Dear Tim Ruehsen, you have suspected correctly.

comment #1:

> You say that you expect --wait=N to wait N seconds before a retrieval !?

So the word between is not a mistake in documentation (my optimistic wish is dashed).
I presume one condition that satisfies between is when it is recursively downloading.

> How can we improve the docs ?
> Please feel free to suggest a change or the wording that suits best to you.

Since my command example does not satisfy the between condition, here is a suggestion of wording of the documentation. I think it clarifies when between condition is satisfied.
 -w,  --wait=SECONDS              wait SECONDS between retrievals
                                  (e.g. waits between recursive downloads when -r is used)

To whom it may concern,

1. I am using the following
    - GNU Wget 1.20.3 built on linux-gnu.
    - Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (Focal Fossa)
    - WSL (v1, File version: 10.0.18362.1049)
    - Windows 10 Pro (64 bit)
2. I am invoking the command directly through WSL default terminal (bash: )
3. I have executed the following command which I thought it would start wget process and suspend it until 10 seconds has elapsed. In other words, it would start downloading after 10 seconds. Instead, it immediately executes.
    wget https://●●●.com/top/index.html --wait=10 --output-document ./top_index.html
I read its documentation which mentions the following (from wget --help):

> -w, --wait=SECONDS       wait SECONDS between retrievals
>     --waitretry=SECONDS  wait 1..SECONDS between retries of a retrieval
>     --random-wait        wait from 0.5WAIT...1.5WAIT secs between retrievals

Maybe I am reading the documentation wrong but the word "between" sounds sketchy. What does the word between refer to? I think the documentation should be more specific.

I tried finding similar post but I do not think it is mentioned in other posts. I looked at the following one but this one talks about wait between retires:

- wget option "--wait" does not work
  https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?func=detailitem&item_id=41906