“I’m tired. Please have them send my meal to the room, I’ll eat it later.” I leave before giving him a chance to urge me not to.
14
MAXIM
When I findmy way back to the room a half hour later, after a short walk agonizing about another completely fumbled interaction with my wife, I find her submerged in a bubble bath, her hair piled on her head in a bun. The sight of her naked shoulders above the surface of the water is enough to necessitate adjusting myself in my pants. She makes me feel seventeen, or like an animal, want bubbling about me and making me tense. I’ve never had the particular urge to run through the wilderness in pursuit of a person until meeting Marianna Morelli. MariannaOrlov, now.
“How is it?” I ask. She doesn’t startle, just closes the paperback I was reading earlier and glances over her shoulder at me. As I approach, I see a hickey I left above her collar bone and the necklace I gave her still around her neck.
“Boring. Too much sand worm, not enough kissing. You should read books with more sex.”
“Noted.”
She gestures to the large, jetted tub. “Do you have one of these in your house in Boston?”
“What, a bathroom?”
Marianna cracks a smile and it is my personal victory of the day.
“Why, do you want one?” I ask. She shrugs, the movement lifting the tops of her breasts just out of the water. I would buy her as ridiculous of a bathtub as she wanted—I’d get her multiple, even. I would buy her a house—a whole building—full of tubs this size if she asked. Whatever she wants.
I don’t know what possesses me, maybe lust or an unconscionable desire to be close to her, but I toe off my shoes and strip off my shirt before climbing into the bathtub facing her. Even with the size, my limbs are long enough that there’s still some maneuvering of her legs between mine before I can settle.
If her bright, wide eyes are any indication, I think I’ve surprised her and much as I have myself. I told myself that I wouldn’t seek intimacy with her again, at least not until I could get my thoughts under control where she is concerned. Easier said than done.
It’s only that I have an unending need for her, worse now that I’ve tasted her, and she’s made it very clear that there is not, nor will ever be, anything as tangible as love between us. I saw her desire, though. I felt it.
Maybe desire can be enough to sustain me.
Under the water, I stroke a line up her calf and revel in the pink that rises on her cheeks.
“Maxim?”
“Hm?”
“You’re not supposed to wear clothes in the bath,” Marianna whispers.
I stare into her brown eyes for the space of a dozen heartbeats before I push a lock of curly hair behind her ear. Her words feel like a challenge, if not an invitation, so I stand and unbutton my shorts, pulling the soaked fabric down mylegs until I’m bare in front of her, evidence of my arousal unmistakeable between us.
I sink back down into the hot water, the suds rising to almost the tops of her shoulders as I sit.
“About last night,” Marianna starts, then glances away from me. “It was—fun, but I know sometimes, for some people, sex can be. . .more than just sex.”
Willing my jaw to relax, I nod for her to continue.
“It’s not for me.” She looks vulnerable, concern on her face, like I might be angry at her for this after she’s promised me multiple times that she can never love me. “Just because it appears we arecompatible, doesn’t mean something more.”
As much as I would love to hear about ourcompatibilityand her inability to love me, I can count about a dozen things I would rather do instead. I reach under the surface and grab her hips, tugging her in one motion toward me, disrupted water splashing over my chest and some over the edge of the tub onto the tile.
Her face now just inches from mine tilts up.
“I thought we were pretending,” I muse. I lower my mouth until I’m just a breath above hers, then wait for her to close the distance. Her eyes flit down to my mouth, and she’s about to when a loud buzzing pulls her attention from me. She looks to the ledge where her phone is lit up and vibrating with a call. I want to tell her to ignore it, to kiss me instead, to let me pull her body against mine and pretend again for the rest of the night, but when she sees the name on the screen, her face turns from confused to concerned. She answers the phone and puts it on speaker.
“Sean?”
I glare at the screen as if her brother-in-law might feel my ire through the phone for the interruption.
“How’s Mexico?” Sean asks, his Boston accent thicker than the rest of the family. “Am I interrupting something?”
