Sex Machine: A Standalone Contemporary Romance

by Force,Marie

  “You were right. He’s all that and a bag of chips.”

  “He’s all that and ten bags of chips.”

  “Agreed.”

  “So you had the big O?”

  “I think I had eight big Os. I lost count.”

  “Shut the front door! Eight? Holy shit, Honey!”

  “I’m so sore, I can’t move, and I’m shooting twins today.” I groan at the thought of the workout awaiting me. My job is very physical when I’m shooting one baby. Two will about kill me today.

  Lauren snickers. “So The Cock lived up to its reputation.”

  “The Cock is a battering ram. My poor va-jay-jay will never be the same.”

  “I remember that. The day after the first time was like losing my V card all over again. Hurt like hell. But after a while, I suppose you get used to it.”

  “I can’t imagine ever getting used to that.”

  “Well, Blake being Blake, you probably won’t get the chance to get used to it. He’s becoming more remote all the time. I worry about him—as a friend,” she quickly adds. “Did he say anything about getting together again?”

  “Not really,” I say, recalling the conversation in his bedroom when he convinced me to spend the night.

  Lauren sighs loudly. “I have a confession to make…”

  “What?”

  “When I encouraged you to proposition him, I was hoping to kill two birds with one stone.”

  “How so?”

  “I wanted you to finally get properly and thoroughly laid, and I was sort of hoping you might be just what he needs, someone he’s known forever who he can trust to let go a little with.”

  “Yeah, well, he let go all right, but it was all sex and nothing more than a few moments of nostalgia about the playground years.”

  “What about the playground?”

  “He used to pinch me and make me cry, which he pretended to not remember, but of course he totally did. He said he pinched me because he liked me. Boys are so weird, and they grow up to be even weirder men.”

  “He’s one of the good ones.” Lauren’s expression is sadder than I’ve seen it since my Gran died. “Losing Jordan messed him up permanently. It’s like he’s broken on the inside or something. It’s such a waste of a good man. He’d be a wonderful husband and father if only he could find a way to forgive himself for something that wasn’t even his fault.”

  “It is sad,” I agree. “He’s a good guy who deserves better than the hand he was dealt by fate.”

  “You didn’t… You know… Start to think…”

  “No! I told you I wouldn’t, and I didn’t. It was just sex. I know that. He knows that. One and done.”

  “Oh good. Phew. I was worried all night that you’d get so wrapped up in The Cock’s magic spell that you’d forget.”

  “The Cock’s magic spell.” I sputter with laughter at her terminology.

  “Is it or is it not a magical cock?”

  “It’s quite magical in the moment. The day after?” I switch positions and nearly gasp from the shock of almost painful arousal that refuses to quit, even hours after I left his house. “Not so magical.”

  “A hot bath with Epsom salts. That’s what you need.”

  I nearly moan at the thought of my tortured lower half soaking in hot water, knowing I’m hours away from being able to do it.

  “I’ll drop some stuff off on your porch on my way home. It’ll fix you right up.”

  “You’re the best friend ever, but I blame you for my current predicament.”

  “Your pre-dick-ament. Ha-ha. You loved every second of it. Admit it.”

  “I really did.”

  “I knew it!”

  “It was like a light went on or something. I finally get why everyone else goes nuts over it.”

  “Praise the Lord. She’s seen the light.”

  “Yes, I have.”

  “So why do you seem so bummed? I thought you’d be all euphoric and glowy today, but you’re not.”

  “Glowy?”

  “After eight orgasms, there ought to be a bit of a glow to you.”

  “I’m not bummed. I’m…” I can lie to some people. Lauren isn’t one of them. “Okay, maybe I’m a little bummed.”

  “Why?”

  “Don’t get mad at me when I say I’m sad that all it can ever be is what happened last night. I knew that going in. You warned me. I warned myself. He even warned me. But that doesn’t stop me from wishing things were different, that he was different.”

  She blanches. “Honey, you promised me!”

  I hold up a hand to stop her from going off. “I know I did, and I still know the score. I only wish it didn’t have to be this way. That’s all. He’s so…”

  “Perfect in every way except for the hole in his chest where his heart used to be?”

  I sputter with laughter at her spot-on description, but just as quickly, my laughter turns to tears because it’s so true. I bitterly resent the tears.

  “Oh, Honey.” She gets up and comes around the desk to hug me. “I told you not to do this. I told you!”

  “I’m not doing it. I’m having a teeny, tiny pity party that will last an hour and a half max, and then I’m moving on. I swear.”

  “All right.” She sighs again as she pats my hair like the mother hen she is where I’m concerned. As a girl whose mother left her at a church to be raised by strangers, I drink in all the mothering I can get. “I suppose I can allow that after what you experienced last night.”

  She stays for a little while, long enough for me to mostly get myself together before my clients show up with a clatter and a bang and the ringing of the bells on the door. Why do they always make so much noise when they arrive?

  “Showtime,” Lauren whispers. “Are you okay?”

  “I will be. Losing myself in work for a few hours will help.” I call out to let the clients know I’ll be right with them.

  “I’ll see you at Julie’s party tonight, right?”

  “What? That’s tonight?”

