"The only mystery is how long you're going to make me wait," I said. "It's not possible to jerk my cock any harder. Not fucking possible."
"If you were here," she started, "would you come on my belly? Put it all over me?"
I murmured in agreement, nodding as my entire body tensed. That was it. That was what I needed from her. "All over you," I said, gasping as a million pinpricks covered my body. Erin cried out, her brows pinched and her lips falling open, and heat swept over me.
My pager sounded, and a beat later, my phone started ringing. It was an auto-tuned symphony to herald long-overdue orgasms, and it felt like the requisite explosion scene in every modern action film. I dropped my head back, sinking into the pillow while my shoulders shook with each powerful spurt.
Ragged breaths. Wet, rapidly cooling puddle stretching from belly button to breast bone. All the happy hormones. Soul-deep desire to sleep for days. Even greater desire to sleep withthis woman.
"How was that?" I asked.
I reached in the direction of the dueling noisemakers, fumbling for my devices while I smiled at Erin. She was swaddled in the sweatshirt now, the sides held close to her chest and her knees tucked up, under the waistband. Her eyes softened when she was sated, and I wanted to give her that every day. It wasn't the conquest of pleasing my wife that I was chasing, it was the possibility of that peaceful glow, where her troubles weighed less and the world was gentler and nothing mattered but us.
A smile pulled at her lips and she blinked. "It was good," she said. "I'm still completely awkward, but it was good. Surprisingly so."
"Give it up, Skip. You're not awkward." I glanced at the readouts, and then turned them to the camera. "Duty calls," I said, still panting. "But let me promise you this: I'll be there this month, lovely."
Chapter Nineteen
Nick
A nonstop flightfrom Boston to Reykjavík clocked in around six hours. Of those six hours, I spent only seven minutes without Erin on my mind. I wondered whether she preferred aisle or window, and if she was an anxious traveler. She couldn't be, not after years chasing volcanoes around the planet. Once, over a late night video chat, I'd asked her to tell me about the places she'd been and everything she'd seen. She'd flipped through her dog-eared passport, offering up stories to accompany each stamp. Portugal, Japan, Indonesia, Norway, Mexico. This world, she knew all of its corners and crevices.
I debated the likelihood that Erin would want todo thingsthis weekend. Yes, I desperately wanted to enjoy some normal coupledom with her, but my only desire was to put my hands all over her naked body and remind her to whom she belonged. Coupledom could wait until my next visit…or whenever we'd be able to find a more grounded existence.
Then I pictured her in an endless combination of leggings and long-sleeve shirts, and imagined stripping her out of them. At one point, I had to press my iPad to my lap to avoid public indecency charges. To snap my attention off the creamy skin I'd find when rolling those stretchy leggings down, I puzzled through the conversation I wanted to have about Doctors Without Borders.
At her ceaseless urging, I'd applied to the medical relief organization that worked primarily in conflict-ravaged regions. They were willing to accommodate my schedule at the hospital, and that was a blessing, considering that I was only able to commit for two eight week tours. It helped that before specializing in neuro, I'd completed surgical rotations in neonatal and obstetric surgery, as experience in both were desperately needed.
This time, I'd be the one going off the grid for months. I was looking forward to the experience, but not the separation. I was a wuss when it came to separation, and I'd only survived these past months because I was too exhausted to make sense of it all. My tolerance for distance wasn't the same as Erin's, and while I respected that Boston wasn't the warmest, friendliest place for her, I couldn't do this much longer if our contact was limited to email and video chat.
I wanted more, and I couldn't gather the right words to express that to Erin. It was tricky with her, knowing when to broach subjects like home and family. To her, both were on par with a swimming pool full of snakes supervised by evil clown lifeguards. Okay, maybe notthatterrible but certainly not her favorite things.
Erin believed there wasn't a home for her there, and there were moments when it sounded as though she didn't believe she deserved one either. Regardless of where the research took her or how many doctorate degrees she wanted to collect, I'd find a way to give her a home. And I wasn't talking about Boston, or even her siblings. Home had nothing to do with place. It was a sense of belonging that Erin had never known.
I didn't have a clear vision of our future, or how we'd get there. I only knew that my compass pointed toward Erin, and bringing her home—wherever that was for us—was the endpoint.
* * *
"I had all these ideas,"Erin murmured between frantic kisses while we hug-walked up the stairs to her apartment, "about how we'd—"
"Fuck ideas," I said, slamming her against the stairwell. One hand was on her ass, squeezing like I was trying to mark her, and the other up her shirt and under her bra. This was only marginally more discreet than the hand job she gave me tonearcompletion in the cab from the airport. "Please, woman. You're brilliant but don't think right now."
Her palm slapped over my lips but I shook my head in protest. She wasn't going to keep me from tasting her. Her hand was a fine alternative to her mouth. "One more flight," she said through a laugh. "I'll race you up there."
She took off running, but my little lovely's legs were short and I caught her around the waist before she hit the first stair. "Here's the only idea we need: I'm not letting go of you until I get on that airplane Sunday night. How's that work for you?"
I slapped her ass for a bit of emphasis, and she tried to return the favor but only succeeded in yanking the tail of my shirt from my jeans. "When did you turn into such a beast?" she asked.
"When I spent months away from my wife," I said, glancing up and down the hallway when I reached the landing. I didn't know where I was going. There wasn't enough oxygen headed toward my brain, and I required an entire minute to remember her apartment number. Then I stomped in that direction, and pressed her against the door. That it didn't magically open was annoying. Everything was annoying right now, everything that got in the way of me and my woman.
Still annoyed, I set Erin on her feet. I ran my hands up her calves, between her thighs, and over her breasts. I was on a mission.
"We're still outside, husband," she murmured into my neck. Her fingers were under my shirt and on my skin, and I couldn't stop growling. I didn't have any intelligible sounds, and I was too damn close to buckling under her touch.
"I know," I said, palming her ass. "I'm looking for your keys." Erin held them up with a devious grin, and why we were still standing out here in the goddamn daylight was a mystery to me. "Inside. Get your ass inside, woman."
She turned to unlock the door, and that wasit. Coats off, jeans unbuttoned, scarves and bags falling all around us. The door was barely shut when I tugged her shirt over her head and threw it into her apartment like it'd insulted me. We hopped around, leaning on each other as we shook out of our clothes and kicked off shoes. She flung her bra aside, and I hooked a finger around her panties, dragging her toward me.
