14. Dominic
FOURTEEN
Dominic
I wake with the first signs of dawn creeping through the darkness, hearing the ocean beyond the glass at our feet, still wrapped around Lina like a tentacle monster.
I take a minute or two to enjoy the feeling of her lush body in mine, her ass firmly nestled into my crotch, my arm under her neck, my other hand curved around the soft flesh of her stomach, our legs tangled together. It’s been years since I’ve had sex, yes, but it’s been even longer than that since I’ve actually cuddled with someone. I bury my face in her soft curls. Luxuriate.
I give myself another minute or two to replay every single moment from last night. The feeling of her wet warmth around my fingers, my tongue, my dick. The look on her face when she came, the shocked ecstasy when she squirted all over my face. The tiny movements, the twitches of her body, the slackening of her mouth, the tightening around my cock, that told me when she liked something I was doing.
I get hard again obviously, and I’m about to spend the next minute or two debating whether I should wake her up with sex, if that’s too presumptuous, or if I should just untangle myself and go make us some coffee—when she speaks aloud into the room.
“I can feel you thinking about whether or not you should fuck me,” she says.
“Yep,” I admit.
“I thought I told you to take for yourself,” she says, wiggling her bare ass around on my cock until the tip rests against the entrance of her shockingly damp pussy. My eyes roll to the back of my head, and I’m glad she can’t see my face because that probably wasn’t pretty.
“That was last night,” I say, allowing myself to push in one centimeter , just one, just the tip, just to feel… before pulling out and rolling over and reaching for a condom. “I wasn’t sure if the consent parameters extended into this morning,” I add on, before rolling it on me and reclaiming my position behind her.
“I’m being clear and explicit now when I tell you that the consent parameters extend to however long we—” This turns into an extended moan when I push in.
I savor the slow slide, this feeling of heaven, of morning intimacy. I’ve learned her nipples are extra sensitive, so I play with them idly, while I thrust in and out like I’ve got nowhere to be.
“I could get used to this,” I say in my head, or maybe out loud, about this lazy, Sunday morning sex that I haven’t had in years. “This rules,” I say next, definitely out loud, definitely by accident, definitely like a total and complete dweeb.
Luckily, Lina laughs while rolling her body, languid movements, her hand reaching around to run up the skin of my thigh, my ass.
We spend the next several minutes like this, laughing and whispering and moving slowly, in no rush. I run my hands through her hair, across her stomach, roll her nipples, rub small, leisurely circles into her clit.
I do this until Lina gets all insatiable and ferocious, which honestly works for me because my stamina is still not where it should be and I’m minutes from coming, anyway.
She shoves me to my back and climbs on top, using and riding my dick like a goddess, her hair a mess and tits bouncing, grinding her clit into my pelvis, and I pray to the sea gods that she comes before I do. They hear my plea seconds later. I explode to the feeling of her spasming around me, of the sight of her head thrown back, eyes squeezed shut, neck elongated, and really, who needs coffee?
I decide to take for myself though, when I hold her against me and force her to make out with me for a pretty long time afterwards, just wanting to feel her tongue and her skin and her hair under my hands.
We fall asleep again.
I open my eyes, realize her face is inches from mine. Her eyes fly open, and they’re golden in the dim morning light. I think it’s still early based on the angle of the sun. She smiles, and I’m shocked speechless at how beautiful she looks like this.
“Can we have the what-happens-next talk?” I blurt out pathetically, ruining the moment.
Her smiles grows wider. “I’m going to guess you don’t like the idea of ‘seeing where this goes’ or ‘just having fun.’”
“I would love that,” I admit, “but I can’t.”
She traces the design of the tattoos on my chest with the tip of a fingernail. “Explain,” she asks gently.
I decide to go for utter honesty, to not play any games and pretend like I haven’t been thinking about this week. “It wouldn’t be fair to Frankie. Starting next week, you’re going to be seeing her all the time, every day, so this has already moved past the ‘casual’ phase whether we like it or not. We can’t ‘just be fucking’ or be ‘no strings attached’ or whatever. That’ll be too confusing for her. I feel like there’s no middle ground. Either we’re together and trying, or not.”
Lina follows the design up to my shoulder. “And you’re too busy being a ‘business operator’ to waste time just fucking around.”
I take her hand and curl it into my chest. “I don’t have time, Lina. I’m so busy, like you are, and I spend every waking moment I’m not working with Frankie, or doing things for Frankie. It wouldn’t be fair. But I know how much that is, how much that could be for you, how it’s asking a lot,” I say reluctantly, trying like hell to sound apologetic. I take a deep breath for this next part. “I also don’t want that, to just be fucking around, because I actually really like you, and Frankie really likes you, and you’re really good with her, and last night and this morning felt deeper than just sex, and I’m willing to try for something real and deep and meaningful,” I ramble like a fucking idiot.
