A Real Man: Limited Edition Read online

  But being back in the city—only three days in—and I was miserable. It just made me feel like I was underwater, and I couldn’t hold my breath long enough to reach the surface.

  I turned from the window just as a line of cars started honking at each other. Even thought the glass and walls, it sounded loud and suffocating. Since leaving Jake’s place, he’s all I’ve thought about, all I wanted to think about.

  Grabbing my cell, I pulled up the app for my bank, entered in my information, and stared at my savings balance. Not really having a life aside of work for the last decade, and putting everything extra I made into my savings, I had a nice nest egg. I’d been putting that money away in hopes of one day buying my own place. As the years passed, I just couldn’t find the energy to make the commitment to get that house while still having to come into the city.

  I tossed my phone on the coffee table, rested my head back on the couch cushion, and closed my eyes. Of course, I imagined Jake in all his manly lumberjack glory. He was just so masculine, and the way he’d worked me over in less than a day had ruined me for any other sexual encounters I might have in the future.

  Who am I kidding? I didn’t want anyone else but him.

  I slowly opened my eyes as reality set in. I didn’t have to be trapped, stuck in this coffin-like existence. I could be whoever and whatever I wanted in this life. I only lived once, and why shouldn’t I be happy?

  All I’d been able to think about since leaving Jake was the words he’d said to me, and how he’d wanted to know me better. It might have been this insta-lust kind of deal between us, but it had been the most real thing I’d ever experienced. It wasn’t even just about the sex—although that had been hot as hell. It had been about the way he’d opened me up and made me feel things I’d never experienced before. Jake might never know that, probably hadn’t even realized how trapped I’d truly been, but he’d opened my eyes to what I could have.

  I grabbed my phone again, dialed my boss’s number to tell him I was taking a leave of absence. I could feel the rush move through me. I was feeling all kinds of jittery-goodness. I was doing this, just going to throw caution to the wind, and wherever I landed had to be better than where I was right now.

  Jake might know me intimately, but I desperately wanted him to know me as a person, mentally and emotionally. I hoped he was ready for me, because I was about to come at him with everything I had.

  Jake

  I’d given her enough time to decide what she wanted. I was done standing back and waiting, done having her fill my thoughts all day, only to have the entire process repeat itself when I woke up. She was mine, whether she realized or understood it.

  Vivian was mine, and I’d make her see it. She belonged with me out here in the wilderness. If I had to throw her over my shoulder and drag her back here like a caveman, I sure as fuck would.

  I parked my truck at the only diner in town, cut the engine, and started running my fingers over the steering wheel. I might be a recluse by choice, but I was familiar with the town and its residents. The way they glanced at me curiously told me being down here was probably a shock, especially since it wasn’t time for me to do the monthly grocery run. I stared at the pay phone by the front door and had to shake my head. Before coming to live in the middle of nowhere, I hadn’t seen an actual pay phone in longer than I could even remember. But now that I didn’t even own a cell phone, this pay phone was my connection to the ‘outside’ world.

  I had a plan in mind, or at least I saw it playing out a certain way. Whether it actually happened that way, I didn’t fucking know.

  I climbed out of my truck and went to the payphone. I only had her name to go by, but at least I knew she was from the city. But knowing my luck there was probably a dozen women with her name.

  And I’ll hunt down every single one of them until I find her.

  That I’d held back this long when I wanted her so badly was a miracle. It hadn’t been about sex for me, not when it was all said and done.

  I picked up the pay phone, and just as I was about to dial the operator, I felt someone behind me.

  “Jake?”

  Her voice shot through me like an electrical current, and instantly, my cock got hard. I hung up the phone and turned around, seeing Vivian standing there, looking up at me like she was just as shocked as I felt.

  There was lot I wanted to say, but instead of speaking, I simply went on instinct. I reached out, wrapped my hand around her waist, and pulled her right up against my body. Taking my other hand and gripping her nape, I tilted her head back another inch and stared right into her blue eyes. She melted against me, placed her hands on my chest, and started chuckling. I knitted my brows. My dick was hard, my heart was thundering, and I didn’t know what in the hell she could find funny right now.

  She smoothed her hands over my shirt. “You wearing flannel makes me think of Mountain Men.” Her smile faded as she drew her gaze from my red flannel button down shirt to my eyes. “But then again, that’s why I came back; I needed my lumberjack.”

  Fuck, I couldn’t even speak right now; I was so happy she was right here with me.

  “I have never felt anything remotely close to what I experienced with you, Jake.” She curled her nails against my chest. “And even though I felt that way while I was still tangled in the sheets with you, it wasn’t until I got back home that I realized how trapped I’d let myself get.” She closed her eyes and rested her forehead in the center of my chest.

  I cupped the back of her head and just held her. I saw people looking at us, the shock on their faces clear.

  I didn’t give a fuck. Hell, I’d bend Vivian over the hood of my truck and fuck her in front of everyone just to show them she was mine.

  “I took a leave of absence because I need to see what this is between us and where it might go.” She lifted her head and looked at me again. “If that’s what you want, too.” She didn’t give me a chance to say anything before she spoke again. “I’m hoping you holding me like this means you want it, too.”

