Not a Fucking Thing
Cady
Present day . . .
IT WAS WEIRD AND IT was concerning when I pulled into the garage, parked and entered the house, that when I turned to look into the kitchen, Coert wasn’t there or sauntering in to greet me.
If he was home and I was not, this was what happened.
Usually I was in the kitchen when he came home, cooking him dinner. Over the last two weeks that we’d been living together, Coert said time and again that I didn’t have to.
He’d stopped doing that when I finally convinced him that I knew I didn’t have to, I wanted to.
And anyway, when Janie was home, I now picked her up from preschool and she helped me and that was my favorite part of those days.
Except when she was asleep in bed and Coert and I were alone in our own bed, of course.
But that night was late day mani-pedis at Maude’s House of Beauty with Alyssa, Josie and Amy followed by drinks and dinner with the girls.
Maybe he didn’t greet me because he wasn’t expecting me to get home that early.
I was home early because the weather got weird.
It was March and we were having an unusual heatwave.
This “heatwave” consisted of it getting over fifty degrees the last two days but such was a heatwave for Maine, which meant the snow was melting fast. Making matters worse, on my way home, a thunderstorm had rolled in. There were weather advisories because apparently a cold front was getting ready to slam right into the heatwave and there were concerns that the rain would turn to sleet, hail or snow and the wet that was everywhere was going to ice over.
As another roll of thunder moved over the house, I looked to the ceiling thinking this was where Coert might be. If there was a possibility the roads would be bad, I’d learned that it was all hands on deck. People took stupid chances in weather and most of Coert’s job was dealing with people doing stupid things.
That said, he’d normally tell me he had to go out.
I put my jacket on a hook by the door, walked into the kitchen and pulled out my phone before I tossed my purse on the island.
I checked it for missed calls or texts from Coert.
Nothing.
“Coert!” I called, tossing the phone on top of my purse.
“Bedroom!” I heard.
“Strange,” I murmured and moved into the foyer, up the stairs and into the bedroom.
As usual, the house was illuminated everywhere even though we didn’t have Janie.
Including the bedroom, although the bathroom door was open and the light was out.
And Coert wasn’t anywhere to be seen.
“Coert!” I called again.
“Here,” I heard his deep voice coming from the closet.
Very strange.
We had a small walk-in. It was nice and Coert had set it up so it was exceptionally functional, but it wasn’t going to be photographed for any magazine because that just wasn’t Coert.
Or me.
It was still better than what I had at the lighthouse (which had been close to nothing), and since neither Coert nor I were clothes hounds, it worked perfectly.
I moved to the closet but stopped dead in the doorway.
“What’s happening?” I whispered.
And I whispered this, frozen in place staring at Coert on his side in the corner of the closet amongst a tangle of Coert’s boots and running shoes, his long body wrapped around a visibly trembling to the point I wondered if she was in shock Midnight.
“The thunder rolled in and she lost it, raced up here,” Coert replied, not moving, wrapped around our dog and stroking her full body from her head that was buried in Coert’s shoulder to her rump. “She’s actually better. She was keening, Cady, and fuck, it was the ugliest sound I ever heard. I can’t leave her. If I even move, she starts making that noise again.”
I went to them, dropped to my knees and instantly wrapped myself around Midnight, twining with Coert to do it when I felt the violence of her trembling physically against my own flesh.
While Coert stroked, I wrapped an arm around her and held her tight, pressing my body to hers.
“I take it from your response you haven’t seen this before,” Coert noted.
I shook my head.
I watched the expression on his face shift from troubled to something that, if I didn’t know him, would have terrified me.
“Whatever those fuckers did to her, they did a number on her.”
“Should we call the vet?” I asked.
I knew how bad it was when he replied immediately, “I’ve been waiting for you to get home to do that. Can’t leave her, even if my phone is on the freaking nightstand, it’s been that bad. But I also don’t think we should make her wait until the storm passes. She needs to be sedated.”
