Thy Neighbor's Wife (29 page)

enough to stop her in her tracks. It was an indescribable pleasure to

watch her new lover while she was unaware of the scrutiny. She

took the bacon out of the pan and turned off the stove, then took a

carton of eggs out of the fridge and popped some bread into the

toaster. Jennifer leaned against the table, folded her arms across her

chest, and enjoyed the view for as long as she could, completely

taken with the glow of Alex’s skin and the curves of her body. Once

again, she was pleasantly assaulted by periodic flashbacks from the

previous night and wondered how long her body could keep up the

state of perpetual wetness with which it seemed to be afflicted.

She wasn’t ready for the sizzling tremor that shot through her

body when Alex finally turned and their eyes met. Alex wiped her

hands on the towel and tossed it blindly onto the counter. Then she

slowly crossed the space between them, her eyes never leaving Jen-

nifer’s. She stopped mere inches from her. Looking down, she

smiled sweetly, and brushed her fingers through Jennifer’s blonde

and tousled hair.

Before Jennifer could utter a word, Alex’s mouth came down

hard on hers and they kissed deeply, as if they’d never left the bed

from the night before. The height difference between them was sig-

nificant, and Jennifer found herself surrounded by Alex. Rather

than feeling closed in or smothered, she felt safe and loved. She slid

her hands up Alex’s chest and around her neck, pulling her head

down more forcefully. Alex pushed into her, directing her back-

wards until the edge of the dining room table hit her rear end. In

the next instant, she was flat on her back on the dining room table,

her robe totally open, her body completely exposed to Alex. Her

legs found their way around Alex’s waist, Alex’s fingers were buried

deep inside her, and she moaned Alex’s name in ragged breaths.

She came fiercely, as she had done every time the night before,

gasping for air, her chest heaving and her muscles tensed into rocks.

She had to literally untangle her fingers from Alex’s hair, which

made them both grin with amusement.

Alex nuzzled her face against Jennifer’s neck, kissing the skin

softly, then pushed up on her hands so she leaned over her lover,

propped on her palms against the table. Jennifer’s legs dangled use-

lessly on either side of her thighs.

“Good morning.” Jennifer smiled.

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“It is, isn’t it?”

“That is an absolutely incomparable way to start the day.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Alex repeated. She looked like she might say

more, but instead, she stood, held out her hand, and helped Jennifer

to her feet. “Hungry?”

Jennifer closed the robe, tied the sash, and tried to get a fix on

what Alex was thinking. “Famished.”

“Follow me.” Alex headed back to the kitchen and picked up

where she’d left off. “How do you like your eggs?” she asked, with-

out looking back at Jennifer. Then she turned, panicking, “You do

like eggs, don’t you?”

“Over easy, please. Can I help with anything?”

Alex stepped to her and kissed the top of her head. “Nope. Just

sit there and look sexy.”

Jennifer blushed. “Yes, ma’am.” She watched Alex in silence

for a few minutes. “What time did you get up?”

“Kinsey got me up at his usual six thirty, so I put him out.

When I came back into the room, you looked…” She turned to Jen-

nifer with a sheepish grin. “I wanted you to be sure to get some

sleep, but I can’t tell you how badly I wanted to wake you up.”

Jennifer flushed a deeper red as she smiled.

“I decided I’d better get right out of the room. Less tempta-

tion.” She pulled the coffee pot out of its housing and reached for a

mug. “So I read the paper and had some coffee.” She set the cup in

front of Jennifer. “Let my raging hormones cool down a bit, you

know? Though I have to say that the sash on that robe is giving me

very naughty ideas.” She winked at the raising of Jennifer’s eye-

brows and kissed her mouth quickly, then returned to her work.

