Bad Penny

by Staci Hart

  I groaned into her mouth with one hand clutching the back of her head to keep her mouth against mine while the other roamed to her breast, kneading and squeezing, my thumb playing with the barbell in her nipple until she whimpered.

  That sound connected straight to my cock. I wanted to record it. I wanted to hear it on a loop. I wanted to touch her until she moaned and called my name.

  I broke away. “Naked. Now.”

  She reached behind her back, panting, and she unhooked her bra as I swept an arm on the island behind her to clear it, sending utensils clattering to the floor. She was shimmying out of her skirt when I lost all patience and pulled it down her legs to toss it.

  “Lie down,” I ordered.

  Penny rested back on her elbows, her body stretched out in offering, illuminated by the overhead lights.

  She was a fucking dream, a fantasy, with her legs spread open and eyes hot, locked on mine, as I grabbed a condom from the pocket of my jeans. When I ripped open the packet, she shifted her gaze to watch my hands grip my cock and roll it on. Her lip slipped between her teeth, and I stroked.

  “What do you want, Penny?”

  “I want your cock,” she breathed, opening her legs wider. “I’ve wanted it since I walked in the door. What do you want, Bodie?”

  I stepped to her, one hand still pumping my shaft, the other grabbing her ankle to pull her to the edge of the counter.

  “I want to bury myself in you until I can’t get any deeper. I want to fill you up so much, you’ll feel empty when I’m gone.” I rested the tip of my cock against her piercing, pressing it into her with my thumb on my shaft. “I want to fuck you so hard, you’ll never forget me.”

  She writhed and whispered, “I won’t if you won’t.”

  I ran my cock down the line, and when I hit the dip, I flexed my hips, filling her agonizingly slow, my eyes on the seam where I disappeared into her.

  “Fuck,” she whispered.

  When I glanced up, her head was hanging back, her neck stretched out, her long white fingers circling her taut, rosy nipple.

  “Jesus,” I breathed, my thighs trembling as I pulled out slow and eased back in.

  My hands slipped under her thighs and brought them up parallel with my body, her calves tucked between my ribs and arms. I felt her feet stretch out to a point as I pulled out and slammed in.

  She lay down flat, chest heaving as one hand worked her nipple and the other found the piercing between her legs, rubbing a circle in time with my hips.

  She felt like heaven, soft and wet and tight, and as I watched her touching herself, I was too close, too soon. I wanted to fuck her all night, all day tomorrow, all week. For a year. For as long as she’d have me.

  I slowed my pace and pulled out, eliciting another whimper from her — this time, in mourning — but I ignored it, grabbing her thighs to scoot her back until her hair hung over the edge, giving me room to crawl up with her. I pushed her thighs apart with my knees, and she lifted her legs, opening them up, hooking them around my hips as I positioned myself to slide into her again.

  “Come on,” she said hotly. “Fill me up.”

  So I did, not at all gently that time, not stopping until there was no space between us.

  I caught sight of the jelly jar and smiled, slowing my hips so I could reach for it. She peeled her eyes open and looked over, wickedly smiling back.

  “Still hungry?” I asked.

  She nodded.

  I dipped my thumb into the jelly and brought it to her lips, parted and so full, smearing it across the bottom one. Her pink tongue slid out to lick it clean, and I cupped her jaw, slipping my thumb into the heat of her mouth. She closed her lips and sucked, wrapping her wet tongue around it.

  I hooked the digit and forced her mouth open so I could take it with my own, wanting her tongue against mine.

  My hips took control, rocking and pumping and fucking her, unaware of anything before or after, only that moment, only her body.

  She bent her legs wound around my hips to force me to get as deep as possible, holding me there as she twisted at the waist to guide me onto my back. I did, not caring that I was lying on a sandwich, not caring about anything outside of the feeling of being buried in Penny.

  She sat up and rested her hands on my chest, her eyes down and lips parted, and when she moved, when she shifted her hips and moaned, my head kicked back, my hands gripping her tattooed thighs like she’d fly away if I didn’t hang on to her.

  “Bodie,” she called.

