LOVE IN LOCKDOWN: A Charity Anthology

by Tracy Lorraine

  Shit! I'd never thought of the fact that she had done all that running yesterday, or that she'd gone over on her ankle. She'd never said a word about any of her limbs hurting. I was such a dickhead.

  "Look, you take a seat and let me know what needs to be brought down and I'll do it."

  "Don't be silly, Dan, I was joking." Rosie touched me on the arm in reassurance and jolts travelled through my body. She must have been able to feel it too because she took her hand away as if shot. "Come on then. We don't want the evening ruined after all our efforts, do we?"

  Throughout the evening, Rosie directed me on what to bring downstairs. We enjoyed a beautiful evening, with the windows of the room open to let in the evening's fresh air. Conversation was easy once more, and I couldn't believe that this woman only moved in a few short days ago. I could have kicked myself for not realising what I'd had under my nose for the past two years.

  "This meal has been absolutely beautiful." I exclaimed, "and so has the company."

  That flush I now adored so much hit her cheeks. "Yeah, the washing up won't be so lovely, and you can load the dishwasher." She joked.

  "I mean it." I told her. "You look beautiful tonight. I feel honoured to be dining with such a talented, pretty, and well, completely fucking adorable woman."

  Her breath hitched. "It wasn't a dream?" She asked softly, as if nervous.

  I smiled. "You thought last night was a dream?"

  She nodded. "Yeah. I mean I'd drunk far more than usual, and it just seemed a bit weird that you'd use those words. You're a bloke; I thought you'd have been more likely to say… well, I don't really know what, but not that."

  I smiled. "So to confirm what happened last night. We both had drinks. I said you were adorable, you said it back. I carried you upstairs and put you to bed where you fell asleep."

  "Oh."

  "When I got up this morning and you weren't there, I actually thought you'd left. As in, found somewhere else to go. I thought you'd been in such a rush to escape that you'd abandoned your belongings and just driven off."

  "No, I'd just gone to do the shopping."

  "Yeah, I knew that when you came back, but this morning, I honestly can say I felt gutted. I’d have missed you, Rosie, if you'd left."

  "Good job you're stuck with me for the foreseeable then." She replied. Then that pretty head tilted and she raised a brow at me once more. "So we could take this upstairs."

  I swallowed deeply. "Just to clarify, are you talking about the dirty plates?"

  She stood up and grabbed hold of my hand. "Dan, you are completely fucking adorable."

  I thought Rosie would be quiet in the bedroom and need some coaxing, but that turned out to not be the case at all. As we entered the room, she slipped straight out of her sundress so that she remained in a white strapless bra and matching panties. She walked over and began unfastening the buttons of my shirt, biting her bottom lip as she revealed more of my abdomen.

  Once my shirt was off, her hand went for the fastener of my trousers, but I stopped her. "Allow me." I said. "Only it's a little stiff." I meant both the fastening of the trousers I rarely wore and also the fact it might take a little more effort to get the zip over my rock-hard cock which was ready to play. As I lowered the zip, Rosie dropped to her knees, put her hands around my boxer shorts, pulled them down and took me in her mouth.

  "Fuuuuuccckk."

  She went between sucking me and flicking her tongue around my glans and it wasn't long before I was exploding down her throat. I was pleased she'd got me off, because now I felt I could take my time before sinking into her depths.

  Picking her up, I threw her softly onto the bed. Edging down her panties, I removed them and then threw them on the floor. Then I parted her thighs, looking down at that perfect pink pussy displayed before me. I ran a finger up her thigh and then through her wetness, as she gasped and raised herself to meet my finger. She was soaked.

  Pushing her knees up, I situated myself between her thighs. Lowering my head, I ran my tongue up her seam.

  "Oh God," she said bucking her hips more. Her hands came to tangle in my hair and as she got further towards her own climax, she gripped me harder. I worked her over with my tongue, dipping it in and out of her pussy and sucking on her clit until I felt her move faster, before she tightened and then exploded against my lips.

  She was glorious. I couldn't get enough, but I needed to be inside her. Now. Grabbing a condom from my bedside table, I sheathed it on and then I climbed back on the bed. Unhooking her bra, I sent that to join her panties, and then I feasted on one nipple and then the other. I trailed and smoothed my hands over every inch of her skin, and she in turn ran hers over me. Over my abs, the firm glutes of my arse. Her fingernails scraped down my back, and finally she grasped the base of my cock and guided it towards her entrance.

  "Please, Dan, I need you."

  I pushed inside her and we both moaned in pleasure.

  "Fuck, that feels so good." I exclaimed.

  "I know." She agreed.

  I took my time thrusting inside her and strumming her clit until once again she began to raise her hips faster. Then I hardened my thrusts, threading my fingers through her hair and slamming into her so much her head almost hit the headboard. And then we came, together, and as I felt her pussy milk my cock, I felt satisfied in more ways than one.

  Withdrawing my cock, I disposed of the condom and then I pulled her into my arms. We stayed in bed so long: fucking, talking, and making love; only breaking off once for a takeaway pizza when we couldn't not eat any longer. We almost missed the next evening's news bulletin.

