Commitment

by K. M. Golland

  Dean was the worst patient ever!

  Demanding.

  Whiny.

  And did I say demanding?

  If it weren’t for the fact that I adored his sorry arse, I would’ve kicked back every day and eaten donuts in front of him while finger-fucking myself. But hey, I’d only done that once.

  The boys had dealt with their father’s injuries surprisingly well. Thomas didn’t quite understand the severity of the situation but had offered his security cadet services anyway, standing guard at Dean’s side for the first week he was home recovering. It had driven Dean crazy, which, for me, was appropriate payback for the demanding, whiny crap.

  William, on the other hand, did understand the seriousness of what had happened. He knew his father was stabbed trying to protect his secretary. He knew his injuries were bad but could’ve been a whole lot worse. He knew the guy who’d stabbed his father was violent and locked away. But most of all, he knew his father was a hero.

  He’d also cried three nights straight because of his understanding.

  Hillary’s boyfriend had been apprehended in New South Wales three days after the stabbing. He was being held in remand — after bail was refused — until his Committal Mention Hearing in three weeks’ time.

  I was nervous about the entire situation, and I knew Dean was as well. He just refused to admit it. So I’d planned a surprise getaway, also known as Alpha Female phase three.

  The boys were staying with Lexi and Bryce.

  I had Eleanor.

  I was about to kidnap my husband.

  I honked the horn twice and waited, butterflies fluttering in my stomach in anticipation of the look on his face when he opened the front door and —

  ‘What the fuck?’ There it is.

  He stepped outside and I squealed, bum-dancing in the driver’s seat.

  ‘Tash! Why are you driving Eleanor?’

  ‘Because she’s ours for the weekend.’

  He adjusted his crotch and scratched his head.

  My eyes widened. ‘Are you hard right now?’

  ‘Yes, I think I am.’

  ‘Should I be jealous?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  His expression was priceless; confused elation at its finest.

  ‘So … you ready to be kidnapped, Mr Jones? It’s date night tonight, and this is my something “new”.’

  He strolled down the steps and stopped at my door, tilting my chin and placing a firm kiss on my lips. ‘You, Mrs Jones, have absolutely nothing to be jealous about.’

  After grabbing a few final bits and pieces, because I’d packed before taking the boys to the penthouse apartment, Dean was loading the car and closing the glove box as I locked up the house.

  ‘So, where are we off to?’ he asked, opening the passenger side door for me like the perfect gentleman.

  ‘Great Ocean Road, babe.’

  ‘Could you be any more perfect?’

  I sat in the seat and smoothed down my dress. ‘No, I don’t think so.’

  Dean climbed into the driver’s seat and turned the key, revving the engine a couple of times. I laughed at his childish excitement before spotting Trixiebell in her front yard, pulling weeds. She looked up, waved, and pointed two fingers at her eyes then rotated them towards our house.

  ‘I’ll watch it like a hawk,’ she shouted. ‘Don’t worry. Go have some fun, kids.’

  We waved back.

  ‘So … I’m thinkin’ of setting up Trixie with Rob,’ Dean said as he reversed out of the driveway.

  ‘Rob? The guy you work with? The one that looks like that short guy in Seinfeld? I thought you said he was a jerk.’

  ‘He is. But I think if anyone could tame him, it would be Trixie.’

  I bit my fingernail. ‘You could be right. So how are you going to set them up?’

  ‘I don’t know. Pool party … barbecue?’

  ‘This could be the best idea you’ve ever had, or it could be the end of the world as we know it.’

  ‘Not the best odds, huh?’

  I shook my head and smiled. ‘Nope.’

  * * *

  Two hours later, we were driving along the Great Ocean Road towards Lorne, the wind in my hair, the sun on my face … my sexy as fuck husband beside me. I eyed his exposed arms, trailing my sight along the ridges of his muscles as he gripped the steering wheel. He was wearing his aviators, his dark brown, windswept hair was blowing in the breeze, and a slight pink sunburnt tinge was forming on his collarbone where his white t-shirt dipped into a V.

  ‘Eleanor suits you,’ I said, twisting a lock of my hair.

  He glanced over. ‘You suit me.’

  I bit down on my pointer finger and smiled seductively.

