Back for Seconds (20 page)

He reached for her hand across the table. “You’re still looking for guarantees in a world that has none. Every season passes, Joely. Doesn’t mean you can’t stop to dance in the rain every once and a while.”

“So, in other words, don’t get too attached?”

“In other words,” he corrected softly, but in a firm, direct voice, “enjoy the now.”

He couldn’t give her any guarantees and she knew it. He’d already warned her that he wasn’t the dating sort, and he definitely wasn’t the happily-ever-after kind of hero riding in on some noble steed. The days of fairy tales were over. She was a grown woman, almost forty years old. She knew how it worked now.

He was a handsome man who knew how to please her, to titillate her, to fulfill her in ways she had never dreamed possible. What more could she ask from this life than that?

He summoned the check, but instead of directing her towards the elevator, they stopped off at the hotel bar for a nightcap and a spin around the dance floor. “You’re driving me crazy,” she giggled as he held her tight while they swayed to the music.

“The waiting is the best part,” he murmured before he bent to kiss the sensitive curve of her neck.

“Says you. I haven’t had sex in,” she paused to count, then said, “nine months.”

He was stunned as he stared down at her. “You’re serious?”

She nodded. “Things slowed down after the kids came. Then, after we were surprised with Hannah, I think Russell was afraid of any other ‘accidents.’ He insisted I get the birth control implant, but even then we only managed intimacy once a month, maybe, if I was lucky. It slowed down even more after Jena started working for him. After they finally hooked up, he really didn’t have any need for me except to take care of the children and clean his house.” As much as she didn’t want to admit it, it still hurt. Xander could tell, right away.

“Do you still love him, Joely?”

“I don’t know,” she sighed. It had been a question she’d been asking herself for weeks, ever since she found that email. “I think by the end of it all I was more in love with the idea of him. He was my husband. I made my vows and never really regretted them. That was our life, even the bits that didn’t fit. I guess I took our happy ending for granted. Maybe we both got lazy,” she finally admitted.

He nodded. “Maybe that’s why the idea of marriage has never held any appeal for me. Seems so archaic. You make a pledge when you’re young and foolish, and have to abide by it no matter the consequences.”

She smiled softly. “It’s not all bad, Xander. Growing old with somebody. Getting to know them better than you know yourself sometimes. Having someone just be there, so you don’t have to face the cold, cruel world on your own.”

“Would you do it again?”

Her eyes met his. They were that perfect mixture of brown, gold and green, dark in one minute, brightly shining the next. She loved staring into them, but she loved it most when they were staring back at her. They saw the parts of her no one else bothered to see. “Yes,” she answered.

He kissed her then, which took her by surprise. She expected him to run screaming for the exit. But nothing she had done had repelled him. In fact, his body bore the evidence of his attraction. She felt him harden against her as he clutched her tight.

She reached up to whisper in his ear, “Time to dance in the rain.” She took him by the hand and pulled him from the dance floor.

Due to her stomach bug, Hannah was even grumpier than usual when Russell put her to bed that Friday night. She couldn’t get comfortable and was whinier than he ever remembered her being. She begged Russell to stay with her as she fended off the chills by snuggling in her bed. He knelt beside her, stroking her hair as she fell into a fitful sleep well after her normal bedtime.

He was exhausted by the time he made it out of her room and joined the other kids in the family room for a movie. “How’s she doing?” Kari asked.

“Fussy,” he answered as he slid into his recliner with a tired sigh. “It’s going to be a long night waiting for her fever to break. Sorry this kind of messed up our plans this weekend.” He had wanted to take them to the movies and out to eat, something special they hadn’t been able to do since before The Event. Unfortunately Hannah was in no shape to be out in public.

“It’s okay,” Kari shrugged as she turned her attention back to her diary. “As long as she feels better.”

He smiled at his eldest. She was a good kid overall. A little spoiled, perhaps, but he couldn’t help that. She had him wrapped around her finger from the time she was born. Now she was growing into a woman right before his very eyes. He loved being able to relate to her as an adult. He had never really been that comfortable around them when they were children. They were loud, messy and unpredictable. It caused chaos in his perfectly ordered life and he didn’t know quite how to handle any of it. He simply hadn’t known how to relate to them then. Thankfully Joely buffered most of that, to foster a more positive relationship between them. But nothing had helped them bond better than each passing year, which transformed his bouncing baby girl into a lovely young woman.

“So how are things at school?” he asked. “Better?”

During their first weekend visitation, she had cried on his shoulder how awful the kids were at her new school. She hadn’t fit in and she feared she never would. They were all just so different. The girls had been heinous at first, making fun of everything from the clothes she wore to the way she looked. Since she wasn’t able to wear makeup, she looked much younger than the stylish girls in her new class. At her old school that had never been a problem. She had scores of friends who would hook her up with all the things her mother never let her wear. She could easily blend in with all the kids who all knew how important her dad was, since they’d grown up in the same neighborhoods and had the same friends from kindergarten.

