Then he released her and she sat up, and he cupped her face with his hands, his eyes glazed with desire. “My turn to give the orders,” he rasped harshly. “Lie down. Now.”
With a soft moan of surrender she lay down on the bed and he pushed the lacy hem of her negligee up, and his strong hands slid between her thighs and spread them open wide, exposing her soft mound and her neatly trimmed blond curls.
Then he reached for the jar of body butter, dipped his fingers in, and with his free hand, spread open the dewy rose petals of her sex, and smeared the body butter on them.
The feeling of his fingers on her labia was ecstasy.
She grabbed his broad, strong shoulders, fingers sinking in, as he ran his tongue along her lips and slowly lapped up the body butter. He sucked at her, harder now, nipping gently, tongue sliding between her lips and circling, and heat flushed through her entire body.
Then his hot, hungry mouth closed over the swollen bud of her clitoris, and she wailed in desperate need as he sucked hard. “Fingers,” she gasped. “Inside me. Oh, yes.”
He slid his two fingers inside her, stroking the velvety wall of her vagina until he found that spot, the excruciatingly pleasurable spot on the inner wall, and she cried out wordlessly as he stroked it.
His tongue and fingers played her like a master conductor, caressing, sucking, strumming her like a violin.
The heat rose in her until she thought she’d burst into flames, and she squirmed under the sweet torment of his mouth and hands until finally she exploded, sweet release shuddering through her body. He kept suckling and probing her until the last waves of orgasm had washed over her, and then he sat up, grinning devilishly and running his tongue over his lips.
“Delicious,” he smiled. Then he quickly stripped off his shirt, jeans, shoes and socks, and he was naked before her, his muscular body so perfect it took her breath away.
“Rafe?” she said in a small voice, drinking him in.
“Yes, sweetheart?”
“Why…why do you like me? Why not a skinny woman?”
He smiled and ran his hand over her breast and then cupped it, thumb running over her nipple. “I like your body because it’s soft and warm and womanly, and I don’t like banging up against a bony skeleton. I like your personality because you’re sweet and kind and loyal and smart and funny.” He pinched her nipple gently between thumb and forefinger, and she moaned.
“And I love having sex with you because you’re so responsive, and I love how excited you get. I love knowing it’s all for me. I love that I can make you come so hard.”
He slid on top of her, hard muscle against her soft, warm, flesh, eyes shining, and he moved until his hard cock was perfectly nestled in between her slick, wet lips.
Then he grabbed her hands and pinned them above her head, and dipped his head into the curve of her neck, nipping and licking at the sensitive flesh there.
“Oh, my God. I want you inside me,” she begged.
“Like this?” He thrust hard, forcing himself into her tight channel.
“Just like that,” she gasped.
His hands tightened on hers, and she lay beneath them, trapped, completely at his mercy. His weight pinned her down to the bed, and every nerve in her body was on fire as he slid across her, thrusting in deeper and then moving his hips, pistoning into her, claiming her as his with every thrust.
His breath rasped out in a harsh, uneven rhythm, and sweat trickled down his perfect forehead as he stared down at her. He looked at her as if she were a beautiful work of art, to be marveled at and worshipped. As if he wanted to drink in every detail of her flushed face, her sweat-dampened curls, her reddened, parted lips.
She could feel her heart swelling inside her, and also fear, throbbing in her chest, and aching inside her.
He thrust and thrust, deep inside her very core, and a tiny hot blossom of pleasure bloomed inside her pelvis, and swelled until it was almost painful, and then the heat exploded into a thousand shooting stars that burned and sizzled inside her.
Rafe cried out as he felt the rippling muscles of her orgasm squeezing him, and he joined her in orgasm, and his harsh gasps were like music to her because she knew it was all for her.
This could never last, but right here, right now, she was the center of his universe, she was the source of his unbearable pleasure. She pressed her face into his warm, sweaty shoulder and breathed in his musky masculine scent and blinked back tears of pleasure and anticipated pain.
