FallingforSharde_MLU Read online

  She paused at her secretary’s desk. “Judi, I’m going to call it a day. If anything comes up within the next hour that can’t wait–”

  Judi, fifty-something and mother of several children, gave her a long look. “I’m sure Darbi can handle whatever comes up. You go home and relax.”

  “I can’t. This is my Friday to work at the shelter. I’ll see you on Monday.”

  Judi nodded. “Okay. If you want to talk about it–”

  She shook her head. She wasn’t about to admit to anyone in the office that she and Jefferson had broken a cardinal rule by sleeping with each other. What was the point when she suspected Judi didn’t miss much? “I’ll be fine. Thanks. Once I get to the shelter, there’ll be so much to do it’ll be time to head home to bed before I know it.”

  She encountered Jefferson in the lobby. “I’m leaving early,” she told him. “Have a good weekend.”

  He nodded curtly and held the entrance door open.

  As she went to slip past him, the handle on her lingerie bag caught on one of the brass handles of the door. She heard a tearing sound. She dropped her briefcase and made a grab for the bag. She missed it and the torn bag tumbled to the floor, exposing the dark red teddy.

  Before she could bend and grab it and stuff it into her open jacket, Jefferson reached down and picked it up. He stared down at the skimpy material for a long time before he looked at her. “Who are you planning to wear this for?”

  Face burning, she snatched it from him, stuffed it inside her coat, picked up her briefcase, and hurried past him into the private parking lot.

  She felt a tingle along the back of her neck and turned. Although it was freezing cold and he only wore a suit, he followed her. She paused at her car and faced him. “What is it?”

  “You told me you weren’t seeing anyone, Sharde.”

  She opened her car door and tossed her briefcase inside. “It’s none of your concern who I see, Jefferson.”

  “I didn’t say it was.”

  She slid into her car. “Then why the third degree?”

  “What third degree? I asked a simple question. If that’s too personal for you, forget I asked! Wear it for whoever the hell you like!” He slammed the driver door and quickly walked back towards the building entrance. She sat watching him until he went inside.

  Taking several deep breaths, she started her car, then jumped as someone tapped on her driver side window. She turned and stiffened.

  A beautiful blonde with blue eyes bent over her car. Swallowing a rush of dislike, she lowered her window, considering Vanessa Del Warren with a smile that was as phony as the other woman’s. “Vanessa. What brings you here?”

  “It’s lovely to see you again, Sharde. I’m here to see Jefferson, of course.”

  “Why?”

  Vanessa’s smile widened. “Because I want him back. Why else?”

  Sharde’s nostrils flared. Vanessa would get him back not a moment before hell froze over. “What makes you think that’s possible after the way you walked out on him?”

  Vanessa flashed her ungloved left hand where she wore a large diamond engagement ring. “He allowed me to keep this ring because he was hoping I’d come back to him. Well, I have.”

  Bile rose in Sharde’s throat. “Things didn’t work out in your greener pasture? What’s the matter? Frazier wasn’t interested?”

  Vanessa’s eyes shot angry daggers at her. “Look, I’ve always known you were jealous, but the fact is, Jefferson wants me. He has from the moment we met. I was hoping to enlist your help in getting him back, but now I see you’re still consumed by jealousy! I wouldn’t waste any more of your time lusting for him, Sharde, because I will have him back!”

  “Get the hell out of my face, Vanessa, before I’m tempted to run you over like the road kill you are!”

  Vanessa sucked in a breath. “When I have him back under my thumb, the first thing I’m going to do is have you fired.”

  She laughed. “Wise up, Vanessa. No matter how in love with you he might be, he’d never even consider firing me. You only think you know him. I actually know him. Get out of my face–now!”

  “Maybe you’re right. Maybe he won’t fire you. But that just might suit me better. I think I’m going to enjoy watching you eat your heart out again as I reclaim his heart and this time take his name. How does Vanessa D. Calder sound?”

  “Like a pipe dream!”

