by Koko Brown
Not too dissimilar from his digs, the kitchen was sparse, consisting of only a makeshift armoire serving as a pantry, a pot-bellied stove and an ice box. The rest of the cabin space was taken up by a couple of chairs and a couch facing a coquina fireplace.
“The bathroom is out back,” Shane offered, “and there’s a wash basin and tub behind that screen over there, if you want to freshen up.”
While she absorbed their temporary digs, Shane walked over to the kitchen table and started unpacking the groceries.
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX
After changing into a simple house coat, Celeste sat down on the bed. Even though she’d slept for what felt like half a day, the past few hours had been draining. She felt lethargic and heavy like the gold band wrapped around her left finger.
Celeste lifted her hand and turned it to and fro.
“Regrets?”
Celeste moved over, giving Shane room to sit. “No. How about you?”
Shane shook his head. “I pray for a long life so that I may spend more time loving you.”
Blushing, Celeste looked down at the quilt. When she lifted her gaze, her pulse lurched. His green eyes, so much like summer grass, bored into her.
“Do you want to eat first then play? Or play, then eat?”
“Let’s play first.”
Shane crushed his mouth against hers. Immediately, his tongue sought hers, coaxing hers to join with his. Celeste savored the taste of him, a knee-weakening elixir of tobacco and coffee.
Only yesterday they’d come together, but it seemed like an eternity. Impatient, she tugged at his undershirt, pulling it from the waistband of his trousers up and over his head.
Celeste ran her hands over his torso. She marked the warm flesh with her fingertips, memorized every sinew and muscle. Just yesterday, she’d explored every inch of his body. And still, touching him felt as if it was the first time.
He made quick work of the fastenings lining the front of her house coat. With each inch of flesh exposed, he kissed, nibbled and sucked.
“Taste so sweet.” He trailed his tongue along her collarbone and Celeste clutched at his shoulders. “Better than anything I’ve ever tasted.”
And he kept on licking from the valley between her breast to her belly and on down to her inner thigh.
Celeste allowed him free reign, neither objecting nor protesting when he gripped the back of her knees and pulled her down on the bed.
Her breath caught when he inched toward the crease where her thigh met her sex. “This part of you is the sweetest.” His tongue snaked out and he licked her folds, took each lip in his mouth and sucked greedily.
Celeste dug her heels into the mattress, her fingers twisted the sheets.
“So sweet and all mine,” he said and then slipped a finger inside her. He stoked the storm forming deep inside her with delicate strokes, while his mouth drew on her clit.
He tasted her, drew on her essence and pushed her to the edge with his fingers, tongue, and mouth. Unable to hold on, Celeste rocked her head from side to side. The orgasm ripped through her, breaking her down and then building her back up at the same time.
While she rode out the maelstrom, he crawled up her body. “Hold me,” he whispered in her ear.
Barely cognizant and limbs heavy, Celeste moved her body to accommodate him. She wrapped her arms and legs around him and held on tight. She gasped when he pushed inside her. Long and thick, he was on the verge of almost being too much. She didn’t complain. She’d rather be filled to the gills than nothing at all.
With deep, penetrating thrusts, he kicked her desire into overdrive. He ground his hips against her pelvis, circling his hips and over and over. Celeste bit down on her lip. He was driving her toward that cliff again.
“Come for me again.”
It wasn’t a question, but she answered him anyway. “Yes,” she moaned, so close it weighed her down made her lightheaded.
“Let go.” He slid his hands under her butt and lifted. “I’ll just keep on going.”
Celeste cried out as she came undone. True to his word, he continued to pump into her, each delicious thrust better than the last.
Hands down he was the one in control. She was just an innocent, yet highly appreciative, bystander, a cypher for his animal passions.
“Mine,” he growled as he thrust over and over again.
It wasn’t a question, but Celeste nodded.
“Who do you belong to?” Shane pushed deep, then withdrew, each stroke taking her higher.
