His Lucky Penny (The Penny Books, #1)

by LL Meyer

  “I’ll see you in a couple days. You’ll pick me up when you get back.” I’m trying to soothe him, but it makes him even grumpier. On Thursday, he has to go to Portland, where Wilson/Zarren flips a lot of houses, to go over the invoicing with the contractor and won’t be back by 4:00 when my exam lets out.

  “Maybe I can try to be back in time,” he says. And I can practically see his mind trying to make it work.

  I shake my head. “I’ll finish early anyway. And I’m sure I can make it home by myself at 3:30 in the afternoon. I’m going home by myself today at four.”

  “Don’t remind me,” he grouches.

  “Dane,” I say with a smile, “I’m a big girl.”

  He leans in to kiss me, giving my bottom lip a tug. “Don’t I know it.” The way he says it has me pulling in a quick breath.

  “No, no, no. Don’t use that voice. I have to go to work.”

  “What voice?” he laughs.

  I pop the door handle, but lean in to give him one more peck on the lips as I grab my coffee and my purse. “You know exactly what voice.” I turn back to flash him a last smile. “I love you.” Then I shut the door and hurry inside.

  I get the text two seconds later.

  I love u 2.

  I spend a lot of the day trying to find time to surreptitiously check my phone and read and reply to all the messages he’s sending me. By the time I’m home and sitting at my desk ready to study, the only things on my mind are decidedly dirty and have nothing to do with architecture.

  My phone buzzes again on the desk in front of me, but I have it face down. I’ve already warned him that I’m not going to answer him anymore tonight. But after two minutes of the back of my phone staring at me, begging me to pick it up, I cave.

  What r u doing now?

  Is he kidding me?

  Dane! Stop it! My concentration is pathetic as it is.

  Why?

  Cuz my boyfriend’s been sexting me all day. I’m sexually frustrated!

  U better take care of that.

  I look at my phone like it’s an alien. Is he suggesting what I think he’s suggesting?

  Good girls don’t do that kind of thing.

  It takes him a while to answer, making me think I’ve made a mistake and he has no idea what I’m talking about. How embarrassing. Okay, this needs to end now. I put my phone down and start going through my notes for my exam tomorrow.

  Buzz! I snatch my phone up.

  All girls do that kind of thing.

  I laugh.

  Not this girl.

  Again, I have to wait, but this time it buzzes before I put it back down.

  Know what u need? A vibrator.

  “What?!” I actually say it aloud. I hope Charmaine didn’t hear me.

  Stop! I have to study. I mean it this time.

  That seems to work, because there’s no more buzzing. Good grief. I’m actually disappointed now. Study, Lily, study. I take a deep breath and organize my thoughts. I’m on page three of my study guide, when I hear Charmaine saying something loudly in the hall and then my door opens.

  “Dane! What are you doing here?”

  He shuts my bedroom door in Charmaine’s face.

  “You’ve got five minutes. No arguing. Get your pants off and get on the bed.”

  “What?” Heat spreads across my skin. He looks supremely confident, taking up most of the space in my room. I want to throw myself on him.

  “Now, Lily.” This isn’t exactly the voice from the car, but I’m very familiar with it. It’s his do-what-I-say-or-there’ll-be-consequences voice.

  His eyes are burning into me, and even though my independent-woman side wants to say no, I’m standing up and undoing my jeans. When they’re off, I start on my T-shirt.

  “No. Just get on the bed.”

  “Dane . . .” I say weakly, but he arches a brow and I’m doing as he asks.

  He lies down beside me and I turn into him.

  “No. I’m not here.”

  I have no idea what he’s talking about, but he’s putting his hand in my underwear, so I don’t argue. What he does next almost has me jumping off the bed. I start to scream in surprise before I slap my hand over my mouth. There’s something on his finger and it’s vibrating against my clit.

  “Dane . . . I . . .”

