by Jolie Du Prè
Somewhere inside the pleasure, I think, Are you watching this, Sam? Are you? Is this what you hoped for, this wild lust, this fucking above the sea of your body and beneath the sky of my grief?
And then the boy’s cock and his deft fingers are making me come, a wild, rising wave that shatters me like glass against stone, and there is no more thought, no more Sam or me or even The Boy, just a pleasure that slides through me and washes everything else away.
The Boy pulls out with a groan, his fingers milking his climax from him with a quiet shudder and I can only watch, marveling in the milky ropes that pulse from him and spread along my stomach.
After, there is no shame, or guilt. Or even grief. And, forgive me, Sam, but for a moment, I am so glad to be weightless, to have nothing more on my mind than the rough loops of the towel as The Boy wipes my stomach off for me. I would take him again, I think as I watch him, the muscles bobbing in his shoulders, the intensity of his eyes as he watches me. I will take him again. Or he will take me, and I will be unthinking and unsinking and I will float above this ocean of grief I’ve begun to call home.
I open my mouth to, finally, ask his name, when he sits back on his haunches, the towel covering his thighs.
“Ms. McCade?” he says. Of course he knows who I am, I think. Of course he does.
He swallows, and the sound is low and wet. I want to lick his teeth, his tongue, the soft palate of his mouth behind those gates. My fingers push into my lap, stay there, fists heavy as stones, resisting the world’s urge to roll and batter them away.
“I’m . . . I’m sorry about your husband.” His words rush past me like wind, water, battering my ears.
“You knew . . . ?” Now it’s my turn to swallow. My tongue is bloated and logged in my mouth, my throat an impossibly small tunnel. I can’t even finish the question.
“I was his guide when he came here. Except, of course, not the last time.”
“Oh,” I say, but there isn’t any sound.
“He talked about you a lot. I know what the papers say, but . . .,” his voice trails off. There’s something he’s trying to grasp, maybe about death, maybe about love. I can’t help him with that. I can’t.
My throat closes around the only words I can get out. “Take me back, please.”
The Boy nods and starts the motor. I let a few fingers trail through the wake as we move forward. The wind slides its fingers into my hair and takes hold, strong and feral as grief. How can we ever know the ones we fuck? The ones we love? How could we ever want to? The secrets hidden in those unfathomable, caressing depths.
Oh, Sam.
About the Authors
Adriana Kraft is the pen name for a married couple writing erotic romance together. Published at Extasy Books and Whiskey Creek Press Torrid, their novels and short stories garner top reviews and are available in e-book and print. Genres include straight m/f, lesbian, bisexual, ménage and polyamory, with both contemporary and paranormal settings.
Longtime social activists, they like to take on stereotypes and challenge social barriers of all kinds. Ageism is near the top of their list and they think sizzling sex isn’t just for the young. Something else special is that they’re writing for both genders, offering scenes that partners might enjoy together. They often read scenes they’ve written out loud as part of foreplay, and they hope their readers will, too – or, as one reviewer suggested, keep “a bucket of toys close at hand!” It may take longer to finish the book, but Adriana believes a good book is meant to be savored.
Bill Brent's sex-and-drugs memoir, “This Insane Allure,” comprises one-seventh of Entangled Lives: Memoirs of 7 Top Erotic Authors. His nonfiction article, “Martin Luther Goes Bowling,” appears in Everything You Know About God is Wrong. His best-known work is probably The Ultimate Guide to Anal Sex for Men (published in French as Le Plaisir Anal [pour lui]). Bill has completed one novel, about a drug-dealing whoreboy who runs away to join the circus.
Follow Bill's antics at http://www.LitBoy.com.
Blue Canyon has been writing since age 22. Now age 52, Blue is a single parent of six children. They all live together in Florida. As part of a self-improvement program, Blue belongs to several writers’ groups including Florida Writers Association, frequently meeting with authors such as Steven King, Tim Dorsey, Don Bruns, Susan Klaus, and H. Terrell Griffin.
Brenna Lyons wears many hats, sometimes all on the same day: president of EPIC, author of more than 80 published works, teacher, wife, mother, member of ERWA, MWW, IWOFA, MFRW, WPM, and Broad Universe. In Brenna’s seven years published in novel-length, she’s finaled for 11 EPPIES, 3 PEARLS (including one HM, second to Angela Knight), and a Dream Realm Award.
