by A. R. Hadley
Cal wanted Annie forever any way he could have her: sick, depressed, tired, upbeat, happy, humble, or whole — anyway, anyhow, and anywhere. The understanding could be felt in the air of the room and in the breaths they drew, all the same yet different.
He was ready.
She was ready.
Their forever was once again alive and palpable.
"Look at that couple over there. Aren't they adorable?" Annie asked Cal while glancing at the two teenagers holding hands in the corner of the restaurant.
It was later that same evening, a cold winter evening, and the Prescotts were on a date. It wasn’t their first outing alone that month. It was their third or fourth or fifth.
It was their fifth.
And Cal and Annie had just ordered their meal — their fifth — when she was distracted by the arrival of the adorable couple.
"What's so adorable about them, Annie?" Cal casually glanced to his right — she could tell he was getting the gist of what she’d implied — and leaned back in his chair as if he were home, wineglass in hand, waiting for his wife’s reply.
And he couldn’t wait to hear what was going to come out of her fabulous mouth.
She put her hand flat on the table, looking as if what she was about to say were a secret. "Look at them. It could be their first love. It's sweet.”
Chuckling under his breath, Cal set his wine down and leaned forward to meet Annie in the middle, dead set on dispelling her romantic notion.
"Annie,” he said, a tinge of haughtiness in his eyes and tone, “that boy over there is concerned about one thing and one thing only, and the sad thing is, he doesn't have a clue what he should do, let alone how to do it correctly.”
With a smirk on her face, Annie tapped her nails against her glass, swung her leg under the table, and said, "Maybe you’re just too old to remember,” then peered at him from over the rim as she drank more of the chardonnay.
"No, I remember." Nostalgia spread across his lips, through the sea of his eyes, and then he looked back at his wife, ready to turn up the heat. "What about you?” He lost his smile, sounding as smooth as the wine tasted. “You’ve never told me about your first time.”
"My first time what?" She batted her lashes.
The expert chess master had somehow managed to turn her innocent observation about first love into a conversation about sex.
“Tell me about yours,” she continued.
Annie was giddy. Cal was exacting.
He picked up the bottle of wine and started to fill up their glasses.
"I asked you first." Cal waited, knowing the silence had her on needles. He stared until she cracked. He loved watching the wheels turn as her mind harkened back to that place.
Rotating the glass by its stem, she hesitated. It had been a long time since she’d repeated the story of how she’d lost her virginity out loud, and telling Cal had never been at the top of her list.
Although, she was surprised it had never come up before.
Her skin began to tingle as she took her hand off the cool glass, tilted her face down, and placed her palm at the back of her neck, trying to soothe the prickly heat with the condensation. Then she peered back up at him, innocence and wantonness mixing with her features.
“Maybe I’m wrong,” he said, a facetious lilt to his words, “if it’s making you all warm.”
Annie took her hand from her neck and rolled her eyes. "I was sixteen.” She relaxed into her seat. "I took surfing lessons that summer."
"Oh, the surfing boy."
"Stop..." Annie couldn’t help but smile. And damn Cal if he wasn't waiting for her to get to the good part.
Actually, Cal was trying to imagine her at sixteen. He had a hard time remembering it had only been just over ten years … fuck … because she seemed light-years away in soul and spirit. She was more perceptive than most forty-year-olds.
"I was ... we were just friends really, and on the day of the last lesson, when we were rinsing off and getting out of our wet suits — he kissed me.” She stopped short and looked dead at Cal. "How much more do you need to know?"
"Oh, I need to hear more." He cleared his throat.
"It was in the backseat of his Jeep. It’s embarrassing.” She looked away. “It wasn't. God. It wasn’t how I imagined my first time. Okay."
"My point exactly." Cal tipped his head toward the adorable couple across the way.
“That’s different,” she pined, glancing at them again. “They might be—”
“So, you think because they might be in love with each other that their first time will be just like they’ve imagined it? They’re sixteen or seventeen, Annie.”
“You’re a killjoy.” She shoved her foot against his leg and rolled her eyes.
"Did you climax?"
Annie covered her mouth. "No!" She stifled a giggle. "I wasn’t super turned-on, and it was over too fast."
“It sounds like your surf-instructor boy was the killjoy then." Cal grinned, thinking he’d won.
"You think this is so funny.”
“I’m not the one laughing.”
Annie stopped, but her smile was wide and impregnable. “Well, Mr. Prescott, now it's your turn.”
Staring across the restaurant, he readied his thoughts. “First of all, I was older than you.”
"No, you weren't.”
"Yes, I was," he said with emphasis. "I was eighteen. It was the summer before college.”
Now Cal was the one hesitating as he looked past Annie in a daze.
"And?" She was on the edge of her seat.
"You find this amusing, don't you?"
"God, yes!"
"I wasn't always what you see before you now." He gestured at his body.
"And what do you think I see?"
Cal did a double take, wanting to know Annie’s answer.
"I was very studious,” he said, recalling himself with humor, “to a fault.”
"Studious? Is that code for geek?"
