by Kira Blakely
“Uh, yeah, I saw it when we got it,” she reminded me. I crowded her down the stairs and flashed Michelle a wink as I closed the bedroom door behind us.
Michelle, of course, darted out the door as soon as she was fully dressed. “Beautiful day for a long walk,” she announced. Connie noted that she was weird. I sent her a text.
Be safe… Come back soon.
It didn’t get any response.
* * *
I waited two days, and I knew I wasn’t going to see Michelle again unless I made the first move. I texted her again, and then I called.
It rang five times before there was an answer.
I imagined her staring at the screen, weighing whether or not to answer.
I know no one wants to hear “Just trust me” when they have good reason to suspect infidelity.
“Hello?” Michelle answered. She sounded bored already.
“Hey,” I said.
There was a pause. “Hey,” she echoed.
“Hello.”
Michelle laughed a little and my heart did a shimmy. “What are you doing?” she asked.
“Wondering when I’m going to see you again. I know if I don’t schedule your ass, I never will.”
“Mm,” Michelle murmured behind closed lips, and my dick thickened at the mere sound. The vibration of an “mm” against her lips was enough to get me ready. I couldn’t even see her. “I don’t know, Ace.”
I furrowed my brow as I realized that I couldn’t remember the last time she called me Ace, if she ever had, even though only my mother still calls me Andrew.
“Hey,” I said, voice almost soft with offense. “You never call me Ace.”
“Because it’s not your name,” she answered simply. “Somewhere, deep down inside you, there’s a little boy who knows that his name is Andrew.” I smiled at the thought of her calling my inner-child whenever she said my name, reaching down into a place inside me that even I have forgotten. “Anyway,” she added, “Ace is a douchebag name.”
My brow dented. “You’ve got a mouth on you, don’t you?” I told her.
“What, I can’t play?” she wondered, and another rush of blood unfurled my cock.
I swallowed. “What are you doing right now?” I wondered thickly.
“Getting out of the bath tub,” she answered in a sultry, husky voice. I reached down and squeezed my prick through the denim of my jeans, biting down on my lower lip and relishing the sensation. Fuck, I was either going to see her right now or I was going to jack off thinking about her right now.
“Are you still naked?” My hand grinded over my cock in anticipation, conjuring images of Michelle laced in bubbles, Michelle’s wet palms slipping over her slippery tits, Michelle’s mouth hanging open in ecstasy, dark tendrils clinging to her neck and the side of her face.
“I can’t right now, Andrew,” Michelle giggled, receding from our erotic conversation. My dick throbbed plaintively as it watched her go. “I have an appointment downtown, but I’ll be back in a few hours if you want to come by then?”
“Fuck yeah,” I growled. My mind was still in that bathtub with her.
Michelle laughed again and my heart soared. “You’re an animal,” she purred.
“Leave the door unlocked for me, will you?” I asked, biting down on my lower lip at the fantasy of stretching out naked with some whipped cream sprayed on my shaft. I didn’t even think about her home security issues.
“Oh, I don’t bother locking the door anymore,” Michelle mentioned, blasé. “Whoever keeps breaking into the house has had a key made.”
“What?”
“Oh, yeah. Every time I come home with one of those alerts, the front door is just unlocked. They have a key; they just don’t have the code to shut down the system.”
“God, that’s shit,” I scoffed. “You need to get out of that house.”
“I’ll see you tonight,” she departed musically, the line going dead.
With my manhood still pounding for her, I decided to take a bath, too.
Fifteen minutes later, I sank nude into hot, sudsy water and the throbbing intensified as my blood vessels dilated. My prick peered up at me, as thick as a two by four, from its halo of bubbles. I ran the fragrant water over my skin and sighed—as a well-endowed mechanic in a bubble bath.
God, I was going to come so hard. It was a shame that my cum wouldn’t be able to find its way into Michelle’s pussy from here.
