by Lola Karns
He traced the rear straps connected to the thigh-high hose. They were pleasingly slippery, as she recalled from attaching them earlier in the evening.
Click. The straps dangled and then he released the front.
“Nice. Garters are such a turn-on. You may have to put this contraption on again later without the panties.”
“You should be so lucky.”
His cheeks twitched, a quick grin perhaps? He turned his head. All she saw was a dark mass of hair on his head and a muscular back. In an instant, he yanked down her thong and let out a long, low whistle. The earlier pain had been worth it.
“Nice arrow, but I wouldn’t have gotten lost. Not with that delicious pussy scent.”
She gasped, not because of his words but because his finger entered her. She watched in the mirror, as she arched her back and thrust her hips into his face. His tongue danced across her swollen lower lips. As he parted them to work a special kind of magic, her eyelids sank lower until the candle flames became yellow spots. His finger stroked inside her as he sucked her clit. Moans and groans merged from above and below, but couldn’t drown out the sounds of wet against wet.
Her hips rocked. She gripped his shoulders and hair as her world exploded into a firestorm of dancing lights.
Her legs were as unsteady as a baby deer. Hell, his weren’t much better, but he stood, nudged his leg in between hers and pressed her against the wall. Her breath grew ragged and each time he touched her ass, she sucked in a deep breath and mashed her boobs against his chest. She was more responsive than he remembered. He licked her neck. She gasped. Their past together was a fog in his mind. Some places so thick he couldn’t see until he got close. She used to look so cute when shocked and aroused. Did she still?
“That shrimp earlier was okay, but your pussy is five stars. I could eat it all night.”
“Eeee.” Redness flushed across her cheeks and chest. Oh yeah. She seemed amenable to the idea. If Lucky couldn’t keep up with Keira, he might have to fulfill that promise.
“Damn woman, I’m tempted to haul you to the bed and start the main course.”
“The bubbles are popping without me.” Her shoulders wriggled against him.
She ducked underneath and clicked across the room, bare ass and high heels. Lucky saluted. If Keira wanted that silly bath, who was he to resist? Her arms contorted to her back.
“That’s my job.”
One step closer and he managed to reach out to her back. Zippers were hard on teeth. Besides, hands led to groping. His left hand rested on her shoulder. Her height suited his. He didn’t have to do much more than tilt his head a little to get his tongue to trace the curve of her pert little ear. She bit her lower lip, and the other side popped up plump and ripe.
He hadn’t kissed her yet, not on the mouth. His left hand slid lower. That black lace looked mighty fine. Good thing he’d gotten that MAN-icure his cousin told him about. If one of his normal hangnails ruined that lace, she wouldn’t be able to wear it for anyone. I am the only one who should see her in this. Where had that thought come from? It wasn’t Lucky. The big guy nudged. Less thinking, more doing.
With his right hand, he tugged down the zipper. He copped a feel with the left. She leaned forward as the garment fell open.
“Hello.” She reached through her legs and squeezed his balls.
“You like?”
“Hell yeah. I like it higher, too.” He clutched her breast tighter, such perfect mounds to cup in his palms. The lace all but slipped away.
“Good to know.” She turned around and sat on the edge of the tub. “Could you?” She nodded at the lace bodice dangling at her torso.
He retrieved it from the floor and set it on the countertop. Something that pretty needed to be handled with care. When he turned around again, Keira had one foot on the floor, one stocking-clad high heel propped up on the edge of the tub, and her still-slick pussy on full display as she fumbled with the shoe. He hissed in a breath.
“I’ll help.”
Logan bent to undo the buckle on the second shoe, and then he slid his hands up her calf and over the knee to the top of her stocking. He sensed her gaze on him. Did she know how hard he was working to not slip into that pink door yet? He raised his head, and she turned away. Her weight shifted as he rolled down the stocking.
“Any time you want to finish.”
He slid the silk down her leg and over her toes. Something solid materialized in the fog of memory. He ran one finger from heel to toe. She squealed and started to slip. His arm shot out to grab her as her legs swung together and scissor gripped his head. Somewhere in there he heard a slosh.
