Price
It’s nothing new to me that my decision-making skills leave a lot to be desired.
Right now is one of those moments, because I’m following Daisy through the foyer of The Black Swan bed and breakfast instead of leaving her at the door and walking away.
A quick goodnight, nice to meet you, glad you’re safe…any of these would have worked. Then I could have turned and left, knowing the little bundle of hotness was safely back in her room, destined to be the fuel for an angry beat-off session in the shower back at camp.
Instead, my eyes are digging into the soft flesh of her lower ass cheeks hanging out the back of her shorts as she turns her face over her shoulder, holding a finger to her lips in a ‘shhhhh’ gesture, then points to a door at the top of the stairs.
“Follow me. My room is right there.”
Fuck me. My boots make clunking sounds on the wooden stairs, no matter how softly I try to step.
Daisy digs in her bag, retrieving a single key attached by a silver ring to a small, stuffed black swan, and aims it unsteadily at the door knob.
“Jussa sec.” Her balance seems to be deteriorating with each step.
I knew I shouldn’t have bought her another shot.
She gives me another one of her ‘shhhh’ gestures, only this time she adds a wink, and I already know this girl could ask me for my left nut, and I’d gladly deliver it to her on a silver platter. “The knob keeps moving.”
She taps the tip of the key all around its intended target, missing the jagged key slot four times before I can’t take it anymore.
“Here.” I slip my hand over hers, guiding the key into the slot, pushing it in as my mind takes the moment to think of how my dick would feel sliding into her soft silky warmth.
“You’re susha a gennleman,” she slurs with a cute little crinkle of her nose.
“You don’t know me. I’m no gentleman.”
Get your ass out of here before she can invite you in.
The door swings open, sending Daisy falling forward as her balance gives way. I catch her in the crook of my arm with a grunt, just inches before her face hits the floor. Holding her soft, curvy body against mine sends my balls into spasm.
“Mrs. Kelsey said after ten is quiet time.” She holds a finger to her lips, tipping her head twice in an invitation for me to come into her room.
Leave, asshole. You need to leave.
My feet ignore my brain. I set her onto her feet and lead us both, my arm still clutching around the soft skin of her exposed midriff, through the door and into the room.
Inside, it’s like a flower shop exploded. Everything that is not made of antique oak is a fury of floral patterns in pinks, lavenders and greens.
Daisy drifts away from my grip, leaving me staring around the ample bedroom, feeling like a two-hundred-and-seventy-pound sore thumb sticking out in this feminine space.
“You wanna drink?” She spins on her boot toward a bottle of Chardonnay that sits corked on the top of a small round table against the wall. She drops her bag on the floor next to the bed as she takes a few swaying steps toward the wine. “It came witha room.”
“No. And you don’t either,” I growl as she turns, staring at my mouth.
I sidestep, reaching out to snatch the bottle away, setting it on the floor by the closet door.
“But—” She looks like I took away her favorite toy, but she’s had enough. I can’t shake the low burning anger in my gut that she’s let a stranger into her room with her half in the bag.
What if that bald asshole had walked her back? Or any of the myriad lecherous locals that had their eye on her back in the bar?
“No buts.” I turn in a slow circle, spotting a six-pack of bottled water on the floor next to an open suitcase. “This is what you can drink.”
I step that way, taking a moment to memorize her scent, the way she makes me feel, all of it. I want to remember all of these moments, because I know this can’t go anywhere, and for the rest of my life I’ll be wishing things could have been different.
What’s one night? One last sendoff…
I crack open the twist-off cap, battling my urges and my conflicted conscience, then hold it to those puckered pink lips. “Drink. You need to hydrate.”
She keeps her lips shut for a beat, but I stand steady, nodding at her to comply, and with a roll of her eyes she draws a swig of the water into her mouth.
“One more,” I say as she blinks, giving me that doe-eyed look that could get her anything she asked for if she really tried.
I hold the bottle up, letting her take a long drink until I’m somewhat satisfied she’s got something other than alcohol in her stomach, then set it on the table next to her bag.
God, she’s fucking gorgeous, standing there with a single drip of the water traversing down her chin. I already know walking out that door is going to be painful. How will I function, knowing she’s out in the world without me?
Seeing other men. Fucking other men.
Christ, no, I don’t want to even imagine that. I’ll choose to believe she’s a fucking nun before I think of her in someone else’s arms.
