The Charlotte Chronicles

by Jen Frederick

  If we hadn’t grown up together, if I hadn’t known what a genuinely good person he is, if I hadn’t felt the genuine torment in-between the spaces of the words he wrote, maybe he would be right.

  But we’ve spent too long apart, and I’m ready to move forward even if he’s afraid.

  “Would you do something for me?” I ask.

  “Anything” is his immediate answer.

  “Come over here and let me look at you.” I lean back on my two arms, allowing my loose-fitting nightshirt to fall around me. It’s not the sexiest of bedroom attire, but it’s a T-shirt of his—one that I’ve kept for nine years. He’s always liked it when I wear his clothes. “And take off your shirt while you’re at it.”

  He rises immediately and walks toward me. Stalks me, more like it. His shirt comes off in the way that men do—one hand at the back of his neck and then over his head. The reveal is delicious. His arms are muscular and veiny, and his abs are magazine cover perfect without any need for Photoshop. Over the right shoulder are tendrils of a tattoo that covers his upper right back. Other than the arm tattoo there are no other marks on him but the scars evidencing his time in a military. My mind takes a million photographs so that I can pull them out when we aren’t together. He stops about a foot from my bent legs.

  I motion for him to turn around. He puts his hands on his hips—as if to say, Really Charlotte?—but this is my show. He pirouettes, slowly, his arms stretched wide. I swear he could almost touch the walls, his wing span is so wide.

  “Colin told me that SEALs can hold their breath for a very long time. Is that true?”

  His nostrils flare, either in jealousy or excitement or both.

  “Five minutes without exertion, at least. But the challenge is doing stuff while holding your breath, like tying a knot in the precise way your instructor wants or doing a series of underwater maneuvers. Stress makes you lose oxygen at a quicker pace, so you learn to regulate your heart rate, learn not to panic.”

  “And your heart rate now? How is it?”

  “You tell me.”

  He places a hand on either side of my hips and stretches his neck forward. His face is so close I can hear him breathing, soft, steady and slow. But when I press my fingers against his pulse, it is beating rapidly. The blood pumps quickly under my touch which, in turns, causes my breath to hitch and accelerate.

  “You’re stressed.”

  “No, aroused,” he corrects me.

  We are not touching at any point but my fingers against his neck, and it’s almost more arousing than having his hard body stretched across mine. Anticipation is stirring our appetites, and it’s intoxicating. I drop my hand and lean back so I can stare into his face, which is tight with want.

  “Take off the rest of your clothes.”

  His eyes widen in surprise. This isn’t the Charlotte he remembers. The only Charlotte he’s ever had his hands on was the young, sick Charlotte. She was followed by the desperate, needy one. I want him to see me as Charlotte the woman who runs her own life and is in charge of her own future as well as her own desires. My demands catch him off guard, but he’s not turned off. Not in the least.

  His hands fumble at his waist, the least smooth move I’ve seen him execute. He was right. He is a machine and most of his actions are executed with nearly careless ease. Except now he’s excited. Very, very excited. And so am I.

  He drops his pants to the floor, and his tight boxer briefs go with them. When he straightens, his penis is thick, long, and engorged. The head bobs eagerly in front of me, and there’s a pearl of moisture on the end. I lick my lips, and he releases an audible moan in response.

  I can’t keep a wicked smile from curving the corners of my lips upward. I like being in control. I like it a lot.

  “Place your hands behind your back.”

  He gives me a questioning look. “But I thought I could—”

  “Now,” I interrupt him. I know what he thought. He thought he’d come in here and overwhelm me with his mouth and tongue and fingers and all his moves. If he believes he is the only one who has built up a library full of fantasies, he is in for a big surprise. He slowly folds his hands behind his neck, his elbows pointing out toward the walls.

  I slip off the bed and onto my knees. I run my hands over his ridged abdomen and down the tops of his muscular thighs. He shakes—shakes!—at my caress.

  “Can you stand still?”

  He nods.

  “Do you promise not to touch me?”

