“I’ll be right behind you,” he assured me.
I stepped out on the wooden plank in front of me and barely made it across. My legs felt like limp noodles, and I held onto the rope attached to the rig above me so hard it left an imprint on my hands. Dane didn’t have the same problem as me, reaching me without breaking a sweat.
I took one look at the single rope stretched between the platforms in front of me, and I knew there was no way in hell I was going to make it across. Not even with the vertical ropes stretched taut every couple of feet to hold onto. On the side for people to come back this way, there was another wooden plank. I switched directions and headed across it since nobody was coming back that way. It still took me as long as Dane to make it across, and the next section was even worse because there wasn’t an easy option on that one.
“Nope. No. Not gonna do it.” I stood there with my arms crossed in front of me. “You go ahead, and I’ll wait here.”
“If you’re not having fun, then we’re done.”
“Oh, thank goodness,” I breathed.
He followed behind me, taking the wooden planks like I did. When we got back to the steps, he held my hand the whole way down. Once the harness was off, I felt like kissing the ground; only it had been walked all over by who knew how many other people so there was no way I was actually going to do it.
“I need a drink.”
“You’re not even twenty-one yet.”
“That didn’t stop you from handing me a vodka on the rocks the night you met me,” I huffed.
“You can drink whatever you want when we’re back at the hotel,” he promised. “But for now, I can at least feed you.”
He walked me over to the huge grass lawn in front of the Confederate Memorial Carving on the rock face. “Wait here.”
He dashed off, returning five minutes later with a blanket that he laid out on the grass. “There you go. Go ahead and get comfortable, and I’ll grab our lunch.”
Then he was off once again, this time in the direction of the marketplace we’d walked past earlier. I sat down on the blanket and grabbed my phone to take some pictures while I waited. It didn’t take long before Dane came back, carrying a big bag.
“How much stuff did you get?” I asked as he kept pulling item after item out of the bag and placing it on the blanket. I spotted two sandwiches, a salad that was large enough to eat as an entree, an apple, an orange, two granola bars, a slice of pizza, a hamburger and some chicken strips, plus a few bottles of water. “Is there an army around here that you’re planning to feed?”
“I might have gone overboard,” he laughed. “But I wasn’t sure what you’d like, so I figured I’d just get a little bit of everything.”
“More than a little bit, but that’s so sweet.” It really was, but Dane doing whatever it took to make me happy wasn’t anything new.
“Speaking of sweet, you’ll probably want to save room for dessert. The fudge and candy apples in the little dessert shop looked amazing.”
The picnic lunch he’d set up on the lawn was too tempting for me to have any room left for even the smallest amount of fudge. It didn’t matter, though, because he bought a couple of pounds of it to take with us, along with two of the gourmet candy apples. Not that Dane wanted any of it for dessert when we made it back to the hotel. He had something else in mind—his favorite treat, my pussy.
7
Dane
Waking up with Addilyn in my arms had quickly become one of my favorite things about mornings. This morning was bittersweet, though, because I had to leave her today. I wanted nothing more than to cancel my return trip back to Chicago, but I had urgent business that couldn’t wait any longer. My hold on her tightened while I thought about how long we might be apart from each other. When she stirred, her body pressing against mine as she stretched, I forced those thoughts out of my mind. I didn’t want to ruin our morning, not when we had a lot to talk about before I headed to the airport.
“Morning.” Her voice was soft and sexy, raspy from sleep—similar to how it sounded when she came.
Hearing it, my cock lengthened and hardened, wanting inside her. The same as always since I’d met Addilyn. “Good morning, baby.”
She tilted her head back and stared up at me with sleepy blue eyes. “What time is checkout?”
“Late enough that you don’t need to worry about it,” I assured her, putting off telling her the news I’d kept from her all week. I couldn’t wait much longer, but I had a feeling she wasn’t going to cooperate with the plans I’d made. It was going to take some convincing, and I wanted her wet and willing with me in the shower first. Angry, make-up sex would have to wait for another day when I didn’t have to leave shortly afterwards.
“Good,” she murmured, burying her head in my chest. “I could use some more sleep.”
“Too bad. I have plans for your hot, little body.” I climbed off the mattress and lifted her into my arms. “And I need you to be awake for them.”
“Dane!” she shrieked.
I stalked into the bathroom and sat her down on the counter next to the sink. Her short nightie rode up, baring her pink pussy to my gaze. It was already glistening with her desire, and a fierce need rose up in me. It was stronger than anything I’d ever felt before. I took a few deep breaths as I moved to the shower to turn on the water, trying to calm myself down a little.
“What’s wrong, Dane?” Addilyn looked worried when I turned back to her.
“I don’t know that I can be gentle with you. Not today. Not when I want you to feel me inside you for days after I’ve left.”
Her lips turned down at the reminder of my flight. “That doesn’t sound too bad to me.”
“You don’t understand.” Some of my possessive need bled into my tone. “I don’t think I can control myself the way I’ve been doing with you. I want to fuck you. Hard.”