That first moment I touched her, emotion surged through me, the same intensity as the first time I saw my daughter.
Those deep brown eyes watch me, and even through the alcohol I can see she’s no bimbo. The Daisy Duke stripper outfit aside, this girl is smart and alive. What’s a girl like her doing in Ompotomic, Michigan?
My mouth waters as she toes each of her boots off the opposite foot, then picks them up and sets them neatly next to her open suitcase.
“Isn’t this room great?” she asks, running her finger over a palm-sized, blooming pink rose on the wall.
I draw a breath through my teeth, taking note of her smile, watching her finger trace the petals of the wallpaper rose, imagining it tracing my lips, dancing down my neck, my chest, ending at the straining button of my pants, popping it open, then working the zipper down…
Lost in my progressing fantasy, I realize I didn’t answer her question.
“You’re in it, so yeah, it’s great.” That’s the truth, and from the way she’s biting into her bottom lip, something I said is working for her.
“You look a little out of place.” She steps my way. In her bare feet she’s a couple inches shorter than in the bar and our size difference is almost ridiculous.
My pulse hammers as I tell myself to step back and ball it out that door, but my feet are stuck rock solid on the pink and green rose-patterned rug.
I curse my moral compass, because all I want to do is drag this precious morsel over to that floral nightmare of a bed, rip off those shorts, and destroy that tart cherry like a wrecking ball.
I’d nut in three strokes, I’m sure. I’d fill her like a fucking bull.
“There’s a bed,” she chirps, with a little teasing sashay of her hips, and sweat trickles down my spine. Our proximity to a bed has my windpipe clogging with all the filthy things I want to say to her.
“Yeah, you should get in it,” I grumble, already knowing my heart has signed on the dotted line with this girl and the memory of her will haunt me to my grave.
“I should, you’re right. You should lay down with me. My big brother could tell me a story while I fall asleep.” She slides her hand down the flat of her chest, jiggling back and forth, and I can’t tell if it’s the booze or her just being a tease.
I bet it’s both.
“I should go,” I hear myself say as her eyes start to flutter, her head swings around on her neck like a bobblehead, knees buckling. Jesus, she’s passing out. I lunge forward my hand slipping around her middle as I groan and my eyes devour her fertile body before she hits the floor.
Panic sweeps through me. Once again, that thought that someone else could have come back here with her assaults me like a bullet to the chest.
Pulling her against me, her limbs are limp in my arms, her lips parted as fear ices my veins. “Daisy,” I hiss, realizing I don’t know her name.
I tell myself she’s just had too much to drink. She’ll sleep it off and wake up thirsty and craving a greasy burger, but seeing her in my arms, helpless and unconscious, has me as unsteady as I was that time Hailey dove into the swimming pool at her mother’s house and sank to the bottom.
This morsel of a girl is going to rip my heart out. That, I already know, and something else I know is I’d gladly let her, if it wasn’t for the promises I made to myself and my daughter.
“Daisy,” I say with more vigor this time, lowering her onto the bed on her side, tilting her head so that if that alcohol decides to turn her stomach inside out, she won’t choke.
I brush the backs of my fingers across her forehead, pushing a silky strand of that rich, coffee-colored hair behind her ear, cursing myself for buying her another drink.
God, I could take her right now. If I was a worse man, I’d strip her down to her birthday suit, spread her thick thighs and do as I please.
My fingers trail down. Over her temple, her jaw, traversing the side of her neck until I follow her collar bone to where her sternum begins.
Just a little lower and the billowing flesh of her breasts could be in my hand. God, I shouldn’t be here. I should have left her at the door. Or I could just beat off while she sleeps, leaving a surprise all over her tits and face to remember me by.
Jesus, the thought has me ready to nut right here.
A blip of anger smolders inside me. This isn’t fair. Meeting this girl, now, when my life is off limits to a relationship. What would have happened if she hadn’t passed out, and things…happened?
She’d expect more from me? Be a boyfriend and a good man? Fucking understand the nuances of a romantic relationship? I’m not even the drunk one, but I’m spinning and intoxicated. Confused and—
A smile crests her pink lips as her eyes flutter open, hazy but focused on me, and she says, “Guess you’re a gentleman after all. You could have done whatever you wanted with me…passed out.”
Jesus. This girl.
“You’re faking?” I grimace. She’s testing me for sure. “Don’t ever do that again, or I’ll turn you over and ripen that ass of yours.”