Lisa Cach - The Erotic Secrets Of A French Maid

"I'm glad you liked it. The meal, I mean. And the rest." She bit her lip, then her eyes widened. "Oh, I almost forgot!" She grabbed two plastic containers off the counter and thrust them at him. "Leftovers, if you want them."

"You don't?"

She shrugged. "I can cook. You can't. Besides, I still have the ice cream."

He accepted the containers. "Thanks. This should last me through the weekend."

"Good." She smiled, and a silent moment stretched between them. "I'll-" she started.

"I'll-" he said at the same time, and stopped. "You first."

"I was just going to say, Til see you Monday, then?' Same time?"

"Yes."

"Great!"

They went to the door together and there was another moment of tense awkwardness. "Good night, then," he said.

"Yes, good night."

He opened the door and looked back at her, trying to read her expression. Trying to see if she wanted a goodnight kiss, or if she just wanted him gone. He couldn't tell.

"Sleep well," he said, and then gestured to the containers. "And thanks."

"You're welcome. Drive safe."

"Good night."

" 'Night."

He turned and walked down the corridor, and heard her gently close the door to the apartment.

When he was back in his car and driving home, his brain began to torment him with self-doubt as he mentally replayed the events. He'd bored her at dinner; he'd been stiff and awkward in conversation and action; he hadn't given her an orgasm.

He felt the burn of embarrassment on his face. He hadn't given her an orgasm.

Maybe she hadn't enjoyed any of it. Maybe the moans and writhing had all been for show, to make him feel good about his prowess. He'd never been with a woman who made so much noise. "Vm here to please you," she'd said. Maybe writhers and moaners existed only in the land of make-believe.

Ah, Christ. He'd just had the most surprising, most erotic, most weirdly exciting sex of his life, and all he could think was that she probably hadn't enjoyed a bit of it. She'd probably been imagining herself anywhere but in bed with him, her mind a thousand miles away. He may as well have been masturbating.

This was no way for a man with self-respect to entertain himself. He'd call her tomorrow and end it.

1 can't believe you lucked into this place so fast," Daphne said, rinding a spot on the windowsill for the plant she'd brought as a housewarming gift.

"God, I'm envious," Emma's friend Beth said, from the futon couch that was the only piece of furniture in the living area. "You're single, thin, and living in a posh apartment in Belltown."

"Don't give me that. I remember how loud and long you moaned about being single. You couldn't wait to get married and pregnant and move to the burbs."

Beth put her hands on her eighth-month belly and made a face. "That was before I knew what was in store for me, or that Ty was only pretending to know how to use a washing machine. Do you know, he leaves his dirty clothes all over the house. You'd think a grown man would know better than to take off clothes at random and drop them on the floor. I'm pregnant, for God's sake! Does he think it's easy for me to bend down and pick them up? It's frickin' impossible!"

"You'd better take her out to lunch," Daphne said in a stage whisper. "Blood sugar. Dangerously low."

"Just you wait," Beth said. "Derek will be just as bad. Oh, they pretend to cook for themselves and to keep their bathroom clean before you're legally bound to them, but the moment they've got you locked up in their pumpkin shell, there they keep you very well!" She angrily plucked at the fringe on the pillow.

"What happened to the glow of pregnancy?" Emma asked.

"Fuck the glow! It's a fucking lie!" Beth started to cry.

Emma and Daphne exchanged wide-eyed glances; then both went to sit on either side of Beth and comfort her.

"It's nothing like I thought it would be," Beth said, wiping at her running nose with the back of her hand and snuffling. "Everything on TV makes it look so lovely and beautiful and like it's going to be the best thing in the world. They don't tell you what's going to happen to your body. They don't tell you that you can hardly breathe, or sleep at night, or that you have to pee every ten minutes. They don't tell you that you can't stay awake for more than a few hours, or that your emotions get all wonky so that you start crying for no flippin' reason. They don't tell you that you'll be frickin' scared to death about everything that could go wrong, and that your husband will just say, 'You worry too much. Women drop babies in rice paddies in China all the time and just keep on working, no problem. You'll be fine.' I'm not a fucking farmer in a rice paddy! I'll bet they're just as pissed off at their husbands, anyway! Who leaves a woman to give birth in a rice paddy?"

Beth snuffled. "I haven't even chosen a theme yet for the baby's room. What type of mother am I?"

Emma wrapped her arms around her and gave her a hug. "Maybe a normal one."

Beth sniffled. "You think so?"

Daphne's cell phone rang, playing a snippet of The Rolling Stones's "You Can't Always Get What You Want." "Hi, sweetie! Yeah, I'm about done here…" Her voice faded out as she went into the other room to finish her conversation.

"Are things really so bad?" Emma asked Beth.

Beth shrugged. "I don't know. I can't tell anymore. It's like I have the worst case of PMS ever, times ten. It messes up my perspective, but I swear, Ty doesn't understand anything about what I'm going through."

"Ty adores you."

"I think he's afraid of me." Beth smiled through her tears. "For good reason, maybe. The happy woman he married has turned into a lunatic." Her smile faded. "And the tender, affectionate man I married has turned into someone who plays deaf if I try to talk during a 'big moment' in a ball game on TV."

"Oh."

"Yeah. I make him pay for that, though," Beth said darkly.

Daphne emerged from the other room. "I gotta run. I'm meeting Derek at his house and then we're going furniture shopping. Woo hoo! He knows I hate his black leather sofa, and I love how he's making compromises for me."

"It's sounding pretty serious," Emma said. "How much have you guys been talking about the future?"

Daphne's grin wavered only the faintest bit. "Oh, it's too soon to get into that."

Emma and Beth exchanged a quick, silent look, but Daphne caught it. "What?! I'm not going to rush him! I don't want to scare him off. This is a big step as it is, moving in together."

"Just as long as you're both on the same page about what you want for the future," Emma said.

Beth added, "You've talked about whether he'd like to be married eventually and have kids, haven't you?"

"It's too soon!" Daphne insisted. "Asking me to live with him is a huge step, and I don't think he would have taken it if he didn't see a future for us."

Emma put up her hands in surrender. "Okay, okay, you know him a lot better than either of us do. I'll be here if you need me, but I know you're confident you won't."

"Thanks for the thought." Daphne came over to give Emma a hug. "I'm going to miss living with you. You'll come over to our place for dinner sometime, won't you?"

"Sure. And you can come down here and we'll go shopping and have lunch."

"Okay."

Daphne said her good-byes to Beth and then left.

"I hope that works out as well as she hopes," Beth said.

"Daphne and Derek?" At Beth's nod Emma shrugged. "I guess I hope so, too."

"You don't like Derek?"

"I don't know. There's nothing wrong with him, really, except that he strikes me as kind of dim. No imagination. But maybe Daphne doesn't mind that."

"Who can tell what type of partner is right for someone else? We can't even judge that for ourselves. Speaking of which! What's the full story on this apartment and the guy who owns it, huh?"