Embracing Reckless

by Melanie Shawn

  She jumped out of bed, clumsily pulling the white sheet that’d been covering us with her, wrapping it around her like she was at some frat house toga party.

  Of course, that left me completely uncovered, and I was standing at full attention.

  “What’s wrong?” I sat up with a start. Apparently I’d overestimated my effect on her.

  “Morning breath. Morning hair. Morning face. Take your pick,” she blustered, looking around the room as if seeking an escape.

  Oh, good. It wasn’t me she was running from. “Okay. I pick morning sex.”

  I leaned back on the pillows, folding my hands behind my head, relaxed and pleased with not only how this was going, but also myself. I’d never really been a braggy guy (or…I guessed “cocky” would be a better term), but I knew that what I have to offer was quite a bit better than above average.

  At first I thought she was going to rush right on into the bathroom without even noticing, but at the last second, she glanced over and her eyes snagged on my tent pole. She froze in her tracks, staring.

  “Like what you see, gorgeous?”

  She nodded, her eyes glazing over as she took it in. Finally, she whispered, “Wow. I mean…it was dark last night…and…just, wow. I didn’t realize it was so…so…wow.”

  I felt the object of her “wow” twitch as she spoke those words, but what was an even bigger turn on to me was how she was eyeing my girth with a hungry look, like it was a hamburger and she hadn’t eaten for a month. Damn, I definitely wouldn’t mind her devouring my meat.

  “Come here and I can show you just how wow it is.” I rasped.

  She licked her lips and then bit the bottom one between her teeth. I could practically see the drool dripping out of the corner of her mouth already. My cock jumped at the sight of that delicate pink tongue of hers circling her lips, leaving them shiny and wet in its wake. She had lips that were made to be stretched around my dick. There was no question about it.

  She nodded and took a couple of steps toward the bed.

  “Wait a minute,” I commanded, my voice has rough and hoarse. When she looked up at me, met my eyes, I continued, “First, drop the sheet.”

  A naughty little half smile appeared on her lips and she stood up a little straighter, her shoulders tilting back, unabashed as she let the white cotton fall to the floor, where it puddled around her feet.

  She made no move to cover herself. Instead, she stood there proudly, her hip cocked to one side with her hand resting on it. My eyes raked up and down her body, seeing her beautiful naked form illuminated by light for the first time. I drank in every detail hungrily. Her creamy skin was so inviting, and her pink button nipples grew harder under the intense heat of my stare.

  I knew I couldn’t keep this up for much longer, laying here in bed, still as a statue as I caressed her naked flesh with nothing but my eyes. I needed to touch her, and it had to happen right then and there.

  “Come here,” I said, barely able to squeeze the words out of my throat, strangled by lust as it was.

  She sauntered toward the bed, moving more slowly than she had before.

  I knew that she wasn’t putting on a show intentionally but that didn’t mean that I wasn’t enjoying the hell out of her performance. Her hesitation caused her movements to be more pronounced, more exaggerated. Her hips swayed from side to side, dancing sensuously to the sound of my heart pounding in my chest.

  I smiled as I watched her body trembling as she climbed on the bed and made her way over to me. I loved that I could see the physical evidence of her need. We were definitely on the same page when it came to that. My entire body was humming with anticipation and hunger.

  Normally, after I’d slept with someone, some of the sharp intensity of need dulled. It’s not that I didn’t want them anymore, it was just that I didn’t want them quite as much as the first time. But with Brandy it was the opposite. I wanted her more. My need, my desire, my hunger were all heightened to new levels. Levels that I’d never experienced before.

  When she reached my dick, the look in her eyes was ravenous. I expected her to stop, lean down and slip her mouth over it, but that wasn’t what she did. Instead, she kept crawling forward, then reached over me to grab the unwrapped condom that I had laying on the nightstand.

  She grinned at me sheepishly. “I’m so turned on,” she revealed with an embarrassed undertone in her voice. “I need you inside me. I can’t wait.”

  “Fuck, you’re not going to get any argument from me, baby,” I groaned.