  I found myself enough to open my eyes and sit up, wrapping my arms around her to crush her against me, to bury my face in her neck, to twist her hair in my hands as she rocked against me making the sweetest noises I’d ever heard.

  “I’m gonna come,” she whispered, her hips moving faster with every rotation.

  I let her go, leaning back enough that I could watch her with my hands on her hips, guiding her as she ground and bounced harder against me, the slap of her ass against my thighs speeding my pulse, speeding time. And when she came, breasts jostling, a cry on her lips, eyes pinched shut, I kept her hips going as I came so hard, I thought my chest was going to explode from the force.

  The sight of her coming would be burned into the back of my eyelids for the rest of my life.

  She collapsed on top of me, and I lay back, taking her with me. She pulsed around my cock, slowing with each heartbeat, and I pumped inside of her lazily in answer.

  “Hey, Penny?” I asked, my voice low and rough.

  “Hmm?” she hummed against my chest.

  “Are you the square root of negative one? Because you can’t be real.”

  She laughed, nestling a little deeper into my chest, and I tried to pretend like she wasn’t already finding her way into my heart.

  6

  FUCK YOU, BRAD

  Bodie

  Penny had left that night with a long goodbye kiss and a smile full of promise, and since we’d seen each other twice in twenty-four hours, I figured I’d hear from her soon.

  Wrong.

  The first day hadn’t been so bad although I ended up in the gym twice to try to get my mind off of her. The second day, I’d tried to satiate my thoughts by watching her show. I’d avoided it because I thought it might be creepy, and when I’d turned it on, it was with the intention of watching a single episode. Eight hours later, I’d made it almost through the season and had Cheetos dust all over my T-shirt. And I’d felt a zillion times worse. I’d even picked up my phone to text her enough times that I threw the fucking thing in my nightstand drawer so I’d stop thinking about it. That had lasted a solid hour before I’d caved and retrieved it and commenced staring.

  I was on day three, and I wasn’t happy about it.

  Three days. Three agonizing days of pounding away at my keyboard instead of her ass. Three days without a single sexual pun that hadn’t come from my brother. Three nights of my hand on my jock, thinking about her spread eagle on my counter. Three long days without my hands in places they tingled at the thought of. Places where my tongue should be, like deep in her—

  “Dude, did you hear me?”

  I turned to Jude, frowning. “Huh?”

  He rolled his eyes. “God, you’re so fucking sad. Just text her.”

  I scowled. “Don’t you think I would if I could?”

  “What’s the matter? Fingers broken? Didn’t pay your phone bill?”

  “Fuck you, Jude.”

  “You act like she’s some delicate fucking flower.”

  My eyes narrowed. “She’s more delicate than you think. I can’t just text her, man. That’s not how this works.”

  He shook his head. “Your big plan to woo Penny is to not talk to her? It’s to let her ghost you?”

  “She hasn’t ghosted me, asshole.”

  “Maybe she has, dickwad. You haven’t heard anything in three days and have been walking around here like a goddamn rottweiler who had his bone stolen.”

  My scowl deepened.
r />   “Get it? Your bone?”

  “I hate you,” I muttered as I turned back to my screen.

  “Liar. You know I’m right.”

  I turned in my chair to face him again. “No, you’re fucking not. My big plan is to leave the ball in her court so I don’t come off as needy. The last thing a chick who wants no strings needs is a guy up her ass.”

  “Maybe she does need a guy up her ass,” he joked with his eyebrows waggling.

  “Fucking cretin.”

  “I’m just saying, what rule states you can’t even text her after three days?”

  “Oh my God,” I groaned with a roll of my eyes. “All of them, dipshit. You had a girlfriend way too long.”

  “And you might have cocked it all up by acting like you’re not interested.”

  I huffed. “I’ve gotta play this smart, Jude. She’s going to come back around. I know it.”

  “And if she doesn’t?”

  “Then I’ll figure it out.” My hope sank like the Titanic, slowly and with a chill. He wasn’t wrong, but he wasn’t right. There was no way of knowing, not until she texted me. I checked my phone, just like I had about four billion times in the last three days.

