The sharks think him a goldfish in their tank. How wrong they are.
Clinking crystal and the hubbub of chatter and laughs are the background noises. Prideful chandeliers, and tuxedos and formal dresses are the background sights. Perfume, masculine and feminine, peaty whiskey and acrid cigar smoke are the background smells.
They circle him, lie in wait, their fins above the surface without self-consciousness. He’s the object of their fawning affection, their fake friendships, but he is also their target, and they’ll sink their teeth into him the first moment they get.
But he knows it. He’s no fool, even if that’s what people think of him by virtue of who he is, what he does.
He takes the compliments with a subdued grace and easy charm that endears him to the wicked people who scramble over each other to talk to him. It is a manner at odds with the visage of him in a steel-mesh cage, tattoo-sheathed arms laying punch after thunderous punch into a bleeding, reeling, drooling opponent.
I see scattered looks of disappointment in those that want him to beat his chest, here and now. That want him to be the cocky and aggressive creature that he is in the cage, the idiot fighter who speaks with slurred words and doesn’t know not to mangle the cap of a cigar, or the difference between a merlot and a cab-sav.
Those are the people that see him as nothing but a pit bull, or a cock in a fight, a chance to make money. They want to watch the show, which is purple bruises, red blood, and exposed white bone.
Most of the men try to buddy up with him, shake his hand, do the fighter’s double-fist-tap as if the mere gesture somehow extends the line of inclusion around them, makes them one with the fighters.
They clap him on the back, but in the same breath test him with exclusive in-jokes, or a privileged wit that he does not understand. They do their best to show that they can one-up him whenever they like, as if through words of marginalization they can tease from him some thread of insecurity, before latching onto it and pulling.
It all rolls off his shoulders like rain water.
The wives… well, they look at him differently, in a way that I don’t like one bit. But I try not to think about that. I can’t control what other people do. And without a doubt, I trust him.
I’m sitting at the bar in the most dangerous room in the state. Politicians, police captains, and fat cat businessmen mill about, rubbing shoulders with the bosses of every major crime family and organization in the tri-state area. At the head of it all is my father, Johnny ‘Glass’ Marino.
He booked out this whole hotel, a new and modern all-glass eyesore that sits like a reflective pimple on the countryside. They had to relocate all the guests at just a moment’s notice, and it was only the out-of-towners who put up a fuss. But they didn’t know any better.
Once they saw the cavalcade of limousines spilling out bodyguards in black, it became clear it was time to fall in line.
Dad’s the man who took basement-dwelling underground cage fighting and made it the biggest money-maker in town… and the biggest money loser, for those who bet incorrectly. Dirt and grime and dusty basements are a thing of the past. Now… now it glitters.
Duncan ‘Creature’ Malone is the star of the show, the man whom the sharks circle. Dad’s always wanted to show off his family ‘pedigree’, even if Duncan is not real family. Heck, he didn’t even take Dad’s last name.
Everybody else knows that he was adopted and didn’t formally join the family until he was twenty. But in the interest of diplomacy, they never mention it. Dad’s temper is legendary, and they allow him the useless indulgence of believing Duncan is actually his son, and actually following in his footsteps.
Wrong on both counts.
At twenty-two, Duncan handles the hostile social atmosphere, all the snarls behind smiles, surprisingly well. It’s his own easy smile, those perfect teeth set within that iron jaw, and his reticence to speak too much that pulls people into the orbit of his natural presence. And when that fails to win hearts, his dark and sharp good looks, and piercing blue eyes do the rest.
There’s only one person who doesn’t smile at him in this room, and that’s Dad. He stands apart, watches Duncan out of suspicious eyes and trembling lips pulled tight across his teeth.
At once he wants to show Duncan off, but keep him all to himself. At once he wants everybody to meet and greet his champion fighter, but his unending mob-paranoia makes him see snakes and shadows where there are none.
No, maybe that’s wrong. There probably are snakes and shadows. I wouldn’t trust a crook, even if he comes clothed in a Brioni bespoke. And for Dad… well, it takes one to know one.
