by Savannah May
“Okay.” He croaks. “I’ll be in the kitchen but I’ll leave the door open. Just shout if you need anything.”
Oh I need something. I need it now and even though I’m exhausted, I want it like I never have. But he powers up off the ground in a single move and I watch his excellent ass leave the room before sinking down under the water.
The bathroom is not like the usual bland space. The tub is one of those old rolltops that has those vintage style fittings. He’s clearly fixed it up to be special which isn’t something guys do. Not if they’re single and straight. Of course, he must be married. His house, the tree, the bath bubbles, it all screams the feminine touch. I’m so stupid to think he’d be available or would ever go for a woman like me. His job comes with the protector badge and that’s all this is. He’s playing his savior game. The look I saw in his eye just now must have been a reflection of my own desperate hunger.
“Lainie, what is it?” He’s standing at the door with a bottle in his hand, watching a tear roll down my cheek before I manage to get rid of it.
Chapter 10
Ryder
I put some water on to boil and chop a few vegetables, a chicken breast. Then I realize that the new shampoo I bought is still in the bag and Lainie’s gonna need that. I take it to the bathroom and freeze in the doorway. Seeing her cry rips a tear in my torso. Maybe I’m susceptible to a girl’s heartbreak since having my daughter because I cannot bear to see a girl unhappy. It’s to be expected in Lainie’s current predicament, what with a warrant for her arrest, living on the streets and addiction. It isn’t wrong to want to make her life better for a little while by bringing her here to eat and clean up. Maybe we can talk about how to sort her stuff out for the future.
So why am I ripped in half by her sadness?
Her face hardens with that look that tells me she’s throwing up a barricade. Then it changes again.
“I’m just so tired, is all.” She says.
“I get that. I think I would be too.”
“No. You’d be fine. Trust me. Men always are.”
“You sure we are?”
I come into the room although I know I shouldn’t. I crouch down beside the tub, so our eyes are level.
“It seems to work out for you. At least you aren’t afraid every moment of your life.”
“Are you afraid now?”
I shouldn’t be doing this I know. She doesn’t want anyone to care, she’s made that plain and the last thing I want is for her to think I’m here for anything more. But she’s driving me mad. She’s been driving me mad pretty much since the moment I laid eyes on her.
“No. But I’m too tired to even move an inch. I might fall asleep in this tub and you won’t be able to wake me up until next year.”
I open the shampoo I’m holding and squirt some into my palm. It’s crazy but it’s my only chance. I need to touch her. I smooth the orange liquid across her hair then dip my hand into the water. As I scoop some up, the backs of my fingers graze her skin, some part of her submerged flesh that makes her gasp. I swallow hard, feeling my Adam’s apple taut in my throat and tip the water onto her head then massage it into her scalp.
She leans her head back, and closes her eyes as though relishing my fingers making circles around and around her skin. A smile lifts her lips and they part as she breathes more deeply. Thank fuck I’m seated on the floor, my lower half hidden by the tub wall between us because I’ve got a raging bolt of steel that’s more voracious than I’ve ever had in my life. It’s been a while since I’ve been with a woman but that’s got nothing to do with it. My cock wants to be inside Lainie and feeling her walls contract around me as she arches her back. I want her under me and gasping like that, from the width of me pressing her open, stretching her until she can’t take anymore.
As my fingers circle her scalp, slow and provocative, I just know she’s picturing the same scenario behind her fluttering eyelids. She inhales deeply and holds her breath almost like it hurts to exhale, hurts to want so fucking much, hurts to contain all the need coursing through every limb. She arches a little more to hold that in and the bubbles part just enough that her pink nipple breaks through the foam.
It slips away over her smooth breast and I shouldn’t but I can’t stop. The agony in my steel is too much to control. I want one small taste of her on my tongue. I tip my head down and suck her firm point into my mouth.
“Ohhh.” She moans and arches higher, lifting up further for my lips to suck her deeper into me.
I do, pulling more of her tit inside my mouth so I can run circles with my tongue around her hard nipple still growing, hungry, wanting more. Her flat stomach lifts out of the water. Along with her ribs. Her ribcage is like an emaciated rack. And it jolts me back to reality.
This girl needs my help. I cannot take advantage of her sadness. I can’t let her give herself to me out of gratitude or because she’s frightened. I lift my head up and take the cup on the side of the bath to rinse the suds out of her hair. She moans again, needing more. Whether the water and sensation of dirt stripping away is as pleasurable as my mouth covering her breast, I can’t be sure.
“You’re so good at hair washing.” She whispers.
“I do it for Jasmine.” I say, blurting it out before I’ve stopped to consider.
Lainie bolts up out of the water. It courses down her body and those perfect tits that I’ve dreamed about and imagined every night alone in my bed bob up on her small frame.
“I knew it.” She says, her eyes blazing. “I knew this was a woman’s house. The gorgeous bathroom, the perfect Christmas tree. How fucking dare you?”
