A Forever Family

by Jamie Sobrato

  She stood before him wearing her white lace bra. He put his hands on her rib cage, then slowly and deliberately slid his hands to reach behind her, and undo her bra. It fell to the ground. He took his time admiring her breasts, as her nipples hardened under his scrutiny.

  He exhaled a ragged breath as he slid his hands back around her rib cage and took her breasts in his palms. She ached to feel those hands all over her, demanding and pleasing as they went.

  Then he pulled her close and kissed her, and it wasn’t a gentle kind of do-you-want-this-too kiss. It was a firm, assertive, this-is-what-we’re-going-to-do kiss, and Emmy was sure she’d never wanted a kiss so badly in her life.

  She slid her arms around his neck and pulled him hard toward her as she backed up. Her legs hit the side of the bed and they fell together onto it. He was on top of her, and she could feel his erection through her pants and his. He pressed his hips between her thighs, and she spread her legs for him, so that the only thing that kept him from penetrating her was their clothing.

  He pulled back for a moment, and she saw his expression, darkened with desire, still fiercely determined as he began working the button and zipper on her jeans. She helped him by pushing them down her hips. Her panties went with them, and a moment later, she lay completely naked before him.

  They’d seen each other unclothed countless times during college, but this…This was an entirely different kind of unveiling. They were no longer kids, no longer in love and no longer innocent. A lifetime of heartbreak, trauma and regret stood between them now.

  And Emmy’s body, it wasn’t the same either. It had been stretched and reshaped by pregnancy and childbirth. She liked herself better now, the way her hips were a little wider and her breasts heavier, but she had stretch marks where once there had been only smooth unblemished skin, and she had a jagged little purple scar across her lower belly where Max, unable to come out the usual way, had had to be cut out by a doctor.

  She wondered how she looked in Aidan’s eyes. She could read nothing but that same desire and determination in his expression.

  And so she sat up and unbuckled his pants. When she got to his boxer shorts, she reached inside and found his erection, curled her fingers around him. He groaned. She began to stroke his hot, hard flesh, slowly and gently, then she pulled him closer and took him into her mouth.

  He moaned louder, and muttered a curse. He tangled his fingers in her hair and moved his hips in time with her mouth, as she stroked him with her lips and tongue. She hadn’t forgotten how much he loved it when she flicked her tongue against the most sensitive spot on his erection, and when she did it, he grabbed her by the hair and pulled her away from him.

  “No,” he said. “I want this to last longer than a minute.”

  He pushed her back on the bed, covered her body with his, and kissed her as his erection found her opening, where she was desperately wet and aching.

  “Do you still take the pill?” he asked, his voice tight.

  She nodded. She always had, and he’d remembered.

  “I’ve been tested…and I haven’t had any partners in…a long time. I’m clean.”

  She nodded again. “Me, too,” she whispered.

  And without any further delay, he thrust himself into her all the way, buried himself as deep as he could, so that she arched her back at the shock and pleasure of it, letting out a soft moan.

  She’d forgotten how well he fit her, how easily their bodies accommodated each other, as if made to be together.

  He began thrusting into her, fast and hard, not taking his sweet time about it, but demanding her body move with his, the way his expression had suggested he would. He watched her, his gaze locked on her face, as if trying to memorize the moment.

  Emmy felt as if she were being transported back in time, for he had always looked at her that way during sex. His intensity had turned her on, but she’d never realized then, inexperienced as she was, how rare that quality would be. She had never found it again, until now.

  She kept her gaze level with his, savoring him, memorizing him as he did her, and their bodies melted into one flesh. She could not say where she ended and he began. His pleasure became hers, and hers his.

  But then he stopped moving his hips. “Damn it. I can’t last like this,” he said, breathless. “It’s been too long.”

  Then he kissed her again, his tongue seeking out hers while his still hips drove her crazy. She squirmed beneath him, hoping to coax him back into action, but he wouldn’t budge.

  Instead, he withdrew from her, and his kiss moved to her cheek…her neck…her ear…Goose flesh broke out on her skin as he teased her with gentle kisses.

  Then, down farther to her shoulder…her arm…her breasts…She gasped at the sensation of him sucking at her nipples, one then the other. Her fingers tangled in his hair, she wanted to keep him there longer, but he moved lower again, to her belly…her hip…her thigh…He pushed her thighs apart, and she was so eager, she strained toward him.

  His mouth reached the apex of her legs, where she ached most desperately, and he worked her closer and closer to climax with his tongue. Coaxing, teasing, pleasuring…she was so close, and then she was there, wave after wave of intense pleasure crashing into her, until she was crying out and spent.

  Before she could recover, he was on top of her again, inside her, stretching her in such a delicious way that he created aftershocks of her orgasm. He was thrusting, harder and faster, as deep as he could go inside her, and she could only hold on, until his own climax came.

  He gasped, let out a long guttural moan, thrust one final time as his entire body tensed. She could feel him spilling into her, and she realized how long it had been since she’d really felt this one with a man…not since…

  Not since she’d last lain with Aidan.

