And You Will Find Love

What she had craved from a man was not really what she would call sex, but love. She wanted to be held and caressed and touched and kissed by a man whose deep feelings for her were beyond his physical needs.

She submitted instantly to Stephen as first he just held her in his arms as they lay together in the loft. He did not rush at his lovemaking by pulling off her clothes and thrusting himself into her as Chet had. Instead, he stroked her face, then kissed her lips, his sweet breath warm against her face. His kisses were soft and gentle, yet she felt they set her mouth on fire. The flame was welcome and warm.

All the while Stephen kissed her, he spoke to Barbara gently, lovingly, about how beautiful she was, and how much he loved her. It was the first time a man had told her he loved her while making love to her. She almost cried with joy as she thought that Stephen's words to her were as soft and gentle and true as she knew his love was for her, and hers for him.

She had not believed it, as a girl barely out of her teens, when she had read the Kama Sutra, the Indian love manual, that "though a man loves a girl ever so much, he never succeeds in winning her without a great deal of talking during his lovemak-ing." But hearing Stephen's words of love, which were like warm sighs caressing her body, she understood.

If Chet or even Ken Knowland had said Stephen's love words to her, Barbara would not have believed them. She would have thought they were just a come-on; verbal foreplay that really meant nothing to them, but were merely a means to an end that would satisfy them, but with no care about satisfying her.

She knew Stephen meant his words of love. Somehow, even though they had not been physically together before, and the years and war had kept them apart, he had found some better under-standing of her than that she was just what some men considered attractive.

"You know, I've thought all along you are beautiful," Stephen said softly as he kissed the palms of her hands, then moved his kisses up inside her right arm to the nape of neck where she was thrilled. "Right from the first moment I saw you, when you came to see Tim at the Academy. All I saw then was your face, and could only imagine the beauty of the rest of you. But what I came to see very soon was, you're not only beautiful, you're a beautiful person. Look how you've risked your life flying planes to help the RAF, and now the GIs. And you've come all this way into a war zone to rescue a baby horse."