Man Of Few Words

by Whistler, Ursula

  “Husband? And, I should have asked that earlier.”

  “Not one of those, either.” She was less comfortable with that, but she’d come to accept that she came off as cold and distant to men.

  “Easy decision. Continue celebrating with me.”

  She rolled her eyes and didn’t care what effect it might have on him. She pushed away from him and stared at the ceiling. He certainly hadn’t changed in his quick decision making. She wondered if he ever weighed all the consequences or bothered to gather all the information. His offer tempted her, because amazing sex was a better way to celebrate than drinking and talking with virtual strangers. Suzy would cause such a stink when she realized that her very proper and prudish roommate wasn’t into much of either. “How do you plan on celebrating?”

  “More sex.” He brushed his fingers lightly over the dark blonde curls on her mound. “I’ve got some whiskey around here somewhere if you want to liven it up, but I don’t need it. Not with you around.”

  Her body responded, her nipples hardening and her pussy growing wet again, but she wondered if she could convince the mental side. She had only said yes to get him out of her system, not that he’d been in her system these past eleven years. It took her two years, but she’d managed to get rid of the crazy romantic dreams of him showing up on her doorstep, apologizing for leaving and begging her to return. Revenge sex felt great, but celebration nookie might do the trick just as well.

  She should tell him the truth, and then let him decide. Since her last big mistake with another man, she’d lived her life trying not to be a jerk, and keeping her motivation from him counted as being jerkish. Not that telling him would make her stay with him. He wasn’t the right man for her, jaw-dropping sex or not. She decided long ago after the second soldier, well, sailor, up and left with the wife that she hadn’t known about that she would never consider a military man for a long term partner. “I only did this so I could walk out on you and never come back.”

  “I figured.” He trailed his hand up and down her stomach, touching her breasts at the top and barely skimming the curls above her sex. “You can be mad at me. I would if I were you.”

  She narrowed her eyes at him. “If you knew it was wrong to leave me without calling at all, then why did you do it?”

  His hand stopped its journey midway. “This will crash the mood.”

  “I’ve already crashed it by not agreeing immediately. ‘Fess up.” Not that anything he could say would make the pain of the past go away. Time had done its work on her. The wound to her heart was no longer raw, but it ached from time to time, especially now that she lived in the town where it all happened.

  He frowned, a deep one. His nostrils flared, as if the air had turned unpleasant between them. “Orders.”

  She poked his chest. “That doesn’t work. Of course you had orders to leave. That’s what happens in the military.” She needed to get away from his nakedness. It distracted her from the gravity of the moment. With a flick, she pulled the used condom off his dick and jumped off the bed to the bathroom. She shut the door behind her not only to give her privacy but to give her time to grimace at his lame excuse. He didn’t understand that it was his leaving that was the issue. If he’d asked her to join him across the country, she would have. He hadn’t, and he never called once he left Pensacola for California.

  “There’s more to it.” Duff’s voice carried through the door. He sounded like he stood just outside of it.

  She flushed the toilet and turned on the water. “I’m sure there is, but if it takes over ten words to say it, you’ll keep it inside. I’m too old for this. I don’t have the patience to figure out your cryptic speech,” she yelled over the noise of the rushing faucet.

  She washed her hands under the warm water and soaked a wash cloth before realizing that cleaning his cock would be a sign that she cared. She turned off the faucet and closed her eyes. She did care. She did want to know if he stopped talking to her for an important reason, like special ops. That one she’d understand. She did want more sex with him. She wanted to stay the night, because that was a celebration worth having.

  “Come out, please.”

  “No. Tell me through the door.”

  “I’m not going to do that. This is something I need to say to your face. That was more than ten words.”

  She squeezed the excess water from the washcloth and opened the door. “Here.” She offered it to him. “If you want to clean yourself.”

  He smirked. “I’d rather you do it.”

  “You brought up the past, or I did. Remember? Ruined mood, and all that.”

  “Fine.” He took the cloth, used it, and tossed it into the sink. “Your father gave me the orders. ‘Leave her alone,’ he said, ‘or you won’t have any assignment you want or get quick promotions.’ Since he was still my superior officer at the time, I followed his orders. He wanted you to have a real chance at a career. Following me, as an active duty Marine, would’ve handicapped you. He didn’t want that, and I certainly didn’t want you to not have a real chance at doing what you wanted.”

  She knew she should react instantly, but his words stunned her. He could have said this before they had sex, and then she wouldn’t have had revenge sex with him. She wondered if it would have felt as wonderful or better. Sex to reunite instead of showing him what he’d missed.

  All she could do was look at him, so she did. She noticed the small beads of sweat forming at the edge of the high and tight haircut he still sported. He seemed to be breathing faster than her. Saying those words, admitting that he’d left her because of her father, her goddamn father, must have been difficult. He’d done it naked. How fitting. She doubted she could lay herself bare like that.

  As she stared at him, he shifted. She had no words to say. They were trapped inside her as she mulled over the control her father had always had on her life. Her family had moved to the rhythm of the Marine Corps. Here one year, there for three, abroad for more. She’d mistakenly thought that college would bring her independence.