But, even more than that, he wants to be recognized as the man who discovered Duncan, as the man who groomed him into the fighter he is today.
As the man who tamed a feral street boy.
But he’s kidding himself if he thinks he’s tamed Duncan. If anything, Dad was a handicap, and even if he won’t admit it to himself, he knows the others see it.
He’s bitter. In his twisted thoughts, he thinks that Duncan is stealing his limelight. And it gets worse with each fight won, with each two-to-five million pocketed in betting profits every week.
He comes over to me at the bar. The suit jacket he’s wearing strains at his shoulders. It was cut for him when he was a younger, slimmer man. His dimpled bald head beads with sweat, what I imagine a dinosaur egg in the early morning might have looked like.
For a moment he looks at the glass in my hand, as if weighing whether or not to ask me if it’s alcohol, but decides not to. His gaze wipes slowly over the crowd, resting on each face for sometimes seconds at a time, before eventually returning to Duncan.
Dad grunts. “Think he’s spilling our secrets? Saying things he shouldn’t be?”
“Of course not, Dad,” I say, not bothering to hide the contempt in my voice. How could he doubt Duncan now, after all the money he’s made off the fights? Duncan’s spilled red in the cage so Dad could line his pockets with green.
Dad fires an angry look at me, but I know the public setting, in front of all the other families especially, grants me precious immunity to his wrath tonight. I intend to take advantage of it.
“You should appreciate him more,” I tell him. “You push him too far, and he may just push back. You’ll lose your goose if you’re not careful.”
“What the hell would you know?” he snaps at me, before stalking back off into the fray.
Despite being used to his cruel outbursts toward me, I’m still stung by it every single time. I can’t remember the last time my father said a kind word to me, and meant it.
I return my attention to Duncan. The other mob bosses rattle off questions at him: How do you do it? What’s your secret? Will you train some of my guys? Are you taking supplements? What’s your training regimen?
Duncan sidesteps every question as though he were dodging rookie jabs in the cage, and continually, as if by magnetic force, his eyes are pulled to me.
I grin at him from the bar, offer him a quick flash of my eyebrows, and sip from my pear martini. I’m only twenty, but no bartender who knows my father is going to say ‘no’ to me.
And I actually kind of hate that.
Duncan shoots me a strained look. It says, ‘rescue me’, but I just laugh at him, shake my head. Hey, he wanted to be the best fighter, he wanted to own the cage. This is what he gets.
Mass murderers, drug suppliers, and glorified pimps competing for mere seconds of his time. Dissatisfied wives eyelashing him. Everybody wanting a piece of him, like he’s just some hunk of meat to be carved up and doled out.
Be careful what you wish for.
I sigh. At least it’s better than the hordes of girls who attend his fights and throw themselves unendingly at him.
All Duncan cares about is the fighting, not this bullshit, and I hate the politicking even more. Mob politics are about as tortuous as it gets.
I used to think it was cool, being a mobster’s daughter, having a name that ‘rang out on the streets’, as Dad likes to put it.
But I quickly realized that all it did was erect walls between me and everybody else. No friends, and until Duncan came into my life, no lovers…
“Your brother looks in over his head,” the bartender says to me. His voice is shallow and wheezy. “I know a ‘save me’ face when I see one.”
My brother.
I’ve never called Duncan that before. He’s my adoptive brother, came into my life when I was just eighteen like a tornado ripping through a barn. He carried me off with him.
I meet the old bartender’s eyes, then tilt my head to the side. He looks… familiar, but from a mental distance. I know him from somewhere.
“You don’t remember me, do you, Deidre?” he asks.
“No,” I say truthfully. “But your voice is familiar.”
“I’ve worked for your old man before. I ran the bar for him at a couple of his birthday get-ups. You were just a little girl, though. Oh, it must have been ten years ago now.”
“I’m sorry, but I really can’t remember,” I say, smiling politely. I do vaguely recall my father having birthday parties, but he stopped when I turned about ten.
“It’s no problem, honey,” he says. “You’ve grown up a lot.”
“Everybody’s been saying that to me.”
