I grinned. “That is a fabulous compliment. You’d better make sure by touching all of it.”
He made a grunt of agreement and soon kisses rained across my breasts, my stomach, his hands caressing my waist, trailing with purpose to cup my ass. I kneaded his shoulders and neck, and he paused to let me work out his hard knots. His ear fell to my tummy, his head resting there while I did my utmost to relax his poor, weary frame. He definitely deserved this, as gongs were likely quite heavy. “Did you rent the gong?” I asked.
“Nope. We’re the proud owners, now. Whenever I wish for you to tell me you love me, I shall ring it.”
“Hopefully not at three a.m. Once we’re in bed, there are better ways for me to show you that I love you.”
His head lifted, along with one saucy eyebrow. “Oh?”
I pushed on his shoulder, and he allowed me to roll us over so I could climb on top. I rubbed myself over him, the hot, firm flesh of man between my straddled thighs, against my breasts making me feel very female, very primal. I stroked his chest with my face, smelling him, teasing his nipples with my tongue. He bucked, and I ran my hand down, down his hard pecs, down his warm belly, to slip inside his boxer briefs. His cock leaped into my hand, and I looked up to his face to laugh.
“What?” he said, the dimple winking just for me. “He missed you.”
“He missed me, the cat missed me. How about you?”
He sent me a melting look. “I didn’t miss you so much as…yearn endlessly.”
“Oooooh.”
“Ache uncontrollably.”
“Really?”
“Itch swaggeringly.”
“Yup, you’re mocking me now.”
“Hanker ominously!”
“Shut up or I won’t touch your cock.”
That did the trick. My body followed where my hand had traipsed, and I pulled him out of his briefs, my touch gentle enough to drive him mad, hopefully. He’d started breathing harder, the wiseass. I licked my lips, staring him in the eye, and placed one sweet kiss to the tip of his penis. His hips lifted, urging me to do more. I supposed I would—he’d gotten me potato balls, after all.
I opened my mouth and slid it over the head. God, he was warm and soft, and the sounds he made—oh, those noises that make you feel like a sex goddess. His hands rifled into my hair, just gently sitting there, not directing me. I moved my mouth farther down still, slowly returning upward as his hips bucked again, thrusting deeper. Heh—his patience was at an end, a feeling I could most definitely relate to. I went after it, burying him in my mouth, in and out, until he finally collapsed against the bed and gave himself over to me. But I couldn’t wait any longer—my mouth wasn’t cutting it.
I got up on my knees and wriggled out of my panties, which he sat up to assist me with. Such a selfless man! As soon as they were off, he reached down and caressed between my legs, pulling me backwards into his lap in the process.
“What happened here?” He craned his neck to see the place where his fingers had been. “Holy crap.”
“Yup, they waxed me bare.”
He cocked an eyebrow. “Damn. Look at that pretty, pretty pussy. But whatever floats your boat, baby— I like you any way I can get you.”
Ding ding ding! He was very good at saying all the right things tonight.
His fingers started their exploration again. “Does it feel any different?” He held me around the waist and traced the recesses of my body, and I opened to let him do whatever he wanted.
It did feel a little different—more intense, since there was nothing between his flesh and mine. “Mmmmmm,” was the only reply I could manage, but he seemed satisfied. I arched back against him, the pleasure building up, my body overjoyed at having him nearby again, where he belonged. He traced slow circles around my clit, and I squeezed his hand with my thighs to hold him near. He laughed at me, close to my ear, blowing hot, breathing straight through me.
He pushed me onto my knees, then farther down, his hands running over my ass, slipping between my legs. I ground against the bed, so ready for this man to fuck me.
“Nasty girl,” he said as he climbed over me.
His legs came around mine, pinning me between them, a place in which I was happy to be trapped. He took his cock and teased the tip between my legs, so warm and soft, and I reached around to touch his skin, to graze my fingernails until he would just do it already. All the polite keeping-our-distance crap had erased what little patience I usually possessed. I lifted my hips to push back until the head of his cock slipped inside. With a groan, he slid all the way home, and suddenly he filled me, in every way.
