I gave her half an hour before following her up the stairs. I wanted to wait longer so the alcohol buzz would dull my edge a bit more, making me safer to be around. But I couldn’t stand being away from her another moment. I needed my tranquillizer. Neil had said it to me before. Brynne is your cure. Nothing could bring me out of my hell when I felt like this…except her.
I breathed easier knowing I wouldn’t have to say much. Her new rule of letting me alone to house my demons in solitude helped a great deal. Everything about Brynne helped me.
When I came into the room it was dark and she was sleeping just as I’d hoped. I ditched the tux and slipped under the sheets, settling in behind her. The first inhale of her comforting scent went up my nose and straight to my brain, immediately soothing, giving me hope to make the ugliness fade away. Best I’d felt all night, the instant I notched into the back of her neck and buried my nose in her hair.
Brynne was so generous with herself to me, she never minded when I woke her up and wanted to fuck.
I needed to fuck right now.
Drown out the guilt.
WHEN I moved down the bed and pulled back the blankets, I found her swathed in some kind of nightgown that covered her up from head to toe, and of a style maybe worn by my grandmother…when she was well into her eighties. Ugly thing was a dustbin candidate for sure. Hiding all that beauty away from my eyes only frustrated me. Being half pissed didn’t help my judgment probably, but it didn’t stop me. I found the place where it buttoned down to about mid chest on her, dug my fingers in between the buttons, and split that fuckin’ rag right in two, all the way down to the hem. Her naked tits came into view first, and then the rest of her. I felt instantly better. My cock was bone-fucking hard.
She woke with a gasp and a scream.
“Shhhh.” I clamped a hand over her mouth and my lips at her jaw. I didn’t want visitors doing the ol’ “is everything all right in there?” routine at this house party, since the place was crammed to the brim with them. Her eyes flared wide, and I sense she was not happy about what I’d just done, but again, that did not deter me. “It’s just me getting rid of that ugly nightgown for you. I loathed it.” I took my hand away and covered her lips with my mouth instead. She mumbled under my kisses at first, and tensed beneath me, but once she got a feel of my tongue inside her, she responded beautifully, softening under my body, letting me play my games, and take her. “I despised that gown, but I love you.” I kissed down her throat to the hollow of her neck, onward over her sternum and then to right between her breasts. I flicked my tongue out and dragged it over to a nipple. She arched her back to bring herself closer. I swirled over her budded, pink nipple ’round and ’round until she was practically writhing beneath me.
“That’s better,” I told her. “I have to see my beautiful wife…every inch of you.”
“Ethan?”
“Shhhh, baby,” I soothed, “just feel what I’m going to give you.”
I kissed my way down, giving a caress over her stomach as I went lower. Spreading her inner thighs firmly, I opened her up and enjoyed the magnificent view. She took my breath away, and she always had. Her pussy… No words for it. I inhaled, getting drunk on her intoxicating scent. Unique to Brynne, and utterly delectable, triggering my insta-need to have her.
I licked up the inside of her thighs, giving equal attention to each one until I couldn’t deny myself another second and had to have her sweet cunt under my lips. I started slowly with little licks along her smooth folds and worked in a circle, pointing my tongue like a tiny cock. She flexed against my mouth and rocked in rhythm as I built her up. I could do this all night, for as long as she was enjoying my feasting, or told me otherwise.
The beautiful sounds of quickened breath warmed my anxiety, melting away my torment, telling me of her pleasure. I slipped two fingers inside her drenched warmth, curling them up to slide into that special little cove, with the rough patch of skin where the magic happened.
She arched sharply, moaning under the onslaught of fingers and G-spot combined with tongue and clit. An explosive mixture. I had her coming for me in under two minutes, panting out my name just as I loved for her to do. Total fucking perfect beauty.
After a second orgasm brought her shuddering underneath my tongue, she pressed a hand to the top of my head. I knew what that meant. She was ready for some cock.
I dragged my mouth off her pussy and mounted up, folding her long limbs over my arms. My girl sighed at me in impatience when I lifted her backside up to meet my cock.
