Queen, page 18
“I need help,” she said softly.
“I think I’m the one who’s going to need help,” he said with a grin. Then he stepped forward, straddling her legs and gently pushing her backward onto his bed.
His hand encompassed her foot, stroking and then lifting it gently as one sock came off with a yank and then the other followed. He crawled onto the bed, pulling gently at the buttons on the front of her jeans. One gave way…then another…and another.
Her eyes widened and her breath shortened as she watched him coming toward her, but there was no time to think as he stretched out beside her and covered her lips with his own. She reached up, her arms tightening around his neck and back, holding on to what was being offered, sighing with pleasure as her fingers found firm flesh.
His mouth took everything from her including sanity, grazing lightly across the curve of her lower lip, taking it into his own and sucking gently before moving across it completely and staking claim.
His tongue ventured forward, tracing the edge of her teeth, then the roof of her mouth, then rocking in and out in an indecent proposal she could not refuse. Aching in places she couldn’t reach, Queen guided his hand instead, begging him without words to make it better.
Following her lead, his fingers moved across the flat plane of her belly and then slid beneath the elastic on her underwear to the pleasure beyond. His own needs increased to the point of pain as she sighed and arched, moving toward his touch, begging him in ways as old as time to release the tiger that he’d teased.
His fingers swept across the soft petals of her flesh and slid into the folds, then stopped, aware that things were moving too fast. He shuddered in response to her moans of pleasure and then moved his attention back up her body in a desperate attempt to regain control.
Her breast felt lush beneath his hand, and when he covered the soft brown areola with his lips, then rolled the nipple between his teeth, the tiny pain made her cry aloud.
“More…no more,” she whispered, unaware that she’d asked for two different things.
He raised his head. She stared up into a blaze of blue and got lost on the way back. His lips were moving, saying things on which she could not focus, promising things for which she dared not hope.
Instinct prompted her to hold on to what was hers. She reached up and cradled his head between her hands, urging him to fulfill the promises he was making. His hair was black and soft beneath her fingers as she gripped thick handfuls of midnight in the full light of day.
The ache between her legs was worse, the heat higher. She felt herself melting and knew from the look on his face that it had only just begun.
“Lady…my lady,” he whispered, and loved her with a look that made her hunger for more.
Queen moved, and then her hands slid between their bodies, her fingers tugging at the soft white band of his briefs.
“Oh, God…baby wait! Let me…”
He rolled away enough to allow her access to free him and then a heartbeat later wondered if he’d gone mad by doing so when she took him in her hands.
“No…let me,” she whispered, and encompassed the hard thrust of his manhood, sliding satin over steel in one smooth motion.
“Queen!” The cry came from his heart. He closed his hands over hers and guided her actions until he lost track of everything but the feel of her hands upon his body. Shuddering, he shut his eyes against the urge to give himself up. But he’d dreamed of this too long to let it happen this fast.
She stroked him to the point of combustion. Cody was going blind and didn’t care. In a matter of seconds it would be over unless he regained control.
“No, you don’t, lady. It’s not going to end like this.” He groaned and rolled away from her touch.
Lost in the pleasure that loving him was giving her, Queen didn’t expect his retreat. Before she knew it, she was devoid of the rest of her clothing and lay bare to his gaze, awaiting his pleasure…and hers.
Cody fumbled in the bedside drawer, slid fully out of his clothes and into protection, then rolled back on top of her before she had time to get cold.
Queen inhaled, closed her eyes, and let her hands roam at will across the body of the man who had staked his claim. His weight pressed her down onto the mattress as the hard thrust of his sex pressed against her legs. She moved, wanting him closer, needing the empty place in her body as well as her heart to be filled.
Cody relished the feel of her beneath him, aware that for the moment he had total mastery over her body, and then knew when she opened her eyes and looked up at him through a green veil of tears that he was the one who was bound. Bound by love and the goodwill of a Queen.
“No more waiting,” he whispered, and slid a knee between her legs, opening the way for him to come in.
She sighed. He was right. It was time.
He paused, stared down into the eyes of love, and then moved with a smooth, powerful thrust, sliding through as swiftly and surely as if it had happened a thousand times before.
She arched beneath him in reflex and shuddered at the feel of so much man within her.
“Cody?”
It was a question as well as a plea.
“I’m here, baby,” he whispered, and braced himself above her, unwilling to burden her any longer with his weight. “I won’t let you down…and I won’t let you go. I swear.”
With that he began to move, slowly at first to allow her body time to accept him. He swallowed a groan at the hot, tight fit and knew that few, if any, had gone before him. But the clutch of her hands on his arms, and then across his back, urged him forward…deeper…faster.
Pleasure came first. The knowledge of being loved, the feeling of a need being fulfilled. And then pleasure gave way to compulsion as their bodies began moving on instinct, no longer able to control the inevitable.
Her blood felt thick, pushing itself through her veins in a constant but building pressure as he moved within her. And then in a sudden and blinding flash of need, it no longer became possible to think of what was coming because it was here. Instinctively she wrapped her legs around him, a subconscious effort to stay on firm ground when she knew she was about to fly.
