A Secret in Her Father's House, A Pregnancy Neither Can Hide novel · Chapter 3 of 24
Chapter 3: Terms
Alana sets rules for the secret and Henrik adds one of his own; the neighbour arrives with a pie and sees two mugs.
Henrik handed her a mug of coffee before she had said good morning.
It was made the way she took it, with a splash of milk and no sugar.
She had not told him how she took it in six years.
"You remembered," Alana said.
"I remember everything about you."
He said it to the stove, in the same flat voice he used for fish prices.
She sat at the kitchen table with both hands around the mug.
Her thighs ached in a way that made her think of his hips.
She crossed her legs and tried to look like a woman who had slept.
"I have rules," she said.
Henrik turned around and leaned on the counter with his arms folded.
"Go ahead."
"It was a mistake."
"You said that."
"It was a mistake that happened once, and if it happens again..." She stopped and made herself start over. "If it happens again, it happens inside this house, with the doors shut."
"Okay."
"Never outside. Never where anyone can see us. Not a hand, not a look, not a joke."
"Okay."
"And it ends the day I leave."
He didn't answer that one right away.
Out on the river a gull screamed and went on screaming.
"The day you leave," he said.
"Yes."
"Fine." He unfolded his arms. "I have one."
She felt her chin come up. "Of course you do."
"You tell me the truth about what you want. Not what you think you're allowed to want. If you don't want something, you say so, and I stop. If you do, you say that too." He held her eyes. "Out loud. Every time."
"That's the same thing you said last night."
"It's the only thing I said last night that mattered."
She looked down into her coffee.
"Fine," she said.
"Say it properly."
Her stomach dropped, and then it burned, low and bright.
"Yes," she said. "I agree."
"Good girl."
He went out the back door to check the boat.
She sat at the table with her face hot and her heart pounding.
She was twenty-six years old.
She managed a four-million-dollar renovation.
Nobody had ever told her what to do and made her want to thank them for it.
By noon she had given up on remote work.
She took her laptop down to the dock instead.
The Maren was tied up at the end of the pier.
She was thirty-eight feet of white hull and old teak, with a faded blue stripe.
Henrik was on the deck in a sweat-dark T-shirt, splicing a line with his hands.
He didn't look up.
"Sit," he said.
She sat on the engine hatch in the sun and watched his forearms.
He worked quickly and without wasted motion.
The veins stood out along his arm when he pulled the line tight.
She looked away, and then she looked back.
He knew she was watching.
He didn't smile, but the corner of his mouth tightened.
"Morning, Henrik!" a woman called from the next dock over.
It was Sigrid Sundberg, the neighbor, in a yellow cardigan, with a bucket of crab pots at her feet.
"Morning, Sigrid."
"Is that Alana? Lord, look at you, girl. You've gotten so grown."
"Hi, Sigrid," Alana called.
She waved, and her face stayed pleasant.
Under her laptop her hands were shaking.
Sigrid said something about Sunday and a casserole and walked off up the pier.
When she was gone Henrik finally looked up.
"You did that well," he said.
"Did what?"
"Lied. Smiled. Waved." He tossed the line aside and climbed down off the cabin. "I'm not sure how I feel about how good you are at it."
"You said you wouldn't give me a hard time."
"I haven't said anything of the kind."
He stepped close enough that she had to tip her head back.
He didn't touch her at all, and she felt it anyway.
"Go up to the house," he said quietly. "I'll be there at five. Don't change."
"Why?"
"Because I want to see you in that."
She was wearing a grey cotton dress and sandals.
She went up to the house, and she did not get a single thing done all afternoon.
He came in at five exactly, smelling of salt and diesel.
She was standing in the kitchen, because she hadn't been able to sit.
He locked the front door and drew the blind on the window over the sink.
"Come here," he said.
She crossed the floor and stopped in front of him.
"Tell me what you want."
Her throat was tight. "I want you to touch me."
"Where?"
"Everywhere."
"Be specific."
"My..." She closed her eyes. "I want your mouth on me, Henrik."
"Open your eyes."
She opened them.
His expression was dark and hungry and absolutely serious.
He picked her up by the waist and sat her on the kitchen counter.
The marble was cold through her dress.
He pushed her skirt up over her thighs and spread her knees apart with both hands.
She held on to the edge of the counter and watched him kneel.
"Look at that," Henrik said.
He hooked a finger in her underwear and slid it down her legs, and she lifted her hips so he could pull it free.
He put it in his pocket.
"That's mine now."
"You can't keep..."
"Watch me."
He put his hands under her thighs and pulled her to the very edge of the counter.
Then he put his mouth on her.
She made a sound that was not a word.
His tongue was slow and flat and unhurried.
His stubble rasped on her inner thighs.
He licked her.
She shoved her hand into his hair.
"Henrik."
"Tell me."
"There. Right there. Don't stop."
He found her clit and drew it into his mouth, and her back arched off the cabinet behind her.
He slid two fingers inside her and pumped them slowly in time with his tongue.
Her whole body started to tighten.
"I'm going to..."
"Not yet."
He slowed down.
She nearly sobbed. "Please."
"Please what?"
"Please let me come. Please, Henrik, please."
"Again."
"Please."
He went back to it.
She bit her own wrist to keep from being heard through the open window.
She came with her thighs clamped around his head and her fingers locked in his hair.
He held her there afterward and kissed the inside of her knee.
She looked down and saw her own wetness shining on his chin.
He wiped it off with the back of his hand.
"One more rule," he said hoarsely. "Next time, you don't have to cover your mouth."
Somebody knocked at the front door.
It was a bright quick knock, three taps.
Henrik stood and straightened her skirt in one motion.
"Sigrid," he muttered. "Casserole."
She jumped down from the counter with her legs shaking.
He opened the door with perfect calm.
Sigrid stood on the porch with a pie in her hands.
She looked at him.
She looked at the two coffee mugs still on the table.
She looked at Alana's flushed face and wrecked hair.
"I just wanted to say welcome home, honey."
"Thank you, Sigrid," Alana said.
"Your father told me yesterday you were staying a month." Sigrid's smile did not change. "Funny. This morning he said three weeks."
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