I look quickly around the large function room. I met a lot of these people when I was younger, when Dad would take me to ‘work’ with him.
I used to love it when he brought me along for a ride in his limousine, what he called his ‘office’. It wasn’t until I found out what he actually did that I stopped asking if I could go.
Truth be told, I hate it here. I just wear this sham smile, maintain this pretend poise, so Dad doesn’t get on my case about it later. Ironically, I’m just doing what everybody else is.
The women, of course, do it best. It takes an especially skilled woman to survive a marriage to a gangster. These are the kind of men who can go from placid indifference to boiling rage in just half a heartbeat. These are the kind of men who are never wrong. These are the kind of men who all keep girls on the side.
The bartender clears his throat. “Why don’t you rescue him? Duncan, I mean.”
I notice that some of Duncan’s easy charm is starting to fade as his patience frays. Soon he’ll get bored of this.
“Nah,” I say to the bartender. “He looks fine.”
I stick my tongue out at Duncan, bring a big grin to his face.
Eventually the crowd around him disperses as they pick up on his signals, and he swaggers over to me, his wide shoulders swaying, and a sexy smirk prying his lips to the side.
He’s got a soft but neat shadow on his face tonight, lining the iron cut of his jaw. His black, careless hair only serves to emphasize his brilliant blue eyes, but also brings out something of a boyish quality in him, something that can’t be quashed by the fighting scars.
He sits down beside me, and then tucks his head my way conspiratorially. “Never thought I’d fucking get rid of them, Dee, Jesus Christ.”
“You wanted this,” I tell him, raising my eyebrows.
“I never wanted this,” he says, gesturing at everything in particular.
“Don’t lie to me, Duncan. You always wanted to be the best.”
“In the cage,” he grunts. “None of this sparkly shit. I don’t need it to fucking sparkle.”
Idly he fiddles with his cufflinks; he’s unused to them. For his first time wearing a full three-piece suit, he looks damn fine in it, though.
The suit slims his muscular body, streamlines him, smoothes him out. It’s the inversion of his usual, rougher, less refined and more boxy dress sense: An old leather jacket that highlights his broad shoulders, jeans and boots.
“You look good,” I tell him. “Seriously. You should wear a suit more.”
“You look better,” he says, meeting my eyes. I feel zapped by energy still, every time our eyes connect. He leans into me and whispers, “You look very fuckable in purple.”
I roll my eyes. “I thought you’d been working on your adjectives.”
“I’m a fighter, not a writer.”
“Yeah, well keep your voice down, the bartender knows Dad.”
Duncan spins around, eyes the old man who asks him if he’s having anything.
“No,” Duncan says. “Nothing for me.”
“Don’t drink?”
“Got a fight coming up.”
“What, tonight?” the bartender jokes.
“Alcohol affects your body for days after consumption,” Duncan tells him matter-of-factly, his voice low and uninterested. “I’ve got a fight in days.”
“Right,” the bartender says, moving quickly up the other end of the bar.
“So, how are you liking your big night?” I ask Duncan.
“I never fucking asked for this. This is for your father.”
“I know.”
“He wants to trot me out like a fucking show dog.”
“I know, Duncan,” I say. I touch his arm briefly, quell the turbulent tide. “I don’t want to be here, either.”
“He wants to show you off, too.”
“No he doesn’t,” I say, shaking my head. “He only wants me to be here because if I’m not, everybody will talk. They’ll ask him where his daughter is, and he’ll get embarrassed he doesn’t know. Now, he knows. He can point at me when they ask him that.”
“You’re the brightest fucking person in this room, Dee, even if your father doesn’t see it. I caught Falcone’s boy looking at you.”
“Shut up,” I say. “Stop teasing me.”
“I’m not. He was staring, had a dirty fucking look in his eyes, so I had a word with him.”
“You what?” I ask in disbelief. “Duncan! You can’t fuck around here.”
I scan the crowd, pick out Falcone’s boy, a short man with his father’s cuboid head, and a neck that swallows his chin like quicksand. He meets my eyes, then catches Duncan’s, and looks away instantly, ears burning.
