This area of the field had persistent horseweed; no matter how often he came through and cleaned it out, it always returned in a day or two. Still, the alternative was to stop trying, and that was no way to solve a problem. He slipped on his gloves and started pulling.
It wasn’t Johanna’s fault, of course; she had no idea how her kindness was torturing him. But every time she did something nice for him, every time she did something that lightened his heart, it pained him in the next second. Johanna seemingly spent her days thinking about him, while he was still haunted by Virginia’s memory.
He was beginning to resent them both: Virginia, for staining his marriage to Johanna, and Johanna for...well, for being such a good person. She was nicer than he deserved, and knowing that was like a cancer eating away at him, filling him with guilt where his heart used to be.
I must be out of my mind, he thought as he uprooted a tall stalk and threw it to the side. Letting a dead woman come between me and my wife. Why’d I even get married again in the first place?
He grabbed for another clump of horseweed and pulled hard, but the stalk snapped close to the ground, leaving a stub sticking up from the dirt. This one would return. So would the others. Trying to get rid of it was futile.
Why did I get married? It was a question that had popped up several times in the last few days, much as he wanted to get rid of it. On the face of it, it seemed to have an easy answer: he was tired of being lonely. This much was true, and Johanna was an ideal companion here on the farm. But a wife’s more than a companion, he thought. You’ve got to love her. And you’re not sure that you do.
Nelson sat back on his haunches, removed his hat, and grabbed his handkerchief from his rear pocket. He wiped the sweat from his face and stared at the dirt under his nails. Normally he didn’t mind it; it was normal and natural, a reminder of honest work done. Today, however, it just looked dirty.
Do I love Johanna? Thinking of his wife wasn’t like thinking of other people. He could summon his dad in his mind, for example, and picture him clearly, as if he bore the label: father. With Johanna, however, things were different. There wasn’t one single thing that appeared when he thought of her; instead, his brain was flooded. There was the way the light turned her eyes from green to brown, depending on what she wore. There was the way she threw her head back when she let out a belly laugh. There was her warmth that pressed against him in the night, or any one of a thousand other things. Thinking about her was opening himself up to a sweet confusion; it was impossible to keep his thoughts straight when she meant so many wonderful things. Not even his first wife had meshed so well with him. Yeah, he loved Johanna. That wasn’t the problem.
The sound of the dinner bell caught his attention, and he stood up to look back at the house. Johanna was there already, waving to him. She must have come home early from the paper so she could make supper, he thought. That’s just like her. She had been nothing but selfless, while he...had not. Selfish, yes; selfless, no. Nelson replaced his hat and started for home. It wasn’t just time for supper. It was time for things to change.
After he washed up, he would have given anything for a reason to linger outside, for some reason to delay all this, but he had none. She greeted him with the same smile as always; the smile that lit up like sunlight itself and gave him a sweet pain in his chest.
“Are you hungry?”
“I am,” he said. “But before that, I wanted to talk to you about something,” he said.
She looked at him expectantly, with a half-smile and wide eyes. “About what?”
Nelson rubbed his aching temples briefly, then met her gaze. “I think we should get a divorce.”
~ ~ ~
JOHANNA FELT HER BLOOD freeze in her veins. “What do you mean?” she asked, her voice suddenly weak and soft.
Nelson pulled a chair out and slumped into it heavily. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and hid his face in his hands. “I’m sorry, Johanna,” he said. “I just can’t do this anymore. It’s not right.”
She slowly pulled out the chair opposite from him and sat down. “To be honest, I was thinking about the same thing,” she said. “Just last night, in fact.”
He raised his face to look at her and she saw nothing but pain in his eyes. “You were?”
“Yes, I was.”
He let out a long, slow breath. “I can’t blame you for that,” he said. “So I guess that’s it, then. It’s over.”
“No, it’s not,” she said. “We’re not getting divorced.” He looked at her dumbly, but before he could speak, she continued. “I decided that I’m not giving up on us so easily. After all, I took a vow, and I intend to follow it.”
“I took those vows too,” he said. “And I’ve already broken them.”
“How?”
“I swore to love you and no one else,” he said. He could no longer meet her gaze, and he buried his face in his hands again. “But I can’t do that. In a way, I still love Virginia too.”
