Out of instinct and painkiller haziness, I tried to extend my right hand, which was immobilized. Then I tried the left one. It took a few tries to convince the elbow to bend, but I think I managed not to wince too much.

  Her hand seemed strong, a bit calloused, and she shook the hand just right—gently enough to respect the sore wrist, firmly enough that it didn’t feel like she was condescending to the broken chick. Her nails were short and polished red.

  “We’ve already gotten it as far as the porch. Might as well get rid of the coat.” She shed her bulky peacoat. Underneath it, she wore a red knit dress, gray tights—and hiking boots.

  My half-glazed eyes focused on the hiking boots. Lucia caught it and laughed. “Not exactly a fashion statement, but I’m not going to move a sofa in heels. Or walk to work in them, for that matter.”

  “Do you…” I hesitated for a second, my foggy brain derailed by the idea of her taking off that dress in my bedroom. I was in no shape to do anything about it, but I could probably manage to enjoy the view. “Want something to change into?”

  She shrugged and chuckled. “The tights are old and the dress is washable.”

  And that was when I fell a bit in lust with Lucia.

  No, I really fell for the way she muscled the sofa up the stairs, moving her end at least as easily as the much larger Nate did his. The way she treated the pretty dress as casually as I’d treat jeans and a sweatshirt simply sealed the deal. I have a weakness for femmes, but show me someone who can rock that look while wearing hiking boots and moving heavy objects and I’m doomed.

  I had high hopes when Nate convinced her to stay for dinner. Normally I can hold my own in the flirtation game, even against Nate, who’s an equal-opportunity lech (boys, girls and the occasional unwary artichoke), and hot enough that even I notice. But when you’re attempting to impress a lovely lady, it helps if you don’t nod off drooling over dinner.

  Which I did, more than once. And Nate’s dinners are worth staying awake for; I swear half the reason I’m friends with the man is that he cooks so well.

  Meanwhile, Nate was on a roll, being Mr. Charm, saying and doing all the things I should have been doing to seduce Lucia. No great surprise, then, that they tucked me into bed and then went off to bed themselves.

  The interesting noises wafting up from Nate’s part of the house infiltrated my drugged dreams. By morning, I couldn’t tell you what I’d dreamed, except that it had involved Lucia and left me very, very wet.

  None of that surprised me.

  Given Nate’s history of flings and open friends-with-benefits arrangements, it did surprise me when Lucia starting turning up weekend after weekend at our place. Once in a while he had a hot-sex date with someone else during the week, usually one of his male fuck-buddies, but that got rarer and rarer as late winter moved into spring.

  It was nice in a way, because at least once a weekend, we’d all have dinner together or do something as a group, but it was definitely frustrating. The more I got to know Lucia the more I liked that combination of girly and strong, dressed up and down to earth. We both came from rural backgrounds—my folks had an apple orchard in New York, hers grew organic vegetables in California. Like me, she missed the country and was glad to be away from it in equal measure.

  And let’s face it, the shallower part of me loved that I never knew whether she’d turn up in jeans and boots, ready to help with the endless projects around the duplex, or in some fabulous dress ready to party—or if she’d show up all girlified and end up taking a few minutes to fix some minor thing that had just broken.

  A hot, dressed-to-impress femme with a screwdriver: be still my beating clit.

  If Nate was in his typical tomcat mode, I’d feel no qualms about hitting on one of his playmates. We’d casually dated the same woman in the past, and it had worked fine until she got tired of us being closer to each other than either of us was to her. But if he’d decided he was semi-quasi-serious about someone at last, I wasn’t going risk messing things up, either by distracting Lucia or by making it uncomfortable for her to come around.

  Damn. I hate being honorable sometimes.

  As Nate’s best buddy, I was delighted for him. As someone with a wicked crush, not so much. I figured, though, the crush would abate in time. They always did.

  And it might have, too, if in the spring, when my arm was finally healed, Lucia hadn’t offered to help us turn our shabby backyard into a garden. I’d thought about it since we’d moved in—helping in the garden had always been my favorite chore as a kid—but the idea of starting from scratch in a yard made of rubble and fill daunted me.

