He leans in and kisses me hard, his mouth opening to mine, his tongue sinking in deep and slow, stirring up heat in my chest, my gut, my core.
My knees feel a little weak and I’m grateful he’s holding me. The man can sure kiss your breath away.
“What are you doing here,” I manage to say when we break apart. He brings his arm around the small of my back and presses me against him.
“I managed to get off early,” he says with a wicked gleam in his eye. “So I came over here to get off again.”
I raise a brow at his bad pun but he bites along my neck, ending at that sweet spot just below the ear, the place that always turns me into putty in his hands.
“Did I ever tell you about all my fantasies about fucking you in this store?”
“No, you did not,” I tell him, surprised to hear this. Surprised but definitely intrigued.
He merely growls into my skin, one hand reaching down to lift up my skirt and cup and squeeze my ass. “Wearing bad girl panties today are we?” he asks, his palm skimming the surface of my ass that’s bare from my thong.
Then he slaps it. Hard.
I jump from the sharp hit but he’s holding me in place and grinning. My ass cheek stings from his handprint.
“Ouch,” I cry out, trying not to be a baby about it.
“I’ll kiss it better,” he says and I know now he’s not going anywhere.
“Hold on,” I warn him before he gets me even more indecent in public. I pull my skirt down and run over to the door, locking it behind me. Then I turn off the lights so it’s not so easy to see in.
When I turn around, he’s already unzipped his jeans and has his dick is in his hands. He’s smiling dangerously and stroking the hard, stiff length of it.
“So where did you plan to fuck me?” I look behind me at the counter. “There?” I slowly walk toward him and, knowing a rack of clothing is extra protection from wandering eyes from the street, I drop to my knees in front of him. “Here?”
I grab hold of his beautiful dick and put him in my mouth.
“Bloody hell, baby,” he says with a groan, thrusting a bit forward. “Don’t ever stop being so perfect.”
I won’t stop if you won’t stop, I think and swirl my tongue around his base.
“Can you do me a favor?” he says breathlessly.
I nod, slowing down.
“Tug my balls. Just a wee bit. I love that.”
Fuck, I’ll do anything to bring pleasure to this man. Plus, he has a really nice set of balls that he does an amazing job of manscaping. While I work his dick with my mouth, I gently cup them with my palm and tug them, just a little bit.
The moan that escapes his lips startles me but travels right to my core, vibrating through my bones. God, it’s turning me on turning him on. I tug a little harder and he makes a fist in my hair, holding me with a burst of warm pain.
“You’re so good, baby,” he says, his breath hitching. “So dirty but so good. Don’t stop. Don’t stop.”
So I don’t. But a minute later he releases my hair and pulls away. “Okay, I lied. Stop. I need to be inside you.”
He shakes off his jeans and briefs and then hauls me to my feet, somehow taking off my shirt at the same time.
“Aah,” I cry out softly, my arms covering my breasts as my eyes fly to the windows. Passerbys may not be able to see clearly but now that I’m standing up, they can at least see some of me.
“The storeroom,” he growls with a nod. “Get in there and get naked.”
I barely have enough time to do so before the door slams behind me and I’m pushed against racks of clothing wrapped in protective plastic. The hangers swing from my weight as he presses into me. He tears off his shirt then puts his strong arms under my thighs and lifts me up. He hikes up my skirt, pushes the thin fabric of my underwear aside and I wrap my legs around his waist.
When the clothes start to give away, he holds me tight and whirls me around and across the room until my back is pressed up against a stack of boxes. Breathing hard, he leaves a trail of wet, messy kisses from my mouth to my breasts, teasing my nipples until they are hardened pebbles. He slaps them slightly and I gasp from the shock and then he’s positioning himself into me. I’m so glad our test results came back clear the other week because feeling his bare cock inside me is like nothing else on this earth.
He grins at me, mouth parted and eyes glazed. “Tell me how bad you want it.”
“I want it,” I tell him, reaching down so he can push himself in better.
“How bad?”
“Fucking bad.”
He gives my breast another slap and then laps his large, flat tongue over the sweet sting. “Fucking hell, you have the nicest breasts in the world. Nicest pussy, nicest ass, nicest everything.”
He bites my nipple and I groan, my head back against the boxes. “Stop stalling.”
“I’m just taking my time. You’re the one being greedy.”
“You make me greedy.”
He runs his thumb over my clit and smiles wickedly. “Greedy, dirty little fucking girl.”
I’m on the edge, teetering on the line between wanting to savor and wanting release. He knows this. He loves this. He leans over and teases the tip of my lips with his tongue.
“Give it to me,” I murmur into his mouth, practically pleading. “Any way you can.”
“The only way I can,” he says. Then he inhales, his nostrils flaring with desire and pushes into me sharply.
Even though I’m wet, the angle is deep and tight. I cry out a little before the pain subsides and I feel this warmth and fullness take over.
“You like that?” he whispers against my neck, biting and licking and breathing so hot, so heavy.
I whimper some sort of response as my legs tighten around him and I’m pushed harder and harder into the boxes. Soon the whole shelf begins to shake. My legs begin to shake. He’s holding me up and he’s spearing into me with these rough, hot thrusts that fill every wanting inch of me.
