Strangers with Benefits (Siren Publishing Classic) (42 page)

“Y–you!” Before Sidonie could get riled any further, he opened the car door and grinned.

“Give me your hands, face up.”

Her fingers shook as she turned her palms upward and stuck them out in front of her.

“Why?” she asked he clicked the cuffs on each wrist.

He leaned in close to her and whispered in at the delicate curve of her neck. “Because you stole my heart.”

He didn’t ask her if she would accept the ring and the expectations that came with it. There was no need to. Den slipped the box out of his pocket and opened it in front of her.

It was modest, but he had debated for weeks before he made the decision. He didn’t make huge sums of money, but the guide he read online said that two months’ salary was the max he should spend.

The ring set him back a pretty penny and was right in that range, but it was worth it. His mother had helped him scour the world for rings until they decided on the perfect one together. It had his mother’s wish list combined with Sidonie’s sense of style. The thing should outlive meatball making, world destruction, and cockroach invasions, too.

She gasped and her eyes sprung a major leak. His were exactly the same, but he got to preserve his manliness due to his mirrored aviator frames.

He kneeled on the pavement and looked up at her as he slipped the ring onto her finger, a perfect fit due to the fact that the night he used the dental floss on her nipples, he’d slipped a ring of it around her finger and gave it to the jeweler later.

“So what do you say? Yes…or no?”

“Yes, you fucking Neanderthal!” She knelt in front of him and tossed her cuffed arms around his neck and their lips met for a sweet first engagement kiss. He dimly heard it as cars tooted as motorists passed by.

A few minutes into their oral celebration, Jackson, that asshole, cleared his throat.

“Hey, McTavish, if you don’t get your shit out of my squad car, I’m tossing it on the street.”

Sidonie pulled her lips from his and he helped her unloop her arms from his wrist.

“Shut up,” she muttered and Den laughed until he cried.

His fiancée was a pistol and he liked it.

A lot.

That night, he elected to take the entire family out to celebrate. They sat in a small dining room at a little Eastern fusion inspired place that even his mother liked to eat at sometimes.

When the twins were calm and sitting down, Den looked at the two of them. “I want to talk to the two of you.”

“All right… go ahead.” Katie beamed and Den knew the girl had already figured it out.

For the most part. But he had a little surprise in store for them, too.

Sidonie sat very still and he knew she hoped they would be happy with the news. He was nervous, but pretty certain they would be okay with him marrying their mother.

“I asked your mother to marry me today.”

“Really!” Katie gasped and bounced. Den smiled at her obvious happiness.

One down, one to go.

He looked at Mark. “What do you think?”

“I think its mega.”

“Mega, huh?”

“Yeah.” Mark grinned with a little more modicum than his sister. Only a little though as his excitement was all too apparent, as well.

Den looked at Katie. “Katie. I know that I’m marrying your mom, but if I want to be part of your family, I’m marrying you, too. He handed her a box and she opened it with a jaw dropping gasp.

“Ohmygodyes!” She pulled out the little gold charm bracelet. He had already placed a few charms on it.

“Each of these charms represents a promise. I got the ring because I want you to be like my daughter. I know you have a father, but I promise that I will be there for you any time he can’t be. I got a winged shoe because you’re fast like the wind and I will do whatever I can to watch you at your events and cheer you on. The dress is to promise you that I will chase off any boy that we find unacceptable with a shotgun and threats of an APB with extreme search. And when you go to prom, I’ll watch you walk down the stairs and take pictures.”

Katie’s eyes misted over, and then spilled in such a rush that she bolted from the table. Den looked at her run off and wondered if he should go check on her.

Sidonie’s eyes were just as misty as her daughter’s. “No, I’ll go. Talk to Mark.”

When she walked away Den looked at Mark. “All right, now that I’ve run the women off, wanna drink?”

Mark laughed. “Yeah right. No way you’re gonna get me to fall for that one.”

“Okay. But I have something for you, too. But don’t run off and have me thinking I smell like B.O. and your mom is too sweet to tell me.”

Mark laughed and rolled his eyes. “Na-aah. I’m a dude. I can man up. Test me.”

He shoved the box over the youth and Mark fingered the velvet for a moment.

“You gonna make me bitch up. I can feel it.”

“You’re lucky your mom didn’t hear that.”

“I know, right?”

Mark opened the box and he coughed. Den smiled, he knew the boy would get it.

Inside was a thin cuff, nothing too excessive, merely a thin, brass C-curve that would fit around the wrist and a folded packet with information for a renowned youth basketball camp.

“Now, I promise mostly the same stuff as I told Katie, minus the running dates off thing, although I do reserve the right to tell you if a girl isn’t good enough for you. But I will help you find a nice tux to wear and even pay for it. Your mom will have to handle the limo, though.” He winked. “She makes more than I do. I will also help you find the college of your dreams and ignore the fact that you might have a few drinks and not be legal after you get there. But, I promise, if you get in trouble I’ll ride you so hard for so long that you wish that your real dad was there instead of me. And when you’re ready for the talk about women and sex in real life, I would be happy to give my advice, too.”