She snuggles into me, into my chest, and I squeeze her tight, but I can tell something is up by the look on her face.
“What do you think?” I whisper into her ear.
“I’m conflicted,” she says after a moment. “I want that with you, too. I want to try, because I like you and I like Frankie, and you’re wonderful and it feels like we could be a good match and you might be really good for me. And I feel this way after knowing you for what, a week? Because I think we’re just that compatible, because there is real chemistry here. But I’m afraid for lots of other reasons, too.”
I nod, because I think I know what she’s going to say.
“I’m wary because I don’t know how I’d fit into your life. It’s like I’m not just starting a relationship… I’m joining a family. And I’m so busy, and you’re so busy. And I just got out of the shittiest relationship of my life, and I’ve been trying to do things for me, and trying to find myself or whatever, which sounds so stupid but something I think I need to do. And joining a family is the last thing I should be doing.”
I nod, trying like hell to be a vision of understanding and acceptance, determined not to hold all those completely valid reasons against her, but I feel my arms loosening because I feel fucking wrecked inside. It’s going to be like this forever, isn’t it? Scaring women away because of my intensely complicated life?
“I also feel like that’s not fair to you,” she adds on with a whisper. “Because you were so upfront and clear and explicit with what you wanted before we even started anything, and you said it over and over again, and I feel like I maybe forced you or tricked you into having sex with me?—”
I turn her head towards me, kiss her lips. “All those other feelings are valid except that one. I’m a grown ass adult, I’m responsible for my own actions, and this was reciprocal decision making, okay? You didn’t trick me into anything, even if you’re the horniest person alive. I wanted you. Badly.”
She looks at me. “Okay,” she trusts.
I peel myself away from her body and roll onto my back to look at the ceiling. I don’t want to push, but I’m also thinking about what she said when she demanded I take for myself. Does that apply to this situation? Am I going to fight for this? Is this really a good idea? Does this make me selfish, this whole taking for myself? What about Frankie?
But then I think of Pirate Plunder, and the bedtime stories, and Frankie passed out on Lina’s chest in front of the fire. And I decide that maybe I can do this. If Lina’s willing.
I make one last attempt.
“I think we should try. We can take it slow. We can actually date, I can take you out without Frankie, we can see each other once in a while, and text and call like normal dating people do. Get to know each other in the real world, with real responsibilities.” I laugh without humor. “Not just be trapped all together half-naked in a vacation beach bubble for seven straight days in a row.”
She’s silent for a long moment.
It’s okay , I’m telling myself, after a full minute, while it inexplicably feels like my heart is being ripped out of my throat. You’ll be okay. Think about your daughter. Everything you do is for her.
But then Lina rolls on top of me to look me directly in the eyes. I brace myself. “You know, it’s because you’re all you, all Dom, that I’m willing to try.”
“What?”
“You’re so honest and mature and upfront that it’s refreshing. You make it easy to not be afraid. To jump right in. I feel like I can trust you and every single word that comes out of your mouth.”
My heart rate increases. “So…”
“Let’s try,” she says softly. “I like you, and I trust you, and I think we should give this a shot.”
I feel like I’m flying. I feel like yelling into the oceanic abyss.
She’s giggling at my obvious glee, and I roll on top of her, ready to fuck her into the mattress, before we freeze, hearing someone knocking on the front door of the guest house. I realize very quickly that it’s more of a teeny tapping noise, which indicates that it’s my daughter, and I pat myself on the back for remembering to lock the door last night.
Lina and I look at one another and laugh, joyous and disbelieving, and I wrench her face towards mine to drop one last kiss, before leaping out of bed and finding the clothes I left in the living room, throwing them on and kicking all of Lina’s under the couch.
I hear the door to Lina’s bedroom shut a second before I open the front door.
“I brought you and Tita Lina coffee, Daddy,” Frankie screams, hair all crazy and wearing one inside out pink sock, holding two mugs and spilling most of it onto the ground and onto my shirt.
I’m still grinning like an idiot. I make a big show of peeking into the now virtually empty mugs. “Hmmm…” I give her.
She frowns, looking in. “I’ll be back,” she says, turning on her heel and marching back down the steps.
“Please ask Lola if she can dig around for travel mugs,” I call out in my Serious Dad Voice. “I think I saw some in the pantry. In the basement. On the very top shelf. In the back. Lola will need to find a ladder.”
“Okay!”
“Walking feet, please!” I shout. She slows down.
I very calmly shut and lock the front door when she disappears from view. Then I whirl around to sprint back to Lina’s bedroom, but she’s already sitting on the kitchen counter and kicking her feet with that smug and devious grin on her face.
