Inn on the Edge (4 page)

“I know. Me too. The guy must be some sort of perverse
genius. Making us want it more by withholding it!” He paused. Drummed his
fingers on the table. “Do you know what? I did see those spots. I just didn’t
let on. It’s my turn again?”

“I knew it!” I watched those long fingers, wishing they were
touching me and not the table. I shivered. “Yep. Your turn.”

Josh filled his spoon, then waited for a drip to plop back
into his bowl. “I’m going with our first time also. I was nervous too—I was
sure you’d think my dick was ugly because of the way it…um…kind of leans to the
left. But you didn’t think it was ugly.” He ate another spoonful of bisque. “Or
maybe you did. What spice is that? Thyme?”

“No! Your dick is adorable!” I refilled my spoon. “It’s
thyme, you’re right. Thyme and another spice I can’t place.” I looked at the
forbidden platters of food. And those chocolates. “I’m so hungry I can hardly
stand it! This is pure torture!”

“Maybe that’s the point? Stomach hunger and sexual hunger,
combining to make us go crazy?”

“Maybe. Probably.”

He shook his head. “Well, it’s working. Quick! Before I
perish! On to your next memory!”

I laughed. “Okay. It’s a good one. The time we were camping
in the Olympic National Forest. Remember? All those trees? It rained almost the
entire time? We couldn’t get the campfire to light? Well, it was like two
o’clock in the afternoon, and we were hanging out in the tent, fooling around,
messing with each other because there was nothing else to do—”

“And those people in the next space yelled at us! I
remember!”

“That’s right!”

“They called us, what, moral deviants? They told us to get a
room!”

“Yes! How ridiculous was that?”

“Totally ridiculous!”

“Mortified, weren’t we?”

“Maybe you were.” He made a lewd gesture with his spoon.

“Stop that!” I said, reaching for his arm. “You’re teasing
me. How am I supposed to stay away from you if you’re teasing me?”

He shook his head in mock dismay, his eyes at half-mast.
“You’re the tease! Just sitting there, all tarted up, pretending to be a
bride.” He set his spoon down. “You know, I had no idea we were making so much
noise that day.”

We smiled at each other. This wasn’t so bad. I swallowed my
tomato, thyme and something-else bisque, wondering what the rest of the evening
would bring.

“I’ve got a good one,” said Josh. “Remember Tilly? What a
crazy dog. Every time we had sex she would jump onto the bed and try to get
between us. What the hell was wrong with her?”

He tipped soup into his mouth.

“She was neurotic. How long ’til we eat some real food?”

“Forget food,” said Josh, “when do we get to have
sex
?”

I rested my hand on the bread basket. “There’s nothing
stopping us from cheating.”

“But I want a prize!”

“Fine.” I looked out of the nearest window. From my seat at
the table, I couldn’t see the twinkling lights of the town that I’d noticed
when Zenith had been in the room, only inky-black sky. “Okay. A couple more,
then. I’ve got a recent memory. From only two nights ago.”

Josh raised his eyebrows.

“It was midnight. We were…doing it. We were almost done. After
we…you know…switched positions but before we…ahhh…” My voice trailed off. I
swallowed. “Josh! This is
brutal
!”

He leaned forward, wanting more. He made a small noise deep
in his throat, his lips parted just a little. “Please,” he said softly.

It was that “please”, so sincere, so genuine, that got to
me. How could I refuse? I took a deep breath and continued. “So. You were doing
that thing you like—and I like too—you were going…in-and-out, in-and-out…of me,
yeah, in and out of my…you know…” I threw up my hands. “Argh! I can’t do this!”

He closed his eyes then opened them again. “Angie,” he
whispered, “it’s making me so hot, hearing you talk like this. Don’t stop now!
Keep going.”

“I want to! But it’s so hard to describe sex. Especially
when all you want to do is
have
sex!” I took a much-needed drink of
water. “That old man must have known how impossible this would be.”

Josh grinned and licked his lips, the fiend.

Gamely, I went on describing my memory, trying not to look
at him lest I leap across the table and ravish him. “Anyway, you started
kissing me. I was on top. I was leaning over you, and you were kissing my neck,
remember? Josh, I thought you’d given me a hickey. Right where it would show on
my wedding day! I thought was going to have a heart attack.”

“Jesus, Angie,” he said, tapping the spoon on the table.
“What kind of person would do such a thing? I would never do that.”

“I know, I know. I was just being an idiot.”