“Thanks.” She purred. The air grew more fragrant with her juices. “The water is nice and warm.”
“Maybe it will cool me off.”
“I don’t think so. I’m going in. All the way this time, not just my ass.”
“Wait.” He held her legs firm and mashed his face into her crotch for one slow lick. “I couldn’t let you wash away all that good stuff without one last taste.”
Her legs unclenched and she rotated on the edge of the tub. “Who said anything about last?”
A future? Beyond this hotel suite? Nah. She once saw a future, but he threw it away like a case of empties. A man like him didn’t deserve a lifetime of Keira. Sometimes, getting through one day without screwing up was a struggle. She asked for a meaningless fling, but being with Keira meant something to him, a chance to apologize, a reminder why he couldn’t drink and to show his devotion. Serenity, Madame Eve, and the Higher Power granted him one night.
“Are you coming?”
“Gotta shuck these first.” But if Lucky cooperated, he would.
“Slip in behind me.” Keira needed to keep control of the situation. Besides, bossing Logan was fun.
“Now that’s an invitation—”
“And wash my back.”
The water sloshed higher on the sides, and the bubbles rose to her chin. What he lacked in grace, he made up for with finesse, or arousal. His hardness grazed her back. He had some goofy name for it and talked about his penis in the third person, but Luke? Was that it? Had a life of his own. That first night she drove him home after he was too drunk to drive, she removed his shoes and belt. He was passed out, but Lucky, that was his moniker, sprang to life.
His legs pressed against hers. One chance to wash away the past. His chest hair tickled against her back.
“I forgot a wash cloth, darlin’, so I guess I’ll have to use something else.” His breath warmed her ear as his hands rubbed her arms up and down.
She turned her head and nipped at his chin. He must have shaved right before he came to the door because his five-o-clock shadow arrived early. Stop the memories. His hands roamed her shoulders and neck. She pressed against him and swiveled her head to search for his mouth.
“Kiss me.”
He took her lower lip between his teeth. Her tongue reached for his, but he pulled back.
“Didn’t you want to get all cleaned up first?”
He cupped her breasts and curled his torso around her side.
“Damn bubbles. They don’t taste good, and they’re hiding your tits.”
“Maybe you need to wash out that mouth.”
“I’d rather eat your pussy again than eat soap.”
A different sort of heat rose to her chest and face. He chuckled.
“I love the way you blush.” He nuzzled so close, his eyelashes tickled her cheek. She closed her eyes, but instead of darkness, she saw Logan’s face buried in breasts.
“You have a talent for embarrassing me.”
His body stiffened around her, as if his flesh sought refuge in his bones. Good.
“I never meant to hurt you.”
“But you did.” She couldn’t go through with this. Scrubbing away the past was a foolish idea. The whole evening had been a sick joke. The desperate schoolmarm caught between the desire for passion and a past of mistakes and regrets.
&n
bsp; She rose, grabbed a towel, and wrapped herself in softness.
“Let me help.”
“No!” Her toes gripped the mat long enough to dry off the bottoms of her feet. Forget the underwear and shoes. She dried off as much as possible while she ran to the dresser in the bedroom. Her phone lay atop the sweater she brought to ward off an evening chill. She pulled up the email from Madame Eve and opened a reply window.
“I hate to be critical, but I think you made a mistake. I know there is a no-refund policy, but is there anything you can do?” Send.
“Keira, babe?”
“Leave me alone.” She found the first layer, cotton-Lycra bikini cut, her everyday underwear, cheap, basic, boring, and forgettable. The towel fell to her feet, and she reached for her department-store padded bra. Her phone chimed the arrival of a new email.
“I do not make mistakes. Logan is for you.”
Chapter Three
Of course. Black text against the bluish light of the screen repeated words she once believed. They couldn’t wash away the past no matter how hard they scrubbed. She couldn’t pretend he hadn’t hurt her because that pain drove her to contact Madame Eve’s service when her plans for love, marriage, and babies blew up like over-inflated balloons.
