Second Choice Wife novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Change the Deal

Naomi asks her husband to change the terms of their paper marriage, and they spend the first night either of them has wanted for a year; in the morning a suitcase waits in the hall.

The drive home was forty minutes of nothing.

I kept my eyes on the dark road and both hands on the wheel.

Heath sat in the passenger seat looking straight ahead.

His mouth was still a little red.

Every few miles I felt him turn his head to look at me, and every time I didn't look back.

Eleanor's lights were off when we pulled up to the house.

It was a big old brick place at the end of a long drive, with a master suite on the second floor and his mother's wing on the first.

I parked, turned off the engine, and sat there.

"Naomi," he said.

"Don't say you're sorry."

"I wasn't going to."

"Don't say it was for show either."

He was quiet.

Then, very low, "It wasn't."

I opened my door and got out.

I walked up the front steps in the green dress with my heels in my hand and let myself in.

He came in behind me and shut the door.

The foyer was dark except for the moon through the fanlight.

I turned around.

"The deal had no sex in it," I said. "You wrote that part yourself."

"I did."

"I'd like to change it."

He didn't move.

I could see his chest rising and falling under the white shirt.

"You're angry," he said. "You had a terrible night, she said what she said, and you're angry."

"I'm not angry."

"Naomi."

"I've been lying next to you for fourteen months. I know exactly what I'm feeling, Heath. I want my husband."

I watched it land.

He shut his eyes.

When he opened them again, something in his face had cracked down the middle.

"You don't know what you're asking for," he said.

"Then show me."

I dropped my shoes.

I crossed the floor and took hold of his lapels and he caught my wrists.

He wasn't pushing me off.

He was holding on.

"Say it again," he said hoarsely.

"I want you."

His hands let go of my wrists and came up to my face.

He kissed me like the first time, only this time nobody was watching.

His mouth was hot and slow and then not slow.

I backed into the wall beside the stairs and he followed, his whole body pinning mine, one big hand spread on my ribs, the other holding the back of my head.

He tasted like the mint he always kept in his jacket and something under it, something I had only imagined.

I got his tie loose and then his collar open.

"Upstairs," he muttered against my throat.

"Here."

"My mother's right below us."

"Then be quiet."

He laughed. It was a short, startled sound, rusty from lack of use.

He lifted me by the backs of my thighs and carried me up the stairs.

I wrapped my legs around his waist and kissed his jaw and the scar through his eyebrow, and he stumbled on the landing and swore.

The bedroom door banged against the wall.

He set me on the edge of the bed and knelt in front of me.

His hands shook on the zipper at my back.

"Heath," I said. "Take it off me."

He drew the zipper down slowly, all the way, and kissed each inch of my spine as it came open.

The dress slid off my shoulders and pooled at my waist.

I turned and pulled him down onto the mattress with me.

He was heavier than I'd thought, and warmer, and he stared at me like I was something he wasn't allowed to have.

"You're beautiful," he said, rough.

"Stop looking and touch me."

He did.

His hands moved over my breasts, my ribs, my stomach, learning me carefully and completely.

His mouth followed.

When he pulled the lace aside and took my nipple between his lips I arched off the bed and said his name too loudly.

"Quiet," he said, smiling against my skin.

"Make me."

"Gladly."

He kissed me again, hard, and his hand slid between my thighs.

He found me soaked.

He made a sound I felt in my own chest.

"God," he breathed. "You're so wet."

"For you. Always you."

I got my hands on his belt and he helped me, and then there was nothing between us at all.

He was thick and hot and hard against my hip, and I took him in my fist and he shuddered all over.

"Slow," he begged. "I don't think I can."

"Then don't."

I guided him to me.

He pushed in with one long, careful stroke and stopped, buried to the root, his forehead pressed against mine, both of us shaking.

I had never felt so full.

"Move," I whispered.

He moved.

He started slow and deep, rolling his hips, and every stroke dragged along the place inside me that made my toes curl.

I wrapped my legs around him and met every thrust.

His breath came hard against my ear.

"Naomi. Naomi."

"Harder."

He gave me what I asked for.

The bed hit the wall.

I bit his shoulder to keep from screaming and his hand clamped over my mouth, gently, and I licked his palm and felt him jerk inside me.

"Don't," he groaned. "Not yet. I want to feel you first."

He reached between us and rubbed my clit in tight circles with his thumb while he fucked me, and the heat in my belly drew tighter and tighter until I broke.

I came with my whole body clenched around him, crying out into his hand.

He followed a few strokes later, with a ragged shout he swallowed against my neck, spilling hot and deep inside me.

For a long time neither of us moved.

His heart hammered against mine.

I stroked the back of his damp neck, and he shivered under my hand.

Finally he lifted his head.

His eyes were wet.

"I haven't touched anyone in ten years," he said.

I stared at him.

"Not since the night everything ended. I couldn't. I thought I'd forgotten how."

"You didn't."

"No." He swallowed. "I didn't."

I pulled his head down to my shoulder and held it there.

He fell asleep like that, on top of me, with his arm around my waist like he was afraid I'd leave.

For the first time in fourteen months, there was no gap between us.

I woke at seven to sunlight on the carpet.

Heath was already gone from the bed, and I could hear the shower running.

I wrapped myself in the sheet and went to the hall for my robe.

A black leather suitcase stood outside the guest wing door, with a pale pink scarf tied to the handle.

Eleanor came out of her room, fully dressed, pearls on.

She looked at the sheet around me and her mouth tightened.

"I've invited Bridget to stay with us," she said. "Until she finds a place. It's the least this family can do."

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