“Nobody?”
“No.”
“Me neither. I think we made up for at least a day of abstinence.”
“At the very least.”
He frowned with self-deprecation. “I had all the finesse of a caveman. Actually, less than a caveman.”
She raised her hands above her head and stretched. “If you’d wasted one second on finesse, I would have combusted.”
“I didn’t have a second to waste.”
“I noticed.”
After a lingering kiss, he moved off her, lay on his back, and worked off his jeans. She propped herself up on her elbow and leaned over him to inspect the cut. “Three of the closures came off.”
He raised his head and looked down the length of his torso. “I don’t see any major damage.”
She continued her survey. “So this is where you hide it.” Hesitantly she used the tip of her finger to trace the tattoo that began just under his left hip bone and extended down the top of his thigh almost to his knee. “It’s Excalibur, isn’t it? King Arthur’s sword.”
“Very good.”
“Why that?”
“My dad has one like it on his forearm. He was a veteran of Vietnam. Had to engage in some bad shit over there. When I was old enough to ask about the tat, he told me the legend. He said the sword represented the moral and honorable attributes that a king, or warrior, or any man should aspire to. The tat would be a constant reminder of those virtues.”
“Why here and not on your forearm?”
“Well, that’s about where a sword would hang, isn’t it? Plus, a man should aspire to be as hard as steel. I thought the juxtaposition—”
“I get it,” she said, laughing. “Very phallic. I studied Freud, remember?”
Then she lay down on her side, and he turned onto his so they were facing. In a move that already seemed natural and familiar, he placed his hand on her hip. Their legs entwined.
“What about this one?” She stroked the pair of angel wings tattooed on his right deltoid which she’d asked about earlier. Meeting his gaze, she said softly, “Angela?”
“No. I’d had it for a few years before I even met her.”
She didn’t say anything, leaving it up to him whether he wanted to pursue the subject. It was a therapy technique he’d come to recognize, and this time he gave in to it.
“It’s in honor of a buddy of mine. We served together in Afghanistan. He was the Catholic chaplain. He was captured by the Taliban. Him being a priest…” He shrugged. “Didn’t sit well with his captors. They wouldn’t even let us collect the pieces of him to ship home.”
She didn’t say anything, just placed her hand on his chest.
He gave a solemn nod, then ran his hand over her ass, squeezing it gently. “Enough of that. Tell me stuff about you.”
“Stuff?”
“What’s your birthday, favorite food, favorite song and movie, chocolate or vanilla? You know, first date stuff.”
“This is hardly a date. You didn’t even buy me dinner.”
He looked down at the patch of paradise between her thighs. “I didn’t have to.”
She swatted his butt. Laughing, he leaned over and kissed her. She put up token resistance, but then placed her handagainst the back of his head and, after a few ravenous kisses that established their hunger for each other again, he turned the mouth-to-mouth foreplay more languid.
He kissed her throat and moved lower as he went to the top button of her blouse and nimbly undid it. “I’ve wanted to unbutton you since I laid eyes on you.”
