Randy just laid there a silent moment. “Jake, I’m sorry. I’m trying. You know I am. I can’t stand the thought of you being angry with me.”
Jake stared at moonlight on the ceiling. “Baby, I’m not angry. I’m…frustrated. I’m at a loss. When we make love, it’s as though you’re only doing it to prove to yourself I’m right there with you and you don’t have to be afraid, but you aren’t… I don’t know… You aren’t truly wanting me as a husband. I’ve never forced a woman, and I sure as hell won’t start with my own wife. And since this incident here in Boulder, I’ve realized how awful it would have been if I’d died—or even if you’d died at the hands of those men—without us having fixed whatever has gone wrong between us.”
Randy moved a hand sideways to take hold of his. “Jake, how can you possibly think I don’t want you that way anymore? I can’t imagine many women enjoy making love as much as I do with you. You always make it so beautiful. I just… I need to put last winter behind me…somehow. It’s left me…” The tears came then. “I feel like it’s wrong now…to enjoy it…like you’ll think it’s terrible that I still want a man after what they did.”
Jake breathed deeply. God help me. He managed to move an arm beneath her and pull her against his shoulder.
“Randy, I’m your husband. It’s good to enjoy it. What happened doesn’t change the fact that you’re my wife. One of the strongest things we’ve always had between us is practically sharing souls when we make love. Two people can’t get much more intimate than you and I. There isn’t one inch anywhere on your body I haven’t touched or tasted and made love to. I adore every part of you, and nothing makes me happier than knowing I’m pleasing you.”
Randy wiped at her tears. “But…I want to please you.”
Jake frowned, ignoring the pain in his side. His wife was more important. He’d gotten her to talk, and he would do whatever it took to keep her talking. “What are you talking about? You do please me. You know that.”
“That’s not what I mean.” She put a hand over her face. “You just don’t understand.”
Jake was able to turn onto his good side enough to look down at her, his eyes adjusted now to the room bright with moonlight. He touched her face, reached under her chin, and pulled her head up, forcing her to meet his gaze in the soft light. “Randy, there isn’t a whole lot about women I don’t understand, and I’m not talking about sex. I’m talking about what I watched my mother go through, and stories from a lot of the women who raised me. So what is it about my own wife I don’t understand?”
She closed her eyes. “I’m afraid to tell you.”
“Since when have you ever been afraid of me?”
She swallowed. “Promise you won’t be upset.”
“You know better.” Jake waited the several long seconds it took her to say what she wanted to say. He wasn’t sure if he dared hope that things might be turning around, but maybe this time she would open up to him.
She squeezed his hand as though trying to hang on. “Jake, that…that thing they did…” Her body jerked in a sudden little sob, the tears punctuating her words. “Jake I can’t make it…go away. Not without…doing something more to take away the ugly. Those three weeks we spent at the line shack…and you made love to me, I lied when I said that made it all better. That’s why…why I—why we feel like strangers. Because we never lie to each other, and I felt the lies between us.” She shivered in another sob. “You’re my Jake…and I’ve been staying close to you to make sure you…don’t leave me because I lied to you. And because you refuse to understand what I really need, and that…embarrasses me and…scares me because I don’t want you angry with me or I might…lose you when I need you most.”
Tears spilled down the sides of her face and into her ears. Jake pulled her closer and kissed her forehead, wiping at her tears with her fingers. “Randy, when have I ever been truly angry with you? You know what you mean to me. And you know I’m not a man who’s surprised by anything. I’ll do whatever it takes to make you happy again, to be close again. You don’t need to lie to me just because you think it’s what I want to hear. I want you better, so tell me what you need. What don’t I understand?”
“Please don’t get upset.”
“I won’t get upset.”