"Apparently she didn't take the hint," I muttered but Andy ignored me. Incidentally, my dick was ignoring me too.
Lo shot me a venomous glare, mouthed "Be nice," and linked her elbow with Andy's. She flipped me off as they walked across the patio to where Wes was seated with Erin, or—as I preferred to call her—the quiet one.
I definitely drew the short straw in this activity.
"I don't spend nearly enough time listening to harpies." I gestured for Shannon to finish her story, and hoped my remarks were enough to send her back to her room for the night. That was my exit strategy, and she was providing more than enough material to work with. "By all means, continue. I'm certain there are some frat boys brewing their own basement lager that you haven't mentioned yet, and I won't be able to sleep tonight without your assessment of their operation."
"The things I do for my brothers," Shannon said under her breath.
I expected another book report on the history of brewing but she stayed silent. She watched as Lo and Andy returned to the inn, and then her attention shifted to Erin. Shannon was putting a lot of effort into making her glances seem casual, and failing miserably.
Her thumb swept back and forth over the bottle's neck, and for a moment, I was transfixed by an image of those fingers on my cock. They were so small and slim, I bet they wouldn't fit all the way around my shaft.
And fuck me, I couldn't stop watching her stroke that bottle. I closed my eyes, and I could feel it, I could feel her skin against mine, and fucking hell, it had been too long.
"Give me that," I said, grabbing the beer away. It was barely cold and I couldn't say I enjoyed beer this hoppy but I drank it anyway.
"We could have ordered you one, dearie," she said.
"Unlikely," I said. "You scared the piss out of Barry, and probably everyone else at this place."
Her laugh was a soft, breathy sound, and it was the most honest thing I'd heard from her all night. "You can't say I don't get shit done."
I couldn't stay seated any longer. I needed something to do, a way to expel the misplaced desire hammering in my veins, and I was half ready to dive into the ocean and swim until I washed up on the shore. At least then I'd be too exhausted to think about wrapping all that red hair around my fist and forcing her to her knees.
Stepping behind the bar, I grabbed our empty bottles and tossed them in the bin. Sam was drunkenly corralling his brothers—plus Wes, Erin, and Nick, the doctor who'd asked me an unending series of questions about tribal healthcare conditions in Pakistan and Afghanistan earlier in the evening—and leading them down the beach toward his cottage.
That was the bullet I was taking for this team tonight: Wes was gathering intel on Lo's in-laws while eyeing Erin, and I was left keeping a leash on Shortcake.
But then I noticed her tracking me, and I realized this little girl and I were playing the same fucking game. How could I have missed such overt scrutiny? And no, of course she didn't have a thing for IPAs.
Yeah, the bitch had balls.
"So you're the tail."
"I'm what?" she snapped, and it seemed plausible that she'd have a trophy case packed with all the assholes she'd torn up.
"The tail," I repeated. "I know my objective here…but what's yours?"
She crossed her arms over her chest, jangling those stupid Slinky bracelets in the process. "Your sister seems to believe you're going to kidnap and torture my brother. She wanted to prevent that."
"It's called enhanced interrogation," I said. "And that's not my wheelhouse."
"That's right," she murmured. "I'm told you're quite the commando."
I bristled. There was a lot of mythology surrounding special operations teams, and most of it was inaccurate or exaggerated. "We aren't fond of that term, ma'am."
"In that case, I'm quite fond of it." She eyed me up and down, visibly taking stock of my dive watch, the Gatorz sunglasses hanging from the neck of my t-shirt, and the frog skeleton tattoo peeking out from my sleeve. "What kind of commando activities have you been up to recently?"
You wouldn't be able to sleep at night if I told you. "Afraid that's classified, ma'am."
She stared at me as if she wasn't accustomed to being refused anything, ever. And look at her. Those pouty lips, the ones that ordered everyone around as if they were on her payroll and they should be fucking thrilled to have that honor. That stubborn chin, angled just enough to communicate her superiority. And those eyes, big and dark, dark mossy green, twinkling as if she was amused by my insubordination.
