by Rose, Ranae
Moisture made her pussy slick. Could he feel it against his belly, where her clit throbbed against the firm plane of muscle just above his groin?
Maybe. He moaned like he could, stopping what he’d been doing in order to urge her to sheathe him inside her instead.
“Let me just get a condom first,” she said, rising. She hated giving up such incredibly close contact with his body.
“Almost forgot,” he breathed, the expression of desire on his face so intense that his claim was utterly believable.
A thrill of something both forbidden and sweet coursed through Ally at the thought of feeling his bare cock slide inside her. The idea seemed incredibly intimate, a temptation that whispered someday in her ear as she made her way toward the dresser.
She retrieved a condom and tore the package open as she settled on the edge of the bed, her gaze drawn to the heavy shaft of his cock.
Pinching the tip of the condom, she prepared to roll the latex down over the length of his erection – another idea that gave her a thrill.
Her fingers glided smoothly over the rounded tip of his cock, sliding down his shaft.
“Maybe sometime,” he breathed, “if you take a pill, or would be willing to start taking one – maybe we could stop using condoms.”
Her hand threatened to tremble as she finished rolling the condom to the thick base of his cock. “Maybe we could.” The idea that had teased her moments ago took root in her mind, burrowing deep and making her core contract. What would it feel like to fuck him bare, to feel the hot rush of his come inside her every time they finished, a lingering reminder of what they’d just done?
“And I do take a pill already.” She’d been taking it for years – it had become a habit, something she hardly even had to think about.
He breathed a long sigh as she withdrew her hands from his groin. “Makes me want to come just thinking about it.”
Her entire body tingled and tightened as if agreeing with his sentiment.
“I was tested for STIs by a military doctor. Didn’t have any then. Haven’t been with anyone since then, until now.”
Her thighs quivered a little as she climbed on top of him, straddling his hips. Her body was buzzing with heightened sensations, but a small pang of sadness sailed through her heart as she absorbed every meaning of his words, remembering again how lonely his life must have been since he’d been discharged from the USMC.
“I have an appointment coming up to get my birth control prescription renewed. I could ask for testing then, just to be safe. Not that I’ve been with anyone else for a while either, but it’s been a long time since I’ve requested comprehensive testing.”
Her sex life had been so careful and so passionless, her encounters so infrequent that she hadn’t thought it necessary – it had never occurred to her that she’d be having a conversation like the one she was having with Ryan.
“All right.” He slid a hand up the back of one of her thighs, cupping one half of her ass.
And it was real – everything she’d been imagining just minutes ago was suddenly real, a promise of ecstasy visible on the horizon. Her heart skipped a beat, infusing her upcoming medical appointment with a meaning she never would have predicted. With her ears ringing faintly with the sound of her own pulse, she lowered herself, spreading her thighs wider as she reached below with one hand and gripped the base of Ryan’s erection, holding it steady as her folds met the smooth head.
He thrust upward, burying himself halfway inside her.
She gasped and finished lowering herself, no longer possessing the will to take it slow.
His cock stretched the softer walls of her channel, unyielding as he rocked his hips below, filling her completely.
Something knowing flashed through his eyes as he ran his hand back down her thigh, bringing it around and pressing his fingers against her clit.
His touch there – steady, almost massaging – undid her and she came hard and fast. The orgasm wrung pleasure out of her every inner muscle, causing her channel to tighten, pause and tighten some more around his cock, as if demonstrating on its own how badly she’d missed him on a physical, even cellular level. She rode the climax out without finesse, letting her body quiver as she gasped, her breath hitching in a way she couldn’t control.
When the pulsing contractions in her core had ebbed to nothing, he withdrew his hand, letting his fingertips rest on her thigh. “Something else I’ve missed,” he breathed.
A final tremor raced through her core, as if in tribute to his sentiment. “Me too.” She hadn’t bothered to so much as touch herself since their last encounter – he’d been the last to give her pleasure of any kind. Her body had definitely gotten used to his attention fast. In her post-orgasmic state, the idea of going without his touch gave her a pang of horror that drug addicts probably felt when contemplating giving up their illegal substance of choice.
As far as addictions went, being hooked on him wasn’t bad. Not now that she knew he wanted her to be a part of his life. He knew what he was doing as he rocked below her, stretching her pussy with motions that were both smooth and breathtaking. The way his eyebrows threatened to knit together above his half-closed eyes left him looking as if he were completely absorbed in his own pleasure, but she knew better.
Still, it was a surprise when he touched her clit again, rubbing the bud with an easy caress. “You can come again, can’t you?” He didn’t bother to wait for an answer before beginning another massage, his fingertips insistent against the tiny but swollen center of her pleasure.
Yes her body seemed to scream in answer to his question. The sudden resurgence of pleasure made speaking difficult, so she settled for showing him her faith in his methods, undulating her hips so that the head of his cock scraped a place inside her that made her toes curl.
