I DO, BUT HERE'S THE CATCH

by Pamela Burford

  She bent slightly at the waist, grappling with a hook and eye. Her hair—freshly washed and blown—fell over her eyes, obscuring her vision. Still, she managed to secure a few of the lower hooks before realizing that the sides didn't match up.

  Charli shrieked in frustration, yanking at the hooks. The door quaked as Grant rapped on it a couple of times.

  "Charli, what's going on?"

  "I can't do this, damn it!" she cried from under all that hair.

  "What's the prob—" Grant broke off.

  The clarity and volume of his voice told Charli there was no longer a door between them. Her head whipped up; she shoved her hair off her face, clutching the bustier to her chest. He stood frozen, staring.

  "I can't do this!" She actually stamped her foot. "How do women do this! It's—it's impossible to fasten this damn thing alone!"

  Vaguely she was aware of the spectacle she presented, half-naked, flushed and breathless from her struggles, with her hair going every which way. But at the moment frustration had her close to tears, overriding all else.

  Her distress finally spurred Grant into motion. He closed the distance between them and placed his hands on her bare shoulders, urging her to turn around. "Let's see."

  Obediently she faced the mirror. His fingertips grazed her back as he lifted her hair out of the way. He stood a full head taller than she, and as he studied the bustier's fastenings, she saw in the mirror that his hair was wet, combed back off his face. Her nose detected the woodsy-scented soap he used, and under it, the fragrance that was his alone—the clean, stirring musk of his skin. She was reminded of that one other time he'd stood behind her at a mirror, after the twins' party, when she'd first exercised those rusty feminine wiles, brushing her hair while casually assuring her husband she'd be as discreet as he in her sexual liaisons.

  Late afternoon sunlight streamed through the sheer, honey-colored curtains, gilding their figures. Only now, as he bent his head to his task, as his warm fingers linked the bottommost hook, did Charli realize Grant was in as much a state of dishabille as she. He ware only white cotton boxer shorts and one black sock. Her cry of exasperation must have caught him in the middle of dressing.

  Bending closer, he squinted. "Do they have to make these things so small?"

  "It's your eyes," she said. "You're pushing forty."

  Without looking up he said, "I could leave now. I don't have to take this abuse."

  "Fine with me. Amanda thought this bustier would be just the thing under that dress—" Charli nodded toward the bed, and the short navy cocktail dress laid out on the white, eyelet-trimmed bedspread "—but I don't have to wear anything at all underneath. Mr. Farman, Mr. Van Cleave and Mr. Holm won't mind, I'm sure."

  "I'm sure." Grant's voice was a dangerous rumble. Though his breath was hot on her back, Charli shivered. "You're going to have to give up your death grip on this thing if you want me to finish doing it up."

  Charli looked down to see her arms tightly locked over her chest. She loosened her hold and adjusted her breasts in the garment's cups, quickly, discreetly—but not discreetly enough, she realized, as Grant's gaze briefly swerved from the hooks to the mirror.

  He said, "Why didn't you fasten it in front and then turn it around?" He'd progressed halfway up the bustier. It must be her imagination, Charli thought, but she could swear his fingers were slowing.

  "I tried. This thing's too tight, and I'm too…" She didn't say it—too big on top—but his slow grin told her she didn't have to.

  "Not too," he said, still staring at the hooks. "Just right."

  The way he said it made a warm prickle crawl up Charli's body. As Grant patiently fastened the remaining hooks, she watched her "just right" breasts gradually fill the bustier's cups and swell over their scalloped tops like rising bread dough. She was unaccustomed to the snugness of the garment, the stiff boning. With every breath she felt invisible hands holding her, shaping her. Offering her.

  Charli looked up to see Grant staring at her in the mirror. Again she crossed her arms over her chest, where the dusky coins of her nipples were just visible beneath the filmy taupe fabric. Grant reached around her and gently pulled her arms away, loosely holding them across her middle. His eyes were a dark gray-green.

  "I've seen you, remember?" he murmured.

