by Starla Kaye
“Take your time,” he said in a husky tone. “You’re completely in charge.”
Oh, how good that sounded. How powerful it made her feel. How thankful she felt that this wonderful man allowed her to have control. It brought tears to her eyes. But she could see how badly he needed her to move on, and she wanted that as well.
Her thighs shook from being spread apart for so long, for holding still. She lowered her body even more and took him barely inside her. And then more. And then she slid down his full length. It only hurt for a second as he filled her, then the sensation was spectacular. As if every tiny nerve ending in her body had come alive. She’d never felt anything like it.
Tears trickled down her cheeks and she closed her eyes. She wanted to relish this as long as she could. She might never have such an experience again.
“Damn, Toni! I’m hurting you.” He curled toward her, his hands at her waist as he tried to pull her off of him.
She blinked at him and refused to be lifted away. Realizing he was reacting to her tears, she dashed at them and shook her head. “These are tears of pure pleasure, you silly man.”
“What?” He stared at her in confusion.
“This has never, ever felt so wonderful.” She smiled as he lie back down, watching her, still looking uncertain. “I was enjoying the moment. But now I’m really ready do this.”
She didn’t give him a chance to agree or disagree. She sat back, shifted his legs apart and held onto his knees while she watched his precious face. He appeared to be holding his breath, waiting for whatever would happen next. His beard-stubbled jaw was tense. Then she felt a slight movement inside her as he pulsed in impatience.
Spurred into action, she let her body’s needs take over, let her instincts free.
He grunted, gaining her attention. His eyes blazed with need and he arched his hips upward, melding her to him.
Oh, God. How had she gone so long without feeling such pleasure? She resented Stanley even more for what he’d cheated her out of.
Stop! Hadn’t she promised herself not to think about that ass again? Done. She was done with him forever.
Chad moved inside her and demanded her full attention.
She sucked in a shivery breath. Yes! Yes, yes, yes! More. She needed more. She rode him in desperation, her thoughts blurring. At the same time he met her every action.
She couldn’t stop. He couldn’t stop.
She gasped, panted. He grunted and his teeth clenched.
With a deep growl, he held her still and erupted inside her.
He was still holding his body up and rigid, when she screamed, “Chad! Oh, Chad!” Her own climax made her cry again, tears streaming down her face.
She was shuddering from the experience when he reached toward her and ever so gently thumbed away her tears. His voice was edged with concern as he questioned, “Tears of pleasure, right?”
All she could manage was a nod before she collapsed on top of him.
As she did so, she wondered how she could face him at work. How could they act normally around each other after this? Because this was a one-time-only thing. It had to be.
Chapter Eight
He hadn’t seen Toni in a week. Chad hesitated on the porch before walking into the office. It hadn’t been by choice; not a decision to avoid her, anyway. Work had gotten in the way. As soon as he’d gotten home that night after they’d made love over and over until they were both exhausted, he’d gotten a call from Alex. Alberta Harper had gone into a state of panic over the situation with her great-grandson. He’d wrestled the mounting problems ever since, in between having to handle issues in Topeka on another elder abuse case he’d been helping with for the last month. All of that had nothing to do with Toni.
Another situation had caught him by surprise. The board of attorneys that he worked with in Topeka wanted him to move his legal business to his office there full-time. He’d yet to discuss the matter with his father. It would also affect his relationship with Toni, if there really was one.
The front door was shoved open, startling him, and forcing him to take a quick step back. Toni came rushing out, looking frazzled. Her eyes glistened with tears. Seeing him, she flew at him. They would have tumbled down the steps if he hadn’t managed to regain his footing at the last second.
“The deacons are talking about firing Dad,” she blurted out, her voice echoing pain. “Because of me.”
He hadn’t heard anything about the matter and surely his father would have told him. The two men had been best friends for longer than Chad had been alive. “When did you hear about this?” And what could he do?
“Mom just called. She’s more upset than I’ve ever heard her. Cursing. She never curses.” Toni eased away, grimacing when she must have realized she had to be hurting him with his injured arm pressed between them. She didn’t appear to notice that the cast had been removed. “Sorry. All I do is hurt you. Hurt everyone around me.”
What else had happened while he’d been away? His father had said something about the temporary secretary they’d hired not being overly friendly with Toni. But he hadn’t paid much attention to that, thinking the problem would work itself out. After all, Ellen had gotten past her initial resistance to her. He had a feeling there was more going on than that, though.
“I think you’re overreacting to…”
“I’m acting crazy again. Is that what you think?” She shot him a disgusted look. “No matter how hard I try to get along here in this town, it’s not working. People just can’t forget my actions as a rebellious teenager.” She nodded to his arm that he held gingerly against him. “Or what I did to you when I came back here.”
Evidently he had some damage control to handle. He’d thought he had done that already. “We’ll deal with this.”
“It’s not your problem. It’s mine.” Hurt settled in her eyes. “Besides, you’ve got your own life. Other people need you.”
