13. Miranda
13
MIRANDA
A s I twirl a pen between my fingers, I stray my eyes to my rapidly dwindling schedule. The pages were once full. Now they’re covered with strikethroughs. My latest client’s cancelation means I have only one event to cater for this month. Considering we’re only weeks out from Christmas, that is extremely depressing to admit.
“I know it’s late notice. But?—”
“It’s fine, Sawyer. I understand.”
I don’t, but what can I say? You shouldn’t listen to anything my husband tells you because he’ll use your lack of loyalty to the catering company you hired a year ago against you when he encourages your husband-to-be to file a last-minute prenuptial agreement.
A divorce attorney is no one’s friend, so I have no clue why Roy’s potential future victims are siding with him.
I would dig deep for answers if I weren’t so angry.
Alas, I don’t want to work with women who will cut off their nose to spite their face. I want to work with clients who respect and appreciate the effort I put in to make their event a huge success. I’m not a member of their staff or their employee. I am an extension of them and the love story they’re trying to cram into a handful of selected dishes.
At the moment, only one couple on my once long list are giving me that vibe. It is for a wedding I’m meant to cater this weekend, the nuptials of Nikolai Popov and Justine Walsh.
Even arriving several hours late to our meeting this morning, and in a frazzled state, Justine assured me I have no true reason to cancel. She offered me the kitchen in the Popov mansion to prepare the feast for their guests and was happy to supply serving equipment.
If I accept her compromise, we will have to move the location of the wedding from the opulent gardens of the Popov mansion to the courtyard staff use for their lunch breaks and the occasional sneaky cigarette.
I don’t want to do that. The gardening crew has been working on the grounds for months to get it ready for Justine and Nikolai’s big day, and the hydrangeas were grown specifically to help conceal the large baby bump Justine doesn’t want her childhood church minister to see.
A push back in dates would greatly assist both Justine and me, but Nikolai is adamant that they are to wed this weekend. Their babies—yes, you heard me right, they’re having twins—aren’t due for a couple more weeks, but Nikolai’s intuition is warning him to wed now or watch his children enter the world as bastards.
I would have been appalled by his bigoted term if he had said it with any hint of harshness. I’ve never seen a groom-to-be more doting and obsessed with his wife-to-be as Nikolai is with Justine. He loves her wholeheartedly and wants to give her the world.
To him, that means Justine should share his last name when she births their children.
It’s old-fashioned, but after reading the many gossip stories printed about Nikolai since the death of his father, it is understandable. He never had a stable, safe childhood. He was born in the ashes of hell and only began crawling out of them once he met Justine.
It makes me hopeful Nero comes through with the pledge he made hours ago. I’m rooting for the fairy tale Nikolai is envisioning for his unborn children and hope they never have to face the nightmares a lot of children unfairly endure these days.
I tune back in to my conversation when my latest cancellation continues harping on about how if she could change the outcome of her husband-to-be’s decision, she would, but that it is out of her control.
“You know what the boys club is like, Myra.” I don’t get the chance to inform her of my real name. “Whether ten years since graduation or fifty, they always stand by each other’s side. Your impending divorce will make my big day look messy.”
I silently growl and bare teeth before I switch my voice from friendly to professional. “It is fine. Truly.” A snippet of snarkiness slips through the cracks of my understanding. “I just hope you find someone willing to work with your budget in enough time. Fifty dollars a head is well below industry standards.”
I only accepted Sawyer’s stingy budget because eight out of ten of her bridesmaids are single. Bridesmaids are prime catering game. We hunt them more than recently engaged brides-to-be because bridesmaids have faced the wrath of a Bridezilla and solemnly vow to never be like them.
Panic resonates more in Sawyer’s tone now than it did when she called me to cancel an event that is only three weeks away. “What rate should I expect? Bill would like to keep things intimate.”
By intimate, she means cheap.
“I’m not sure. I am only responsible for the quoting of events for my business.”
