Pride and Pancakes

by Ellen Mint

  She began to slide back on the waiting bed, but when Tristan remained in place, Beth drew her fingers up his wrist. Tugging, she thought he’d follow suit, but the man remained a stone guardian. Abandoning her mouth, he whispered in her ear, “I want you here.”

  Burning his gaze into her, Tristan abandoned the mattress, leaving behind the silver wrapper he’d excised from his jeans. Smart. But Beth didn’t have time to consider the luck of a prophylactic being in reach as he drew both hands along the outside of her thighs and took a knee.

  A gulp rose in her throat as she realized he wasn’t planning on screwing her while standing. As Tristan fell to his knees as if in obeisance to her, he circled a slow strum of his fingers from outside her thighs, down her calves and around her ankles. All the while, he watched as she struggled to funnel air to her lungs.

  “Do you—?”

  Beth parted her thighs open wide, bringing a laugh to the man before he could finish his question. As he nuzzled his cheek against the right side of her inner thigh, a static charge rose from his patchwork scruff. Not against her skin, but the sparks carried up through her body. The lightning struck deeper and deeper into her core, causing Beth to tremble in anticipation. He drew closer, trailing kisses up her leg to the crease of her thigh.

  With his tongue, Tristan lapped from the bottom of her folds clear to heaven. Not expecting him to leap forward so fast, Beth cried out in shock, digging her fingers into his hair. Reading the signs correctly, he lapped that acerbic tongue in figure eights all along her clitoral hood and down her labia. Each turn of slick heat washed another wave of pleasure against her core.

  Where before her orgasm had been sparking to go off at a touch, now it was ebbing and flowing like the tide. When Tristan rose to tap the point of his tongue directly on her clit, Beth gasped, trying to clench inward, but the orgasm slipped away. Aching for more, she hooked her legs over his shoulders. All the while, he curled his fingers around her ankle, forming a cuff with his wide hand.

  The orgasm tide returned, its crest rising higher than ever before. Clenching her toes, Beth leaned back as her heartbeat thundered all the way up to her hair. But once again, it wouldn’t break, the wave slipping away to the tantalizing kisses licking her closer to heaven. To think, those lips that had serenaded countless girls in their bedrooms, that had thrilled arenas and rocked charts, were licking and sucking her to bliss.

  Squealing at the mounting pressure rising in her body, Beth tipped backward to lie on the silky coverlet. Breath panted down her throat, but not enough to quench the flames rising through her veins. A moan rumbled from Tristan’s lips, causing her to buck against him.

  Quickly, he hooked his arms around her thighs and tugged Beth to him. As she felt herself slipping, the duvet sliding to the floor, Tristan suckered his mouth around her. He flitted a patter song against her clit while his lips spread a warmth across her entire being.

  Rising from her depths, the orgasm wave towered thirty, forty, fifty feet high. She clung by her clenched toes, arms outstretched to claw for a handhold as it reached its aching crescendo. All the blood rushed to her ears, blanketing away the sounds of sex. Spots of gold glittered across her vision, blinding her to the sight of Tristan on his knees. All Beth knew was the rush of pleasure reverberating across her body. She wanted to stay in that cocoon, to swaddle herself in the flying freedom of her body.

  The power chord struck hard, Beth gasping incoherently as she folded in on herself. Her hands dug tight to Tristan’s head, holding him prisoner between her thighs as she clung to the orgasm. God, her head was floating, her lips numb from the panting. She couldn’t think, Tristan forced to dig himself out of her crumpled-in ball.

  There was a quirk in his eyebrow, his gaze stripping her. As he rose from the depths of her thighs, all she could focus on were those sapphire blues and the fallen mahogany hair clinging to his forehead. “I’m guessing that was…?” he began when Beth grabbed his cheeks and kissed him deeply.

  Her own arousal smeared across her chin, the taste quickly replaced by Tristan’s tongue as they tried to scurry back onto the bed. On the trip up, Beth snatched the condom as if it were a holy relic. All the while, he kept kissing her, cupping her face as if he feared she might vanish.