  Nothing, apparently, daunted Lucia. Raised beds, she said, were the answer. (As soon as she said it, I kicked myself, realizing I should have thought of it.) Nate ordered a delivery of topsoil. Lucia and I agreed to go to Home Depot and buy some lumber.

  It was a weeknight and we headed out to the suburbs after work. She wore a dress and heels and talked lumber with the Home Depot clerk in a way that would have impressed my uncle, who ran the lumberyard back in Seneca Falls. It went straight to my pussy.

  I offered to work with her on the raised beds. “Nate’s only a tool-user in the kitchen,” I joked, which was true, but had very little to do with my motivation. A raised bed was the only bed I was likely to share with Lucia, so I’d take what I could get.

  We didn’t talk much as we worked, just about how best to anchor the wooden frames in place and level them on distinctly unlevel ground. She was busy, focused.

  I was staring at her hands and imagining them on my body, just as skillful as they were with tools. All the time I was driving rebar into the hard soil and digging and hammering, my mind was definitely elsewhere. Even with Nate and me doing the basic cleanup during the week, it took a full weekend to finish those beds and load them up with topsoil. I don’t think I had a clean thought the entire time.

  Except when Nate came out to see if we needed food and gave Lucia a hug and a kiss and a playful grope. Then I guiltily tried not to think how much I wished I was the one molesting her.

  The next weekend it was time to plant, and it was unreasonably, unseasonably warm.

  On planting morning, Ben pulled up in his pickup truck and honked just as I’d meandered downstairs to collect Lucia and Nate for garden duty. (Lucia was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, but the T-shirt was bright pink and fitted, if obviously old—as close to girly as you can get doing serious gardening. It matched her garden clogs.) Nate grinned; gave Lucia a hard, quick kiss; grabbed an overnight bag and raced for the door.

  As an afterthought, he waved at me. Then he stopped in his tracks. “Sorry, Allie. I’m a dope—I forgot to tell you I had a last-minute chance to go out to P-town with Ben. I’ll be back Sunday night. Have fun getting dirty without me, ladies.” He leered as he said it, but Nate leered a lot. Even at artichokes.

  We said good-bye and filed out to the garden, where our seedlings awaited us. I’d seethed quietly at first, but finally I let loose. “He’s my best friend,” I said, “but he can be such an asshole sometimes. He knew we have all these seedlings to get in.”

  Lucia shrugged. “I told him to go. He’ll be useful in the garden when it starts producing food. Meanwhile, he’s kind of clueless and underfoot and you know what you’re doing. Besides, he’s way past due for a boy-date.”

  I gaped like a fish and Lucia laughed at my expression. “Come on, you’ve known Nate for a million years. Did you honestly think he’d gone monogamous?”

  “I wasn’t sure, but you’ve been keeping him pretty busy.”

  “And he’s been keeping me pretty busy, too. He’s a lot of fun. But he’s not the only interesting resident of this house, you know.”

  She said it lightly, but the sultry look in her dark eyes wasn’t the one that went with telling a friend, “It’s cool hanging out with you.”

  Sometimes I need a clue-by-four, but that was a clue-by-sixteen.

  Lucia liked me.

  And if Nate was off banging Ben this weekend with Lucia’s blessing, then I could stop feeling guilty for my crush and finally kiss the woman.

  Which I did.

  As soon as I touched her, even before our lips met, all my pent-up desire bubbled to the surface. My heart raced, my stomach lurched, my nipples jumped.

  And when her sweet lips parted for me, it took all my strength of will not to wrestle her down into the garden. That was moving a bit too fast, and besides we’d left some seedlings outside overnight to harden off and I’d hate to roll onto them. Instead I groaned into her mouth and wrapped my arms around her. She fit against me just perfectly, breast to breast, hip to hip, lip to lip, like we’d been created to facilitate making out.

  When she pulled away, I felt like crying. But it was only so she could set down the flat of peppers we’d been crunching between us. They didn’t look too damaged, but replacing them would be a small price to pay.