Holy fuck. This was wild. She simply couldn’t imagine Cal any other way than as he sat before her now: self-assured and inherently masculine.
"No, but it was a while before—"
“Before what?" She couldn’t wait for him to finish, tapping the toe of her boot to his shin.
"Before I learned how to please a woman, Annie." Cal exhaled, picked up his glass of wine, and drank. He may have even rolled his eyes, but he didn't take them off his wife.
A spark lit her gaze as she smiled and leaned forward. "So … you think you know how to please a woman now?"
"I think I've got a handle on it," he said, and oh, his lips — they twisted into a devious smile.
"And what about at eighteen? You didn't have a handle on it then?" She wanted to have a handle on it.
Cal grinned, stretched his arm across the table, and pressed his fingers over her wrist. “I would say the girl suffered the same fate as you. It was over quickly, and I seriously doubt she climaxed.”
Annie’s pulse rose as Cal continued to finger her wrist. They both looked at each other — staring, perspiring, practically panting.
“I always wondered what you must’ve thought of me … the night we met." Cal released her wrist as he looked deep into Annie's eyes.
"You mean, had I ever met a man like you? You already know the answer to that question. No." She giggled and shifted her gaze to the table, then back up at him, minus the laughter. "No."
Annie went silent a moment, then continued. "You were a force when I met you … when I first saw you, and as I got to know you … it was like nothing I’d ever felt before. And by that first date, I felt like I’d always known you. Like there was no time without you there in my life. I fell in love with you. You always made me feel safe, and you always supported me, never judged me, and you listened to me like you are now — quiet and strong, safe and comforting. And when you do speak, you usually have just the right words to say.”
"Jesus, Annie."
"I'm not done." Taking Cal’s hands, she t
urned them over, palms up, and pressed her fingers along the cracks, following the lines with her eyes. "And your skin…” She turned her head away for a second, remembering and feeling, and then she looked back at him, right into his waiting eyes. “From the first time your skin touched mine, it was … God, it was more than—"
"Just physical," they both said at the same time.
A shot of pure, unadulterated electricity coursed through her body, down her arms and to her fingers, where she began to brush her thumbs over the veins on his wrists.
“I was always afraid at the beginning … it was just me feeling it — all of it. I thought I was just another girl you wanted to fuck.”
Her stomach filled with butterflies. She had never admitted that to Cal, but she knew, on some level, he had to have known.
And he had.
Cal was aware.
Cal had always been aware.
Of Annie. Of everything.
Of his own strong feelings which had terrified him in an instant.
At first sight, Cal had denied Annie might have been anything more than a fling, but he’d known — without being able to articulate it — that very first night, when he’d seen the way she’d taken the photographs on the sand, when he’d heard the comforting sound of her voice, and when he’d looked into her eyes — her telling eyes — he’d known she was different.
Annie made him feel alive. Terrifyingly alive.
She made him think about who he was and who he was going to be. She stretched his imagination beyond his wildest dreams. But Annie was no dream. She was real. And she was his home.
"It was always different with you, baby." Grabbing her fingers off his wrist, he began to play with them, twisting her wedding ring around and around.
"How was I different?" A lump sat in her throat.
"Because you care.” His eyes moved from his grandmother’s band to Annie. “It was obvious immediately. The way you care. About yourself and other people."
She shook her head.
"It's true. You look at the person, the whole person, and I mean you really see them, not what they have, the things they possess, or even what they look like on the outside, but you see the insides. And when I saw that you wanted to know me — and I wanted you to know me, but I just didn't think you could love me if you really knew me — I tested you." He grinned. "You were something … this relationship was something I realized I did not want to screw up.”
"Well, you did a fine job … testing me,” she joked, trying to lighten up the intensity. “I think I'm more screwed up now than ever before.”
Cal’s expression didn’t budge. He didn’t lighten up. His primal intensity was written across his entire face. The man was completely exposed.
"I don't know what every day of our married life is going to be like, but I know what I feel for you hasn't changed." He sat forward in his chair and took a deep breath. “I feel closer to you now, more than I ever did. And I always felt close to you.” Cal’s eyes glistened. He failed to pull back the public display of emotion. It bled from his chest.
"I want to make love to you. I want you tonight." He exhaled the nervous air trapped in his lungs.
Transfixed, Annie peered into Cal’s eyes deeper and deeper. His stare was so penetrating she almost had to turn her face from it, but she didn't. A sharp feeling ran through her entire body, encapsulating her. Their passion was finally coming together — at the same time and at the right time — and it hadn't felt more right than right now.
“I’ve never stopped wanting you. I just wanted you to feel better. I wanted you to feel good about yourself again. I wanted to be able to be myself again with you in every way. I thought my ardency might scare you further away.”
“Ardency,” she mumbled and grinned but then became serious. “Yeah, well, even just a few weeks ago, your ardency might have still scared me away.” She squeezed his hand and looked at him in earnest. “I was a mess for so long, and I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t want you to touch me in any way. It wasn’t you.”
“I know, baby.” Cal rubbed her arm, tickling her. “That’s the past. This is today. Rosa can get up with Ben if he wakes. I want you with me all night tonight — without distraction.”
