I felt like an idiot. I kept my arms crossed, nonetheless. I thought it might make me look a little more innocent.
“I was just--”
“You thought I was talking about some chick I was eating breakfast with? Like a woman?”
I dropped my arms. “I didn’t…I was…”
The words got jumbled between my brain and my tongue and came out in pieces of what I was thinking. I couldn’t lie to him. I swallowed heavily and simply shrugged.
“What?” he snapped back. “You were just what?”
“I did,” I admitted. “I thought you were talking about being with a woman for breakfast.”
He folded his arms over his chest and shot me a sideways look. “Do you trust me?”
“I do. I swear--”
“It sure doesn’t look like it.”
I tried to put the blame on him. It seemed like a better idea than accepting it myself. “You’re the one that brought it up. You said, I’ve got a girl I want you to meet who is articulate and cute and I eat breakfast with her every day. I might have jumped to a conclusion, but I didn’t have to jump far.”
“I didn’t say she was cute. And you jumped about as far as a person can.” His eyes fell to my waist. “Take off your shorts.”
“What?”
“Your shorts.” He motioned toward them with his eyes. “Take them off.”
“Why?”
“Because you trust me.”
I glanced over each shoulder. “Here?”
“No, Taryn,” he said sarcastically. “I want you to take them off in Encinitas. Yes, here. Where else?”
“What are you going to do after I take them off?”
“Spank your ass.”
“Spank it through my shorts. I deserve it.”
I didn’t care if I deserved it, or not. He could spank my ass anytime. Hell, I’d dream up accusations on a daily basis if that’s all I had to do to get spanked.
“Off, Taryn,” he said dryly.
“You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Off.”
I checked over each shoulder again. It wasn’t dark yet, but it wasn’t far from it. In about ten minutes the sun was going to set, but for the time being, it was still daylight.
I decided my panties were more tasteful than most of the bikinis I’d seen throughout the summer, and really wasn’t risking much by exposing them. I could rock my panties on the beach like a boss.
I peeled off my shorts and tossed them to him. “There. Now what?”
He gestures toward my crotch. “Panties.”
I lowered my chin and cocked an eyebrow. “You want me to take my panties off? Right here?”
After turning toward the ocean, he took a long breath, and let it out. He then turned to face me. “Yes.”
“Seriously?”
“Take. Them. Off.”
With reluctance, I took them off. I had acted like a turd, as he often called me. If he wanted to spank my bare ass, I’d let him, and then get dressed. If he hurried, we could still see the sunset.
I twirled them on my finger. “What now, March?”
“Face the horizon.”
“What is this,” I asked. “A hazing?”
“Something like that.”
I looked to my left. The beach was bare. I looked to my right. A few hundred yards away, a couple stood at the edge of the water, staring toward the horizon. They were too far away to be able to tell if I was wearing a bikini or not. My risk was nil.
I wadded my panties in my hand, turned to face the horizon, and prepared for my non-punishment.
He held out his hand. “Panties.”
It seemed ridiculous, but I handed them over.
He positioned himself behind me. “Bend over.”
It seemed unnecessary. I glanced over my shoulder. “Seriously?”
He pressed his bare chest against my back and moved his mouth to my ear. “Seriously. And, if you know what’s good for you, you won’t turn around again.”
I bent over and planted my hands in the wet sand. Oddly, I found the naked Down Dog on the beach to be quite exhilarating.
And arousing.
While I waited for him to spank me, I gazed toward the horizon. A sliver of sky was all that prevented the sun from beginning to melt into the ocean. I clenched my jaw in anticipation of a bare-handed slap, and waited for it to disappear.
Instead, I felt a finger being poked in my pussy.
“What the--”
“Don’t. Turn. Around.”
I repositioned my hands and gazed at the sunset as he slowly fingered me from behind. Not a bad way to spend the evening, as far as I was concerned.
The sliver of sky disappeared and the sun slowly began to lower itself to the wet horizon.
I gasped – and almost tipped over – as I felt the pressure of his cock against my pussy.
“Marc What the…” I stammered.
He gripped my waist firmly and forced himself into me with one brutal shove. I stumbled forward and somehow caught myself just before I topped face first into the sand. As I braced my hands against the sand, the waves dribbled forward, covering my hands and feet.
As they receded, his hand came down hard on my ass. “Face the horizon, Taryn.”
Oh. My God.
My ass was on fire. I wanted to scratch the skin or rub it, or something, but I didn’t dare. Then, it happened again.
Slap!
It stung like hell, but for whatever reason, it caused my pussy to open up like a flower. As the juices flowed through me, he began to fuck me with a pleasurable ease.
I lifted my chin. The sun was one-third of the way gone, and the sky directly above the platform of water was turning shades of purple and pink.
He continued to fuck me slowly as I watched the sunset. He may have thought what he was doing was punishment, but I found it to be beautiful. I couldn’t think of a better way to spend the evening.
Stuffed full of my lover’s cock, and watching the sunset.
At the same time.
He gripped my shoulders and pulled me upright. Awkwardly standing in front of him, and attempting to focus on the sunset, I fumbled to find my footing. Obviously aggravated by my poor sense of balance, he lifted me from my feet, and dangled me a few inches over the sand.
