by Lexie Ray
“What’s wrong?” Jonathan asked.
“I’ve been with someone since we were separated,” I said, not even hesitating. After all of the misconceptions and the lying that had torn us apart, I wasn’t about to not tell my husband the truth. It would’ve been easy enough to find out — especially since Jonathan had seen Milo and me together in my office.
“I want the time apart to not exist for us anymore,” Jonathan said. “I want to just erase it and try to pick up where we left off. Do you think that’s possible? Do you think it’s naïve?”
“I think we deserve to at least try to make it work,” I said, kissing him again. Would I ever forget Milo? Of course not, just like I wouldn’t forget anything. Every single thing, from my parents dying in that car wreck to meeting Jonathan to being betrayed by our friends and family to losing my baby … those were all the factors that made me the person I was right then, in the arms of my husband. After everything, we’d still come around full circle. If this was going to work, we had to take each other as the full packages.
“Wait,” I said, pulling away from Jonathan again. “No, I won’t forget about that time.”
“Michelle …”
“It’s our lives, Jonathan,” I said. “We are who we are because of everything, in spite of everything. Do I think we deserve another chance to be together? Yes, definitely. Out of the history of the world, we deserve that more than anyone. But I don’t think either of us should want to sacrifice memories anymore, do you? Memories are power. Memories are how we learn. Memories are —”
Jonathan cut me off with a kiss, deeper than any of the ones we’d shared so far. It shocked and soothed me into silence, drove me to stop thinking and just feel.
I was breathless by the time our lips parted again.
“I want to make new memories with you,” he said. “I want all of our happiness to banish all of this despair.”
“I think that’s a fair request,” I said, kissing him again.
We’d been here before, been in this same position, but we’d been different people. Making love in Jonathan’s office had been a game to us then, something to spice up our sex life. We’d had to be quiet, had to consider the people outside the frosted glass of his office, but now, none of that mattered.
I toed my shoes off so I was my natural height, and Jonathan tore at my dress until I took pity on him and took it off myself. I helped him with his belt and pants, then undid the buttons on his shirt that were giving his trembling fingers so much trouble.
Neither of us asked if the other wanted to wait, wanted to find some more suitable place to have our reunion, to unite our bodies in a way that would make everything start again.
It had to be here, and it had to be now.
We stood naked in front of each other, each relearning the lines and curves and shapes of the other’s body.
“You’re too skinny,” Jonathan murmured.
“And you’re too hairy,” I joked back, studying the whiskers on his face. “I don’t know. I think you’d look good with a beard. More like Collier.”
“I have to be honest with you,” Jonathan said. “Now is not the time that I want to be thinking about my father.”
“Sorry,” I said, opening my arms to him. “My lips are sealed now.”
“I certainly hope not,” he said, kissing me again before lowering us down to the floor.
It became almost like a reorientation, our foreplay. I dragged my hands down his back, relearning its dimensions. He traced patterns up my thighs, at the juncture of my legs, moving his hands over my smooth mound.
I arched into him, urging him on. It was better than anything I’d had with Milo, and we were only just getting started. Even if Jonathan’s hands were getting to know me all over again, he still knew me better than the lawyer ever could have.
I shook my head free from those thoughts. I didn’t want to think about Milo right now. I wanted to focus everything I had on Jonathan.
I took his length in my hand and squeezed it slowly, increasing the pressure minutely as I rubbed the shaft. Jonathan shuddered and breathed hard at the contact, and I wondered if he’d been with anyone during our separation.
I didn’t want to ask him. If he didn’t want to tell me, that was fine, too.
“There hasn’t been anyone,” he said, seeming to read my thoughts. “I haven’t wanted to be with anyone since you.”
I answered with a single kiss. Did it make me a bad person for being with Milo? Jonathan and I had responded to the separation differently. I had been hungry for contact, after a time, and Milo had served his purpose, as horrible as it was to put it like that. I’d needed him, and when I realized that I didn’t anymore, it had been over.
Jonathan, on the other hand, had stayed by himself. Part of that realization relieved me, and the other part made me worry about him. Nobody deserved to be alone, and I knew that was why I’d halfway hoped he’d gotten back together with Violet during our time apart.
“Don’t overthink it,” Jonathan said, and I knew I must’ve been distracted. “Just let this happen, baby. Let’s just take it slow.”
“I don’t want to take it slow,” I said, releasing my grip on his cock and pushing him backwards against the carpet. My body was suddenly on fire, as if a match had been struck. I was consumed with desire for my husband. I wanted to feel his pulse inside of me, to be whole again with him.
Even if we had the rest of our lives to feel like that, I needed it immediately.
I straddled him, and he put his hand against my pussy, his fingers finding my clitoris easily, pushing against that sensitive button until I was wet and crying out hotly. I thrust against his fingers, against his abdomen, and felt his cock respond, jerking for its desire of my body.
There was no reason on earth to wait any longer for this.
I got on all fours and kissed Jonathan on his mouth, our tongues lingering over each other, exploring that exotic taste again. I licked his neck, sampled his earlobe, and trailed kisses down his body until I was sitting right on his dick, straddling him once more.
