I Want Candy (26 page)

“I’m sorry I didn’t call,” he said, hearing a scratchy desperation in his own voice. “It was absolutely wild today.”

She nodded, then shrugged. “Okay.” Candy tilted her head slightly. “Sleep well, Turner. Good night.”

And she was gone. The door shut. He heard her footsteps heading down the hallway. He listened for the click as her door closed.

“Oh, fuck,” he whispered, rubbing his hands hard over his head. He felt as if he were going to die if he didn’t find release for all the pent-up lust inside him—lust for Candy—even if he had to do it himself. How pitiful could a man get?

Turner threw the covers off and staggered into the bathroom. He ran cold water in the sink, splashing it in his face until he’d knocked some sense into himself. He returned to his bedroom, but couldn’t put himself back in bed. Instead, he threw on some boxers, went to the door, pressed his ear against it, and listened.

What did he expect to hear? The sound of her breathing? Her voice calling out to him, begging him to come to her? Morse code?

This was ridiculous, he knew. He wanted her. She wanted him. He’d have to go get her.

Turner opened his bedroom door and gasped. Candy stood in the center of the hallway, eyes wide, biting her bottom lip, pulling down on the front hem of her T-shirt to cover her crossed thighs.

“Hi,” she squeaked.

“Oh, hell, yes,” he said, moving toward her.

Chapter 17

Candy couldn’t move and she couldn’t breathe. Turner was coming right at her, that slow and sensual walk of his sending electric jolts right into the sweet spot between her legs. He was mesmerizing, his body exquisitely naked from the waist up, his black boxer briefs revealing nearly as much as they hid.

She tried not to whimper, but she failed.

Candy swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry. She stared at him, illuminated by the overhead hall light fixture, unashamed that she was staring, determined not to miss a detail of that gleaming, smooth brown skin, the muscles and tendons rolling beneath the surface, the confidence in how he carried himself. Turner was surely tall and strong and masculine, but he was beautiful at the same time. He’d always been so.

She’d seen Turner in swim trunks a thousand times out at the lake, and it had been impossible not to notice his agility and grace. Whether he was swimming, diving, rowing, running—he’d always seemed to take joy in what his body could do. But those days had been a dozen years and a good twenty-five pounds of muscle ago, and Candy could honestly say that she’d never seen a man as fine as Turner in the flesh. No one in her life had even come close. And though she wasn’t a particularly religious woman, she said a prayer right then that she’d have other opportunities to study every facet of him, because right at that moment, she was too nervous to pay close attention. And she was running out of time.

Turner moved closer. His eyelids were heavy. His smile was sly. His hips rolled and the muscles in his torso and thighs rippled. She noticed he didn’t have much body hair at all. Oh, God, she planned to lick him
everywhere
.

Only a few seconds remained before he was right in front of her and the choice would be made. They would choose to touch each other. They would kiss and caress and devour each other—this time in private and barely dressed—and everything would change. Her life would change. His life would change.

Oh, God,
it was happening
.

Turner put his hands on her. He gripped her by the upper arms. He slid his grip up to her neck and down again to her wrists, where he clutched her tight. She thought she saw him nod ever so slightly before he lowered his mouth to hers, as if to reassure her that, oh, yes—he was fixin’ to have his way with her and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do to put a stop to it.

And that was okay with her. Candy didn’t want to stop him. She wanted nothing more than to finally, truly, fully feel what it was like to be taken. Somewhere in the back of her brain this moment felt familiar. It felt ancient, like she’d dreamed of it and wanted it for as long as she’d been alive, like she’d always wanted Turner in exactly this way.

His lips landed on hers. The kiss started gently. Candy decided it felt like a kind of introduction, where Turner explained to her how it would be. With only the use of his lips and tongue and teeth and varying pressures and angles, Turner explained to her that she was his, and that he’d be taking her somewhere she’d never been but had always belonged.

He released her wrists. She raised them up, skimming her palms along the smooth front of his body, groaning in appreciation as the kiss intensified and her fingertips encountered firm muscle, tender nipples, a hard clavicle. Eventually she brought her hands up along the ridge of his shoulders, along the sides of his neck, then clasped her hands on either side of his head.