  When she struck the pillows, Beth paused, both of them leaning up, Tristan on his knees astride her hips. She glanced at his cock, which had grown even larger from his eating her out. Dipping his chin down, Tristan worried a hand through his scruff and confessed, “I should warn you it has been some time.”

  Tugging apart the foil with her fingers, Beth met his gaze as she fished to sheathe him in a protective layer of latex. “I should warn you—” she said, rolling her hands up his back, her nails evoking a gasp. When she gripped his shoulder, she tugged the both of them down to the bed. “—I don’t care.”

  Tristan knocked her thighs apart. Thrusting once, he slipped partially inside her, Beth gasping as he filled her fuller than she’d been in months. Tristan gripped her thigh, guiding the leg to circle around his hip as he leaned down. He crested his forehead over hers and his trembling lips spoke sacrilegious prayers as he gently worked his way deeper inside.

  Latching on to the nape of his neck, Beth tipped her head to kiss him and hissed in pain. That damn lump she’d put on her skull struck the pillow’s edge. Tristan paused, his face twisting in concern, but she smiled wide and adjusted away from the bump.

  Even buried nearly to the hilt, Tristan waited. He kept stroking the leg she had wrapped around him, Beth lifting the other to envelop that tight waist. His sharp hips prodded into her thighs and her heels rested on the buttocks she wanted to feel flexing. But he remained holding himself upon that cliff.

  Rising off the pillow, Beth breathed in his ear, “I want you to fuck me until I see stars.”

  A solitary laugh broke from his lips and he turned them to her. His hot breath curled across her cheek as Tristan whispered, “Gladly.”

  In an instant, the shy, cautious man transformed into a ferocious Casanova. Tristan thrust a steady beat, each push of his hips reaching deeper and deeper. Beth happily grabbed on for the ride, her sight slipping closed as she savored in the rising swell of another buried orgasm. Each pulse drove her closer to release, her spine arcing to meet him as her legs tugged her onto him.

  “Damn it!” she cried, flinching at her cursed bruise once again thrusting into the pillow.

  “What?” Tristan swallowed, his breath panting as he struggled to keep himself coherent and also pounding her to the stars. “What’s wrong?” The answer came to him from Beth trying to rub away the bruise. She didn’t want him to stop, but the constant jab of pain wasn’t exactly a turn-on. Not that kind, anyway.

  “Here.” He bent down, that glorious cock trying to slide free of her hold. Grabbing her shoulders, Tristan hefted her up. Not far, perhaps a forty-five-degree angle from the bed and his still pulsing penis. With one hand wrapped around her lower spine for support, Tristan leaned back. He reached to keep himself steady, the thrusts faster but shallower by default.

  Sweat dripped down Beth’s breasts, her face heating to a thousand degrees from the passion rising between them. She watched his face struggling to maintain composure as the pleasure of her body swarmed his. A flush burst across his cheeks, reddening them to sunburn levels as he increased his thrusting.

  “Damn,” Tristan gasped. “Damn, damn, damn it!” The hands switched, his left cupping her back and the right…

  She caught the small trickle of blood welling up from his wound. Even bleeding, he wouldn’t stop. It was Beth who reached out to hold his hips and still him.

  Fractured blue eyes snapped open, hunting wildly for the cause of his abrupt halt. When Tristan focused on her, she smiled almost sarcastically at how foolish both of them were. “My turn,” she said, lifting off him. A gasp erupted from him at the loss, but she was fast to flip him onto his back and climb over his reclining body.

  “This makes far more sense,” s
he explained, even as the wounded look grew to a knowing smile. Tristan swept his palm over her hip, gliding his fingers against her glistening belly. With certainty in her veins, Beth straddled him and began the rhythm herself.

  She was no musician. Beth couldn’t keep a beat to save her life, but Tristan didn’t seem to mind. His head tipped back into the pillow, no goose egg to stop him. Quickly, both palms swept across her bounding tits. Tweaking her nipples, Tristan sent shudders of electricity racing down Beth’s spine as he met her thrust for thrust.

  “Take me,” Tristan whispered between his moans, his hips rising off the bed. Reverse planking, he tried to burrow deeper into her, deeper than even Beth thought she could manage. But fuck, was it good.