“What the hell did you say to get him so rattled?”
“I told him not to fucking look at my sister,” Duncan says in something of a growl. “I didn’t need to say anything more. But that’s not what I really meant.”
“Then what did you really mean?”
“My girl,” he says, pride in his voice.
“Shush!” I hiss, looking up the bar. Thankfully nobody is near us, and the old bartender is milling about at the other side.
“I like your dress tonight,” Duncan says, looking me up and down. His tongue darts out to wet his lips.
“It feels a little snug,” I say, my hand coming across my waist unconsciously. “I think I’ve put on a bit of weight recently.”
“Don’t even think about getting self-conscious, Dee.” It’s spoken to me like an order. “You look fucking amazing tonight. Hell, in old sweats and that soy-sauce stained hoodie, you bring me up with just a look, let alone this beautiful dress.”
“Oh, wow, thanks,” I say sarcastically, reaching out to flick his chin, and not a moment’s too soon snatching my hand back.
That was close.
He brings his face closer to mine, and his full, soft lips are an invitation I have to force myself to ignore.
I want to kiss him, want to feel him, want to smell him.
But not here. Not now.
It’s our secret. If it ever got out…
“I want to kiss you,” he whispers, his eyes on my lips. “I want to feel you.”
“Stop,” I say. It’s too big of a risk. This is reckless, but Duncan always was like a skydiver that assembles his parachute on the way down.
“I want to smell you.”
“Duncan…”
“Taste you.”
“Shut up!”
“Don’t you?”
I don’t answer for a moment. “Not here.”
“You’re lying,” he says, grinning. “I can always tell when you lie. You definitely want to here.”
“I’m not lying,” I say, making a face at him. “And I wouldn’t want to do it here.”
“You and I both know we’re not talking about here here.”
“If not here here, then where here?”
But he just looks at me, those supremely kissable lips pried to the side, those azure eyes on mine.
“Seriously, Dad’s got a big stick up his ass today. Meeting the other bosses always makes him nervous.”
He ignores my warning, and says in a low voice, “I’ve been thinking about you all day.” His eyes travel up and down my body, linger on my every curve in hungry adulation. They settle on the skin of my neck, and his breathing quickens, and his pupils widen.
Despite my earlier protestation, I indulge him: “What kind of thoughts, exactly?”
“Oh, don’t worry, nothing pure.”
I shake my head and laugh.
“I haven’t seen you in twelve hours. I counted.”
“You can count that high?”
That pulls a deep and quiet chuckle from him.
“Why so long today, Dee?”
I sigh. “Classes ran late. And actually it’s pretty normal for people to not see each other for twelve hours.”
“Even couples?”
“Even couples.”
“Even secret couples?”
I roll my eyes. “Especially secret couples.”
“But not you and me,” he says.
“No,” I say after a pause. He’s right. “Not you and me. But when I don’t see you, it can be for months at a time. Or in one case, two years, though I guess that doesn’t really count.”
“But you left me with something in Thailand.”
“What’s that?”
“A reason to work my ass off.”
“Why’s that?”
“Did I ever tell you this before?”
“No.”
He hesitates for a moment, licks his lips. “Because I knew it’d be the only way to see you again.”
“So I made you a better fighter, huh?” I ask through a smile.
He pauses.
“What?”
“No, Dee. You made me a better person.”
Now I pause.
“Come on,” he says, getting up.
“I haven’t finished my drink yet.”
“Finish it, then.”
“Hold on,” I say, freely indignant. Nobody, not even Duncan, is going to rush me. “I’ll drink at my own pace, and where exactly are we going?”
“The fuck out of here.”
“We can’t just leave. Dad will go crazy.”
“Fuck your dad.”
Normally, I would agree. I had enough of Dad’s shit a long time ago, but tonight of all nights is not the night to test him.
“Fuck him,” Duncan says, and that defiant smile and gorgeous, commanding eyes are an inch away from winning me over.
“You should be mingling with his friends.”
“I don’t give a fuck about his friends. I want to mingle with you.” He leans forward, whispers, “Inside you.”