I nodded. “Do you want me to call or do you want me to stay with her and you call?”
“I’ve got her. You go.”
I nodded again, bent my head, shoved my face in her fur and whispered, “It’s okay, baby. We’re gonna look out for you.”
She didn’t shift, just stayed shoved up against Coert, quaking full body.
I gave her a squeeze, carefully slid away, got to my feet and walked as calmly as I could out of the closet.
It wasn’t until I got to the bedroom door that I ran.
I called the vet, explained the situation, told her there was no way we could take our dog out into the storm, begged for a house call, and I must have sounded as frightened as I was because I got one. I took my phone back up to stay with Coert and Midnight while we waited for the vet to arrive.
When the doorbell rang, that time Coert decided to leave me with her, and by then we knew it was the right call because the thunder had passed, the storm hadn’t, and Midnight was no better.
The keening began again when Coert started to disengage from her and hearing it felt like my ears had started bleeding.
I flashed eyes I knew were wild with worry at Coert and tried to waylay him from moving.
“I’ll go,” I told him.
“Be back as quick as I can,” he muttered and moved fast.
When he left, Midnight wailed like she’d been surprised by sudden and intense pain and she shuffled on her belly into the corner, burying her face under her paws.
I plastered myself to her back and wrapped my arms around her, murmuring, “Daddy’s gone but I’m right here. I’m right here, baby. You’re safe, Midnight. Daddy’s going to be back. But I’m right here.”
Coert was true to his word and he and the vet came into the closet within minutes. Since there wasn’t enough space, I let Coert take over, watching Midnight scuttle into him whining and doing it feeling my heart swell as he accepted her fear into his big, strong body at the same time break at the sight of her having it. I moved to stand in the doorway as Coert held a shaking Midnight while the vet looked her over, asked a few questions and then administered an injection.
“Drag her dog bed in here, honey,” Coert ordered as the vet straightened away.
I dashed out and down the stairs to the living room where we’d put Midnight’s dog bed when she and I moved in.
The vet was standing just outside the closet when I got back. I pulled the dog bed in and Coert adjusted to his knees, lifting a calming Midnight in his arms.
I fell to my knees and shoved the shoes aside to position the bed in the corner. When I got it in place, Coert laid her down on it but then rearranged himself to wrap around Midnight and the dog bed while I moved out to talk to the vet.
“Do we have reason to worry?” I asked.
“Did the shelter give you any history on this animal?” she asked back.
“They mentioned this but we haven’t had a storm since I’ve had her so this is our first time,” I shared.
She nodded. “Animals display behavioral symptoms to psychological scars just like humans do. There are even studies that suggest animals suffer from PTSD after traumatic events. They also find coping mechanisms like humans do, which is why she’s in the closet. I would hazard to guess it’s not about the closet, but that your scent in there is stronger than anywhere else and she finds safety in that.”
It was sweet to think of it like that but Midnight didn’t seem to be indicating she felt all that safe even with the smell of Coert and me all around her, or even when Coert and I were all around her.
The vet carried on, “If this behavior is only exhibited during storms, I’ll get you a prescription for an oral sedative that you can give her when a storm is coming. It should help. If it doesn’t, call the office again and me or a vet tech will come out and administer another injection.”
I nodded.
She nodded back, walked into the closet, checked on Midnight and then she came out and I walked her downstairs trying to hide how antsy I was to get back when we said goodbye at the door.
Once I closed it behind her, I went right back to the closet.
When I got there, Coert said, “She’s better now, think she’s almost asleep. Come in here and lay with her, will you?”
He moved out. I moved in. And my relief couldn’t be described when I felt her resting peacefully on her dog bed.
This relief was short lived when I heard Coert clip, “This is Sheriff Coert Yeager. When you get this message, I want you to phone me with the details of who left the black German shepherd named Gorgeous Midnight Magic at the shelter, the dog that was rescued by Cady Moreland last year.”
