Love’s Unselfish Gift Read online

  Corby nodded. “Suzy has a point. They had chemistry.”

  “Thanks,” Cassie said under her breath. “For your information, I trust Suzy and Mark.”

  Dumb blondes never looked dumber. That’s when it hit me. The Tellers and Mark were going to absurd lengths to keep me out of Alanzo’s bed. Something was up and someone had some answers to questions I probably needed to ask.

  “I appreciate your…” I paused while I tried to find the appropriate word. “Generosity,” I quickly added and almost laughed. What the hell were any of them thinking? “But I’ll probably pass on the offer.”

  Cassie looked at me with complete sincerity. “If you change your mind, we’re all willing to help. In fact, if you get lonely, I’ll send all three guys over here, and you can put them to work.”

  Okay, that was it. Undoubtedly, Cassie had lost her mind. Between the children and the men, also known as overgrown babies, Cassie needed some serious help. Maybe I’d recommend a shrink.

  Apparently, Corby, Steve, and Mark had fucked away her common sense, not that she was all that bright to begin with, but come on. No woman in her right mind would leave her man, or men, with me! It just didn’t happen in this town.

  Then, I thought of Marco. His love changed me and because of him, others learned to trust me, even Cassie, which was a great feat in itself.

  Cassie’s offer went above and beyond the call of friendship. It bordered along the lines of hilarious considering our past history.

  “Thanks for the offer, Cass, but we’d kill each other,” I said, flashing Mark a smile and then grabbing my purse from a teacart located near the door. “We might enjoy a few good times, but in the end one of us would off the other one.”

  After a group laugh, I walked outside and inhaled the fresh air. A light breeze carried the robust fragrance of autumn. Taking a deep breath, I closed my eyes and tried to remember what my gardener told me he planted last. The mix of lilies and chrysanthemums filled my senses, and, for the first time in ages, I felt rejuvenated.

  With a spring in my step, I didn’t look back after I unlocked the Honda. This was a day I wanted to remember. If for no other reason, I wanted to mark this date down as the day Cassie Teller tried to give back my ex-husband. Of course, she really didn’t want us to have sex, but I still found her offer quite amusing.

  I should’ve reminded her of the obvious. I wasn’t Wal-Mart and I didn’t offer a return policy. Sliding behind the wheel, I waved to the unusual trio staring back at me. Ah, Cassie, I thought, remembering our often tumultuous friendship. If you ever piss me off again, I’ll remind you of this moment.

  Oh well, if Alanzo didn’t want me. At least I had options. I wheeled the car toward the main road and tried to relax. Things were looking up. The day hadn’t started off half bad, all things considered.

  It was time to find Alanzo. I had a feeling he would welcome my apology. And I planned to grovel.

  Chapter Seven

  I pulled into my driveway and almost hit the real estate sign located at the edge of my yard. What the hell? I slammed the gearshift into park and decided I should’ve plowed over the damn thing.

  Sliding the gears into reverse, I backed up and decided what the hell. Revving the engine, I drove over the metal sign. Humph, I thought. Apparently the real estate agent didn’t understand the obvious—the occupant of the home didn’t want to sell unless she was permitted to buy.

  Glaring at the front porch, I stared at Alanzo for a few seconds, trying to remember I planned to issue a sincere apology prior to finding an oblong reminder in my front yard. The Giovanni family planned to sell, and they apparently didn’t believe in wasting time when they decided to move the fuck on.

  Opening the car door, I tried to contain the building fury, but some things weren’t easy to do when a woman dealt with volatile hormones. I tried to justify my behavior prior to pitching my fit and stormed toward the porch.

  “Where’s your mother?”

  “She’s halfway back to South Padre by now.”

  “I guess when you’re flying on a broom, travel and flight times vary.”

  He tried to conceal a smile. I started to ask him if he agreed but reminded myself that he was a momma’s boy, just like his brother.

