by J. J. McAvoy
He kissed and sucked up my chest, to my neck. “Oh…” I moaned, licking my lips. He kissed all the way up to my lips and only broke away to rest his forehead on mine.
“Now it’s priceless,” he whispered, bringing his hand up to stroke my cheek.
“I want it priceless for me too,” I whispered back, undoing his towel, reaching in to stroke his cock, feeling as it got hard and stood proud in my hands.
“Umm….” He closed his eyes and took the very same knife, dipped it in the same jelly and slowly ran it up the length of him, and then once more over the thick vein, begging for me to run my tongue across it, and who was I to deny it. Bending down, I licked him like he was ice cream on my spoon, candy made only for me. I sucked so forcefully on the side of his dick, he cried out, placing his fingers in my hair.
“Ethan, you…you taste so good.” I licked the tip of his cock before taking him into my mouth. My body bent over as I took as much of him into my mouth as I could.
“Fuck…ahh…Ivy…” He hissed.
I smiled. I loved when he lost his composure like this. Lifting my head back up, I licked the tip of him once more and said, “Yes, baby?”
His eyes snapped open, lust shining through. He didn’t say anything. Instead, he reached for my leg and pulled it and me over, lying on his chest…backward.
“I didn’t realize you were as hungry as me…baby,” he said, lying back on the bed, my ass and pussy completely exposed to him. He gripped my thigh with one hand and used two of his fingers to spread the lips of pussy for him to eat—
“Oh…my…Ethan. Ahh!” I gasped, my body trembled as his tongue tickled my clit. Unable to stop myself, I rocked my hips into his mouth, my eyelids feeling heavier as my body temp rose.
“Eat, baby,” he said, and feeling his lips vibrate against me as he spoke was almost too much for me.
“Yes.” Was all I could say before taking him back into my mouth, my hands caressing his balls, both of us moaning against each other.
Yes!
God, yes!
More!
I wanted more of him.
I wanted all of him.
I never wanted this to end.
ETHAN
Fuck. Why was she so damn beautiful?
Her moans were intoxicating.
The way she looked while being fucked, a thin layer of sweat on her white skin causing her blond hair to stick to her body, was divine.
I wanted to lose track of time kissing every part of her body. I wanted to see how many ways I could make her legs weak.
“Ethan...ah…please…oh…” she cried out, her palms so sweaty she was starting to slide on the kitchen floor…
The kitchen? Why are we in the kitchen?
Right. We’d come to get more food, but she had to tempt me with that cute small robe of hers. Which didn’t cover her ass when she bent over to get something from the fridge. Which led to this. Her on all fours and trying to stay that way as I rammed myself into her ass. Sweat rolled down my face, off my chin and onto her back with each thrust forward.
“I can’t—” Her hands slid and she went down, her breasts on the tiled floor, but I couldn’t stop. No, I needed her to scream out more. I wanted to be in her more, much more. So I sat up on my knees more and pulled her hips to me, holding them in place with my arm as I leaned on top of her, chest on her back.
“Ethan.” She drooled, lost in her sexual daze. “So good.” She kissed my chin, until her mouth got to my lips, and from there, our tongues roamed each other’s mouth.
“You are mine,” I said when we broke away, my hands wrapping around her neck. “Always…say it.”
“I’m…” She tried to close her eyes, trembling as I slammed into her ass.
“Say it.”
“I’m…yours…”
I pulled out slightly, trembling with her before thrusting back in, swallowing the saliva in my mouth to ask her, “For…how long? For how long are you mine?”
“Always,” she muttered.
“Louder!”
“I’m yours always!”
“Whose?” My grip tightened on her, my pace quickening.
“YOURS!” she screamed out and once she screamed she gave into the pleasure, the lust, the wildness in herself and kept screaming. “I’m yours! I’m yours, Ethan Callahan! Oh, fuck…yes...baby, yes! OH! ETHAN!”
