“This is fine.” I come to sit next to her, noticing a paper menu on the table. “Dinner?”
“I asked for the omakase,” she explains, still picking at the fruit. “I hoped you weren’t too full from your meal with your friend. Chef-picked tastings are always fun.”
“We only had drinks.” I reach for a piece of fruit as well, trying not to be distracted by how beautiful she looks. She’s wearing a black bikini that doesn’t leave much to the imagination, which surprises me, and a sheer gold sarong over one hip. It leaves all of one creamy thigh bare, and I have to resist the urge to slide my hand up it.
“Oh, good.” Saoirse looks relieved. “Did you have a good time?”
“It was nice to catch up.” I’m eager to move on from the topic. I don’t want her prying too much and accidentally causing me to slip up and mention something about the visit to the Nakamura house. “Do you want a drink?”
“They’ll bring sake pairings with the food,” Saoirse explains. “But a cocktail would be nice. Whatever you think I’ll like.”
I go to the bar and order a whiskey for myself and some kind of sweet lychee cocktail for her, rolling my shoulders to try to ease some of the tension. I have half a mind to go ahead and slip into the onsen, just to let the heat relax my muscles. I feel wound tighter than I have since we arrived here.
“Are you alright?” Saoirse asks as I return with our drinks, and I nod.
“I’m fine. Just a little tired. I haven’t been doing a lot of long hikes lately. Or spending much time in the gym at all, actually.” Jacob and I have done some boxing practice in the ring a few times since I arrived in Boston, but I’ve been so wrapped up in Liam and the business of the Kings and navigating my new marriage that I’ve let it slip.
“You don’t look as if you’ve missed a day,” Saoirse says cheekily, letting her gaze slide over my arms and chest. “As handsome as ever.”
Her casual compliment touches something in me, as much as I try not to let it. She sounds genuine, as if she really means it, and I stand without thinking, stripping off my shirt to go sink into the water—and because I want to see her eyes on me like that again.
I’m no stranger to women looking at me with desire. I’d fucked half of London before Saoirse arrived and put a healthy dent in Boston before that. But something about how Saoirse looks at me feels different. There’s a possessive glint in her eye that’s almost masculine as if without even meaning to, she thinks that I’m hers whenever she looks at me.
I shouldn’t like that. It should trouble me, because once we fulfill the business of getting her pregnant, monogamy is off the table. But as she looks at my bare chest hungrily, I feel myself getting aroused at that gleam in her eye. I like feeling wanted by a woman like Saoirse. I like feeling as if she wants to possess me.
Never before have Ienjoyedthe thought of losing my sexual independence to a woman who might want to claim me all for herself. But after this weekend, in particular, I’m becoming more and more hard-pressed to imagine what I could be missing.
As I step into the onsen, feeling the swirling heat sinking into my skin, I try to picture that gorgeous red-headed stripper at my bachelor party. I’d enjoyed watching her dance, been turned on by her. But even as her face swims into my head, it’s replaced by Saoirse. After all, they’d looked very nearly alike.
You’re losing your mind,I tell myself sternly. But as I sink deeper into the water, turning to face Saoirse, both my heart and my cock leap at the sight of her swaying towards me, discarding her sarong as she comes to join me in the onsen.
“What about dinner?” I grin at her as she swims toward me, and she laughs, reaching to pile her dark red hair atop her head.
“They’ll serve it to us here,” she says with a shrug, and I reach for her waist, pulling her towards me through the water so that she’s pressed to me from chest to thighs, my hard cock nestling against her. “None of that,” she adds teasingly. “We can’t fuck in here. We’ll get thrown out.”
“Don’t tempt me,” I warn her, one hand sliding around to squeeze her ass. “I fingered you in the pool with all our friends and family close by, remember?”
Saoirse flushes hotly enough to let me know that she does, in fact, remember. “I want you in our bed tonight,” she murmurs. “Allnight.”
My cock throbs at the easy way she says it, as if hearing my wife tell me she wants me to fuck her all night long isn’t something out of the ordinary. Back home, sex between us was verging on combative every time, but this weekend has felt like everything Saoirse wanted it to be. Romantic, affectionate, passionate.
And we haven’t even had to try that hard.
The experience she’s arranged for us defies expectations. We’re served a steady array of small plates and tasting dishes by the onsen, arranged so that we can nibble at the food as we float in the hot water with the cool breeze coming off of the park, sake refreshed with each new item that’s brought. The bartender refills our drinks as well, and by the time they bring us green tea ice cream and cherry blossom mochi, both Saoirse and I are full and hazy with good food and too much alcohol, floating in each other’s arms.
I turn her so that she’s leaning back against my chest, both of us looking out over the grand vista of the park as I feed her a bite of mochi. She lets out a soft sigh, and for once, I enjoy the simple pleasure of having her in my arms, the soft weight of her body melding into mine as we eat dessert and look at the moon over the view beyond us.
“This is heaven, I think,” Saoirse says softly. “I wish we could stay here forever.”
“We’d be broke in a month.” I bite her ear gently. “I know we’re both rich, but—”
“It wasn’tthatbad.”Saoirse rolls her eyes, turning to give me a light kiss on the jaw. “We should go upstairs soon.”
“Oh?” My hips arch instinctively against her at that, my cock swelling at the thought of what we’ll doupstairs. “Is that the sound of my wife begging for my cock?”
Saoirse narrows her eyes at me, her kiss on my jaw turning to a soft bite. “I don’t beg any man for anything.”
“We’ll see about that.” I give her a dark grin, climbing out of the onsen and giving her a hand. The stone is cool against my bare feet, and the sight of Saoirse slipping out of the dark water, her black bikini clinging to her pale skin, has me hardening even more. “We should get upstairs before I embarrass us both,” I tell her, pulling her in for a kiss so she can feel how hard I am.