I suppress my groan. “They’re the ones who keep you fighting, you know.”
“Exactly,” he growls. “If you don’t come with me right now, I’m going to pick you up and carry you out. Not like a newlywed bride, but over my shoulder.”
“You can’t!” I hiss. “Everybody will see and then everybody will know.”
He smirks. “Then let’s go.”
We walk together, shoulder to shoulder, through the crowd. I want to reach out and take his hand, and it’s a battle not to do so. I realize, with a kind of distant horror, how easy it would be to slip up, to hold onto his arm, or run my arm around his waist before dipping lower to grab his tight ass.
I do these things all the time, but in public, with people watching, with Dad watching, I have to constantly remember not to.
What if, one time, I forget? Or he does? How quickly everything would break apart!
People murmur things at us as we wade through the sea of bodies, and we reply politely, but we’re bee-lining straight for the door.
I’m considering this entire hotel, booked out, empty, and Duncan says to me, as if reading my mind, “Time to go exploring.”
Once we’re out of the doors of the main function room, which doubles as a ballroom or banquet hall, we grin at each other.
He takes my hand then, leads me quickly through the winding, empty hallways until I’m sure we’re totally lost, and then he backs me up against a wall, pins my arms above my head, and he just looks at me.
His gaze runs down the back of my arms, and his lips part as he sweeps his eyes over my armpit, along the line of my shoulders, inward toward my chest.
He brings his lips close to my ear, whispers, “I want you right fucking now.”
I grip onto his fingers tight, and his hot breath on my earlobe stirs up something inside of me. I can smell him now that he’s so close to me, really him, beneath the cologne, and I love it.
His body is tense, hard, and I can feel the electricity in his every breath. He takes my earlobe into his mouth, bites it gently with his teeth, and then he smells my neck before laying a smoldering trail of kisses all the way to my shoulder, leaving me quivering.
“God, you look sexy with your hair like this. What do you call it?”
“It’s just a braided bun,” I tell him. “Don’t you know anything?”
“I know how to make you feel good.”
“That’s just biology.”
“I love it when I can see your neck, Dee.” He traces a finger from my ear to my collar bone, then runs along it to the middle. “And here,” he says. “I love it when I can see you here.”
He meets my eyes, and I see that familiar demon in his. He takes my hand, holds it against his thigh, and I gasp when I feel him, hard as a steel bar, straining against his suit pants.
“Just like that,” he tells me. “Just one smell, just one touch.”
I hold onto him, rub him slowly, draw a tortured look of lust from him. “Just one man with a one-track mind,” I whisper.
“No,” he tells me. He takes my face in his huge hand, and I feel the heat in his palms, press my cheek into it. “Only you do this to me.”
After a moment I ask him, “You going to kiss me or what?”
He smirks. “Do I really have to?”
“You assho—”
He kisses me, crushes his lips against mine, brings me up to the tips of my toes. I wrap my arms around him, heart thumping wildly in my chest as I feel his desire for me in the fervor of his kisses.
I run my hands through his hair, hold onto him, press myself against his body, as if suddenly a crack in the dam has burst. I’m as desperate for him as he is for me.
He gropes me hungrily, and I pull at his hair, and our bodies are touching all the way up and down, and I’m melting in his arms, falling into him…
“Not here,” I whisper, breaking the kiss. “We’re still too close.”
We look around, then start walking down the hallway again. As if on cue a staff member of the hotel walks past us the other way, his eyes lingering on Duncan’s crotch for a moment, a look of embarrassment stretching out his face.
I lean forward, and when I see Duncan’s tented pants I cover my mouth and laugh.
“You look ridiculous.”
“It’s your fault.”
“We are we going, anyway?”
He points up at some signage as we walk. I read it: Indoor swimming pool.
“Swimming?” I ask. “In what?”
“Use your imagination.”
“In our underwear?”
“If you want.”
“But I’m not wearing a bra.”
He smirks at me. “Neither am I.”
I slap his shoulder.
“Come on, Dee. Live a little.”