  ‘Want to know something?’ he asked, a smile creeping in at the corners of his mouth.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I’ve always fantasised about finger fucking a girl while driving a Mustang convertible.’

  ‘Really? Just any girl?’ I asked, elevating my voice all girly-like.

  ‘No. Not just any girl; the perfect girl. My brown-eyed, brunette donut-lover.’ He reached over and set his hand on my leg, slowly inching it up my thigh and pushing up the hem of my dress along with it.

  The muscles between my legs clenched with excitement and a sweet tingle shot straight to my core. I sucked in a deep breath and opened my legs just a little, rocking my pelvis into the seat to create a little friction.

  ‘Mmm,’ I moaned.

  Dean slid his hand down the inside of my thigh, gripping it tightly, his fingers pressing into my skin. I opened even wider for him, and his finger found the seam of my underwear.

  He lightly skated it across my clit and I jolted, pleasure hitting every nerve ending in my body. I was so fucking wet that my vagina could rival the world’s greatest water slide. I mean, seriously, it could be named the Epic Plunge or Tash Snatch Splash Express. For fuck’s sake, babe, take the plunge. Do it now!

  He did.

  And his plunge was epic.

  ‘You’re so wet, love. Are you laying eggs again?’

  I laughed. ‘No! This time it’s all you, babe. Own it. Be proud.’

  ‘Oh, I’m fucking proud all right.’ He slid deeper and swirled his finger round and round.

  I rocked against it. ‘Tell me what it feels like.’ My voice was low and sexy. ‘I want to know what I feel like.’

  He groaned and strained to reach deeper, his strokes more desperate against the walls of my pussy. ‘Mmm … it feels like … like wet bubblewrap.’ What the fuck?

  ‘Bubblewrap!’ I exclaimed. ‘Could you have picked anything less sexy?’

  ‘It is sexy!’ he exclaimed back. ‘Slippery, wet … bumpy.’

  ‘Now I’m a four-wheel drive track. Thanks!’ I wiggled away, removing his finger and crossing my legs. ‘I need a tissue. Where are the tissues?’ Reaching forward, I opened the glove box and a can rolled out and landed in my lap. I looked down, a big-breasted woman with spread-eagled legs staring up at me. ‘What the hell is this?’

  ‘What’s what?’ he asked, glancing over then back at the road, then back over at me.

  ‘This!’ I read the can. ‘Vulcan Vagina: the realistic LoveSkin masturbator feels just like a tight ripe vagina.’ Oh my God! It’s boss-man’s. ‘Ew! Ew! Ew!’ I squealed.

  ‘I can expl—’

  ‘That’s so gross. It’s Bryce’s pussy in a can.’ I threw it on the floor at my feet then pulled my legs up to my chest. ‘It’s on my hands. Help! Quick! Pull over. I need to jump in the ocean and purge the “hell no” from my body.’

  He nodded his head rapidly and pulled into a roadside beach entrance stop.

  I got out.

  I found a tap.

  I washed it all away.

  ‘Ew. I touched boss-man’s vagina can. I’m scarred for life. Why? Why on earth would he have that thing? Isn’t Lexi’s vagina good enough for him?’

  Dean just stood there, leaning against Eleanor with his
head in his hands.

  ‘I’m contaminated and you don’t care.’

  ‘You’re not contaminated, love. The pussy in a can isn’t Bryce’s, it’s mine.’

  I stopped shaking my hands like a crazy jazz dancer and froze. ‘It’s yours?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But why?’ I glanced down at my tunnel of Tash. ‘What’s wrong with my vagina?’

  ‘Nothing. Come here.’

  I trudged over to him.

  ‘I bought it a while ago … under duress.’

  ‘So you don’t use it?’

  ‘No. I was going to throw it away.’ He smoothed my hair on both sides of my face, poking it behind my ears. It had grown so much over the past few weeks and was now sitting on my shoulders. ‘Look … last year, when you and I weren’t on the same page, when we weren’t communicating like we do now, I may have considered using it. I don’t need to now. I don’t want to. I have you. You’re all I’ll ever want and need, inside and out of the bedroom.’

  I wrapped my arms around him, hugging his body to mine. ‘You’re all I’ll ever want and need, inside and out of the bedroom, too.’

