All or Nothing

by Deborah Cooke

  “How so?”

  “Scars are a mark of triumph, just like this one is. Scars mean survival and persistence and victory. Scars mean strength and power.” He nodded at her with confidence. “I’m sure the Amazon queens saw it that way.”

  “I thought I was supposed to be an Amazon. Shouldn’t I be telling you how we think?”

  “Don’t give away all of your secrets. I only ask that you be gentle with your love slave,” he teased and she smiled a little, despite the tears in her eyes.

  “Maybe I’ll have to lock you up until you learn to do it right.”

  “Promises, promises.” He bent then and kissed the scar gently. He felt her breathe deeply, then exhale, then whisper his name. He didn’t let her distract him from giving her pleasure. He wanted her, but he wanted her to really want him.

  She felt precious to him. He felt lucky to be with her. He wanted her to know all of that, yet he didn’t know how to tell her in words.

  He’d have to show her.

  Zach inhaled her scent, let his hands slide down around her waist. He ran a trail of kisses down the center of her chest, tucked his nose into her navel, then and undid her pants with his teeth. He smoothed the pants off her long legs, using his tongue to tease her through her underwear while his hands were busy. The smell of her desire sent an electric jolt through him, made him peel off his own clothes in a hurry.

  But this was going to take some time.

  This was a moment to savor. There would never be another first time between them, and Zach was determined to persuade Jen of her desirability and her beauty before the sun rose.

  * * *

  The man was going to kill her.

  Zach touched Jen with his tongue, teasing her to climax with embarrassing ease. Each time she got close, he stopped, cheating her of release, then started again. Her skin was on fire, she was writhing on his bed, she was ready to beg him to finish her off, and she didn’t care.

  He did this three times.

  “I’ll going to have to kill you for insurgency,” she threatened, breathless and agitated.

  He grinned. “It’s worth waiting for.”

  “I’ll remember that when it’s your turn.”

  He chuckled, then moved behind her. His muscled strength was against her back, his arm wrapped around her waist. His busy fingers coaxed her to a frenzy again. Jen had never felt such desire. She arched back against him and moaned. He kissed her ear, whispered to her of what he was going to do to her, demanding to know what she liked best.

  His erection was pressing against her butt, and Jen liked knowing that he was as aroused as she was. He was huge and hard, so huge and hard that he couldn’t possibly be turned off by her scar.

  In fact, Jen forgot about her defect. There was only pleasure and Zach’s wicked whisper and his dancing fingers and the heat building inside of her. As the heat rose again, she twisted and squirmed, but he held her tightly. His fingers were relentless and she loved it.

  “Don’t you dare stop,” she managed to say.

  “Me?”

  “Promise me,” she demanded, breathless.

  “Or what?”

  “I’ll have you flogged, love slave. Bread and water for a week. You’ll be locked in the dungeons with the spiders.”

  He laughed, his fingers flicking so surely against her that she gasped. She reached behind herself and grasped his erection, caressing him so that he choked a bit. “Okay, warrior queen, I promise,” he murmured into her ear.

  “Don’t let go,” she said, not letting go of him.

  “Promise.” Zach’s arm tightened around her waist, his fingertips moved against her again and Jen felt her every muscle go taut. She struggled as the orgasm rolled through her, arched her back and dug her fingers into his arm with the fullness of release.

  She was dizzy.

  She was disoriented.

  And she had to give serious credit to her mother’s conviction that an orgasm was good for a woman’s world view. Jen’s world view was improving by the moment.

  “Okay?” Zach asked and she smiled over her shoulder at him, uncertain how he could have any doubt.

  “I think I woke the neighbors.”

  “No chance. I paid for extra soundproofing.”

  “For moments like this?”

  “What can I say? I’m an optimistic kind of guy.”

  “Yes, I can feel your optimism.” Jen closed her hand around his erection again and he caught his breath.

  “Don’t go playing with the toys unless you plan to buy,” he growled and Jen laughed.

  Jen rolled toward her stomach and slipped him inside her from behind. He muttered her name with a surprise that made her smile, then he swore a little.

