Peacock

by Nora Flite

  “What we have between us,” I said, swallowing. “It's just for fun.”

  “Is it?” Simon demanded. “Was tonight just for fun? I see it in your eyes, Tazzy. You’re falling for me. Why else would you have done those degrading things?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about—” I began, but Simon cut me off before I could go on.

  “The way you gobbled up your own nectar. The way you knelt at my feet, let me bend you over any and every object. It's not something a good girl should do, but you loved it. What does that make you? Obsessed with me, or isn't that what love looks like?”

  My body went pink at the memories. I kept my head high, not wanting his words to affect me. Was he trying to be cruel? Or was this a new game?

  “You’re ridiculous,” I told him hotly, almost losing my footing as a big wave crashed around my knees. But Simon only shook his head.

  He reached out for me, but I stepped back, closer to the water.

  “Don’t lie. It shows in your face. I can tell that you want me even now, after everything I've said.”

  What could he read in my face? I wasn’t even sure what I was really feeling. My emotions were a heady mixture of confusion, revulsion, and desire. Because even now, I did want him. I wanted him to grab me and kiss me roughly, his pulsing cock hard against my leg. I wanted him against me, and inside of me, too. But I didn’t want to admit that to myself, not when he was being such a baffling jerk.

  I stood tall against the force of the waves. “Back off, Simon.”

  “Why even stick around if you can’t stand me?” he pressed. He was almost shouting against the echo of the blue water as it hit the rocks. “You can go if you want.” He threw his arm to the side. “Just get away from me. It's better for us both.”

  The words that slipped from my mouth were unexpected, even to me.

  “Maybe I am falling for you,” I said, my voice catching in my throat. “What if you're right? What if this is love and how it's meant to feel?”

  Simon’s whole face seemed to break before my eyes. His lips softened. The anger drained out of him. “You must have a pretty fucked up view of relationships,” he whispered, “if you’re capable of loving a guy like me.”

  My soul shredded. “I'm not fucked up. I... before you, every guy I dated was decent. Kind. Normal.” His words cut me open, not just because they were meant to hurt, but because the deeper meaning was that Simon thought to love him, I had to be broken.

  A strange, wry smile crossed his mouth. “Bet there were a lot of guys, weren’t there? Dozens of them, in and out of your bed.” I didn’t dignify that with an answer. Simon went on. “It must have been your parents, then. Child of divorce, right? Did they fuck you up real bad, Tazzy?”

  Anger flared inside me, hotter and wilder than it had before. Who was he to talk about my family? What the hell did he know?

  Lightning shot through my body. My senses were in overdrive—I could smell the tang of salt and seaweed. I was invigorated by this boiling anger, this need to do something because I was under attack. My very existence was being stomped on.

  And he had no right.

  None.

  I snapped my arms out in front of me. I wasn’t sure if I was trying to strike him, or simply push him away. A wave broke around our knees at the same moment, and he went falling into the water, suit and all.

  His dark eyes opened wide in the moonlight. I loomed above, looking down on him for the first time. I wished he appeared more pathetic, because even now, soaked through, he had an energy to him; a sort of innate bubble of perfection.

  “Don’t you dare say anything about my family,” I hissed. “Especially what I told you because I was trying to open up! My parents might have been divorced, but they taught me what it meant to be loved. That’s more than you know, you stupid asshole.”

  Simon stared up at me. He went to answer, but I didn’t give him the chance.

  “I’ve dated plenty of guys, and never once have I let one get under my skin. Not even you. Especially not you.”

  But the words came out soft and unconvincing. Simon let me run my mouth, let my anger drain out with the tide. Then he held out his hand. His expression was surprisingly gentle in light of the heat of my words.

  “I’m sorry,” he said firmly. “I didn’t expect this either. Not you and your fire, just... none of it. Truce?”

  I hesitated. He looked appropriately contrite, his expensive suit ruined. But above all, I had the sudden feeling that we were in this together. I reached down, thinking I would help pull him out of the water. Our hands touched.