“If what you’ve been giving me so far is you holding back, then I can’t wait to see how much better it is when you really let go.”
I was already half-crazed with the need to mark her as mine, inside and out. Hearing her give me permission to do exactly as I wanted? What little self-discipline I had left snapped. I crossed back to her in a couple of strides and ripped her nightie up and over her head. I let it fall to the floor, without giving a damn about where it landed, as I shoved my boxers down my legs. My cock was rock-hard and leaking pre-come at the tip. I gave it a couple of pumps before I helped Addilyn off the counter.
“Face the mirror,” I rasped out.
She did as I asked and our eyes met in the mirror, which was starting to fog up from the heat of the shower. I felt like a rutting beast, but I wasn’t about to take her without making sure she enjoyed it, too. I slid my hand down her spine and nudged her body down onto the counter. Dropping to my knees, I lifted her up until most of her body was on the counter and her feet were dangling off the floor. The angle gave me access to her pussy, and I took full advantage of it—diving right in and devouring her like a starving man.
“I don’t know how I’m going to last even one morning without being able to taste you like this,” I growled against her wetness.
“Oh, God!” she cried out as I circled her clit with my tongue and shoved two fingers inside her tight hole. Curling them, I found her G-spot and made sure to rub it with each pump of my fingers. Her body trembled and then tightened as she screamed out my name. I didn’t wait for her to finish. I wanted to feel that tightness around my cock.
Surging to my feet, I gripped her hips in my hands and entered her with one hard thrust. “You ready for this?”
“Yes,” she gasped out, her pussy fluttering against my cock.
I pulled partially out and then plunged right back in. Steam swirled around us and sweat was already dripping down my chest. I thrust into her, hard and fast. Over and over again. My balls slammed against her with each drive of my hips, and the sound of our skin slapping together filled the air.
I felt a tingling at the
base of my spine, but I refused to give into it. Not yet.
“Fuck,” I groaned. “I need this to last longer, but you feel too damn good. Your pussy is so wet and tight around me.”
I felt her inner walls clench. She liked it when I talked while I fucked her. The dirtier, the better.
“I can feel your wetness dripping down my cock. Are you going to come again for me, baby? Is your little pussy going to grip me even tighter as you milk my come from my cock?”
“Yes,” she hissed out.
I thrust even harder, my hips pistoning back and forth like a jackhammer. “That’s right, baby. Give it to me.”
Her body tightened up, and her toes pushed against my shins. Whimpering noises crept up her throat as she gave me what I wanted. Her pussy clamped down hard on my cock, and I couldn’t hold back any longer. My breath came out in hard pants of air while I pumped into her a few more times. When my orgasm rushed through my body, I planted myself deep inside her. My cock shot a stream of come into her, and I prayed it took root in her womb. Nothing would mark her as mine more than a belly rounded with my baby.
My eyes locked with hers in the mirror as I pulled out of her, and I was shocked to find them filled with tears. “Shit, baby. Did I hurt you?”
I grabbed a washcloth and ran it under cold water in the sink. I pressed it against her pussy, swiping it clean as gently as I could. Once I was done, I lifted her into my arms and carried her back to the bed.
“The shower’s still on,” she reminded me in a shaky voice.
“I don’t give a fuck about the shower. What’s wrong?”
“The way you made me feel, taking your pleasure from my body the way you just did? It was intense. Amazing.” She offered me a small smile. “But it made it so much harder to leave. I want to stay here forever and forget about the rest of the world.”
“Then stay.”
She shook her head, and I knew the battle I’d been anticipating was about to begin. “I can’t. Not when you won’t be here with me.”
“It’ll only be six days since I plan to fly back Saturday morning after I’ve taken care of some business in Chicago.”
“You’re coming back on Saturday?” she echoed, her eyes widening in surprise.
“Of course I’m fucking coming back, Addilyn.”
“Oh.”
“Oh? That’s all you’ve got to say?” I pinned her to the mattress. “What the hell do you think has been going on between us? Did you expect me to just hop on the plane, head back to Chicago, and forget all about you?”
“No,” she sighed. “Not really. But I didn’t think you were going to come back so quickly. How was I supposed to know? You never said anything.”
“I’ve told you over and over again that you’re mine, baby,” I reminded her. “I meant it, each and every time.” I dropped a hard kiss on her lips to punctuate how serious I was. “I take care of what’s mine, which means I take care of you. I can’t do that from Chicago while you’re here, which means I’ll be here as often as I can while you finish school.”
“For me?” Her eyes were filled with hope, and her plump lips were turned up at the corners.
“Of course for you, silly woman.” She cuddled against me, her body finally relaxing. “Well, for you and the bar I’m buying.”
She pushed against my chest to stare up at me suspiciously with narrowed blue eyes. “What bar are you buying?”
“The one where we met.”
“I think you meant to say the bar where I work,” she corrected.
She didn’t seem too pissed off, so I grinned at her. “Yeah, that one.”
“When did you decide you were going to buy Club Cache?”
“My first night here,” I admitted.
