One lazy Saturday afternoon, after a beautiful evening of lovemaking and a good night’s rest, I was standing at the sink, shaving, when my wife came into the bathroom in her blue terry-cloth robe. As is usual during this morning ritual, I was naked, with a towel across my shoulders. Vanna came up and stood right beside me. I could tell she was watching me, and it made me a little nervous.

Instead of saying anything, she leaned forward and put her arms around my hips; the hug was warm and reassuring. I continued shaving, but now I felt my wife’s hand move down to my crotch. She closed her fingers warmly around my flaccid penis and began to squeeze it in a nice, slow rhythm.

Neither of us spoke. I concentrated on my task, trying to scrape away without cutting myself, but I was becoming more excited by the second. Soon I was fully erect, and Vanna’s fingers continued to milk me slowly and seductively. I removed the last remaining shaving cream from my face and stood there, leaning beside the washbasin, enjoying her practiced touch.

From her position behind me, she laid her cheek against my naked back and spoke to me in a near whisper. “I saw you yesterday… I watched you… playing with yourself. It got me very excited.” Her voice was soft and lovingly intimate-and almost confessional. “I watched you… jerking off. I was amazed… and really turned on.”

A welter of emotions ran through me: love, embarrassment and, strangest of all, a rush of sexual hunger. Vanna continued speaking in that soft, confessional tone, but her fingers never deviated from their slow, maddening rhythm on my penis. “I was surprised… I didn’t know you played with yourself when you were alone. I thought I was the only one… sometimes… who liked to masturbate.”

Before I had time to deal with that surprising confession, Vanna took hold of my right hand and brought it over to my cock. She closed my fingers around the rigid shaft and with her own hand began to move my fist in that familiar, instinctual rhythm. I was wildly excited, and yet I felt vulnerable, naked, exposed in some new, profound way. Her voice was now almost inaudible. “Do it for me,” she breathed. “I want to see you jerk off, again… up close. I want to watch it spurt.” Still behind me, my wife turned me so that I faced the full-length mirror. In the reflection I could see her face over my shoulder. We appeared as an odd, almost gothic-like image, standing together before the glass: a naked man, his hand beautifully wrapped around his cock, masturbating slowly, while a beautiful woman in a floor-length robe stood behind him, watching avidly.

“Make yourself come… for me,” Vanna whispered. “Do it against the mirror.” She opened her robe and pressed herself up against me, so that I could feel her warm breasts against my back, the hard little points of her nipples pressing against my skin.

I reached over to the sink and turned on the warm water. Sometimes I soap up my cock and balls for lubrication. And now I was fully into it. I wanted her to see, I wanted to show myself off, to spurt against the mirror. I opened my legs a bit and began to fondle my dangling testicles with my free hand. I closed my eyes and whispered to my beautiful wife, “I’m going to come for you. I’m going to show you how I jerk off. I want you to watch. I’m playing with my balls, and it feels good.”

The mood was deepening, the sensations building. “I’m going to shoot all over the mirror… you’ll see how a man does it to himself. I’m jerking off… and you’re watching me.” And then it was upon me. I pumped frantically, crying out and shooting semen, as Vanna tightened her arms around my shoulders. My eyes closed and I could not see where she was looking at the last moment-at my pumping hand and spurting cock or at the helpless convulsions of my face and torso.

When I finally opened my eyes, I could see the thick rivulets of white sperm gliding down the glass as the last spasms of orgasm shook my body. I turned and we embraced, kissing deeply, passionately. It had been an unbelievable kind of emotional breakthrough. I felt a total, uncanny sense of release. Taking Vanna’s hand, I rushed her into the bedroom. I threw back the covers, and we lay down together. I began stroking her breasts as our mouths met in a delicious kiss.

I reached down between her legs and discovered that she was marvelously open and wet. “It really turned you on? Watching me jerk off?” She nodded in silent assent and gently moved her cunt against my hand. I held my fingers steady and felt the slow, rhythmic pressure of her hips; she was like a sleek and beautiful panther in heat, trying to rub herself off against my hand. But then I withdrew suddenly and sat up. “It’s your turn,” I said. “You have to do it to yourself. I want to watch you masturbate now.”

In an instant, as if she had been waiting for my request, Vanna slid her right hand down between her spread thighs. While she probed and stroked herself, she brought her left hand to her mouth and moistened her fingertips with saliva. After this preparation, she began to play with her nipples, rolling them between her fingers. I watched, fascinated.

It seemed that words inflamed both of us, so I decided to speak to her, softly, while she excited herself. “You look beautiful doing that… playing with yourself… rubbing your clit and pulling on your nipples… I love watching you… knowing you’re masturbating for me. Do it like that. Put your fingers inside your cunt while you stroke your clit. I can smell you, your excitement. Your pussy is fragrant, and I want to lick it… but I won’t. You’ll have to make yourself come while I sit here and watch.

Vanna whimpered softly, but the rhythm of her fingers quickened. “You’re going to make yourself come for me,” I continued. “I’m going to watch your face and your fingers and your breasts and your cunt. Stroke it like that. Rub it. Make yourself come.” Her fingers moved quickly, delicately, and she plucked at her hardened nipples. She offered a maddeningly erotic sight as she masturbated frantically, sighing as she did so, tensing and moving her beautiful thighs. I gave her no respite. “You’re going to come. Do it for me. Rub it. Stroke it. Your legs are spread and you’re jerking off like a dirty little slut.”

And at that she began a high, singing wail. Spasm after spasm racked her body. Her fingers moved in a blur as she stroked herself up to and through a shattering climax. I waited an instant before I fell on her and pressed my cock up into her quivering vagina. We fucked wildly until I spurted and she felt the wave of a second orgasm wash over her.

Since that time, masturbation has become a particularly erotic element in our lovemaking. Once when Vanna was sitting on the living-room couch, I asked her to pull up her skirt and masturbate while I watched from across the room. All the lights were on, and though we’d closed the drapes, the scene still felt like one of “naughty” exposure. Masturbating while half dressed-exposing only one’s genitals and stroking hand creates an even more sensual, erotic mood.

Vanna once asked me to take out my cock and masturbate while we drove along in the car, and I’ve even used a thin rubber probe in my anus and jerked off while she watched, again with all the lights on. What an amazing turn-on that night was! The strange mix of embarrassment and a wild new exhibitionism has created a subtle eroticism that we have explored so many times. To masturbate alone, in private, is still fine, but Vanna and I have discovered that to masturbate before a beautiful lover’s avid gaze is one of life’s most erotic experiences.