Page 21 of Now and Forever

“Yes!”

He curses in German.

Wow, that’s quite a string of expletives!

Then he turns to me, and his voice is completely different. “I want to make love to you. I want to kiss you. I want to show you how much I love you. I want you naked in my arms. I need you. And now you’re telling me you’re going to deprive me of all that?”

“Yes, precisely,” I say in an icier and more distant tone. “You’re not going to touch a hair on my head until I say so. You broke my heart, and if you love me, you’ll respect my punishment as I’ve always respected yours.”

Eric curses in German again.

“And for how long am I being punished?” he asks, staring at me so intensely.

“Until I decide you’re not.”

He closes his eyes. He takes a deep breath. When he opens his eyes again, he nods in agreement.

“Fine, sweetheart. If that’s what you think you need to do, then fine.”

Delighted, I finally smile.

I glance at my watch and see it’s two thirty in the morning. I’m not sleepy, but I need to get away from him, or the first one who’ll crack about this absurd punishment will be me.

“Where’s my room?” I ask as I stretch.

“Your room?”

I try to contain my laughter when I see his face. “Eric, you don’t think we’re going to sleep together, do you?”

“But—”

“No, Eric,” I say, cutting him off. “I need my privacy. I don’t want to share a bed with you, and you don’t deserve it.”

His face tense, he slowly nods. “You know the house has four bedrooms,” he mutters. “Choose the one you want. I’ll sleep in one of the others.”

I grab my backpack without looking at him and head toward the room he and I shared last summer. Our room. It’s beautiful. Eric has had a stupendous and enormous canopy bed placed in the center. The rest of the furnishings are white, and the linen curtains are orange, matching the bedcover. I close the door, and my heart is racing.

What am I doing?

I want him to undress me, to kiss me, to make love to me, but here I am, denying us both what we want most.

After dropping my bag against a wall, I check myself out in the oval mirror and smile. I do look sexy and suggestive in this dress. I smile naughtily and think about how to rub salt in his wound. I really do want to punish him. I open the bedroom door and search for Eric, finding him standing by the fireplace.

“Can I ask you a favor?”

“Of course.”

I go up to him and move my long dark hair to the side.

“Could you unzip me?”

I turn around so he won’t see me grinning, and I hear him sigh. I can’t see his face, but I can imagine his eyes on my skin. He puts his hands on me. They’re so warm! He lowers the zipper very slowly. I can feel his breath on my neck. I know what an effort he’s making not to tear the dress off.

“Jude ...”

“Yes, Eric ...”

“I want you,” he confesses with a raspy voice in my ear.

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