  He'd seen her, yes, but not in unforgiving daylight, and not in a garment so blatantly sexual she felt more vulnerable than if she were naked. His hands seemed to generate some kind of electric current as they glided up her arms, finally settling on her shoulders. His head dipped and he nuzzled her hair just over her ear. All at once, air was a precious commodity. In the mirror, she watched her lips part, her nostrils flare. Her breasts rose and fell in a heightened rhythm.

  As if drawn by the movement, Grant's long fingers slid lower over her chest. Dizzy, Charli let her eyes drift shut as he slowly stroked the exposed upper slopes of her breasts. Her skin was almost unbearably sensitive. She felt her nipples pull into stiff knots, and knew without opening her eyes that he was watching it happen.

  His words were a scalding whisper against her scalp. "How could I have ever thought…" With a ragged sigh, he pressed a kiss to her hair. "You're more woman than I ever could have imagined. God, I must've been blind. Or crazy. Maybe both."

  His hands moved downward over her breasts. Charli's breath caught at the shock of pleasure that arrowed from the aching tips straight to the feminine heart of her. She opened her eyes and watched her husband's big hands progress down the stiff front of the bustier, over the band of exposed skin where her belly button peeked out. They settled on either side of her hips, his long, splayed fingers nearly meeting over the dark triangle clearly visible through her panties.

  Breathless, Charli watched Grant's hands shift to frame the triangle between his thumbs and fingers. Tingling warmth flooded her intimate flesh. She felt heavy down there, needy. In her ear he whispered, "Do you touch yourself here? In your bed at night?"

  She grasped his wrists, shocked by the question, mortified that he could guess how deeply she hungered, here, in the cloistered hell of this beautifully appointed bedroom.

  "Answer me, Charli." He met her eyes in the mirror. His hands moved a little, up and down, in a slow, seductive cadence, close to but not touching the place that so desperately needed to be touched. "You do, don't you?"

  Sharp-edged craving battled with Charli's anger and resentment. She tried to pull his hands away, but they were immovable. "So what if I do," she snapped. "Don't you?"

  The corners of his eyes crinkled, the only hint of a smile. "More than I did when I was a teenager, thanks to you." He seized her hand and slipped it under the top edge of her panties. "Show me what you do, Charli." He kissed her temple, his eyes still on hers; he stroked her fingers through the panties in a suggestive rhythm. "Show me how you pleasure yourself."

  "No." She struggled without success to extricate her hand.

  "I've imagined you doing it," he said. "I've pictured you raising your nightgown, parting your legs."

  "Did you ever picture yourself raising my nightgown, parting my legs?"

  His fingers tightened on hers; his voice was low and hoarse. "Charli, I've pictured myself doing everything to you that you could possibly imagine." He smiled grimly. "And a few things I'll bet you couldn't."

  He released her hand, only to replace it with his own, sliding his fingers down her belly and under her panties. She stiffened, and he soothed her with his gentle touch, with the low, rich timbre of his voice as he murmured hotly in her ear.

  Charli stared, spellbound, as Grant's hand moved lower, as his fingertips parted the springy curls. She trembled, dinging to his other arm, now clamped around her waist. He watched her in the mirror, his gaze darker, more intense, than she'd ever seen it. His fingers curled inward, touched the slippery folds. Charli gasped, barely aware of her nails digging into his arm.

  He emitted a groan of pure male satisfaction, exploring further as if to test her wetness,
her readiness. He found her most sensitive spot, holding her tighter still as she arched against the fiery burst of sensation. Languidly he stroked her, until her breathing matched the cadence of his caress, until her body rocked in time to it. It was as if everything outside the two of them had ceased to exist.

  She barely recognized the woman in the mirror, with her slumberous eyes and her tousled hair and the flush of passion sweeping from breasts to hairline. Her breath caught as one long finger pushed into her, a short distance only before he paused.

  "Charli?" Grant's eyebrows drew together. His finger probed gently. He looked down at her then, not at the mirror, but at her. "It can't be…" he breathed.

  Charli didn't even try to make sense of his words, overcome by the glut of pleasure, the unaccustomed feeling of being caressed from within. Mindlessly she pushed against his hand.

  He pressed his lips to her hair, closed his eyes briefly. "Charli, sweetheart, tell me. Have you ever been with a man?"

