Keeping Her

by Holly Hart

  I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding. All this time, I realize that I have thought of Harlan as an irresponsible playboy, even with all the evidence to the contrary.

  After all, you don’t exactly build a billion dollar hedge fund business if the only thing on your mind is getting laid.

  “Okay, okay,” I groan, I moan, as Harlan slowly unwraps the condom over his cock. “Enough teasing already. I need you.”

  Harlan makes a noise. I’m not sure how to describe it – a moan, maybe, a low, inarticulate growl. He sounds more like a wild animal more than he does a human.

  And the sound sends my ovaries into fucking heaven.

  Harlan lets himself tumble forward, breaking his fall with his hands, and climbs up my body. I encircle him with my arms, touching his burning skin. I lean up and kiss him on the mouth, wishing I could see what he sees. Wishing I could see my hair spread out on the sheets beneath me.

  Wishing I could see what he sees in me.

  And then, as if he can read my mind, as if he can hear the self-doubt growing inside me, Harlan enters me.

  He does it slow, first, just teasing me with the tip of his massive cock. My eyes close, and my head tips backwards, and my knuckles scrunch up with the unexpected pleasure and pain.

  It’s never been like this before. Not with any boyfriend. Not ever.

  “God, you’re tight,” Harlan groans.

  I don’t know if it’s true, that something he just says to all the girls, but it fills me with pride.

  “I am?” I whisper up at him.

  “You’re the perfect package –” he groans, collapsing more on top of me and biting my lower lip with uncontrolled desire, “ – Every fucking inch of you.”

  “You’re just saying –”

  The last word dies in my throat. Harlan quits playing and feeds his cock inside me, all the way to the hilt. It’s so big, stretches me so deep that it brings a tear to my eye.

  He pauses there for a second, decorating my neck with kisses. My pussy slowly relaxes, grows comfortable with his presence.

  And then it begs for more.

  “Ready?” Harlan growls.

  Between the tears of pleasure decorating my eyes like precious stones, and the wetness between my legs, I’m more ready than I’ve ever been.

  I nod, and Harlan starts fucking me.

  From the very start, I realize that this is like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. I don’t know – maybe I’m reading too much into the moment Harlan and I shared on his private jet – the way he came clean to me, but I feel like I’ve got a connection with him I’ve never had before…

  …with anyone.

  Then conscious thought is banished from my mind. I enter a world of sex – sweat, sensation, sensuality. My fingernails scrunch into the silk sheets, and I buck my hips, trying desperately to build a rhythm with Harlan’s driving cock.

  He grabs me by the shoulder, digging his fingernails into my skin. It hurts, but it feels so fucking good. He grabs the shoulder hard, using it like a lever to direct his thrusting.

  “God, you’re wet,” he says, his eyes closed, his perfect, muscular, rippling body dancing in front of me like a piece of artwork.

  I don’t have the strength to reply. Stars explode behind my eyelids, vicious streaks of delicate, perfect pain that I can’t even describe.

  I feel something building inside me. A heat, a pleasure, like all my muscles are contracting at once, and like every single nerve ending in my body is coming alive – sending signals they have never sent before.

  I yelp. I beg. “Don’t stop,”

  My cries of pleasure only drive Harlan on.

  If he was a man on a mission before, it’s like his energies have been redoubled. I see his ass muscles contract as he drives his hips into me in the reflection of the window behind.

  God, they couldn’t be more perfect. Then I close my eyes again. My eyelashes slam closed like the bars on a vault at Fort Knox.

  “Stop?” Harlan growls, as if the thought hadn’t even crossed his mind. “Baby, I’m just getting started.”

  I don’t even register the corniness of his line. Harlan’s cock feels like a rod of molten steel inside me. I never imagined that sex could feel this good. I feel like – for the first time in my entire life – I’m on the verge of orgasm.

  I can barely hear. All I am is what is going on right now: the salty tang of sweat, the cock pounding inside me, the whiteness flashing across the blackness of my vision.

