Too Bad So Sad

by Lani Lynn Vale

  Theo, whom I knew well and who had a very busy life and no time to spend with a girl.

  Theo, who probably figured I had something going on with this half-pint-sized woman based solely on my reaction to the two losers who had threatened her when we gave them every fine in the book for taking plant life from the lake.

  “How do you know Theo?” I asked as I walked around to the passenger side of the truck and held the door open for her.

  She gave me a look full of scorn. “I’m not that drunk. I can get my own door.”

  I shrugged. “Too damn bad. I open the door for my female passengers. Always have, always will. I learned it from my dad.”

  “Well your dad is old-fashioned,” she muttered.

  I snorted. “My dad is dead.”

  Reagan blinked at me wide-eyed. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  I shrugged. “It happened a long time ago.”

  A really, really long time ago.

  Luckily, before he died, I was at a really impressionable age where I watched everything my father did because I wanted to do everything exactly like he did to be the kind of man that he was.

  Hence my joining the Marines and then becoming a peace officer for a bit—I wanted to be just like him.

  Once she was settled, I shut her door and rounded the hood of the truck, keeping my eyes out for her loser ex.

  After not seeing any sign of him, I climbed into my truck and started it up as I slammed the door.

  Pulling out of the parking lot, I went in the opposite direction from the way that we needed to go in case the ex was watching and I just hadn’t seen him.

  “I met Theo when I interviewed for my job. Other than spending some time with him once every few weeks as we’re riding the lake, I don’t really know him all that well,” she explained. “And I’m sorry to hear about your father. How did he die?”

  I processed what she’d said about Theo and then moved on.

  I wasn’t sure why it made me so irrationally happy to know that she didn’t know him well and wasn’t spending that much time with him, but it did.

  And I didn’t like the way it felt like relief spread through my chest, so I changed the subject.

  “My dad died in the line of duty,” I said. “When I was eleven, he was shot while pulling over a man with an outstanding warrant. The passenger also had an outstanding warrant, but he was also carrying enough meth on him to share with half the damn town. They got scared and when my dad walked up to the window, the passenger shot him in the face.”

  Reagan was silent. “That’s awful.”

  It was awful.

  I agreed wholeheartedly.

  I’d gone through roadside bombs, insurgents and random attacks from the Taliban while deployed. But once I was a full-blown officer of the law, I could barely walk up to a window and hand out a ticket because all I kept seeing was my father’s head being blown apart while at police academy.

  The administrators had no clue that the video they’d shown of the traffic stop was of my father.

  We were in a different state, eight hundred miles away and our name had changed because my mother’s husband had adopted us—Alana and me.

  How were they supposed to know that the video they’d shown was the very one of my father being shot?

  “When I was at the police academy,” I found myself saying. “They showed an instructional video on the importance of knowing what’s going on around you. It was a dashcam video from an officer’s camera. It shows him walking up to the vehicle where they’d pulled over on a two-lane road. There were cars passing by slowly.” I cleared my throat, unaware that I’d frozen at a red light and it’d been green for over thirty seconds.

  The light turned from green to yellow to red again and I still hadn’t moved.

  “Since the officer was watching the driver, he didn’t see the passenger reach for his gun. The dashcam caught the whole scene from there, though. Two seconds after the driver’s side window rolls down, the passenger extends his arm across the driver’s face and shoots the officer when he bends down to ask for the man’s license.”

  I didn’t know why I was telling her this.

  It wasn’t like she’d asked anything about me or my father.

  But for some reason, I felt compelled to tell her.

  “It was your dad, wasn’t it?” she asked. “They showed you a video of your dad while you were attending the police academy, didn’t they?”

  I nodded. “I walked out of the room and threw up. They gave me shit about it afterward until someone from the back of the room remarked that I had a stunning resemblance to the man that was shot. Then, I think, it all started to fall into place for them.”

  “I’m surprised you were even able to go the police route,” she admitted.

  The light turned green again and an angry driver honked behind me before I’d even had time to process the change.

  I went, slowly and waited for the car to zoom around me—which they did a few moments later.

  When they shot past me, I picked up the mic next to Reagan’s knees and called the license plate into dispatch.

  Ramirez, my newest officer, pulled out of the Quick Stop moments later and pulled the car over.

  Reagan snorted. “You’re bad.”

  I shrugged. “I sat through that light. They were allowed to honk. What they’re not allowed to do is drive recklessly because they’re pissed.”

  Reagan sighed. “I’ll go home with you under one condition.”

  I looked over at her. “What?”

  “You tell me why you won’t date me.”

  Chapter 11

  My last words will probably be “fuck it.”

  -T-shirt

  Reagan

  I laid next to Tyler, who’d been serious when he said that what we had wouldn’t go past sex.

  Moments after laying that ultimatum down—sex or nothing—he’d gone to sleep.

  Now, I lay in bed next to him, wide awake for hours, thinking about what he’d explained to me about Tara.

