by Quin Perin
Releasing his shirt, I let him fall into me and grabbed the back of his neck, tugging him into a kiss. It might take some work, but I wasn’t ready to give up yet.
TWENTY-SIX
Dima
“White or black?”
“Black.”
“Long or short?”
“Long.”
“Fluffy?”
“Yeah.”
“And what about the...thing on the end?” If blushing had a tone of voice, Zoe would be mastering it.
Tony had left around an hour ago because he had to get ready for his first shift at the bar. I had objected, not wanting him to take his cock and leave, but well, Tony did need fresh clothes, and he certainly wouldn’t fit into any of mine.
Once he’d gone, I called Zoe and asked her to come over with her laptop. She’d been more than eager, mostly because she wanted to gossip more about Tony. She was a good friend. When I’d said I wanted her help with something, she’d been willing. I wondered if she regretted that decision now.
We were curled up on the couch together, drinking the coffee I’d made while she scrolled through a website that sold butt plugs with fuzzy tails attached to them. I’d been thinking about it since yesterday as I had lain on my bed and prepared myself for Tony. This would be even better. Tony would like our role play even more, and I could lose myself in my kitty state of mind. Zoe had seemed almost scandalized by the idea, but I’d whined until she gave in. This was one of those frustrating things I couldn’t do on my own, and I couldn’t ask Tony because then it wouldn’t be much of a surprise. Zoe was the one person I could count on, the one I knew who wouldn’t judge me.
“The plug needs to be pretty big,” I informed her. “It needs to have style and function, y’know?”
“Not even a little bit,” Zoe said honestly.
Poor girl.
Resting my head against her shoulder, I closed my eyes. “Talk to me. Tell me what you see. I want a nice one.” I wanted to show off for him. Make sure we got to live out as many of our fantasies as possible while he was still around.
Zoe tried her hardest to give me the measurements as we went through listing after listing. It didn’t help much though. It was one of those things impossible for me to visualize. I only knew I wanted a tail that fell to about my knees, was black, fluffy, and had a decent size plug attached so we could go straight from playing to fucking.
The touchpad clicked to the next page, and Zoe sucked in a breath. “Holy shit!”
“What? Did you run into porn?” After all, it wouldn’t be unusual to find porn advertised on a sex toy website.
“No!” She huffed. “It’s just, Jesus, this thing looks so big. I don’t get how you’d even fit it in.”
“Lots of lube and lots of patience.” I grinned. “Is it black?”
“Uh-huh. Matches your specifications.” Her mouse kept clicking, and I wondered if she was zooming in or examining the pictures.
“I want it,” I said instantly, getting off of the couch. I padded across the room and grabbed my wallet. Pulling my card out, I felt along its edge for the three almost imperceptible ridges I’d put on there with a knife. All my cards and my ID had those. I knew what number corresponded with what, and it worked for me. Returning to the couch, I held it out to her. “Please. Express shipping too.”
“Dima, are you sure?”
“Of course. Why?”
“You’re so tiny! And I don’t want you to hurt yourself.”
Her genuine concern was touching, but it also made me burst into laughter. “It’s fine. It’ll work out,” I said, trying to bite back my smile. “I mean, Tony is huge, and I’ve taken his dick several times already so…”
“Okay! Right! Buying.” The sound of her fingers tapping at the keyboard filled the room.
Reaching out, I touched her cheek with the tips of my fingers. We’d been friends long enough that there were hardly any boundaries. Her face skin was burning. “Are you blushing?”
“Nee,” she scoffed in Dutch. “Of course not.”
I poked the warm skin again. “You are. You’re blushing.” I snickered.
“Look, it’s not like I do this every day,” she stated.
“You should,” I teased. “Could be your new job. Buying sex toys for blind perverts. Could be charity work too, depending on how you sell it.”
She shook her head, batting my fingers away. “Stop it. I’ve done it, and we’ll not talk about this again.”
“I thought you were interested in my sex life,” I mused.
