Her voice tightens. “No . . . I’ll wait for you. Maybe I should order something for you to eat.”
Clearly this isn’t about a few streaks of blood. She’s pushing me away. My chest tightens, squeezing the breath from my lungs. If I don’t fix this tonight, I might lose her forever. And I can’t . . . even imagine . . . She’s my girl. My Natalie. She’s been mine since we were sixteen. I would do anything, risk everything, cut out my heart and die for her.
Maybe that’s what I need to do.
“It hurt too much,” I say.
Natalie freezes, her hand outstretched toward the phone. “What are you talking about?”
“Ethan. Losing Ethan. And then you. And then my dad.”
“Me?” She turns to face me, propping her head up with her elbow, mirroring my position. “You didn’t lose me.”
“You were there, but not there.” I stroke her cheek. “You just sat in the rocking chair in his room every day, and I didn’t know how to help you. I didn’t know what to do. You wouldn’t eat. You wouldn’t talk . . . ” I shrug. “It was like the day my mom left and it was just Dad and I sitting there at the kitchen table, not saying anything for the longest time. We didn’t know how to cook, or where anything was, or how to run the house. And then he started to cry.” My stomach knots at the painful memory. “I’d never seen my dad cry. I didn’t know what do, how to help him. So I cried too.”
“You never told me.”
“It’s not something a sixteen-year-old boy admits to the girl he’s crushing on.”
Her lips tip up at the corners. “You might have got a hug. Maybe something more.”
I run my hand over the curve of her hip and along her narrow waist, back and forth, remembering how desperate I was to get out of the house every morning to see Natalie. She saved me then, but she couldn’t save me after Ethan died. Not only was she suffering alone, I made it clear I didn’t want to be saved.
She edges closer, so close I can feel the heat of her body. “I like to know you’re human after all.”
“You thought I wasn’t?”
“You shut down after Ethan died.” Her fingers trace along the edge of my jaw, sending a flush of heat through my veins. “I guess I did too. Tonight was the first time I really felt happy. Not happy for having lost Ethan, but happy for the time I had with him. Aiden helped me remember that, and he also made me realize I was lucky for every day I got to spend with my son.”
“I should be the one to make you feel good.” I cup her breast gently in my hand, rub my thumb over her nipple until it peaks beneath her clothes. I’m half afraid that she’ll push me away again, but I can’t be this close to my wife and not touch her. Our connection can’t be repaired by words alone. “You’re mine.”
She moans softly, arching into my palm. “I wasn’t interested in getting it on with Aiden.”
“I’m glad because good dentists are hard to find.” I move slowly, carefully, rolling to my back beside her. Wrapping my arms around her, I pull her on top of me and settle her against my chest.
“It was kind of sexy the way you beat him up.” She rests her chin in her cupped hands. “Wrong, of course. And totally unacceptable behavior. But . . .”
A grin spreads across my face. “It turned you on.”
“I think I’m genetically programmed to be attracted to powerful alpha males who beat up dentists so they can spend the night with me in a hotel.” She pushes herself up until she is sitting across my hips, straddling my thighs; so beautiful she makes my heart ache. “What do alpha males do with the women they seduce for a night?”
I try not to think about how my cock is nestled against her entrance, or how hard I am despite my efforts not to get turned on by the way her dress hugs her curves, hints at the treasures underneath. She wants to talk. I want her to be happy. But damn. She looks so sexy sitting on top of me, so sweet as she gently teases, I can’t help but be aroused.
“First they get you naked.” I trace small circles along her inner thigh beneath her dress, stopping just short of where I want to go. “Then they claim you and mark you, so all the other males, especially dentists, know to stay away.”
Encouraged by her smile and the hitch of her breath, I run my finger along the edge of her panties.
“How are you going to mark me?” She rocks her hips over my cock, and I fight back a groan.
“Here.” I feather my fingertips along the slim column of her neck. “I’ll bite you here the way I used to.”