She writes in 21 established worlds plus stand-alones, poetry, articles, and essays. She’s a bestseller in indie/e fantasy, horror, and erom. Brenna has been termed “one of the most deviant, erotic minds in the publishing world . . . not for the weak.” (Rachelle for Fallen Angels Reviews) Milieu-heavy dark work is practically Brenna’s calling card, with or without the erotic content.
Brenna enjoys hearing from people who read her work and can be reached at [email protected]
Craig J. Sorensen
A computer geek by day and an author by early morning light, Craig J. Sorensen’s short stories have appeared in diverse erotic anthologies as well as print and online magazines. He recently completed an erotic novel, Augsburg Diary, based on his experiences stationed at a military intelligence unit in Germany in 1980.
Visit him at his blog: http://just-craig.blogspot.com
Doug Harrison’s erotic ruminations, which complement his opera fairydom and offset his PhD in optical engineering, appear in zines, more than twenty anthologies, and a spiritual memoir, In Pursuit of Ecstasy.
Doug was active in San Francisco’s gay and leather scenes. He is a founding member of Black Leather Wings, a twenty-year old pansexual S/M group with spiritual foundations. He is an Associate member of the Chicago Hellfire Club.
Doug, a.k.a. Brad Chapman, appears in BDSM educator and practitioner Cleo Dubois’ groundbreaking S/M video The Pain Game as Mistress Cleo’s male submissive; this video discusses the “why” of S/M. Doug can also be seen with male, female, and transgender partners, either as top or bottom, in eight other erotic videos. He has also been the subject of professional still photo shoots; e.g., Michael Rosen’s Sexual Art, and an AIDS Emergency Fund’s Bare Chest Calendar.
He is the father of two children, a grandfather, and the slave of two delightfully entertaining tomcats. He has a gregarious but firm leather partner, with whom he experiments with the tried and true, the new and delightful, and the concomitant mixture of pleasure and pain.
Doug lives in warm Hawaii ([email protected]), where his most difficult sartorial decision is which color jock or thong to wear.
Dona Lee has completed two novels and is currently co-writing a nonfiction consumer guide for writers, as well as a nonfiction on the homeless, an erotica novel, and a paranormal thriller. She is the editor of Plotting Success, a monthly newsletter for the Sarasota Fiction Writers. Last year she was President of Sarasota Fiction Writers, an 80 member local writing group, and has been the leader of Florida Writers Association Manatee, an affiliate of the state group with over 1000 members for over three years. She has won numerous short story contests, two of her nonfiction short stories were recently published in an anthology on family, Our Family to Yours. She also writes occasional stories for the local papers on writing and the art community.
Donna George Storey has always found food sexy and sex delicious. She is the author of Amorous Woman, a very steamy novel about an American woman’s love affair with Japan, which explores every flavor of erotic pleasure the country has to offer. Her short erotic fiction has appeared in over a hundred journals and anthologies, including Swing!, Penthouse, Best American Erotica, The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica, Best Women’s Erotica, and X: The Erotic Treasury. She currently writes a column for the Erotica Readers
and Writers Association, “Cooking up a Storey” about her favorite topics: sex, food, and writing. She loves to read—or rather, purr—her work aloud and is producing a series of erotic podcasts.
Read more of her work at www.DonnaGeorgeStorey.com.
D. L. King
The editor of The Sweetest Kiss: Ravishing Vampire Erotica and Where the Girls Are: Urban Lesbian Erotica, D. L. King is also the author of The Melinoe Project and The Art of Melinoe. Her work can be found in anthologies such as Swing! Adventures in Swinging by Today’s Top Erotica Authors, Girl Crazy, The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica 8 and 9, Best Women’s Erotica 09, Best Lesbian Erotica 08 and 10, Frenzy: 60 Stories of Sudden Sex, Please, Ma’am, and from Circlet Press, Like a Sacred Desire: Tales of Sex Magick. She is also in the process of editing the new anthology, Spank! due out from Logical Lust early in the fall of 2010. D. L. King is the publisher and editor of the review site Erotica Revealed.
