Susan Johnson: Again and Again

He really was unconscionably gorgeous, she thought, taking in the splendor of his tall, rangy form. She could see the scars from the war, visible now in the rising light of dawn; they’d gone unnoticed in the darkness. He’d always discounted them as “nothing… a little shrapnel” when he’d almost died from loss of blood. They’d faded since she’d seen him last, although the scars still streaked his body. He was leaner than she remembered, breathtaking in his raw virility-his taut, hard musculature honed, no doubt, by his life of excess.

It wasn’t at all fair when she hadn’t had sex for so long, she thought, resentful in a totally illogical way that ignored the circumstances of their lives and society’s disparate sexual standards. She shifted her hips faintly, as though she could repress the shimmering heat turning liquid between her thighs as she gazed at his damnable perfection. “You’re irritating me,” she said, apropos of nothing even remotely reasonable.

“You’ll feel better when you warm up.”

“Simon, listen to me. We have to be rational about this.” Even as she spoke, her body was intent on defying reason, a molten heat beginning to melt through her veins.

“I am.”

“I’m not talking about having tea here,” she said, pettish and much too aroused for her peace of mind.

“I know what you’re talking about. I’ll have this fire going in no time.”

How could he speak so calmly when her emotions were in tumult? Could he really be unaware of how irresistibly male he was squatting on his haunches, his powerful torso twisting and turning as he transferred logs from the wood box to the fire, his muscles rippling and contracting with each unhurried swing.

Licks of flame were beginning to leap from the coals, igniting the kindling. “There. We’ll have a blaze going in no time,” he said as though he were a eunuch, as though they were asexual strangers, as though the pulsing inside her hadn’t accelerated at the thought he might be coming back. Rising to his feet, he brushed off his hands and turned to her. “Are you hungry?”

“Meaning what?” She spoke a trifle too breathlessly.

This wouldn’t be the time to make any sudden moves, he understood. “I have food here… that’s all.”

“Please, Simon, for God’s sake, don’t talk to me about food or the weather or the state of the world in that calm voice when I’m ready to scream or hit you or bang my head against the wall.”

She needed sex, he thought, but sensible of his audience, he said, “We’ll talk about something else then. If it’s not too late, I’d like to offer my abject apology for last night.”

“Simon… everything’s too late for us. And you don’t know what abject means.”

He smiled faintly. “Maybe I could learn.”

“And maybe I could sprout wings and fly.”

“Come, darling,” he cajoled, undeterred by her sarcasm. “You have to admit, Lady Luck or fate or some jinn spirits had a hand in our meeting.” He smiled. This is a god-awful place to bump into each other.“

She blew out a breath, her pagan antenna twitching fiercely at the mystical implications of so rare an occurrence, “like ships passing in the night, you mean.”

“In a blizzard, yet” His brows rose. Think about it.“

She pulled the covers over her head. “I don’t want to think about it.”

Her muffled words made him smile. “Would you like to think about it over breakfast? I do have food.”

Flipping the covers back, she gave him a hard, flinty look. “Whatever works? Is that your strategy?”

“Jesus, Caro, I don’t have a strategy. I wish like hell I did and then you wouldn’t be scowling at me. You’d be smiling. I’d be smiling. The world would be sweet-scented and untainted by iniquity.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Speaking of iniquity. Finding you in my bed isn’t very subtle.”

He gave her one of those tolerant looks that parents give to a child who’s being unnecessarily obstinate. “We’ve slept together a thousand times.”

“Don’t remind me. How do you do it, by the way?”

“What?”

“Keep from having an erection?”

She’d noticed. A definite point for his side. “I try to think of something gruesome-like decaying cadavers.” He glanced down. “But right now, it’s colder than hell.” He grinned. “Do you think I could come in and warm up?”

She nodded at his crotch. “Just to warm up. That’s all.”

He roiled his eyes as he walked toward the bed. “Talk about fifteen.”

“Am I making too much of this?”

He shrugged. “You’re asking the wrong person.”

“Because a fuck is a fuck is a fuck.”

“Sometimes.” He lifted the quilt “Not now.”

“How charming.”

“If I wanted to be charming,” he said, sliding into bed, “I’d lie.”

“Because that’s what you do best.”

Lying back on the pillow, he slid his hands under his head and glanced at her. “That’s not what I do best”

She grimaced. “I’m not entirely sure I don’t hate you.”

“For this?”

“For everything.”

He didn’t ask what everything was. He knew. The specter of their parting had haunted every word they’d spoken since they met downstairs. “I’m sorry about that night. I was drunk. I thought it was you.”

“Then you should have come after me and explained.”

“I know.” And if she hadn’t called him every vile name on earth, he might have.

“But you didn’t. You stayed with her all night.”

“I’d been drinking for two days if that’s any excuse. I probably fell asleep.”

“You probably didn’t I know what you probably did.”

“And you ran to Louvois,” he said as bitterly as she.

“Do you blame me?”

He shut his eyes for a moment and then stared at the ceiling as he spoke, his voice constrained. “I don’t want to fight about this. He’s gone; she’s gone. Five years are gone. I missed you. And that’s God’s own truth.”

“Because it’s useful to say that right now.”

He turned his head and looked at her. “Because it’s the truth.”

It took her a very long time to respond.

“Very well, then.”

His gaze narrowed. “What a condescending tone. Are you my mother?”

“I dearly hope not,” she said in an altogether different tone, “considering my carnal interest in you.”

His smile was suddenly sunshine bright “Are you finally sure?”

She nodded.

It was his turn to pause. “Just to be absolutely certain there’s no misunderstanding,” he said, each word measured, “say five years from now or five minutes from now-you have to ask me.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” She edged away.

“I don’t want any recriminations later about who did what to whom.”

“I’m not asking.”

‘Jesus, Caro, you never had any problem asking before.“

‘That was different. You’re making me say it.“

He took a deep breath. “Fine. We’ll both ask. Would that be better?”

Another long pause and then she nodded.

“Arranging the peace treaty with France was probably less onerous,” he grumbled, sitting up and drawing an imaginary line between them on the bed. Holding out his hand so it rested directly above that designated halfway point, he tipped his head in her direction. “I would very much like to make love to you, Lady Caroline. If you approve of the arrangement, we could shake on it.”

She held up one finger to test the temperature of the air.

“It’s warm,” he said.

“Your warm and my warm are different.”

He grinned. They never used to be.“

“Very funny.” But she rose to a seated position and held out her hand just short of his. “I find myself inclined to make love to you, Your Grace.”