“Damn, you made me bitch up.” Mark sniffed, but held it together, barely.

When Sidonie and Katie returned a few minutes later, both ladies sported red eyes and noses, too. Den stood up and hugged Katie.

She grinned with her reddened eyes on him. “I’m sorry. Will you help me put on my bracelet?”

“It would be my pleasure.” He fingered the clasp and finally pinched it open with his blunt fingertips.

When he looked at Mark, the boy shook his head. “I can put on my own bracelet, thank you very much.”

Sidonie hugged him and dropped her head to his chest. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For being you.”

“I love you.”

“Ditto, McTavish, ditto.”

Den got to celebrate his engagement with Sidonie that night, after the twins were picked up by their father for the weekend.

They still had quite a few items left on their sexual bucket list and after they started dating, lovemaking became so all-encompassing that they forgot all about it.

Maybe it was time to surprise her with a little something new.

It wouldn’t do for his fiancée to get bored with him.

Not at all.

That night when they arrived back home, he let her walk in to bedroom before him and the moment she stepped through the door, Sidonie whistled.

Den had a nice romantic set up going and the room was banked in candlelight. Or what appeared to be candlelight, but was actually a bunch of little electric candles scattered about the space. There was a bottle of champagne chilling in what remained of the ice, but hopefully was a decent enough temperature to be palatable.

But he knew what would have garnered the whistle.

He’d shoved the bed right against the corner by the window and in the center of the space was a sex swing that he’d adjusted to the perfect height hanging from the ceiling.

Beneath that was a stiff set of cushions, one shaped like a small wedge and the other propped against it was a much larger half circular shape curved side resting balanced on the floor.

“This has a lot of possibilities.” Sidonie grinned and slipped her dress off of her shoulders.

“I know, right?”

Once she was naked, he helped her into the swing, which was way more awkward than he thought it would be. But by the time she hung in front of him, he wondered what he would do first.

“Just do it.”

“Oh, I’ll do it all right.” So he did.

The swing almost broke when they got good and into it. He should have taken the time to brace it, but he was in such a rush when it came time to install the sucker. He heard a creak and looked up to see plaster crumble around them. Den had to stop mid stroke and get her out of the thing before she wound up in the ER and he was the laughingstock of Wilmington PD for real.

He probably had enough ribbing to deal with on Monday, when he went back to work.

The cushions proved to be much better than he imagined. It was all of the fun of the swing with none of the “sky is falling” fears they had before. She grew wetter with each thrust, the suckling sounds that emerged from the push and pull of their bodies grew louder and louder still. Until she keened his name.

“Denbabyshit!” He gripped her wrists and used her torso to drag the cushion into an arc of motion.

Back and forth.

Forth and back again.

Her nails pinched his hands as she strained to clench her fingers into a fist.

“I love when you speak in tongues woman.” He groaned and let the pillow do half of the work for them. It was lazy sex, the padded surface perfect for the moments when he was worn out and too tired to work hard for her screams.

He was fond of laying pipe with brute force, every now and again. Maybe a little more than that, but she had never complained when he manhandled her with a touch of gentleness.

Just a touch, as she liked him a little Neanderthal and he always aimed to please.

Her spot was offered up perfectly at this angle and every time he rubbed over it, she hissed with a pained cry that only made him want to tap the spongy nubbin some more.

So he did, over and over again, like the song and listened to her pleas for more.

“Oh… more, baby… more.”
Music to my ears.

He knelt on the ramp and rocked the cushion back and forth, glided in and out of her with an ease so natural that he wondered why everyone didn’t own a set.

When he laughed at the errant thought, Sidonie looked back at him.

She moaned. “Do I want to know why you’re laughing?”

Did she really want to know? He sure the fuck wished he didn’t.

Hell, she asked for it. “I was thinking mom and dad might like these.”

“Ewww….” she said, but then she laughed with him. “Really?”

“Yeah, remind me to tell you that story later.”

She giggled and rocked her hips as the cushion rolled smoothly along with her. “Now you have to make me forget about it in the first place. Senior sex. Humph.”

He made her forget about it all right, and for a while, he forgot about it, too.

When they finished, it was a comedy of errors. Den attempted to lean on the cushion with her and it flipped over, left the two of them sputtering in the floor and laughing simultaneously.

Sidonie rolled her eyes and made a check mark in the air.

“Sex furniture. Check.” The words were breathless, but that was the way he liked her. Rode hard and put away wet.

Den just laid in the floor where the spill left them and let his head flop onto the floor as he gasped for air. “Damn… I love you.”

They drank the champagne straight from the bottle in his bed and he didn’t kick her out when it spilled over. They just rolled to the dry side of the mattress and slept there.

THE END

Jennifer is an odd duckling and still fixes stuff by day and chases two preteens in between work and sleepless nights. She has recently relocated, so hopefully the Piedmont will be even kinder than the coast has been.

I don’t have to deal with the ants anymore, but I kinda miss the little buggers. But email me at jenwritesureadATgmail.com for comments, complaints, and accolades (lol we authors love those)!

For all titles by Jennifer Willows, please visit

www.bookstrand.com/jennifer-willows