  I didn’t say anything verbally; I just leaned down and kissed her until she was gasping for air, and her body was pressed hard against mine.

  I pulled away and looked at her now pink, swollen lips. “I hope that answers that.”

  She nodded slowly.

  “I’m not letting you go, Vivian.” I kissed her again and murmured against her mouth, “You’re mine.”

  Epilogue One

  Vivian

  One year later

  When I’d first come back to Jake it had been to see where things might go. Well, twelve months later, I was still here, with no intention of going back to the city. This was where I was happy, and Jake was the man that made my life whole.

  I lifted the cup of coffee to my mouth and leaned against the banister on the deck. I watched Jake and a few of the men he worked with cut and measure out the lumber for the addition on the cabin.

  My focus was trained on Jake as he leaned down and picked up a raw log and balanced it on one shoulder. Part of the interior of the new addition would have exposed beams and bark detailing. That had been something I’d wanted, and Jake had been more than happy to give it to me. With me having no intention of leaving, and Jake and I talking about marriage and even babies, this one-room cabin wasn’t really going to cut it. But neither of us wanted to move, so we were expanding on it and making a few more rooms.

  Despite four other men working on the cabin, I was just wearing one of Jake’s oversized shirts; I didn’t care if they saw me watch my man work. There a nothing more arousing than seeing Jake handle lumber.

  He dropped the log by the chopping block, pulled his ax free from the wood, and started working on cutting the timber. He had on a blue flannel shirt this time, the sleeves rolled up his forearms and sweat beading his hairline. It was only eight in the morning, and they’d all been hard at work for the last two hours.

  He looked up at me, his ax braced over his shoulder, and gave me a wink. My pussy c
lenched, got wet, and all I wanted to do was tell him to come inside and fuck me until I passed out. I had never seen myself as a fiend, but Jake brought a whole new meaning to the term.

  Maybe he saw the way I looked at him, or maybe the sight of me in his clothes—which I knew turned him on—had his control slipping.

  “Take twenty,” Jake yelled out to the other guys while still looking at me.

  I grinned and moved back from the banister.

  In no time at all, he stalked toward me, grabbed me around the waist, and hauled me up against his hard body. He was slightly sweaty, but it was that clean kind of perspiration, the kind I wanted to lick off of him.

  “Only twenty minutes?” I teased.

  He grunted. “Baby, I only need five to get us both off.” He kissed me deeply. “The other fifteen is me recovering after fucking you raw.” He kissed the side of my neck. “If you haven’t realized it yet, you work me over pretty damn hard.”

  I couldn’t even say anything for how aroused I was. But I did pull back and look into his eyes. We had talked about marriage, but I wasn’t rushing that. We didn’t need a paper to say whom we were meant to be with. I knew Jake was mine, just as much as he knew I was his. We were in this together, and for the long haul.

  We also weren’t getting any younger, which was something we’d also talked about.

  I grinned, and I could see on his expression he knew where I was going with this. “Let’s start on that family,” I whispered against his ear, and I felt his whole body tense.

  He pulled me impossibly tighter against him, and the feeling of his cock, hard, big and thick, pressed against my belly, had a gush of wetness leaving me.

  “You sure you want to start that?” he asked me, and all I could do was nod.

  “I’m sure.” And I was.

  “You sure you want my baby growing here,” he growled out those words, and placed his hand right on my belly.

  A shiver worked through me at the possessiveness in his voice. “I’ve never been more sure of what I want, Jake, and that’s you in my life, and your baby inside of me.”

  He carried me to the bed and set me in the center. I watched in female appreciation as he took off his flannel shirt, pulled the white t-shirt that had been under it up and over his head, and looked down at me with the intense arousal.

  “You’re mine, Vivian. You’ll always be mine.”

  Yes I was, and God did it feel good.

  Epilogue Two

  Jake

  I could have watched Vivian all fucking day. I could just sit here and get lost in the fact that my woman, my wife, and the mother of my children, was mine.

  All. Fucking. Mine.

  She held our eight month old son, Ollie, as our two-year-old, Jackson, ran circles around her legs. But she never lost patience with him despite the fact that he was, at times, annoying, just like me.

  I smiled at that. My life was pretty fucking perfect. I had the love of my life, had two healthy sons, and my life was pretty fucking incredible.

  I watched her through the living room window as she rounded Jackson up. It was the kids’ naptime, which meant she’d have some time to relax, or do filthy good things that filled my head.

  I was sweaty and exhausted from being up since the ass crack of dawn chopping wood to store for winter, but still I could have taken her.

  I will take her. I’ll make her so exhausted she’ll remember how fucking incredible it is when we’re together.

  Yeah, there was no way I was going to pass up some free time with my woman, not when she needed some good lovin’, and I was just the man to give it to her.

  Vivian

  I stared at Ollie for a suspended moment, watching as he fell asleep. I went and checked on Jackson, and when I saw he was sleeping for his nap as well, I breathed out. A little bit of the stress from the day washed away.

