Silver Mayor: The Silver Foxes of Blue Ridge

by L. B. Dunbar

  Snap goes the button of my jeans.

  “Push them down a little bit,” he whispers, and his deep, commanding voice sets me on fire. I press at the sides, lowering my jeans just a little bit to loosen them so Charlie’s hand can slip lower.

  “So wet,” he moans as his fingers curl and cup my ready folds.

  “You do this to me,” I whisper.

  “I make you wet?” he questions, his voice roughens, but he’s well aware of how damp I get for him.

  “Yes, sir.” I hiss as a finger enters me.

  “Fuck,” he groans, pulling back to add a second one. He takes his time, dragging his fingers back and forth to draw out the pleasure. I can’t take it. With his eyes watching mine and his fingers disappearing in my jeans, I shift.

  “What?” Charlie chokes, but rolling to my shoulder, I tug down his sweats.

  “No, sweetheart,” he says.

  “Yes, baby.” I move his waistband enough to get my lips over his thick shaft, lowering my mouth to draw him in. His fingers never leave my jeans, and he returns them to my channel even though we rest in this awkward position. I rise a bit to my elbow, angling better to draw him deeper into my mouth. His fingers work within me, dipping deeper and forcing faster. The movement of my mouth matches the rhythm of his fingers.

  “God, I want to fuck you,” he strains, and I increase my suction. My hand curls around the part of him that wouldn’t fit in my mouth, and I squeeze. “Fuck that, actually,” he hisses. “I want to make love to you.”

  I release him with a pop, looking up at his face.

  “Charlie?”

  “I know, the girls, but still, I want to slide into you and take my time with you. I want to feel you come around me.”

  Goddammit. My mouth returns to his shaft, swirling my tongue around the length as his fingers work harder within me.

  “I’d slide so deep and then pull to the edge…” Charlie whispers, his other hand coming to the back of my head. His hips move the slightest bit, and I realize he’s doing to my mouth what he’d do to me.

  “I take my time to reach the depth of you…” He slowly thrusts upward, tickling the back of my throat. My eyes water. He’s too much, but I want this for him. I want to feel him lose control—sweet, satisfying control.

  “Draw you to the edge and keep you there…” he continues, moving his fingers in a slow beat. Slow enough for my hips to chase those retreating fingers, not wanting him to leave my body. We take this time to tease one another. Soft surges and rolling hips, and then it becomes too much.

  “Charlie,” I warn around him. His hand doesn’t leave the back of my head. His fingers increase their intensity. My hips rock, working with the friction he’s creating while my mouth hoovers over him. I’m out of control with rhythm dancing in my head as my channel draws him to me, and my mouth latches onto him.

  “Nessa,” he groans, and I know he’s close. I move my hand to cup his sac, squeezing as his fingers press inward. He breaks first. A jolt and a jet as I swallow around him. The excitement of doing this to him, bringing him to this point with only my mouth, sets me off as well. My hips still, and my knees clamp. Charlie tugs my hair a bit, signaling for me to release him. Dragging myself upward, I brace on my elbow, my other hand fisting into the couch cushion as I come undone around his fingers.

  Once I settle, I lower to press a final kiss to the tip of him exposed above the rim of his sweats. He chuckles, withdrawing his fingers from my pants, and I press all the way upward to face him.

  “I’ll never get enough of you,” he says. His voice is earnest, and if I’m honest with myself on only this, I feel the same. I’ll never be full of Charlie Harrington.

  20

  Coming Clean

  [Charlie]

  Being with her like this on my couch wasn’t enough, and after a round of soft kisses, I need more from her.

  “We can’t do this here,” she mutters against my lips as if reading my mind, and I accept that the exposure of sex on my couch is a risk.

  “Bedroom?” I suggest against her mouth, but she shakes her head. She doesn’t want to get caught up there again and with the girls so close. “Laundry room?”

  “What?” She giggles as she leans away from me, but I quickly stand, take her hand, and practically drag her to the laundry room, which is off the hallway leading to the back entrance. The pocket door slides shut, and we’re submerged into darkness minus the thin shade on the window. Hands roam and grope until I have her jeans to her ankles and my sweats below my ass.

