And would I stand by this man through another prison sentence? I had to wonder. Ten or twenty years he might get, for a repeat performance. Then I’d really have a decision to make. Wait for the man I loved and forfeit my sexuality again, any career mobility, my decisions about motherhood . . .
“I’ll talk to my sister, when we’re there,” he said slowly.
I looked up. “About?”
“About how the things she needs from me, the role she needs me to fill . . . What it’s doing to you and me.”
I snorted softly. “Yeah, because she’s such a big fan of mine.”
“It won’t happen overnight. I have to be there for her, this time. But I promise I’ll try to get some of this shit out on the table, in the open.”
“Would you?” My heart felt a little lighter, cautiously hopeful. It wasn’t the stand I wished he’d take, but it was more than he’d been willing to concede before. It made me feel heard, at least. Made me feel like he was starting to understand.
He nodded. “I promise.”
“Okay . . . Good. That makes me feel way better about . . . about staying with you.” How those words scared me. Like stopping short and realizing how close you’d come to walking off a cliff.
He dropped his head to my lap and as I stroked his hair he mumbled, “Oh, Annie.”
“You fuck up and get put away, my letters are going to be short on sweet nothings for a very long time,” I warned, just the tip of the iceberg of what had me terrified.
His strong arms circled my calves, hugging them tight, and his breath warmed my thighs through my jeans.
I tried to steer us someplace more lighthearted. “At least this way, I can keep an eye on you.”
He raised his chin. “Already got a parole officer. Or do you mean with other women?”
I went serious again; deeply earnest, surprising even myself. “I can’t imagine you ever doing that. Going with somebody else, behind my back.”
He held my stare. “Neither can I.”
After a long silence, punctuated by the assorted audio ambiance of a Saturday night in Darren, I put my hands on Eric’s shoulders, patting. “C’mon. I’ll make us dinner.”
He got up and I used his proffered hand to pull myself to standing. I felt about two hundred years old, the surrender fitting me like a damp coat. But at least the uncertainty was through. At least I’d scored a tiny taste of compromise.
I made our supper and we ate on the couch, flipping channels then half watching a documentary about fire ants.
Once he’d set our bowls on the coffee table, Eric turned and took my hands in his. “I’m sorry.”
“For?”
“For all this. For you having to feel like you’ve lost this fight.”
I shrugged. “I might still get to keep you. That’s not the worst consolation prize. And I’m okay, deep down. Just tired. And a little . . . defeated.” But if he meant what he’d said, about talking to her, beginning to cut this brutal cord that bound them . . . maybe I could win the war. Just not this nasty battle.
“You will get to keep me,” he said, and I wondered if he could truly make that promise. “I’ll be smart, if anything does go down. And it’s real unlikely it will.”
“If you were smart, you’d stay the hell away from your sister’s drama.” I paused, catching myself. Where the fuck did I get off, downgrading a brutal assault, maybe a rape, to drama? “No. I’m sorry. That was . . . That was way too cavalier.”
He cracked a smirk. “Cavalier?”
“That was uncool. Anyway . . .”
“Anyway,” he agreed, not seeming offended by my misstep. He looked around the room at nothing in particular.
“Would you do your beat-down girlfriend a favor?”
“What’s that?”
“Rub my back?” Maybe those big man-hands could squeeze some of the angst out of me.
“Of course. I’ll do the dishes first. You go take a bath or get comfortable on your bed. I’ll meet you in there.”
“Deal.”
I took him up on the bath suggestion, feeling a good deal better as I toweled off. I’d worn the now-thoroughly-belated Christmas underwear today, and it was all I bothered putting back on before I left the bathroom, lotion bottle in hand.
In my absence, Eric had prepped the room.
It looked like something out of his fantasies, the ones he’d written to me about. He’d found three candles and lit them on my dresser, flames reflected in the mirror, their lavender and sage and beeswax scents mingling. All the other lights were out, the curtains and blinds shut. He’d brought my kitchen radio in and it was playing classical music on a low volume. My masseuse was sitting up on the bed, back against the wall, in his jeans and undershirt, hands clasped patently in his lap.