“Ten minutes?” she asks me, as I step between her knees and help her wiggle her shorts off, because this could very well be the last time I can be inside her for a very long time.
I can’t answer her immediately because my tongue is busy in her mouth. It’s almost aggressive, the way I want her. When I finally pull away, she magically has a condom in her hand, like some sort of sex magician, and together we’re pulling my shorts down and rolling it on. “Probably eight, now,” I say, yanking her to the edge of the counter and sinking deep where it’s paradise and perfect even for the fifth time in twelve hours.
“How is it this good? I don’t remember it being this good.” I’m already panting and sliding my hands under her ass, angling her hips to go even deeper and pulling her into me with every thrust.
“Your dick,” she gasps before licking up my neck and tugging on my earlobe with her teeth, “is insane”.
I hope this is a good thing, because I feel this all the way down to my balls. “Fuck, Lina. This is going to be fast. Touch yourself. Please.”
She wedges one hand between us and the other under her shirt, rubbing herself, fondling her own nipple, and gets herself there with an admirable efficiency.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah,” she breathes, her body already tightening around me.
Somewhere in my lizard brain I remember she likes a sharp bit of feeling, and since both my hands are occupied under her ass, I bend and bite down on the fleshy spot between her shoulder and her neck.
“Coming,” she cries, and the spasms of her inner muscles bring me over the edge.
“God. Fucking. Damnit.” I’m saying in between clenched teeth, in between thrusts, finally pulsing into her.
Lina takes my face in both of her hands and gives me one more kiss, and I fill it with passion and trust and heaven and tongue.
“One minute left,” she tells me after pulling away, but I’m mesmerized by the indentations I’ve left in her shoulder from my teeth. I trace it with my finger.
“Thirty seconds,” she says, and I reluctantly grab the condom by the base and pull out.
I give her one more peck on the lips. “I’m glad we’re doing this,” I tell her, and secretly myself. I can’t help but give her a big hug, wrapping her in my arms, because I’m a big sap and I feel full of feelings.
“Me too,” she whispers, then “we have to move,” to my dick, which is currently hanging pleased yet sad and droopy and out of commission for a while between us.
One last peck, and we both move to our respective bathrooms, and I manage to get cleaned up before I hear tapping on the front door again.
I walk over and swing the door open to my daughter, who is holding two travel mugs with pride. “Wow,” I tell her, so very impressed, taking them from her hands. “Great problem solving. That was a really smart idea you had, to pack it in travel mugs.”
She nods solemnly, taking all the credit. “Sorry I took so long. We couldn’t find them.”
“No worries. Thank you so much for this, Frankie.”
Frankie wedges herself into the house. “Are you ready to go? We should hit the road soon.”
“Where are you trying to be so quickly?” I ask her, taking a sip of the surprisingly well-made coffee.
Lina walks out into the living room, radiant and glowing. I enjoy a brief moment of smug satisfaction that she looks like that because of me. “Hey, girl,” she tells my daughter.
“ Morning ,” Frankie screams, running to wrap herself around Lina’s waist. “I brought you coffee, Tita Lina.”
“Thanks, gorgeous,” she replies, squeezing back, and this image, at eight in the morning on a Sunday, of Lina hugging Frankie in the kitchen and holding a coffee that Frankie made for her is just a little too much. Especially considering the events of last night and our conversation minutes ago. I experience a spike of panic, of fear, that I’m making a really big mistake, but then Frankie is asking Lina to do her hair and Lina is dragging Frankie into her bathroom and Frankie is screaming at me to pack so I don’t really have time to have an anxiety attack.
* * *
The seven of us are all standing in the driveway, standing around our cars, chatting and laughing about nothing in particular. No one wants to be the first one to pop the magical vacation bubble by saying goodbye and driving away, so we’re lingering, but it’s become an hour long linger at this point. I, for one, am certainly not ready to leave Lina and this whole Relaxing thing we’ve been doing, so I twirl my car keys around my finger and bring up new discussion points and stalling tactics in the way a parent of a five-year-old can be a professional at.
Frankie is all but tearing her hair out, doing the cataclysmic whine thing.
“Okay,” I finally relent, after a final round of hugs. Lina sneaks a pinch to my butt during ours. “Get in the car, Frankie.”
“Thanks again, Tita Gloria,” I murmur to her, bending down for one final hug. “We did really need this. All of this. I appreciate you.”
She squeezes around my waist, because that’s how short she is. “ Mahal kita ,” she says simply, then blows a kiss to Frankie and slips away.
I make eye contact with Lina one last time before she ducks into Ollie’s rental.
“Call me later?” she mouths, holding her thumb and her pinky up to her ear, like it’s 1999 and I’ll have to call the landline when no one is using the internet.
“Yeah,” I say, and we pop our magical vacation bubble.