For Ben (Corbin's Bend Book 6) Read online

  What had he done with malleable Roy? She lay sideways on the mattress, wondering where he’d disappeared to when he returned with an evil grin and of some kind of…rope?

  “What is that?”

  “Gotta love houses with a garage. Full of fun things. Sshhh, I think we will also say no talking. Can you manage that?”

  Oh, for masterful, sex-god Roy, she could. His trousers tented in the front enough to remind her his cock would stretch her and fill her. And her core ached for it. They’d played their games in college, too. They should never have stopped.

  He pushed her straight on the bed and removed her blouse and unfastened bra. “Four poster beds are perfect, aren’t they? I can tie you just right, like,” he looped a length of rope around her left wrist and bound it to one of the wooden posts, then the other, “like this.” Testing her bonds, he took another piece then looked at her legs with the pants at her knees and sucked in a deep breath. “You were already pretty bound, weren’t you?” Roy rested his palm on her lower belly and pressed and she gasped. He always knew where to touch her. “I’d ask your opinion, but, for once, we’re going my way. And I think my way is spread-eagled.”

  She shivered when he drew her pants off and fastened one leg to a bedpost. “Roy, I—” He rested a finger on her lips and she subsided. How had the power tipped so far in their relationship?

  “As soon as I get your other leg just right, we can get started.” He kissed her instep and finished up then stood back. “You look lovely. Are you comfortable? You may answer.”

  “Yes, I…yes.”

  His blue eyes darkened and he pulled his polo over his head and kicked off his shoes. Roy still had the torso of the athlete he’d been in college. He’d earned his undergrad degree on a baseball scholarship, his toned form catching the eye of too many coeds before he’d noticed her. She’d played hard to get to make sure she’d be able to keep him for the long term, afraid an easy catch would be easy to let go of.

  “Good.” His pants sat on hipbones framing his six-pack. She mentally urged him to keep going, but he left them in place and paced around the bed like a caged tiger. Waves of sexual energy flowed over her, and she bit back a whimper.

  Touch me, touch me. Please!

  “It’s been too long, Teri. I’d almost forgotten how nice you look at my mercy.” Sitting next to her, he traced her lower lip and bent to draw it between his, then nipped it. “I think my backing off on dominance, at least in the bedroom, has been a big part of the problem.”

  Maybe so. She lifted her head, trying to reach him for a kiss and he indulged her for a second before moving back to her breasts. He worked one nipple then the other, back and forth, sucking and licking one while pinching and rolling the other then switching off. After forever, he moved lower, gliding his lips down her abdomen and pausing to dip his tongue in her belly button.

  Roy rested a hand on her upper thigh, his fingertips grazing the edge of her labia. The torment ripped a groan from deep inside her and the pleas began again. Please, oh touch me. Flames ripped her apart, and a trickle of moisture rolled between her butt cheeks. Just as she thought she’d explode, he left her and moved to the foot of the bed.

  “I want to taste all that cream.” He paused. “Okay with you?”

  She nearly shrieked but feared if she did he would stop. Alpha Roy was not predictable.

  “No? Not yet?”

  She thrashed her head from side to side.

  “Okay, then. Let’s try something else first.” He bent and traced one long finger through her moisture and stuck it in his mouth. “Mmm. But I can wait.” Before her blurring vision, he unzipped his pants and drew them off then stepped out of his boxer briefs. Mounting the bed, he lifted one knee over her body and knelt over her face, his luscious cock bobbing against his belly. Roy lifted her head and poked the tip against her lips. She parted them, savoring his musky scent. “Atta girl, take a little more.”

  Teri obediently opened her mouth and he fed his dick to her, an inch at a time, filling her mouth with its salty tang. He rocked back and forward again, moaning. “You’re so good, deeper now, yes.” She eagerly accepted his cock, let him fuck her mouth while her pussy sent aching signals of need. Roy’s hands tightened in her hair and his balls banged her chin. “Too good,” he sighed, resting back on his heels. “I think it’s your turn.”