Irritation weaved its way into his mood. “You don’t need me. Is that what you’re saying?”
She glanced away. “I did.”
“So that one night together cured whatever sexual ails you had? It was a wham-bam-thank-you, sir, thing.” Even as he snapped out the words, he regretted them. Exhaustion evidently played havoc with his rationality.
Her eyes widened, misted for a second. Then she stiffened her shoulders. “If that’s how you saw it, fine. I don’t have time to even think about that now.” She stepped around him. “I’m leaving. You can add another day to my schedule here or report me to the court. I really don’t care.”
“Where are you going?” he asked, feeling sheepish for his foolish comment, and worried.
She faced him at the bottom of the steps. “To butt heads with some stupid deacons.”
“I’ll go with you.”
“No! I’ll handle this myself.” Frustration marred her expression. “It’s time I fought my own battles here.” She huffed. “But if you want to take on another of my battles - our battle, really, work on the problem with that realtor, Donald Caruthers. I put copies of all of my paperwork and communication with him on your desk.” Her lips pursed in irritation and she shook her head. “I’ve been trying for the last two weeks to get in touch with him. Left messages that he doesn’t return.”
She was right about the issue. It was past time that he and his father looked into the situation. Something about the name wasn’t right, though. Caruthers sounded correct, but he thought the man’s first name was Harold. Maybe he was wrong. He’d have to double-check their paperwork.
“If you’re sure you don’t need me…” But she was already walking around the side of the house toward her car, he assumed.
Before he could follow after her, his father stepped outside onto the porch. “She’s right, son. I think she needs to start facing the problems in town herself. We’ve already tried to establish that we’re supporting her, just as Thomas has.”
“Exactly what is going on at the church? They’re really talking
about firing him?” He couldn’t believe it.
His father shook his head, concern and acceptance in his expression. “Actually, they’re fighting hard to keep him there. Thomas handed in his resignation last night. Apparently Mary misunderstood, thinks he did it because they were harassing him.”
Because of his daughter.” Chad didn’t need an answer; her father would do anything for his family. No doubt he’d finally had enough of the gossip about Toni from members of his church.
***
Toni parked her Mustang right in front of the First Baptist Church on Main Street. She refused to go to the parking lot on the side. She wanted everyone to see exactly who was here, and she knew there probably wasn’t anyone in town who didn’t know her flashy red car by now.
Snagging her purse, she pulled in an anxious breath, and climbed out of the warmth and into the bitterly cold wind. This was the second week in March and spring should be coming soon, but it didn’t feel like it today. Yet as cold as she felt on the outside, she was burning hot on the inside. Furious. She hadn’t been this mad in a long time. She hadn’t even been this upset when her marriage had fallen apart and she’d faced lies upon lies in Denver society.
She marched up the dozen steps and jerked open one of the pair of thick wooden doors. She hadn’t been inside this church in almost eight years; since going away to college. Mixed memories swam through her mind as she stepped inside and pulled the door closed. She’d grown up here, gotten into a lot of innocent mischief here with her friends. They’d stitched most of the choir robes closed one time, turned around all of the books in the library so the titles faced away. They’d…
“If you’re looking for the Deacons’ meeting, they’re in the church lounge.”
Jerked out of her musings, Toni glanced in surprise at the church secretary who had walked out of her nearby office. A gentle smile lit the much older woman’s face. Berniece Chatterly had never had an unkind word for anybody, as far as Toni knew. And she’d always tried to calm down her father and the church leaders whenever she and her friends got into trouble. She had a kind soul.
Toni gave a curt nod of acknowledgment. “I can’t let them treat him like this. I can’t let them fire him.”
“But…”
She didn’t wait for any possible excuse Berniece might have for the idiocy of the situation. She strode briskly down the tiled hallway toward the lounge. With each step taken, she got madder and madder. How dare they do this to her father? This church was his life. He loved each and every one of his parishioners. He looked after them; he helped them however he could. No. This was not happening!
The door was shut and she heard voices inside, but she didn’t waste time with knocking. She gripped the handle and opened the door, burst into the room. The dozen middle-aged and elderly Deacons she’d known for years gaped at her in surprise. Her father stood frowning by the window overlooking the back parking lot.
Without hesitation, she snapped, “You cannot fire my father! He’s the best preacher in the whole Southern Baptist Convention.”
“Toni,” her father interrupted, sounding confused.
She glanced at him and focused on the men sitting around a large table. “He’s also the most loving, most supportive father anyone could ever want. Believe me, I’ve caused him more headaches over the years than any person should ever have to suffer. I still do.”
The men watched her, looking curious, including the three who had been in the meeting her first day working at Chad’s office. She had to get through to them; had to make them see that, whatever her father might have done or said to support her, his job shouldn’t be at risk because of it. She would do anything; even if she had to tell them about the humiliation that had been her life until recently.
“Antoinette,” her father tried again.