Heavy. He was heavy when he covered me, and I loved it. Skin to skin, body to body, he swept the back of my neck with his hand to brush my hair to the side, and followed with kisses on my eager skin. Each touch of his lips struck me like shivery lightning, each one igniting the fire inside me to grow, the desire to blossom. My body eased to accommodate his cock, and I knew he was being gentle in order to not hurt me. I reached up to rub his head, covered in a down of hair. He took the opportunity to cup my breast, easing out of me just a little as he did so. I moaned—damn, he felt so good, and I’d missed him so much. His hand trailed down my waist to my hip, and he moved inside again, sliding easily now. Oh, yeah. It was on.
“You like that, baby?” he asked.
I didn’t reply so much as whimper and push against him, demanding more of what I obviously liked. He chuckled in my ear and nipped my shoulder while he thrust inside. Again. And again. I wanted to shout from the rafters, to sing a song about how insanely good he made me feel, but I settled for bunching the duvet in my hands and moaning with every thrust, every delicious inch of his body covering mine.
A nip at my hand, and I squealed, my eyes flying open. Captain Taco had expressed his displeasure at what he was seeing. Hey, nobody had asked him to grade our performance.
Sam leaned over to gently ‘suggest’ he leave the bed to us, and the cat danced away toward my head, where he promptly sat down against my forehead, his tail bouncing on my mouth. I spit the cat fur away and started laughing, and Sam burst into a fit of mirth, too. He pulled out of me with an apologetic pat on my butt, and I pushed the cat off my face so I could turn over.
We took a minute, while laughing, to pat the cat and make him feel as loved as we two. After a few moments, he seemed mollified, and began ignoring us in favor of licking his own private parts.
Sam turned to me, his face wry. “Ready for round two?”
“Ask him.” I shoved against Sam’s shoulder, and he fell onto his back. With all my own feline grace, I climbed over him and took him in my hands to inspire him once again. “Maybe this time it’ll be your toes getting bitten.”
“Mmmmmm, I hope so.”
“Oh, really?”
He fluttered his man lashes so innocently, a halo appeared over his dick. I shimmied backward until I came to his feet, which I inspected close up.
“Washed just this morning,” I was assured.
My ass in the air for his enjoyment, I bent to place a sweet kiss on the tip of his big toe. “Thank you,” he said, a saucy grin on his face.
I bit his toe. He yanked it by instinct, and I nearly got a foot in the face.
“Careful!” I said. “If you want sexy toe loving, then control yourself, sir.”
“A thousand apologies, my darling wife.”
I harrumphed and nodded. This time, I took his whole toe in my mouth, and he gasped, his hips squirming. Toes aren’t my favorite thing, but he did have lovely feet, and boy, did he adore it. Bodies are strange and wonderful. I sucked on him some more, his whole body twisting in pleasure, his chest taking in great gulps of air, his hands reaching for me.
“Stop,” he gasped. “It’s too much.”
Chuckling, I said, “I’ll be the judge of that.”
“Don’t sass me, wife.”
Wife. He kept saying it as if he finally believed it. He sat up and grabbed me around the waist, and befo
re I knew it, he’d flipped me onto my back and pushed my legs over his shoulders. “This is what happens to sassy little redheads.” His cock slid inside me, and he leaned forward to hold my hands above my head.
I felt totally open, totally exposed, and so totally into it. My punishment elicited a smile from me, which he kissed away.
His hips moved, and my body dissolved into pure pleasure. He released my wrists so he could flick his thumb over my nipple. I arched up into him, and bucked my hips to meet him thrust for thrust. I pulled him in, and he grunted his approval of my wantonness. He increased his pace at my behest, and the world fell away under his passionate onslaught. My desire, my pleasure grew to a desperate point where we joined, and my legs began to shake against his chest. I ached with unbearable delight, and I came, languid and slow while he tempered his movements to make me last as long as possible. The room burst into a blaze of light and bliss, and I shut my eyes, too overwhelmed to register anything more.
