AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I settle into a corner chair, refusing to be forced out of the room. I intend to sit here, watch my crappy TV show she hates and completely ignore her so she can see she has no effect. Although, admittedly, the way I jumped away from her was a point in her favor.
I sip my beer, settle the bottle back on my leg and try to focus on the TV. But from the corner of my eye, I see Simone lean over to rummage through the tote she brought down. I cut a glance at her to see she’s pulled out a bottle of lotion, and not just any lotion. A special brand that I buy her that smells like cherry blossoms.
Putting my focus back on the television, I hear the click of the bottle opening and I can see her moving, rubbing lotion on her legs and arms. The sweet scent reaches my nose and fuck if that doesn’t make my dick take notice.
She’s a witch and she knows all the subtle ways to seduce.
“Can I ask you a question?” she asks.
I refuse to look at her. Refuse to answer.
Simone sighs. “I just want to know if you’d have sex with me tonight.”
There’s no stopping my head from turning her way. “What?”
“Sex. I want to have sex with you. I miss having sex with you. So will you?”
Yes!
“No.” My head swings back to the TV, but it’s not enough to just deny her. I need to start breaking down this eternal optimism she has for us. “Besides, I told you before… you lost your shine.”
“Nowould have sufficed,” she pouts. “You don’t have to be a jerk.”
“Apparently, I do,” I mutter before taking a long pull on my beer.
She doesn’t reply, doesn’t move. Several minutes go by before she lets out another sigh and then reaches over to her tote. I refuse to peek but from the periphery, I can see she grabbed something from the bag and she settles back onto the couch.
A buzzing sound fills the air and it forces me to look at her, my curiosity just too fucking sensitive.
My jaw drops when I see she’s got a vibrator in her hand. Purple, about six inches in length and a fairly thick girth. I know it well because I bought it for her probably a year ago and I use it on her from time to time. She runs the tip of it casually along the top of her thigh, then back down again, her eyes pinned to it.
“You know,” she says softly, her gaze lifting to meet mine—assured I’ll be watching. “I’d really love to crawl on my hands and knees to you. I’d kill to take you in my mouth. I’d make you see stars, baby.” The fingers on my free hand curl into the chair’s upholstery. “But I know you don’t want me like that since I’m not shiny anymore.” Simone changes the trajectory of the vibrator and it slides along the inside of her leg where she rubs it along her panty line. “Guess I’ll just have to take care of myself.”
My cock swells to aching proportions and I cannot stop watching her. She lets her legs fall open, uses her delicate fingers to pull her panties to the side so she can—
I lunge out of the chair, spilling my bottle of beer and cracking my knee on the coffee table. I abandon the beer and try not to hobble through the living room and down the hall to the master bedroom.
I slam the door behind me, locking it for good measure because Simone can’t be trusted. I pace with agitation. Christ, she knows how to rile me up, and there is nothing in this world I want more than to go back out there, put her across my lap and blister her backside with my palm before fucking her hard. It’s what she wants me to do. It’s what she’s goading me to do.
I hear something and freeze.
Was that laughter? She’d have every right to be amused over my hasty retreat and I’ll let her have this joke because she played that perfectly.
I tip my head but I can’t tell exactly what I’m hearing. Ever so carefully to not make any noise and with much thanks that this house was recently renovated so there are no squeaky hinges, I unlock the door and ease it open just an inch.
The soft sounds of weeping reach me and it feels like my chest cracks right down the middle. Out of all the fights we’ve had the last few weeks, Simone has held a stiff upper lip. She only cried once and that was the day I left, although I suspect she might have done so in private. She’s a proud woman and likes to be strong.
The desolation within her soft sobs makes me question what kind of monster I am. Because no matter how much it kills me that I’ve hurt her, I’m not changing my mind about anything.
Quietly, I shut my door again and lock it.
Moving to the bed, I sit on the edge and open the drawer of the bedside table. I pull out the thick hardback book. The dust jacket is bright white and on the front is a black-and-white picture of my father. The publisher chose to go with a candid taken during his trial. It was of him sitting at the defendant’s table, leaning back in his chair to talk to me and my mother as we sat in the front row. My stomach cramps seeing eight-year-old me sitting there, in my Sunday suit with my hair slicked down. I look terrified and out of place. My dad is smiling, holding hands with my mom, propped on the low wall that separates the front of the courtroom from where the public sits. He does not look like a man on trial for multiple rapes and murders but rather a good father and husband who has been separated from his family.
Nausea wells and bile surges up my throat as I read the title of the book. “Chip Off the Old Block.”
I don’t know how much input Arco had into this book. I only know he sold his prison diaries to a biographer, but the title is a direct message to me.
When I visited my father in prison before he died, he knew exactly why I was there and he played right into my fears. Arco sat across from me, thick, bulletproof glass separating us. We communicated through a phone, but it didn’t lessen the crudity of his words.
