by Carol Rose
“We need to let the Easter Bunny stand up.” Molly appeared at his side, and she and the child-handlers removed several kids that were still clinging to him like starfish to an underwater rock. Hearing the chatter and the enthusiasm emanating from them, Drake found himself smiling inside the damned bunny head.
Okay. Happy kids were nice to have around…not that kids were always happy.
“Let’s go over to the gazebo and make some baskets to hold all the eggs you’ll get at the Easter Picnic.” Molly urged the children toward the summer house that he guessed now held unadorned Easter baskets, stacks of pastel-colored tulle, heaps of bright green plastic pretend grass and stacks of spools of ribbon.
At least that was what he saw stacked in the back of Molly’s Beetle.
Getting to his big bunny feet, he found a smaller child and an older girl on either side of him. Forming some sort of junior escort, the little girl took his furry paw in her hand, like she was accustomed to having a big rabbit walk beside her. Drake looked down into the mocha face she innocently lifted to him and retrieved the paw from her long enough to brush it across her small braid-covered head. She smiled sweetly as she again clutched his paw.
“This way to the gazebo.” Continuing to urge the group of kids along, Molly seemed to be functioning as his voice, since he couldn’t speak.
Drake walked across the grass, the little girl still holding one paw while the older girl held his other paw. They all climbed the shallow steps to the gazebo that he and Molly had built before their steamy kiss.
As he walked across the garden, his mind flashed back to that moment, her mouth moving beneath his in instantaneous response. He’d surprised her, bracketing her in between the ladder and himself, but she’d responded to his kiss like a wanton. All day, he’d tried to remember that she was his friend and he shouldn’t be thinking of her mouth and the sweet thrust of her breasts against her work shirt—breasts he could still remember fondling when they were teens.
And then he’d kissed her again. Pulled her into his arms and bent his head to take her mouth like he was a wild man claiming her.
He felt himself getting hard just thinking about it. Damn, she kissed like a sinner, all hunger and need.
Drake had made out with a number of women since he was a teen, sleeping with his share. That was just what a single guy with a healthy sex drive did. He’d dated, even seriously with several, but kissing Molly again had left him feeling like he was going to explode. At their first kiss the other day when she was upset about her cartoon guy showing up late for the kid’s birthday party, he’d felt himself go from zero to hard in seconds.
You weren’t supposed to feel that way about a friend! What the hell was the matter with him? Yes, she’d been more than a friend for a while, but he thought he’d moved beyond those kinds of feelings for Molly.
And then he’d kissed her by the ladder that day and she’d shoved him away from her like he was a leper. From really, really hot to colder than the arctic.
He didn’t need to put himself in this kind of situation.
In a few minutes, his mini escorts led him up the gazebo’s shallow steps and he sat at the table in a chair pulled out for him by the bigger girl.
“Here, bunny.” She sat down in one next to him, pulling a plain basket forward and beginning to look through several containers of ribbon.
While he was distracted by the child next to him checking out the basket decorations, a small blond boy climbed up on his lap.
Drake looked out the bunny suit’s mesh eyes at the six year-old who was making himself at home on his knee.
“Stephen, climb down this instant! The bunny doesn’t need you in his lap.” One of the child handlers took the boy’s arm and urged him to move.
To his own surprise—if you’d have told Drake two hours ago that he’d encourage a kid to sit on his lap, he’d have laughed—Drake put up one bunny-fur covered arm, patting the worker in a reassuring way. He then looped his arm around the boy, shifting him to more security on his bunny lap. Drake had no idea what had come over him, but he could play an affable bunny, if that were the role. The Easter Bunny was a kid thing and kids were welcome.
He could understand actors who said they disappeared into their roles. Suddenly, he wasn’t Drake. He was the Easter Bunny. Not that he wanted to be a damned cartoon character ever again. Lots of people were better with kids than him, but he’d taken this on. Even if he had done it under duress.