He left his number and then I saw his frame fill the door to the closet again.
“You called the shelter?” I asked.
“Yes,” he bit out.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because I’m going to talk to the children of the man who got Midnight to see if I can find out where he got her, and then I’m going to investigate the assholes he got her from.”
“And then what will you do?”
“Scare the fuck outta them by charging them with felony animal cruelty.”
Oh my God.
“Honey,” I whispered.
“It won’t stick but I’m still gonna do it.”
“Is that actually a thing?” I asked.
“It is. It’s harder than hell to push through and the charge is usually brought in extreme cases where more than one animal is affected, dogs are used in fights or there’s loss of life, which in the case of an animal means loss of property. But it’s still a fuckin’ thing.”
It appeared my man was more than a little angry and even though his anger warmed my heart and I understood and agreed with what was causing it, I still had to do something about it.
“She’s fine now,” I said softly in an attempt to soothe him.
“She wasn’t ten minutes ago and she’s fine now because she’s been fucking medically sedated.”
It was then, something happened.
His words and the force behind them made visions of Coert wrapped around our quaking dog in the corner of a closet pop into my head. These visions juxtaposed with memories of Coert sweetly admonishing Janie not to talk with her mouth open. And those juxtaposed with Coert not caring even a little bit when baby Callum used his jaw as a punching bag. All of this overlapped with demanding the shelter provide him information about an abused dog and Coert not allowing me to go downstairs and answer the door even though we knew it was the vet because he was just that protective of me.
More started crowding in but I stopped them when I whispered, “I love you.”
“I know,” he replied.
I kept whispering when I blurted out, “And I think I’m pregnant.”
Coert went stock still.
“I’m a week late,” I shared. “I was going to stop by the drugstore on the way home but the weather was nasty so I decided to do it tomorrow.”
It seemed stiff somehow when Coert asked, “Are you ever late?”
“No.”
He remained still and unmoving, and I did too, until he seemed to sag against the doorjamb but he did it without taking his eyes from me.
“I cannot believe you told me you might be carrying my baby while you’re lying on the floor in our closet with our dog.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything until I knew for sure but you were being paternal so it just slipped out.”
Coert raised a brow. “Threatening criminal charges against asshole animal abusers is being paternal?”
“Taking care of your baby, no matter what form she comes in, even if she’s covered in fur . . . yes, it absolutely is.”
His eyes traveled my body before they came back to mine.
And when those hazel eyes hit mine, they warmed every inch of my body.
“You might have told me you’re having my baby while lying on the floor of our closet with our dog, but I’m not kissing you after you tell me that while you’re lying on the floor with our dog so, Cady, baby, could you kindly get your sweet ass over here?”
I gave Midnight a stroke, got to my feet and walked to Coert.
He slid his arms around me so tight, it was a wonder they didn’t wrap around twice. This meant I was held so close to him, I felt my flesh bunch at the back of my neck in order to look up at him.
“Do you want me to go out and get a test?” he asked softly.
In this weather?
No way.
“I don’t want you to go anywhere,” I answered in the same vein.
“Do you know how happy I am?” he went on.
“I know it’s probably not a good idea to get too excited. It could be a false alarm. We haven’t been trying that long. We should take a test and then get it confirmed with my doctor,” I replied.
“I’m not talking about that, though it doesn’t need to be said that a baby would just make that better.”
Oh my God.
I closed my eyes.
I wouldn’t have imagined I could get closer to him but his words made me melt right into him so much it was a wonder we didn’t fuse.
Still, I opened my eyes and fretted, “Do you think Janie will be okay with it?”
“I think if she shocks the shit outta me not being okay with it, we’ll find a way to make her okay with it.”
I still fretted, even though I knew he was right.
“Okay, then do you think you can kiss me now?” I requested.
His lips tipped up, his eyes got warm (or warmer) and his lips came down to mine.
“Yeah,” he whispered. “I can kiss you now.”