My heart beats double time when Tempy’s quick leap to her feet announces I have a visitor. She doesn’t bark. She just races for the door with her tail wagging excessively.
“But I wish you well.”
Before Sawyer can get in another word, I hit the end call button on my phone’s screen, then twist in the direction Tempy raced.
As expected by the excited patter of her paws, my guest is welcome in my home.
Very much so.
As Nero drags his dark and brooding eyes down my body, his teeth get friendly with his bottom lip. I’m wearing a skirt I made indecent by cutting off the overhang Roy is adamant all women should have once married and paired it with my first, but unlikely last, sleeveless blouse.
My outfit is flirty and makes me feel very much like a woman who should be desired as much as she is respected.
“Hey, butterfly. You look pretty.” Nero releases his lower lip with a moan as his lust-crammed eyes return to my face. “If I had known we were eating out, I would have dressed up.”
He speaks as if he isn’t wearing dressy slacks and a button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows to show off his array of tattoos. His boots could use a polish since there are a handful of red splotches over them, but his hair is combed, his beard is trimmed, and he smells divine.
He looks sexy as fuck, and shockingly, our threads complement each other. His shirt is the same color as my blouse, and his slacks are a similar midnight black as my now-mini skirt.
The image of him in my doorway, waiting to be invited into my home instead of stomping over my privacy, makes my clit ache and has me grateful I decided to cook the meal I offered in exchange for his help instead of eating out.
Dessert is always quicker when you don’t have to wait for the waiter to return to your table after you’ve finished the main course.
While striving to act like I’m not hopeful I will once again be Nero’s dessert of choice, I open my screen door and officially invite him in before accepting the bottle of wine he’s holding out. It is my favorite label, and its hefty price tag has me forgetting he distributes drugs and guns for a living and not art and antiques.
Although this will make me sound like a twit, I wasn’t surprised when Shiloh shared some damning information about Nero and his many business dealings. He is well known by the locals in Vegas and extremely popular with adults her age.
I wasn’t surprised because from the moment I’d laid eyes on Nero, he’d screamed danger. It’s just never been directed at me long enough to cause the slightest tickle of fear to impede my speech, so I refuse to judge him on what society deems acceptable.
Nero’s actions the afternoon we met, and the times that have followed, are what I will pay the most attention to.
Furthermore, I’ve done the man who’s clean-shaven, would never get a tattoo, and would not tarnish his exemplary employment record by taking a single day off to swoon you.
It didn’t work out.
He destroyed a decade of hard work in a weekend, and he doesn’t appear anywhere near ready to end the brutal slaughter he’s smacked my confidence with over the past fourteen years.
Roy wants me on my knees, and it is for a reason completely different from the one that fills my head when Nero’s scent returns my focus to the present.
He stares at me until my heart returns to my chest instead of the floor Roy threw it on when I turned up at my warehouse to find it empty, and I’ve forgotten that the unseasonally barbaric heatwave in my kitchen has nothing to do with our location, and everything to do with him.
Then he kisses me.
Nero’s mouth is warm, his lips are demanding, and his embrace as a whole is extremely claiming. It doubles the steaminess of my kitchen and has me wishing I had picked to forgo a bra when changing out of my work clothes.
Under-boob sweat is always worse when there’s something to absorb it.
Our kiss is an inferno of touches, moans, and licks. It is as fiery as the flames that incinerated the legs of my once-marital bed, and I can’t get enough.
I kiss Nero back with everything I have. The movements of my lips are just as claiming, my needs just as vocal.
It is a kiss so potent my thighs shudder and my clit throbs.
A kiss fantasies are made from.
It is the type of embrace that has me uncaring of a single person or thing not associated with the man breathing life back into my lungs one fire-sparking connection at a time.
My moans urge Nero on.
Before I know it, I go from the entryway of my home to being pinned to the wall oven in the kitchen.
My head is in such a tailspin, I’m barely grasping a sense of reality, let alone the pricy bottle of wine Nero arrived with.
