Man Of Few Words (2 page)

“Congratulations.” He slid money to the bartender when he delivered the drinks to them. “A toast to you. You want to move to a quieter place? We could catch up.” He looked hopeful as brown eyes bore into hers. She looked for a ring. None.

What good would telling him about her life do? What would it change? Nothing. Gone was the romantic past and the ideals of having children as they moved from base to base every three years. She’d matured into a woman who realized the benefit of staying in one place to develop a career. Today, she had a house, her father’s estate to close, and a job that promised a real future. She wouldn’t risk falling into a funk again when it was time for him to leave.

He wouldn’t be allowed to know any of that. She refused to be weak and melt for him. Suzy had urged her to be the party girl of the past, so Kirsten pasted that party persona on the outside as her heart cried for what she once lost.

The music carried her away as she said, “I’m here to celebrate, not to reminisce.” She wouldn’t do it. He’d not get the chance to hurt her again, because she knew, in no time she’d be right back in love with him and in his bed. That wouldn’t do at all.

Chapter Two

Duff kept his elbow planted on the bar as he watched the woman he’d always wanted saunter away toward men ten years younger and slightly leaner. Nothing about her fit this club. Her dark blonde hair didn’t have fashionable streaks of gold shot through it, and she wore clothes that covered her curves. The only skin she put on display was her face, a little of her neck, and her hands. The black pencil skirt she wore hugged her ass, still round and firm. Age hadn’t touched that part of her.

As her hips bounced to the music, his cock swelled. His hands itched to grasp those luscious globes and to free them from the confines of her skirt. This time of year, she wouldn’t have those tantalizing tan lines on her hips that always made him want to tug off her bikini bottoms.

She’d be his now if her father hadn’t interfered. Her hand would be on his arm as she smiled and talked. They’d be celebrating her new job together, not as strangers who’d not communicated for over a decade.

After a night of dining and dancing, he’d hold his own private party for her, making her moan with pleasure and leaving her sprawled across their bed after a night of sex. Beginning with a leisurely trip of his mouth from her breasts to her pussy, he’d not stop until she had four orgasms. His cock nodded its approval of his fantasy.

A promise and almost a dozen years had changed everything. He considered leaving the bar for a moment, and then tossed that idea on the fact that it looked cowardly. He knew he wasn’t the perfect image of a Marine, but no one could ever call him a coward. So, he took a manly chug of his beer, abandoned it on the bar, and headed in her direction.

He caught her eye as she turned, and if she were a super hero, the flames from her eyes would have burnt him to ashes. He’d faced worse in recent years and kept advancing. She turned her back on him, and one of the young ones took that as encouragement to grab her hand.

She snatched it back the moment Duff spoke next to her ear. “You’re right. Celebrate only. There’s no room for anything else, and I know better than to man-handle you.” Duff stared down the flight student across from him and waited for Kirsten’s answer.

“Fine, but none of that ‘when we were young’ thing.”

Duff laughed and motioned to the dance floor. “Of course not. We’re still young.”

“Well, I am.” She took his arm after setting her half-empty beer on a table. With her eyebrow arched high, she added, “I’m not so sure about you.”

The five year difference in their ages had loomed large between them and her parents when she was nineteen. Now, those years meant nothing. With her fingers pressing into his arm, his thoughts migrated to the times when they did more than hold hands. “I’m at the perfect age. Great stamina.”

Both of her eyebrows lifted, and a smile brightened her face. “Already angling to get a piece of ass? You move faster than you used to.”

“Nah,” he said as they joined the dancers who bounced to a song older than them. “But if we skipped right to that, we could be reminiscing and celebrating all at the same time.”

Her tinkling laughter carried over the pulsating music. “Hard to argue with that.”

“So don’t.” The younger Kirsten would say yes and damn the consequences. He’d mellowed with age, and he wondered if she had as well.

She twirled under his arm. “Tempting.”

He’d take that since it was better than an upfront no. With the music so loud that it reached the decibel level of a helicopter screaming forward at full speed, he gave her his undivided attention. She demurred at his first attempt to twirl her into his arms, keeping her distance. To get her to relax, he bumped her hip with his.

