Milestones

by Hensley, Alta

  “I don’t know why I asked that,” she said, looking down at her hands.

  “Because I made you feel less-than. I didn’t tell you often enough that you were the most important thing in the world to me. I’ll fix that.”

  Kate let out an audible breath, and it was followed by a flood of emotion that stung her nose and cramped her face into odd shapes best hidden from boys a gal wanted to impress. When she tried, he turned her face to him.

  “This didn’t happen overnight. I forgot what was important and you retaliated in small ways that pushed me away. And the farther away I got, the worse I felt—about you, about me, and about us. The worse I felt, the worse I tried to make you feel, because I was hurting, too. I’m a brilliant man in many ways, but I’m really dumb in others. I’m going to need your help.”

  “You’re really not a mind-reader, are you?”

  “No. It’s one of the talents that passed me over when talents were being handed out.”

  “It isn’t the most romantic thing to tell you how to come in from the rain, Jack.”

  “I know how to come in from the rain, and in fact, I’ll yank you inside with me, because you tend to stay out in it too long, looking for rainbows, and then you catch cold. Cold leads to fever and bed rest, soup-making and the like, and I am really bad at all that.”

  She laughed. “Yes, you are.”

  “I’ll get better, because I know how much you like to be pampered.”

  “I do.”

  Jack pressed his lips to the warm hollow of her throat, breathing in her fresh scent, the underlying jasmine tickling his senses. He tried to follow it as it wafted across her skin on the fall breeze. A pain pierced his side, and he tried to hide the sudden jerk his body involuntarily gave by planting feather kisses to that hollow spot. A wave of nausea hit him, and then it passed. A gasp almost escaped, but he hid behind it with a cough, and a dramatic clearing of his throat.

  “Are you okay?” Kate held his face between her hands.

  “Yeah. Just a tickle in my throat. I’m fine.” He was not proud of the lie, but he wasn’t ready to talk about that yet. He chuckled to himself as he worked to slow his breathing. Had the situation been reversed and Kate had kept this secret, the woman would have to design a new ass for herself, because he’d have spanked hers right off. He decided he’d work on some double-standard issues, too, while he was at all the other stuff.

  Kate combed her fingers through his hair. Emotion hit her as she held him tight against her breast. In the beginning, Jack Barrington was everything to her. She couldn’t remember how quickly that changed for her, and maybe Jack was right: It had not happened overnight. At twenty-two, she did not understand the ebb and flow of a relationship. At twenty-two, she didn’t know it took effort, patience, and communication to make a marriage work. At twenty-two, he was her fantasy, and when he stopped living up to those unrealistic expectations, she blamed him. She spent so much time lamenting about what Jack wasn’t that over time she lost sight of what he was.

  She took his hand and led him back down the path toward home. She had some things she needed to say to him, too.

  ****

  Kate gave the lamb and beef stew a stir while Jack stoked the fire. She could not recall the last time she stood at the stove and cooked something for the two of them. Most nights they had ordered from the Chinese take-out place, or one of them had picked up something ready-made from the store. Sometimes she ate alone, and he grabbed something at the office. She forgot how much she enjoyed doing this for him. Standing at the stove stirring something she made from scratch made her feel… wifely. She giggled to herself.

  Not terribly liberated of you, Kathryn.

  Now, at thirty-two, she realized she no longer cared. And that thought brought up another: his promise to spank her, and then actually doing it. That had been two days ago. It seemed longer. If she was honest with herself—and she promised she would be—she had to admit that his determination, his willingness to take things as far as a spanking to get her to at least participate in dialogue, had been a turn-on: a shocking, panty-soaking turn-on.

  “Oh, what is wrong with me?” she mumbled to herself. Truth was, there had been times during their marriage when Kate actually fantasized about Jack taking her in hand. Like when she went out with a girlfriend and got so drunk she couldn’t remember how she got home. She made the mistake the next morning of confessing that to Jack.

  “You what?”

  “It was crazy, I know.” She had laughed.

  They were in bed, Kate on her back. Jack rose on one elbow and took her arms firmly in his hands. “I never want to hear that again. You know better.”

  “I know. I do. It was late and I…”

  “No more excuses. Don’t ever do that again.”

  Kate had never seen him so angry, but she had heard the determined tone before. As the day wore on, and she thought about it, she realized how stupid her actions had been. Kate thought she was immune. Her friends believed the same. She answered to another person now. She appreciated Jack’s firmness, and it was the first time Kate remembered wishing he’d been firmer.

  As they got busier in their careers, she found they both answered to each other less. And during the times when Jack had something to say about her health, her time away from home, or issues surrounding her safety, she rejected him and his authority. It wasn’t long before he stopped ‘bossing her’, which Kate interpreted as lack of concern and care.

  She set the burner to simmer and joined Jack next to the fire.

  “If I could recall all the times I rebuffed your attempt to…be you, I’d apologize for every one of them,” she said.

  “I’m not sure exactly what you mean, but rather than recall who did what to whom, let’s start again. Brand new.”

  “I’d like that,” she said. “Very much.”

  “Really?” A smile covered his face, and she realized she hadn’t seen enough of it over the years.

