Long-Lost Wife?

by Barbara Faith

  “Madre de Dios, ” he whispered. “How much do you think I can stand?”

  “I didn’t know you were awake.”

  Awake and ready. My God, so ready. He tried not to move, tried to think about something, anything except the terrible urgency of his body. Soccer. Think about soccer. The next World Cup. It didn’t help. He was rigid as a goalpost, panting like a puppy.

  She touched him, felt a thrill of excitement, a sudden heating of her body, and said, “Oh my.”

  Which Luis felt was pretty close to being the understatement of the year. “Listen,” he said, his voice made hoarse by all that he was trying to control, “if you don’t want to wind up flat on your back in thirty seconds, you’d better stop that.”

  “What?” She began to stroke him. “This?”

  “Annabel...” He groaned. “Por Dios, Annabel, you’ve got to stop.”

  Half-ashamed because she liked touching him like this, she whispered, “Don’t you like it?”

  “Like it!” He closed his hand over hers. “You know what you’re doing, don’t you?”

  “Oh, yes,” she said, “I know.”

  He kissed her then, kissed her with all the longing and the passion he’d kept in check these last few nights. She answered his kiss and their mouths clung, searching, exploring, and all the while she stroked him, stroked him until he knew he could no longer bear it.

  He rolled her beneath him then, and with his mouth still on hers, he entered her. And moaned with sheer joy when her softness closed around him. And when she said, “Oh, yes. Like that, yes,” he thought he would die with the pleasure of it.

  She lifted her body to his in total abandon, giving all that she had to give. She held his face between her hands and kissed his mouth. She tasted his lips, licked the skin of his shoulder, and whispered her pleasure into his ear.

  She held him with her arms and with her legs, and when he cupped her bottom to bring her closer, when his strokes deepened and his movements quickened, she went a little wild, reaching, reaching for that final incredible moment. And when it happened for her, when she cried her cry against his lips, he, too, went a little wild.

  He crushed her to him, holding her close, frantic because he didn’t want it to end. He wanted her to keep him close like this, to feel the clench of her muscles holding him, the small quivers that shook her body and told him what this was doing to her.

  He kissed her mouth and told her in Spanish what he could not tell her in English. And when with a great cry it ended for him, he raised himself over her and cried, “Anna! Mi querida amorcita, mi preciosa. No voy a permitirte que salgas de mi lado nuevamente.”

  She barely heard the words, didn’t think she understood them. Nor did she understand why she wept. She only knew that it was heaven to be close to him like this. And that she loved him.

  When at last he made as though to draw away, she said, “No, Luis, don’t leave me. Not yet.”

  She kissed the side of his face. He felt her tears and licked them away, then held her close with arms made strong with love.

  They drowsed awhile, and though he said, “I’m too heavy for you,” she would not let him go.

  In a little while he felt himself grow again, and when he began to move against her, she said, “Oh, yes. That’s nice, Luis. So nice.”

  In that half state between waking and sleeping they clung to each other while he moved slowly, deeply inside her. He kissed her mouth and the side of her face. And thought of all the things he wanted to say, but could not. And in the moment of release it was he who felt hot tears sting his eyes.

  Later, when he left her to go to his room to shower and shave, he faced the realization that he had to tell her the truth about who she was and why he had brought her here. For if he did not, if she regained her memory before he told her, he would lose her forever. He couldn’t bear that. Not again.

  Ambrosia filled the tub with hot, scented water. Annabel selected a tape of Spanish music and stepped into the water to the music of “Malagueña.”

  With a murmured “Mmm,” she lay back and closed her eyes. And knew she had never felt quite so content, quite so fulfilled. Her body felt light, her mind dreamlike, floating.

  That’s what it had been like when they made love the second time, when, half-asleep, their bodies still joined, they had moved together to that final moment. She hadn’t known making love could be that way.

  The music of “Granada” filled the misty room. Granada, tiera sonada por me, land of dreams...

