The Alibi

“The reason I’m telling you this… She, my wife, gets all worked up if I so much as give another woman the time of day. Not that I blame her,” he rushed to add. “She’s got a right to be suspicious. I handed her that right when I committed adultery.

“But the least little thing—even a kind word to another woman—sets her off. Know what I mean? She goes to crying. And saying that she’s not woman enough for me. That she can’t fulfill my needs.” He looked up at Smilow with weary eyes. “You know how they get.”

Again, Smilow shot Steffi a look that told her not to jeopardize this by lambasting the man’s sexist editorial.

“I didn’t describe that lady to y’all in detail because I didn’t want my wife to get upset. We’ve been doing pretty good here lately. She even brought along some, you know, sexual aids on this trip to spice up our time alone. She sorta looked on it as a second honeymoon. Isn’t much you can do on a church choir bus, but once we get in our room each night… whew.”

He grinned up at them, but then his smile deflated as though someone had pulled the plug on a rubber mask. “But if the missus thought I had paid attention to another woman’s face and figure, she might have thought I was lusting in my heart after a stranger. I’d have had hell to pay over nothing.”

“We understand.” Steffi laid her hand on his arm with rare and, Smilow knew, insincere compassion.

“Mr. Daniels, are you now saying that you can describe the woman you saw in the hotel corridor in greater detail?”

He looked across at Smilow. “You got something to write with?”

* * *

Slowly, he pulled the old T-shirt over her head. Before, he had touched her in darkness. He knew what she felt like, but he wanted to see what his hands had touched.

He wasn’t disappointed. She was lovely. He liked seeing his hands on her breasts, liked watching them respond to his caresses, liked hearing her hum of pleasure when he lowered his lips to them.

“You like this.”

“Yes.”

He took her nipple into his mouth and sucked it. She clasped his head and moaned softly. “Too hard?” he asked.

“No.”

But he was concerned, especially when he spotted whisker burns on her pale skin. He ran his finger over the spot. “I didn’t realize.”

She looked down at the light abrasion, then raised his finger to her lips and kissed it. “Neither did I.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It didn’t matter.”

“But if I hurt you—”

“You didn’t. You won’t.” She curled her hand around his neck and tried to draw his head back to her.

But he resisted. “Do you mind if…” He nodded toward the bed.

“No.”

They lay down, not bothering to straighten the linens. He leaned over her and, holding her face between his hands, kissed her so passionately that her body arched off the bed in order to touch his.

His hand skimmed over her breasts, down her rib cage, onto a smooth stomach. “Jesus. Look at you. Beautiful.” He fitted his hand into the vee of her thighs, covering her mound with his palm, his fingers tapering downward. Inward. Into her softness. “You’re already—”

“Yes.”

“So sweet. So—”

“Oh…” she gasped.

“Wet.”

He rose above her for another kiss. It was a silky, sexy kiss that ended only when she gave a soft cry and climaxed around his fingers, against his thumb.