  “Yes.”

  “No divorce?”

  “No divorce.”

  “Good. Because if I hear the word pass your lips again, I’ll paddle your ass for you. Put it right up there with fuck.”

  “Consider it up there.”

  “That’s my girl.” Jack came close and pressed his lips against hers. They were firm, at first—tentative. And then they grew soft, exploring her mouth, her neck, the area behind her ear, and then across the hollow of her throat. “I need you, Kate,” he groaned against her neck.

  Kate pushed him back and searched his face. “We’ve been separated for almost a year. I need to know, Jack: Has there been anyone else?”

  The clock on the wall ticked in time with her heart, and Kate realized she’d asked the question without thinking about the possibility of an answer she didn’t want to hear. Jack was a virile man, and when things were good, he was at times insatiable. It had been a long time since they had been together. The fire was hot against her face as she searched his face for even a hint of deviation from the truth, for if there had been another woman, she could not bear it. It was not fair, and she knew it. She wasn’t twenty-two anymore. It would have been perfectly reasonable for him to seek comfort, or even love, in the arms of another woman. Could she forgive him and allow herself to move on with him if that was the case?

  Jack’s eyes dilated in the firelight, and the tip of his tongue came out to moisten dry lips. His eyes filled, and they moved back and forth, studying her. She knew the answer before he said it.

  “Yes,” he whispered.

  Kate drew her lips between her teeth as tears sprang to her eyes. Hot betrayal fish hooked into her heart, imbedding deep. The ache in the center of her stomach threatened to double her over, and all of her senses screamed, Run. Run before you stay, because if you stay, you’ll always have this, like a huge boulder that you have to climb over. If you run, you’ll save face, save yourself, save your heart. If you run, you will never have to admit that you worked at pulling away from him, long b
efore you actually did it. If you run, you will not have to acknowledge the deep regret that lined his face as he uttered a simple, one word truth, and then waited, his face torn and fire-lit, for you to run, run away from him for the last time.

  If you run, you will never have the opportunity to make this one thing not matter.

  If you run, you can make a fresh start, and you will do it without Jack Barrington.

  “When?” she whispered.

  “Over the summer.”

  “How long?”

  “A few months.”

  “Did you love her?”

  “No.”

  “How many women?”

  “Does it matter, Kate?”

  “Yes.”

  “One.”

  “Do I know her?”

  “No.” He swallowed past a lump in his throat. “Please tell me this doesn’t matter, Kate.”

  “Shhh.” She took his face roughly in her hands and pressed her lips against his. Jack sobbed against her mouth.

  I betrayed you, too.

  She hadn’t seen the confession for what it was. She supposed now she was glad. She couldn’t have handled the yes, that ultimate confession, two days ago. She could handle it now. She could.

  “Never in the time we lived together: never as long as I thought we had a chance.”

  “You’re here now, darling. You’re here with me, now.”

  “Oh, Kate…”

  “Shhh. Darling, shhh..” Kate kissed his lips, his face, his eyes. On the road back to each other, this would be as bad as it got. She took solace in that. Things would not get worse than this.

  How could they?

  Chapter 6

  Kate lay on her side and stroked his bare back. The sheet rested just below the top of his buttocks, and she caressed the small of his back with her fingertips, then moved up to his strong shoulder blades.

  “Mmmm,” he groaned. “I might never get up.”

  “That would be unfortunate for you, since I am making walnut pancakes this morning.”

  Jack raised up and turned his head to her. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  “What did I do to deserve such kindness?”

  “That thing you did with your tongue and your…”

  “Ah, yes. I seem to recall you enjoying that quite a bit.”

  “Three times, actually.”

  “I thought four.”

  “Ah. Maybe.”

  Jack rolled over onto his back and pulled her into his arms. They had spent the rest of the week walking, talking, and lying next to each other, touching, holding, caressing. Two nights ago, they slept in the same bed, and they made love for the first time in over a year. It was slow and tentative, and then it was familiar. They found each other throughout the night, each time stoking a fire that eventually became bigger than both of them. Last night, Jack claimed her as he never had before.

  “You’re mine, woman. You’re mine. Don’t ever forget it,” he said over and over and he fucked her: the love-making, the tenderness, the tentativeness, a thing of the past. It was what she had wanted from him. He seemed like a different person, and she confessed to him that his dominance had attracted her from the beginning. They would address the subject again, but for now, Kate was content in his arms.

  “You know what tomorrow is, don’t you?” he asked.

  “Hmmm, let me see…” Kate rolled away from him in deep contemplation, until he turned her over and smacked her bottom.

  “Is it coming back to you now?” he asked, his hand raised and ready to swat her bottom again.

  “Yes, it is starting to come back to me now. Something about a bride coming…”

  “She did that, yes. And she will continue to if I have any say in the matter.”

  “You do.”

  “Ten years, babe. That’s a milestone.”

  “It is. Paper, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah, paper.” He rolled his eyes. “That’s the first year, sweetheart. How did I know that?”

  “You’ve been working hard.”

  “I have. I have something for you, but I want something from you first.”

  “I did that already…twice, as I recall.”

