Within Reach (29 page)

He chuckled and shifted position so that he could see her face. It was flushed and damp. He gently kissed dots of moisture from her nose. “Are you happy?”

“Very.”

“No second thoughts?”

“None. How could what we did be wrong? You said it once yourself, that it was only a deeper expression of what we already felt.”

“That it was, but there was nothing ‘only’ about it. It was un-be-lievable!”

She smiled, knowing she felt more feminine and better loved at that moment than in all of the moments of her life combined. She smoothed her hand up from his hip to his chest, delighting in the firmness of his skin, in the rock-hard strength beneath. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, imprinting the scent of his love-warmed body on her senses.

They lay like that, enjoying the quiet closeness as their bodies fully recovered from what had hit each with such force. Then Michael gently pressed her back to the bed.

“I want to look at you,” he explained in a voice that shook with emotion. The light in the cabin was waning, but it was enough to cast a glow on her skin, and propped on an elbow, he took in every inch. His eyes touched her breasts, slid down to her navel, then lower.

Had it been anyone but Michael looking so openly at her naked body, Danica might have tried to cover herself. She wasn’t used to such exposure, but the adoration in his eyes made mockery of her modesty. Tiny ripples of excitement surged through her as his gaze explored one spot, then another. When his hand slid around and over her breast, she bit her lip. Her nipple responded with an instant tightening, which its mate mirrored when his fingers spread the joy. She was trying not to arch off the bed when his hand fell to caress her hips, then her stomach, then the fair curls at the apex of her thighs.

A small whimper slipped through her lips. She closed her eyes and turned her head to the side even as she strained closer to the fingers that were opening her, stroking her. “Michael!” she gasped.

Without removing his hand, he leaned forward to lick the corner of her mouth. “You’re lovely.” His voice was thick.

“I’m awful. I mean, after that…I was so…I should be weak and tired…this couldn’t be.”

“It feels good?”

“Oh yes.”

“That’s how it should be.”

She turned her head and looked up to find him grinning. “Not again. It’s too soon…”

“You’re not the only one who feels it.” His voice was hoarse but held a definite satisfaction. Reaching for her hand, he drew it down his body. She resisted at first, but he was firm in the gentle way that was Michael, so she let him curl her fingers around him. When her eyes widened in surprise, he laughed. “When it’s good, it’s good.”

“But I didn’t think men could…”

“I believe,” he teased gruffly, “that you have proof to the contrary in your hand.” He was showing her the motion that most pleased him, and when she’d begun, timidly at first, to mimic the caress on her own, he returned his fingers to the warm, hidden spot that cried so silently for them.

He marveled at her innocence. From the very first he had known that she had been sheltered from many of the greatest joys of life, but he had never allowed himself to think of her innocence in sexual terms. She had been married for nine years. He had assumed that she was thoroughly aware of a man’s body and her own. It seemed he had assumed wrong. In more ways than one he was pleased. He would be the one to teach her the fine art of love, to teach her the glory of her own body and the ways she could glory in his. She might not have come to him a virgin, but in many ways she was as pure, which made her every response that much more sweet, that much more stimulating. She wasn’t acting on habit or fore-knowledge or training. She was acting on love.

This time he entered her only after he had done the kissing and touching he had so long dreamed of doing. He tasted every inch of her skin, nipping and sucking until she cried out his name, which encouraged him all the more. She was writhing and clutching his back by the time he reached his own limit. He watched her face as he slowly eased into her, delighting in the wonder she couldn’t hide because it was too strong, too real, too heartfelt.

As much as his body would endure he prolonged the mating. He buried himself deep in her, then withdrew, slowly, nearly completely, before surging forward again. She sighed and moaned and sought his lips in a frenzy, but only when she caught her breath, held it, then burst into ragged gasps did he permit his own powerful release.

Arms and legs entwined, they slept then. When Danica awoke, the cabin was totally dark. Disoriented, it took her a minute to remember where she was and what was causing the weight that curved around her waist and over her legs.

“Hi, sleepyhead,” came a familiar voice in the darkness.