“That was meant to be for when we get back,” Nero says, talking over my kiss-swollen lips when the wine bottle tings against the wall oven. “But fuck if I can wait a second longer.” He bites at my lips before he wedges his knee between my thighs, giving me something to grind against. “I’m hungry now.”
The friction is delicious when I rub my damp panties against his muscular thigh. It steers me straight toward the finish line as productively as the tip of Nero’s blade digs into the cork of the wine.
He pierces the cork before giving it a little wiggle, loosening it from the tight confines before his teeth wholly free it.
I smile like I’m a decade younger than I am when he spits the cork across the room like unnecessary messes are my jam before he tells me to open up.
When my lips part, I’m anticipating the rim of the bottle to cool the burn of his bearded kiss, so you can imagine my delight when I’m not served the wine from the bottle.
It is fed to me from Nero’s mouth.
He swigs from the bottle, swirls the liquid around his mouth, doubling its flavors, before he tugs back my head by the roots of my hair and spits the wine into my mouth.
It tastes delicious, and I can’t help but moan.
They gargle in my throat along with the wine when we share the equivalent of a glass with our mouths as the only utensils.
“Don’t spill a drop, printsessa ,” Nero murmurs as he licks up a droplet of wine from my bottom lip. “I’d hate for your sexy little shirt to get stained.”
With a confidence I’m still learning is okay to explore, I grip the hem of my shirt and pull it over my head.
Nero’s hiss is as good this time around as it was when I wasn’t wearing a bra.
His response makes sense when I lower my eyes to the bra he’s edging as ruefully as his sexy face edges my horniness. The lace of the cups leaves nothing to the imagination, and the alluring baby-pink coloring adds a touch of sexiness to a usually bland palette.
“Mm,” Nero moans, doubling the output of my heart. “Rosy and pink, just like your nipples.”
He bites one of the said nipples through the scant material covering it before he rolls it between his teeth and tongue. Then, just as I’m about to beg, he pulls down the cup and doubles the stiffness with the coolness of the bottle’s rim.
“Not a drop,” I murmur when he tilts the bottle, bringing the liquid inside to the lip.
My knees knock when cool, fruity liquid rolls down my left breast half a second before Nero licks it up. His tongue is wide and enticing, and when it swivels around my nipple, it sends a current of electricity straight to my clit.
The coolness of the stainless-steel wall oven gives relief to my overheated skin when Nero follows the weave of a felonious droplet of wine. He tracks its movements down my stomach and its hazardous careen over my belly button before he catches it at the waistband of my skirt.
Goddamnit!
My fret is unwarranted.
“I’ll buy you another one,” Nero says two seconds before he shreds my skirt off my body, its flimsiness no match for the strength of his tug.
As my skirt sits tattered on the floor, he homes in on another defying droplet, its trek even more dangerous than its counterpart’s.
It has slipped further down my body, almost to the waistband of my skimpy panties.
They’re too scant to absorb the droplet and incapable of ignoring every heated breath that leaves Nero’s mouth when he discards the wine bottle, his selection made.
My heart skips a beat when he hooks his index finger into the delicate edge of my panties before he slowly pulls the material away from my body.
He assesses me slowly and dedicatedly before his eyes float up my body. I’m panting hard and on the verge of hyperventilating when I realize how many lights are on in my kitchen, but he looks at me as if I am perfect—and I almost believe him.
“I so fucking wish you could see what I’m seeing right now.”
He growls, and my hips jolt. I moan when my jerk forces his nose to mash with my over-sensitive clit, and then I grunt when Nero loses all sense of control.
He spears his tongue between the folds of my pussy, doubling the shake of my thighs, before he drags it up to my clit.
A desperate squeak pops from my lips when he hits the nervy bud with back-to-back strikes.
With a handful of licks, he brings me to the edge so fast that I feel dizzy.
I won’t fall. Nero’s grip on my ass assures me of this, not to mention the leg he curls over his shoulder to open me more to him.