Jennifer swallowed as the erotic jolt that had zapped her lower

body eased to a dull ache. It was becoming obvious to Jennifer that

Alex wasn’t ready to talk about anything deeper than their sexual

connection at that point. Maybe she was right; that connection was

red hot after all. Jennifer did want to talk about things; she knew

they needed to talk about things, but it had been so long since she felt this desired by somebody—somebody whom she desired—all

she wanted to do at that moment was sit and bask in the glow of it.

She could understand Alex’s avoidance. They could talk later.

They’d have to talk later.

She sipped her coffee.

* * *

Alex and Jennifer spent the entire day in various stages of

undress. Like two children with brand new toys, they couldn’t keep

their hands off each other for longer than an hour or two. Alex

Thy Neighbor’s Wife 155

delighted in Jennifer’s stamina. In past relationships, Alex had

always been the one with the higher sex drive; her partners inevita-

bly ended up pushing her away at some point, murmuring, “no

more” as exhaustion took over. Not so with Jennifer. She matched

Alex touch for touch, stroke for stroke, orgasm for orgasm, and was

ready for more.

When darkness had fallen and they’d opted to return to the

bedroom rather than the couch, the kitchen counters, or the bath-

room floor, things shifted. The raw, intense passion was replaced

with tenderness. They made love slowly, deliberately, sharing eye

contact and emotion, though avoiding the words that would make

things all too real. They mapped one another’s bodies, learning

what touches made the other gasp and filing the information away

for use in the future.

Jennifer was getting used to this new side of her, the boldness,

the aggression. The only time she lost her lead was when Alex phys-

ically took it from her, using their size difference as leverage. She

reversed their positions, flipping Jennifer beneath her and pinning

her arms above her head, Jennifer struggling feebly to play along.

“Careful,” Alex warned against her mouth. “You don’t want

me to have to get that sash out and tie you to this bed.”

Jennifer gasped at the words, the intensity climbing up another

notch as Alex’s tongue plunged possessively into her mouth. They

kissed hungrily, the tenderness morphing back into the animal pas-

sion from earlier. Alex used her mouth to travel the length of Jenni-

fer’s body and settle between the legs that opened to her unbidden.

Jennifer was already very close and crested almost immediately, her

orgasm striking without warning and burying her. When she finally

reached for Alex’s head to push her gently away, Alex caught both

her wrists and held them captive, preventing Jennifer from escaping

the probing tongue and lips still exploring her oversensitive flesh,

forcing her to ride out the sensation of “too much,” ride it through

to the other side. Her groans of protest quickly changed to gasps of

erotically pleasurable shock as a second climax enveloped her with

its power.

Alex stopped stroking and waited for her lover to come down,

still gripping the smaller wrists in her hands, reveling in the moans,

gasps, and whimpers as she felt Jennifer slowly relax.

“God,” Jennifer murmured in wonder. “I’ve never done that

before…in a row like that. Nobody’s ever…Jesus.”

“Good,” Alex replied, happy to have such a memorable sensa-

tion belong only to her. She slowly crawled up Jennifer’s body,

showering it with light kisses along the way. She scooped Jennifer

up and arranged their bodies in a comfortable position. “You’re like

a rag doll,” she chuckled as Jennifer’s limbs flopped uselessly.

156 Georgia Beers

“I can’t move. I feel like Jell-o.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

They lay cuddled together for a long while, listening to the gen-

tle lapping of the water against the shore as the sound drifted into

the bedroom on the soft breeze that tickled the blinds. Jennifer’s

head was tucked under Alex’s chin, resting on her chest.

“I love the sound of your heartbeat,” she said softly.

Alex kissed the top of her head and squeezed her tighter. Kin-

sey hopped up onto the bed and settled down with a sigh, his head

resting on Alex’s ankle. She lay there, replaying the summer to that

point, amazed by the way things had ended up. Her mind stopped

on the argument she’d witnessed between Jennifer and Eric; the

image of Eric raising his hand to strike his wife was still burned

into her brain.

“Jennifer?” Alex whispered, wondering if her lover had fallen

asleep, expecting she had.

