Iron Princess (Iron Palace Book 2)

by Lisa Ferrari

  Not the in-and-out-slow-rest-pause-go-again like before, either.

  He has my hips, tight. He pounds me hard and fast. Relentless.

  His skin slaps my skin. His hips slap my ass. His balls slap my clit. He’s so deep.

  My cheek is rubbing on the countertop. I’ll probably have a mark. People will think Kellan hit me. I don’t care. My entire being is between my legs and deep inside myself.

  Kellan is fucking me. Fucking me like I’ve never been fucked before. Like animals.

  And then I’m coming.

  And coming.

  And coming.

  I can’t breathe. I can’t see. I can’t think.

  I’m vaguely aware that I’m moaning.

  Kellan moans. Low and deep. Then louder. Then louder still.

  “Oh God Claire…” He’s an ecstasy machine. “I’m coming, Claire! I’m coming inside you!”

  Kellan screams as he erupts inside me. He continues slapping his body against mine as he comes, enjoying a very long, very loud climax.

  EVENTUALLY, KELLAN SLOWS and finally stills. He remains inside me. I feel him flexing, pumping every last drop into me.

  I’m a ragdoll. I’m spent. My knees hurt. My neck hurts.

  Kellan pulls out slowly and climbs off the island and comes around to my side. He peers down into my face.

  I’m not entirely conscious. My exhausted, limp, numb body flops onto its side and almost rolls off the island.

  Kellan catches me and scoops me into his arms. He carries me outside to the back yard and carefully descends the steps into the spa, which is hot and bubbling and full of red light. I didn’t even know it was on. I have no idea how much time has elapsed during our interlude.

  The hot water feels divine. Kellan holds me in his arms, my cheek on his shoulder, as my limp body floats in the hot water.

  The December night air is cold and crisp. The sky is full of stars. I enjoy them for about three seconds before I pass out.

  I OPEN MY eyes.

  I’m on the sofa in the living room. The Christmas tree smells amazing. I’m swaddled in ultra-soft microfiber blankets and surrounded by pillows. Kellan is sitting beside me, watching TV at very low volume. He has a shaker cup in his hand. It has brown liquid in it. Bruce Willis is on the big TV. He’s in a building, running around with no shoes on, with a gun in his hand. It’s Die Hard.

  Kellan leans down and kisses my cheek.

  I sit up.

  He offers me his shaker. “Want some?”

  I take it. “What is it?” I drink. It’s sweet and chocolatey and coconutty and delicious.

  “I mixed a scoop of chocolate with a scoop of coconut.”

  “It’s good.” I chug the whole thing. I sheepishly hand the empty shaker back to Kellan.

  Kellan goes to the kitchen and I watch Die Hard and listen as he prepares two more protein shakes and pops microwave popcorn.

  He comes back and hands me a shaker and sits down and feeds me popcorn.

  We enjoy our protein shakes and popcorn and watch the movie in relative silence. The volume is low so the action and shooting and music isn’t jarring. But with Kellan’s home theater system, I can still hear the movie.

  We take turns feeding popcorn to one another.

  When Die Hard ends, we watch Lethal Weapon, another of Kellan’s old-time favorite movies that isn’t a Christmas movie per se but it takes place during Christmas so it somehow feels appropriate to watch during Christmas time. I’m quite taken by the opening scene in which Mel Gibson is sitting in his trailer, pining for his late wife, his beloved, clutching a framed photo of her. He’s drunk, with a glass of booze in one hand and his famous Beretta 9mm pistol in the other. He puts the barrel of the gun in his mouth and tries to kill himself. But he can’t. And the movie goes on from there.

  I don’t remember the scene. But I’m moved by it. I can imagine losing Kellan and feeling so lost and distraught and heartbroken and lonely that I might consider putting a gun in my own mouth. If I hadn’t met Kellan and fallen madly, madly in love with him, I never would’ve been able to appreciate this scene.

  An hour-and-a-half later, after Mel Gibson beats the ever-loving stuffing out of Gary Busey and the movie ends, we take a pee break, get more food (chicken and asparagus), and watch Gremlins. It’s another movie I haven’t seen since I was little. It too is not exactly a Christmas movie, but it’s Christmas in the movie, so again it feels appropriate.