  She slid down the length of my cock with the latex tube after she removed it from the package, and the way her fingers grazed over my dick, squeezing as they unfurled the condom, it almost felt like the prelude to a hand job rather than just the application of safe sex apparatus.

  When it had been completely unrolled down to the base and my cock was totally sheathed in protection, she swung one leg over me and reached between our bodies, grasping me firmly in her fingers and positioning me at her opening.

  When she had arranged us perfectly, she leaned back and lowered herself down my length, enveloping me with her warm wetness slowly, inch by inch.

  Fuck, it felt amazing. Better than anything I could remember, actually. But the sensations she was sending through my cock weren’t even at the top of my mind.

  What I was fascinated by, what I absolutely could not tear my eyes away from, was the otherworldly expression of bliss on her face as she fully surrendered herself to the experience of being filled up by me. It was spectacular.

  When I was buried inside her all the way to the hilt, she paused and leaned forward, planting her palms firmly on my chest, her eyes still closed as she concentrated on the feelings inside her body. Her chest heaved with gulping breaths, and my eyes traveled down to her tits. They were still topped by rock-hard nipples. In fact, her nipples had hardened even a little more, standing out from the dusky skin that surrounded them proudly, as if they were standing at attention.

  I slid my hands up her belly and grasped her breasts, cupping them with my palm as I flicked both of her nipples with my thumbs. God, I loved the way her hard nipples felt as they tickled the pads of my thumbs.

  My rock-hard shaft twitched inside her, and she must’ve felt it, because she took it as a signal, apparently. At that exact moment, she drew her hips up, lifting them until I was almost completely out of her, and then slamming herself back down on my shaft again.

  She rode me hard, bouncing up and down, and I could feel myself gearing up for orgasm. I knew it wouldn’t be much longer until I was totally unable to hold back, and I groaned, “Fuck, baby, I feel like I’m gonna come.”

  Without losing a beat in the rhythm of her hips, she gasped, “I want…I’m so close…”

  Knowing exactly what she needed I slid one hand down her belly and found her pleasure button with my thumb. It wasn’t easy to keep it steady as she bounced up and down, but I was completely committed to the task. Before even a minute had passed, she let out a cry and bore down on me, trembling under my touch as her body was rocked by climax.

  I dug my fingers into the flesh of her hips as I shot my load. Every single one of my muscles convulsed under the powerful pleasure of our shared orgasm. As it died down, shudder after shudder swept through me, and, under my fingers, I could feel the same thing passing through her muscles.

  When our breathing and our heartbeats had finally returned to normal, she collapsed down beside me, resting her head on my sweaty shoulder and running her fingers over my still-panting chest as it rose and fell.

  “That was amazing,” I said, stroking her silky hair.

  “It was,” she agreed. “In fact, I can only think of two things in the world that I really need right now.”

  “What’s that?”

  She popped up, collecting the sheet from the floor where she’d let it drop and wrapping it around her tempting curves. Heading back to the bathroom, where she’d been going when I stopped her, she said, “First, a showe
r. Then, breakfast. I’m starving.”

  I grinned. “Sounds like a great plan.”

  Chapter 14

  Brandy

  I pushed eggs around on my plate, made a big show of cutting my waffles up into tiny pieces, and dragged them around in the pools of syrup and melted butter. I did everything that someone does with breakfast food. Well, except, of course, eat it.

  As soon as we’d stepped out of the little bubble of our motel room, reality had come crashing in on me. I couldn’t stop thinking about my situation, and now conflicting emotions crashed around in my belly, swirling up so much chaos that they didn’t leave any room for food: satisfaction from the most amazing night of my life the night before (not to mention this morning), anxiety over what the mechanic was going to say when the shop opened in twenty minutes, and animal lust every time I looked over at Clay sitting across the table.

  He, on the other hand, seemed to have no trouble at all with his appetite. He shoveled food down at a truly impressive rate, and I was actually kind of mesmerized by how he was working his way through the massive amounts of food on his plate.