Natalie sucks in a sharp breath and tips her head to the side, as if inviting me to fulfill my promise. “Anywhere else?”
“Here.” I place a gentle hand on my tummy. “When you’re pregnant . . .”
I don’t know why I said that. Longing? A deep-seated desire to have a family to replace the one I lost? Regardless of how it escaped the walls I built to be able to make it through each day, I regret my words as soon as they drop from my lips. But it’s too late. Pain flashes across Natalie’s face, and in the time it takes me to reach for her, she’s gone.
My pulse pounds so hard I can’t hear for the roaring in my ears. Natalie scrambles back, pushing off the bed when only moments ago we were connecting again.
“A baby isn’t going to fix us.” She stares at me aghast. “This . . . ” She waves her hand vaguely around the room. “A few hours in a hotel together doesn’t mean everything is fine. I can’t have another baby, Sam. We can’t go through that pain again.”
Pain of loss. Pain of longing. Pain of indifference to my wife’s suffering, and my own need to heal. I want to give her my pain and take her own. I wanted to share it with my body and swallow it with my soul.
“The doctors said the chances of it happening again are almost nonexistent.” I push to sit, run a hand through my hair for lack of anything better to do with my hands now that Natalie has put some distance between us. “But it’s up to you. If you don’t want to have another baby, then I’ll respect your decision. Hell, until tonight, I didn’t want to try either. But when I thought I was going to lose you, something changed for me. I woke up, Natalie. I saw a life without you in it, a life without the family we always wanted to have. You and Ethan were the best things that ever happened in my life. I want that again, Natalie. I want a family. But only if I can have it with you.”
Chapter Ten
NATALIE
I thought I was going to lose you.
“Sam . . . ” My heart trembles in my chest. Although I’m not ready to admit it, a secret part of me, buried deep beneath my fear, wants a family too.
“I never talked about those things before,” Sam says. “It hurts to let the pain out, but not as bad as I thought. All my memories of him are good ones. Happy. He made me happy.”
“Me too.” My throat tightens so hard I can barely get the words out.
“I loved that he had your eyes, and my nose, and your mother’s fair hair.” After ten years of silence on the subject of Ethan, his words come tumbling out. “And the first time he smiled . . . it killed me. He had your smile and the first time you smiled at me, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.”
“If I remember correctly, it was the chemistry lab. Not heaven.” I cross the room and sit on the edge of the bed beside him. “And you weren’t the only one who fell for a smile.”
We laugh at the shared memory and then his face softens. “I miss him, Natalie. I miss the way he looked at us, like he was memorizing our faces, and how it felt to hold him. I had dreams for him, plans to do the things my dad did with me, and things that were just mine. I was going to teach him to play baseball and throw a football. I was going to take him fishing off the swinging bridge and camping in the mountains. I was going to buy him a guitar and teach him to play. I hoped he would have your voice so he could sing, maybe be a frontman in a band instead of giving up the glory. I wanted to show him the stars, tell him our stories. I lost those hopes and dreams when we lost him. A whole life of possibility.”
We’d never talked
about our dreams for Ethan. We’d never talked about our loss, our pain, or our future. We’d grieved in our own separate ways, instead of grieving together.
“I had dreams for him too,” I say, following his lead and letting go of my pain. “Mostly I wanted him to always feel wanted and loved. I was always going to have time for him. He was never going to be left behind, or forgotten, and I was going to buy everything new. I wanted to teach at his school so I could see him during the day. And take him to every soccer practice and baseball game he wanted to play. I was going to tell him stories every night, and every year on his birthday, I planned to buy him a book that we could read together. I did keep that promise to him. I buy a book every year and donate it to the library in his name.”
“My Natalie’s all heart, and she’s had no one to lean on.” His voice thickens, and he strokes his warm hand down my back. “I locked everything way—happy times, good memories, my hopes and dreams. I thought if I threw myself into the farm like my dad did when my mom left, I wouldn’t have to feel the pain. I never realized that when I locked it all in, I locked you out.”
