A Midnight Clear (12 page)

A bride wasn’t supposed to spend her wedding night in the bathroom.

But Frances found that opening the door and greeting Joe—her husband, a title that creaked in its newness—in only her nightclothes was beyond her at the moment. She had to, she knew, but… but not yet.

The train whistle sounded as if from far away and the carriage gently swayed. It ought to be soothing, the sounds and motions of the train, but the atmosphere couldn’t penetrate the shell of her anxiety.

She rubbed her arms and the thin silk of her dressing gown slithered across her skin. The set had been a gift from Suzanne. Frances appreciated the gesture, but the ivory silk made her feel as if she were wearing someone else’s clothes. Usually she went in for white cotton, or flannel if it was cold.

Joe might expect her to wear things like this though. She had no idea. She missed her mother’s guidance more than ever, because even now Joe was waiting on the other side of that door while she pondered her sleepwear.
 

What did he wear to bed? She stared at the doorknob, her fingers sinking into her upper arms. She was going to find out. Tonight. Almost this instant.

She swallowed down a lump. All right. Time to be brave. Not that she was scared exactly—more like nervous. About-to-vibrate-out-of-her-skin nervous.
 

Joe probably wasn’t nervous. No doubt he’d done this before and was simply impatient.

She shivered at the thought. She didn’t like the idea of Joe touching, let alone kissing, let alone doing
that
,
with someone else. So, like Juliet, she was going to stay that mansion of love that had been bought and not yet possessed for a bit longer.

She concentrated on the train’s
clacketa-clacketa-clacketa
for a few beats.

No. Enough of this! Lurking about in the bathroom was only making things worse. It was time to be a wife.

The doorknob was cold under her palm, and gooseflesh rose under the silk. When the door swung open, there was Joe, waiting by the table in the sitting area of the stateroom. He was in a set of dark blue pajamas, covered by a black dressing gown.

So he did wear pajamas. Somehow that made her feel so much better. He’d been watching the door, his brow furrowed and his body tight.

He looked… he looked wonderful. He was hers and they were alone and the train wouldn’t be in Niagara Falls for hours and she wanted to launch herself at him… but her anxiety about this wasn’t nearly worked out.

She clasped her hands before her, unsure of what to do next. Would he tell her what she ought to do? That would make this easier.

Or maybe not, hearing those things said aloud…

“You look very nice.” He sounded uncertain, as if he were nervous too.

“Thank you. So do you. This was a gift from Suzanne.” She held the skirt of the peignoir out and then let it swish back around her. “She got it, I think from that shop on Duke of Gloucester Street, you know the one.” She was rambling now.

When she trailed off, Joe looked her over again and said, “I’ll have to thank her.”
 

Then they both fell silent.

They stood like that for a bit and Frances almost smiled, except she may have forgotten how. It seemed, however, like she
ought
to smile.

Then Joe lifted something in his hand. “Would you like to play?”

Cards?
That wasn’t what she’d been expecting at all. “We’re playing cards?”

“Gin rummy. If you know it.” He rubbed his neck. “Do you not want to?”

He was giving her a reprieve then, but an odd one. “If that’s what you want.”

He leaned forward as if sharing a secret. “Are you as nervous as I am?”

He was nervous?
“I don’t think you could be as nervous as I am. I mean—” Her cheeks went searingly hot. “You’ve done—” Lord, she couldn’t even say it. How was she supposed to do it?

“Have you done this before?”

What a question! “Of course not.”

“Neither have I.”

That knocked her backwards. “Oh.”

She liked that he hadn’t, that this was something that would always be between the two of them and no one else, but now, it also seemed more real and immediate and Frances could hear her pulse hammering in her ears.

He held up a finger. “Hang on.” He poured two glasses of scotch that had been a gift for him from her father. “This will help too. Along with the cards.”

She didn’t quite see how. “It will?”

“That’s what Steven said.”

She gasped. “You asked your roommate about this?”

“Not about specifics. Just… generalities.”

That didn’t make her feel any better.