“Hmm?” She startled Alex by responding.

“What happened that night? In the backyard with Eric?”

Jennifer was silent for such a long time that Alex started to

wonder if she’d been out of line by asking the question, that maybe

Jennifer wasn’t going to answer at all.

Finally, Jennifer took a deep breath and spoke quietly. “I’m not

totally sure, not really, but I have my own ideas. I think he’d proba-

bly just had enough.”

“Of you?”

“Of everything. Eric and I are a lot alike. He’s been so stressed

out trying to do what’s expected of him—take over the family busi-

ness, be happily married to his high school sweetheart, have just the

right cars and just the right house in just the right neighborhood.

He’s been trying so hard to uphold that image—the image of the

Good Son. I honestly thought I was doing him a favor. My inten-

tions were good, I swear they were.”

“What do you mean?” Alex asked, noting the tone of guilt that

had crept into her voice.

“Remember when Eric’s father came to see me? The day we

took the jet ski out?” She felt Alex nod. “He seemed very concerned

about his son’s stress level. He said he was worried about him.

Frankly, I was ecstatic that somebody had finally noticed. When he

asked me if I thought Eric really wanted to take over the firm, I

thought honesty would be the best policy.” She sighed. “I told him

no.”

“Oooooh,” Alex drawled out, wincing with understanding.

“Yeah. Probably not my swiftest maneuver.”

“And Eric found out.”

“Yep.” Jennifer propped herself up on an elbow so she could

Thy Neighbor’s Wife 157

look Alex in the face. “Look, Alex, I know how you must feel about

him.”

Alex looked at her, but said nothing.

“He wouldn’t have hit me. He’s not like that.”

Alex bristled at the idea of Jennifer defending her husband; she

didn’t like the sensation. She didn’t know if she agreed with Jenni-

fer’s assessment of his actions, but she felt it was not the time nor

place to argue them. Instead, she simply nodded. “Okay.”

“He’s a good man. We’ve both just made some bad choices in

our lives.”

Alex stiffened further and hoped Jennifer didn’t notice. She

didn’t want to talk about Eric, but she knew it was a subject that

wasn’t going to just disappear. “Okay,” she repeated. Jennifer

returned her head to its previous spot on Alex’s shoulder.

Jennifer hadn’t been back to her own house since she’d shown

up on Alex’s doorstep more than twenty-four hours before. She’d

made no attempt to locate her husband and she had no idea if he’d

been trying to get in touch with her. Much as Alex would have liked

for them to hole up in her house and forget about the rest of the

world, she knew that would never happen…that it couldn’t happen.

They were quiet for several minutes before Alex spoke again,

gently. “You’re going to have to go back and face him sooner or

later, baby.” She hoped she didn’t sound as terrified at the prospect

as she felt. Thinking about Jennifer with Eric made her feel nau-

seous.

“I know,” Jennifer answered, her voice small.

Chapter

Sixteen

After more than three days together doing nothing but talking,

making love, and having food delivered, Alex and Jennifer finally

managed to wrench themselves away from each other. It wasn’t

easy, but their bodies were sore and their answering machines had

been working overtime; people were getting worried. Alex sent Jen-

nifer on her way across the yard mid-morning on Wednesday and

they managed to make it through to the evening with only six phone

calls to one another.

That night was their last volleyball game of the season. Alex

could hardly believe it was the end of August already. Summer goes

by so fast around here, she thought as she warmed up, bumping the

ball with Jennifer. She looked through the net at their opponents,

noting the weak links. They had no shot whatsoever at first place,

but the battle for third was on. The humidity from the weekend had

subsided and a refreshing breeze was blowing off the water. It was a

beautiful night.

Speaking of beautiful…They lined up to take turns spiking as

Jennifer set for each of them. She wore black, lycra shorts and a

white tank top she’d borrowed from Alex. “I want to keep you close