  We have a nice high fence, but until Lucia starting hanging around, the yard wasn’t exactly a location to inspire romantic, erotic thoughts, more like groans about whose turn it was to mow. I’d never thought of making love out here and I doubted Nate, horndog though he was, had either. But Lucia and I had worked hard to make it nice and would be working more to finish the job. Why not enjoy it?

  I asked, “Do you want to go inside or stay out here?”

  In response, she peeled off her T-shirt, exposing a blue bra that was more like ribbons, scraps of lace and the power of suggestion. If I’d thought for a moment she hadn’t planned this, probably with Nate’s eager collusion, that bra gave the preplanning away. I don’t care how girly you are; that’s a bra you put on hoping someone will see it. No, expecting someone will see it.

  Looking was a treat but touching would be better and I wanted to get to it.

  First things first, though. I wiggled out of my shorts and T-shirt and tossed them in the general direction of the steps. (I missed. I didn’t care.) The shirt was one of those with a built-in bra and I managed to get the panties off along with the shorts, so that left me naked beneath the morning sky for the first time in…well, ever. (I still had sneakers on. Impulsive al fresco sex was good. Cutting your foot open was bad, and I knew how much broken glass and other junk we’d found in the yard.) The warm spring air felt like a torrid caress now, thanks to Lucia’s appreciative gaze. I think of myself as more cute than beautiful, but I keep in good shape and she seemed to like what she saw.

  Liked it well enough to reach out and touch.

  Lucia’s hands were small and elegantly shaped, a little dirty from handling the flats of seedlings. They traveled over my skin and left heaven and small muddy streaks in their wake. When they reached my nipples I thought I would scream from the sweet, sharp pleasure. I didn’t scream, but only because I kissed her again and kept my mouth busy.

  Kissed her and touched her soft skin and the hard muscles underneath. Caressed her breasts through the delicate little bra, then managed by some miracle to get the bra off without looking as clumsy as I suddenly felt. Her nipples were big and prominent, mocha against her golden skin, and I licked and suckled at those delights until she was writhing and mewling. She wriggled out her jeans and a ridiculously tiny pair of lacy blue panties with a lot of eager help from me. I finally learned a justification for those ugly rubber garden clogs—it was easy to kick them off, take off the jeans, and then slip the foot-protection back on. (Since they were now the only thing on an otherwise nude Lucia, they looked a lot less ugly.) Naked, she straddled my thigh and slipped her leg between mine.

  We ground together until I was sure everything in the universe danced in rhythm to the pulsing of my cunt.

  But when she got her oh-so-clever hands into the act, I forced myself to break away.

  It was hard to make myself do it. I knew how good Lucia was with her hands, and I’d spent a lot of time imagining how that might translate to the sexual arena. But I needed to. She’d met me when I was damaged goods, unable to fend for myself. I’d done my best to change that impression as quickly as I could and from what she’d said about my gardening skills, it had worked. Still, she had ended up doing a lot of what was usually my share of house chores until I was fully healed, not to mention picking up a lot of slack for my adorable but absentminded housemate.

  Not this time. “Oh, no you don’t,” I said. “You always end up doing all the work around here. This time you get to relax and enjoy.”

  “For a while, at least.”

  “For a while,” I conceded. Hey, if her OCD tendencies extended to sex, I’d hate to deprive her of her fun—and hate to miss out on the fun she could provide—but I wanted to see her limp and sated first.

  Nate’s big contribution to the backyard redesign was a cedar bench so we could sit outside and enjoy the garden once it was finished. I steered her toward it. When the back of her legs bumped the seat, she sat down—she didn’t flop like I would, but sank down gracefully. I knelt before her. The mulch we’d spread around it at Lucia’s instruction wasn’t the most comfortable surface for kneeling. Normally I make sure there’s a pillow handy before making this sort of sexy dramatic gesture, and I thought very briefly of bringing the party inside.

  But warm earth and the green smells of spring scented the air, and the hot smell of sex rising from Lucia’s body blended too perfectly. I kissed her again, putting all my long-suppressed desire into it. She moaned into my mouth. I could scarcely hear it, but I swear I could taste it.