She cried as she came forcefully, her legs bucking, taking me with her as she collapsed. Bracing myself onto my elbows, I kissed the side of her sweaty cheek.
“Never forget that,” I whispered into her, slowly calming down as I too was at my limit. “Never forget you belong to me and me alone. I’ve waited for only you, Ivy, dreamed only of you, and now that I have you, I’m going to fuck you like this until…ugh…until I figure what the hell you’ve done to me. UH!” I grunted, gripping her waist as I came deep inside her.
I held myself up on my hands on either side of her.
I closed my eyes, trying to both breathe and calm myself down.
I don’t know how long we both stayed like that, naked, sweaty, pressed together, breathing heavily, and I didn’t care.
It was only when I found the will and the strength to move again did I slowly push myself up and gently pulled out of her, both of us covered in each other. On my feet, the world felt like it was spinning for a moment, before I felt upright. Moving to the open fridge I’d pulled her from, I reached for the milk and drank it from the bottle, bracing myself against the kitchen counter when I was done.
“Ethan.”
Her voice was so soft I thought I’d imagined it.
Turning to face her, she’d rolled over onto her back, her hand over her eyes, and I didn’t realize why until she spoke. “Ummm…fuck…I mean…I…whatever I did…whatever I’ve done…don’t figure it out.”
She was crying.
Not sobbing.
Just tears flowing out of her eyes.
“Why are you covering your face?”
“Because my eyes are leaking and they shouldn’t be!” she shouted in frustration. “I should cry when I’m sad. Now this wasn’t sad…this was the best…I’ve never felt like that before.”
Putting the milk down, I walked back over to her and even when I picked her up into my arms she wouldn’t let me see her face, even though I could feel her tears on my chest.
“Say it,” she whispered.
“What?”
“Say you’ll never try to find out why me?”
“I’ll never question why I fell for you.”
TWENTY-TWO
“Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself.”
~ J.K. Rowling
SEVEN DAYS LATER
IVY
“Twenty more dead as of this morning. City council members and doctors are warning that many more will die due to the flood of miscellaneous drugs being distributed in heroin. Dr. Rioja, head trauma surgeon of Boston Medical, says that over the last week they’ve seen more deaths due to heroin overdose than in the last eighteen months—”
Switching the station and lowering the volume, Ethan leaned back into his seat, speeding up as the light changed.
“Do you want to get anything to eat on our way?”
“On our way where?”
“Somewhere,” he replied, and I wanted to jump him, but he just put his free hand on top of my thigh.
“You—ugh.” I sighed, crossing my arms and leaning back. I could tell he was amused…no, not just that. He was also content. Content with the state of the city, with the way we’d been living.
For the last week we’d pretty much stayed inside the safe house, falling into our own routine in that short time. Ethan would wake up at some ungodly hour in the morning, kissing my forehead and telling me to go back to sleep before leaving the house to go for a run. Something he did for no other reason than he knew it was dangerous. Because he knew they’d be watching him. And because I felt paranoid when he was gone I’d watch the cameras until I started to see
him come back around the corner before getting the shower started. We’d have breakfast together, eat, make love, talk or watch a movie, end up back in bed, where he’d either fuck me like his own personal whore or gently make love to me like I was his wife. Whichever really depended on his mood. Luckily I hadn’t cried again! Oh my gosh, that was embarrassing. Luckily he hadn’t brought it up.
After finding out how we were connected, he’d opened up a little bit more, but not as much as I’d like. Ethan lived in his head. I’d wanted to get in there at first, but it was a maze even he was lost inside of, so I could only pull him out, forcing him to read to me, watch old movies, or draw me, a secret talent of his. He was an artist, obsessed with classical works of literature, art, and people. I’d ask questions only to keep him from falling back into the abyss of his mind. I was sure he knew, but he went along with it. The one thing he did not talk about was his childhood or his parents. All he’d say was that his parents loved each other, loved him and his siblings, and never wanted them to be weak. That was it.
