Page 27 of Lover
The urge to defend my wife was waylaid by my desire to give her room to handle things on her own, as she’d done for herself for two years without me. She’d properly accused me of underestimating her. I had, and it was to the detriment of us both.
“Sounds right,” Millie replied, accepting the insult with a hint of pride, which likely threw Margaret off balance. Well done. “Now let me read you. You married rich, but it’s not a love match, so you spend your time and your husband’s money dressing yourself up like a fortune teller and going about to make a fool of him in some perverse form of retaliation for the bleak lack of passion.”
I pressed my fist to my mouth to stop the laugh. Millie had nailed her to the board, and Margaret was especially sensitive to being called a gold digger.
“You little…” she sputtered. “You don’t have a clue what you’re dealing with. Callum sucks dames like you dry, then spits out their husks. You don’t even know—”
I stepped into the dining room.
“Margaret, there you are,” I said, keeping my tone pleasant, though I couldn’t much control my face. “Your husband mentioned you had a tendency to wander, especially after too much to drink.”
Another insult, but she was forced to swallow this one in the face of the man who could toss her out. Word would get around,it always did, and she’d be humiliated once again in her coveted social circles.
“I didn’t want you to get lost,” I continued, motioning toward the door. “If you’ll make your way to the sitting room, there’s coffee, it’ll help you keep your wits. There’s a girl.”
She took her leave, trailing rage behind her, and I faced Millie, full of praise.
“I was worried about what Margaret had in mind, but shouldn’t have been. You held your own.”
She took offense, igniting a significant argument that had both of us seething. She dismissed me and retreated into the hall. Unwilling to let her escape without explanations and resolutions, I chased after her, taking her arm.
In response she raised her voice, and I was forced to pull her to the nearest door, guiding her roughly inside and closing us into the dark, where our disagreement could enjoy some privacy.
“And here you’ve whisked me away to a lonely, dark room. How on pattern,” she accused, though now she nearly whispered, the dim light and loneliness of the space silencing her ire somewhat effectively.
It did something to me too, something I hadn’t intended, stoking other fires besides anger, which had been smoldering all night. I was frustrated, more in body and mind than I’d ever been, and she only continued to pour the fuel.
“Your mouth is running away with you,” I growled, and I bet on her continuing to let it.
“I’m going to the parlor to enjoy more pleasant company. Stay here in the dark like the beast you are.”
As she opened the door, I made my decision. Keeping my distance hadn’t done any good. The doctor had agreed to try a new method if the dinner came to nothing, so I took it upon myself to choose one. Desperate for change, and dishonorably aroused by her smart mouth, I turned and brought a hand topress upon the door, forcing it closed again, and as she whirled around to face me with an indignant huff, I closed her in.
We continued our quarrel in the gloom, the closeness and our equal fierceness riling me to a point where I could have had her up against the wall, proving to her my desire was genuine.
“You’re trying to intimidate me,” she accused.
“Are you intimidated?”
“No.”
“You’re trembling.”
“Do you like it?” she whispered, and I was done for.
“Yes.”
I kissed her. The ferociousness of it awakened something in her and she threw her arms around my shoulders. I pulled her close so I could feel the shape of her, and she of me, delving my tongue into her eager mouth. The first time we’d kissed had been a sweet affair, and I cherished the tender touching of our lips, but there was nothing like kissing Millie when she was impassioned. She drew out every fragment of longing and I burned.
In that dark room, I crossed the lines I’d laid for myself, teasing the hill of her pleasure taut with my fingers, watching as she watched, driven near mad with lust at the sight of my hand beneath her dress in the mirror. I’d stroked her to climax, covering her mouth to save us from needing to explain ourselves, and was rewarded with the quake of her body, the heavy pulse beneath my fingers, and the exquisite muffled sound of her ecstasy, which I would never grow weary of.
Before I could whisper promises of future pleasures, the doorknob to our hideaway began to rattle, and we hurried to correct ourselves. I glanced in the direction of the side door leading from this room into an adjacent studio, which emptied through to the music room. As I ushered Millie quickly out intothe hall, there was a jangling of keys. We hadn’t been that quiet after all.
“Ms. Dillard is always roaming around checking every unusual noise,” I grumbled, closing the door, frustrated by the interruption. We looked at each other and both dissolved into a fit of laughter. The moment was so dear that I drew her into an embrace.
Dr. Hannigan called out into the hall and we stepped apart again, neither of us fully serious. I encouraged Millie to go to the parlor, excusing myself to clean up after our recreation. I glanced behind to find her watching after me, a dreamy half smile on her face, a look I’d much missed.
It dismayed me to discover when I returned that Millie was nowhere to be found. I looked for Margaret, finding her grousing in a chair by the window, a halo of cigarette smoke around her head, two red spots of anger on her cheeks. She wouldn’t leave on her own, but I had no energy to deal with asking her to go. Since we couldn’t discuss Millie around the princess of coins, we somewhat unenthusiastically played our game, and though I worried about her, I resolved to believe that tonight was the first step toward Millie returning to me for good.
