At first Jean thought it was a game, but later came to think of it more as a ritual. On Saturdays when Matthew was off watching cricket with the boys and the phone was silent, his patients happy to tend to their own lives, Lucien would pad silently into the sun room. Jean thought this was odd given that no one was around to hear him and often wondered whose detection he was trying to avoid. Perhaps it was her's, perhaps it was God's, perhaps it was some ghost to be named later. He would sneak into the room and watch Jean as she tended to begonias and African violets. Jean would pretend not to notice him but she always knew he was there. Her spine would tingle under the intensity of his stare. But she always humored him, he would approach her in his own time. It usually wasn't long after that his arms were around her and Jean's work was quickly forgotten.
If they weren't in a bedroom, Jean reasoned, they certainly could not be accused of impropriety. Those who wondered what went on in the beds of a couple who lived under the same roof could be told in all honesty, nothing. Technically speaking, the sun room might not even be considered part of the house. That was Lucien's contribution to Jean's theory, mumbled into her neck as he pressed her against a bench under a lush pot of crimson lilies. If they weren't even in the house, they certainly could not be up to no good.
If Lucien did not muss her blouse too badly as his teeth grazed across her breast in search of skin it was unlikely anyone would notice. If Jean muffled her cries against his shoulder then the neighbors would not hear and could not gossip. If Jean carefully set aside the geraniums so a pot did not shatter in their haste then no one would ask what happened here. If Lucien spilled himself so deep inside her that there was little to clean up, then surely no one would be the wiser.
But only if.