My Bad- Lani Lynn Vale

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  There was a half hour time period that I most certainly wouldn’t be forgetting any time soon, and that wasn’t just because of the soreness between my legs.

  After walking into my house and going to the back door to let my dog and pig out, I walked to the fridge and pulled out a few pieces of fruit for Redbird and Bluebird before going to the shower.

  Stripping my clothes next to the laundry basket, I tossed them and managed to miss with both my pants and one sock.

  I didn’t bend over to pick them up, however. I left them where they were and promised myself I’d get them tomorrow.

  That was likely a lie. I’d pick them up three days from now when I was forced to do laundry due to having no work clothes. Until then, the clothes would stay exactly where they fell.

  Cranking up the shower to blistering, I stepped inside and felt relief surge through me.

  I had three days off, and I was going to spend every single one of them doing nothing.

  Hopefully, anyway.

  It was in between rinsing my hair of the shampoo suds that a snort had me looking down at Bacon, who was pressing his nose to my glass shower door.

  I didn’t wonder how he’d gotten in—I knew that it was Hoax. Nobody else would take their time to let my animals in if they had been in here for ulterior motives.

  I left him outside for a reason, though, and Hoax learned that the hard way when he tried to get in the shower with me and Bacon followed him inside.

  “Why do you think I leave him outside while I’m showering?” I whispered.

  He cursed as he tried to shove Bacon back out, but in the end, Bacon and his massive tub of lard body won.

  The moment he realized Hoax was giving up, he flopped himself down between my legs and allowed the shower spray to hit him fully.

  I continued my shower, used to this, causing Hoax to stare at me in wonder.

  “There was a rather large piece of bacon walking down Bayou’s driveway, and I thought I’d bring him home before Bayou decided to smoke him.” That voice sent chills down my spine.

  I smiled but didn’t talk.

  “You okay?” he asked, rubbing my shoulders with his large, strong hands.

  He too was having to straddle Bacon, but he didn’t act like he cared.

  He’d come to tolerate a lot from my animals over the last week.

  I shook my head. “Headache.”

  His hands moved up the length of my neck, causing my legs to feel like putty at the sheer relief he brought on with his skillful fingers.

  “You take something for it?” he asked, sounding too knowledgeable for his own good.

  “I always have headaches,” I murmured to the man behind me. “Nothing touches them. Not Motrin. Not Tylenol. Not even Excedrin that’s supposed to be made for migraine sufferers. Hell, I’ve even tried prescriptions from my doctor. Other than helping me lose ten pounds, that didn’t help, either.”

  Handing him the shampoo, I moved toward the conditioner and loaded so much into my palm that some would’ve thought it was too much.

  It wasn’t.

  Not only had my mother graced me with her good looks, but I also got her mass of curly, thick hair. It took a lot of conditioner to keep my locks in a somewhat manageable state.

  Once I had the conditioner lathered in well, I put the bottle down and reached for the soap while keeping my hair out of the spray. Spray in which Hoax reached over to remove the shower head in order to rinse the suds from his hair.

  With the way Bacon was positioned, we couldn’t get close enough to each other to share the spray.

  “This is wild,” he said softly. “Who knew pigs liked water?”

  “He likes mud more,” I admitted. “But I don’t do mud.”

  When I pulled the soap out of the shower caddy I had it resting on, it slipped from my hands. It rolled down the side of the shower and wedged between the wall and the pig.

  Hoax started to laugh and bent over to reach for the soap. As he did, I got a good view of his muscular back, and a tendril of want poured through me. I reached forward and ran one finger along his spine, trailing it upward until I met his hairline.

  He stood back up with the soap, and I let my hand drop away.

  “Here,” he said, placing the soap in my hands.

  I smiled, but it instantly fell away when even the slightest movement of lifting my cheeks caused my brain to pound.

  Hoax missed nothing, though.

  Taking the soap back from me, he rubbed it along my body.

  It wasn’t sexual. He did it quickly and methodically, not stopping until every single part of me was squeaky clean.

  Though, I did see that his cock was rock hard.

  “Rinse your hair,” he ordered.

  I did, letting my head fall back and my eyes fall closed as I let the water pour down over me.

  I lifted my hands to help coax all of the conditioner out of my hair and didn’t stop until it no longer felt slick.

  When I was done, I opened my eyes and found Hoax’s on me, burning.

  I smiled weakly at him and he just shook his head, leaning past me to put the soap back on the shower caddy before reaching for the showerhead.

  “Why don’t you towel off and get dressed while I rinse off?” he suggested.

  I would have, but I didn’t want to move.

  Which he noticed and smiled over.

  “Go. Then I’ll order us pizza…” He stopped at the shake of my head.

  “I don’t want pizza.”

  He frowned. “I can go get you anything you want.”

  I felt emotion roll over me. “The only thing that sounds good right now is food that’s forty minutes away, so I think it’s best if I just find a snack.”

  He looked at me for a long few seconds. “Which restaurant?”

  I told him about my favorite taco place that happened to be all the way in Hostel, Texas. I then went on to explain how good the tacos were, and how great they reheated the next day for lunch.

