One Chance, Fancy

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  “She’s like an adult trapped inside a child’s body,” I muttered.

  Bayou snorted. “She’s a sweetheart, but I don’t think kids are supposed to act like her.”

  I heard the underlying words of panic in his voice as he’d said that. He was scared because he thought she was like him.

  And, she might very well be. But, she also might be acting the way she was acting because her mother had traumatized her. We just didn’t know.

  Only time would tell.

  Bayou locked the door.

  “Is the back door locked?” he questioned.

  I nodded. “It is. I was on my way to change my clothes before you got here.”

  He nodded once and looked back over at where Isa was, only for her to be gone.

  “She moves like a goddamn cat,” he muttered, instantly prowling farther into the house.

  I watched him go, trying not to admire his muscles as he went, but that was futile.

  It would be like looking at a work of art and not noticing the beauty of it.

  He peeked into the kitchen, shook his head, and then moved into the hallway.

  I followed at a much slower pace.

  When I finally caught up to him, it was to find him standing in my doorway with his arms crossed tightly over his chest, staring at what I assumed was Isa.

  “What…” My voice trailed off as I got a good look. “That’s Karate Kid.”

  “You listed off other animals that you had,” he rumbled from my side. “I didn’t remember hearing a cat mentioned.”

  I studied his little girl, who was curled up on the bed with Karate Kid on one side of her, and Mr. Miyagi on the other. Her eyes were closed, and she was snoring lightly.

  I wondered if Bayou snored.

  Was it bad that I wanted to find out?

  “I didn’t before yesterday,” I admitted. “I went to the pet store and adopted two of them because I was there for treats for my sister and saw them sitting there, looking all pitiful. Mr. Miyagi is missing an ear and Karate Kid is missing an eye. The sales chick said that they’d been there for almost a year with no attention.”

  Bayou’s eyes were shining when he looked down at me. “That’s how I got my cat.”

  I smiled then, and his eyes zeroed in on my mouth.

  I stilled, wondering if I should move, go get into the shower, but my feet were planted firmly on the beige carpet and had what felt like minds of their own.

  Bayou moved all at once. One second his arms were crossed, and he was standing positioned facing my bedroom, and the next I was in his arms, and his mouth was on mine.

  I swallowed a cry of surprise—or Bayou did with his mouth—and nearly fell into euphoria.

  Bayou was kissing me.

  Bayou was kissing me really, really well.

  I moaned into his mouth, my fingers digging into his biceps.

  “My head’s spinning and all I can think about is how I am going to fuck this up.” He pulled back, his eyes so intense on mine that I almost felt fileted down straight to my soul. “And then you’re there, bringing me back under control and making me see reason.”

  I shook my head, trying to clear it.

  It didn’t work.

  Mostly because before I could get my wits about me again, Bayou was back.

  “Spent the last half a year trying to tell myself that you’re better off without someone like me. Someone that has too much on his plate—someone that has more added onto it every day—that can barely deal with the problems he has. But then you wear something like this, all day long, and bend over in front of me, I think, just to see if you can get a reaction…and I just…can’t.”

  I swallowed hard. I had done that.

  I’d done that because I wanted to see if I’d get a rise out of him. I wanted him to repeat the kiss we’d shared. I’d wanted him with a ferociousness that was bordering on unhealthy.

  A person shouldn’t want someone like I wanted Bayou. It was just crazy, to want and need someone as much as I did him.

  Surely what I felt for him was just a passing crush.

  But it wasn’t.

  It hadn’t been when I was fifteen, and sure as hell wasn’t now.

  “Now’s not the time,” I tried to say. “You have too much on your plate. You need to focus on…”

  “I’m focusing on her,” he said, eyes going to the bedroom where I could see Isa laying, sound asleep. “But Isa wasn’t the only thing that I found out about yesterday. I also found out that I needed you.”

  I opened my mouth to reply.

  “I was well on my way to having a panic attack,” he said.

  I frowned. “What?”

  “When you walked out yesterday? I was telling myself that I couldn’t do it. That I couldn’t be a father. I had too many things on my plate. My mind was whirling a thousand miles a minute. I was working myself up into a really good attack of the ‘you can’t handle it’ blues. Then you walked out and my soul just went…quiet.”

  I swallowed hard.

  His hand went up from my hip, skimming lightly along my side until it met my breast.

  “I’m not normal,” he said. “Never have been, and never will be. I’m proud of the man that I’ve been able to carve out of the boy that I used to be. I’ve gotten my shit together. I’ve gotten a job. I’ve overcome so much…and all of that went sliding right out of me the moment I was told that I was a father.”

  I felt something tighten in my chest. “Bayou, being a parent isn’t a death sentence.”

  “No,” he agreed, his fingers tickling the outside of my breast. “It’s not. And I wouldn’t have realized that had you not come out to speak with me last night.”

  Tears prickled my eyes and my nipples hardened as he brought his hand farther around, drawing a line with the tip of his finger as he followed the curve of my breast.