“Oh, okay.” The handler smiled at him. “Thank the nice Easter Bunny, Stephen. He said it’s okay for you to sit there.”
The boy looked up. “Thank you, Bunny…now can you give me a chocolate egg. I like them best.”
* * *
By the time the last Austin Women’s League member and all the kids were gone, Molly felt ramped up. This was such a big, damn deal for her. The tea party was just the start of the spring League events leading up to the Easter Picnic. In addition to the under-privileged kids and the children of League members, local business people would be invited to several smaller events before the big day.
If she’d been without an Easter Bunny, she didn’t know what she would have done.
Turning to Drake, who still sat in a chair in the gazebo, she had to grin at him.
“Is the last one gone now? Are we alone in this place?” he asked plaintively. “Can I take off this damned bunny head?”
As things wound down, he’d assumed less of a bunny-posture, despite his still wearing the bunny head with upstanding ears, and he sat now with one ankle resting on his other knee, the huge bunny foot making her want to giggle.
“Yes, I think all the League members are gone now. The kids left fifteen minutes ago.”
The light in the secluded, private garden was fading and the sounds from the parking lot had died away. It was over. She’d made it through her first League event without bursting into flames.
He started to lift the bunny head off and she jumped up to help, grasping the head at the sides and pulling. Bending forward, Drake pulled back as she yanked the head off. When he was finally free of it, she set the head aside and sat down in a chair next to him in the gazebo.
“You know, you really saved me.” Molly knew he hadn’t been thrilled about her desperate request that he pretend to be a rabbit.
Drake ran his hands through his short hair, looking glad to be free of the head. “Yes. And you now owe me in perpetuity. Whatever I want. Whenever I want it. Your ass is mine.”
“I wouldn’t say that exactly.” She forced herself to laugh, giving his shoulder a shove. Just the thought of her ass being his made her breathe more quickly.
After his kiss the other day, she had some idea what he wanted from her and it wasn’t just her ass, although he probably had some interest in that, too. Molly knew that by kissing him back so passionately when he had tried to comfort her after the birthday party, she’d tipped her hand. Her interest in his comforting kiss had clearly started his engine.
And then that kiss by the ladder. Good grief! She’d felt like she was going to lose it and start ripping his clothes off right there. She’d had to shove him away before she went totally crazy and stripped him.
The kisses were phenomenal and amazing and made her melt into a hot puddle, but she wanted more than Drake’s libido.
It came right down to that.
If he’d really been into her as a girl he wanted to date, she’d have seen some sign of it all these years of them being friends. They’d hung out together, played racquet ball every now and then, saw the occasional movie and parted with no more than a casual nod.
Somewhere along the way, she’d started thinking of him differently, though, started noticing the fizzy sensation in her stomach when he was around. She’d fallen in love with him, but he hadn’t done the same with her, she knew.
Touching him at all now was risky, but her profound gratitude for his rescue left her feeling all wobbly inside. She had to try to reestablish a normal friendshi
p and the shoulder-shove was a classic friend-thing. Even as she made the gesture, she was acutely aware of the muscle beneath the bunny suit.
Taking off his bunny hands, Drake reached down to pull off the costume’s big feet. “Whatever I want. Whenever I want. You owe me. You were so desperate not to mess this tea party up that these terms were implicit.”
“You’re nuts,” she scoffed, looking away from him as he sat so comfortably in his folding chair. Now that he’d shed the bunny hands and feet, he propped his elbows on his thighs. Even dressed in a full body furry animal suit, he looked incredibly hot and desirable.
Not every guy would have answered her desperate plea. How could she not love him more for it?
“Seriously, I—I hope you know how grateful I am.” Molly looked over at him. “I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t agreed to do this for me.”
He returned her steady gaze. “No problem. I’m sure you’d have done the same for me. Hell, you helped me with the blog all that time. The least I could do was help you in your hour of need.”