She’d never climaxed twice with anyone else. In fact, she hadn’t even been sure it was possible. One orgasm had always taken so much effort to achieve that she hadn’t even really thought about what it might be like to have two almost back-to-back. And yet, it was clear already that she would, this time. Little bolts of mounting pressure were arcing through her core, readying her pussy to shrink tight around his shaft again.
The second toll of her pleasure was nearly as intense as the first. It swept through her in wrenching waves, filling her from the inside out with a bliss that reached the tips of her toes and fingers. She dug the latter into Ryan’s shoulders, having fallen forward over him, her spine turned to something like mush by the feel of him creating friction inside and outside her.
When it was over, she felt spent enough to slump over on his chest and fall asleep with him still inside her. How could she have known that a double-climax would be so exhausting? Exhausting, but amazing. It was as if he’d pushed her body to its limits of pleasure, claiming some previously unexplored territory for himself. The notion sent a spike of satisfaction through her, leaving her feeling more connected to him than ever.
As if he’d read her mind, he wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her down, onto his chest. With her belly flat against his and her breasts pressed so firmly against his chest that they ached, he came.
She gasped along with him as he made a feral sound, breathing something that sounded an awful lot like fuck yeah into her ear as he pumped himself into her, making her entire body remember what it had felt like when she’d reached her own climaxes a short while ago. She didn’t come again, but she might as well have for how short-winded the last few minutes left her.
When he was still she lay on top of him for a little while longer, consciously steadying her breathing as her heart slowed, its decelerating beat in tune with his. When she regained confidence in her ability to control her own legs, she climbed off of him and settled at his left side, breathing a sigh of mingled satisfaction and astonishment.
He slipped his unhurt arm around her neck and they rested that way for a while. Getting up didn’t seem important, though it wasn’t really late enough to g
o to bed yet. Her tiredness was due completely to what they’d just experienced together. Slowly, her energy returned, leaving her feeling oddly full of life, as if she were glowing from the inside out. The feeling was almost overshadowed when her stomach gave a whining, high-pitched growl.
“Hungry?” Ryan asked.
A touch of heat crept into her cheeks. “Yeah. I haven’t had dinner yet, have you?”
“No.”
She’d suspected as much. When was the last time he’d eaten?
“Do you want to help me cook?”
She turned to face him, surprised. “Yeah, sure. What do you want to make?”
“Some of the ingredients I stocked up on for breakfast a while ago will go bad soon if they’re not used. I was thinking we could dice everything up and throw together some omelets.”
“Okay.” Her stomach gave a little growl of anticipation. It wouldn’t take too long to make omelets, and the protein in the eggs would make for a filling meal.
They dressed – jeans for him and jeans and the top she’d worn there for her – and headed to the kitchen together.
“I can take care of the dicing,” she said. “Where is there a knife I can use?” There was no wooden block full of assorted knives on the counter, like there was at her home.
He pulled open a drawer below the sink and handed her an ordinary kitchen knife handle-first.
“Is this the only one you have?” she asked, faintly bemused.
“Old faithful,” he replied. “Believe it or not I’m not exactly a gourmet chef. I tend to keep my cooking pretty simple.”
“I wouldn’t say I’m a gourmet chef,” she replied, gripping the knife’s well-worn handle. “But I’ve learned a lot about cooking from my mother. Maybe I could make dinner for you sometime.”
He nodded as he opened the fridge and began plucking items from its shelves, cradling them in the crook of his arm. “That would be nice.” He set down his findings on the counter – a bag of shredded cheddar cheese, a bell pepper, a handful of mushrooms and a tomato that slipped from his hold, bouncing against the countertop. “Damn it.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Ally said, reaching for the rebellious fruit. There was a little soft spot where it had landed. “We’re going to be dicing it up anyway.”
She began cutting the tomato into little red cubes.
Meanwhile, Ryan put a frying pan on the stove, smeared its inside with the end of a cold butter stick and turned the burner on medium.
“The tomato is ready. Do you have another plate I can use to cut the pepper and mushroom on?” There was no cutting board in the kitchen.
“Yeah.” He pulled one from the cupboard beside the fridge and handed it to her.
“Thanks.” She made quick work of the pepper and mushrooms, reducing them to little slivers and cubes that would be perfect for omelets.
Meanwhile, Ryan attempted to one-handedly break a few eggs over the edge of the frying pan.
Surprisingly, he succeeded.
“You weren’t kidding when you said breakfast foods were your specialty,” she commented, grabbing the bag of shredded cheddar cheese and opening it in preparation.
“Not so much my specialty as the only thing I can cook. You’d be good at cracking eggs too if you ate them every day.”
“Okay. So no eggs on the menu for whenever you come over and let me cook for you.”
He shrugged. “I never said I didn’t like them.”
“Still. A little variety may do you good. Are you ready for these?”
He whipped the eggs with a spatula he’d pulled from a drawer. “Yeah.” Accepting the plates one by one, he dumped the diced tomatoes, peppers and mushrooms into the pan, topping it off with a generous portion of shredded cheese before he began stirring again.
She gathered up the plates she’d cut the vegetables on and headed for the trashcan, ready to dispose of the unusable parts – the core and seeds of the pepper and the dark spot where the tomato’s stem had once grown.