“Wow,” he murmured. “Is that it? My present?”
I looked down at the satin garden hiding my breasts and sex. In the candlelight the colors were all muted to mauves and olives and golds. “Yeah. And wow right back at you. This is quite a setup.” I crawled across the covers then flopped facedown, lotion bottle tossed in Eric’s general direction. The soothing voice of an NPR host informed us that Brahms was up next, after a word from the underwriters.
Eric chuckled. “Sorry. Best I could do.”
“It’s perfect.”
I groaned as his palms swept down my nearly bare back, slick with lotion. The world went blurry, reduced to the steady pressure of this man’s hands on me. My man’s hands. Hands capable of tender caresses and shocking violence, of getting lost on my body or in nurturing a delicate plant, capable of threats and of aid, and of composing the most beautiful words I’d ever read.
After perhaps fifteen minutes he moved to my side and said softly, “Turn over.”
I did, my body jelly. His touch was different now, more grazing than massaging, fingertips tracing light tracks down my arms, across my collarbone. A whisper of palms over my breasts and down my belly. I shivered in their wake, nipples tensing, breath drawing high in my chest. He palmed my hips, and I saw his reverence morphing to something else above me. Something hungry.
For a long moment his eyes took in their gift, then his body came right down against mine, forearms hugged to my ribs. Leaning close, he made a sound not unlike a growl at my throat.
“Thank you,” I murmured, drawing my fingers through his thick hair. “That was amazing.”
He sat up some, bracing himself on straight arms, holding my gaze squarely. “I was selfish, last weekend.”
“Maybe, by request. But you more than made up for it, just now.”
“But I haven’t gotten you off since before you left for Christmas.”
I had to smirk. “Oh yes, you did.”
His brows rose. “Must’ve slept right through it, then. How was I?”
I ignored that. “You custom-made every fantasy I’ve thought about since then. With your texts and your email, and what you gave me last Saturday.”
“Not the same and giving it to you with my hands. Or my tongue. Or . . .” He grabbed my hand, rougher than usual, and cupped it hard against his cock. My blush ran from my hair to my sex, and I swallowed.
“Make it up to me, then.”
“How?”
“You show me.”
He sat up all the way, looking steeled. Looking ready. I could make out the gorgeous contours of his chest through his shirt and see his hard belly swell with quickening breaths. I felt a warm flush of pride that I’d manifested this—his newfound ability to steer our sex. To worship me without resorting to caution or deference.
He moved back. Moved to his knees between my ankles and pushed my legs apart, ditched his shirt. He slid his arms right up under my thighs, my butt, my lower back, hands cradling my ribs. My relaxation morphed to excitement in an instant, blood rushing to my core. His face was ther
e, right there. A long, hungry inhalation, then his tongue traced me through the satin, nose teasing my clit.
I sucked a gasp and fisted his hair.
The fabric grew wet, his mouth explicit. Until I could feel every nuance, almost as though there were nothing between us at all. I watched his shoulders bunch and release in time with the hands kneading my waist, and felt an entirely different muscle moving against my sex with greedy precision.
He brought me there steadily, with his tongue and his moans and his possessive hold, and when I came it was from nothing more than reality. No highlight reel in my head of fantasies or memories. Just his warm mouth on me, in this set he’d constructed for my pleasure. I came for longer than I could ever remember experiencing—a slow, deep, silent release. His fluttering tongue faded with my spasms, until all that was left was the heat of his panting breaths against my pulsing flesh, through the drenched satin.
He gave my waist a final caress, his palms damp. Bringing his body alongside mine, he wrapped his arm around me. “Mmmf,” I grunted as his kisses teased my neck, and patted his hair with a clumsy, limp hand.
“Better?” he whispered.
“Yes. Very better. You’re forgiven.”
“Oh good.”