“Yeah, well, your sex life is getting way too weird for me,” she said. “Let your freak flag fly and all that. But keep me out of it. Remember what happened last time?”
Another laugh and I wrapped my arms around her waist, giving her a tight hug. Oh, of course I remembered what had happened last time. “Thank you, Zoe,” I whispered. “I know it’s kind of weird, but thank you for helping me out.”
Zoe patted my head and shrugged against me. “There’s not much I won’t do for love,” she answered with a sigh.
“This is sex though. Not love,” I pointed out.
She scoffed at that. “Tony is crazy about you, Dima. You should see the way he looks at you.”
“You’re projecting what you want to see,” I told her. Tony didn’t like me. Not like that. The sex was fun, and we had this game we were playing. But that was it. We weren’t dating, and we definitely weren’t falling in love.
“If you say so,” she hummed. “All I know is that his eyes get all starry when he looks at you, and he smiles like an idiot.”
“Probably because he knows he’s going to get laid.”
She groaned. “Dima.”
“Shush,” I warned her.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Tony
Before my shift began, I headed back to Sara’s place, pulled on jeans and a V-sweater. I barely had any time to look in the mirror before heading out again. Neither Sara, Leslie, nor Jan was around to interrogate me about my night away, so I stuffed another change of clothes and my laptop into a small backpack and left.
I practically ran to work, and to my surprise, the bar was bursting with people when I arrived. Warm air hit me the moment I stepped inside, loud music pulsing through the speakers. I wasn’t late, but clearly, the after work crowd had already arrived a couple of hours prior. Marcel gave me a nod from behind the bar and gestured to where I could leave my backpack. Then I jumped right in.
Marcel introduced me to Tim, another bartender who’d been working for her for quite some time. He smiled and shook my hand. He was almost as tall as me but reedy. Light skin dusted over with freckles and reddish-blond hair that was shaggy around his face. He looked more like a student than a bartender.
“Glad you could make it. We can use some extra hands tonight.”
Apparently, it was Dirty Cocktail night, which was why women as well as men, ordered tons of drinks with the filthiest-sounding names. I couldn’t stop grinning as a young woman strolled up to the bar, cheeks already flushed, when she ordered two Redheaded Sluts and another cocktail called Sex on my Face. She kept glancing back at her girlfriends and giggled while I looked for all the ingredients I needed. Tim handed me the cranberry juice as if he’d read my mind, and I smiled thanks before checking the small cheat sheet Marcel had pinned to the side of the bar. Once I was sure I knew the right ingredients, I mixed up the drinks the girl had ordered.
The bar filled up until all seats were occupied and there was no spot left at the bar. People were standing around. It looked like everyone in the whole damn town had come to drink. No wonder Marcel needed another helping hand to feed the crowd. I did as I was told, and time flew by in the blink of an eye. It was almost midnight when Marcel told me to take my break. I laughed, not having noticed how much time had passed, but I was grateful I could smoke a cigarette in the back.
I headed down the narrow hallway, away from the crowd, and opened the door to the little yard behind the building.
My body still buzzed with adrenaline, trying to keep up with the fast pace inside the bar. However stressful it was, I loved it. Sure, I had spilled a few things here and there, and sometimes I couldn’t find a bottle of liquor fast enough. But really, that was to be expected on my first day.
Inhaling a lungful of smoke, I leaned against the open door and gazed up at the sky. Back here, all I heard was the faint murmur of the crowd. After a couple of minutes, I noticed footsteps coming my way. I expected Marcel, asking me to come back, but to my surprise, it wasn’t. It was my fellow bartender, Tim. He set down a box full of empty bottles and brushed his hands off on his hips.
“How’re you holding up?” he asked.
“You mean between all those Cock-sucking Cowboys and Redheaded Sluts?” That made him laugh.
“Yeah.”
“Going alright. Appreciate your help in there.” I nodded down the hallway and tapped off the ashes of my cigarette. I expected him to turn and leave, but he stirred in his spot, looking outside, past me.
