Visiting Emma Ch. 03

"No kidding?" I asked, completely dumfounded. I'd never known any of this.

"No kidding," Mel replied. "Though, what's even worse is that she was still with Jeremy at the time."

"Was she?" Emma asked, quietly.

"Of course she was, you don't remember? It's not so terribly bad that she wanted to get some on the side, that's between her and Jeremy, but to try and get it from another woman's man, that's just... low."

"Well," I said, taking a sip of my own water and hoping that this conversation was really about that Memorial Day boat trip. "I wonder what she's doing now?"

"Laura?" Melinda asked.

I nodded.

"Last I heard she'd married Jeremy, though I heard she still wiles away her days pining for you," she said seriously, waiting a moment before laughing.

"You're mocking me, aren't you?"

"Yes," she admitted, everyone seemingly amused by it.

At that moment, thank God, our waiter arrived and we were able to order.

The rest of dinner was great, the food was spectacular and the drinks were top notch. We spent a little over an hour there, making small talk and enjoying the company. And thankfully, we didn't talk about boats or attempted man-stealing the rest of the evening.

Once we got home, we had to hurry inside. The weather had gotten bad quickly and the wind was the worst. Colorado's rain and snow can be awful, yes, but it's wind is just murder.

So, once we got inside, Steve went to turn on the thermostat, but Emma pulled him away and we all ended up out in the living room. The living room was great; it had a wood stove and some small couches, lots of floor space. It had the potential to be very cozy.

Joe and I were talking about a student of his (Joe was a history professor at a small college near Beaumont) who had written an extraordinary treatise on the cultural splintering in Yugoslavia that resulted in the Kosovo conflict—I admit, it wasn't really my forte, but Joe had a way of getting a person hooked into a story—when Emma came up to us.

"I didn't want to interrupt," she started, though Joe gave her a wave of his hand to let her know that he didn't mind at all. "I thought I should tell you, we're all changing into our pjs."

"Really?" Joe asked. "Kathy's agreed to this?"

Emma laughed and gave a nod. "Kathy's borrowing something of mine."

"I wondered what she was going to wear," Joe laughed.

"I'm going to change too," Melinda said, as she came up to us.

I wondered if that meant she was going to wear my shirt and sweatpants again, but all I asked was, "So, everyone's doing this?"

"You don't have to," Melinda said, playing with the lapel on my suit coat. "You can do whatever you like. I'm just letting you know that I'm changing."

"Okay," I replied, thinking I would stay in my dinner clothes. I turned to say something to Emma, but she and Kathy had already headed upstairs. When I looked back to Melinda, she was going to. So, I turned back to the only person that seemed to be hanging around, Joe.

"Well Joe, tell me more about this student of yours."

He smiled, put his hand on my shoulder, and we walked across the room to where Steve was getting the wood stove going.

A little while later, the girls had come back downstairs. Emma was off making popcorn, while Mel and Kathy gathered some blankets and pillows, and we fellas just tried to stay out of the way. After all, Steve had handled our one task, which was getting the fire started, so the rest of our time was spent just getting comfortable.

It turned out, much to my surprise, that the girls had purchased new sets of pajamas while I was trying on clothes earlier that day. Emma was in a cream that matched her dinner dress, and Melinda was in a sky blue outfit that I immediately fell in love with. As soon as she walked by me I let her know how much I liked her choice in sleepwear.

"I thought you'd like them," she said, showing that lovely little flirty smile of hers again. "I was thinking of you when I got them."

"Partly me and partly you?" I asked.

She laughed, nodded, and handed me a blanket. "Hold on to this," she said. "I like it, so it's mine tonight, okay?"

I nodded and she went into the kitchen.

I took off my coat, shoes, and socks, so I was quite relaxed by the time Melinda came back. The other girls came with her and they finally began to settle down. Emma brought in the popcorn and a couple of bottles of wine that she promptly handed to Steve. I'm not sure whether one has the red or the white with Pop Secret, but we had the white, and though it was an unusual combination, it made for some real good fun.

As we sat around talking, everyone gradually slid down to the floor. There's no other real way to put it. One minute I was sitting on the couch, watching Melinda sip wine and eat the occasional bit of popcorn, and the next I was down on the carpet behind her. She had a nice blanket too, not very heavy but with a soft feel, and a couple of pillows. She put a pillow in front of the loveseat that separated the living room from the kitchen and had me lean back into it. Then, she slipped in front of me. She moved between my knees, removed her hair clip, and leaned back into me. It was quite lovely.

