Must Love Curves (Six Wicked Shorts)

by Wick, Christa

  Howard's wimp-ass sucker punch move tripled my embarrassment. I had really scored a trifecta with him -- married, a coward and, in the end, just another guy who wanted to ride the fat girl for a time. Whatever humiliation I felt, it paled against the anger blazing across Cayce's face as he deflected the bucket before it could slam into his head.

  Lucky for Howard, Cayce learned how to control his emotions long ago. Some days, I wasn't even sure he had any. He would be smiling one minute and the next minute I couldn't squeeze so much as a blink out of him. So his anger evaporated before the water could even begin to drip and he settled for locking one of his meat hooks around my wrist and dragging me back to his apartment to change before driving me home.

  Home -- where I would be alone all over again.

  Thinking about the house I grew up in and how empty it was now, I heard the dryer door shut, then the sound of the cylinder turning. A broad, shirtless chest slid into view two feet in front of me a second later. The wet jeans were gone, too, but he had apparently pulled a pair of gym shorts from the hamper.

  "That loser isn't worth pouting over, little girl."

  Ignoring the need to lick my lips again, I let my gaze crawl over the valley and peaks of his abdominals and the hard plates of his chest with its dark red nipples. When I finally reached Cayce's face, I found him scowling at me.

  He thought I was upset about Howard. Yeah, I was pissed at Howard, but the emotion shaping my mouth was something more. This last year, I had lost the two most important men in my life -- one to kidney failure and the other for no known reason.

  Indifference, I guessed.

  I scowled back and slitted my eyes at Cayce. It was fine by me if he wanted to think I was being a baby and lamenting my lost lover. The oversized jerk had been all but invisible this last year. A couple of visits the first few months, a couple more calls after that and the monthly checks signed by someone else. I could have been dead for all he knew!

  Clearly, Cayce Gerard didn't give a damn about me and probably never had. All the little acts of kindness over the years, the shoulder to cry on when some boy hurt my feelings -- all of that had been exposed as a sham since daddy died.

  Cayce moved toward his bedroom for fresh clothes. Spoiling for a fight, I followed after him. I couldn't face Howard again, at least not without going to jail. I wanted to cut that man's balls off. Since I don't think I'd do very well in prison, Cayce was the next best target for my anger.

  He deserved it, too.

  I crossed my arms over my chest. "I'll pout if I want to."

  "Frank spoiled you." Bending down, Cayce slid the bottom drawer of his dresser open. Water still clung to his torso from the wet shirt, making him look like he'd just stepped out of the shower and into the clingy gym shorts that molded so enticingly to his muscular ass when he reached down like that.

  A shiver of appreciation ran through me before I forced myself to look away. "Leave daddy out of this. He only did right by you."

  "True, princess. But did he do right by you?" Taking out a clean t-shirt, he tossed it onto the bed and started for the bathroom. "I mean, why else do you always pick these whiners with wallets? You've been like that since high school, but that guy tonight was the worst. What did you see in him, Ashley?"

  Cayce looked at me. I cocked an angry brow at him. He didn't deserve an answer and he wouldn't like the one I had to give him. That much was clear from his prolonged absence.

  He slapped a towel over his shoulder and growled. "Answer me, little girl."

  I pressed my lips tighter. There was no way to tell Cayce that I picked guys like Howard because they were the exact opposite of Cayce. Or that all my ex-boyfriends didn't mind dating fat girls, which was not something I had ever seen Cayce do. All the girls who had hung on his arm during high school were cheerleaders or pretty and thin enough to be on the team.

  I didn't want to admit my fat girl insecurities, but, far more than that, I didn't want to even think about that first reason -- my feelings for Cayce. Just talking to him on the phone made my knees weak. Actually looking at him left me wet and struggling to breathe. Every year my body's reaction to Cayce grew worse, but the attraction remained a one-way street. From cleaning my skinned knees when I was in junior high right up to the scene at the restaurant and the lecture-filled, patronizing walk to his apartment, Cayce had treated me like his little sister.

  I ached and yearned and I didn't want a husband or a boyfriend with that kind of power over me. All Cayce had to do was scowl at me and I felt my heart grinding to dust like dried butterfly wings.