She stands up in the water, bare naked in front of me. Her pink clit is level with my ravenous mouth and I’m glued rigid on the floor. My dick is pumping in my jeans so painfully I don’t dare move. If she sees how much I want her, she’ll kick my ass. She climbs out of the bath so water splashes down on me and I avert my eyes but too late. Her pinkness opens, her wetness is exposed, plump and livid, then closes again. When I return from my stunned state and the surge of hunger that threatened to overwhelm me, she’s wrapped herself in one of Jasmine’s small white towels. It barely reaches the tops of her thighs.
“Where did you put my clothes, asshole?”
“Lainie.”
“Don’t say my name like that, in that barroom midnight voice of yours fit to seduce any woman, if they were losers left at closing with nowhere to go.”
Okay, I knew this was a mistake but christ she’s gorgeous when she’s mad, the fire in her is enough to make me melt.
“Where’s Jasmine now? Working to pay for all this?”
She goes on and on in her rant. I knew it, I knew you were married, did you take off your ring for me or are you one of those assholes that doesn’t wear one so as to keep your options open?
At some point I lose it. My dick has retreated enough that I can get to my feet without her going off on another jag about my massive bulge. I grab her by the hand and drag her still hollering about married men down the passage. I throw open the door and pull her struggling inside.
“This is Jasmine’s room.” I say. “She’s five. I was about to tell you about my daughter right before you lost it.”
Like any woman I meet, when she finds out I have to give what little spare time I have to my little girl, I wait for Lainie to lose it at me. The other guys at the station talk about their wives and girlfriends in that way - you know, the ball and chain jokes, the complaints about ‘where were you?’ and ‘when you coming home?’ I’d never felt like that about women until I had a kid and felt myself split up the middle unable to keep everyone happy.
It comes to my attention that Lainie’s quiet now. She’s walking around Jazzy’s room like she’s entered fairyland, taking in everything on the walls, running her fingertips lightly across the pictures, the stuffed animals (Jasmine will have nothing to do with dolls, only beast babies) and the chiffony stuff draped around her miniature four-poster bed.
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p; “Look at this.” She breathes, her eyes wide. “It’s so magical, like being in a fantasy.”
“I dunno about that,” I smirk.
I can’t help it because right now I’ve got a very different fantasy going on and it only involves one beast. Shoot me, I’m a man, okay?
“But I try to make Jasmine’s time when’s she’s with me here as special as I can. Call it guilt I guess, for not being with her 24/7. My job isn’t exactly nine to five and nannies are quite a way above my pay grade.”
“You miss her.” Lainie says, verbalizing my emotion exactly.
I like how she doesn’t try to offer some band-aid for what I’m feeling. Because honestly, there is none. You never get over missing your kid.
“Yeah I do. It’s been a lot to juggle these past few years. So whaddaya say we get you out of that towel?” Lainie turns to face me with a look of mock horror on her face. “I mean, let’s find you some clothes to put on. The ones you came in, were wearing, are -“
“Filthy and disgusting.” She says bluntly.
“In a word, yeah.” I say and smile.
She doesn’t tease or make me feel like a jackass for blundering around, stuttering about her clothes because my mind is elsewhere. If we weren’t standing in the middle of my daughter’s room, I doubt I’d have managed to hold myself back from catching hold of a corner of that towel and pulling her into my chest, tearing it away enroute so she’d land on my lap totally naked.
I can see her reaching her arms up to wrap around my neck as she likes to do and the fucking towel dropping to the floor between us. I can feel her soft skin under my fingers as I trail a line down the side of her spine and over the rising of her ass. I can feel her tits pressing into my chest, christ, I want to take each one in my fist and squeeze the flesh while I roll her big nipples between my fingers. I can see myself dropping to my knees before her as though to worship her perfect form. My palms on her thighs I’d pull her open and run my tongue the length of her slit. How sweet she’d taste, her own essence coming through the aroma of bubble bath.
“Ryder?”
What?
“Where were you?”
She grins so for a second I wonder if she can read me like an open page. Imagine the tongue stripping I’d get if she could.
“Nowhere? Just trying to come up with a plan for an outfit. You’re a bit too big to borrow something from Jazzy.”
“Jazzy, that’s cute, I love it. You’re right, I feel like Alice in Wonderland in here.”
She takes off out of the room and storms down the passage and straight into the master. Shit.
“What are you doing?” I follow her.
She’s opened the closet door and is rifling through some shirts of mine and a suit I haven’t worn since the last funeral.
“Hmm, I thought I’d find something of your wife’s to borrow.” She says, with a provocative tone.
“Does it seem to you like I’m married?”
“Maybe an old girlfriend then, or current one. You seem like the kind of man that women ‘accidentally’ leave their clothes in his closet for.”
“What kind is that?”
“You know, the kind they want to keep.”
“You’re saying I’m a keeper?”
“The cute kids room, the dog - you’ve got it all going on.”
“Do I really?”
“Hmmm.”
Then why haven’t I gotten laid in forever?
