“Ugh! Oh!” I couldn’t form words any more, and I could feel an orgasm swelling, right at the cusp, ready for him again.
“Are you going to come for me again?” he asked, teasing me, in an inch, out an inch. “Are you going to come on my cock?”
“Yes,” I groaned, wanting it so badly, wanting to feel his come shoot hot inside of me as I milked it from him.
“Come on my cock, baby.” As always for Dom, I did as I was told, coming crazy for him, my pussy quivering and clenching on his wide crown. I felt his whole body tense, and then he pulled out as he came in full, hot spurts all over my ass. The f
eel of him coating me, marking me, gave me another crest of orgasm and we both groaned together, losing our minds. For the last time.
He left my side as I was still in a daze, then came back with a washcloth to clean me.
Like before, I protested. “I want you on me.” But I let him tend to me, such strong and caring strokes, cleaning my ass cheeks, my lower back, my own arousal that had dripped between my inner thighs. He pulled his jeans back on, and I fought the tears that clung to me once again. The halo of orgasmic joy still hovered. I wanted it to last.
He circled me in his arms and pulled me against his chest, spooning me as he’d done before. This time he pulled the comforter up over both of us.
“Sleep, beauty,” he murmured into my ear. “Sleep.”
“I love you, Dom,” I whispered to him.
I’d never know if he felt the same way. I drifted off, somehow the exhaustion of all my intense emotion winning out over my desire to stay awake and savor every last minute. I fell asleep encircled in his heat, his scent, his protectiveness.
When I woke up he was gone. I didn’t even know where he was going, but true to his word he picked up and left without a trace. Even his mother didn’t know where he’d headed. His cell phone was no longer in service. I had no idea when or if I’d ever see him again.
I left town, too, heading to my brother Colt’s apartment in the city for the last couple weeks of August. Soon I’d head back down again to Nashville for my sophomore year of college. I hadn’t seen much of my father before, and I didn’t see much of him for the remainder of the summer, either. He and Brandi eloped, making it official. So that happened. But other than that, things in my life went back to how they always had been.
Even though everything about me had changed forever.
Part II
FOUR YEARS LATER
10
Dom
The wings lifted us into the sky, gray clouds swallowing us up. The flight attendant who’d been so openly checking me out when I boarded the plane made her way over to me as soon as she could.
“You need anything you just let me know.” I nodded and asked her for a scotch. Twenty-five days left of my thirty-day leave and already I felt antsy. Funny, out on tour sometimes I’d wish like hell I was back stateside. But once I got back I’d realize I’d gotten used to the rhythm of the Special Forces. All that constant adrenaline, the nonstop problem-solving and maneuvering into or out of life-threatening situations, it made things like sitting for a few hours on a commercial airline seem impossibly boring.
Four years ago I’d had no idea what I was signing up for. Driven by the need to get away, I’d showed up on the doorstep of a recruiting center. I hadn’t planned on joining the Special Forces, but apparently I’d showed potential. I kept calm under pressure. I smacked down their physical fitness tests like I wanted them to give me a real challenge. The only problem was my juvenile record. As an adult I was clean, but at 13, 14 and 15? That was another story, and it almost knocked me out of the running.
They’d nearly denied my enrollment, but I’d called in the big guns. Colt kept asking me what he could do for me. I’d asked him to help me apply for a waiver, asking the military to overlook my youthful transgressions and instead consider my strengths and the fact that I’d had a clean record since I was 16. Colt was the one who made it all come together. He didn’t just serve as a character witness, himself, he got me a couple letters of references from guys so far up the chain of command my ranking officer had called me into his office.
“You know a lieutenant general?” he’d asked with genuine surprise.
Years of keeping a straight face no matter what got thrown at me helped. Of course I didn’t know any lieutenant generals. But I was able to answer with honesty, “I have some good friends, sir.”
He’d stamped his approval on my application that afternoon and I’d begun months of grueling training: boot camp, advanced training, airborne, survival training, specialty training in weapons. The language training was the hardest. A working knowledge of Pashto didn’t come easy. But I wrestled my way through it and it had come in handy during my several tours in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Four years ago I thought I’d seen too much violence and death. I’d had no idea. I’d just spent the past five days with the friends and family of a guy from my battalion who’d died in an explosion. Only 27 years old, just like me, Hank had had everything to live for, a wife and a two-year-old son back home in North Carolina.
I couldn’t help thinking it should have been me. We’d both been out riding in a convoy, slowing for a checkpoint. But Hank’s truck had been ahead of mine, and it had been the one to trigger the roadside bomb. I should have been the one in the lead. I had a lot less at stake. But he’d been the one to go. Now the guy who’d always had my back with his wiseass smile and wicked sense of humor, a husband and father, was gone.