  I grab Harlan’s ass cheeks and pull him in. His thrusting fights me, and I ride him like a bucking bronco.

  “Harlan,” I moan. “I’m so freaking close!”

  Harlan pushes himself even harder. He pushes himself like only a former SEAL can. His body, a temple of muscle and wounds and energy, settles into a rhythm. My moans and his grunts provide the soundtrack to the most perfect song ever composed.

  But the orgasm that tempted me, that threatened to explode into being, just fades away.

  I try to fight my body’s betrayal.

  Because the truth is, this is still the best sex I’ve ever had. Hell, I didn’t know that anything could feel this good. Even without the promise of an orgasm at the end of it, I’d let Harlan take me like this as often as he wanted, whenever he wanted, wherever he wanted.

  “God, Skye,” Harlan grunts, “I’m going to come.”

  I squeeze my pussy around his cock. I think I read that in some girly magazine once upon a time – “a hundred and fifty-six sex tips to please your man!”

  Harlan’s eyes spring open, and he stops mid-thrust.

  “Skye?” He says in a questioning voice, panting slightly from his exertions. A single bead of sweat drips down his temple, and I trace it with my eyes. Tingles of pleasure are still darting out across my body, but concentrating on them is like trying to cycle in a straight line in the eye of a hurricane.

  “What?” I moan.

  I’m not putting it on. It really does feel that good. But I feel something else, as well – guilt. Because I wasn’t the only one who was close to an orgasm – Harlan was as well.

  And I know the reason he’s stopped mid-thrust.

  “You’re not close, are you?” He asks, grimacing with disappointment.

  I see something in his eyes – a cloudiness. That’s the only way I can describe it. It’s almost as though he’s shocked he couldn’t tip me over the edge.

  I reach up with my hand and cup Harlan’s cheek, then slide my fingers around his neck and dig them into my man’s soft hair. Because if there’s one thing I’m going to take from that stupid article, it’s that Harlan is my man.

  “You took me closer than any man ever has,” I say, without breathing a word of a lie. My chest rises and falls rapidly. I’m breathing harder than Harlan is, and I barely did anything!

  “But not close enough,” Harlan says, gritting his teeth. “I’m sorry.”

  “You have nothing to be sorry for,” I say, pulling Harlan towards me and grazing my lips against his. He resists me, somehow – as though by failing to give me an orgasm, I’ve somehow dented his pride.

  But it’s not that.

  “We’ll keep going,” Harlan says, refusing to kiss me. “I promise you, and I meant it – I’m not going to come until you do.”

  I look up into Harlan’s eyes, and I don’t see pride rearing its ugly head. I see the same thing that probably took him through the long months of brutal training down on San Diego beach. I see the same strength that allowed him to not just survive, but thrive after the death of his wife.

  I see determination.

  But this is one area where just wanting something hard enough won’t make it magically spring into life.

  I shake my head sadly. “We’ll get there, Harlan,” I whisper, “just not tonight.”

  Slowly, grudgingly, Harlan allows me to pull me toward him, and his lips meet mine. Even with the fading glow of what could’ve been, and even with Harlan’s still erect coc
k between my legs, another reminder that I’ve still never experienced what so many women have, it’s still a great kiss…

  …because, Harlan Wolfe is a great man.

  So, we’ll work it out. I know we will.

  219

  Skye

  I close my eyes for a second – head resting on Harlan’s chest – and an hour passes. I wake up to an empty bed, pitch blackness outside the windows where a mountain stood just a few hours earlier, and the sound of a crackling fire burning downstairs.

  The bedroom is slightly chilly, but as a sheet tugs my skin as I sit up, I realize that Harlan must have tucked me under the covers before he left me.

  I wipe my tired eyes, and spot a silk dressing gown hanging on a hook nearby. I hop out of bed, slide it over my shoulders and tie the sash around my waist. Then I go in search of Harlan.

