by Meg Jackson
“Please fuck me,” she relented, her eyes trapped in his sea green irises, the heat and smell of him intoxicating, her early morning brain rolling with a need that was no lessened by what he’d already given her the night before. “I want your cock in me, Kennick.”
Kim had never been one to indulge in dirty talk, but it felt right. It felt amazing. Almost as amazing as when he pushed himself inside her, spreading her once more, his impressive cock sliding into her wet slit slowly, the angle driving him deep inside her, so deep she could swear he was going to reach her womb. She groaned, loud and long, as her thighs gripped him tight, her ankles crossing to hold him inside her as her hips bucked upward until he bottomed out, every inch of him touching every inch of her.
“Jesus, baby,” he moaned into her ear, “I think this pussy was custom made for me.”
She could only groan her agreement as he began to thrust, slow and hard, into her warmth, his arms falling to grip her waist and pull her tighter to him. She was hot and wet and pulsing around his cock, ready and so eager, he didn’t know how long he could possibly last before releasing inside her. But as her body responded to his thrusts, moving in perfect rhythm, the pace increasing between them, he could feel her thighs quivering around his waist.
“That good, baby?” he cooed against her skin, feeling her heart racing against his chest, her desire rising with each stroke, deeper and harder each time. Kim nodded and moaned her response, a familiar heat creeping into her face and fingers, a tidal wave of pressure in her gut that rose and rose, impossibly huge, terrifying in its intensity. When that wave broke, she would be gone, washed away. And the more he drove into her, each stroke determined, as though he wanted only her pleasure, craved her orgasm as much as his own, she knew she was a goner.
With a rough gasp, Kennick grabbed her thighs and pushed them forward, her knees bent against her chest, her feet hitting his chest as he continued to drive into her with relentless force, the new angle now driving him against her most sensitive places, places she’d never known existed.
Blinding pleasure swept through her body as she came quick and sudden, the tidal wave crashing over and flooding her body with white-hot ecstasy, blinding her as she screamed out his name and thrashed against him, rolling on her lower back as he plunged deep inside her and, with a groan, released his own climax, shooting wave after wave of cum against her clenching pussy, her contractions milking every last drop of cum from his dick.
Kim’s body, stretched to the limits of pleasure and beyond, shook and wilted underneath him as he panted and fell back onto his heels. Her feet lowered slowly to the bed, her legs shaking like jelly. Disposing of the condom and rolling over to her side, Kennick kissed the side of her neck, under her ear, inviting one last shudder from her still-reeling body. High on pleasure, she giggled and turned, wrapping her arms around him and yanking him close so she could feel his now-soft cock nestled against her still-wet pussy.
“You’re…shit, Kennick,” she said between breaths, her eyes trapped in his again.
“Really? I thought that was pretty good,” he said, feigning offense. She giggled again and then sighed, allowing her body to go limp as he curled his arms around her.
“What time is it?” she wondered aloud, not having heard an alarm go off. His arms shrugged around her.
“Morning,” he said. She huffed a sigh and rolled the top of her head against his chest, feeling more at home in his arms than she’d ever felt with anyone. One night could change so much, it seemed.
“I have work,” she said, realizing she’d have to give herself enough time to go home, get changed, brush her teeth and shower before going to the office. Typically, Kim would not have spent the night on a work night. Then again, Typical Kim seemed to be taking an extended vacation. One that was, perhaps, long overdue.
“Mmm,” Kennick responded, only hugging her tighter. “I could think of better work for you to get done if you decided to play hooky…”
Kim laughed and pulled herself away from the sweat-soaked embrace. The world outside of Kennick’s arms felt a lot colder, even with the summer heat outside. She groaned when she found her cell phone on the floor and saw that it was just past 7:30; she’d probably be late no matter what. But dallying would only make her later.
“I gotta go,” she said, hopping from the bed before the desire to stay could overwhelm her. Throwing on her clothes, she bit her lip when Kennick emerged from the bed naked, with no apparent plan to get dressed. His elegant, intricate tattoos invited her eyes to linger, and that trail of hair leading downwards between the V of his abs demanded her attention, too. But she had to go.