  Had she been there with Luis? Had they made love under the Spanish moon and listened to the music of Spanish guitars? Had she loved him very much?

  A smile curved Annabel’s lips. Perhaps, after all, there was something to be said for losing your memory. Now everything she saw, everything she did, was new to her. Like making love to Luis. The first time they did it had been like the very first time for her.

  Even now there was joy in discovery as their bodies became accustomed to each other. Love was a mystery that was only now beginning to unravel. How exciting it was, starting life all over again.

  From now on, everything she saw and everything she did would be new to her, for she was being given a second chance at life. There would be new things to see and to experience. She and Luis would go to Spain and she would be seeing it as though for the first time.

  She sank down to her chin in the water and blew soap bubbles off her fingers. And smiled, smiled because she had been given a second chance to fall in love with Luis all over again.

  She remembered the words he had spoken in Spanish, words he whispered in the throes of his passion. “My little love, my precious one. No voy a permitirte que salgas de mi lado... neuvamente. Again. I will not let you leave me again.”

  Again?

  Her eyes went wide with shock. Had she misunderstood the Spanish words? She didn’t think so. Somewhere in the back of her mind, in that part of her brain that remembered, she knew Spanish well enough to have understood.

  He’d said “again.” Had he meant he didn’t want her to make any more trips without him? Like the trip she’d made to Miami to visit friends? Or had he meant something else? She didn’t understand.

  The music of “Ojos Verdes” filled the room. Green Eyes. “Serenos”...serene eyes. But Luis’s eyes weren’t serene. Never serene, but always filled with questions, with shadowed mystery.

  Puzzled and oddly disturbed, Annabel left the tub. She dressed in a pair of white shorts, an off-the-shoulder yellow blouse and white sandals, then brushed her hair back off her face and braided it.

  She was ready by the time Luis knocked and said, “Ready for breakfast, querida?”

  She didn’t say anything, didn’t question him until they finished breakfast. Then she said, “This morning when we...” Color crept into her cheeks.

  “When we what?” he teased.

  “You know.”

  He reached across the table and took her hand. “When we made love?” He kissed her fingertips. “Such wonderful love, my Annabel.”

  She looked into his eyes, caught for a moment by something she had not seen there before. Unable to look away, she forced herself to take a deep breath and say, “Yes, Luis, when we made love. You said...you murmured something in Spanish. You said you would not let me go again.” She drew her hand away. “You said ‘again,’ Luis. What did you mean?”

  Tell her! a voice inside his head screamed. Tell her now! But he couldn’t. Not yet. Instead, not quite meeting her eyes, he said, “You liked to go to Miami. To shop and visit friends. I meant I didn’t want you to leave me like that again.”

  And because he wasn’t sure she believed him, he said, “Wherever we go now, Annabel, we’ll go together. Back to Spain, to places there you’ve never been, to Segovia, Granada.”

  “Tiera sonada por mi, ” she murmured.

  He looked at her, startled. If she remembered Spanish she would remember other things. He had to tell her. And he would. Soon. Another day, another
night.

  He forced himself to smile and, rising, took her hand and brought her up beside him. “We’ll go many places together,” he said. “When we find the Cantamar and when we salvage her we’ll go back to Spain. And Morocco. You’ll love Morocco, Annabel. There are wonderful things to do there, colorful, exotic sights to see.

  “There are places that haven’t changed in hundreds of years. The souks, the bazaars where you can find everything you’ve ever dreamed of buying.”

  He touched her cheek. “I’ll buy you a robe and a gossamer veil. I’ll pretend you’re a slave girl I bought at auction for a king’s ransom. I’ll make you dance for me, and when the dance has ended, I’ll take away the robe and the veil. I’ll perfume your body with scented oils from the East and rub henna on your breasts.”

  His eyes grew dark with passion, and in a voice made rough with the fire that burned in his belly, he said, “I’ll fasten golden earrings in your ears and a slave bracelet around your ankle.”