Since I was somewhat pinned down, I made the most of it and asked her for everything. At first she responded right away, but by the third time I asked for a single piece of popcorn, she caught onto me. It was good for a laugh.

We talked about old times, Joe told us stories about Steve as a kid, and a couple of them seemed new even to Emma. Everything felt good then, and whenever I could I watched Emma. I saw her give looks to Steve that could melt ice, and she was definitely flashing her smile. She seemed at ease, and she seemed happy. Sitting, as I was, with Melinda, I couldn't have hoped for better. Though I would always remember what had happened between Emma and I, I didn't want it to happen again, I didn't want it to hurt her and Steve, and I didn't want it to hurt Melinda. The conversations we'd had earlier at dinner had proven to me that the thing between Emma and I needed to stay a secret. Maybe I was being selfish. But I didn't care. The fun we were having sitting on the floor was far too good to ruin.

We were there for a while. Even with the wood stove going, the room never really got too warm, so the blanket stayed on us.

And I admit, it's awful, but... I couldn't keep my hands from playing.

Melinda wasn't exactly jumping at my touch, so she's partly culpable in this, but it was primarily my fault. She felt so good under my hands, through the absolutely divine fabric of her pajamas, that I couldn't stop. Luckily, the large blanket easily veiled the small movements of my hands.

At first I simply ran them over her hips and around her waist. I even dared so far as to slide my fingertips a couple of inches beneath and below her waistband, but as soon as I did it, she leaned forward and asked Steve for another glass of wine. Her waistband snapped back against her skin.

I pretended as if nothing happened because I wasn't sure if anyone had heard it, but luckily, no one was really paying close attention to us anyway. They were talking and laughing and asking us a question here and there, but that was about all.

So when Melinda sat back against me, I gave her a soft little pinch and she laughed quietly into her newly filled glass.

Then Joe started asking about Emma's family, and everyone seemed to get very interested. They were all looking at Emma, so, I slipped a hand around Melinda's waist, down below the little ties in the front of her new pajamas, and between her thighs. Again, she didn't even flinch.

Slowly, lightly, I began to run my fingers against her, in the creases of her thighs and against the padded front of her pubic bone. She took a larger sip of her wine as Emma began to give everyone an update on her brother.

Emma's brother, Michael, had recently gone off to college in England. He had never been much of a student in his younger years, and was what some people called a 'late bloomer' I suppose. In any case, he was enjoying himself overseas, and he was always emailing Emma with the latest news and/or gossip.

As she relayed the latest story to us, I tugged on Melinda's pajama ties. One quick, short pull, and the ties were undone. It was the biggest movement I'd made under the blanket, but no one noticed. The only person to react was Melinda, and she responded by taking another sip of wine and leaning back into me even further.

I adjusted my position behind her, just a bit, and gave myself a little more room to move my arm. Once I was comfortable I slid my index finger behind the front of her pajama bottoms. I lifted the fabric away from her skin, and held it there for just a moment. I pretended to be listening to Emma, but I was waiting for Melinda. She had her head leaning back against my shoulder, and when she turned and kissed me lightly on the neck, I took that as the okay to keep playing.

My hand went under her pajamas. Her skin was hot, and I could feel her heartbeat against my chest. I drew circles against the fabric of her panties, and I felt her stiffen just a bit against me. As she did, I stopped.

Emma was finishing her story, and everyone laughed, including Mel. Then she turned and whispered in my ear.

"I didn't mean to react so much," she said, knowing I would understand. "Don't stop."

I'm not sure I can explain the rush I felt. Touching Melinda under the blanket was wonderful in itself, which I'm sure is not that difficult to understand, but doing it surreptitiously right in front of everyone else added some sort of forbidden excitement that made it impossible for me to resist. It's not something I'd done before, or something that I've done since, to be honest, but at the time it was one of the most exciting things I'd ever done.

So, while our friends began to talk about Joe's students, and Kathy's projects, and Steve's work, I continued to caress Melinda under the blanket. There was no urgency, no need for her to climax—surely, we'd get caught if that happened—just a gentle moment between the two of us, laced with the excitement of it being a secret.

At least, at first.

Later, she told me it was the combination of the wine, the feel of her pajamas on the inside of her thighs, my cologne—a very subdued spot of Hugo Boss, by the way—and my 'damnably wonderful hands' that got her in trouble.

I didn't realize her mood had changed until she put her empty wine glass down on the tray sitting on the carpet next to us. When she leaned back into me afterward, I could see that her chest, behind the first button of her top, was getting flushed. But at the time I thought maybe it was the wine.

Then Steve noticed her glass was empty and reached for the bottle, only to discover it, too, was empty.