We arrive at the pool, open the glass door, and find it completely empty. It’s a heated pool, it steams, and the lighting is dim, and the pool casts shards of wavy light against the walls.
Duncan closes the door behind us, and I hear the click of a lock. He opens a digital keypad flap, touches a button, and the glass door turns opaque instantly.
“How did you know it would do that?”
“You mean because I’m just some dumb fighter?” he asks, taking me into his arms and pulling me against him.
“You are a fighter,” I tell him. “And sometimes, you can be dumb.”
“The button said ‘privacy’. I took a chance.”
“How brave of you.”
I grin, pull away from him, walk up the side of the pool. It’s small, meant for private parties.
I walk to a storage cupboard sitting flush almost invisibly in the wall. It slides into a recess, and I pull out a fresh towel, and lay it down on one of the deck chairs.
Duncan starts to approach me, but I stop him with an outstretched hand.
“Uh-uh,” I say. I slowly take off my heels, let him watch me, and then lie down on the deck chair, get comfortable. “Take off your clothes for me. Let me watch.”
He licks his lips.
“Come on,” I say, daring him with my eyes. “Show me what you got, champ.”
He pulls off his jacket without hesitation, folds it in half lengthways, tosses it at the deck chair next to me.
“Your turn,” he says.
I shake my head at him, and so he starts at his vest, undoing the buttons one by one, his eyes never leaving mine. They’re bluer than the water in the pool.
He tosses the vest, too, then loosens his tie, slides it off, his eyes ablaze with a lustful, singular intensity.
“Your turn,” he says.
I take my left cap sleeve, pull it down over my shoulder, and then return my eyes to Duncan and flash my eyebrows at him.
He laughs, and begins to undo the buttons to his shirt. I watch, eyes wide, as his muscular chest comes into view first, darkened on his left side by the solid tattoo of a house silhouetted – the windows are squares of uninked skin – and on the right side a leaping tiger.
Then I see his stomach, hard, flat, cut, like any fighter’s body should be.
But it just looks so much hotter on him.
He leaves his shirt still tucked in at the bottom, but runs his hands slowly down over his stomach, fingers dipping below the line of his pants for just a moment. As he pulls it down, I see the buzz of his neatly trimmed pubic hair.
“More,” I tell him.
He pulls out his shirt, rolls it off his shoulders then lets it drop down his arms. His arms are sheathed in coiling black tattoos, nothing defined, just impressions, like inked emotion. Some of those lines are sharp and severe, others calm and curved.
When he catches his shirt behind him, turns slightly to toss it onto the deck chair, I get a glimpse of the lines and lines of blessing script he has tattooed on his back.
I soak up the sight of his body, broad shoulders, narrow waist, an Adonis belt at his hips that takes my breath away, the kind that makes smart girls stupid.
God, he’s drop-dead gorgeous, and it still gets me even now.
“More,” I say, humming a grin at him. He doesn’t move, and so I crane my neck to the side, rub a hand down it, bite my lip at him.
“You are so fucking sexy,” he growls in defeat, his hands going to his belt. He unbuckles it deftly, pulls out the leather, then wraps it around one open hand until it’s a tight coil, tosses it at the deck chair.
“Your turn,” he says. “I’m serious this time.”
I grin, reach my hands behind me over my head to pull the zip down to my dress. His eyes linger on my underarms, and he swallows, his Adam’s apple jumping up and down.
“You look fucking hot in that dress, especially when it’s coming off.”
I pull the zip down a little, then lower my other sleeve over my other shoulder.
“Who said anything about coming off? Your turn. I’m serious this time.”
The quick smudge of red-pink that is his tongue wetting his lips steals my attention, before I focus on his hands as he unbuttons and unzips his pants, pulls the flaps open to either side, and I can see his black boxer briefs beneath, his bulge.
He hooks a thumb into the elastic, slowly teases it down, reveals the base of his wide shaft. He stops, looks at me, lips slightly parted so I can see the tips of his teeth.
“More,” I whisper at him.
Millimeter by millimeter he pulls down, and more of his manhood comes into view. I gasp as he finally springs out, as he tucks his underwear beneath his smooth balls.