  She closed her eyes and silently cheered. While she loved his cock in her mouth, she wanted her pussy in his and he was too much taller than her for a sixty-nine to have ever worked well. When she peeked, he rested on the foot of the bed, gaze fixed between her open legs. No longer talking, joking, he skated a finger up her thigh to her slick pussy and tickled her. She squirmed in discomfort, wanting to demand he eat her, but this Roy didn’t seem as if he would respond to demands, and she was pretty sure if he left her hanging, she’d die. He lifted her with one hand and gave her an evil smile. “Your ass is still hot.”

  She wasn’t positive whether he meant from the spanking or if it was a compliment, but it didn’t matter.

  He surged forward and his mouth fastened on her pussy, sucking in her clit and nipping at her. He pushed one, two three fingers inside her, finger fucking her in time with his mad eating of her cunt. His late afternoon beard stubble scraped her sensitive skin and drove her mad. She bit down on her lip and strangled back any words. She wanted to come more than she wanted to talk or scream or wail her passion. She wanted to come more than to eat or sleep or ever breathe again.

  He fucked and sucked harder then yanked his fingers out and brought them between her butt cheeks. Sliding them back and forth from her pussy to her ass, he rubbed a thumb at her butt hole then breached it, stretching the opening.

  She flew over the edge into orgasm, shaking and quaking and unable to hold back her screams of pleasure. It all became too much, too intense, tipping from pleasure into pain and his thumb drove deeper into the back door they’d never used, not once, in all their years together.

  Roy lifted his head, his chin and lips shiny. He licked some off and gave her a lazy grin and she almost came again just looking at him. He nosed her and she arched off the bed, so sensitive she almost couldn’t take it. “I think we need to reconsider my fucking that tight ass soon.” He pulled his thumb out and replaced it with one, then two fingers, banging her ass and scissoring them inside her. “Mmm. I definitely think we should. You’re so hot, baby.”

  As she shuddered, he withdrew and moved up her body, resting her legs across his forearms and poised his cock at her entrance. With a thrust of his hips, he shoved inside, stretching her but not painfully. She was too wet for any discomfort except sensitivity. He lifted her bottom, the cheeks, still stinging from his attentions, resting in his palms. Somehow her sore ass was the sexiest thing she’d ever felt. Her bottom had become a focal point of their lovemaking. It was already his.

  Roy drove in and out, over and over and then looked down at her with a question in his eyes, and a vulnerability she hadn’t expected.

  “Do it.” She trusted him.

  “I love you so much.” He moved back and untied her arms, her legs then embraced her and lifted her hips higher. The head of his cock poked at her bottom and she shoved back, helping him breach the tight ring of muscles.

  “Ohhh,” She moaned as he drew back and rocked his hips, gliding deeper into her.

  He paused. “You, okay?”

  “So much better than okay.”

  Roy slipped a hand between them, supporting her lower body with the other, and rubbed a fast circle on her clit and she exploded in an orgasm like none ever before.

  Teri wrapped her arms around his neck and held on, relishing his strength, his passion, his words of love. With a final thrust, he filled her with his cum, searing her inside, shuddering and squeezing her against him. Then he released her and dropped panting onto his elbows.

  “I thought you needed lube for that,” she murmured.

  Roy toyed with a lock of her hair. “Don’t forge
t this was my first time, too. But as wet as you were…I figured we’d take it slow and see.”

  She lay under him, silent although she thought the don’t talk game over. She was just too relaxed, too happy, too at peace and full of afterglow to make the effort. When he rolled to the side and to his feet, she watched. Although the sun had not yet set, she was drowsy enough to fall asleep until morning but Roy disappeared then returned and lifted her in his arms. He carried her into the bathroom where he lowered her into a tub of warm water and washed her with a soft cloth and lavender bath gel. “I have no bones left.”

  He laughed and helped her out of the tub, dried her off and deposited her back on the bed.

  Teri frowned when he donned his undershorts and pants and sat on the edge of the mattress to pull on his shoes.

  “Come back to bed,” she said and yawned. “I want to cuddle.

  He laughed, as well he might. Of the two of them, she was not the cuddler. “I never thought I’d turn down that offer, but we need to be dressed when Ben comes back.”

