Chapter 29: A Measured Breath

Saturday, September 14th, 10:23 am

Pain.

As consciousness dripped into my brain like a leaky faucet, pain was all that existed.

My shoulders hurt. My back felt like someone had taken a roller pin to it.

I’d never felt my eyeballs as a singular unit, but I fucking felt them now—throbbing like they suddenly had their own pulse.

And Jesus Christ, my abs ... they were literally screaming at me.

I hadn’t even opened my eyes yet.

It didn’t occur to me to check the time when all of us finally crashed, but I remember seeing that faint pink across the skyline of New York from my bedroom window as I was fucking Charity doggystyle on my massive bed. We’d gone non-stop since the moment I emerged from that closet with Charity in my arms.

My nose itched, and without opening my eyes, I scratched it, thankful to be able to provide myself with some modicum of relief. Moving just that much hurt, though.

As I dropped my hand, it landed on something soft ... and that’s when I finally noticed that someone was lying on top of me. Several someones, in fact.

Curious, I decided to undergo the monumental task of opening my eyes, which I hated. My eyeballs protested as I blinked, trying to make my surroundings come into focus. As they did, I saw a tangle of dark brown hair lying under my hand; the head it belonged to shifted slightly on my abdomen, and a faint groan came from ... I think it was Shea.

She wasn’t the only one in my bed ... or the only one on top of me. Lying unconscious to my right, her face less than a foot from mine, was Rose. Her long hair draped messily over her chin and mouth so that some of it fluttered with each breath.

She slept so peacefully, that innocent face hiding the devil that lurked within. Her Nubian nose had an upturned, button-like appearance that—combined with her full lips—gave her a cute, doll-like quality. Her arm was sprawled across my chest, and I could feel her leg lying across both Shea and me.

Curled up against my left was Charity, drooling a little on my chest. Rose’s hand rested on me just under her chin, and Charity had placed one of her hands on the dancer’s wrist. My head of PR was clinging to my side like a koala as she snoozed, which made me feel suddenly protective of her for some reason.

On the other side of Charity lay Helen—the big spoon to Charity’s little one. Her arm was outstretched, and I suddenly realized that I was resting my head on her palm. Her other arm was wrapped around Charity’s waist, the hand cupping a breast. Helen’s eyes were the only ones open, and as I looked at her, she gave me a small, contented smile and mouthed, ‘Good morning.’ Her thumb affectionately stroked along my cheek.

We were all very naked.

I closed my eyes, nuzzled into Helen’s hand, and began piecing together the events from last night—the teasing of Tara, the cum-swapping double blowjob from Shea and Charity, fucking Kelly...

From there, it had all devolved into even more debauched chaos. I’d already climaxed at least four times, but aside from Charity, the rest of my girls had only climaxed once a piece ... or not at all.

After fucking Kelly, Charity ended up on the coffee table, with Erin on her face while I fucked her again. Then I fucked Erin’s pussy while Helen produced a strap-on. She ended up with Shea in her arms, fucking the masseuse in a standing position— relatively easy, considering how petite the flight attendant was.

Helen then ended up fucking Kelly while I fucked her. Then Helen and I spitroasted Erin, with Helen taking my tiny assistant’s ass. She wanted us to double penetrate her at the same time, and Erin had been willing to give it a try, but I wasn’t interested in trying with Helen’s larger strap-on, and she didn’t have a smaller attachment.

So, raincheck.

Instead, we ended up dominating Jess between the two of us. We started with her on a couch, on her back, with Helen fucking her cunt while I had my cock in her throat. Jessica’s reluctance was still present despite her getting more turned on with each passing hour. Her walls toward being intimate with the other women were dissolving, and the rest of the girls and I spent the next hour making her the center of attention.

I fucked her, Helen took another turn, Rose, Erin ... most of us fucked her while others continued to stimulate her tits, kiss her, finger her, and anything else we could think of. By the time we’d finished, she was a barely coherent mess. Kelly ended up passing out as well, cuddled up with Jess, and the rest of us decided to go somewhere more comfortable, where we kept the party going until strands of purple began to creep along the night sky.

The last thing I remembered was curling up with Shea and falling asleep while watching Charity eat out Rose, my cock had finally deflated, sore and abused ... and content.

To think I’d only been in Norway until a few days ago, cold and scared for my life. Oh, how easily things could change.