  I stomped right by him and headed inside. I didn’t care if he stayed on my heels or took a hike all the way back to South Padre. Once inside, I yanked opened the refrigerator and found a covered pot roast with a note attached. I stripped back the aluminum foil and read my mother-in-law’s hand written note.

  I made your favorite meal. Eat something. You need to keep up your strength. Moving is a tedious task.

  Here I thought I couldn’t be angrier! I dumped the roast into the sink, jerked open the drawer for some silverware, turned on the garbage disposal, and started jabbing the meat and veggies down the large opening in the middle of the stainless steel drain.

  “Alanzo!” I shouted over my shoulder. “Call your mother and tell her I’m not moving.”

  I glanced outside and saw him there. He must’ve heard me because he glared back at me and then walked toward the detached garage. A few seconds later, I heard him start up the engine of Marco’s old Mustang, a car Marco purchased a month before he keeled over with a heart attack. I didn’t want this imposter, this man who pretended he cared for me driving that particular car.

  Rushing outside, I stood behind the Mustang and refused to move. The taillights blinked and I saw Alanzo adjust the rearview mirror. He shifted and I imagined he was cranking the window down. A few seconds later, he leaned out of the car.

  “Suzy, move.”

  Not in this lifetime.

  “If you think I’m going to let you drive a 1968 Shelby Mustang convertible out of this driveway, then think again.”

  He jumped out of the car seething, and, while the steam swirled from his ears, he said, “If you think I won’t drive that car, then you’ve lost your mind.”

  “Let me remind you. The house may be yours but the Mustang is mine,”

  Gritting his teeth, he stormed toward Marco’s SUV, the older model Lincoln his mother drove while she was in town. “And don’t think you’re going to drive that one either.” I rushed over and snatched the keys from his hand before he had a chance to disappear behind the wheel. While I was at it, I ran over to the old Ford and crawled halfway in the window and jiggled the key until I held it in the palm of my hand.

  That’s when I felt Alanzo’s hand come down straight across my bottom. Furious, I wiggled out of the car and glared at the culprit responsible for burning my ass. He didn’t look amused. He looked angry, hurt, and unwilling to discuss exactly what he was feeling.

  “What the hell was that for?” Outside of the obvious.

  “You deserved it,” he stated flatly. “When you act like a child, you can take your punishment like one.”

  I started to hit back. Then I decided I wasn’t going to waste my time until I took a moment to process everything happening here.

  Marching toward the house, I heard him say, “I guess you expect me to walk then?”

  “I don’t care what you do!”

  He followed me. Once inside, I returned to the task at hand and paid him no mind. I continued to discard the meat and carrots my mother-in-control left behind.

  “We both know that’s a lie,” he said.

  “What?” I focused on gouging the fork into the chopped meat and turned the disposal on once again. My hand rested on the small of my back while I waited for the grinding noise from the kitchen appliance to become a rattling gurgle.

  Yelling over the sound, Alanzo said, “You came back early because you wanted to apologize.”

  Stilled by his arrogance, I flipped the disposal switch and rushed by him, heading for the bedroom.

  “Suzy, this is absurd not to mention immature, especially for you, an aging woman,” he said without one hint of laughter in his voice.

  “How dare you?” I demanded, tossing a few of my things
into a suitcase and resenting the hell out of packing in the first place. Alanzo and his mother were driving me away from my home, sending me back to the very place I left in order to move in with Marco.

  Alanzo moved behind me. He bracketed his arms around me before I had the opportunity to put up a fight, resist the urges he somehow forced to resurface again. “Don’t fight me, Suzy. Make up. Kiss me, fuck me, but, hell’s fury, don’t you fight me.”

  Wheeling around, I slapped my hands against his chest. “What do you want from me?”

  He released me when I struck him. The obvious hurt etched its way across his handsome face. “You think I want what you had with Marco. I don’t. I want what you can have with me.”

  I pointed outside and easily saw the remains of the bright red real estate sign. My anger well founded, I screamed, “You want to sell my house!”

  “I want you to find your way home!”

  “This is my home!”

  “I’m your home, Suzy. Open your eyes and, damn it, quit trying to fight this thing we have.”