  “Do I need a credit check before I shop here?” she teased.

  “Well, if that’s how it’s going to be, then I demand a view,” he said, then pulled out of her. Jen had a beat to be disappointed before he rolled over, and lifted her atop him. He winked at her. “C’mon, honey, take me. I’m all yours.”

  Jen hesitated. He’d have a full view of her damaged chest if she sat astride him. It seemed to her to be a perfect recipe for erection failure. “Not like this?”

  “Exactly like this. Nothing like a lady in charge. Or a warrior queen triumphant, as it were.”

  Encouraged by his easy manner, Jen sat astride him, taking him inside her in increments. She liked being able to watch his expression, liked how his eyes closed and he caught his breath. He wasn’t faking his arousal, that was for sure.

  And that meant that she didn’t have to worry.

  There was a lot of Zach and it had been a while since Jen had slept with anyone. It took her some time to accommodate him, but other than gritting his teeth and begging once for mercy, Zach didn’t complain. She teased him a bit, getting her own back, liking how obviously he was pleased.

  By her.

  Once he was fully inside her, she leaned against his chest. She would have been content to kiss him and finish in that pose, but Zach wasn’t having any of it. When their kiss broke, he caught her around the waist and lifted her back to a sitting position. Before she could argue, his fingers slipped between her thighs again.

  “You’d forfeit this, the other way,” he said, his smile wicked. “And it’s my job as a love slave to ensure your pleasure every time.”

  “I can’t come like this. And not again. Not so soon.”

  “How do you know? Have you ever tried it?”

  Jen shook her head, finding herself aroused already. She gasped as his fingertip eased across her.

  “Then let’s try. What’s the worst thing that can happen?”

  “You could suffer a tragic penis-related accident.”

  “Not a chance. I’m lying in bed on my back.”

  “I could fall off the bed and break something and be left in a compromising position, thereby providing entertainment for paramedic personnel.”

  He shook his head. “I won’t let you fall. Promise.”

  Jen believed his promise, at least. “People don’t come simultaneously. It’s a myth.”

  He arched a fair brow. “They said the Amazon warrior princesses were a myth. I’m thinking they had that wrong.”

  “So all myths are up for re-evaluation?”

  “Why not?”

  Why not. It was all too easy to be seduced by this man, by his confidence and his curiosity. Jen leaned forward, bracing her hands on his shoulders. He smiled up at her, undeterred. “Okay, love slave, I’ll bet you an orgasm that you’re wrong on this one.”

  “Chicken,” he said, his eyes sparkling. “Make it three orgasms and you’re on.”

  Jen laughed and he moved inside her, making her gasp. Maybe he was right. “Deal,” she agreed, not really caring whether she won this bet or not.

  And that, she suspected, was Zach’s point.

  * * *

  The phone was ringing.

  Jen was half-asleep, but waking up too fast for her preference
s. The ring of the phone was insistent, nudging her out of warm, cozy and contented slumber.

  Where was her mother?

  The phone rang again, close at hand. Jen opened her eyes, didn’t know where she was, but saw the phone on the floor beside the bed. Good enough. She pounced on it, if only to shut it up. “Hello?”

  There was a pause, as if the person on the other end hadn’t expected a woman to answer the phone.

  That was when Jen recognized her surroundings. She realized she was in Zach’s bed, in Zach’s apartment. It was morning. The bedroom was filled with radiant sunlight. The sky that she could see was a brilliant blue, and Jack Frost had done his creative painting on the windows. The frost sparkled coldly against the azure of the sky.

  She snuggled deeper beneath the blankets at the sight and realized at the same time that she felt remarkably good for someone who had spent most of the night having enthusiastic sex.

  Maybe because of that.

  “Hello?” A woman said. “Did I call Zach Coxwell’s place?” She said the number quickly.

  “I think Zach’s gone to walk the dog,” Jen said, her cheeks burning at the obvious implication of her answering the phone. Her gaze fell on the alarm clock on the window sill. It was eight-fifteen. “Could I take a message?”

