by Sosie Frost
And when the pleasure turned to an ache, when my thoughts and breathing and sanity slowly dulled and my senses returned, I collapsed between him and the wall. Wishing—praying—that when I opened my eyes, I would be in the arms of any man but Julian Payne.
No such luck.
Damn it.
I slid from him with a cleared throat and spots my vision.
He was right. I was a mess. Sticky and slippery and delighted by the sensation. Sweat tickled my neck, but it coated his forehead. He wiped it away with a grin and jerked his still-hard cock two more times. Only a drop coated his fingers. The rest slicked the inside of me.
Oh. My. God.
I straightened my dress and checked my watch.
“Oh, no…” I spun, flicking the lights back on. My panties were gone. “I have five minutes until the meeting.”
Julian adjusted his jeans. Within an instant, he looked perfectly innocent. Damn him
“Good timing,” he said.
“No. Very bad timing.” My papers had scattered over the desk. I hurriedly recovered the messy files and stacked the folders on the desk. “Where…”
“What?”
“Where are my…”
A knock would have shattered the office door. I turned with a yelp. My hands grabbed a fistful of my skirt and yanked it lower, nearly pulling it off my waist.
Oh God. Was it obvious that I’d just gotten the fuck of my life?
Where the hell were my panties?
Sharon, the receptionist, stuck her head in the office. The woman was already flustered, and the meeting hadn’t even started yet. She rapped against the doorframe and shook her head, the newly dyed red awfully fancy for a monthly meeting.
“Well, the great heads for coleslaw are here.” She pushed into the office and made a beeline for the jar of candy sitting on my filing cabinet. With a frustrated groan, she helped herself to a mini-Milky Way. “You better get out there. Got a full house in the audience, and the council is ready to declare war on Henderson Road.” She stopped and patted Julian’s arm. “How you doing, Jules? How’s your poor brother?”
Julian winked at me. “Doing much better now.”
“Glad to hear it. When Kathy told me what happened to Marius, we were just sick.” Sharon wagged a finger at me. “Now, Micah. You give Jules here whatever he wants. Payne family deserves it.”
“Oh, she’s given me plenty tonight,” he said.
Sharon pointed to the stack of files on my desk. “I’ll take these out. Christ save us if I miss a second of the meeting for the minutes. Donny DeBlasio turns into Chairman Mao the instant he’s given a gavel.”
I didn’t manage a word before Sharon nicked the folders and a second piece of candy and hurried back to the meeting room.
I let my breath out in a frantic huff and dove under the desk.
The council was unbearable on most nights. I couldn’t face them without panties.
…And stuffed so goddamned full of Julian’s searing hot seed.
“So…” Julian didn’t help me search. “Do I get the barn now?”
I jerked upwards in shock, cracking my head against the desk. Even a concussion wouldn’t convince me that approving an unapprovable application was a good idea.
I laughed. “Now who’s the whore?”
“Give me the barn, and I’ll stop by after the meeting. Tuck you in tonight.”
“Oh sure.” I rolled my eyes. “Maybe the encore will last more than a couple minutes.”
“You want me to go all night?”
“I just want you to go.”
He didn’t move. “That’s the thanks I get for giving you the greatest orgasm of your life?”
“You think that was the best?”
“You’re a liar, princess, but you’re not good at it.”
The shock wore off. Wish it had lasted longer. Maybe then the shame wouldn’t have crippled me in guilty shivers. I ignored him and struggled to find my panties. Nowhere to be found. Not behind the desk. Not under the chairs.
Panic and humiliation didn’t blend well. I sucked in a breath that went nowhere.
“Where…” I stared at him, hating the question. “What did you do with my underwear?”
He grinned. “When?”
“When you removed them.”
“Before I fucked you senseless?”
“Yes.”
“I tossed them away. Then I put them on your desk while you were still…” He winked. “Recovering.”
“On my desk?”
