by Nancy Warren
“I hope I’ve learned a thing or two as well. I hope I know how to please you.”
He was half teasing but there was a hint of seriousness behind the words that made her gaze into his earnest green eyes and ask, “Is that why you never came when I invited you?”
In a dozen years she’d never thought that might be the reason, but she saw it was when he nodded solemnly. “Honey, I was a virgin. I didn’t have the first clue what to do with a woman.”
“You would have learned,” she said softly. “I would have helped you.”
“I would have made a fool of myself. You weren’t some girl as clueless as I was that I could fumble around with and try to fit the right parts together. You were so experienced and—”
She turned abruptly. “A slut, you mean. That’s why you didn’t come to me.
You thought I was—”
“No!”
He swung her around, holding her against all the hot length of his body by splaying his hands across her back so she couldn’t avoid him. Not his touch, not his expression, not his eyes, which shone with the truth.
“I thought you were amazing. Incredible. Sexy. And I figured you must think I was in your league. But I wasn’t. I wanted to climb that stupid vine so badly I hung around almost every night that week. Once I even made it into your yard. But I chickened out every time.”
She felt like weeping for the girl she’d been then. So cocky, so goddamn sure of herself. When sex had been the easiest thing in the world.
She touched Tom’s cheek with her palm. “I’m not that girl anymore.” She’d tried to explain to him before, but she wasn’t sure her message had been received. “Some things have happened to me since that time.”
How could she explain to this honest, uncomplicated man? He wouldn’t understand the million subtle cruelties, and some not so subtle. The way Eric had done his best to humiliate and control her. In the early days, she could get high and go to a place where it didn’t matter, but when she stopped escaping her reality, it became uglier. And, she now realized, Eric had punished her for cleaning up her act.
At first, she’d thought it was fun the way he’d make her beg before letting her come. Then it stopped being fun. And then, after a while, she stopped being able to orgasm at all. And he’d taunted her with that. Called her stupid, ugly names.
Now she faced having sex again—she didn’t know what she was capable of, what she even wanted, apart from simply being held by someone good and solid. Someone she trusted.
And if this turned out to be a disaster, she wasn’t sure she had the courage to try again.
“I want you to do something for me.” She realized she was still gripping the flowers. “I should put these in a vase,” she said.
Tom gripped her shoulders. “They were in the rain all night. They’ll be okay. What is it you want?”
This was so hard. She was such a coward. She didn’t want to explain, didn’t want to admit she was scared and messed up and unsure of herself. She flicked a brief glance at Tom and realized that if he hadn’t let fear stop him all those years ago, things might have been so different.
She didn’t want to be the coward this time. It was sex. A natural, normal human behavior and she’d get through this. Tom might not be exciting, but he’d be kind and the boy who’d rescued stray animals would never hurt her deliberately.
“I’ve got some bad stuff I want to put behind me.” She trailed off, but he didn’t push. He watched her steadily. He knew about violence against women. When he’d stopped her on the highway and seen her black eye, he’d known. Of course he’d known.
Why had she stayed with a man for eight years if he’d been so bad for her? That was a question she didn’t have an answer for.
Tom’s hands gentled on her back. She felt his erection, as stiff as before against her belly, but the rest of his demeanor gave no clue to his arousal. It was hard not to respect that kind of restraint in a man.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“Yes. Someday. But not today.”
He nodded and ran his fingertips over the faded bruise on her face. “We will talk about this. I can’t do anything until we do.”
“But not tonight,” she begged.
“No. Tonight there are only the two of us in this room. Agreed?”
She nodded, hoping she could manage it, hoping the demons from her past didn’t insist on crashing the party.
He took a look around the room, which had never been redecorated since she’d lived there, as though her grandparents had somehow always known she’d be back. The single bed looked virginal with its white iron frame and faded chintz comforter.
“This is what your room would have looked like if I’d been brave enough to climb up here when you asked me,” Tom said, as he took her hand and led her to her bed.
She nodded. Absurd to be trembling. He must feel it through their joined hands, but she had a feeling her entire sexual destiny would be mapped out in that narrow bed over the next couple of hours.
She was so nervous she was hyperventilating. Soon she’d faint. Just what Tom needed in his life. A naked, passed-out former slut. She might as well give it up now and see if there was a convent in the world who’d accept a woman like her.
While these thoughts cascaded through her mind, Tom led her forward until her knees bumped the edge of the mattress. She swallowed, as though seeing it for the first time and associating it with something other than sleep. She turned to him and raised a trembling hand to his face. “Be careful with me.”
There was a serious light in his eyes when he said, “Always.
He kissed her, pulling her gently into his arms, and she thought, Maybe this is going to be okay. He didn’t grab or grope, maul or shove, simply kissed her, leaving his hands loose around her waist.
She’d forgotten how nice simple kissing could be. His lips were warming up nicely, his tongue subtle but masterful as he took possession of her mouth, then eased away, letting her take the lead.
She began, very slowly, to melt.