  Most likely feeling my eyes on him, he looked up and met my gaze. “Hey, beautiful. You’re gonna make me feel bad. You said you were starving. And I definitely would’ve thought you worked up a big appetite.”

  He delivered this last part with a wink, and that was all it took for lust to win out in the Battle of the Dueling Emotions going on down in my belly. How could so much hotness be contained in one single person?

  I didn’t trust my voice. I thought that if I spoke at that moment, it would come out rusty and creaky, like turning on the water in a pipe that hadn’t been used in years. So, instead, I just smiled and popped a bite of waffle into my mouth. Luckily, that seemed to be plenty good enough for him. He looked into my eyes for a few seconds, winked, and then went back to his meal.

  “So, you never told me where you were going,” he said.

  “Going?” Apparently lust fog enveloping your brain can severely impact your snappy comeback capabilities. Who knew?

  He laughed. “I assume this wasn’t your final destination.”

  “Oh, right. No. I’m headed to Missoula.”

  His eyebrows shot up. “Seriously? That’s where I’m headed, too.”

  “Real funny,” I teased, tossing my napkin playfully across the table at him.

  He held up his hands in mock defense. “I swear! My mom lives there with her new husband. Well, I mean, I guess they’ve been married for almost ten years now. I just still think of him like that. Her ‘new husband.’ Anyway, I’m on way to visit them.”

  “Is he, like, an asshole or something?”

  He shrugged. “Nah. He’s nice enough. Just kinda boring, I guess.”

  I sighed. “God, what I wouldn’t give for nice enough, if kinda boring, parental units. My mom is…a handful, I guess you could say. And my dad is—” I cut myself off. I wasn’t ready to share this yet. I hadn’t even told Sandy. Right now, this possibility was just for me. “Well, he’s not in the picture,” I finished lamely.

  “Sorry about that.” Clay put his hand over mine. I felt something that I couldn’t remember ever feeling before, at least before I met Clay—I felt safe, taken care of.

  It was wonderful. In fact, I thought that it could get kind of addicting if I wasn’t careful.

  Clay squeezed my hand and then went back to eating his breakfast. “So, what’re you headed there for?”

  “What?” I answered, my voice a cloudy film of haziness. Holy mother, if I couldn’t get a hold of myself when this man touched me, I was going to have real problems going forward. What was this spell he had cast over me?

  And how could I make sure it was never broken?

  “Why were you on the road to Missoula?”

  “Oh!” I said, snapping out of my trance. I decided to make good use of my clarity while I had it. I knew that, if our brief history together was any indication, that clarity of mind was only going to last until the next time he touched me.

  “I was on my way to visit a friend.” I quickly settled on the “visit a friend” story because, while it wasn’t strictly true, it wasn’t strictly not true, either. After all, if the man whose name and address were on the slip of paper in my purse turned out to be my father, then I certainly hoped he’d turn out to be my friend, as well. And for some reason, even though we’d known each other for less than eighteen hours, I just couldn’t bring myself to lie to Clay. Even the smallest and most innocuous lie. It simply didn’t feel right.

  “Does your friend go to school up there?”

  Well, crap. This was a tangled web I had no desire to get further enmeshed in, so I did the first and simplest thing that came to mind. Changed the subject. “Oh, wow, will you look at the time!” I exclaimed, fastening my eyes on the clock above the hostess station. “The auto shop’s about to open. We’d better get the check.”

  He turned and looked over his shoulder at the clock. “Oh, damn. I guess time flies when I’m spending time with you. I’ll go take care of the check.”

  He got out of the booth and headed over to the cashier station, and I did my best to slow my pounding heart. Sure, I was nervous about what news the mechanic might be about to deliver, but it wasn’t stress about the car that was causing the erratic rhythm of the pounding in my chest. Nope.

  And, although I found being near Clay very affecting, it wasn’t even his presence making my heart gallop off like a stampeding horse.