  “We have nothing,” I said, scooting by him. “You just came back here, and suddenly you feel entitlement. I can’t stand you!”

  “You love me. Maybe you’ve always loved me.”

  I shook my head and remembered where we stood. I was in the house I’d shared with Marco, steps from the bed where I’d made love more times than I could count. All I thought about then was falling onto that pillow-top mattress with Alanzo, the man I realized owned a huge chunk of my heart. Maybe he was right. Maybe I’d always cared about him and perhaps even loved him.

  “I’m going to love you, Suzy. You can fight me every step of the way, but it’s going to happen.” He looped his arms around my hips, drawing me up and holding my calves behind his back, even while I squirmed in what might have resembled resistance.

  What a joke. Turning away a man who could move inside a woman like Alanzo proved he could was like saying no to chocolate right out of the factory.

  His face didn’t showcase his satisfaction. Instead, he was solemn. “I’m going to love you today, tomorrow, and again next week. And if you fight me day in and day out, I’ll take the blows and count down the hours, maybe the minutes, even the seconds, until I make love to you again.”

  “Don’t do this,” I said, whimpering when I felt the bulge underneath me.

  “I can’t help myself,” he said, kissing my open mouth and caressing my face. “If I can’t touch you, my life is without purpose. I’ve waited too long for you, Suzy.”

  I didn’t understand how a man like Alanzo forgave a major slip of tongue, words mistakenly spoken at the wrong time. Now, here he stood, looking like all was forgotten. It was as if he ignored the fact I had called him his brother’s name in the heat of our previous tender moment.

  But all wasn’t forgotten. I was still in love with my husband. I would take years off my life just to have him back for a few hours. At the same time, when Alanzo’s lips covered mine and he kissed me into complete and undeniable arousal, I finally accepted another fact.

  No doubt about it. He was right. I loved him too.

  “Alanzo,” I breathed. “Make love to me.”

  “You couldn’t stop me if you tried.”

  * * * *

  My fingers wrapped around him once he covered us with the thin light-blue sheet. I pulled his length through my closed fist, working his hard dick up and down, marveling in the way his cock retreated into layers of skin and then pushed forward once more when I slid my hand down again.

  His slender fingers found the proof of my arousal. Working between my legs, two of his fingers plunged inside my vagina. Arching for him, I continued to stroke his thick cock. He locked his fingers high inside me and then moved away, inserting one finger and then three, switching each time until my body required much more than manual stimulation.

  Rolling over me, his eyes went to the headboard. I knew what he saw without turning to view the hooks. Marco once told me where he first heard about Domination and submission. Only, something told me Alanzo wasn’t his brother where Domination was concerned.

  “I won’t try to conform to the submissive role again,” I informed.

  “Trying isn’t necessary,” he said. “You are what Marco taught you to be and, whether you like it or not, this is what you need.”

  Before I realized he’d already prepared for a moment like this, he yanked a pair of handcuffs from under the mattress and clamped them around my wrists, attaching them to a pulley and then securing them on the hook behind me.

  “Oh, God, Alanzo. You can’t do this.”

  “Watch me,” he muttered, placing his thumb on my clit and applying the right amount of pressure. Tweaking and teasing, his fingers and the way he used them were remarkable, skilled, and oh so damning.

  “That’s it,” he whispered, lowering his mouth. “I want you to enjoy every second. Let me remind you of all the reasons you’ll always crave a man like me.”

  I didn’t want to remember. I wanted to experience.

  Wet with desire, I spread my legs. He then held them firmly against the mattress, trapping them under the weight of his muscular arm and making mobility impossible.

  The sexual tension continued to build. He watched me, staring first at my eyes, then moving his gaze down to my breasts. He apparently didn’t plan to touch them but preferred to observe the rise and fall of my chest without lapping at my nipples already burning for his lips.

  Then, he studied my pussy, fingering me while he hovered over me. He smacked his lips like he intended to feast but refused to eat.

