Two-and-a-half years later
"Did you hear the news? Lisette Latimer is expecting!"
Harold's ears immediately perked up at that. Though he was ensconced in his office and the woman who had issued this proclamation was in the emporium's shop – it was not uncommon for Mrs. Shinn and her ladies to take refuge there on afternoons when the weather was chancy, and as it was a stormy, blustery day in mid-March, they would most likely settle in for quite some time – her voice echoed clearly down the hall, and his door was open. If he'd been alone, the music professor would have crept closer to the threshold to eavesdrop, but as Marian was also in the room with him, looking over the emporium's books, he pretended to be thoroughly occupied with polishing his trumpet as Maud Dunlop continued chattering to her companions.
"Or should I say, Lisette Carlisle," she amended. "It's funny, isn't it, how a certain name will insist on sticking in one's head even after it changes? I suppose it's because her former surname and Christian name rolled so nicely off the tongue, when paired together."
"Well, no one can deny she's much happier as Lisette Carlisle than she ever seemed to be as Lisette Latimer – even when her first husband was still alive," Alma Hix slyly put in.
"And John Carlisle has perked up noticeably, too," Mrs. Squires added. "He seems almost a different man, walking around with that huge grin on his face!"
Avis Grubb giggled. "It's such a lovely change, though, especially as no one thought he'd ever marry again after his wife died, poor man! But their wedding last September was just beautiful," she said fondly, ever the sucker for sentimentality. "They seemed so happy, and they're a fine-looking pair when they're all smiles… "
As the clucking hens continued to dissect the taciturn farmer and erstwhile widow's history, both as individuals and a couple, Harold started to lose interest in the conversation, as he and the rest of River City were aware of most of those details already. Instead, he thought about Billy Latimer. By all accounts, the boy had done very well after being pulled out of Professor Hill's boys' band – not only was he thriving in his new family, he had grown into a handsome and likable teen. He'd also discovered a natural talent at football and recently became quarterback of the high school team, which made him even more popular with the girls than he already was. But even though music was a yearning Billy had long since put aside as a childish dream, he always had a smile and a wave for his former mentor on the rare occasions they crossed paths. The music professor's unwarranted burst of laughter did not affect him so deeply as to engender permanent animosity and, now that he had found his niche, he could remember his old teacher fondly. And that was more than enough for Harold.
It wasn't until Mrs. Hix piped up again that the music professor's ears not only perked up, his heart jumped into his throat.
"I wonder what made Lisette Latimer accept – or even notice – John Carlisle's attentions in the first place," she mused. "Up until then, she'd spent all her time staring at Professor Hill!"
At first, Harold wondered that the ladies would be so bold as to gossip about him in front of Tommy Djilas, but then he remembered that his second-in-command was currently working on setting the storeroom to rights. So for the moment, the ladies were free to speak as candidly as they pleased, and they did just that.
"Yes, it's a wonder their courtship ever happened at all, as Mr. Carlisle seemed content enough to quietly make eyes from afar for years," Mrs. Squires agreed. "I wonder what made him muster the gumption to finally speak up!"
Though the trumpet was now shining beautifully and he risked wearing off the plating if he polished it any further, Harold continued toying with it, resolutely avoiding his wife's eyes even as he felt her looking at him.
"Well, I'm glad he did finally speak up," Ethel Washburn said resolutely, her voice laced with sympathy. "It was painful to watch Lisette looking at Professor Hill like that – she couldn't have picked a more unattainable man to pine after, he's so in love with his wife!"
Harold smiled and relaxed a little, though he still didn't feel comfortable enough to meet Marian's quiet but penetrating gaze. Good old Ethel – he could always count on her to go to bat for them!
"Well, even if the Hills weren't so enamored with each other, Lisette Latimer should have known better than to pine after a married man," Mrs. Hix sniffed. "Though as we all know, that's never stopped some women from doing more than pining. Men, too… "
She trailed off, letting her unsavory comment hang tantalizingly on the air. Putting down the trumpet and getting to his feet at last, Harold braced himself for a firestorm of unpleasant gossip – even as he planned to enter the shop and divert the conversation, something unseemly would end up slipping out before he could put a stop to things – but it seemed that not all the ladies relished this burgeoning opportunity to hear about impropriety and scandal in River City.
