Strangers with Benefits (Siren Publishing Classic) Read online

  If only he knew the truth of the matter. “Your cock made it that way.”

  “It does, huh? Tell me about it.” He huffed and she could hear the slap of skin on skin as he sated his lusts with the palm of his own hand.

  “When you’re inside me, I forget my own name. Your cock is so meaty, so big that I always wonder if I can take it all, even though I know that it’s fit me perfectly before.”

  “That’s right, baby, your cunt is so tight, so delicious I can’t think about anything but when I will get to have you next.”

  She wondered if she had any panty liners, there was no way she wanted to change underwear only to slicken the crotch with her juices when she had an errant thought.

  By the time she had lunch with him on Thursday, she was a mess. She’d played with herself the entire night in the hopes she wouldn’t embarrass herself and hump his leg. But when she parked next to him, he waited for her beside the truck bed and the sight of him was enough to make her regret not touching herself one more time.

  “I hope you like turkey?” he asked, as if her response was of the upmost importance.

  “I do.”

  They sat at a park bench in plain view of anyone walking by. He was in his uniform and all she wanted was to pluck the buttons off one by one with her teeth.

  “Sidonie, if you don’t stop looking at me like that, I’m going to break my promise.”

  She glanced away and looked at the pond, where geese swam and frolicked in the water.

  “Which one?” He’d made several.

  “All of ’em.” He spoke conversationally, as if the words that left their mouths were of less import than the weather.

  She shivered. She was in a dangerous place at the moment. She was hot enough to scramble eggs and had little way to hide it.

  Even her sunglasses poorly hid the glint of need as his statement proved.

  He handed her a wrapped sandwich, from the looks of it a turkey club. “Eat and get your strength back up. You’re going to need it.”

  “When?”

  “Can I get you for a few hours on Friday night?”

  “But the tests?”

  “They only take a little while. We should know by the evening.”

  “Okay, Katie has a cheer competition on Saturday, so she won’t be in town. Uh, Mark is headed to a college game with the team to watch them play in Raleigh, and they both should be back Sunday at different times.”

  “Who comes back first?”

  “Uh, Mark, the bus should be back at around two since the hotel check out is at eleven and they usually stop for lunch on the road. But he’ll text me when they get back into town.”

  “So I have you all night again.”

  “Okay.” How long could they juggle this? Eventually, she was going to slip up and the last thing she wanted was for her children to find out.

  He grabbed her wrist. “Look at me.”

  “You just told me not to.”

  “Look at me.” He prodded. “If you don’t want to spend the night, you don’t have to.”

  He seemed sad somehow, as if she had already affirmed what he thought.

  “It’s not that, Den. I just don’t know how much longer I can take this.”

  “Take what? My cock? Me? This arrangement? What exactly?”

  She could hear the frustration in his voice. “That’s not it.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “I don’t know if I will want to leave by the time you’re finished with me.” It took everything she had within her to say it.

  But one of them had to. They had long since passed murky waters and delved into forbidden territory for a man a woman who were supposed to eschew emotional ties.

  He sighed. “You’ve got a long wait, Sidonie, I don’t know if I’ll ever be finished with you.”

  “What am I going to do?” Sidonie rubbed her fingers over her temples.

  “The same thing I’m going to do. Drink my fill until I can’t take another drop of you. Then I’ll wait until I’m thirsty enough to do it all over again.”

  That hurt. She didn’t think she would ever be able to walk away from him, walk away from this.

  Parcel out sips of herself with him. It wasn’t that simple.

  Nothing was.

  Maybe for him, because he was a man, and men didn’t stay faithful based on good sex alone.

  But he tried to treat her like she was worth his time and respect, with small moments that were only for the two of them. It wasn’t his fault that she had an issue keeping her heart out of it.

  When all was said and done, would she be the same?

  No, definitely not. Although when she thought about it, about the ways he’d made her scream and moan and groan, the pleasures they’d shared together that left her a heartbeat from trying to escape her own skin? She didn’t want to be.

  Physical pleasure and sexual torment so profound should leave a lasting mark.

  She felt like a newborn calf when in his presence, all confused limbs and bodily displacement that only time would shake.

  “Tell me something about yourself.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like what man was foolish enough to leave a woman like you.”

  That was a long story and one that she wasn’t certainly ready to tell yet. Or even if she ever would be ready.

  “That’s a long story.” She prevaricated, but she had forgotten that this guy had the patience of Job.

  “Good thing we have a little time then.”

  “What happened to your last relationship?” she asked as a diversionary tactic. It was a shallow one and not very good as she assumed he might dither about it.

  This was something real, not the cutesy, fluffy conversations that acquaintances had. This was raw and unfiltered, with no chaser.

  “She had a problem with my career. Liza couldn’t handle life as a cop’s woman. She had an issue with everything about it. The hours I worked, the fact that I didn’t want to move up in the hierarchy. She hated the idea that I would have to work most holidays and weekends.

  Then when she wanted to show me off, I had the nerve to get beat on by a perp and show up to her function with a black eye and busted lip. That was when we parted ways.”

