[Here's a bit of sexy and romantic flash fiction to keep the celebration going! Fancy a female leprechaun?]
Two
weeks. That was all the time he had left, before they cut off his
benefits. The Feds had already extended the deadline twice; they
weren't about to do that again, no way, not with the swelling deficit
and the endless war and the blizzards that had slammed the country
over the winter.
The
mortgage payment was due in mid-April. He sipped his beer. It tasted
flat and sour, but he couldn't afford another one. What kind of a
world was it, when you couldn't even drown your sorrows in drink?
On
the tube above the bar, the Canadiens were trashing the Bruins again.
Jimmy's other patrons yelled and swore at the screen. Nick couldn't
focus on the game. He'd grown up with most of these guys, but now he
felt walled off, insulated from their enthusiasm. He was trapped in a
glass box, money leaking out like oxygen. Soon he'd smother.
And
nobody would care, that was the worst of it. His dad barely
recognized him these days. The old guy's body was still pretty
healthy, but his confused mind found the past more real than the
present. The kids were far away in LA, with Mary and their new
stepfather. He was lucky to get a call from them once a month. His
friends—well, unemployment was a bit like the plague. Everyone
acted like it was contagious.
“Can
I buy you a drink, handsome?”
The
lilt in her girlish voice dragged him partway out of his funk.
“Um—excuse me?”
“Sure,
but you look like you could use stiff one, if you know what I mean.”
She
was a tiny slip of a woman, with a butter-cream complexion, emerald
eyes and a riot of ginger curls under her bright green cap. Freckles
dusted her pert nose. Her cherry-red lips bowed in a provocative
smile that clashed with her apparent youth. His ears burned at her
label—him, handsome?—and he felt an ominous stirring inside his
boxers.
“Have
we met?” Nick surveyed her critically. Not too many women ventured
into Jimmy's place, with its grimy floor, smoke-darkened ceiling and
reek of hops. He would certainly have remembered someone like her.
Hell, she looked too young to even be legal.
“Not
yet, but I've a feeling we'll be getting to know each other quite
well in the near future.” Her brogue was more pronounced than most
of the folks in the neighborhood. Maybe she's a tourist, he
thought as she bounced up onto the stool beside him.
She
leaned close and held out her hand. “You can call me Caitlyn.”
She favored him with another of those suggestive smiles. His one beer
went suddenly to his head. “And you're Nickie, if I'm not
mistaken.”
“How
do you know my name?” Nick was so flustered by her nearness and
her unexplained knowledge that he forgot to withdraw his hand from
hers. She brushed her thumb across his. Motes of pleasure skittered
up his spine.
Her
skin felt satiny and warm, despite the fact that she must have just
come in from the raw March night. She wore a fitted jacket, a
teasingly short skirt, tights, and high-heeled boots, all in a green
that exactly matched the garland of paper shamrocks Jimmy had hung
over the bar. She looked great, but—strange. Even in this Irish
neighborhood, on the eve of Saint Patty's, few people wore more than
a token green scarf or tee shirt.
“Ah,
but you're quite well known in some parts. Lucky Nickie, some call
you.”
“Lucky?”
Nick snorted. He couldn't keep the bitterness out of his voice. “You
must be thinking of someone else. I haven't had a stroke of luck in
years.”
“Is
that so? Well, how about this fine Bushmill's I've just bought for
you?”
Jimmy
grinned as he set two glasses of amber liquid in front of them.
“Compliments of the lady,” he stage-whispered. “Guess she likes
you.”
“Slainte!”
Caitlyn raised her glass and swallowed almost half in a single gulp.
“Slainte!”
The whiskey burned on its way down, smoky, smooth and unutterably
delicious. A glow kindled in his stomach and spread along his limbs.
“Thank you,” he choked out, when he could finally speak.
“Good?”
She squeezed his hand, which she still held captured.
“Wonderful.
It's been a long time.”
“Mores
the pity. A man like you should be able to drink what he wants.”
