When she picked up his near arm and began gently scrubbing his muscles, Steve let her manipulate him as she willed. The combination of slick suds and scratchy sponge relaxed and invigorated him. Coupled with the attention she was giving him, he felt a renewal of the love he knew she held for him. He had given her care and attention last night, reasserting what had been suppressed by the troubles in their lives. Now she was giving it back to him.
“I don’t know…” He trailed off, unsure if he should say it.
Rachel looked up from his shoulder and upper chest, working her way across to his other arm. “You don’t know…what?”
“I don’t know if you’re just reviving my deep love for you, or making me fall in love with you all over again,” he murmured diffidently, and watched her blush with pleasure. He smiled. “I think a little of both.”
“Good. We’ve forgotten to do things like this,” Rachel said, reaching across him to scrub at his other arm. Soap smeared across one breast from his closer arm, dampening and turning her undershirt translucent. “We were on a pattern spiraling down into dullness, weren’t we? I mean…not that you’re dull, but that we’d gone and forgotten how special we are together.”
“I was thinking the exact same thing,” Steve agreed, admiring the way the dampened silk permitted the darkness of her nipple to show. Tracing the little peak made her glance at him. “You’d better take that off before it gets too wet and soapy to wear, in case we can’t do laundry for a few more days.”
“But then I’ll freeze,” she pointed out. “You’re the one in the water, not me.”
“Then come in here, and straddle me,” her fiancé coaxed. “I’ll keep most of you warm.”
Stripping off her remaining clothes, Rachel found herself asking skeptically, “Most of me warm?”
He grinned, looking at her breasts. “I like certain parts of you best when they’re cold. It’s so much more fun that way.”
Considering how her areolas had puckered, she couldn’t blame him. Chuckling, she finished removing her undergarments and stepped carefully into the tub with him. The heat from the water was heavenly. Kneeling carefully, she scrubbed his abdomen with the sponge, then sat back and worked on his legs, taking her time to refamiliarize herself with every inch of his skin she could reach.
Her fiancé had a decent body; working in the dairy had kept him reasonably fit, and there was just enough hair on his chest and legs to say he was a man, but not enough to suggest he was a beast. Some women liked their men to be downright furry; Rachel just wanted a little bit of curl on her man’s chest, and not much elsewhere. The texture of Steve’s sparsely dusted skin was just the way she liked a man to feeclass="underline" warm and silky in some spots, warm and crinkly coarse in others. Perfect.
Leaning forward, she made him sit up, then wrapped her arms around him, kissing him somewhat awkwardly while she scrubbed at his back. Getting him to stand, she scrubbed the parts the water had covered, then urged him back down again, rinsing and using the sponge to trickle water over his body. Midway through her task, he stole the brown sponge from her.
Against her protests, he lathered it up again and scrubbed her in turn from neck to toes, shushing her mouth with kisses. Catching on to his silencing scheme, Rachel mumbled a few more protests, making him kiss her again. The water had turned too murky to rinse with, but she had anticipated that. Standing, Rachel urged Steve to his feet, and with his help, lifted the final milk bucket over both their heads. It was still full of hot, clean water. Steve helped her pour it over both of them for a rinse while the tub drained at their feet.
Steve laughed when the last of the water was done dripping out of the can. “We still have soap on our bodies. I think we’ll need to risk a brief shower.”
Rachel nodded. It was now late; if any of the other guests had taken a shower, there might not be much hot water left, but it also shouldn’t be a strain on the generator to siphon some from the tanks. Letting him pull the curtain into place, she turned and worked with the faucet, waiting until warm water spilled forth. The position left her bent over at the waist. She didn’t know why she was surprised when he grasped her hips, but she was. Pleasantly, at least.
The sight of her stooped over like that excited him. Being bathed had been more sensuous, like a backrub, but this was just too sexy to resist. Swaying closer, Steve teased her flesh with his own. He didn’t have a condom handy, so he wasn’t going to penetrate her…mostly wasn’t going to penetrate her…she pushed back, slotting him into position, then into place with a soft, feminine groan. A spasm of lust twitched through his entire body. Gritting his teeth, he held back, held himself still within her.
“Rachel…I’m not wearing a condom,” Steve managed to warn her.
“We’re getting married in less than ten days,” she reminded him, grinning over her shoulder. “I won’t tell if you won’t!”
“Well, since not even the worst blizzard in the history of the whole Midwest would stop me from marrying you,” he conceded, pulling out almost all the way before pushing back in again, nice and slowly, “I think we can keep our mouths shut.”
She turned off the tub faucet again to conserve the hot water; they could always rinse off after making love, but not if they ran out first. From the slow pace he was setting, she figured they’d definitely run out of hot water if she left the taps open. Not that slow was a bad thing…but it was getting cold in the bathroom without the shower running. Changing her mind, Rachel stood up, letting him slip free. Turning, she silenced his wordless protest with a kiss, looping her arms around his shoulders. “Let’s finish rinsing off, then get dirty in bed, under the nice, warm covers.”
As much as he wanted to just take her, Steve conceded not only the increasing chill in the air, but also the slipperiness of their location. Kinky was only okay if it didn’t lead to a broken neck, in his book. “Alright. Rachel…I’ve been thinking,” Steve added as she turned on the taps and lifted the lever for the shower head. “I kind of miss the way we used to, you know, court each other. Not that I’m aiming to be spoiled or anything, but I liked you pampering me just now, and I liked doing it to you last night.”
Turning to face him, Rachel let the hot water rinse any lingering soap from her back. “I liked it, too. I missed doing things like that.”
He nodded. “That’s what made me think. What if we set aside one weekend each month, or a weeknight, whatever works with the rest of our schedule…and just make sure to pamper each other on that day?”
Considering the idea, Rachel finished washing off the soap, then shifted out of his way so he could rinse himself, too. “It’s not a bad idea at all. But I’d rather spend one day on one of us, and the other day on the other person—the one being lavished with love can reciprocate if they want on their day, but it’s their day.”
“‘Lavished with love,’” Steve repeated over his shoulder, twisting under the spray. “I like the sound of that. And a day apiece, that’s good. Nothing too extravagant—we live in Iowa, so no buying either of us a yacht,” he teased, making her laugh. “But little things, we can do that. Things we can do around the needs of the Inn. And we could even space it out every few weeks between the two of us. Say, you get the first and I get the sixteenth of each month?”
Rachel thought about it as she twisted off the taps again. “No, that runs up against New Year’s Day. That conflicts with our wedding, which is supposed to be about both of us. How about the fifteenth and the thirtieth? That way, it’s separate from any possible holidays or anniversaries, and makes the days in question ours alone for a celebration.”