By the time she returned, he was waiting for her. After folding the comforter in half, he flipped open the edge. “Get in, woman, before I embarrass myself. Clothing is optional. It’s not like it will stay on long, anyway.”
Sam grinned and, after glancing around, stripped in what was surely a new land speed record before crawling between the soft layers. She snuggled down to enjoy watching Bret all but rip off his clothes, inhaling the scent of fabric softener, her nipples hardening with each breath as they rubbed against the flannel of the comforter.
But, instead of climbing on top of her and finishing what he’d started, after kissing her, he slid lower beneath the cover.
Sam lay waiting, eager to see what he would do. She didn’t have to wait long.
Warm kisses trailed from her knee up the inside of her leg. His breath ruffled what little pubic hair her recent waxing had left.
She waited in breathless anticipation only to be disappointed when he left the spot literally weeping for his kiss to trail kisses up the other leg. Once again, his breath teased and tickled her.
His thumbs massaged the outer sides of her labia, his hot breath taunting her aching folds.
When his tongue stroked the length of her, she almost screamed, her every nerve ending pulsing, waiting for his touch.
Finally, finally, he dragged his tongue upward, the slight abrasion of his stubble making her senses scream until his teeth clamped around her clitoris.
He held it between his teeth, probing it with the tip of his tongue, the pressure of his thumbs preventing her from bucking her hips in a wild effort to gain satisfaction.
Just as she was sure she was having a heart attack and would die unfulfilled, he sucked the morsel deep into his hot mouth and continued sucking until he’d wrung three earth-shattering climaxes from her.
This time, she knew the fireworks were not all on the beach.
Panting, she lay there, commanding her wet noodle muscles to obey her commands to move. They obviously were not listening.
But when Bret slid up her depleted body, his eyes feverish, her moisture still glistening on his lips, she reached deep within to find the strength to take the lead.
It took some effort, but she managed to flip him to his back. Straddling him, she trailed kisses over his face, down his neck, and across his sexy chest, all the while teasing the tip of his penis with her moisture. She wiggled her hips, taking wicked pleasure in feeling his erection twitch with each swipe of her swollen labia.
When he tried to grasp her hips and impale her, she slapped his hands away and maintained her distance.
Slowly, ever so slowly, she kissed her way down his beautiful body until she came to the part literally leaping to attention.
After an initial kiss, she took the bulbous tip into her mouth, swirling her tongue round and round smooth skin, occasionally taking light nips on the top.
Bret groaned and arched his back, thrusting higher into her mouth.
She smiled around his fullness and pushed on his pubic bone until he was once again flat on the makeshift mattress. She’d never done this before, but she’d read a lot about it and listened when her girlfriends talked. She’d always been a fast learner.
Sam slid to Bret’s side in order to get better leverage as she sucked him deep into her mouth.
Immediately, she gagged.
Plan B was not to take him quite so deep and increase the tongue action while sucking.
It worked very well. Maybe too well, because she realized she was also turning herself on. Of course, when Bret’s hand found her wet core, playing with her while she pleasured him, her libido elevated to stroke level.
Although Bret had not yet climaxed, he was breathing hard, his magnificent body shaking and covered in a light sheen of sweat.
She released him to kiss her way back up. He rolled on a condom in record time but when he again grabbed her hips, she glared at him and moved his hands to her aching breasts.
He squeezed rhythmically while she circled the head of his penis with her wetness.
When neither could take any more, she slowly lowered onto his shaft until their pelvic bones met.
They both groaned and enjoyed their private fireworks display.
17
“What would you like for Christmas, if you could have anything in the world?” Bret asked a couple hours later as they lay naked, cuddled up in his big bed after another earth-shaking bout of lovemaking.
Yes, she could now admit, at least privately, it was lovemaking, not rebound sex. In fact, what she shared with Bret was unlike anything she’d ever experienced. It made her suspect her previous encounters had been the just-sex kind.