I grip his back, feeling the muscles ripple under my fingers, his pure strength and size. The backs of my heels dig into the sides of his firm ass and I’m holding him tight, tight, as tight as I can.
“Fuck,” he hisses through his teeth as he grips my skin. “Fuck, fuck, fuck. You feel so fucking good, baby, you feel so good.”
The pace picks up and it’s like he’s trying to fuck me through the boxes, through the wall, and into the store. The need in his face, the want and desire, it makes me feel like I’m being devoured, eaten alive, and gladly.
He lets out a frustrated cry and the cords on his neck stick out as he strains for control, sweat running down his face and his hard, broad chest as it crushes against my breasts. He’s close to losing it. “Come with me,” he growls, and he focuses his piercing, carnal eyes on mine. “Come.”
His thumb grazes me. It’s a hair trigger. I come and come loose, a feral, uncontrollable sort of bliss ripping through me until I feel like my skin and bones and nerves have been annihilated. My mind feels like it’s been blown wide open and from the intensity in his rough grunts, I know he feels the same.
When he pulls out and gently lowers me to the ground, it feels like a dream and the storeroom is a cloud. I’m not really here, I’m somewhere else, but I’m with him.
My heart beats hard in my throat and I can’t feel my legs and I can’t open my eyes. The whole interior of my body throbs and pulses, sending waves of pleasure through every crevice until the waves get smaller and smaller and smaller. Eventually I remember how to breathe.
I am so, so deliriously happy. I’m high. I’m joy.
He is so fucking good.
***
“You know what’s weird?” Linden asks me as I drive us over the span of the Golden Gate Bridge, heading north toward Petaluma. Even though I love this bridge to death I’m also scared of it and I try and stick to the middle lane as much as possible. If I even glance toward the edge and the Bay, I get sick.
“
What’s weird?” I ask.
“Well,” he says, placing his palm on my leg and stroking my bare thigh up and down until I have to shiver, “the fact that I’ve never met your father is kind of weird. You know, considering how long we’ve known each other.”
He’s right. Actually he only met my mom on the day I opened the store. Of course, my father was out of the picture at that point. It was just one of those things where they had a bunch of opportunities to meet – working at the Lion, my graduation dinner – but it just didn’t work out that way.
Now, that my dad is somehow back in the picture, I have to say I’m a bit nervous about it. It’s one of the reasons why I invited Linden along, so I would have some backup. The fact that my dad is back with my mother but hasn’t actually moved back in, is whole world of strange and I don’t know what the dynamics of their relationship will be. Linden makes a great buffer.
The other reason is equally as selfish: I want to show Linden off. I want my mom and dad to look at him and be impressed, because how could they not be? He’s handsome, he’s successful (at least I consider being a helicopter pilot a successful career, even if Linden’s own parents do not) and he’s charming.
I want their approval. I know I shouldn’t but considering I’ve stayed silent about Linden when talking to Nicola and Kayla, and Penny and James are still clueless, I want someone to tell me I’ve made a good choice. I want to know how the two of us and our quasi relationship look to other people.
“Bad timing, I guess,” I tell him. “Whenever they were around where you could actually meet them, you weren’t.”
“Guess you could say the same about us.”
I glance over my shades at him. “What do you mean?”
He shrugs and runs his hand through his thick hair. “Just that for so many years, when I was single you were with someone else and when you were single, I was with someone else.”
“There were a few years in there where both of us were single, you know,” I point out.
“I know. I remember them very well. It took a lot of restraint on my behalf not to tell you how I really felt.”
All this time, all this time. “Why didn’t you?”
He takes a moment and then says, “James. I guess it always came down to James. You know sometimes, if I wasn’t his best friend, I’d think the guy hates me.”
“Hates you?” I repeat.
“Yeah.” He looks over at me and his eyes are troubled. “Since the day we first met there’s always been this…I don’t know, resentment toward me. Maybe it’s all in my head. It probably is. But it’s just been years of little digs on how I get everything I want and I never have to work hard and how privileged I am.”
I think I know what Linden is talking about. “But you do work hard. You worked extremely hard to get to where you are now. Your parents didn’t help you out with that.”
He gives me a wry look. “No. But they did pay for my school and my flat. I would have worked hard if they didn’t but it would have been a lot harder to get to where I am now. I mean, I know I’m lucky in many respects, but I’m also not in others. But James doesn’t see it that way. He grew up with a messed up family but so did I. Just because my family had money, didn’t mean my life was any better. When you’re a child, you don’t care about that shit. You just want love.”
My heart is breaking a little bit for him. I know it’s been hard for Linden to have the family that he does. I also know that James’s family is a little bit worse. I still don’t know all the details but it was a poor, hard knock life in Oakland for that kid, with an abusive deadbeat dad and a struggling mother. And I know that James does sometimes talk about Linden being born with a silver spoon in his mouth.
“So he’s jealous of you,” I say.
“I think he’s jealous of the me he thinks I am,” he says. “You know…James and I, we don’t really talk about that stuff. We don’t talk the same way that you and I do. You know me better then he does, baby blue.”