I chuckled at her frustration when I slid the shaft of my cock along her clit for a few dragging strokes.
“I’m going to fuck you now, baby,” I whispered, nudging forward. Fully aware, I lost a measure of my control the instant the bell end of my cock kissed her slippery heat, I went floating off into a haze of sex and lust, and superb fucking.
The tight squeeze of her grip around my cock as I slid in deep sucked the breath right out of me. From base to tip, she took me in, accepting the invasion I couldn’t curb. I’d never curb my driving need to be inside her. Impossible. My only truly safe place in the world.
As the frenzy built, I felt her clamping down with each penetration of my cock into her slick quim. She started to wheeze and circle her hips to get the friction where she needed it to be. I pushed deeper with every downward stroke, and saw the look she gets when it’s about to happen. Triumph. She got off on making me come just as much as I did with her.
My cock swelled in preparation for the blast.
Her eyes blazing up at me, I clasped her neck and held her in place, rotating my thumb around and down into her mouth. She wrapped her tongue around my thumb and sucked. My balls tightened and let go, a flood of sheer blinding pleasure washing over me as I emptied into her.
I did manage to move off to the side before I collapsed, coherent of the baby, and not wanting to crush. Brynne breathed heavily against me, silently coming down from the peak, along with my cock still pulsing inside her. I drew my hand away from her neck, down to a breast, and filled my palm. I clearly felt her heart beating beneath the super-soft barrier of flesh. My heart.
“What was that?” she asked after a moment, her expression difficult to read as her eyes burned rather green in the lamp light.
“That was you being well and truly fucked by your man, my beauty,” I teased, plumping the breast I was holding in my hand and giving her a slow grind of my hips.
“Not the fucking, Ethan. That, I understood perfectly when you ripped my nightgown off. I want to know why you abandoned me all night to get drunk at your best friend’s wedding.”
My cock withered, as I gained some clarity about what she might be feeling. There was hurt and sadness in her sorrowful eyes, and even the watery glistening of tears.
The feeling of euphoria vanished as I became aware of what I had just done to her.
I don’t deserve her, and I never will.
I watched his smug grin fall away to be replaced with remorse. “Did something happen, Ethan? Did you decide that you made a mistake in marrying me? Are you—unhappy…with me and the baby…because my body is ch-changing?”
I had to ask him. He knew how I operated, and it was by truth. The thing was, I’d always felt that about Ethan. He’d always been so blunt and truthful to me from day one. I loved that about him. He told me what was on his mind, sharing his desires, helping me to understand what he wanted and needed. But this awkward detached behavior really confused and hurt me.
“Oh, baby…no! Fuck no!” He shook his head vehemently. “Marrying you was the best thing that’s ever happened to me, Brynne. You think I am unhappy about you and the baby? Why?!”
He tightened his hand at my breast and loomed over me, his face very close, his dark blue eyes searching, flicking over me as if staring intently would reveal some mystery to him.
“You hurt my feelings. You left me there at the table and went off and started drinking. You never do that, Ethan. Why did you dance with Gwen and not with me?” The pitiful questions tumbled out of my mouth, humiliating me, but I couldn’t help it. Blame the hormones.
“Who?”
“Gwen, the skinny blonde.”
He didn’t look any less confused.
“Dillon’s date,” I said with emphasis, wondering if he was still drunk.
“Ahh… Yeah, her,” he grunted dismissively, “she pulled me out there, and I was too smashed, and too distracted to say no.”
“This does not make any of what you did tonight okay with me.” He needed to hear my unfiltered thoughts and know this sort of behavior would never fly.
“I’m so sorry, baby,” he said earnestly, before dropping his mouth to mine. He kissed me softly; very gentle and very loving, settling into his pattern of our after-sex make-out session. Long drawn out sweeps of tongue and lips, with no other purpose other than showing me he did indeed love me. I did feel considerably better, I’ll admit, but I was still confused about what had transpired tonight at the reception.
When he finally pulled back and gave me his eyes again, I sensed something big was going to be revealed.