  Simon linked his fingers with mine, yanking me down on top of him. I fell with a splash and a yelp of surprise, but he just smiled as our hips connected.

  “Truce?” he asked again. I fought against him for only one second longer, because when I looked into his eyes, I saw the way they shined with genuine emotion. No wall, no mask... nothing but kindness and the smooth, flawless shape of his smile.

  “Truce,” I told him.

  I went to say more, because there was so much more...

  But instead, I kissed his full lips as the waves lapped up over our bodies. And that was enough for now.

  10

  Simon moved his mouth down my throat with a fervency that bordered on madness. He buried his face in my chest, taking deep breaths of my skin and the ocean air that had kissed it, as though he wanted to inhale me, to consume me whole. His hands were both forceful and skilled as they edged up my dress to feel the lacy fabric beneath. I threw my head back, so wracked with desire that I couldn’t be sure if it was his touch or the ocean’s that caressed my thighs.

  For a moment, just a moment, he pulled his mouth back from my skin, laughing into the space beside my ear. “I know the water has soaked you to the bone, but I'm going to make you even wetter.” He plunged his fingers inside of me. I shivered as his hand entered, so strong, so firm, so undeniable. Waves rippled through me, strong as any ocean.

  “Simon,” I breathed, half-bracing myself for him to tell me to shut up.

  But he didn’t, not this time. In the moonlight, he only smiled at me, his teeth white as porcelain. Then he leaned down and kissed me again as he slipped another finger inside of me, edging closer and closer to the textured roof of my pussy. Pleasure built in my belly, wild and warm.

  “I want to make you happy,” he breathed against me. “I want to make you come until you explode.” My hips lifted off the sandy beach, rising to meet him. I wanted him deeper inside of me. I wanted us to have one body, one mind. I tightened around him, close already.

  “I want that too,” I answered in a whisper. “Simon, make me . . .” But my words were swallowed up by the waves and my own pleasure as I crested closer to orgasm. I didn’t want to come, not yet. And somehow, Simon knew that. It felt like he always knew exactly what I wanted him to do to me. Slowly, he withdrew his fingers, leaving my body tense and trembling. I watched as he licked my juices off of them. This time, he didn’t force me to share.

  I wanted to make him feel what I was feeling, this sense that he was the gravity in my world. I wanted to put my lips, my hands, all over him. I reached out, and began to undo his belt. I eased his pants off, watching his hard cock swell in the brisk night air.

  He put his hand gently on the back of my head to guide me, but really he didn’t need to. I sucked his whole length down. He groaned above me, the waves splashing both of us, but I didn’t care. I gripped his muscular ass and pushed him in until my nose tickled his curls of hair on his pubic mound. The way he grit his jaw was incredibly arousing. My pussy squeezed as I choked on his cock—I was imagining it stretching me out.

  “Tazzy,” he breathed. “Christ, Tazzy.”

  I kept my strokes slow and torturous. Each time I drew back and then sucked him in deep again, he moaned. Seeing him like this left a new puddle of desire between my legs. I started to finger myself through my panties. As I sucked him faster and faster, I thumbed my clit to
the beat of my heart. We were both close now, teetering on the edge.

  With ragged breath, he drew my head back, bent down, and kissed me. My mouth was warm and half-numb, but I felt a smile grace my lips.

  “I want to be inside you,” he said. “I want to feel us come together.”

  “Fuck me,” I whispered back fiercely. “Fuck me hard and don’t stop until I black out.”

  Simon laughed, but he didn't say no. He reached into his pocket and handed me a condom. I tore it open and rolled it down his full length, pausing to kiss his cock as I did. He let out a low moan at our shared touch. Then, with strong hands, he turned me over and slid my panties down my ass.

  But he still didn’t fuck me, not yet. First, he tugged up my dress and left a trail of kisses all over my spine and the small of my back. My body ached with pleasure, exploding everywhere his lips met my flesh. I felt the pressure of a finger against my ass; I tightened with anticipation and surprise.