“Yes," Annie whispered, glancing up at him. Could he hear her heart thumping against her chest?
The energy floated across the air between them, crackling like lightning. All of the talk about their first times, and now they both were acting like virgins.
“I want to leave,” Cal said, a smile and his heart smack across his face.
“Now? We haven’t even eaten."
“I’m only hungry for you." He paused, continuing to grin. “We can take it home.”
“And eat in bed.” Her eyes opened wider and wider. “Like on our honeymoon.”
Cal looked like he was ready to eat all right.
“The food!” Annie quipped.
“You’re beautiful.” Pulling her hand away from her earring, he held her palm and pushed his index finger slowly up and down the tendons on her wrist. “I want to taste you.”
The server suddenly appeared with two plates of hot food.
“We’re going to need that boxed please. We had an emergency arise. Please bring the check too.”
Annie started laughing as soon as the server departed. He hadn’t barely had a chance to speak. “Do you think he heard what you said before he arrived?”
“Did you hear me?” The husky inflection in Cal’s voice was never more deafening. “I want to put my mouth on you. All over you…” Cal spoke like cinders floating through the air in a forest fire. “I want to taste you with my tongue…” His words wrapped around her body like silk, tying her up. “I want to kiss you. Everywhere. All over your fucking skin. Until you scream my name."
He watched Annie’s face — her eyes were practically rolling into the back of her head. “Have you forgotten what that feels like?”
“No,” she squeaked.
“Are you ready … for everything — the way it always was?”
Annie couldn’t speak.
It was already just the way it had always been: paralyzing, aching, her panties wet. Maybe she had forgotten. Shaking her head, she clasped her fingers around his and stared at their fused hands.
“Look at me,” Cal whispered.
Annie swallowed with great difficulty, then looked up at him keenly, feeling nude in the middle of the restaurant.
“I love you,” he said.
Her eyes began to water as she squeezed his hands. He squeezed back and wrapped his feet around her ankles. She tilted her head down and squinted, causing tears to drip from her lids.
Cal lifted their hands and wiped the moisture away with their fists. “You know I always wanted you, Annie. I never stopped wanting you, loving you, or needing you.”
“I know,” she said, fighting more tears. “You told me.”
“I’m telling you again. You deserve to hear it again. And tonight, I’m going to make you feel it — again and again and again.”
Hand in hand, Cal and Annie left the restaurant, each stride in unison, pulses vibrating against each other as their coats flapped in the wind.
Upon reaching the Land Rover, Cal opened Annie’s door personally, holding her palm as she stepped in, placed the take out in the back, and sat down.
He paused.
He smirked.
And then he began to undo the buttons of her coat … one by fucking one.
Pushing the lapels open over her chest, he slid his hands down the edge of the garment until he reached the hem, watching her figure materialize as he raked his gaze over her beautiful body — the soft, black dress, her swelling breasts, her curves — and then he peered back up into her eyes.
“Take off your boots.”
Annie dropped her head, releasing her breath as she set her foot against the dash, wondering what in the hell he was doing. But he’d spoken to her so straightforwardly, so commandingly, so Cal, she desired
to do whatever he said.
The moment she placed a hand at the top of the black, high-heeled boot, he took over, pulling the zipper toward her ankle, watching her skin unfold little by little through the fishnet of her stockings. Then he did the same with her other shoe.
He was calculating and planning without speaking in the middle of a freezing-cold parking lot, deciding everything he wanted to do to Annie and the way in which he wanted to do it.
His slow, precise movements, the smell of his skin, and the solid intention written all over his face rendered her immobilized.
“You’re so sexy.” He ran a hand up her stockings, stopping at her thigh. “Put your feet back on the floor.”
Annie swallowed — hard — as she looked at Cal, touched his cheek, and asked to be kissed using only her eyes. Surely, he could see the desire and desperation in them.
He smirked.
Yeah, he saw it. He knew.
He took her hand from his face and placed it above her head, over the seat, and then he pressed his palm against her thigh.
He timed his breaths to the rise and fall of her lungs … waiting, waiting, waiting … until he could feel her begin to squirm. Then he slid his hand underneath her dress. His face remained near the heaving cleavage of her breasts.
“Cal…” Annie whispered, both resisting and entreating him.
He lifted her other arm above the seat and clasped her hands together behind the headrest.
“Take me home," she said while moaning and shifting her head from side to side, ready to burst. Closing her eyes, her heart pumping faster and faster, blood filled up between her legs where his hand aimed. “The bed is warm." She opened her thighs despite her words.
“You are warm.” Cal pushed two fingers into her center, up into the nylon of her tights, finding her spot over the material, tickling her and cupping her all while watching her face — the way he always liked to. God, how he’d missed seeing that expression, the one he saw now with her arms above her head wrapped around the seat, clasped, her head tilted back, hitting the cushion, squirming, whimpering, and looking fabulously out of her mind.
“Oh, God,” she said, squeezing her thighs together — aching and aching — forgetting she was in a parking lot, seeing only him, hearing only him, and breathing only him. “You’re going to make me come. It’s been so long.”
