“You’re just going to take me out, and then drop me off here afterwards?” I ask carefully.
“That’s generally how dates work,” he says. “Unless you want something different. I want you to be happy. But I’m not giving up on you, El. Not ever.”
“Okay,” I say, nodding. “If you’re really going to respect me and go slow.”
“I will,” he says immediately.
“Thank you,” I say. “And if you need relief before then…”
“If you tell me to get a side chick one more time, I’m going to tattoo a stop sign on my forehead with the wordcumareon it.”
I can’t help but giggle at that, the tension between us easing. “I was going to say, I could text you a picture or two,” I say, sipping my drink. “You lost your chance at a mistress when you took me.”
“That’s fair,” he says, sliding off the bar stool and leaning in to kiss my forehead. “I’ll pick you up at eight on Friday.”
And that’s how I start dating my husband.
For the month, King takes me out twice a week, to dinners, shows, concerts, galleries, movies, and even a club. Sometimes I can forget what he did, and we just have fun together. It’s truly the best of both worlds—I maintain my freedom, but I get a partner, too. I don’t have to obey him, but I have someone to do things with, a guy who wants me, makes me feel beautiful and sexy and wanted but not pressured. We kiss in the car when he drops me off, which progresses to making out, but I never invite him in. Sometimes, I send him nudes to tease him after he drops me off, but he doesn’t push things.
I know I should go home, but I’m having too much fun with this, and I’m afraid he’ll go back to being his dominant self, and that I’ll want that too much. I don’t want to lose sight of who I am, to disappear into our marriage. He’s patient, but I know he won’t be forever, so I revel in the honeymoon phase, living it the way I lived my party days before the wedding—diving in with both feet, committing with abandon. When he’s not around, I’m working up the nerve to do something I know I have to do before I can be a good wife.
twenty-three
King
It’s an odd thing to be a single, married man in New York. I no longer go to parties like I did in high school, but I don’t have a family to go home to, either. I’m a bachelor but not. Before now, I’ve only lived alone for a few months before the wedding. Before that, I had my brothers to look after. It leaves an empty place, a restlessness, as if I have no purpose. I know it’s good for me, though. Ma said she went from her father’s house to her husband’s. It’s not much different for me. Being married so young means I’ve never really been on my own.
I’m not made for that kind of life, though, and I soon realize it. I want Eliza home. I worry about my brothers, about what they’re doing down in Arkansas and about the fact that they’ve pulled away, not talking to me as much as they used to. I need someone to take care of, someone to put my energies into. When I don’t have it, I end up working until well past dark most nights. Al gave me a new partner, and we’re both eager to prove ourselves.
With Eliza, things are strained at first, but they get more comfortable as we get to know each other. I want to take care of her, but she won’t let me, and I never know when I’m going to piss her off or what she’ll do if that happens. She’s learning to trust me with her body, though, even if she’s still moving slow. I’m okay with that. She’s worth the wait.
When I take her to the club, she even dances with me, grinding on me until I’m ready to take her right there on the dance floor. Of course I can’t do that, though. I’m respectful, and she doesn’t freak out about my hard on this time. She grinds on it like teasing me is her sole purpose in life.
I don’t push for more. Between what happened to her when she was a kid and my violation, she’s slow to trust. I don’t mind waiting. She’s worth it. I’m going to keep showing up for her, showing her that I’m not going to hurt her. Eventually, she’ll learn that I’m a man of my word, that she can let her guard down and let me help her heal. I may have failed the last girl I had to care for, but it won’t happen again.
This time, I’ll save her.
We kiss goodnight each time, but nothing more happens. It’s funny how I’ve begun to notice other things now that sex is off the table. When I know it’s not coming later, I can relax and feel physical pleasure apart from sexual pleasure. It’s almost deeper, the pleasure I take in her soft, small body curled against mine in a booth; the heat and weight of her head when she rests on my arm while I’m kissing her dizzy in the car; the buttery smoothness of her skin under my calloused hands. Touching her feels fucking amazing no matter where it is or where it’s leading.
Finally, she starts to invite me in after our dates.
I’ve never been selfish enough to get off without making sure I got the woman off, too. I thought that meant I wasn’t a selfish lover, but with Eliza, I realize that’s not true. Making a girl cum has always been a point of pride to me. I was doing it for my ego, to prove that I was a good lover. Or because I knew she would tell her friends that I was good in bed. But I was still doing it for myself.
With Eliza, I don’t think about myself. She makes me take things slow, think about only her—what she wants, what she needs, what feels good to her and what is triggering.
For a few weeks, we go slow, and it’s hard to see progress, but we’re intimate in the ways she’s comfortable with. We kiss, and I let her explore my body, which she likes so much it kinda goes to my head. I’ve never been with a girl who was so painfully innocent, so curious, so fascinated by my body, not just my dick. Maybe the girls I’ve been with were as selfish as me. We were always both just thinking about getting off.
But Eliza isn’t thinking about that. Whenever she gets close, she freezes up and backs off. She seems more interested in me, which I have to admit is hot as hell. She’s fascinated by things no one else has ever paid attention to, like the fact that guys like their nipples played with, too, or how to touch my balls. She likes to lie her head on my belly and breath on my cock and watch it get hard. And she seems pretty intent on learning to excel at blowjobs and hand jobs both.
Still, it’s frustrating. I want to touch her the way she touches me, with freedom and wonder. I want to spread her open and sink my fingers into her hot little cunt and make her moan for more. I want to taste her, to fuck her with my tongue until I push her over the edge, and I want to feel her lose control and cum in my mouth. And I want to fuck her hard and deep, to cum inside her while she screams my name.
But we’re a long way from there. Instead, I spend a lot of time with the nudes she texts me.
One night after a Halloween party, we arrive back at her father’s house and stumble in, both a little tipsy.
“Come here, my bride,” I say, scooping her up in my arms with a growl.
She gives a little shriek and kicks her legs, but she’s laughing as she links her arms around my neck and leans up to kiss me.