  “I want to—”

  I interrupt. “I’m going to put my mouth on you and give you the greatest blow job you’ve ever experienced, but only if you don’t touch me.”

  He opens his mouth and then closes it. Then opens it again. Then closes it. Again. Finally, he takes a deep breath and says, “No touching. Got it.”

  With a smile, I congratulate him. “You’re catching on.”

  I run my nose along the side of his erection, from the base where his heavy sac hangs down to the very tip that is wet with his ejaculate. I repeat the action on the other side, inhaling his masculine scent and reveling in the steel-hard silk.

  “You’re very long,” I say throatily. “Do you think you’ve grown?”

  “In the time you’ve started touching me or since I was eighteen? Because I swear the damn thing grew an inch the minute you said take off your clothes.” His voice is full of strangled laughter.

  Steadying myself, I lean in for a taste. A light lick across the head causes him to jerk. Ten years ago, I barely knew what I was doing. I’ve spent those intervening years imagining Nathan in dozens of sexual positions. His head between my legs; mine between his. His body hovering over me. His front to my back. I’ve dreamt of this. My body has ached for it.

  I open wide and take him as far as I can go. He cries out above me.

  “Do you remember when you taught me this? How you introduced me to how it felt to have you in my mouth?”

  His eyes widen in shocked memory. “Oh shit, Charlotte,” is all he can manage.

  I use his thighs as leverage and begin a slow, steady rhythm. The hard length against my tongue is intoxicating and arousing. The sounds he’s making, the way he’s trembling under my touch is driving me crazy. And making me wet. So very wet.

  I squeeze my legs together, turned on by the hardness of his erection and the desperate gasps he makes when his head hits the back of my throat.

  So lost in the pleasure, he forgets my orders and his hand drifts down to the crown of my head, pushing my long hair aside. I stop immediately and release him with a pop.

  I look up, and his eyes flick open. His gaze snaps to his hand, and he lifts it immediately back into place behind his neck.

  “Good soldier,” I murmur.

  “It’s sailor,” he corrects me.

  “What?

  “I’m a sailor. Army has soldiers, Air Force—you know what. I don’t really care. Call me a soldier. Will you just put your mouth back on me?” he begs.

  With a wicked smile, I fist the base of him and attack, hollowing my cheeks and sucking harder and faster than before. His sounds take on a rough edge, and his legs become tense. Above me he spits out single syllable words as if breathing is an effort.

  Charlotte.

  Your mouth.

  So good.

  Fuck.

  I can’t.

  Don’t stop.

  Yes.

  I’m coming. Shit, Charlotte. Now. I’m coming now.

  He tries to jerk away, but I follow him, drinking him down until every drop of him has slid down my throat. And with his seed spent, his knees give way. He crumples in front of me, collapsing onto his knees.

  “Charlotte, your gift. It was too much,” he says.

  “It was no gift,” I drawl and take his hand to press it between my legs. “I wanted to. I did it for me.” All my modesty and shyness are gone because I don’t fear him. I don’t fear his rejection. When he asked me the other night to tell him what I wanted, I was
afraid. I’m not anymore.

  I want him to know that I’m turned on by pleasing him, by being with him, by him loving me.

  He stills at the evidence of my desire and then slowly rubs between my legs. A slow, dirty smile spreads over his face. “My turn.”

  He cups my face and draws me in for a fierce kiss—uncaring that I still have the taste of him on my tongue. The way his lips press against mine—it’s as if he wants to breathe only if he is attached to me. He conveys so much need and love though his lips. His hands glide down my back and then, with a sharp jerk, pull me tight against him. My legs fold around his hips, and he rises in one swift, elegant move.

  In another second we are on the bed, the weight of his heavy body pressing me into the downy comforter and the soft mattress. “Start counting, baby, because I’m going to show you exactly how long I can hold my breath.”

  He moves down my body until his shoulders are pushing my legs wide apart, exposing my core to his gaze. He spends a long time taking me in long, slow licks, exploring every part of me, sucking my inner thighs, my sex, the tender crease at my hip. His ministrations are endless as he brings me to the brink time and again. His turn, indeed.