“I love you so much, Brynne, and I can’t make it in this life without you. I’ll never regret our baby, and I’ll never stop loving you, or our children. You’re my life, and you’re stuck with me. And you are the most beautiful woman in the world. In the fucking world! Do you understand me, Brynne?” He sounded harsh, but the look on his face was pleading.
“Y-yes.” I sucked in a sob, feeling over-emotional and relieved, but still needing some answers from him. “S-so what happened t-tonight? Something happened, right?”
He settled on his side and faced me with his hand on my hip, as if he had to have physical contact with my body in order to tell me whatever he needed to say. “Yeah, baby, something happened.” He pulled me against him and pressed his lips to my hair and breathed in deeply. “Remember the woman who wanted to meet you at dinner? Sarah?”
“Yes. She seemed very nice, and friendly. How do you know her, Ethan?” Sarah was a beautiful woman, and charming in conversation. I recalled her seemingly genuine interest in how Ethan and I had met. She’d asked about my due date, but it had all felt socially normal to me, nothing weird.
“She came to the wedding today to pay her respects I suppose, but she had to leave because it was too hard for her to see Neil and Elaina, and you and me, living our happy lives with people we love.” His hand at my hip began to rub in a slow motion. “Sarah Hastings was married to someone who served in the SF with Neil and me. He didn’t…m-make it out of Afghanistan.”
“Oh…that’s horrible. I imagine you and Neil were close to him…”
“Yeah. He was under my command—in my squad.”
Ethan appeared calm as he talked, but I felt that he was harboring some deeply held grief or guilt about this man’s death in the war. I could only imagine whatever the experience had been for him, was horrific.
“You cared about him,” I said gently, not wanting to ask questions that would hurt him further. It was better for me to make statements of fact, rather than ask for more than he felt comfortable sharing.
“Mike Hastings was the very best of soldiers. Strong, loyal—a fighter to the bitter end. The kind of soldier you want at your back when the shit goes FUBAR,” Ethan said, in a faraway voice, weighted with respect and honor for his fallen comrade.
“I—I’ve heard you call out his name once…when you had a bad flashback…” I swept my lips to his chest and kissed right over his heart. I laid my ear there so I could hear his courageous heart beating against me. My heart.
He brought his hand up to the back of my head and rubbed into my hair, keeping me against him, allowing the comfort. “Mike. Yeah. That…m-memory about Mike is—is the worst one.”
“You don’t have to talk about him, Ethan, if you don’t want to. Baby, please don’t put yourself through it again just for my benefit.”
“No, you should know. You’re my wife, and you should know why—why I’m this way.”
I closed my eyes and braced for the explanation, knowing it would be something truly dreadful. “I love you, Ethan,” I whispered.
“Mike was taken prisoner along with me. He suffered what I suffered for just twenty days instead of my twenty-two. Then they ex-executed him in front of me. They used him as a—a p-practice run f-for what they were planning to do to me.”
I felt him swallow but his voice didn’t change. He sounded eerily calm and I tensed as I imagined how Mike Hastings had met his death. I remembered very well what Ethan had told me once. The Taliban were going to behead him and show the world a video of them doing it.
“They used a big fuckin’ knife and forced me to watch. They told me if I closed my eyes or looked away, they would make Mike suffer longer, cutting off parts of him that wouldn’t kill him, but lengthen the agony and prolong the inevitable. This was amusement for our captors, in their senseless, fucked-up, pious war they are so fanatical about.”
I cried silent tears as he told me of his experience, unable to say anything, unsure of what to do except hold onto him and be whatever he needed me to be.
“But I failed Mike. I tried—I tried so fucking hard, Brynne, not to flinch away, but I couldn’t help it—”
He stopped talking. The silence grew deafening above the steady pounding of his heart against my cheek, now drenched by my hot tears…for him, for his friend, for the helpless guilt he carried over things beyond his control.
“I love you, and I always will.” There was nothing else to say to him.
He breathed in my hair at my temple and seemed to relax somewhat. After a time of quiet he asked me a question. It was painfully difficult for him to get the words out. I could hear the fear as he struggled to force the words past his lips. “Do you think there’s a place, or a person somewhere that may help me?”
“Yes, Ethan, I know there is.”
