by Lolita Lopez
Chapter Six
“No, but thank you, ma’am. Yes. If she comes in to your hotel, please call me back at either of those two cell numbers I gave you.” Tom tapped his touch screen and ended the call with the manager of a nearby hotel. He’d been scrolling through a list of hotels, bed and breakfasts and crummy motels while Frank crawled the streets of the small town. Frank had parked the SUV in a restaurant parking lot and ducked inside the burger place to see if anyone had noticed the car Lexi was driving.
Tom’s stomach ached. He tapped the phone against his forehead and tried to calm his racing heart. He felt as if he’d just run a half marathon. His hands were shaky. His feet were cramping. His palms were damp. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this scared. Maybe as a kid? It had to have been the night his parents were both so high and drunk they’d gone after one another. Just the memory of finding his mother slashing at his father with a broken bottle made him queasy.
God, how long had it been since he’d thought of that? Seven or eight years? He quickly batted away the intruding memory and focused on finding Lexi. After the way things had gone down in the kitchen, he was worried about her safety. She’d gunned out of that garage like a bat out of hell. It was dark and the roads weren’t great out here. He prayed she really had gotten a hotel room and not tried to drive all the way home tonight.
The driver door opened and Frank hauled himself into the seat. “A couple of teenagers told me they saw the car earlier.” Frank fastened his seat belt. “Another guy told me he saw a blonde woman and that car at the liquor store a few blocks over.”
“Liquor store?” Tom had never seen Lexi drink anything stronger than a mojito or margarita. “We’ve got to find her.”
“I’m on it.” Frank backed out of the parking spot, crossed the parking lot and pulled onto the busy highway. He turned onto a side street and made another left. “There.”
Tom followed Frank’s pointing finger to the liquor store up ahead. Across the street, he spotted a ratty ass motel. Seeing Lexi’s dad’s car parked in the lot there stunned him. “She’s staying there? Our Lexi? In a shit hole like that?”
“Let’s just hope she still is our Lexi,” Frank muttered as he pulled into the lot and parked next to the car. They sat in silence for a few moments after Franked turned off the engine. “I really fucked up, Tom.” He grimaced and held his head in his hands. “I can’t believe I said that to her. What the hell is wrong with me?”
Tom winced as Frank slapped the steering wheel, no doubt hurting his hands. “Look, we both fucked it up back there. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”
“We’ve got to play this just right or it’s over, Tommy.”
Tom’s gut clenched even tighter. “I know, Frank. I know.” He glanced toward Frank when he felt the other man’s hand closing over his own. “What?”
“I love you, Tommy.”
Tom smiled. “I love you, too, Frank.” He squeezed Frank’s hand. “We’re going to fix this. You’ll see. It’s going to be fine.”
It wasn’t often that Tom got to play the reassuring role in their relationship. He honestly didn’t know where all of this confidence was coming from now. He decided to embrace the feeling and just go with it. “Let me pop in to see the night manager. Hopefully, he’ll give me the room number.”
Tom left the SUV and started across the parking lot. A door opened off to his left and Tom glanced over out of habit. He always liked to aware of his surroundings. When he spotted Lexi exiting the room with a cheap plastic ice bucket in one arm, he tripped over his own feet. He barely caught himself before hitting pavement. The tumbling motion caught Lexi’s attention. Eyes wide, she hissed, “What are you doing here?”
Tom straightened and crossed the parking lot. Frank hurried to catch up to him. Relief and anger battled within him. He used his bigger body to box her in against the door to her room. She put the ice bucket between them. The plastic liner rustled as he crowded close to her. The scent of her shampoo and lotion invaded his nostrils. He dipped his head until their noses were almost touching and held her gaze. “I didn’t touch Allie except to get her dirty hands off of me. It was a setup, Lexi.” He planted his hands on either side of her head. “I love you, Lexi. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. You’re the only woman I want. Ever. It’s you or no one.”
She gulped and finally lowered the bucket between them. Her hand reached for the door knob. “Come inside?”
He wasn’t letting her get off that easy. Tom brushed his lips across hers. “Tell me you believe me, Lexi.”