Once more she didn’t let him stop her. “I admit that I was an immature young woman when I left Petersville. I went against my parents and their wishes. Because I was certain they didn’t know what they were talking about. They only saw that Stanley Beaton was much older than me. They didn’t see how wonderfully he treated me at the time. I was a love-struck, blinkers-wearing twenty-one-year-old.”
She closed her eyes for a second; swallowed hard. When she opened them again, her father had walked closer. She held him off with a hand. “No, Dad. You need to hear this. They need to hear this.”
He started to speak, but didn’t. His eyes held such worry and such love that she had to look away from him.
“They were so right to be wary of Stanley.”
She looked at her feet and then up again. “He was an awful, awful man. But it took me a while to fully see that. By then he and his family had managed to change me into someone who would fit into their lifestyle.”
She decided to let that go. It was time she took responsibility for what she’d allowed to happen. “I was young and in awe, foolishly blind. I didn’t stop any of it. It’s all on me.”
Her father moved closer again, stopping when she shook her head.
This was the hard part, but she had to tell them. She had to tell her father what until now she’d only hinted at. “I’m embarrassed to admit that my ex-husband abused me.”
It was as if they all sucked in a shocked breath at the same time.
Her face heated in shame.
A few of the men grumbled in outrage. And her father cursed.
That made her blink. She’d heard him get angry before, many times. But she’d never heard him utter a swearword of any kind. What had she done to her parents? First her mother and now her father were lowered to cursing; something neither of them believed in.
She’d gone this far and she needed to explain a bit more, so they might possibly understand what she’d gone through. “Mostly it was verbal abuse that I won’t go into. No woman should ever be called such names; ordered around that way.” She looked boldly at them. “I took it because I was determined to save my marriage, no matter how bad it was.”
She drew in another breath, gripping the handle of her purse until her fingers ached. “Eventually, he started slapping me when he got angry with me. It didn’t happen often.” She hesitated, adding quietly “I struggled with that, even when he apologized afterwards. I’d promised to honor and obey him, love him, too. But there was very little of that left at that point.”
The older men were looking uneasy; frowning, glancing between her and her father.
“The last time Stanley struck me was different,” she admitted in a near whisper. “I couldn’t take it any longer. There was no marriage to salvage.”
Her father was at her side, trying to pull her into his embrace. Momentary panic made her resist, shove him away, and then freeze in horror at what she’d done. She saw the shock on the men’s faces, on her father’s.
She had to explain. “That’s what happened with Chad. I still have trouble with being touched, especially by a man. I’m so sorry, Dad. So sorry.”
He opened his arms to her and waited. She knew he wasn’t judging her, just accepting and hoping.
After an awkward second, she stepped into his outstretched arms, dropping her purse and not caring. She slid her arms around him and let him hold her close. It felt so good. She’d needed this so badly.
“Oh, honey, it kills me what you went through,” he said with calm gentleness. “I wish you had told us. We would have been there for you.”
“I know, but I was determined to make it work,” she whispered, fighting back tears. “I wanted the kind of marriage that you and Mom have.”
She heard the other men getting to their feet. She worried that she still hadn’t made them see that they couldn’t fire her father. Turning her head to face them, she pleaded, “Don’t take away his church, his life. If he said anything or did anything out of trying to defend me…”
The older man who had spoken with her at Chad’s office looked straight at her. “We weren’t firing him, Antoinette. We were doing our best to convince him to take back his r
esignation.”
She gaped at her father. “You resigned?”
He looked uncertain. “I thought maybe you needed me right now more than my church does. If I can’t be there for my own daughter when she’s suffering, how can I help anyone else?”
“Oh, Daddy.” She watched him smile at her childhood name for him. “I’m getting stronger every day. I’m moving past what happened. I came back here to find myself again, to live where people are good, where they care about each other.”
She glanced at the men still watching and listening. “Even though sometimes a few people have trouble letting go of what happened when I was a teenager.” She sighed. “Well, and what I did to Chad. It was a reaction, a final disappointment that broke me…for a moment. An incident that I deeply regret, and am paying for.”
“Things will get better here,” the Deacon leader stated firmly. “We’ll make sure of that. And, for my part, I’m sorry for misjudging you.” He offered a sympathetic look. “If my daughter had gone through what you did…”
She smiled through teary eyes. “Thank you for that.” She gazed at her father and back to the men. “He’ll be staying on as your minister,” she stated, determined that would be true.
***
“Chad Anderson,” he said into the phone; a bit distracted as he glanced up from the contract Toni had signed in connection to the house. No matter how many times he’d gone over it, everything appeared to be in order. Yet the contract he and his father had signed was as well. “Mr. Carter, I appreciate you calling me back.”
“I got your message earlier and have to admit that I’m confused. You mentioned a problem with our family’s property in Petersville, Kansas.” The man sounded not only puzzled but also a little annoyed. “Exactly what do you have to do with the house?”
Definitely not a good sign. “I’m an attorney in the town and—”
The man sighed heavily. “That place has been a headache for the family for far too many years. None of us want it, but we can’t seem to get rid of it. What sort of problem is there now with the house?”