Molly looked at the floor of the gazebo. Friendship was good. She should be happy with that—but she didn’t feel satisfied or happy. Like an idiot, she wanted a whole lot more. And it was so much more complicated because she was fairly certain Drake would do the nasty with her.
He already had one sex buddy and she couldn’t join the list of girls he called when he wanted to get his rocks off. It would break her heart.
Molly took a deep breath and let it out in a sigh.
“So….” Drake glanced up at her. “Can we talk about the thing with the kiss here in the garden?”
She looked over at him, suddenly nervous. “What do you mean?”
“The kiss,” he said patiently. “When I kissed you by the ladder.”
She drew in another breath, suddenly unable to meet his gaze. “What’s there to talk about?”
“Molly.” His voice was soft. “One minute you were eating me alive and the next you shoved me away. Don’t you think some kind of explanation is called for?”
Swallowing hard, she felt a prickling at the back of her eyes. She knew she ought to tell him that she’d kissed him like that—both after the birthday party and when they were building the gazebo—because he kissed well or because she hadn’t gotten laid in a while and she was horny. But she couldn’t lie.
This need for truthfulness was inconvenient.
“You,” he started to say, still in that soft voice, “you set me on fire, girl. The way you kissed me. Wow. When you shoved me away, I started thinking that maybe I’d offended you somehow, that you were mad at me.”
Drake straightened in his chair. “Although I’m not the bunny suit kind of guy—and I don’t want you to ever expect me to do this again—I was kind of relieved when you called.”
Trying to keep her voice from shaking, she said, “I know this wasn’t comfortable for you and I’m truly, truly grateful. No, I don’t expect you to ever do this again.”
“And those kisses?” He lifted his eyebrows as he looked at her. “Molly, I’ve never been kissed like that.”
The darkness descending around them left the gazebo insides shadowy and somehow intimate.
“I know, I know. I’m sorry.”
She loved him and wanted him. Reaching out now would be so easy, to pull him closer and apologize for shoving him away….
“Sorry? Sorry you set my hair on fire?” He’d shifted his chair toward hers.
“I didn’t mean to lead you on,” she said, as low-voiced in her response as he’d been. He was so close, so warm and she wanted him so much.
“It’s only leading me on if you didn’t mean it.” Drake looked at her, his gaze questioning. “Did you mean it, Molly?”
She threw her head back and wiped away a tear that had leaked out of her eye. Her smile felt tight. “You’re a great guy. A good friend, and I really, really appreciate your being my bunny today.”
“None of that answers my question,” he pointed out grimly. “Did you mean it when you kissed me like that? The first part. Not when you shoved me away.”
“I guess…I meant both parts.” Molly looked up then. “I-I kissed you back those times because I…. I really wanted to.”
He tilted his head to catch her gaze. “And you shoved me away?”
“Because,” she said in a whisper, “because I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to stop…kissing you.”
“Molly.” His voice was low and thick as he reached for her. “Don’t stop kissing me.”
Drake dropped to his knees then, right in front of her chair. Reaching out, he grasped her and pulled her toward him, legs splayed as he knelt between them. He reached up to hold her face with both hands, his mouth on hers in gentle exploration. Only gentle turned deep and hot and hungry so fast Molly could hardly catch her breath.
He pulled her into his arms and angled his head to kiss the socks off her. She felt the heat of his mouth, opening over hers, his tongue warm against hers. There in the darkened gazebo, he knelt between her legs and held her while his mouth pillaged hers. It happened so quickly, she didn’t think about the wisdom of kissing him again, the consequences of letting him hold her. She wound her arms around his bunny-suit-covered body and let her head fall back against his hand. He held her there tenderly, his hand tenderly bracing her head, while he kissed the living daylights out of her.
Molly sank into that kiss. She’d been startled by his comforting kiss after the birthday party and she’d managed to gather herself to wrench out of his embrace by the garden, but she couldn’t resist this moment. Then, the daylight had helped her stay sane, the possibility of discovery by some Women’s League member in the garden giving her the strength to push him away.