"Oh Lord," Steve said in mock-astonishment. "We're out of wine!"

Emma laughed and suggested he get some more, because she didn't think anyone was done drinking.

Steve stood to go to the wine cellar, and Joe stood up next to him. "I'll go with you," he said. "And the bathroom," he added. "Must use the bathroom."

Kathy nodded and got up to go as well, saying that she needed a bathrobe too, because she still hadn't warmed up.

Then Emma stood.

"Kathy," Emma said. "Why don't we get some more blankets then?"

"And a movie?" Joe asked.

"Yeah," Emma nodded. "A movie sounds good."

The entire time neither Mel nor I said a word.

"Do either of you need to take a break?" Steve asked us.

Mel simply shook her head, but I answered, "No, I think we're comfortable."

Steve nodded, and everyone left.

As soon as they were gone, Melinda turned her head to me and I saw immediately that her eyes had gone glassy, that her neck was flushing. It was definitely not the wine.

In my ear, she said, "You have got to let me come."

"How?" I asked, not knowing what she needed.

"Put your hand on my skin," she told me.

Her skin was slippery, and wet, and she sighed luxuriously as I palmed her beneath her panties.

Then she put her own hand over mine and guided me, showing me a quick move that was really just a motion of my wrist. On the downslide, it pushed my middle and ring fingers to the bottom lip of her velvet-slick opening, and on the way up, my palm pressed against her clit, tugging it and its hood toward me. I tried it.

"Oh, that is exactly it," she moaned lowly into my neck and closed her eyes.

I pulled again and she flexed her legs under the blanket. I sat on the floor with my knees on either side of her forming blanket-covered arches that she put her own knees under as she widened her thighs and brought her heels together like a diamond. I didn't know how much time we had before someone was going to come back but I was too turned on not to risk it. I flicked my wrist again, and again, pulling against her skin faster with each movement.

She turned into me, kissing my neck. Her breath was hot, and coming quicker, and she began shifting her hips to push herself into my hand.

"Are you going to come for me?" I asked her, whispering.

She opened her eyes, saw that I was watching her, and nodded, smiling and biting her lip. I lengthened my stroke, pushing my fingers down a little further, and her eyes rolled up as she closed them. I tugged faster.

That brought her off.

She pushed her nose into my neck and let go, her body shuddering under the blanket, her breathing completely erratic.

At that moment, I happened to look over her head and I caught Kathy just behind the loveseat. She was the first to come back, and she had stopped short of the couch, leaning over at the hip, bent down, her eyes as wide as saucers. She immediately put a finger to her lips, and backed away.

I hadn't heard her approach, and I didn't hear her walk away.

A moment later, Melinda stretched, shifting her knees back together.

"Comedy or romance?" Kathy asked from back in the kitchen.

Melinda snatched at the blanket and pulled it up to her chin with a short giggle. She never giggled. Perhaps it was the wine. "That was close!" she whispered to me.

"Yes," I nodded, my own version of Kathy's amused smile coming out. "It was."

"Actually," Melinda said louder, to Kathy. "How about a game of some sort? Like Catchphrase or something?"

"I'm sure that will go famously with the wine," Kathy replied dryly.

So that's what we did. For about an hour, we played Catchphrase and finished off another bottle of wine. After that, Joe and Kathy all but begged to go to bed. They were, after all, an hour ahead of the rest of us so no one argued. In fact, I said bed sounded just fine to me.

"Me too," Melinda agreed. "I'm tired."

"I think we're headed upstairs then," I said to everyone. Then to Mel, I asked, "Can you walk, or would you rather I carry you?"

She gave me a lazy smile and asked, "Would you really carry me?"

I lifted the blanket off of us, stood, and then bent down and picked her up. She put her arms around my neck and I carried her up the stairs to bed.

"I'm so tired," she said again as I laid her down. "I think the wine is knocking me out...."

I pulled the thick covers of the bed aside, and helped her crawl under them. She was already half asleep by the time I was done, but, I knew she was going to be thirsty later, so I figured I'd head downstairs and get a glass of water to set on her nightstand.

I made my way down the stairs and nearly into the kitchen, slowing down before I entered through the open entryway. Unexpectedly, I heard the soft guitar strains of Santana's Sideways playing through from the living room. I'd thought everyone else had gone off to bed, but clearly someone was still up. I tried to get a look without getting caught—who knew what sort of mood I could be breaking—and found Steve holding Emma in a tender embrace, the two of them swaying to the hypnotically soothing music. They looked wonderful together, both of them so very much in love, and I couldn't help smiling.