  How was I supposed to tell the big jerk that I had it really, really bad for him?

  "You're pushing my patience, Ash." Slowly drawing the towel from his shoulder, he exited the bathroom.

  Crossing my arms, I forced myself to look at him. Well, I looked at his left ear. My pussy was tingling too much to risk anything more. His face is as overwhelming as his body. Pale gray eyes, dark lashes, a heavy brow and that mouth. It's the easiest thing in the world for me to get lost looking at that mouth of his -- expressive, full, the lips a brownish red like his nipples, with a faint part at their center showing a hint of teeth. Just watching him eat an apple is nearly orgasmic.

  The things I had imagined him doing with those lips and teeth and tongue would make a seasoned hooker blush.

  "We're not leaving until you answer me, princess."

  Showing me he had all the time in the world, Cayce started drying off. My pulse kicked into high gear at the sight of the cloth caressing his arms and chest. A fresh twinge of need rippled through my pussy. I wanted to take the towel and rub it all over the chiseled abs and thick biceps before I stripped his shorts away.

  I shook my head, trying to dislodge the image of my touching him so intimately. "It's none of your damn business who I go out with or why."

  "Yes, it is." Cayce dropped the towel to the floor and walked slowly across the room in my direction. "I promised Frank I'd look after you -- that I wouldn't let anyone hurt you, Ashley. Anyone."

  "Some promise!" I backed closer to the wall as he kept moving toward me. "Daddy's been dead a year and you've been by maybe four times. And all those were at the beginning."

  He stopped, blinked once, and I knew that I had finally hit a nerve. He shrugged it off and continued walking until I was backed all the way against the bedroom wall and he was less than two feet from me.

  "Little girl, your daddy was a great vet, but a really lousy businessman. I've been through the books and he wasn't even drawing a salary the last three years." More than half a foot taller, Cayce had to tilt his head down to glare at me. "For almost a year, I've worked morning, noon and night -- all so half of the patients' owners can pay me in eggs and sides of beef. But I've been there every time you needed me."

  "Like you'd have any clue when I need you." I shot back.

  "I knew tonight."

  I couldn't argue with that. I still had no idea how he knew Howard had gotten drunk and warped into a complete asshole. Still, I come equipped with ovaries, so I don't feel compelled to argue rationally. And with all the things Cayce's presence was doing to my body, I was in no shape to try. My nipples were too hard to think. My clit ached. My pussy dripped. I didn't have a single neuron available to process any kind of logic.

  Physical sensations. Emotions. Those were all I had left.

  "If you really meant to keep your promise to daddy, you wouldn't have stayed away." I pushed at his chest, trying to force him to step away. I might as well have been playing pat-a-cake with a concrete wall. "He treated you like a son, same as if you were his flesh and blood."

  With a growl, Cayce closed the rest of the distance between us. He pressed his palms flat against the wall behind me, his nails scraping at the paint as tension curled his fingers. "But we're not blood, little girl. And that's not something you want me thinking about right now."

  His face surged closer and then he snapped his teeth at me. "Believe it."

 
; Tears stung my eyes. Whatever love Cayce once had for my father clearly didn't extend to me. His words told me as much. We weren't blood. I was Frank's daughter and Frank was dead. Ergo, I no longer meant anything to Cayce.

  My hand flew up before I had a chance to realize what I was doing. My fingers clenched into a fist half a second before I connected with Cayce's chin, the diamond ring Howard had put on my finger that night cutting into his skin.

  "I..." Gasping, I shook my head. I hadn't meant to strike. It all just hurt too bad to keep listening or feeling him against me. "Cayce...I--"

  Cayce didn't give me a chance to apologize. He grabbed my wrist, yanked the ring off and tossed it across the room.

  "Hey, that's--"

  "Shut it, princess." Cayce scooped me up, tossed me on his bed, then sat down and dragged me across his knees before I could scamper away. He lifted my skirt. Cold air caressed my ass and then I felt the sharp sting of his open palm across my butt.

  Lord how I wanted him to touch me, but not like that!

  "Cayce Gerard, you let me up this instant!"