I sighed as I reminisced, and then realized I was missing someone. Erin had come to bed with us, but as I lifted my head and looked around, she wasn’t among the others. Instead, I caught sight of her in an overstuffed chair across the room, scrolling through her phone and making some notes on a tablet sitting on a table next to her. She was dressed in one of my shirts, with one foot resting on the cushion so that she was hugging that knee. It showed off the curve of her ass, covered in black French cut panties. A pair of glasses was perched on the end of her nose, and as I watched her, she pressed a dainty finger to the eyewear’s bridge and pushed it up.

A pot of coffee was sitting on another table nearby, with several empty mugs. And she had one sitting next to her tablet, steam wafting from it.

I slowly began to sit up, and a groan of protest came from Rose as I carefully extracted my arm from under her. One eye slid open just enough to peek at me, and when I gave her a smile, she reciprocated it with a curl of her lip in a silent snarl before turning to bite my arm playfully. Then, promptly closed her eyes and went catatonic again.

Charity didn’t stir at all as I shifted. Shea barely seemed coherent as she peered around through her mess of dark brown hair, and then immediately began crawling up the hole I’d made between the girls as I sat up. She promptly buried herself in Rose’s arms and also went back to sleep.

I climbed over Charity and paused, straddling her and Helen, and my beautiful blonde lawyer rolled over on her back as I hovered over her. She reached up and stroked my cheek, and I leaned down to capture her lips in mine. Her morning breath was strong ... and very real. I loved it and wanted more. I lapped at her lips with my tongue, and they parted, allowing me to dip between them to taste her even more. She wrapped her arms around my neck and pulled me into her as we kissed, humming against my mouth.

I indulged in her lips for another few moments before breaking the kiss to explore her cheeks, her ear, and then down her neck.

A contented smile graced her lips. “Mmhhm ... you’re going to start something.”

“Shhh,” I murmured into her neck. “Sleep.” I reached up and kissed her ear again and whispered, “I’ll deal with you later.”

With her arms still around me, she pulled back just enough to meet my gaze, her electric blue eyes rimmed with red ... hungover and still tired. I wasn’t sure what time it was, but none of us had gotten enough sleep.

“Is that a promise?” She asked.

“Of course,” I said, and kissed her once more before extracting myself from her embrace. She didn’t protest. Instead, she simply rolled over on her side, wrapped both her arms around Charity, and pulled her close. I grabbed the edge of the large comforter and tossed it over all four of my girls before slipping out of bed and grabbing a robe that I was pretty sure Erin had laid out for me.

Throwing it on, I approached Erin, who had been watching me interact with the girls as I’d gotten up. The look she gave me was thoughtful as she rested her head against one hand.

“Coffee?” She asked quietly, as I cinched the robe at my waist.

“Please,” I said, still keenly aware of the throbbing in my skull.

Erin set her phone down and poured me a cup while I scrubbed at my face and ran my fingers through my hair. By the time I was done, she was standing up with a fully-made cup and a pleased little smile. She handed it to me, glanced at the bed full of women, and jerked her head toward the door where I had a smaller receiving area. “Want to let them sleep a little longer?”

I followed her through the door into the sitting room, and Erin started to close the door behind me.

“Oh, wait,” I said, suddenly remembering that I hadn’t grabbed my phone.

“It’s over there,” Erin said, pointing to a table next to a chair.

Best assistant ever.

I sighed, dropped into the chair, and took a sip of the coffee, noting that it seemed to taste better than usual.

“Mm,” I said, glancing at Erin. “New beans?”

“Emiko found them,” Erin said, taking a chair opposite of me. I took a moment to appreciate how fucking sexy she looked in my shirt with those glasses. With her silver hair thrown up in a careless bun, she was every man’s wet dream.

Very aware that I was admiring her, Erin sat back in her chair, spread her legs a little more, and gave me her signature Cheshire grin.

“How long have you been up?” I asked, not bothering even to hide the fact that I was staring at her long, slender legs.

“An hour,” Erin said.

“Jesus, Erin,” I said, shaking my head. “How do you do it? It must have been around six in the morning when we all fell asleep.”

Erin shrugged and took a sip of her coffee. “I’m one of those lucky ones who only need roughly five hours of sleep.”

“Those people aren’t real,” I groused.