"Well, I think it's marvelous news that Mr. and Mrs. Carlisle are going to be blessed with a bundle of joy!" Mrs. Shinn said in that blithe but determined tone she adopted whenever she deemed the conversation was going down avenues that were far too indecorous, even for a gossip session.
"Yes, marvelous news, indeed!" all the ladies chorused.
"My daughter-in-law is also expecting her second any day now, as you all know," Mrs. Dunlop prattled on, sounding relieved as well as cheerful. "And Jane Hearst is due with her first in July, I believe. Adding to those Lisette Carlisle's little arrival in August, there will be a veritable crop of babies in River City this spring and summer!"
Having finally mustered up the gumption to look at his wife, Harold's heart constricted to see a similar glow of nostalgia radiating from her countenance. Robert was just over two years old now, babbling and toddling up a storm. The music professor and librarian had both wanted another child so badly after the twins, preferably a son, and they'd been blessed with the sweetest, most perfect little boy – Harold still could not fathom his remarkable luck without getting a lump in his throat. And when he recalled how unhappy he'd been while Marian had suffered through the earliest stages of a pregnancy she was afraid to reveal to him, and how in his petulance he'd allowed his head to be turned by the smiles of another, he had to turn away from his wife again. The music professor could never think on that summer without a small twinge of conscience, and on the rare occasions it crossed his mind, he pushed it away and continued to revel in his newfound happiness not just with Marian, but their darling Robert. However, though the librarian had wholly occupied his mind and heart once they'd finally patched things up, and though he had not thought of Lisette Carlisle, nee Latimer, in quite some time, the anguish and desperation of those days came rushing right back to him.
Marian laid a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Harold, is everything all right?"
He turned to her and buried his face in the crook of her neck, not wanting to shut her out, but still not able to look her in the eye. "It is, even if it doesn't look it," he said honestly, if a bit guiltily. "I was just – remembering that summer after Paris."
The librarian grew still in his arms. "What about that summer?" she asked softly, her tone inscrutable.
Alarmed, Harold looked up at her. Her expression was calm but pensive; there was reservation in her eyes, but no judgment. Not yet. She was waiting for him to explain himself – and he knew he was only going to get one shot to defuse the row that was brewing, so he'd better get it right on the first try. He forced himself to keep meeting her gaze. "There are too many 'pitchers with big ears' to go into it right this second – wait here while I close up for the evening."
Marian blinked, as if she still wasn't quite sure what to make of all this. But she nodded, and the music professor breathed a sigh of relief. So far, so good.
However, perhaps he oughtn't to have put it off even for just that short amount of time. Although it took him only fifteen minutes to greet the ladies and usher them out of the shop, and then an additional ten minutes to send Tommy packing, the music professor still hadn't determined what he should and should not to reveal to his wife – let alone the best words to convey it!
When Harold finally walked down the hall to his office, he was such a nervous wreck that he was actually trembling. What on earth was he going to say that wouldn't reopen old wounds and reignite old fears they had finally managed to put to rest? But when he entered his office and saw the apprehension and dismay in Marian's expression – having time alone to think had clearly done her no favors, either – his first inclination was to put his wife at ease, whatever it cost him in dignity or pride.
"Nothing happened between me and Lisette Latimer," he said firmly. "Whatever those cackling hens might have implied."
Though a good deal of the tension ebbed from Marian's demeanor at his assertion, she continued to regard him with a skeptical expression. "Then why did their chatter bother you so much? Lisette Latimer wasn't the first woman to make cow's eyes at you, and she certainly won't be the last! You know as well as I do that given the chance, practically any other woman in River City would jump at you."
Harold nodded. "It's not the first time I've noticed a woman staring at me. But" – he swallowed – "it's the first time it took me more than a few seconds to forget."
The silence that greeted his statement was the heaviest and most heart-wrenching he'd ever experienced in Marian's presence. Though it might have been wiser not to go any further into this most treacherous of topics, he couldn't bear the distressed and astonished look in his wife's eyes, as if her whole world was crumbling beneath her feet, and she couldn't even begin to fathom how to regain her bearings.