  I was panting, and my chest was heaving.

  “We can’t do this now,” I tried, panic starting to take over the rational thinking part of my brain.

  He caught me before I could make it even a few steps away from him.

  “I’ve been told,” he drawled. “That being a parent, there’s never a good time.”

  I wanted to argue with him, but I’d heard that myself.

  “But this really isn’t a good time.”

  He paused, his eyes going hard. “You don’t want me?”

  I laughed in his face and wrapped my hand around the back of his neck. Pulling him down until his mouth was inches from my own, I stood up on my tippy toes and made sure that he understood exactly how much I wanted him.

  Which was a lot.

  He growled into my mouth and his hand that’d been on my breast moved away. Both of those strong, muscular hands went to my ass and pulled me into him.

  I lost control.

  That’s the only way that I can describe what happened next.

  I gasped into his mouth, and his tongue swept inside.

  He took no mercy on me. He devoured my mouth, licking, sucking and biting.

  I shivered as a wave of need swept over me, nearly knocking me off of my feet in the process. If it weren’t for Bayou’s supporting hands on my ass, I would’ve surely fallen to the floor.

  I gasped, unable to continue kissing him without breath in my lungs, and he pulled away, breath just as heavy as my own.

  A sound had us both turning to see Isa toss herself to her other side, disrupting Mr. Miyagi. He just rolled with the punches, though, and repositioned himself so that he was up near her head and not her feet.

  I swallowed hard, trying to get myself back under control.

  He wasn’t having it.

  Before I could tell him this really wasn’t a good time or place for what I knew this was escalating to, he picked me up.

  My legs went around his waist, and my hands went to his shoulders as I stared in awe as he picked me up as if I weighed nothing more than a feat
her. His intense gray eyes held mine as he carried me into the bathroom and quietly shut the door.

  “We get you an alarm tomorrow,” he muttered, walking forward until my ass met the countertop.

  He set me down slowly, letting my overheated core slide deliciously along his tight abdominals. And when my butt finally met the cool countertop, I prayed that he would step away. That he wouldn’t. That he’d come back at me and thrust his tongue back into my mouth. That he’d leave the bathroom.

  Hell, I had no freakin’ clue what I wanted.

  “What’s the alarm for?” I asked, trying to get myself back under control.

  He wasn’t having it.

  His mouth was on my neck, and his beard was tickling along my exposed throat.

  “So I can set the alarm and have confidence that she’s at least in the house.” He paused.

  I could totally see that…now.

  I swallowed hard and tried to once again pull myself under control.

  But his mouth was on my neck, lips running sensually along the muscle that ran just underneath my ear.

  “This isn’t…” I shivered when his lips moved around the front of my throat. “This isn’t the best…” His hands went to my thighs and pushed them open wider. “…Time.” I swallowed. “There are people over at your house waiting for…” I trailed off when he sucked the skin of my neck into his mouth and pulled lightly. I’d have a bruise there in no time. My skin was so sensitive that sometimes even my own fingernails caused it to bruise from scratching. “For you and me to get back.”

  I mean, they were waiting for us, weren’t they?

  “They’re not there yet.” He paused. “At least not all the women.”

  I shook my head, trying to remain at least a little in control.

  He didn’t let me.

  And then…I just didn’t care anymore.

  I didn’t care if this was right. I didn’t care that he was my boss. I didn’t care that tomorrow he could realize that he wasn’t thinking straight and that his decisions from the night before weren’t the best of decisions. I just didn’t. Care.

  Because his lips were on my body, his hands were now running up the insides of my thighs, and I was feeling everything that I’d wanted to feel from the man since I was too young to even realize what it was that I wanted.

  I moaned in surrender, and it seemed like he started to understand that. As if he could read my surrender in my body.

  I tried one last ditch attempt to get him to stop, even when I’d made my own mind up to continue. “I think this is a bad idea.”

  It was just as I was throwing my head back and letting him do his thing that he stopped.

  Just straight up stopped.

  His hands moved away. His mouth released the skin of my neck. Then his body soon followed, leaving me feeling cold.

  His eyes were wild when they met mine.

  I’d never seen them so conflicted, either.

  Bayou was a man that made his decisions based on forethought and clinical detachment. He never allowed emotion to get in the way of what he knew to be ‘right.’

  And obviously he was trying to battle with his own mind as he struggled to make the correct decision.

  Or at least I thought he had been.

  Then he was unzipping his pants and freeing his erection.

  “You on the pill?”

  I nodded.

  I had an IUD, but there was no reason to go into that kind of detail at the moment.

  “Good,” he growled, tugging at his waistband.

  I swallowed hard.

  Okay, so he wasn’t stopping. He was pushing away so he could make room for the monster he’d been hiding in his pants.

  A monster that obviously required the kind of distance he’d put between us.

  I swallowed hard, my mouth filling with saliva as I tried to tell myself that I would stretch. That his cock looked big, but the vagina was made to stretch and elongate to take the penis.

  His penis.

