In the Arms of the Wind (22 page)

“When was the last time you and he were in bed together, Mrs. Gallagher? If I remember correctly, Danny said it was before your marriage to his brother. Tell me, how long has that been now? Almost twenty years, isn’t it?” Kaycee asked, folding her own arms and having the satisfaction of seeing Moirrey’s green eyes narrow with irritation.

“You think you know Danny but you don’t,” Moirrey said in retaliation. “If whores like you would leave the man alone, he would come back to me!”

“Don’t hold your breath,” Kaycee said, and was beginning to feel a lot more confidence when she realized Moirrey Gallagher was losing some of hers.

“You do know he was fucking your boss Rosemary Adams, don’t you?” Moirrey threw at her. When Kaycee’s brow furrowed, Johnny’s wife pressed the issue, her face filled with venomous gloating. “Oh yes. Danny had been screwing that decrepit old hag for years! She had her filthy hands all over him, touched him in places she had no right to! He’d probably still be screwing her if someone hadn’t offed the wrinkled bitch!”

Danny’s words came back to Kaycee,
“I’m not made of stone. There’s a lady I see when the male hormones need releasing. It’s just a convenience for her and me, nothing more. It doesn’t mean anything.”

Kaycee felt as though the other woman had slammed a fist into her belly but she managed to lift her chin, speak casually in a voice she prayed would not break with emotion.

“That must have really hurt you, Mrs. Gallagher,” she said. “To know he preferred sleeping with a woman as old as Rosemary to being with you had to be hard on the ego.”

“Fuck you, you goddamned ugly little tramp!” Moirrey said, and whipped around, all but running from the bedroom in her haste.

For a split second or two Kaycee felt like laughing but then she realized Johnny’s wife was desperately in love with a man she could never have. That wasn’t anything to laugh about, she thought. She supposed she should feel pity for the other woman, but she found she couldn’t dredge up that emotion. If anything, she felt contempt tinged with more than a dollop of smugness that despite all Moirrey possessed, all her wealth, she—Kaycee—had the one thing the woman wanted more than life itself—Danny Gallagher.

She lowered her head and sighed. There was no doubt in her mind Moirrey would make Kaycee’s stay in her home a living hell.

“That was a gut-wrenching sigh,” the man in question said. “May I ask what caused it?”

Kaycee looked up to find Danny leaning against the doorframe. He looked so sexy standing there with the sleeves of his white shirt rolled up to his elbows, the tail untucked and lying outside his faded jeans with the holes in the knees and the toes of his black boots scuffed. His arms were folded over his broad chest—the thick mat of which could be seen in the space where the top four buttons of his shirt had been left undone.

Despite wanting to throw herself at him and jump his bones, she stayed where she was, her face carefully blank.

“Why didn’t you tell me you had been sleeping with Rosemary?” she asked.

It was Danny’s turn to sigh and the sound was loud and filled with annoyance.

“Moirrey has the same condition Kathleen does,” he said.

Kaycee arched a brow. “What’s that?”

“Diarrhea of the mouth,” he replied. “The same shit comes spewing out of both of them.”

“Are you saying she lied?”

He stared at her for a long moment then shook his head. “No,” he said. “For once what she says is true.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked, hurt evident in her voice.

“What I did before I met you isn’t important, Kaycee. I didn’t give it another thought.” He narrowed his eyes. “Do you want to know the names of every woman I’ve ever screwed? If so, it might take me awhile to write them all down—especially if you want the play by play of how many times and how often I slept with each one, what we did and when and where.”

“There have been three men in my…”

“I know exactly how many men you’ve slept with,” he said. “I don’t care. That was before. This is now.”

They stared at one another for a full sweep of the clock’s minute hand then he spoke, his voice soft.

“Do you really want to know?”

“No.”

He pushed away from the door and came over to her, putting his hands to either side of her on the vanity top, hemming her in.

“Baby, look,” he said, searching her gaze. “As long as we are in this house you know what’s going to happen. She’s going to insult you, try to get a rise out of you, try to make you think something’s going on between me and her when I swear on my grandmother’s grave there isn’t. She’s going to push you as hard and as far as she can. I will have a talk with her but…”

“No,” Kaycee said. “This is between me and her and I’ll handle it. If you get involved, it’s only going to make matters worse.”

“I’m not going to have her making your life miserable,” he said, a muscle jumping in his jaw.

“I’ll take care of it, Danny,” she said. “Like you reminded me—I’m a lot stronger than I realized so I don’t need you to fight my battles for me.”

He shifted his hands to her waist and lifted her onto the vanity, wedging himself between her legs.

“Do you know how much I love you, lady?” he asked.

She snaked her arms around his neck. “Probably about as much as I love you,” she answered.

“Nah, I don’t think so.”

He took her mouth in a hard, passionate kiss filled with need. His tongue thrust deep between her willing lips as he ground his lower body against her. His hand came between them to cover her breast and he caressed her, running his thumb over the nipple hardening inside the cup of her lacy bra.

Kaycee wrapped her legs around his waist and that was all the invitation he needed to lift her from the vanity, turn and walk with her into the bedroom. The door stood open and he went to, kicked it shut then backed her against it so he could reach down to engage the lock. Turning around, he carried her to the bed, climbed the steps on the side and fell with her onto the mattress, flipping to his back so he could hold her stretched out along his hard length. He plied her mouth expertly until she pulled back and rolled off him. He started to protest but she began unbuttoning her blouse so he wedged his hands behind his head and laid there watching her.

She removed her blouse, unhooked her bra and draped both garments over the footboard. Coming to her knees, she unsnapped her jeans, pulled down the zipper then lay on her back to peel the pants from her legs.

