by Coralie Moss
“Why’d you stop?” Leo patted her hand.
She started, and shrugged. “Because I went off on a mental tangent. But I’m back, and I think I was supposed to begin with your feet. How did that feel?”
“Perfect amount of pressure. And anything you want to share?”
“Not right now.” She shook her head even though his eyes were closed again. “I’ll start down here at your feet and do your whole body, just like she worked on mine.”
The room had warmed enough for her to remove her sweater. Anna positioned herself so she could reach Leo’s entire left leg, from his toes to the top of his thigh.
“You okay?” she asked, circling his ankles with her hands.
“Perfect,” he murmured, a faint smile playing at the corners of his mouth. “I’m just going to lie here and breathe. Nudge me if I snore.”
Anna held his ankles a few more beats then released his right foot and concentrated on his left side, starting with firm, rhythmic squeezing and releasing at the arches then the toes and moving up his leg to the ankle and calf.
As she neared his knee, he shook his leg. “Ticklish. A bit, right there.”
She rested her hands directly above and below the knee, gripped, and let go then finished the left leg by moving her hands, breath by breath, to the top of his thigh, her fingers close to his groin. Visually, she could see no reaction. Maybe he had excellent self-control. Or maybe he really was more profoundly affected by the chemotherapy and she would have to continue to trust his explanation.
“Let me have your hand.” She started with his wrist then moved to his fingers, one at a time, and up his arm, to the shoulder. No rings, no watch this time. Smooth skin, lightly tanned, moderate amount of body hair.
The quiet of the room around them was punctuated by the occasional calls of crows, the snap of resin heating within the burning wood, and their breath. Once she started touching his body, the need to fill in the empty spaces with conversation dissipated.
Anna moved down Leo’s other arm and leg and reversed the process. A half hour passed. She reached over his legs and added another log to the woodstove.
“I like being squeezed, Saff,” he whispered, speaking in slow motion. “I feel so relaxed.”
“I know something else that’ll feel good.” She crawled around to sit near his head, threaded her fingers through his wavy hair, and massaged his scalp with her fingertips. He groaned again. “Do you want to take off some clothes?”
Leo nodded and opened his eyes. The sun was close to setting. Anna unbuttoned the cuffs of his flannel shirt and helped him remove one arm at a time. He lifted his head and shoulders, his abs tightening to curl his torso off the ground enough that Anna could slide the shirt out from under him. This was the part of the intimacy dance where the chasm between the old and the new, between forgotten feelings and potential experiences, appeared. She’d crossed it once and would likely cross it again, but it continued to startle her with its intensity.
“I don’t really know how to give a massage, but I can manage a back rub, if you’re okay with me winging it,” she said.
Dusk and low flames. His bare skin looked good in this light. Anna almost missed his request for her to hand him the copy of Gaia’s book.
“Let me read you what she has to say about touch.” Leo held the book in one hand, away from his face, and rested his other hand on her forearm. He lifted it so his fingers barely skimmed the delicate hairs on her arm. “Touch can go from very light to very deep, where it feels like it is penetrating below the surface of the skin.” He squeezed right above the wrist. “That too much?”
Anna shook her head. “No. Feels good. Feels like you really mean to touch me.”
“She recommends we touch with purpose, whether we’re using the lightest touch, like a feather,” he said. Anna’s skin tingled as he trailed his fingers up her arm toward her inner elbow. “Or something more like a deep tissue massage.”
“Let me see that passage.” She reached for the book. There were long descriptions of different levels of touch and a helpful, bulleted chart. “She also recommends we be patient and precise, and that we keep it moving. I think I can manage all that. You ready?”
She put the book on the floor and turned to him.
Leo rolled to his chest in response.
“Hmm, to oil, or not to oil?”
He lifted his head and turned to face the fire, his voice muffled by the quilts. “I trust you.”