This woman was lethal.
Tearing my gaze away from Shannon, I surveyed the beer selection and opted for another Summer Ale. "Why is Matt in such a hurry to marry my sister?"
Before seeing Lo or meeting her fiancé, Wes and I endured one of the most stern lectures my father had delivered in years. It seemed the Commodore was drunk on the Matthew Walsh Koolaid. At the very minimum, my mother was force-feeding it to him. He officially warned us off any initiatives aimed at interrogating or otherwise scaring the shit out of our future brother-in-law. That didn't mean I wasn't free to collect intel.
Shannon smiled, and for the first time, it was authentic. "Because they have crazy, filthy love for each other." She wandered behind the bar and inspected every bottle in stock before selecting a Sam Adams. She leaned against the counter, staring at me while she sipped.
Okay, so maybe she wasn't too much of a socialite for beer.
"Really? Do you even like beer?" I shook my head as she drained the bottle and reached for another. "And whatever happened to your blessed IPAs? You should know Barry's off crying in a corner somewhere."
She held the bottle in front of her face and studied the label. "I'll leave him a generous tip. Nothing a few months of psychotherapy won't solve." I couldn't repress the surprised laughter that bubbled up from my chest. "Now explain to me why you have a problem with Matt."
"I don't trust him," I said. "It's really fucking simple."
"Do you trust Lauren?"
"Of course," I said, reaching for my beard and once again finding it missing. "Without a doubt."
"Obviously not," Shannon laughed. She tugged her sweater's sleeves down from where they'd been bunched at her elbows, and now they hung over her fingers. There was absolutely no reason why I'd find that sexy, but…post-deployment horny. That's all it was. "If you trusted her judgment, you'd also trust her choice of husband."
I leaned back against the counter, mirroring her stance. My goal was keeping my eyes on her face and away from her legs and fingers, but then I noticed the way her sweater was always sliding off one shoulder. That shoulder…I couldn't stop staring at it. "I don't trust any guy with my sister."
She tossed the empty bottle into the trash and went for another. "You're a misogynistic meathead," she said.
"If you want to hit me with meathead, I'll own that, but I'm not taking misogynistic. I can respect, admire, and champion the fuck out of women, but that doesn't mean I can't also protect my sister. That doesn't mean I can't make it clear he'll have to deal with me if she's ever harmed in any way."
"That was a lot of words for you all at once. I'm kind of impressed." Shannon ran a hand through her hair, and I noticed we were completely alone. "Let me tell you something about Lauren: she is a badass chick. You want to talk about torture? She put Matt through all kinds of hell."
"Good," I said. "It builds character. And he probably deserved it."
"While your last point is most likely accurate," Shannon said, "you need to lighten up, commando. Not all womenfolk need looking after."
"Someone should be looking after you," I murmured before draining my beer. Too often, the world wasn't very nice to females, and yeah, we needed to deal with that shit straightaway. But no one was going to tell me to stop standing up for the women in my life.
"Erroneous." Her lips curled into a smile that walked the line between playful and demonic, and she shook her head. "If anything, I'm the one who does the looking-after around
here."
"In other words, your brothers are lazy sacks of shit," I said, and I knew there was a reason I didn't like those guys.
Her pale brows drew together in a vicious scowl, and I recognized I was wrong about Shannon. She wasn't a socialite, not at all. She was a fighter, and a scrappy one at that.
"In other words," she said, "I run this town and I don't need any help doing it."
She shrugged and now that shoulder was all the way exposed. A wild splash of freckles ran across her skin, and I was too tired, too fed up with this conversation, too tightly wound to do anything but imagine tasting her right there. I pushed off from the counter and stared out at the sea, all while searching for enough discipline to make it back to my room without doing something unbelievably stupid.
But instead of leaving the bar right then, I stopped beside Shannon and studied those freckles. "Like the tail of a comet," I murmured.
I reached out and traced a line from the ball of her shoulder across her collarbone. Then my gaze shifted to her mouth and those defiant, sinful lips, and my other hand was sliding up her neck and into her hair.
