by Angel Devlin
“I will and it’s Seth.” He replied. I elbowed him sharply and he just looked at me with a naughty glint in his eye.
“Oh, sorry about that, Seth.” Alexander said, frowning. “I’m usually so good with names. I’ll blame Jodi; she just told me some big news, it must have distracted me.”
“Ella and Finn are pregnant.” Jodi grinned at me. “Twins. She’s extremely shocked right now. Happy but shocked. They weren’t planning on babies until after their wedding.”
“Jeez, a surprise pregnancy and then to find it’s two for the price of one.” Alexander grimaced. “Rather them than me.”
“Right.” Agreed Jodi.
“Oh, I don’t know.” I said, looking at Seth. “I think having twins is pretty incredible. Send her my best.”
Then I took Seth’s arm and went to meet up with Shane.
THE END
Are Riley and Dante a holiday fling or the real thing? Find out soon!
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HIS BIRD OF PARADISE
Chapter One
Riley
South Padre Island, Spring Break, early March.
“Put me down.” I squealed as the stranger ran with me down the beach. I could hear his giggles as he and his friends ran with us in their arms. Eventually, they deposited us back on the sand.
Me and my friends, Tasha and Sherry had come here for Sherry’s bachelorette party. We’d been too nervous to do Spring Break properly when we were younger, so Sherry had dragged us down here for her final ‘free’ days. She’d just had a guy drink out of her bellybutton for a dare.
I watched completely and utterly shell-shocked as one of the guys—a tall blond—leaned over to Tasha and kissed her.
The guy who’d picked me up, pointed to my face and burst out laughing.
“You look stunned. Have you never seen people kiss before? Their mouths move together. It’s really quite nice.” He leaned toward me and I backed away.
“I don’t even know your name.” I said, taking in his features. He had light-brown hair, and green eyes. His skin was sun-kissed. He wasn’t as tall as the blond twins; but was just as ripped. He had a body that showed he worked out a lot and his eyes… well, they were staring at me with a twinkle to them as I realized I’d been caught ogling him.
“My name is Dante.” He held out his hand and so I offered him mine. He tricked me, pulling me closer and kissing me quickly on the lips.
I glared at him, at his audacity, and then I took a moment.
We’d come on this break to have fun. At home I was the little wallflower, the quiet one who never felt brave enough to ask a guy out, to do anything exciting. Instead, I just went to work at the bookstore where I was employed, dressed like a librarian, and lost myself in books and customer’s queries and my favorite book chatter. Here, I realized I didn’t have to be Riley ‘shy and retiring’ Strellet. Rather, I could try out a new, confident persona. I mean look at Tasha, she wasn’t holding back! And although Sherry was staying faithful to her fiancé, she was still getting wasted and having fun.
So I leaned back over to Dante and pressed my lips against his, just resting them there. His own mouth smirked against my own and then he kissed me. Hard and deep. We only broke off when Tasha shocked the shit out of me again by kissing another man—the identical twin of the first! But Dante’s own kisses were like a drug to me and so I didn’t break off for long.
When I wasn’t spending time with the girls or with everyone together, I spent the rest of the time having passionate encounters with Dante Duchovny while his friends hung with Tasha and Sherry, leaving us with an empty room. The break ended with me barely knowing a single thing about the guy, other than he lived in New York the same as me; although I knew his body very well. We arranged to meet when we got back but he never called. Though I could have contacted him via the twins, who Tasha was now in a relationship with (yes, both of them!), I didn’t bother. If he’d wanted to stay in touch, he would have done.
So I went back to the bookstore and my quiet life.
Until eight weeks later…
Chapter Two
Riley
Brooklyn, New York, early May
I rested my head against the toilet bowl and with my eyes closed, I began to come to the conclusion that I didn’t think I had a stomach virus after all.
My period last month had been lighter and shorter than usual, and I’d blamed it on the travel messing with my cycle. But this was day three of being sick and I’d been feeling nauseous for the past two weeks. I needed to do a test to find out once and for all. But I didn’t want to do it alone, so I rang my besties Tasha and Sherry and asked them to come around to help with an ‘emergency’.
An hour later, I’d showered and popped out to a local pharmacy, and my friends had arrived and were currently sitting in my one bed apartment in Brooklyn looking bewildered.
“Pregnant? To who?” Sherry asked. “You didn’t tell me you’d been seeing anybody.”
“How many weeks pregnant are you?” Tasha queried.
“I don’t know I am pregnant yet. I need to do the test to find out.” I shook the paper bag. “I bought two different ones to be sure.”
“Go on then, pee on a stick.” Sherry shooed me into the bathroom.
I emerged four minutes later with a stick with lines down it and a digital one that declared me eight weeks pregnant.
“Dante?” Tasha asked.
“He’s the only person I’ve slept with in the last year, so yes. What a mess.” I slumped down onto my sofa throwing the tests onto my coffee table.
“So, now what?” Sherry asked. “Other than for me to say thank fuck I get married in four weeks, so we won’t need to get your bridesmaid dress adjusted to fit a bump.”