Anna poured warmed coconut oil into one palm, drizzled it into the other, and stroked both hands down either side of his spine. She moved onto her knees for better leverage and worked the oil into his skin in long strokes, using the heels of her palms, up and down. An extended sigh issued from the vicinity of Leo’s mouth. She continued, rubbing her hands in circular motions over the big muscles of his back, up his neck and over his shoulders, until he was oil-slicked and gleaming in the firelight.
What a difference a few days and a random encounter at an intimacy workshop could make. She sat back on her heels, admiring the man facedown between her thighs. His breathing had slowed to the pace of almost asleep, and every time she touched him, his bones hummed in response.
Five years.
No, longer, since she’d felt like…this.
A thick cord, threaded with memories of her two decades as Gary’s wife, gave a sharp tug, pulling her away from any drift toward comparing one man with the other. Her marriage, mostly happy and loving, was then. And this moment with Leo, was now. There would never be a going back, and all her days and months and years with her husband deserved to remain undiluted and well-remembered.
The waistband of Leo’s pants rode low on his hips. She refocused her attention, working her thumbs in small circles at the dimples just above the V shape of his sacrum and up the thick muscles on either side of his spine, all the way to the base of his neck.
She massaged one arm then the other and circled each palm with her thumbs, giving extra attention to the callused areas. When she was finished, she wiped her hands on one of the towels to remove the excess oil and rested a hand on the upward curve of Leo’s butt.
The darkened room held them in a comfortable embrace. Her hand rose and fell with her companion’s breath.
“I need to add another log to the fire,” she whispered.
Anna draped his flannel shirt over his back and shoulders before she opened the door and inserted the wood. Flames leapt to claim the fuel as Leo rolled over. He bent one knee and drew her hand to rest on his belly, right above the zipper to his jeans. The button at the top had come undone, tempting her to slide three fingers under the waistband of his briefs while she curled one finger into the hairs below his navel.
“What were you thinking about?” he asked.
“When? Just now?”
“When you were rubbing my back.”
“I was thinking that I could not have predicted there would be a handsome, half-dressed man in my living room less than two weeks after my birthday. I should turn fifty more often.”
Leo laughed, his belly tightening under her hand. “This wasn’t on my wish list for my sabbatical, but now that we’re here, there’s no way I’m not keeping Massage with Saffron in the top three.”
He half-closed his eyes and stretched. Silky skin and curly belly hair moved under her fingers. Leo squeezed and released her wrist, okaying her hold of the zipper pull and her indicated desire to draw the head to its base. When she went in search of more skin, and his growing erection, he stopped, placing her hand on top of the snug boxer briefs.
“I’m not ready for that kind of touch, not yet. But this is nice.” He offered an encouraging grin and pressed her hand to his rising erection.
Anna met his gaze, fighting to stay neutral about him declining her offer of a more erotic touch. Her mouth wanted him: his lips, his chest, the head of his cock. She satisfied herself with the intimacy of her fingers tracing his outline through the thin cotton knit. He had swelled. Not to gre
at proportions or hardness, not yet, but something was happening, and he appeared to savor her touch.
She continued to run her fingertips and thumb up and around his semi-erection. He released his hold on her wrist and propped himself on his elbows, tilting his hips and letting his head drop back whenever Anna’s touch provoked a deeper reaction.
“Would you mind if I took off your pants?”
Leo sank back onto the bedding. “Mm, not at all. And what about you?”
“Take my pants off? For homemade pasta,” she giggled, “I’ll take off whatever you’d like. I’ll match you, item for item.”
They raced to undress. Anna was left in a T-shirt and another matching bra and panties set.
“Come here.” Leo indicated he wanted her to kneel on either side of his hips. She settled herself, and he reached for the bottom edge of her T-shirt. Her lace-covered breasts received a rise of approval from below.
“May I?” He sat up halfway and released the bra’s hooks. The ripples in his belly muscles played against her rounded softness as he slipped the straps down her arms. His strength, even after what he’d been through, continued to surprise her. Leaning his weight onto one hand, he used the other to secure Anna’s arms behind her back. His mouth searched for equal time with each breast.