  “Sshhh. I’m not here, remember?” He’s got his head propped up on his hand and he’s whispering right in my ear. “Use your hand and move it to the right spot.”

  The completely unfamiliar feeling of the vibrating is quickly becoming very agreeable. And though I’m hesitant to play this game with him, the thought of coming erases my cowardice. I reach into my underwear and move his finger slightly to the left.

  The vibrating increases. And again I have to slap a hand over my mouth to stop from making too much noise.

  “Now,” he murmurs, “I want you to imagine my cock in your mouth.”

  My breath hitches and then I swallow nervously. What is he doing to me? I can already feel the pressure building inside of me, his words helping to push me higher. My knees come up and I move him again.

  “So good, right?” he murmurs. “Can you feel my cock?”

  I moan.

  “Are you choking on it?”

  The vibrating increases again, and I can barely pull air into my lungs. I’m close now. My hand clamps down on his and I arch into him, but that just dislodges the delicious vibration. When I whimper, he laughs softly. “Put it back.”

  He lowers the intensity and we start all over again. Higher and higher he takes me, his dirty little words unleashing my imagination, the buzzing fueling the blaze inside of me. This time I let it come to me. I want it so badly. And once I’m over the edge, he leaves the vibrator on and milks me for all I’m worth.

  When it all finally stops, I’m panting and my heart is racing a million miles a minute. He gets up.

  “Where are you going?” I whine.

  He smirks at me. “I was never here, remember? You have to study.”

  He came just to get me off?

  “No, Dane . . .”

  “Sshhh,” he says, leaning down to kiss my brow. “We’ll go get you a real vibrator tomorrow night. You can spare an hour for me.” It’s not a question. “Now get back to work.”

  And then he’s gone. I hear him say goodbye to Charmaine and then the sound of the front door shutting. I immediately pull the blankets over my naked bottom half.

  “What the hell was that?” Charmaine demands, flinging my door open.

  I have no words for her. What was that? is a perfectly valid question that I have no answer for.

  “Well?”

  I start laughing as I tell her the truth. When I’m finished, she doesn’t know whether to be appalled or in awe, but soon we’re giggling like teenagers. She tells me that Josh would never do something like that, but that she thinks she’s good with that.

  I almost roll my eyes at how she always manages to put me down in some subtle way.

  My phone remains quiet for the rest of the night and finally, I’m able to settle down and get some studying done.

  So, I made time to be there to pick her up this afternoon when she finished her first exam, making sure I was there a half hour early. She’d been thrilled, gracing me with a smile that lit up my world. I’d dropped her off at home with a quick kiss, both of us happy as could be.

  But now, hours later in the car, all she’s giving me are one-word answers when I try to start a conversation with her. I sincerely hope I didn’t fuck up with my little stunt last night. But I swear, I didn’t even make a conscious decision. One minute I was eating my Thai takeout with Jason, texting my girlfriend, and the next, I was in the car with a mini vibrator in my pocket. And to make matters worse, her roommate had been home. Personally, I couldn’t have cared less, but maybe Lily did.

  It had been worth it, though. I got to watch her come and she’d loved it. And now, we’re going sex-toy shopping. I can’t imagine life getting any
better.

  I look over at her. She’s sitting in the passenger seat, quiet as a mouse. “Lil?”

  She turns to me. “Hmmm?”

  “Are we good?”

  She smiles. “Yeah, of course.”

  As I pull into the parking lot, her face darkens. Ahh. That’s what it is.

  “Imagine it’s Walmart,” I tell her with a wink.

  She glares. Yikes. Maybe this was a mistake. Jason told me to just order something online, but I’d wanted to see her reaction to it all. I still do.

  I get out of the car, but she doesn’t. Going around and opening her door, I offer her my hand to help her out. She likes that, and for a moment her expression relaxes, until she notices the darkened windows of the shop that give little hint of what’s inside.

  “Are you calling ‘penny’ on me, Pretty Girl?” I tease.