  “Really? She sounds like a piece of work.”

  “Something like that. She isn’t a bad person. But her idea of a relationship and mine differed and we couldn’t cross that gap no matter how hard we tried.”

  “Okay. I can respect that.”

  “But that brings me back to my original question.”

  Sidonie sighed. “Well, the gist is that my ex-husband was in the closet his entire life. When we met in high school, we dated, and everyone assumed our relationship was perfect. And it seemed like it. We never fought, he didn’t look at other women and he was always respectful. When he was sent away to boot camp, he begged me to marry him and I agreed. My parents hated the idea because we were both so young, but I thought I knew it all.

  “I had plans to go to college, so I was faithful about my birth control. But he didn’t touch me until the night we became husband and wife. I knew something was missing. He didn’t chase me around the house like I saw on TV and we rarely had sex. If we did, the lights were off and I was under the covers. He hated sex with me, I was just too naïve to realize it at the time.

  “But when he came back from deployment, I made a mistake with the pills and some cold medication, then ended up with the twins, although, I have to admit, I’m glad I got the chance to be a parent.”

  “So he’s gay?” There was no condemnation, no surprise, and he didn’t make her feel ashamed like so many other people had before, by accident.

  “Yep.”

  “Wow. That takes the cake.”

  It had at the time.

  “Walk with me.”

  She stood up and hoped they didn’t have far to walk as she had chosen her shoes for sex appeal and not comfort.

  But they only walked toward the lake,
where he pitched the crumbs into the water. They wandered to a large tree and he tugged her to the back side. Sidonie couldn’t help it, her breath hitched and his eyes narrowed.

  “Kiss me, Sidonie, like only you can.”

  “But we’re not?” Please say yes… Please say yes…

  “No, but believe me, I want to.”

  His head dipped slightly, since with the heeled shoe, she was much closer in height and when their lips met she savored the flavor of him. The salty-sweet taste of their lunch, the softness of his skin, the way he felt larger with the Kevlar vest around the torso.

  She fell into the kiss and when they emerged, geese clucked around their feet aggressively.

  “I should have walked us further. Looks like we have some avian stalkers.”

  “That’s what it looks like to me.”

  They tip toed around the congested gang of chattering water fowl and he walked her back to their vehicles.

  Before he could say good bye, she touched her lips and rubbed her fingers over the bruised flesh, tender from their oral games.

  When he opened her door, a woman ran over.

  “Excuse me… officer?”

  “Yes, ma’am, how can I help you?”

  “I locked my car door with the keys in it. Can you help me?”

  “Well, we don’t usually—”

  “My grandbaby is inside, sir.”

  “Yes, ma’am, I’ll help you. Where are you parked?”

  “Over there.” She pointed to a blue late model car.

  “Just wait by the car, I’ll get my kit out of the back,” he said to the older woman as she wrung her hands together.

  When the woman walked away, he looked back at Sidonie. “Duty calls. I’ll text you later.”

  “Okay, Officer McTavish, be safe.”

  Sidonie climbed into her car and before she pulled away, she watched him grab a black bag from the trunk of his car and when he looked up, she blew him a kiss.

  Yet again, he caught it and stuffed it in the breast pocket over his heart.

  Yeah, she was a goner.

  When she arrived back to work, her phone chimed and she looked down expectantly. Don’t forget… tomorrow afternoon

  Of course not! TTYL

  The rest of her day went smoothly. She watched Katie’s cheer practice and she got to see Mark’s home game on the varsity basketball team before they went home and called it a night.

  Mark was excited about the weekend he would spend watching the college team practice, and then their home game that Saturday. He had already chosen a couple of schools he liked for undergrad. Katie hadn’t made a choice yet, but she wanted to try a program out of the country, although, Sidonie was uncomfortable with the idea.

  Her baby, continental at eighteen? That was a little much. More than she was ready for at any rate.

  When she was finished for the day, she went to bed, excited about the idea of having Den to herself for another weekend. Maybe this would go off without a hitch.

  When Friday afternoon rolled around that week, she was on pins and needles as she drove across town to the place Den suggested for their STD checkup.

  It wasn’t as bad as she thought. In fact, the place catered to women and it made Sidonie a bit uncomfortable as they checked off boxes on the form together.

  “You’ve never been here before?” she asked as she watched him fill everything out.

  “No. I didn’t want to take you to my doctor, I didn’t think you’d be comfortable there. The staff is entirely male, except for the receptionist. And a lot of the officers go there. So I found this place, they cater to women especially and I thought you might like it a bit better.”

  “Thank you, that was really thoughtful.”

  “That’s what I do.”

  She couldn’t help but to take a peek at the form as he checked off his boxes. He was allergic to bee stings. Hmmm, she didn’t know that.

  She didn’t have any allergies, but she did have palpitations, due to an odd valve that didn’t grow in correctly as a child. But she didn’t have it repaired as the issue rarely came into play and was discovered by accident.

  “So you have palpitations, huh?”

  “Yeah. And stop looking at my form.”