  I could have taken a bath, added some bubbles, and just soaked until the boys got up. But with taking care of our sons, and Jake’s work schedule, it had been too long since I’d been with my lumberjack.

  Not being with Jake in the most primal of senses was wrecking havoc on my libido. In fact, just thinking about him had every erogenous zone in my body coming alive.

  I walked back out to the living room and looked out the picture window. I could see his cutting block, his ax in the slab of wood, and lumber all around. I could even see his flannel hung over the banister of the deck. But I didn’t see Jake.

  And then the hairs on my hairs stood up. I felt his heat, smelled his clean sweat, and I closed my eyes. He ran his finger down my arm, and a shiver worked its way up my body. When I turned around I saw this fire in his eyes. He looked feral, like he was about to lose it just by being in my presence.

  We didn’t speak, didn’t even move for long seconds. I watched as a bead of sweat trailed down his chest. I followed that droplet as it moved down the hard ridges that made up his muscular body, and finally got absorbed in the waistband of his jeans.

  “You keep watching me like that and I’m liable to say fuck the slow and romantic and just give you hard and fast, Vivian.”

  My heart beat double time. “What look is that?” I whispered, my throat dry, my words strained.

  He took a step toward me and I took one back, but the glass of the picture window stopped me. I placed my hands on the cool hardness behind me, and instantly my body heat warmed it.

  “You’re looking at me like you’re starving for me, baby.”

  I was. I was so hungry for Jake.

  “It’s been a long time,” I whispered.

  “Too long,” he growled out.

  We didn’t speak again, the heat moving between us, the chemistry still there as if it were the first time we met. And then he had his big body pressed to mine, sandwiching me between his masculinity and the glass. I wrapped my arms around his neck, he wrapped his arms around my waist, and then we were kissing. He fucked my mouth with his tongue and lips. It was hot, intense, and I felt how hard he was for me. Those thick, huge inches were pressed to my belly, and I wanted that steel rod between my thighs, deep in my pussy.

  “You want this?” he asked and pressed his hard cock even further against my belly. “You want this monster between your thighs, stretching you, making it hurt so fucking good?”

  “Do you really want me to answer?” I said, my voice a whisper, strained.

  He growled like this wild beast, like a bear about to devour its prey.

  And damn, was I glad to be that prey.

  Jake

  I had her out of the fucking pants and panties in a matter of seconds. I didn’t have to have her naked for this fast fuck, but I wanted her that way. I wanted her bare for me, ready to take me the way I wanted it.

  Placing a hand on the center of her back, and my other one on her hip, I adjusted her so she now had her glorious ass popped out, and was bent slightly forward. I leaned back and looked down at her body, at the slope of her back, the slight indentation of her spine, and the roundness of her ass.

  “Fuck, baby.” I smoothed my hands down her ass, squeezing the flesh, and wanting it red from my hand. Hell, I wanted my handprints on her pale skin. “As much as slow and gentle sound really nice right now—” I all but grunted out the words, my cock so fucking hard I couldn’t stand it, “—I need to fuck you right now.”

  “Thank God,” she whispered, and looked over her shoulder at me. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips were parted, and her pupils were dilated. Yeah, she was right here with me.

  My heart was thundering behind my ribs as I reached between us, unzipped my fly, undid my button, and pulled my cock out. I stroked the fucker for a few times, a groan ripping from me at the thought of having this fucker buried in my woman.

  When I ran my fingers through her wet slit, heard her moan softly, I knew there was no way I was going to last once I was in her.

  “You want my big fucking cock in your tight little pussy, baby?”

  She breathed hard as she nodde
d. The glass was starting to get foggy from her respiration, and I saw the way she had her fingers pressed right up on the window. Her knuckles were white from the force with which she was trying to steady herself.

  “I want you shoved inside of me hard and rough,” she moaned and my cock jerked, my tip becoming wetter from my pre-cum.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” I murmured in this husky voice. I leaned back and looked at where my hand was. Taking my other hand, I gripped her ass and spread it wide, letting me see her pink, soaking center. I couldn’t contain the guttural sound that left me.

  “It’s been too fucking long since I’ve had you,” I said more to myself, but she made this needy little sound that was like a nail right to my cock. The fucker jerked again, and my balls drew up tight. I needed to be with my woman, my wife, and I wasn’t going to deny us any longer.

  Taking my cock in hand, I led the head to her pussy hole. Taking a deep breath, I told myself to reign in some control. Busting a nut before I was even fully in her was an amateur move, but then again, when it came to Vivian she pulled any kind of control I had taut until that shit would break in half.

  “Just fuck me already,” she panted out.

  I fucking lost it then. With my cockhead at her entrance, I gripped her waist with both of my hands, and in one hard thrust buried my dick in her. I felt Vivian stretch around me, loved that she made this gasp at my penetration, and I forced myself not to come right then and there.

  Swat beaded on my brow, and I saw droplets along the length of her spine. Leaning down, I dragged my tongue along her flesh, lapping up those salty droplets and digging my fingers into her sides.

  “Fuck yeah, Vivian.”

  She didn’t speak, but her rapid respirations were enough to let me know my woman was right here with me, primed and ready for some hard fucking.