I ate my spoonful of soup.

“Tell me again about the in-out, in-out thing.” He made the
lewd gesture with his spoon again. “Was it like this…or more like this?”

I swatted at him. “Stop it.”

He sat back. “The other spice is cinnamon—I just figured it
out.”

“Enough memories,” I said, flustered and feeling hot, too
hot—alarmingly hot. “Let’s turn over the next card.”

He reached for it. He read it. He frowned.

“What?” I said.

“We’re so screwed, Angie.”

“What’s it say?”

He set the card on the table. “We either eat something or we
take off an item of clothing. Not both.”

He was right. We were screwed.

“The blue cards at the bottom of the deck will tell us what
to do.”

“Fine,” I said, reaching. “Shall I draw a blue card, then?
Get us started?”

Josh eyed me. “Wait a second.”

I put my arm back into my lap.

“You don’t suppose that weirdo has cameras in here?”

I looked at the high, dark ceiling. If there was a hidden
camera, where would it be? In the light sconces? In the heating vent? I frowned
at the blinking red light of a smoke detector I hadn’t even noticed before. “No.
He wouldn’t.”

But somehow, I wasn’t so sure.

Josh’s mouth twitched. “There might be.”

Staring at my husband, my hand clutching a blue card that
I’d drawn but not yet looked at, I realized with a jolt that we were enjoyingthis. My senses were heightened, my body quivering with anticipation as I
wondered what each new card would bring. I could tell just by looking at him
that Josh was affected in the exact same way, which took me to a whole new
level. Who would have thought that being told how to have sex—or how not to
have sex—would be so sexy? Who would have thought that a hidden camera, real or
imagined, would make me almost faint with excitement?

Slowly, Josh smiled. He reached his hands across the table
and took mine in his. “Read the card.”

I read it. “Jeez. This is complicated. I draw the card, but
you
choose what I do.”

“Okay. What does it say?”

“You decide whether…let me see…I take off my shoes—which
would be nice, my feet are killing me—or whether I get to eat half a dinner
roll.”

“Only half?”

“Yes. Crap! I want both things! This is monstrous.” I
dropped the card and held my hand wistfully over the nearest roll, feeling its
warmth, knowing Josh would never let me have it. Why was I suddenly so hungry?
Was it because this lavish spread in front of us was off-limits, just like my
own husband was off-limits? Everything I wanted was off-limits. “Those rolls
look really good, just so you know.” I picked up the basket and sniffed long
and deep. “Those spoonfuls of soup only made me hungrier.”

“We could have kept doing sex memories, you know.”

I made a face at him. “Choose!”

“Put down the basket. Off with the shoes. I want my wife
naked on her wedding night. Eventually.”

“What kind of husband starves his wife?” I muttered, still
thinking about how far out of our comfort zone we were…and how exciting it was.
Was what we were doing considered kinky? I had no idea. I wasn’t even sure what
kinky was, to be honest. But I set the basket on the table and reached below my
chair to slip off my shoes. I wiggled my toes and arched my soles, then ran the
bottoms of my feet, still clad in pantyhose, over the area carpet under our
table. It felt wonderful. Maybe I’d get a roll next time. Besides, I did want
to make love with him at some point. “Your turn.”

Josh took a card. He gazed at it, horror-stricken. “A
serving of broccoli or my suit jacket. Ugh, broccoli. Please! Angie! You know
how I detest broccoli!”

“I do know. Your least favorite vegetable.”

He squirmed.

“But I am a much nicer person than you are. Take off the
jacket.”

He shrugged off the jacket and hung it carefully on the back
of his chair. “Thank you. I owe you. Your turn.”

I drew another card, then whistled. The mother lode! My
dress…or a steak. I knew which he’d choose. Saying a silent goodbye to my lost
steak and telling my stomach to shut up already, I closed my eyes and turned
away from Josh so he could reach the long row of tiny pearl buttons running
down my back. His hands grazed my shoulders, caressed the small of my back,
lingered on my hips as he slid the bodice down and peeled the lacy sleeves from
my arms. Cool air brushed my skin. I sucked in my breath, shivering even though
I wasn’t cold. “Josh,” I whispered. “This is… This is…”

“I know,” he said. He kissed me at the base of my neck. “Now
stand up.”

He tugged the many yards of white fabric over my hips and
bottom, stopping for a quick feel. He turned me toward him, shifting me in
tiny, watchful steps so I wouldn’t tread on the dress, which now lay in a white
lacy puddle at my feet. “You’re so beautiful. You’re radiant. No wonder that
pervert liked you.”