He started to kiss me but it was interrupted by the doorbell going.
He didn’t let me go but he did lift his head to look toward the wall beyond which was the hall, his brows knitting.
“A freeze is coming and there are weather advisories everywhere,” I said. “Who, outside a vet on an emergency house call, could be out in that?”
“Is your brother still in Denver?” he asked.
“Yes,” I answered.
“Anyone else would call,” he muttered as the doorbell went again and then we heard the hammering. “Shit,” he hissed, gave me a squeeze but didn’t let me go.
He looked over my shoulder at Midnight.
“I’ll stay with her,” I told him.
He looked down at me, nodded, bent to me, touched his lips to my nose, then let me go.
I watched him disappear and then I moved back to Midnight. I squatted and ran my hand over her, feeling her chest rise and fall with her breathing, finding her heartbeat and knowing how sedated she was because no one would even get close to the door without a bark or at least a woof.
Her eyes were closed so I suspected she was sleeping.
I then wondered how Midnight would take to a new member of the household.
I wondered this for about two seconds. Considering how she was when she met Janie, I figured she’d like it a lot.
I was on my behind, in the midst of taking my boots off, doing this smiling, when I heard shouted, “I’ll fucking have your fucking badge!”
Midnight didn’t even lift her head.
Quickly, my heart racing as I heard Coert’s low murmur of a reply, I checked for her breathing again just in case something went wrong with the injection, felt it coming steady, then I took off on stocking feet out the door.
“You’ll leave on your own or you’ll do it in handcuffs, your choice, Stone,” Coert said as I kept my eyes glued to his broad back where he was standing in the foyer while hurrying down the stairs.
Stone?
Boston Stone?
Boston Stone was here?
“Using county resources to investigate commercial entities because your girlfriend doesn’t want to live next to a hotel will be interesting to the County Commission.”
“First, she’s not my girlfriend, she’s my fiancée,” Coert corrected as I moved in behind him only for him to shift without even looking back at me, and he shifted in a way that told me he wanted me to stay behind him.
So even if I moved slightly to his side, I did it staying behind him.
And it was then I saw the man who was two steps into our foyer was tall, dark haired and quite handsome.
But the furious look on his face, the mean in his eyes, and the hardness of his mouth meant he wasn’t that handsome.
Not to mention he was too slick. I’d never been attracted to slick men.
Then again, I’d only ever really been attracted to Coert, so . . .
His eyes flicked to me then went back to Coert.
“I’d congratulate you on the advancement of your relationship but I don’t give a fuck,” he snapped.
“Do not use that language in front of my fiancé,” Coert bit out.
I did my best to have no reaction to Coert demanding this when he freely cursed in front of me and just stayed close to his back, eyes on Boston Stone.
“My apologies, Ms. Moreland,” Boston Stone said to me snidely.
“Second,” Coert rapped out and Stone’s attention cut back to him. “I’m an elected official. I answer to the citizens of this county, not the County Commission. So although they might be interested in your bullshit for the sake of curiosity at how deep that bullshit can get, even if there was an issue, which there isn’t, they can’t do dick about it.”
“You leaked private affairs of one of your citizens you illegally investigated using county resources to the press, which is impeachable,” Stone declared.
“Are you making this up as you go along?” Coert asked derisively.
“I’m not certain the State Supreme Court will find this as disinteresting as you do when they hear it prosecuted,” Stone retorted, these words making me put my hand to the small of Coert’s back.
“Coert didn’t leak anything,” I piped up. “If you’re angry about someone finding out your plans before you could push them through under the noses of the people of Magdalene, you should talk to the people who shared about them freely. You shouldn’t show up at the doorstep of the sheriff to harass and threaten him.”
“If it was someone finding out, I’d still be talking to them. But before I fired them, they shared it was the sheriff finding out.”
“I didn’t identify myself as the sheriff,” Coert stated, and I pressed my hand into his back because I didn’t think it was good he said that.