“It goes two ways.” I clasp his hand and draw it to my cheek. “I was so wrapped up in my own sadness I didn’t see yours. Some days I resented you for being able to get up and go to work like it was any other day. And some days I was convinced you didn’t feel anything for Ethan and that’s why it was so easy for you to move on. I had Alexis and my friends and my sisters if I needed to talk. But you had no one except me, and I wasn’t there for you.”
Sam turns his head and kisses my palm. “You’re here now. With me.”
Caught in a maelstrom of emotion—fear, regret, love, loss, and longing—I don’t realize I’m crying until Sam wipes a tear off my cheek.
“It hurts my heart to see you cry,” he says gently.
“It hurts my heart to think you were suffering alone.”
“I was never alone.” His eyes glisten. “You were there, Nat. Even though we didn’t talk about the big stuff, you told me you loved me every day with the little things you did to make my life easier—the care you took to make meals that I liked, the long hours you worked beside me when none of my hired men would come out, the buckets of sandwiches you brought out to the field no matter the weather. I never thanked you, but I’m doing it now.” He cups my face between his hands and stares down at me. “Thank you for being my wife, even though I haven’t been a good husband to you.”
“We’ve both made mistakes.” I take a breath, and for the first time I don’t feel any tightening in my chest. I am lighter. Unburdened. Connected to Sam in a way I haven’t been in years. “What do we do now?” I ask.
“I’d like to kiss you in a Terms of Endearment kind of way.” He sits up and pulls me into his lap.
I laugh and it feels so good. I want more of this. More of Sam and his gentle teasing. More feeling the freedom that comes from opening up and letting go of my pain. “How does that differ from a regular kiss?”
“There are no strings attached.” He nuzzles my neck. “No expectations.”
Closing my eyes, I soak in the moment. The feel of Sam’s strong arms around me, his warmth, his strength, his scent, the taste of scotch as I run my tongue over the seam of his lips. My skin flushes, my blood races through my veins, and I go from cool and calm to hot and aroused in a heartbeat. “What if I want strings and expectations?”
“Then I’ll kiss you like a man should kiss his wife when he has ten years of being an ass to make up for.” His eyes, filled with sensual promises, and his devilish grin, catch me off guard. I’m not used to him being so open or light-hearted.
“And then what happens?” I run my hands through his thick soft hair.
“Then we get naked.”
Chapter Eleven
SAM
“It’s been a long time since you’ve seen me without clothes on. I’m not the same.”
My stomach knots. The idea that my Natalie feels embarrassed to undress in front of me says more about the state of our marriage than the fact she was out with another man.
“There is nothing about you that I don’t love.” This could go two ways. Either we take it slow and easy, or I appeal to the rebel who tried everything to get her family’s attention, including dating the new kid in town, a city boy with long hair, a battered guitar, and dreams of becoming a star.
It’s a choice that is no choice at all. I want the rebel. My rebel. My Nat.
Without warning, I lift her off my lap and cross the room to the armchair in the corner. Settling myself on the soft cushions, I gesture to her clothing. “Strip for me.”
“Sam . . .”
“Now.”
Her eyes narrow and a kick of adrenaline rushes through my veins. This is the Natalie I know, the Natalie I lost. She’s a fighter to the end. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
I lean forward in my chair. “Do I need to pick you up and carry you over here?”
“You wouldn’t dare.” Her eyes sparkle with the challenge.
Yesterday I wouldn’t have dared. Yesterday I would have told myself Natalie wanted her space and I needed to respect that. Yesterday it was easier to follow the path we’d been following for five long years.
But yesterday, she wasn’t out with another man. My Natalie had one foot out the door and Steadman was waiting on the other side. If there was ever a time for a Hail Mary pass, it is now.
“Try me.” My heart pounds, counting out the seconds.