“I see you met Dima.” Immediately, my eyes darted to his. He held my gaze while I exhaled the smoke into the cool night.
“I did,” I replied simply, cautiously. Tim shook his head and put on a rather nasty-looking grin. The friendliness from before was melting away now. “How did you know?” I probed, flicking off more ashes before I set the cigarette back between my lips, eyes on Tim.
“Your neck. You have scratch marks.” Something inside me twisted. Not because he’d noticed them, not because I’d been too oblivious to put something else on. No. Only someone who’d been with Dima would know he liked to scratch during...sexual activities. A jealous pang settled in my chest as my mind jumped to conclusions.
“You’ve been with him,” I stated and averted my eyes.
“Yes, and let me tell you, man, he’s one wicked son of a b—”
“I dare you to finish that thought.” I pinned him with a stare. As far as I was concerned, Dima was mine to protect, whether he was here or not. I put my cigarette out against the brick wall of the building and stepped toward him, making him gaze up at me. “Dima is none of your business, understood?” I warned him, aware of the growl in my tone.
Tim scoffed and drew back to put some space between us. “You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into. He’ll chew you up and spit you out. He’s a fucking—”
Before he could finish that sentence, both of my hands slammed against his shoulders, ramming him against the wall in the hallway
“...maniac,” he groaned on his next exhale, face contorted.
“I told you not to finish that thought.” Easing my hands off his shoulders, I pulled back. I didn’t want to get into a fight. But he needed to know his place. Needed to know I wouldn’t allow him to trash-talk Dima. Although it shouldn’t bother me that he knew Dima’s preferences, that Tim knew what he looked like naked, my chest felt tight, and my stomach twisted into knots. And fuck, my heart—it thudded so loudly I could hear it in my ears.
“He’ll drop you the moment he finds someone better,” Tim called behind me as I turned around. “His bed probably still smelled like me when you got in it.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
Dima
A loud bang made me jump from the couch. My whole body tensed, shaking as I tried to listen. “Tony?” I asked, voice hoarse. Despite my best efforts, I’d fallen asleep while waiting for him to finish work.
“Yeah. It’s me,” he mumbled as I opened the door. He brushed past me; I heard him take off his shoes and jacket before he put something else down. I clicked the door shut and yawned before moving and waving my hands around until I found him. I grabbed his arm, holding it in place, and then promptly whacked him. I let out a breath. “You fucking scared me.” My heart started to calm down, but I was still jittery.
“Sorry,” Tony said, pulling away. The couch squeaked as he sat. I followed until I stood right in front of him.
He sounded off, as if something was bothering him. Brow furrowing, I moved toward him. My fingers brushed over his hair and then down. His jaw was tight, pulse beating beneath my fingers. I trailed them over his lips gently, feeling a frown, before he turned his head from me. “What’s wrong?” His bad attitude was really killing my mood. I’d invited him over after work and stayed up late so we could have some fun. Not so he could throw a tantrum.
Tony didn’t answer right away. He shifted on the couch, and I heard him grumble quietly.
“I met Tim,” he said, barely concealing his resentment.
I’d forgotten Tim worked at Marcel’s; I hadn’t even thought of it when Tony told me he’d gotten a job there because I’d completely blocked that drama with him out of my mind. I wondered what bad things he’d been saying about me. “Okay, and?” I asked. “He’s a dick, but that’s no reason to be in a pissy mood.”
“Funny, he seems to feel the same way about you,” he grumbled.
“What?”
“He didn’t have a single nice word to say about you,” he scoffed and carried on, “But he seemed to know you really well.”
I shrugged. I really didn’t get where Tony was going. “We fucked. A few times. Before you got here. Then he got upset when I told him he was getting too clingy.”
Apparently, that was the wrong answer. Tony rose from the couch, the force of it nearly knocking me over. There was almost no distance between us, and when I reached out toward him, the muscles in his arms were bunched together. His hands were balled up into fists. Anger practically rolled off of him, making the air around us feel thick.