  He worked it in slowly, making me whimper. I was so full... too full. Meanwhile, his cock was against my folds, hard and ready.

  Gently he teased my ass, rolling his hips to cover his shaft in my juice. He was slippery, spreading me open easily until he was just an inch inside—then the ridge of his cock-head popped inside my walls.

  In that moment, there was no ocean, no moon, no bet, no anything. There was only flesh, his cock and fingers and my ass and my cunt, aching around him. He groaned. I did too, as though our pleasure was one chorus.

  His free hand found my clit and began to rub, the rhythm matching the rhythm of his cock as it moved in and out of me. Ecstasy flooded my body. At first, everything was slow, sensuous, but the tension was immense. I needed release. I was the one who began leaning into him faster and faster still, my ass slamming against his hips.

  I kept expecting this heat to melt me. Simon had me stuffed to the brink, controlling my growing climax with precision. Then I was coming, an orgasm that didn’t seem to have a beginning or end. It pulsed on and on incessantly, the force of it pushing his fingers away from my body. But his cock resisted. He stayed inside. Even when my orgasm began to fade, he just kept plowing into me. I didn’t want it to stop. I wanted him inside me, wanted my pleasure to go on until the earth was a dead husk.

  He fucked me hard on that beach, cock hitting spaces I hadn’t known were inside me as he moved in and out and in again. Before I knew it, my toes were curling, my pussy clenching. Somehow, impossibly, he seemed to be getting even bigger and stiffer. His hands held me so close that I thought my body might split in two from the force of his cock.

  He came, his breath hot against my neck. I felt the powerful jolt of his seed through the condom.

  He didn’t pull away from me. His fingers made a careful circle around my clit, making me twitch one last time. I laughed, kissing him deeply.

  “Truce,” I groaned as he kept teasing me. “Truce, truce.”

  Simon hugged me tight as the ocean crashed around us, my body pale and tired and sweet with pleasure. He did not let me go.

  After, when we’d put ourselves back together and wrung the salt water from our clothes, we walked along the beach again. This time we were silent, no banter or arguing. My body felt all syrupy and tired. We were making our way back toward the restaurant and Simon’s waiting car, but I think we both walked more slowly than we needed to, savoring every step together.

  And then Simon did something that surprised me. He swung his fingers closer to mine, then took my hand. Static bounced between us and in my cells, but comfort, too. He gazed down at me, and I looked at him, smiling.

  “I want to go back to your place tonight,” he said, his voice raw on the corners.

  “You mean you want to fuck my brains out some more?” I asked.

  “Yeah,. That too. I know you have work in the morning, but I don’t want to sleep without you tonight.”

  This night was dizzying and a little unbelievable. I looked at his dark eyes, his soft lips and how they gently parted. He was waiting for my answer.

  “Okay,” I said, as I led him toward his car.

  We drove the whole way across town in delicious, spent silence. Simon’s expression was one of simple ease. But to be honest, beneath the satisfied way my body seemed to buzz, I was still a little stunned. A little confused, too.

  Could this be love? I wondered, as Simon held the door open for me and, holding my hand, spirited me away toward my apartment. I unlocked the front door, and suddenly his mouth was upon me, kissing me, breathing me in.

  And if this was love... was that okay?

  Yes, I told myself. It means you win the bet. So why did a part of me feel so nervous?

  We undressed one another as we moved from the door to the sofa. He peeled my dress off. I unbuttoned his shirt. My hands took in his rippling abs, tracing his form lower and lower. He let out a grunt of desire. I opened his zipper, easing his cock, already rigid, out of his pants. But when I went to put my lips around it, I grimaced.

  “You’re all sandy,” I said.

  For a moment, Simon’s face remained clouded with lust. But then he eased his eyes open, licking his lips.

  “Where’s the bathroom?” he asked. I gestured past the door. Simon stood, shedding clothes as he crossed my apartment. For a moment, I only watched him go, resisting the urge to touch myself. With his pants off, I could see the tattoos that traced his whole body, birds and dragons curling downward and gracing the small of his back. I started to stand, moving to follow. But without turning toward me, Simon simply slammed the door shut.