Sam sat back on his thighs and pulled me toward him, thrusting his cock into my still-shivering body, a nasty, dirty smile on his face until he closed his eyes, cried out, and came. He was the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen, and I gathered him into my arms so that he wouldn’t get away ever again.
“I can’t breathe,” he whispered.
“You take my breath away, too, baby.”
“No, really”—he reached around to dislodge my clutching hands—“you’re hugging the life out of me.”
Oops. I released him. He rolled onto his back, saying, “I know I’m amazing. I’ll bang you again, you don’t have to hold me prisoner.”
I swatted him on the chest, as he deserved, then I cuddled against it, as I deserved. He murmured, “I’m so happy to have you back in this bed. I’m going to actually sleep tonight.”
He was being so chatty, I was loath to stop him. I kissed him on the shoulder instead.
He kept talking, “I missed you, so I kept watching your movies. I thought I was going to hurt myself laughing at The Ovarian Hellion. You make a surprisingly great superhero.”
“Super-she-ro, thanks.” I pushed up to my elbow, indignation fueling me. “And why ‘surprisingly’?”
“You’re so short!”
“Well you’re—stupid!”
He yanked me onto his chest. “I am stupid. I should never have let you move out.” His sigh rattled through my ear to pierce my heart. “I kept trying to think of nice things to do for you that would make you want to stay with me, but then we had that huge fight, and—”
“Wait—” I traced spirals in his pec. “You were trying to get me?” The whole time, I’d been turning cartwheels in my brain working to make him choose me. And he’d been what…trying to court me? Oh, this man… I squeezed him around the waist until he gurgled in pain. “It never once occurred to me to abandon you, Sam. I told you that I would stay—”
“I didn’t trust that.” His voice broke. “I’m really messed up. I figured that any day you would just wake up and realize it and think why the fuck am I staying here with this idiot low-life criminal? And all the while”—he turned to face me and lifted my chin—“I was falling in love with you. Not because of memories, but because you fought for me, and stayed by my side in the hospital, even when I didn’t even appreciate it. And you broke into your director’s house with me, and you saved me from an evil cabbie, and you’re so kind and funny and—and—fish porn!”
I kissed him, because I was about to full-on bawl—and I try really hard not to do that naked in bed. He kissed me back with passionate urgency, and we conveyed every emotion, all three billion of them, through our hands and mouths and arms.
When we came up for air, he told me, “We had to make up. Your mother ordered it.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“She came here, looking for you, and told me that if I didn’t beg you to be my wife again, I was the stupidest ex-oncologist in the world. Not a big sample size, but still.”
Aw, my mom really did think I was great. Or she thought that I’d never catch another man.
It was my turn for a confession. “I don’t want you to work for those damn Feds anymore.” The vehemence of my tone shocked even me.
His eyebrows sprang to attention.
“I mean—they hung you out to dry. Why should you risk your—?”
“No, no. No more. My life of adventure is behind me. So behind me, I can’t fucking remember half of it.” He lifted an eyebrow of chagrin, but finished with a smile. “I’m happy to be a bored househusband.”
I shifted up to sit against the headboard. Sam pulled the covers over our legs, and settled me into the crook of his arm. Oh, he smelled so good, and we smelled like sex. Our bed, our scent—I was in heaven.
“You know,” I said, “Ellen said something to me that I laughed at, but maybe she’s right. She said that instead of living your thief escapades, you should write about them. You’re the artistic type. It would be ‘fiction’, of course. But I bet your life would make a great series of thief anti-hero books.”
“Anti-hero? I’m noble and upstanding!”
“Nobody likes a straight arrow.”
He laughed, his fingers tracing soft shivers into my arm. “Books?”
“Books.”
“Huh.”
“The thief should, of course, have a wise-cracking love interest.”
“A short one, no doubt.”
I grinned up at him. “Short women are considered the most desirable in the world.”
He turned to the side and held my face. “You don’t have to tell me twice. I love you, Samantha. Even out of my right mind.”