“Yeah, by the files.”
My stomach dropped.
I stared at my desk, the piles of papers and books growing more and more unmanageable by the hour. I flung a few files to the side, but no panties peeped under the paperwork.
“Oh God…” I clutched my stomach. “Oh no.”
“What?”
“They aren’t here.”
“What do you mean?”
I pointed to the hall, to the packed meeting room, to the centralized location where all six of my bosses—elected and appointed—sat, searching through my files which would contain not only reports on new construction, a proposed amendment to our comprehensive plan, and a listing of every code enforcement violation…
…But now a pair of drenched, bright red panties, ripped off in the throes of passion.
“They’re…” I couldn’t even say it. “They’re out front.”
Julian had a bad habit of laughing at my misfortune. Joke was on him. This one spelled disaster for him too.
“You still want your barn?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he said.
“Then you better help me right now.”
“Why?”
My desire turned to dread. “Because I’m about to get fired.”
4
Julian
I’d just had the fuck of my life, and now Micah needed me to protect her job?
Maybe my luck wasn’t so bad after all.
I grinned. “If I save your ass, do I get to fuck it later?”
I caught her hand before it struck my cheek, but we both knew how that last touch had ended.
Micah panted, cocoa eyes wide. Just as beautiful now as she was staring at me when I’d brought her to an orgasm that’d shocked her as much as it shocked me. Nothing had ever been as sexy—as amazing—as that little brat writhing on my cock.
I didn’t figure Micah for a cuddler, but I didn’t think she’d panic.
She covered her mouth with her hands. “Oh, no…”
Micah paced her office, smoothing a meticulous bun. Not as tight as before, but the woman still looked pristine, even after getting rutted against the wall. Her hair was perfect, her dress wasn’t even wrinkled. No panties, but I sure as hell wasn’t complaining about that.
“I can’t believe I let you do that,” she groaned.
“Let me?” I laughed. “You begged for it.”
“You…” Micah’s words edged hard with either terror or rage. “I was not begging for anything!”
“Not with those lips.”
“I can’t believe I let you touch me.”
“I can’t believe you came that easily. Thought I’d have to work a little harder.” Not that I minded. “When was the last time you got fucked?”
“Doesn’t matter—I’m about to get screwed now.”
Sexy little pain in the ass. “Give me five minutes to catch my breath, and I’ll give you an encore.”
“Jesus, cowboy!” She rushed to the door and peeked into the hall. The municipal center filled with the hum of dozens of conversations. “Don’t you get it? The entire town is out there.”
“Not all the town,” I said. “Just…the busybodies. The senior citizens. The gossips. The church congregation—one of my brother’s old rules, community involvement.”
“Your brother?”
“The minister.”
“A minister is here?”
“Don’t worry. Varius quit years ago. Pastor Miley took his place.�
� I snickered. “Varius would find this hilarious…Pastor Miley will probably invoke a prayer circle.”
Micah failed to see the humor in the situation. Granted, everything to me had that golden, just-fucked glow to it.
A woman this beautiful didn’t need panties. A tranquilizer, sure. But panties? Nah.
“This…” She attempted to calm herself with a deep breath and failed. “Was a mistake.”
“I thought it was great.”
“Yeah, I tend to rock people’s worlds. That’s not the point.”
“I was referring to my performance, which you could compliment, by the way.”
Micah rolled her eyes. “Didn’t know you needed a pep talk to have sex.”
“Didn’t think you’d need to be talked down after an orgasm.”
She pointed. “Only because you’re the prick who made me come.”
“Princess, I’m the only one who will ever make you come like that.”
“You’re the only one who would gloat about it too,” she said.
I crossed my arms. “Still waiting for the pat on my back.”
“I’ll give you a slap to the face if you don’t shut up.”
“Make it my ass, and we might have a deal.”
She glared at me, but her lips were still swollen from my kisses. Her chest still puffed out of breath. Hadn’t even seen her tits. Damn shame. How long would we have to fight before she’d give me a peek at those curves?
