LipstickLeslee

Lipstick Leslee

Titania
Ladley

Sequel to Kaydee & the Tramp.

“Melanie, please. Please help me. I
don’t know how to dance and I don’t know how to dress up like a
¼
a ‘hot chick’.”

Hearing that heart-wrenching plea
from anyone else would normally have hetero-femme Melanie Kirtright rolling her
eyes. But Leslee Franks isn’t just anyone. She’s Melanie’s lesbian boss. And
anyway, it might be fun transforming the gender-neutral Leslee into a lipstick
lesbian for a pub contest—while earning herself a few points at work.

But Melanie’s decision takes her on
an unknown path of discovery. While giving Leslee a makeover into a seductive
femme, Melanie undergoes some transformations of her own. Plunged into a level
of fiery, kinky, panty-melting passion she didn’t even know existed, Melanie
tries not to fall prey to Leslee’s irresistible charms.

Tries, but fails.

Miserably.

A
Romantica®
gay/lesbian erotic romance
from Ellora’s Cave

Lipstick Leslee

Titania Ladley

Chapter One

Melanie: The Dare

Patron vehicles from Pussycat’s Island Bar & Grill’s
parking lot overflowed into the designated spaces for the closed retail cell
phone and apparel shops next door. I circled the strip mall once and rolled my
eyes at the overdone Christmas decorations on every window and door. No spots
available, so I drove to the far end and swung my Nissan into the vacant
section along the sidewalk. Just as well. I didn’t want to waste time worrying
some drunk butch lesbian would stumble out, yank open her car door and give my
new SUV a door-dink dent.

It was a nippy early-December night in Louisville, Kentucky,
so I kept the motor running, flipped down the visor and did my last-minute
chick-check—not that it mattered, given the place probably had no men
customers, but one never knew. So I took the cautious route and made sure
everything appeared in order.

I’d put my auburn hair in a haphazard updo. The loose
tendrils and long, sideswept bangs framed my face and made my dark-brown eyes
pop. I studied the pastel shadow and coal outline I’d drawn around my eyes, the
fake lashes I’d glued onto my upper eyelids, the pink-tinged cheekbones and
crimson lips.

“Crap, you look like a hooker.” I slammed the visor closed
and shut off the engine. Maybe it was just the soft lighting around the mirror
overemphasizing everything?

Oh well. It didn’t really matter how I looked, not here
anyway. I had to get real and quit being so vain—there wouldn’t be any men, so I
wouldn’t be here long, and I certainly didn’t care what a bunch of lesbians
thought of me. Besides, after finding my widowed stepmother Savanah and my best
friend Kaydee in bed together last summer, I’d vowed never to be caught dead or
alive within fifty miles of a lesbian bar—or anything to do with gay
at all
.

Well, except for Kaydee and Savanah themselves. I’d forgiven
them both for what I’d called their betrayal and accepted their relationship.
But that didn’t mean I had to be a part of their lifestyle.

Oh, and I’d also decided to make an exception for my
coworker Leslee. She was pretty cool, and even for a tomboyish, stripped-down
model of a female, she didn’t seem…well,
gay
to me. Too much, anyway.

I winced, knowing that sounded bigoted even though I didn’t
mean it that way at all.

So anyway, I’d been on my way to meet my date Tom at
Santana’s Italian Pub downtown and had made a grudging detour toward Pussycat’s
when Leslee had called my cell and begged me to stop by for a few minutes.
She’d refused to tell me why in this cryptic sort of “help me” way, so my
curiosity had gotten the better of me and I’d agreed.

Great. Now here I was within fifty
yards
of a lesbian
bar, never mind miles.

Get over it, you phobe.
I snickered at my idiotic
hypocrisy and took one last look at my iPhone screen to make sure I hadn’t
missed any text messages or calls. On a whim I tossed it on the passenger’s
seat, knowing I’d only be here for as long as it took to find out what Leslee
wanted, then I’d be right back behind the wheel headed for cocktails and dinner
with average-looking but likable Tom.

Why couldn’t I find some smoking-hot hunk to sweep me off my
feet?

Because Will, that a-hole ex of mine, had ruined my trust in
men and even, to an extent, any attractions. I knew it was temporary and that I
needed time to heal. Which was why I stuck with average-looking, likable Tom
for the time being.

I was safe from heartache with him because he just didn’t
trip my switch like Will had all those years ago when
he’d
swept me off
my feet. Yes, he had tripped my switch—hadn’t he?

Something nagged at me, but I shoved the confusion of it to
the back of my mind like always.

My stomach fluttered as I opened the car door and planted my
black, strappy stilettos on the asphalt lot. The bite of winter wind sent a
shiver up my bare neck…or maybe it was just my nerves making me tremble?

