I wanted to dive into the deep end right now. Wanted to tell her everything, even if it broke me, and I wanted her to promise we’d figure it out together.
But then she started snoring again.
I laughed to myself and skimmed a finger down her cheek, and told myself there was time. There’d always be time for us.
Now that there was anus.
A strange level of vindication came with hearing it hadn’t been entirely one-sided. All the time I’d spent hating the guys she went out with, the agony I’d experienced from seeing her with them—maybe she’d shared a bit of that.
I wanted to go back in time and rewrite our history but I knew that if this part—this huge fucking fundamental part—had been different for us, it wouldn’t change the rest of it.
Even if she hadn’t laid down her no-players law from the start, I wouldn’t have lasted more than a few weeks with her. A month or two if I’d respected the rules she never thought to share with her boyfriends. And that was assuming I’d had the time and mental bandwidth to do anything more than go to school, play football, and help keep my family from going off the rails before and after my dad died.
Most days I’d only had the bandwidth to watch Emme peel her tangerines and carefully pick bits of pith off the segments. I would’ve been another one of her worthless boyfriends who couldn’t get it together to be the guy she deserved.
Goddamn. If I’d known…
But I knew now.
And if that was what she wanted—what she’d wanted since the start—then we could finally stop telling each other this arrangement was temporary. That it had anything to do with her ex or my business deals or even our pact. And we wouldn’t have to act like last night had been a mistake or whatever the fuck was happening there.
Traffic was heavy for no apparent reason so when I took a break from dismantling the belief system underpinning our entire fucking relationship, I switched gears and freaked the fuck out about her asking if we were exclusive. What the fuck was that about?
When I was done with that, I spent ten minutes in standstill traffic shooting off emails to see whether I could cancel my West Coast meetings or any of the endorsement appearances scheduled for me this week because I wanted to stay in bed with my wife.
Very productive night for me.
It only improved when we returned home and, instead of insisting my half-conscious wife explain herself and the past decade and a half of our history, I steered her toward my room. It was closer to the front door and she was enough of a fall risk tonight without adding a whole staircase to the equation. We’d figure out which one would beourroom later.
I steadied her in front of a dresser and dropped to my knees to handle the lace-up shoes that I was convinced had manifested themselves from a dark, filthy corner of my mind. She held her dress to her knees while I took my time trailing my fingers up the back of each calf and slowly unwrapping the ribbons from her legs.
Save for the city lights flowing in through the windows, it was dark in here though I could still see faint lines where the ribbons had pressed into her skin. I rubbed small circles into her calvesand told myself it was probably the wrong time to duck my head under her skirt and lick my way up her thighs.
If there was one thing I could do for this woman, it was wait.
“I need to take this off,” she grumbled, her fingers reaching for the zipper at the back of her dress.
I gained my feet and nudged her hand away when she missed a second, then third, time. “Let me.” She dropped her head to the side like it was too heavy to hold up while I drew the zipper down. “Did you get everything you wanted from tonight?”
“Not really. I think I grabbed the nighttime allergy meds instead of the non-drowsy stuff,” she said around a yawn. “I blame the bleary eye situation. Grace also takes everything out of its packaging and organizes it into little containers with dainty labels which actually makes things much more complicated so she gets some blame too.”
I ran my knuckles down her bare back. She shivered, clutching the dress to her chest. “That’s not what I meant.”
A beat passed before she pulled in a wobbly breath. “You were great. Nice job on the media face. It never looked like you wanted to eat anyone’s soul simply for existing which is leaps and bounds ahead of most of your press conferences. Very nice job on whatever the hell you had those guys doing in the backyard later on. I’m sure my ex nearly broke his own neck ignoring you but also hanging on your every word, and that’s all I can ask for.”
I dropped my hand to her hip. “Was it the revenge you wanted?”
Another breath, another yawn, and, “Can I borrow a hoodie? Or a t-shirt?”
Keeping that hand on her hip, I pulled open a drawer and grabbed some options for her. “Since when do you ask? Your thieving little fingers always steal my shirts.”
“Not always.” I could hear her pouting.
She held the sweatshirt to her chest and glanced back at me, an expectation of privacy in her eyes. I didn’t think she’d need that after last night but I wasn’t going to press the issue. I knew how she operated. Just another game of inches.
I paced to the windows facing Boston Common. I heard the dress swish to the floor and the shuffle of bra straps sliding down her arms. I shoved my hands into my pockets and stared at the city lights until all I could see was bright white halos.
I realized then I should’ve walked out when I had the chance. I couldn’t just stand here with my dick hard and my head making the best and worst of everything I’d heard tonight when I knew damn well she’d be asleep within the next five minutes. And I knew this wasn’t the night for another one of our sleepovers.