  “Turn around,” I tell her, and she spins, lowering her upper half against the dryer. It isn’t the most romantic spot, and we certainly aren’t making love like I wanted, but my need is too great. I must be inside her. My hand slips over her perfectly sculpted ass. Fingers twitching, I pull back and smack her smooth skin. Her knees bang on the metal dryer as she hisses, “What the hell?” And then I ram into her.

  She tries to look at me over her shoulder, elbows on the surface of the dryer, but I’m a man on a mission. I want to imprint myself on her.

  “Don’t fuck Richard,” I growl as I surge into her, my hips out of control as I thrust into her heat.

  “I’m not fucking Richard,” she snaps, pressing back to take each pulse, each push. Her pussy clenches me in that way I like, like she doesn’t want me to leave her body.

  “I want to be the only one you fuck,” I hiss, holding her hips as my dick disappears into her. I can hardly see, but I don’t need to witness what I’m doing. I feel her. The wetness coating me. The heat of her around me. The depths I can reach within. I want to mark her heart like she’s marked mine.

  “You’re the only one, Charlie.” Her voice tries to soften, but she stutters as I don’t let up and continue to relentlessly hammer into her.

  “Only me,” I demand because she’s the only one for me. The one I want by my side, in my bed, in my soul.

  “Charlie,” she warns, but I don’t want to hear her tell me we can’t see each other or be together. This is it. This is us. Too soon, I delve forward, pausing inside her as tiny sparks of white dance before my eyes, and I fill her with my seed. I’d impregnate her if I could. I’d make her mine in all manners, and I’d love her more than that dickhead ever could.

  “Shit,” I hiss, realizing she didn’t come. My hand slides over the swell of her hip and lowers for her clit, rubbing at her until her hand on my wrist stops me.

  “Charlie?” Her voice lowers, and something in it tells me she doesn’t want me to continue. She doesn’t want me to get her off, and I’m pissed at myself for taking advantage and at her for letting me lose control without taking her over the edge as well.

  “I want you to come,” I whine like a child, lowering my head for her shoulder. I want you to have a reason to never leave. It’s irrational. Even I know sex cannot save a marriage.

  My head pops up. We aren’t married, and thankfully, she isn’t still married to Richard, but what if…If he gets to her, could he tempt her into sex? Could he remind her how good they’d once been? Could he reassure her through touch and affection that he means it this time? He’ll stick.

  I don’t like it. I don’t like my thoughts or our position, and I quickly pull out of her. Bending at the waist, I tug up my sweats while she rights her jeans.

  My mouth opens, and I’m ready to apologize when the pocket door slides open, and I’m blinded a second by the light in the hallway.

  “Dad, what are you doing in here?”

  Janessa’s hands clutch the dryer as Lucy stares up at me. I reach for the washer lid and open it.

  “I’m looking for my jeans. Tomorrow will be a casual day at the office.” My voice shakes as I lie to my child, and my heart races between what I’d just done with Janessa and the knowing glare of Lucy.

  “It’s dark in here,” she says.

  “No wonder I can’t find them. So what are you doing out of bed?”

  “Vega’s crying.”

  Janessa pushes
past me and races for the main staircase.

  “What happened, Pint?” I ask, reaching out for my daughter.

  “I think her grandpa died.”

  Oh, my God. No.

  + + +

  I can’t forgive myself, and I’m certain Janessa won’t forgive me either. If we hadn’t been fucking up against my dryer, she would have gotten the call of her father’s passing. Why Vega was called I still don’t know, and I realize that even though Janessa claimed she threw out Vega’s cell phone, she must have bought her a new one.

  Still, I stand with guilt weighing on my chest as she stands at the burial ground…with Richard at her side.

  Somehow, he was present at the hospital when she arrived. He was by her side at the funeral service, and he’s the one with an arm around her shoulder as she cries while they lower her father’s casket.

  Richard.

  Not me.