“Silly,” I muttered to myself. “Nothing to be nervous about,
you twit. It’s just a bar, it’s just a bar, it’s just a
¼
Okay, so here we go. Into a lesbian bar for the first time in
your damn life.”

I dragged in a deep, cold breath and held it, blew it out
slowly in a white puff of condensation. My heels clicked on slick pavement as I
neared the covered entrance with its thatched tropical roof and small valet
circle drive. Twin fake palm trees decorated in white strings of holiday lights
flanked the tinted glass doors, which were decorated with colorful parrots,
Captain Hook and Santa Claus. I snorted. It was kind of an oxymoron to portray
a paradise in the middle of winter-drab Louisville. But whatever.

The booming beat of music grew louder as I approached the
door. A darkly handsome man in a tux—no wait, on second glance it appeared to
be a butch—smiled and opened the door for me.

She looked me up and down, licked her lips and said,
“Welcome to Pussycat’s Island.”

“Thank you,” I replied, feeling a bit like my little black
cocktail dress and fur coat had just been peeled from my body. My face warmed
at the woman’s blatancy as the tempo of club music grew louder and the scent of
coconut and cigarette smoke wafted out and teased me.

I stepped inside, stood near a hostess podium and an easel
advertising something about a contest, and scanned the packed room. It was
bigger inside than it appeared outside, even with elbow-to-elbow people filling
the space. High bamboo pub tables were set around a dance floor while booths in
tropical neon vinyl lined the walls and a section of the center space. A stage
resembling a sunny island filled the wall to the right just beyond the dance
area, and a tall Christmas tree sat in the corner. A busy tiki bar spread the
length of the left wall, manned by three bartenders, two in jeans and
wife-beater tanks, and one femme with a bleach-blonde ponytail and breasts
spilling out of her barely there blouse. The far wall had been painted in a
colorful mural of sand and sun…with nothing but women in bikinis sunbathing on
the beach. Ha ha, not a man to be found. I could also glimpse an outdoor sand
volleyball court through a rear door, of course vacant of patrons due to the
cold and forecast snowstorm.

“How many?” A petite girl in khaki knickers and a Hawaiian
shirt with the sleeves cut off gathered up menus from the podium shelf. Her
nametag read
Billy
. She wore dangly candy cane earrings, and her dark
hair was shaved short, Mohawked down the center with the tips tinged by
raspberry-and-green dye. She had a forearm rainbow tattoo with black wings, and
a ring of thorns etched around her opposite biceps. One nostril, the corner of
her lower lip, and an eyebrow were pierced with tiny diamond studs. It made me
wonder with reluctance what else this young, pretty girl had mutilated on her
slim body.

I clamped my legs together and shivered at the horrible
thought of getting pierced
there
. Kaydee had her pussy hood pierced, but
I’d always regarded that as TMI and never had taken a look or even broached the
subject with her.

“Uh, just me. I’m meeting Leslee Franks. Do you know her?”

The girl smiled. Ironically, she looked more feminine when
she didn’t smile. I got the full picture of her butchiness with that toothy
grin. “Yep. Of course I do. She’s my boss—well, one of them,” she said with a
raspy, boyish tone to her voice.

I arched my brows. “Your boss?”

Billy shrugged. “Yeah. She’s co-owner of Pussycat’s with her
ex-husband—only he doesn’t hands-on manage the place anymore, or even step foot
in here too often. He leaves that to her, does the books and takes care of
promo and advertising instead.”

Leslee owns a gay bar? Has an ex-
husband
? Ah, amazing
how much one can find out about their closest coworker when they take time to
step outside the office and into the real world.

“Hold on. I’ll see if she’s in the back.” Billy held up a
finger and sauntered off toward a door in the corner by the tinsel-lined bar.

I clutched my purse against my abdomen and allowed myself to
further explore Leslee’s playground, the place she’d mentioned frequenting many
times before. Well yeah. Duh. Of course she came here a lot. She owned the damn
place. She
owned
Pussycat’s? Such a lively place, not such an oxymoron
now that I’d left the cold behind and stepped into the tropics.

Wow. Why didn’t she tell me about this? And why did she
work days at Starling Hotel too?

The music changed to a reggae tune and a crowd of women
shrieked their approval and swarmed the dance floor. Bodies of all shapes and
sizes gyrated and swayed. Many held up their beer bottles or cocktails and
whooped out their approval of the lyrics, which just then chanted over and
over, “Hot sex on the beach, yeah mon, lick ’er juicy peach…hot sex on the
beach, yeah mon, eat ’er juicy peach…”

Ooo-
kay
. Well. I closed my eyes and turned away from
the dance floor. I fanned myself with my little flat clutch purse. It sure was
hot in this place.