“We don’t even know she wants it yet. Do you want to keep it?” Tasha queried.
I shrugged my shoulders. “I think so, but, well, I’ve only been officially pregnant for a couple of minutes. I need time to think.”
“What about Dante? Shouldn’t he know?” Sherry added.
“No. Not until I decide.” I looked from Sherry to Tasha. “I know you can contact him, Tasha, via Seth and Shane, but please don’t. Not unless I ask you for his details.”
“I wouldn’t do that to you, babes.”
I sighed. “I know you wouldn’t. Fuck, I just feel like I’ve been hit with a sledgehammer. I feel ill, tired, and yet I’m supposed to make a momentous decision about my future.”
“Not today, you don’t. Let the shock settle and seeing as it’s the weekend, go back to bed. You’ve two days before you have to drag yourself to the bookstore and it’s so dark there no one will notice your pale or green looking face. Plus, it’s not like there’ll be a huge queue for the bathroom if you need to run in there is it?”
She was right. We weren’t overrun with customers. Most transactions took place online these days, so we kept shorter opening hours and I spent the rest of my time dealing with those.
The girls stayed a while, and we chatted about the upcoming wedding. I couldn’t help but notice that Sherry was looking particularly nervous about it all.
“It’ll all be okay, Sherry. It’s just a day, remember, and then you can get on with the rest of your lives. Have a baby even. Do you want mine?” I half-laughed.
“Does the fact you’re joking about it, mean you’re becoming a little more used to the idea now?” Tasha tucked a piece of my dark-blonde hair behind my ears.
“I think I’m in denial.”
“Yeah, that’s how I feel about my wedding.” Sherry announced.
We looked at her with wide eyes. “It’s in four week’s time. How can you be in denial about the fact you’re getting married? Every moment is taken up with sorting out another detail.” Tasha bit her lip, looking at me with an expression that said ‘WTF?’
“Are you having cold feet?” I asked Sherry.
“It’s just l
ast-minute nerves.” Tasha moved closer to Sherry and hugged her. “Every bride gets them apparently. I shall happily avoid them if things between me and my men get serious, unless I can marry both of them.”
That broke the tension as Sherry called Tasha a ‘greedy bitch’.
When they’d gone, I made myself a pizza as I now felt ravenous and then I took a large bottle of water and a huge bag of Cheetos to bed, dressed in my pjs, and hunkered down under the covers watching re-runs of Friends.
Ironically the episodes were near the end where Monica and Chandler found out they couldn’t have babies, and by the time I fell asleep, my hand was on my stomach and I was counting my blessings at this unexpected but now welcome surprise.
Now I just had to tell the father. But that could wait. I had to see the OBGYN first and get everything checked out.
In the store on Monday, my cell rang. It was Tasha.
“Can you talk? I just wondered how you were.”
I’d told the girls my decision to keep my baby and I’d promised Tasha I would call Dante sooner rather than later.
“I have Dante’s number for you. Ssh, but I snuck onto Seth’s cell when he was in the bathroom, so no one knows I got it for you. You can breathe now.”
I let out a deep exhale. “Thank God for that. I’m not too bad today. I ate a slice of toast and sipped some water, and so far, so good, but I’ve the trashcan close by just in case it’s needed.” I laughed.
“Well, I’m glad you’re feeling better because on Saturday night our presence has been requested at Sherry’s second bachelorette.”
I groaned. “I thought we could bail on that as we did Spring Break?”
“She says she can’t do without us there, to help keep Kade’s family at bay. She reckons his sister has said she’s going to try and sleep with the stripper.”
“No! Seriously?”
“Yup, so she’s begged that we go.”
Damn, I’d been looking forward to spending the whole weekend in my pjs like I did most of the last one. But I knew Sherry didn’t really want this second bachelorette—her and Kade’s family had made her put on one, annoyed that she’d gone off to Texas with us. This second one was for family, work colleagues, and non-inner-circle friends.
“So, where’s this strip club again?”
“West 47th Street. It’s called Bird of Paradise.”
“That’s a weird name for a strip club.”
“Trust you. I think people are more interested about the people performing than the name. It’s a great venue according to the online reviews. Very popular for bachelorettes.”
“Well, tell Sherry, I’ll come, but I’m not sleeping with the stripper.”
Chapter Three
Dante
“For God’s sake, man. I can get her number from Tasha.” Shane groaned, after learning I’d turned down the chance of a date with a brunette from work I’d been flirting with for months.
“No. It’s better that I leave it as a vacation romance. She’d have got in touch if she were interested.”
“How many times have we been through this? You lost her number; I can get it for you.”
“Well, I lost her number and thought she’d find mine through Tasha and call, but she didn’t. It’s fate. Not meant to be. Stop giving me a hard time over it and let it go.”
“Your life, dude. Offer remains open if you come to your senses.”
“You still coming to meet me after work Saturday night? I need to get wasted.” I sighed. “Especially after I’ve suffered from all my workplace sexual harassment.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Seth and I will be there. I don’t know about Ty. He’s still pining for his ‘lost love’.”
“Seriously, he’s still depressed over Sherry, a woman who’s getting married any day now?”