  The woman had broken his heart and showed him in no uncertain terms that women were lying, conniving sleaze bags who were always going to be bitches.

  He hadn’t said that in those exact words, but it was close enough that I hadn’t been confused.

  He was done with women, plain and simple.

  He’d been burned, badly and he didn’t want to go that route again.

  But as I lay there, I recalled his words and realized that it hadn’t been Tara’s name that was said with the most anger. It’d been Rome’s.

  I had a feeling that it wasn’t that he was pissed off at women in general, but at his best friend for ruining what they had.

  And for him to get past whatever slight he felt that the female population had done to him, I’d have to repair what Rome broke in him.

  To do that, I was going to have to get him and Rome together to fix what had been broken.

  While I was doing that, I’d make sure that I showed Tyler that I wasn’t a woman who would leave him for his best friend or who would ever cheat on him.

  Tyler was, by far, the most handsome man I’d ever met.

  He was intense, sometimes scarily so, but sexy as hell. He was also everything that I’d ever wanted in a man—even if he pissed me off half the time just because he could.

  I was concocting my plan of action and telling myself that he wouldn’t be too mad if I pursued this when I felt a hand slide over my exposed abdomen and slither up my shirt.

  “Why are you still awake?” he rasped against my ear.

  I shivered.

  “I’m thinking,” I told him honestly.

  “About what?” He moved his hand up to cup my breast, slowly guiding the pad of his thumb over the soft nipple, teasing it to a sharp point while he waited for me to answer.

  “About life in general,” I told him. “W-what’s it to you?”

  He chuckled a
nd moved so that his big body was plastered up against my side.

  “Roll over,” he whispered.

  I swallowed, but did as instructed, rolling into him instead of away from him and doing a shimmy and slide so that I could rub up against his body as I got into the desired position.

  He chuckled, coming up to his knees in the bed at my side and slowly skimmed my t-shirt up over my ass.

  I was wearing panties—or what were called panties. Really all they were was lace and elastic. They certainly didn’t cover much, but they were soft and sexy and made me feel confident.

  Tyler obviously liked them, too, because he caressed them where they covered my ass, trailing his finger along the path of skin that just under the seam.

  “I wondered how the hell you had such a toned body,” he said as he moved so that he was straddling my knees. “This ass of yours is molded from years and years of hard work. It’s more than obvious that you were athletic and that you kept up an intense workout schedule.”

  I still did.

  “I run and lift weights, every single day,” I said. “Except sometimes on Sundays, because that’s my one day to sleep in.”

  He squeezed my ass again, molding it to fit his hands.

  “I want to fuck it.”

  I shivered. “I…I’ve never done that before.”

  Not that I hadn’t been curious, after all. But I never truly trusted Dusty—and that act required a lot of trust in your partner.

  But Tyler, though? I trusted him.

  I was slightly skeptical, however, because Tyler’s cock was big and well, that hole was small.

  I’d tested it out once to see how it’d feel—sliding a finger inside—and had felt how tight it was.

  There was no way that Tyler’s cock wouldn’t hurt as it made its way inside—none.

  “Do you want to?” he asked, switching from squeezing to shifting my panties down my legs.

  Once my bare ass came into view, he slowly dragged one finger down the crack of my ass and waited for me to answer.

  “Y-yes…” I hesitated. “But it will hurt.”

  He laughed. “Sometimes the best stuff has to hurt before you get to the good stuff.”

  I wasn’t too sure what to make of that statement.

  Honestly, I wanted to do that with him about as much as I wanted to make him mine.

  I wanted him with a level of absurdity that made me feel slightly off balance.

  This girl? This woman who was asking for these things? This wasn’t the usual me. The usual me was quiet, reserved and watchful. The woman that I was with Tyler was anything but reserved. She knew what she wanted, she had no problem telling him whatever was on her mind and she was brazen.

  I’d never felt like this in my life.

  That particular hole had been an exit only for my entire life and the one and only time that Dusty had brought up that particular sexual escapade, I’d shut him down firmly.

  But, Tyler suggesting it didn’t send chills of dread tickling down my spine.

  Nope.

  What it did was cause goosebumps of need to pepper my flesh.

  Tyler’s finger trailed down my spine.

  Soon, I was gasping and his hand was smoothing down the length of my spine.

  I couldn’t see a single thing, I could only hear.

  And what I heard had my breathing increasing.

  His breathing was cool and calm, but every once in a while, he’d omit a nearly subsonic growl as I shivered or breathed a sigh of pleasure.

  “I want to claim every single part of you,” he said into the darkness. “I want to take your pussy. Your ass. Your mouth. I want to take everything that you have to give and then I want to take more. I want you to feel me when I’m not there. I want you to think of me when you’re in bed with the next man you replace me with—because you will replace me. But when I’m gone, I want you to remember what you had. Because I will.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that.

  It was too early in what we had to tell him that I was starting to have feelings for him that were definitely on the verge of being obsessive.

  Nor did I want to tell him that I was fairly certain that I was already in love with him.