“Melanie?” I turned to see Leslee walking toward me. She
wore jeans and a neon-green polo with the restaurant’s logo on it—two buxom
women dressed like pussycats, lounging suggestively on a tropical island. Her
dark, shoulder-length hair swung over her shoulders as she neared. For some odd
reason, my eyes trekked downward and noticed for the first time that she had
large breasts—which jiggled with each step she took—and a womanly curve to her
hips.

Maybe it was the atmosphere, I really didn’t know. But it
sure weirded me out that I’d given Leslee a once-over, and especially in a gay
bar. Well, it would be the last.

“Thank you so much for coming.” I caught a quick flash of
moisture glittering in her eyes right before Leslee took me in her arms and
hugged me as if I were her long-lost sister or some shit.

But whoa, no sister here. I became aware of those large
boobs snuggled to my less ample ones. Her bra must be a thin one because the
unmistakable sharpness of taut nipples pressed into mine. I had my arms wrapped
around her too—hell, what was I supposed to do, push her away and hurt her
feelings?—when a curious tingle washed down my body from my chest to my crotch
like a hot waterfall. With my stilettoes on, I was tall enough to match the few
inches she normally had on me in height, so our bodies were mirror images of
one another size-wise. My abdomen lay flat against hers while my hips and
thighs
¼
and oh my god, our pussies, fit
together in a female puzzle of curves interlocked with more curves.

Leslee’s faint floral scent wafted up and captured my
attention. I turned my nose into her soft hair and inhaled, realizing it was
her shampoo I smelled. Her body quivered along mine, and at first it made the
tingling more tingly.

Until I realized she was crying.

I gripped her shoulders, noting the surprising tightness of
fit muscles beneath my touch, and drew her behind the podium desk into a small
vestibule for more privacy. I pulled her away from me so I could look her in
the eyes. And wow, why had I never noticed the brilliant green of them? “What’s
wrong, Leslee? What’s happened? Why did you call me here tonight?”

Fat tears gathered in her eyes and spilled over the rims,
trailing down high cheekbones and skin of satin. “Because I-I need you.”

Every face muscle I had screwed into what I hoped wasn’t an
expression that hurt her feelings, but I couldn’t stop the cheek-jerk reaction.
Before I could stop myself, I croaked, “You
need
me?” in a tone that
made Leslee flinch.

“Yes, yes, oh god, yes.” Leslee incessantly nodded and
swiped at the tears like an angry child. She turned away, presenting me with
her narrow waist and the swell of her ass in snug, low-slung Levi’s.

And holy crap, I had to admit her ass looked damn good in
the jeans. My hands curled into balls as I wondered what the full globes would
feel like being lifted by my hands in the throes of some lezbo sex and
¼

What the fuck was wrong with me? In the span of a few
minutes, I’d gone from a homophobe to a drooling lesbian. It had to be the
atmosphere. It
had
to be. Otherwise this shit just wouldn’t cut it.

I spun her around to face me, this time sensing feminine
softness along with the fit shoulder muscles. My heart thudded to a halt
against my breastbone. Her eyes were big round discs of watery wretchedness
within the delicate oval shape of her face. The lashes were spiked by tears and
she had faint half-moon circles of exhaustion beneath her eyes.

Something I couldn’t name snagged my heart like an
unsuspecting fish on a hook. Emotion I couldn’t define had me yanking her into
my arms and holding her close. “Shh, shh. Baby, it’s going to be all right. I’m
here. I’m here to help in any way I can.” I stroked her hair. The strands were
a downy caress against my palm and fingertips. “Just tell me what’s up and
we’ll get this all handled. Then you’ll be dancing a jig before you know it.”

That only made her wail louder. Her full breasts abraded
over mine with each hiccup and sniffle she took. Her arms went around my waist
and she clung to me like a vine to a wall. Our nipples pressed together and my
eyes widened at the hot tingling that started there once again and spilled down
into my groin.

What the fuck?

“That’s exactly what I
don’t
want to do,” Leslee
cried.

I pulled her away from me and thought how it seemed a lot
like trying to peel Saucy, my adorable cat, off me when she’d snuggled up to me
on the couch. “What’s exactly what that you don’t want to do?”

“Dance or jig or whatever.” Her gaze darted to the side then
back to latch on to mine. She bit her lip and frowned, as if to decide what to
say—what to reveal?—next. She reached up and held my face in her hands. They
trembled against my cheeks. “Melanie, please. Please help me. I don’t know how
to dance, and I don’t know how to dress up like a
¼
a
‘hot chick’.”