Having a man at her nipples, biting and sucking with a foreign kind of hunger, brought a new set of sensations into her body. With arms caught, unable to grab his head and guide him, she willed him to keep playing with the edge of pain and pleasure provoked by his teeth.
Leo lowered himself to the floor, releasing Anna’s arms, freeing him to play and explore more. One hand cupped her left breast, as his right hand slipped between lace and her aroused, plumped skin. His fingers found her opening as his mouth continued to suck at one nipple and the other, a figure eight of wet scoring her chest.
Anna closed her eyes and gave in to sensation as much as she could. The running commentary of her inner critic ran up against the positive reinforcement offered by her cheerleading squad.
She gave up trying to pleasure him or moderate what was in her head. It was all she could do to stay poised above, giving his hand the space it needed, her palms on the floor on either side of his head.
He began to slow his movements, replacing nipple bites with long strokes of his tongue. He moved his fingers to the outside of her underwear, pressing to find where she was most swollen and where she was wet. Once he did, he alternated between stroking himself and stroking her.
“Saffron.” His lips moved against hers when he spoke.
“Yes?”
“If you’d pleasure yourself, I’d like to see what happens.”
All movement stopped while she considered his request. She’d thought about self-pleasuring during her bath when she followed the masseuse’s directions on her legs and arms, but that touch was to relieve soreness and muscular pain.
Opening her body and mind to the realm of possibility contained in Daniel’s emails and Leo’s touch opened her eyes to the pain of grief stored too long in her body. She hadn’t eaten her way through sorrow, nor had she become hypersexual or overly reclusive, but remnants of her mourning process came to light under Leo’s lusty gaze.
Leo brought his hand to his cock and began a slow stroke. Anna leaned onto her left hand and felt below, knowing she might not see herself through to orgasm. She didn’t know her fifty-year-old body’s response time as well as she’d known herself at other decades, but she was willing to give it a try.
“Look at me,” he whispered, his voice unrestrained and sensuous. “Look at me, Saffron.”
Anna did. The fire in the woodstove was down to glowing embers, and there wasn’t much light to illuminate Leo’s features. His eyes were dark pools into which she could have dived and never surfaced. She let herself go into the pleasure of self-touch and found she wasn’t so unskilled after all.
She rocked her hips against his while her fingers made circles, skin on skin. The buildup of sensation was strong.
“I think I’ll come soon,” she said.
He increased the tempo of his strokes in response. “I will too. Keep your eyes open. Watch me.”
Her breasts swayed in matched rhythm as she moved in time with him. Sound came from deep in his throat, deep in his chest and belly, bringing a roar to the surface when he orgasmed. Anna joined in, her energy and voice matching his, higher in tone. She struggled to keep her eyes on his, but it was worth it. Something primal had passed between them when they crested and released in near unison.
She rested her hands on her thighs, one set of fingers damp. Her legs were useless.
“So, that’s the secret to good homemade pasta…” She toppled to Leo’s side, pulled a blanket to cover them both, and lay on her back, limbs akimbo.
Leo swept one leg over her thighs and one arm over her ribs and rubbed his face against her shoulder. “Shh, don’t tell anyone.”
Chapter Nine
“Can I get you anything?” Anna asked, once they’d catnapped and cleaned up. “Wine, water?”
“I’ll join you with the wine.”
She regarded the shelf of dust-covered stemware at the top the cupboard. She reached, hesitated, asked Leo for help, and washed and dried the glasses he handed her.
Anna stared at him, unabashed. The way he leaned against the counter, pouring their wine, accentuated how at home in his body he was, how handsome he looked. And her kitchen hadn’t seen handsome like that in who knew how many years.