“Michael! For a minute I didn’t know…”

“Was it strange?”

“Yes. No. I mean, I’ve slept like this so often…no, that’s not what I mean…I mean, I’ve dreamed of being with you so much that there’s nothing strange about it, but it’s so dark and at first I wasn’t sure if I was still dreaming but your leg is very real and…and I’m…babbling.”

He was laughing. “Don’t stop on my account. I love it.”

“I love you,” she breathed, snuggling closer to his warmth as her heart resumed its normal beat. “What time is it?”

“Nearly ten.”

“Have you been awake for long?”

“Long enough to get my bearings and to realize that I wasn’t dreaming, either.”

“Are you hungry?”

“Very.”

“I can’t move.”

“I could always munch on cold ramaki.”

“Yuk. Throw it overboard. Let the sharks have it.”

“There are no sharks in this water, Dani.”

“Oh.” She took a breath. “Something else will eat it, then. As for me, I could go for one of those nice big juicy steaks we bought.”

“That’s supposed to be my line.”

“Then we’ll reverse roles all the way. You cook.”

“Wh-whoa, wait a minute. I always cook. At least, whenever we’re at my house I do.
You
cook. I can’t move.”

She pressed a kiss to his chest. “That was my line. I think we’re going in circles. How ’bout if we both cook?”

“I guess I can live with that. Of course, there’s still the problem of getting off this damned bed.”

“I don’t know. This bed is pretty nice.”

“I am not going to serve you dinner here.”

“You’re serving dinner?” she asked sweetly.

He scrambled to his knees and picked her up, crawled to the edge of the bed, then promptly stumbled across the minuscule floor space and into the door. Danica yelped. Michael turned to brace his back against the wood.

“Shit, this place is too small.”

“That’s what you get for playing macho. Put me down. My funny bone kills.”

He lowered her slowly, deliberately letting her body slide down his. “Good thinking. We’d never have gotten through the door that way.” His hands were crossed over her bottom. “Wanna shower together.”

“No way.” She was arching back from him, rubbing her elbow. “I saw the shower. It was definitely not made for two.”

“I think you’re shy.” He began to rotate his hips against hers.

“Mostly practical. And at the rate you’re going, bud, you won’t be able to fit in that shower even alone.”

“Are you complaining?” he asked in a husky tone.

“Me? Complain about you?” Elbow forgotten, she put her arms around his neck as he hoisted her up and brought her legs around his hips. “I’d never complain.”

“You don’t sound sure,” he murmured against her lips.

“It’s not that I’m not sure, it’s just that…I think the steak can…wait a little…longer…” Her voice had grown steadily softer and the last of the sound disappeared into his mouth as it closed over hers. Drawn into his kiss, she waited for him to lay her back on the bed, but instead he simply raised her hips and lowered her onto his hardness. She gasped and clung more tightly to his neck, then muffled another cry against him when he began to do something with his finger that made the rhythmic thrust of his hips all the more electric. She was sizzling, burning, exploding into a million scattered pieces, and she wouldn’t have cared if she had died just then because she knew she would have died happy.

Sometime around midnight, the steaks were delicious, as was their lovemaking when they returned to bed soon after, then again when they awoke at dawn.

Danica had never known the physical pleasure Michael showed her, though she knew it would have been nothing without the love that surged uncontrollably between them. If she was stunned by her own abandon, which only increased each time, she was no less stunned by Michael’s gentle skill, his patience, his fiercely tender passion. As she grew freer in touching his body, he grew bolder in touching hers. At one point, when he slid her to the edge of the bed and kneelt between her knees, she demurred, only to be gentled by soft words, then sent to heaven by a velvet tongue, and that inhibition fell with the rest.

By the next morning she doubted she would ever walk again. “I feel about eighty years old,” she told Michael over a breakfast of bacon and eggs.

“You don’t look it. You’re glowing.”

She grinned. “Now that’s a line if I’ve ever heard one. You’re just making excuses for what your beard did.”

He stared at her cheeks, then rubbed his jaw. “I think you’re right. I should have shaved.”