“Being out of your mind helps.”
My anti-hero kissed me then, with enough love to last me a lifetime. He’d come into my broken existence like a hurricane, turned everything upside down, and we’d put it together again, bigger and better than I could ever have dreamed of—and I have enormous dreams. Even a couple of screw-ups can have a happy ending, as long as they fight like hell for one another and crack bad jokes.
The bad jokes are a must.
* * * *
Thief of Hearts
By Zachary Ballitch
She was a dark and stormy redhead, and she stole my heart faster than I snatched that Picasso. She sauntered into the party at the Metropolitan Museum of Art looking like a tall order of trouble on two short legs.
I’d shown up to lift the star of the museum’s exhibit, but suddenly all I wanted to do was lift her onto the nearest cocktail table, which would hopefully be sturdy. I didn’t know then that she was about to ruin my life, but I had a definite inkling. An inkling stirring in my pants.
“You’re standing in front of the potato balls,” she murmured with lush lips.
“Oh, I’ll give you a ball,” I replied with my best smile, the smile that unleashed my dimple. Dames went dizzy for my dimple.
“Did—did you just offer your balls to me? Is that your pickup line?”
“Um…”
Her fiery eyebrows raised as fast as my boner was deflating. “‘Um?’ Wow, you’re great at flirting. Get out of the way.”
“Maybe we should start over,” I said. “My name’s Sam.” My name wasn’t really Sam, at least not this week. I mean, it was Sam, technically, but she didn’t know that. She couldn’t know that—it was too damn dangerous.
“Don’t tell me about your scrotum anymore, Sam.”
The way she said my name sent shivers down my criminal spine, and the way she said ‘scrotum’, well, it’s already a beautiful word, but in her mouth, it was a masterpiece. I’d need to salvage this conversation if I hoped to get into her tight, red dress. Or into her tight, red heart.
It was about to be her lucky night. I flashed my dimple, hit her with a come-hither stare, and said, “How do you feel about Picasso?”
Also available from Totally Bound Publishing:
Samantha Lytton: The Dimple Strikes Back
Lucy Woodhull
Excerpt
Chapter One
You Can’t Spell ‘Happiness’ Without ‘Pain’
No one would suppose, looking at me, little Samantha Lytton, that I am a sophisticated movie maven with an illicit thief for a lover. But that hypothetical lookie-loo would be wrong, and not just because I’m shorter than the average actress and/or gangster’s moll.
Outside the oval window beside me, clouds floated by on the vicious air currently bouncing my airplane to and fro. And taking my cocktail with it. “Shit!” I hissed. I swiped at my lap and accidentally splashed the puddle of vodka I’d dribbled there onto my seatmate’s sleeve. The businessey dude frowned at me and patted the offending liquid with a napkin.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I hate flying. But I love vodka! And talking when I’m nervous!” A too-long peal of laughter floated out of me from parts unknown. I took a deep breath and fought for calm. “Okay, I’m done now.” I beamed him the smile that Entertainment Weekly called ‘charming and dorky’.
I’d like it noted that they totally put ‘charming’ first.
My fellow first-classer didn’t seem impressed by me. No matter—I was suspended over the ocean, high on Xanax and whatever booze I’d managed to get into my mouth, on the way to London to shoot my very first starring role in a film. A bona-fide film-film—not one of those budget shoots where the catering is a Happy Meal thrown at you after filming illegally in an alley while you wear Goodwill clothing all night.
In the last year, People magazine had called me ‘Clara Bow two-point-zero’, and declared me the only entertaining part of my first movie I Cried Lavender Tears in Paris. Well, except for the bit when Justin Bieber exploded.
After that, I’d won a small but memorable scene in a Judd Apatow flick, a sidekick part in a Tina Fey movie and a recurring arc on a TV show soon canceled for being too clever for anyone to watch. I was an underground darling in that I was a funny actress who looked like an average woman—with better-than-average teeth. I’d accepted any project offered to me, and as they began coming out, I got noticed by the Powers That Be.
The Wrath of Dimple Page 26