  Almost… but we liked to keep up to date with what was happening.

  And we had a lot of time to repeat what had just occurred.

  Chapter Eight

  Rosie

  Thankfully, taking things to the next level proved to not be a mistake. We spent the next few weeks getting to know each other intimately in more ways than one. We spoke more about Dan's business dreams and researched when we weren't researching each other. And bless him, Dan completely understood about my deep concerns when Boris got Covid and how relieved I was as he got better.

  It took a long time for life to return to anything approaching normal, but eventually restrictions were lifted and people emerged from their homes. Strangers hugged us in the street. Street parties happened around the world and everyone in the UK held a toast to the NHS and the rest of the keyworkers. There were lots of tears, both of happiness at being reunited with family and friends, and sadness for those who had passed due to this dreadful virus.

  I'd like to think that as humans, we'd learn lessons from all this: appreciating the world and it's freedoms, taking more time to be kind, but ultimately I expected life would eventually go back to how it was before for most.

  Me? I would always look at the stars in the sky in an evening and be grateful for my survival, the survival of my mother (who was now firmly in a relationship with Jim from down the street), and for the changes this whole thing brought to my life.

  Like Dan.

  When the pub opened up again, I finally met Rachel. She congratulated us and then informed Dan that she was pregnant.

  I think her words were, "What did you expect would happen when I was locked up for weeks with my randy husband."

  Sometime in the future…

  Dan and I stood on the back garden of our new country home. The garden was vast, enclosed, and housed kennels. We'd set ourselves up as an elite boarding opportunity for people's dogs, complete with them getting a holiday experience of their own. There was doggy massage, paddling pools, and lots of play, walks, and fuss.

  "So, wife, are you happy we took the plunge into our new business?" Dan said, taking hold of my hand and running his thumb over my wedding band.

  "I'm just happy full stop." I told him.

  "Daddy, hold my hand." Our son Tobias said, or something that sounded like that. He wasn't quite two yet.

  Oh yes. Rachel ha
dn't been the only one to emerge from lockdown pregnant.

  What did you expect after all those weeks?

  THE END

  Author note.

  Of course at this moment in time none of us know when the lockdown restrictions will be lifted, so I kept the timings at the end of this story deliberately vague.

  Thank you for reading this book and this story. I hope it brought you some joy. Though this is a standalone read, you can read Rachel's own story in Banned, and Anna's story in Lucked.

  And thank you for purchasing this anthology and helping us raise much needed funds.

  Forbidden Delights

  Cora Reilly

  Copyright © 2020

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Forbidden Delights

  Stella is a forbidden fruit Mauro isn’t allowed to taste.

  Not only because she isn’t promised to him but also because she’s his stepsister.

  She used to be his annoying shadow, the little girl he needed to protect and babysit. Now she’s all grown-up and he can’t stop noticing. Being locked into a panic room with her might be the ultimate test of his self-control…

  Mauro has always been her protector and ally until she starts to see him as more. Afraid of his reaction, she hides her attraction. But can she keep doing so when they’re trapped in a small room all alone?

  Chapter One

  Mauro

  The mafia world was built on rules.

  Rules never to be broken. They’d outlasted generations, resisting the ever-occurring changes of modern society. They were like the Colosseum. The foundations of our traditions remained steadfast even as we adapted to our surroundings.

  One of those rules was not to desire a girl that wasn’t promised to you, especially if said girl was your stepsister.

  As Underboss of Cleveland, my father needed to remarry after his first wife, my mother, died. I was eleven when she passed away, still a boy and yet well-acquainted with death. Growing up in the mafia, especially if your father was one of the Famiglia’s Underbosses and ruled over hundreds of men, you were introduced to the dark underbelly of the business early, to harden you for future tasks.

  Father waited exactly the expected year before he married Felicitas and disappeared into their cocoon of wedded bliss, leaving me to deal with something I hadn’t bargained for: a kid-stepsister. The first time I met Stella, she was seven with braces and ridiculous pigtails, and so goddamn shy, she didn’t talk to me for a week after she moved in. That changed quickly though and as her mother began popping out three babies in short succession, forgetting about her oldest daughter’s existence, Stella became my shadow and I, hers—at first not so willing—protector and companion.

  Stella had always been a kid in my eyes, a girl I needed to protect because we were family, albeit not by blood and not even by choice because nobody asked us before our parents sealed their bond. Being five years my junior, I hadn’t noticed the gradual changes in her body because I didn’t pay any fucking attention to her body. Small shifts right before my eyes just didn’t register. Until Father sent me away to help our family in Sicily in their fight against the other mob famiglias. I was gone for a little over a year and when I saw Stella for the first time after all that time, I did a double-take. She rushed toward me with a huge smile and flung herself into my arms. I hugged her back after a moment, suddenly feeling her curves, her breasts pressing against my chest. When I pulled back, I actually checked her out. Something I’d never done. She was Stella, my stepsister, not a girl I checked out. And yet my eyes lingered on all the right places, and fuck, they were spectacular. Stella shared her mother’s breathtaking beauty, but luckily not her self-centered vanity or air-headedness.