“When should I bring Ricky over to talk about the editorial?” Kim asked, straightening up suddenly, the subject having fallen somewhere behind the bookshelf of her mind during the night’s activities.
“Tonight’s fine,” Kennick said. “Ricky’s the sister?”
“Oh, yeah, sorry,” Kim said, realizing she’d never told Kennick her name. He gave her a strange look.
“That’s a dumb thing to apologize for,” he said, striding forward to collect her half-clothed form in a tight embrace. “You should save your apologies for times you really need them.”
“Mmm,” Kim hummed as she felt his skin against hers, the heat between them unrelenting. “Then I’m sorry I have to go to work right now.”
He laughed, the rumble in his chest pleasant against her cheek.
“That’s more like it, Little Mayor,” he said. “Much more like it.”
17
Watching Ricky and Cristov spar was like watching a tennis match.
“Are you going to let me write one thing down this whole interview, you kindergarten drop-out?”
“I'd love to, I'm just making sure you don't accidentally write down my name over and over again instead of his answers.”
Ricky snarled before turning back to Kennick.
“So, your father bought this a few days before she was murdered?”
It had been easy to convince Ricky to take on the assignment. In fact, Kim hadn't had to convince her at all. The night after Kennick had invited Kim over for dinner, she'd called her sister with a brief description of what she'd learned that afternoon.
“Oh my God,” Ricky had squealed over the phone, her voice high and excited. “You are officially the best sister of all time. This is like, serious juice. Like Tropicana, not from concentrate.”
Kim smiled. Ricky was a sucker for mysteries. Ludlum, Carver, and Christie littered her bookshelves. And she was always complaining about the lack of newsworthy stories in Kingdom.
“Are you sure Don will be okay with you writing something so…scandalous?”
“Don can suck my big fat dick,” Ricky snorted. “I’m the only writer worth a damn on the whole staff. I write what I want. When can I meet him? I mean, you know, I wanted to interview one of the new business owners, anyway, you know, for a profile, but this is way better.”
“Um,” Kim said, suddenly realizing that Ricky meeting Kennick could be a bit awkward. Not for any reason she could pinpoint but….
Don’t lie to yourself, Kim said. You know exactly why it will be awkward.
It was true. Kim didn’t like the idea of Ricky meeting Kennick because Ricky had an awful habit of being completely oblivious to Kim’s crushes, and stealing them away for a two-week affair, rendering them utterly un-dateable for Kim. Guys responded to Ricky’s flirtatious nature, her spontaneity, the sense of excitement and rushing she brought to the table. Kim had a much slower, subtler approach; too subtle, if you asked Ricky.
“I didn’t know you liked him!” her sister would cry when the truth came out, usually months after the man in question had flown the coop. “You need to tell me these things! Or, you know, actually act on your desires, for once.”
But Kennick, somehow, seemed like he might be the kind to be impervious to Ricky’s charms. Kim didn’t know why, but something about him was different. Not easily swayed by a charmi
ng giggle and a bouncy ponytail, Ricky’s trademarks.
“I’m seeing him tomorrow,” Kim said. “I’ll ask him.”
There was a pause on the other end of the line.
“Seeing him or…seeing him?” Ricky asked, pointedly. Kim bit back a smile.
“Seeing him,” she said and held the phone away from her ear as Ricky squealed again. The girl had the squealing powers of a piglet.
“Kim’s got a date with a gypsy.” Ricky said, talking to someone else on the other end of the line when Kim put the phone back to her ear.
“Who’re you with?” Kim asked
“Tricia’s here,” Ricky answered. “We’re coming over. Right, Trish?”
“Comin’ over!” called a second voice, somewhat muffled. Kim could tell her best friend had gotten into the wine, and hoped her sister was sober enough to drive.
Kim and Ricky had grown up next door to Tricia, and they’d been best friends since they were little. The three girls had spent that night talking about what Kim would wear, what it would be like to date a Rom, and watching My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding online.