Micah had lost her patience with her panties. “We should not have done that. It was a mistake. If you had any shame, you’d be mortified.”
Christ, the woman was sexy, even when she raged. “What do I have to be ashamed of? I just fucked a beautiful woman.”
“The impropriety of it all?” Micah asked. “The scandal? The inappropriateness?”
I adjusted my jeans as my cock swelled once more. “If you want it again, all you gotta do is ask.”
She gritted her teeth. “Listen, cowboy. My panties are currently making their way to the front of Butterpond’s monthly meeting, and they’re about to be discovered by the council, the mayor, and every little old bitty who can see beyond her knitting. I’m one thong away from getting fired, and it’ll be your fault.”
I raised my hands. “Wait a minute. Why is it my fault?”
“You took them off!”
“Yeah, it was a prerequisite to tonight’s entertainment.” I smirked. “Or had it been so long since you got fucked you forgot how this process worked?”
Micah darted to the hall, glanced down the corridor, and scowled. “You’re going to get them back.”
“What?”
Her voice darkened. “So help me God, Julian Payne, if you get me fired, I will do things to your cock you’ve never imagined, and it won’t be as pleasant as this was.”
“Better than pleasant, don’t you think?”
She ignored me as she plotted some elaborate scheme that would only inconvenience me. “You’re going to cause a distraction. Do something, anything to stop this meeting. Then I can get my panties.”
This didn’t sound fun. I leaned back against her desk with a shrug. “And if I don’t? What if I want to watch you run out front, no panties on, my cum dripping from your pussy?”
Micah had nothing near her to throw except a box of tissues. “You already have that visual, cowboy. But you don’t have a barn. And now we don’t have a choice.”
“Wait…” I smiled. “You get your panties, I get my barn?”
She seethed. “I’ll consider it.”
“I think we’re beyond considerations now.”
“Cause a distraction, and we’ll talk.” She shoved me to the door. “Now go.”
A distraction?
Holy Christ, I could hardly think after a fuck like that, let alone walk, talk, or play hero and save the day. My cock pounded as hard as my head. I needed to lie down and fall asleep—preferably still sheathed inside Micah.
She didn’t just have a pussy, she’d enthralled me with a goddamned hellcat. Why did the greatest fuck in the world have to come from the world’s biggest pain in the ass?
Why should I have cared if she’d be on display for the entire meeting’s entertainment? Micah had blocked my every attempt to rebuild my barn. Since when did an application come with contingencies? Panties for a hammer. Sweet talk for the nails. Sex to silence the damned harpy when she started squawking about regulations and laws.
And it wasn’t like I’d had any help. Dad hadn’t done a damn thing to renovate the farm or fix the barn when he was alive. And the rest of the family was content to let the whole property slide into disrepair. Cassi had taken care of Dad as best she could, but even she sided with our brothers. Why rebuild the barn? Too many bad memories since the fire, and too much work to be done together as a family. Apparently, three hundred acres wasn’t enough space for the Paynes to function normally.
What the hell had happened to us?
Fine. If a pair of fucking panties got me a barn, I’d claim the thong as mine and wear the fucking thing out of the meeting. Nothing could be more humiliating than returning to Butterpond with a failed professional football career and crushed vertebrae. If I couldn’t fuck the building approval out of Micah, maybe I could bargain.
“Julian!”
A dozen little old ladies coo’ed my name and promised their granddaughters’ hands in marriage. I held the door open for the graying troupe, flinching after not one, but two ass pinches. Hard to tell who the offending parties were, especially in the shuffle of untangling plastic bonnets and the shaking of umbrellas. I’d learned long ago to keep my back to a wall, though that only invited more intimate pinches.
They giggled as they funneled into the meeting though they poker faced as soon as the double glass doors closed behind them.