"Lisette Latimer does not and never meant anything to me," he emphatically assured the now ashen-faced librarian. "Was I flattered by her stare a lot more than I ought to have been? Yes – I can't deny that I was." He sighed, and his shoulders slumped. "I saw her looking at me at a time when things weren't so rosy between us – but even then, I wasn't about to throw away everything we had built to indulge in a fleeting fancy," he quickly added. He looked entreatingly at his wife. "I tried so hard to forget about it, and I did manage to forget most of the time." He tentatively reached out to take Marian's hand in his, and was slightly reassured when she did not pull away – though her countenance remained thoroughly consternated as he continued to explain himself. "When we made love, I never thought of anyone but you. But on the days and nights when we were interrupted, and when we argued – it was during those low moments that look, which lurked in the background like an evil shadow, would pop into my head. It disturbed me – haunted my dreams. More than anything else, I just wanted it to go away."
"And when did it go away?" the librarian asked in a voice that was surprisingly level.
"When I talked to her," the music professor said, relieved that his wife wasn't quite the wreck he'd feared. But he didn't get too comfortable – in his tone, he'd heard echoes of the "just to talk" line he'd given Marian all those years ago when he first invited her to the footbridge with him, and her brow quirked as if she recalled this, too. "I didn't seek the widow out, mind you. In fact, I did my best to avoid her, even when it proved difficult; as you might recall, her son Billy was in the band at the time. But as it just so happened, the mouthpiece of his trumpet got clogged, and she came to the shop to get it fixed the morning after our worst fight yet. It wasn't too long after I began talking to Mrs. Latimer that this fleeting fancy started to dissipate. And when she laughed at something I said, her laugh was so discordant and braying" – he couldn't help chuckling, but more out of nervousness than mirth – "I couldn't help bursting into laughter, myself, so that was the end of her fancy, as well. In fact, I'm pretty sure I inadvertently played matchmaker when a concerned John Carlisle proceeded to follow her out of the shop after she left in a huff!"
The corners of Marian's lips twitched, and while it was only a ghost of her usual radiant beam, Harold was heartened. Though it might have been wiser not to go any further into this treacherous topic, he couldn't help continuing, "And then we made up that night – not only was it Paris again, we were going to have another baby! I was elated… and shamed as well, because it drove home how much of an undeserving heel I'd been." The lump started to build in his throat again. "Even though I never forgot that no other woman was worth throwing away my family for, I couldn't help wanting novelty and admiration – but from you, Marian. And when I couldn't get it from you… "
"Then the glances of adulation from another woman started to look awfully attractive," she shrewdly summed up.
It was hard to tell if Marian was regarding him with understanding or censure, as her expression had become disquietingly inscrutable. "What can I do to make it up to you?" Harold asked, quietly and earnestly.
The librarian regarded him for a long moment before that steady and steely look of determination he knew so well took hold of her features. But Harold didn't know whether this boded well or ill for him, especially as her tone remained coolly impassive as she replied, "Let me make a phone call, and then we'll continue this conversation."
XXX
Mrs. Paroo picked up on the third ring.
"Hi Mama," Marian greeted her, marveling how easy it was to speak in a level her tone after such a troubling revelation about her marriage. "Harold and I are running behind – we have some things we need to finish at the emporium before we leave for the evening."
"Oh, don't you worry about a thing, me girl," her mother reassured her. "The children are doing just fine. I'll go ahead and feed them their dinner, and keep yours warm for the two of you. What time do you think you'll be over?"
Marian's voice caught in her throat, but she quickly recovered it after swallowing. "It's hard to say. Seven, perhaps?"
"Of course," her mother said smoothly. Marian rolled her eyes in amused exasperation – she could just see the knowing twinkle in her mother's expression! "You and Professor Hill take all the time you need."
"Thank you, Mama," Marian said with real gratitude, and hung up the phone.
The librarian thought she would fall to pieces when she finally turned toward Harold, but even – or perhaps because – she saw how remorseful and dismayed he looked, she still felt that eerie sense of benumbed calm. Perhaps the reality of what he had divulged to her hadn't fully sunk in yet. But as she regarded her shamefaced husband, she began to grow annoyed. Not so much at him, but at the ladies who'd heedlessly forced his hand. Given that nothing had actually happened between him and Lisette Latimer – except one conversation that was perhaps a bit more flirtatious than he was letting on – this was a revelation she could have happily lived the rest of her life not knowing. And if it weren't for this inopportune interlude, the librarian would never have found out; until she'd seen the way Harold tensed up at the ladies' gossip, she hadn't the least inkling of his fancy for the lonely widow, though she was well aware of the heated gazes the woman had given to the dashing music professor before settling down so happily with John Carlisle.