“Those people are rare,” she corrected. “I’m living proof. Most people need at least seven hours. There’s a tiny percentage of the population that can thrive on less.”

“Well,” I said, “Your math’s off. Three hours isn’t five.”

“I’ll probably sneak in a nap this afternoon,” Erin said. “I needed to take care of some stuff this morning, though.”

“Like what?”

“First off,” Erin said. “I looked through the news to see if Desai or Hiro decided to call your bluff and drop some major bomb on you. You’re in luck. All I found were crickets. No kidnapping of Ryo Tanaka ... no ‘Marcus Upton is a war merchant’ or anything like that.”

I let my head fall back against the seat. “Good.

“Indeed,” Erin said. “Then, I got Bobbi to bed.” She cocked her head to the side. “Did Helen leave her there all night on purpose?”

I pressed my thumb and forefinger to my eyes and rubbed them. “Fuck ... I don’t know if she did, but I wouldn’t have let her if I’d thought about it.” Looking back up at Erin, the stars in my eyes from the massaging began to clear. “Is she okay?”

“She’s fine. Not very talkative and a little worse for wear ... the Sybian wasn’t running. Helen must have had it set on a timer.”

“At least she’s not a total psychopath, then,” I said.

“Yeah,” Erin said. “She was asleep when I found her, but she looked grateful to see me, which is a first.”

“Yeah. I’ll tell Helen to leave her alone for a couple of days. She was being a bit of a brat to Natalie, but I don’t think she deserved anything like that.”

Erin smiled thoughtfully. “Getting a soft spot for her?”

My response was knee-jerk. “No! She still rubs me the wrong way. I don’t hate her like I once did, but that doesn’t mean that I like her or anything.”

“Mmhm,” Erin said.

I eyed her over my coffee cup, telegraphing my disapproval of her using that kind of disbelieving tone, suggesting that I was actually starting to like Bobbi.

“What else?” I asked, changing the subject.

“Phoebe left this morning about forty minutes ago,” Erin said.

“Oh...” I said, a little surprised. I thought I’d have a chance to say goodbye to her before she left.

“She wasn’t sure what Nate would have with him, so she wanted to buy him some new stuff. I sent a couple of the Johns with her and five thousand dollars in cash.”

“Cash?”

“No paper trail. Helen told me you guys agreed that she should keep a low profile.”

“Oh. Yeah. Good thinking.”

“Why the low profile?” Erin asked.

I gave her the Cliff’s Notes version of the conversation I had with Helen and Psalter last night.

“Ah,” Erin said. “You’re afraid of someone like Hiro or Tyler weaponizing Phoebe’s husband.”

“Exactly.”

“Why not just pay him off? What’s his name? Jim?”

“Yeah,” I said, considering the suggestion. “I mean ... I guess I could, but Jim’s not exactly the most honorable guy. What keeps him from rolling over when someone just offers him more money? Besides, if it gets out that Jim did receive a suitcase full of cash, someone might put it together.”

Erin shrugged. “I guess it makes sense to keep her off the grid for a bit. Not a lot of people know about the Catskills spot, and I imagine very few would think to check there ... not when they all have their eyes on you here.”

I nodded.

Erin stood up and approached me. “She seemed upset that she wouldn’t get to say goodbye to you. She told me to tell you, ‘thank you.’”

She bent over at the waist, putting her hands on my knees as she leaned in close. I felt my heart skip a beat as her face came within inches. Erin’s brown eyes flickered over my face, and then she husked, “She also told me to give you this...”

Leaning in the rest of the way, Erin’s lips brushed mine. The coffee on her breath was strong and warred with the typical flowery scent I’d come to associate with her. Her lips were free from lipstick—soft and moist as they closed on mine. Her mouth remained closed as she moved it against mine, only parting near the end so that I felt the briefest press of the tip of her tongue on my upper lip.

And then it was over. Erin pulled back just enough so that I could see her entire face. The pleased look on her face suggested I was a little dumbstruck at the implication.

“She...”

I cleared my throat, making her smile widen.

“She told you to give me that?”

“Just the thank you,” she flirted. “Trust me, though. Phoebe Lucas wanted to kiss you.”

Erin didn’t know just how right she probably was. I didn’t think she knew that Phoebe had kissed me in my old apartment ... nor that we’d almost had a repeat performance in this very building the night we returned to New York.