She slid her hand up his arm, kneading his biceps as if testing his
strength. The lump in his groin swelled further. Stop it, he
told himself. She's just being friendly.
The
dreamy look on her face as she touched him told a different story,
though. Her eyes were half-closed and her ripe lips were parted. His
gaze drifted to the pale vee where her jacket fastened across her
swelling breasts. He could see the rise and fall of her breathing
under the taut green fabric. His cock and his heart both ached.
He
hadn't been with a woman since Mary left. What was the point? Ten
years of marriage, the joys and the struggles, challenges and
achievements, had simply dissolved on that day. His whole life had
vanished like dew in the summer sun. Stewing in regrets, replaying
that decade over and over, trying to understand what went wrong, he
hadn't wanted anyone else.
Until
now.
He
didn't understand this, either, this fey creature at least a dozen
years his junior, flattering him and leading him on. Had someone put
her up to this? If so, she was a fabulous actress. Her expression
suggested that she might come simply from stroking his arm.
Suddenly
she seemed to wake from her lustful trance. “Go buy a scratch
lottery card,” she ordered. She pointed to the display next to
Jimmy's register. “Money Mania will do.”
Indignation
replaced Nick's confusion. “What? What are you talking about?” he
sputtered. “I don't have cash to waste on gambling. Why, in two
weeks...”
“I
recommend that you follow my instructions,” Caitlyn interrupted,
her eyes flashing like green jewels. She grasped his hand in both her
own. “Do you not trust me?”
“I
don't even know you, lady.” Still, he couldn't manage to hold on
to his anger when he gazed into those remarkable eyes. She raised his
hand, brushing her lips across his knuckles. Electricity sizzled
through him. His erection grew heavier, his balls tighter.
“Trust
me,” she whispered. “You will not be sorry. Go, do as I bid.”
Her angel's face under its coppery halo was uncharacteristically
serious. “Please, Nick.”
He
had to believe her. He couldn't help himself. As he signaled for
Jimmy's attention and handed over the last five dollars in his
wallet, he marveled. It seemed that poverty and cuckolding, two years
without work, nearly three without love or sex, still had not
completely killed his hope.
Caitlyn
handed him a bright red-gold penny. “Use this,” she ordered. His
hand trembled as he hovered over the ticket, the coin clutched
between forefinger and thumb. Caitlyn gripped his thigh. She might
have intended the gesture to be reassuring but the effect was quite
different. More blood surged into his cock. He struggled for control.
“You should not worry,” she purred. “Sure, but I will take care
of you.”
He
scraped the penny across the ticket, gradually exposing the numbers
underneath.
“Don't
hold your breath, Nickie,” she laughed. “I would not have you
collapse. And look, look at the ticket. You have won.”
Won?
Nick stared at the values he had revealed. Two thousand dollars.
Two thousand dollars!
“Hey!”
he shouted out to sports fans around him. “I won! Two thousand
bucks!” He waved the ticket in the air. “Jimmy, a round for all
my friends!” He bowed in response to the scattered applause. “And
another whiskey for the lady and me.”
The
second Bushmill's went down even more smoothly than the first. Nick
couldn't tell if his light-headedness came from the alcohol, the win,
or Caitlyn's proximity. “Thank you!” he babbled, wringing her
hand. “This will cover the mortgage payment, with some left over. I
can take my pa out for a nice St. Patty's dinner...” Caitlyn
watched him, a feline expression of satisfaction on her delicate
features.
“How
did you know?” Nick asked, finally getting a grip on his
excitement. “What did you do? And how can I thank you?”
“I've
done nothing but point you in the right direction. 'Tis your own luck
that has brought you this gift.” Her hair gleamed like spun fire.
“But if you truly want to express your gratitude”—she paused, a
rare blush painting her downy cheeks—“you might take me home with
you.”
