Page 21 of Feast

Maddie figured it took her a full five minutes to catch her breath. When she had, she tried her voice. “I don’t mean to kill the afterglow,” she rasped, “but you’re kind of heavy.”

A muffled grunt vibrated against her left breast, then he lifted his head. “Want me to move?”

She didn’t, not really, but now that the endorphin buzz of arousal and orgasm was spent, she was really starting to feel the ache in her hips. “If you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” he rumbled and rolled off her, one hand clamped around his now limp dick to keep the condom in place. “You can move your hands now.”

“Oh. Right.” Feeling sore and wrecked and fantastically used, Maddie peeled her fingers off her scalp and sat up. She surveyed the bed—wrecked—and herself—also wrecked—in bemused delight that quickly turned into a grimace of pain when she tried to straighten her legs.

“All right?” he asked drowsily at her soft curse, and she turned to look at him.

He was sprawled on the bed, had one hand on the condom and the other flung out in a pose of either wanton abandon or total exhaustion. Since his face had gone slack and his eyes were closed, smart money was on the latter.

“Fine,” she said, amused that he was all but passed out. “Just sore muscles.”

He forced his eyes open at that, a hint of concern in their sleepy brown depths. “Bad?”

“Nothing a little stretching won’t fix,” she assured him.

“Oh.” His eyes drifted closed again. “Okay.”

Maddie shook her head and reached for her boots, wincing at the stretch in her thighs and hips, and unzipped them. Tossing them aside, she peeled down her jeans and panties and swung her legs carefully over the side of the bed. She slid to the floor, hanging onto the bed for balance until her feet were solidly under her, then straightened and took a tentative step.

It hurt, but she stayed upright, so she hobbled her way into the bathroom.

After emptying her bladder and washing up, she grabbed one of the bottles of water on the bathroom sink and guzzled until it was empty. Grabbing the second bottle, she carried it with her back to the bed and stared at the man who had just fucked her into heaven.

He was dead asleep.

Mouth open, snoring like a buzz saw, already in a REM cycle asleep. His hand was still on his dick, as was the condom, and she circled the bed, thinking she’d peel it off him before the come dried and effectively glued it to his skin. But when she tried to gently lift his hand he snorted, jerked away, and rolled over onto his stomach, pinning his condom-covered-dick underneath him.

“That’s a you problem, then,” she decided and reached for her underwear.

She dressed quickly, enjoying the view of his bare ass, then retrieved her room key and phone from the table. She tucked them in her pockets, then walked to the desk and picked up the pen and notepad resting there.

She jotted a quick note, tore it off the pad, and set it under the box of condoms on the nightstand. Then she picked up the bottle of water, turned off the lights, and let herself out of the room.

When she reached her own room one floor down, she tiptoed though so she wouldn’t wake a finally sleeping Halley, then climbed into the shower.

The hot water felt glorious, and she could’ve stayed there until it ran out, but the long day of travel was catching up to her. She made quick work of washing up, blew her hair mostly dry, then dug out a fresh pair of panties and a sleep shirt and crawled into bed.

She set the alarm on her phone, plugged it into the charger she’d already set on the nightstand, and fell into a deep, sexually satisfied sleep.

5

“Why do we have to buy her a present, anyway?” Maddie asked.

Halley, her brown eyes a shade darker than her sister’s, looked at her with calm reproach. “Because she’s going to be our stepmother, and we want to make her feel welcome.”

“Right,” Maddie muttered and moved down the jewelry case.

“She makes Dad happy, Mads.”

“I know. And I’m happy for them,” Maddie said, then sighed when her sister just stared at her. “Mostly.”

“This isn’t about Mom, is it?” Halley asked, abandoning her search for the perfect stepmother present to frown at her sister. “You’re not harboring some childhood fantasy about her and Dad getting back together?”

“Oh God, no.” Maddie shuddered at the thought. “How could you think that?”

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