  It was pretty obvious what she was doing in Zach’s apartment this early on a Thursday morning, and no one was going to assume that it was to play secretary. Jen was embarrassed to have even this stranger be aware of it.

  The caller wouldn’t be a stranger to Zach, though, and Jen wondered who she might be.

  The woman laughed. The sound was friendly and Jen relaxed a bit. “Would this be the elusive Jen?”

  Zach had talked about her?

  “I’m Jen, although I’m not sure I’m that elusive.”

  The woman laughed again. “And here I was doubting your existence. I’m sorry. Oh, I’m Maralys Coxwell, by the way, married to Zach’s oldest brother.”

  Jen sat up straighter. “The one who shops vintage?”

  Pleasure filled Maralys’ tone. “Yes! Why, do you shop vintage, too?”

  “Uh hmm. So, what’s your favorite shop?” This was Jen’s trick for understanding other women, because if you knew where they liked to shop, you knew a lot about their income, their taste, and even their assumptions.

  “Easy. My friend Meg’s place in the North End: Twice Loved. It’s between a bakery…”

  “And an Italian take-out place. I love that store.”

  “Me, too,” Maralys admitted. “I try to stop by at regular intervals to remind Meg to breathe.”

  “She does talk fast.”

  “But really has a heart of gold. You know, if you’re ever looking for something special, you should tell her. She’s good at hunting.”

  “Thanks. I’ll remember that.” Jen heard the door to the corridor, then the sound of dog toenails on the floor. “Sounds like Zach is back. It was nice meeting you, Maralys.”

  “Wait a minute. You’re not done meeting me yet. Didn’t Zach ask you?”

  “Didn’t Zach ask me what?” Jen met Zach’s eyes as he came into the bedroom. He was still wearing his leather jacket and carried two steaming take-out cups of coffee. Roxie followed him, sniffing with pleasure at the bottom of the brown paper bag he also carried.

  Zach shrugged in response to Jen’s glance, obviously uncertain what she was talking about.

  “He was supposed to invite you to Christmas dinner,” Maralys said. “In fact, he’s supposed to bring you to our Christmas dinner, since you’re engaged and all. Didn’t he tell you yet?”

  Jen held Zach’s gaze as she arched a brow. “No, Maralys, Zach didn’t tell me about Christmas dinner.”

  At the mention of his sister-in-law’s name, Zach winced.

  Meanwhile, Maralys kept talking. “Well, I don’t mean to surprise you, Jen. As you can imagine, we’d all love to meet you. I assume you are engaged again, seeing as I’ve, um, caught you at Zach’s.”

  Jen fumbled for a plausible thing to say and couldn’t come up with one. So she agreed, and tried to sound confident about it. “Of course, we’re engaged again. We just had a little misunderstanding.”

  Zach looked at her and she shrugged, trying to communicate ‘what else could I say?’

  “Every good relationship has to suffer an interval,” Maralys said. “Lucky for you, yours didn’t last eighteen years like ours did.”

  Jen had nothing to say to that.

  Meanwhile, Zach crossed the room and put the two coffees down on the headboard. He reached into the pockets of his jacket, removed a handful of creamers from one side and half a dozen packages of sugar from the other. He looked enquiringly at Jen, offering her choice of additions with a gesture. She nodded for both, and held up two fingers.

  “Double, double,” he said quietly. “Good choice. This place’s coffee could be used to clean carburetor parts.”

  Jen put her hand over the receiver. “You make it sound so tempting.”

  “They’re close so it’s hot. That’s a big plus. Maybe the only plus.”

  “We meet mid-afternoon,” Maralys said into Jen’s ear. “Although of course, everyone would understand if you had your own family arrangements that day. Do you have a family dinner?”

  Jen felt put on the spot. Should she mention Christmas Eve at her Gran’s? Or would that sound like she was agreeing to come to Coxwell’s? She watched Zach mix coffee, unable to read his thoughts. He didn’t seem to be thrilled that she was talking to Maralys.

  Had Zach been intending to ask her to Coxwell’s himself?

  Or not?

  Or was he intending to ask somebody else?

