“I don’t want to live without you.”
He reached for her, bringing her onto his lap, his mouth instinctively finding hers. Everything she’d planned to say was caught between two hungry mouths. Trapped between two pounding hearts.
Fourteen
Several months later a storm, a Seattle cloudburst, woke Charlotte. Dawn was on the horizon, but very little light filtered through the gray clouds. The wind beat hard against the windows, rattling them until Charlotte feared they might break.
Gently setting aside the covers, she climbed out of bed and crept into the living room. Higgins was sleeping there, looking worried. She patted his head and offered him reassurances.
She opened the living-room drapes just in time to watch a bolt of lightning rip apart the night. For an hour or so afterward, smiling contentedly, she watched morning creep across the sky. Her life, inside and out, was everything she wanted it to be. Jason had moved into her apartment; they planned to buy a house in the spring. She was taking a break from work, enrolled in an advanced accounting course. Eventually she’d handle all of his bookkeeping and maybe look for a few other clients, too. Yes, life was full of new possibilities.
“Charlotte?” Jason murmured when she returned to bed. He reached for her and without a second’s hesitation she slipped into his embrace.
“There’s a storm,” she whispered.
His smile was lazy, sleepy. “So I hear. Are you frightened?”
“Not anymore.” There’d been a time when she would’ve been terrified, but that time was long past. She felt intensely alive, completely calm. The dangerous storms were gone from her life. She’d survived the raging wind, the drenching rain, the booming thunder. That was all in the past. Her future was holding her in his arms.
She sighed, cuddling close to her husband, suffused with a feeling of profound joy.
“I love you,” she whispered.
“I know,” he said without opening his eyes. “Believe me, I know.”
She slid her arms up his shoulders and brought her mouth to his. He welcomed her kiss, which was slow and deep. Hot excitement poured into her blood. Soon the kiss was no longer slow, but hungry, needy.
Charlotte felt Jason’s chest lift with a shuddering intake of breath.
“I want to make love,” she said against his lips.
Jason went still. His hand, which was sliding up her thigh, stopped at her hip.
“You’re sure?”
It was the first time she’d ever made the request, the first time she’d ever initiated their lovemaking.
“Yes.”
Lightning briefly brightened the room, shadows frolicked and danced against the walls, followed by the roar of thunder. The bedroom vibrated with sound.
Jason, ever-sensitive to her moods, paused, but she refused to allow any hesitation. She drew his mouth down to hers and they kissed, until Charlotte’s whole body seemed to throb with excitement.
Gently Jason removed her nightgown, pulling it over her head. He’d awakened her to an entire world of sensual pleasure in the months since their marriage, a world she wanted to explore now.
He hungrily covered her mouth with his own and her head spun, her nails digging into his back. Abruptly she broke off the kiss, her shoulders heaving. “Jason, please…I want you.”
He didn’t need any further encouragement….
“Okay, so far?” he asked sometime later.
“Oh, yes,” she whispered, smiling her assurance. The pleasure was so keen it was almost beyond bearing.
Lightning flashed and thunder rolled, punctuating their lovemaking. “Jason…oh, Jase,” she cried out, her voice a trembling wail of pleasure as her senses caught fire, exploding into a mindless madness. Her body shuddered as she gave herself to the storm, to her husband, to the night.
Afterward, when he, too, had reached completion, they were both panting. Jason gathered her in his arms, and they were silent, words between them unnecessary.
Eventually their breathing steadied.
“I still have trouble believing how good this is,” Charlotte whispered. “Making love, I mean.”
Jason kissed the crown of her head. “It always has been.”
“Not in the beginning.”
“It was,” he said. “Because you let me try to prove how much I love you.”
Charlotte was quiet for a moment as she absorbed his words. Their first attempts at making love, on their honeymoon, had left her frustrated and in tears. She was convinced Jason had made a terrible mistake in marrying her. He wouldn’t allow her to criticize herself, though. His patience astonished her and gave her the courage to keep trying.
She’d struggled with her inadequacies, silently condemning herself, but on the seventh night of their stay, they’d broken through the restraints and made beautiful, intoxicating love. Charlotte had wanted everything to be magically different from then on, but that would have been unrealistic. Her fears were unpredictable and continued to be for weeks. But now, four months after their wedding, loving Jason was the most incredible experience of her life.
Tears slipped down Charlotte’s cheeks as she recalled the first weeks of their marriage—his gentleness, his unwillingness to give up, his love.
“You’re crying,” he whispered, his lips against her hair.
“You’re not supposed to notice.”
“But I have. Are you going to tell me why?”
Emotion clogged her throat as she struggled to hold back the tears. “In a minute.”
Jason’s brow creased with a thoughtful frown. “Is it something that came from your meeting with Bill?”