Each day I tried to pry more and each day he changed the subject. Today I was determined to get him to speak up about it. However, of course we were now going somewhere…the both of us.
Glancing over at him as he drove in the rain, his hand was like a heater on my thigh, stroking back and forth gently.
“Yes?” he asked, not needing to look at me to know I was staring.
“You still haven’t told me where we’re going.” He just said ‘out’ when I asked him before. “Or will you not know until we get there?”
“We’re here,” he said, pulling up in front of a barbershop, the name “Carofiglio” elegantly written on the windows.
“I thought you cut your own hair?” I’d seen him perfectly cut and style his hair yesterday with nothing but scissors and barber razors.
Of course he didn’t answer me, instead stepping out of the car and coming around to my side to open the door for me. Stepping out, I eyed him carefully.
“You’re very interested in my childhood, and I prefer not to talk about it,” he said, shutting the door behind me and taking my hand. “This is a compromise.”
I didn’t understand how until we stepped inside on to the checkered floor, the wooden walls covered with dozens if not hundreds of photos, some faded to black and white.
“Ethan!” An old man, who had more wrinkles than the bunched up shirt, pure gray hair, which was parted and styled with waves in it, and a small gut, put his scissors down to come up to Ethan, who bent down to the man who was a few inches shorter than me, to kiss his right cheek, then his left. When they backed up the man grabbed his shoulders. “Mio caro! Che piacere vederti. Mi sei mancato molto! Come sta?”
Ethan actually smiled at the old man. “Non posso lamentarmi con una bella moglie così.”
The old man’s brown eyes finally shifted over to me. “Una vera bellezza!” he said before pulling me into a hug and kissing the sides of my cheeks so quickly I didn’t even have time to process he’d done it till I was standing apart from him.
“Ivy,” Ethan called, finally back in a language I could understand. “This is Giovanni Carofiglio, my former boss. Giovanni, Ivy Callahan, my wife.”
“It is a pleasure, my dear.” Giovanni smiled at us, crossing his arms to look at us together. “For shame your wedding was so private.”
“Oh, yes, for shame you missed free wine and food.” Ethan snickered at him then nodded to his stomach. “Though, I see you are preparing for two—”
Giovanni sucked his teeth and raised his hand. “Do not forget your mother gave me permission to smack you if needed.”
“How could I forget?” Ethan rolled his eyes. “You find a way to mention it each time we meet.”
“Former boss?” I cut, looking between them before they continued merrily down memory lane.
“Oh, yes.” He nodded to the seventh and only barber chair not occupied. It sat in the corner, like a well-polished leather throne. The name Ethan C. was engraved on the upper corner of the glass next to pictures. Mesmerized by it, I walked toward it. Sure enough the photos were of him when he was a teenager, still tall, his hair a little shorter than now but ever the epitome of cool. There were pictures of him cutting hair of small children and of older men, and even women too. The most shocking was Wyatt, both of them laughing. Ethan looked ready to bust his gut, while Wyatt used a piece of hair to make a mustache over his upper lip.
“When was this?” I whispered, looking at each picture on the corner of the mirror.
“Ethan started working in my shop when I lived in Chicago. He was twelve,” Giovanni said, now standing beside me, looking at the pictures with pure pride. “He wasn’t anything but a sweeper when he first got started.”
“And in no time I had more regulars than you,” Ethan said, walking around to the other side of the chair and taking off his leather jacket, picking up a gray button-down uniform shirt. His name was also stitched onto it.
“The bitter part of me wants to blame it on your last name.” Giovanni huffed angrily. “Of course people would want to get their hair cut by a Callahan…”
“But my skills spoke for themselves,” Ethan said, pulling out a box filled with barber tools that shined beautifully.
“Humility goes a long way, boy,” Giovanni replied.