  He slides a condom on and pushes into me, the ruddy head of his cock stretching the swollen tissues. I move restlessly under him, and he whispers sweet things to me.

  Let me in. Relax.

  Shh. Doesn’t this feel good?

  Your pussy is so tight. So fucking tight.

  I let my legs fall open as he pushes into place, thrusting in deep until his cock is fully encased inside of me. He begins to move in smooth, even strokes. Into my hair, he continues his litany of praise.

  God, you’re beautiful.

  You feel like heaven.

  I don’t ever want to leave this place, this moment.

  I love you.

  “Love you too,” I answer back, squeezing him tight inside me. “Always have. Always will.”

  “I was a fool, baby. Such a goddamn fool.”

  The broken words elicit ones he’s been waiting to hear. The ones that have been on the tip of my tongue since I read his letter. “I forgive you.”

  His sure strokes stutter, and his head falls to the comforter beside me. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

  He repeats himself and begins to thrust harder, pulsing against me. His words are drawn out and guttural as if they’ve come from deep inside him, a well of need that is exploding.

  A hand dips between us, and his sure fingers find me, pressing down, circling and bringing me over the cliff and into the free fall of space called ecstasy. His hips jackhammer between my legs as he finds his own release. He flops on top of me, a mass of unmovable man. He makes a half-hearted attempt to move, but I clutch him tightly to me. I want to be crushed into the mattress. I want to luxuriate in the weight of his body heavy against mine. I listen to his breathing and match him, breath for breath until it is as if we are one being, inhaling and exhaling together.

  My nails lightly score his back, over his muscled trapeziods and down the valley of his spine to the top of his firm buttocks and then up again.

  “You keep doing that and I’m going to get hard again,” he mutters into my hair.

  Deliberately I inhale just to enjoy the sensation of him sinking even deeper into me. “Is that a threat or a promise?” I tease.

  “Promise.” With a regretful sigh he pushes off of me and settles by my side. “Charlotte Randolph, you’re all grown up.”

  “I am.”

  We lie entwined together, hugging each other close.

  “It’s still my turn,” he says, cupping the back of my head and delving in for a kiss full of carnality and passion.

  “You’ve bossed me around for years,” I protest. “Surely I have several turns left.”

  He chuckles and kisses me again. In the post coital aftermath, thoughts of the trauma Nate had suffered but so casually swept aside creep in. I hug him closely, as if I can ward off the past with my body.

  “You do know you were a victim, right? She didn’t rape you, but she violated you in ways that hurt your soul. And here’s the kicker: it, like rape, was about gaining power over you.” Unstated is that she did gain that power.

  He halts the circular rub of my back. “It’s hard for me to accept that. Even then I was bigger and stronger than the girls. And stupid. Very stupid.”

  “If I’d gone to a party, been drugged and put in the same situation, would you have blamed me or expected me to blame myself for nine years? Would you have said, ‘Oh Charlotte, if only you hadn’t gone to the party, if only you’d drank less, if only you’d sat inside your house, not touching a lick of alcohol and not venturing outside the apartment, we would still be together. The separation would never have happened.’ Would you have placed that burden on me?”

  Mutely, he shakes his head.

  “Then why on earth, Nathan, do you blame yourself?”

  An internal dilemma plays on his face while he struggles for the words. “I don’t like admitting I’m weak and not in control.”

  “It’s better to shoulder the blame?”

  “Easier to cope with.”

  I have no response and so say nothing. He hasn’t coped with it, or rather his way of coping was shutting down. I can only hope that if we hit rough times in the future, he doesn’t turn away from me again, for my own good.

  He pushes my face up to his for another kiss. I melt under his attention, but there’s a tiny part of my heart that I’m afraid to give, for my own good.