  It was the fear of him looking at me with pity when he found out how shitty and complicated my life was. Or, even worse, looking at me with derision and blame, just like all the people who had to deal with my mother did. Like, oh, Brandy…if only you were good enough, smart enough, you could keep things under better control… Your mother wouldn’t drink herself into a stupor every night, your twin wouldn’t regularly run out of gas and overdraw her bank account. Your life would be better if you were better.

  I knew I was being ridiculous. Even as I imagined that over-the-top reaction to Clay finding out the complexities of my situation, I knew that I was being ridiculous.

  Project much? I heard Sandy’s voice quip in the back of my brain.

  And, yes. I did project much. I knew I was doing it, but I couldn’t help it. Shit, I shouldn’t even care what he thought. He was a fling! I knew that. I wasn’t crazy.

  But…there was something about him. An air of strength and capability that made me shrink inside to think of him looking at me the way that Joe had the night I’d gone to pick up my mother. I wanted Clay to have a good opinion of me. I couldn’t help it.

  And what would a nice guy, a smart guy, a capable guy like Clay—someone who came from a family where the worst thing he could say about his stepdad was that he was “kinda boring”—going to do when he saw what a mess my family was?

  I didn’t know the answer for sure, but I had a fear that wouldn’t go away; he’d ride his Harley right off into the sunset and never look back.

  Chapter 15

  Brandy

  Tears pricked my eyes, and my hearing went all fuzzy as the mechanic talked. His voice melted into a flat drone that sounded far away, like I was hearing it from under water. I could see he was talking to me. His mouth was moving, that much was clear. But the words? They were a mystery.

  “Wait, wait,” I said, shaking my head a little, hoping that would clear it. “How much did you just say?”

  The mechanic rubbed his grease-stained hands over his grizzled stubble and sighed. “I hate to be the bearer of bad news, little lady. And, of course, I’d have to really tear her up and look at parts prices to get you an exact total, but you’re lookin’ at…well, let’s just say, a far site more than the car is worth.”

  A sharp pain stabbed my gut, and I doubled over. Oh, God! This was the universe punishing me for throwing caution to the wind. How could I have been so stupid? Now I was going to be stuck here, in Bumfuck, Montana, with no car, no money, no place to st
ay…and no one to blame but myself.

  What had I been thinking?

  My breath started to come in small, shallow pants, and I thought I might be hyperventilating. Panic gripped me as I tried to calm down and couldn’t, and then that panic only made the whole thing worse.

  What. The hell. Was I going to do?

  Then, the most amazing thing happened. A preternatural sense of calm washed over me, and I knew exactly where it came from. The source wasn’t tough to track. It was Clay’s arms as he wrapped them around me, and Clay’s voice in my ear as he whispered, “Everything is going to be all right.” My breathing slowed, my heartbeat returned to normal, and finally, my thinking cleared.

  I stood up and smiled gratefully at Clay.

  “There you are. You’re back with us,” he said gently, rubbing my shoulder.

  “Yeah. Sorry about that. Had a little moment, there.”

  “No worries. Look. You just head on into the waiting room and relax. I’m gonna talk to Jensen here and see what we can work out.”

  I nodded gratefully. I didn’t have the mental or emotional strength to argue at that moment. I didn’t know what kind of arrangement could possibly be reached, but just the very idea of relaxing while someone else did the heavy lifting for a change was so wondrous that I couldn’t do anything else, really, but just play it out and see what happened.

  I walked around the side of the building, picking my way through weeds and brambles, and sat down on a rough-hewn wooden bench that sat against the outside wall of the mechanic’s bay. As close as I could figure, that was the “waiting room.” I brushed off the part of the bench I planned to sit on, eyed it, and then took off my hoodie and folded it up in quarters as a sort of make-shift cushion.

  I sighed and leaned my head back against the aluminum siding, already heating up under the steadily-intensifying morning sun. I’d had my moment of panic, now that was done. I was back in Badass Brandy mode, figuring out options and taking names.

  I thought about my resources. My mother was out, for several obvious reasons—the most pressing being that she was probably still in jail, and the most overriding being that she was a total mess and couldn’t even take care of herself, let alone me.