But there was nothing for it. Now that everything was out in the open, all they could do was try to work through it as best they could.
Although Harold's complaisant and penitent glance indicated that he was just as eager as she to put this unpleasantness behind him, Marian found herself at a loss as to where to begin. She had wondered at her husband's alternating distance and desperation during those uneasy post-Paris months, but had chalked it up to his frustration with her aloofness and attempted return to Victorian delicacy. She had no idea that her music professor been grappling with an attraction to another woman on top of everything else and, even though they'd long since resolved the issues that led to their estrangement, it alarmed her to realize just how close she had indeed come to losing her husband. And it was even more upsetting to have it once again brought home to her just how much her prim reticence had cost her. If she had only talked to Harold in August, Lisette Latimer's yearning gaze would not have struck his fancy at the parade in early September.
While it was not an inevitability that the music professor would stray, Marian wasn't naïve enough to believe that a man of his sensuality would be able to weather an entire marriage without feeling at least a faint stirring of lust for a pretty stranger every now and then, especially when things weren't so rosy with his wife. But now that she was actually contemplating how she felt upon discovering that another woman had indeed caught her husband's eye, she did not feel the icy and imperious sense of contempt she expected. She didn't even feel the awful rending sensation in her heart she'd experienced all those years ago when she realized after Harold had given her his first, illicit love-bite in the corner of his office that she had to break things off with him. It did hurt and unsettle the librarian that her nagging fear had indeed come to pass, but it didn't break her. Surprisingly, she even understood.
So why couldn't she open her mouth? Marian had to say something to continue the conversation between them. As the awkward silence between husband and wife stretched from seconds into minutes, Harold's expression grew downright terrified. Certainly, he wasn't going to be the one to speak first. Not when he looked like a man who feared he was going to lose everything if he dared to so much as twitch the wrong way.
So it was up to her to figure out how to overcome this impasse. And since words had failed them both, the librarian resorted to the one thing that had always allowed them to scale the seemingly insurmountable walls of Jericho that sprang up between them. Stepping forward and closing the gap, Marian put her arms around her husband and laid her head on his shoulder.
Harold broke down. "Marian," he choked, throwing his arms around her and burying his face in the crook of her neck. "I'm so, so sorry… "
Oddly, the music professor's complete loss of composure steadied the librarian, allowing her to recover her voice. "Sssh," she said soothingly, rubbing his back in long strokes as he trembled in her embrace. "I may not like that it happened, and I can't deny that I was hoping it never would, but I can understand how it came to pass." She sighed. "I really can't blame you for feeling how any man would when a pretty stranger smiled so warmly at him, at a time when his wife wasn't doing her job."
Harold's head snapped up and his eyes locked with hers. "It shouldn't be work to make love to me, Marian. I don't want you to make love to me out of a sense of obligation, or fear that you'll drive me into the arms of a pretty stranger if you say 'not tonight.' You won't lose me. You didn't even come close. I would never betray you."
Marian fought the perverse urge to smile at his vehemence, even as it heartened her. "I meant that I need to be open and honest with you. I need to share my fears and concerns, instead of trying to push them away and pretend everything is all right when it isn't. We need to be intimate in every way, not just physically." Her tone turned sheepish, though she forced herself to continue looking steadily into her husband's gaze as she said, "I know I'm too Iowa stubborn, and I know that I'm still not as forthcoming as I need to be when something is bothering me, but hopefully I've made at least a little progress since Paris?"
Harold's arms tightened even more securely around her. "You've come miles forward, Marian. Like tonight – you're the one who arranged for us to have this time to talk."
Marian gave him a warm squeeze in return. "It hasn't been the most comfortable or pleasant conversation, but it needed to happen as soon as we could arrange it. Otherwise it would fester between us, and I refuse to let something so insignificant in the grand scheme of things spoil our happiness."