Chapter Sixteen
“Go, for God’s sake! I don’t need a babysitter.” Jeffrey hadn’t come to help out at Sweet Surrender because he had a client meeting, and Viola was uncharacteristically cranky. For the first time, Poppy wondered if Rafe might be right about the two of them. Could it be that Viola actually enjoyed the exchange of verbal sniper fire between herself and Jeffrey all day long?
She needed to deposit the store’s receipts in the bank, and Rafe insisted on going with her, but she was nervous about leaving Viola working in the front of the bakery by herself.
“Lock the door until we get back,” Rafe told her sternly.
“Promise me,” Poppy added. “Look me in the eye and promise me you will lock the door until we get back.”
“Oh, for the love of Beelzebub, fine. Scout’s honor. I promise,” Viola waved them out of the store.
“She wasn’t actually a girl scout, you know. So I’m not sure if that promise was legally binding,” Poppy worried as they headed down the street.
“The bakers are in the back. She should be okay,” Rafe said, although he didn’t look completely convinced.
Half an hour later, as Rafe backed into his parking space, Poppy caught sight of the front of Sweet Surrender, and gasped in horror.
The words “Die Whore Die!” were spray painted in red on the outside of the store.
And the front door was unlocked, and the store was empty.
“Viola?” Poppy cried in a panic, rushing inside. She heard a sound coming from down the office.
Oh, God, she should never have left Viola alone.
Before Rafe could stop her, she grabbed a fire extinquisher from the wall and raced over to the office, shouting her friend’s name, while Rafe raced after, yelling “Stop! Poppy, get back here!”
She could hear muffled groans coming from her office. Viola was being murdered – and it was all her fault!
Frantic, she kicked the door open, fire extinguisher pointed like a gun…to see Jeffrey and Viola, butt naked and writhing in an anatomically impossible position on her desk. Rafe ran up right behind her, bumping into her so hard she staggered into the room, and Jeffrey and Viola quickly sprang apart.
“Hey!” Viola yelled indignantly. “A little privacy here?”
“Jeffrey! Your fiancée!” Poppy gasped.
“She dumped me this morning! Have you ever heard of knocking?” Jeffrey grabbed a file folder to cover his crotch.
Poppy made a quick mental note: Burn accounts receivable folder at earliest opportunity.
She turned her attention to Viola, who was glaring at her and not bothering to hide her nudity. “Viola? Your boyfriend?”
“Oh, fuck him. Let him find another ATM. Now could you please get the hell out? I was right in the middle of an orgasm!”
Rafe and Poppy backed out of the office. Poppy slammed the door behind her and swung around to stare at Rafe, her jaw hanging open. He was laughing so hard tears were streaming down his cheeks.
“That was classic,” he gasped, between chortles.
“You do not get to say I told you so,” Poppy hissed. “Good God. My eyes. I want to bleach my brain. What the hell was Jeffrey doing with that chocolate pop? That wasn’t hygienic! And what if Viola’s leg got stuck that way? And damn it, how am I ever going to sit at that desk again, after the way they…violated it?”
Rafe laughed even harder, clutching his stomach.
“And seriously, they’re going to just…keep doing it? Even though we’re rig
ht here in the store? My best friend is a hussy and your brother is a manslut.”
“That about sums it up.” Rafe was wheezing with laughter now. “Did you see the looks on their faces? Did you see they got chocolate all over the files in your inbox? ”
“Yes. I hate you,” Poppy said glumly.
“No, you don’t. You want me to take you upstairs and paint you with strawberry finger paint and lick it off.”
“Well, aren’t you self confident. Maybe if-“
Something came rattling through the open front door, rolling on the floor and coming to a rest in the middle of the bakery. Something metal and pineapple shaped.
“Down!” Rafe bellowed. He threw his body on top of hers, and knocked her down behind a display case. Seconds passed, and nothing happened.