His skin was still damp in places, his hair in wet curls against his scalp, but he was warm. So warm. He eased her onto the bed, not even attempting to take off her night dress. Maybe it was the way they seemed to have gone back in time, but she felt like a girl again, as though she were starting out. Each touch felt new. Each caress surprised her.
“Would it be all right if I touched your breasts?” he asked softly, his lips kissing her ear after he whispered the words.
She was charmed. If anyone had ever asked her, she didn’t remember it. Romance, he’d promised her. It seemed she was getting it.
She appeared to consider his request, and saw that for all his careful wooing, he was half crazy for her. Which was good. She was gaining confidence and taking back control of her body. The years fell away along with her bad memories. Maybe some people thought rewriting history was cheating, but Gillian decided if it had been botched the first time around there should be rewrites allowed.
“Yes,” she said equally softly. Then shivered, her breasts pulsing and throbbing with the knowledge they were about to be caressed. And when it happened, when his hands touched her there, she discovered the anticipation had made her response that much richer.
“I’d like to kiss your nipples, if that would be okay?”
She moaned, as the heat scorched her.
“I’ll kiss you through your night dress. I promise,” he said. He was sweet and careful with her but he wasn’t a boy.
There was nothing fumbling, groping, or adolescent about his moves. She began to realize she was in the hands of a sexually confident and experienced lover.
“All right,” she said, her own voice shaking, with need now more than nerves.
As his mouth closed over her nipple, she felt the hot wetness of his tongue as well as the abrasion of wet Indian cotton on her sensitive skin. It was quite possibly the most erotic sensation she’d ever experienced.
She knew his tong
ue would feel smooth and luscious on her naked skin, but the barrier of wet cotton kept up a maddening scratching, scraping that wasn’t painful, merely different. He sucked a nipple into his mouth, cotton and all. As he lifted his head, the cotton quickly cooled, making her nipple ultra sensitive, so she felt it pucker along with the wet fabric. She didn’t want any barriers between them. She wanted his tongue on her nakedness.
All of it.
But Tom was in no hurry.
His hands might not be quite steady, but they were slow, smoothing the cotton against her sides as he stroked her. Kissing her breasts for so long, her lower body was in torment.
She tried to give him a hint that it was time to speed things up, gripping the waistband of his boxers and attempting to yank them off, but he stilled her hands.
“Please,” she gasped.
“Not yet,” he replied softly.
How could he not understand that she needed to get this first time out of the way? That she wanted to replace Eric with Tom as the last man who’d been inside her body. Then, she squeezed her eyes tight shut, realizing she’d let Eric into the room, after she’d promised both of them she wouldn’t.
Breathing deep, she concentrated on the feel of Tom’s body against hers, on the smell of his skin and rain-washed hair. She played with his hair, learning its texture, loving the way the damp, short curls brushed her fingers. Following his lead, she took the time to learn his body, his textures and his most responsive zones, while the urge to get on with things grew thicker and hotter within her.
Once she’d finished with his hair, she moved to his neck, his shoulders, his torso. Maybe he was only upholding the law in a podunk town in Oregon where nothing much ever happened, but he stayed in shape. If muscle was ever needed, Tom Perkins was your man. His shoulders were hard, his neck muscular, and his torso—well, that looked like something you’d see on an infomercial for some ab and chest strengthening device.
He seemed as interested in her torso as she was in his.
He toyed with the ribbon that held her bodice closed. His eyes were dark and his face achingly familiar as he asked, in his slow way, “Could I untie this? I want to see you.”
She gulped and a tremor shook her. She couldn’t speak over the ache in her throat, so she nodded slowly, wondering if she’d ever felt this special. She didn’t think so.
Suddenly, she wished she’d thought to switch off the lamp, but it was too late now.
Her heart was having trouble finding a rhythm as Tom’s big fingers made clumsy work of untying the pale blue silk ribbon. It was the first awkwardness he’d shown. He really was as anxious to see her naked breasts as she was suddenly shy about displaying them.
He parted the fabric slowly and she held her breath, feeling his gaze on her almost as real as the soft slide of cotton.
His breath caught as at last, at long, long, last, he bared both breasts.
Her flesh shivered. He didn’t go straight for her nipples, or palm her entire breast, but propped himself on one elbow and with the index finger of his other hand traced the outline of her breast.
The move was subtle, her reaction anything but.
She felt warm, pulsing waves of desire—and this was from his fingertip tracing her left breast. She couldn’t wait to find out what he would do to her when she was naked and he really put his mind to it.
Her breasts were generous in size. At eighteen they’d been high on her chest and perky as twin balloons. At thirty, some of the air had leaked out of the balloons. She reached a hand for the lamp and he stopped her.
“You are so beautiful,” he said.
21
Gillian stared up at Tom and drew in a shaky breath. “I’m afraid of what you’re going to do to me.” A man like this could steal all her love and never give it back.
He lifted her hand and placed it over his heart, so she felt the solid thump against her palm, and he placed his hand over her heart, which was bouncing with nerves and excitement. “I promise I will do my best never to hurt you.”
As they stared at each other, she knew he’d keep that promise. Maybe she was being given a second chance, she thought, as her eyes drifted shut and the sweet balm of desire warmed all her cold, numb places. Her fingers danced over his chest, and his also got busy.