He distributes half my weight to his body and the other half to his tongue when he forces a flood of euphoria to race to my lower extremities from the expertise of his eating skills.
As his relentless pursuit to have me seeing stars ramps up, my hips instinctively roll. I grind my pussy against his mouth while his tongue demands the full attention of my clit.
“Give it to me, printsessa .” Excitement zaps through me, his deep, rumbling voice enough to push me within an inch of the finish line. “Come on my face like a good little wifey.”
Just the thought of him thinking I’m a good wife sees me losing the battle not to climax in a shamefully quick minute.
I buck like a bull while moaning his name in a mangled cry.
Tingles dance across my face while a tsunami wreaks havoc with my womb.
I can’t stop coming, and Nero can’t stop singing my praises.
He tells me how delicious I taste and that he’s never sampled a more scrumptious meal. That he didn’t think it was possible for me to get even more beautiful, but I defy the odds every time I come.
He builds me up so well that instead of crumbling into pieces when I come back from the lust cloud he forced my head into, my confidence grows along with the strength of my orgasm.
Roy never praised me. He never told me I was good at anything. He degraded me and made me feel worthless, so the thickness of the bulge in Nero’s pants, and the desperateness in his tone to make me come undone, is addictive.
I feel wanted.
Needed.
I feel fucking invincible, and it is undeniable when I pluck Nero from the floor like he doesn’t stand several inches taller than me and like the digits on my scale aren’t higher than his.
As he kisses me like he knows his attention is reviving my lungs with air, I tug at Nero’s belt and fumble with his zipper.
I pull away from his sinfully delicious mouth when his cock springs free from his pants. He’s so thick, so hard, so mouthwateringly damp on the engorged tip that my train clatters off the tracks before my head hears the pleas of my body.
I fall to my knees and drag my tongue across the crown of his cock, sampling the evidence of his excitement, too impatient to wait.
Nero’s grunt of approval surges my eagerness.
I grip him in my hand before feeding the first inch of his fat cock into my mouth. His heaviness both inside my mouth and in my hand makes me hot all over.
I’m both eager to please him and incredibly aroused that eating me has him hard enough to drill through to the Antarctic.
“Fuck, butterfly,” Nero grunts when I take him to the back of my throat, his hips rocking.
I smile, loving the return of the nickname he only uses outside of the bedroom. It is as if he can see my wings expanding and my confidence soaring.
I suck him faster, greedily, dying to taste his cum once again.
I lose control, assured Nero will help me find my way back.
As Nero’s hip thrusts double, his grip on my hair tightens. He tugs firm enough for the roots to sting, and I love every twinge of pain.
When I flutter my tongue down the vein responsible for the length and girth of his impressive manhood, his thigh muscles bunch as a cussword leaves his mouth. His free hand opens and closes as his head thrusts back.
He’s close, so very close, and I am desperate to push him over the edge.
“Fuck.”
His grunts come out thicker and stronger, as do the droplets of pre-cum leaking from the crown of his cock.
“Mir…”
His murmur of my name is cut short when I hollow my cheeks while swiveling my tongue around his cut crown. I suck gently, like his cock’s head isn’t throbbing with want, and then peer at him to marvel at his loss of control.
While maintaining eye contact, he rocks his hips faster, driving into my mouth with desperate, needy pumps.
My eyes bulge when he buries his cock a little too far, and tears spring, but I encourage the wildness beaming from him by flattening my tongue and relaxing the muscles in my throat, accepting him more profoundly.
He takes every inch of power I award him and thanks me for it by coating my taste buds with the deliciousness of his pre-cum. He fucks my mouth for several long minutes until the pointless gropes of my vaginal walls grow jealous by the attention my mouth is receiving.
I want him to fuck my pussy as hard as he is my mouth, and my prayers are answered two seconds after he pulls off his shirt like he’s a member of the Magic Mike team and folds me over the kitchen island.