He crossed over to her, pressed the drink into her hand. “We should both relax. So we’ll play cards and sip scotch until we’re ready. And if we’re not…” He shrugged, although it wasn’t at all casual. “It’s only one night in the rest of our lives.”

“Okay.” Cards. That
was
something she knew. She sat down at the little table, watched him deal.

“Win a point, take a sip of whiskey,” he explained. “Lose a hand and lose an item of clothing.”

She’d never played gin rummy like that before. She picked up her cards and considered Joe for a moment. “You have more clothes than I do.”

He shrugged out of his dressing gown. “Okay, now we’re even.”

“Do slippers count?”

He smiled. “Yes. Are you going to leave those for last?”

She didn’t answer right away. She arranged the cards in her hand and, when she was ready, she drew to start the game. “We’ll see.”

Joe lost both of his slippers before she had to give up one of hers. The hand after that was… fraught. As she ran her fingers along the edge of her cards, she realized that if she won, Joe would have to take off his pajama top. And she’d see his bare chest.

Her heart fluttered at the thought. She knew how his chest felt under her hands through clothing, or pressed against her when he’d held her tight. She’d speculated about it more times than she could count, and she wanted to know if he had hair there, but when she saw it, that would be just one step closer to the bed.

She took a healthy sip of the scotch, which had stopped burning so bad, and laid out her hand.

“Oh.” A small noise from him, surprised and slightly reticent. As if he were just now realizing the full terms of the rules he’d laid out.

She licked her lips. “Did I win?” He set down his cards: a pair of eights, a three, and the makings of a straight, marred by holes. She clucked her tongue. “Oh Joe, never draw on an inside straight.”

He didn’t respond to her advice—he put his fingers to the first button of his shirt. She watched in rapt fascination as first one button, and then another, came free. There was hair, yes; dark hair spread across his chest—and skin. Warm, golden skin. He must take his shirt off a lot on those boats.

The hair didn’t go all the way down. It stopped just after his rib cage and she couldn’t see the rest. The table hid him from her. She had the urge to pop up on her toes and peer down there, but she stayed where she was.

He shrugged out of his shirt and her heart went
thump thump thump
at the sight of his shoulders and arms.
That
was why he’d filled out his sweaters so nicely.

“Shall we go again?” His voice was a rough echo of how he normally sounded.

She swallowed hard and nodded.

He lost the next hand too. At this point, he wasn’t even trying.

Her pulse was loud in her ears as he stood—she discovered that the hair began again below his navel and disappeared beneath his waistband—and then with a quick motion, his pants were gone.

She had a brief impression of his undershorts and something perhaps within them and then he was sitting down again.

Now she was fully clothed and he was nearly naked. It should have put her more at ease, him being vulnerable like that, but the situation didn’t feel easy. It felt wrong.

She wanted to be naked with him. She, she…
wanted
. The nerves were still there, but so was a new kind of need.

They kept playing. Joe told some story about a squall and a sow from his childhood that might just have been a random string of words for all that she comprehended. She took and discarded cards without understanding, and when she laid her hand out on the table, she didn’t have a single set or run. His eyes widened a touch and his lips parted, but otherwise he didn’t react.

Ducking her head, she rose slowly from the chair.
Quickly. Do it quickly
. A deep breath and she untied the dressing gown and let it fall from her shoulders. Then she grabbed the hem of her nightgown and pulled it off, the silk a caress against her skin as it left. She couldn’t help it—she crossed her arms over her chest as she sat. Her cheeks were burning and she couldn’t seem to look up, but she heard Joe’s breathing go deep and ragged.

He cleared his throat. “Uh, next hand? Or if you’re cold—”

She dropped her arms and his words ended on a deep groan. But she still couldn’t look up. “Perhaps we should get under the covers?” She tried for coy, but the effort was thin.

His swallow echoed throughout the room. “I’ll, uh, just turn off the light.”

When he crossed the room to flick the switch, she took the opportunity to toss back the last of her drink and dash into the bed. She wrapped the blankets tightly around herself and turned over in time to catch a glimpse of Joe’s backside—which was almost as impressive as his front—and then it went dark.