And Stone pounced right on it. “So you admit to calling?”
“It isn’t illegal to call architecture firms to ask if any plans for the development of the Magdalene parkland were being drawn up,” Coert retorted.
“They told me they wouldn’t have shared if it wasn’t a person of authority.”
“That might be so but I didn’t identify myself as the sheriff or mislead them by stating I was phoning as part of an investigation,” Coert returned.
“Then it’s a ‘they said, you said’ situation and you can use your version as your defense during your impeachment hearing,” Stone fired back.
“I phoned them on my cell so my name will come up on caller ID and it isn’t hard to find out I’m the sheriff of Derby County. But even if I did tell them I was the sheriff, me making inquiries about what might be happening on land that’s under my jurisdiction would not be improper. Considering inquiries had already been made about reclassifying that land, I’d say it’s not only not improper, it’s also my job to know what’s happening in my county. But I didn’t call as the sheriff. If they’re trying to cover their asses by talking shit about how they shared openly with a random caller about a client’s business, that’s their problem. But me making a phone call is not an impeachable offense. And me making this kind of phone call to be thorough in understanding what’s happening in my jurisdiction is part of what I’ve been elected to do.”
“Then you attempting to get re-elected next year after it’s shared widely Magdalene’s lighthouse was saved by the ill-gotten gains of a gold digger who married an old, sick man in order to inherit all his money, and then you married her will be an interesting proposition. But I’d suggest you start looking for alternate employment now. I hear there’s always need for mall cops in Blakely.”
I felt Coert’s body tighten under my hand.
I did not get tight.
I moved instantly around Coert but he caught me with an arm around my stomach and pulled me back to his body.
So I used my mouth.
“You need to go,” I advised.
“I’m not sure you’re a threat,” Boston Stone said, lip curled.
“I’m not the threat,” I told him.
He lifted his brows. “Are you saying the sheriff is threatening me?”
“I’m saying if he was, he’d have every right to do that considering you’re in his home and you’ve been asked to leave at least once and you’ve not left but instead stayed, continuing to harass him, threaten him and say foul things with the intent to bait him.”
“You should have called me about the lighthouse, Ms. Moreland,” he said ominously.
“Get over it,” I shot back. “And also leave.”
He did not leave. He continued pushing.
And he did it leaned toward me, his face moving from snide to spiteful. “I’m going to ruin you and I’m going to ruin your fiancé.”
Ruin me?
I’d already ruined myself, more than once.
And now . . .
Now the only people that it mattered what they thought knew me and loved me.
I was untouchable.
Coert, on the other hand, was sheriff. So he was not.
Still, this man was acting like a villain in a Victorian drama.
It would have been funny if it wasn’t so irritating.
I mean, I’d just told Coert I might be pregnant, for goodness sake!
What Coert said next shared he agreed with me.
“Christ, you’re a joke. Just go, would you? Jesus,” Coert drawled impassively.
Stone leaned back with surprise drifting over his features and looked at Coert.
“You wanna report me to the County Commission? Do it,” Coert invited. “You wanna try to impeach me? Try it. You wanna spread malicious gossip about Cady in an attempt to make me lose the next election? Go for it. The only person who thinks you have any leverage anymore is you, Stone. Everyone already thinks you’re a snake. You want them to think you’re a fool too, it isn’t me that’s gonna stop you. It’s just me who’s gonna say you got five seconds to walk out my front door before, honest to God, just because I’m sick of you boring me, I’m putting you in cuffs, arresting you for trespassing since I didn’t invite your ass into my house, you shoved in, and I’m having a deputy come pick you up. Your choice. But trust me, I’m bein’ very serious.”
“I’m being very serious too,” Stone spat.
“I don’t really care,” Coert replied.
Stone scowled at him.
Coert adjusted me so he was holding me casually at his side and when Stone continued to scowl at him, he sighed.
“Cady, my cuffs are in my gun belt in the closet. You wanna get them for me? And check Midnight while you’re up there.”