  “Tacos make you animated.” He chuckled.

  I pushed open the shower door on my side and stepped out, reaching for the towel—the only towel—that was on the rack. Once my body was sufficiently dry enough to get off the bath mat, I shuffled my way into the main part of the house, wincing when the harsh lights of the living room burned through my retinas.

  As I moved, I flicked the lights off. By the time I got to the laundry room where a load of towels sat folded on the dryer, I was in near darkness.

  As I moved back through the living room toward the bathroom—slowly since movement made my headaches worse—I glanced outside and saw a weird light through the almost sheer curtains.

  I blinked and focused in on a car that was parked next to the curb.

  “Hey, you got a towel I could use?” Hoax called out.

  Putting the car out of my mind, I walked back to the bathroom and tossed him the towel. “Sorry, I haven’t actually done laundry in a few days.”

  He caught it easily and unfolded it, then roughly started to run it over his body in quick, jerky movements.

  I stood there and watched him for a few long seconds before turning on my heel and heading back into the bedroom.

  I found Hoax’s clothes laid out on the bed and smiled when I saw his t-shirt on top of his pants.

  Reaching for it, I snatched it up and dropped the towel just as Hoax came into the room.

  It was over my head and I was threading my arms through the holes when Hoax’s amused voice sounded from behind me.

  “I do believe that’s mine,” he drawled.

  I sighed when I had it pulled all the way down.

  It smelled like him—a mixture between a strong deodorant smell and pine.

  Unable to help myself from bringing the fabric to my nose and inhaling, I heard Hoax sigh dramatically behind me.

  I didn’t spare him a glance as I crawled into my bed, then collapsed onto my sid
e.

  My eyes closed, and I didn’t open them again until I heard the clink of Hoax’s belt buckle. And even then, I only opened one.

  I watched him go to my closet where he’d somehow started a collection of clothes and reach for one of the three shirts that I’d hung up on the hanger the night before. I wasn’t sure how I was finding his clothing since he had never spent the night, but there they were.

  He pulled it down roughly and caused the hanger to swing furiously for a few long seconds before it finally stopped.

  I let my eye fall closed and felt a wave of exhaustion roll over me.

  My body grew heavy, and even the depression of the bed at my side didn’t cause me to open my eyes.

  At this point, the only thing keeping me awake was the steady throb of my head that had started to feel like something was tearing through my right eye.

  The covers pulled up over me, and I moaned. The warmth felt good, and I hadn’t realized I was cold until my soft blanket was up around my ears.

  Then I felt his heat as he got closer.

  He bent over and pressed his wet lips to my forehead, then blew on it after pulling slightly backward.

  The cool air in the shape of his lips on my forehead felt divine…and damned if I didn’t ask him to lick me again.

  Though, not in the way I would’ve wanted a few hours ago.

  I fell asleep with him blowing on my forehead.

  ***

  It was the smell that woke me.

  I had no clue how long I’d been asleep. An hour, possibly.

  My headache, although not gone, was definitely no longer the roaring pound that it’d been before I’d succumbed to sleep.

  I opened my eyes to see a brown paper bag sitting on my nightstand, and Hoax beside the bed stripping his boots off one by one.

  I sat up, feeling my breasts jiggle where they were free-wheeling underneath Hoax’s shirt, and stared at the bag in hope.

  “Is that what I think it is?” I whispered.

  I knew it was.

  “If you’re wondering if it’s the taco place you were telling me about, it is.” He paused as he stripped off his socks next. “But, since I didn’t know what exactly you wanted, I got a little bit of everything. And the lady suckered me into a piece of her fried pie, which I tasted in the store. I bought three more, though I’m not sure I want to share those.”

  A smile grew on my face at his admission. “At least you’re honest.”

  A weird look crossed over his face but was gone before I could examine it further.

  “Do you want to eat in bed, or do you want to go to the kitchen?” he asked.

  I looked at the bed and wondered if I could deal with crumbs for the rest of the night.

  I must’ve studied the bed too long because before I could tell him an answer, he was up and moving, whipping a sheet off the shelf in my closet and unfolding it. Moments later, he was spreading it out on the bed and then reaching for the food.

  I spied my usual and reached for it, happy to see that he’d gotten two of the tacos.

  But then I saw a new taco that looked fairly good and reached for that one as well.

  He sat down on the bed across from me and waited until I’d made my selections, and then started reaching for his own.

  He peeled open the foil and took a bite, groaning right along with me as I expressed my pleasure at the taste.

  “This is good. I can see why you like it,” he exclaimed. “How’d you find the place?”

  I waited until I was finished with my bite before saying, “My dad’s business took me there. Plus, that’s where Janie lives now.”

  “Janie the crazy girl who always had her nose stuck in the computer?” he asked. “The one with the just as crazy best friend?”

  I laughed. “That’d be her. Her best friend’s name is Kayla. She lives down there now, too.”

  He grunted. “One of my club brothers, Rome, has a good friend that’s the chief of police down there. His name is Tyler. Know him?”

