I woke up that morning with that slight disorientation that always comes with having slept in an unfamiliar place.  The warm, comfortable weight against me reminded me that I was visiting Lara, a woman I had met over the Internet and who had invited me to spend a week with her and her family on the north Florida coast.  The scratchiness against my legs informed me that I was still in my black jeans, my worn leather “truckers’ wallet” rubbing against my hip.  And the soreness of a spot on my back just below my shoulder told me that we had fallen asleep in each other’s arms, watching TV.  

I found the remote lying on the floor and turned the TV off.  I glanced at the wall clock; two A.M.

“Sleep well?” came the whisper in my ear.  I started slightly…I hadn’t realized she was awake as well.

“Mmmm, pretty well,” I responded.  “Probably would have been better if I’d remembered to move the pillow under my back like you warned me.”

She chuckled…not the high-pitched girlish giggle one would expect from her 5’1”, 110-pound frame, but a throaty, easy contralto sound.  “I tried.”  She had, too; even before we had sat down on the “couch”…more of a slightly-oversized love seat…she had cautioned me to shift some of the pillows she always left on it to help pad the arms.  Now I knew why.

As my awareness gradually focused, I became conscious of another sensation – one that I hadn’t expected:  the feel of her soft breast under my hand…and that of her hand atop mine.  My cheeks grew warm, and I tried to swallow the sudden lump in my throat.  I hadn’t even realized that I had slid my hand under her loose gray sweatshirt, let alone to so…intimate…a position.  But another surprise came to me when I tried to withdraw my hand; she gave it a gentle squeeze.  “Leave it there.  I like it.”

“Umm…you sure?”  I turned my head just enough to look at her face.

She smiled, her eyes remaining closed.  “Yeah.  I’m sure.”  She gave my hand another squeeze, pressing it against her a little tighter.  “It feels so good…I’ve been needing someone to hold me.  It’s been too long.”

Despite my nervousness, my body began a predictable response to her touch against me.  True, we had actually met in an Internet cybersex chat room, and we had both had fun describing various lovemaking sessions to each other.  But we started chatting back and forth outside that room too, sharing details of each others’ lives, exchanging juicy gossip, directing each other to interesting Web sites…and surprising each other with the genuine friendship that was developing.  And when my first opportunity in over three years for a vacation came up, she had invited me to the small house she leased, without any hesitation.  I had just as readily accepted her invitation, trusting our friendship to keep a platonic separation in place.  She’d said she trusted me, and I had vowed in return never to betray that trust.  But now, with her slim, almost delicate, dancer’s body lounging back against mine, her breast pushing into my palm, I started to wonder how far her trust extended.

I made a small noise.  “You know, this really isn’t why I came down here.”  I had wondered why she had almost pleaded with her brother to watch her two children tonight; I had thought it was simply so we could visit with each other without interruption.  Naïve me.

She finally opened her eyes, turning to look into mine.  “I know.  And I know you told me you’d never