I roll my eyes and smack her ass and her grin reappears, bawdy and suggestive this time. “Let’s go inside,” she mouths. I nod and without putting her down, wade toward the steps.
Beth clings to me, rolls her hips and tightens her legs so that her wet heat is pressed to my hips. She drops her head to pepper my throat with hot kisses and my entire body responds to her silent command,
She gets turned on my crowds, and normally, I’m down to take her to the nearest bathroom or broom closet and make her come. But, in our backyard surrounded by hundreds of people, there’s no way. She’s kissed her way up my jaw and is almost to my mouth.
I growl and squeeze her ass under the water, but I pull her hips back and give her warning look. She steals a kiss and smiles mischievously, but stops humping me.
Unlike our yard, the pool is sparsely populated. The sun has gone down, and the two of us are one of the last to get out of the water. No one can see what we’re doing. But, if I get out of this pool with a boner, there’s no way I’ll make it all the way across the packed yard and into the house with no one noticing.
Just the thought of that being caught on camera shrivels my wood.
I put her down when we get to the steps and link our fingers as we climb out. The sun’s gone down, but it’s still almost eighty-five degrees. These hot summer nights are one of the only things I like about living in Houston.
We cut our way through the crowd of similarly clad people. They’re facing the stage set up on our back lawn singing along to the music, dancing, kissing, and having a great time. I squeeze my mom’s shoulder as we walk by her and Joe. Rose, Nadia’s daughter, sits perched on Joe’s shoulders. Ramzi, Phil’s husband nods and smiles when we squeeze past them.
Beth and I exchange surprised smiles. If he’s smiling, then we must be doing something right.
We hit a dense patch of revelers and find our way blocked by a cluster of women dancing in a tight circle. I tap the shoulder of the woman in front of me. She turns around, a toothy, ecstatic grin on her face. When she sees me and Beth, she grins even wider. “Great party!” she yells, exaggerating the movement of her lips as she speaks.
I don’t recognize her, but clearly she knows who we are, so I smile and yell back, “Thanks.” Then, I point past her, indicating that we want to pass. “Ooh,” she smiles apologetically and hustles her friends out of the way.
We’re about halfway through the crowd when our song starts to play. It’s the one I wrote from our wedding vows. Almost nine years later, Paradise is still a favorite cover for bands, including the one entertaining this crowd.
The crowd hoots and claps as the opening strains start and I wrap my arms around her from behind and pull her warm, still damp body against mine. She relaxes against me dropping her head as we sway to the music.
“You asked me when I’d stop trying; I said never.
You asked me how long I’d love you; I told you forever.
Because from the moment I saw you, I knew I’d found my always. The paradise in your eyes is where I want to spend the rest of my days.”
The light from the stage casts us all is shades of blue and white. And even with all the noise, with her in my arms it’s like being in the labyrinth garden we built as a replica of James’. We dance there nearly every night when we’re at our house in Corsica. And, almost always to this song.
This is the beginning of a new us.
This is the start of our new world.
One where we can see forever.
One where we’ll always be together.
Our love story isn’t your everyday romance.
And I know it’ll never end.
Because this is us…
And us, is forever.
She turns around and looks up through her lashes. Those still lavishly expressive, heart-slaying eyes of her make my heart stand at attention.
I drop my head and take her mouth with mine. When my tongue sweeps along her lower lip, I taste the mango and the vanilla from cake she made for son’s birthday. I love this woman so much, she’s the flavor, feel, and sound of my happiness.
A body slams into my back, making us stumble and breaking our kiss. A beefy damp hand pats my shoulder a few times and by the time I turn around to see who it, they’ve blended into the crowd.
“Come on.” I take her hand again and start back through the crowd. This time, not stopping until we’re through the crowd and on our way to the house. Our backyard was the selling point of this house. It’s a little more than a full acre in size. Once we’re away from the concert area and the pool, the noise isn’t as oppressive because we didn’t set up speakers.
We approach the large carnival like tent we set up as a makeshift dining area.
“Hey,” Susan shouts waves us over. She’s squinting and sweating from the smoke and heat, but that grin on her face says it all. She’s in hog heaven.
Literally.
She’s got at least five different cuts of pig and six different flavors of sausage on the smoker grill she’s standing in front of. She ordered for the house when she moved in five years ago.
We stop upwind of the billowing, applewood smoke, but the smell of the smoked meat and spices fill the air with a mouthwatering aroma and I make a mental to come back and grab a few links before they’re all gone.
“Where you two sneaking off to?” she shouts, louder than necessary and I press a finger to my lips and look around for signs of our youngest children. They’ve got radar that goes off whenever we’re trying to find time alone.
“Inside for just a minute, but keep it down,” I tell her.
Beth wraps her arm around my waist, tracing the outline of the muscles at my side, but leans closer to Susan. “We don’t want the kids to follow us,” she winks.
Susan rolls her eyes heavenward and shakes her head in exasperation. “You two are like those horny little monkeys we saw in Bali last year,” she scolds.
Then, with the lightening fast reflexes she thanks twenty years in jail for honing, she slaps a marauding hand away from the meat she’s got cooling on a rack next to the grill. We make our escape while she scolds the unfortunate soul naïve enough to think they could get one past her.
Susu, as the kids call her, is legendary for her eagle eyes and heavy hands.
We’re almost at the sliding glass doors that lead from our terrace to our kitchen when Beth stops and groans.
“God, this is a total shit show,” She lifts her foot up and peels a discarded pineapple wedge off the bottom. She holds it out in front of her and glares at it.
“Too bad that pineapple wedge isn’t a mirror,” I quip and hold the door open for her to step into the house.
“What is that supposed to mean?” she asks, indignantly as we step into our blessedly quiet and clean kitchen.
“That this poor man’s Coachella that you planned is turning out exactly as I predicted,” I say and duck just in time to dodge the pineapple.
“It’s not that bad,” she insists, crossing her arms in front of her and glaring at me.
I eye her coolly and wordlessly as I make slow work of peeling the pineapple off the wall behind me.
“Right, sure. This is all perfectly normal,” I say meaningfully, my eyes never leaving her face, as I drop it ceremoniously into the trashcan.