by Aliza Mann
And a sex joke. Things were definitely looking up. “Sure you can. It’ll be a few hours before dinner since I have to thaw the entrée, so we’ll need to find something to occupy our time.” I walked over to the freezer and took out the package of farm-raised, grass-fed organic beef, then placed it in the sink.
“Is that an invitation?” I didn’t even need to look at him to know he had a lecherous smirk on his face.
“To Uno. I have a new deck of cards that someone at work gave me. White elephant gift for Christmas, so they thought. I actually love Uno, so the joke was on them. Anyway, I’ve never played with them and you seem like the perfect victim…I mean, competitor.”
“Who told you I can’t play? I could be a literal Uno savant, so don’t be so arrogant. Who would have known you were such a card shark?”
“You learn something new every day. Set ’em up, loser,” I chided.
The cards were in the junk kitchen drawer. I grabbed them and slid them over the counter to Ash, who took them into the living room. Before I headed out, I grabbed a bottle of wine and some fruit from the counter for us to snack on before dinner. The sun was setting outside, casting an orangish glow over the living room and kitchen. In the sun, Ashton’s highlights in his hair were vibrant as I approached him from behind. The subtle variances were alive with a riot of colors. I took my seat in front of him, on the floor at my coffee table, and poured our modest glasses of wine.
With a wink, Ash began to shuffle the deck with the same ease he had as he made his way through life. Until his minor breakdown about his father, I hadn’t known he had deep feelings about anything. He was always as light as a summer breeze. Until then. When he went down, he went down hard. It had been horrible to watch, and even worse in the aftermath. But he was on the upswing. For that, I was thankful.
I picked up my seven cards and arranged them by color in my hand. Not a single draw four card to be found, but I had two Wilds, a yellow Skip, and two red Draw twos. I would easily kick his ass. He flipped the top card from the deck and revealed a red eight.
“On you, Terra.”
“Yup,” I said, pulling a wild card from my hand. “The color is red.”
I took a sip of my wine and watched as he thought on it for a moment before laying down a coveted Draw four card.
“The color is blue,” he said. Then he laid a blue six back on top from his hand.
“Bringing out the big guns early, huh? Amateur.” I was attempting to blush, trying to make him believe I had more than I actually did in my hand.
“Well, I want to win. Let’s say we make it a little interesting. If you win, you can make whatever soft meal of your choosing.”
“And if you win?” I took another sip from my glass. There was no way I would take a bet from him without knowing all the rules.
“I get to play with my favorite toy,” he said with a lick of his lips.
A quiver ran over me, and the sheer force of it would have buckled my knees if I had been standing. I hadn’t had sex with Ashton since the morning of the thing. While I had known he was recovering, it had been exceedingly difficult to resist his advances and my thoughts of him doing all sorts of things to me, and me to him. I collected my four cards from the deck with a nod and said, “Okay. You’re on.” A part of me wanted to forfeit the game just so I could feel him inside me once more. But where was the fun in that?
I laid a blue two I’d just collected on top of his last thrown card. Then he hit me with a Draw two. “Go on, my dear. And remember, first I spank you in the game and then I have plans for a different type of spanking.”
“You are so messy. I have a need for you, I’m going to win.” I added a little force to the words, playfully letting him know I had my own tricks up my sleeve, even if I didn’t.
After I took my two cards, he laid down a Wild, changing the color to yellow, a color that wasn’t in my hand at the time. Ugh. The game went faster then. I skipped him with my yellow card, a few more of the same in various colors from my recent selections from the deck, ending with a red Skip. Then laid my two Draw twos on top of them all.
“Oh, look at you with the cards dwindling,” he said, picking up four cards from the deck.
“Scared?”
“Never scared.”
“Okay, then,” I said, laying down a red eight. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”
Our game went on, the position of power ebbing and flowing between the two of us. Until we were down to each of us with only a couple of cards. I had a Draw four finally and a red six. I could easily win on my next round. Ash had no poker face and I could see he wasn’t faring as well. He laid out his card. A red two, with trepidation.
“Uno,” he said nervously.
I had a choice to make. Either hit him with the Draw four and win the game or let him win. Technically, I owed him one, considering I called his father, had nearly given him a concussion the day we’d met, and had gotten him shot. I laid out the Draw four, because to hell with letting him win. I was a feminist after all. “Uno, the color is red, uno out.” I called out the actions as I was supposed to when ending the game and laid my final card on the table, thus soundly spanking his ass.
“Come on, seriously? I almost died for you and this is how you treat me?” He was nearly pouting.
“What kind of woman would I be if I let you beat me? Besides, you made my terms and didn’t even ask me what I actually wanted if I won.”
He stared at me quizzically, then the gentle laugh came. “And what would that be?”
“You laid out on your back while I take full advantage of you. You’ve got what I need, Ashton. And I’ll even make the beef after. How about it?” I asked, trying hard to keep my serious expression.
He stood, his transition from seated to standing looked considerably easier than on previous days. “Damn. I’d had my heart set on being in absolute control of your lovely body, Terra. But I guess, if you won fair and square, it’s your world. Do with me what you will.”
