Another Man's Child

Her big brown eyes were sultry-looking, telling him she was his to command, to do with her as he willed. There was no sadness in them now. No disappointment lurking in their depths.

Marcus stepped out of his shoes and dropped the rest of his clothes in a pile at his feet in one quick move. Lisa’s eyes widened, and for the first time in a long time, Marcus was proud of his body. Sex

ually, he knew no other man could please her more than he did. Because no man could love her more.

“I hope you didn’t call for room service,” he said, lowering himself, facing her, into the warm water.

She shook her head, her eyes filled with a hunger room service couldn’t assuage. “I waited for you.”

“Good.” He slid his hands up her calves to thighs that were still as smooth as the day he’d married her, holding her gaze with his own. “Your skin’s like satin.”

She smiled slowly, the smile that had brought him to his knees the first time he’d seen it and kept him there ever since. For a woman who had come to him almost innocent, she had the art of seduction down to amazing perfection.

Skimming his hands over the sides of her hips, he found her waist and almost circled it with his big hands. Every time he felt her slenderness, her femininity, he was filled again with a need to cherish her, to protect her from whatever hurts life might throw her way.

He’d just never counted on being one of those hurts.

His fingers continued their exploration, up her rib cage to her breasts. He cupped their exquisite softness, knowing the feel of them, and yet finding their familiarity wildly exciting. They were his. She was his. Right here. Right now.

“You’re as beautiful now as you were the first time,” he said.

She reached for his swollen penis and caressed it. She chuckled softly, a sweet husky sound. “You remember that first time? I wanted you so badly it was driving me crazy, but I was scared to death you’d think I was easy.”

Marcus smiled, too, remembering. She’d been such a contradiction, seducing him and crossing her knees at the same time. “All I could think about was getting between those gorgeous legs of yours. You’d been tempting me all summer, running around in shorts so short they revealed more than they concealed.”

“They did not!” she said, pretending to take offense.

“Oh, yes, you were a little tease,” he returned, and then he immediately availed himself of the treasures the shorts had promised that long-ago summer.

Her hand had fallen away from his penis, and now she reached for him again. “Oh, Marcus, please…”

He gently pushed her hand away, completely caught up in his memories of the past, the invincible feeling he’d had the day he’d married her. “Not yet, my love.”

“But…” She frowned up at him as he placed his finger against her lips.

“Let me.” He spent the next hour, in the bath and then out on the bed, showing her how much he adored her.

Her eyes were slumberous with passion, with a peace he hadn’t seen in months, when he finally entered her and found his own bit of paradise.

“I love you,” she whispered in the aftermath, her body still clinging to his. Her words warmed his heart as thoroughly as she warmed his body.

“I love you, too,” he said. He looked at her and saw she was smiling. And at that moment, Marcus had all he wanted. “Happy anniversary.” They fell asleep, locked in each other’s arms.

MARCUS STAYED IN BED with Lisa for most of the next twenty-four hours, loving her, laughing with her, debating with her about everything under the sun—except the life awaiting them outside the door of their cabana. They explored each other in ways they never had before, made love in ways that were achingly familiar and ordered whatever outside sustenance they needed from room service. He wanted to draw out their time at the cabana forever. To never let the honeymoon end. Because he was afraid of what came next.

As long as they were in the cabana, he was everything Lisa wanted. It was only outside those doors that he failed her.

“Can I ask you something?” Lisa said, looking up from the crossword puzzle she’d found in the morning paper that had been delivered along with their breakfast. She was dressed in his shirt from the day before, propped on a mountain of pillows in the middle of the bed.

He set the business section of the same paper down on the table beside him. “Sure,” he said, but he wasn’t sure. The shadows were back in her eyes.

“If you’d known ten years ago that we couldn’t have a family, would you still have married me?”

“Does it make a difference?” He wished he was wearing more than the sweats Lisa had packed for him. He had a sudden urge to head back to the city.

She shrugged, laying aside her puzzle. “I think it might.”

“I suppose, if you’d known then what you do now, if you’d been content with that knowledge, then yes, I’d have asked you to marry me.”