  She drew in a deep breath, trying to make sense of everything. Duff had dumped her for his own career? All that pain she’d suffered. “Selfish bastard.”

  Duff straightened. “I did it for you as well as me. I wasn’t trying to be an asshole. You had goals, direction. I’d been nineteen once, and I knew that that kind of determination didn’t come easy. It was worth all the shit I felt to know that you’d make it. And, you have. A professor.”

  She covered her face. He’d done it for her? Her heart beat against her chest. She would have yelled at her father if he’d said something like that to her, or she’d like to think she would have. But…She exhaled. Her choice would have been the same if her father had posed the same ultimatum to her.

  “What do you want, young lady?” her father would have had his determined face on. “Think about it. Do you want him to be a low level officer always doing scut work, or do you care enough about him to let him succeed?”

  She’d have cursed her father, but her answer would have been to let Duff succeed. “What an ass.”

  “I’ve already admitted to being that. It isn’t helpful for you to rub it in.” Duff’s mouth was drawn into a tight line.

  “Not you.” She placed a hand on his chest to comfort him. “My damn father, may God rest his controlling soul. This is quite a revelation. It’s going to take some processing.”

  “Oh.” He shrugged.

  She had experience with many superior officers that appeared arrogant, and unflattering epithets were often used to describe them. She never believed the complaints from their inferiors. Those men they complained about were her father’s friends, and they always took care of her and treated her well. Now, she thought of them differently. “Are all officers at my father’s level such asses?”

  “While I haven’t reached the rank your father did, I’m sure my students have some choice descriptions of me.” He smiled.

  She shook her head and turned her back
to him. Duff was many things, but she didn’t consider him overly controlling. “You think they call you an ass?”

  “I never asked, and I doubt they’d tell.”

  She spun quickly, her body communicating her anger at her dad. “Well, my father was one.” Thoughts zinged through her head so quickly that she felt dizzy. Duff’s speech had turned her world upside down with a shake for good measure.

  “Yeah, he was that.”

  “He never said a thing about it. Never acknowledged my sadness when you left. Nothing.” She put her hands on her hips.

  Duff reached out to her and brushed his hand against hers. She held it. “I wanted to tell you, but I figured you’d defy him just because you could. That would’ve ruined both our chances at a good career. So, I left, when what I really wanted to do was take you with me.”

  “I would have gone with you.” The hardened shell she’d erected around her heart opened after hearing those words from Duff. The anger left, and all that remained was an echo of sadness. Revenge sex seemed unnecessary and downright mean after that confession. Showing him what he lost meant very little to her now. A little potion of hope bubbled from within. “We should probably sit down, maybe put some clothes on. I’ve been through so much with my father lately, hearing this is shocking and puts me in no mood for anything more.”

  “I’ll do the sitting part, but putting on clothes means that you’re gonna leave. So, no.” He turned back to the bed, giving her a fantastic view of his ass.

  Despite the serious tone that their conversation had taken, she had an urge to grab it, maybe give it a pinch. Why not, she decided. Tomorrow would be fine for processing that her father had gunned down a perfectly good chance for love. In a step, she was behind him. Using her fingers, she pinched and twisted. Grabbing some flesh was harder than she imagined. His ass was more muscle than she remembered.

  He snatched an arm around her and pulled her to his chest. “Hey, that hurt.”

  “It was supposed to. It’s for following orders all those years ago. Shithead.” A little twinge of pain for the mountain that she’d felt all those years ago. She had to have a tiny bit of revenge.

  His other arm joined the one behind her back. His hands rested on the curve of her ass, and prickles of delight spread from where his palms touched her skin. “Fair enough. You can punish me eleven more times.”

  “So one for every year? How poetic.” She grinned as she considered eleven good smacks on his wonderfully sculpted ass.

  “Not really. I’m only trying to limit you. That pinch did hurt. In fact, all punishments can only be to my backside. I’m protective of the guy up front.”

  “He still works well, maybe better than I remember.” With the closeness came longing and the fire of desire. She’d denied herself the pleasures of the flesh too long, and Duff gave her the chance to overindulge if only until he moved along again in a year or two.

  “A man’s not supposed to brag, but I have skills.”

  “Oh, stop. That’s over the top.”

  “I did like you on top, kind of like how we used to end our dates in the seat of the car.” His cock poked at her leg, and he kneaded her ass. A longing for his hands to be all over her grew and spread to her breasts and pussy. She pressed closer, letting his shaft press into her hip.

  “Clearly, that excites you.” As it did her. So much of their foreplay in the past involved elaborate French kisses and dips of hands under shirts and down waistbands. She’d amassed a large collection of easy access skirts so that when she wanted to crawl atop his lap in the passenger seat of his sports car, she did. Instead of wondering why she switched to a girlish wardrobe, her father praised her for ditching the tight jeans and shorts she used to wear. If only the lieutenant colonel had known why.

  “Being on top isn’t exciting to you?” One of his hands dropped to the back of her thigh and raised it so that her knee was at his hip. He reached beneath her upraised leg and slid his fingers over her pussy. Her head dropped backward when he parted her folds for the warm, wet center. She licked her lips and closed her eyes to let the ripples of pleasure be her only focus. The small circles he drew over her clit delighted her and had her wanting more.