“Keira?” A hint of fear sounded in Logan’s voice, as if he actually cared.
Medical science had come so far that biological clocks seemed obsolete. She could have a baby on her own. Enough scuttlebutt reached her ears through the children and conferences with parents to know marriage didn’t guarantee a happy life, but she wanted a husband anyway, or at least a man to come home to with whom she could snuggle on the couch or share a meal or converse. She scoffed at her folly. So much for the feminist rhetoric she heard growing up.
“Can I come in? Please? No joking, no teasing.”
The atypical tremble in his voice pulled at the heartstrings she wanted to sever and sent a ripple across her skin. There would be no relief in her future until she excised the past. His presence was a test, no different from an exam at the end of a lesson plan. Get through this and move forward to the next topic. Master the humiliation and prepare for happiness.
Her state of undress exposed too much. She pulled on a T-shirt one-handed, the phone both an instrument of torture and an anchor in her other hand. “Fine.”
As the door pushed open, she stared at the bed. Red rose petals swam above the covers in the sea her watery eyes manufactured. “Not in here.”
“Couch?”
“Like in therapy? I should have spent my money on that rather than on this night.” A shrink might help her understand why she wanted love and companionship. The magazines told her how to find it and how to recover when it went wrong, at least in theory.
Logan held out a robe and looked poised to help her. She snatched it from his hands and pulled it on as she crossed the main room. Her gaze fell on the silver ice bucket and the locked minibar. If she called, the concierge could send up a bottle of something. It wasn’t a tequila night. Whiskey was more pensive even if it burned the entire way down the gullet.
“Nuh-uh. Put the phone down.”
She looked at the strange object in her hand then at the man staring at her. “You don’t know what I need.”
“I know you’re looking for an out, some kind of easy escape.”
The handset dropped. She glared at his chin. “I’m tired. I can’t play this game anymore.”
“Is this a game? Because right now, I’m not having any fun. What we did in the bathroom? That was a good time. This?” His chin shook. “Why don’t you take a seat? You’re pale.”
Sitting might help with her queasy stomach. Being in a different room or with someone else would make more of a difference. Logan brought her a bottle of water.
“Would you like a glass? Or do you have one of those colorful cups you like so much stashed somewhere?”
“No.”
He knelt on the floor and reached for her hand, but she outmaneuvered him and put both on the bottle.
“Keira Jones, my cowardice hurt you. My actions hurt you. I wish every day I could change that past, but I can’t and neither can you.”
He re-draped the plush fabric across her knee and then set his hand atop.
“I am sorry for what I did. I let the booze and fear cloud my mind. I’m trying. When I think too hard about all I lost, my mouth waters for one drink to make the memory go away. And I think of your beautiful face and warm laugh and how happy you looked taking your niece for a turn on the dance floor, and I hate myself. I want to drown myself in kegs of beer.”
“So do it. Who’s stopping you?”
“You.”
The laugh boiled up from deep inside until it erupted through her throat and shoulders.
Logan’s grip tightened on her knee. This emotional stuff was brutal, and confusing. Over the last few months as he’d made amends, he faced anger, tears, indifference, and more than one punch, but her laugh ripped him apart. The tremors started. He grabbed a pillow and clutched it tight until his skin paled from the effort. He wanted to tear the damn thing in half. Cotton coated his teeth. One sure-fire way existed to get rid of that. That shrill sound of Keira’s hysteria echoed. He could drown it out. Minibar codes weren’t that hard to figure out. The pillow fell from his hands. There it was. Salvation in a corner. He turned toward comfort, but something stopped him. A hand on his. Her hand.
“How do I stop you?”
The Siren’s song stopped replaced by a better tune.
“Now? With your touch.”
“But it’s been months, Logan. You made it sound like something different before.”
“Normally, I want a drink. I tell myself no, but the coward within says yes, but then I close my eyes and I see my one moment of clarity from that wedding night, the anguish on your face when I made the dumbest mistake of my life.”
“Which is?”
“Amber.”
“Hmmm. That’s it?”