  Nothing.

  I ran a hand through my hair.

  Jude watched me. “You should take a walk. Get out of the apartment. We’ve been cooped up here for three days, working and binge-watching TV, and I think you need some vitamin D, since you’re not giving any.”

  I made a face. “Hilarious, jackhole. And I would have already seen her show if you’d fucking told me about it when you found out.”

  “I did tell you, bro.”

  “Dude, there’s no way I would forget you telling me that Penny was on TV. Literally no fucking way.”

  “Well, there’s no fucking way I wouldn’t have told you because I knew you’d had a boner for her for a decade.”

  I chuffed, opening my mouth to argue, but he cut me off.

  “I’m serious. Why don’t you get us ice cream? It’s, like, a thousand degrees out, and you’re miserable. No one can be miserable after ice cream. It’s scientifically impossible.”

  I sighed and stood, sticking a finger in his face. “Fine. But only if you promise to keep your fucking mouth shut about Penny. It’s hard enough without your nagging.”

  “Yeah, I bet it is.”

  He tried to flick me in the nuts, but I jumped back and countered with a solid slap upside the back of his head.

  “Get me some cherry chunk,” he called after me.

  I flipped him off over my shoulder as I walked to the door, opened it, and slammed it behind me.

  Frustrated was a good word to use — sexually, emotionally, generally. I’d had a little taste of something that had consumed me like wildfire, and now that I was deprived of it, I felt wild. Feral. Like I’d crawl out of my skin if I couldn’t see her, smell her, touch her.

  Even the thought of touching her had my johnson reacting.

  Maddening, that was what it was.

  I stepped out into the blazing summer afternoon, and my mood spoiled like rotten milk in the heat. I mean, why hadn’t she called? We’d spent an hour in the shower the last time I saw her and another hour in my room, in my bed, touching, talking, kissing. She’d made me feel so good, and I thought the feeling was mutual.

  Maybe I was wrong. Maybe she was playing me.

  Maybe I was just a fuck boy, someone whose body she could use.

  The thought made me feel cheap. Cheaper still when I wondered how many guys out there had felt just like I did.

  Maybe Jude was right and I needed a new plan. At what point should I stop waiting? At what point should I take action, and what could I do? Because one thing was perfectly clear.

  I wanted to be with Penny in any context she would let me have her. But to be with her, I had to play by her rules even if I bent them to get my way. I wanted to win, and I wanted to win her.

  There wasn’t much I could do besides texting, not without crossing the line. Showing up at her work would definitely be crossing the line. I could send her flowers at the tattoo parlor, but that would be way too big, too serious. I imagined her getting flowers from me and her eyes bugging out like I was psycho. Or worse — I imagined her laughing.

  No. Definitely no flowers.

  I huffed, running my fingers through my hair again, annoyed with myself for being so annoying. But I felt like an addict with no dealer, cracked out and irrational and driven to the point of desperation.

  At that thought, I took a breath and told myself to ease up. The plan was to wait, so I’d wait.

  She’d come around. My hope glimmered, revived by the thought. And when she did, I’d take advantage of every single second I had with her.

  * * *

  Penny

  The bell over the shop’s door rang, and Ramona laughed.

  “Penny, delivery.”

  I glanced up from my desk in my booth to find a delivery guy looking around the room with a vase of flowers in his hand.

  My heart shot into my throat.

  Bodie!

  Yeah, his name had an exclamation point in my head because I hadn’t stopped thinking about him for three full days and nights, and I was mildly — extremely — annoyed that he hadn’t texted me. Of course, I hadn’t texted him either.

  The third date loomed, and I wanted to stave it off for as long as possible. I mean, until I couldn’t even stand it anymore. I was probably almost there because the thought of those flowers being from him made my vagina do stuff. Squeezy, clenchy stuff.

  I hopped out of my seat and bounded to the delivery guy. “Are those for me?” I asked, grinning like a goddamn fool.

  “If you’re Penny, yes, they are.”

  I squealed and bounced on the balls of my feet. Every one of my co-workers watched me like I’d been possessed.

