The Secret Wife

by Susan Mallery

  Pleasure flooded her. “Thank you. You’re pretty amazing yourself. Of course, I don’t have a whole lot of experience.”

  He frowned. “How many guys have you kissed?”

  “Kissed like this, or just family kisses?”

  “Real, tongue-in-your-mouth kind of kisses.”

  At his words, a jolt of awareness shot through her legs and burst between her thighs. Had he felt the same excitement when she’d talked about kissing yesterday? She eyed his damp mouth and wondered how long they could actually spend kissing each other. Would it ever get boring? She smiled at the thought. No doubt they would have to contend with a muscle cramp or starvation before boredom ever became a problem.

  He shook her gently. “Elissa, you’re not listening to me. Answer the question.”

  What was the question? Oh, yes, she remembered. She licked his lower lip. “Counting you?”

  “Yeah.”

  She drew his lower lip into her mouth and sucked it. His entire body tensed. He gripped her upper arms and set her away from him. “Will you pay attention?”

  She pouted. “If I have to, although I’d rather be kissing. One.”

  She slipped a hand behind his head and urged him closer.

  He resisted. “One? You’ve only kissed one other guy?”

  When she couldn’t reach his mouth, she settled on nibbling his jaw. It was almost as nice. “No, I’ve only kissed you.”

  “Wait a minute.” He straightened and stared at her. “We didn’t start dating until you were almost seventeen.”

  “I know.” She tossed her hair over her shoulders and wondered how on earth to get his attention again. She didn’t want to talk, she wanted to kiss. And maybe do other stuff. Her body felt tight and hot, her breasts throbbed, and that place between her legs was driving her crazy with its tingling and clenching and aching.

  She tried to kiss him again, but he held her back.

  She sighed. “If we get this settled, can we go back to kissing?”

  “Yes. I want you to explain to me how come you haven’t kissed anyone else but me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “This is so incredibly dumb, but okay. We met when I was ten and, despite what you say, became friends. We saw each other when I visited the orphanage and we wrote.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “Oh, Cole, grow up and get a clue. I had a crush on you from the time I was twelve years old. You were seventeen and nearly a man. You knocked my socks off. I spent all my free time thinking about you, trying to get you to notice me. I mean, you did notice me, but not in a girlfriend sort of way. By the time boys started paying attention to me, I wasn’t interested. I was about fifteen or sixteen, which made you twenty. You were in college. Those high school boys didn’t have a chance. I went out with a couple, but there were no sparks. One date might have ended with a kiss on the cheek, but I can’t remember. Now, can we go back to kissing?”

  “Dear God, what did I do to deserve you?” he growled, then buried his hands in her hair and dropped his mouth to hers.

  Finally, she thought in satisfaction as her lips parted and he plunged inside. Her eyes fluttered closed as she concentrated all her attention on the sensations he invoked.

  There wasn’t a part of her that wasn’t on fire. She remembered enjoying making out with him before, but not like this. Was it the time they’d been apart, proving the old adage of absence making the heart grow fonder?

  As she squirmed to get closer, Elissa decided it wasn’t that at all. After they’d married, she’d known that kissing was going to lead to other things, things that hurt and frightened her. So she hadn’t been able to enjoy what was happening between them. Now, while she would confess to a lingering case of nerves, she wasn’t truly afraid. Armed with information and the goal of getting Cole back in her life, she wanted to take the next step in their physical relationship.

  Cole broke the kiss and trailed his mouth down her chin to her neck, then lower to the scoop neck of her cap-sleeve sundress.

  She’d chosen this particular dress on purpose. Not only did the deep rosé color highlight her hair and eyes, but it buttoned up the front. So if anything should happen, Cole would have easy access to her, ah…to her, well, to her. She’d never before chosen clothing based on the hopes of getting a man to make love to her, but it had been fun, if a little embarrassing. She was wearing her prettiest bra and pantie set, too, just in case.