  I nodded my head. “He’s married to Reagan, another one of our band of misfits.”

  He took another bite of his food. “She lived in the compound with you.”

  The compound where I’d lived growing up, where my father still lived, hadn’t always been considered a compound. But, when my father and his team retired one by one from the Army, they built a line of duplexes on some land so that they could all live near each other. Over time, they’d built it into the compound that it was today.

  “Yep,” I agreed, licking my fingers free of the sauce that had leaked out of my taco.

  So. Fucking. Good.

  A growl had me looking up, and I smiled at the tortured look on Hoax’s face.

  “You’re driving me mad.” He laughed. “Did you know your pig’s still laying in the bathroom?”

  His change of subject had me smiling. He didn’t want to be thinking about sex.

  Either the food was too good, or he was looking out for my welfare.

  Either possibility made me like him even more.

  “He’ll lay there until the water’s evaporated,” I told him. “He really, really likes the water.”

  “I’m getting that,” he stated as he took a bite of his next taco.

  My brows rose as I watched him eat the street taco in two bites. It took me at least four.

  “You have a big mouth,” I told him.

  He chewed and watched me. “I have a normal size mouth. You just take dainty little bites and eat slowly because you’re basking in the taste of your food. It’s killing me.”

  I looked down at his jeans and couldn’t miss the bulge there.

  Just the memory of how he’d felt inside of me had me squirming.

  His eyes went to my chest where my nipples were hard behind his soft tee, and I smiled.

  “Let me finish,” I told him, holding up a finger.

  He didn’t miss the meaning.

  Our conversation dragged on as we practically demolished each and every taco he bought. And he reluctantly allowed me to share his dessert tacos.

  He was right.

  They were good.

  I was still munching on mine, so full I could barely stand it, when he put what we didn’t eat away in the fridge.

  Once the last bite of my dessert taco made it into my mouth, he swept the sheet off the bed and folded it in on itself as to not drop any crumbs, then dropped it into my laundry basket.

  He then followed that up with picking up all the clothes that I always managed to miss getting into the basket.

  I licked my fingers as I watched him bend over and pick up a dirty pair of socks.

  “Does my messiness drive you crazy?” I teased.

  He dropped the socks into the bin before turning to me, a look of concentration on his face.

  “No,” he admitted. “I’m just trying not to look at you while you suck on your fingers. You’re making my dick so hard that it’s nearly painful.”

  I licked clean my last finger and made sure to take my time as I did.

  “Your head still hurt?” he rumbled.

  I nodded. “But not enough that I can’t do things that’ll be jarring.”

  He reached behind him and grasped the collar of his shirt before shrugging it off his shoulders.

  I swallowed hard as I saw the solid muscles of his chest come into view.

  First, the lower V peeked out—and God, was that something that every woman should get to experience just once—followed by his abdominals, which were no less impressive. Then there was his chest. He had man boob muscles—and not fat, but actual defined, muscular pectorals that were clearly built up from years of hard work. His shoulders also had that muscled hump by his neck, better known as his trapezius muscles.

  My eyes once again snagged on his tattoo.

  “What does that mean?” I wondered.

  The more I looked at it, the more I wanted to know what
it was for.

  “What?” he asked as he tossed the shirt onto the ground, missing the chair where he’d been aiming completely.

  I grinned and watched him work on his pants next.

  I wasn’t surprised to see him slip a gun out of the back of his jeans, nor was I surprised to see a couple of magazines follow it. What I was surprised to see him take out was a…

  “Why do you have a roll of condoms in your back pocket?” I laughed.

  When he pulled it all the way out, it unrolled and nearly hit him about shin level.

  The roll of condoms went to the chair as well—this time actually making it.

  “Bayou gave them to me as I was leaving his house today,” he answered. “He told me to wrap it up because he knew that I wasn’t.”

  My face flushed. “How would he know something like that?”

  Hoax’s head tilted slightly. “Have you seen yourself? If someone gave me the chance to have you and gave me the option of gloving up or taking you bare, I’d choose bare every time. Even if you weren’t on birth control.”

  I snorted. “But I am.”

  This was a discussion we’d had after the impromptu staff bathroom incident. Something that we definitely should’ve had before we’d gone as far as we did, but oh well. At least we’d had it.

  I hadn’t been worried that he’d been clean. Hoax was more than a little bit concerned about my well-being, and he wouldn’t put my life at risk, not even if it meant hurting himself in the process of protecting me.

  “How does he know we’re having sex, though?” I persisted.

  Hoax started on the buckle of his belt and had it undone, his pants unbuttoned, and his jeans around his ankles in the time it took for me to draw in a breath.

  “Those are cute underwear,” I teased.

  He laughed.

  “The Army was nice enough to provide me with underwear when we were in basic, and I like the support.” He defended his choice of wardrobe.

  “They’re tighty whities. Only old men wear tighty whities.” I paused. “My grandfather wears tighty whities.”

  He snorted and dropped his underwear, making my lips go slack as I looked at his penis.

  He had such a nice penis.

  One that I wanted to wrap in my hand and coax to life and then straddle and make use of the beautiful specimen.