  Gizmo is so cute I immediately wish I had a Mogwai. But then they put water on him and six more pop out and they’re assholes and they turn into gremlins, so I know right away I would never want to be trusted with owning such a creature. I’m impressed by Phoebe Cates’s story about her dad getting stuck in the chimney. My dad is a bit judgmental and narrow minded and he always sides with my mom no matter what and whenever I call him I always get the feeling he doesn’t want to talk to me because he immediately hands the phone to my mom. But I would never want him to meet his end via a drunken attempt to come down the chimney dressed as Santa Clause.

  By the time the movie ends and gremlins are getting microwaved, Kellan is asleep and I can barely keep my eyes open. It’s almost 2:00 a.m.

  I turn off the TV and lead Kellan to bed.

  He goes back to sleep immediately. But as I snuggle up to his naked body, I feel awake and alert. Probably because of my post-coital Jacuzzi nap and all the good food we ate.

  After lying in the dark doing nothing for twenty minutes, I slowly get out of bed, trying not to disturb Kellan, and go and find my phone.

  There’s a bunch of texts from my mom. Lord.

  I read an article

  about

  women bodybuilders

  and how

  lifting weights

  makes you sterile.

  So if you want

  to have children

  one day,

  you best stop

  with all the exercise,

  rethink

  your relationship

  with Kellan

  and hurry up and marry

  that nice boy from work

  whom you like. :)

  And she ends it with a smiley face.

  “Are you freakin’ kidding me?”

  Kellan sits up on one elbow. “What’s wrong?”

  I said that out loud. Oops. “Nothing. Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

  Kellan flops back on his pillow. “Is that a text from your mom?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “What else could it be? What is it this time?”

  “She says she read an article claiming bodybuilding causes female sterility.”

  “Abuse of androgens can but bodybuilding can’t. What else did she say?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Claire, you wouldn’t have gotten pissed off enough to curse out loud to yourself if that was all she said. Was it about me?”

  “No.”

  “Hand me your phone.”

  I reluctantly hand my phone to Kellan.

  He reads the text and chuckles. “Chris? Really? She sees you with him?”

  “I don’t know. I guess. Whatever. I don’t care. I love you and that’s all that matters and anyone who doesn’t like it can go you-know-what themselves.”

  I snuggle up close to Kellan.

  “So what about Christmas?” he asks, yawning.

  “What about it?”

  “I’m sure your parents are expecting you, and therefore us. But my mom would love for us to fly back to see her. My sister and her family, too. Sheila said we can come to her place in San Diego again.” Kellan yawns, half asleep. “Or maybe we should just fly to Maui and spend Christmas together, just the two of us.”

  My phone pings.

  It’s another text from my mom.

  “Oh my God what is she doing up? It’s almost two.”

  Just wanted to tell you

  Beth is helping

  Chris find a house.

  He’s a man
with

  his priorities

  in order.

  Also,

  my friend Rose’s daughter

  just had to have

  emergency surgery

  because her breast implant

  ruptured when she

  fell off a horse

  and she almost died.

  So you better not get a boob job!

  No matter how much

  Kellan tries to force you!

  Your father would have a fit!!!

  “Oh my God…”

  I flop back against my pillow, dropping my phone.

  Kellan picks it up and reads the text.

  “Did you know Chris was buying a house?”

  “He mentioned it like, a couple months ago.”

  “When was the last time you talked to him?”

  “A couple months ago. Probably that day at work.”

  “Are he and Beth an item?”

  That thought hadn’t occurred to me. “I don’t know.”

  “ ‘Your father would have a fit.’ That’s a good one. Does she still use that on you?”

  “Yep. On Beth, too.”

  “You guys aren’t twelve years old anymore. It’s nice to have parents who love you and care about you and want good things for you and are there for you. But the worst thing a person can do is to create a prison in their mind based on the fear of what other people think of them.”

  Being afraid of what other people, namely my parents, think of me has been my modus operandi for my entire life.