“It’s a grenade, but apparently it’s a dud,” Rafe said, still covering her with his body.
“A grenade?” Poppy cried out, horrified. “Apparently, but not definitely, it’s a dud?”
“I’m pretty sure it’s a dud.” They waited for at least a minute more. Even with a potentially explosive device a dozen feet from them, Poppy couldn’t help but be aware of Rafe’s muscular body pressing against hers, his arms circling her protectively.
Finally he stood up and helped her to her feet.
Then he hustled her down the hallway, pausing to bang on the office door.
“No! Go away!” Viola yelled.
“There’s a grenade in the bakery! Get out here now!” Rafe yelled back. Poppy could hear muffled swearing behind the door.
A minute later, a disgruntled looking Jeffrey and Viola stumbled out of the room, hair and clothing disheveled. disheveled. Viola’s black lace dress was on backwards, Jeffrey’s shirt was buttoned up wrong, and he had chocolate around his mouth.
“Wipe that chocolate off your face, it’s disgusting. I think the grenade’s a dud, but we’re still going to have to call in the bomb squad, and we need to exit out the back door. I’ll go tell the bakers,” Rafe said.
Minutes later, a fleet of police cars came barreling towards the store, sirens wailing , and the bomb squad showed up not long after. Soon a gawking crowd formed outside the store.
As Poppy stood across the street watching the bomb squad remove the dud grenade, someone tapped her shoulder from behind.
She turned to face Henry Chenowith, whose brow wrinkled with concern as he spoke to her breasts. “I just want you to know we’re all behind you, Poppy,” he said. “The chamber of commerce has called an emergency meeting tonight, to address these attacks on your store. It starts at seven p.m.”
After the bomb squad left, Viola and Jeffrey went to the hardware store down the street to buy paint, and painted over the graffiti. Then they disappeared down the hallway into the massage demonstration room, and Viola didn’t even try to hide the fact that she had grabbed a vibrating lollicock, a pair of licorice handcuffs, and a strawberry flavored g-string. And Jeffrey didn’t try to hide the enormous grin on his face.
“You’re a couple of perverts! Get a room, like normal people!” Poppy yelled after them, but her only answer was the sound of the door to the massage room slamming shut.
“You’re just jealous,” Rafe murmered in her ear, his strong, warm arms folding around her. “You wanted to be the first one to try the licorice handcuffs.”
“Oh, shut it,” Poppy said, wriggling out of his embrace as a group of businessmen walked in the door. “Actually, I’m just annoyed that she’s going to be in the back for the next couple of hours and I’m going to have to deal with all of these customers.”
“And that I was right and you were wrong?”
“That too.”
She pasted a smile on her face for the rest of the afternoon as she served the steady stream of customers who flowed in to the store, but her stomach was churning with worry.
A grenade? How much longer could she go on like this? She’d promised Penelope that she would help her run the store – but was it fair to Viola, and the bakers, and to her customers, to keep the store open under these circumstances? Was she putting everyone at risk?
Of course, if she was no longer running Sweet Surrender, she had no reason to be in Port Rollins anymore. And that meant goodbye to Rafe and an abrupt end to their affair, which of course had to end anyway, but she’d been hoping to at least have him for the summer.
A dull lance of pain pierced her heart at the thought of saying goodbye to him, and she bit her lip, leaning against the glass bakery counter.
Rafe, who had stayed in the bakery all afternoon, noticed the look on her face and walked over to her.
“Hey. What’s on your mind?” Rafe put his hand on her arm, and she turned to him, downcast.
“I’m wondering if I’m putting everyone’s lives at risk by keeping Sweet Surrender open.”
“There will be a police car stationed on this block for at least the next few days. And we can make a decision after that.”
Poppy nodded, and turned away, her heart pounding. So that bought her a few days.
He said “we”, she thought, feeling slightly giddy and also very afraid of how happy that made her.
The chamber of commerce meeting was packed that evening, with several dozen business owners in attendance, along with Officer Renault.