“I’ve missed you so much,” he said, gritting his teeth as my inner muscles convulsed around his shaft. “I’ve missed this so much.”
“We have the rest of our lives,” I said. “The rest of our lives, and right now.”
Jonathan’s cock jerked again, inside of me, and I groaned, low and long. I remembered that there were people just on the other side of the glass, and just as easily, I forgot them again. The only person deserving of my attention was right below me, staring up at me, his sky blue eyes full of love and longing and other emotions I couldn’t quite place.
I had a strange and sudden moment of insecurity. When we were together, Jonathan still didn’t have his memories. But now, he was whole again. He could remember all of his previous trysts with other women. Before, it hadn’t mattered. He’d taken my virginity and, in a way, I’d had his, as well. I was the only woman, the only sexual encounter he’d had, and it had been an even playing field.
Now, though, he had a wealth of experience that he hadn’t had access to. How did I measure up to all those other women? Brock and Jane had both reveled in telling me all about my husband’s numerous exploits.
“Baby, stop,” Jonathan said. “Focus on me. Focus on this. Everything else is just noise in the background.”
“Am I good?” I asked in a small voice.
“Good?” he repeated, narrowing those blue eyes. “What do you mean?”
I gestured uselessly, feeling silly. “I don’t know. At this?”
“At what?”
God, he was going to make me say it. “Am I good at sex? Do you enjoy it with me? I know you’ve been with a lot of different women, and I’ve only … my experience is limited. If you want something different, just tell me. I wouldn’t be offended. I know things are different now, and I just want you to feel good.”
He blinked up at me a couple of times, his lips pressed firmly together, and then my wo
rld was literally upended. Jonathan sat up suddenly and laid me on my back, the ply of the carpet biting into it a little.
“Nothing has changed,” he said, staring down at me intently.
“Jon, everything has changed.”
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “We may be different now, but the only thing that has shifted is that I love you even more, admire you even more, desire you even more.”
“But, your memories …”
“Are worth nothing without you in them,” Jonathan said. “Let me prove it to you. Don’t overthink this, Michelle. Just let it happen. Let me show you just how ‘good’ I think you are.”
He was still buried to the hilt inside of me, and he began to move, to thrust for the first time. Was it the same as when we were two innocents taking pleasure in each other in a field? No. But it had shifted, had changed, had morphed into something more meaningful than before, if possible.
In the woods, we’d stumbled into each other’s lives. Now, here in Jonathan’s office, we were making the conscious decision to be together again no matter what — even after all of the drama and tragedy.
That was love — choosing a person in spite of everything that drove you apart. I loved my husband, and he was about to show me just how much he loved me.
Jonathan pulled out until just the tip of him was inside me, the maddening sensation making me squirm and twist and buck to get some more contact. Then, with no warning whatsoever, he plunged deeply into me again, filling me completely and then some. I was so wet that he just glided easily in, brushing past my G-spot with explosive results. I cried out, pushing my face into his forearm, kissing whatever skin I could find, wishing that this could just go on and on forever.
I never wanted this feeling to end, this feeling of belonging to each other. Even when he pulled out of me after this was all over, I wanted to feel like we were still together, always.
I never wanted to be away from him again.
Jonathan buried his head between my breasts, nuzzling the soft surfaces there, before looking up into my eyes as he took one of my nipples between his teeth and squeezed lightly. I gasped and shut my eyes, giving myself over to the pleasure. It was mind-blowing and naughty and just the right amount of pain to increase all of my pleasure tenfold.
“Let me tell you a secret,” Jonathan said, covering my body with his own so he could lean down and whisper in my ear. His cock was fully in my body, and I was still struggling to accommodate its length and girth, especially at this new angle. It was cloying and explosive and delirious, and I struggled to be able to listen to what Jonathan was about to impart.
“Sex means nothing unless you love a person,” he said, kissing the shell of my ear and making me shiver. “You are the best, Michelle, because I know we love each other. This becomes an affirmation, not a means to an end. That’s what sex should be, what I’d never understood until I met you, what I didn’t know I understood until I thought I’d lost you forever.”
Tears ran out of the corners of my eyes, wetting the hair covering my temples.
“I love you,” I managed to say, through the tears and raging emotions and impossibly high level of arousal. “I love you so much.”
“I have never stopped loving you,” he said, and straightened again to continue his thrusting. Each pump forward of his hips, each time his cock left my body and entered again, was a promise. It was sensual and extraordinary and made me realize that even if we might never be the same Jonathan and Michelle, we were at least going to keep loving each other until the end of time. We had already gotten through the worst of it. It could only get better from here.
Jonathan angled into me, his fingers finding my clitoris again, and I moaned louder and louder as I approached the magical pinnacle, the place I wanted to be, the place I knew my husband would take me.
Then, all at once, we were there. I was screaming into the hand that Jonathan suddenly clamped over my mouth, and he was moaning, muffling the sounds of completion in the crook of my neck. I felt an extra wetness between my legs that told me he’d come inside of me, and I welcomed it. It was his essence, and I loved the way it mingled with my own juices.
We held each other through the throes of ecstasy and after, the glow of our twin climaxes warming our faces.