Chapter 11
Lainie
My body won’t stop moaning. I learned once, in a library when I could still go in there and keep warm, before they told me to stop coming when my clothes got too dirty and the other readers gave me side-eye, about the hierarchy of needs every human has. After food and shelter and warmth which are the main things, then you get into other desires. The book was talking about stuff like life purpose and self awareness but now that my basic needs are being met in Ryder’s house, I’ve got one really bad case of desire. Lust.
The fact that I’m only wearing a towel and nothing underneath doesn’t help the pulsations between my thighs. My awareness centers on sensitive points on my body that are crying out for his big calloused hands all over them, tweaking and pinching. I can still feel his strong lips sucking my nipple and the other one is moaning with bitter envy like the ugly twin.
I cross to the dresser beside his bed - a huge king size. I guess any bed looks big when you’re accustomed to a cardboard box but what if I were to drop the towel and climb up onto it on my knees? How about I throw the ball and see if he throws it back.
I should do it. I’ve got nothing to lose. But I’ve made such an ass of myself by acting all jealous that I can’t get a read on Ryder. It seems like the hot moment between us has passed. I could kick myself.
I glance back at him and he’s leaning on the door frame, arms crossed over that barrel chest I love getting lost in. He looks like a god.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to steal anything.” I snip.
I tug open the second drawer, because you know what’s always in the top one. Yep, as expected, full of tee shirts. I lift the top one, pristine white, I relish how clean it is. Here goes nothing. I drop the towel on the bed and pull Ryder’s tee shirt over my head with all the confidence I can muster, sure his eyes must be burning into my attributes.
When I turn around full of myself, he’s gone. So there’s my answer. Put him down for not remotely interested. I guess once a guy’s seen you at rock bottom you’re never going to be his Disney Princess.
I take the towel back to the bathroom and hang it then go looking for Ryder. I find him not vegged out on the couch with beer and TV like I’d been expecting. He’s in the kitchen. Also a nicely remodeled room, with black cabinetry and white for the uppers.
“Not only a saint and savior, the man has style.”
Now I’m the one to lean against the door frame and cross my arms across my chest. My nipples are like little bullets pushing through the fabric of his shirt. Do I imagine his eyes glance down there before he drags them away?
“It’s only noodles.” He grunts.
“I meant the kitchen design, but oriental cooking is another plus.”
“My kid has an obsession for stir fry - it’s the only thing I know how to cook.”
“It smells amazing. So where are my clothes? I should get going and leave you to your dinner.”
“You aren’t going anywhere.” Ryder says, with that matter-of-fact tone no one would dare challenge.
He’s so unlike other men I’ve known with their vicious orders and definitely nothing like Thad. No, I’m not thinking about that psycho. Not here. I want this to be a Thad-free zone.
“You’re going to eat a proper meal.”
“Okay Daddy.” I joke.
“That sounds kind of weird when you say it like that.”
“But you are one. And everything you do is about taking care of others.”
I go to the island counter he’s working at and pull open a drawer.
“Bingo.” The cutlery is there and I take out settings for us.
He looks at me with appreciation, as though he thought I’d be the type to lounge around while he works.
“There’s beer in the fridge.” He says. “It’s all I’ve got so I can’t offer you any Chardonnay.”
Uh-huh. Just like I thought. “Beer’s good.” I say. “I don’t know much about wine.”
My stomach is rumbling in agony from the aroma of the Chinese cooking. But nowhere near as painfully as the throb in my clit. I feel Ryder’s eyes trail me around the room as I walk from counter to table, table to refrigerator, then refrigerator to table with two beers in hand. He’s focussing excessively on his wok but I feel his gaze burning into me and when I glance back quickly, his eyes are alight watching my bare thighs.
A shard of light goes through my pussy, sending showers of sparkling sensation through my core. I can’t help but be very aware of how uncovered I am under his tee shirt. It would be s
o easy for him to pick me up and set me on the table, or counter, and shove his tee a few inches out of the way. I want him to spread me open and stroke every inch of me before pushing inside me.
I want it all. I want him. All of him.
But a man like him, aside from how gorgeous and caring, with a nice home and perhaps most important, a stable soul, would never be up for a girl like me even for one night. I go back to the drawer for a bottle opener just as Ryder’s serving noodles into bowls. He looks down at me and grins and I almost feel safe. Such a strange feeling. This is what it must be like to be married or living with a guy. These simple rituals carried out together, secure and happy. Or perhaps he’s just glad I’ve stopped squawking at him. Which is in no way my right to do. If I so much as uttered one word like that to my ex, I’d have been kicked to the ground.
Moaning. My body can’t take it, him sitting this close. His knee butts my thigh when he sits at the round table which is a little too small to take all of his length. He pulls the chair away a little so we aren’t touching. Disappointment cascades through me. If he liked me he’d have left it there, his joint pressing against my flesh so we’d stay connected. I can’t take this. I’ll eat then leave because being with this man and not being able to touch him is worse than being outside all the time where anyone feels free to touch me whenever they want.
“You feel like talking?” Ryder asks between bites.
“What about?”
“What’s going on with you. How you ended up under a bridge after leaving the hospital. You didn’t wait for your aunt to come for you.”