“Hey,” I said in surprise.
“I am so fucking horny,” he growled. “I want to be inside you right now.”
For the sake of his career and my dignity, I moved off him, slid behind the wheel of the car, and put the key in the ignition. “How about I get us home first?” I whispered, and Paul didn’t say anything, only reached for my hand and rubbed it against the bulge in his pants.
This was all well and good until I had to shift gears. “I need my hand back,” I said as I pulled into traffic, and Paul relinquished it, briefly, then unzipped his pants and released his anatomy from the stranglehold of his briefs.
“I am so hard right now,” he said as he stroked himself.
I glanced over at his lap. He wasn’t wrong. “Tell that to the Carabinieri when they pull us over.”
“No one can see,” said Paul softly as he reached for my hand once more. This time he folded it around the pink shaft of his penis and moved it up and down until I gave up and began to do it for him.
On the drive home, there was a small turnoff, just a dirt road that led up into the hills. “Pull over,” Paul said, and because he was in a compromised position, I did as he asked.
“Am I going to be able to turn around?” I said as I navigated the narrow lane, but Paul didn’t care. He had begun touching himself again, and as soon as the car was in park, he told me to get on top of him. I lookedbehind us at the Via Padule, where the occasional car zipped by. “What if someone comes?”
“No one’s coming,” said Paul.
“Someone could.”
“For the love of God, Eileen. I’m dying.” His voice was practically a whimper. “Take off your shorts and get over here.”
It wasn’t that I didn’t want to have sex. I did. But I could see this plan’s flaws. For one thing, we had no idea who lived at the end of the road and how often they made use of it. For another, my shorts—once removed—would be impossible to get back into in a hurry.
There was a third, more pressing concern. “My diaphragm’s at home.”
“Just let me put it in for a minute,” he said, and I smiled in spite of myself.
“A minute, huh?”
He got the joke. “Maybe less if you keep teasing me like this.” He reached for my hand, guiding it back to his penis.
“Paul,” I whispered in a treacly sweet voice I barely recognized. “Remember what we talked about?”
He wrapped his own hand around mine and started to move them in tandem. “Remind me.”
“Not getting pregnant?”
“Right,” he said, but his eyes were closed, and he was in another world. “How about just a little pregnant?”
“Not funny.”
“I promise I’ll pull out.”
“You will not,” I said, and he held up three fingers.
“Scout’s honor.”
The whole time we were talking, our hands were moving in a steady rhythm, slowly at first, and then faster, until eventually, I didn’t have to bother making the case for not having intercourse. Paul let out a sharp gasp and came in his hand, and while he cleaned himself up, I focused extra hard on reversing down the narrow dirt road so I wouldn’t have to think too deeply about how this reunion hadn’t been exactly what I’d had in mind.
87.
PAUL HAD A COUPLE OFdays off when he got back from the cruise, so we decided we’d take the ferry over to Palau and try to find the Roccia dell’Orso, which was just a big rock shaped like a bear.
There were signs at the ferry landing directing us up into the hills, and when we came to a small parking lot, more arrows pointed us up a steep path. “This better be worth it,” said Paul as we got out of the car.
Paul hadn’t asked many questions about how I’d filled my days while he was gone, and I hadn’t offered much, but I’d spent a lot of time thinking about what I’d tell him if hedidask.