His eyes never leave mine, and he begins to slowly stroke himself.
“Just looking at you is enough, Dee,” he groans, his body tightening.
I breathe unsteadily, let the straps of my dress fall lower.
“Show yourself to me now,” he says. No, he orders.
I pull the dress lower down, and my breasts come into view, and he sucks in air, and his body goes tighter still, and he begins to pump himself faster.
“God damn I love your breasts,” he growls, stepping closer to me. “Now pull your dress up.”
I reach for the sleeves hung down my shoulders, but he stops me with a sharp command.
“No, not there. Lower.”
“Oh, you meant there,” I tease.
I reach down, and begin to pull my dress up, over my knees, and his cobalt eyes eat up the sight of my skin. Just by looking at me he makes me tingle, raises my temperature, makes me feel so sexy.
I see nothing but desire for me in his eyes.
Duncan strokes his manhood, leans back a little, crunches his stomach.
“Higher,” he groans.
I pull the dress higher.
“Now spread those sexy thighs. Let me see you.”
I open my legs for him, my dress now bunched around my hips, and it’s like he can’t take it anymore, like something snaps.
He comes to me fast, takes my lips, claims them, pulls moans from my mouth while he kisses me fiercely, while he massages my breasts and thumbs my nipples.
I grab onto him with my legs and pull his hips toward me, and I mewl when I feel him at my entrance through my underwear.
“You’re so hard,” I whisper at him, reaching down and holding him.
“It’s you, Dee. Always.”
He kisses me again, this time just my lower lip, and when I try to kiss him back, try to taste him again, he pulls away, that sexy-as-sin smirk bringing his lips to one side.
“Don’t move,” he says, and I obey him. He traces a finger down in between my breasts, lower still, and a soft moan escapes my mouth as I feel his hand on my thigh, coming up to my center. He cups my sex, and I gasp.
His fingers run up either side of me, and when he brushes against my clit I jolt on the deck chair. He pulls his hand up farther still, over my mound, and then slips it into my underwear, squeezes my lips down there together.
Unconsciously, I lift my hips to him, bite my lip, stare into his eyes, beg him silently to make me feel good.
He traces a finger up my sex, makes me sigh as ripples of sensation course through me, and then starts to massage my bud, rubs it in circles, makes me feel like I’m in heaven.
“Mmm,” I moan. “I like that.”
“Put your arms up,” he tells me, and so I obey, lift my hands over my head, look him in his gorgeous eyes.
He inhales sharply, and I watch as his eyes wander over me, eat up the sight of me, from my underarms to my breasts, to my neck, to my lips.
“Come and kiss me,” I whisper.
He leans into me, and just when he touches his lips to mine he pushes his finger all the way inside me, and I moan out, unable to concentrate on kissing him.
He takes my lower lip, sucks on it, bites it while he fingers me, and when he slides a second finger in, I feel stretched around him, undulate my hips, rock myself to his rhythm.
“You like that?” he asks, bringing his thumb to my clit, making me feel all kinds of bliss with just his one hand.
“I like it.”
“Say it again.”
“I like it,” I breathe, taking his lips into mine again, pushing my tongue into his mouth.
He fingers me so deftly, brings me racing right to the edge so quickly, and I feel so tight, a coiled spring waiting to be sprung.
“Wait,” I pant, pulling up, shifting my body. “Too fast. Not yet.”
“Tell me what you want.”
“I want to come at the same time as you.”
He climbs onto the deck chair, bends my knees then crosses one over the other, and leans over me. He pulls my underwear to the side, and his tip touches my entrance, and with his arms on either side of me, he waits there, looks me in the eyes.
“Come on,” I breathe at him.
He leans his weight against my knees, presses them to my chest, and then ever so slowly he inches into me.
I grip at his shoulders, dig my nails into his flesh as he stretches me, as he pushes himself so gradually into me, filling me up.
“Oh God,” I pant, clamping my eyes shut, my body tensing up.
“Jesus, you’re tight, Dee,” he groans. “You feel so fucking good.”
I reach out to his hips, run my hands up his strong waist, pull him toward me.