“The Magdalene Park project is moving forward,” Stone declared.
“You beat down the injunction or we lose the election to recall the rezoning come November, you’re right,” Coert returned. “It probably is. Monsters who feed on greed like you win a lot, and it doesn’t matter what devastation lies in their wake, as long as they can jot their win on whatever messed-up mental tally they got in their head, it’s all the same to them. The joke’s still on you because you think you’re building a legacy when history will record it as Stone’s folly or nothing at all. So whatever. Jot your win. But don’t delude yourself you’re writing the Declaration of Independence. Whatever you got planned is the same as a strip mall. It’ll come and it’ll go but that lighthouse will be that lighthouse until it crumbles to the earth. There won’t be any plaques with your name on them put up in stone a hundred years after you die. Way you’re goin’, when you’re gone, no one will give a shit at all.”
Stone apparently had no response to that so he just stood there seething.
So Coert gave me a jostle before he let me go and prompted, “Cuffs, Cady.”
“You’re not arresting me,” Stone snapped.
“I am if you don’t get your ass out of my house,” Coert replied.
Stone stared at Coert then glared at me before he turned and walked out the front door.
He slammed it, making the glass rattle.
“What an ass,” Coert muttered.
I turned to him. “Coert—”
He looked at me and didn’t allow me to say another word.
“Don’t think about it for a second.”
“But he—”
“Listen to me,” Coert demanded.
And the way he did, I shut my mouth and listened.
“If you think that guy can do me dirty, you should know Jake was a professional boxer who built a junior boxing league and has been running it for years. Parents love him. And not just parents right now. Parents and the kids he taught how to box for the last however-many years he’s been running the thing and kept them fit, helped them learn how to defend themselves and gave them a good male role model to use when it was their time to start to become good men. And Josie’s family has been living in Lavender House for over a century and her grandmother wasn’t beloved, she was practically worshipped in this town. And Josie adopting Ethan after his mother all but forgot him elevated her to that status in about a second.”
Ethan’s mother all but forgot him?
Josie hadn’t shared that with me. Although considering she had adopted him, I assumed something like that had to happen, unless the woman had sadly passed. But I hadn’t yet asked mostly because whatever had to happen would have to be sensitive and there hadn’t been an appropriate time.
Still, how awful.
Coert kept talking through my musings.
“And Mick’s a volunteer firefighter who’s put his ass on the line repeatedly to keep people safe and save property, and his family owns Maine Fresh Maritime frozen seafood and not only is he loaded, his family helped settle Magdalene. Not to mention Amy is Amelia Hathaway, of the Hathaways, the oil gazillionaires. She’s got more money than you and me will see in five lifetimes or Boston Stone could ever dream of conniving a way to get in his bank account.”
I knew Amy was a Hathaway.
She’d seemed embarrassed when she’d shared for some odd reason, but she told me.
Coert kept at it.
“And you’re loaded and not only used your money to restore what the townspeople consider their pride and joy, you opened it to the public which is something they’ve never had. So they’re not gonna give a shit you married Moreland. You’re you and one look at you tells anyone you’re no gold digger. But you stayed married to the guy for seventeen years and anyone who meets you will know in about two seconds that was about love and loyalty.”
Wow, that was sweet.
Coert continued, “But even if I didn’t have all that firepower behind me, Alyssa’s just gotta open her mouth at the salon and drop the right thing in a few ears and he’s toast.”
This was absolutely true. Everyone knew in a small town it wasn’t the town paper, it was the town’s beauty salon where everyone got their news.
Coert wasn’t finished.
“That man doesn’t scare me, Cady. And that man shouldn’t scare you. He’s a megalomaniac who thinks money means everything and the fact he has a lot of it gives him delusions of grandeur. I said he’s a joke because he’s a joke. If she had a mind to do it, Amelia alone could crush him. This project is not going forward. He’s not going to get me impeached. And you’re waking up in my bed every day, and hope to God for the next however many months, doing it pregnant with my child. I got that, nothing can touch me, Cady. Not a fucking thing.”