  Why was he asking that? He had to know the answer. "Grant," she moaned, and reflexively pressed her hand over his, through the thin fabric of her panties. Slowly his finger burrowed deeper. Charli shuddered, and uttered his name again, a tortured plea.

  Transfixed, she watched the rhythmic movement of his hand in the mirror, felt the pumping, clutching response of her body. The hunger coiled hotter, tighter, until release shimmered at the edges of her awareness, like gasoline fumes needing only a random spark to ignite.

  For an instant, Charli panicked—she'd never shared this with anyone. Grant seemed to sense her hesitation. "Don't fight it," he whispered in her ear. "Give yourself to it, that's right, that's it, sweetheart, you're so beautiful…"

  At the critical moment, he deepened his caress and her orgasm detonated, a fireball of sensation that she greeted with a hoarse shout. Her eyes squeezed shut and her world shrank to the pulsating pleasure that went on and on as Grant continued to stoke it.

  Awareness gradually returned, like sunshine burning away fog. Her eyes drifted open and she saw herself in the mirror, drowsy and limp, supported by her husband's long, powerful arms. He slid his hand out of her panties, now damp with her passion. Reality crashed in on her, bringing with it a sense of loss.

  "Don't let that be all," she pleaded, shameless in her need now that she'd had a taste of the fulfillment they were meant to share.

  "Charli…" Tenderly he turned her in his arms.

  "Don't say it shouldn't have happened." Tears pricked her eyes. "I couldn't bear that."

  "Shh … sweetheart." His lips touched hers, lightly but with a depth of feeling that startled her. Nevertheless, she felt the tension in his body, and braced herself for the words that would break her heart. This meant nothing, he would tell her. It won't happen again.

  But Grant didn't say those things. He just stared at Charli, studying her, as if he'd never seen her before. "You're a virgin," he said at last.

  "Of course. What did you think?"

  His expression went from awestruck to chagrined. "I didn't think. I assumed."

  "But you … well, you had to know I'm not experienced. Men haven't exactly been beating down my door all these years."

  His hands slid around her back. Quietly he said, "Charli, if you reached the three-decade mark untouched, it's not because you're unattractive, or undesirable."

  She averted her face; he turned it back, making her look at him, at his lopsided smile. "Which you're not, no matter how much you may have convinced yourself." The smile faded. "No matter how much I may have made you feel that way. If I did… God, I didn't mean to. Please believe that."

  Charli swallowed hard, torn between her stubborn pride—don't be silly, I've always known I'm nothing special, why should the truth bother me?—and her bone-deep need to have the man she loved appreciate her, admire her. Want her.

  Looking into her eyes, he stated the simple truth. "It was your choice. You waited for marriage."

  "I waited for you," Charli whispered, forcing the words past the knot in her throat.

  A look of such shining, unadulterated wonder came into Grant's eyes that they seemed to glow from within, glistening with emotion. "Want to hear something funny?" He brushed her tangled hair off her face. "I thought the reason you refused to sleep with me back when we were dating was that you suffered from some kind of deficient libido." With a self-deprecating smirk he added, "I mean, what else could've made you immune to my raw sex appeal?"

  "I wanted to," Charli admitted. "I just … didn't show it. I didn't want you to know I had those feelings. It seems so foolish now."

  "Sweetheart, when it comes to foolishness, I think I take the prize." He lifted her into his arms and walked toward her bed.

  Her eyes grew wide; she clung to his shoulders. "What are you doing?"

  Grant set her down on the white bedspread. He lifted the cocktail dress off the bed and draped it over the back of her dressing-table chair. "We've talked enough."

  * * *

  Chapter 13

  «^»

  Charli's heart bucked against her rib cage. She watched Grant pull off his one black sock. She watched him drop his boxer shorts and kick them away.

  Then she could only stare wide-eyed. Nothing had prepared her for the sight of her husband naked and thoroughly aroused. He was magnificent, perfectly proportioned and smoothly muscled. Every part of him was beautiful, including that most mysterious part now revealed to her. That part was beautiful and potent and, good heavens, enormous.