But now the darkness fell around them and she felt suspended in Drake, lost in the warmth of his lips on hers, his strong arms holding her close. He held one hand bracketed behind her head, steadying her for his kiss, and he caught her against his body, his other arm snug against her back.
With him there, between her knees, pulling her close and closer, she yielded to temptation and kissed him as hungrily as she’d long dreamed of. This was Drake, the guy she’d fallen in love with. Her friend and more. The man who’d come to her aid in this, as well as, many other moments.
He pulled her so tightly against his body, that she felt him against her crotch, against the most sensitive part of her. Only their clothes kept them apart and Molly felt herself begin to throb.
She kissed him hungrily, straining against his broad, fur-covered chest. Drake loosened his arm around her, reaching up caress her breast, his thumb finding and rocking over, her kerneled nipple. Through her blouse and bra, Molly felt his touch as if the ceiling had crashed in on her, moaning into his mouth. He cupped her breast, caressing it and pressing his hand against the roundness until she was burning everywhere.
Pulling back then, he began unbuttoning her shirt. Molly’s eyes flew open and she met his gaze, dark and hooded. The rasp of their breathing filled her ears and she could no more stop what was happening than she could pull the gazebo in on them. She wanted this. Hell, she’d dreamed about it in excruciating dreams that left her aching for his touch.
The coolness of the spring evening air played over her skin, more exposed with every loosened button.
Molly felt helpless against the fire raging inside of her and the heat between them, but she knew she was making a choice. She could have stopped this at any moment, halted his touch just by telling him to stop. She didn’t want him to stop. Over and over, she’d told herself that sex with Drake wasn’t a good idea. She loved him; she didn’t just want to jump his bones. But she’d struggled against this yearning for a long time now.
There’d been nights she cried herself to sleep over the reality that she’d stopped dating him. Sure, they’d both been kids then, but she and Drake weren’t in high school anymore. They’d both had other lovers, both dealt with career changes and setbacks, both lea
rned a lot about being adults. For years now, they talked and laughed and called one another when they were down.
She loved him and she wanted to finally make love with him. Maybe that wasn’t what this was to him, but she couldn’t deny herself at this moment.
His bunny suit had a zipper running from neck to navel. Molly tugged at the zipper pull, meeting his gaze as steadily as he met hers. Down she tugged, until the suit was open to his waist and she leaned forward, kissing him as she pulled at the suit to free his shoulders.
Kissing her back, he pulled her blouse open to cup both her breasts in his hands. She felt the burn of his touch through her bra and she thrust her chest forward, silently urging him on as she kissed his mouth, her hands stroking at his broad shoulders as she tugged the suit off him.
Drake pulled away, bending to put his mouth on her breast, still covered by her bra.
She stopped jerking at the bunny suit long enough to shrug out of her shirt, the cool night air feeling good against her heated skin. He pulled the straps of her bra down then, until the cups followed and her breasts were bared to his avid gaze.
“Damn.” He breathed, looking at her breasts in the dim light. Cupping her, he brushed his thumbs over her nipples, rubbing back and forth as he lifted to kiss her again. Then, he broke away from the kiss to bend and draw her into his mouth.
Molly arched her back toward him, crying out as he suckled at her breast, his hands jerking her bra down. She felt him reach around to the bra’s hooks, but she was too lost in the warm, wetness of his mouth on her nipple to even help. In a moment, the silky thing fell away.
Under the rabbit suit, Drake had worn an old t-shirt, worn thin from years of washing. Now that she’d pushed the suit off his upper body, she pulled at the t-shirt, hungering to touch his skin.
All this time, they’d strained and stripped one another in the gazebo, but Drake pulled back again to say, “Let’s take this into the tent.”
She had a hard time making her brain follow what he’d said—since all available cells were focused on the sensations raging through her. Coming to some level of awareness of their surroundinhgs, she murmured, “Oh, okay.”