  His only response was another sharp smack to my ass. It hurt like hell, but, worse than that, I realized as the sting subsided that I was aroused by what he had done. My flesh was exposed to his view, and -- no matter how briefly -- he had touched me someplace that only a lover could claim access to.

  Another two smacks turned my pussy into an inferno, squeezing in on itself to make my clit pull up tight and begin to ache with an unbearable sweetness I had never experienced. When the next smack came, I knew I had to stop him before I embarrassed myself.

  "You're hurting me!" I glared at him over my shoulder as I struggled to free myself from his iron hold.

  Cayce froze for a second, his attention on my face. Then he hiked my skirt up higher and returned his gaze to my bottom. He traced the visible outline of his palm print with one fingertip. "Yeah, I am."

  I bit down on my lower lip. Feeling the slow slide of his skin over the enflamed area, I wanted Cayce to trace the entire outline, to have his fingers move under my panties and follow the curve of my plump flesh down to my equally achy pussy.

  Starting to shake with a desperate need, I grew more frantic. "Let me up!"

  "No, princess. You need this." He shook his head, his gaze never leaving my exposed flesh. "We both do."

  We both do?

  Down his hand came. My hips jerked, my pussy tightened. I bit out a cry as another twitch ran through my cunt. Another spank, every bit as hard, and the sound in my throat twisted into something else. Something that didn't sound anything like a protest.

  Faster than he'd laid me over his knees, Cayce tossed me on my back. His face an inch from mine, his gray eyes drilled into me. "Was that a moan?"

  No fucking way would I admit that or how close his so-called lesson had me to coming. "You're a brute!" I cried out. "An absolute beast!"

  Eyes smoldering, he gave me a little shake. "Was-that-a-moan?"

  "It doesn't matter what it was!" I pushed at him, desperate to get him off me before I did something stupid like wrap my legs around his hips and start pumping against his crotch. He didn't want anything to do with me as it was. How much more poorly would he think of me if he knew I was beyond turned on?

  Cayce started to move and I thought for a second he would relent. Instead, he slid down my body, pushed my skirt up and my legs wide apart. His shoulders filling the space between my thighs, he focused his attention on the silk front of my panties. "It matters, Ash."

  Hooking his thumbs under the sides of my waist band, Cayce tugged my panties up until they molded against my flesh. I didn't want to think about the image presented to him. It wasn't just the ample flesh that always made me uncomfortable with my lovers tearing at my heart. With his intense gaze on me, my muscles jumped, my thighs flexed, and my labia twitched as lust relentlessly squeezed my pussy. With all that hot, wet rolling and squeezing, I knew the fabric of my panties would be dark with my juices.

  Horrified by my body's betrayal, I lowered my trembling hands to cover my mound, my fingertips instantly finding the cloth warm and soaked through. Unable to control the quiver in my mouth, I closed my eyes.

  Why was Cayce doing this?

  To embarrass me?

  I couldn't believe that was it. He may have ignored me for most of the last year, but I hadn't known Cayce to be cruel to anyone.

  Could he have secretly loathed me all those years? Had every kindness been an act?

  His lips brushed my knuckles. I cracked my eyes open the tiniest bit, afraid to meet his gaze. It was a needless worry, his eyes were closed. He gnawed gently at my fingers, pulling the tip of one into his mouth to chew and suck.

  Pleasure spiked through my pussy, spreading like wildfire and tweaking my nipples to rock hard points. For the second time that night, I moaned.

  He didn't seem to hear. Opening his eyes, he pulled the front panel of my panties to the side and stared down a second before his thumb stroked along one edge of my parted labia. My heart stopped while he traced up the other edge then started down the middle.

  Hitting that center line, my clit felt like Cayce had just touched a live wire against it.

  My heart lurched then thumped wildly at the knowledge Cayce was touching me. Not just anywhere, but down there. He had kissed my fingers, sucked at them. This wasn't a mere smack or four on the ass anymore. If Cayce didn't stop immediately, his actions were a prelude to sex. The kind of sex I'd been dreaming about for a good many years. The kind of sex I had to pretend I was having with Howard so I could climax.