  “Alanzo, don’t do this. I need to touch you.”

  “No,” he said, blowing a steady stream of hot air over my opening. “Let me touch you.”

  I struggled to push my hands together, bracing for the coming excitement, the pleasure Alanzo would bring, especially with the fundamental control he gained through domination. He bound me to the bed and refused to give me the one connection I now completely craved.

  Hooking his arms under my knees, he positioned himself in between my legs and continued to gape, studying my pussy and examining my reaction. His mouth opened and he took the first of many long, well-calculated swipes. Slow and easy, his tongue ran over the length of my folds, penetrating on occasion but only when absolutely necessary. He sipped at my lips when the teasing didn’t sate his thirst.

  “Alanzo, please, let me feel you.”

  “Shh,” he said. “You will, but first I’m going to drive you straight out of your mind.”

  On his promise, his jaw dropped and his tongue advanced, forging through my opening and then thrusting inside with a long and steady swipe. Feeling detached, I relaxed with my arms high above my head and my legs splayed.

  Kissing my mound, he muttered against my skin, “Watch me, Suzy.”

  What was he, nuts? I couldn’t look down the length of my body and gaze into those dark, lust-filled eyes. I refused to follow his request, afraid of what I might find when I stared into his knowing gaze.

  He raised my hips and stuffed a pillow under my bottom. Then he ate like he was hungry, sipped like he’d never tasted a woman capable of quenching his thirst, and he licked, God how he lapped, like he never planned to stop.

  The pleasure was building, but he pulled away, refusing to let me ride his tongue and grab hold of the climax threatening to shatter around me. Bracing for an overwhelming finish, I finally opened my eyes to the hot gaze watching for a satisfied reaction. He withdrew his tongue, and with a swat across my mound, he said, “You’ll look at me while I please you or else I’ll wait hours before I fuck you.”

  Hours? Did he really think he possessed that kind of control? Marco never had the discipline to resist me. I’d be a crazy idiot to think any man so physically aroused maintained enough self-control to use refraining from sex as a form of punishment. I closed my eyes again and dared him to try and defy the laws of logic, the needs stirring inside of him.

  I found o
ut rather quickly where brothers certainly maintained significant differences. And I discovered the truest of Dom-sub relationships.

  Chapter Eight

  “I warned you,” Alanzo said, tapping the end of a dildo right where the sun should never shine.

  “This has gone too far,” I complained. The toy locked inside my channel and hummed with various speeds. Maybe the batteries inside the vibrating monster realized the job at hand was a task one man fully expected performed.

  “I’m just getting started, baby” he said, shoving the toy higher and slapping my pussy with smart swats, timed and precise.

  A flood of excitement washed over me, and I braced for the finish. “You’re killing me, Alanzo. I need to come,” I whispered, begging for mercy.

  “I’ve never heard of anyone dying due to their inability to orgasm.”

  He slowly slid the toy away, replacing the device with his fingers taunting what had to be the mouth of a river, a flood waiting to happen. I humped at thin air, rising and falling against nothing in particular, aggravated and excited, a mix of emotions alerting my nerve endings and slamming the reminder into my tight chest. I realized his tongue would soon slide into place when he saw more evidence of my burning need, rising desire.

  “Damn,” I swallowed and continued to roll my hips forward, “I’m coming.” Without a tongue to swipe or a finger to guide, the climax I’d worked to achieve rolled forward anyway like an invisible hand moved over my body, persuading me to take what Alanzo worked to achieve and I longed to experience.

  Compliant, Alanzo used his tongue and reacted appropriately while his fingers performed. He worked his hand against my body with his mouth readily available. Lapping and growling with a famished man’s intentions, Alanzo let the lust stir him even though he continued to resist taking me, branding me once again as his own.

  “Alanzo!” I cried out, dying to wrap my legs around him, itching to feel his cock rippling inside me. Before I begged for specifics, he towered over me. His fingers twirled inside of me, working for complete satisfaction until I jerked one last time with the last tide to ride. Then he fisted his cock and slid inside.