Now, as Kim and Ricky sat in the Volanis' trailer, with Cristov and Kennick sitting opposite them across the table, Ricky was scribbling furiously in her notebook as Kennick laid out his manilla folder of evidence. Kim was impressed with the straightforward, emotionless way Kennick answered Ricky's probing questions, and the way he abided his brother's infuriating method of flirting.
“Pretty impressive little scoop, huh? Bet it's got your reporter senses all tingly,” Cristov said, interrupting the flow of the interview, eyes twinkling. Kim noted the way Ricky determinedly bit back her smile.
“You know, being a member of the press, I can always tell when someone's hiding something,” Ricky shot back. “And when a guy talks a game like you, he's usually hiding something pretty tiny.”
“Tiny? Oh, honey, there's nothing I love more than exceeding expectations,” Cristov shot back. “Come on, let me prove you wrong.”
“Fat chance, cockroach-dick,” Ricky said before turning back to Kennick, who effortlessly returned the conversation to the matter at hand. After another hour and a half of the same thing, the conversation constantly being derailed by Cristov's innuendos and Ricky's rebuffs, she closed her notebook, tucking her pen into the pages with a humming sigh.
“This is gonna be good,” she said, smiling at Kim with gratitude.
“Thank you for speaking with us,” Kennick said, offering his hand across the table. Ricky took it, giving it a professional shake. “Do you have plans tonight? Either of you? We're having a party, I'd love to give you a chance to meet some of our people.”
He had directed the question at Ricky, but it was clearly more aimed at Kim. Ricky smiled as she shook her head and slipped Kim an expectant glance.
“I can't,” she said. “Want to start working on this.”
“Kim?” Kennick asked, finally turning to her with a smile on his face.
“I can stick around for a while,” she said, her cheeks warming as her sister not-so-subtly pushed against her shoulder. “Let me walk you to your car, Ricky.”
Outside, the afternoon had turned to evening.
“Holy. Shit,” Ricky said as she paused, half-entering the driver's side of her car. “I can't believe that's your gypsy man. I mean, Kim...way to effin go!”
Kim blushed at her sister's reaction, a twinkling of pride inside her heart. For once, Ricky was impressed by Kim's love life.
“He's a good guy, too,” Kim offered bashfully. Ricky rolled her eyes as she plopped the rest of her body into the seat.
“I don't care if he eats puppies,” Ricky said. “You better work that body as much as you can, for the sake of all us women who can't.”
Kim was left laughing as Ricky pulled her door closed and drove off, honking a few times on her way out and brandishing a hand out the window to wave goodbye. When Kim turned around, she saw Kennick leaning against the door, watching her.
“So, this party?” Kim asked as she approached. He merely laughed, which she’d come to expect as a normal reaction to her questions, and took her hand.
18
He hadn’t been lying when he said that a gypsy party was a sight to behold. The party was held outdoors, in the rows between the trailers and on the “porches”, where people set up makeshift bars, barbecues, and long tables of food. There was enough booze to slake the thirst of a hundred sailors on shore leave, and enough food to sober them up enough to drink some more.
Music mingled and mixed from where it played through open trailer windows or on tiny radios, much of it shimmering, incandescent, and exotic to Kim’s ears. Children and adults alike twisted and turned under Christmas lights strewn from trailer to trailer, dancing wild and free in the cool summer air.
Damon, who’d been absent when Ricky was talking to Kennick, appeared during the party with a guitar, settling down at the far end of trailers and strumming some simple folk songs that people intermittently sang along to.
Kim had started out the night feeling on edge; parties had never been her forte, and especially amongst this crowd of strangers who looked at her as an outsider, she felt out of place and judged. But as she helped set up, drifting from family to family at Kennick’s side, the wondering looks turned to warm acceptance. She felt the enormous amount of liquor that the gypsies seemed to drink helped that, but then so did her association with Kennick, whom they trusted implicitly, it seemed.