Find her at www.dlkingerotica.com
Emerald has been a writer since age seven, though her repertoire did not begin to include erotica until her early twenties. Her erotic fiction has been published in anthologies edited by Jolie du Pré, Rachel Kramer Bussel, Alison Tyler, and Violet Blue as well as online at various erotic websites. Currently, she resides in suburban Maryland where she works as a webcam model and serves as an activist for reproductive freedom and sex workers’ rights. She may be found online at her website;
The Green Light District www.thegreenlightdistrict.org.
Heidi Champa has been published in numerous anthologies including Best Women’s Erotica 2010, Playing with Fire, Frenzy, and Ultimate Curves. She has also steamed up the pages of BUST Magazine. If you prefer your erotica in electronic form, she can be found at Clean Sheets, Ravenous Romance, Oysters and Chocolate, and The Erotic Woman.
Find her online at http://heidichampa.blogspot.com.
J. C. Wesner
J. C. is a twenty-nine-year-old who has been writing since she was fifteen to pass the time while her grandfather was in the hospital. She has always been obsessed with what happens after the “Ever After,” and often wrote or re-wrote the endings to her favorite books, movies and TV shows. She is an avid reader and often, as a child, was the one caught with her flashlight on reading under the covers at 3 a.m. “Illicit Desires” is her very first published work, and she hopes that in the future, J. C. Wesner will become a household name much like Nora Roberts and Nicolas Sparks. She lives in North Carolina with her husband and five-year-old daughter.
Jeremy Edwards is the author of the eroto-comedic novel Rock My Socks Off. His libidinous short stories have been widely published online, as well as in over forty anthologies. His work was selected for The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica, vols. 7, 8, and 9; he has read at New York’s In the Flesh, Philadelphia’s Erotic Literary Salon, and (via telephone) In the Flesh: L.A.; and he has been featured in the literary showcase of the Seattle Erotic Art Festival. Out on the newsstand, he is a frequent contributor to Scarlet and Forum [UK] magazines.
Jeremy’s greatest goal in life is to be sexy and witty at the same moment—ideally in lighting that flatters his profile. Readers can drop in on him unannounced (and thereby catch him in his underwear) at www.jeremyedwardserotica.com
Julia Barrett has lived many lives, but the one central theme of each is her writing. She’s written prose and poetry since she was a child. She comes from a long line of men and women who love to read and write, starting with her beloved grandmother, a playwright. Julia has had articles published in medical and nursing magazines and poetry published in various literary journals. Now she writes romance in several genres, including science fiction, futuristic, paranormal, romantic-suspense and she dabbles in contemporary romance.
Julia attended the University of Iowa, where she majored in Creative Writing and the University of Utah, where she majored in nursing. She’s been a hospice nurse for ten years. Between the time she graduated from The University of Iowa and found her calling as a hospice nurse, Julia has been a waitress, a bartender, a legal secretary, a caterer, a private chef, a pastry chef, and a restaurant owner.
Julia and the love of her life live on the West Coast with an entire food chain of animals and three children who come and go frequently.
She loves to hear from her readers at [email protected]
Jolene Hui is a writer of literary and erotic fiction and about anything else her fingers feel like typing. She's been known to write a horror column for The Flesh Farm and a hockey column for Inside Hockey. One of Tonto Books’ first authors, her literary fiction has been published in their Tonto Short Stories, Tonto Christmas Stories, and More Tonto Short Stories anthologies. She’s also been published by a variety of newspapers, magazines, websites, Cleis Press, Pretty Things Press, Logical-Lust, and Alyson Books. She still holds onto her dream that she will one day be the mother of a Standard Poodle and frequently daydreams about cheesecake. She is based in Los Angeles.
