by Gwen Hayes
Because she wanted to get him in that hot spring. Naked.
Sex, they’d decided last night, would not fix their marriage. But as she’d drifted off to sleep, she realized she didn’t see the harm in at least using her Mother Nature-given charms to give the fix a helping hand. And her charms were never more charming than when skinny-dipping in a hot spring.
“I thought I’d give you a tour of the camp, show you what I have in mind, and then I’ll show you the hot spring.”
He grunted. He’d be better in a few minutes. After his coffee kicked in.
When they’d been to camp as kids, the hot spring was an urban legend. The counselors always teased that there was one—for senior counselors only—but the kids were never allowed to use it or even know where it was. She’d assumed it was a fable until she bought the place and found it by accident.
After coffee and a quick breakfast, they set off. Suddenly nervous, Heather stopped abruptly on the trail outside of her cabin. What if this didn’t work? What if he thought her ideas were stupid or impossible? What if she couldn’t get him behind her dreams?
Was she strong enough to stand firm? Was she willing to trade one dream for another? Her marriage for a summer camp? A summer camp for her marriage?
Michael palmed her shoulders. “You okay? Why are we stopping here?”
His presence steadied her, even though it was his presence here at camp that had her nervous. She turned slowly in his arms. “I’ll put in a shower, you know. At the cabin. It’s on my list.”
“Okay…”
“I just wanted you to know.” If he could read into her subtext, he’d know what she was trying to say was that she would do the things that made him comfortable here. But Michael hadn’t been very good at reading the subtext in her words in a long while.
Why couldn’t she just tell him her thoughts outright? Why was she always waiting for him to figure things out between the lines? God, she needed to take her fair share of their communication breakdown didn’t she?
“I wanted you to know because I am not completely impractical. I do want to be able to shower in my own cabin. And I also want you to be comfortable here. If you come to camp. I want you to have your coffee and your shower and your internet. I’m working on that, too. Getting internet. Wi-Fi will suck. But there’s no reason we can’t have access at the main house.” She took a deep breath because all the rambling took it out of her. “So, anyway, I just want you to know that it’s important to me that you are comfortable.”
“I don’t think you are impractical.”
“Yes you do. But that’s okay. I don’t mind being impractical most of the time.”
He picked up her hand and kissed her knuckles. “Show me your camp.”
There. That wasn’t so hard.
But it wasn’t going to be all smooth going. The camp wasn’t in great shape. She could tell he was holding back a lot of comments when she showed him the sleeping cabins.
“You’re going to wire them all?” he asked. He was probably doing math. That would account for the dubious tone.
“Yes. A lot of adults aren’t really ready to go all the way back to nature. The cabins will be like hotel rooms. With indoor plumbing and electricity. And maid service. They just need to feel rustic, not be rustic.”
“I see,” he answered, deep in Michael-thought. In her experience, I see didn’t usually mean good things.
She’d worked in hospitality long enough to know she was right. But being right currently wasn’t going to fix anything in her marriage.
They went to the main house next. She already had an office set up in there. And there were some rooms she’d designated as VIP, though they didn’t look it yet. There was also a great room filled with comfortable furniture, books, puzzles and board games for rainy days; a reception desk, and a kitchen that would someday be state of the art.
“Why do you want a chef? Why not just a head cook? It would be a lot cheaper.” He was still doing math.
“A chef will be important to foodies. I’m marketing Camp Firefly Falls to professionals, not campers. Corporate retreats, possibly weddings, certainly singles and overworked white collars.”
Michael paused in his inspection of the stove, as if he had any idea about wiring in general or stoves specifically. “Corporate retreats?”
A frisson of excitement zinged through Heather. That was the first look of real interest she’d gotten from him.
“I was thinking team building, leadership training, and communication. That kind of thing. I’ve been looking at a couple different companies that can come in and do that here.”
“You don’t want to do that in-house?”
“I don’t think I’m especially qualified for that. I’d need a facilitator. Someone who better understands corporate culture and who knows the ins and outs.”
Michael nodded but his forehead crunched into deep thought. “It’s good for companies to bring their teams out of the office. It can fortify bonds and open up new ideas…especially now that so many employees are telecommuting.”
Pleased that he finally found something to agree with her about, she took him to the boathouse.
“Dances?” he repeated when she told him her ideas.
“Yes, dances. With an open bar. And live music sometimes. And the longer camp sessions could have a talent show on the stage.” She pointed to the rafters. “I want to hang thousands of white lights in here to echo the fireflies outside.”
He was thoughtful for a few minutes, standing in the middle of what would be the dance floor. “We didn’t have a dance when we came to camp.”
“I know. We had to make due with stolen kisses in the woods.” She took his hand. “C’mon. I promised you a hot spring.”
* * *
The hike was a gentle one, but her heart pounded the whole way. Being there with Michael was surreal in so many ways. The familiar suddenly new, different.
When they arrived at the pool, he chuckled. “There was a hot spring here the whole time?”
