“They have the movement disorder in common.”
“Exactly.”
Luna wiped her eyes. She was crying, yes, but happy that it wasn’t blubbering. A silent, stoic steady leak from her eyes as she tried to process. “So…if this were me…back when I was his age…” She cleared her throat. “Would you have let me go?” Her father eyed her and actually touched the screen as if he could touch her. “Do you even have to ask, lightning bug?”
She shook her head no.
“It would have been very hard,” her mother said, trying to comfort her. She knew what Luna was feeling. “But yes, Luna. We would have let you do what you needed to. Just like as sad as you feel at seeing him leave for the summer, you know that he’s in good hands—“
“The best,” her father interjected.
“And you know you will honor his feelings. You always have.”
“Well…” She blew out a sigh and wiped her face with one sweeping motion. “Have plenty of beef jerky, Pepsi Throwback and kiwis on hand. He can eat them by the fistfuls.” She took a few minutes with her parents, going over things and getting herself together before calling Nick back to his room. She had no doubt he’d been eavesdropping. He was smart and sweet but nosey as hell. Just like his mother.
“I guess tomorrow you pack up.”
He hugged her a bit tighter than normal. She felt random tics and pops work through his body but nothing as severe as they had been. The meds were doing their thing. “I love you, Ma.”
“I love you, too, kid. Now I’m going to bed. And you should soon.”
“I will.”
“Soon!” she said, pointing.
“I will.”
“Lies!” she said, trying to leave the room on a light note. She heard him laugh as she went down the hall. Part of her heart broke just a little.
* * * * *
She didn’t tell Ben she’d dreamed of him when he came to check in on Nick. Nick was still sleeping. She didn’t mention that she’d relived their time together in her dreams. Or that she woke with trembling fingers and a fluttering heart on the verge of orgasm.
“You okay?”
She realized she was slamming her work clothes into the machine. Savannah had called to say the distributor had dropped their supplies at her house. They were good for the night as far as food, now it was just a matter of assembly. Some of the servers, who were regulars, were coming to chip in getting food ready. They’d give them a nice bonus to compensate.
“I’m fine. Last minute job tonight,” she sighed.
They were wedged in the small downstairs bathroom that served as half powder room, half laundry room. It also served as a place that prying ears couldn’t hear due to the confined space. She started the machine and leaned on it.
“So he’s going and you’re okay with it?”
She nodded, chewing her lip. “Okay is relative. But I understand he needs it and I won’t stop him.”
Ben ran his hand through his hair and smiled. “Then I’m on board too, Loo. You know me, I follow your lead.”
“I know.” Luna heard the tone in her voice—the slice of irrational anger directed at no one, really. Just the situation.
“You okay?”
She turned away from him, knowing her current urge wasn’t fair to her or him or Nick, if you got right down to it.
“Fine.” Her hands busied themselves folding a small basket of towels on the dryer. She folded them precisely in quick economical movements until he came up behind her. Ben tucked his chin on her shoulder and wrapped his arms around her, hugging her gently. His hands covered her hands and stilled them.
“Loo, it will be okay.” He squeezed her and she held her breath. Willing herself not to cry or cave or lash out.
“I know.” She forced the words out.
“No you don’t. You are just…vibrating with rage.”
She laughed, it was an ugly sound. Half sob, half laugh. “Am not.” Weak protest.
He chuckled, pressed his face to her hair. “You are. And it’s okay. Hey, kid, you’re the one here with him every day. You have to see it and deal with it and fret over it, constantly. I remember. I wish…” He shook his head, squeezed her once more before backing off. “I just remember is all. The stress is off the charts.”
She turned, suddenly, not letting herself think. The luxury of thinking was for people not feeling like this—this claustrophobic worry. “Is the door locked?” she asked it even as her mind told her no, no, no.