“I do,” she whispered. She touched his cheek and offered an apologetic smile. “I do.”
Tom kissed her tenderly. He nuzzled her nose before taking her hand and leading her into the motel room. Frank was hot on their heels. He shut and locked the door before joining them on the bed. With Frank on her right and Tom on her left, Lexi had no means of escape. They each took one of her hands and waited for her to speak.
“I really hate those people,” she said finally. “Like loathe.”
Tom rubbed her hand. “I should have been more careful, Lexi. I suspected Allie wasn’t on the up and up but I still let her come up to the room to get towels. I thought she’d left, but the next thing I knew she was trying to climb in the shower with me.”
“I was downstairs with your dad,” Frank chimed in and sighed. “He’d seen Allie go upstairs with Tom. I got up there as quickly as possible but she was already trying to assault Tom. I carried her out of the room.”
“And that’s when Ramon snapped the picture?” She gestured to the small table near the windows and the rattling air conditioning unit where her purse sat. Tom spotted the glossy picture next to her leather bag. It fluttered with the cold breeze. He could only imagine how awful that had been for Lexi. Finding that picture after being upset like that in the kitchen? No wonder she’d run off.
He was heartened by the sight of the unopened bottles of wine and vodka sitting next to her bag. “We thought you’d be three sheets to the wind by now.”
She glanced at the table and shrugged. “Turns out drunk isn’t what I wanted after all. It seemed kind of pointless. Tomorrow, I’d just wake up with a hangover and still be feeling the pain of this betrayal. It didn’t sound so appealing once I thought it through.”
“I hear you,” Tom muttered. He’d seen firsthand what happened to people who made a habit of crawling into a bottle to assuage their pain. It wasn’t pretty.
“Speaking of heavy drinkers, how were Mom and Dad when you left?”
“Yeah.” Frank rubbed the back of his neck and shook his head. “You know, Lexi, your dad was a lot cooler about seeing Allie going upstairs with Tom than I would have been. It was weird, Lexi. I swear he was almost happy to tell me that.”
“Probably because he doesn’t like Tom or respect his work,” Lexi explained. “You’re the better catch in his eyes. You’ve got money, business smarts and the big-time education. Knowing Dad, he probably thought he was doing the right thing by breaking us up.”
Tom stiffened at those words. “Are we?”
She frowned at him. “Are we what?”
“Breaking up,” he clarified. He held his breath as he waited for her answer.
“No.” She squeezed his hand. “I mean, unless you don’t want to put up with me and my crazy family anymore.” She looked toward Frank. “I’d understand if the two of you wanted to bail after this shitty vacation.”
Frank cupped her face and leaned forward to kiss her lovingly. “You can’t choose your family, Lexi. We get it. It’s a package deal and we’re willing to take it on for you.”
“But only if there are boundaries,” Tom said, knowing full well how to deal with difficult family. “Your dad can’t pull this kind of stunt again. Period. End of story.” Tom put his foot down. “And Allie and Ramon are absolutely never welcome near us again.”
“How much do they want?” Lexi motioned to the picture. “This ain’t my first rodeo.
I figure they want cash to keep the pics private, right?”
Reluctant, Tom nodded. “And a gym.”
She narrowed her eyes. “You’re fucking joking.”
Frank shook his head. “They want me to give him a franchise in LA.”
“You’re not even in the LA market!”
Frank smiled. “I know. But,” he said with a long exhale, “if that’s what it takes to keep these pictures out of the tabloids and from hurting you, we’ll do it.”
“Your business is growing. You’re being featured in magazines and doing interviews about your jewelry.” Tom stroked her soft skin. “We don’t want you to be hurt by something stupid that we did.”
“You,” she glanced between them, “didn’t do this. Like you said, it was a set-up. Unfortunately, you two haven’t been around snakes long enough to sniff them out and protect yourselves. If you stick around me long enough, you’ll learn.” She looked sad. “People get a whiff of money and it makes them do despicable things.”