She laughed. “Duff, it’s not the seventies.”

He kept bumping the side of her hip. “We can start a trend. C’mon. Try it. You used to be good at hip bumping.”

With his next jut of his hip, she matched it. “I still am.”

He winked. “Knew you had it in you.” Together they laughed.

She moved to the front of him and grabbed around his waist. Her breasts pressed against his chest as she leaned forward. “No more moves like that. Regular dancing.”

His arms wound around her back. He pushed his hips forward. “Are you aware of what they call dancing now? We might as well be naked.”

“Call it practice, then.” When she didn’t draw away from his full cock pressing on her belly, he relished the moment. Maybe he had a chance at making this more than a night of revelry in a crowded bar.

After two songs, she took his arm. “I can’t stand this one, and I need a drink. You were right about the stamina part.” Her coy look encouraged him.

“Let’s go to the piano bar, then. Quieter.” He could snag a table in the corner and convince her to leave with him. He took her hand and led her out of the room. Never had he longed to hold someone against him like this. Even when they’d been a couple, he could barely fight the desire during the times they were with friends. Tonight, though, she gave him reason to hope that the night promised more. She glanced at him with lustful eyes and dilated pupils. Her voice rasped when she spoke, signaling to him that she felt more than she admitted. Every touch of her hand on his arm sent fire through his veins, filling his shaft. Possessing her was the only way to quench it.

“Not that place.” She tugged him down a long, dimly lit hallway to a brick courtyard. “It’s like the central hub of desperate men and women looking for a hookup. I don’t want that.”

As they emerged into the January air of north Florida, a chill swept through him. She felt it as well, evidenced by the pebbled nipples underneath her lavender shirt. He slipped an arm around her shoulders. “There’s a heater over there. If you grab a seat, I’ll get drinks. What can I get you?”

“Don’t laugh, but just water. I don’t drink much lately,” she apologized with a smile and downturned eyes.

“Gotcha.” That had changed about her. All kinds of questions to ask came to mind, but he wouldn’t ruin the mood by asking them. Hell, there were more than a few situations that he didn’t want to explain.

In a few minutes, he returned to where she sat beneath a patio heater, rubbing her hands together. He set the plastic cup of water in front of her. “Are you sure about that piano bar?”

“Trust me. Have you been in there lately? Those people are sad to watch, or at least I get sad.”

“You come here a lot?”

“No, just once last year for a bachelorette party, and we ended up in there to watch a friend of a friend perform. He was great, but…”

A wave of sadness splashed across her face and the sparkle of her blue eyes diminished. He wanted the delightful cheer back, not some melancholy moment. “Don’t go on. Obviously not a good memory, and tonight is about celebrating. Just what is it that we’re happy about? You said a job.”

“All those years of slaving away in a lab and thinking that I was barking up the wrong damn tree paid off. I got hired as a professor at the new college here. It’s not new, but it just became a four year college.” She shook her hands. “I’m talking too much. So, I’ll start over. I am a professor of chemistry. Finally.”

“Congratulations.” He held up his beer to toast her and the return of happiness to her face. By far the most intelligent woman he’d ever dated, she would cut short a date with him to study for a test. He once offered to quiz her as she lay on her stomach crossways on his bed, but she said he distracted her, and he always tried after an hour of her studying. With a tickle of her feet, he’d begin the seduction, letting his hands travel up her legs. She’d smack him once, playfully, barely a sting, but she’d give in to temptation when his hand dove under the hem of her skirt to massage her ass. He lost himself in the memory of when she’d let him take her from behind without any foreplay. Her pussy had been so tight, so wet.

“Hey, Duff!” A familiar voice echoed off the brick wall behind where they sat. “Good to see you out this evening. Not moping around the apartment tonight. That’s a step in the right direction.” Mark Stone approached them like he was landing in a battlefield zone—direct and with bravado. They were both flight instructors and, although they’d known each other for years, they’d never been the best of friends.

He stood to greet Stone face to face. The man was known as a lady charmer and had stayed single throughout his entire naval career, something many servicemen never managed. “How you doing, buddy?” They shook hands before Duff introduced him to Kirsten. “This is Kirsten Tanner. She’s a chemistry professor. This is Mark Stone. He’s Navy and also an instructor.”