  The thought struck her with its significance, but she pushed it away, not wanting to give more weight to this encounter than it deserved.

  Aidan kissed her one more time, then he shifted his weight so that he lay beside and against her, with one leg still between hers and one arm draped over her belly. His head rested on the pillow next to hers, and she could feel how hot his exertion had made him.

  They were simply two lonely adults with physical needs. That was all. They’d allowed sexual tension to build up between them, and this was just them relieving it.

  This…what they’d done, it didn’t mean they were going to get romantically involved. And it didn’t mean there would even be a repeat performance. It only meant that they’d let go of their self-control and indulged in a little mindless sex for old times’ sake.

  Emmy had to keep reminding herself of this, as she drifted off to sleep.

  AIDAN WOKE near dawn, when the light was just beginning to change the sky from black to gray, and he realized that he’d slept for the first time in months without having nightmares. He felt remarkably wellrested.

  Then he rolled over and spotted Emmy next to him, and memories of the night before came rushing back, and he understood why he’d had such a good night’s sleep. But that only made this feeling of well-being all the more remarkable.

  He’d had sex with Emmy. And they’d slept together. And he’d slept soundly for the first time since Darfur. Emmy, who’d broken his heart and whom he’d sworn he’d never let into his heart again.

  It all seemed so wildly unlikely, and yet, at the same time…

  Inevitable.

  It was the best sex of his life.

  He stared at her in the near darkness. She slept peacefully, her expression serene. She’d always been a quiet, still sleeper. And he remembered the way he’d sometimes watched her sleep when they’d been a couple.

  Back then, he’d thought he’d spend his whole life watching her sleep, waking up next to her, making love to her, laughing and living with her. He’d been such a fool. He’d had no idea of the twists and turns and crashes and burns that lay ahead.

  He’d been too young, too naive, too passionate�
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  Too much of everything.

  Now all this time lay between them, even though they were only inches apart, and he doubted they could overcome any of it. He’d be crazy to hope otherwise.

  And yet…

  He did hope.

  All the passion between them was still there. All the energy. All the intensity. Only now, it was tempered by life experience and maturity. They had that going for them now, whereas before, they hadn’t.

  Emmy opened her eyes and squinted at him. “Hey,” she whispered, her voice scratchy from sleep. “What time is it?”

  Aidan glanced at the clock across the room. “Almost five in the morning.”

  She yawned. “You’re awake early.”

  “I’m not used to getting such a good night’s sleep.”

  “I didn’t mean to fall asleep,” she said. “I mean, I hope you don’t mind that I stayed over.”

  “No, it’s fine.”

  “Max is at a friend’s house.”

  “I know.”

  She gave him an odd look but said nothing.

  He probably should have been ashamed of himself for manufacturing a fight with Emmy. It had worked out better than he’d hoped. He’d merely had the childish desire to engage her somehow, because he was so damn sick of living next to her without ever being able to talk to her or touch her.

  He should have been mature enough to knock on her door, but he’d known instinctively that would only lead to more frustration.

  She propped herself up on her elbow, her hair falling over one eye in a way that made Aidan want to make love to her all over again. He felt his body stirring at the thought of sex.

  “I just want to make sure we’re both on the same page about this—I mean, what happened last night.”

  “What page is that?”

  “I…It’s just, I’m not looking for a relationship, you know?”

  He felt as if she’d punched him in the gut.

  “Of course. Because you’ve already made it clear you don’t want to be with me, right?”

  She winced at his words. “No. Please don’t turn this into something bad.”

  He felt anger welling inside himself. Anger, and desire, and…the stirring of those feelings for Emmy that should have long been laid to rest.

  Maybe he’d never stopped loving her, and that was why sleeping next to her was so easy now, and why it infuriated him to hear that she wasn’t “looking for a relationship.”

  Before she could go anywhere, he grasped her around the waist and pulled her to him.

  “Tell me you don’t want to be with me,” he said.

  Then he kissed her, and she didn’t resist. But she didn’t kiss him back.

  “Aidan,” she said when he broke the kiss. “I think that aside from the fact that we’ve already failed as a couple, we’re both in emotionally precarious places right now.”

  “That’s bullshit,” he said, his gaze locked on hers, daring her to argue with him.

  She shook her head slowly. “I’m sorry, but I don’t have enough energy left to love you again.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  But she said nothing.

  Regardless of their disagreement, his body responded eagerly to their physical contact, and his erection pressed against her belly.

  When he shifted his hips so that he was pressing between her legs, she sighed and closed her eyes, clearly wanting more.

  “I want you,” he whispered in her ear.

  She said nothing, but she slid her leg over his hip, then rolled onto him so that she straddled his hips. She sat up, her breasts dangling tantalizingly near his mouth, looked at him with an expression that held both desire and grim determination, and she shifted until he was pressing against her hot, wet opening.

  And then…Then he was inside, and he felt like he would burst with that very first thrust. Her inner walls, so warm and silky and tight, held him and stroked him, driving him into blissful delirium.

