Bitter Sweet by Lavyrle Spencer Read Free Book Online

orange juice, uncapped it and swilled half of it straight from the bottle. Backhanding his mouth, he continued standing in the wedge of light from the open door, baffled. He’d probably never know the real reason. Loneliness, maybe. Nothing more.
    He put the juice away, snapped out the kitchen light and returned to his bedroom.
    Nancy was sitting up cross-legged with the light on, dressed in a peach satin teddy and tap pants, her shapel limbs gleaming in the lamplight.
    ‘Well, that took a while,’ she remarked dryly. ‘Surprised the hell out of me.’ “Maggie Pearson?’ ‘Yup.’
    ‘The one you took to the prom?’
    ‘Yup.’
    ‘What did she want?’
    He dropped onto the bed, braced his hands beside her hip and kissed her left breast above an inviting edge of peach coloured lace. ‘My body, what else?’
    ‘Eric!’ Grabbing a fistful of his hair, she lifted his head ‘What did she want?’
    He shrugged noncommittally. ‘Damned if I know. She said she talked to Brookie and Brookie gave her my phone number and told her to call me. I still haven’t figured it out’.
    ‘Brookie?’
    ‘Glenda Kerschner. Her maiden name was Holbrook.’ ‘Oh. The cherry picker’s wife.’
    ‘Yeah. She and Maggie were best friends in high school. We were all friends, a whole gang of us who ran along together.’
    ‘That still doesn’t answer my question. What is your old girlfriend doing calling you in the middle of the night?’
    With his inner wrists brushing her jutting knees he smiled smugly into her face. ‘Jealous?’
    ‘Curious. ‘
    ‘Well, I don’t know.’ He kissed Nancy ’s mouth. “Her husband died.’ He kissed her throat. ‘She’s lonely, that’s all I can figure out.’ He kissed her breast. ‘She said to tell you she’s sorry she woke you up.’ He bit her nipple, silk and all, ‘Where does she live?’
    ‘ Seattle .’ The word was muffled against Nancy ’s lingerie.
    “Oh... in that case. . .’ Nancy uncrossed her legs, slid onto her back and pulled him down on top of her, linking her arms and ankles behind him. They kissed, long and lazily, rocking against each other.
    When he lifted his head she looked into his eyes and said, ‘I miss you when I’m gone, Eric.’
    ‘Then stop going.’
    ‘And do what?’
    ‘Keep the books for me, open a boutique and sell all your fancy cosmetics to the tourists here in Fish Creek...’ He paused before adding, ‘... be a hausfrau and raise a pack of brats.’
    Or even one brat would do. But he knew better than to push the subject.
    ‘Hey,’ she scolded, ‘we’re starting something interesting here. Let’s not spoil it with that old epistle.’
    She drew his head down, invited his tongue inside her mouth and became the aggressor, stripping him of his briefs, rolling him onto his back, and slithering from her own skimpy lingerie. She was adept, very adept, and infallibly desirable. She saw to her desirability the way some wives see to their daily housework, expending much time and energy upon it, allotting it a fixed time in her schedule.
    Lord, she was a beautiful creature. While she reversed their roles and seduced him, he admired her at close range, her skin with the exquisite texture of an eggshell, incredibly unaged for a woman of thirty-eight, cared for twice a day with the expensive French cosmetics she sold; her nails, professionally groomed and artificially lengthened, painted a gleaming raspberry; her hair, which was presently a deep mahogany colour, shining with highlights added by some costly beautician in some far-off city where she’d been this past week. Orlane paid their sales reps a hair and nail allowance and gave them unlimited gratis merchandise with the understanding that they present themselves as walking testimonials for their products. The company got its money’s worth with Nancy Macaffee. She was the most beautiful woman he knew.
    She ran one long nail across his lips and inside them. He bit it lightly, then, still