  “Take all of me.” He slapped his hands to her hips, raising and lowering her to his hungry beat. Beth scrambled to hang on, her body quivering down to her knees as she leaned back. In an instant, that thrusting cock pulsed against her G-spot and she was gone yet again.

  Sound remained, thank God, as she could hear both her cries of joy and Tristan responding with a guttural moan of satisfaction. But her vision grew white as the orgasm racked her body, Beth gripping to the man still thrusting patiently into her. He had to know she’d succumbed, her cunt constricting around what brought it such pleasure.

  “Gladly,” Beth whispered. Her sight returned just as Tristan tipped over into his own orgasm. His face shuddered, the lips lifting into an almost sneer-smile while his eyes rolled clean into the back of his head. Beth’s heart quickened at his pleasure-filled face, at how undone he let himself become in her presence.

  The wild sight slowly softened to that of the cultured man she knew. With a laugh, he abandoned her hips to swipe the sex-sweat off his forehead. Wincing, he asked, “You’re… Your head?”

  She winced, brushing back her soaked and mussed hair. When she touched the bruise, a burst of pain knocked into the back of her head. “I don’t know why I did that,” she chastised herself, before glancing down to the right hand cupping her. “Your hand?”

  Tristan tugged it off her. There was no bloodstain left behind, but he still frowned at the wound that really needed a Band-Aid. “Well enough,” he answered.

  Rising to her knees, Beth slid herself off him. It wasn’t easy—even with his orgasm, he didn’t seem to be wilting anytime soon. Tristan sat up, using his elbows for leverage. They gasped together, Beth trying to breathe in air that wasn’t bulging with sweat and sex. But try as hard as she might to ignore what had happened, neither could deny it.

  “So,” Tristan whispered, pushing her fallen hair back behind her ear. His palm lingered, curling down her shoulder, his fingers kissing with a light touch. Did he regret it? Did he despise himself for giving in? Did he despise her for not stopping it?

  Straining his neck in a stretch, Tristan asked nonchalantly, “How was it?”

  “Encore,” she called, raising both her hands to clap. “Encore!”

  Laughing, Tristan nuzzled her neck, his breath whispering against her skin. “Happy to oblige.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Don’t sleep.

  It’d been an easy order to follow when pain thundered up through her eyeballs. But curled under the warm blankets against the furnace of his body, Beth kept drifting away. She’d be awakened by a gentle shake each time, Tristan staring down at her as the afternoon slipped to nightfall. Shadows crept across the dark bedroom, attempting to lull her down into their depths, but he wouldn’t let her fall.

  They had left the bedroom at one point, rummaging for that box of crackers as sustenance. It was no strawberries and cream, but the energy helped tremendously as they somehow found their way right back to that oversized bed. Afterward, Beth tried to dig in to her research books, regretting not bringing some light reading for herself, while Tristan had to stretch his legs. His taut and overworked legs.

  Huddling under the blanket to try to escape the draft whistling through cracks between the logs, Beth glanced to the chair at the vanity. The one where she’d put the screws to him. Hm…screwing on that? Put a pin in it.

  Piled at the top was Tristan’s sweater, torn off long before their shower began. Heat burned up her cheeks as she thought back to those earlier hours. Beth rose from the comfortable bed to tug the cable-knit wool over her shoulders.

  Most men’s clothing would fall about her body like a bag, often reaching her knees, but this cut was snug around her hips and bust. The waist was loose, the hemline just long enough to skirt her upper thighs. Though the sleeves dangled clear over her hands. He might be wiry, but the lankiness is a challenge.

  After rolling up the cuffs, Beth eased out of the bedroom. The door remained open, allowing their only light source—the fireplace—to leech in. But as the sun faded to night’s embrace, it was difficult to see beyond the corona of the hearth.

  Beth headed for her phone, more on instinct than with a plan, when the breath caught in her throat. With only the firelight coating his naked body, Tristan sat on the couch. His head was bent over, the once styled hair scattered from their fun, a hand strumming the guitar resting in his lap. One leg was folded inward, cupping around the guitar as if to protect it. He plucked at a stripped-down song while in his stripped state.