“You,” she moaned. And then again, “Only you.” Celeste’s back arched from the bed. Her body pulsed with bottled up energy, her sex gripped him in a tight vise and she groaned in disbelief. He’d pushed her over the edge again.
This time she wasn’t alone. He gripped her hips tighter, dug his heels in and began to drive into her savagely. His body began to sweat, covering her and him in a slick sheen. Their bodies slid against one another. Although she was slightly dizzy, she reveled in the feel of him.
As he spilled his seed into her, he cried out like a wild animal, pumping and grinding his hips. With one final thrust, he collapsed on his side, spent, his arm cradling his head.
Shane draped his leg across her and pulled her in the circle of his arms.
“I love you,” he whispered, drifting off to sleep.
While Shane slept, Celeste rolled out of bed. She afforded the one-room cabin a cursory glance then decided to pull on her overcoat and galoshes.
She’d always wanted to see the Adirondack Mountains. Earlier, she’d been unable to see past her own two feet. Now she could see for miles and miles.
Rustic and untarnished, the air was so fresh she almost choked on it. A dozen or so mountain peaks rose in the distance, their majestic summits reflecting on the surface of Otter Lake.
Despite the rugged territory, remnants of the Gilded Age dotted the opposite shoreline. What appeared to be a hotel and several cottages stood out in stark contrast to the surrounding forest with their white facades and red roofs. Catering to rich railroad tycoons and oil barons, the hotel’s interior probably contained every modern amenity.
While their cabin didn’t have electric, running water, heat or indoor plumbing, she wouldn’t trade it for the world, Celeste mused, as she took a trail that paralleled the shore line. They were far from prying eyes, questions and most importantly discrimination.
Celeste frowned. Shane probably didn’t a clue what he’d gotten himself into. And neither did she it seemed since she’d allowed stardust to get in her eyes and her love for him cloud her judgment.
Even though Celeste loathed ruining the paradise they’d found, they needed to discuss their future—straight on and with no blinders. It was inescapable.
Dreading the inevitable, Celeste kept walking. She didn’t stop until she made a complete loop around the lake and the midday sun drove her out of her overcoat. Since she didn’t want to be caught dead walking around in nothing but rubber boots and a thin housecoat, she decided to head back to the cabin.
When she entered, Shane no longer occupied the bed. He was standing over the stove. He’d dressed in a pair of gray wool slacks and a white, short-sleeved t-shirt.
The wool draped well over his narrow hips, and muscular thighs, while the tank emphasized his powerful build. When he stirred the contents of a sauce pot, his biceps and the muscles in his back rolled and bunched under the thin cotton of his shirt as if fighting to be set free.
“I’m cooking breakfast,” he said, glancing over his shoulder. “You hungry?”
Celeste removed her coat and goulashes and left them by the door. As good as he looked she was suddenly hungry for something more than food.
Tamping down the urge to run into his arms, she walked over and stood next to him. A pan of cooked bacon sat on the stove next to a pot of bubbling grits.
“You had enough time to make biscuits?” she asked, leaning over and sniffing the country gravy he was diligently stirring.
“I woke up shortly after you left. I decided to make breakfast instead of dragging you back inside.” He lifted his eyebrows up and down and heat stole up her neck to settle in her cheeks. “You deserved a break.”
“You should’ve called me back in, I could’ve helped.”
“And allow us to starve?”
Celeste punched him, but she burst out laughing just the same. Her cooking skills hadn’t improved, since their first dinner date. Now she had the rest of her life to perfect them.
The thought should have delighted her. Instead, Celeste grew somber.
Not yet sensing her change in mood, Shane tried to pull her into his arms. At the last moment, she sidestepped him.
“We need to talk,” she said, hiding on the other side of the kitchen table.
Shane groaned loudly. “A woman’s famous last words.” With a protracted sigh, he leaned against the table. “Okay, what gives?”
“Us…this…our marriage.”
