Pushing the Limit

Peppermint

Both Skylar and Allie have their eyes on me as I try to focus on stocking the liquor bottles. Allie whispers to Skylar, and she giggles.

“Do not stand there talking about me like I’m not here.”

“We’re just wondering if you should go change your panties,” Allie comments.

“Yeah, those might be a little wet,” Skylar snickers.

A little wet? That’s an understatement. Pretty sure a fucking waterfall came from my pussy when Dash kissed me. Surprised it didn’t overflow onto the bar and down to the damn floor, flooding the whole damn place.

“Ha. Ha. You two are so not funny.”

Davina walks in, followed by Lina, Carson’s ol’ lady. “What’d we miss?”

“Not a word,” I warn.

“Oh nothing,” Allie says. “Just that Peppermint has the hots for Dash.”

“Oooh nice!” Davina comments. “He’s a sexy fuckboy.”

And that’s all he would be for me. A fuckboy. A temporary release. And what happens when I want more? When he’s ready to move on and settle down with someone his own age?

“I don’t have the hots for Dash,” I deny, feeling my cheeks heat.

“Hmmm, what was it that you told me?” Allie asks. “That I was being a chicken shit? Yeah, that sounds right.”

“There’s a huge difference in you going after your baby daddy and me hooking up with a dude more than ten years my junior.”

“Dash is like twenty-three or something,” Lina says, seemingly oblivious.

“Yes,” I nod. “And I’m almost thirty-seven.”

Davina shrugs and takes some bottles to the shelf. “I don’t see the problem. You’re both consenting adults. He’s not underage. And from what I’ve heard, he’s definitely not some innocent little virgin.”

Another reason I need to steer clear of him. I’ve been with two men my whole damn life. One was my husband and the other…well…he could’ve been everything. I had been so swept up in him and the fact that a male aside from Ryan was showing me attention.

We had this frenzy of an affair, because yes, I cheated on Ryan with him. He wanted me to leave with him, get out of Birmingham. I wanted to. More than anything at the time. But I found out I was pregnant, and the baby wasn’t his. The timing just wasn’t right.

When it came down to it, we hardly knew each other, so there was no way he would’ve wanted to be tied down to a seventeen-year-old chick with a baby on the way. I stayed with Ryan, married him, and we had a decent marriage. I wouldn’t say I was unhappy, but I don’t know that I was completely satisfied either. Guess you play the best hand you can with the cards you’re dealt.

“You need some spice in your life, woman,” Skylar encourages. “When was the last time you dated someone?”

“Not that she’d be dating Dash,” Davina teases.

“I agree. He’s not really dating material, but who needs dates?” Allie questions with a laugh.

“I do,” I say. “Or at least it would be nice.”

I can’t imagine Dash taking me out to dinner or to a movie. When…I mean, if he gets what he wants from me, I doubt he’ll stick around. Too many other willing women hanging at the clubhouse for him to pursue me.

“Well, I say give in, Peppermint,” Skylar says. “Don’t worry about the dates or anything else. You are a beautiful woman, and you deserve a man who will do everything in his power to please you. From the looks of that kiss, that man is Dash.”

That kiss. Damn, I felt it all the way to my bones. My body immediately responded, which it always seems to do when he’s within five feet of me.

Maybe Skylar and everyone else is right. Why should I deny something I want — especially when that something has made it explicitly clear he wants me too?