At the new school she felt horribly alone. Nobody knew who she was. Nobody cared. At best, her detractors had assumed she was poor. It was something she feared herself the instant they left Fairway Oaks, despite the fine house they now occupied with her Nana. It still wasn’t
their
house. In a very real sense, they were homeless.

At worst the new bullies pegged her as just plain weird, which was what she suspected deep down that she was. She wasn’t like everyone else. She had no idea what she wanted to do with her future, and her life. She’d never dated. She had no idea what she wanted for a career, often defaulting to medicine simply because that was what her father wanted for her. She felt like a blank slate, completely undefined. The only time she felt even remotely normal was when she was around Xander. He didn’t see her as some weird mutant trapped somewhere between childhood and adulthood. He didn’t treat her any differently than anyone else at the restaurant, despite her young age. When she talked, he actually listened. He wasn’t trying to correct her like her mom, pacify her like her dad or treat her like some child like her Nana or Granny Faye.

Instead of suspending her in some adolescent limbo where she didn’t know anything, he treated her just like an adult.

That one little thing made the mean girls at Abilene High irrelevant. “Better,” she finally answered her dad.

“Making new friends?” he probed.

“Sort of,” she said. “I’m really busy at the restaurant.”

“Ah, yes,” he said as he sat up. “Try to keep some balance with it, Kari. School is far more important than some part-time job. You’re preparing yourself for a college career, and that’ll take you much further than bussing some tables at Lillian’s Place. You need proof of that, just look at your mom.”

Kari shot a look towards him. It wasn’t uncommon for him to use her mother as a cautionary tale of what not to be, but it rubbed her the wrong way given all the hard work that she was putting into
Back for Seconds
. “She’s actually doing really well, Dad. Those cookies sell at the restaurant for, like, four bucks a piece. And she sells out practically every day.”

“No one can bank their future on cookies, Kari. It’s probably just a fad. It’ll pay for a while but there’s no security there. I want something better for you. And I should hope that you want something better for yourself.”

“I just want to be happy,” she said.

“You can be just as happy in a mansion as you can a trailer park, Kare-Bear. Remember that.” Having made his point, the discussion was closed. He turned on the movie and that was that.

She returned to her diary, where she could freely daydream about Xander.

It was just after eleven o’clock when Xander opened the door to their modern suite overlooking the skyline of downtown Dallas. He pulled Joely into the room by the hand, which he placed another long kiss upon as he shut the door behind them. She walked into his arms, leaning up to kiss him now that they were finally, blissfully, alone.

He groaned in his throat as he deepened the kiss. She pushed his jacket from his broad shoulders off onto the floor. He responded by lifting her up at the waist, to devour her mouth as he carried her through the split suite room towards the bed on the other side of the wall.

He didn’t bother to turn out the light or close the drapes as he deposited her next to the bed. Instead he turned her around, facing the window, so he could unzip her dress slowly, trailing fire along her spine where his fingertips lingered. He pushed the dress from her shoulders and slid it from her trembling body until it fell at a heap at her feet. He held her by each arm as he leaned forward, kissing the line along her neck, towards her ear, where he blazed a trail of fire at the tip of his tongue. She tried to lean backwards towards him but he held her fast. Instead he stepped closer, and she felt how hard he had grown as he pressed against her ass, bared by the skimpy panties she wore.

She watched their reflection in the window just across from the bed as he nibbled along her neck, near her ear, and down to her shoulder. He released one of her hands so he could slide his large hand across her tummy, slowly lowering between her legs. She gasped as her head rested back against his shoulder. Their eyes met in their reflection. “Watch me.”

She obeyed his gruffly issued command, watching as his fingers rub her aching clit through her underwear. She ground against him as her free hand reached up for a handful of his dark hair. He brushed his mouth against her neck, taking nips out of her skin. His left hand still circled the wrist of her other hand, which he lifted up to her breast. He guided her to cup and squeeze herself until she was unable to withhold her gasps and moans any longer.

She felt his body jump against her, which only made her hungrier for him. “Xander,” she breathed. He captured her earlobe between his teeth, practically growling in her ear.

“Tell me what you want, Joely,” he instructed as he watched her squirm against them in their reflection.

She knew what he wanted to hear. She shuddered hard as she said the words out loud. “I want you to fuck me.”

He chuckled against her skin, which spread goose bumps across her sensitive flesh. He took a step backwards, away from her, to kneel down, kissing his way along her spine until he was on his knees behind her, spreading her legs where she stood so that he could bury his face there. Her knees nearly buckled when she felt his breath against her wet panties. His tongue replaced his fingers, licking her through the dampened material, latching onto her with his whole mouth until she cried out loud.