  “Yes, you dummy,” she says, laughing. “You knew this. We talked about going in on a gift for her two days ago, before you had your brain pickled by The Cock.”

  “Oh my God! He’s friends with Matt! He’ll be there! I can’t see him! It’s too soon.”

  “You have to go, Honey. Julie is one of your best friends, and Blake will be a perfect gentleman. You know he will.”

  This conversation is being conducted in loud whispers so my clients won’t overhear us.

  “How will I ever look at him again and not think about that weapon he has in his pants?”

  Lauren is laughing so hard, tears fill her eyes. “The same way the rest of us who’ve experienced the weapon do—we don’t look down. No matter what, don’t look down.”

  “Don’t look down. I can do that.” I tell her what she wants to hear, but honestly, I’m wondering how I’ll look anywhere but down when I see him again. That party is going to be pure torture.

  I wake up alone and feel oddly disappointed that she’s gone. Disappointment isn’t something I normally feel after a night with a hot woman, but Honey isn’t just any hot woman. She’s a friend, too, and our shared history makes her different. That’s exactly why I usually stay away from sleeping with women I grew up with in Marfa. I know them too well, but when a woman like Honey walks into a bar and asks me to fuck her, well, I’m only human, and she’s a freaking goddess.

  I’ve always thought so, even in high school when I was in love with Jordan and planning to spend my life with her. Honey was the untouchable queen of all things Marfa High School—homecoming queen, prom queen, cheerleading captain. In other words, off-limits to mere mortals. And that was fine with me. From tenth grade on, I was completely enthralled by Jordan and didn’t give a thought to being with any other girl the way I was with her.

  We were going to get married right after high school and have four babies—every two years for eight years. And then, when they were grown, we would trav
el and see the world. All our plans were shattered the afternoon a semi ran a stop sign, killing her instantly and injuring me so badly, I spent a month in ICU. For a time, the doctors told my parents to prepare for the worst.

  I survived, but I’ve never been the same. I miss Jordan every day and have never stopped thinking about what might’ve been for us. I have no memory of the crash itself, but I have vivid nightmares in which my brain imagines what it must’ve been like, forcing me to relive the horror over and over again. That’s one reason why I rarely spend the night with a woman. Do I need the whole town talking about Blake Dempsey’s pathetic night terrors?

  That wouldn’t be good for business, the one area of my life that’s actually satisfying and successful, and I intend to keep it that way.

  It’s weird to feel disappointed about waking up alone when I wake up alone every day of my life and wouldn’t have it any other way. Like Honey said, I never bring women home with me anymore. It’s too messy when I want them to leave and can’t think of any other way to get them out but to ask them to go. They’re all the same. They all hope they’re going to be the one to fix Blake Dempsey’s broken heart.

  What they don’t know is my heart shattered the day Jordan was killed, and it doesn’t exist anymore as anything other than an organ that pumps blood. It doesn’t feel anything. It took three years after Jordan died for me to have sex with someone else, and that was a total cluster fuck. I broke down into pathetic sobs that scared the hell out of the poor girl I’d chosen to get me back on the horse.

  Thank goodness that happened during my brief stint at UT Austin, far enough away from Marfa that no one who mattered ever heard about it. A year after that, I got totally wasted with a girl in a bar and did it again, this time without the histrionics. I declared myself cured and got back on the horse in a big way with a different woman any time I wanted one, all of them knowing the score before they went to bed with me—one night and one night only.

  My system-wide numbness makes for a drama-free, peaceful existence most of the time. I mean, it’s not every day that a woman like Honey propositions me in a bar, and she more than lived up to the nickname her Gran gave her by calling her “Honey” for her entire childhood. Her real name is Evelyn, but no one has ever called her anything other than Honey.

  Now I know she tastes like the sweetest honey I’ve ever had, and hours after I last touched her, I can still taste her on my lips and smell her scent in my bed. Am I really lying here on a rare free Saturday thinking about a woman? Yeah, I guess I am, probably because I’m surprised that a guy as jaded as I am can still have his world rocked once in a while.

  She rocked me by walking into a bar so far below her usual hangout, it’s not even in her stratosphere. She rocked—and shocked—me with what she said. And then she totally rocked me with how she responded to me. It’s no secret that Honey Carmichael has dated her way through many of the single guys under forty in Marfa, so it was interesting to discover how innocent she really is underneath her smooth, sophisticated veneer.

  I never would’ve guessed, for example, that she’s never been spanked or had her ass played with or come as hard as she did many times last night. Just thinking about the squeeze of her pussy around my cock makes me hard. She was so small and tight, and it was such a battle to enter her—a battle I loved all three times I coaxed her into trying.

  Wrapping my hand around my cock, I stroke from base to tip, nice and slow as I relive the night with Honey, from the second she uttered those unforgettable words in the bar to the third time I came inside her. I wonder if she’s sore today, if she’s thinking about me the way I’m thinking about her, if she’d want do it again if she were still here…

  I close my eyes, remembering the way her big, round breasts heaved with every deep thrust of my cock. God, I loved watching them move and the way her nipples dragged against my chest. I’m starting to feel the telltale tingle at the base of my spine, and I’m dripping pre-cum onto my hand, but that makes the up-and-down slide easier and hotter.