It was my turn to stand. I walked over to him and wrapped my arms around his waist, yanking him close to me. “You need help with all those clothes,” I whispered.
“I do. Please…” he said, leaning in and positively capturing my mouth with his. He hadn’t drunk any of the wine, so he still tasted of the spearmint gum he’d been chewing earlier. I ran my fingers up his muscle-rippled back and dug my nails in as they made their way back down.
The audible wince was mixed with a groan of pleasure. Lifting his shirt, I waited for him to release me before pulling it over his head. The absence in my mouth was immediately felt and I went back to my original position, pressing my body against his naked flesh and drew him closer. He kissed me again, which came with a surge of desire that radiated from my core outward, slowly overtaking every part of me. The only reason I stopped, the only way to make myself stop, was remembering we were still dressed. Under normal circumstances, I would have been content to let myself linger in the kiss. But it wasn’t normal, by any stretch of the imagination. I felt like someone who’d been deprived of water, standing in front of an endless supply.
I pulled back and stripped in front of him, leaving only my bra and panties on. He drank me in, eyes full of lustful need as he stared at all the black lace. “You look amazing,” he growled.
All the healthy eating had helped to tighten up a few things and I enjoyed the fact that he’d noticed. I had been careful not to be in the buff when we lay together during his recovery, so it was possibly the first time he’d seen me naked in a few weeks. Reaching behind my back, I undid the bra and allowed the flimsy fabric to drop to the floor. Instead of going for my panties, I stepped forward again and opened the button of his pants.
Ash reached out and seized one of my nipples, rolling the taut tip of it between his fingers. The powerful surge ran through my body, making me quake and nearly come just from the contac
t. We remained silent, even if our need for each other was nearly a physical presence in the room. Heat radiated from him as I carefully slid his jeans down his legs. His cock was rod straight and barely moved as I pulled out the elastic of his boxers and moved it around his manhood.
With the ease of a man who hadn’t been shot less than two months before, he pulled me up onto his chest, my feet leaving the ground, and instinctively my legs went around his waist. He backed up, taking me with him, and sat on the couch.
“Are you on…something? I mean, I haven’t got any condoms or…”
“I think I would have known if you were a threat to me since I’ve seen all your medical records. And yes, yes I’m on the pill,” I whispered, leaning down to kiss him again.
“If you’re sure, we can—”
“Ashton, I don’t think I could leave you to even go get something. So please, I need to feel you inside me this instant,” I purred against his mouth.
“Umph…” was all he managed before I surged forward, pressing my mouth into his, raised my hips, and positioned myself over his shaft. I slid onto him, my body adjusting to accommodate his size, every inch of him erect and hard going inside me.
When I reached the bottom, I sat from a moment, enjoying the fullness, the heat of him deep in my core. Gripping my hair, he pulled my head back and licked me down my neck, then onto my breasts, taking hold of my nipple and sucking in hard. I shivered, lifting my hips again and savoring the force of his mouth on my flesh, then drove myself onto him again and again. The desperate need urging me to go faster, riding him as he moaned and suckled me harder and harder. His hands were on my ass, gripping my cheeks and spreading them as he urged me to collide against him.
Cool waves started in the pit of my stomach, crashing against me and radiating out and over my entire body. The shudder was so hard my teeth clacked against one another, followed by another shudder, my body convulsing as I began to release what had been pent up for far too long. I tightened on his cock as he swelled inside me.
His fingers ground into my hips, holding me in place as he lifted his body and took control. He pressed upward, his manhood driving into me, spearing me, the hard slapping sound filling the air.
With a flip, he was on top of me. “My turn,” he growled as he carefully maneuvered around his stiff side. I positioned myself, and instead of entering me once more, he kissed me down my body. “I meant what I said…that day, Terra. And in the days after. I think it’s safe to say, you’re mine now,” he said between lingering kisses and gentle bites on my flesh. But I heard him and sank into the couch, riding the erotic pulses shooting through my body.
“And you’re mine,” I whispered.
Ash was kneeling over me when he opened my legs wide and his fingers sank into my folds, dipping and playing as my body reacted to his touch. “You bet your sweet ass, love,” he said. I was blinded with pleasure as his mouth latched on to my nib and suckled, his tongue rolling over the sensitive flesh until I could barely contain myself.
I grabbed at him, handfuls of hair in my fists as I pressed his mouth closer and still impossibly closer to my body. I ground out the weeks of nervous energy, the fear, the worry in that moment, seeking a final release from all the building pressure.
The next round of orgasms exploded within me. I rocked against his teeth, his tongue, trembling as weeks of frustration seemed to pour out of me.
I pulled myself up to him, wrapped my arms around his neck, pressed my mouth onto his, and kissed him. He inserted his manhood once more and sank into me, my body seizing as heat, pleasure, and passion nearly overtook all my senses once again. The ride intensified, his mouth on mine and his groans mingling with my cries of ecstasy and release. I felt him swell inside me, his cock rod-hard as if he was just as hungry for me as I for him. I cried out his name as he gripped my hair, pulling with such an erotic force that my head was back exposing my neck. He licked down it, kissing and biting. “I love you, Terra,” he said, his body keeping rhythm with the words.
