I loved seeing her flustered, so I continued to stare at her.
“How long have you been standing there?”
“Long enough to check out your ass.”
“You check out my ass even when you know I’m looking.”
I shrugged. “True.”
She set the plate on the table. “Are you hungry?”
“I’m always hungry for pancakes.” I wrapped my arms around her waist and kissed her. “And you.” The ChapStick on her mouth tasted like vanilla, and I was starting to wonder if she did it on purpose. Her perfume was the same scent.
“Well, I take less time to prepare than pancakes.”
“Saves you time.” I squeezed her hips and pulled her tight against me, her tits pressed to my chest. I’d never tit-fucked her, and it was on my bucket list. But I really needed to fuck her soon. All this touching and kissing was going straight to my dick.
When she pulled away, she squeezed my arms, her favorite feature. “How’d you sleep?”
I didn’t dodge the question because she asked it so casually. It seemed like we were a married couple in the fifties. “Okay.” I made sure the door was locked twice, my nighttime ritual, before I was able to fall asleep. A baseball bat was tucked under my bed just in case. I didn’t have a gun in the house because those were more work than they were worth. I wasn’t afraid of Rome down the hallway. I wasn’t afraid of anyone specifically. My father had been gone for nearly ten years, and there was no one else on the planet who could cause me any harm. But the fear was ingrained in my skin like a tattoo. “You?”
“Like a pile of bricks. My god, that bed was so comfy. And those sheets…” She rolled her head back and closed her eyes like she was in the middle an orgasm. “I didn’t want to get up this morning. Plus, it’s so quiet around here. I’m used to rap music and car alarms in the background.”
When she rolled her head back like that, I immediately thought of one thing.
“Unfortunately, I’ve got to open the office and start a new day.” She sighed like it was the most disappointing thing in the world.
If she were mine, she wouldn’t work at all. I pictured her living with me, making me breakfast and dinner every day like clockwork. She’d take care of my laundry and hang up my dry cleaning in the closet. And when I came home, she’d give me a hard kiss on the mouth then fall to her knees to suck me off right in the entryway. After I showered and we had dinner, she’d straddle my hips on the couch and fuck me nice and slow, letting my dick enjoy every inch of that wet pussy. She would tell me she was mine and she’d thought about me all day while I was at work. And then, I would tie her up and spank her ass with my belt.
The thought came from nowhere.
She turned away and poured a mug of coffee before she sat at the table and sipped it. The newspaper was sitting there, and she was reading the comics. I assumed she would want to read about politics or national news. Inexplicably, I found her choice to be cute.
I sat across from her and poured syrup onto my pancakes. There were scrambled eggs and bacon as well. I took a bite and hid my surprise at how good it all tasted. Up until that point, she’d never cooked for me.
She kept reading.
I took advantage of her distraction to stare at her across the table, wishing the sweetness in my mouth wasn’t from the syrup but her lips instead. I didn’t want to go to work. I wanted to stay there and handcuff her to my bedpost.
One day, I would get the chance. But for now, I would just look at her.
“How’s Vanilla?” Jackson was restocking the bar when I walked inside. The club was closed during the early hours of the afternoon. Everyone had real jobs and real lives they had to get through before they could return to the place that made them feel most alive.
“Don’t call her that.”
“Why not? It’s not offensive.” He was dressed down in a V-neck t-shirt and jeans. His smug smile annoyed me because it was so similar to mine.
“It is when another man uses it.” Vanilla or not, she was mine. If anyone called her anything, it would be me. “You can refer to her as Rome—her name.”
Jackson grinned hard. “My god, you’re so far gone.”
“I don’t know what that means, and I don’t care to find out.”
“You’re so hung up on her, and she hasn’t even put out. Dude, you’re in love.”
I rested both of my hands on the counter made of glass. Blue lights burned underneath to give it an ethereal glow. “Shut the hell up and don’t say anything like that in front of her—if you see her again.” Which he wouldn’t.