“Oh, Nelson,” she murmured, and she rose from her chair. She went to kneel by his side, and she laid her hand against his cheek. He quickly pressed her hand against his lips, then pushed it away, as if he didn’t deserve her touch.
“I’m not asking you to stop loving Virginia,” she said. “I know that you always will.” His eyes were welling with tears now, and though she hated seeing him like that, she went on. “I’m just asking you to love me too. Can you do that?”
He closed his eyes and a pair of tears rolled down his cheeks. “How can I, when I loved her with my whole heart?”
Johanna placed her hand on his chest. “I know what kind of man you are, and what kind of heart you have,” she said. “I know that you have enough love for her and for me.”
“I’m so sorry, Johanna,” he muttered. “I never meant to hurt you like this.”
“I know you didn’t,” she said. “But you’re hurting, too. I want to help you.”
“I never thought all these old feelings would get dredged up again. I thought all that was over long ago,” he said. “I just don’t know what to do.”
She brushed her hand across his cheek, looking closely at him. Pain and confusion were clear on his face. “Nelson, do you pray?”
He snorted. “Not in a long while,” he said.
“Do you want to pray with me now?” she asked. “That helps me when I feel lost.”
“I don’t think I even remember how,” he said.
She stood up and pulled her chair around the table, next to his, and sat down at his side. “Just say what’s in your heart,” she said. She briefly squeezed his wrist, then clasped her hands and bowed her head, waiting for Nelson to speak.
He was silent for a long while, so much so that she was afraid that he was going to give up. Finally, however, he spoke. “Dear Lord,” he murmured. “I know I haven’t prayed in a long time, but I need to ask for your help today. You blessed me with not one wonderful wife, but rather two of them. But I need to let one of them go,” he said. There was a tremor in his voice that made Johanna’s heart ache for him.
“I never thought that anybody could take Virginia’s place in my heart, but when I met Johanna I found a helpmate who filled a hole in my life. I guess I finally realized that she isn’t taking Virginia’s place,” he said. “She has a place in my heart all her own. Please give me the strength to show Johanna how very much she means to me, every day. And finally, as we go forward from this day, please continue to watch over us.”
“And Lord, watch over Virginia too,” Johanna murmured. “Amen.”
“Amen.”
She reached for his hand and they sat quietly there, her head against his shoulder, feeling his chest rise and fall with his breath. As near as they were physically, it finally felt like their spirits had moved closer as well.
“So you’re sure you don’t want to leave me?” he asked.
“No, not yet,” she said. “I’ll let you know.”
He let out a chuckle as he hugged her. “You’ve been very patient with me,” he said. “And kind.”
“Did you know you just quoted the Bible?” she said. “It’s in Corinthians. Love is patient and kind. I guess that’s fitting.”
He sat back and took her by the shoulders, staring at her with a suddenly serious gaze. “Johanna, I haven’t said it, and I definitely haven’t shown it,” he said. “But I want you to know, I really do love you. I’m going to work every day to show that to you.”
She cradled his face in her hands and leaned forward to kiss him. “And I love you,” she said. “You know, there was something else in that verse. It says that love never fails.”
His smile was like a friend she hadn’t seen in a long time. “Then we should have nothing to worry about,” he said, moving to kiss her again. His lips lingered on hers this time, and she suddenly found herself pulled to her feet.
“What are you doing?” she laughed as he scooped her up, cradling her against his chest.
“Something I should have done a long time ago now,” he said, heading for the bedroom. As soon as the door was closed, he began to undress her, fumbling with her laces and ties as if his dexterity had been replaced by desire.
Johanna giggled. “How about you let me do that,” she murmured, gently pushing him away. “You just watch.”
His eyes flared and he couldn’t keep a grin from forming as he stepped back and hurried out of his shirt and trousers.
Heck of a good looking man, Johanna thought, taking him in as she slowly undressed. She could already imagine his body, so lithe and strong, pressing her to the bed, and she could see a bulge already growing in his drawers. By the time she let the last of her things fall to the floor, standing naked before her husband for the first time, she was nevertheless as warm as could be.
Nelson let out a long sigh of pleasure as his gaze ran over her body. “Johanna, you are beautiful,” he murmured. “Too beautiful for words.” He took her into his arms and kissed her then, while his stiffening cock brushed against her belly.
She grasped him through the fabric of his drawers. “I see you brought something for me.”