  He grasped her hips and met her thrusts with his own as she rode him, and he forgot everything else except their bodies, here and now.

  The rest of the world could wait.

  Reality could be put on hold.

  If this was all she was willing to offer him now—this sweet, heavenly taste of her body—he would take what he could get.

  CHAPTER TEN

  After the guard’s throat was slit with the makeshift knife, I felt the ugly permanence of my actions, but I could not pause to mourn. There were three other men whose lives I’d sworn to protect, men I knew by name, men whose families and wives and children were desperate with worry about them, and I could not waste a second finding them.

  From Through a Soldier’s Eyes

  by Aidan Caldwell

  AIDAN SAT in the front room of the cabin on the navy chintz sofa, with the psychologist sitting in a chair across from him. Dr. Lydia Cormier was an attractive woman in her forties, with green eyes peering out from behind rectangular glasses and her blond hair swept back in a knot. She wore a simple gray suit and a pair of white high-heeled sandals that he noticed only because of the way she occasionally bobbed her left foot a little.

  It was their third session together, and he had the sense that they were, as therapists like to say, making progress.

  Dr. Cormier wasn’t the first psychologist Aidan had seen since his time as a hostage, but she was, he had to admit, probably the best.

  Emmy had booked the first appointment for him the week before, and the initial session had been mostly an information dump—Aidan telling the doctor all about why he was so screwed up, while she nodded, asked a few questions and took notes.

  He felt surprisingly comfortable in her presence. She was the kind of person who instinctively knew how to put others at ease, he supposed. And for that reason, he was able to talk to her, and to talk about his experience, without having an anxiety attack.

  He’d agreed to work with her two to three times a week for now, which seemed like a lot to him, but she’d said it would help him overcome the agoraphobia faster if they worked at an intense pace.

  She was scribbling something on her notepad, then she looked up at him and smiled encouragingly.

  “You were saying you feel frustrated by your inability to interact with people in a positive way since the hostage situation, and it’s gotten worse since you came here and started working on your book.”

  Aidan nodded.

  “Is there anyone you feel you can interact with positively? A friend or family member you’re particularly close to?”

  How to explain about Emmy? “There’s one person. She’s…a romantic interest. Or, well, we were a couple during our college years, and then we broke up. But recently, we’ve sort of started having a relationship again.”

  “Sort of?”

  “We spent the night together recently, so I guess it’s mostly a physical relationship…though we do talk and interact with each other, because she lives in the cottage next door.”

  “Oh, is this Emmy, who made the first appointment for you?”

  Aidan nodded.

  “How would you describe your feelings toward Emmy?”

  “Maddening,” he said, half joking. “I mean, I’m really attracted to her, and we have a strong physical bond, I guess.”

  “But not an emotional bond?”

  Of course there was an emotional bond. “No, that’s not right. It’s just complicated. She broke up with me in college when I proposed to her, and she later married my then-best-friend. They’ve since split up, and…”

  And what? And now he wanted Emmy back? Was he really about to say that out loud?

  “Would you say you have unfinished emotional business with Emmy?”

  “Maybe, maybe not. I mean, she broke my heart, and I was over her. But we’re different now. We’re both older, more mature, have been through heavy life stuff… In a way it’s like she’s a different woman than the one I used to be in love with.”

  “And of co
urse, in a sense, she is, for the reasons you’ve stated. Do you feel her presence in your life now is healthy?”

  “I…think it is.” It felt like a revelation to say it aloud. “She got me to start talking to you, and she got me to come out of the cabin for the first time, and I don’t have nightmares now…since we slept together.”

  “It sounds like there is still an emotional bond between you. Do you think that’s a correct statement?”

  Aidan nodded, mulling over her words. “Definitely, on my part. I’m not so sure about her though. She tries to keep me at a distance.”

  “What happened after you slept together? Did anything about your relationship change?”

  “She’s kind of pretended it didn’t happen, I guess. We haven’t talked about it. She’s busy with her son and her work and with building a house.”

  “But she’s otherwise treated you normally?”

  They hadn’t really talked since that night. He’d been on a high since then. Nearly floating.

  “I’d say she’s probably trying to ignore me.”

  The little stop watch the doctor kept beside her beeped, and she picked it up and turned it off. “Our time is up for today,” she said. “Shall we meet again on Thursday, same time?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “We’ll pick up then where we’ve left off, about your relationship with Emmy. Until then, I’d like you to keep a journal of your ventures outdoors, how you feel during and after. Try to go outside at least once each day, and stay for a longer interval on each outing.”

  “Okay,” he said, standing to follow her to the door.

  She turned and offered him a parting smile as she walked outside. For a moment he stared through the screen door at the construction site on the other side of the property, and he couldn’t believe his eyes.

  He’d been keeping the curtains in this room drawn because of the hammering and building noise for the past few days, but he was pretty damn sure that the last time he’d looked, there had been no house, only a finished foundation.

  But now beneath the redwoods there stood a little cabin. It was covered in some kind of rusty looking metal siding, and it had the big windows and stark, angular lines of the post-modern architecture he knew Emmy loved.