He put his hands to my jaw and dipped his face close to mine.
“Now let’s go check on our dog, and just in case all the energy we’ve been putting into it hasn’t actually taken root, we should see about keepin’ that effort going. And just to say, my call is to find out the sex. My boy is gonna be bedding down in a room that’s blue. It’s a girl, I’ve learned the drill, and when we do up the baby room, it’s gonna be all about pink. None of that neutral yellow shit, lying in wait to see what we get. When they come home, we’re gonna be ready for them.”
When they come home, we’re gonna be ready for them.
I stood in the foyer of an old, renovated farmhouse on the coast of Maine and felt the phantom wet of beer gliding over my fingers as I stared up into hazel eyes that I saw right there, I’d seen across a pillow from me, across a room from me, across a great emotional divide, and for almost two decades, in my dreams.
It had taken years and we’d lived through everything, even murder.
And we were right there.
Nothing can touch me, Cady. Not a fucking thing.
“Cady?” he called, the pads of his fingers digging into my flesh.
“I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life—”
Coert dipped his face closer and it came in a whisper when repeated, “Cady.”
“But I was spot on when I made the decision to believe in you.”
His forehead came to rest on mine and he got so close, our noses rested alongside each other’s.
And we stood in the foyer of an old, renovated farmhouse on the coast of Maine, so close, when Coert’s eyes closed, his lashes swept through mine.
Then he kissed me.
He tasted of chill nights and wool sweaters and sea breezes and holding hands and playful teases and crooked grins and warm eyes and man and musk and sex and a million, billion other things that made Coert that I’d discovered, and a million, billion more I hadn’t yet, and I couldn’t have stopped my tongue from touching his in my need, my hunger, my yearning to have more.
He slanted his head and gave me more, wrapping his arms around me and pulling me deep into his body.
We consumed each other’s mouths in the foyer until I broke the kiss, broke from his hold but grabbed urgently at his hand and tugged him toward the stairs. I was at the foot of them when he tugged me back around and his mouth slammed down on mine again.
His hands were everywhere, but his tongue was my entire universe, until I felt him yanking up my sweater.
I lifted my arms and took a step back to draw him closer to where I wanted us to go.
He pulled my sweater free just as the heel of my boot caught on the first riser.
I started going down but Coert caught me around the waist and he didn’t stop my descent, he just controlled it, following me to the stairs.
We kissed and touched and tore at each other’s clothes as we made our way up the stairs, and it wasn’t until we were at the top that Coert came up to his feet with arms around me pulling me up with him.
I was in my bra and undies and his diamond, he was in his boxer briefs, our sweaters, jeans, socks and boots strewn along the stairs when we turned and kissed and turned and kissed as we made our short way down the hall, banging into walls, hitting the doorframe to his bedroom, each of us half groping, half struggling to get the upper hand.
Coert got impatient then and caught me just below my bottom and around my upper back.
He picked me up and strolled to the bed where he put me down.
“Don’t move,” he growled, towering over me.
I only let my eyes move to follow him to the closet.
He disappeared in it for moments but came out naked and hard, his thick cock rising proud from the spring of dark curls between his legs. That lumbering gait of his I loved so much and was such a part of him, his utter confidence in himself and his physique, his burning eyes intent on me, I felt a rush of wet hit between my legs and a whimper escape my lips.
He got to where I was lying horizontal across the bed, my calves over the side, and he bent to me.
He put a hand in the bed beside me and I watched the back of his strong neck, the muscles moving in his shoulders and back, as he put his lips to the skin just under my bra between my breasts and he trailed them down to my belly.
I held my breath as he stayed there, just his lips brushing my skin before he turned his head, and I felt the gentle abrasion of his evening whiskers grazing my skin. Claiming me. Staking his territory. Declaring me and what might lie beneath what he was doing and where he was doing it as all his.