  My God.

  “You’re really big,” I croaked.

  It sounded like I’d swallowed a shot of whiskey and was on the verge of hyperventilating.

  My head felt like it was full of cotton, and I knew any second my verbal filter would take a hike.

  When I got nervous, it seemed to desert me.

  “I’m four inches over the standard male norm of five point one.” He paused. “The girth is an inch and a half over average.” He fisted said cock in his hand and squeezed until the point it turned an alarming purple. “I’ve been told that it’s not too big, though.”

  Not too big for you to take, was left unsaid.

  I wasn’t so sure about that, but with the way I was feeling at that point, I was willing to give it the good ol’ college try.

  When he stopped squeezing his erection, a drop of precum formed at the tip, and I licked my lips as I thought about how he’d taste.

  His eyes caught the movement and flared white hot.

  His pants started to sag where he’d unbuttoned them, and instead of catching them to hold them in place, he allowed them to drop to his feet in a puddle, leaving his muscular thighs exposed as well.

  And God, his thighs were just as built as his cock.

  Bayou was a big man everywhere, and if I’d seen his legs before I’d seen his penis, I would’ve realized that fact.

  “You’re looking at me like you want to devour me,” he growled.

  I did want to devour him. “I do.”

  “Take off your shorts,” he ordered.

  I swallowed hard and went to jump down from the counter, but he was suddenly right there, forcing me to stay.

  “No, stay there,” he ordered.

  “But…” I started, but he stopped me by placing his hand over my mouth. The same hand that’d just been wrapped around his cock.

  “Stay there.”

  So I did.

  Awkwardly, seeing as he was back pressed up against me, I reached for the button of my jean shorts.

  When I did, my knuckles bumped up against the shaft of his cock, and we both froze.

  I couldn’t stop myself from reaching out with my hand and clasping my hand around his length.

  He felt like a steel pole sheathed in muscle and sinew. Was it normal for it to feel soft and so hard at the same time? And God, it was so warm. I wanted to rub my chilled lips against him.

  He hissed and pulled away, saying one word. “No.”

  I swallowed hard, knowing instinctively that he was just as much on the edge as I was at this point.

  I let him move away and reached for the buttons of my shorts once more.

  When I went to slide them down, I realized that I was only going to get them part of the way off. Leaning from one ass cheek to the other, I repeatedly moved them down a bare inch at a time until I had the shorts around my knees.

  When I pulled one leg through and went to work reaching for the jeans to get them off my leg, he was back, stopping my next move by situating himself back between my thighs.

  The heat of his cock met my pussy, and all thought fled.

  All that was there was me and him. My pussy and his cock.

  He was at my entrance and pushing inside before I could draw my next breath.

  And he was big.

  So big.

  But he knew how to work his cock, and pulled out before it got even remotely uncomfortable.

  I looked down to see where we were connected, and nearly came right then and there when I saw the way I was stretched so fully around him.

  The length of his cock was a scary looking purple, and my pink lips looked downright obscene the way they were stretching to accommodate him. Honestly, if I wasn’t feeling it live and in person, I would’ve thought that it looked painful.

  It wasn’t.

  It felt delicious, and when Bayou went to push forward a second time, he got another inch inside of me before
he was forced to pull back.

  Over and over this went until I felt him come to a stop.

  But his cock wasn’t all the way buried inside of me, and I couldn’t help but feel disappointed.

  I wanted him all.

  I wanted to know that I’d taken him all.

  “More,” I breathed, looking up.

  When I did, it was to find his eyes directly on mine. He’d been staring at my face while I’d been staring at us.

  I didn’t know which was hotter.

  “Why’d you stop?” I asked.

  “Because you were holding your breath,” he answered instantly. “And I wanted you to look at me when I sank in to the hilt.”

  I swallowed the extra saliva that was pooling in my mouth.

  His hands went from my hips to my thighs, and he pushed them open wide.

  “Hold them there,” he ordered. “Ready?”

  I nodded my head once.

  He pulled back, and I nearly growled.

  He caught my aggravation and bared his teeth. “Gotta take it slow, Fancy. I don’t want to hurt you.”

  I loved it when he called me Fancy.

  But him calling me Fancy when he was inside of me? Yeah, that was so hot that I knew I’d want to experience it over and over again.

  And then he thrust forward, this time without any easing, and my eyes flared wide.

  The roughness of the act, paired with the suddenness of feeling so full that I could barely draw a breath, was enough to send the air straight from my lungs.

  But my eyes stayed open and fixed on his the entire time.

  “Good?” He came to a stop, his pubic bone pressed up against the slick skin of my sex.

  “Yes,” I answered. “Full. So full. But I’m good.”

  The grin that tilted up the corner of his mouth caused my heart to pound hard.

  Then he started to fuck me, slow and steady at first, causing me to moan in delight.

  He felt great inside of me.

  If there was ever any doubt that sex was a good thing, every doubt was now obliterated.

  Sex was amazing. But only because of the man I was currently having it with.