We lay quietly for a time, until the concerto came to a close and the radio host’s spiel wrecked the flow. I came to my senses some, wrestling around to face Eric.
“Your turn,” I said, then kissed his lips.
“I sent you to bed hungry last time.” He stroked my hair. “Won’t hold it against you if do the same to me.”
“No way. No keeping score when it comes to orgasms, Collier.”
“Okay, then. What are you up for?”
I gave it some serious thought. “I’ve always wanted to watch you,” I murmured. “Like we talked about.”
“Watch me stroke?”
I nodded, suddenly feeling shy.
“How?”
“However you do it.”
He sat up, scooting back to lean against the wall. He knees came up and his jeans and shorts went away, then those long legs were stretched across my covers. His cock was already hard, and he wrapped it in a loose fist.
I got comfortable, kneeling by his calves. On impulse, I reached back and undid my bra. I didn’t take it off, not yet, just let it hang about my breasts like a promise. The way he stared, I was surprised it didn’t go up in flames.
I stared in return. At his hand, at his fingers looking pale against the ruddier skin of his cock. This is how he looks when he thinks about me. I did this to him. Drove him to this.
“Show me,” I said, grazing the back of his knee and calf with my fingertips.
“Anything you want.” His hand began to move. “Anything you want to see, you just tell me.”
“All I want to is to know how you look, when you think about me. About us.”
He licked his lips, eyes shutting for a moment. When they opened them he sought the lotion bottle, pumping a measure into his palm. I watched his cock grow slick in the candlelight, imagined how good that hand must feel. His shaft shone like satin, his head smooth as glass. His abdomen clenched each time his fist crested the crown, muscles standing out.
I muttered, “Jesus,” without even meaning to. Then, “What are you thinking about?”
“About you watching me. Do you like it?”
“Yeah,” I breathed. “You look perfect.”
His hand stilled but his eyes were shut tight. “I haven’t come since that last time, with you.”
“No?” Jeez, I’d gotten myself off every night since then, I bet. Even pissed off and uncertain, I was helpless against the memories he left me with.
“I felt too weird about it,” he said. “Or maybe . . . Or maybe I wanted to suffer. As punishment for not getting you off.”
I didn’t admonish his reasoning, but instead rolled it into our game. I scooted close to stroke his hard shoulder, admiring the round swell of muscle. When his brown eyes opened, I spoke sweetly. “You must need it real bad, then.”
He swallowed. Nodded. “Yeah. Real bad.” His eyes grew wide as I let my bra fall away, his lips parting.
“Show me how you do it.” Rough and fast? Slow and savoring? “Exactly how you’d be, if you were by yourself. So I’ll know what to picture, when we’re apart.”
He breathed, “Sure.” And he gave me my show.
Not too rough. Quick, but not too fast. When my eyes drank their fill of his hand and cock, I watched his arm flexing. The muscles of his chest and abdomen clenching. The look on his face. The thickness of his thighs, and his nonstroking hand—restless, rubbing his lower belly faintly. His breathing filled the air, the heavy huffs solidifying, turning to grunts, then moans as his pulls sped. Surely he’d never been able to do this when he was locked up. Not this openly, not this vocally. I imagined the first time he got to touch himself with this much abandon after all those years, knowing beyond the shadow of a doubt that he’d been thinking of me.
“I’m close,” he told me, eyes opening a fraction. His face was beautiful and pained.
“Good. I want to see.” I ran my palm lightly over his chest, down his belly, the touch telling him, here, right here. All over those gorgeous muscles. Let him feel the heat of his own release, the way I’d felt it last week, on my breasts.
His noises changed, long moans becoming clipped and disbelieving. He concentrated his caresses just below his head, the motions twitchy now.
“Show me, Eric.”
And he did. His long torso curled, every muscle taut as his hand froze. He basted his golden skin in that perfect, pure white of male surrender.
“Good,” I murmured, stroking his hair. Kissing his cheek. “Good.”
He sighed raggedly, cleared his throat. Blinked then met my eyes with his glassy ones. “That what you needed?”
