Page 22 of Shameless Vows

The single text reply Isla sent to me two nights ago is like a new and powerful addiction. I can’t stop reading it.

When I got myself off earlier.

My mind has produced about a thousand pictures of what she looked like doingthat.

After all, she’s donethatwhile I watched her before.

Isla and I werewildlysexual as teens exploring that new side of our relationship. There wasn’tanythingshe wouldn’t do for me and wouldn’t let me do to her. Add to that the fact that, once I started college, all we had was FaceTime for the majority of the year and subsequently had to get by with only watching each other through the screens of our phones.

It was nevernearlyenough to watch her as her fingers went to work on the swollen, glistening lips of her glorious pussy while I fisted my throbbing cock and came in my palm, but it was something. All the other beautiful, sexy photos she’d send in the middle of the night so I’d wake up with a fun surprise on my phone were never enough, but they were something, too. The flirty correspondence satiated us enough to get us through the weeks between her visits or my visits, during which we spent the vast majority of our time in bed.

And now, all I’ve got is yet another mental picture of her, this one of the utterly fucking delicious adult version of her splayed out on the large, queenly bed in her chamber while she reaches between her thighs and bucks her hips against her hand. For the past two days, it has kept me up late and roused me early with an aching erection that I need serious fucking relief from, but the relief evades me.

Ican’tget myself off despite all the mental pictures her message evokes because all I canreallythink of is the last message she sent me eleven years ago. The one she used to expose herself as the backstabbing whore that she became.

And so now, I’m just really fucking cranky.

But you’re free to think of me and everything you destroyed when you’re dying alone as a decrepit old man in this cold, empty palace.

Fucking cranky and really fucking heartbroken, that is.

I didn’t destroyshit, and none of it had to be this way.

Two days after Isla decided to defy me and caused a potentially giant and permanent thorn in my side, I’m in the middle of preparing notes to address the committee overseeing the implementation of the Freedom of Information Access Initiative, and my phone starts buzzing on the desk in my study.

Ernesto Reyes.

Oh for fuck’s sake.

I don’t know specifically why he’s calling, but I’ve got a pretty good idea.

“Good morning,suegro,” I answer, and then pause. “It is morning in New York, correct?”

Ernesto heaves a deep, raspy chuckle. “It is,mijo.Around 8:30. And I know it’s late afternoon there. How is your day treating you?”

“Very well.” I recline in my large, leather office chair and absently thumb through the stack of documents on the desk. “I have a meeting with the committee tomorrow morning to discuss the first phase of the initiative. I’ll be sure to have the minutes sent to your office later this week.”

“Excellent, excellent,” he says. “I’m pleased with the expedited process and the reception I’ve seen while perusing some of the local news from Corwick. Most of the analysts are speaking about it in a hopeful way. I think we should all feel good about that.”

“Yes, we should.” I swivel the chair from side to side and roll my wrist in a circle as if I can mentally will him to wrap it up before he gets to the topic I’m worried about.

“And speaking of the local news,” he goes on, andfuck. Here it is. “My daughter, Liliana… you know she’s one of thesemillennials, verdad?”

He chuckles heartily, and I match his laugh.

“She is indeed,” I agree.

“Yeah, yeah…” He chuckles again. “She loves that celebrity gossip. And she brought to my attention a little story about you and Isla that popped up in her Twitter feed this week.”

Fuck.

“Is that right?” I say neutrally, gripping my hand into a tight fist.

“It is. There were some pretty high def pictures that turned up,” he goes on, and there’s a mouse click in the background. “Looks like Isla’s got a nasty bruise on her face.” He pauses heavily, and my stomach curdles. “I also saw the statement you gave to the press about it, but I was wondering if you could give me the non-bullshit-saturated version of that,jovencito.”

My mouth is suddenly dry as a desert, and I gulp. “Ernesto, in all honesty, Isla and I have—”

“Actually, I don’t have any interest in hearing whatevermierdayou’re about to try to feed me,” he rumbles. “You and I have an agreement, an understanding, and acontract. You gave me your word that if I placed my daughter in your care, that you would take care of her. I am not fucking stupid, Malachi. I know what all of those marks on her face really were, and I know they didn’t happen because she tripped on the fuckingstairs.Ihad to answer tomy wifebecause of that. You promised me that you and your security detail would ensure thatestos matoneswould never be able to reach her. I didn’t think I had to specify that she needed protection fromyoualso!”

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