Ben looked confused, then realization flickered over his face and she got to see every nuance of his understanding. “I…are you…”
Luna slid past him and pushed the lock on the door. She tugged the knob once hard to make sure it was locked. When she turned to him she pushed her finger to his lips. “Shh.” And then he kissed her. Everything was in that kiss: anger, want, need, hope, sadness.
Ben pushed her back until her ass hit the vibrating washing machine and she felt the tumbling vibration of the machine in her pussy. It sidled up right next to her lust for Ben.
“Kiss me,” she murmured even as he kissed her.
“I am.”
“Kiss me… more. Harder, deeper… bigger.” Ben put his hand to the back of her head, cradling it. Holding her—stabilizing her…which was what she so desperately craved. His other hand trapped the small of her back and he held her still, kissed her so all she could focus on were his lips to her lips.
“Fuck me. Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me,” she whispered, pulling at his button and his zipper.
“You’re going to spoil me, Loo.”
“I just…I need it,” she confessed. “And I trust you.” That confession felt bigger than the other.
“I know, Loo.” He pushed up her worn and stretched out UCLA tee and sucked a bare nipple into his mouth. Luna gasped, stilled, waited, as he painted her skin with warm wet strokes of tongue on flesh.
“Get these off,” she said, pushing at his waistband.
“Hold on,” he muttered, moving slowly—maddeningly slow—on to the other nipple. He bit her and she jumped. Shock warring with the anger that had taken up residence in her gut. It felt good. That startled moment of pain brushing up against pleasure.
“Yes,” she sighed.
“You always did like a bite or two.”
He hiked her up. She had lost weight and it made it even easier for Ben, who stood a head taller than her, to pick her up and drop her ass on the vibrating white machine. His fingers yanked her pajama bottoms and she thrust her hips up to help him. Beneath the cotton pants she was bare and he stopped, simply looking at her for a moment.
“Don’t wait, don’t wait…” She reached for him.
Ben batted her hand away. “Just wait, Loo.”
He pushed his fingers to her pussy lips, traced them. Luna’s body undulated under his touch, automatically seeking out more of the contact that was making her nerve endings sing. His fingers drove into her and she sighed, feeling an urgency build in her chest much like fury. But a tiny bit softer.
“No more,” she grunted, shoving her hips forward to envelop his fingers.
“I know you’re mad—”
“Fuck me.”
“I know you have a lot going on inside of you—”
“Fuck me.”
“But give me one moment to enjoy you.”
She shut up for him. Let him slide his fingers deep inside and flex them so she hummed softly—her noise barely audible above the rumbling washing machine. Then he leaned in, kissed her and said, “Okay, Loo?”
“Okay.”
He took his time, took his sweet time, getting into her. Trailing the tip of his cock from the swollen knot of her clitoris down over the drenched slit of her cunt all the way back to her ass. Then back up—a slow drag in time that had her shimmying on the hood of the washing machine—until he was level. When she surged up to meet him, to force him in, he let her. Then he was in and she was kissing him, using her teeth roughly and more often than he
r tongue.
She thought she tasted blood, but Luna wasn’t sure whose, so she gripped his broad shoulders in her clutching hands and held him while they fucked. Ben was well accustomed to being with her and found her chaotic desperate rhythm easily. Shoving his forearms under her knees so she tilted back on her tailbone, open to him as he thrust. Her legs draped over the crook of his elbows as he moved and he bent his head to grasp her taut nipple between his teeth.
He bit her—yes a bit too hard—hard enough to make her tremble and she came. A heavy, sudden orgasm that rocked her back on her precarious balance. She started to cry out, but Ben hushed her and she clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle her sounds.
“Don’t wake the baby,” he said in a sly whisper making it all come flooding back to her.
How they had been as young parents. How very in love they’d been. A lifetime ago, yet just yesterday.
“Oh, God. Oh, Ben, I’m sorry…”
And then she was sobbing. Crying. Great giant gasping breaths because she was using him really. Using him to get off. To move past the hurt and the pain that she couldn’t pin on any one person.