“And I know that you haven’t had it easy.”
“But as long as James’s life is worse and more of a struggle, then I’ll always be the winner in his eyes. That’s what I think he resents me for. And that’s why I stayed away from my feelings for you for so long.”
My stomach tingles at the mention of feelings. I want to press him more on that subject but I refrain myself. I don’t want to be the pushy needy girlfriend when I’m not even his girlfriend.
Linden glances at me. “I didn’t want him to think I took you away. There was a while there, where…”
“What?”
He shakes his head. “Nothing. I just thought if I made any advances toward you, I’d be stepping on his toes too much. And then of course there was the fact that I had no idea how you felt. All these years I assumed that you only thought of me as a friend and that’s it.” Pause. “For the most part.”
“For the most part?”
He grins. “Well, I did catch you checking me out a few times.”
“Oh you did not!” But my face is turning red.
“I think I did. I also caught you catching me checking you out. And you looked like you liked it. A lot.”
“Whatever.”
“You know it’s true. But even then, I wasn’t about to risk our friendship.”
“So what changed?”
He chews on his lip for a moment. “I think I grew some balls.”
“I’m glad you did,” I tell him, reaching for his crotch. “You know I love your balls.”
An hour later I’m pulling the car down my parent’s driveway and kneading my hands on the steering wheel.
“Are you…nervous?” Linden asks, sounding shocked.
I give him a look. “I haven’t seen my dad since he fucked off.”
“But they are still your parents.”
“You get nervous around your parents.”
“With reason.”
“Yeah, well, sometimes I have reasons too.”
I take in a deep breath and get out of the car. Once I do, Linden walks around and pulls me into a deep hug.
“Don’t worry,” he says into the top of my head before he plants a kiss there. “I’m here.”
And just like that, half my worries slip away, to the ground, like rain. I close my eyes and let him hold me for a moment. He is here, with me. My rock.
We pull apart and head over to the door. Normally I would just barge in but I feel like it’s best to knock now.
When the door opens, it’s my father and suddenly I don’t feel like I just turned thirty, I feel like I just turned thirteen. He looks the same, tall, tanned, with a dark, lowered brow and intimidating demeanor.
But when he sees me, he smiles and he goes from scary, disapproving dad to someone who genuinely looks happy to see me.
“My little girl,” he says and he comes out onto the stoop to embrace me. He holds me for what seems like forever and I know Linden is just standing there beside us awkwardly.
Finally he pulls away and looks me up and down. “You look beautiful.”
He now turns to Linden and sticks out his hand. “You must be Linden. I’ve heard all about you.”
“Good things I hope,” Linden says, the classic response.
“She says you’re a pilot,” he says and his eyes go all twinkly for a moment before he suddenly looks at the ground and clears his throat. “Anyway, let’s go in. It’s freezing out here.”
As my dad turns and goes back inside, Linden gives me an inquisitive glance. I know he’s wondering what the deal is with the pilot remark and I feel like an idiot for not remembering that’s one of the things my brother Nate and my dad liked to do. When Nate was really young, he would take him to the airport and watch the planes and helicopters take off. Later on, Nate had a remote controlled one that he was really good (at flying).
But then when he got more and more sick, he wasn’t able to play with it as much and eventually we could only take him to the airport for short periods of time.
It wasn’t that my dad had wanted Nate to be a pilot and it’s not like Nate ever expressed that himself – he had wanted to be a lot of things. But I guess that’s what really stings. Nate never really thought of himself as sick, even when he was at his worst. He had that optimism of a child that things would get better. He really thought he would live forever.
“Stephanie,” Linden says softly and he grabs my hand, “are you all right?”
I nod and swallow the lump in my throat. “Yeah. Just remembering something.”
“Your brother?”
I nod again. I don’t really talk about this with Linden, or anyone, actually. I rarely think about it myself. It’s just easier that way. So sometimes, when I’m reminded of Nate and what he used to be like, what our lives were like, it really catches me off guard.
No matter how badly you push it away and ignore it, the pain of loss never really goes away.
We go inside the house and it immediately smells like home. I guess because it is, but it’s funny how no matter where you end up living in life, some places always remain more than just a roof over your head.
We take off our shoes and I grab Linden’s hand, leading him toward the kitchen. There we find my mother, looking absolutely perfect as usual. Her hair is up and curled off her face, she’s got an apron over a dress and patent leather pumps on her feet.
Have I mentioned that my mother is probably where I got my fascination with fashion from? Whether she was taking care of Nate or playing with me and my toy horses, she never had a hair out of place and always looked put together. Even now, and my parents are on the older side, so she’s pushing her sixties, she looks like she should be in the pages of Good Housekeeping.
“Hello dear,” she says brightly and then smiles wide at Linden, red lipstick against white teeth. “Hello Linden. How was the drive over? I hope traffic wasn’t too bad.”
“It was fine,” I say and she’s coming around the kitchen island and pulling out the stools.
“Here, sit,” she says and when we don’t move she claps her hands together and says, “or sit with your father in the lounge. He just opened a bottle of scotch. Linden, you’re Scottish, you must like scotch.”