“He liked you too.”

“I know. But he liked you better. Now step out. Carefully.
One foot at a time.”

He kneeled on the floor and put his cheek to my thigh. His
hands ran up and down my legs, lifting, helping, moving the dress aside, making
me melt over and over again. I thought I might fall right onto the table, I was
trembling so hard. I rested my hands on his head and felt his hair. He kissed
the just-revealed crease at the top of my leg, right on my tan line, ignoring
my hose and the special panties I’d chosen especially for my wedding day. I bit
my lip. What delicious agony, not being allowed to do more! But there was only
the one illicit kiss, then Josh was back to undressing me. Once my feet were
entirely clear, he lifted the wedding dress and draped it over the foot of the
bed, where the poor thing—I’d been so damn proud of it, had tried on thirty-six
dresses before I’d found the perfect one—looked deflated and lifeless, bulky,
extravagant, its big day over and done with.

Josh moved behind me.

I felt him fumbling with the hooks of my bra. I twisted
away. “No! Only the dress.”

He ran his finger down my shoulder, my arm. His lips touched
the hollow under my shoulder blade. He drew in a long breath, inhaling my
scent. “No harm in trying. Shall I draw a card now?”

I pressed against him, feeling vest and cummerbund and
bowtie and buttons and all the rest of his wedding paraphernalia on the bare
skin of my back. “It’s not fair,” I said, whining, “You’ve got…what? Ten pieces
of clothing? Fifteen? Look at me—I’m almost undressed already!”

“We can stop playing.”

I shook my head.

“Okay then.” Not even bothering to sit, he reached for the next
card. “Steak or…” He looked up, grinning. “My pants!”

I bounced up and down on the balls of my feet. “Over your
shoes? Really?”

He nodded, arching his stomach toward me. “Look! My cock is
about to burst the zipper. Quick, take them off before something bad happens!”

I took his hand and led him to stand with his back to the
bed, where I refused to be rushed. I dawdled. I explored. I took my own good
time with his belt, his button closure, his zipper, complicated gadgets all of
them. I am afraid that toward the end of this endeavor, my hands came into
contact with his penis. But what else could I do? He’s a man! Everything is so
close together down there! How could I unzip his fly and not caress his
erection at the same time? I was doing my best for him, I swear.

He groaned. “Angie…let’s forget all this and just
do
it.”

I laughed. “Why? You did the same thing to me only a few
minutes ago! Your fingers were all over me. You groped and felt and touched,
remember?” I pulled down his pants, then pushed on his stomach with the flat of
my hand until he plopped, bouncing, onto the bed.

He groaned.

“Oh dear,” I said, shaking my head, “your dick. It’s
escaping your underwear. I’ll have to put it back.” I bent over him, my lacy
bra almost but not quite brushing his chest. Slowly, I worked my fingers under
the band of his boxers. He drew in a sharp breath, almost a hiss. His hips
pushed upward but I shoved him down again. Letting the tips of my fingers graze
the head of his penis, I pulled up his underwear until everything was nicely
tucked away again. “There. Now we can take your pants all the way off.”

“Damn, Angie! You are a despicable person, you know that?”

“You have no idea.” One at a time, I worked his pant legs
over his shoes. Then I held out the pants at arm’s length and let them drop to
the floor.

He made a pained noise. “Angie, it’s your turn. Draw a card.”
He fell back onto the bed, his arms spread. “Put me out of my misery.”

“Fine.” I left him there, flat on the bed, and took the next
blue card. “My bra, or steak.”

“You know which I want. Come here.”

I flopped down on the bed next to him and let him fold me in
his arms. I was still hungry but now a different sort of hunger was taking
over. I closed my eyes and breathed in his familiar scent. I felt the tickle of
his hair on my forehead, felt the stubble of beard, felt the beating of his
heart. Josh. My Josh. We allowed ourselves a quick kiss, knowing it was against
the rules. My heart threw itself wildly against my ribs. A kiss, a simple
little kiss, and I was about to have an orgasm. How was it possible that this
quick, forbidden kiss could be so shattering, so much better than an ordinary
kiss? Better than quite a few of our sexual encounters, even? We gazed into
each other’s eyes, smiles flickering on our lips.

“Turn onto your stomach,” he said after a long minute,
touching my shoulder.

I turned over.