“Take
you home?” Nick couldn't hide his shock. Despite her lascivious
moods and his physical reactions to her, he couldn't imagine touching
this young girl in an intimate way. Then he looked at her, really
saw her, and something shifted. She was older than she looked, older
perhaps than he was. And she wanted him. He could imagine, oh yes. He
saw himself running his hands over the ripe curves betrayed by her
holiday costume, licking his way down the creamy expanse of her
belly, parting the moist auburn curls that hid her coral secrets.
Above the yeasty stink of old beer, he caught a whiff of her warm
musk, like a breath from some tropical ocean.
“Yes,”
he nodded, slipping into his battered leather jacket as she threw
some bills on the bar. “Let's go home.”
A
chill wind from the harbor assaulted them as they stepped into the
street. Newspapers and fast food wrappers skittered around their
ankles. Caitlyn clasped his arm, snuggling against him. The top of
her head barely reached his shoulder. Her petite perfection inflamed
him. The swelling in his jeans made it tough to walk.
She
let her hand drape down across his front. Shockingly casual, she
cupped the bulk at his groin.
Nick
shivered, on the edge of losing control.
“Are
you cold, Nickie?” He couldn't see her face, but he could hear
laughter in her voice.
“No,
no, I'm fine...but you must be freezing...” She didn't have a
coat, just that green knit jacket straining over her breasts.
“Not
in the least. Let me show you how warm I am.”
She
pushed him out of the illuminated pool created by the streetlight, up
against a blank brick wall. Her strength astonished him. Her scent
made him dizzy. Before he knew what was happening, she was crouched
between his legs, pulling at his zipper.
“Caitlyn...no,
stop, I can't...” She ignored his half-hearted protests, deftly
releasing his cock from its painful confinement. The raw March air
was a sensual shock on his bare skin. The next instant, that chill
turned to fire as she swallowed him.
“Oh...”
He couldn't believe it, couldn't bear it. Caitlyn's mouth was a
boiling cauldron. Her agile tongue stirred him this way and that. She
sucked as though his cock was an enormous straw and she planned to
draw every drop of the come out of his balls. He knew that he'd erupt
in a matter of seconds. She backed off, though, exposing all but the
tip to the frigid night. She flicked at the sensitive ridge under the
bulb, gathering the liquid that oozed from the slit, her touch a
searing contrast to the cold breeze playing along his shaft.
He
twined his fingers in her auburn curls, urging her to engulf him
once again. She understood and took him deep again, tightening her
lips around his rod and opening her throat. Her tongue still played
along his flesh, but now she let him set the pace. In and out, fever
and chills, he stroked, while Caitlyn urged him on with sweet
whimpers of lust.
He'd
never known anything like this, except in his dreams. Mary had been a
good Catholic girl. She'd been deeply offended when he suggested that
she kiss his cock. Of course, she wasn't too good to betray him with
her bastard boss...
Nick
pushed the thought away and concentrated on the miracles Caitlyn was
performing. That was the past. It couldn't hurt him now, in this
glorious now in which an exquisite woman devoured his cock with a
hunger that was almost frightening.
He
closed his eyes, letting sensation bear him away. Heat, cold,
wetness, the scrape of her teeth, the caress of her tongue. His
balls coiled tight. His cock felt so hard he thought it would burst.
Caitlyn did something—he didn't know what, only that it was
ecstasy—and he was suddenly coming. He didn't have time to pull
out, to offer her a choice. He poured himself out, helpless,
overwhelmed, flooding her sweet, hot mouth with his come.
Nick
shuddered against the wall, suddenly cold. Caitlyn rose and pressed
her body against his, kissing him for the first time, making him
taste his own jism. He kissed her back, running his hands over her
curves, unable to believe his good fortune. Without breaking the seal
of their lips, she unbuttoned the tailored jacket and brought his
hand to her breast. It fit his palm as though made to order. The
taut, fat nipple at the center poked rudely at his flesh. He squeezed
the elastic nub between two fingers and she gasped into his mouth.