  I had been. By Bodie’s dick and math jokes.

  The delivery guy had me sign his little doohickey and handed me the flowers, which I promptly skipped over to the desk with, and Ramona and Veronica appeared by my side, eyeballing me.

  “This is literally the first time I’ve ever seen you excited about getting flowers,” Ramona said incredulously.

  Veronica watched me like my body had been snatched by an alien.

  “They have to be from Bodie,” I said, digging through the rose blooms for a card. “He hasn’t even texted.”

  “We know. You’ve only mentioned it every hour, on the hour, for three days.” Ramona patted my arm.

  I found the card and plucked it out of the bouquet with an, Aha!, opening it with frantic fingers.

  My stomach fell into my shoes with my smile.

  “To Penny. Miss you. Consider my offer. Love, Brad,” I read aloud.

  Veronica groaned. “Ugh, fuck you, Brad!”

  I read it again, sure there was some mistake. “Brad? I haven’t even fucking seen that shithead in weeks, not since he asked me to move in with him. The curse of date three.” I picked up the bouquet by the vase and dropped it in the tall trash can behind the desk.

  Ramona eyed them, torn. “Do you have any idea how expensive those are?”

  I pointed at her. “Don’t you touch those. Those flowers are tainted by freaknut Brad and his inability to take a hint. Those flowers are from the wrong guy.”

  I was whining, and I didn’t even care. I was way too butthurt to care.

  “It’s not fair,” I said, bobbling a little.

  Joel frowned at me from his station in the front of the shop before glancing at Veronica. “What’s the matter with her?”

  She took my shoulders gently, angling me to him as I pouted. “Bodie hasn’t called her.”

  “New fuckbuddy?” he asked.

  “Doesn’t he like me?” I asked, my voice squeaky.

  “I’m sure he does, honey,” Veronica cajoled. “Maybe you should just text him. You obviously want to see him again.”

  I groaned. “I know, but it’s date three! And
instead of turning into a pumpkin, he’s gonna turn into Brad.” I tossed a hand at the trashcan as if those flowers explained everything.

  Joel sighed. “You like the guy, right?”

  I nodded.

  “Then fucking text him, you weirdo.”

  “But what if—”

  “Who cares? You want to see him, so see him. If it falls apart, deal with it.”

  I was still pouting. “Why do you make everything seem so simple?”

  “Because it is.” He rested his meaty, tattooed forearms on his knees and leaned toward me. “Listen, your afternoon job canceled, right?”

  “Yeah,” I answered begrudgingly.

  “It’s too hot in here, and your booth is the hottest in the shop. Go cool off. Cold shower. Ice cream. Something.”

  “But what about the walk-ins?”

  “Max is here for walk-ins. You just get outta here.” He jabbed a finger at the door with authority.

  I sighed. “Fine. But only because you said ice cream, and that’s my weakness.” I could already taste the cold salted caramel on my tongue. This also made me a little sad — it reminded me of Bodie.

  Who even ARE you right now?

  I walked back over to my station to grab my bag, stopping by Veronica’s station next to Ramona, who leaned on the short wall.

  “Just text him, Pen,” Ramona said. “You’ll feel better.”

  I nibbled my bottom lip. “Even if he gets clingy? Even if he bugs out?”

  She laughed and kissed me on the cheek on my way out. “Better him than you.”

  I sighed and headed into the sweltering sun, slipping on my sunglasses.

  My problem was this: I was obsessing.

  I was so predictable, I could have been a fucking atomic clock. I’d always been this way, and it was one of the many reasons why I didn’t date. I didn’t like how I felt, which reaffirmed that the three-date rule was just as much for myself as it was for them. And here I was, after only two dates, already all itchy over Bodie. He was just so dreamy and funny and smart, and I couldn’t stop thinking about him.

  All of this was dangerous.

  Of course, it was entirely possible that I’d gotten weird simply because I was holding out. Maybe if I just ripped off the Band-Aid and saw him again, it would take care of itself. Once he got all gooey on me, I’d probably lose interest anyway.