“What did I tell you?” Jonathan asked, kissing me. “Sex is always better when you love the one you’re with.”
“I believe you,” I said.
He eased out of me, and we curled up together, not caring that we were just naked on the carpet of his office, not caring that anyone could walk in at any time and see us.
All that mattered was that we were together again, that we would never be apart again, that we would never, ever stop loving each other.
A comfortable silence settled around us, and I contented myself with listening to the beat of Jonathan’s heart. Its thump was primal and soothing both at the same time, and when he finally began to speak, I realized I had been nearly asleep, soothed by the rhythmic life force of my husband.
“I went back out to the cottage,” Jonathan said, weaving his fingers through mine. “You weren’t there, the car wasn’t there, and I knew that something was wrong. The door was unlocked, the garden was overgrown, and the goat had gotten loose. But I couldn’t figure out where you were, where you’d gone, and it made me panic. I thought — I thought we had our differences, that it was hard to see whether or not we’d be able to get past them, but that there would always be the opportunity, when we were ready, to try to get past everything.”
It was a strange revelation to hear, especially since I was naked and in his arms. He thought that time would heal everything?
“You thought we were just going to get past everything at that point?” I asked, dumbfounded. “You were willing to wait until — until what? Until I told you I was ready to kiss and make up?” I swallowed hard. “I have to be honest with you, Jon. I don’t know if that day would’ve ever come.”
“I know,” he said, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “And I’m sorry. I’m sorry about everything. When I realized that you’d gone, that I’d pissed away any chance I had of ever making it right, knew that I’d probably never see you again and that it was all my dumbass fault, I lost it. I don’t know what to call it. Some kind of nervous breakdown, maybe. All I know is that when I finally came out of my stupor, I remembered everything.”
“Just like that?” I asked, peering at him. “Everything was back with just a snap of the fingers?”
“The doctors can’t really explain it, either,” Jonathan said, “but it makes sense for me. I understood what happened. It had been all mental — all of it — from the very first. I’d banged my head pretty good in the woods, but the memory loss was all of my mind’s twisted doing.”
“Why would your mind fool you like that?” I asked, cocking my head. “I thought you said it would make sense.”
“Well, it does,” Jonathan said, meeting my eyes. “It does when you understand why I was riding through the woods on my motorcycle in the first place.”
I tried not to tremble as my husband sat up a little, noticeably gathered himself, and began to tell me exactly what we had both always wondered about.
“I’d stolen the money,” Jonathan said. “I’d just stolen the money from Wharton Group out of, I don’t know, boredom, I guess.”
A chill that I couldn’t resist made its way up and down my spine. He sounded almost exactly like Jane. What had happened to them to make them listless enough to commit crimes and other terrible misdeeds for fun?
Jonathan faltered a little bit at whatever look I had on my face before plunging onward.
“I hadn’t wanted to marry Violet,” he said. “The marriage was my mother’s creation. Violet and I had fucked — excuse me — we’d slept together, traveled a bit while we were dating, but that was it. I wasn’t that interested in her, but she was extremely interested in me. Violet contacted Amelia, enlisted her help in trying to arrange something.”
“Amelia viewed Violet as the daughter she’d always wanted. Violet was attentive and would do anything Amelia suggested, and finally, they both cornered me into making a marriage proposal. It wasn’t something I wanted for myself. I didn’t think I wanted anything to do with marriage, least of all marriage to Violet. She’s vapid, she has a mean streak — well, you know her.”
“Yes, yes I do.” And I wished I didn’t.
Jonathan squeezed my hand tighter without seeming to realize he was doing it. “So, out of frustration or boredom or hatred or whatever you might call it, I stole the money. It was so easy that it scared me, and I decided that I didn’t want this life anymore. I didn’t feel like I deserved to helm Wharton Group. I didn’t want to marry someone I didn’t love. So I left without having any idea where I was going — just that I wanted out. I rode my motorcycle for so long that I rode right into a storm and turned off into a path in the woods to try to shelter from it.”
This time, I squeezed his hand. They had been my woods, though he hadn’t known it then. He’d run away from his life and fled unwittingly into mine.
“I hadn’t bothered wearing a helmet, or maybe none of this would’ve ever happened,” Jonathan said, waving vaguely at me. If he hadn’t been injured in the woods, there would’ve been no way that I would’ve found him.
There had been a time when I’d wished I’d never met Jonathan, but I didn’t feel that way anymore. I couldn’t regret knowing him, loving him. Even after everything, after all the horrible tragedy, I couldn’t say that I wanted to forget him. I’d come too far for that. Loving the man beside me had helped propel me forward in life. I’d thought my cottage, my woods were a sanctuary, but I had been fully prepared to make them into a prison of my grief. It was Jonathan who’d led me out of all that, Jonathan who’d made me start looking in the mirror again and assessing what needed to be done to be happier, freer, whole again.
“I guess I’d overestimated my off-roading abilities on the bike,” Jonathan continued. “But in a slippery, flooded patch of mud, I lost it. I went straight over the handlebars and down an incline, and the next thing I remember was waking up to you, not knowing anything.”