  He went on, telling her all the things he would do to her, for her. She was mesmerized, caught up in his erotic dream, trapped by the intensity of his gaze, the throaty, impassioned tone of his voice. She was trembling, heated. Weak with sudden desire.

  “I’ll make love to you in a thousand and one ways,” he whispered. “I’ll fill my nostrils with your scent, my mouth with your taste. And when it’s over, you will be my Anna again.”

  Again. A shiver ran through her, but before she could speak, he swept her up into his arms and pressed his lips to hers. He kissed her with passion and with need. She felt the frantic beating of his heart and gasped when he started across the terrace with her.

  “Luis. Wait. “What are you...?” She caught a glimpse of Meadowlark’s startled face, heard a smothered chuckle, and then she was swept away, her senses reeling. His captive.

  Across the terrace into the dining room, up the stairs, down the hall, past her room to his. Inside he kicked the door shut, and then she was on the bed and he was over her, pulling down her shorts, his shorts.

  “Luis,” she tried to say. “Luis...”

  He took her words, he took her breath. He was over her, in her before she had a chance to protest. If she had wanted to protest.

  The loving was hot and wild and so fierce it frightened her. He held her so tightly she couldn’t have gotten away if she had wanted to. But she didn’t want to. She clung to him, gasping with pleasure, a little afraid of him and of what was happening to her. But loving it. Oh yes, loving it.

  Almost as quickly as it started it ended, ended like a million skyrockets going off, red and yellow and blue and purple and green, all merging into a rainbow of light that dazzled and weakened.

  He cried out, cried her name, “Annabel!” and collapsed over her, his body shaking with all that he experienced.

  She felt the frantic beat of his heart against her breast and was suddenly overwhelmed with tenderness that a man so strong could become so quickly vulnerable. For now, in this moment, with her arms around him, Luis became hers. Her man. To have and to hold and, yes, to love.

  They stayed in his room all that day. They made love in the shower and in the Jacuzzi on his private, screened-off balcony. On the floor of the bathroom and in his bed.

  He kissed all the secret places of her body and brought her to a release she hadn’t thought possible.

  Once he urged her up over him and, giving her full rein, let her set the pace while he caressed her breasts. He looked at her with eyes hooded with passion, and when, on the edge of desire, she closed her eyes, he said, “No, open your eyes, Annabel. Look at me when it happens for you.”

  And when it did, he said, “Oh, love. Oh, love.”

  He was insatiable, unable to get enough of her. Or her of him. They loved and rested and loved again, and when at twilight they ventured out onto his balcony and stood looking out at the sea, he said, “This is a small madness, isn’t it?”

  Annabel smiled and touched his face. “Perhaps, Luis. But a good madness, one I hope we’ll always have.”

  He kissed her, tenderly and without passion, and because he did not want her to know all that he was feeling, he smiled and said, “But you’ll be walking funny when you’re ninety. I wonder what our grandchildren will have to say about that.”

  “They’ll be green with envy.” She laughed, but when the laughter died, the thought struck her that though she and Luis had been married for eight years, they hadn’t had children. She wondered about that. Hadn’t he wanted children? Hadn’t she?

  “Luis,” she started to say, “why didn’t we—”

  “I’m starved,” he broke in. “On the verge of collapse. A man can’t do what I’ve done all day without sustenance.” He rested his hands on her shoulders and gave her a gentle shake. “You keep doing what you’re doing, woman, and you’re going to make an old man out of me.”

  “Too bad.” She nipped his earlobe. “Because I plan to keep right on doing what I’m doing.”

  His grip on her shoulders tightened and his eyes took on a smoldering look that she knew was a presage of rising passion. With a laugh she stepped away from him. “Food,” she said. “You need food.”

  He laughed, too, and arm in arm they went out to the terrace.

  They ate a prodigious amount of food, big bowls of conch chowder, broiled crawfish, peas and rice and steak, blood-rare for him, medium for her. For dessert, though Annabel said she couldn’t possibly eat another bite, there was guava pie served with rum sauce.