"Oh Marian," he moaned, sounding close to breaking down again. "I really don't deserve you. I've been a vain and selfish fool, and still managed to hurt you just the same as if I'd actually strayed – "
"None of that, now," the librarian said firmly, kissing him on the top of the head as he buried his face in her shoulder again. Then, after a brief moment of contemplation, she decided to tell him something she never thought she'd ever reveal. "And… I can understand your feelings a little better than you might think," she said as gently as possible. "Because you're not the only one who's ever had an admirer waiting in the wings, darling."
Harold's head popped up, his eyes wide with shock and alarm.
Marian muzzled a smirk – though her motives in opening such a dangerous subject were to demonstrate her understanding and bring them closer together, there was something undeniably satisfying about seeing him truly understand her discomfort. "I didn't wrestle with a foolish infatuation," she immediately assured him. "But there was a certain element of… flattery that gave me butterflies whenever I caught Fred Gallup staring at me all those years ago, when he first came to town to cover the boys' band."
Now her husband's eyes narrowed. "I should have guessed it was him," he said sullenly.
Though she was treading on precarious ground indeed, the librarian felt duty-bound to continue her confession. "During the Easter concert, when you were conducting the band's final song on the Madison Park pavilion, Mr. Gallup nearly declared himself to me while we were sitting together in the alcove – the very same alcove Lisette Latimer was ensconced when she captivated you with her ravenous stare," she added pointedly, to quench a little of the mutinous fire in her husband's eyes. "He asked me if I ever worried that with all the attention you received, you'd stop looking my way. Though I carefully avoided looking at him, I knew from his tone that he was itching to say – and perhaps do – so much more than was proper or decent, if I gave him the slightest inkling of encouragement. Naturally, I pretended not to hear his question. And then you came back, which ended his advances for good. I wasn't at all tempted to welcome the reporter's barely restrained overtures, of course, but I can't deny that I felt those butterflies stir a little."
"Well, I don't suppose I can blame you for that – Fred Gallup is a handsome and intelligent man," Harold acknowledged, albeit bitterly.
Marian found her husband's shaking hands and gave them a squeeze. "But he's not you, Harold. When you came and took me in your arms, I forgot he was even there. And when we made love that night, those butterflies were as distant a memory as if they'd never even fluttered. Though it unsettled me that I couldn't feel completely repulsed by the reporter's regard on the rare occasions I did recall that moment, it was easy to dismiss. We were so happy – we'd just had a wonderful first winter together, and we were going to have a baby. But if we'd been going through a rough patch, like when we returned from Paris? I could see how it might be a little harder to forget such heated advances."
"I suppose that's fair," Harold said glumly. Then he got incensed. "I always suspected that mealy-mouthed reporter had made a pass or two at you, but I never dreamed he'd have the gumption to play so brazenly on your insecurities, especially when he was well aware you were not only very happily married, but pregnant with my child at the time." His fists clenched in her hands. "Why, I ought to knock that smarmy grin off his face the next time I see him!"
Marian had to repress a smile – he was awfully indignant for a former philanderer who had so glibly and shamelessly seduced other men's wives, once upon a time. But perhaps that was why Harold was so upset; he knew how easily a liaison could be sparked with a sweet word or smoldering glance at just the right moment…
"I don't think that will be necessary," the librarian said both tenderly and sensibly as she unwound the music professor's fingers and twined hers through them. "Fred Gallup is very happily married to a woman he loves dearly, and he has not so much as given me a wink since then. You and the 'mealy-mouthed reporter' are the best of friends now, and he and Lucy couldn't dote on our children more than if they really were their aunt and uncle. Whatever danger there might have been of us falling into bed together – and there was absolutely none on my part whatsoever – is long gone."
Harold had relaxed as she spoke, but as there was still a hint of resentment in his gaze, Marian decided it was high time to bring the conversation back to the matter at hand and close the matter for good. "Your erstwhile admirer is also smitten with another. And the two of us – " She broke off to swallow the lump in her throat – why in heaven's name was she getting emotional now? – before finishing with, "We have been even happier than Paris, since Robert came along."
Harold smiled that wonderful, soft, self-effacing smile he only ever gave to her, and cupped her cheek. "We have indeed."
Having made her point, Marian could have stopped right there. But something made her keep going. Cupping her husband's cheek in return, she said, "I once told Jane that it wasn't temptation that's the sin, it's how one responds to it that determines their character. And I don't doubt for a second that you must have fought valiantly to overcome it, even in the midst of your anger with me."