“Damn. Congratulations, then.” Stone turned on what others called his blinders, which meant he smiled with teeth so white they glowed. “I couldn’t ever figure that stuff out well enough. You teach?”

Oh, dear lord. One of those.
Kirsten thought as she raised her hand just enough to wave. She’d reached a mental place where she was entertaining the idea of revenge sex, and this new guy was a complete, unwanted interruption. For appearances sake, she’d be as nice as possible. “I do. An intro course and three lab courses.”

Stone elbowed Duff. “Are you going back to school? Flying isn’t working out for ya?”

“Shut up, Stone. Kirsten and I know each other from when I was a student. We realized we were in the same place and decided to do some catching up.”

He lied, but only Kirsten knew that. She couldn’t believe that Duff was banking on her Marine upbringing keeping her from embarrassing him with the truth. Family members understood the
Semper Fidelis
motto, too. He stepped behind her chair, marking his territory against the invader or reminding her who she knew better. She wouldn’t get her revenge like this. “It’s been a nice, intimate time, even in this loud place.”

“I never thought this place was good for a cozy conversation. Maybe I should have gotten here earlier, though, before the young ones made their appearance. Seems like ages ago since we were students.” Stone turned fully to Kirsten. “How could I not have met you then? I really should have been paying more attention to the locals.”

“Did you pay attention to anything back then?” Annoyance laced Duff’s voice. She imagined Duff puffing his chest. She wouldn’t sneak a peek to see if she were right.

Gone was the joking voice of earlier, when he danced with her like a man in his twenties, fully showing his sexual interest in her. Part of her felt like a girl in a song, stay or go. Sex or no sex. Purge the anger with a roll in the sack or leave him wondering. Revenge or try again. How the hell was she to decide? “Now, boys. No need to show off for me.”

“Only if it had to do with the physics of keeping an aircraft in the skies.” Stone kept talking, as if he were unaware of Duff’s chilled attitude. “Wait. I remember now. You were with him when we got our wings.”

She shifted in her seat, not remembering him at all. She brushed her hair from her face. “Yes.”

Duff seemed to pick up on her discomfort, putting a hand on her shoulder. Stone kept talking like both of them were laughing hysterically with him. “Well, hell, we’ve got a reunion going.”

“It wasn’t in the plans. That’s for sure. In fact, I’m ready for that dessert you said you had at your place, Duff.” She stood beside him, desperate to get away from Stone and to a place where she could figure out her plan of action tonight.

He took the bait. “What the lady wants, she gets. Catch you on Monday, Stone.”

“Yeah. Have a good evening. Hope you cleaned your apartment.” With a wink, Stone left and sauntered over to hold the door open for a group of women.

Fucker,
she thought.
Thinks he knows what we’re about to do.
She wished she were that confident.

She glanced at the beautiful man beside her. And, holy fuck, if Duff wasn’t glowing with confidence, too.
Goddamn Marines. Didn’t they know that they couldn’t always win?

“Are we really leaving?” Duff whispered to her.

At least he showed a little bit of uncertainty. Kirsten threaded her arm around his, and sparks ignited throughout her. Holy hell in a hand basket, she wanted him. Not to keep, but to have for one hot and heavy night. She eyed him, wondering if she could do it, fuck him once or twice before giving him an unceremonious send off like he’d done to her. “Well, did you clean your apartment?”

Kirsten didn’t know why she asked that question of Duff. It was as if her body warred with her rational self just like the heater battled with the chill in the air that carried the scent of salt from the Gulf of Mexico. She’d given herself a choice—leave him as soon as she got outside or she could do just as she did all those years ago, which meant straddling his lap in the front seat of his sports car.

Her thoughts traveled through time as they navigated the growing crowd at the bar. She had broken her own rule the night she met Duff. At just nineteen, in this same bar, using a friend’s ID, she’d caught Duff’s attention. She still couldn’t explain what about him attracted her. His brown hair and eyes were like so many others, yet she encouraged him, flirting with him and forgiving him when he spilt beer on her.