  “We should stop,” he murmured as he nibbled on a sensitive spot below her left ear.

  “Why?”

  “Because I don’t want things to get out of hand.”

  She arched her head back, giving him more room. Her breasts swelled and she leaned against him, but the pressure only increased. “Would that be so bad?” she asked.

  “You don’t know what you’re saying.”

  “I have a pretty good idea.”

  He rested his forehead against her shoulder. “I can’t do this, Elissa. I’m just not strong enough.”

  That got her attention. She leaned back and looked at him. “What do you mean? Strong enough to make love?”

  “No.” He raised his head. “I’m not strong enough to take another rejection.”

  Raw pain filled his dark eyes. Compassion tightened her heart, making her want to weep for him. Maybe for both of them.

  “What did we do to each other?” she asked, then bit her lower lip. “It wasn’t supposed to be like that. We should have enjoyed each other. I never meant for our bedroom to become a battleground.”

  “It’s my fault. If I’d figured out how to please you—”

  She pressed her fingers against his mouth. “Don’t say that. I wouldn’t let you. I’ve been doing a lot of reading lately and I can see a lot of the places where we went wrong. There are things we could have done before, to make it not hurt.”

  He tugged her hand away and smiled. “Foreplay. I’ve heard of it.”

  “Oh.” Heat flared on her cheeks, but she ignored it and kept on talking. “Well, there’s that. Foreplay. I never let you do anything. Once we started, I just wanted it over as quickly as possible. Apparently it takes some kissing and other kinds of attention for a woman to, well…”

  “Become aroused?”

  She cleared her throat and stared at the center of his chest. “Yes. After becoming aroused, it can still take her a while to, um…”

  “Climax?”

  “Right. Assuming that’s even real. My point is—”

  This time he was the one to press his fingers over her mouth. “It’s real,” he said, his smile fading. “I should have done things differently. I should have made you see what the possibilities were. I’m sorry.”

  “No apologies required,” she said, kissing the pads of his fingers. She brushed his hair off his forehead. “I don’t want to reject you. I can’t promise not to get nervous. I’m probably going to get all jumpy and maybe even clam up, but it’s not rejection. It’s just trying to figure out my body. I’m twenty-five years old and I don’t have a clue about what goes on ‘down there.’ I’ve read a lot in the past few days. I have some ideas, and a couple of working theories. Maybe we could go into the other room and you could help me with my homework.”

  She held her breath as he considered her request. Apprehension, desire, pain and a few emotions she couldn’t read skittered across his face. There was, she realized, a more than even chance that he would turn down her offer. The thought made her wince. Then she remembered all the times she’d rejected him and knew that he had every right not to trust her.

  “Is this homework assignment going to be graded?” he asked lightly, rising to his feet and pulling her along with him.

  Relief made her knees weak. “I’ve heard the teacher grades on a curve.”

  He put his hand on her waist, then slid it down her hip and around to her derriere. “Then you’ll get an A. You’ve got lots of curves.”

  She laughed as he pulled her close. At the first touch of his mouth against hers, the humor f
aded. They were going to make it, she thought giddily. Cole had taken a chance on her and she was determined not to let him down.

  Still kissing, they made their way into her bedroom. In a moment of boldness she’d unmade the bed, folding the comforter on the floor and pulling back the sheets. Now, as he walked her to the edge of the bed, she was glad. She didn’t want anything to get in the way of them being together. She knew they weren’t going to be perfect—not their first time after everything that had gone on before—but she wanted it to be right.

  Cole released her long enough to close the door and turn off the light. As the darkness engulfed her, she had to swallow a shiver of apprehension.

  “Could we leave the light on?” she asked.

  “Sure.” Light filled the room. He shifted uncomfortably. “I thought you’d be more at ease in the dark.”

  “I know. I would have thought so, too. But before, we always did it in the dark, and I don’t want to do things the same way. Besides, one of the books said that it would help if I saw you naked.”

  He shoved his hands into his pockets. “Look, Elissa, we don’t have to do this at all.”

