Chapter 4: First Night

The judge married us in four minutes between a divorce and a traffic dispute.

He asked if I took this man, and I said I did.

He asked Glenn, and Glenn said, "I do," in a voice that did not sound like a janitor's.

Then he kissed me, quickly, politely, on the corner of my mouth.

It was the most polite kiss I have ever been given, and I felt it all the way down my spine.

We ate tacos on the courthouse steps and did not talk about it.

We rode the 14 bus back to Fenner Street with the marriage certificate folded in my purse.

By nightfall the laundromat downstairs had gone quiet.

He had put a candle on the card table, a stub he must have found in a drawer.

"It's not much of a wedding night," he said.

He stood at the window with his back to me.

"I'm not asking for a wedding night," I said.

"I know."

He turned around.

His eyes went to my mouth and stayed there.

I crossed the small room and reached him.

"Sam," I said.

"Jean."

I put my hand flat on his chest.

His heart was going hard under my palm.

"Tell me to stop," I said.

"No," he said.

His voice broke on the word.

That was all I needed.

I took hold of his collar and pulled his mouth down onto mine.

He made a rough sound against my lips.

His hands came up to my face, and I kissed him harder to show him I would not.

I tasted coffee and the salt of the tacos.

I walked him backward until his knees hit the edge of the bed, and he sat down with me in his lap.

"Wait," he said, breathless.

"No."

I pulled his shirt over his head.

His chest was broad and warm, with a dark gold trail of hair down the middle of his stomach.

The scar ran down his forearm.

I put my mouth on it.

He swore under his breath.

"You're beautiful," he said. "God, Jean, you don't know."

Keep reading free with an account. Start Swept Away by My Janitor Husband from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.