Meetings were serious in Butterpond, a town mostly composed of broken dreams, broken trucks, and broken government. Mayor Desmond had lost control over a particularly rowdy meeting three years ago, and the council had yet to reclaim order. Now, they ceded the open forum to those who used the platform to air lifelong grievances with neighbors.
Tracy Sheldon, PTA President and Chairman of the Butterpond Flat-Earth Society, offered me the usual bingo card for the event. Looked like a decent board—had the spaces for Jerry Rooke’s came to the meeting drunk as well as Widow Barlow’s houses should be painted in only three colors rant. If I wasn’t on a panty hunt, I might have tossed a twenty into the pot.
“Looks crowded…” Tracy also led the Sawyer County Agoraphobic Support Group which met following the monthly meeting. She nibbled her fingernails to the quick. “Hope there’s room…”
Oh Christ. The meeting was packed. People stood shoulder-to-shoulder, crammed into the back of the room. Today’s special—three members of Henderson Road wrapped in a full length American Flag, handing out pocket-sized Constitutions.
Dave Horsden clutched his flag with one rheumatoid swollen hand and patted me with another. He tucked the constitution in my pocket and narrowed his eyes.
“Jules, you’re a man of reason.” His words mumbled over the chew. “That city gal they got in zoning? Says she wants to limit birdfeeders. You believe that?”
“…What?”
“Says one birdfeeder per household.” Dave shouted over the seated residents, waiting for the meeting to begin. “The government thinks it can tell a man how many birds to feed in his own goddamned yard! It ain’t right!”
A rumble of agreement rose from those tucking candles into their birdfeeders to begin their vigil. Most of the residents had chosen to empty their feeders, though a trail of seeds led from the front door into the hall. Marcy Hannigan’s triplets made short work of the seed, hoovering up the spill as they roamed beneath the chairs.
Unfortunately, Ethel Greene had spilled the entirety of her feeder—an unstable hummingbird contraption filled to the brim with vibrant red Kool-Aid. Sticky nectar flooded the meeting room aisle, coating one of the triplets, and prompt
ing the little old ladies to once again don their plastic babushkas.
At least it wasn’t blood this time.
I edged to the corner of the room, greeting my younger brother with a nod. Tidus wasn’t happy to see me. Then again, not much made him happy anymore. Used to be endearing when he was a kid. Now? I just worried about him. Usually, the middle kid always got fucked by the family. This time? He’d fucked us.
Tidus leaned against the wall, arms crossed. Did nothing to hide the tattoos that had prompted such whispers from the little old ladies furiously knitting on the far side of the room. A cigarette tucked behind his ear. I took it, broke it in half, and tossed it to the floor.
“You told Cassi you were quitting,” I said.
Invoking the soft-spot for our little sister usually shamed him. Not tonight.
“I tell Cassi a lot of things,” he said. “Sometimes they’re true.”
“Where’ve you been?”
Tidus scowled. “Didn’t get permission to leave the farm?”
“You haven’t been home for the past three nights. Thought you were dead in a gutter somewhere.”
“Where’s the search party?”
I didn’t have the patience now. “Not many people in this town willing to look for you.”
“Not too many people in the family looking either.”
“Whose fault is that?” I asked.
“It was five years ago, Jules.”
I shrugged. “I’m willing to forget if you are.”
“Yeah. You’ll forget. But no one’s forgiving.”
Forgiveness was a two-way street, at least, that’s what Varius used to preach. Took a big man to forgive, and a bigger one to ask for forgiveness.
“What are you doing here?” I said.
Tidus smirked. “I happen to be very passionate about our three birdfeeders.”
“You’re a regular ornithologist.”
He scowled. “What the fuck did you call me?”
“Never mind.”
He checked his watch. “Al shut down Renegades to come to the meeting.”
“Think you can spend a night sober?”
“Can you?” He looked away. “You talk to that zoning lady?”
I tensed. “Yeah.”