  But Kellan is right. I see a zillion memes on Instagram every day offering pithy expressions about courage and living life to the fullest and working hard in silence in order to let your achievements speak for you, and people will tell you that you can’t do something, until you do it and then they ask how you did it. And in the meantime, everyone wants to tell you what to do.

  Like my mom. Telling me to dump Kellan and marry Chris. Does she not realize Kellan already has a house and four cars and a motorcycle and a thriving business? That he’s a millionaire?

  And that he loves me.

  And I love him.

  Irrespective of his material wealth.

  But why does it even matter? It’s my life.

  “Screw it, let’s go to Maui.”

  Kellan looks at me. “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  “Really? You really want to?”

  “I don’t want a repeat of Thanksgiving. We’ve already established that we’re not going to spend Christmas day over there enduring their weird, psychotic bullshit. So yes, I really want to. I’ve never been to Maui. I can think of no better reason to go than to spend my first Christmas with you.”

  My phone falls to the floor with a thump as Kellan sweeps me into his arms and kisses me. The next thing I know, he’s on top of me, kissing me, he’s inside me, and we make love until the sun comes up.

  IN MAUI, WE have the perfect Christmas Eve, the perfect Christmas morning, and the perfect Christmas Day.

  We exchange gifts in our hotel suite overlooking Kaanapali Beach. The windows are all wide open and a gentle breeze flutters the long white sheers. We can hear the waves crashing on the beach. We’re both naked, of course. We’ve been naked since we got here. We wanted to get naked on the plane but the FAA frowns on that, even in First Class.

  I texted my mom before we left and told her our plans. When she texted me back, all she wrote was “Fine.” I could tell she was super, ultra pissed because she said so little. Her little bulimic slut Claire Bear was trotting off to Hawaii with a drug addict instead of spending it in church and with her family.

  Whatever, mom. Church would’ve been fine. You and dad and your psychodrama wouldn’t have been. So no thank you.

  Kellan gets me beautiful diamond earrings for Christmas. They’re big. And white and sparkly. I don’t know much about diamonds but they’re so beautiful they must be CZ’s. But if these are real they were definitely expensive.

  Kellan assures me they’re real.

  I get him three more pair of silk boxers, although it’s kinda self-serving because I want to make love with him while he’s wearing them. I love the feel of his penis through the silk.

  I also get him a digital photo frame preloaded with all of our pics, so he can put it on his desk and can look at them scrolling randomly while he works. He loves it.

  That evening, we go for a walk on the beach. We watch the sunset while we’re standing in the sand with warm water and gentle waves lapping at the beach. The sky is ablaze with orange and pink light, painting the big, puffy white clouds. It’s so gorgeous it’s otherworldly.

  “This is my idea of Christmas,” Kellan says.

  “Mine, too.”

  He’s standing behind me with his arms around me.

  Everything is so perfect, I’m not sure if I want to make love right here on the sand, or take a nap.

  “I could spend every Christmas here,” Kellan says.

  “Me, too.”

  “I want to spend every Christmas with you.”

  “I want to spend every Christmas with you, too.”

  Kellan gets down on one knee.

  “Claire, the first time I saw you was the day you walked into my gym. Our eyes met and I felt something I’ve never felt before. I was drawn to you. That afternoon, I was kicking myself because I’d let you get away. But that night, when I was doing my ab work and still kicking myself, I looked up and saw a beautiful woman doing cardio. I decided to go say hello to try and cheer myself up because I’d totally wimped out earlier that day. And that was when I realized it was you. You had come back. And I knew it was a sign. It was a sign that you and I were meant to be. I’ve wanted you by my side every day since then, and I want to be with you always. I love you more than I ever thought I could love another person. And when we’re together, I’m happier than I’ve ever been in my entire life. And I know, deep in my soul, that I want to spend the rest of my life with you. So…”

  Kellan holds out a square box made of shiny, polished wood.

  He opens it.

  Inside is the most beautiful ring I’ve ever seen.

  “…Claire Valentine, will you marry me?”

  To Be Continued…