I closed my eyes and settled along the slope of the tub, stroking gently, smoothly, up and down my own shaft. I pictured her round ass in front of me, slippery and soapy, her pink little pussy tucked neatly between those thick thighs. I would ease her backward onto my cock and slip into her so easily, so readily. She was always so wet for me. She would shudder around me and grip the ledges of the tub as I thrusted. I would grip her hips and jerk her back and forth, relishing how she slithered over my shaft, whimpering and gyrating....
A dollop of lotion swept my hand rapidly over the broad head of my cock and my thighs tensed. I hissed in a breath and my hand tingled with the desire to smack Michelle’s ass hard right now. I wasn’t going to last long. She would press and twist and milk my cock for all its honey, telling me yes, her dark hair getting wet, her glasses off, tits bouncing, yes, yes....
It was the mental image of bouncing, soap-slippery tits that made my cock spurt ribbons of white into the bath water and I exhaled with vigor and relish, feeling like a new man.
Maybe I should do that every time I’m going to see her, just to keep my head on straight.
* * *
After the bath, I dressed myself in a plain red cotton t-shirt and jeans. I glimpsed in the mirror and was delighted at the progress of my five o’clock shadow’s return. I practiced my bedroom eyes on myself in the mirror and then laughed. What kind of girl would fall for a face like this? I looked like mountain terrain, all brush and stones. Oh, well. If Michelle wanted to swing her hips and saunter down to my league to be with me, that was her decision.
I went to her house with a can of spray whipped cream and her car was still in the driveway. Huh. I was going to strip down and stretch myself out on her bed, but if she was already home, maybe I could spray it on her instead. I wondered briefly if she was the kind of person who would get upset if her bedding was damaged, and then disregarded the thought. She wouldn’t care. If she cared about us staining the bed, I wasn’t doing my job right.
My mind was on Michelle’s mouth as I strode up her front porch steps. There was a spring in my step and a song in my heart as I reached for the doorknob.
But it twisted before I could touch it, and I pulled back. I assumed it would be Michelle on the other side.
But the door fell open and Chet Browntooth strode into the dying July afternoon, an old composition notebook and a photo album clutched to his chest.
Within an instant, I knew everything. The look in his eyes told me everything that context couldn’t. It hit me like a bolt of lightning and I broiled. He was the reason the police department never received any alerts. He was the reason there were no signs of forced entry. He was the reason the profile of this thief was so creepily obsessive. How hadn’t I seen before that his personality fit the crime perfectly? Why had I believed his story on that first night, when he was on her porch in the dead of night, front door hanging ajar? How could Michelle have been the only female Chet ever successfully bought a gift without offending? He knew she would like the pearls because it was in a journal or a picture or something. He’d probably been plying her with her own secrets and memories all month.
I launched myself at him with all the primitive instinct of a caveman and we tumbled back over Michelle’s threshold together. Chet telegraphed his first swipe one beat before it came, so I dodged easily and pinned him to the wood floor.
“You’re one sick son of a bitch, Browntooth,” I told him through gritted teeth. “What were you doing in there, huh? Reading her diaries?”
“Jerking off in her panties,�
�� Chet sneered up at me, and I swiped his jaw with my knuckle too quickly to even comprehend what I was doing, what I had just done. “You’re about to be under a-fucking-rrest, Ace!” he roared, mouth spraying blood where I busted a tooth loose.
“Oh, yeah?” I gave him a little shake. “How are you going to explain what the fuck you were doing in here, Browntooth? I’m supposed to be here! You’re not!”
“Just because you’re here doesn’t mean she’s yours, grease monkey,” Chet jeered. He grinned, even though blood seeped over his lower lip. “I see her all the time, and she loves to talk to me. Giving me little smiles. Shaking that ass when she walks away. You’re not the only one she wants, and I live right next door.”
“You’ve been stealing her shit!” I struggled off Chet and snatched the composition notebook from his hands. “What is this?” I flipped it open and saw handwriting on lined paper. Vintage. There was a Chapter One heading, and it spilled right into some deep, passionate love scene.
My palms raked a little trail down the patch of hard stubble on Gavin’s jaw…
The guy sounded a little like me, actually.