“Let it happen,” Cody begged. “You won’t be alone…I’m with you all the way.”
It was all she needed to hear. The last vestige of her restraint shattered along with her sanity as the flashfire of pleasure exploded.
And just as he’d promised, Cody groaned and then, with a single last thrust, spilled himself inside her and collapsed across her body, shuddering from exhaustion.
As she lay beneath him, he felt her body tremoring in the dying throes of spent love. He raised up on his elbows and stared intently, yearning to see past the body to the soul inside.
Her hair was an auburn fan of thick, damp curls that spread across his arms as well as the pillow beneath her head. Her eyes were wide with dissipating shock, as if she still couldn’t quite comprehend the magnitude of their joining. And her body still held him, unwilling to lose what had given so much pleasure. But it was the look in her eyes, and the tears that ran freely, that moved him beyond words.
He leaned forward until their foreheads were touching, cradled her face within his hands, and pressed constant but fleeting kisses across her cheeks, her eyelids, and her mouth, telling her in the only way he had left that she meant everything to him…that she was everything to him.
Peace had come to Queen suddenly, without searching, without warning, in the guise of love, at the hands of Cody Bonner. She sighed. It had taken so long, and she’d come so far. But if she’d known it would be this easy, she might have gotten here sooner.
“I’ll be right back,” he said, and rolled away, headed into his bathroom. Moments later he crawled back into bed with her.
“Cody…”
“No pressure, remember,” he whispered, and slid an arm beneath her neck and pulled her against him. “Rest. There’ll be plenty of time to talk later. Right now I just want to feel the love.”
Feel the love. What a simple yet overwhelming way of expressing what had come and gone between them. Queen smiled, dug a place for herself in the bed beside him, and let the feeling roll over her, too. Just before she dozed off she remembered thinking that he’d been right. The love was there, if you knew where to look.
She’d been awake forever, just watching him sleep as he lay flat on his stomach, one arm sprawled out across her upper body, the other tucked beneath his pillow. She leaned on an elbow, brushed away a wing of black hair from his forehead, and kissed a small scar on his shoulder while marveling at the strength and length of him. She smiled to herself, remembering that her first impression of him had been of his boots, abandoned on the bottom of the stairs.
I was right. It took a big man to fill them.
She looked at his legs, so strong and lean, and thought of a time when he’d been hurt and broken. She could have wept at the idea of him in pain. Then she remembered how fast he had traveled through the snow to come after her, to rescue her from Virgil Stratton, and of how he’d never stopped or given up his pursuit even though he must have been exhausted.
He moaned in his sleep and shifted, his arm sliding lower from her breasts to her waist, then tightening in automatic response to the move. Even asleep he wouldn’t let her go.
His hands, so broad and strong, yet gentle with his sons and so loving with her, had killed for her. She would never get over the feeling of waking up in the snow and hearing his voice and feeling his hands on her body and knowing that God had heard her prayers.
This man…her man…was worth fighting for, worth keeping. If she could get past a lifetime of doubts and remember that not every man was like Johnny Houston, then maybe…just maybe…they could make it work.
“I love you, Cody Bonner.”
But he didn’t hear, and later when he woke, she didn’t repeat it. It had been hard enough to say when she’d known he wasn’t listening.
It took hours for them to get out of bed and dressed. And the single most obvious need for doing so was his three sons, who were running up the driveway from the bus stop, tossing snowballs and verbal assaults back and forth as they came.
Queen spun from the doorway in sudden fright. “Don’t tell them,” she said.
Cody nodded. He didn’t have to ask what. And he didn’t have to ask why. What had happened between them was too new and fresh to share with anyone. Besides, what would he say? “Boys…today I slept with your aunt who’s not really your aunt.” Or better yet, “Boys…today I made love with the housekeeper, the woman who bakes your cookies.” Not exactly the sorts of things a father tells his sons, especially when the woman in question is not their mother.
Queen sighed with relief, uncertain of what she’d thought he would do but happy that he agreed with her enough to pretend nothing had happened.
They could have saved themselves the time.
Donny burst into the house ahead of his two younger brothers, eyes bright with laughter, cheeks glowing from the sharp wind, and headed for the stairs to dump his books before razing the kitchen for an after-school snack.
“Hi, guys,” he yelled as he ran past. Then something struck him as odd, and he turned on a dime and stared back at the pair who were standing on opposite sides of the room.
He backtracked into the room with a slight grin on his face, ignoring Will and J.J., who raced in behind him, slamming the door and barreling into the kitchen to lay claim to their snacks. Donny had suddenly realized there were more interesting things to do than fight for food.
“So…what’s new?” he asked, and dumped his books on a chair.
“Not much, son,” Cody said. “And I think that’s supposed to be my line. What’s new with you?”
Donny shrugged and turned his attention to Queen, missing nothing of her high color or the way she carefully avoided his father’s slow gaze.
“Boring day, hunh? What with this snow and all, I bet you never set foot outdoors, did you?”
Queen blushed furiously and then realized that they were falling into the little wretch’s trap.
Donny grinned. “Hot damn!” he shouted, clapped his hands together, and then started out of the room.