“How long ago was this?” Tony wanted to know.
“As I said, right before you got here.” I touched his chest, rubbing my hand in soothing circles. “You’re so tense. Come on. Let me relax you.”
His hand landed against my shoulder, touch so heavy I stumbled a bit. I heard his breath, shaking and harsh.
“Dima...stop!”
It was a barked order, and I did not appreciate that.
“This is important.”
“What the hell is wrong with you? You’re acting fucking weird.” His tone. His anger. I didn’t know what he was on about, but he was starting to frustrate me. “You were supposed to come over so we could have some fun.”
“Is that all this is?”
“Fun?”
“Yeah.”
“Of course!” Why couldn’t people understand that? We were having fun. That was it. There was nothing deeper there. We barely knew each other beyond the surface level, and here he was, acting like a jealous wife. “It’s fun! At least it’s supposed to be fucking fun. But you’re not making that easy!”
I couldn’t help the way that my voice rose, frustration crackling through it. I was living in a bad movie. Playing out my mistakes on repeat.
Tony leaned forward, heated breath that smelled faintly of liquor washed over me.
“Don’t tell me you don’t feel this,” he hissed from between his teeth. “Don’t feel this...fucking connection between us. This isn’t just fun, Dima. This is—”
“Nothing.” I finished for him. I jerked my body away from him and stepped around the coffee table, fingers fisting in the sides of my pajama pants. “This is nothing, Tony. And it’s never going to fucking be anything.”
As I turned and stepped away, he didn’t walk after me, but I felt his eyes on my back.
“You’re bullshitting yourself. This could be something. We could be something together.”
I hated his words. The sharp tone in his voice. As if he fucking knew better than me. He didn’t know me. Didn’t know anything about me. And I hated the way he pretended to be the nice guy. Pretended that he wouldn’t give up. That he wouldn’t leave in the end. Because I knew he would.
I spun around to face him once again, cheeks burning. “This is a FANTASY!” I shouted. Loud enough to wake the neighbors. “That is all it is. I don’t date. I fuck. You’re not a boyfriend. You’re not a partner. Or a lover. You’re a fuck.”
T
he coffee table shrieked across the floor, and Tony was on me in a flash. He put his fingers around the back of my neck, yanking me close. My heart halted, and my entire body tensed. I was alone and helpless, and he was so angry. He made me look up at him—like it fucking mattered. Eye contact didn’t really work when I couldn’t see him. “Stop lying,” he growled.
“I’m not! You’re a warm body with a big dick,” I snapped, digging my nails into his forearm and trying to jerk him away from me.
“You’re lying!” Tony shook me. Our bodies were against each other; he could have hurt me so easily without even meaning to, but he wasn’t. He was warm, and I hated the way I wanted to melt into him. “Stop acting like such a brat. Stop trying to push me away! I care about you.”
I pounded the side of my fists against his chest until I tore myself away. It was so hard to orientate myself when I didn’t exactly know where I was. “Get the fuck out of my house,” I shouted. “Now!”
He stomped toward me, and I tried to dodge in the right direction before he could grab me again. “Dima!” He sounded as if he was going to scold me.
“Get out!”
I didn’t hear him move. Stubborn lump of fucking stone. “Get. Out.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” Fucking hell.
I felt like all the walls were closing in on me. Like I was trapped. Tony’s presence was overbearing. His anger and frustration so thick I couldn’t breathe. This was too much. This was why I didn’t do relationships. Too much emotion. Too much hurt. I couldn’t bear it. I needed to get away.
I figured he blocked the front door, but I still had the bedroom, so I took off toward it. I could lock myself in there until he left.
Tony had moved the coffee table, and only too late did I realize that. My leg connected with the edge of it, my toes hit the leg. I stumbled and pitched, hands out to break my fall as I plummeted to the floor, landing sprawled. Tears welled up in my eyes as the pain shot through my leg. Worse than the pain was the embarrassment. It was hard to make my point, make a dramatic exit when I was now on the floor near tears.