He smiled as he kissed her, then led her to the bed and had her lie down. He knelt alongside the bed and kissed her again, teasing her tongue with his. “Honey, what you’ve been doing for me all these nights...I want to repay the favor,” he said. “Let me taste you.”
The thought of having her husband’s mouth down there was undeniably exciting, but also exotic, like nothing she’d ever heard. Her friends, anyway, had never confessed to this pleasure before. “Nelson, you don’t have to do that,” she murmured, as his tongue trailed down her throat, leaving a thrill coursing through her.
“I want to,” he said softly, just before letting her nipple slip between his lips. Her desire flared as his mouth, so soft and warm, enveloped her flesh and he began to gently suck. She trembled as he moved his mouth to her other breast, then left both nipples stiffening as he laid a chain of kisses down her chest to her belly.
“Nelson.”
He nuzzled the soft hair between her legs, and almost unconsciously, she let her thighs drift apart.
“Nelson, no...”
His mouth finally found her most precious spot, and his tongue swiped against her flesh.
“Nelson...yes,” she murmured, before her breath was stolen away. This man, this shy man who had barely touched her up to now, came alive at the taste of her. His tongue was everywhere, sliding between her lips, diving deep within her, tickling her clitoris, even dropping down to probe her bottom. Johanna had never known that anything could make her feel so good, and her fingers were clenched in his hair as if to make sure he couldn’t get away. She had pleasured herself before, of course, but she had never felt anything like this.
Her body felt like it was burning from desire now, and Nelson’s tongue only fed the flames. He let his tongue plunge deep to drink from her most inner places, then hovered over her clitoris and gently lapped at her.
“Something’s happening,” she groaned, just before she felt herself set alight from the inside. For a long moment it felt like she was gone from her own body. It was like she was floating on a cloud, wrapped in joy and light, and afterwards it took her a minute to even realize that Nelson had paused.
“Good lord, that’s sweet,” he muttered. When he raised his head, she could see her juices shiny on his cheeks. “Say you’ll let me do this to you every day.”
“Let you? I’m going to make you.”
He grinned as he licked his lips, still savoring the taste of her, but then rose up. “Are you ready for me?” he asked.
She swallowed hard as she stared at him. His cock was as stiff as a flagpole, and the tenderness she was used to seeing in his eyes was gone now. It had been replaced by lust. “Honestly, I don’t know,” she said.
He let his gaze slide all over her body again, before returning to the slickened flesh between her legs. “I’d say you are.” Nelson knelt before her and nuzzled her with the head of his cock. As much as she was nervous about taking him inside of her, she felt a flare of desire as well when she felt his skin against her there. She reached for him and brushed his cock up and down, as if he were just her plaything. Her lust finally drowned out her fear. “I’m ready,” she murmured. “Take me.”
She knew it was going to hurt a bit, but she wasn’t expecting the pain to be so quick and sharp as he entered her. Johanna’s eyes watered as she clutched him close to her, and she couldn’t stifle her cry.
“My poor baby.” Nelson kissed her tears away, and when he brought his mouth to hers she could taste herself on him. He began to thrust, filling her entirely while his hands roamed all over her body: squeezing her buttocks, cupping her breasts, pinning her wrists down to the bed. He used her like he owned her.
In spite of the fading pain between her legs, Johanna was surprised to feel a growing arousal as Nelson worked her. She grabbed his hands and pressed them to her full breasts, her nipples stiffening at the feel of another’s skin on them. She craned her neck to watch him pierce her, diving into her again and again as he worked his hips back and forth. His cock was slick and shiny with her essence now, and Johanna ran her hands down his back, pulling him close.
She kissed him deeply, lashing her tongue against his while he ground himself against her. Her body was entirely alive, filled with sensation from her toes to her head. She could feel both the lingering ache and her muscles clenching his cock, as if to hold on. She could feel goosebumps on her arms and perspiration on her chest. She could feel her nipples both hardening and melting under Nelson’s tongue as he lowered his head to suckle at her breasts.
Every sensation was inflaming her. Thrilling her. Exciting her. But most arousing of all was the realization that after such a long wait, things were finally in place. Here, in her bed, her husband’s cock buried within her, it felt like she was precisely where she was supposed to be. And when he finally came, driving himself so deep within her as if to stay for good, she felt complete herself.