  And that was the truth. I’d learned so much in recent times about want, need, lust and desire. About marriage and what was expected as opposed to what we made of it.

  Marriage wasn’t a chore. It wasn’t a contract you entered with gold bands, flowers, suits and dresses, nor was it everyone’s expectation of you or promises you thought you were obligated to make when you had no fucking idea what it meant to make them.

  It wasn’t any of that.

  It was simply working in unison while moving in varying directions. Sacrifice. Compromise. Respect. It was handing your partner a towel when they got out of the shower while you were brushing your teeth. It was smelling their godawful morning breath and just dealing with it. It was pressing your cold feet against them in bed because they were warmer. It was knowing what TV shows to watch on what days and just switching them on, and it was putting the toilet seat down — or up — and shutting the fuck up about it.

  It was loving each other on a level that no one else could, and it was striving to increase that level every chance that you got. Marriage was wading through the ups and downs, fixing the bad, and celebrating the good.

  Marriage was commitment.

  EPILOGUE

  Fourteen years. That’s how long Dean and I have been married. Fourteen years of ups, downs, forwards, backwards, haircuts, donuts, whirlywhirls and somersaults. Whatever the obstacle we’d faced during that time, we’d nailed it. And not just nailed it; we’d MacGyvered the arse out of it.

  Our fourteenth year had been one of our most testing, but it had also been one of our most enlightening. We’d changed so much, grown so much, and learned a freakin’ shitload. We’d made mistakes and progress, fucked up and made up. But most of all, we’d rediscovered each other.

  Opening the front door to my home, the expectant smile on my face instantly morphed into something similar to a cat’s puckered arsehole.

  ‘Happy anniversary,’ Lexi sang cheerily. For the love of best friends who wished to die a horrible death.

  ‘Why?’ I asked, shaking my head and pointing to the anniversary balloon she was holding. ‘Why do you hate me so much?’

  ‘I don’t hate you, silly,’ she said, dismissing me and taking a step forward. ‘I don’t hate anyone.’

  I pointed to the floating foil piece of fuckery. ‘You’re not coming in with that.’

  ‘Sure I am.’ Her overly pleasant smile remained.

  ‘Nope. Sorry.’

  ‘Honey, I did warn you about bringing a—’

  ‘Shut it, Clark,’ she said to boss-man Bryce. ‘You also warned me against Ronald McDonald. Clearly, both you and Tash have issues with fun childhood icons.’

  ‘And, clearly, you’re a mega pain in the butt. A butt-pain that is not entering my house with that evil thing. Lose it or … lose. Your call.’

  ‘Fine,’ she huffed. ‘I’ll tie it right here.’

  Lexi twirled the string of the balloon around the handle of my security-screen door, the heart-shaped silver and pink balloon flapping in the breeze, prompting me to step back further inside my house.

  ‘Come in. Now. Quickly.’ I ushered them into the entryway, scruffing Nate, Charlotte and Brayden on the head as they walked past me before I closed the front door. ‘Go ahead. Go straight through, everyone is out back by the pool.’

  Alexis stopped and handed me a Tupperware container as the others continued outside. It warmed my fingers upon contact. ‘Here you go,’ she said, quickly kissing my cheek. ‘I baked.’

  ‘You baked?’

  ‘Yes! Why do you not believe I bake?’

  ‘Because you don’t.’

  I popped the lid and peeked inside, the waft of steamy chocolate hitting my nose. ‘Wow! You did bake.’ Surprised, I peeled the lid back to find a rather sad-looking brown blob. ‘But we may need a lot of cream.’

  ‘Why? What’s wrong with it?’ She leaned forward and spotted the fallen-apart mess inside the container. ‘Oh. That’s not what it looked like when I took it out of the oven.’

  ‘I’m sure it tastes lovely,’ I reassured her with a not-so-reassuring pat on the back.

  She glared at my minuscule mockery. ‘It will. The batter was the best I’ve tasted.’

  ‘You’re supposed to grow out of that, you know.’

  ‘What? Eating cake batter?’ Lexi’s eyebrows elevated profusely. ‘Who are you? And what horrible birthday crime was committed for you to be so opposed to balloons and cake batter?’

  I paused as I placed the container down on the bench. ‘It wasn’t a horrible crime,’ I said quietly.

  ‘So there is a reason?’