“So that’s why Bob gave me the week off!” she gasped. “It didn’t make any sense at the time, him offering to pay me when I wasn’t going to be there. It was because of you, wasn’t it? During that business call you took while you were there.”
“That depends, are you going to be angry if I admit to it?”
“I probably should be,” she sighed. “It was pretty presumptuous of you to interfere with my job like that, but it’s hard to be mad when you did it so you could spend time with me.”
I heaved a deep sigh of relief. “I’m glad you’re looking at it that way. On the surface, it might seem like an insane decision. But it was worth it because it gave me you.”
Her eyes filled with tears, but she was grinning widely. “Gah! I feel like I’m an emotional yo-yo this morning.”
“As long as you stay on the upswing when it’s time for me to head to the airport.”
Her expression fell again. “Are you sure you have to go?”
“Unfortunately, I do. I have some meetings lined up to put the bar on the market.”
She rose up to her knees and stared at me. “You’re selling your bar?”
I shrugged, figuring the answer was obvious. “You’re here, and my bar is in Chicago. Something’s got to give, and it’s not going to be you.”
“Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, I’ll stay in the suite until you come back on Saturday.”
One yes was good enough for now. I figured I’d wait to tell her I’d also contacted a realtor to set up a time for us to go apartment hunting when I got back.
8
Addilyn
“Why doesn’t Addilyn ever have to do any of the shit jobs anymore?”
I’d been hearing complaints like that from the other employees at Club Cache for the last two weeks, ever since I’d come back to work. I only put in a few nights a week when Dane was out of town. He wasn’t happy about me doing it, but he didn’t argue too much about me working since I hadn’t put up a fight about our living arrangements—but only if it didn’t interfere with us being able to spend time together when he was in town. And as long as I didn’t work too hard; something he’d ensured by having another talk with Bob. The preferential treatment hadn’t gone unnoticed by my co-workers.
I stomped over and grabbed the two bags of garbage from her hands. “Enough with the whining. If it’s such a big deal, I’ll do it.”
I still had another hour to go until the end of my shift, and I was tired. Exhausted, really. I’d been sleeping more than usual all week, but it didn’t help me feel rested. I didn’t have the energy to deal with other people’s petty complaints, even if they had reason to feel that way. I stalked through the bar and pushed my way through the Employees Only door in the back. The dumpster was only a few steps into the alley, but the stench overwhelmed me before I made it there. Dropping the bags to the ground, I bent over and puked.
When my stomach was finally empty, I knelt there for another moment. I was afraid to get back up because my legs felt like jelly, and I was light-headed. While I stayed crouched low and out of sight, unexpected noises reached my ears. There was a high-pitched giggle, followed by a series of male grunts. Tonight had already sucked, and it sounded like my luck had gotten worse.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I groaned softly.
I used the dumpster to pull myself back up and found a couple standing about five feet away from me. The guy had the woman pressed against the brick wall. His pants were shoved down past his knees, and his pale butt practically glowed in the moonlight. The girl’s eyes widened when she caught sight of me, and then the guy turned to look at me over his shoulder. I pivoted on my heel and ran for the door, but not before I recognized him.
“Crap, crap, crap,” I muttered to myself. Of all the people to have caught having sex in the alley, it had to be a married politician who ran on a family values platform. The woman he’d been banging against the brick wall had not been his wife.
I ducked into the bathroom to wash my face and hands before heading back behind the bar. Between the puke, touching a dumpster, and witnessing alley sex, I desperately needed to get clean again. It also gave me a little time to pull myself together. The small amount of compos
ure I’d been able to gather was sorely tested when a slick looking man approached the bar, his beady eyes searching me out from the moment he walked in.
“Addilyn Johnson?”
The fact that he knew my name only creeped me out even more. “Yeah?”
“I was hoping to speak with you in private.”
I instinctively took a step backwards. “About what?”
“Something confidential.” He slid a hundred-dollar bill across the bar towards me. “And I’m willing to make it worth your while.”
I picked the money up, crumpled it into a ball, and tossed it back at him.
He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “You don’t want to talk? That’s fine, as long as you keep your mouth shut about what you saw in the alley tonight.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His eyes gleamed with satisfaction. “Keep it that way, or else things will get unpleasant for you. I’d hate to see something horrible happen to a pretty girl like you.”
My hand shook as I dug in my jeans pocket for my cell. I punched in Dane’s number and didn’t even have to wait through a full ring before he picked up the call.
“Dane?” My voice came out shakier than intended, and I was close to bursting into tears. My emotions had been all over the place lately with so many changes happening in my life all at once, and my little confrontation with that guy hadn’t helped at all.
“Addilyn? Baby? Are you okay?”
“Yeah. No. I don’t know.” Hearing the sound of his voice helped a lot, but I wasn’t sure if I was good or not.
“Hold on a second.” I heard a quick, muffled conversation and then he came back on the line. “Are you at the bar? What happened?”
“I went to take the trash out, about thirty minutes ago,” I started, but he didn’t let me get any further before he interrupted.
“Why in the hell didn’t someone else do it?”
Sex, Vows & Babies_Mixed Into Love Page 4