“Your mother was pretty furious.” Tom thought she needed to know. “She came barreling into the kitchen and let your dad have it. Ramon made the mistake of getting in her line of fire. She put him out and threw a handful of hundreds at him. It was pretty pathetic. You should have seen him scrambling to pick them all up.”
“Really?” Lexi seemed stunned with disbelief. “Mom did that?”
Tom nodded and wrapped some of her silky hair around his finger. “She went all mama bear on everyone. I was impressed.”
“And Dad?”
Tom shot a quick glance at Frank who took on the ugly task. “He’s sticking by Allie’s side. Needless to say, the lines were drawn in sand tonight. I don’t think this divorce is going to be very pretty.”
“No,” Lexi said sadly. “I think that was just a pipe dream of mine.”
“Look,” Frank rubbed her arm, “they’re adults and they’ll sort this thing out, sugar. The three of us,” he gestured between them, “we’ll keep a low profile until it all blows over. Between your business, the gym and Tom’s training for his fight this winter, we’ll be so busy we won’t even be aware of most of it. You can avoid the gossip sites online. I’ll do the grocery shopping so you don’t have to see the tabloids in the checkout lanes. Tom can run interference with anyone who tries to get an interview or a picture. We’ll make it work, honey.”
Tom’s heart swelled as Frank went out of his way to make Lexi feel better. “Frank’s right. We’ll get through this.”
Lexi’s eyes glistened and she blinked rapidly. Tears dripped onto her cheeks. Tom’s heart ached at the sight. He pulled her onto his lap and wiped away the tear drops with his thumb. She started to speak but he pressed his finger to her lips. “Don’t, sweetheart.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “You don’t have to thank us for being here for you. That’s part of being in a relationship. That’s just part of loving you.”
Tom silenced her with a kiss, unwilling to let her protest or doubt herself. He pressed all of his love and affection and acceptance into that kiss, desperate for her to see that he and Frank truly didn’t mind making sacrifices for her. She slid her arms around his neck and plunged her tongue between his lips, showing him that she understood. In that moment, all was forgiven. He no longer cared that she’d run off without a word or that she’d doubted him. He sensed that she no longer cared about the tense showdown either.
Frank slid closer. Lexi broke away from Tom’s mouth to lean over and claim Frank’s. Before she succeeded in getting a much needed dose of sugar, Frank clasped her face and rubbed his thumbs across her skin. “I’m sorry, Lexi. What I said back there in the kitchen is unforgiveable. I’m so embarrassed by what I said and there’s no excuse for it.”
“It was pretty awful,” she agreed. Then, with a teasing smile, she added, “You realize I’m going to throw that in your face the next time we argue, right?”
“You’ve earned that right.” Frank looked so mortified. “I deserve to be smacked around for that one. I don’t even know where the hell that remark came from, Lexi.”
“I’ve been there,” she assured him. “Sometimes, when you’re stressed and afraid, it’s easy to lash out and say nasty things. I’ve done it. I’m sure Tom’s done it.” She shrugged. “We’re human and we make mistakes.”
“Well this is one I won’t make again.” Frank touched their foreheads together. “Do you forgive me?”
She grinned mischievously. “Depends.”
“On?”
“How the rest of this night goes.”
Tom laughed at her brazen request for makeup sex. He pulled her back onto his lap and took her down to mattress. With one knee between her thighs, he grasped her waist and hauled her into a better position on the bed. Tom claimed her mouth again, loving her with his tongue and making her moan. Behind him, Frank shed his clothing. When he joined them on the bed, Frank tugged at Tom’s shirt. He broke free from Lexi’s mouth just long enough to allow Frank to whisk the shirt free. Then he was on her again.
She bucked underneath him. Her legs wrapped around his waist and she ran a hand up and down his back. Tom plundered her mouth. She purred in response and pulled down the waist band of his shorts, baring his ass to her greedy fingers. He chuckled against her lips as Frank got in on the action and tried to remove his shorts.
“Hang on,” Tom said, still laughing. He rolled onto his back and lifted his hips as Frank jerked on his shorts. His shoes and socks followed next. Frank quickly did away with Lexi’s capris and undies too. She’d already been barefoot.