Shane crossed his arms and Celeste instantly realized this wasn’t going to go well. “If you think you can get this marriage annulled, you can forget it,” he gritted out. “I’ll contest it. Plus, you might already be carrying my baby.”
His stubbornness left a sour taste in her mouth. “This is paradise up here because it’s just you and me. Are you sure you’re up for what’s waiting for us back home? Are you ready to face a life where you’ll run into the maître d from the Hotel Theresa every single day of your life?”
In the subsequent silence, Celeste wondered what he was thinking. For sure it was a hard reality. She wanted him to be prepared and if he wasn’t ready for it, then they should part ways once they reached the city.
The thought did a number to her insides, and yes she would be devastated if he changed his mind about an annulment. She just wanted to make sure he was walking into this thinking it was going to be a cakewalk.
“In all honesty, I didn’t think about the outside world when I asked you to marry me,” he finally said. “I was just thinking about how much I love you and want to be with you the rest of my life. I’m a fighter Celeste and I’ll brave whatever comes. I just ask that you do the same. Will you stay by my side and face whatever storm that comes our way?”
He reached out, took her hand and she responded the only way her heart could, “Yes.”
***
Even several rows back Celeste could hear the clank of the scale’s counterbalance. She held her breath. Shane had increased his conditioning in the past week to make his weight. He worked out four hours a day and even increased his amount of protein. Still, he woke up this morning nervous, believing he hadn’t done enough to shred the last five pounds to meet his class.
“Shane Brennan…” the boxing commissioner looked at the scale again, “weighing in at one hundred and ninety pounds.”
Shane’s gaze lifted. His eyes searched the crowd, finding her he raised his arms bent them at the elbow and smiled from ear to ear. Heart pounding, Celeste returned it with one of hers.
Bronzed and rippling with muscle, in nothing but his underwear, he was a beautiful male specimen. And he was hers.
Shane stepped down from the scale to allow his opponent to make weight. An inch shorter than Shane, the brute’s muscles looked carved from marble, reminding her of the Roman statue of Hercules at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
“Weighing in at one hundred and ninety-five pounds, current light heavyweight champion Jim Clarke.”
“Tomorrow Madison Square Garden will host one of the most anticipated cards of the year, Shane Brennan versus Jim Clarke.” The commissioner took hold of both fighters’ wrists and hefted their arms in the air. The audience erupted into cheers.
Not as caught up in the excitement, Celeste left her seat. She picked her way up the aisle to stage left. A couple of reporters and even his coach, Ollie, milled around him as he dressed.
Not wanting to draw unnecessary attention before his big fight, she hung out near the stairs. Right now, he didn’t need the unnecessary attention her presence would cause.
“Why do we have to wait around, Johnny?”
Normally, Celeste would’ve ignored the platinum blonde standing next to her, but her nasally whine was hard to ignore like the sound of screeching tires.
“I got an appointment,” her companion replied.
“Everything revolves around you.” The blonde pouted and it wasn’t pretty. “If I miss my hair appoint—”
Before she could finish, her companion grabbed her by the jaw. He pressed his fingers together until the woman moaned. Celeste thought the woman was annoying as all get out, but she didn’t deserve to be manhandled.
“Business comes first. Say it.”
For several drawn out moments the woman didn’t make a peep. Instead, the two waged a battle of wills. Celeste gave the woman credit. She held out much longer than expected, considering they had an audience.
“Say it,” he repeated.
They glared at each other a moment longer, the woman finally mumbled something that seemed to appease her companion enough that he released her, yet leaving behind angry fingerprints.
“Now go sit your pretty little ass in that chair over there and wait for me.”
Doing as told, the blonde stumbled away.
As if manhandling a woman had mussed up his appearance, he skimmed his manicured hands over his hair. Celeste snorted. Besides being a bastard, he was also a narcissist.
“Well… hello, Toots. How you doing?” the bastard even had the nerve to edge closer.