Her silver-tongued charmer of a music professor just gaped at her, looking both as taken aback and smitten with her as he did when she first declared her love for him on the footbridge all those years ago. That wasn't the last time he had ever looked at her that way, either; over the course of their courtship and marriage he frequently regarded her with the same awestruck expression, as if he had fallen in love with her all over again. As Marian also often experienced this same wonderful phenomenon, the sensation of her heart turning over just the way it had when she met his eyes as they shared their first strawberry phosphates together in the Candy Kitchen, she relished these occasions.
"I'm so sorry I took you for granted after Paris," she whispered sadly, caressing his cheek. "I'm sorry I forgot to just be your wife."
Harold's free hand rose to cover hers, and he brought her fingers to his lips. "The world may be full of beautiful women, Marian, but none of them are you," he whispered back, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down in his throat. "Do you remember?"
Marian nodded, blinking away the tears that still insisted on coming to her eyes, even though she now knew everything was going to be all right. "I still have that letter."
"I still have yours." Looking as if he were trying not to cry, himself, Harold leaned in until his lips were brushing her ear. "I was never, ever going to tell you this, Marian, selfishly burdening you with a foolish fancy that was never acted upon. But now that circumstances have forced me to own up to it, I hope it will ease your mind to know that this was the only secret I've been keeping from you. My head has never been turned by another woman, before or since."
Perversely, the librarian felt even more prone to bursting into tears at her husband's staunch avowal, even – or perhaps because – she heard the passionate earnestness in his voice. Since they were doing such a wonderful job of moving past this little hiccup, she refused to spoil the increasingly lovely atmosphere that was growing between them.
"Well, for a man with your sensual appetites, one fleeting fancy in fifteen years of marriage could actually be considered an achievement," she wryly observed.
But she had ruined it, just the same – her husband stiffened in her embrace. "It's definitely not an achievement I'll ever be proud of," he muttered.
"I'm sorry," Marian said repentantly. "I shouldn't have teased."
Harold raised his head to look at her, and she felt even more ashamed when she saw his pained expression. "I don't want this to be a sore point between us, Marian."
"Neither do I." She looked steadily at him as her fingers found the buckle of his belt. "Which is why I think it's time we made a new memory."
Harold blinked, bemused. "Here? Now?" He grinned crookedly at her. "We've already done that, ten times over. I'm sure you haven't forgotten that rainy afternoon last spring – "
Marian silenced him with a hard kiss as she continued to unfasten his trousers. "I want you to take me exactly the way you were tormented… with her."
Her husband inhaled sharply, his eyes wide as saucers. "Are you sure that's a good idea?"
"It's what I had in mind ever since I called my mother," she confessed as she worked his erection free from his union suit. "You're hard," she said matter-of-factly, though she wasn't sure whether to feel flattered or jealous by his response. "You want this."
"I want you, Marian." He regarded her with shrewd, penetrating eyes. "Do you want this, Marian?"
Despite how far she'd come in shedding her inhibitions, not just in Paris but River City as well, if anyone had told the librarian that morning she would be urging her husband to make love to her in all the ways he'd dreamed about being with another woman – inadvertent and unasked for dreams, but still a woman who wasn't her, all the same – she would have been appalled and repulsed. They were treading novel and dangerous ground here, and though it was unnerving it was also exhilarating – Marian felt that delicious coil of lust in the pit of her stomach as she stroked one long moan after another from her husband's gasping mouth. "I don't want her ghost between us in any way," she said, practically panting in her anticipation and nervousness. "I want us to do the things that haunted your dreams, whatever they are," she said recklessly. "So if you ever think about them again, it will be me you remember."
Giving her that look, Harold stripped both the librarian and himself down to their undergarments, tugged her over to his chair and motioned for her to kneel. Feeling both amused and relieved, Marian had to repress a giggle as she took him in his mouth. This act was almost banal for a man of his enthusiastic appetites – were his illicit dreams really so ordinary? But she had barely gotten a good rhythm going when he pulled her off of him, swept her up in his arms, propped her on his desk, and buried his head in her lap. Excepting the fact they were in his office, what he was doing wasn't too far out of the bounds of convention, either. Marian had to repress another giggle – which quickly turned into a moan and then a scream as his fingers and tongue deftly coaxed one climax after another from her.
