Dropping to the edge of the crepe de chine, he held out his hand to Esme. "Would you care to join me, Mrs. Rhy?"
Esme walked toward him. Just looking at him and imagining what was to happen on the pink pallet made her nipples strain eagerly at the damp cotton of her camisole.
She hesitated as she neared the makeshift bed. She wanted to join him, but she didn't want to ruin the beautiful piece of material with her heavy work shoes. "Let me take my shoes off," she said.
"Please," Cleav agreed. Leaning back, he watched her, smiling wickedly. "In fact, why don't you just take off everything," he suggested.
"Everything?"
"Well, not everything," he corrected. "Leave the garters, I think."
Esme's eyes widened in shock. Then, as his assessing look became a teasing grin, she found herself smiling back.
"You think I won't do it," she told him.
His grin widened. "Dare ya."
What hill-bred gal could ever resist a dare?
Esme hastily discarded her shoes and began tugging at the hooks at the back of her skirt. In an instant the worn gray serge pooled around her feet, and she stepped out of it.
She was reaching for the straps on her camisole when she glanced back at Cleav. He wasn't grinning anymore. His look was scorching and wild and maybe, well, maybe almost reverent.
Esme slowed her motions.
Leisurely, painstakingly, she eased the straps of the camisole off her shoulders. Her eyes never leaving his, she gently caressed her bare shoulder as if she could no longer wait for his touch.
With unhurried deliberation, she exposed the delicate curve of her bosom inch by inch as she casually stripped the damp cotton from her flesh.
Cleav swallowed visibly.
She teased him with her eyes and her lips pursed in a playful pout. Leisurely casting the damp camisole on the counter, she stood before him wearing nothing but a blush in her cheeks and a pair of pink and white garters.
Cleav reached for her.
"Why would God make a woman with legs so long?" he murmured as his strong brown hands firmly grasped her hips and pulled her toward him.
The minute Esme stepped on the pink crepe de chine, all her risqué bravado vanished. The touch of his warm hands against her bare skin made her tremble.
"I've never done this," she whispered, her voice sounding strained.
"I know, Esme," Cleav answered as his hands ran possessively up and down the bare white limbs before him. "Nobody knows about these beautiful legs but me."
His hands were almost determinedly hesitant in their caress as he pulled her forward. Standing, trembling and nude, with her husband, the man she'd fought so hard to win on his knees before her, Esme's fear melted away like mountain snow in springtime.
"I know you aren't going to hurt me," Esme told him with conviction.
Cleav raised his blue eyes to hers.
"Hurt?" He shook his head, then gently kissed her pale thigh just above the plain store-bought garter. "Hurt, no. Never hurt."
Grabbing the dainty piece of pink and white feminine fastening with his teeth, Cleav slowly pulled the garter down the length of her thigh and over her knee.
The garter tickled her leg and Esme's breath caught in her throat and her limbs turned to crabapple jelly on a warm day.
"I can't stand up!" she announced with quavering alarm.
Cleav immediately loosened the garter and brought his hands up to steady her. "Trust me, Esme," he said. "I'm not a man that will let you down."