  35

  Nathan

  “Is there a family joining us?” Charlotte asks. Her voice is husky from sleep. As she raises her arms to stretch, her oversized robe gapes in the front, revealing the edges of her delicate collarbones and the soft inner flesh of her breasts. Beyond her is the bed that we spent the better part of the afternoon, all of the evening, and some pre-dawn hours destroying. And I’m still ready for another round.

  Trying to distract myself, I assess the room service cart that was just delivered. There are six silver-domed plates full of steak, waffles, bacon, three different types of eggs, fruit, and oatmeal. Seems reasonable.

  “I see only enough for me,” I joke. “Unless it’s a family of mice, I think everyone but you and I are going to go hungry. Come on and sit down.”

  I’m sprawled on the sofa, wearing nothing but a towel that has loosened at the side, and I pat the cushion beside me. She settles under my arm without argument or complaint. It’s not easy eating one handed, but I’m not taking my arm off of her. Part of me is unconvinced she’s real and thinks that the whole night was just one fucking vivid dream.

  “What do you have going on today?” I ask.

  “I’m finishing up with a client. We’re closing the sale on a house, and then the wife and I are meeting with the principal of the new school.” She leans forward and takes a bite of the omelet.

  “School’s already in session?” I ask. It’s July.

  “No, but I want to make sure that the transition is smooth. That’s what I’m hired to do.”

  I know about her job because I have grilled Nick constantly about it, but there’s something domestic and comforting about hearing her explain. “Let me come with you. I’ll be your assistant.”

  The request causes her to fumble with her coffee mug. After a noticeable hesitation, she asks, “Is shore leave like some kind of vacation?”

  Her uncertainty is disturbing, and my hand tightens around her shoulder unconsciously. She’s forgiven me, but she’s not forgotten, and her heart isn’t fully mine. If it was, she wouldn’t pause for a second to invite me along. She’s okay with fucking me, but she’s not convinced she wants me in every part of her life. I see it in the stiffening of her body and how she shrinks in my embrace.

  I close my eyes for a minute and stifle my impatience. Did I really think one letter and several orgasms were going to make all the past years of heartache disappear? Apparently I did. Of course s
he’s skittish. My past history with Charlotte is abandonment and pain. Failure is refusing to keep trying. I’d failed her before. Not anymore. I had to prove myself, though—be a man of actions, not just words.

  The key here would be to stay close and become so deeply embedded into her skin that she won’t be able to walk away from me. But I have to play it close to my vest. If I come on too strong, she might flee.

  “Yes. Some of the guys will go fishing or spend time with their families.”

  “And what would you do on past shore leaves?”

  “Go fishing or visit my family.”

  She flinches because my family should have included her. It did once.

  “You’ll have to put on clothes.”

  “I can do that.” I will do anything.

  “Do you have a suit? Or is your entire closet uniforms and beach bum outfits?”

  I try to keep the tone light. “It’s like you’ve seen my closet.”

  I realize my error before the last word leaves my mouth. She doesn’t know what my apartment looks like, let alone the interior of my closet. Everything I say is just a reminder of how I’ve cut her out. Of course she hasn’t seen my closet. Of course she doesn’t know what I do on shore leave. Maybe sticking close is a mistake of epic proportions. Everything out of my mouth is salt in a wound.

  After some internal struggle, she gives me a small smile and tucks a few strands of hair behind her head. “To the mall and then a few errands.”

  I curl my hand around the back of her neck. “As long as I’m with you, I’ll wear a clown suit if I have to.” My lips meet hers tenderly, and as her lips part, I press her into the cushions. I hadn’t intended to take her there on the sofa with the eggs and coffee growing cold, but I can’t resist. When we’re connected like this, I feel invincible. Nothing and no one can separate us. Not even me. With a fumbling hand, I loosen the tie around her waist. “Charlotte, you are so beautiful.”

  Her breath catches and her eyes grow luminous as I trail the backs of my fingers over the rise of her breasts, to her stomach, and then lower. At my touch, her thighs clench together in aroused discomfort. I waste no time in spreading her legs and delving between them. She’s swollen, tender, and wet.