It wasn’t that far from the main campus, not even that well-hidden. But the counselors had made it sound like you had to go through middle Earth to find it.
“Right?”
And then his expression darkened. “And you bathe in it. Alone. Naked?”
“Well I’m not bathing with anyone else if that’s what you’re asking.”
“No, of course not.” He ran a hand through his hair. When had he started doing that? He didn’t like to be mussed. But he just gave her a hard look, like he didn't care at all that his hair was now standing adorably on end. Like the only thing he cared about was figuring out his wife. This stranger in front of him. “What if someone sees you?”
“It’s my land. If I want to be naked on it, it’s nobody’s business but mine. It feels good, Michael. Natural." All of that was true, but she pushed it a little further. Yes, maybe she was testing him. He needed to be tested. "I like being one with the earth.”
He clenched his jaw, but kept his voice even. “It’s not safe. You living out here alone. I know you like your chakras balanced or whatever, but don’t you think it’s dangerous?”
Heather unzipped her jacket. “Nope.”
One brow arched high, the only indication he was interested in what she was doing next. “You just run around naked whenever you want.”
She toed off one shoe. “Yep.”
He bit back whatever he was going to say. She could see him counting in his head. Then, in a very mild tone, he asked, “When your campers are here, using the spring, will you still come out here naked?”
“Nope.”
“No?”
She dealt with her other shoe, her socks, and her jacket while she spoke. “I’m not telling anyone about it. It’s my secret. You’re the only one who knows it’s here besides me.” She smiled and pulled her shirt over her head.
Michael no longer hid his interest, openly appraising her bare breasts as she paused on the button of her jeans. His voice
got a little deeper, a little less questioning. Gotcha, mister. He licked his lips. “I guess that makes it our secret then.”
“Michael? I have another secret.”
“What’s that, babe?”
“I went commando this morning.”
She shimmied out of her jeans feeling every bit the goddess he seemed to be entranced by. Michael didn’t look like the same man she’d shared coffee with yesterday. Gone was the put-together business man who lived by the dictates of his watch and the expectations of a corporate master she’d never understood. In front of her stood a complicated man with very uncomplicated instincts.
He wanted to devour her alive.
As if she didn’t understand what she was doing to him, she turned away, dipping her foot to test the water. The temperature was perfect. Just perfect. Because while this seducing business was exciting and all, she was really fucking cold.
He was behind her instantly, grabbing her around the waist, his nose buried in her neck. “Minx,” he said roughly as he pressed against her. He was fully clothed against her nakedness, and she felt deliciously naughty.
The cold air in front of her, the heat of him behind her, the contrast of his jeans and her bare ass, the scrape of his morning scruff against the delicate skin under her ear all combined, making her sensitive beyond reason. If he touched her now, where she was wet and aching, she’d come with no fanfare or preamble.
As if he sensed how close she was, he snickered in her ear and backed off. The rustle of his clothes got her stepping into the water and turning so she didn’t miss the show.
Was he really going to do it? Her Michael, who could probably tell her the number of the state regulation code she was violating by taking off her clothes, was really going to skinny dip with her?
God the sound of his zipper was the most erotic sound she’d ever heard.
She didn’t have time to admire him, though she wanted to. He was in the water too fast, pulling her to him in a slippery kiss. She ran her hands over his shoulders and toned back, the minerals making his skin slick.
Her foot slipped on the bottom of the pool and she almost took them both down, but Michael’s arms banded around her middle and there was nothing to do but laugh at the ridiculous situation.
So much for a sophisticated seduction on her part.
“God, I love your laugh.” The raw honesty in his tone sucker punched her right in the gut, sobering her immediately.
She reached up and traced the lines around his mouth and he rested his cheek in her hand. She loved those brackets around his lips, a testament to the time she’d invested in their relationship making sure he had laugh lines and didn’t grow stodgy and unsmiling like his father. Like his parents seemed to want him to be.
His parents. She hadn’t missed them the last six months that was for sure.
Except that right now, maybe it was time to be serious. To discuss where things stopped working in their marriage. How they got to the place where she felt justified in making huge life changes without his input and he didn’t notice her absence from their home for three days.
Talking, the idea of it, scared her to death. And that was wrong. It shouldn’t. But she was still worried. What if they talked and it fixed nothing? What if a real conversation about what was going on was actually the last light left to be turned out at closing time?
“Hey, where’d you just go?” he asked, pulling her with him to a sitting ledge. He sat her between his legs, his chest against her back, his arms holding her firmly.
“I’m afraid of talking now. Things have been so great today. I don’t want to say the wrong thing and ruin it.”
Michael’s hand flexed on her stomach. “Don’t be afraid.”
She rested her head against his chest and closed her eyes, letting the soothing pattern his hand traced on her skin relax her. Yes, sometimes he was too serious for his own good, but then again, she’d always needed the extra grounding that his logical, rule following mind provided.