Slowly he peeled away the panties. The cool air hit her as he revealed her inch by inch. When his mouth covered her again, there was nothing between them, not even the night. His tongue flicked over her sensitive clit until she had to lean forward on the bed or else she would have collapsed entirely. Within minutes she was coming hard, grasping the covers in both hands as his tongue penetrated her to capture every last drop.

He shed his shirt as he rose to his feet, watching her in the glass as she tried to catch her breath. She tried to stand but he kept her bent over the bed, his hands running up the backs of her legs and over her hips. Out of nowhere he delivered a firm swat on her ass, which caught her by surprise. “You’ve been a bad girl, Joely,” he grinned at her. “I told you that you were due a proper spanking.”

She shuddered as she waited. His eyes darkened as he stared at her, caressing her slowly with his right hand, lightly brushing his fingers against her skin until every nerve ending was practically reaching out for him. Then, another swat, this time firmer, which caused her to cry out again.

“You ready to be a good girl for me, Joely?” he asked as he stepped closer. She could feel how hard he was through his pants as he pressed against her. She nodded and he chuckled again, his hand brushing against her skin, soft and tantalizing, before another, firmer swat. “Say it. Tell me you’ll be my good girl.”

She was so turned on she could barely speak at all. “I’ll be your good girl,” she managed. His hand, which had been caressing the area he had swatted, lifted again, and cool air hit that sensitive skin as she braced for another good swat. Instead of delivering it, he held his hand in place above her, hovering in exquisite anticipation for just a bit before he stepped back again.

“Good. Now lie on your back and spread your legs.”

She did as he instructed. He stood in between her legs as he unfastened his slacks. She eyed him hungrily as he bared himself for her. He was massive and hard, which only made her crazier for him. He kicked away the last of his clothes and retrieved a condom from the nightstand beside the bed before he crawled between her legs until he was hovering over her. His eyes bored into hers as he gave her the condom. “Put it on me.”

She tore the wrapper open with two shaking hands, withdrawing the prophylactic. He was almost scary hard as she placed it on the tip and slowly rolled it down with two hands until it fit snug at the base. She circled his now protected, raging erection, with one hand, which filled her tiny palm to overflowing. Her insides turned to jelly as she imagined him inside of her. She stroked him with increasing urgency.

“That’s it,” he crooned as he watched her face. “That’s what you want, isn’t it?” She nodded, practically delirious with her need. He bent closer to whisper in her ear, “Tell me.”

“I want you,” she murmured.

“What is it about me that you want?” he persisted, his breath hot in her ear.

She shuddered again. He was pushing her outside of her comfort zone, steadfastly refusing to let her off the hook until she obeyed every command. “Your cock,” she finally whimpered.

Finally his body lowered until she could feel how hard he was as he rubbed himself against her. “This cock?” he murmured as he teased her. “This big, hard, throbbing cock?” She was a puddle of goo beneath him as she nodded. “Say it,” he commanded again.

“Your big, hard, throbbing cock,” she repeated.

“Where does my good girl want that big, hard, throbbing cock?”

He was driving her crazy as he rubbed the swollen head of his dick against her clit. “Inside me. Please.”

“Inside where?” he persisted. “Where is it that you need it? Where do you ache for it? Which part of you is begging for it?”

She shuddered all over. “My pussy,” she finally breathed, empowered and intimidated all at once.

“Oh yes,” he groaned in response. “That’s my good girl.”

With that he shoved himself up inside of her until she cried out, her eyes wide as she lost herself in his darkened gaze. He filled her completely. He didn’t move at all at first, allowing them both to luxuriate in that moment. He wore an impish grin as his hand slipped in between their bodies. She gasped when his fingers found their target: her clit. He watched her face as he rubbed it, slow at first but then faster and faster until she was thrashing beneath him. He hadn’t moved his body one inch, holding it steady deep inside of her, filling her completely as he teased her. Within minutes she was rocketing into the stratosphere, crying out as she came hard. He wore a smile as he withdrew his hand.

“That’s what it feels like to come with a nice hard dick inside of you,” he said. “In case you’d forgotten.” Before she could say anything more, he lifted her legs up by her knees and bent her forward. “And this is what it feels like to be fucked, Joely. Because I know damned well that no one has ever been man enough to show you. Until now.”

With that, he thrust himself inside of her hard and deep. She couldn’t hold the scream back if she tried. He grinned, empowered by her response, as he thrust even harder, speeding up his motions with every cry and every gasp. Her eyes widened as he watched her face, reading every signal and responding to every cue, slowing down to savor each and every stroke, speeding up to drive her even crazier until she was bucking up against him to meet every single thrust. If she dared close her eyes, intimidated by the intense intimacy of the moment, his voice was strong and commanding. “Look at me. Look at me while I fuck you.”