  Ben. She shot up in bed. Their argument came back, fighting to break through the calm of the afternoon, but in a moment it stopped. Rather than being angry with Roy for sending him off with a woman she’d met once, she conceded she’d babysat Suzanna without thinking a thing of it—except a little panic at having two kids to keep alive for hours on end all by herself. Kirsten had been Melinda’s friend and what, assistant painter? And Ben was comfortable with her. More normal for him.

  No, what threatened to send her flying was the knowledge she’d forgotten about him for the whole time they’d been in the bedroom. Not even remembered somewhere out there was a little boy who would depend on her for everything for the next fifteen or twenty years. To clothe and feed and care for him. And she could put him out of her mind so completely?

  “Roy, maybe I am the wrong choice for Ben. I can’t be his mom. I—I forgot about him while we were, well, you know what we were doing.”

  He grinned at her but his eyes were serious. “Of course you weren’t thinking about him while we were intimate. And I hope you don’t plan to give up what’s between us because you have a new person to love. I will need your attention, too.”

  She dropped her head in her hands. “And how have I taken care of you? I’ve left you on your own to find your own dinner and missed our dates and cancelled our vacations. Roy, I haven’t seen Melinda in three years.” The tears came again. She’d cried more in the past few days than in her whole life. “And I will never see her again.”

  Roy sank beside her and bundled her into his arms. She cringed back, a little afraid he’d spank her again but he soothed, rubbing small circles on her back. “Sshhh. Melinda knew you loved her. Didn’t you chat every week on Skype? Didn’t you send her that rare paint whatchamacallit nobody else could find when she needed some odd blue for her work? Didn’t she name her son after you?”

  No longer hysterical, she gulped back a weepy laugh. “Poor Ben with a middle name like Terry. I tried to stop her.”

  He kissed her forehead. “But you couldn’t stop her because she loved you, too. For two ladies who almost never got together, who were as different as night and day, you two were tight.”

  She sniffled. “We were twins.”

  “You still are, I think. Your kind of bond, death cannot break.”

  The words resonated. “Do you think so?”

  He gave her a hug and set her on her feet. “Absolutely. Kirsten is bringing Ben back in a bit, and you’ll want to be dressed.”

  “You need a shower, too. We don’t look like respectable parents.”

  Roy stood and slapped her bottom. She yelped. It still stung.

  “Okay, Mrs. Respectable Parent. I’d invite you to join me but I don’t trust myself in the shower naked with you right now.”

  Teri arrived, dressed and shod in the living room as the doorbell rang.

  Chapter Nine

  When Teri opened the door, the two kids scooted in and Kirsten remained on the steps.

  “Thanks so much for taking Ben this afternoon, Kirsten. My husband and I… Well, thanks.”

  Kirsten stepped inside. “I understand. It’s hard to get alone time with kids. What a shame you will be moving back to the City soon. Ben and Suzanna will miss one another and we’ll each lose a great relief babysitter.” Her infectious grin lit her blue eyes and Teri had to join her.

  Glancing down the hall, where the kids had disappeared toward Ben’s room, Kirsten reached into her purse and pulled out a jar. “I thought I would offer you my favorite remedy. I noticed you were moving a little stiff in the park and it’s a big seller around here.”

  Teri’s cheeks heated as she took the salve and read the label. Lady Juneau’s Organic After-Balm. “I am afraid I don’t understand?” She prayed she didn’t understand. Did everyone in town know her husband had taken up spanking her?

  Kirsten frowned, but shook her head. “I don’t mean to interfere but the stuff helps. Especially after things get intense. I figured if you had any, you would have been more comfortable.”

  Her world tipped on its axis. Did she know? Did she not? Had Kirsten handed her after-spanking balm? “Umm, thanks. I was a little stiff earlier but a warm bath helped.”

  “I prefer mine tepid, but to each her own I guess. Anyway, it is good to know you are like the rest of us.” Before Teri could respond, she went on. “Isn’t your husband home?”

  “He’s in the shower.”

  “Great.” Kirsten led her into the living room. “I am glad to get you alone. I wanted to ask you something.”