My eyes thundered down at Chet and I said nothing.
“I’m going to tell her,” I informed him solemnly. I had to keep my cool, or it was going to look like something it wasn’t. “What she decides to do with this information is up to her.” But she better fuckin’ move in with me and sue your ass for harassment if you come within 300 feet of her.
“I think you should tell her,” Chet encouraged me, propping himself up on his elbow. In spite of Chet’s slimmer stature and the fact that his hands weren’t half as hard as mine, he’d taken that punch like a champ. As I recall, he was in a lot of fights as a kid, and his old man was pretty sour, too. We were born in the ‘80s, but that kind of stuff still happened behind closed doors. “I think you should be the one to tell her that you have been breaking into her house and stealing her little treasures,” he explained as he shambled to a stand and dabbed at his lip. “That’s noble, Ace.”
“She would never believe that, even if I did tell her myself,” I said.
Chet grinned. “You mean, the way she didn’t believe that you were still hooking up with Lola?” he provoked me. “Don’t you have a license to locksmith? Didn’t you get all that equipment when you started the garage?” He rolled his tongue thoughtfully in his mouth and sauntered toward me, sizing me up like he thought he was becoming the alpha in this scenario. I watched him with even, calm eyes, waiting for his next move. I knew one was coming soon. His body language radiated restrained aggression like heat waves coming off a desert road. “And isn’t it so fucking weird how perfect she thinks you are? How perfect you seem to be?”
I swallowed and told myself that violence never solved anything.
Who said that? Can’t remember. Doesn’t matter.
I surged forward and bound one arm around his weasel neck, wrestling his head down into my armpit in a snug headlock. Unbelievably, Chet laughed.
“And while she’s crying and vulnerable and so scared, I’ll be right next door, making all her favorite foods, listening to all her favorite songs,” he sneered up at me. “She’s gonna lay that pussy out for me like a goddamn buffet, Ace. Mm, mm, mm!”
Everything went white for a second, and the next thing I knew, I felt searing heat travel down both my arms and we were outside, Chet in the air, dangling by his throat. I tossed him into the yard like he was a rag doll and he rolled.
I wanted to feel satisfied and victorious, but I didn’t. I knew that it wasn’t over yet. I knew Michelle was in real danger. No one would believe my word against Chet’s. She wasn’t going to move in with me. I knew that. Even if she trusted me about Chet—and Chet was right, she’d chosen his side before—she’d think moving in was too sudden and risky. She’d be trapped, right here, next to that leering psycho. She’d be trapped, and he must have had a key to her place. She’d be trapped, and he was willing to do everything in his power to make her his own.
Chet scrambled up, streaked in dirt and bloodied, a bruise forming on his cheekbone.
“You never really got to know me, Chet,” I barked at him from the porch, feeling like Michelle’s own personal Rottweiler. “But the first goddamn thing you’re gonna learn is that I protect the people I love. I protect them to the death.”
“Are you threatening a police officer?” Chet wondered, rolling his tongue over his dirty cut lip.
“Fuck yeah, I am,” I snarled.
“You’re not gonna tell Michelle,” Chet sang eerily. His eyes gleamed as he loped backward across Michelle’s yard, back to his own property. “I’ve got access to a lot of things in my line of work, Ace. It’d be a shame to watch that garage get shut down. See little Connie grow up without a stepdad.”
Everything went a little hazy again, but this time, I fought through the urge to kick his motherfucking ass and just nodded at him, eyes slits, jaw tight. Everything in my expression said that I was serious, and he’d understand that. He was not to come back. His life might depend on it.
I closed the door behind him and I almost moved to lock it, but then I remembered that he’d made a copy of the key.
We were changing these locks tonight.
* * *
Headlights swung into the driveway while I was on my knees, back to her, with the front door hanging open and clamped by an extractor tool. The headlights swung away again, blanketing me in shadows. Her high heels clicked and crunched on the driveway as she approached.