His
cock was rising again. It was unbelievable but indisputable. He
rubbed the knob against the rough denim of her skirt, making a damp
furrow between her thighs. With a growl of impatience, she released
him just long enough to pull the skirt up around her waist. Her naked
flesh gleamed pale in the shadow. Her tights stopped at her thighs,
held up by garters that were no doubt bright green.
She
crushed herself to him once again. His cock rooted in the nest of
soft curls hiding her sex. She ground her pelvis against his still
growing hardness. “Take me, Nickie,” she moaned. “Make me
yours.”
He
slipped his hands under her warm, bare buttocks. She weighed next to
nothing. She reached down to part her lower lips and guide him into
her channel. Holding her tight, Nick lowered her onto his raging
cock. She was wetter than a dream. Her soft folds clung to his rigid
flesh. Her legs locked around his waist. He arched up, burying
himself to the hilt.
“Aye!
Aye, Nicholas!” Her cries were surely loud enough to alert the
neighborhood, but he didn't care. Deep and then deeper, he plunged
into the heart of her. She welcomed every thrust, moaning and
thrashing as he filled her.
He
reached down, searching for the little nub Mqary had revealed to him,
the key to a woman's pleasure. Caitlyn's clit was a slick, hard
marble that burned like a hot coal. He brushed a fingertip over the
tip and she writhed in his arms . He circled the base and she
clenched down hard on his buried flesh. He pinched the swollen nub
and she screamed, exploding into a wild climax.
Nick
wanted to last, to bring her to ecstasy again and again before he let
go. But her convulsions, the feel of her sex fluttering madly around
his cock, made that impossible. While she still shuddered in his
arms, he swelled and burst, filling her with his seed. Caitlyn
yelled, a unearthly keening that shattered the darkness. Then she
came again, shaking so violently that he nearly dropped her.
They
panted in each other's arms. The wind died away. Quiet rose around
them, broken once by a distant barking dog, then by a scrap of some
Celtic tune from a passing car radio. Caitlyn unknotted her thighs.
Nick lowered her to the ground. She pulled down her skirt, though now
that he knew she wore nothing beneath she looked more indecent than
ever. Her jacket still gaped open. The nipple peeking out started him
hardening yet again.
She
smiled up at him, her eyes sparking like jewels even in the dark.
“Well, sure and that was a fine way for you to say thanks, Nickie.
I only wish everyone was as grateful as you.”
“Do
you still want to come home with me?” There was something in her
tone of voice that worried him, something that suggested finality.
“Of
course. I want to wake up next to you on Saint Patrick's morning.”
She stood on her tiptoes so that he could kiss her. “Then I want
you to pay a visit to the employment office. I have a feeling that
the perfect job is waiting for you.”
“And
you'll stay with me? Move in? Marry me?” Aching and desperate,
Nick grasped her shoulders and pulled her against him. He could feel
her slipping away.
“So
hasty, Nicholas!” she laughed. “You are already speaking of
marriage? You barely know me, as you yourself pointed out not an hour
ago! You have no idea who—or what—I am.”
“I
know you,” Nick replied, his mouth set in a grim line. “I want
you.” He kissed her, fierce, tender, letting her see all the hurt
that she had so miraculously healed. Letting her know how fragile
that recovery really was. “I need you. You're my luck, Caitlyn. The
luckiest thing that ever happened to me. Please, don't take that
away.”
The
hardness in her eyes scared him. “I love you, Cate. I don't care
what you are. I don't care if I'm poor forever. If I have you beside
me, I'm the luckiest man in the world.”
“Well.”
Caitlyn slowly rebuttoned her forest-hued jacket, pensive. “It
would violate traditions, certainly. Some of my—colleagues—might
complain about having to take over my workload. Still, I might be
able to make some arrangement.” She smiled up at him, her cheeks
dimpling. “After all, it's not as though you were asking for a pot
of gold.”
Caitlyn
slipped her hand into his. Nick felt the weight lifting from his
heart. “No—only you, Caitlyn. Only you.”
She
kissed her fingertip then laid it on his lips. “Let's go home,
Nickie.”