With his hands on my waist, he lifted me and lowered me like a toy, shoving me full of dick each time my ass met his hips.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Uh…huh,” I grunted.
He suspended me over the beach and fucked me while the sun set. Together, we watched it melt into the horizon.
Then, he pushed me over, onto my hands and knees.
He whispered detailed instructions into my ear on how I was to rub my clit, and I complied. While I rubbed myself into a frenzy, he worked himself in and out of my wetness, pushing me closer to the tide with each stroke.
At the moment when the sky went dark, I bellowed my pleasure out into the night’s sky. We had created yet another memory of testing our limits, and learning one of life lessons, and I loved every minute of it.
Marc was different. There was no two ways about it. He was right. He wasn’t a Dom. He wasn’t even close.
But he was sexy as fuck without really trying.
He lowered me to my feet. “That was hot.”
“Yeah…it…was,” I said breathlessly.
I pressed my hands to my knees, and heaved to catch my breath. “What about my shorts? And panties?”
It wasn’t easy to see in the moonlight, but it appeared that he raised them in his clenched fist. “These?”
“No, goofball. The other panties. Yes, those.”
“I told you I was trustworthy,” he said. “And, that I wouldn’t cheat on you. Don’t ever doubt me again.”
And with those words, he took off in a dead sprint toward our back deck, leaving me on the beach, naked from the waist down.
As he screamed like an idiot and ran toward the house in a zig-z
ag pattern, I realized that he’d opened up considerably since we met.
And, I couldn’t help but love every ounce of the man that he’d let me see him become.
Chapter Two Hundred Seventy-Six
Marc
I pointed to the fifth booth on the left. “Right over there.”
“Okay,” Taryn said.
Halfway to the booth, Charlee sat up and peered over the top of her seat. Upon seeing us, she straightened her posture and set her book to the side.
“Is that her?” Taryn whispered.
“That’s her.”
“She’s adorable.”
“Don’t let her age fool you,” I said. “She’ll lure you in with her curls and her smile, then she’ll crush you with her intellect.”
“I’ll be careful.”
We sat across from each other in the booth. I pushed the silverware to the side, tossed my newspaper on the seat beside me, and leaned over the edge of the table. “I really like your hair that color.”
It had grown to the middle of her back and was fixed in an almost straight style, with just a slight curl twisted into three-fourths of the length. Over the last three months, her hair had been three different colors, but I liked the dull gray the most.
At least for the time being.
“Thank you. I can’t decide if I do or not.”
“When it’s that color naturally, you’ll want to change it,” I said. “For now, enjoy it. Personally, I like it. A lot.”
I glanced at Charlee. She was wadded into a ball in the back of the booth, eyeing Taryn from head to toe. After a hardened inspection, she unfolded her legs, scooted to the center of her booth, and then volleyed a compliment over.
“I like your hair.”
Taryn looked at her and smiled. “Thank you. I just did it. I can’t decide if I like it or not.”
Charlee inspected her hair one last time. “When I’m eighteen, I’m going to do that. If it’s still cool. If it’s not, I’ll do something else kind of like that. Something trendy.”
“Tell me when you’re ready,” Taryn said with a smile. “I’ll do it for you.”
Charlee edged closer. “Do you do hair?”
“I do.”
“Cool.”
“Marc tells me you’re a reader. What are you reading?”
Charlee lifted her chin slightly. A look of uncertainty followed. “Do you read?”
“I do. Probably not anything you’d read, though.”
“Like what?”
“Romance novels.”
Charlee flipped her hair away from her face and slid a little closer. “I don’t read romance novels. Not today’s romance novels, anyway. Romance doesn’t really exist anymore and here’s why. Boys are dumb. And, dumb people do inherently dumb things. Girls are smart, but we’re intrinsic dreamers. Therefore, when boys lie to us and tell us what we’ve come to expect from reading romance novels, we believe them. We trust them because we want to believe in the concept of love. I’m no longer receptive to their comments and pre-prepared pickup lines. In the end, they’ll break your heart. Bradley Prescott broke mine. I’ll never recover. At least not totally. The way it stands now, I’ll be single forever.”
“I’m sorry your heart was broken.” Taryn scooted to the inside edge of the booth. “Want to join us?”
Charlee’s eyes shot toward the kitchen and then back to Taryn. “Just until the food comes.”
As she climbed in the booth, her mother approached.
“Good morning,” Jacky said with a broad smile. “What can I get you two to drink?”
“Coffee,” I said. “And the usual.”
She looked at Taryn. “Would you like to see a menu?”
“No thank you. I’d like the huevos rancheros. And coffee. Cream and sugar, please.”
Jacky smiled. “The huevos rancheros are great, by the way. I’ve tried to get him to eat them, but getting him to make a change to his routine is impossible. Every day for the last two years, he gets the same thing.”
“Jacky,” I said. “This is Taryn. Taryn, Jacky.”
Jacky wiped her hand on her apron and offered it. “Nice to meet you.”
Taryn shook her hand. “Nice to meet you, too.”