“It’s okay.” He smoothed her hair and let her wrap her legs around his waist. He moved more gently, the motion of their coupling a bit more lulling as she cried it out, still clutching at him but in an entirely different way.
“I’m using you.”
“And I’m using you,” he said, his fingers biting into the meat of her ass as he rocked against her.
Her cunt, slick and plump, grew tighter and tighter with the friction and she knew she’d come again. Knew she had it in her to release all this pent up emotion one more time if he let her.
And he would.
“We’re using each other,” she sighed.
“Because it’s safe and we can.”
When he kissed her, the tears built again but didn’t come. They just sat there under the surface, a deep throbbing pressure in her head as she moved up to meet him. Luna clenched her internal muscles and felt the warm flex of her orgasm start to overtake her.
“Jesus, I forgot how well you do that,” he said, his fingers bruising her flesh.
“Come for me, Ben,” she sighed into his ear. And she clenched again. Milking him greedily as her peak overtook her and the spasms pulled her down, down, down into the pain-tainted pleasure.
Ben came with her, saying once, fast and soft, in her ear, “It’ll be okay.” Chapter Four
“Shrimp puffs, shrimp puffs, where are the fucking shrimp puffs?” Luna muttered.
Nick was home and would be through the weekend. But then he was leaving and it was weighing heavy on her mind. She felt the frazzled surges of anxiety that shot through her every few minutes as surely as tremors after an earthquake.
“Take a deep breath, baby cakes,” Savannah said in her ear.
“I never should have said yes to this.”
“You’re fine. It’s got nothing to do with the job. Everything to do with what’s up with you, babe.” Savannah put her hand on Luna’s lower back and made soothing circles.
“You are a good friend.” Luna let the words come out in a rush of air.
“You too.”
“Thank you. I’ll be fine. Don’t worry.”
“You sure?”
“I’m sure,” Luna said, laughing. “I found the fucking shrimp puffs.” Savannah grinned. “Good. I’m going to go find those salmon, dill, pumpernickel things.”
“Salmon dill bites,” Luna corrected.
“Right, those.”
“I’m going to find the rest of the food and figure out how she wants it set up. Buffet and servers, Just servers. Just buffet. Small staggered tables.”
“Or a partridge in a pear tree,” Savannah sang.
“Right.”
Savannah was hurrying away and Luna remembered the cheese straws. Possibly the most delicate item they ever served. They had to be handled gently getting them onto the serving trays.
Once they were festively displayed, all was well. If a patron broke them grabbing them off the platter that was their fault.
“Cheese straws!” she blurted to herself and turned quickly. She bounced off a large man in a white shirt and black pants. And his tray went flying, covering her feet with none other than…”Shrimp puffs,” Luna sighed.
“Jeeze, lady,” he growled and bent to gather the mess.
“Lady!” She snapped, hating the tone in her voice but seemingly unable to stop it.
“That’s boss lady to you, Mr.…?”
He blinked and then grinned at her. That grin went right to the center of her. It made her shift, as if she could avoid the pulsing attraction that had taken up residence in her belly. And lower.
“Adam,” he said. “Adam Singleton.”
When he shook her hand she felt her pulse race a bit. The touch of his skin to hers was beyond normal contact. It was hot yet cold, soft yet rough. It was a million sensations swirled into one blink-of-the-eye moment.
And now you have officially gone off your rocker…
“Right. Adam. Well, let’s get you a new tray.”
“Yes, boss lady. Let’s.”
Christ.
She found him a new tray and wiped it down with shaking hands. A nice white doily and she was ready to pass it off. But not ready to turn and face the bulk of the man standing close behind her.
“Ready for me?” His voice was softer than at first because he was close.
God, yes. Distract me, big boy…
A riotous burble of laughter tried to burst out of her, and Luna managed to bite her lip and tamp it down. “We need to find you some more…” Her mind went blank. “Puffs,” she finally managed. “More shrimp puffs.”