  “Don’t you wish?” Vanessa straightened, held her full-length mink around her body, and stalked to the entrance.

  Shaken, Sharde sat in her car, uncertain if she should leave as planned or return to work in an effort to ensure Jeff didn’t fall into Vanessa’s clutches again. She gave an angry shake of her head. If he took her back after she’d left him for Clayton Frazier, they deserved each other.

  She drove out of the parking lot to the other side of town. In the shelter’s small parking lot, she removed her heels and replaced them with flat shoes. Her wallet, checkbook, and keys went into the leather fanny pack she fastened around her waist, under her jacket. Getting out of the car, she locked her briefcase, handbag, and the teddy in the trunk of her car before going into the big rundown building where she spent the first Friday of the month volunteering.

  She went in through the back entrance. A tall, thin woman with faded blonde hair and brown eyes stood behind a table serving a group of men and women. She looked up, her smile rearranging the lines around her mouth. “Sharde. You’re early.”

  Sharde hung her outside and suit jackets on a clothes tree and donned one of two aprons hanging there. She moved behind the table and reached for the ladle. “You look like you could use a break, Dianne. Why don’t you go home early? I’ll finish serving, give out condoms if anyone comes asking, and lock up before I go.”

  Dianne sighed, surrendering the ladle. “I wish I could, but state funding has been cut again and I have to go crunch numbers and see where and how we can go on.”

  Sharde had been volunteering at the All Faiths House for the last five years. Although most company employees only volunteered during the month of January, both Sharde and Jefferson volunteered monthly. She came every first Friday of the month and she knew that Jefferson, whose hobby was carpentry, often came to make repairs to the building since the place always seemed a breath away from falling down.

  “Go home, Dianne. I’ll crunch the numbers for you and leave you a note on your desk.”

  “I couldn’t ask you to do that. It will take hours.”

  She shrugged, lading several ladles full of fragrant beef stew into the bowl of the man standing in front of her. “It’s not like I have anything pressing to do.”

  Dianne hesitated. “Are you sure? I am tired, but I hate to impose on you.”

  Keeping busy would help take her mind off what might be happening with Jeff and Vanessa. She nodded. “No imposition at all. I can sleep late tomorrow, but you’ll be back here doing breakfast. Just this once, take yourself home to Arthur early.” She grinned. “There’s no use in both of us going dateless on a Friday night.”

  “Okay. You twisted my arm.” She gave Sharde’s free hand a squeeze and hurried along the back of the room to the door leading into the office.

  Two hours later, the last of the diners left the large dining room. Sharde sighed and put the ladle down. Taking off her apron, she started across the room to lock the door.

  She was halfway there when the door swung open. She bit back a tired sigh. If it was more than one person there was not going to be enough stew. “You’re a little late, but come on.”

  Jefferson entered.

  A wave of relief washed over her. He wasn’t somewhere lying in bed with Vanessa allowing her to reel him back in. She frowned. The faithless hussy could be waiting in his car for all she knew.

  He looked around the large room, then turned and locked the door. “Where’s Dianne?”

  “I sent her home. What are you doing here?”

  He lifted a large metal tool case. “I pr
omised her I’d fix the doors to the women’s bathroom.”

  Although there were no beds, the homeless were welcome to shower and hand wash their personal items every morning except Sunday when the shelter part of the store front church didn’t open until two p.m. for an early dinner. “Oh.”

  She bit back the urge to ask him about Vanessa. She’d probably given up that right when she refused to sleep with him again. Besides, Vanessa wasn’t the kind to sit quietly in the car. “Well... you know the way.”

  He nodded and made his way across the back of the dining room. She went around the dining room gathering the plates and utensils. Many of the plates were chipped, but Dianne insisted the shelter use china and silver instead of paper plates and plastic utensils.

  She pushed the dish cart down the hall to the kitchen. She loaded the dishes into the dishwashers and left the kitchen. Walking down the hall to the office, she could hear Jefferson’s electric screwdriver buzzing.