His footfalls were soft on the carpet as he made his way to the bed. A brush of cold air met her skin as he lifted the covers and then he was lying beside her.

Without thought, she nestled herself alongside him. His arm came around her and pulled her close, her face fitting perfectly into the notch when his neck met his shoulder. They cuddled like that for several breaths. It was lovely, lovelier than she could have ever imagined, but she wanted more.

Summoning her bravery, she reached down and shimmied out of her panties. Next to her, he did the same with his underclothes.

When they came together again, her most intimate parts were against his bare thigh and his…
appendage
was pressing against her thigh. Rather insistently.

But she wasn’t afraid. This was unfamiliar, yes, but exciting. Anticipation was zinging along her nerves, charge building on her skin.

“May I kiss you?” he asked in a harsh whisper.

She had to partially come atop him to reach his mouth, but when their lips met, she forgot all about the awkwardness of her position in the resulting flare. This was familiar, for all that they were doing it naked. Their engagement had sometimes seemed interminably long, and as the months had gone on, their goodnight kisses had grown increasingly frantic. Now, the anticipation went from electric to flame.

He set his hands at her hips, tentatively at first, and then more firmly when she kept kissing him. He spoke against her mouth: “May I kiss you other places?”

“Yes. Please.” Then a thought occurred to her, the awkwardness rushing back. “Where… where should I be?” And what should she be doing with her hands and her mouth when he was kissing
other places
?

“You can stay where you are. That way you can pull away if I do anything you don’t like and I’ll know not to do it.”

That solved the issue of her hands: She’d have to brace herself above him. As for her mouth—

Everything left her as his mouth found the base of her neck, including her breath.
Oh. Oh. Oh.

He went lower and kissed her breast. Her nipples went painfully tight. And then his lips brushed across one.

A needy sound left her throat and his fingers bit deep into her hips. Between her legs she was growing wet and heated. Could he feel that? Did it disgust him?

He took her nipple in his mouth and she forgot to worry. Forgot everything but the pressure there and the pleasure spiking.

He stopped.

“What?” There was more, she knew and she was on her way to getting to
more
, so why was he stopping?

“May I… There’s another place I want to touch you.”

When she realized what he meant, she tried instinctively to snap her legs together, but his body was between them.

He went very still. “If you don’t want to, I won’t, but… it’s supposed to be best there.”

Best?
“It’s…” Her voice died under a flame of agony. This was quite possibly the most excruciating moment of her entire life. But she had to warn him, in case he hadn’t noticed and would be horrified by it. “It’s
wet
.”

He actually laughed. “I did notice. And Frances?” He pulled her hips closer to him, rubbing that wetness against him, and the part which was now rock hard. “I can’t tell you wild that makes me.”

“Oh.”
He liked it
. It was such a revelation, she could only say, “Okay.”

He reached between them. She was grateful for the dark, for the fact that she couldn’t see his expression. She could hear his breathing, a ragged, animal sound between them. And she knew that he enjoyed this, that it truly did drive him wild.

His fingers found a spot that had her catching her breath.

“Help me,” he urged. “Show me.”

Because this was as new to him as it was to her, because she knew now had nothing to be ashamed of, she set her fingers over his. Showed him what felt best.

The pleasure rose until her skin felt too small, as if couldn’t contain all that she was feeling… and then her skin didn’t matter anymore because nothing was holding her in and she was dissolving into a burst of sensation, her breath sawing out of her control as she went rigid above him.

Slowly, her flesh became real again, and he was there, holding her. Her precious, precious Joe.

She didn’t even need her bravery anymore as she said, “I believe it’s my turn now.”

She felt the heat coming into him. “You don’t… I’m ready already, so—”

She pressed a finger to his lips. “I thought you wanted a modern wife.”

His breath came in hard and fast. And then he held it.

She took that as a yes and reached down, finding what she sought. It was hard and smooth and much bigger than she’d been expecting. After a few exploratory strokes, he grabbed her wrist. “Sweetheart, I’m close,” he warned.