“Samantha? Are you asleep?” He traced the shell of her ear with tiny kisses. When she shook her head, he asked again, “What would you like for Christmas, if you could have anything you wanted?”
You. Forever. But that would make her sound like a pathetic loser, not to mention desperate.
People didn’t fall in love in less than three days. Did they?
Stalling for time, she rolled to her side, slipping her leg over his thigh, resting her foot between his legs while she traced little circles over his heart with her fingertip.
“Anything?” She shrugged, pretending to think. “The same thing I’ve always wanted, I guess. I want to get my dog back and go home. I can’t think of a better Christmas present,” she lied. “What about you?”
He hugged her close and kissed her forehead. “I already got it. But I do have a surprise for you. The circuit judge left a message today. He’ll hear your case tomorrow afternoon at one. You may get your Christmas present early—well, at least part of it. Good night, Samantha.”
She lay in the dark, cold despite the heat Bret radiated, long after his breathing told her he slept. She should be happy her “house arrest” was drawing to a close. With any luck, she could get Rhetta back and be home in time for Christmas.
Sam hurried along the sidewalk of the square. According to the old clock on the courthouse, she had to be back in three hours. After much searching for a meaningful Christmas present for Bret—just to thank him for all he’d given her, of course—she’d finally decided to go for light and frivolous. After all, if she was leaving town, there was no point in tipping her hand. It was too risky.
If she took this gamble, she could lose her heart.
The next gamble was the most she could manage.
The bells chimed merrily when she pushed open the door of the Hair Hut.
“Hey, sugar—Merry Christmas!” The redhead she now knew was Nadine smiled at her when she walked in. “Your hair still looks darlin’. Don’t you just love it?”
Sam touched the curls. “I really do.” She glanced around. “Is Bambi free? We talked about going to lunch. She hasn’t left yet, has she?”
Nadine shook her head, little dangling Christmas tree earrings swinging with the movement. “No, she called in sick today.” She leaned over the counter and whispered, “I think she’s having personal problems, if you know what I mean.”
Sam didn’t, but she nodded.
Nadine glanced around and then whispered, “I heard her having words with her guy when he picked her up last night. Why don’t you go see her? I’d go myself, but I’m booked. I can give you her address.”
“Ah, no, that’s okay, I know her address.” Bambi might be more receptive to giving up Rhetta if they could have the discussion Sam had planned in private. It could work out.
She hurried back to Bret’s to make sure he hadn’t come home for lunch to surprise her. Everything was as she’d left it. Tamping down her guilt, she plucked her keys out of the bowl by the front door and headed to the lot behind the building to her BMW.
She had to take the car, she rationalized, shifting into drive and flipping on her turn signal. It was the only way to go see Bambi, have their talk, pick up Rhetta, and still get back in time for her hearing. Bret would agree. Or at least understand.
She hoped.
Walking up Bambi’s front walk, Sam cast a worried glance at the Wiley house. Mr. Wiley, the old man she’d met the first day, liked to talk. She sure hoped he hadn’t talked to Bambi.
After suffering through two choruses of “Winter Wonderland,” Sam worried Bambi wasn’t home. Or, worse, what if Sean was in there with her?
Sam turned to leave as the front door opened.
At first, she didn’t recognize Bambi. Gone was the perfectly coiffed and made-up model type. Her hair was sticking out in frazzled-looking clumps around her swollen, tear-streaked face.
“Bambi? Are you okay?” Maybe she needed to go to the hospital.
In response, the taller woman threw her arms around Sam, practically buckling her knees, and wailed, “No, and I’ll never be all right again! My life is over!”
Fresh tears began soaking through Sam’s last clean turtleneck. “I’m sure it’s not that bad,” she said, awkwardly patting Bambi’s shoulder as she walked her backward into the foyer and closed the door.
Where was Rhetta? The dog was manic about barking and running to the door to greet visitors. That tendency made her a rotten watchdog because she’d never met anyone she didn’t like. Fortunately, due to her size, her bark was usually sufficient.
