She pulled up the right sleeve of her sweatshirt to her elbow and dunked the sponge back into the bucket she’d filled, which explained the source of the running water. “I’ll be done in fifteen minutes. Could you grab the grocery bags out of my backseat, please?”
“When you come inside.”
There was a flash of something in her eyes that he’d seen at the therapy session. Regret. Heaviness. A little bit of panic. He didn’t like it.
“I’m digging in my heels,” she said.
“You’ve been doing a lot of that lately.”
He instantly regretted his words when she broke their eye contact.
“I’ve got on two layers under this sweatshirt. Please just let me do this?” Her voice was laden with determination. “I need to do something for you.”
Despite his fears over her falling ill, warmth rolled into his chest like clouds over the water, huge, blocking everything else out. “Will you stay for a while afterwards?”
She stopped soaping for a moment, looking at him over her shoulder. Blinking a couple of times. Slowly. “Yes.”
That single word made anticipation sing over Dominic’s skin, but his body needed to chill the fuck out. He was horny enough to read sexual intention into a brisk hello. If he’d learned anything by now, it was that his wife wasn’t breaking the no-sex rule. And he hadn’t caved on his promise, either. Next time he got relief, it would be inside Rosie, so help him God. Unfortunately, he was feeling the strain like nobody’s business.
Dominic went inside to throw on a jacket, then headed back out to retrieve the bags from Rosie’s backseat. While he was inside, she’d turned on the small vacuum cleaner they used for their cars, the loud hum absorbing the sounds of his footfalls. As he drew even with Rosie, she bent forward over the rear cab seat, leaving her tight, round ass on display.
Pure torture.
He itched to light up a cigarette, but he never smoked when Rosie was around. Only on the job site, while running errands, or after she’d fallen asleep. He’d come back from his deployment with the stress-reducing habit and she’d never asked him to stop, but he hated the idea of breathing tobacco breath anywhere in her vicinity and he damn well wasn’t going to start now, possibly hurting his chances of winning her back even more.
By the time Dominic returned with the grocery bags in his arms, his dick was hard enough to jimmy a lock. Rosie was still leaning forward over the backseat, knees planted on the torn leather of his truck, hips tilted enough that he could see the stretch of Lycra over her pussy. Jesus Christ. Was it dark enough yet to hide them from passing neighborhood traffic if he climbed into the truck behind her and rocked his cock into her from behind?
She flipped off the vacuum. “Dominic?” Her eyes found him over her shoulder, then lit up with what looked like reluctant awareness. “Did you, um . . . get the bags?”
“Yeah,” he rasped, hefting them up a little.
“Thank you,” she returned, sounding breathless herself, that ripe ass still on display.
Dominic growled. “Goddammit, Rosie. Did you come here to torture me?”
“No.” She quickly sat back on her heels. “No, I didn’t.”
“Just tell me what to expect here, Rosie. My body hurts. It wants yours.”
“I know.” She abandoned the vacuum and climbed out of the truck, hands wringing at her waist.
His heart picked up its pace so much at having her close—having her home—that he got dizzy.
“I’m really thrown off by what happened at our appointment, you know? Realizing we’ve both let this marriage get to this point . . . and I’m feeling kind of scattered. Like I’ve been seeing everything all wrong and I’ve just . . . I’ve fallen really hard off my high horse. And I don’t know how or if we’ll make this relationship work, but I know when I woke up feeling lost this morning, I wanted to be near you.” She inhaled in a rush. “Can we just spend some time near each other for a little while tonight?”
“Yes,” he said, voice resonating. His whole body resonating. “I want that.”
“Me too.” She wet her lips. “I’m going to finish up here. Can you go inside and preheat the oven for me? Three seventy-five.”
Backing away from her when she’d just admitted to needing him, even in a small capacity, was fucking agony, but he did it. Anything to not screw up this chance to have her cross the threshold of their home, even if it was just for a few hours. He stopped to glance back at Rosie on his way into the house and found her watching him from beneath her lashes. Looking . . . in need of reassurance? He knew how to give it to her. By worshipping her, pleasuring her, communicating love with his body.
But that didn’t work, did it? Not completely. Hadn’t Rosie said she felt empty afterward? He had to find a way to offer more. Give more.
Tell that to the testosterone flowing through his veins. As soon as he got inside, Dominic dropped the groceries off on the counter and adjusted his hard cock through his sweatpants. He planted his hands on the edge of the kitchen counter and breathed in and out. “Okay, not jerking off for a week was a bad choice, bro. Admit it. But you can do this. You can be in the same room as your wife and not fuck her until she screams the town into a power outage.”
Dominic visualized the same thing he’d been picturing all week, while trying to get his dick under control. One of his fellow marines had been bitten by a scorpion while on a perimeter check and the bite had gotten infected. Dominic pictured that mass of oozing flesh and started unpacking the contents of the grocery bags, teeth dug into his lower lip. Chicken stock, eggs, tomato paste, a green bell pepper.
His visualization exercise was working. He was halfway to losing his erection until Rosie walked in and immediately stripped off her sweatshirt at the door, carrying the T-shirt beneath it up to her breasts, showing off a hint of underboob before dropping back into place. She hung her sweatshirt on a hook and blew out a breath, glancing around the house as if she’d forgotten what it looked like, maybe even missed it—and Dominic’s throat cinched tight.
“Your truck was already pretty clean,” she said, tucking loose hair into her bun. “I feel like I cheated on my homework.” Her laughter was kind of skittish, reminding him of those first few middle-school dates to the coffee shop, when they were just getting to know each other. “Wow. Why am I so nervous?”
“This is your home. I’m your husband. You shouldn’t be . . .” Dominic heard the rote lines coming out of his mouth and dragged a hand down his face, laughing without a drop of humor. “I’m nervous, too, Rosie.”
Her breath caught. “You are?”
“Yeah.” Now that they’d returned to the scene of the crime, it became even more obvious how drastically their communication had dwindled. Their voices sounded almost foreign filling the kitchen together at the same time. “It doesn’t make you see me as less of . . . a man? Knowing I’m nervous?”
“What?” She pressed a hand to the center of her chest. “God, no. It makes me feel like I’m not crazy. It puts us on the same team.”
Surprise prickled up his spine. “I want to be strong for you at all times,” he said hoarsely. “Isn’t that my job?”