  She went into the office and sat behind Dianne’s battered desk. She looked at all the receipts and folders, sighed, and turned on the calculator. As she worked, the sounds of Jeff’s tools provided surprisingly pleasant background ambiance.

  An hour and a half later, she finished and sat back, rotating her shoulders. The shelter really needed a steady source of income instead of depending on monthly allotments from the state that were frequently cut.

  She took out her checkbook, wrote out a check to the shelter to cover the shortfall, and rose. Making her way through the quiet building, she abruptly realized she hadn’t heard Jeff’s tools for some time.

  A dim, forty-watt bulb provided the only illumination of the long corridor she had to traverse to reach the exit. Anxious to get out of the empty building and get home to a tossed salad and bed, she quickened her pace.

  As she passed the women’s shower room, the door swung silently open. Frightened, she stumbled backwards until she saw Jeff. Her shoulders sagged and she gave him an angry look. “You scared me witless!”

  “Did I? Let me make it up to you.”

  “What?”

  Closing his hands on her arms, he pulled her against him. His mouth crashed down on hers, swallowing any protest she might have made.

  With thoughts of Vanessa waiting in the wings to win him back, she abandoned any thoughts of playing hard to get. She shuddered and melted against him. It had only been three weeks since they’d spent three and a half days in each other’s arms, but it seemed as if it had been an eternity.

  She clung to him, immersing herself in the pleasure of his mouth moving so hungrily over hers as he crushed her in his arms. She loved everything about him, from the taste of his mouth, the feel of his aroused body against hers, the sound of his voice, husky with desire, to the absolute joy of knowing she could arouse deep-rooted passion in him.

  Still devouring her lips, he turned her, easing her back until she came to a stop against the wall beside the door.

  The fanny pack around her waist bit into her stomach, impeding the level of intimacy they could obtain. He reached around her back and unbuckled it. He pulled it from between their bodies, dropped it to the floor near their feet, and pressed his body tight against hers.

  She knew she should stop him. After all, she’d just told him that afternoon that she didn’t want meaningless sex. But she ached for him and couldn’t deny either of them. Besides, if she didn’t give him what he so clearly needed, he might go to Vanessa. And damn if she’d allow Vanessa to get her hooks into him again. Even if things didn’t work out between her and Jefferson, he deserved better than Vanessa.

  She raised her hands to his back to hold him as she returned the heat and fierceness of his kiss, parting her lips so that their tongues could tangle and dance together.

  Passion and desire raged in her. He pulled the pins from her hair, tugging uncomfortably in his eagerness to free it. When her hair fell around her cheeks and shoulders, he buried his face in it, holding her tight, pressing her against the wall as he ground himself against her.

  “Sharde?”

  She felt the unmistakable bulge between his legs against her. Recalling the sweet interlude at the cabin, her knees shook and she went damp. Damp, hungry and a little crazy. She had to have him.

  Shaking with need, she pushed him away and tugged at her clothes. He took her hand and led her into the shower room and beyond to the bathroom. Unzipping his pants, he sat down on the highest toilet seat. He reached into his open trousers and drew out his cock.

  Her mouth went dry as he sat with his legs parted, his fully erect shaft protruding from within his pants. Heart hammering and her core damp with love and lust, she pushed up her skirt, yanked down her panties and pantyhose. She kicked off one shoe, pulling the pantyhose over that leg and foot. Leaving the other part of her panty hose on just below her knee, she straddled his body, her eyes on the cock she couldn’t wait to feel invading her body again.

  He dug in his jacket pocket and handed her a condom. She took it and tossed it aside.

  She moved to sit on him, but his strong hands on her waist halted her downward movement with his cock just a heartbeat from her entrance. “Sharde, it’s crazy to do this again without a condom.”

  “We’ve already been through this, Jeff! We don’t need to rehash it.”

  “Neither one of us was thinking clearly at the cabin.”

  “And you’re thinking clearly now?”

  “Enough to know that we should use a condom.”

  “I want to feel you inside me... not a piece of latex. And I want you to come inside me.”