  I blinked back surprise and fell back on the sofa. I could hear the water running behind the closed door. I wasn’t sure whether I should finish undressing myself or prepare to go to bed alone. Simon was so inscrutable. He ran so hot and cold.

  But then he threw open the door, standing there, beautiful and naked.

  “Simon—” I began. He looked at me, raising one eyebrow. Then he held a finger to his lips.

  “Shhhh,” he said. He gestured for me to follow him. I stood slowly, and stepped into the bathroom.

  He’d drawn a bath, fragrant and glistening. With firm, patient hands, he undressed me, and helped me step into the heated water. He was a big guy; it was a tight squeeze. I had to settle in against his chest to get comfortable.

  Not that I was complaining.

  With gentle hands, he began to wash my hair, rinsing all of the sand and salt away. I was relaxing against him, every muscle soft and slippery.

  “Simon,” I said softly, “I feel so safe with you.”

  It felt embarrassing to say it—I wanted it back. But I’d never felt so open with someone else, or so vulnerable. His hands worked the soap from my hair and then drifted downward. He was massaging the knots from my shoulders, occasionally stopping to scatter kisses over my neck.

  “Good,” he said. “I want to take care of you. I don’t want you to worry anymore, Tazzy. I’m here. With you.”

  It was such a simple thing to say—earnest. In the moment, I forgot all the dirty things we’d done together. There was only the water, warm and soothing, and his body beside mine, and the sense that I didn’t have to scramble or struggle anymore. He was here. He’d support me.

  “You like to make people feel things . . .” I said wistfully, smiling. “Up until now, you’ve mostly made me feel confused.”

  “Sorry,” he said simply. “I hadn’t expected this either. I’ve always been skeptical when it came to internet dating.”

  I laughed. “Don’t let my boss hear you say that.”

  “Oh, so I’m going to meet your boss now? Are you going to introduce me to your folks, too?”

  I winced at the idea of Simon meeting my mother. She’d probably throw herself at him, be her old hot-mess self. But my dad, that wasn’t such a terrible idea. It would be kind of sweet to see them together, opening up a beer, talking about motorcycles.

  “Maybe someday,” I told him. “But that’s a little fast, even for me.” />
  “Is it, now?” Simon said, leaning in to kiss me again. His hands drifted down, caressing me. He kissed my wet throat, then whispered in my ear.

  “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go to bed.”

  I followed him, and let him wrap that big towel around me. I was clean and raw and new, a different creature than the one I’d been that morning. There wasn’t a speck of anxiety inside me. Just delicious exhaustion, perfect comfort. We went to my bed together, and laid down, just gazing into one another’s eyes.

  We slept naked that night, tucked together between my comforters. It felt so good to be the little spoon in his arms. I couldn’t believe everything I’d done with him, all the things that we’d said—and everything that had gone unsaid. And yet my heart felt peaceful, my mind still and calm as I drifted away toward sleep.

  I woke early to a cold bed. I felt a moment of panic and confusion, and bolted upright. Had that whole amazing night with Simon been nothing more than a dream? It wouldn’t have been the first time that my sub-conscious had fooled me into thinking that my fantasies might somehow be real.

  Or, worse, had it happened but he'd slipped away, making this into another weirdly shameful one night stand?

  Then I heard a rustle in the kitchen. I rose, and pulled on my robe, eager to see what surprises he had in store for me next.

  11

  There was a clatter of pots and pans down the hallway. My stomach tightened with nerves. I was kind of a control freak about my kitchen. After years spent making sure that both my dad and I had decent food to eat, I’d developed a hatred for sharing my cooking space with anybody else.

  And my experiences with other guys, who made me mac and cheese and managed to burn all my copper-bottomed pots in the process, had only made me feel more confident in that position. It was my apartment, and under normal conditions, I needed to know that every spoon and whisk was perfectly in its place.