The trashcan’s contents were surprisingly colorful. “Flowers?” she asked, eyeing what appeared to be a discarded bouquet.
Chapter 20
“My parents sent them.” Ryan sounded like he was making an effort to keep his voice neutral, but an underlying thread of agitation was audible anyway.
“Oh.” A dozen little pangs of curiosity shot through Ally as she stared down at the unappreciated flora. “Is that your cellphone?” Several pieces of black plastic were scattered throughout the trash, peeking from between petals and stems. It looked like the device had been run over by a car.
“They called, too.”
Or maybe thrown against something. Ally frowned at the thought. “I didn’t even realize they knew how to get in touch with you.”
“They have their ways of finding things out. They made some calls, bothered some people from my old unit until they wheedled the information out of them.”
The memory of Ryan tensing as he spoke to an old marine friend on the phone flashed through Ally’s mind. “Oh.” She bit her tongue as she finally discarded the unused bits of vegetable that remained on the plate she held. Obviously, the conversation with his parents hadn’t gone well.
When she returned to the counter, he was still stirring what was clearly going to be one giant omelet. “Sorry you couldn’t get in touch with me. I was just so pissed that I threw my phone. That was pretty fucking stupid – now I don’t have one.”
“It’s okay.” She thought back to the way he’d looked when she’d first arrived that day. To look at him now, he seemed transformed. Would he have answered her text that morning if he’d been able to? Her gaze lingered on his shoulders as he watched the omelet, a spatula at the ready. It didn’t matter. Whatever had happened, she couldn’t deny that she was relieved to be with him now.
“They found out I’m not enlisted anymore.” He kept his gaze on the cooking omelet. “Wanted me to come back to New York. Like nothing ever even happened.” He grimaced down at the frying pan.
“Oh.” What else was there to say? It felt good to hear him open up to her, even if it was just to share the bare facts of his conversation with his parents. She didn’t really know enough to interject an opinion.
“Yeah.” He lowered his spatula and slipped one corner beneath the edge of the omelet, apparently testing its doneness. “Between that and the flowers, it was pretty obvious they’re out of their minds.”
“I guess it is pretty strange to send a guy flowers for his birthday.”
“I’m sure even they didn’t think I wanted flowers. They sent them to let me know that they know my address – where to find me.”
The matter of fact way he said it made his parents sound kind of creepy. It also reminded her of Manny, in a way – specifically, the way he’d been stopping by their house just to let them know he could. “Did they expect you to pack up and come home?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. They really broke out the heavy artillery – or at least, I’m sure that’s what they thought.”
“What do you mean?”
“Offered me a job. A nicer place to live than anyone really needs. Money. All that shit.”
“Your parents have a lot of money?” She wouldn’t have guessed.
“More than what’s good for them. My father is CEO of a multinational construction firm headquarted in Brooklyn. It’s a pretty successful company.”
“So I guess they were disappointed when you joined the Marine Corps instead of pursuing a white-collar career?” It wasn’t exactly easy to imagine. Yeah, work-wise she’d followed in her mother’s footsteps in a way, but it was only at a hair salon and she worked there out of necessity. Her parents would have supported her taking another path if she’d had the chance. Instead, she’d graduated high school amidst the turmoil of her father’s arrest and imprisonment.
“That’d be an understatement. I dropped out of college to join when I was less than a year away from a degree. They were furious – thought I w
as throwing away my future.” A bitter chuckle escaped him as he flipped the omelet. “Maybe they were right in some ways, but not in the ways they think.”
“What led you to make such a drastic decision?” A military life would be hard enough even with family support. She could only imagine what would drive someone to stick to such a choice without it.
“I wanted to do something on my own – make my own choice, you know? I felt like I was too old to just go along with whatever my parents wanted me to do. I wasn’t ready to settle down forever in the version of life they’d imagined for me. I guess that sounds ungrateful, since my life was an opportunity some people would kill to have.”
“I don’t think so.”
“No?” He looked up for the first time, casting a questioning glance in her direction.
“It’s not like you left to do something selfish. You volunteered for something that wasn’t about you – something that not many people could do. And it wasn’t easy. So why should you feel bad just because what you wanted wasn’t what your parents wanted?”
“Yeah. You’re right, but they won’t see it that way. They’re not used to not getting their way. And honestly, after all this time, I couldn’t give a shit less.”
The broken phone lying in bits and pieces in the trashcan seemed to tell a different story, but she didn’t say anything about that. It was natural that he was angry at his parents over their rejection – anyone would be, in his circumstances. “Sorry about your parents and … everything.”
He shook his head. “Not your fault.”
“No, I mean, this is a terrible birthday. I wanted to make today special for you, but it’s been anything but.”
He turned to face her, abandoning the omelet he’d been preparing to lift from the pan. “Last year on my birthday, I was in Afghanistan. Spending the day with you – sex with you and even eating omelets with you – beats the hell out of that.” The raw sincerity in his eyes defied her to disbelieve him and made her toes curl inside her socks.