  "Don't tell me you're having second thoughts," he said with a small smile, never taking his eyes off her face. He joined her on the bed, pushing her down and lying next to her, propped on an elbow.

  "I … no, of course not." Charli swallowed hard. "I just didn't expect… I've never seen…"

  He lifted her hand and placed it on his rigid penis. After a stunned instant she lightly wrapped her fingers around him. He was smooth and hot and impossibly hard, and he twitched under her touch. Grant's features softened; he made a little sound, half sigh, half moan. His long fingers enfolded hers and he showed her how to caress him, with light, rhythmic pressure.

  "It's hard to believe…" she said, watching him grow even larger. "I mean, is this really going to…?"

  She felt rather than heard his chuckle. "Sweetheart, I have a feeling we're going to fit like we were made for each other." He sobered, and lifted her hand from his rampant flesh, twining his fingers with hers. He looked directly into her eyes. "I need you to trust me, Charli. I'll be as careful as I know how."

  "It's okay. I know … I know it'll hurt. The first time."

  "Maybe the second and third times a little, too," he said, reinforcing what she already knew—that Grant was a man of experience, a fact both comforting and daunting. How could she ever catch up, learn to please him? How could she ever compete with the sophisticated women he was accustomed to?

  He raised her fingers to his lips, placed a warm kiss on her knuckles, his gaze still boring into hers. Charli lowered her eyes, half convinced he could read her mind.

  "You're all I've thought about," he murmured, releasing her hand to trail his fingers over the exposed tops of her breasts. "Not an hour goes by that I don't imagine stripping you naked and taking you, right there, wherever I happen to be at the moment." His lips quirked. "I've had you under my favorite table at the Four Seasons, and in my car—front seat and back—and everywhere in the game room, and about a hundred times on my desk at work. Oh, and once we did it in Judge Randolph's chambers. Sometimes I imagine I can smell you, your soapy scent, and that's all it'll take to get me instantly hard."

  He stroked his hand down her side to her hip. "Charli, you're the most fascinating woman I've ever known. I haven't wanted anyone else since I met you. Hell of a playboy I am, obsessing about my wife."

  An obessione. Nonni had been right, Charli thought Grant had been looking at her like that, thinking about her like that She touched his cheek, clean-shaven for the party. She slid her fing
ers around to his nape, pulled him down and claimed his lips.

  This was a greedy kiss, hot and openmouthed and urgent. Charli didn't stop to wonder if she was doing it right; she didn't care how brazen or demanding she appeared. She felt brazen. She felt demanding. For once, she let herself go, satisfying her own clamoring desires, with no thought to propriety or ladylike behavior.

  Grant's groan of startled pleasure fueled her passion. They writhed like animals in heat, clung to each other with arms and legs and hard, hungry mouths. She wrestled for position, angling herself on top of him, only to have him roll her underneath him with one sinewy burst of speed.

  The weight of him pressing her into the mattress triggered a dizzying rush of heat. The pressure of his big body, the leashed power of him, aroused her unbearably. Restlessly she moved underneath him. He leaned more heavily into her, pinning her with both his strength and his penetrating gaze. An unspoken communication flowed between them, ancient and immutable. For all their civilized trappings, they were still, beneath it all, as nature made them.

  Charli held her husband's gaze for long moments, as the old alarm clock on her dresser ticked and the breeze billowed the sheer curtains, bringing with it the green scents of spring. Finally she flexed her hips upward, slowly, deliberately. She felt an insistent presence there, at the entrance to her body, and knew that only the thin fabric of her panties kept him from penetrating her.

  Grant pulled back then, trembling slightly, his face dark, a vein prominent on his temple. His hair was still damp, and thoroughly rumpled, making him look dangerous, untamed, a far cry from the natty, refined Wall Street attorney the rest of the world knew.

  He sat next to her. She tried to rise, but he pressed her back into the covers, perusing her from head to toe as if she were some luscious dessert and he was deciding whether to consume her slowly in little bitty bites or devour her all at once.

  She said, "Grant, I … I think I'm ready."

  He gave her a slow smile full of promise. "I'm glad to hear it. Now lie back and relax."