should go. The roads will be icy. You won’t be back until past midnight.” My breath shows white in the air. The temperature has been dropping all day, and the smell of new snow lies heavy about us.
“I know.” He makes no move.
I turn my face up to his. I love his kisses, tender and thorough, usually on my lips but sometimes slipping down to my jaw, my neck, the hollow of my throat, while his breath comes fast on my skin and his fingers press through the thick layers of my clothing.
But no more than that.
“You are not Budgie Byrne,” he told me, a week ago. “You’re too good for car seats and furtiveness. You’re sacred , Lily.”
“I wouldn’t mind being a little less sacred,” I said.
“When the time comes, Lily. When everything’s just right. Just you wait.”
This week, I don’t want to wait any longer. I wrap my arms around his neck and deepen the kiss. His mouth is sweet and molten from the Hershey bar we shared at the movies. I think of Claudette Colbert and Fredric March embracing on the screen, and the way Nick’s fingers had wrapped around mine in the darkness and the flickering silver light, and the way I felt his touch right to my center, like a decadent ache, like no other sensation in the world.
I rub the soft skin at the back of his neck, the stiff little hairs that grow above. He smells delicious, soapy and warm.
“Lily,” he whispers.
We go on kissing, combusting together in the cold, and all at once I realize that his hand has come around to the front of my coat, that he is unfastening the buttons, one by one, with his long and diligent fingers.
My heart pounds against the wall of my chest, so hard he must feel it under his hand.
“Lily.” He slips his fingers inside my coat to cup my left breast.
My breath catches, my head falls back, and his lips follow me and travel across my throat. Ungloved, his palm ought to be cold, but instead it burns through the silk of my blouse and the brassiere beneath.
He jerks backward, as if from a daydream, throwing himself against the seat. “Oh, God. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t stop.” I pull him back. Already my breast feels chilled, exposed, deprived of Nick’s warm hand.
He pulls together the ends of my coat and buttons them clumsily. His chest heaves for air. “I lost my head.”
“It wasn’t you. It was me.”
“Yes, you’re irresistible.” He places his hands along my cheeks, kisses my nose, and rests his forehead against mine. “But it’s my job to resist you. Look how beautiful you are, how innocent.”
“And you aren’t?” I have tried to wrest this information from him, but he is reluctant to give it, as if the details would somehow contaminate the purity of our own gleaming new affair. I think there have been women before. There was certainly some woman last summer, I’ve gathered, from hints and allusions. Some woman he met while he was in Europe with his parents. Some woman with whom he perhaps made love, or perhaps came close. How close? How could I say, when I don’t know the gradations myself, the minute step-by-step of sexual consummation? How far a leap is it, from accepting Nick’s massive hand around my breast to going to bed with him? What territory, vast or small, lies between?
His hands are stroking my hair. “Not innocent in my thoughts, that’s for sure.”
“Neither am I.”
Nick’s stroking hands pause around my ears. He lifts his face away and peers at me. “Is that so? And just what . . . No. Stop, don’t tell me. God.” He exhales. “Lily, Lily. This is . . . This is . . . not easy .”
“I know.”
“Do you know, really? I want it so much, Lily. Don’t think I don’t. I think about it every minute, I torture myself with it. Lying with you, together with you, all the time in the world. Just imagine, Lily.”
“I do imagine it.” I put my hand on the wool covering his heart, and wonder how it will look when the wool is gone, and the jacket, and the shirt,
“I know.” He makes no move.
I turn my face up to his. I love his kisses, tender and thorough, usually on my lips but sometimes slipping down to my jaw, my neck, the hollow of my throat, while his breath comes fast on my skin and his fingers press through the thick layers of my clothing.
But no more than that.
“You are not Budgie Byrne,” he told me, a week ago. “You’re too good for car seats and furtiveness. You’re sacred , Lily.”
“I wouldn’t mind being a little less sacred,” I said.
“When the time comes, Lily. When everything’s just right. Just you wait.”
This week, I don’t want to wait any longer. I wrap my arms around his neck and deepen the kiss. His mouth is sweet and molten from the Hershey bar we shared at the movies. I think of Claudette Colbert and Fredric March embracing on the screen, and the way Nick’s fingers had wrapped around mine in the darkness and the flickering silver light, and the way I felt his touch right to my center, like a decadent ache, like no other sensation in the world.
I rub the soft skin at the back of his neck, the stiff little hairs that grow above. He smells delicious, soapy and warm.
“Lily,” he whispers.
We go on kissing, combusting together in the cold, and all at once I realize that his hand has come around to the front of my coat, that he is unfastening the buttons, one by one, with his long and diligent fingers.
My heart pounds against the wall of my chest, so hard he must feel it under his hand.
“Lily.” He slips his fingers inside my coat to cup my left breast.
My breath catches, my head falls back, and his lips follow me and travel across my throat. Ungloved, his palm ought to be cold, but instead it burns through the silk of my blouse and the brassiere beneath.
He jerks backward, as if from a daydream, throwing himself against the seat. “Oh, God. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t stop.” I pull him back. Already my breast feels chilled, exposed, deprived of Nick’s warm hand.
He pulls together the ends of my coat and buttons them clumsily. His chest heaves for air. “I lost my head.”
“It wasn’t you. It was me.”
“Yes, you’re irresistible.” He places his hands along my cheeks, kisses my nose, and rests his forehead against mine. “But it’s my job to resist you. Look how beautiful you are, how innocent.”
“And you aren’t?” I have tried to wrest this information from him, but he is reluctant to give it, as if the details would somehow contaminate the purity of our own gleaming new affair. I think there have been women before. There was certainly some woman last summer, I’ve gathered, from hints and allusions. Some woman he met while he was in Europe with his parents. Some woman with whom he perhaps made love, or perhaps came close. How close? How could I say, when I don’t know the gradations myself, the minute step-by-step of sexual consummation? How far a leap is it, from accepting Nick’s massive hand around my breast to going to bed with him? What territory, vast or small, lies between?
His hands are stroking my hair. “Not innocent in my thoughts, that’s for sure.”
“Neither am I.”
Nick’s stroking hands pause around my ears. He lifts his face away and peers at me. “Is that so? And just what . . . No. Stop, don’t tell me. God.” He exhales. “Lily, Lily. This is . . . This is . . . not easy .”
“I know.”
“Do you know, really? I want it so much, Lily. Don’t think I don’t. I think about it every minute, I torture myself with it. Lying with you, together with you, all the time in the world. Just imagine, Lily.”
“I do imagine it.” I put my hand on the wool covering his heart, and wonder how it will look when the wool is gone, and the jacket, and the shirt,
Similar Books