  Zach tugged two keys on a ring from the pocket of his jacket and dangled them from his fingertip. It was the jacket he’d worn the night before to impersonate Elvis, so she assumed the keys were for the motorcycle.

  “Well?” Maralys prompted.

  Jen was sufficiently distracted to admit more than she should have. “Actually, we celebrate on Christmas Eve,” she said, realizing too late what she’d implied.

  “Great!” Maralys said with such enthusiasm that Jen had to hold the phone away from her ear. “Then we’ll see you on the 25th.”

  “Um, I guess,” Jen said, uncertain how to read Zach’s grim attitude. She shrugged at him and he came to take the receiver.

  “Thanks a lot, Maralys,” he said and didn’t seem very pleased about the transaction. He sat on the bed beside Jen and offered her the double-double coffee with his other hand.

  Jen sat an increment away from him, not sure what to think. She picked her shirt off the floor and put it on, feeling very naked all of a sudden.

  And a bit cold.

  “I assume you called about the keys to the bike,” Zach said with some impatience. “And only accidentally got to meddle in my life.”

  Maralys said something and he grimaced. “I’ve no doubt that you would have done it on purpose if you could have. Look, I didn’t leave the keys because it was too late to knock and leaving them in the mailbox seemed like a good way to get the bike stolen.” He paused. “Yes, I know that James would have killed me if anything had happened to his baby. He made that pretty clear.”

  He listened for a moment and Jen stirred her coffee. It was disconcerting how he concentrated on the conversation and barely looked at her.

  But then, she had assumed that his pursuit had been only about sex. She shouldn’t be surprised that having sex should have diminished his interest. She got out of bed, patted Roxie, and went to the washroom with her bra and her fake boob.

  It would be easier to face the morning with her props in place.

  * * *

  Trust Maralys to screw up his timing.

  Trust Maralys to shove him into a situation that he wasn’t sure he wanted any part of. Zach had been hoping, actually, that Jen would invite him to her family’s place at Christmas and the entire Coxwell festive ordeal at Gray Gables could have been missed.r />
  Now that couldn’t happen.

  Zach sat on the bed and drank his coffee, not really tasting it, after he’d hung up the phone. Jen seemed to be taking a lifetime in the washroom, but then, how long had it been since he’d been waiting on a woman? He didn’t like how quiet she had gotten, or how spooked she had looked when Maralys had popped the question, and he knew he could have eased her into the concept of meeting his family better than Maralys had done. Jen must have felt cornered, and he knew she didn’t like that much.

  Trust Maralys. She was about as subtle as a whack in the side of the head with a two-by-four. This was not the morning he’d planned. No doubt about it: any favor he owed James for lending him the bike was officially forfeit.

  His coffee was almost gone and Jen’s was stone cold when she came out of the washroom. She avoided his gaze and reached for her pants. “There was a new toothbrush in its package,” she said, her tone cautious. “I hope you don’t mind that I used it.”

  “No, that’s fine. Did you find everything you needed?”

  She shrugged. “More or less.” She fastened her pants, then pulled on her socks as if she couldn’t wait to get out of his apartment.

  Zach felt about as smooth as a piece of steel wool. “I thought maybe we could go for breakfast this morning. There’s a place around the corner…”

  Jen forced a thin smile, a pale shadow of the one she usually flashed. “Sorry. I’ve got some things to do today.”

  “Right.” Could this get any more awkward?

  Jen paused before she left the bedroom. “Look. I’m sorry I answered the phone. I was half-asleep and just grabbed it without thinking. If I’d been awake enough to realize where I was, I would have just let the machine get it.”

  “It’s okay,” Zach said.

  “No, it’s not.” She looked straight at him for the first time. “You’re annoyed that Maralys asked me to Christmas dinner. Message received: I’m out of here.” She turned to leave, and had grabbed her coat by the time Zach realized what she was saying and went after her.

  “Wait a minute. That’s not it.” He caught her elbow and she regarded him warily. “Okay, I’m not happy that Maralys leaped right in, but not because she invited you. I just don’t like the way she did it. I was going to ask you, but in my way.”