Note: This story was dynamically reformatted for online reading convenience. Chapter 19 Life in our house settled down to a routine much as it had when Jordan had stayed with me when Trish went away. The big difference now, in addition to Jordan and I sleeping in 'our' bed, was that Jordan wanted to do more than just look after feeding Maxie and helping do the occasional job. Now she wanted to be my partner and do things like cook. She was an apt student and she was soon exploring different recipes. Occasionally we had an 'interesting' meal and once something that looked and tasted like some sort of 'science experiment', but for the most part, she was turning out to be a very good cook. Her thirst for knowledge didn't just rest in the kitchen. She also was game to try new things in the bedroom. One weekend we'd gone down to an area of the city that had a large number of used book stores to see if there were any out of print books by authors we'd grown to like. I felt Jordan come and snuggle right up to my side and in a quiet voice she said "Look what I just discovered," and showed me a somewhat dog-eared copy of 'The Joy of Sex'. I smiled and asked her if she wanted me to buy it. Her ear-to-ear grin answered that question. Jordan was always good for surprises but one day she floored me with her request. It had been a hectic day for me as I was trying to finish editing a number of technical manuals and there was a definitive deadline that I must meet. I wasn't too worried about the final deadline, but I'd given myself an earlier one so that I could allow my customer time to review my work before the deadline. I'd been working hard at this for several days and still wasn't happy with one particular portion of one of the documents. I was trying to think of how I could reword that section to make it readable without making it so wordy as to turn the reader off. I guess I'd been ignoring Jordan as she sat beside me talking. "Brian, can I get one?" she asked poking me in the ribs to get my attention. "Can you get what?" I asked. "Weren't you listening?" she asked then shook her head in exasperation. "Since I can't wear a ring yet, I want something to say I'm yours so I want to have a pair of linked hearts tattooed right here..." she said as she pointed to her abdomen right above her pussy. "Jordan..." I couldn't think of what to say. "Um Jordan, do you think that's wise? That will hurt, you know." I told her. "I know, but I so want something that I can see that reminds me that I am yours and yours alone. Please?" Jordan looked so pleadingly. "Let me think about it, okay?" I asked. "Okay," Jordan replied, "but don't forget that I asked you." I looked Jordan right in the eyes and said "I promise." After much agonizing and a call to Trish, I finally decided that I would go along with her request. The next Saturday, we looked at a bunch of tattoo places and narrowed our list of 'okay' places to 3. The following Monday I made a trip to each of them and discussed Jordan's request with the operator. I finally decided on one and made arrangements to bring Jordan in the following Friday evening. Jordan got ready by shaving all the hair above her pussy and wore a pair of bikini panties. The place where the tattoo was to be done had a man and a woman who did the tattoos and the woman took Jordan back into a private room and a little while later came back with an excited Jordan. "I'm marked as yours," she whispered in my ear. The woman gave Jordan some directions on the care and reminded her that she'd be sore for a few days. Jordan continued to mature and become more adult. Several times during the next few years I asked if there was any boy at school she had an interest in and the answer was always an emphatic 'NO!'. After the third or fourth time asking, I quit since I could see that Jordan was not happy with me asking. The last time I'd asked I was told "Absolutely NO! I told you before, you are the only man I want and you are going to fulfill your promise to propose to me on my eighteenth birthday. Don't ask me about some pimply faced, hormone driven child." About six months after Trish and Wilson left, I got a call from Laurie, my ex, telling me that she was going to be in town for a couple of days and asking to get together with me. I told her I'd love to and offered to have her over for supper. Laurie knows I enjoy cooking and that I'm pretty good at it so she immediately agreed. I didn't tell her anything about Jordan. When Laurie arrived in town we talked about a day and time. Since she would be free the next day, we agreed that we'd have supper that night and since she had the afternoon off, I invited her to come over in the afternoon so we could visit. When Jordan came home from school, I told her about Laurie's visit. Jordan and I had talked about Laurie before and Jordan had seen some pictures of Laurie. "Sweetheart, Laurie doesn't know about you staying here but I'll tell her when she gets here tomorrow. She obviously doesn't know about us living like man and wife and we need to try to keep it that way. Okay?" Jordan nodded in agreement. The