“Humility is not in the Callahan dictionary,” I said, laughing. This was amazing. Who would have ever thought Mr. Richie-Rich, silver spoon-fed Ethan had a part-time job growing up?
“Aww, true.” Giovanni nodded, looking at me. “It would help too if they were bad at some things. Did your husband not tell you he’s my greatest student?”
“Auhmmm!”
We both turned, and it was only then that I realized how packed the barbershop was. A few men and even young boys sat waiting on the benches by the wooden wall. They were all eyeing Ethan as he set up. However, the one who’d fake coughed loudly was a man about my height with brown hair that was faded on the sides but thicker and smoothed back on top. He looked up at us from the sideburns he was shaping up.
“And here I thought I was your greatest student, pa,” he said.
“He meant the greatest student he didn’t teach, Marco,” Ethan said, cleaning off his blades. “Didn’t you, Giovanni?”
Giovanni groaned. “I forgot you were a smartass. I might have guided your hands, but you still learned from watching me, didn’t you? Hmh…speaking like you just woke up a barber one morning.” He caused both Marco and Ethan to snicker.
“Good to you have back, Ethan, now help us get rich too.” Marco laughed, nodding to the line of people waiting.
“How rich we talkin’?” Ethan turned his chair.
“Very,” both Marco and Giovanni said at the same time.
“Greedy bastards,” Ethan muttered, though I could tell he was enjoying it.
“So be it,” Giovanni said, walking back to his chair and his very, very patient client apparently. “Gabby, bring out a stool for Mrs. Callahan! And say hello to your godfather!”
He shouted, and a young girl, no older than eight or nine, with curly blond hair, stuck her head out from behind the door of the shop. Her hazel eyes stared at me and then she turned to Ethan. A huge grin spread across her face as she burst out of the doors fully and hugged him.
“Uncle Ethan!”
“She’s still a hugger, I see,” Ethan said to Marco.
Marco frowned. “Only to you, it seems. No loyalty, that one.”
“I haven’t seen Uncle Ethan in forever!” She squeezed tighter, and Ethan raised his arms, staring down at her.
“Is that why your Christmas list gets so bloody long every year?” he asked her.
She flashed her teeth at him, one of them missing on the bottom. “Yep!”
“So now that you’ve seen and hugged me near death, you won’t need anything this year.”
Her hands dropped along with her smile and all the men within the barbershop laughed as she looked heartbroken.
“Uncle, you’re mean.” She pouted.
“So I’ve been told.” He put his hand on her and turned her until she was facing me. “Luckily my wife is much nicer. Send her your lists from now on and she’ll handle it.”
“REALLY?” She brushed Ethan’s hands off and walked over to me. “Hold on, Aunty, let me get you a chair.” She rushed behind the curtains.
“You’re right. No loyalty at all.” Ethan shook his head, staring at where she had disappeared behind the doors.
“Here, Aunty.” Gabby put the black padded stool just off to the side of Ethan as he called up a boy who looked about twelve. He took off his baseball hat when he sat on the chair.
“Thanks, Gabby,” I said to her, sitting down.
“You’re welcome—”
“Oh no, you don’t.” Marco pointed at her. “No gift-getting, or wish-making until I see that C- morph into an A.”
Gabby pulled out a piece of paper, lifted it up, and showed how if you turned a ‘C’ onto its side and put the ‘-’ inside it made an A.
I laughed so hard my sides hurt.
“Did you just forge your grades in front of me?” Marco asked her.
“No.” She hid the paper behind her back. “You didn’t say that a C- needed to be an A for me to make wishes.”
“She’s right,” Ethan replied, placing a white strip around the boy’s neck.
Marco sighed. “Just go.”
“We’ll talk later,” Gabby mouthed to me, and I nodded to her.
“Go!”
“I’m going!” She groaned, making a show of having to go back.
“So you all are family,” I replied when she was gone. That made more sense. I doubted Ethan would be so comfortable with people if they weren’t family.