  I’ll be honest with you – it’s almost hard to walk. If there’s one thing my body isn’t used too, it’s a man the size of Harlan Wolfe having his way with me. Hell, I think I’d probably be feeling it even if a less perfectly endowed man had entered me after so long without a man at all. But it’s a good kind of sore.

  The best kind of sore.

  When I get to the top of the stairwell, I pause. I can hear a woman’s voice, and in my post-sex, post-sleep haze, I wonder if a cleaner has arrived.

  But that doesn’t make sense. It’s late at night. No way is someone schlepping all the way up the winding mountain road that leads to Harlan’s cabin in the dark – no matter how much money he has!

  I walk down a couple of the stairs, but I’m careful to walk slowly. It’s not like the metal and glass stairwell is going to groan underneath me like the wooden floorboards of some old, decrepit house, but I’m still cautious.

  “– And it’s been a good trip, baby?” A voice asks, floating down the hallway.

  That’s Harlan’s voice.

  I hear the woman’s voice next. She sounds young, slightly higher pitched, but I can’t make out the words from this distance. Harlan’s lower voice travels better.

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t call earlier, I was… busy.”

  Busy, huh?

  Yeah, that’s definitely Harlan’s voice.

  But who is he talking to? I know it’s bad, but my mind immediately jumps to a very dark place. I feel betrayed. The way he’s talking to that girl on the other end of the line – whoever she is – it’s like they’ve known each other forever.

  There’s no way that’s his secretary.

  But does that make me the other woman? And does the girl on the telephone know about me?

  I walk down another step, turning my ear toward the source of Harlan’s voice. It’s echoing from somewhere further down the corridor. I realize that in my whistle stop tour of this cabin when we first arrived, I never got to look around properly.

  I sure as hell don’t have my bearings, let alone a floor plan. But I walk down another step, and another, letting the cool glass kiss my naked feet.

  Harlan’s voice again. “I promise – we’ll do something special soon.”

  A burning pang of jealousy rips through me. I know I should have expected this. There’s no way a man like Harlan – rich, powerful and good-looking – doesn’t have other women on the side. I should have known not to let myself get attached.

  Yet that doesn’t stop me from feeling so betrayed it hurts – a physical pain, a knife to the heart.

  I hear the woman’s voice again. Harlan must have her on loudspeaker, or else on Face Time or something.

  “Okay, daddy, I’ve got to go now. We’ve got a match in twenty minutes, and I need to get on the coach.”

  Daddy.

  That one word cuts through my anger, sluicing it out like the waterfall Harlan kissed me underneath earlier today. It only takes a second for me to realize that my anger was unjustified. I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions so quickly. It makes me sound crazy.

  Hell, maybe I am crazy.

  Maybe I was just jealous that the one man who’s ever been able to take me close to the edge was sharing me.

  Even when the person he’s sharing me with is…

  … His Daughter.

  It all falls into place. I mean, hell, if his daughter doesn’t take priority, then Harlan Wolfe isn’t the man I thought he was.

  So now I’m finding two things out – and I don’t know whether to be happy or sad – First: Harlan sounds like a hell of a father.

  And second?

  He lied to me.

  Or at least, if Harlan didn’t lie, then he failed to tell me that in addition to being a widower, he’s also a father.

  “Knock it out of the park today, kid,” Harlan says, his voice filled with fatherly affection. “You’re the best out there – and don’t you forget it.”

  “I won’t, daddy,” the woman – no, the young girl – says. “Okay, I really gotta go.”

  “I mean what I said, kiddo. You’ll do fine out there,” Harlan laughs down the phone. “Be safe out there.”

  The kid’s voice is light and buoyant. “I wiiill. Bye daddy!”

  Then there’s a ping as the connection ends. Suddenly, I’m left standing there wondering how I should react. Two parts of me are at war – on the one hand, my therapist’s side, on the other, just little old me.

  Because, the truth of the matter is, I am kind of jealous and more than a little upset. I know that’s crazy. I know that Harlan is just doing what any good single dad has to do – protect his daughter at all costs.