Wincing, I took a sip of my scotch. I’d taken a piece of shrapnel to my shoulder in the blast. It didn’t slow me down, but our captain had told me it was time to take leave. That was an order. I was long overdue, but I kept signing up for more. There was always need, and always guys who had wives and kids waiting for them back home. It made more sense for me to be out there, especially in the areas that saw a lot of action with insurgents. Better me than a guy with people back home waiting for his return.
I looked out the window. Gray on gray. The flight from North Carolina to New York took less than two hours. Then I’d head up to my mother’s place, the penthouse apartment on the Upper East Side she now owned in the wake of Richard’s death.
Their marriage had barely lasted a year. He’d been diagnosed with stomach cancer about six months after their wedding. It had metastasized, spreading into his bones and brain, and he’d passed just over six months later at 67. It was hard to imagine. The man I’d met that summer had seemed like the consummate businessman in the prime of health. Sure, he’d had gray hair and the slightly stooped shoulders of an older man, but he’d had the buffed and polished look of the wealthy. I would have given him another 20 years. Instead, he’d married my mother at 40 and left her a widow at 41.
I hadn’t gone to the funeral. I’d been in the middle of training. I’d thrown myself into it so wholeheartedly, it almost seemed surreal when I got the call. Of course I’d worried about Gigi. She had to be devastated. But my showing up might not make things any less upsetting. Plus, duty had called, and my mother had straight-out told me not to come to the funeral. Apparently a lot of people in the extended Kavanaugh family plus a few other interested parties like his COO were less than happy about Richard’s much-younger wife of one year inheriting a bundle. She’d told me to stay away from the mess. And she didn’t even know how messy it really was.
I’d kept in touch with Colt over the years, or rather he kept in touch with me, calling me every few months. He was as good as his word. He never forgot what I’d done that August night. Months after I first left and our parents had eloped, he’d invited me back to the Kavanaugh holiday party, asking me to come join the celebration with his closest circle of friends and family. I hadn’t taken him up on his offer. But even after his father had died, he still kept up the invite, telling me even though we were no longer related through marriage I’d always be like a brother to him. I’d saved his life and that of his sister’s. He’d never forget it.
There were a lot of things I’d never forget, either. Over four years had passed and I could still remember that summer as if it had happened yesterday. Gigi’s face, her scent, the feel of her skin. She stayed with me no matter how far I traveled, year in, year out.
But I didn’t hope. There was no future for us. I’d always known that. It didn’t matter that our parents weren’t married anymore. It didn’t matter if I finished up this tour and settled into doing a job that didn’t involve risking my life on a daily basis in classified operations on foreign lands.
I was fine on my own. And by now I was sure someone had snapped her up. Sh
e had to be out of college, maybe planning her own wedding. Colt had taken over the family business. Maybe she’d linked up with one of his executive team members, some Ivy Leaguer who’d support her in the lifestyle to which she was accustomed. The lifestyle that she deserved.
It didn’t make any sense that I wanted to smash in the face of this imagined executive. There was no reason to feel pissed off about the fact that we lived in completely different worlds. In fact, it made things easier. It wasn’t as if I’d ever have to run into her with her man. Really, there was no reason I’d ever see Gigi again. Unless I went to the holiday party Colt kept inviting me to attend. The one happening that weekend in New York.
The plane landed at JFK. I grabbed my carry-on duffel, hopped on a bus and then the subway up to my mother’s place. Every button on the doorman’s uniform was polished to satisfy even the most demanding drill sergeant. He looked down his nose at me with suspicion, but once he got my name he warmed right up.
“Your mother’s expecting you.” He opened the door.
The building was way too fancy for my taste. I didn’t want to look at a gold cherub’s bare ass every time I came home, never mind wait under it for the elevator. But my mother had always had expensive taste. She’d always spent every penny she had on luxuries. Back in the day, when a commercial would come on TV for a fancy car or a tropical vacation, she’d always murmur “one day.” I guessed that day had come.
“My baby!” She squealed with excitement at my knock, flinging open the door and giving me a big hug. She looked good, if kind of done-up. But Mom had always gone in for the dramatic eye makeup and the cleavage-revealing tops. When I’d been 14 I’d wanted to cover her in a robe, but now that I was 27? So fucking what. I’d just watched a buddy of mine die right before my eyes. If she wanted to wear a lot of makeup and show off, I figured I wasn’t the one to say anything about it. Life was short.