  They sat side-by-side on the couch and Kirsten rested a hand on her arm. Teri tried not to shrink away. Next, she expected the other woman to ask her to a swinger’s party or something. What kind of kinky town had she landed in?

  “It’s about your sister’s mural. You know it’s not finished, and I thought, maybe, you would like to help fix that.”

  Damn those tears again. Melinda’s unfinished masterpiece would never be finished, not if it involved her untalented sister. “I can’t paint, I’m a businesswoman, not an artist.”

  “No, me either. I am a recipe blogger, a mom, and sometimes a teacher, not an artist at all.”

  How confusing. “But you said you were helping her with it?”

  Kirsten nodded. “It’s how murals are done. Your sister did all the complicated stuff and made a diagram. Basically, I had to color inside the lines using the indicated shade.”

  “It’s a paint by numbers?” That didn’t sound like her artistic sister at all.

  “Kind of, at least the parts left to do are. Melinda already took care of the rest.” Kirsten offered a wobbly smile. “I think it would make her happy to know her sister helped finish it for Corbin’s Bend.”

  Teri’s heart thumped in her chest. She couldn’t imagine anything Melinda would like less than her messing with her art. She’d destroyed a few masterpieces trying to “help” when they were young and had not improved since then.

  “Can I get back to you? I don’t know how long we’ll be here.” And why say no? Kirsten’s eyes held the same wet look she’d been viewing in the mirror all week. “And thank you for being her friend. I wasn’t much of a sister.”

  Kirsten stared. “Not much of a sister? She talked about you all the time. My sister the big success. I couldn’t wait to meet you after all the stories I heard.”

  “If I’d been a better sister, you’d have met me sooner.” Melinda had always painted her in a better light than she deserved. Paint. Hah. Another artistic talent her sister possessed.

  “Anyway,” Kirsten said, hopping to her feet. “We’ll get out from under your feet. Ben ate a big dinner and should be ready for a bath and bed in a little while. I’m so glad for the chance to get to know you, even if you aren’t staying long.

  “I am, too.” Teri sighed. “I haven’t had a woman friend in a while. I mostly work and barely make time for my husband. I don’t know why he puts up wit
h me at all.”

  “I do.” Roy appeared in the doorway, freshly showered. His light blue polo brought out the color of his eyes and outlined the cut muscles of his shoulders and pecs. If she hadn’t already been his wife, she’d have wanted to be. Or at least his lover. “You are beautiful, smart, and love children—or so I’ve recently learned.”

  “You just learned I am smart?”

  “No,” he moved toward her and helped her to her feet, wrapping an arm around her. “I’ve always loved your brains, and your looks but I was beginning to think you didn’t want to have a family.” Brushing his lips across the top of her head, he murmured, “And how tragic that would have been because I can see already how wonderful you are with our Ben.”

  Our Ben. “What did I ever do to deserve you?” She closed her eyes, savoring his clean, sandalwood soap scent and strength. “If I didn’t have you I’d be lost.”

  “Umm, guys?” Kirsten’s voice came from a distance away and she opened her eyes to see the woman standing by the kitchen door. “When I took the kids so you could clean up…you missed all the mess.”

  Teri hid her face in his shirt, fighting the laughter threatening to bubble over, then gave up and let it erupt. She clutched the cotton and allowed his strong arms to keep her upright while gales of over-the-top merriment flowed out of her. Finally it was all out and she cringed. “You are going to have me locked up, Roy, aren’t you?”

  “No, I think you’re going through some of the toughest days of your life and I’m glad to be here for you, baby.”

  Kirsten cleared her throat. “Since you are both going through rough times, I am going to clean up all this broken glass.”

  Teri twisted away from her husband, feeling better than she had in ages. “I can’t let you do that, Kirsten. Why don’t you sit down and I’ll do it and bring you both something cold to drink?” The kids’ noisy play assured her they were fine and she wasn’t so anxious for anyone to leave. Somehow the presence of Kirsten and her daughter helped her feel more normal—odd considering her usual “normal” involved being alone in her office. Or maybe she felt closer to Melinda in her home setting.