He paused.
“Please make love to me, George.”
“I am making love to you, Phee.”
She grasped his cock. “You know what I mean. Please tup me.”
A chuckle escaped from him. “I guess you’re not very good at innuendo either.”
She ran her hand up and down his length, stroking him. “I would rather have this in me than innuendo.”
She giggled at her own joke and he laughed, too, and it all seemed so natural again to be with him, to have him on top of her, both of them trying to please the other one.
And then she discovered the delight of lying on his chest afterwards, his arms around her, knowing they didn’t have to move, neither one had to leave.
He’s my husband now. I belong here.
“Phee?” he said and kissed the top of her head.
“Mmph?”
“You know how you said you wouldn’t send me away again?”
“Yes?”
“If you ever have to, it’s fine. Just as long . . .”
She raised her head off his chest. His eyes were closed.
“Just as long as what?”
“As long as you don’t run away. My mother, she left five or six times, I think. They were terrible weeks for my father, for me. I don’t think Alice really understood what was going on, she was too young. And, of course, we made sure no one outside the household knew.”
“I’m so sorry, George.”
“So if I’m suffocating you, if you can’t bear me and need me to leave you alone, I’ll go to another part of the house. I’ll sleep in the stables. As long as you don’t run away, as long as I know where you are and you let me see you.”
Her husband had wounds she knew nothing about. She brought her hand up and stroked his head. “I won’t run away.”
He opened his eyes. “Good.”
George made sure there was no fish on the dinner menu and felt an enormous satisfaction in having Phoebe eat with him that night for the first time as his wife. She nibbled at her roast chicken. She laughed when one of her potatoes, slippery with butter, got away from her fork and slid off the plate. She teased him about the book that rested, unopened, next to his own place-setting.
“It’s how I occupied myself when I was eating alone.”
“But now I’m keeping you from your reading?”
“I’m glad to have you keep me from it.”
They went to his study afterwards rather than the drawing room. She sat in her chair.
“Let’s play,” she said.
He felt her looking at him as he got out the table and the chessboard and began setting up the pieces.
“You don’t wear a wig anymore.”
“No.”
