Chapter 12: What I Buried

"You said nothing happens while I'm his wife," Briggs said against my mouth.

"I buried that marriage on the drive home last week," I said. "I just hadn't told you."

He laughed, low and shaky, and then he stopped laughing.

"Lena. Are you sure?"

"Drive."

He drove us to his hotel with one hand on the wheel and the other wrapped around mine, and neither of us said another word.

The room was on the fourth floor, with a lamp on and a made bed.

I kicked the door shut and pushed him back against it.

He let me.

I pulled his jacket off his shoulders and dropped it on the floor.

His shirt came next, one button at a time, because I wanted to see him slowly.

He was broader than I remembered, tanned to the collar and pale below it.

I put my mouth against his chest, where his heart was going hard.

"Seven years," I said.

"Seven years," Briggs said, and his hands shook as they came up under my sweatshirt.

He pulled it over my head and stopped.

He looked at me for a long moment, in the lamplight, with his lips parted.

"Say something," I said.

"I've wanted to see you like this since I was thirty years old."

Heat ran through me from my scalp to my knees.

I took his wrist and put his hand on my breast.

He groaned.

His thumb found my nipple through the lace and circled it, and I gasped and arched into his palm.

"Lena." His voice had dropped. "Tell me what you want."

"You," I said. "Everything. Now."

He lifted me off my feet, and I wrapped my legs around his waist.