Weird things happened within his body. Something stung his eyes, but no matter how tight he clenched his lids, the pain didn’t leave. His gut clenched and pressed into his lungs. He wrapped his body around her legs. As his forehead pressed against her, something wet hit his cheek. I’m crying. He couldn’t stop. All that he’d ruined spilled forth with a powerful force. There was nothing but an expulsion of guilt, shame, and tears.
A soft massage on his scalp drew him back to the physical world. The corners of his mouth pulled in an unfamiliar way. The world smelled clean and new, but mixed with Keira. She was here, touching him. He pressed his face into the white fluff of the robe.
“I’ve seen people break down like that at meetings, but it seemed strange to me. I never understood till now.”
She responded without words and covered the side of his face with one hand while still stroking his hair. One night wasn’t enough with the woman who understood what he needed before he did. He interlaced his fingers with hers and inhaled her warmth and serenity.
“I knew that night, I’d never be worthy of you. I’m a good contractor but a fuck-up at people.”
“Don’t say that.”
“But I am. Long before I screwed up the wedding of the man who was like a brother to me and lost the woman of my dreams to boot, I ruined people. I spent so much time in detention in school, I shouldn’t have graduated. My parents hated me almost as—”
“How can you say that?”
“Because I can. They fought all the time. Dad was a mean drunk, busted Mom’s nose once and broke my arm the night she tried to leave him.”
“That wasn’t your fault.”
“I get that now. They could have both used AA but….”
Keira’s hand moved from his hair to his neck, long slow strokes that inflamed him from head to foot. She sidetracked him better than the bottle ever did.
“Don’t make excuses for them. No child should suffer what you did. Did she stay?”
That awful pit formed in his g
ut. Even within the safety of her presence, some places should stay unvisited. She accepted his silence but didn’t stop that magic touch.
“Come. Sit beside me.”
His leaden feet refused to cooperate. Even Lucky stayed still, his lower half burdened by a need to confess.
“I ruined that night because I didn’t want to become him, and, above all, I didn’t want you to become her. You were the best part of my life, and when I saw that dreamy look in your eyes during the ceremony, I got scared. I drained my flask in the bathroom before the limo ride. And when you danced with your niece, I caught a glimpse of the future of you with a baby, our baby, and then I tried to hold the baby, but it was hurt and then you were hurt and my hand was bloody and I panicked.”
Her legs slid, and she was on the floor around him. Her breath blew hot against his neck.
“I’m not angry anymore.”
“You forgive me?”
“I didn’t say that. But I can work toward finding peace.”
“I’ll take it.”
She wrapped around him for a long time. Maybe five minutes, maybe hours but the sky outside remained dark. He came to Las Vegas to get laid. Instead, he’d bawled like a baby and then found something he didn’t have words for when the most beautiful woman in the world held him. Keira was apple pie and picket fences.
“I’ll never be good enough to deserve you.”
“Shut up.” He hadn’t realized he’d spoken until she answered. “You don’t decide what I deserve. I do. And even though I don’t always like the decisions I make, they’re mine. When I met you a year and a half ago, I saw deeper in you, and I wasn’t wrong.”
The vanilla bubble bath faded from her skin. Good. He liked her better. Her nails raked across his back.
“I’m going to bed. I might feel different when the sun comes up, but you can stay tonight, in the room, in the bed.”
As she walked away, he caught her muttered words. “Some one-night stand. Maybe I’ll get good-bye sex.”
Logan, vulnerable and raw, chipped away at her defenses. He wasn’t supposed to do that. Her 1Night Stand was supposed to make her feel beautiful and to add mortar to the cracked walls around her heart. All that relationship dribble Keira read over the last months failed to prepare her. She tried to throw away the mental magazines but a few headings stood out from the jumble. “When to Forget and Forgive” and “His Emotional Needs” she cast aside. She focused her inner eye on “20 Types of Sex to have in your Twenties.” Angry sex, check. Public sex, double check. By dawn, she could cross off another, sex with an ex, the kind that takes place months after a breakup and offers no promise of a future. If nothing else, she’d get closure.