Coffee and pastries were set out on a table at the back of the long rectangular room, and Viola glanced at them scornfully.
“We totes should have brought the refreshments,” Viola said, picking up a blueberry muffin. “Look at this. It isn’t shaped like anything.”
“It’s shaped like a muffin. That’s how normal muffins are shaped. Working at Sweet Surrender has warped you for life.”
“Pretty sure I was like that when I started there.” Viola bit into it and then tossed it in the garbage. “Our muff muffins are better.”
Poppy sighed and shook her head. “Don’t get used to your new career in bakery porn. We’ve got about seven more weeks left before Penelope takes over again.”
“Don’t remind me. Sadface,” Viola scowled.
Martin Gotschall waved at them from across the room and came over to say hello. “Terrible thing about these attacks,” he said, biting into a muffin. “Wow, these are terrible. I hope they catch the person who did it; it’s really bad for the property values in the neighborhood.”
Viola gave him a dirty look. “Yes, and it would also be bad if he actually, you know, kills somebody.”
Gotschall looked alarmed. “That would be terrible for property values.” He turned away and melted back into the crowd, and Viola stared at him as he walked away, frowning.
“What?” Poppy asked.
“I don’t know. There’s something familiar about him. Something’s setting off alarm bells in my head, and I don’t know what.”
Rafe watched him go. “He’s not the guy that I saw in Poppy’s apartment. Wrong build.”
“I know he’s not. Still…” she shrugged unhappily and turned away.
During the meeting, Henry Chenowith proposed the formation of a neighborhood watch committee, and Officer Renault agreed to be the police department liaison.
Then Rafe stood up to address the crowd. “These attacks are putting everyone in danger. Who knows who ‘ll target next?” he said. “If we all put our heads together, maybe we can come up with the information that will put him away. What do we know about the person carrying out the attacks so far? He’s homeless, and he’s been targeting Sweet Surrender frequently, so I’m guessing he’s staying somewhere in the area, most likely in the abandoned buildings near the river.”
A man in the audience stood up. He was a portly Italian with wavy black hair frosted with streaks of silver.
“Robert Marcone, I own Marcone’s Restaurant. I’ve seen him talking to another guy, with long stringy hair. The guy with the stringy hair, he seemed to be getting the tall skinny guy all worked up.”
“I’ve seen the skinny guy, the one who always leaves the flyers on winds
hields, walking East on 39th street,” another man volunteered.
Officer Renault nodded. “Okay, this is good. There’s a cluster of empty buildings on 39th street, by the waterfront. We can patrol that area, have a SWAT team search the buildings.”
Amelia walked up to Viola and Poppy with a half eaten muffin in her hand. “I’m glad you guys didn’t get blown up. Hey, your muffins are way better than these. If I ever need a caterer, I’m hiring you.”
“Catering!” Viola’s eyes lit up. “We could cater!”
“If you think I’m driving around town delivering vagina cakes and penis pops, you are truly off your rocker,” Poppy informed her, but Viola and Amelia were already walking away, raptly discussing the possibilities.
After the meeting adjourned, Rafe walked up and slung his arm around Poppy’s shoulder, and leaned down, his hot breath caressing her ear.
“We’re making really good progress in the hunt for this guy, but he’s still out there. I think you need a bodyguard tonight,” he murmured.
“But who’s going to guard my body against you?”
“Nobody. You will be completely at my mercy.”
The pretty redheaded owner of a jewelry store glanced at them from across the room, smiling when her eyes lit on Rafe, and looking puzzled when her gaze rested on Poppy. Poppy looked away, but she could still hear her mother’s voice in her head. “Men just don’t love fat women like us….”
She took a deep breath. She was here for the summer. Rafe was by her side now. He wanted her, and he was offering her a night of panty-scorching, multiple orgasmic sex, and then she could fall asleep in his strong arms with his warm breath in her hair.
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