He undid my bra. His hands moved over my back, pushing aside
the straps, exploring me as if he’d never done that before. He snuggled next to
me, so close and yet so far. His erection pressed against me, a warm promise of
things to come. I closed my eyes and held my breath as he rolled on top of me,
his weight so delicious, so very delicious. His hands continued their journey
around my body, following my bra straps. A finger grazed the side of my breast.
Abruptly, his hands froze. “My, my…what is this?” he breathed into my ear as
his hand explored my breast. Apparently he approved of what he’d found, because
he worked both hands under me, cradling, squeezing, kneading. “Treasure! Let me
see what I’ve found. Turn over.”

I turned over again, feeling faint. Laying on my back,
holding my breath, I looked up at him.

“Lovely. Now lift your arms.”

Helpful as always, I raised my arms and he slipped my scrap
of a bra over my hands. He tossed it in a corner. “Nice…” he said, running a
finger around one of my nipples, then the other. “Would you look at these? What
dainty little morsels.” Taking his time, making me squirm, he leaned over and
took the closer one in his mouth. His hand moved to rest gently on my mound.

Now it was myturn to moan, to arch my back, to beg
for more.

To hell with the game!

But it only lasted a moment. Josh sat up, the brute, leaving
a cold, hollow space next to me. He grinned down at me, his face flushed. “My
turn now.”

He was still playing the game. Damn it all.

I lay on the bed, quivering, unable to move. I was
twenty-seven years old and I’d just discovered a new world of sensual delight.
Sex—foreplay—had never been like this before. Every single nerve in my body
buzzed and vibrated and sang. If I were the E string on Josh’s guitar, I’d be
stretched so tightly I would be
this close
to snapping.

“Josh,” I begged, “make love to me.”

He smiled, long and slow. “What? I’m not sure I heard that
last bit.”

“
Fuck
me!”

He came back from the table, blue card in hand. He stood
over me. “And quit the game?”

“Yes!”

“What game? I don’t know nothing about no game.”

I laughed.

With a theatrical flick of his fingers, he sent the card
spinning into the air. We watched it flutter down toward the bed, where it
landed facedown on my stomach. “I don’t need a game to tell me what to do
next.” He lowered himself onto me, kissing me, pressing his hips onto mine.
“God, Angie. I’m going to spontaneously combust!”

I wriggled out from beneath him, my breaths coming in sharp
little puffs. “Don’t combust yet. Wait until afterward, okay?” I stripped off
my hose, tore off my panties. Then I helped Josh with his shoes and socks. His
boxers were already off. We didn’t bother with the rest. A shirt and cummerbund
were no impediment—no impediment at all to what I had in mind.

I helped him with the condom. In one swift move, he was on
top of me.

Then he was in me, filling me, making me gasp with pleasure.
I took him into my depths, welcoming him, wanting him, needing him. I spread my
knees, held him between my thighs, threw my arms around his chest, cradled him
to my breast. He moved within me, caressing my innermost parts. Oh the wonder
of it! Oh how I loved him! I would never love another like I loved him. He was
it
for me. I would never-never-never make love with another man for the rest of my
life. Never!

“Angie…” he said. “Angie. Oh Angie…”

I answered in the best way I knew. The only way I knew. I
raised my hips, fitting myself against him as closely as humanly possible, pushing,
straining, wanting him farther inside me. Asking, begging, pleading for more
cock…for more cock…and more, and
more.
I wanted it—I wanted that
beautiful-beautiful-beautiful cock pounding into me, making me feel as if I
were about to shatter. I wanted it—I wanted it now—and he gave it to me. Oh
yes, he gave it to me!

My back arched. I gasped. Oh—

Oh—

And then it got even better.

He found my nipple and began to roll it between his fingers.

His hips, his thighs, his chest! Oh, the sweetness of it!

His penis, moving in me… Indescribable!

I was in heaven. After this long, long day—together. We
clung to each other, holding tight for dear life. We loved one another with
startling fierceness, staring into each other’s eyes, shouting and hollering
and laughing, because who could hear us anyway, way up here by ourselves in the
North Tower? In this weird inn out in the middle of nowhere? We rocked the bed
with our wild lovemaking, bumping and scraping it against the wall—and then we
did it even harder, on purpose, louder, longer, wilder, causing the bedside
table to jerk and dance and its vase of flowers to topple to the floor, and
finding ourselves funny, funny, oh so funny! Together, we traveled beyond this
world and into another.