Her laugh sounded genuine this time.
“Sexy, sophisticated, and he has the one thing I can’t give you.”
She cocked her head. “What?”
“Paige.”
“Ryan,” Jennifer said, “you enabled that possibility. We did that together.”
“I miss… swinger Ryan,” he said, realizing that fact as he said it. “I was better. Better than I ever was before. More confident, less edgy. Certainly better than I’ve been since.”
“I wouldn’t say better, I’d just say—”
“Think about it, remember the way I was at the beginning? Man, the way you looked at me then. Like you were hungry for me. That night you pointed out that we’d essentially lapped ourselves in the sex department. When it was new. When it was exciting.”
“When it was good,” said Jennifer, with a nod.
“We had a blowout,” he told her. “It was big. Because we’d hit a pothole shortly before, and we’d never quite recovered from it.”
“That’s enough metaphors for you,” said Jennifer, moving to sit next to him. She took his hands in hers. “We can fix this.”
“I don’t want to lose you,” said Ryan.
“Then you need to stop pushing me away,” she replied.
“I know.”
“You’re right.” Jennifer could feel the tears coming. “Our time after meeting Bruce and Paige was the most fun we’ve ever had together. And I think that was the closest I’ve ever felt to you.”
“We connected,” said Ryan. “Much deeper than before. But that meltdown was spectacular.”
She couldn’t argue with that. “We added a lot of complexity to our lives very quickly. What sort of idiots were we, to think that there wouldn’t be a learning curve?”
He smiled, but it was short lived. “I saw the card,” he said, looking away. “The divorce attorney.”
Jennifer nodded, feeling a momentary flush of embarrassment. Then she remembered that she had nothing to be embarrassed about. That he’d pushed her so far, and so hard, by being just… awful. Her jaw tightened, and she was about to tell him why she had it, that she thought she might use it, when he sidelined her.
“I understand if you want to use it,” he said. “I’ve been terrible since that night. It’s my fault, and I’m sorry.”
She decided to try to salvage, instead. “It melted down because we went in stupid,” she said.
“Without rules,” said Ryan.
“Well,” said Jennifer, “We could set some.”
He met her eyes. In an instant, Jennifer saw a bit of a flash. The flash of potential, that maybe, somehow, they could find their way back. Back to each other, back to the world. But before they did…
“But you can’t treat me that way again.”
Ryan nodded.
“Ever,” said Jennifer, slapping her hand on his knee. “You didn’t respect me enough to treat me like a person. You treated me like this thing you owned.”
“I’m sor—”
“Listen, I really need to say this to you!” she said, poking him in the chest.
He nodded in silence.
“You don’t own me. Or my feelings. Or my desires.”
He nodded again.
“And I’m not sitting around this house in silence for days ever again! Do you understand me?” She took a deep breath and stared him down.
He nodded once more.
“Okay,” she said, sitting back and putting her hands on her knees. “Here’s what I would like. And you can talk again, by the way.”
Ryan gave her a small smile, but still just nodded silently.
“We can’t swing right now.”
“No,” agreed Ryan.
“Paige said we’re a drama risk,” she told him, and he nodded in assent. “We need to reconnect. We had some amazing sex before that party, and there’s no reason we can’t continue to have that.”
“I agree.”
“But more importantly, we need to talk. A lot. Often. About stupid things, as well as important things. We need to talk so much that when we hit conflict, our default will be talking, instead of…” She trailed off to demonstrate the alternative. “How do you feel about what I want?”
“I’m on board.”
She put her hand on his. “Now, I want you to really think, just for a moment. We can restart our lives together here. Do you want to do this with me?”
He looked into her eyes. “Yes, I do. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
She kissed him, realizing exactly how long it had been since she’d done that. Their lips pressed tightly together, wrapped in each other’s arms. A kiss of assurance. A kiss of memory. A kiss reminding them what it had once been like. The warmth returned to the room. Perhaps it had just been the furnace kicking on, but it pushed them forward.
When the kiss loosened and invited the tongues to the party, she felt flush. She’d missed this so very much, missed him. That person she’d left the party with, that person she’d lived with since, that hadn’t been Ryan. Just a shell instead, wearing his clothes, shuffling around their house without purpose. For the first time in forever, she felt like Ryan was there with her.
She slid her hand up his leg, finding him hard. A pulse, the beginnings of the wave, rocked through her, beginning between her legs and shooting tendrils upward. They kissed harder, tongues deeper. Moving back and forth, sucking and nibbling on lips and tongues. She unzipped his fly.
Jennifer’s eyes widened when Ryan reversed their positions. They didn’t break the kiss as he moved in front of her. He took her head in his hands and kissed up her cheek and down her chin to her neck, down her neck to her collar. He reached his hands to the hem of her dress and paused.
She opened her eyes. They stared into each other.
“Is this okay,” he asked, breathless.
“Yeah,” she said, “Yeah, whatever, just… touch me.”
He lunged, and the kiss elevated to another level. He slid his hands up her thighs, discovering with muffled surprise that she had no panties. He laughed.
“What?” she asked, letting a sly smile crawl across her lips.
They grinned at each other for a moment, then Ryan dove between her legs, licking and sucking with a surge of vigor and ferocity. With one hand she gripped a clump of his hair, with the other the couch, feeling the need to keep herself from taking flight and drifting away. The first wave broke, then two smaller ones followed. Ryan upped his game, sliding two fingers inside beneath his tongue.
The next wave that broke crashed on her shore in a cascade of wetness. She looked down at his soaked grinning face and realized she’d just found the female ejaculation orgasm Paige had raved about.
“Well,” he said, “That was new.”
Wide eyed, she nodded.
Her husband returned between her legs, wave after wave of orgasm, none as explosive as the surprise one, but all intense. He continued to lick and suck until she held her hand up, palm out, exhausted.
As she worked hard to catch her breath, Ryan kissed his way back up to her face, giving her two kisses on the lips. A flutter deep in her core as she tasted herself on his lips. She smiled.
“What do you want?” he asked her.
About to speak, Jennifer realized what her answer always would’ve been in the past, regardless of what she actually wanted. Something for him, something demure, something like “I’m fine.” Not tonight, kiddo, she told herself.
“Ice cream,” she said. “Lots.”
He grinned back. “I’ll get my keys.”
50
“That is, without a doubt,” said Ryan, pausing for emphasis, “The largest American flag I’ve ever seen that wasn’t flying over a sporting event.”
Jennifer looked at the flag flying over Barbara and Noah’s front door and nodded. “Maybe the one over the expressway?”