  He would run.

  I know he would.

  And I didn’t want him to run. Not until he knew he had me to run back to.

  I made a sound in the back of my throat that was neither compliance nor denial.

  It was just a sound and that sound was enough to allow him to make his next move, which was to brush his finger over my ass in a wide sweep. The arc he made with his thumb had him coming within millimeters of the place he’d just been talking about and I found myself anticipating the next sweep.

  Moments later, he didn’t disappoint, but his finger didn’t stray from the previous path.

  “I’m going to fuck you,” he said. Then, before I could even react to his words, his middle finger was filling my pussy and I was struggling to catch up. “Once I get you all nice and wet,” he said, pulling and pushing his finger in and out. “I’m going to slide my cock inside your pussy. I’m going to use my fingers on your ass and I’m going to get you so worked up that you’ll be begging for it by the time I’m through.”

  I swallowed as he pulled his fingers out, then slicked them up and down the crease of my pussy and up to the crack of my ass.

  He wiped his fingers off on my asshole and I shivered when I felt the tip of one finger barely penetrate the tight hole.

  “I’m going to wait until you’re ready, until my fingers stretch you and then I’m going to bury my cock in your ass and fuck you some more.”

  I whimpered into the pillow, knowing without a shadow of a doubt that this man could do just about anything to me and I would never complain.

  I felt him move on the bed and suddenly his cock was no longer being contained by the boxer briefs he’d gone to bed in. Now that cock was tapping lightly against the lips of my sex, teasing me without even trying.

  It was hot, hard and ready.

  “Please,” I whispered.

  I whimpered it so low that honestly, I wasn’t sure that he’d heard me.

  But then he laughed darkly and reached between us so that he had his cock firmly in his hand.

  Moments later, he was allowing that cock to drag up and down my slit, coating it thoroughly in the juices that were practically pouring out of me.

  His words, paired with my need for him, had me worked up and squirming for him. Honestly, I’d probably be embarrassed about how wet I was later. But for now, I was enjoying hearing the sounds of his cock moving through the slickness between my legs. I liked the way it sounded sticky as he tapped his tip gently against my clit.

  And when he notched that fat head at my entrance? I’d never felt anything so right in my life.

  He sank inside, not stopping until he was buried to the hilt and I found it hard to breathe.

  I screamed into the pillow, gasping loudly as he filled me, giving me every single inch in one long push.

  It didn’t matter if it was our third time or our three-hundredth, I’d never get used to his size.

  “So hot and wet,” he snarled.

  I swallowed hard, feeling something akin to euphoria blooming in my chest.

  Tyler was right.

  If we didn’t work out like I planned, I’d never be able to have sex again and not think about him.

  He was the biggest asshole on the planet, but the man had a talented cock.

  Or maybe it was that he had a big cock and knew how to wield it.

  Whatever the reason, the man had it and I didn’t want to let it go.

  He pulled out and the rest of my thoughts fell to the wayside.

  His hands went to my hips and his fingers dug in deep. Moments later, he was fucking me.

  We moved into a rhythm, my hips rocking while he pulled me to him. Seconds later, he’d push me away just
to turn around and pull my hips back to his roughly all over again.

  I closed my eyes and concentrated on what he was making me feel, which was why I never noticed him remove one of his hands from my hip until I felt his finger circling my asshole.

  Gasping, I jolted backward, taking him even farther inside of me at the same time that he snuck that finger in past the first knuckle.

  I froze, unsure what I was supposed to do, causing him to chuckle.

  “Relax,” he ordered. “It’ll be okay.”

  I wasn’t so sure about that.

  Then again, he could tell me to relax all he wanted but he wasn’t the one about to have a cock shoved up his ass.

  Tyler squeezed my ass with his free hand, making me jolt from the sudden pain of it.

  Once he had my attention, he let up, but only long enough to move it back to my hip and then shove me away from him before yanking me back.

  Our skin hit with a slap and I felt the tip of his cock in my belly, causing me to moan.

  It was when I felt that a second finger enter my ass that I realized he was distracting me, making me forget what was really on his agenda.

  “Feels good, doesn’t it?” he rasped.

  I would not tell him yes.

  I would not tell him yes.

  He thrust into me simultaneously, filling my pussy with his cock and my ass with his fingers.

  “Oh my God. Yes!”

  I told him yes.

  Goddammit.

  So not only did the man make me do things that I never wanted to do before, but he also made things come out of my mouth that I didn’t want to admit.

  I shivered as he withdrew his cock, gasping when the wet tip fell from my entrance and swiped deliciously down the inside of my thigh, leaving a trail of wetness in its wake.

  He rested there against my thigh for a few long seconds and then he pulled his fingers away, too.

  I thought for sure that he was about to just shove that fat dick inside of me, but before anything could be shoved or moved, he was reaching across my back.

  I heard the drawer open and close and then he was back in position behind me, lining his cock up with my entrance once again.

  When he filled me back up a second time, I was confused.

  “But…”