“Come on,” I whisper, practically beg.
“Ask me again,” he says, stopping.
“Come on!” I hiss, and he thrusts all the way inside me, bottoms out, pulls a cry of overwhelming pleasure from my lips.
He drives himself into me again and again, and it’s all I can do to keep myself as silent as possible, God forbid someone from the party wander by outside.
With one hand, Duncan scoops up my face, tilts it up to him, and my eyes travel over his sexy lips, and I bite my teeth together, arch my body as he fucks me wildly.
He plucks strings of pleasure inside me so deep, they thrum through my body, shake me like the beat of a bass drum.
His eyes stay locked with mine, and he tangles my hair into his hand, pulls my head back, turns it to the side, and as he leans lower, he drags his tongue from my neck to my ear, an action so primal and consuming it sends me quivering.
With rough hands he turns my knees to the side, forces me to tuck them up against my chest, and then I feel his hand on my sex from behind, and he rubs my clit, and all I can do is grip onto the edge of the deck chair above me, close my eyes, and let him take from me everything he wants.
“Moan for me,” he says, and he adjusts his position, and his cock rams against my front wall, and I moan out my pleasure loudly, no longer caring that someone outside might hear.
“Fuck, I love your pussy,” he growls. “I love your tight fucking pussy. I want to fuck you forever.”
He speeds up somehow, and his cock swells within me impossibly more, and I’m lost in his grip, clutched by his feverish desire for me, utterly and completely his.
“Oh God!” I gasp, his fingers working my pearl like magic, his cock stretching me with each hard thrust, making me feel so full.
“Like that!” I cry, my body tightening, that ball of pressure inside me expanding. Duncan doesn’t stop, doesn’t slow, doesn’t change his rhythm.
My mouth falls open, my tongue comes out, and I hold onto the chair with a white-knuckled grip, my body a tense snapshot of pleasure, right on the brink.
“Shit, shit, shit!” I breathe as I plunge off the edge, come hard and long, and Duncan’s hand cups my face, his thumb rubs my lip, and I bite down on it as white-hot bliss sears me.
I hear him grunt, feel his body tighten as he lets go, and I swear I feel him come inside me, not just the giant swelling and twitch of his manhood.
I moan into his hand as he fucks me even more manically, as he buries himself to the hilt again and again, rubs my clit, drives me through my own blinding ecstasy, draws it out until I can’t breathe anymore, until I’m tensed up, crunched up, toes curled so tight they might cramp.
And then he slows, and I’m panting, coming down, the last touches of bliss like feathers on my skin, ticklish almost.
His eyes are shut as he slowly pushes himself in and out of me, his cock jolting inside me seemingly at random. Sweat glistens on his chest, his abs, and I reach out and run my hand down his slick skin, into his buzz of pubic hair, and I squeeze the base of his shaft, still hard as if he hadn’t just unloaded himself.
He climbs onto the deck chair beside me, behind me, and our bodies form the same shape as we stick to each other from top to toe, and his arms wrap me up, tell me I’m his, tell me that I’m all that he wants.
I lie there, holding onto his hands, playing with his fingers, his cock still twitching inside me, his hot breaths against my neck.
He leans up, and I take the opportunity to smell his neck, kiss the line of his jaw, and then take his lips into mine, and we share a soft and passionate kiss that sends me quaking.
Our tongues meet slowly, our lips dance to the exact same rhythm. Our heartbeats have aligned, and if I could wish for a moment to never end, I would wish it now, and it would not be the first time I wished it.
And when our kiss breaks to the sound of voices outside the opaque glass door, we fix our clothing in unison, sharing grinning glances, until I feel the sticky sensation of all his essence globbing out of me.
“Damn. Is there a changing room here?” I ask. “You’ve made a big mess.”
“Here,” he says, leading me toward the other side of the pool.
I go in, clean up as best as I’m able to, and then together Duncan and I make our way back to the function room. As we’re walking down the corridor that leads there, hand in hand, laughing and chatting, I see the double doors down the end open, and Dad sweeps out, furious eyes glaring at us.