  He shook his head. “Sharde–”

  “What are you afraid of?”

  “I’m not afraid of anything... except hurting you.”

  “I’m a big girl. I can take care of myself and I know what I want and I want you inside me now. We’re both clean and I’m protected against pregnancy. So no condom.” She stared at him, her frustration building. “Or maybe you’d rather have Vanessa?”

  “Fuck Vanessa!”

  “Have you been fucking her tonight?”

  “Hell, no! You think I’m that stupid? The only woman I’m going to fuck tonight is you, you teasing bitch!” He jerked down on her waist. She reached between their legs, curled her fingers around his thick, hot length, and lowered her hips, facing him. She wiggled her hips, driving his bare cock deep up into her body.

  She sat on his lap, with her legs on either side of his thighs, sighing with pleasure as the last few inches of his thickness slid into her body. She sat with her lips parted, her eyes glazed, luxuriating in the wonderfully full feeling that she’d never experienced with anyone else. Lord, there was nothing quite as delicious as his thick, long cock.

  Whoever said white men had small cocks clearly had never met Jeff and his pussy-stretching cock. Lord, it felt good. So good. “Oooh.”

  He moved his hands from her hips and pulled her blouse open. The silk fabric tore and buttons flew everywhere. The blouse had cost a small fortune, but she was too far gone to care about anything but what was about to happen. He reached around her body and unhooked her bra. Feeling wanton, she shook her upper body and her breasts bounced into view.

  He didn’t spend any time looking or fondling. He groaned softly, leaned forward, and closed his lips over her right breast, his tongue teasing the nipple.

  She moaned and rotated her butt against his thighs, loving the way his mouth felt on her breasts and the way his cock jerked inside her.

  She linked her arms around his neck and slowly lifted and lowered her hips. Each time she sat down on his lap, he thrust his hips upward, burying himself deep inside her slick center of need. Joy radiated all through her and she thought she would lose her mind.

  Sex had never been this good... this wonderful... this fulfilling with any other lover. Her feelings for him left her feeling raw and open to hurt. But for this incredible, delicious delight, she was willing to risk getting hurt.

  He sucked at her breasts until th
ey felt almost unbearably tender. She clasped her hands over his face, pulled his head up, and pressed her lips over his.

  Kissing him deeply, she thrust her tongue into his mouth. She stroked her fingers through his soft, silky hair, sliding up and down on his long, throbbing length with a greedy enjoyment that nearly robbed her of her ability to breathe.

  Her heightened senses urged her to seek greater pleasure. The passion and the delight tightened her stomach muscles. She gasped against his lips, riding him faster.

  He groaned, grabbed her hips, slammed her up and down onto his heated flesh with a fury that sent her over the edge of a high cliff and tumbling down into the valley of bliss. Her pussy squeezed and tightened uncontrollably around his cock until he thrust into her, hurting her.

  It was such a sweet pain. It prolonged her pleasure. When he came, calling out her name and blasting his seed deep inside her, she smiled and cradled him against her breasts, squeezing her pussy around his cock to milk the last drop of seed from him.

  Finally, she collapsed against him, sucking his neck while he continued coming in her, putting out the fire his cock had started inside her.

  She laid her face against his shoulder. He held her close, stroking his hands down her body until she stopped shaking. As she lay in his arms, feeling weak and satisfied, he pulled back, lifted her chin, and pressed a long, warm kiss against her mouth.

  He bit into her bottom lip and slapped her on both cheeks, making them sting. “Holy hell, Sharde, each time with you is better than the time before.”

  She lifted her head and looked at him. “That was good enough to make me wanna holler,” she told him.

  He laughed and rewarded her with another set of stinging slaps against her behind. He moved his hands over her butt. “You have a lovely ass,” he told her. He looked directly into her eyes. “I’ll bet it would look so sexy all red with a palm print or two branding it and you as mine.”

  Sitting on his lap with his semi-erect shaft still inside her soaked pussy, the sexy words made her gasp. “I’ve never... no one’s ever hit me there before.”