  “You told me what was good for the goose was good for the gander right? Well, I’ve watched you take a gander at my forms since I started writing.”

  “You caught me.”

  “Sure did.” He laughed.

  Then a lovely girl came into the lobby. “Dennis?” She was too attractive and wholesome in appearance to boot.

  Den stood up. “That’d be me.” He looked back at Sidonie and winked. The playful gesture dispelled her worries about the adorably freckled brunette with a killer body in the pink scrubs.

  Just a moment later, her name was called.

  “Mrs. Clark?” It seemed like people had a hard time when they saw her name.

  But the pronunciation was just like the Australian city.

  “That’s me.”

  The nurse, Paula, took her information and checked her blood pressure and other vitals. “Okay, you can change right here and the doctor will be in shortly to take the cultures. I’ll be right back to take a couple of vials for blood testing.”

  “No problem.”

  When she had changed her clothes and put on the supersize pink T-shirt, she wondered what the nurse had McTavish wear. As perfect as his body was, likely nothing hid his rippled frame from every woman who wanted a peek at him.

  But he’s fucking you and you’re here to get tested so you can have that fucking without a condom.

  That quelled any of her doubts, even as she sighed over the number that popped onto the scale. She was only a heartbeat away from two hundred even. And he probably outweighed her by twenty pounds of sheer muscle.

  Once the nurse returned, Sidonie was fitted with a tourniquet and had a bit of blood taken.

  When the woman smoothed a small bandage over the prick, Sidonie grinned. “Will I live?”

  “Well, I can’t promise that. But I can promise the doctor is on her way now to help you out.”

  “Okay, I can live with that.”

  “Good,” Paula quipped and with a wink popped out again.

  There was a knock at the door. “Come in.” Sidonie called out.

  “Hey, I’m Dr. Garcia. So I see that you are coming in for an STD checkup is that correct?”

  “Yep.”

  “Well, you’re in the right place.”

  “Glad to hear it.”

  Dr. Garcia chuckled. “So you and your boyfriend decided to come down and be responsible? I like that.”

  “He’s notmyboyfriend,” Sidonie huffed out in a rush, embarrassed.

  “Really? Hmm, does he know that?”

  “Yeah? I would assume so.”

  “I think he has a slightly different take on it. All he did was talk about you. So much, in fact, that I was in a hurry to meet the lady that could have a man like that agog.”

  “We’re just friends.”

  “With benefits, hah? Well, I have to admit, out of every couple that’s passed through here for testing, I’ve never had two come together if they weren’t in a serious relationship. That’s a new one.”

  Sidonie looked down at her hands.

  “It’s complicated, hmm?”

  “Something like that.”

  Dr. Garcia grinned. “Okay, so I assume that you know the drill. Spread ’em and sit low on the table.”

  When all was said and done, the doctor had jacked her wide open with a speculum and rubbed her with several large cotton swabs.

  “You can clean yourself off with these moist wipes and get dressed. I should have some results from the swabs back in a bit if you want to wait. Otherwise, we can call you when they are ready.”

  “How long will it take?”

  “The blood can take the longest as the lab can take two weeks for some types, like herpes or syphilis, as they look for antibody re
actions. The HIV will be the fastest, that takes about twenty minutes or so and the more common types like gonorrhea should be ready around the same time frame.”

  “Okay.” Sidonie sighed.

  “Don’t worry about it. It is what it is. But based on the sexual histories that you put on the paperwork and the fact that the two of you use condoms, you should be okay. Most diseases have symptoms within the length of time you have been celibate up until recently.”

  That was true. If she hadn’t found anything in the last few years, then she probably wouldn’t have anything. But it was still scary, the idea of finding out something was wrong with her. But her ex was a decent enough man, he would have said something.

  When she walked out, she had a clean bill of health for almost everything. The only thing she had to worry about were the longer antiviral tests the bloodwork would require.

  Den already sat in the waiting room and when she walked out he stood up.

  “Here.” His test looked exactly like hers. He gave her the results from his last two physicals, faxed over from his doctor’s office to Garcia’s.

  “We are required to have checks for insurance purposes and if we are exposed on the job to something risky, we have to go and be checked out to make sure that we didn’t contract anything.”

  “Okay. Well, I can have my last test sent. But its years old, from after I divorced and I haven’t had sex or engaged in risky behaviors since.”

  “Good to know that I haven’t been cavorting with a junkie, huh?”

  “Right?” Sidonie chuckled.

  “So the question is, do you trust me?”

  She looked at Den, a man that she knew for only a handful of weeks and thought about his sense of integrity. In that moment, she knew she trusted him.

  She nodded. “But the question is, can you trust me?”

  “If I didn’t, we wouldn’t even be here in the first place.”

  “All right. Well, I have to go home and check the luggage for their away trip. I’m doing the carpool and dinner before they go.”

  “Then I’ll see you later, lady.”

  “Later.”

  When she got home, she looked over the duffels that would hold her children’s belongings while they travelled the road. Katie was missing her bonnet and an extra pair of underwear and Mark had forgotten a T-shirt and hoodie in case it was cold.