  But that’s the rational side of me.

  The other side of me, the Skye Warren who just woke up, still sore from Harlan’s attentions, she’s the one who’s upset.

  Because, that Skye thought that Harlan had opened up to her on that plane ride. She thought she knew the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Now, it turns out, that was a lie.

  I walk down the stairs, all the way to Harlan’s study. He’s staring at a blanked out screen, still lost in thought. He doesn’t seem to notice me, not until I break the silence.

  “I think we need to talk.”

  220

  Harlan

  I’ve been caught in the act. I know I have. And you know what?

  I don’t feel guilty about it. Not one little bit.

  If there’s one person in this life that I have a duty – am obligated – to look out for, it’s Poppy Wolfe. She’s My Daughter, and she’s all I’ve got left.

  Until Skye, that is.

  Because – right now – as I look at this gorgeous, dressing gown-wrapped, flame haired, woman standing in front of me – I soften. It’s so freaking obvious to me that she’s different from every other woman I’ve met over the past ten years that it pains me.

  Skye Warren doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. She would never betray me; I know that just by looking at her. She’s not like any girl I’ve ever come across.

  Not since Ashley, anyway.

  “I guess you want to know what all that was about?” I say, struggling to pitch my tone respectfully. I’ve messed up, I know it. So now I need to find a way out. I don’t think I could bear it if Skye turned her back on me. Not now.

  Skye inclines her head. She’s acting cagey… which is unlike her. “I guess I do.”

  I consider my options. I know what the old Harlan would have done. The man I was before I met Skye, before I – mostly – came clean to her on the plane ride up here.

  I would have lied through my teeth. I would have done anything necessary to do what I thought was right, if it meant protecting my daughter.

  Because, in my world, protecting Poppy means hiding her – from my friends, my enemies, and anyone who might be trying to get close to me.

  So I almost lie anyway.

  My brain conjures a story, spits it out onto my tongue, ready to burst forth at a moment’s notice. I could claim that Poppy’s really my niece, or maybe I’m in the Big Brother program. I don’t know. All I know is that if I had lied, I’d have f
ucking owned it.

  I could sell snow to an Eskimo, and have him come away thinking he’s screwed me!

  But I don’t. Not this time. I can’t do that. Not to Skye. Not anymore.

  “She’s my daughter,” I say.

  I pause for a few seconds, as much to let my brain deal with the admission, as to let Skye do the same. I’m breaking every code I have. Poppy’s my secret – because it’s safer that way.

  But then, Skye’s right.

  I can’t just go barreling through the world like a bull in a china shop for the rest of my life. There are – some – things on this earth that I cannot control.

  And my relationship with this gorgeous redhead is one of them.

  “But I guess you knew that already,” I say with a pained grin. Skye grimaces. I let out a deep sigh. “Okay, okay,” I mutter. “I’ll come clean.”

  Skye crosses her arms across her chest, but doesn’t say a word. She’s studying me with that therapist’s eye – and I know that she’ll know if I lie to her.

  But I have no plans of doing that.

  “I told you about Ashley, right?”

  Skye nods.

  I bite my lip. I didn’t expect it to be so hard to talk about this. I guess a decade’s worth of pushing down on my emotions can’t be unwrapped in one evening…

  “We both signed up straight after 9/11. We met not long after basic training, a few weeks after I applied to join the SEALs the first time.” My voice softens as I recall that happy time in my head. In fact, I kind of forget where I am and who I’m talking to.

  “We had one of those crazy military relationships. We’d catch each other for a week here, when I was back from training in San Diego, or right before she was about to ship out for a tour in Afghanistan.

  Hell, sometimes we’d come across each other on bases in the middle of fuck nowhere, all covered in dust. We beg and borrow some illegal hooch, and find a broom closet for a sneaky conjugal…”

  I pause, cocking my head and look at Skye. “TMI?” I ask, throwing her a lifeline.