Cody rolled his eyes and shrugged. He should have known they would be helpless in the face of teenage ingenuity.
“Donny!”
Queen’s sharp tone stopped him in place. Thinking he was about to be reprimanded for his vocabulary, he sighed and turned.
“You forgot your books,” she said.
He grinned and wiggled his eyebrows Groucho Marx style, his favorite new thing to do. “Yeah…right.” And then he was gone.
“It’s not my fault—” Cody started to say.
Queen held up her hand. “Don’t bother apologizing for anything,” she said. “It’s no one’s fault. And we should have known we can’t hide hormones…not from someone with an overabundance of them.”
Cody burst out laughing. The description of his son was perfect. And she was right. He could no more hide what he felt for her than he could stop breathing.
“Shall we dine?” Cody asked, making fun of the fact that they were about to referee snack time in the Bonner household.
“No, I think I’ll leave the pleasure to you,” Queen said. “Surely I’ve got some mending…or patching…or something that needs my attention. I think you should join your sons and have a time of sharing. It will be good for you.”
He rolled his eyes. When those three were together there was no such thing as sharing; it was always more of a “go to your corner and come out smiling” sort of time, and she knew it.
“Thank you for the honor, my lady,” he said softly as she left the room.
She turned and smiled at the look he gave her. On the surface she knew he’d been teasing her for the fact that she’d dumped the care of his sons in his lap, but on a deeper level she also heard him thanking her for more than here and now. He was thanking her for the past few hours they’d spent in each other’s arms.
“It was my pleasure, sir,” she said. “My pleasure indeed.”
He stood for a long time, staring after her, and thought, No, that’s where you’re wrong, love. The pleasure was entirely mine.
As always in the mountains in winter, night came swiftly. Weary boys struggled through lessons and protested little when bedtime came. And as children will do, they sensed the change in their home without understanding it. Clinging to Queen as if she might suddenly disappear, Will and J.J. insisted on a nighttime ritual they’d almost forgotten: a bedtime story.
“How about me, guys?” Cody asked, seeing Queen’s exhaustion in the dark shadows beneath her eyes, remembering that a short time ago she’d suffered a severe emotional and physical trauma. He also remembered what they’d put each other through only hours ago.
“No…we want Queenie,” J.J. said, and then grinned at his father. “She does the sounds along with the story.”
“She does? Then maybe I should listen, too. I like stories with sound effects.”
“Yeah!” Will said. “You can sleep with Donny. We get Queenie.”
Queen flushed. There was no way she was going to look at Cody’s face. She knew him well enough to know that he’d be enjoying this greatly and at her expense.
“It’s fine with me,” she said. “I don’t care who listens, but they’d better be quiet.”
Cody knew that last jab was meant for him but wisely made no comment.
“And remember the rules,” she continued. “One story and then lights out.”
It took forever to get the boys settled. Even though she’d warned them, the war still came when it was time to choose the story. They argued until Cody was about to step in and settle it his way. Queen intervened—as always, the peacemaker.
“How about if I tell you a story instead?” she asked.
The novelty of the idea was enough to make everyone curious and quickly get in place, waiting for the show to begin.
Queen took a deep breath, suddenly certain of what she would say. She needed to tell her story…in her own words…and to the people she’d come to love. They had to know her world just as she’d come to know theirs. And they had to accept her for who she was, as well as what she’d become to them.
“Once upon a time…,” she began.
Cody grinned, unaware of the importance of the impending story until he saw the expression on her face and heard a tremble in her voice.
Donny sensed that more was about to happen than a little-kid fairy story, and he quieted instantly, shushing his brothers with a hiss and a look that brought silence to the room.
And then there was only Queen and her deep, husky voice, telling in a slow Tennessee drawl the story of the gambler’s daughters.
“…in a tiny town…far away in the Tennessee hills, there lived three little girls and their father, who was by trade a gambler.”
Cody caught his breath and tried not to stare at the sheen of tears in her eyes. If she cried, he would not be able to keep his hands off her, and he knew that she had to tell this story alone.
The boys listened, their eyes widening when she told them how the children were often hungry and many times never knew where they would sleep. And how they moved from town to town with their father, who was always in search of a better deal and a little luck, who would bet anything and everything he owned at the turn of a card. She told how the girls would whisper in their single bed, making plans for the day when they’d be grown and leave this awful life behind. Go somewhere to a faraway place where the air was clean and no one knew that they’d been poor.
“And the years went by, and the girls grew up, and a funny thing happened.”
“What? What?” J.J. and Will echoed each other’s questions, drawn to the story by the idea that three little girls had been motherless just like them.
“Just listen, and you’ll find out,” Queen said, gently hugging them against her. “Well! As much as they’d hated their father’s life and the way that they’d been raised, they found out that they couldn’t leave him as easily as they’d imagined. The tables had turned. They were still tied to him as they had been when they were children. But now it wasn’t because they were small and poor. They couldn’t leave him now because he was growing old, and he would have been alone. You see, along with the bad things in their lives, they realized that they’d had something very, very special as well. They’d had love. It held them together long after they were grown. And it held them together until the old man died.”