But she quickly reached out to stroke the light stubble. “I was just teasing. I didn’t mind it. You look handsome with a shadow. Did anyone ever tell you that?” When he shook his head but still seemed unsure, she went on. “I remember it from the day I met you for the very first time. You looked so roguish then, but you were gentle, always gentle. I don’t think you could be any other way.”

“With you, no.” He leaned forward to kiss her, sweetly and at length, before dragging himself off to shave.

Danica insisted on watching, which was not the easiest thing given the size of the head, but it was a small intimacy to go with the others and was a precursor of the day to come. They were beside each other constantly, holding hands, kissing, touching, making up for lost time and enjoying every minute.

They cruised leisurely through Penobscot Bay, then made their way slowly south, back down the coast, before dropping anchor for the night by an island just east of Port Clyde. They ate in style, by candlelight, with wine, and spent hours lying on the V-berth just talking, being close. Their lovemaking was different then, slower, more savoring, richer for the knowledge each had gained of the other, fuller for the knowledge each had gained of the other, fuller for the confidence they shared.

Sated and content, they fell asleep. When Danica awoke the next morning, it was to the sound of the engine and the forward motion of the boat. Throwing on her clothes, she ran to the helm.

“Why didn’t you wake me? I should have gotten up with you!”

Michael drew her close to his side. “It’s only seven, and you were exhausted.” He kissed her temple. “This thing’s due back at ten, though. I figured I’d better get a move on.”

The thought of returning to land put a damper on what was already a cloudy day. Danica tried to push it from her mind. “Have you eaten anything?”

“Nope.”

“Would you like something?”

“Yup.”

With a gentle smile and a promising pat to his stomach, she returned to the cabin and made breakfast. After they’d eaten, she cleaned up as best she could, then returned to his side. But the closer they came to Kennebunkport, the more uneasy she felt. Occasional glances at Michael told her that he too sensed the encroachment of reality. Though he maintained a constant physical contact with her—an arm around her waist or her shoulder, or her hand held tightly in his—he seemed somehow distant. They were thirty minutes from home when he abruptly killed the engine and turned to her.

“Divorce Blake, Dani. Divorce Blake and marry me.”

For a minute she couldn’t breathe. She wondered if she had known it was coming, if it was precisely this that she had feared might happen if their fantasy was given full reign.

“I know how you feel about divorce,” he went on, his features tense, “and I know how you feel about your family. But we have something that most people spend a lifetime looking for and never find. We can’t just let it go.”

Danica stared up at him, wishing more than anything that he hadn’t raised the issue but knowing that he wouldn’t have been Michael if he hadn’t, particularly given the weekend they had just spent. She was almost surprised he had waited this long. She took an unsteady breath, then moved to the far side of the boat and tucked her hands deep in her pockets.

“Talk to me, Dani. Say something.”

She hesitated. When she finally spoke, her voice was soft and filled with a feminine version of the pain she had heard in his deeper voice. “What can I say?”

“Say ‘yes.’ Say ‘no.’ Say
something.
”

She shook her head. “There’s not much I can say. I’ve been through this so many times myself. I’ve asked the questions and made the arguments and gone back and forth with my mind saying one thing and my heart saying another, and I just don’t know what the answer is. I don’t think I can do anything, at least not yet.”

Michael clenched a fist in frustration. “But what do you have with Blake that I can’t give you?” When she simply shook her head and refused to look at him, he went on. “You hate Washington, which Blake loves. He hates Maine, which you love. Boston is the only ground you really share and do you really share it? From what you’ve said, the time you spend together is purely for the sake of social obligation. It’s a marriage without feeling. Am I wrong?” She didn’t answer. “
Am
I? When was the last time you laughed with him? When was the last time you enjoyed yourself, really enjoyed yourself, with him? When was the last time you made love with him the way you did this weekend with me?”

“Never!” Then she lowered her voice to a near whisper. “We haven’t made love in over a year.”

He had suspected as much, though he had felt guilty hoping it. “Have you missed it?”