  I don’t know how he did it, other than playing on her weakness at the moment. Me, on the other hand, I haven’t been able to get close to her.

  After she scooped Vega to her chest in Lucy’s room and then used her daughter’s phone to call her brother, it was confirmed her father died during the night. Zander had been in the cafeteria getting a late-night coffee, but her mother had been in the room. Vega remained with us for the night, and Zander collected her the next day.

  Not Janessa.

  “Mami’s taking this very hard,” her brother said to me as he scooped his niece into his arms as though she weighed nothing.

  It was understandable. What was not understandable was Janessa not reaching for me when I was reaching out to her. I wanted to comfort her. I wanted to bring her to me and tell her we’d work it out. Her. Us. Richard. Even her parents. This was their home, and her mother was free to stay even without Henri.

  “What’s wrong with you?” my brother hisses beside me at the cemetery. Giant didn’t know Henri per se, so it’s nice of him to show at the funeral. In fact, most of my family is here since Henri was my groundskeeper for years. He was like an extended part of my family, and I loved my own for supporting him.

  “I’m coming out of my skin,” I say, shaking my leg, coins rattling in my pocket. I couldn’t stand watching Richard rub a hand down his ex-wife’s back and then settle it near her ass. Too close.

  “Is this about Jan?” Giant asks, recalling the night in the Pub a few weeks back. I’d gotten caught by my eldest brother coming down the stairs before Janessa, and the cross between pissed and pleasure was still etched in my face.

  Whatcha doing up there? Giant asked, but I simply shook my head. I didn’t have a clue what I was doing with this woman or how she rattled me to my core. That night, I said it would be our last night and look where we are. A funeral with her ex’s arm around her.

  “Shh.” I hush my brother because he knows. While I stood there telling him I wasn’t doing anything upstairs, Janessa came down the steps and caught us in the hallway. Without meeting my eyes, she excused herself, and my eyes didn’t leave the retreat of her back.

  That didn’t look like nothing. Giant chuckled. He was too observant some days, but at least it hadn’t been Billy. He would have been merciless had he caught me getting laid…again.

  “What’s that guy doing groping Jan at her father’s funeral?” Billy mutters next to me, and I close my eyes. So much for silence from him.

  “That’s her ex,” I mutter.

  “He looks like Richard Swank, new center fielder for Atlanta,” Billy says, his voice too loud for a funeral.

  I huff.

  “Damn, Charlie. How you gonna compete with that?” Billy adds, making me feel like the child who didn’t make the cut. I might have played baseball in college, but I obviously didn’t go pro. Giant reaches around me and taps Billy on the back of the head, just as he did when we were kids.

  “I’m just saying, he’s all brawny and muscly. Isn’t that the shit women would say about him?” Billy chuckles softly. “I bet he can go for hours.”

  Sweet Jesus. “I wouldn’t know,” I mumble, and Billy snorts.

  “That’s what I mean.” Billy’s still picking on me. At my expense, he’s assuming I know nothing about sexual stamina. “And that’s her ex?”

  “Okay, that’s enough,” I say a little too loudly, and Giant knocks my shoulder to quiet me.

  As the final prayer is said and the casket lowered, Rosa sobs, stringing together words of anguish I don’t understand. Zander Cruz steps forward to pull his mother to him, and Richard wraps an arm about Janessa, bringing her into his chest.

  “I’m done,” I say to no one in particular as I turn away from the congregation of people and cross the grass to my car. I drove separate from my brothers, leaving the office to attend the service and planning to head back there to drown my thoughts.

  21

  Funeral Folly

  [Janessa]

  “I’m done,” I mutter to my brother next to me. We’ve been standing for hours, accepting hugs and condolences from people we don’t know. In addition to our parents working for Charlie Harrington, they knew several people in the community and were active members in their church, so the line of well-wishers seems endless. The church generously hosted the funeral luncheon in its basement, and I could use a drink despite the midafternoon timing.

  I have no idea what Richard is doing here, what game he’s playing, or why he felt he could touch me during the funeral. I’d been looking over my shoulder every chance I had, waiting for camera flashes to capture the doting husband at his wife’s side.