I didn't know why I did it. Maybe it had been too long since I touched a woman. Maybe I couldn't handle the post-deployment horny as well as I used to. Or maybe…maybe I wanted to get into a power struggle.
My forehead rested against Shannon's as I moved into her space, crowding her and feeling all five-foot-nothing of her pressed against me.
"What are you doing?" she whispered.
"Waiting for you to stop me," I said against her lips.
She sighed, and I couldn't tell if the sound originated from pleasure or pain. Then she shook her head and it was highly probable her knee would be connecting with my groin any minute. I felt every single second tick by, each one heavier than the one before.
"Will," she finally said, my name no more than a gasp.
I stole those last syllables from Shannon when my mouth met hers. She tasted like beer and sweetness, and just that quickly, my entire world condensed down to her skin, her hair, her scent. We dropped into an easy rhythm of kisses; sweet and simple, and perfectly right for the dark of night at the beach.
But then she bit my tongue and the gauntlet was thrown. Lips and tongues and teeth all fought for control, and oh holy fuck, I was bringing this girl to her knees tonight. I didn't care what it took, she was going to surrender to me. I pulled that plump bottom lip of hers between my teeth, nipping and scraping as my hands moved down her body. Her ass fit right in my palms and I jerked her against me, my fingers squeezing that taut skin until she yelped.
"Not nice," she murmured against my lips. Her hands traveled up my chest and over my shoulders, and the fire in her eyes was enough to get me as hard as a goddamn lamppost.
"The last thing I'm going to be to you is nice," I said.
For more Bites by Kate Canterbary, visit her at https://bookandmainbites.com/katecanterbary
If you loved this Bite, read The Cornerstone on Amazon
About Kate Canterbary
Kate Canterbary doesn't have it all figured out, but this is what she knows for sure: spicy-ass salsa and tequila solve most problems, living on the ocean--Pacific or Atlantic--is the closest place to perfection, and writing smart, smutty stories is a better than any amount of chocolate. She started outreporting for an indie arts and entertainment newspaper back when people still read newspapers, and she has been writing and surreptitiously interviewing people--be careful sitting down next to her on an airplane--ever since. Kate lives on the water in New England with Mr. Canterbary and the Little Baby Canterbary, and when she isn't writing sexy architects, she's scheduling her days around the region's best food trucks.
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A Private Lap Dance Gone Wrong… Or Very, Very Right
Lauren Rowe
Maddy
I remain frozen on the bed, my arms above my head, my eyes wide, my nipples hard, watching Keane’s muscular backside in the dim light as he bends over my computer, the waistband of his sweatpants riding impossibly low on his trim hips.
When “Trip Switch” begins blaring, Keane turns around and stands at the edge of the bed, his chest heaving, his muscles taut.
I hold my breath, waiting for him to start dancing. But he doesn’t move. He just keeps standing at the edge of the bed, commanding my attention with nothing more than his smoldering gaze.
I rise up onto my forearms, my chest heaving in synchronicity with Keane’s, anticipation killing me—but still, Keane does nothing but glower at me like a vampire assessing his next meal.
Finally, mercifully, when the song reaches its first chorus, Keane begins moving his body, his eyes still trained on mine. But this time, unlike the way Keane danced to “Pony” a few moments ago, his movement isn’t flashy. It’s raw. Sensual. Honest. It seems Keane’s not performing to this song—he’s revealing something to me. Something intimate—a secret just for me.
I part my lips, suddenly overcome with desire.
After several understated moves, Keane bends down and peels off his sweatpants, his eyes still locked with mine, and when he straightens back up in nothing but grey boxer-briefs, my breath catches.
“Wow,” I whisper.
But Keane’s got his game face on. He crawls onto the bed like a panther and, starting at my bare feet, his body gyrating subtly to the beat of the music, he slithers up the length of my pajama bottoms, skimming his nose and mouth up my shins and knees and inner thighs. When his face arrives at my crotch, he pauses ever so briefly right above my aching clit.