“I love…I love you,” I said, tears building in the corners of my eyes as another wave took me down, down into the abyss of longing and desire.
The heat of his release filled me as his body jerked to a stop, corded muscles rippling as he held me in place. I quivered around him, my body, my core, my legs, every part of me reacting to the awakening surge of energy. I was left spent as every drop of my strength drained from me.
Ashton laid me down, his torso atop mine, onto the couch. We remained a tangle of limbs as he planted quick kisses on my lips, down my neck to my chest, and back again. “I could do that every day for the rest of my life.”
“Me, too,” I whispered despite the ripple of fear that ran through me. I worried that he didn’t mean it. That he was simply grateful for my kindness.
“I’m nervous because I’ve never…I haven’t felt for a woman…ever really. And then when all this happened, I’m afraid I was already on my way to loving you. It’s a sad state of affairs really, because I hadn’t stopped to ask myself if you could…if you did care for me as well.” Ashton kissed me once more, then buried his head into my neck. His breath was warm and comforting against my skin.
I shifted my position, releasing my legs from his waist, and wrapped my arms around his neck, allowing my fingers to play in the silky hair at his nape. As sadistic as it sounded, I was happy that he was scared, too, on this ride we were on. That he really worried about where we would end up. “I feel the same, Ash. Even though I was married, and I guess what I felt for him was something close to love, it wasn’t like this. Nothing has been like this.”
He shifted himself, pulling out of me and turning me to my side. We lay there, in the most comfortable silence I’d ever felt, entangled in each other.
“We’ll figure it out,” he said finally.
“I need to tell you something, too. I hadn’t wanted to broach the subject since you’re in the middle of your own stuff. They set the date. The DA called me and said I have to appear in court in two weeks since he waived his right to an arraignment. I was wondering…”
“Yes.”
I turned to face him. “Yes, what? You don’t even know what I’m about to say.”
“Oh, well then—yes, I’ll go with you and yes to anything else you could have been about to ask me.”
The familiar warmth that accompanied Ash taking care of me washed over my body. I sank into him, kissed his arm that was snugly wrapped around my body, and told him, “Thank you, Ash.”
“Love, you don’t have to thank me for taking care of my woman.”
I smiled and we lay there for a bit longer, silence sealing in all the goodness that we’d created.
A buzzing sound came from the kitchen and I realized it was probably my phone. Most likely the pharmacy calling to let me know his new prescription was ready. Thankfully, it was Monday so I didn’t have to go to Ivy. I could run over and grab it after dinner. Which I still needed to make. “I’ll be right back,” I said, planting a kiss on his chest.
“No, let the inconsiderate wankers go to voicemail.”
“You won’t feel that way when your postcoital haze wears off and that chest of yours starts aching,” I said, laughing from halfway across the room. I made it to my phone after a quick jog and answered the semifamiliar number. It was the same area code as the pharmacy, so they probably were just using a different line.
“Hello,” I said after hitting the green illumination on my touch screen.
“Hello,” the voice said. It was a man’s voice. He sounded like Ashton, yet more gruff…older, and an even heavier English accent. “Is this a good number to reach Ashton Lyle?”
“Um…” Panic broke out over me. Even without asking, I had a hint of who it was. More than a hint. It would have had to be an oncoming car to hit me harder. “Yes, it is. May I ask who’s calling?”
; “Benton Lyle,” he said. After a short moment, he continued, “You see…I’m his father and—”
“One moment, Mr. Lyle,” I said. I turned to find Ashton sitting up on the couch, his eyes wide.
On shaky legs, I started over to him. Ashton shook his head, indicating he didn’t want it. When I reached him, I leaned forward. “Ash, sometimes, we all need a second chance.”
His eyes were glossy, as if he was on the verge of tears. But he wasn’t the type of man to just let them fall. Taking the phone, he turned away from me and sat up. Clearing his throat, he placed it to his ear. “Hello, Father,” he said, his voice filled with the same unshed tears.
Chapter 21
Ashton
Her touch was probably the best thing I’d ever felt. A silken kiss against my healing flesh. Terra had turned out to be a wonderful helper with the bandages and all the other unpleasantries of being shot. And as we stood outside the courtroom, her skin was against mine once more as she held on to my hand tightly, staying close as we waited for our case to be called.
The 36th District Court was an old building that I’d never had the pleasure of entering before the day of the preliminary hearing. Her tosser of an ex-husband was being held there for attempted murder in the first degree, illegal possession of a firearm, and extortion. It was safe to say he’d be there for a long, long time. I, for one, would be glad when it was all over.
After my conversation with my father where we hashed over what happened to me and I was finally able to release a little of the anger I hadn’t known was pent up in my box of shame for so long, Terra and I became closer. She’d been there to help me through a difficult start with my father and there was no way I wouldn’t do the same for her.
“Are you okay, Terra?” I asked, despite already knowing the answer. She wasn’t okay. She would never be when it came to him.
“Yeah,” she lied. The deep breaths and the biting of her lower lip were the signs that she was hiding something from me, I’d learned.