Now, she was nestled under Kennick’s arm, holding a beer in one hand and a shot glass of clear, strong-smelling vodka in the other, near where Damon strummed out a beautifully lonesome tune. Three old men, whose names she thought were Dago, Turk, and James, though it was hard to remember considering how many names had already been thrown at her that night, were trying to one-up each other with fantastic tales.
Some were uproariously funny, some tinged with a kind of horrible awe or aching loss. All the same, each story blended into the next one regardless of subject or tone, synchronized with the familiarity of retelling, sharing the same practiced beauty that comes from years of details perfected and refined.
“That’s nothing,” the man Kim thought of as Turk said, taking a sip from the shot glass he held, which was a sign for everyone gathered to do the same. “Let me tell you about this woman I worked for back in ’83.
I was tarring her roof all summer, got to know her pretty good. She was a real sweetheart, and not stingy with the lemonade. Had two pretty daughters and a husband who, I guess, was never around too much. I barely ever saw him, anyway. The girls were in school, and I guess I was her only company, and with me on the roof knee-deep in tar, I wasn’t much for conversation.
So she goes and gets herself a parrot. Real pretty thing, all bright green and blue. She got it for a steal, too, and she didn’t figure out why until the damn bird started talking. Best we could figure, the last place that bird hung out was a bordello. ‘Cause when he talked, it was all pretty filthy.
First time she brings the bird in, I’m in the shitter, and when I come out I hear him squawking. He looks around, he goes, ‘new house, new madam.’ We didn’t thinking nothing of that ‘til he looked at me and says, ‘new house, new madam, new john.’ That got us thinking. And then later, when the girls, they were teenagers anyway, come home from school, the parrot gave ‘em a good look and said, ‘new house, new madam, new john, new whores.’ And that’s when we knew.
I was laughin’ all the way home, and pretty damn well into the next day. ‘Cept when I get there, I realize half the shit in the house is layin’ out on the lawn. So I say, ‘what’s this?’ and the lady, all red-faced, says ‘I’m kicking the hubby out!’.
That’s a pretty damn rash thing to do, and she always seemed like such a sweet lady, so I ask what it is he did to deserve it. And she points to the parrot. She goes, ‘last night when John came home, that damn bird said: new house, new madam, new whores, old friends! Hi George!’”
La
ughter erupted as Turk broke into a smile. Mina, who’d come up to witness the storytelling marathon, nudged Kim in the ribs.
“I bought him the joke book that one came out of,” she said with half a smile on her face. Overhearing her, Turk puffed his chest out and pretended to take offense.
“You callin’ me a liar, Mina Volanis?”
“I’m calling you a funny man, Turk,” Mina answered sweetly.
“How about this one?” Dago asked, pointing to Kim across the circle with a glint in his eye. “Looks like she has some good stories.”
“Me?” Kim asked, suddenly feeling that old roar of anxiety rushing up her throat, threatening to expel all the liquid courage she’d taken in so far. She looked to Kennick for support, but found only a bemused, expectant smile on his face. She swallowed hard. Her mind went blank. “I’m really not…I’m quite boring, actually…”
The booing sound that surrounded her was almost worse than the prospect of having to tell a story that would match the yarns the old men had been spinning. Kennick moved closer, tightening his grip around her shoulders. Her brain raced, trying to think of something – anything – to say.
“There was a flood once,” she said, still staring into Kennick’s green eyes. She could pretend they were in bed, like they had been the night before, conversation flowing free and easy and unencumbered by shame. “In the 60’s. My father was young – maybe 19? It was a massive flood, though. It almost washed the town away.”
As Kim spoke, she slowly tore her eyes from Kennick’s and, finding herself the center of attention, stalled out. Her mind blanked. And then he squeezed her again, and more words tumbled out of her, surprising her entirely.
“My father worked for a stained-glass factory. He had a friend there named Rodney, a much older man with no wife or kids. But he had a dog, Abe. He was really big, like, a Rottweiler. I think it was a Rottweiler. But it was huge, anyway, but it was sweet. So sweet, like, wouldn’t hurt a fly. But right before the rains began, Abe ran away, and Rodney was heartbroken. He was sure that Abe was dead, drowned or whatever.”