  “I can’t move,” she said when she finished. And, stifling a yawn, added, “I feel as if I could sleep for a week.”

  “With me?”

  “Of course,” she said softly. “Always with you.”

  It got to him. Somehow those three words hit him right in the solar plexus. Annabel had decided to trust him and he knew, deep in his soul he knew, he wasn’t worthy of that trust.

  Perhaps all that he was feeling showed on his face, because she said, “What is it, Luis?”

  “Nothing.” He made himself smile. “How about a walk?”

  “On the beach,” she said. “We’ll walk barefoot in the sand and hold hands in the moonlight.”

  “All right. We’ll...” No, he thought, they couldn’t walk on the beach because someone, whoever it was who had tried to drown Annabel, might still be out there, hiding, waiting.

  Every inch of the island had been searched. Now he wondered if indeed it had been an intruder, if perhaps one of the island people, someone he thought he knew and trusted, had been behind the two attempts on Annabel’s life.

  One of the women, he couldn’t remember if it was Ambrosia or Meadowlark or one of the women who occasionally helped out, had a brother who’d caused trouble on the island before. Something to do with a woman. Had the man assaulted a woman? He couldn’t remember, but tomorrow he’d find out.

  In a way it made more sense that it would be somebody like that rather than an outsider. He had no enemies that he knew of, nor could he conceive of Annabel having enemies. It didn’t make sense, but until the culprit had been caught, he would be careful.

  “We won’t go far,” he told her. Then, just to be sure that nothing happened, he told her that he would be right back and went into his room to take his gun from his dresser drawer.

  It wasn’t there. He frowned, told himself that maybe he’d put it in another drawer by mistake. He searched all his drawers, he looked on all the closet shelves. The gun wasn’t there. What in the hell had happened to it? How could anybody have gotten in here without his knowing it? Could it have been one of the servants?

  He didn’t want to alarm Annabel, and if he mentioned the missing gun she would be alarmed. So when he went back to her, he said, “Let’s put that walk off until tomorrow. I guess I’m a little beat.” And with a forced grin he added, “You wore me out today, lady. How about a brandy in the library while we watch a video?”

  “Fine with me. What have you got?”

  “Dr. Zhivago?”<
br />
  “It always makes me cry.”

  “Casablanca?”

  “That makes me cry, too, but I like it. Maybe this time Bergman will decide to stay with Bogart.”

  They sat on the leather sofa in front of the television set and sipped their brandy. Sure enough, Annabel cried when Bogie said, “Here’s lookin’ at you, kid,” and sent Ingrid flying off into the wild blue yonder with Paul Henreid.

  He put Tootsie on, but halfway through it Annabel fell asleep. He turned the TV off and picked her up and carried her to her room. Rob was waiting outside her door. Luis said, “Sorry, fella, not tonight.”

  He put Annabel on the bed and undressed her. “Sleepy,” she murmured.

  “I know you are, sweetheart.” He got into bed beside her and took her in his arms.

  She turned her face into his shoulder. “But if you want to, we could...could...” She began a purrlike snore.

  He chuckled and tightened his arms around her. “In the morning,” he said.

  Then he, too, went to sleep. And thought of how it would be in the morning.

  The next few days were the happiest Annabel ever remembered. Her memory might be short, but surely nothing she had experienced before could possibly have made her as happy as she was now.

  In the early days, when Luis first brought her by boat from Nassau to San Sebastián, he had seemed different, sometimes distant, often cold. But he wasn’t cold now. He was everything she might have dreamed a man could be, tender and loving and thoughtful. And not just in bed. By every gesture, every word, he showed how much he cared. And though he had not said the words “I love you,” she was sure that he did.

  Just as she was sure she loved him. And she would tell him. Soon she would tell him.

  He questioned Moses and Samuel about the islander before he approached Ambrosia and Meadowlark.