"You're so wet," Harold groaned. His tone was tremulous, as if he wasn't sure whether he should be so aroused by this.
The truth burst out of Marian – words that she still sometimes found difficult to say aloud unless she was in the throes of abandon. "I've wanted you all afternoon," she said in a rush, straddling her husband as he gathered her up in his arms and brought her to sit with him in his chair. "If it weren't for Mrs. Shinn and her infernal ladies dropping by, I would have suggested we close the shop and do this hours ago… "
Harold groaned again, though whether it was from her words or the fact that he was now inside her and they were writhing fiercely together, Marian couldn't determine. Not that it mattered – as they moved in the intimate rhythm that was universal yet theirs alone, his eyes bored into hers and she knew that all traces of any illicit dreams he might have had once were now thoroughly obliterated.
Long ago, the music professor confessed the sort of dreams he'd initially had about the librarian when he first came to town. Marian had been both amused and appalled by the chimera he described: a brazen, loose, heartless seducer who had no qualms about wringing out every last drop of pleasure from him the same way he did her. That he had dreamed of the timid and modest Lisette Latimer being similarly bold and wild therefore came as no surprise, and the librarian was relieved that her husband's fantasies had nothing to do with the character of the actual woman, herself.
But when Harold grasped her hips and brought their writhing to an abrupt halt, Marian was surprised. And when he whisked her over to the wall where he gave her that first love-bite, her heart dropped into her stomach and she began to tremble. For the first time since she'd learned about her husband's fleeting fancy, she felt the icy but white-hot anger she'd been expecting overtake her – the chair and desk were understandable enough, but this corner was their yesterday. How could he have defiled this?
"It's not what you think, darling," the music professor reassured his shaking wife, quick to read her as ever. He kissed her sweetly on the lips. "I appreciate what you were trying to do and it was delightful, but I want an element of this memory that is just us – and us alone."
As his mouth found her neck, Marian burst into tears. Usually, she would have castigated herself for this spectacular loss of control, but she was so distraught that all she could do was cling to Harold and sob into his shoulder as he caught her in a bear hug and attempted to soothe her.
"It wasn't Lisette Latimer herself that was alluring," he said in a heated, smoldering voice that was not born of glib seduction, but passionate sincerity. "It was the thrill of having a woman look at me as if she wanted me with all her heart and soul, duty and propriety be damned. It was the way I desperately missed you looking at me."
"A woman who could give you a son to be a father to," the librarian hiccupped. "Not just a brother-in-law." Even though that someone had ended up being her, it sent her into a fresh wave of weeping.
"We shouldn't have done this," her husband said, his voice heavy with remorse.
Once again, Marian silenced him with a kiss, but softer this time. "I don't regret it, Harold. Besides, this wasn't the first time I've ever cried as we made love." She wiped her eyes and even managed a small smile. "And I don't suppose it will be the last time, either. Please, let's see this through. I couldn't bear it if the memory ended this way… "
The words were barely out of her mouth when Harold's mouth found her neck again, giving her sweet, soft love-bites until she was trembling with desire instead of dismay. The music professor was trembling, too, as he whispered how much he loved and wanted and needed her, until neither of them could bear being apart any longer. Tumbling to the sofa, they moved wordlessly together. Their embrace was frantic at first, but it soon softened into something languid and tender. Whether it was from fatigue or them finally managing to draw reassurance from one another that us was still intact, Marian wasn't sure. Nor did it matter – by the time they both stilled, gasping and spent, any ghosts that lingered were permanently dispelled, and husband and wife had yet another "today" worth remembering to add to their pile of yesterdays.
When they finally managed to rouse themselves from their blissful stupor, it was nearly seven o'clock. Although Harold and Marian were both famished, they dressed slowly, showering each other with kisses and caresses as if they were a newly-married couple on their honeymoon who had all the time in the world to linger. In truth, there was no real hurry – dinner awaited at her mother's, as did their children. So Marian did not scold her still-amorous husband to make haste, even in jest. And she did not issue so much as a token protest when Harold wrapped his arm around her waist as they exited the emporium, neither of them caring who saw the full measure of their joy as they continued to look forward to many more happy tomorrows.