My God, Coert Yeager was just . . .
Everything.
I slid my fingers in his hair and whispered, “Baby.”
He lifted his head, his chin scraping my skin, his beautiful eyes hitting mine, as his fingers curled into the sides of my panties.
More wet saturated my sex as he slid them down my thighs and they fell down my calves and only then did Coert join me in bed.
Gathering me to him, his fingers flicked the hooks on the back of my bra. It came undone, he pulled it off my arms and tossed it aside as he hit a hip in the bed and rolled to his back, turning me, pulling me over, positioning me so I had his rock-hard cock in my face.
Before I could do a thing about it, his hands pressing in at my bottom, my knees slid down the comforter on either side of his head and his mouth was on me.
I pulsed into him, my neck arching back, then I rocked against him, reached to his iron shaft, curled my fingers around tight and sucked it deep.
He growled into my wet, instantly moving from lapping to hungry, insatiable eating.
Like we’d consumed each other’s mouths, we consumed each other’s bodies, Coert’s fingers gripping the cheeks of my behind, biting into me, driving me against his tongue. I cupped his balls in one hand, stroked his cock with the other one as I bobbed and sucked.
And I sucked hard.
I didn’t lick. This wasn’t playing around. This wasn’t going slow.
This was us, taking all we could get of everything we had as fast as we could.
I tasted salt on my tongue, knew he was ready and it was an enormous relief because I was so close to ready too, I was about to stop and beg him to take me.
I wanted to climax with him inside me, connected, looking into my hazel.
I was on my back before I could consciously slip him out of my mouth and Coert was dragging me up his thighs, looming over me, wrapping my legs around his hips. His eyes roaming, starving, all over me, one of his hands left my leg and went between us.
I felt him coating the head of his cock with my wet before his gaze locked on mine and he drove inside.
My back arched again, my hands went over my head, clutching the edge of the bed, using it as leverage to push down into his strokes.
He held my hips steady and slammed into me. I could hear his heavy breathing rasp in the room, grating against the sound of mine, when I felt him drift a hand over my hipbone, in, and his thumb hit my clit.
Oh yes.
“Coert.”
“Yes.”
“Coert.”
“Yeah, Cady.”
He pounded into me and I watched his face, flushed and hard, staring at mine like it was the only thing in the room, the only thing on earth, the only thing in the universe, and I understood that, because he was the only thing in mine.
His thumb pressed harder and circled.
“Coert,” I whimpered, starting to lose our rhythm, needing to let go.
“Cady,” he grunted, the muscles in his neck standing out.
He circled my clit hard, slammed into me, I let go and went flying.
I heard his growls turn to groans as he bucked between my legs and pushed my orgasm higher manipulating my clit, but it just added to the glory of floating on nothing but his cock buried deep inside, his cum flooding me, connected to Coert.
I was gasping and falling, again feeling the bed under me, when Coert’s thumb left me and he fell forward into a hand on the bed, arm straight, his other hand still steady on my hip.
Dazedly, I focused on the top of his head, which was bent, staring down our bodies to where he was gently stroking me with his cock.
“Coert,” I whispered.
Instantly, his head came up, his eyes sought mine, he buried himself inside and then he lowered himself to me, releasing my hip so he could brace some of his weight into a forearm.
“Yeah?” he asked softly.
“Yeah,” I replied.
He brushed his mouth to mine and again and again, before he gave me a sweet, wet kiss. He broke the connection of our mouths to rest his forehead against mine.
“That hit the top five,” I told him.
I watched the light of humor hit his eyes. “Agreed.”
I grinned at him even if he was so close, he couldn’t see my mouth.
Then I asked, “Did you have dinner?”
“Yeah.”
“Was Midnight okay?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you want to do that again?”
I felt his body shake with his amusement, a body still connected to mine.
But he answered, “Yeah.”
Then he kissed me.
And we did it again.
But we went slower that time.