satin beneath her hands. Her fingertips found the three moles on his back, three slick beads which she read as braille. Her palms skimmed his ribs, arms, shoulder blades, learning each dip and furl, each shift of muscle as his hands moved likewise over her.
With her legs she clung, compressing him, herself, so nearly joined that they could not tell her heat from his.
'It’ll be all right tonight, won’t it, Elly?'
'Yes… yes.'
'Will it hurt you?'
'Shh…' She muffled his question with her kiss.
He pulled back. 'I don’t want to hurt you.'
'Then come back to me alive.'
Neither of them had voiced it before. Desperation now became part of their embrace while urgency moved their hands to fondle, explore, stroke. They drew deep breaths, holding momentarily still, the better to absorb the moment, the memory.
'… ohhh…' she breathed, and her head dropped back until her braid touched the water.
He uttered a throaty approval, licked the underside of her chin and kissed what he could reach of her breasts. She was limp with acquiescence and he bade his time, pleasuring her, being pleasured, watching her eyelids flicker open, then close, her lips grow lax, her tongue tip appear as she drifted in a mindless torpor. In time she began moving, stirring the water until it lapped against his chest. Her caresses kept rhythm and he set his teeth, then arched like a strung bow.
The water became quicksilver. Tomorrow became an illusion. Here and now became the imperative.
'Oh, Elly, I wanted to do this so long ago.'
'Why didn’t you?'
'I was waiting for you to say it was all right.'
'It would’ve been all right two weeks ago.'
'Why didn’t you say something?'
'I don’t know… I was scared. Shy.'
'Maybe I was, too. Let’s not be shy.'
'I never did things like this with Glendon.'
'I can show you more.'
She hid her face against his neck.
'Can I wash you?' he asked.
'You want to?'
'I want to be in you. That’s what I want.'
'That’s what I want, too, so hurry.'
They shared the soap. They shared each other. They got to their knees and forsook washcloths in favor of hands. They lathered and kissed, sleek as seals, and twined together and murmured sweet sentiments and adored with hands and tongues. And when the compulsion was magnified to a welcome ache, he grasped her wet arms and pushed her back, freeing his lips. 'Let’s go to bed.'
They stood in the steamy bathroom, impatiently wielding towels, caring little about dry or wet, watching each other, grabbing a quick kiss, laughing excitedly-tense, aroused, ready. He plucked his jeans from the floor and found in a pocket a prophylactic.
'What’s that?'
He closed it in his palm and looked at her. 'I don’t want to get you pregnant again. You got all you’ll be able to handle with no man around the place.'
'You won’t need that.'
'I don’t want to leave you with another one, Elly.'
She stepped across his wet towel, took the packet from his hand and laid it on the high shelf.
'Women don’t get pregnant when they’re nursing, didn’t you know that, Will?'
By an arm she tried to lead him from the room, but he balked. 'Are you sure?'
'I’m sure. Come.'
He took the lantern and they tiptoed into their own bedroom. In it she turned, placed a finger over her lips and mouthed, 'Shh.' Each one taking an end of the basket, they moved Lizzy out into the front room for the night.
When their door was closed they turned to each other. Their pulses seemed to do a stutter step, but neither of them moved. Alone… suddenly hesitant. Until she took the first step and they came together swiftly, kissing and clinging, reminded again of the hourglass shifting its sand. So little time… so much love…
Impatiently he hooked her beneath her knees and carried her to the bed, whispering, 'Pull down the covers.' Riding in his arms, she dragged the spread and blanket over the foot of the bed. On knee and elbows he took her down, dropping across her with their mouths already joined in a frenzied kiss, tongues reaching deep, arms and legs taking possession. It was untamed, that prelude, all lust and anticipation drawn to its maximum. Twist and roll, thrust and rut. Sexual greed such as neither had experienced until now.
When it stopped, it stopped abruptly, he above, she below, their breaths gusty, labored.
'Do you need anything… to make it easier?' The baby’s Vaseline was on the bureau. He’d studied it dozens of times while imagining this moment.
'I need you, Will… nothing else.'
Her kiss silenced him as she hooked his neck with an arm and brought him down.
'I want to make it good for you, Green Eyes.'
He knew how. He’d been taught by the best in a place called La Grange, Texas. He touched her-deep, shallow-with hands and tongue until she bent like a willow in the wind.
As he eased into her body she closed her eyes and saw him as he’d looked that first night, standing on the edge of the clearing, lean and hungry, wary and secretive, hiding beneath his hat-hiding his feelings, his loneliness, his needs.
She closed her eyes and opened her body, offering solace and love to equal his own. It hurt after all, but she hid it well, grasping his head and pulling it down for a deep kiss within which she disguised a soft moan. But soon the moan was dictated by pleasure instead of pain. He took her to the tallest tip of a tree, where she poised-a graceful bird at last, trembled upon the brink of flight, then soared for the first time. Becoming one with the sky, she called his name, twisting, lifting, reborn.
And when her cataclysm had passed, she opened her eyes and watched him follow the way she’d come, watched his gold-beaten hair tapping his forehead, the muscles in his arms standing out like formations in stone, beads of sweat dotting his brow.
He quivered, groaned and pressed deep, arching. He uttered her name, but the sound was trapped by his clenched jaw. When he shuddered in release, she found it glorious to witness, a blessing to receive. She held his shoulders and felt his deep tremors and thought it more beautiful than the flight of an eagle.
When it was over he fell to his side, draping a limp arm on her ribs, waiting for his breathing to slow. Eyes closed, he laughed once, satisfied, replete, then rolled her close, held her in a powerless caress with their damp skins touching.
He rolled his head tiredly and let his eyes caress her. 'You all right, Elly?'
She smiled and touched his chin. 'Shh… I’m holdin’ it in.'
'What?'
'Everything. All the feelin’s you give me.'
'Aw, Elly…'
He kissed her forehead and she spoke against his chin. 'I had three babies, Will-three of ’em-but I never had this. I didn’t know nothin’about this.' She clutched him close. 'Now I find out about it on our last night. Oh, Will, why did we waste two weeks?'
He had no answer, could only hold her and stroke her hair.
'Will, I felt like I always wished I could feel-like I was flying at last. How come that never happened with Glendon?' She braced up on an elbow to look him in the face.
She was such an unspoiled thing, innocent like no woman he’d ever known. 'Maybe ’cause you were married to a good man who never visited a whorehouse.'