Naked now, he reached over and grabbed Lexi by the hips. She squealed with surprise as he easily lifted her over him. He really loved manhandling her like that. His bigger size had always made things in bed interesting but with Lexi it was even better. She always looked so stunned when he picked her up or tossed her over his shoulder. Sometimes she protested at his Neanderthal behavior but he knew how much she really enjoyed it.
Frank straddled Tom’s leg and enveloped Lexi from behind. Frank’s hands slid under her camisole. He caressed her skin and made her shudder as he pinched her nipples through the fabric of her bra. She lifted her arms overhead and helped Frank remove the camisole. The bra went next and landed on the TV behind Frank.
“That’s a good look.” Tom chuckled. “Maybe we should do something similar at our place.”
Lexi thumped his chest. “Don’t tempt me. Draping my panties over your TV might be the only way I get any attention during football season.”
Laughing, Tom sat up and wrapped his arms around both Lexi and Frank. “Or we could get you one of those sexy little cheerleader costumes. I can’t think of a better way to spend halftime. Can you Frank?”
Frank nipped at Lexi’s neck and made her shiver. “I’ve always wanted to fuck a naughty cheerleader.”
Lexi laughed. “You two are terrible, you know that?”
“And, yet, I bet right now, you’re thinking of where to find a cheerleader costume,” Tom retorted playfully.
She smiled impishly. “Maybe.”
Tom was still laughing when she pressed her mouth to his. His chuckle faded as she swept her tongue against the roof of his mouth and then swirled it around his own. Growling with need, he kissed her even harder. He wanted to brand her, to remind her that she belonged to him always.
Lips trailing down the curve of her throat, Tom peppered soft kisses on her skin. Frank cupped her big breasts and tweaked her nipples, just the way she liked it. He pinched and pulled and rolled the peaks until she was undulating on Tom’s lap. Her pussy was so wet Tom could smell the musk of arousal. His cock banged around between her legs as she moved. Sometimes it came dangerously close to penetrating her. He fought the urge to shift his hips and impale her on his stiff rod. She deserved way more than a quick fuck tonight.
He dropped back to the bed, grasped her hips and pulled her up toward his mouth. A trail of wetness appeared on his chest as her soaking wet cunt left its mark. He cupped her ass
and silently urged her into position by giving her cheeks a squeeze. Frank put an arm around her waist and lifted her right where Tom wanted her, settling her knees on either side of his head.
Still holding her hips, Tom wiggled his tongue between her pussy lips and found her clit. She gasped and moaned, the sound music to his ears. Tom lashed her yummy cunt with his tongue. He flicked the swollen kernel and circled it slowly. He couldn’t get enough of her taste and let his tongue slide into her pussy. She cried out at the invasion and rocked her hips. His nose rubbed her clit as he tongue-fucked her deep and slow.
“Tom!” Her fingernails scratched his scalp as she reached down to grab hold. “Oh! Oh, fuck. I’m going to come. I’m…Ah!”
Her shock was shared by him. He’d never seen her come so fast. He kept his tongue deep inside her silken channel and moved his head side to side, stimulating her clit even more as she continued to climax against his mouth. Her sweet cream flooded his tongue. He groaned excitedly as he enjoyed the wickedness of it all.
When she could take no more, she fell off to the side, her thigh resting on his chest. He turned his head and kissed her belly. Her pussy was close and he just wasn’t ready to stop lavishing it with attention. He slid a finger between her folds and slowly penetrated her. She whimpered but didn’t stop him. Instead, she slid her knee a little higher on his chest, opening herself for him.
Frank moved down the bed and forced Tom’s thighs wide apart. Tom groaned when Frank’s tongue licked from his sac straight to the tip of his cock. His fingers stilled inside Lexi as he enjoyed the sensation of Frank’s tongue gliding over his shaft. His stomach wobbled and clenched when Frank sucked hard on his crown and fluttered his tongue over the sensitive underside of his dick. He reached down with his free hand and ran his fingers through Frank’s hair. He grabbed a handful and tugged. “Suck me harder.”