I glanced over my shoulder and softened at the sight of her. She wore a simple white sundress, almost too casual to be appropriate for a lawyer, and her hair was down. Her heels were sandals tonight. Her curves were so strong that even the hint of them beneath her clothes was overwhelming to the casual observer. Her breasts struggled against the cotton and her ass bent the skirt all out of shape. “Hey, babe,” she greeted me uncertainly. “What are you doing?”
“Changing your locks,” I answered briefly. I glanced over my shoulder again to watch her ascend the porch staircase. This close, I could smell the zest of lemon and sugar from her body scrub, the sheen of coconut oil on her shoulders and thighs. Her curves gleamed in the meager porchlight and I felt a little crack of jealousy for every person who looked at her when she was this beautiful. “Did you come here in someone else’s car?”
“An Uber,” she answered lightly.
“You should’ve told me you needed the Volvo looked at again,” I told her, even though it was the furthest thing from my mind right now. “Look, Michelle. You know I would never ask you to do anything for petty or spiteful reasons, right?”
“You mean like that time you called me to tell me that my invoice was ready because you wanted to force me to come down to your garage and pick it up like a regular customer?”
I wanted to smile at her comeback, but I had to show her that this was serious. “Please don’t… indulge Chet, okay?”
Michelle furrowed her brow and crossed her arms over her chest. She lowered her voice, like a proper lady does when she’s gossiping. “What are you talking about? I don’t indulge—”
“I mean, you need to start avoiding him,” I hissed, also lowering my voice. It was a good idea. “I saw him myself, walking out of your house, while you were at your appointment. He had a photo album and a notebook. He’s the one, Michelle. I can’t prove it, but please believe me. Stay away from him.”
“Are you sure?” Michelle squeaked. She was too good for this world. “Sometimes he lets himself in when he thinks something is going on.”
“Trust me,” I muttered, returning to the extractor. “You’re what’s going on.”
Michelle scrutinized me as her voluptuous legs idled alongside my work. Several seconds passed, and then she said: “Okay. I won’t say another word to him.”
“Good.”
“Thank you for doing this, baby,” she said. Her hand massaged between my shoulder and my neck for a second. “I didn’t re
alize you had this kind of equipment.”
“Yep,” I told her. “I’m a certified locksmith, so I’m going to take care of this while I’m here.”
“You just get sexier and sexier,” she mused, not budging from my side. Her sweet, sugary scent tickled at me, calling me away from the task at hand, but I consciously cleared her allure from my head and focused. Focus. “How long do you think that’s going to take?”
Her weight shifted from one foot to the other and my eyes flicked to see why she was shifting.
She beamed down at me, her pink lip pinched between her teeth, her nipples puckering against the stiff cotton of her sundress. I could just barely decipher their shape under the dress and it was tantalizing.
I forced my eyes back to the extractor tool. “Give me another half hour,” I said.
“Okay.” She leaned down and brushed her lips over my ear. “I’ll just be upstairs... taking a bath.”
My dick pulsed out of control and I exhaled, long and low. Michelle stepped over me and her sandals gave up delicate clicks as she passed into the foyer and glanced back at me meaningfully from over one shoulder. I glared after her and came to a stand. I dropped the extractor and slammed the door. Michelle must have seen the monstrous erection in my pants. She must have seen the tightness in my body, the hold that she had over me. Her eyes twinkled as she turned away and continued her saunter, sliding out of her heels, then slipping the straps of her sundress down her creamy shoulders.
I followed obediently, stripping off my clothes with every step.
* * *
It was 2:33 in the morning and I couldn’t sleep. I stared at the dark ceiling and listened to Michelle’s deep, even breathing. I worried about her, alone in this house. I didn’t know how far Chet might go. My heart felt tight and heavy with every beat. I sat up and shuffled over to her bedroom window, stirring the curtains to the side. There was Chet’s house across the way. How many times had he pulled out those binoculars to watch her? When she climbed out of that bubble bath today, had he been sitting comfortably with a box of popcorn? Did he take pictures of her as she blotted the water from her chest?