  “Yes,” she choked out as he continued his attentions and added his tongue and teeth to her neck. Reason faded into the recesses of her mind, but one coherent sentence came out. “There’s so much more to say.”

  “You’ve got all night.” He hefted both of her legs upward and secured her at his waist. With a strength and control she admired, he lowered them to the bed, but he stayed in a sitting position. She settled on her knees, straddling him. He rubbed his cheeks and mouth over her breasts. “We’ve got days.” He kissed one nipple, then the other. “Years, maybe.” As one hand pressed against her lower back, the other hand drew circles over her clit. “Just a yes will do.”

  When he pushed two fingers into her pussy, she forgot all the words she thought she should say. Bracing herself on his shoulder, she leaned over for a condom and pushed away enough to roll it along his engorged cock. His hands traveled to her ass as she lowered herself onto him. Lights sparkled in her eyes as he filled her. All of this felt right, but yet she knew it wouldn’t last. With the mattress as her support, she perched on the balls of her feet and used her legs to move up and down, creating the friction she desired. If this were only going to be one night, she’d make it the best one she’d ever had. Although he had good reason to leave her guessing all those years ago, he was still military, and that meant moving on. He wasn’t right for her, no matter how fabulous the fit of his cock in her pussy.

  He buried his head in between her breasts. His hot breath came in puffs as she squeezed her pelvic muscles. “You can do more of that.”

  Instead, she wrapped a leg around his back and twisted her hips enough so that his cock rubbed at a different angle, deeper and pressing against her G-spot. They both gasped at the new sensation. He threw his head back and grabbed one of her breasts with his hand. He kneaded it to the same rhythm she used to ride his cock. She let nothing hurry her, not the building sensation between his legs or the pressure of his hand on her back.

  For a beautiful moment, she relived the past as it ought to have been. Two people in love, though they never said it aloud, naked on a bed with no time limit, no curfew, no strict parent waiting on the front porch swing. She pulled his mouth to hers and thrust her tongue into his mouth. He crushed his lips to hers and held the kiss as they rocked against each other.

  Her body begged for more, so she leaned backward with her hands on his knees. With this new position, his cock reached further inside her pussy and sent new zings of delight through her limbs. He supported her back with one hand while the other sought her clit just above where their hips joined. “Oh, yes,” she breathed as his thumb found her sweet spot.

  She closed her eyes and let the hormones run amok in her body. They created wave after wave of blinding lights and heat. His moans mixed with hers. She wanted nothing more than to be with him forever like this. Flesh to flesh. Pounding against each other.

  His fingers pressed harder on her clit and the waves of pleasure grew until they overtopped the dam. Her hands gripped his knees, tightening as the ecstasy zoomed her. She cried out as the waves burst from her pussy to her breasts and along every nerve. From her wet, hot center to her thighs, she gripped his cock and rode it, wanting the pleasure to consume her. He kept pressing and rubbing, and the waves continued their assault upon her body until he stilled.

  A deep-throated ah filled the room. His shaft throbbed inside her, making her clench the walls of her pussy around him. The hand on her back gripped her tighter as his mouth opened again with a sigh. He thrust his hips up and shuddered. “Damn, woman. That was great.”

  He pulled her to him and breathed against her neck. She held him in a tight embrace and hoped she could remember how the lines on his hands felt as they caressed her spine and how he smelled of mint and spice. Walking away from him would be t
he hardest thing she’d ever have to do, but she would. He couldn’t ever be the right man for her. Marines, Navy, any man in the military was too much of a risk.

  Chapter Five

  Kirsten dreaded the morning hours, and this Saturday, after a night away from her regular life, she dreaded even more than others. These hours never brought good news. It was as if all things broke or failed overnight, as if the mind of someone healed during the day only to be broken by nightmares or even dreams. While other people viewed the sunrise as something beautiful, Kirsten considered it an ill omen. Shepherding her father through his final illness had taught her that.

  Sometime in the night, Duff offered to drive her home, but she declined, wanting to live this carefree moment until the bright, shiny end complete with coffee on the small balcony. She’d put off the interrogation she’d get from Suzy for a while longer. As she sat across from Duff wrapped up in his sweatpants and sweatshirt, her emotions took center stage. Anger at her father, disappointment at time lost, and elation that she’d found something close to completion with this blight upon her life.

  Duff had wanted her to come with him when he left for more advanced flight training and her heart still fluttered when that fact came to mind. What an interesting life they could have had together.

  Or, maybe it wouldn’t have been that great. The decade of military action that dominated the news would have been central to their lives. Maybe her father, damn interfering ass that he’d been, knew best.

  She broke a rule she’d made after their second round of love-making by asking, “I know I said we weren’t to ask about our past, but did you serve in Iraq or Afghanistan?”

  “Both.” His face showed nothing, not even a twitch. He’d schooled himself well on how to deal with the questions about his service.

  She sighed. He’d returned to the man of few words too quickly after spilling the beans about her father’s orders. “Oh.”