Chapter 47
COLE
I opened the bedroom door, looking for my girlfriend, and wasn’t at all expecting her to be lying on the bed. Naked.
She continued to surprise me every day.
“I thought we were going on a leaf-watch drive.”
It was a beautiful time of year in the Finger Lakes, the leaves just starting to fall, which meant it was this weekend or never.
“I still want to do that, but I want you more.”
I was happy to oblige.
First, I took off one shoe.
And then another.
One by one, I slowly removed every article of clothing as Jules watched.
She looked so fucking perfect on that bed.
When she started to get up, I stopped her.
“Uh, no you don’t. I want you just like that.”
I loved that she loved when I took control in the bedroom. To that end, I headed to the closet where my ties hung and grabbed two of them.
When I brought them back out, I didn’t even have to say a word. She lifted her hands up toward the headboard spindles.
As I tied her first hand to it, I complimented her choice of furniture. “You’re never getting rid of this bed.”
I moved around the bed to tie the second one.
“Agreed. And actually, I was thinking, maybe you should make it your bed too.”
She was tied to it, and as I crawled onto the bed, between her legs, one of my favorite positions, I tried to gauge if she was serious.
Using my thumbs, I spread her wide.
“To be my bed, I would have to be living here.”
One lick. And then another. When I thrust two fingers inside, my thumb circling at the same time, the blessed sound of her heavy breathing filled the bedroom.
“I’m asking you to move in with me.”
Her words were disjointed, interrupted by the kind of panting that could only come as a precursor to an orgasm, one I was determined to give her.
But I also wanted to answer her.
So I changed positions and looked into my girlfriend’s eyes.
“I have moved in with you that first day back.”
“Oh my God. Oh my God, that feels so good.”
“But better late than never. Since I’m here most nights anyway, I think it’s a great idea.”
And then I stopped talking, intent on pleasing the woman who had given me so much.
She helped me with my job search and was mostly responsible for the current position I held as a history professor at Ithaca College. But more than that, she’d given me an unconditional love I never imagined actually existed.
“Not being able to move my hands is torture.”
I continued working her. “That’s the point.”
She smiled, but didn’t laugh, Juliette very close to release.
“How about you come for me so I can fuck you hard on the first thrust.”
“Oh my God. When you say things like that.”
She was close.
“Say things like, this afternoon I’m going to take you again on our hike. Just off the trail, and if anyone sees us, I don’t give a shit. Your hands will be out, bracing yourself on a tree, as I take you from behind. And doing this too, of course.”
I simultaneously massaged both spots, like she liked, and Juliette screamed my name.
Just like I promised, I entered her easily and didn’t relent. She tugged her wrists, but they didn’t move. I stayed with her through every aftershock, and my own release, until her breathing slowed and she finally smiled, spent and warm beneath me.
After I untied her, Juliette curled up into a ball by my side, my arm under her, cradling her. I played with a strand of her hair. This position was one I could stay in all day, every day.
“We’re not really going to have sex on the trail, are we?”
“I guess we’ll see in a bit. That is, if we ever get out of this bed.”
“We have to get out of the bed. Emilio’s viewing is at four o’clock.”
I had only distant memories of the wine shop owner, but the whole town had been devastated when he’d passed. It had also affected Jules deeply. The two of them had all bonded over their shared roots.
“So hike, back here to shower, and get there for four or a little after?”
Juliette snuggled in more deeply.
“That, or we skip the hike and just stay here, and then go for four o’clock.”
She looked at me expectantly.
We decided to hike this morning, and it seemed like a good idea at the time, but this seemed like a better one. Plus, I knew her pretty well and was certain she wanted Plan B.
“Let’s stay here. We can hike another day.”
Her smile told me I’d gotten it right.
Some days I did, but some days I got it wrong. And on those days, I learned.
“Oh, Beck is having something at the bar afterward,” I said. “Emilio’s family is mostly from out of town, and he got talking to one of them, a cousin I think, and anyway… We’re all going over. If that works?”
“I’ll try not to be jealous of the fact that you know what my friend is doing before I do.”
She smiled, Juliette liking the fact that we had eight of us to lean into.
“Four couples. It’s hard to believe that all of us are committed. That we all broke the rules.”
“Is that really so surprising?”
I thought back to the day we made the pact. “Actually, it is.”
I looked down at her.
“But obviously, I was wrong.”
“And I’m glad you were.”