  Had I just never noticed her curves or had Stella developed them all in only a year?

  It seemed impossible. I must have been oblivious, and it was a state I needed to reach quickly again. Stella was completely off-limits. Fuck, we shared a last name. We were family.

  After that day, I made an extra effort to not look at her body, focusing only on her face. Yet, even that didn’t help matters. Because Stella’s blue eyes and teasing smile haunted my nights, and sometimes even popped up when I fucked another woman. It was maddening.

  Stella had become a fucking star, shining so brightly that she’d burned herself into my mind. No matter what I did, the image of her smile, of her curves, flashed up, even when I closed my eyes. It was like closing your eyes after you’d looked directly at the sun for too long: speckles of light kept dancing against the dark of your eyelids, reminding you of the enticing brightness you’d closed off.

  I cleaned my hands of the blood. The cleaners took care of the body and the cut off parts. Torturing Bratva assholes for information was one of the perks of my job, which currently was jack of all trades because at twenty-three, my father wanted to show me the ins and outs of every area of the business in our city before I’d take over from him in a few years.

  My phone rang and I dried my hands before I took the call.

  “Mauro, I need you to come over right away to watch Stella.”

  I paused. “I thought you were leaving for Vermont today?” At every family dinner I’d been forced to attend in the last few weeks, Felicitas hadn’t shut up about their upcoming ski trip to one of those uptight luxury resorts.

  “We are,” Father said impatiently. “But Stella’s not coming with us.”

  “What about the midgets?” That’s what I called my three little half-siblings.

  “Of course, they are coming with us. Felicitas would go crazy if she had to be separated from her children for a week.”

  “Stella is her kid too, she knows that, right?”

  “I don’t have time to talk about this. Come over. You need to stay here the days we are gone and protect Stella.” He hung up, not waiting for my reply. Naturally, he expected obedience. His soldiers always followed his command after all, and as his son, I was little more than that in his eyes.

  I grabbed my car keys, left the torture room and hurried toward my car, a new Aston Martin model that Father had given me to my last birthday. What he lacked in praise and affection, he made up with money and pricy gifts tenfold. I wasn’t a little kid anymore who craved his love or approval, so I was fine with our arrangement. I froze with my pointer finger against the start engine button when I realized what Father’s newest task of babysitting meant for me. I’d have to spend an entire week under a roof with Stella, my off-limits stepsister who visited my dreams almost every night.

  Fuck. I was so screwed. Something I couldn’t do with Stella—never.

  Stella

  Mother didn’t deign me with a single glance as she ushered my three half-siblings into the lobby where their luggage waited for the bodyguards to pick them up. She’d never been this motherly to me, not even when I had been younger. Maybe it was because she’d been only nineteen when she had me, or maybe she just didn’t like me very much because half of me was Dad. She’d never looked in love with him while she seemed infatuated like a teenager with Alfredo.

  “Where is he?” Mother asked, annoyed, as she peered at her Rolex, matching the Rolex around Alfredo’s wrist.

  Alfredo knew that tone, and he took out his phone to call Mauro.

  Excitement bubbled in me when I thought of spending a week alone with Mauro. When he’d moved out, and worse, spent a year abroad, I’d been devastated. He’d always been the only one who sided with me in this house. As a Made Man he was busy, so I only saw him once a week when he visited for family dinner. Before his time in Sicily he’d occasionally picked me up so we could do something together, but that never happened anymore.

  A ring sounded and Mauro appeared in the open doorway, rolling his eyes at his father. �
�I’m here. I came as quickly as I could. Unfortunately, I’m not the only car on the street.”

  “We’re going to be late for our flight,” Mother said. I hovered on the last step of the staircase and gave Mauro a quick smile, trying to ignore the way my belly fluttered. For three years, I’d been in love with him, a completely insane, impossible crush I couldn’t shake. It was a good thing that Mauro didn’t see me as more than his little stepsister, someone he now had to babysit as if I were eight and not almost eighteen.

  Mauro cocked an eyebrow at me over my mother’s head and I had to bite back laughter. She’d probably have grounded me eternally if she’d discovered I wasn’t half as sad as she wanted me to be because I wasn’t allowed to go on their ski adventure with them.

  “Will you be gone the planned week?” Mauro asked.

  “Of course,” Alfredo said as if it was a stupid question.

  Mauro’s eyes tightened, his brows building a V and a muscle in his left cheek twitched in a way that showed his displeasure over the situation. Was it so bad to spend a few days with me?

  “Stella’s birthday is in four days. Isn’t it tradition to celebrate with the family?”

  Oh. He was pissed on my behalf. The stupid butterflies in my stomach rioted.

  Mother made a small non-committal noise. “She should have thought about it before acting out.”

  My little sister had hit me with her Barbie doll because I didn’t do what she wanted, which was why I’d taken the thing away. Mother had spoiled her and my other half-siblings rotten and obviously preferred to keep it that way.