“I think we both needed that,” I teased.
“Hang on.” He left the bed, jogging to the bathroom in that clumsy, postcoital way men do. I heard water run, saw a sliver of light as the door opened, then he switched it off, returning to me, all cleaned up.
We tugged the covers free and climbed underneath, holding each other, watching the candlelight bouncing on the ceiling.
After a time he asked, “So you’re definitely coming next weekend?”
I nodded, my hair brushing his neck. “Yeah. I’ll come.”
He kissed the crown of my head. “Good.”
Whether the trip would indeed prove good remained to be seen, but having made the decision, I felt lighter. The dread could wait until Friday, until we were in his truck, driving to his hometown. For now, I had my man back. And I wasn’t about to trade this feeling for one of anxiety, not for as long as I could manage.
When he yawned warmth into my hair I told him, “Sweet dreams.”
“Always, when I’m with you.”
And I told myself to bask in that, not knowing when or if the nightmares might catch up with us.
Chapter Nineteen
The next Friday, Eric picked me up outside my apartment at six.
“Hey, you.” I tossed my bag in the well behind the seat. As I leaned across to kiss him hello, it was a different, welcome caress that shocked my senses.
“Whoa—you got your heater fixed!”
“Yup.” He waited for me to buckle up, then pulled us onto the road. “This new guy who’s on my crew does auto HVAC on the side. Fellow Cousins graduate. He did the repair in exchange for me helping him move.”
“Nice. The CCF Alumni Society has its perks.” I took off my gloves and held my palms before the vents. “Oh man, this is luxury.”
“Tell me about it.”
“So. Work okay?”
“Backbreaking,” he said, but didn’t sound too down. It had snowed heavily overnight, so he’d surely been busy. It wa
s flurrying now—nothing treacherous, but the visibility wasn’t great.
“The guys were all punchy today,” I told him. “The exercise yard’s all shrunk down from the snow banks. Territorial BS.”
“Don’t miss those days.” He aimed us toward the highway.
“I’m sure.” Though strangely, even without the promise of seeing Eric, Fridays were now a highlight of my workweek, probably second only to Thursdays in the bookmobile with Karen. I’d gotten so used to the safety drills at Cousins, outbursts rarely scared me much more than an attack dog tossing itself against a chain link fence. And now that I was a visiting favorite of many of the inmates, and many of them favorites of mine—pet projects even—I looked forward to my shifts. I was never bored at Cousins, that was for sure. And unlike at the library, I didn’t have to break up any of the fights, myself.
“How long’s the drive?” I asked.
“In this weather, over an hour. It’s a couple exits past that lake I took you to.”
“How does everybody feel about my coming with?”
“Hard to say. I just told my mom, ‘I’m bringing my girlfriend.’ In case she wanted to clean the place up special or something. She just said, ‘Okay. She a fussy eater?’ And I said, ‘No.’ And she said, ‘Okay, see you then.’”
“What about Kristina?”
He shrugged. “I told her, too. All she said was something like, ‘She’s still in the picture, huh?’ And that was that.”
“Wow. Welcome wagon.”
“My mom and sister aren’t much for the whole Martha Stewart happy homecoming scene.”
“So I gather.”
He smiled at me. “But my mom’ll like you. She’ll think you’re way outta my league, and that maybe you’ll save me from myself or whatever. She’s a big believer in all that love-of-a-good-woman country-music bull. God knows why. Not like she ever managed to reform my dad.”
I’d wondered what his family would make of me. I’d be an outsider, for sure. Going home to Charleston after all that time in Darren had driven home how vast the gap was between middle-class and poor. I had a master’s. I had a very un-Michigan accent, and at least fifty people I’d met via work since my move had commented on how suspiciously polite I was. I was going to stand out on this visit. No fighting it. I’d decided to do my best not to stand out in the way I dressed, at least. Tonight I was wearing jeans and a plaid flannel button-up, sneakers. Hat hair. I’d come prepared to blend in. To recede into the background.
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