Chapter Thirty-Nine
Charlotte
Emery and Charlotte were in the backseat of an SUV, driving to his house after having just flown in from Boston where they’d spent the last three nights. Their time there was busy, the days spent at the jobsite or at the builder’s office. On occasion, they’d work at Emery’s townhouse but that was becoming less and less now that they were getting deeper into the construction.
The nights Charlotte stayed in Burlington were silent, the Boston ones so loud. She liked the mix, but she liked the noisy ones more. She enjoyed lying in bed at the hotel that was only a few blocks from Emery’s place, wondering what he was doing, thinking of the small white towel he had been wrapped in. What he would look like if he were stretched out on his bed wearing only that small piece of white fabric.
Those were the images Charlotte thought of when she touched herself.
Her skin heated as she glanced in his direction. He was so focused on the phone in his hand, his long, thin fingers tapping the screen. Charlotte couldn’t stop her mind from wandering, thinking how those fingers would feel on her body. Her gaze moved up a few inches, remembering the dips of his chest and the definition in his shoulders. She lifted once more and thought of the short hairs of his trimmed beard.
The urge to touch it was so strong, she had to turn away from him and face the window, concentrating on a view that didn’t have him in it.
They were getting closer to his house and the mountains were becoming more descriptive. The colors deepened. The edges of the cliffs grew sharper as they came into focus.
Charlotte looked up ahead, seeing the storefronts and homes and motorcycles. There was even a biker about a football field away, hugging the shoulder of the road. Charlotte recognized the bright blue base of the bicycle as one of the ones that had been in Emery’s garage. Once she studied the back of the woman who was riding it, she pointed out the window and said, “I think that’s Jesse.”
Emery immediately glanced up from his phone and Charlotte watched his face. As he realized the woman was his wife, a smile sparked in his eyes. It quickly moved down his cheeks and to his mouth.
“That’s her,” he said.
He didn’t use her name. He gave no details that described her, nothing endearing or memorable. But it was the sound of his voice and the look in his eyes that said it all.
Charlotte hoped one day a man would gaze at her the same way he was staring at Jesse.
And if that person were Emery, that would be even better.