  Ha.

  Most of the time, I’d notice Charlie hovering nearby but not close enough. I hadn’t returned his calls because I didn’t know what to say. Things were left unresolved the other night in his laundry room after we were caught once again by his daughter only seconds after I’d pulled up my pants.

  Good God, we were playing with fire.

  “How are you holding up?” Roxanne asks me, holding up a cup of tea for me.

  “I could use something stronger than that,” I whisper, and her head tilts.

  “Want to get out of here?”

  I hate to leave my mother, but I need a break. It’s been three days of constant crying, calling out for my father, and wailing in broken Spanish about him leaving her. I’m not trying to be insensitive to my mother’s emotions, but I’m coming out of my skin, and Zander is suspiciously absent at night. Vega’s taken to covering her head with a pillow, and I allowed her to go to Charlie’s for the afternoon and swim instead of suffering through this never-ending funeral luncheon.

  “The Pub is only a mile away. We can sneak out and be back within twenty minutes.”

  It’s a devious plan, but I like the way Roxanne thinks, so I mindlessly follow her lead after she sets down the teacup and guides me to a back hallway as if we were headed to the restroom. Once we exit the main hall, we both race up the stairs like teenage girls breaking free of the Catholic school I attended as a child.

  We slip into her car and head only a few blocks to the Blue Ridge Microbrewery & Pub. Roxanne doesn’t wait for us to be officially seated. She just tips her head at the bartender, Clyde, and pushes me into the farthest booth.

  “What do we have here?” Billy asks. He was at the funeral, but I didn’t notice him at the luncheon. It was nice of his family to attend. Giant and Letty. Billy and Roxanne. Mr. and Mrs. Harrington. Charlie.

  “Escape. We have nineteen minutes on the clock,” Roxanne says, and Billy chuckles.

  “You escaping prison or something?” He leans against the booth, crossing his arms.

  “Something like that,” I mutter.

  “I’m sorry about your father,” he offers, and I weakly smile in acceptance. I’ve had the same frozen curve to my lips all morning. It’s my look of appreciation, one I perfected while on the arm of Richard.

  Just smile and don’t speak, Nessa. I curse him under my clenched teeth.

  “Thank you.”

  “Okay, two su
mmer ales coming up.”

  “Quick,” Roxanne snaps, and Billy chuckles again.

  “Darlin’, you know I like to take my time.”

  My cheeks heat as do Roxanne’s, but she also tips her face upward, and he cups the back of her neck, leaning in for a quick kiss.

  “William,” she says against his mouth. “Seventeen.”

  “On it.” Billy backs away, and Roxanne looks over at me. My swollen eyes ache from the silent tears I’ve shed at night. Certainly, Roxanne can read the exhaustion in the bags under my eyes as I’ve tried to assure my mother that Zander and I will take care of everything. There’s a pain in my heart that I didn’t know my father as well as I should, and he still treated me like I was Daddy’s little girl.

  “Your mother told me she saw you coming out of Charlie’s bedroom.”

  “Papi, it wasn’t like that,” I lied and then told him he should only be thinking of getting better.

  “I don’t care if I work for him, I’ll kill him if he hurts you like Richard did.”

  Aw Daddy, where had you been earlier in my life?

  Tears fill my eyes at the memory. We hadn’t had the chance to talk further, discuss things, or make a plan. I hadn’t told my parents Richard was back. I didn’t want them to worry. But Richard took it upon himself to show up late the other evening and try to talk to my dad. He wanted to assure him he’d look after me. I worry his words might have pushed my father over the edge.

  A tear plops from my eyes onto the wooden tabletop.

  “Ah, honey.” Roxanne reaches for my hand from across the table, and my fingers shake as I return my sunglasses to my eyes despite being inside the dim pub. “My mom died when I was in high school, and my father ten years ago, so I understand. You let it all out.”

  I nod, lowering my head and cupping my forehead with my palm as the tears fall into the lenses of my sunglasses.