Dirty Daddy Fairy Tales

Chapter 3

Eyes barely open, I decided to enjoy the ride. I needed more of whatever was in that shot from the Dive Bar, I thought while Thor carried me back to my hotel.

That’s right—lifted my full-figured ass off the ground. The entire way.

The entire way.Brutus made me appreciate being treated as if I were light as a feather for the first time ever. In his arms, I had the additional benefit of nearness: I could touch him, plant kisses on his jaw. And it just seemed right, you know? His limbs enfolded me like branches, transporting me through the streets of Sacramento. People watched us as if they could absorb romance into their pores via osmosis.

right“Will it hurt if I rub it?” I raised my hand to his face and asked, then realized his scars no longer startled me. He went rigid beneath me and quit moving. I dropped my hand before touching him. Every feature of his face conveyed the fact that he wanted to do something savage with me.

We had arrived at my temporary lodging. The creature cradled me stiffly against his chest, standing in the lobby, under the glow of the Arts and Crafts style lights. I noticed our reflection in a gilded, oval mirror the size of a door. The difference in our size was so vast that a soft gasp of surprise escaped my mouth. He held my entire body so it draped across his lower arms, my long black hair spilling to his knees, backlit by the elegant ambiance of the leaded glass lamp shades throughout the foyer. His stance was formidable, shut down, no visible wedge to access his heart. Although his posture appeared to be that of a predatory animal, he didn’t scare me. I felt safe in his barbarian arms.

“Saaaayyy.” I pointed at him. “How d’you know where my place is?”

“Well, little fool, you gave me your key when I asked for it. The name of your hotel and room number are printed right on it. What would you do if my motives were impure?” He bared his teeth with that remark and carried me effortlessly up the wide marble steps to the second floor. My imagination took me to multiple scenes I’d read with princesses being locked up in a tower.

Yet I was in a lovely mood. No wonder people liked drinking so much. The fear that goons were after me vanished; my world was carefree. This giant was my defender. A grouchy, prickly protector but a guardian nonetheless.

“Hey, you never gave me your name,” I said.

“Correct. You never told me yours,” the creature growled in a friendly enough way. “You tell me yours, I’ll tell you mine.”

“Mine’s Isabella. Most everyone calls me Bella.”

“Well, Isabella, my name is Liam Whittaker and the answer is no.” I had no earthly idea what he was suggesting; it didn’t matter so long as he kept talking. The side effect of potent drink was that his gravelly voice with its iron-fisted essence stirred a furnace in my hoo-ha. It required stoking with his warrior wood.

IsabellaI cracked myself up and burst out laughing.

He glowered at me, until I settled down and asked him, “No, is the answer to what question?”

“No. It won’t hurt if you pet my old wounds.” Hercules held me far enough away from him to lock his stare on my eyes and hypnotized me so I froze in place with a single look. Weren’t prey supposed to flee the beasts in their surroundings?

He stopped at my suite and set me on the patterned carpet. I swayed as if standing at the bow of a boat, only the ocean was nowhere in sight.

He fiddled with the card and opened the apartment. To steady the motion of the waves, I fisted his black t-shirt in both hands. I reached up to stroke his cheek and chin and he picked me up anew and kicked the door shut behind him.

I took him up on his petting offer. “Oh wow, it’s smooth and stiff at the same time. The patterns are as if you have continents outlined on your skin. Although, this side’s so clear.” I poked his nose reaching for the side without defects, stroked his stubble underneath my palm and giggled. “Such dichotomy between the two sides.” Funny, I was growing used to his scars. They didn’t startle me as they did back in the Dive Bar. I traced the generous shape of his lip, rubbed the pad of my index finger over the bottom lip, returned to sketch the swirls of his facial markings, back to his lower lip again, and he snapped his teeth down on my finger.

Not so it hurt. But I was caught there, between his jaws. And I couldn’t breath. The world came to a halt. There were so many things I should be afraid of with this man, so many reasons if I weren’t drunk a million times over. But this one gesture of his snapped me into sobriety and frightened me more than his strange features or presence in my hotel. I couldn’t think.

“You’re lucky you’re drunk,” he grumbled.

He let me go and slid me to the ground. The sensation of my body skittering over his was slow and stimulating. I had to bend my neck backward to see him. He wrapped his massive biceps around me when I started swaying and I pretended the moment where time stopped didn’t happen. “Boy, I feel great. Do they have any tequila in the mini bar?” I teetered to the bed and fell backward onto the mattress. “Can you help me take off my clothes? I need a hand. Getting undressed is hard.”

“Mercy,” he said in his rough voice and flung his jacket into the wing backed chair in the corner.

I held my feet up to him, expressing he should remove my shoes. He hesitated and then frowned down at my feet, his hands looked ginormous untying my laces.

“I mean it, I could go for another drink. This is the best I’ve felt in years. Years. You wouldn’t believe how long it’s been since there was a real live man in my bedroom. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever had a real man in my bedroom.” I cut my eyes up to his angel and demon face, “Hey. What are you doing here, anyway?”

realare“You invited me.” He peeled my stinky socks off. “You keep forgetting that?”

So what if he got a whiff of my sweatiness? “Oh yeah, now I do. Gotta question for ya. Can you help me take a shower? The rug moves when I walk.”

“Maybe you’ve had enough. You’re lucky I don’t take advantage and do all the things I’m thinking about right now.”

“Come on. I wanna do shots and be your naughty girl.” I waved in his general direction, similar to the Mermaid waving her limbs in the tank. “What are you thinking about right now?”

“I want to pin your hands above your head on that mattress and bite you hard on the neck. HARD. Luckily, you won’t remember anything I’m saying in the morning.”

Everything was under water. “Do it! Pick me up like a Viking again, throw me on the bed and take me.”

“I don’t have s*x with drunk girls. Personal rule of mine.” His jaw tightened.

“Gah. You’re no fun.” I sat up, wrestling out of my shirt. “And now? Does this change your mind?” I unsnapped my bra in the front, flinging it in the air. “These are two excellent reasons to revise your personal policy.” I lifted a boob in each hand, bounced them for good measure, and put a toe on the floor to keep the place from tilt-a-whirling around me.

“Those are two very compelling reasons that you need protection and have no business allowing strange men in your room.” He was stroking his own throat, just below the carved out tributaries on his flesh. My insides crumpled a little again at his reprimand.

no business“Now, you’re going to do as you"re told, be a good girl, and have another shot.”

Now“Yes! Goodie!!!” I threw my arms in the air, fell back on the pillows and watched his first class ass walk to the minibar and pour the entire contents of an airplane-sized bottle of booze over ice.

He returned with a dark look on his face to where I rested and said, “Bottom’s up.”

That’s how I passed out. Nose smashed on the pillow, bottom up in the air, a head full of dreams in which I cleared my father’s name and brought him home safe.