From tracing her breasts his hands moved slowly but surely to her nipples, palming and cupping them, along with the full part of her breasts so they warmed to life and began to spread pleasant, throbbing sensations to the rest of her body.
Relaxing into the slow, easy seduction, she found herself lying pliant and warm, nothing on her mind but her own pleasure. When she felt the warm, wet heat of his tongue on her nipples, a sound escaped her lips, part sigh, part moan.
“Too rough?” Tom asked, raising his head.
“No,” she said breathlessly. “Perfect.”
Part of her wanted to rip their clothes off and get on with it, but a truer part of herself, one she hadn’t always listened to in her life, wanted to stay with this slow pace, wanted to enjoy every minute, to savor and prolong. She’d had a lot of sex, but she’d known very little of making love.
That’s what Tom was doing and she found she liked it a whole lot better.
He went back to her breasts, lapping, kissing, suckling a little, and meanwhile his hand traced her belly through the cotton. As he hit the base of her belly, the pressure changed so his fingers brushed her curls through the cotton gown.
At first she thought it was accidental, then after the not-quite-caress left her with the suggestion of a touch rather than the touch itself, and that only upped the anticipation, she realized he was doing it deliberately.
Her exploring fingers had made it down his back—the plaid boxers were a serious impediment to any further action. She wanted to see him, feel him, taste him. She let her fingers toy with his waistband for a minute, held back a gasp of frustration as he air-brushed her crotch once more.
He brushed her again, not so lightly this time and she touched him as softly through the boxers.
His breathing rate upped as she caressed him slowly. Meanwhile, he reached down for the bottom of her gown and raised the hem an inch at a time, all the while continuing to play at her breasts with his mouth. She slid her thighs apart the minute the gown passed her knees. She felt an orgasm in her imminent future as sure as she’d smell rain in the air on a gray, cloudy day. She wanted that orgasm so fiercely she trembled all over with the wanting.
Of course, Tom didn’t know about her recent troubles. He couldn’t know that she, who had never previously grasped the point of a vibrator had recently wondered if even one powered by a super battery could bring her body back from the dead zone.
And here was the elusive orgasm tingling in its possibilities, hovering just out of reach.
If Tom tormented her much longer it was going to take off for greener pastures.
How she’d gone from being unsure about even being touched to burningly close to climax, she couldn’t quite fathom.
Whether Tom had picked up on her distress or had simply reached the end of his own tolerance, she didn’t know, but suddenly things seemed to speed up.
His lips moved down her body until they brushed her inner thigh, her nightdress was slipping deliberately up over her hips, which she raised to aid the operation. She was mostly naked before him, apart from the gown rucked around her waist, but damn it, he was still wearing his boxers. What the hell was on his-
“Aaaah,” she cried aloud as his mouth found her sweetest place and he licked at her with the same focused effort he put to every task.
After all the waiting, the slow seduction, the may-I-put¬my-mouth-on-your-nipple, to have his tongue swirl right up inside her and then slide slickly over her throbbing clit was a joy to her love-starved body. She rose, slowly, as he played his tongue with gentle deliberation over her most sensitive flesh.
There was no hurry, no pressure. She felt his pleasure in his task and believed he’d be happy to s
tay there all night, so she relaxed and gave herself over to the relentless heat building slowly but surely.
She heard panting, and knew it was coming from her throat, heard the springs of the old bed creak, and knew that was caused by her lower body, which was starting to thrash.
Reaching back over her head, she grasped the metal posts of the bed frame, feeling she needed to anchor herself.
And she was right. In a move as mind-blowing as it was unexpected, he sucked her clit right into his mouth, maintaining a gentle suction. And just like that, she flew apart.
By the time she floated back to earth and her heart seemed to be back in her body, she discovered that Tom’s boxers were nothing but a tartan heap at the end of the bed.
And he was slipping a condom onto a cock as rock-solid and reliable as its owner. The jingle of a truck commercial flashed through her mind. Something about being made in America and built tough. That was Tom.
As he slipped between her legs, she opened for him and then he was there, entering her body slowly and deliberately as though he’d be in no big hurry to leave again.
With a sigh of pure bliss, she wrapped her legs around his hips and rose to meet him. Their gazes caught and held and as he began to thrust she felt, absurdly, as though she were starting all over again.
In all thirty years of her life, she realized, she’d never been intimate with a man she truly loved.
Until now.
She kissed him, tasting herself on him, and his own heat and need.
The speed increased and she discovered safe, reliable Tom had some moves on him she’d never have guessed, including a delightful habit of hitting her g-spot with each deep thrust.
She’d had her orgasm and was happy to ride along with him, enjoying her own aftershocks and ready to enjoy his pleasure almost as keenly as she’d experienced her own.
She had no idea quite how he did it. He changed the angle somehow and seemed to stretch her in some new way that had her gasping and forgetting all about climaxing vicariously through him as a second orgasm exploded through her. She was clinging to him, arching to receive each thrust as he took her deep and hard and to some new place she’d never been.