They moved to the oven station where he helped her lay out clusters of golden brown puff pastry. “I’m sorry I snapped at you,” he said.
“I’m sorry I threw boss at you,” she laughed. “And by the way, welcome. You’re clearly new here and have saved our asses from the fire by coming in to work.”
“And you’ve saved mine by giving me a job earning some dough for rent. Right now, the construction company I work for is in court. No new jobs for us until it’s settled.” She cleared her throat and finally dared to look at him. Six foot two, or in that range, dark blue eyes the color of unwashed denim. But they have an amazing ring of dark green around the iris… She shook off the rogue thought and continued to assess him. Hair the color of damp sand at the shore. He was broad without being too big. He was lean without being ropey. A body that came from hard work, not repetitions at the gym.
“You okay?” He touched her arm and she felt a wave of heated lust wash up to her shoulders, invade her neck, settle into her chest. And parts of her much lower than that.
“I’m fine. I’m just…um…Hey! I’m glad we could help you out. Sorry about your job.
We have more coming up, and if you do well maybe we can put you on the roster.” So you can distract the fuck out of me and make me stammer…
He smiled. It was a crooked smile that was half little boy, half evil prince. A mixed bag, for sure.
“That would be awesome.” He stared. It was unsettling. He simply stared at her, taking her in, his intelligent eyes studying her from top to toe and then back again.
“Good…um…Adam. Good!”
“Luna!” They both turned to see Savannah pin wheeling her arms. “Any day now. The guests are starting to arrive and they want shrimp puffs!” She pumped her arm and Luna couldn’t do anything but laugh.
Adam touched her again and the laugh died in her throat. When he squeezed, her pussy clenched in time with his grip. This was bad.
“Thanks again. And sorry again. And off I go. I have shrimp puff lovers I need to go satisfy.”
And with that, he was off with a confident stride and his tray held high. A study in black and white and handsome man.
It didn’t take Alice Brown, their emergency prone hostess, to corner Luna. A clutch of shrimp
puff and eggrolls in her slim fingered hand.
“Oh, my darling, do tell me who the studly new server is.” Her mousy hair was done in unflattering braids giving her the appearance of an aged school girl. Not a good look for anyone.
Luna shrugged. “I have no clue. It’s his first time. We have a server out on maternity leave and we needed someone. I can only assume one of our regular crew asked him to pitch in.”
“My, my. He does fill out those black trousers nicely,” Alice crooned.
No shit Sherlock…
Luna found herself biting her tongue again to keep a fresh burble of laughter at bay. She really needed to find a way to get more sleep. It had not come willingly since Nick’s ticcing had started up again. But she could feel herself sliding that sharp silver edge of hysteria at times—so she had to do something. Even if it was a PM labeled pain reliever at night.
“I think he’d make a stunning addition to your roster,” Alice cooed.
Luna smiled. “Just to look at, even,” she said and then bit her lip. Had she said that aloud?
“Exactly!” Alice said patting her hand. “And thanks to you, as always, for saving my skinny old butt when it comes to these last minute soirees I put on. I couldn’t do it without you.” You got that right…
But the woman paid top dollar so who was Luna to complain.
“I’d better go make sure the trays are full,” she said, moving toward the kitchen of the office building.
“You’d also better get a date with that new one and then share all the gory details with me.”
Luna found herself casting a glance at Adam and repressing a sigh. If only. She smiled at Alice. “I’ll give it a shot.”
She’d do no such thing.
“Better go,” she said again, and Alice waved a thin hand at her.
“Shoo. Shoo.”
Luna hit the kitchen almost running. What a zoo! She felt overheated and apprehension suddenly clawed at her chest. She couldn’t catch a breath and when Savannah looked up from dressing a tray, Luna pointed to the door that led outside.
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