  “What if I was?” Her tone is serious.

  I look down at her in surprise. Would she really? Over a store? Resisting the urge to scoff, I very calmly reassure her. “Well, then I’d take you home.”

  Her eyes flicker nervously between the shop and me, and she licks that beautiful little red mouth. “No pennies here,” she finally says.

  Not wanting to analyze the triumph I feel at her capitulating to me, I wrap my arm around her shoulders to get us moving. “That’s my girl.”

  Inside, the store is much bigger than the façade would suggest with row after row of products. It’s not as bright as a Walmart, but not dark and seedy like I’m sure she was expecting. Almost immediately, she glances up at a flat screen on the wall that’s showing a girl who’s getting the shit fucked out of her from the front and the back.

  Her feet stall on the concrete tiles. “That,” she says softly, “cannot feel good.”

  The words are out of my mouth before I even know what I’m doing. “It doesn’t have to be so . . . ah . . . violent.”

  She tears her eyes from the TV to look at me, a million emotions playing out across her expression. After a few seconds, she asks, “You’ve done that?”

  Oh shit. “I’ve done it all, remember?” Nice save, I think to myself, but it’s an evasion that doesn’t keep her from the next question.

  “With Jason?”

  Oh double shit. I start walking again to give myself a chance to think and to get out from under the weight of her stare. “Who else?” I finally come up with. “It’s not something you do with a random guy off the street.”

  She giggles. “I guess not.”

  I almost heave a sigh of relief when she doesn’t pursue it further.

  Instead of taking her directly to the appropriate section, I lead her around the aisles starting on the right. We come to the bondage section, and she stares at the packages showing women and a couple guys tied up in various positions. I watch her pull her bottom lip into her mouth, biting on it. I have to repress a groan.

  I lean down to her. “You want me to tie you up?”

  She tenses and I hear her make a nervous squeak, but she neither denies nor confirms anything, just starts walking again. I do notice that she keeps looking up to the TV, though she doesn’t seem to want me to know. See? I knew this was a good idea.

  At the gags, she looks a bit horrified.

  “Don’t worry,” I tell her. “That’s not my thing. I will blindfold you, though.”

  “And . . . that?” she asks nervously, pointing to where the section with whips and floggers starts.

  I smile down at her. “I’m more into you being uncomfortable than in pain.” She seems relieved until I add, “Though it’s a fine line sometimes.” The anxiety comes back, so I put it in perspective for her. “Like the spanking.”

  Understanding blooms on her face, and she relaxes again. We move on. Now we’re closer to our intended destination, but first come the butt plugs, and I watch her take it all in. There’s a ton of selection.

  “Dane? Do you want to do that to me?” She’s hesitant to meet my eyes and for once I’m glad, but not because I’m embarrassed. I’m pretty neutral on ass play. I can take it or leave it, but Jason? He’d definitely want that from her. Do I reassure her with the truth about me? Or do I get her considering the idea for Jason’s sake? I take the coward’s way out.

  “Do you want me to?”

  Her eyes quickly scan my face and then fall to the floor. “I don’t know.”

  I pull her closer and kiss her temple.

  When we get to the vibrators, after much deliberation and mortification on her part, I help her pick out two. The first is just for her clit, because I know it’ll work. And the other is of the pink dildo variety, because she confessed to liking me inside of her when she comes better than without.

  I grin at that little tidbit I’d gotten out of her. Though getting it had been a bit like pulling teeth. I’m not sure what she’s worried about; it’s almost as if she thinks that her admissions will be used against her in some way. My smug grin dims. Does she not trust me?

  Throwing a pack of double A’s on the counter, I wait for the cashier to give me a total and then hand over the cash. In the car, I keep the idea turning over in my mind.

  The sound of her voice brings me back to the present.

  “Dane?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Did I do something . . . wrong?” She sounds so insecure, exactly what I don’t want.