“Where’s…your dog?” Sam couldn’t bring herself to call Rhetta by another name, especially a lame one like Lassie.
Bambi looked up through teary eyes and sniffed. “Oh, don’t worry, she won’t bite.” She broke down again but regained control. “Poor baby won’t even come out of her little bed, her daddy scared her so much!”
Anger flared, but Sam fought it back. Sean may have been a lying, cheating sack of doo-doo, but even he wouldn’t hurt Rhetta. “What did, ah, he do?” Okay, she could not bring herself to call Sean Rhetta’s daddy. Even her deception had its limits.
Bambi’s blue eyes filled with tears. She took two giant sobs. “W-we broke up. He-he left me!”
It probably would have been crass to point out to Bambi how she’d dodged a bullet. Bambi was way too good for a guy like Sean. Heck, anybody was too good for a guy like Sean.
“I’m, ah, sorry?” She patted the sobbing Bambi again. “Is there anything I can do?” Say no. “I’m a pretty good listener.” Not that she really wanted to know, but maybe it would make Bambi more receptive to listening to her plead for Rhetta.
“I just made some coffee.” Bambi turned on her ridiculous high-heeled slippers and walked toward the back of the house, her brightly printed silk robe flowing out behind her.
Sam followed, glancing around as she went. Bric-a-brac and knickknacks covered every available surface. Sam had always preferred minimal decorating, and the sight of Bambi’s excess made her itch. How could Sean, who had professed to like Sam’s style, stand all the clutter? Then again, if Bambi was what he wanted, no wonder he’d left Sam.
Bambi finally got control of her tears after the first cup of the strongest coffee Samantha had ever tasted.
“Sean—that’s my boyfriend—well, my ex-boyfriend, I guess, now. Anyway, I thought…I thought—” She fanned her eyes while she shook her head. When she regained her composure, she continued, “I thought he loved me. He-he said he understood about me wanting to wait until my wedding night before—” She dissolved in unladylike sobs.
Sam reached across the tiny, cheerful yellow table and patted Bambi’s hand. “It’s okay. You don’t have to explain. I can fill in the blanks.”
“B-but when I told him the real reason I had to wait, he, he…left m—me!”
Crap, Sam thought, how could she take Rhetta away from Bambi at a time like this? It would be a double whammy, thanks to that rat-fink Sean.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
Speak of the devil.
Sean stood in the kitchen doorway, one arm braced on the doorjamb in a white-knuckled fist.
“Sean!” Bambi stood up, bosoms heaving.
Sam noticed they were also pretty impressive bosoms. Yet another reason Sean had left her for Bambi, no doubt.
“This is my friend, Samantha, and you have no right talking to her like that.”
Oh-oh. The jig was up. Sam inwardly cringed, waiting for Sean to tell Bambi exactly how he knew Sam.
“I should have known!” Sean bellowed, sneering in a most unattractive way. Really, what had she ever seen in him? “I’m just picking up the rest of my stuff, and then you two can be alone.”
What the hell did he mean by that? Did he think Sam had been so broken up over losing him she’d gone to the other side?
“Daddy,” Bambi whined in a sickeningly pathetic voice that made Sam want to tell her to shut up. “Please, come home. We can work it out. I love—”
“Shut the fuck up!” Sean drew back and punched Bambi square in the jaw, knocking her to the tiled floor.
“Sean!” Samantha scrambled up from the table, scanning the little kitchen for a weapon. “Since when do you hit women? She—”
Sean gave a derisive laugh. “Check under her skirt. She’s no woman. I’m outta here.”
After the front door slammed, Sam went to help a whimpering Bambi up. “Do you need a doctor?”
Bambi shook her head. “No, I know how to take a punch.” She grinned and winced, gingerly patting the little cut on the edge of her lip. After giving Sam a quick hug, she stepped back. “Thanks for coming over. Don’t look so worried. I’ll survive. I own my own home, have a career I love, and a town full of friends and family. And I have a great dog to love and take care of, so I can be thankful for that, can’t I? It’s best to find out about Sean now than after we married, right?”