  I shrugged. ‘Kinda.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Well, when I was eight, Mum, Dad and I went to pick up a big bunch of balloons for my brother’s birthday. There were so many of them. Like they had the ability to reproduce when you looked away—’

  ‘Balloons can’t do that, hon,’ Lex said, interrupting me.

  ‘I know that. It was just how I felt at the time. Anyway, there were way too many to fit in the boot of our car, so Mum and Dad crammed them into the back with me.’ I shuddered at the memory and performed an uncontrollable spaghetti dance. ‘They were all over me, pressing into my face, my arms, my legs, and making my hair all static and sticky. They wouldn’t leave me alone. I couldn’t see. I couldn’t hear. I COULDN’T BREATHE!’

  Her hand touched my shoulders. ‘It’s okay. They’re gone. They can never assault you again, the perverts.’

  ‘Ha ha! You’re so funny.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she laughed, pulling me close and hugging me tight. ‘It’s funny but it’s not.’

  ‘No, it’s not funny. AT ALL!’

  ‘I want to cure you of this. I’m gonna make it a life goal.’

  I shrugged free. ‘Noooo. You really shouldn’t. I’ll be fine.’

  ‘Leave it with me,’ she said, giving my shoulders another mocking pat. ‘So, is Carly here yet? I need to talk to her about my hens’ night. You too, for that matter.’

  I pulled an ‘eek’ face — clenched teeth, strained neck, wide eyes. ‘Not long now till the big daaaaaay.’

  ‘I know!’ she squealed, the most genuine, radiant smile spreading across her face. ‘I feel like it has taken forever. I’m so ready to become Mrs Clark.’

  ‘It has taken forever, Lex. You’ve been engaged for two years.’

  She stared out the window. ‘Tell me about it.’

  I followed her line of sight, spying Bryce. He was holding Brayden, who was wiggling like a little maniac in his arms, as he shook Dean’s hand.

  ‘You’ve only got yourself to blame though, missy. It was your idea to wait for Brayden to be able to walk down the aisle with you, remember?’ I nodded towards the wiggly terror. ‘Yeah. Good luck with that.’

  She turned and rolled her eyes at m
e. ‘I know it’s my fault. I just didn’t want to rush this, you know? Everything else that Bryce and I have experienced together has been a whirlwind. I didn’t want our wedding to be the same.’

  Placing my hands on her shoulders, I held her stare. ‘For what it’s worth, I think you did the right thing. Secondly, sometimes whirlwinds are the best type of wind.’

  ‘What’s the best type of wind?’ Dean asked, interrupting us as he entered the kitchen. ‘A whirlwind? Naah.’ He shook his head then paused. ‘Mind you, a whirlwind helps shake it all out.’

  Dean stopped behind me, kissed my neck and then smacked my arse. Hard. I shrieked, stunned by his statement and the aftereffects of the sting buzzing my butt cheek. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘A whirlwind.’ He opened the fridge and pulled out a tray of sausages. ‘It’s when you drop your guts and swirl it around.’ To my utter horrification, my disgusting husband performed a hula-hooping hip rotation.

  Alexis laughed. ‘Ew. I hope you didn’t really just do one.’

  ‘Do what?’ Carly asked as she entered the kitchen with an empty wine glass, which she passed to me as if to say fill her up.

  ‘A whirlwind,’ I uttered under my breath.

  ‘Really? Did he just go down on you? Is that why you disappeared for a bit?’ What the freakin’ donuts? And thank Christ all the children are outside right now.

  ‘No!’ I took the glass from her. ‘Unlike you and Derek, we know there’s a time and place for that. And hang on a second, why would you even ask such a thing?’

  She shrugged and looked from me to Dean to Lexi, as if to wait for us all to know what the fuck she was on about. ‘Whirlwind?’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘It’s when he licks your clit, yeah? In continuous circles?’

  ‘Oh my God!’ I exclaimed, throwing my hands into the air and turning for the back door. ‘I’ll be outside … with the grown-ups.’

  * * *

  As it would appear, there weren’t any proper grown-ups outside either. Not if you included boss-man — who came close — and Derek, a handful of children, and … Rob, who was all of a sudden walking in my direction with a look so cheesy it would make a slice of cheddar jealous. Shit! Mayday. Mayday.