  She crossed to him and wrapped her arms around his waist. “Yes, we do,” she murmured. “I want you, Cole. I want to make love with you. I want to figure out how to apply all that I’ve learned so that we can both enjoy being together.” She gave him a quick smile. “So shut up and kiss me.”

  He complied. How he complied. As his tongue stroked hers, her bones began to melt. His hands rubbed her back, then slipped lower. When he cupped the curves of her behind and squeezed, she arched against him. He moaned low in his throat, rotating his hips against hers.

  Through the layers of his briefs and jeans, and through her dress and panties, she felt his hardness. Before, knowing he was aroused had always made her tense. Now she thought about what he might look like. She wanted to see him and touch him. Several of the books had given her ideas that she wanted to try. One had guaranteed that if she followed the technique, he would explode in her hand. She wasn’t ready for any kind of explosion, but a few moans of pleasure would be nice. She’d never been able to make him do that before. They were both overdue for the experience.

  But Cole seemed in no hurry to let her have her way with him. Twice she dipped below his belt to try to touch him, and both times he pulled her hands back to his waist.

  “You first,” he said, barely breaking their kiss.

  Her first? “Talk about performance pressure,” she muttered.

  He laughed. “You’re all grown up, Elissa. I like it.”

  “Me, too.”

  He dipped his head and pressed his mouth against the side of her neck. At the same time his hands moved to the front of her dress and began unfastening the buttons.

  She held on to his shoulders, using his strength to stay upright. Her knees were still weak, but this time from anticipation, not nerves.

  As he nipped at her skin, tiny electric bolts zinged through her body. Heat flared between her thighs, radiating out until all of her glowed. The back of his hand bumped her right breast. Not hard, just a small point of contact that made her gasp. She wanted his hands there, on her breasts, touching her, stroking her, doing all those things she’d read about. She wanted to feel the sensations the books talked about and she wanted to feel them with Cole.

  When the last button was undone, he drew the dress down her body, slipping her arms out of the sleeves and pushing the fabric over her hips so that it pooled at her feet. Then he took her right hand in his and brought it to his mouth.

  With her standing before him in nothing but a pale pink bra and a pair of panties, he licked her palm. More heat, like a tongue of fire, swept through her. The ache between her thighs intensified. Slowly, as if they had more time than any two people could need, he nibbled on each of her fingers. First he drew them into his mouth, then he tasted them from tip to base.

  She hadn’t thought of her hands as being especially sensitive or erotic. But if he stopped now, she would sob in protest. So when he reached for her other hand, she offered it eagerly. It didn’t matter that her thighs trembled or that she couldn’t catch her breath. Nothing mattered but how he made her feel.

  When he’d finished loving her hands, he began a sensual assault on her arms. He traced a line from the inside of her wrist to the inside of her elbow, tasting and kissing and nibbling her into a sensual fog. He nipped at her shoulders, suckled her earlobes and traced random lines between her breasts.

  Then, when she thought he was finally going to touch her throbbing nipples, he sank to his knees and pressed his mouth into her belly.

  Her legs started to collapse. She had to hang on to his shoulders to maintain her balance. Shudders racked her body. She was alive with unbelievable sensation, lost in a world she had never experienced before. Everywhere he touched was magic. Perhaps she’d never fully been alive before. Perhaps she’d passed on and this was the reward of the afterlife.

  He kissed her stomach, teasing the sensitive skin, moving close to her feminine secrets and up toward her breasts, but not touching her in either place.

  “Cole,” she breathed, not sure what she asked for.

  Yet he knew.

  He stood and led her to the bed. Before lowering her to the waiting sheets, he unfastened her bra and let it fall to the floor.

  Her back touched the sheet at the same moment Cole’s mouth closed over her right nipple. The combination of cool cotton and moist heat made her arch toward him. She clutched his head as if to urge him to do it again, to keep doing it.