  “You know what?” He pushed her onto her back. “You’re sexy and nasty and I’m going to tan your butt if you’re not careful.”

  “Yay.”

  “We’ll be giving that a try tonight, then, lady. Count on it. For now, though, I want you to call Doug Strutts and your bulldog, Cliff Haskell, and order them to tear up those documents.”

  “You want me to do that.”

  “Yes. Then I’ll give you one of your tenth anniversary presents.”

  “Ooh, I’m getting more than one?”

  “If you can behave.” Jack turned her over and gave her a swat, sending her off the bed. She went into the living room with her cell phone, while he got out of bed, and made his way to the bathroom.

  The week had been nothing short of a miracle. He’d done it. He’d won her back. He loved her so much, he’d missed her so much, and he regretted every second of the year they had spent apart. He vowed to make those seconds up to her, one day at a time.

  Jack stepped into the shower as he heard her say hello to his partner, Doug Strutts.

  Kate paced the living room with a smile on her face. “How much of this plan did you know about, Doug?” she asked after giving him the good news, in brief choppy sentences that went something like, “Tear the fucking things up, and don’t tell Jack I said fuck.”

  “You mean Plan A?”

  “Oh, dear. It had a name. What was Plan B?”

  “You don’t want to know, except that it involved passports, a private plane and a foreign island.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “I’m so happy for you two, darling.”

  “I’m happy, too. It’s work, but the good kind, not the burdensome kind.”

  “Good. He’s told you everything, sweetheart?”

  Kate sighed. But of course Doug knew. He was Jack’s best friend. As embarrassed as she was that she was the last to know, as much as Jack’s confession hurt her, she was glad she knew, she was glad Doug knew, and she was glad Doug knew she knew.

  “Yes, of course. We’ll get through it. It’s not the end of the world.”

  “Well, good, because it’s going to be an ordeal. I know that with you by his side, he’ll come out of it just fine.”

  It was at ‘come out of it’ that Kate realized they were not talking about the same thing.

  “Come out of what, Doug?”

  Silence screamed in her ear, broken only by Doug stammering, “Huh? Wait, what?” And then, “Oh, shit.”

  Jack sang an out-of-tune song as he shampooed his hair and then started on his body. He couldn’t wait to surprise Kate with gift number one that day, and then hit her with gift number two the next day, on their tenth anniversary. He was so happy he couldn’t see straight. Looking back, he’d been so young and so ambitious and so smug, thinking his wife would sit there and wait for him to tire of his toys and his fame, and then welcome him back into her arms. Kate was smarter, and stronger than that. They had both made mistakes, allowing their egos, their tempers, and their prides to push them into themselves, instead of closer to each other. That was all going to stop.

  Jack turned off the water and reached for a towel. He dried his face and then turned the towel on his body as he stepped out of the shower. Kate stood in the doorway, the phone pressed against her lips, tears resting in her eyes.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Her words were choked, competing with a sob that threatened to escape. The smell of cedar and musk hung in the moist air as water glistened on the brown and gold glass tile that she told him she picked out because they reminded her of his eyes. The light from over the sinks shone in dim reflection in her eyes, the pain sitting like shards of glass, cutting her in two. Red flannel pants and a black tank top resting on a body worn out by new and unwelcome news made her look ten years
younger, like she did the day she said yes to him. The cell phone pressed against her lips prevented them from opening up and crying out the anger that, for now, stayed etched on her face. The pink towel he held in his hand seemed out of place in the darkness that seemed to fall between the two of them.

  It was about secrets. Jack had two, and he’d only confessed one of them to his wife. Doug told her the rest, assuming Jack had already done it.

  “I wanted you to come back to me because you loved me, not because I was sick.” He did not recognize his own voice.

  “I would have accepted the latter, and still felt the former, you fucking idiot.”

  Jack’s eyes burned through her, and after he dropped the towel and came to her, she tossed the phone out onto the bed and fell into his arms.

  “My God, what is wrong with you? Are you going to die, Jack?” She pulled away and searched his face with pleading eyes.

  “No. The doctors have assured me of that. They’re not sure what’s wrong. I have pain, and when I do, it’s bad. It can last a few seconds, or it can last hours. They want me in the hospital so they can rule out the really bad stuff.”

  “Have they ruled out…? Doug said…”

  “Yes, they’ve ruled out cancer. And I’m sure Doug said plenty. It’s not his fault, honey. It’s mine.”

  “I know that.” She slapped him on the arm and he collapsed in pain. “Oh, God! Jack, I’m sorry. I…” He laughed and grabbed her up in a hug.

  “You are a cold-hearted…”

  “Don’t say it, young lady. You’re already in big trouble.”

  “I am not. You were wrong on so many levels that I just might say your favorite word once a day.”

  “Then I’ll spank your bare bottom once a day.” He pulled her tight against him and kissed her mouth.

  “Jack, tell me the truth. Are you going to be okay?”

  “Yes. Especially now that I have my girl back.” His kisses covered her lips, her cheeks, her brows, and then moved from her hand down her arm to her neck, and then to her lips again. “I wanted our tenth year. I’m so sorry I kept this from you, but it had to be done.”