  I kissed my way down her body, paying special attention to her nipples again: first one then the other. God, they were more perfect than I’d imagined in my fantasies, plumper and darker and more sensitive. I could have spent hours sucking and teasing and nibbling and exploring, and if I was lucky enough for a second chance with her, I would. But the heady, rich scent of an aroused pussy was just too tempting to resist.

  I sank down, getting better acquainted with the mulch than I’d ever meant to be, and got my face between Lucia’s open legs.

  Inhaled her warm, feminine, musky smell until I swore I was drunk on it.

  Took a good look and enjoyed what I saw. She was clean shaven, her pussy lips as dark and delicious as her nipples and slick with juice. Her clit was swollen, a tempting little morsel all but quivering in anticipation of my tongue.

  I thought about teasing her a little, a small revenge for all the months I had waited and dreamed and lusted, thinking she wasn’t interested.

  Then she breathed, “Please,” and that game paled before the fun of making a beautiful woman scream.

  I put one arm around her, pulled her forward (with her eager, squirming help) to reach my mouth more easily.

  I could get all flowery and poetic and talk about oysters and musk or something like that, but what Lucia tasted like was an aroused woman on a warm spring day, rich and tangy and a little salty, delicious.

  Her hands tangled in my hair. She rolled her hips, moving her pussy against my eager tongue. I spent some time indulging myself, exploring and enjoying getting to taste Lucia at last: savoring her scent and flavor, the little shudders when I hit just the perfect spot, the wonderfully erotic noises that I’d heard from Nate’s place—and had masturbated to—so many times.

  But as the shudders became contractions and the noises grew more frantic, I had to finish the job, had to make Lucia scream and sob with pleasure.

  I slipped one finger inside her as I licked, then two. She was sleek and slippery and gripped my questing fingers, the muscles of her pussy as strong as her wiry arms. I caught her rhythm, pushed it.

  “Please,” she cried, and “Almost too much,” and “Yes!”

  Then she lost words and simply screamed and wailed as she bucked against my mouth and clamped down on my fingers.

  I didn’t stop until she grabbed my hair and moved me away.

  “Good thing the neighbors are used to crazy noises from this house,” I said, smiling what I knew had to be a terribly smug grin. “Otherwise they might call the cops.”

  “Confession time.” Lucia’s voice was still shaky, but her arms were strong around me. “Nate brought me around that first time planning to set me up with you. But you were in such rough shape I couldn’t tell if we’d suit or not—I liked your looks, but you weren’t exactly coherent. And Nate…”

  “Did what Nate, from all reports, does best,” I finished. “And by the time I wasn’t the armless wonder, it seemed to be getting serious, so I didn’t even try.”

  “It’s heading toward serious. But neither of us is cut out for monogamy. It’s something we’ve talked about a lot. I’m not sure how you two feel about dating the same person…”

  “Wouldn’t be the first time.” But it would, I resolved, be the last—because Lucia was a keeper and one of us, if not both, should keep her. “Nate and I are family. Why not keep it in the family?”

  “Good. Because I really like you both. Nate and I wanted to make sure we were solid before we went out to play again, or I’d have made a move before now. And it’ll be good to get a break from him once in a while. He’s a lot of fun, but he’s kind of needy and greedy at times.”

  I dropped my voice to what I hoped was a sultry pitch. “Actually I’m feeling needy and greedy right now, and I could use some help from your clever hands.”

  She kissed me quick and hard, then said, “That kind of help I’m always happy to provide!”

  NEVER TOO OLD

  DeJay

  You did what?”

  “I just went online and got the address of Wild Hearts for you. It’s on Commercial Street, right across from the Crown and Anchor, so I can wait there and have a drink while you pick up our purchases.”

  I looked at my wife, my partner of thirty-plus years, and couldn’t believe what she had just said. “Why would you do that?”

  She smiled at me—the little-girl grin, the one where her eyes twinkle and her dimples pop. “It’ll be fun.”