He used his tongue to nudge Candy’s mouth open, and she made everything available to him, everything delicate and vulnerable was his. He could have it. And he pushed his tongue into her and she felt it as intensely as if he’d just entered her pussy.

Turner began to walk forward, forcing Candy back. She had no concern about that. She didn’t need to know where he was pushing her. Whatever he chose was fine. She continued to edge backward until she felt her heel hit the baseboard. He pushed her until her butt thudded against the log paneling of the wall, then, more gently, the back of her head.

“Feel me,” he whispered. “Put your hands on me.” And though the instruction wasn’t specific, Candy knew exactly what he wanted. Slowly, she trailed her hands back down the front of his body, feeling the places she missed on the way up—his sternum, his ribs, his rigid abs, the protrusion of his hipbones. She slid her fingers down the front of his boxers, and opened her grasp to accommodate his width.

She had to keep opening.

“Oh, my God,” Candy whispered, looking down to where her hand linked their bodies.

“Let me get hard in your hand.”

Candy glanced up at Turner’s face, seeing the pleasure wash over him as he stared at the ceiling. His Adam’s apple danced as he concentrated on the gentle movement and squeeze of her hand.

“Um, you mean you aren’t hard?”

“No.”

Candy let her head fall back against the wall.

“Does that scare you?” Turner looked down at her, nothing but seriousness in his eyes—serious lust.

“Not at all.”

“Good,” he said, propping his hands on the wall over her head and leaning closer to her. “Because you’re going to be spending a lot of time with that big dick and the last thing you need to be is scared of it.”

She swallowed and nodded.

“I want you to love it. Crave it. I want you to get to the point where you can’t go a day without it.”

Candy tilted her head to the side as she cupped his balls in her hand. “A day? How about an hour? How about five minutes?” Then she nipped his bottom lip.

That’s when Turner kicked her feet apart, almost causing her to lose her balance. “I need this off of you,” he said, using his teeth to pull at the neckline of her T-shirt. As soon as Candy nodded, she felt his hands at the bottom hem. He ripped it over her head and she stood wearing only a pair of white bikini panties, breathing hard, her legs wide apart.

Turner’s mouth opened. “Lord have mercy,” he said. “You are the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

“I’m glad you think so.”

“Ha!” She watched him rub his hand roughly over his mouth, his chin, cheek.

“Is something the matter?”

“Ah, no.” When he rubbed his hand over the top of his head she knew he wasn’t telling the truth. She recognized his little dance of anxiety. She’d seen it the night he pulled her over and she kissed him for the very first time. She saw it again when they’d kissed in the parking lot of the municipal building. And now. She knew what it was—he hadn’t been with a woman since Junie died and it was a lot to process for him.

Right then she noticed that his hands were shaking. And that he was no longer wearing his wedding band. The realization hit her with a thud. She had no idea when he’d decided to remove the ring or why. All she knew was that it was a very big deal, and it was because of her.

“We can go as slow as you want,” Candy whispered, touching him gently along the side of his face, along his chin.

Turner chuckled. He shook his head slowly. “That’s not what I’m worried about, darlin’.”

“Tell me then,” she said. “Your hands are shaking. Your ring is gone.”

Candy sucked in air as she felt his fingers trail up the inside of her thigh. He leaned in and hovered over her, his lips grazing hers when he spoke. “Yes, I took off my ring. But my hands are shaking because I’m trying to hold back. I’m afraid I won’t be able to stop once I start.” His finger skimmed over the damp crotch of her panties and slid down the inside of her other thigh. “I’m afraid I’ll go at you so hard and for so long that you’ll run away and never come back.”

She laughed. “There’s only one way to know if you’re right.”

“Hmph.” Turner raised an eyebrow. “You’re in for it now, baby.”

Turner began kissing down her throat, across her chest, then dragged his lips and tongue to her breasts. Slowly, gently, he kissed and caressed each breast, cupped their weight in his palms, nuzzled his nose into her cleavage. After paying homage to them like that he began to suck on her nipples, first softly, then with more pull, his teeth nipping and tugging at her until she began to cry out.