next day Laurie arrived about 2 in the afternoon and we spent a bit of time catching up on what each of us was doing. I took the opportunity to let Laurie know that Jordan was staying with me. "Laurie, I have a bit of an odd situation. About a year ago, a couple who lived three houses down the street broke up and because of some rather unique circumstances, I've become the guardian for their daughter. The girl's name is Jordan and she'll be home about 3:30. She's very personable and I'm sure you'll like her." Laurie was a bit surprised at this bit of information so I filled her in on the details of the situations that led to this unique living arrangement. When Jordan came home, I introduced her to Laurie and as I'd predicted, they hit it off right away. After supper the three of us retired to the living room and chatted. Finally, Laurie told me she needed to get back to her hotel as she had some prep work to do to prepare for the next day. Jordan said goodbye and told Laurie how happy she was to have met her and headed upstairs as she needed to get her homework done. Laurie and I finished off the glass of wine we had and I walked out to her car with her. She reached down to open the door then stopped and turned to me. "Brian, be honest with me. It's obvious that you two are deeply in love with one another. Oh, I know Jordan was discreet and did nothing that could be construed as a gesture between lovers, but just looking at the way she looked at you and the way you looked at her, it was obvious to me." She stopped and looked at me. 'Caught' I thought, 'what now?' I paused and took a deep breath. "Can you spare me another 10 minutes? Let's go back inside and I'll tell you what has happened." Laurie took my hand and back inside we went. Once Laurie and I were seated again, I told her the whole story - Jordan's request that I be the one to take her virginity, my realization that I'd fallen in love with her and my promise to formally propose to her on her eighteenth birthday. When I finished I looked at Laurie and waited. "Oh how wonderful, you lucky man." Laurie said as a huge smile came over her face. I needed to leap in. "Laurie, it is extremely important that this be kept secret. Because of the difference in age between Jordan and myself, I could be prosecuted for statutory rape." Laurie nodded. "I know and don't you worry, I won't say a word to anyone, not even Dennis (Dennis is her husband). Is Jordan still up and if so, can she come down for a moment? I'd like to congratulate her." I smiled and called up to Jordan to come down stairs. When Jordan arrived, Laurie took Jordan in her arms, hugged her and congratulated her. "Brian was always such a kind and gentle man and I often felt a bit sorry that we broke up but I always realized that that was the best for both of us. I hope you both have a wonderful life together, and if it fits into your plans, I'd love to get an invitation to your wedding. Jordan was, for the first time I'd known her, temporarily speechless. That quiet didn't last long and soon she was talking almost non-stop to Laurie. I need to help Laurie get out of here so I gently broke the two apart. As soon as Jordan was out of Laurie's arms she came and put her arm around me and pulled me to herself. She looked at me for a moment then turned back to Laurie and told her there would be an invitation coming in the mail "When this big goof finally proposes to me." That last gave everyone a laugh. Jordan went back to her homework and I escorted Laurie out to her car - again. Before opening the car door, she reached up and pulled me down to give me a long kiss and hug. "Don't break her heart or I'll come and find you and cut yours out. You hear me?" Laurie said looking at me. I smiled. "There's no worry about that. If that happened, Jordan's mom would beat you to it. Seriously, though, I've never been happier and my love for Jordan grows deeper every day." I leaned down and gave Laurie one more kiss and opened the door for her. As she was driving away she rolled the window down and called out to me "Don't forget my invitation." Then rolled the window back up, waved and drove away. I went back in to find that Jordan had finished her homework and had watched Laurie kiss and hug me. "She's still a bit in love with you, you know?" Jordan said. "I know," I replied "It's too bad we didn't sort things out. On second thought, that's not right. If we'd sorted things out I would never have found this wonderful, beautiful young woman standing in front of me." Jordan hugged me and pulled me towards our bedroom. If seemed that our long sensuous love making that night was more wonderful than any time before. A year after moving to Maxton with Wilson, Trish and Wilson formally tied the knot even though they'd been living together since they'd moved. Jordan and I went to the wedding and were delighted by the love that was so obvious between Wilson and Trish. "I hope others can see the love that you and I have for each other when we get married." Jordan said and I couldn't help but hug and kiss her. "Jordan, my love, I know they will."