  An overwhelming urge to preserve the image sent her dashing for her phone. She snapped a single shot, most of his bass clef hidden in the shadows of the guitar. There was a faint silhouette to remind her that lean guys weren’t lacking, but mostly she focused on the serenity washed over his face. How his once rigid spine bent his body lower to caress his guitar. How he didn’t need his striking gaze to look beautiful.

  A rotating bar grayed out her screen, sending the tender picture away. It said it was having trouble updating to the cloud it couldn’t find, what with Wi-Fi and all electricity being SOL. Beth told it to try again later when it had some damn signal.

  “Checking to see if there’s word from the outside world?” Tristan spoke, his voice carrying over the tune.

  She silenced her phone and left it on the mantel, which was where he’d hung their underwear to dry. That’s one hell of a way to do laundry. Smiling like a cat in the sunshine, Beth leaned closer to him. “There’s an outside world?” she said, catching his silent lips in a kiss. The laugh at her honest joke bounded against her mouth before he calmed to kiss her properly.

  Falling to the cushions, Beth faced him. He raised an eyebrow at her thieving his sweater but didn’t say a word. She’d never felt so warm in a single piece of clothing in her life. The scent of his body baked into the wool from the past two days only stirred her attentions deeper.

  Just the crackle of the logs and the twangy pluck of guitar strings echoed between them. She rubbed her leg against his, their shins touching as Beth tipped back to let the music swirl around her.

  “I don’t know that song,” she confessed, her ears failing to provide an answer to her brain.

  “You wouldn’t,” he said, “I barely do. I’ve had the music in my head for…feels like years sometimes, but the lyrics keep eluding me.” Tipping his head back, he sang to match his harmony, only la’s slipping in for where poetic words should be.

  “Another good reason to aim for a Christmas album first,” Beth threw out, then winced as his sight homed in on her.

  She expected a scoff, perhaps a frown, but a knowing smile wound about his lips. “A good point. A very good point. The first original song after nearly a decade since recording one and I fear…” His words faded but the song picked up steam. There seemed to be a rising tempo in the middle of it, or perhaps Tristan wasn’t certain what he wanted it to be yet. A forlorn melody for loss or a happy dance tune for gain?

  “We’re near strangers,” he said carefully as if testing to see her reaction.

  “Knowing each other for three days, I’d say that makes us acquaintances.”

  A laugh rolled from the side of his tempting lips. “Associates.”

  “Social-media friends.”

 
“Oh, I don’t know. That seems a bridge too far.” Tristan laughed.

  “Ships in the night,” Beth threw out, her brain too trapped in the pink cloud to drum up more synonyms for the game. To her surprise, the man who’d prided himself on his aloofness glanced down.

  The music stilled and he said, “I pray it’s more than that.”

  Pulling in a breath at the raw emotion wafting in his words, she nodded. “Me too.”

  “You.” Tristan picked back up the music but seemed to switch the tune. “Were you ever a Harty-throb?”

  Beth snickered, shaking her head. “No.”

  “No poster on the bedroom wall?”

  Shrugging, she stretched her arms out to admit, “What bedroom wall? I didn’t have one I could even legally put tape on until after college.”

  “Fair point.” The smile darted around his lips, showing off his sparkling teeth. “I suppose I just…” His words fell away as he kept up the song, his fingers playing like it was burned into his memory for an eternity.

  Beth scooted closer, sliding her hand up and down his shin. “Worried I’m only into you for the fame?”

  “The expectations built from a poster fifteen years old and…enhanced—they’re not easy to shake.” He lifted his broken eyes, his face begging for understanding.

  He, the svelte, patrician songwriter who’d come onto the scene when all boys were expected to have six-packs was worried that she wouldn’t appreciate the reality. Gliding her hand back up his thigh, Beth found that glorious stomach and those abs weighing on him. Pooched in his sit, it bore the signs of adulthood with a touch of sagging, but that meant there were years to it. Experiences. Stories.

  “Reality is far better than two-dimensional fantasy,” she breathed, rising on her knees. He dropped his hands from the guitar to cup her under his sweater. Kissing him as if she’d never get enough, Beth pressed her chest to his bare one while scooping her palm to his shoulder.