“Yup. Says he felt a ‘connection’. He’s such a pussy. Who pretends they’re on their own bachelor party on a vacation anyway? He’s even more tragic than you.”
“Screw you.”
“I’m taken, bro, but there’s a woman in Brooklyn who I hear is still very single.”
“Are you ever going to give it a rest?” I asked, sighing deeply, and wondering whether I should actually get her number after all.
I’d give it the weekend and then decide.
Chapter Four
Riley
“What a fantastic venue. So not what I was expecting.” I yelled to Tasha over the noise of women getting inebriated. I stared at my plain water and sighed. I’d have killed for a shot of tequila right now. Bird of Paradise was painted in the bright colors of the bird, or the flower, with splashes of bright orange, sky blue, hot pink, and stem green. My first ever job had been at a flower market and I’d tried my best to memorize as many different types of flowers as I could and still remembered this one as its genus name Strelitzia was similar to my surname of Strellet.
There was a large bar down one side of the room and at the opposite end a huge stage with a walkway that led down to the center of the room where there was another stage, this time a small, circular one with a pole on it.
“Hurry up and grab your drinks and get down to the front. I want the best view.” Shouted Sherry, who seemed to have completely forgotten how annoyed she was at having to be around family, given that they had been taking it in turns all night to buy her drinks and she could barely stand up.
“We’ll be lucky if she lasts as long as the act.” I raised a brow at Tasha.
The first act came on. It was a group of five men all dressed as ‘men in uniform’. They were a little too oiled and oily for my liking. As they stripped down to their various undergarments, it made me think of Dante in his board shorts. I really was going to have to contact him soon. He had a right to know what was happening.
Exhaustion hit me out of leftfield. “I don’t think I can stay until the end; I’m wiped.” I told Tasha. “Oh, honey. Come follow me. There are some stools at the back at the right-hand-side of the bar that I spotted earlier. Let’s sit and then if you feel the same in ten minutes, I’ll catch a cab home with you. I’d just like to catch the last act if possible.”
My forehead creased while she was looking over toward the exit. She was dating two underwear models but wanted to stay late to watch a stripper? I didn’t understand it, but I was too tired to question it.
“Hey, the views not bad from here.” I said. “When they come over to the circle, we should be able to have a good ogle, so I hope they’re fit.”
“Hmmm.” She said non-committal. It didn’t surprise me. None of the first lot had rocked my socks and as I said underwear models. There was a lot to live up to.
The lights went down, the music dipped, and the emcee came on stage. He was a stand-up comedian, and he said a few jokes first and then started to warm the crowd up into a frenzy. “So are you ready, ladies, to meet the King of Love?”
The sound raised the roof and then a man came on stage dressed in royal robes and wearing a crown.
“Oh God, I can’t believe people go for this kind of thing.” I said. “I’m feeling a lot better, but if he doesn’t do it for you, I’m ready to leave when you are.”
“Erm, yeah, I just want to hang on a little longer if that’s okay?” Tasha said, and again she looked at the door.
“What’s going on, Tash? Are you expecting something, or someone?” I craned my neck to look where she kept looking. “Is that Seth and Shane there, with Ty?”
“Err, yeah. Shane texted me an hour ago saying they were coming out for drinks and meeting Dante.”
“So you told them to come here? Why on earth would they want to come to a strip club on girl’s night?”
But then all became clear as the ‘King of Love’ made his way up toward the circular stage, now minus his robe. And as he reached it, he swung around the pole and removed his thong at the same time. His dick swung as he came to a stop and the crowd screamed. And so did I… for an entirely different reason.
Chapter Five
/> Dante
I wasn’t ashamed of my job, it paid good money, but I was getting a little old for it. I’d been saving my money for a while and fancied running a little business of some kind. I just didn’t know what yet. To be honest, a short sabbatical sounded tempting. I might just take a year out. I’d given my notice and I had another three weeks to work until I finished at Bird of Paradise. Currently, I worked three nights a week. My pay was basic, but the tips were huge, basically because so was I. Those women all wanted to slip bills in my thong hoping for a quick stroke at my large dick. So after the show I put my thong back on and walked the crowds to amass as many tips as I could.
I’d met Ty, Shane, and Seth, at the gym years ago. We were all focused on looking good and in turning that to our advantage, hence our careers. Ty was a paramedic, and we always joked that he caused women’s hearts to go awry, before picking them up in the ambulance. We all knew woman liked a man in uniform. In my case I had several at my disposal.
Tonight, I was the closing act of the evening before the DJ came on and the dance floor filled. I was oiled from head to toe, hair slick, crown in place, and my short red thong said ‘crown jewels’ on it, hidden under my elaborate royal robe.
The music started and I made my way onto the stage. The noise of women shouting, screaming, and hollering picked up and I worked it all I could, performing little dance moves, twerking my ass, and grinding near to women’s faces. My first tips of the night were slipped down my thong faster than you could shout ‘big boy’. I kept taking the money and placing it in a secret compartment in my crown so that I didn’t lose any, seeing as the thong wasn’t staying on.