her core. He ran a hand up her thigh, over her hip and belly, to cup a breast. Mandy gripped his hand with hers. His tongue circled the swollen nub at the top of her core, then slipped along her folds as he entered her with a finger, two fingers. And then her body was writhing against his face, her channel tightening around his fingers. Fire shot along his cock as he imagined being joined with her for her orgasm.
When she grew still, he kissed her hip, her belly. He dipped his tongue into her navel, then licked along her ribs as he rose to her breasts. He kissed her collarbone, ran his tongue over the center of her throat, captured her chin between his teeth, and grinned at her.
Mandy laughed. He looked pleased with himself. His black eyes, so often sad or tormented, looked happy. She switched places with him.
“Your turn.” She pressed his hands against the tile wall, flattening his arms. “Don’t move.” She drew her hands down the muscles roping his arms. The dark hair of his chest and underarms streamed with water down his torso and abdomen. His penis stood upright from its nest of black hair, like turgid iron. His muscular thighs were spaced apart, bracing him against the wall.
“Kiss me,” he ordered, his eyes becoming hooded and intense. Mandy smiled. She leaned forward and kissed his pec, then his shoulder, then his other pec. “That’s not what I meant.” He breathed heavily through flared nostrils, his gaze held hers, his hands sticking to the wall as if shackled.
She stepped up on her tippy toes and kissed his neck, his jaw, slowly, working her way up to his mouth. He groaned as she pressed her lips to his. Mandy tilted her head, fitting her mouth against his. Her tongue did not penetrate his lips. She licked the circumference of his mouth. He growled, a low, rumbling sound when she reversed her direction and started kissing a long line down to his navel.
Water rained on her back as she knelt before him. She looked up to see the way desire tightened the features of his face. Without touching him, she flicked her tongue against the head of his penis. He spread his legs wider. She licked the sensitive underside of him.
“Do it,” he rasped. “Take me in your mouth. Now.” She turned slightly, mouthing only a portion of him, flicking her tongue back and forth over the engorged vein at the base of his cock.
“Jesus, Mandy. You’re going to fucking kill me. Take me now.”
She smiled and moved her mouth leisurely upward until she wrapped her lips around the crown. He groaned and thrust forward, pushing himself as deeply as she could take him. “Yeah, like that.” Every time he pulled out, her tongue caressed the hard length of him. He’d wanted this to go on forever. She sucked and stroked and pleasured him. She gripped his balls and gently massaged, even as she squeezed the base of his cock. He pushed into her mouth, feeling as if he was fucking her throat. His balls tightened, his only warning before semen shot like fire into her mouth.
He knelt before her as she lifted her face to the shower, rinsing her mouth with the streams of water that were growing cooler. He kissed her throat, her chin.
His eyes looked sad again. She touched his cheek. “What is it?”
“You’re looking at a man without a heart. It belongs to you now. Keep it or throw it away-do what you will with it. I can never take it back.”
She shook her head. “How is it that I feel as if I’ve known you my whole life, not just these past few weeks?” She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, buried her face in his neck. “I’ve been alone for so long. Most of my life.”
“But you’re not alone, now. You have my heart.” His arms tightened around her. “You give me a reason to live, to want to come back.”
She took hold of his face. “I’m counting on it.”
It was just before 11:00 p.m. when Ty parked in the side lot at Winchester’s. The place was packed. The band’s bass throbbed across the parking lot. Inside, the noise was almost deafening. It was odd, Ty thought, how disproportionate the number of men to women there were. The men were large and poorly groomed. Many had shaved heads. Some sported beards and moustaches. Most of them wore leather vests over wife-beaters, maximizing their display of ink. Not what he would have expected for a Western bar’s clientele.
Three women sat alone at one long table-two of them looked like Jersey Shore transplants complete with big hair, heavy make-up, and form-fitting clothes. The other few females in the place were on the dance floor or in crowded booths. Every table and booth was occupied, leaving nowhere for the group to sit together.
Val looked the situation over, spotted the table with the three women, then grinned at Ty. “Get me a Fat Tire. I’ll get us a table.”
Ty and Kit got their drinks first, then paused at a half-wall separating the bar from the booths, waiting for the others. Val was now sitting at the table with one of the women on his lap. Across from them was the other Jersey Shore princess. A third woman sat at the far end of the table, her nose buried in her phone. Wearing a T-shirt, jeans and hiking boots, she seemed an odd companion for the others. While Ty watched, she made short work of a guy who approached her. No one spoke to the other two women, which, given their come-fuck-me attire, surprised him.
Val waved them over.
“The guy’s a man-whore, but he got us a table,” Greer grumbled.
“You don’t hear me complaining,” Kelan commented, following him. They pushed their way through the crowd. Ty handed Val his beer, then sat between him and the hiker chick. Kit sat at the end near Ty, and the other guys filled in around the table. The brown-haired girl looked up at him. Her lips were compressed in a tight line. She offered no welcome but simply went back to her phone.
Ty leaned toward her. “If you don’t want to be here, why are you?” he asked, honestly curious about her answer. Again, she looked up at him. She wasn’t wearing any make-up. She didn’t need any. She looked like she’d come here right from a lengthy hike outside. What color would her smoky topaz eyes be in the sunlight? Her hair was wavy and looked unbearably soft. She was like a draft of fresh air someone had let into the thick, crowded room.
“I had no choice. They needed a D.D.”
Ty set his cane against the table and leaned back, absently rubbing his thigh. “Same here. I’m unstable enough as it is with this. Figured I didn’t need to be stumbling around in a drunken stupor.”
The girl’s smoky eyes studied his. “What happened?”
“War injury.”
She frowned at his thigh, lost to her thoughts. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
“Why?”
“That you’re hurt.”
“Wasn’t your fault. You didn’t do this to me.” Ty wondered, as he said it, if he wouldn’t have voluntarily taken a bullet just so that he could sit here with this girl and have this conversation. He stuck out his hand. “Name’s Ty Bladen.”
Her eyes widened then narrowed. “Bladen?” She shook her head. “We got no further need to chat. No offense intended, Bladen.” She returned her focus to her phone.
Ty frowned. What was that about? He’d been gone for more than a decade. He’d done nothing to earn her frosty attitude. He could only think of one reason why she’d had that reaction. “Did you know my father?”
“No,” she said without looking up.
“Eddie! Get your nose out of your phone. We have visitors, honey,” the Jersey Shore girl cuddling with Greer leaned forward to call down the table. “Be nice to the man.”
Eddie flashed the woman a look, but stayed silent. “S’all good,” Ty spoke up, deflecting the woman’s attention. “The two D.D.s’ll just sit here and keep tabs on you guys.”
Ty sat silently for all of a minute before leaning over to Eddie and asking, “So-what’re you reading?”
The girl looked up at him with the hardest, ball-busting glare she could summon. “Listen, Bladen. This is how it’s going to go. You’re going sit in your chair and talk to your boys and leave me alone. Otherwise, someone’s going to get hurt.”
Ty couldn’t help but grin. God, she was hot. “Right. No talking.” He crossed his arms and slumped farther in his chair, his legs spread wide to ease the tension in his groin that his interest in the girl had caused. He tried to think