I widen my legs at the sensation of his warm breath on my bull’s-eye, but even as I do it, he’s on the move again, his nose and lips skimming up the length of my torso toward my breasts.
Keane’s face nuzzles briefly into my cleavage and then skims over to my hard left nipple jutting up from underneath my tank top. He hovers over the erect bud for a long beat, his labored breathing warming the fabric over my breast, until, without warning, he nips at the outline of my nipple, making me moan softly in shock and arousal.
Keane looks up from my chest, his eyes blazing, perhaps looking to gauge if I’m comfortable with the new direction of this lap dance, and I nod, encouraging him. He smiles wickedly and, without hesitation, lowers his head and buries his face in the fabric-covered valley between my breasts again, this time with ferocious enthusiasm. I run my fingers through Keane’s hair as he makes my breasts jiggle and my nipples harden to steel.
But, quickly, Keane’s face is on the move again. He lays soft kisses on my collarbone and up my neck as his hand fondles my breast from the outside of my shirt.
I arch my back, moaning with pleasure, my body on fire. Every fiber of my body wants to reach out and grope Keane the way he’s doing to me, but I’m not certain about the rules of this “lap dance.” Keane’s clearly told me the pickles are never allowed to touch him when he performs . . . and I’m honestly not sure if I’m a pickle right now or if I’m just . . . me.
I’ve no sooner wondered about the nature of this “lap dance” than Keane covers my body with his, presses himself into me, and grinds a massive hard-on straight into my crotch.
I let out a soft moan, relieved and excited to discover Keane’s as turned on as I am. I throw my arms around his back and hike my legs around his gyrating hips and grind myself into him feverishly. “Keane,” I whisper, excitement surging inside me.
“Touch me, Maddy,” Keane whispers into my ear, his hips coaxing mine into sensual movement to match his, his hands exploring my breasts. I slide my fingertips down Keane’s muscled lower back, over the waistband of his briefs, and caress and squeeze his hard ass from outside his underwear as he gyrates deliciously on top of me. Oh my God, this feels incredible.
In response to my grip on his gyrating ass, Keane slides his hand under my tank top and caresses my naked breast, sending electricity shooting through my entire body. “You’re sexy as hell,” Keane whispers, his fingers pinching my nipple. “I gotta see ‘em,” he says. “I’m dying to see ‘em.”
“They’re all yours,” I whisper.
Keane deftly repositions himself until he’s straddling me, his knees resting on either side of my hips, his erection poking monstrously from behind his gray briefs. He takes a deep, shaky breath and slowly lifts my tank top to my neck, his palms brushing against my naked skin as he lifts the fabric. “Gorgeous,” he breathes. “They’re perfect.” Without hesitation, he leans over me and swirls his tongue around my rock-hard nipple.
When Keane’s mouth moves to my other breast, I slide my fingers straight down his back, burrow them underneath the waistband of his briefs, and grope every square inch of his bare ass.
At the touch of my greedy fingers on his flesh, Keane shudders on top of me with obvious arousal. “I shouldn’t be doing this,” he breathes. “Oh, shit.” He slides off me, taking his ass away from my reach, and stretches his body next to mine on the mattress, and, before I can pout about him pulling his bare ass out of my reach, he reaches between my legs and begins massaging my clit from the outside of my pajama pants.
At his confident touch on the most sensitive spot of my body, I arch my back and widen my legs and literally growl with pleasure.
“Does that feel good?” Keane whispers, his fingertips stroking me fervently, his steely hard-on grinding into my thigh.
“So good,” I gasp, jerking underneath his hand.
I reach over and stroke the bulge straining behind his briefs, and he lets out a loud groan at my touch. Oh, God, I’m dying to slide my fingers inside his briefs, or, hell, to slide those damned underwear right off and see Keane’s naked body in its full, erect, breathtaking glory, but I refrain. Keane’s not slipping his fingertips inside my underwear, after all, so I suppose I’ll follow his lead.
First Kisses: a Book+Main Bites anthology Page 15