Just when she didn’t think she could take any more, Turner skimmed his tongue down from her sternum to the middle of her belly, then went to his knees in front of her. Candy stroked his head as her breath went shallow. “Oh, God,” she said. “Oh, Turner. Oh, your touch feels so good.”

He flicked his tongue into her belly button. He ran the tip of his tongue along the elastic band at the top of her panties. When Candy felt his fingers push away the crotch panel, her knees began to give, but Turner slapped his free hand up against the inside of one of her thighs and propped her up. Then his tongue found her wet and swollen outer lips.

“Ohhhhh,”
Candy moaned. It had been so long since she’d been touched like this that she felt shock waves run through her. Then Turner opened her up with his tongue and began to flick at her swollen clitoris and it really didn’t matter how strong he was.

She was going to fall.

*   *   *

“Gotcha.”

Turner caught Candy as she began to crumble, picking her up and carrying her in his arms to the guest room. With extreme care he laid her back on the bed, almost every inch of her beautiful body exposed to his view under the bedside lamp.

Candy opened her eyes. She lay there and gazed at him, her big, vulnerable blue eyes fixed on every move he made. There was such hunger in her expression, so much need that he fell to his knees on the bed and picked up where he left off, this time removing the soaking wet, skimpy white panties, dragging them down her silky legs and off the ends of her painted toes.

And she was finally, perfectly bare for him, her breasts heaving in anticipation as he pulled her legs apart and back. He felt like a man dying of thirst as he buried his face between her pale thighs and drank from her.

She was everything he’d ever imagined Candy would be. She was sweet—oh, definitely sweet—but she was salty, too, like the ocean, and slick with arousal and so swollen that she blossomed like a flower in his mouth, her clitoris a little hard bud at her center. The experience was almost too beautiful, too delicious, and he felt his whole being tremble with emotion.

This was Candy. She was giving herself to him. After all this time, all these years, this luscious woman of his fantasies was finally his to lick and kiss and suck and fuck.

God, how I want to fuck her.

And just then, she cried out and came in his mouth. Turner jerked back in surprise as her juices squirted all over his chin.

“Oh! Whaa—”

Candy quickly sat up, a horrified look on her face. “I’m sorry!”

“What?” Turner was still trying to figure out what had just happened, but one thing he was sure of—Candy had nothing to apologize for. He licked his lips.

“I didn’t mean to do that…” she stammered. “I’m not sure … I don’t know what that was…”

Turner slammed his mouth onto hers to stop her from talking. He kissed her with all the desire and love he felt welling up inside of him. He kissed her until her mouth opened to him, until she enthusiastically shared in the taste of her own juices.

“Baby,” he said, catching his breath and holding her face in his hands. “Never,
ever
apologize for coming like that. I’ve never experienced it—I’ve heard about it, but never known it firsthand and I gotta tell you—I fuckin’
love
it.” He began leaving little kisses all over her face and throat.

“It’s never happened to me before,” she whispered.

Hearing that made Turner want to pump his fist in victory, and he promised himself right then that his goal would be to make that kind of response commonplace. “Squirt all over me, baby. I want to drown in Candy juice.”

Her laugh might have been shy but her hands were boldly trying to tug off his boxer shorts. He decided to help her, since getting them off was going to be a trick in his present condition.

Turner pushed himself off the edge of the bed and stood, looking down on Candy’s ivory-skinned beauty accented with pink, pink everywhere. A pink blush of arousal had spread across her cheeks and chest. She had little pink painted toenails. And she had beautiful, pouty pink lips—two sets. He focused on her face as he pulled down his boxers, and he couldn’t help but smile as Candy’s eyes flew wide and her mouth formed an O of astonishment. She pushed herself up to a sitting position on the bed, then scooted until her legs hung over the edge.

“C’mere, Halliday,” she said, looking up at him with mischievous crystal-blue eyes.

Turner was happy to comply.

The instant Candy’s fingers brushed the length of him, Turner heard himself call out in delight. Her caress was achingly good. A shock to his body. It had seemed like a lifetime since he’d felt a woman’s loving touch, and he knew it would take intense concentration to keep from exploding in her hand. “Damn, Candy,” he moaned.