“If we’re going to eat tonight, I better get going on the dough.” Her guest chef put his glass on the counter, reached into the market bag, and pulled out two sacks of flours, a carton of eggs, a bench knife, a long-bladed chef’s knife, and a rolling pin before giving Anna a guilty shrug. “I’m a bit of a foodie.”
“Did you leave room in your suitcases for seasonally appropriate clothes? Because you know it’s only going to get colder and wetter while you’re here,” she teased.
“At least I’ll eat well. Could I use this area of your counter?” He gestured to the large butcher’s block Gary had installed when the kitchen was updated from the original laundry sink and two-burner stove. A shallow dip in the center of the laminated maple spoke to the thousands of meals Anna and others had prepared over the years.
“Of course. What else can I help with?”
“Nothing at this point. The dough will need to rest about thirty minutes before I roll it out.” Leo wiped the wood with the cloth Anna provided and poured a blend of all-purpose and pasta flours onto the board. He formed a bowl shape in the center of the mound and cracked two whole eggs into the center.
“Do you have a dish? I need to separate two more eggs. Oh, and a fork.”
Anna reached into the dishwasher and handed him a clean cereal bowl and the utensil. “This size okay?”
“Perfect. And do you have some olive oil?”
“Right there.” She pointed to the bottle standing next to the stove.
He squinted at the label and returned to cracking eggs and adding the extra yolks to the mixture, leaning back and chuckling as a fine spray of flour hit the front of his shirt. “It’s been awhile since I did this. Do you have an apron I could borrow?”
She opened the deep drawer holding stacks of dishtowels and mismatched cotton napkins and fished out a ruffle-edge apron patterned in shades of 1950s’ tomato red and bottle green. Leo dropped his head so she could position the loop around his neck and sneaked in a kiss. A smattering of silvery white hairs glistened throughout his thick chestnut hair, especially above his ears. She drew the ties around his waist and secured them with a lopsided bow.
“You really should consider this as part of your daily look,” she observed.
Leo paused and looked down the front of his chest. His tried to hold a serious face while his eyes twinkled. “I think I need more ruffles. A lot more ruffles.”
They exchanged bits of casual conversation as he mixed and kneaded the dough and Anna
washed leaves of the lettuces she grew in barrels on her porch. When the dough was ready, he wrapped the ball in plastic to let it rest. Outside, a southwesterly wind had picked up, sending cones and needles from the Douglas fir trees scampering over the roof.
He washed his hands, removed the flour-streaked apron, and cradled his glass of wine in one hand. “Join me on the couch?”
“Soon as I’m done with this.” She was almost finished patting the remaining lettuce leaves dry with a threadbare linen towel. Her phone rang as she moved to join her guest.
“Mom, I missed the last ferry. Can I stay with you tonight?”
Anna had no idea Gigi was on the island, and she’d never said no in the past to her daughter’s spontaneous sleepovers. Faint alarms trilled along her spine. She was entering territory for which she had no prior protocols. Her daughter would meet her lover. One of her lovers. Daniel wasn’t a lover yet, but he might be.
“Of course, you can,” she assured Gigi. “Are you hungry?”
“Starving. I haven’t eaten since breakfast, and then I lost track of time, so yeah, food would be good.”
“Then come join us.”
“Okay. See you soon.”
Us. Gigi hadn’t noticed Anna used the word.
She looked over at Leo, somewhat apologetically. “That was my daughter. She’s joining us for dinner. Are you okay with that? I’m sorry. I should have asked before I said yes, but I think you’ll like her.”
“The more the merrier,” he said. “I made enough dough for at least five or six people. Do you have any kind of a drying rack?”
“Like the kind for hanging laundry or a flat one like for cakes?”
“Laundry. Those racks with the wood dowels?”
“I do. It’s in the linen closet in the hall.”
He came off the couch and followed the direction of Anna’s uplifted arm.
“Be careful you don’t start an avalanche,” she cautioned as he rounded the corner to the hallway. “That closet’s been in dire need of organizing for years.”