  “No,” I say, taking my attention off the road for a second. “Why do you say that?”

  She looks small and timid in her seat. “You got so quiet.”

  I chuckle, reaching for her hand. “I was just thinking that I don’t want you to be scared to tell me stuff . . . about sex or anything for that matter.”

  She holds my hand, but turns to look out her window for the rest of the drive. I park in front of her house and turn the engine off.

  “So,” I say to her. “I’m going to need the long version.”

  She turns to me with a weak smile.

  Looking at her expectantly, I wait for her to speak. The resignation on her face has me feeling a bit uneasy, but I need to know what I’ve done to make her so unsure of herself.

  “I . . .” she starts. “It’s just . . .” Her shoulders sag, and then she undoes her seatbelt and leans forward to rest her forehead on her hands on the dash.

  Rubbing my hand in circles on her back, I give her the time she needs to sort out her thoughts.

  “The sex stuff scares me a bit,” she finally gets out.

  What? “But I told you to tell me if I hurt you.”

  The accusation makes her flinch as she sits up to look at me. “You haven’t hurt me,” she says, exasperated. “It’s just overwhelming.”

  “What is?” I’m really trying to keep my voice neutral here, but I can tell by the look on her face that I’m failing.

  “What is?” she says incredulously. “Vibrators, three-ways, tying me up, things that go in my ass. I think that I’m entitled to worry that you might want someone who knows anything at all about that stuff. God, Dane, you gave me my very first orgasm six days ago!”

  Irritation stings me, but I cover it with a joke. “So what are you saying? You don’t want me to make you come anymore?”

  She does not find that funny.

  “Please don’t tease me. You just said five minutes ago that you want me to talk to you about sex, and now I do, and you’re making fun of me?”

  She’s right. “I’m sorry. It’s just hard for me to understand you. I mean, what are you actually worried about? That I want to do those things with you, or . . . that I don’t?”

  Fuck, that last part didn’t come out sounding right. Actually none of it did; she looks like I slapped her.

  “You know what?” she says, her voice low and cutting. “You may not have had a girlfriend before, but I had Parker for a year, and he never once made me feel like shit like you just did.” She opens the door and gets out. Before she slams it, she says, “See you tomorrow night.”

  Her tone is so final. I think tha
t’s what doesn’t let me follow her. I just sit there, my head against the headrest, completely stunned. How did this happen? I didn’t mean to offend her. It was a reasonable question, wasn’t it? All right, maybe it was a bit mean-spirited, but I don’t want to hear about how she’s worried I don’t want her because she’s inexperienced. It’s total bullshit – made-up drama.

  Slowly, a sliver of worry crawls in with my indignation. But she’d said see you tomorrow night. She wouldn’t take this further. Would she? Suddenly the depth of my mistake crashes over me. She could. She could be gone and I’d never see her again.

  The hole I swore I would never allow myself to feel again begins to form in my chest. At first, it’s the size of a pinprick and just makes me a bit nervous, but then it starts eating away at me, like acid, a cancerous growth that can’t be stopped. Soon, a space the size of my fist is hollowed out inside of me.

  My phone buzzes, but I ignore it.

  I run my shaking hands over my face. I’m transported back all those years ago when I’d come home from school and she’d been gone. No! I won’t do this. My fingers curl around the steering wheel.

  The sharp edge of panic in my veins cuts me deep.

  Stay calm, I tell myself. I’ll just go and explain that I didn’t mean to offend her. Fuck, we never have to talk about sex ever again. Fucking sex, I think desperately. I let it run my life, make all my decisions.

  She’ll forgive me. I have to believe that. The alternative is unthinkable. Living with this hole in me is not an option. Eventually it’ll take me over like the last time and that was a long, hard road back. I’ll never survive again.

  The car door pops open and I jump in fright. Trying to think against the sudden light and the pounding of my heart, I slowly focus on her. She’s touching my face, and the relief is overpowering.