  I don’t want to come yet, so I slow it down and recall her shock when I fingered her ass. No one had ever touched her there, and I take a perverse thrill in knowing I was the first. I let my mind wander to what it’d be like to fuck her there, how she’d writhe and grunt and scream when I forced my way past the tight ring of muscle that would try to keep me out.

  I’d have us both so slick with lube that I’d be able to push into her until my balls are tucked up against her pussy and she’s taken the widest part of my cock. I’d keep her coming the whole time so she’d be in a hot frenzy, unable to do anything other than take me over and over and over again until I come deep inside the most private part of her.

  I picture her ass stretching to accommodate me, and that’s all it takes to send me over the edge, the hot splash of my release covering my abdomen and flooding my hand. I’m gasping from how hard I came, almost as hard as I did with her during the night.

  It was good with her, I concede as my heart rate and breathing slow to normal. The best sex I’ve had since Jordan died, if I’m being honest with myself. It was comforting being with someone I’ve known all my life, someone who knew me before I lost Jordan and who still cares about me, even though I’ve given her no reason to.

  And then it occurs to me that tonight is the surprise party for Julie’s thirtieth birthday. Julie is one of Honey’s lifelong friends, and Matt is one of mine. As I get out of bed and head for the shower, I try to pretend that my lifeless heart didn’t give a happy little jolt at knowing I’ll get to see her again later.

  I can’t wait.

  Chapter Five

  The shoot is a disaster from the get-go, with two cranky babies and parents who try to micromanage every aspect. I want to tell the parents to come back in an hour, but I can’t do that, so I put up with them, nodding in the right places while doing it my way in the end. My way is what people come from all over for.

  Before I had the idea for my Desert Babies series, my studio was on the verge of bankruptcy. People don’t hire photographers the way they did before the digital age brought do-it-yourself photography into vogue. Weddings were the backbone of my business until the bridal magazines started touting candid photos taken by guests as an alternative to one of the biggest expenses—the photographer. Don’t even get me started on what cameras built into smartphones did to my already struggling business.

  I’d begun to panic about how I’d survive if the studio went under when I stumbled upon the idea for the Desert Babies, quite by accident, late one night when flipping through a magazine that featured Anne Geddes’s distinctive baby photos. Then I moved on to a local magazine that had photos of the desert outside Marfa, the rolling hills of West Texas and the wild vegetation. The two things had come together to give me the idea that I began implementing the next day by designing props and costumes and backdrops that plopped the babies into the environment in clever and inviting ways.

  After I posted the first shots to my Facebook page, the idea was an immediate hit, with word-of-mouth publicity bringing in clients from all over the state. It surpassed my wildest dreams, and I have a waiting list a month out. However, the success of my idea means I spend a lot of time with babies who are often less than accommodating of my vision and that of their harried parents.

  Today is one of the worst shoots I’ve had since I started the program a year ago. The mom is a total pain in the ass with her endless demands. The dad is a useless doormat who does whatever she tells him to do, and the babies… Well, I hate to say this about innocent children, but they aren’t photogenic. It happens sometimes, and I’m usually able to make lemonade from lemons. I do what I can with these two and have my “money” shots in the first hour, not that the mom will hear that. She forces us through two more interminable hours, after which her twins are in full-on meltdown mode, and I’m wishing I kept vodka on hand in the studio.

  By the time they finally leave, I’m feeling almost as sorry for the kids who have
to grow up with her as I feel for myself, having lost three hours I’ll never get back dealing with her. My body hurts so badly I can barely walk as I leave the studio two hours before Julie’s surprise party and head home to the house my Gran left me when she died.

  I adore the thirties-era Craftsman that Gran lovingly restored over the years, one room at a time, until every inch of the two-thousand-square-foot home gleamed with new floors, paint and windows, some of which are stained-glass beauties she found at antique stores and yard sales.

  She went with desert landscaping outside so we wouldn’t have to mow grass in the heat of the summer. Cactus and gravel require very little upkeep. Gran was right about that, but then again, she was right about most things. It took me four years after she died to move into the larger master bedroom suite that I will always think of as hers, but she disliked nothing more than pointless sentiment, and she would’ve protested me being squashed into my tiny bedroom when her much larger one was going unused.

  Lauren helped me make the room my own and mopped up my tears when I finally got around to packing up Gran’s things and donating her clothing to the needy, which she would’ve loved. She was forever giving away money she didn’t have to help people who were less fortunate than she was, not to mention taking in a baby abandoned at the church and raising her as her own.

  I kept her good jewelry along with photographs of her parents, siblings and cousins, all of whom predeceased her. They were the closest thing to family that I’ve ever had, even if I never met any of them. I count those photographs and the ones I have of her among my most prized possessions.

  I limp onto the porch, where I find that Lauren has come through with a basket of Epsom salts and other bath products. I moan with anticipation of sinking into Gran’s cast-iron, claw-foot tub. Because this day has been a total bitch, I fix myself a tall glass of wine and a plate of crackers, cheese and grapes to tide me over until the party.