  He read her mind. While his tongue mated with her erect point, he used his other hand to stroke her full curves, discovering sensitivities she hadn’t dreamed existed.

  Over and over he loved her breasts, alternating his hands and his mouth, making her squirm and sigh and moan.

  When he raised his head, she nearly shrieked in protest, then he brought his mouth to hers and cupped her breasts with both hands.

  Yes! she thought, savoring the feel of his body against hers. She shifted, then wrapped her arms around him, pulling him close. His thumbs and forefingers teased her tight buds, his lips clung to hers. She felt his arousal against her hip and nearly laughed with the joy of being with him. This was so simple, so fun. Why had she resisted so long?

  She barely noticed when he drew back far enough to tug at her panties. She was vaguely aware of kicking them off, then wiggling close to him again. But he got her full attention when he moved his hand between her thighs.

  She blinked as she considered the situation. She was naked, he was not. They were sprawled across her bed. He was kissing her and had one hand on her breast and the other “down there.”

  “This is the most amazing homework assignment I’ve ever done,” she said, hoping her apprehension didn’t show in her voice.

  Cole knew her too well. “Don’t be afraid,” he said.

  “I’m not. I’m just—” She bit her lower lip.

  “Nervous?”

  She nodded.

  He moved his fingers slightly. She jumped as pleasure swept over her. Her eyes widened. “Do that again,” she said.

  He did. The pleasure bolt returned.

  “I’m impressed.”

  He smiled. “You’re also wet as hell and it’s driving me crazy.”

  She started to speak. He stopped her words with a brief kiss. “Wet is good. It means you’re getting ready.” He moved his fingers again. “I’m going to circle around and you tell me where it feels best, okay?”

  “Ah, sure. It all feels really nice.”

  Passion flared in his eyes. “We want something a little better than nice. Close your eyes and concentrate.”

  She drew in a deep breath and tried to relax. He wanted her to concentrate on what he was doing. Hardly a difficult request. As his fingers moved, circling through her most secret places, she found herself parting her legs and raising her hips to urge him on.

  “It’s all great,”
she said as wave after wave of sensual excitement swept through her. “I really don’t think—”

  His finger brushed over something magic. Barely realizing what she was doing, she clutched his forearm. “There!”

  He touched it again. Elissa had to swallow back a scream of sheer delight. She hadn’t known feelings like that existed. Nothing in life had prepared her for the amazing sense of pure joy.

  He continued to touch her, circling that one spot, teasing it, moving quickly, then slowly. She lost her grip on this dimension and allowed herself to float freely in a place where there was only one exquisite sensation after another. Pressure built, but she ignored it. She wanted Cole to keep doing this; she would be his slave for life.

  He shifted and she parted her thighs more. One finger slipped inside her. He slid in and out, matching rhythms. She clutched at the sheets. Tension increased.

  Her breath came in gasps. She couldn’t focus on anything but what he was doing to her. Somewhere in her cloud of mindlessness she heard him whisper her name, heard him urge her onward. But she had no control of the journey. She could only experience the perfect pleasure, could only feel and be.

  He moved faster. She became caught in a vortex. Time, space, some force she couldn’t define, pulled her onward, pushing her toward the tension, toward the building pressure.

  For a heartbeat she hung suspended. Then her world shattered. Not destructively, but with purpose. Like a cloud making rain, she thought. It was her last thought as the spasms took hold of her, carrying her back through the vortex, back through time, returning her to the bed and Cole’s loving embrace.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Cole held his wife in his arms and listened to her sigh of contentment. Already the flush of arousal had faded from her skin, but he remembered seeing it. Without even closing his eyes, he could picture her as she’d looked at her moment of completion. Head back, mouth parted slightly, hands gripping at the sheets, a blushing patch sweeping across her breasts, chest and face.

  “The books weren’t lying,” Elissa said, her voice laced with wonder. “I just sort of figured they had to be.”

  “I’m glad you enjoyed it.” He brushed her bangs off her face and kissed her forehead.