  "We...we need to talk about this." Lifting my head, I looked across the swell of my clenched stomach and saw Cayce Gerard dumbstruck for the first time in all the years I've known him.

  His expression lasted half a heartbeat before he gave a dismissive shake of his head and refocused his gaze on my throbbing wet pussy. "Love, a hungry man doesn't talk about eating -- he eats."

  I had less than a second to register Cayce calling me love before his mouth descended onto my sex. His lips and tongue catching and sucking at my clit, he explored the perimeter of my pulsing cunt with his thumb. Each contraction found me wetter and tighter than the last. I sucked a ragged breath in -- sucked and sucked and sucked to keep from exploding all over Cayce in a creamy mess of excitement.

  The air released with a sharp cry.

  Cayce froze then he lifted his head. His gray gaze darkened as tears slid down my cheeks. Hastily, he lowered my skirt then surged up my body.

  "Ash, love. Shh." He smoothed his hand along my arm, trying to calm me. "I'm sorry, baby. I stopped. I won't touch you again--"

  "Don't you dare..." He had no idea why I was crying or that he'd stopped just a few licks shy of my climax.

  "I won't, baby, I promise." His hand cradled my head, his thumb stroking my cheek as he buried his face against my neck. His breath blew hot against my throat, his voice issuing raw and cracked as he tried to reassure me. "I love you. I promised your dad I'd look after you, not do something like this...I just lost it thinking you might get engaged to another man tonight."

  "Just how did you know where I would be?"

  "Your post." Lapsing in his promise not to touch me, he lightly nipped the side of my jaw and growled. "You put your status as 'Ice at Uchi's?' What the hell else could that mean?"

  "The post was supposed to go to Carol," I whispered. "Not to my entire timeline."

  "I wish to hell it had." He buried his face against my neck again. "You would have decked that jackass all on your own and I wouldn't have..."

  He swallowed hard, the motion detectible against my flesh, and then he roughly squeezed my shoulder as his body started to vibrate with tension. "I'll take you home, baby girl. You don't have to worry about my doing something like that again."

  I curled my arms around his head and knotted my fingers in his hair. I couldn't believe he was trembling against me. Cayce, who topped six feet and was packed with muscle. Cayce, who had once
wrestled a sick bull to the ground because no one could land a tranquilizer dart in the beast's thick hide.

  Shaking.

  Because of me.

  "You don't understand girls very well, do you?" I teased with a broken laugh, still unable to control my breathing.

  "Just parts." He lifted his head, his gaze dead serious.

  Smiling, I blinked away fresh tears. "I was saying, don't you dare stop."

  Understanding crept across his face. His cheeks flushed. Nostrils flared and pupils dilated to crowd the gray irises. Sucking his bottom lip in, Cayce blinked once…twice.

  "You mean..."

  "Yeah," I whispered, my body starting to shake again from so much male arousal hovering on top of me. "Please continue."

  He blinked again, more slowly this time, as if he was the one surrendering. His mouth came down on mine in a fierce kiss that sucked the last bit of oxygen from my lungs. Deft fingers unbuttoned my blouse. The kiss grew more languid. His lips sucked at mine. His tongue traced the edge of my teeth.

  Cayce hooked my blouse's collar and bra straps to ease them down my arms. Reaching the bra's front closure, he groaned and unsnapped it.

  Sucking at his lower lip, he pushed the cups to the side to expose my breasts.

  I held my breath. With full Ds, I was at least two cups larger than any woman I had ever seen Cayce with. The two large globes reminded me all over again that his past lovers were petite women and I was…

  "Perfect." Groaning, Cayce wrapped a hand around each breast and gave a gentle squeeze before he mashed them together. He nosed the line where they met, his breath leaving him in a shaky moan. "Just perfect."

  Nuzzling my flesh, his eyes drifted shut. "I tried so hard not to want you, Ash. Picked women who looked nothing like you so I could forget. But I can't keep you out of my head."

  His mouth slid left, found a nipple and sucked it in. He pulled it taut. The achy bud escaped with a wet pop before he covered it again. A few more drawn out sucks were followed by a kiss along its side.