She knew she wasn’t practical, though she’d tried really hard not to be an embarrassment to the Tully name. She was a dreamer, an optimist, and lately, an exhibitionist. At least the squirrels and the birds must have thought so.
Without his level-headed influence, though, she’d been feeling less free and independent than she thought she would. It was easier to take chances when she was sure someone would balance her out. Without him, sometimes she froze in indecision. He gave her structure and a solid home base. On her own, she was learning she felt adrift.
“You’re tensing up again.” His hands cupped her breasts. Slowly, she opened her eyes, surprised by how erotic the sight of her body in his hands was. His touch felt incredible, but watching him work her over took it to another level.
“Michael,” she started but couldn’t finish her thought when he strummed his thumbs across her nipples. Her suddenly very sensitive nipples.
“I just want to touch you.” His voice, low and husky near her ear, sent goose bumps skittering down her arms and the ache between her legs intensified. “I know all the reasons we should wait, and we will, but right now, I need to touch you. Can we bend the rules a little? Is that okay?”
Michael didn’t bend rules. Ever. But who was she to tell him no? “I would love it if you touched me.”
She might die if he didn’t.
One of his hands left her breast and traveled lower. He was bolder now, kneading her breast and stroking her thigh. She was completely supported by his body and warmed by the water. All she had to do was relax. “Heather, God, you’re so beautiful.” He spread her folds with his thumb, dragging it over her clit in a rhythm he’d perfected over the years. He’d bring her to a peak, then slow his circle, barely touching where her nerves bundled up and sparked.
She gasped his name and several deities, and finally every swear word she knew as she crested closer and closer. It was everything, being surrounded by him, and played like an instrument under his hands.
His cock rubbed against her back, growing harder. Heather reached one arm up and hooked her hand around the back of his neck. “I need to come, Michael.” Her voice didn’t even sound like hers.
“Then come, Heather. Come on my hand, sweetheart.”
She keened as he pinched her nipple, setting off the fuse that burned through her. Through her haze she heard him moan as well as he clutched her tighter, harder.
She came down slowly, feeling like she was returning from a trip across the Milky Way, getting used to things like gravity and air and blinking again.
Then she started to cry.
Chapter 5
Michael wouldn’t think that what they'd just done was a mistake—nothing that felt that good, that right could be wrong, but his wife was hiccupping and his dick was throbbing and this was a disaster.
Plus, they were sitting in a hot spring, buck-naked.
This was so far out of his comfort zone, he wasn't sure he could find his way back.
Although with Heather in his arms—even teary—he wasn't sure he wanted to. Twenty-four hours ago, he'd been heading into a board meeting. Twenty-four hours ago, she'd served him with divorce papers.
Those two facts were now inexorably tied together. He felt sick at the realization that he'd been paying more attention to his career than his marriage, and he'd almost lost the latter because of that choice.
"Sweetheart?"
She didn't answer him. Instead, she twisted in his arms and buried her face in his chest.
Well, at least she wasn't running away.
He brushed his lips over her temple, then tugged her around in his lap until she was straddling him.
Her thighs gripping his, her arms around his neck. How had he ever let this go?
"I've been a colossal idiot," he muttered, pressing his forehead against hers. She still wasn't looking at him, which was hard to do with their faces less than an inch apart. "But I'm here now, and I know that I've hurt you. I'm here to make amends."
"In
the form of an orgasm?"
"Sure."
"I didn't reciprocate," she whispered.
"We're past the point of playing tit-for-tat, babe. I'll survive."
"I could…"
"No. Not right now." Not until he found a way to show her just exactly how much he was on her side.
But a little bit of that was her call—he didn't want to railroad her. It was his personality. Dominating and bossy. Had its uses at times, but now wasn't one of them. He had to let her lead. "Where do we go from here?"
Her answer, when it came, was slow and loaded with doubt. "I don't know."
He wanted her to know. He wanted her conviction to be as strong as his, although maybe he was the only one who'd been hit by a lightning bolt of clarity. It felt dangerous to open up like this, but it felt right, too. "I don't want to go back."
"Okay. We'll…we'll make this work. I'm sorry I pushed so hard with the divorce papers." She took a deep breath and shoved the wet strands of her hair off her cheeks. "I can't promise you much time in the city until the fall, because I do need to get this place up and running. That's non-negotiable. This is my future. But…you're right. We'll find a way to balance my life here and your life there."
His heart pounded in his chest as he traced a drop of water down her cheek where a strand of hair had just been. Had he ever noticed that before? How droplets found pathways forged by other droplets?
Nope. He'd been too busy taking over the world to pay attention to anything quite as special as his wife in a hot spring.
"No. I meant, I don't want to go back," he repeated, his voice cracking. "To my job. To that life."
She blinked twice, her eyes wide. Her mouth fell open, and she burst out laughing.
* * *
"It's not funny," Michael huffed as he stalked down the hill, tugging on his shirt.
"Right. Of course not." Heather trundled beside him, and he knew he should slow down, but he'd just bared his soul—to himself, as much as her—and he felt raw.