Danny raised his head, his eyebrows going up. “You’re not wearing panties, woman,” he accused.

“What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander,” she said.

“I’ve always been a firm believer in that philosophy,” he declared, lowering his head again when she rose up on her knees. “Are you going to ravage me?”

“I’m going to give it the old college try even if Moirrey says I have meager talents in bed.”

Danny snorted. “I could say something but I won’t,” he told her.

“Pull your legs up.”

He did as she asked and she tugged off his boots, let them fall with a heavy clunk to the floor then slipped off his socks to toss them over her shoulder.

“Litterbug,” he said with a twist of his firm lips.

She leaned over him and put her hands on his shirt to begin unbuttoning it, peeled the two sides apart to bare his chest then moved her hands to the snap at the waistband of his jeans.

“I could get used to this,” he said as she unzipped his jeans.

She slid off the bed, pulled the pants from his legs and hung them beside her blouse and bra before climbing onto the mattress again.

“You are going to have to tell me how to do this,” she said.

His eyebrows came together. “Do what?”

She reached down and wrapped her hand around his stiffening cock then lowered her head to kiss the tip.

“Oh that!” he said as she ran her tongue along his slit. He squirmed. “Baby, I don’t know. You’re not…”

He didn’t get a chance to say anything else for her lips parted and she drew him into her mouth, the velvety heat and warmth stopping the breath in his throat. She laved him as though he were a lollipop then drew him out of her mouth.

“Tell me, Danny,” she said.

It was the sight of her licking her lips that was nearly his undoing. His cock leapt in her hand and hardened almost to the point of pain.

“I…I…” For the first time in his adult life, he lost the ability to speak. He couldn’t say what was striving to get out and it was probably just as well for he saw her shrug then lower her head to take him in her mouth again. He swallowed hard for she began drawing on him as though he were a lollipop.

Kaycee had never performed oral sex on a man, but she’d read enough books to know the gist of what should be done. She knew men liked their balls caressed and suckled, but she had no idea how to fit something so large into her mouth. Danny’s cock was huge as well, and just enveloping the head made her jaws hurt. She also knew some women found what oozed from a man’s cock to be distasteful, but the salty flavor of her lover didn’t bother her—nor did the slickness of the composition. Running her tongue up and down his length seemed to please him immensely but she noticed when she flicked the tip just under the head of his cock where it met the shaft, he arched his hips up for more. She figured that was one of his goody spots.

“Tell me what pleases you,” she whispered against his stiff flesh.

Though it took several tries to get the moisture back into his suddenly dry mouth, Danny complied.

He reached down to guide her hand as she plied him, gently making suggestions for her to try with fingers, lips and tongue and mouth.

“Take it slow and if something bothers you, don’t do it,” he whispered.

He told her of the sweet spot between his ass and balls and how pressing against it would give her access to his prostate without having to stick her finger inside him.

“I don’t like that anyway,” he said, “but pushing on that spot when I’m coming…” He left the rest to her imagination.

He encouraged her to look up at him as she worked his flesh. He told her he didn’t mind her making noise as she suckled him. In fact—he assured her—he would really like to hear her moan if she appreciated what she was doing to him.

“Scrape your teeth over him, baby,” he told her at one point, and when she obliged him, his hands went to her hair to hold her head. “Yeah, like that. Just like that.”

Kaycee had always been a quick learner and knowing the things she was doing to him was causing him to undulate on the bed filled her with power. She cupped his balls and slid him down her throat as far as she could, relaxing the muscles as he suggested. She flicked her tongue all around the head and nipped gently at the tender flesh—causing him to squirm. She spread his thighs wide and kissed him along his inner thighs and lifted his balls to lap at the crease where groin met leg.

“Oh God, baby!” he gasped, and his hands slammed to the bed to grab a handful of cover.

She ran her tongue all over his balls and lapped at that sweet spot, the small indention behind his shaft, and knew she was driving him wild. Once more his hands went to her hair and he began to gently lift and lower his hips. His head was thrashing back and forth on the mattress.

Realizing he was close, she slid her mouth all the way down on him and he jerked as though he’d been prodded with a hot iron. He grabbed her head and pulled her off him, lifting his own to stare into her eyes.

“Kaycee, I’m ready to come, baby,” he warned her.

“Then come in my mouth,” she said innocently.

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “Not the first time. I…”

She pushed his hands away and deliberately took him in her mouth.

He groaned and tensed.

She suckled him firmly.

He came hard enough to make the bed tremble beneath them.

She swallowed convulsively as he squirted down her throat—afraid if she didn’t, she’d gag and offend him. His hands were tight in her hair. He shuddered once, twice, and then seemed to deflate like a party balloon, his thighs falling wide apart, his hands falling to the mattress. As he lay there completely drained, she licked him clean then slid up to lay beside him.

“Was that okay?” she asked.

Danny couldn’t move. He couldn’t speak. His heart was pounding like a jackhammer and his blood was coursing through his ears like a horse along a racetrack. A thin film of perspiration had formed in the center of his chest and on his forehead. His breathing was nothing more than a harsh series of gasps—the exhalations almost sounding asthmatic. He was depleted as he’d never been before.

And more sated than at any other time in his life.

Slowly he turned his head so he could look at her.

“I love you,” he said, and felt tears stinging behind his eyes.

“Then it was good for you?” she asked.

He forced a smile to a face that felt numb. “Woman, if it had been any better, I’d be dead right now.”

She smiled and snuggled up to him, throwing one leg over his and threading her fingers through the hair on his chest.