“I’ll get this right in,” Jacky said. “It’ll be up in a few.”
As she turned away, she glanced over her shoulder. “Leave them alone, Charlee. They didn’t come in here to see you.”
“I invited her over,” I said.
“Only until the food comes.”
Taryn gestured under the table. “I like your shoes.”
“I like yours. I saw them when you came in,” Charlee said. “I hate ‘em when they’re new, but I really like yours. Red’s a cool color for Chucks.”
“We think alike.”
Charlee made a fist and held it between them. Taryn pounded hers lightly against it, and Charlee did the explosion thing with her hand. I was worried they wouldn’t get along, but it sure looked like I was wrong.
“Boys aren’t dumb,” Taryn said. “They just--”
Charlee motioned toward me. “I don’t think Atticus is dumb. Everyone else is.”
Taryn looked surprised. “Atticus?”
Charlee nodded. “From To Kill a Mockingbird.”
“Atticus Finch?”
“Charlee’s eyes shot wide. “You know the book?”
“One of my favorites.” Taryn looked at me. “She calls you Atticus?”
“She has since she read the book.”
She shifted her eyes to Charlee. “I can see why you call him that.”
“Why?” Charlee said, challenging Taryn with her tone.
Taryn took the challenge, and responded without thought. “Atticus is stern when he has to be, but he always takes time for a bedtime story. He teaches his children to do what’s right, regardless of the cost. He set a prime example for them by defending Tom Robinson. Atticus defined humility, and did it with southern grace. Marc is the same. Always doing what is right, regardless of the cost. And, he doesn’t want the recognition, either.”
“You see him differently,” Charlee said. “I like what you said, but I don’t know him like you do. Here’s what I was thinking.”
She wadded her hair into a quick bun and then twisted in her seat to face Taryn. As she cracked her knuckles and shook her head in preparation of the speech she was going to give, her bun came undone and her long curls fell into her face.
“Let me show you something,” Taryn said.
She removed a hair tie from her wrist, and asked Charlee to turn around. She then separated Charlee’s hair into four sections – each side, the top, and the back. Explaining everything as she went, she made a conventional ponytail with the back section, and then scrunched it into a curly wad, using the hair tie to hold it in place. Each section was taken, twisted until almost tight, and then wrapped around the back portion loosely. After tucking the ends into the hair tie, she teased it into an elegant bun.
She pulled a mirror from her purse. “Here. Have a look.”
Charlee looked in the mirror. Her eyes slowly widened. She turned to the left, and then the right. “This is awesome. Thank you.”
“Maybe if Bradley Prescott sees you with your hair fixed like that, things will be different.”
“Oh!” Charlee exclaimed. Her eyes shot to me. “I almost forgot. Guess what?”
“What?”
“Catelyn Mayberry. She goes to my school.”
I recognized the name from the names of the nine girls who were kidnapped. I widened my eyes in feigned surprise. “Oh. It’s a small world, huh?”
“It is.”
“Who is she?” Taryn asked.
“She was one of the girls who was kidnapped last summer,” Charlee said. “Some guys that work with Marc saved her, and she’s back in school now. We’re friends. That’s all.”
Taryn smiled, shifted her eyes to me, and held my gaze. “That’s awesome.”
“Back to Atticus,” C
harlee said. “Atticus gave words of wisdom on how to live life, but he didn’t do it in by saying, here’s words of wisdom on how to live life. Everything he did and said could be looked at as advisory. In his being, he was an exemplary example of mankind.”
She looked at me. “That’s why I call him Atticus.”
I doubt until that moment that I had ever blushed. Hearing Charlee’s examination of me sure made me do so, though.
“Quite a compliment,” Taryn said.
“He’s quite a guy,” Charlee said.
“He sure is.”
Balancing two plates on her arm, and carrying two cups of coffee in her free hand, Jacky stepped to the edge of the table.
Charlee let out an audible sigh and then stood. “Let them eat, Charlee.”
Jacky set the plates on the table, and then slid the cups of coffee beside them. “Sorry about the coffee, I made a new pot. I doubted you’d get a drink in with the little motormouth sitting here.”
She glanced at Charlee and grinned. “Wow. I like your hair.”
“She did it.”
Jacky looked at Taryn. “You’ll have to show me how.”
“I know how, Mom. She doesn’t need to show you.”
Jacky rolled her eyes and then looked the table over. “Creamer and sugar are in the caddy. Enjoy.”
Taryn situated her plate, and then reached for her silverware. “This looks great. Thanks for the recommendation.”
I unrolled my napkin and pulled out the silverware. “She said they were good. I hope they are.”
I took a sip of coffee, and then began my meal. Before I finished my first bite, Taryn let out an exaggerated sigh. “Oh. My. God.”
I looked up. “What?”
“Try this.”
I pierced the other half of my egg, folded it over, and poked it in my mouth. After swallowing it, I wiped the corners of my mouth with my napkin. “Okay.”
“Let me get you the perfect bite.”
After assembling a bite with a piece of tortilla, part of a fried egg, some salsa, sauce, and beans, she carefully lifted her fork. “Come here, before I drop this.”
I opened my mouth and leaned forward.
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