She walks across the room, swaying those beautiful hips, looking up at me through her long, thick lashes. “Come and get me.”
I lean back in the chair, legs spread, arms on the armrests, feigning a casualness I don’t feel in the least. “If I have to come over there, I’ll tear it off you, and that will be the end of your sexy dress.”
Lips quivering in amusement, she fights back a smile. “You think it’s sexy?”
“You’re sexy. And in that dress . . . no wonder Steadman was all over you.”
Right thing to say. She reaches for the zipper on her side and slides it down “He wasn’t all over me. We had a few drinks. We talked. He was a perfect gentleman until you showed up and went all alpha on his ass.”
I give a satisfied grunt, remembering the fight in the bar. Steadman got what he deserved. “I know how guys think. And what he was thinking was not what any man should be thinking about my wife except me.”
“What are you thinking?” Slowly, carefully she pushes one strap over her shoulder, then the other. My mouth waters in anticipation.
“Sick, twisted, dirty things, baby. All the places I want to put my cock. All the ways I want to make you scream.”
“So . . . the usual.” She slides her dress down to her waist, exposing her cream-colored bra trimmed in fine lace. When did Natalie start wearing lace? I hate that I don’t know. “At least, the usual like it used to be.”
Fuck. Now my head is filled with images of our sex life before she got pregnant. There weren’t many things we didn’t try. Few lines we didn’t cross. I yank open my belt, unzip my fly and wrap my hand around my erection.
Natalie wiggles gently, working the dress over her hips, as I work my cock.
“Slower, baby. I’m taking it all in.”
“Maybe I don’t want to go slow.” Her gaze drops to my fist as I pump. “Maybe you’re too tempting.”
I like that she’s looking, and even more that she likes what she sees.
Her dress pools at her feet. She steps out of it and walks toward me, a feast of curves in all the right places.
“You haven’t finished.” I gesture to the silky cream-colored panties that cover the soft down between her legs.
“Neither have you.” She kneels between my legs and covers my fist with her hand.
A low growl escapes my lips. My Natalie. Half naked. Kneeling in front of me. Impossible to resist. I am sorely tempted to give in and give my cock over to her sweet mouth. But still feeling raw and vulnerable, with my inner wal
ls crumbling, I need more than quick and dirty. I need to explore the emotions I locked away ten years ago—to feel again, and I want her on the journey with me. Tonight, I’m going to make love to my wife in such a way that she knows I never stopped loving her, and I never will.
Tonight will be Natalie and Sam. The way we used to be.
Chapter Twelve
NATALIE
“Nat,” he pulls me to stand, confusing me with the sudden shift from heavy-lidded passion to cool, detached control. “I need to see you. All of you.”
Biting back my frustration, I reach behind and unhook my bra, letting it slide down my arms to pool on the floor between us.
Sam hisses in a noise, his eyes pinned to me as if he is seeing me for the first time. I suppose in a way he is. I never let him see me naked anymore, and at night we have sex partially clothed or in the semi-darkness, under the covers, and always with one of the condoms I keep in my bedside table, because I’m not prepared to take the risk of getting pregnant ever again.
Emboldened by the lust in his eyes and the ache in my core, I hook my fingers into my panties and shimmy them over my hips.
“Jesus Christ. You’re killing me.”
Under the heat of his gaze, I don’t feel self-conscious that my body has been changed by pregnancy and the hard labor I do on the farm. I am no longer slim and soft. Instead, my hips are wider, my muscles firm and strong, my skin a deeper olive from the outdoors and freckled from all the sun.
“Come here.” He stands and shoves down his clothing, making quick work of his jeans and boxers before kicking them away.
I drink him in, taking in the hard planes of his chest, the grooves between his abs that weren’t there when he was a young, aspiring rock star. Farm labor has chiselled a god out of his lean ropey muscles, added bulk to his slim frame. Even his cock, jutting out from its nest of curls, seems bigger, thicker, the crown wide and inviting.
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