Sam nodded. “Right. But…he said such mean, hateful things.”
“You mean about me not being a woman?” Bambi poured another cup of coffee.
Sam nodded.
Bambi took a delicate sip and sighed, dabbing an errant tear. “That’s the irony of it all. If he hadn’t pushed, hadn’t challenged me to prove my love, I would have been a woman before our wedding day. I had the hormone shots, the money saved, and the surgery date set.” She sighed again. “Don’t tell me you didn’t suspect? Samantha, think about it, there are very few women my size.”
“Um, do you plan on going through with the surgery now?” She couldn’t believe she was having this conversation.
“Of course! I’m still me, still trapped in the wrong body. The surgery was planned long before I even met Sean. I’m doing it for me, not for him or anyone else.”
“Well, good luck.” Sam took a step toward the door. “I was just worried when you weren’t at the Hair Hut when I went to meet you for lunch.”
“Do you still want to go to lunch? I can get changed and cleaned up.”
“Thanks, but I have to be somewhere at one. I’m going to be here for at least another day or so. How about a rain check?”
“Really?” Bambi smiled for the first time since Samantha had been there and then frowned. “You don’t have to, you know. I’m fine.”
“Well, I’m not. I may need a friend, not to mention a cheeseburger, after I talk to the judge. How about tomorrow?”
“It’s a date. Well, not a date, but—”
Sam laughed as she stepped onto the porch. “I know.”
Sam waved good-bye as she opened the car door. Still smiling, she slipped onto the leather seat of her car and turned the ignition.
Click. Click. The engine wouldn’t start.
Crap.
18
“Don’t be mad,” Sam said to a silent Bret as he drove. “I had to talk to Bambi.” She glanced at the muscle ticking in his jaw. “I thought you’d understand.”
“And I thought you understood the meaning of house arrest.” He glared across the Jeep at her. “What else have I been wrong about, Samantha?”
“Nothing!”
“Oh, that’s good, because I thought maybe I was wrong to think you cared enough about me, respected me and my authority enough, to stay where you promised you would stay.”
Ouch. “It has nothing to do with how I feel or don’t feel about you or even respect. If I get the charges dropped, I could leave Christmas this afternoon, tomorrow morning, tops. Don’t you see? I had to go talk to Bambi to try to get Rhetta.”
He arched a dark brow and looked pointedly around the Jeep. “How did that work out for you? I don’t see a dog.”
“Yeah, well, when I got there, Bambi was a basket case. Sean, scumbag that he is, had dumped her, and she was heartbroken.” She narrowed her eyes. “You don’t seem surprised. Wait. You said you grew up with Bambi. You knew. Why didn’t you tell me? You let me go on about everything and didn’t say a word.”
Bret navigated into a parking spot in front of the courthouse. “Wasn’t mine to tell.” He heaved a breath and turned off the ignition, turning to look at her. “Growing up, Bambi was Bill Donner. When our class saw the Bambi movie in first grade, he announced he wanted to change his name to Bambi.”
“That must’ve gone over well.”
“Actually, I don’t think any of us were all that surprised. The adults probably thought he’d grow up and forget about it. But by junior high, we all knew he was different. But he was also our friend.” He shrugged. “Bill deserves to be happy, and if being a woman named Bambi does that, that’s his business.”
“You know, I kind of get that,” she said as he helped her out of the car and they walked toward the courthouse. “A month ago, if I’d discovered Sean had left me for a transsexual, I would have considered it cosmic justice. But now…I feel sorry for Bambi.”
“So sorry you decided to let her keep your dog?” He held the door open for her and pointed to an elevator.
“Not quite. But I didn’t want to kick her while she was down. I’ll try again.”
“And when you get your dog back?” He removed his cowboy hat and nodded at the receptionist, who seemed a little too happy to see him. “Afternoon, Lissa. We have a meeting with Judge McVay? The Harrison case.”
Under The Covers Page 25