Keeb Knight was born in London. He grew up in the cities of Detroit and Philadelphia. Currently living in Philadelphia, he enjoys writing erotic, multicultural, urban, and romantic suspense stories. His story “Mandatory Overtime” was featured in Zane’s New York Times Bestseller Caramel Flava: The Eroticanoir.com Anthology. His most recent story “The Gerswins” was published in Swing!, an erotica anthology published by Logical-Lust Publications, edited by Jolie Du Pré. He’s currently working on a romantic suspense and an urban erotica novel. www.keebknight.com
Madeline Moore began writing erotica in the twenty-first century. Her short stories have appeared in a number of anthologies including the Black Lace collection, Lust at First Bite: Sexy Vampire Short Stories. To date, she has written three Black Lace novels: Wild Card, Amanda’s Young Me, and Sarah’s Education. In another guise, Madeline’s scripts have been produced by the National Film Board of Canada as well as by a number of Independent Television Producers. Madeline lives in sin with Nexus author Felix Baron near Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Rachel Kramer Bussel (rachelkramerbussel.com) is an author, editor, blogger, and reading series host. She has edited over twenty-five anthologies, including Peep Show, Bottoms Up, Spanked, Dirty Girls, The Mile High Club, Do Not Disturb, and Best Sex Writing 2008, 2009 and 2010, and has contributed to Cosmopolitan, The Daily Beast, Mediabistro, Newsday, Time Out New York and other publications. She is senior editor at Penthouse Variations, former sex columnist for The Village Voice, and host of In the Flesh Reading Series.
She blogs at http://lustylady.blogspot.com
and http://cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.com
Randall Lang lives wild and free in southwestern Pennsylvania. He has authored eight books published by Renaissance E-Books (www.renebooks.com ), including the five-part Trailer Park Nights series, two Sweet Nothings books of erotic short stories, and Pleasure’s Choice Older Women, Younger Men. At Midnight Showcase (www.midnightshowcase.com), Randall was a contributor to the first release of Midnight Raunch, a compilation of erotic stories by several authors. His first full-length romance novel, Magnificent Man, is scheduled for release in May of 2009. At Logical-Lust Publications, Randall contributed a story to the Swing! anthology (www.swinganthology.com) joining twenty-four other hot authors to produce a steaming product.
Shanna Germain’s award-winning poems, essays, short stories, and novellas have been widely published in places like Absinthe Literary Review, Best American Erotica, Eclectica, Harrington Lesbian Fiction Quarterly, Juked, Salon and more. She is a Pushcart nominee, as well as the recipient of the Rauxa Prize for Erotic Poetry and the C. Hamilton Bailey Poetry Fellowship.
Visit her at http://yearofthebooks.wordpress.com
Sascha Illyvich started writing nine years ago, first releasing poetry and an occasional short erotica story before focusing on kinky erotic romance. His books have been listed under the Road to Romance’s Recommended read list, as well as nominated for the Cupid and Psyche Award (CAPA).
He is also the host of the
Unnamed Romance Show on Radio Dentata and continues to write for Renaissance E-books, and Total E-bound. Readers can find his work, at http://www.saschaillyvich.com including free reads
Sascha is part of the WriteSex Panel, a blog group that’s defining erotica for writers in any genre!
Find him at http://writesex.saschaillyvich.com
Tara S. Nichols
Ever since Tara was a little girl, she has had an affinity for romantic adventures. With crushes on the likes of Tarzan and Han Solo, she grew up looking for the perfect gentleman rogue. When she is not writing about romance, erotica, or paranormal fiction, she can be found tending her garden, keeping bees, or reading a spy novel. Tara roams free on the flat prairieland in Manitoba, Canada where she lives with her young son and husband. Currently, she has six published stories with four publishers.
She can also be found at her author website and guest book. www.tarasnichols.com
Trish DeVene’s fiction and poetry have appeared in Rose and Thorn, Not One of Us, Byline, Gold Dust, Sounds of the Night, Wicked Hollow, and Karamu, among other speculative and literary publications, as well as the anthology, Apparitions. Her poetry has won the Rhino Reader/Writer contest and her fiction has received honorable mentions in Ellen Datlow’s The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror (2004 and 2005). She lives in a suburb west of Chicago with her husband and two daughters.
About the Editor
Jolie du Pre (Joliedupre.com) is a full-time freelance writer who writes for a variety of sites, including Associated Content and Seed.
Jolie is also an editor and author of erotica. Her stories have appeared in a variety of Web sites, in eBook, and in print anthologies including, Cream: The Best of ERWA edited by Lisabet Sarai, Best Lesbian Erotica 2007 edited by Tristan Taormino, Best Erotica 2007 edited by Berbera and Hyde, Purple Panties, edited by Zane, and Making the Hook-Up, edited by Cole Riley, among others. Jolie is the editor of Swing! Adventures in Swinging by Today’s Top Erotica Writers, published by Logical-Lust and Iridescence: Sensuous Shades of Lesbian Erotica, published by Alyson Books.