In her element around thugs, bastards and near-do-wells, Celeste didn’t bother with making eye contact. “Hey, yourself.”
Unfortunately, her lack of interest didn’t waylay him. “I can’t believe a beautiful doll like you is into boxing?”
“I’m not.”
The bastard chuckled. “That’s funny,” he said wagging a finger at her and finally pulling her attention from Shane. “You’re at a weigh-in before a title match, and yet you don’t like boxing. I wasn’t born yesterday.”
No. But maybe last week. “I’m here to support a friend.” The bastard didn’t need to know any more than that and neither did anyone else for that matter. She was proud to have Shane as her husband, but she wasn’t going to let her ego ruin his chances for the light heavyweight title.
“Who’s your money on?”
This guy was a real gem! “Why? Do you have inside information?” Celeste was
only stroking the bastard’s ego. Men like him tended to think they were ten times more important they really were.
“I might,” he paused to admire a gold signet ring on his pinky. “I could give you a few inside tipsover dinner of course.”
Celeste had no doubt the choicest tips would be dished out in bed. And to think, a few months ago, the party girl in her would’ve bought what this clown was selling hook, line and sinker.
Riddled with guilt and a tad bit dirty for even acknowledging the bastard, Celeste looked away. Her gaze collided with her husband’s. Fully clothed again in the tan bucks, tweed slacks and camel-colored turtleneck he’d worn for the weigh-in, his hair was slightly disheveled and his cheeks contained color.
Probably from all the excitement, Celeste mused. She also noticed that he was engaged in conversation with Ollie, and yet his gaze remained locked on her. Well, not entirely on her, but also her unwelcome company. And telling from his brooding expression, he didn’t like it one bit.
“Here’s my card if you ever find yourself interested.” The bastard shoved a vanilla calling card in her hand. Celeste gulped. He had no idea he was playing with a loose cannon with fist that could lay him flat. “Now if you would excuse me, I need to take care of some business.”
Celeste wished him bon voyage as he bounded up the stage steps. Hand held out, he walked right up to Shane.
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN
Contrary to the morning’s excitement, the cab ride home was decidedly somber. Celeste tried to enga
ge Shane, but he simply brooded in the corner, tightlipped and staring out the window.
Eventually, she gave up, chalking it up to tomorrow’s fight. Over the past several days he’d started to withdraw, grow more serious. Still, he’d never been this withdrawn.
Had something happened at the weigh-in? Celeste tensed. Was he mad about seeing her talking with another man? Worried and wanting to set the record straight, she turned to him.
Unfortunately, Shane had another motive. He suddenly leaned forward and tapped the cabbie’s seat. “Take a left here on Flatbush. The lady’s going to Forte Green.”
“What are you doing?” She balked after he gave the driver her address. Ever since they’d been back from their honeymoon, they’d fallen into domestic bliss in the Paddy Wagon.
“It’s best you stay at your place tonight. I’m gonna need my rest for the fight.”
“We don’t have to do anything. I can sleep—”
He leaned back and closed his eyes. “Don’t fight me on this, you’re going to lose. I need to get some rest, concentrate on the fight.”
Even though it made perfect sense, his excuse didn’t stop her from stewing over the rejection and the fact that she would be spending the rest of Christmas on her own.
***
Adrenaline pulsed through Shane’s veins. The excitement of the crowd was palpable. He fed off it, consumed it as he stood in the tunnel, preparing to make his entrance. Shane closed his eyes, channeling their energy.
“You ready, kid?” Ollie came up behind him and slapped Shane’s shoulder.
“I’d better be or I’m a sitting duck.”
Chuckling, Ollie patted Shane’s shoulder. “This is your moment. Your victory will be splashed across all the morning rags. I see it now.” Ollie lifted his hand. His fingers slightly curled from arthritis. “Sugar Shane Claims Bittersweet Victory Over the Mountain Man.”
As the challenger to the title, Shane’s entrance music, Nine Pound Hammer pounded through the Garden’s speaker system.
