Thigh High (3 page)

Maz smiled and wondered how Captain Cook would feel about being a namesake of a park that held a toilet block that was the second biggest attraction to the now nonexistent falls. There was even a shiny brass plaque proclaiming they were fourth best.

“Yeah, dunnies are important if you pass through Amberwarra as there’s nothing for miles until Krogan’s Crossing.” Blue slapped some more money on the counter for a refill.

Merlene pulled the beer, flicking the tap with an expert hand. “And your Auntie Beryl does a roaring trade with her crocheted doll toilet roll cover stand that she’s set up just outside those toilets.”

“That’s right.” Blue thanked Merlene for the beer. “Beryl does big business for the Pioneer Women’s nag-fest group and no one gets past her without buying one.”

That was true. Auntie Beryl could sell toilet roll covers to aliens from Mars. It wasn’t so much she was a great salesperson or that the dolls were attractive. They weren’t. It came down to the fact that Beryl, at fifty-three, with her fake raven-black locks and large breasts and forceful voice, often stopped people in their tracks. She was like an aging kewpie doll, complete with Doris Day bow in her hair. Once stopped, they often walked away with at least one crocheted doll and a few less dollars in their pockets. No one said no to Beryl.

“G’day all.” Three generations of the Petersen family walked into the pub. They were a large clan who liked to do things together. Maz found that sweet. As much as she loved Beryl, she wished she had more family. Her mother, Mae, had passed away when Maz was a teenager and her father had been a shearer passing through town that her mother had taken a shine to. “She never could keep her legs together long if there was a charming man around,” Beryl had often told Maz as she was growing up in her care. “But she wasn’t a slut. She was passionate and wild and carefree. I think Mae got more out of her short life than most people dream of. Not that I would condone that for you, Maz. Your mother was just different.”

Maz just smiled and accepted Beryl’s words without querying her contradictory words. That was Beryl. She was a law unto herself.

“It’s a bit late for you lot to be out and about, isn’t it?” The Petersens were rarely seen at the pub after dark. They were sociable folk but only during the day.

“We had a bit of trouble at home,” Esther Peterson, matriarch of the family, reported as she came to a standstill at the bar. “Big Bill Baxter got drunk and invaded our house. Snakebite please, Maz love. And told everyone to piss off out of his home.”

Big Bill was a force to be reckoned with drunk or sober. He was six foot seven and built like a brick shithouse. “But it’s not his house.” Maz smiled as she poured three quarters of a schooner of beer, added a quarter of cider and a splash of black currant juice for the black snakebite.

Esther nodded, her faded cornflower-blue eyes alight with cynical amusement. “Yeah, but you know what Big Bill is like when he’s pissed as a newt. Besides we went to a screening of
Gone with the Wind
at the Coronet theatre. He’ll have buggered off by the time we get back home.” None of the Petersens seemed particularly worried about it.

“I love that movie.” Maz made a mental note to find time to go to the Coronet to watch it.

“Bloody hell. It’s him.”

Maz didn’t flinch. She knew in a heartbeat who “him” was. She had been waiting for the day when he walked into The Naked Shearer. Joe Patterson was now officially back in town and as much as Maz wanted to deny that and avoid him she knew that was going to be impossible. She grabbed a glass and began filling it with beer. It would work best if she acted as normal and made no more fuss than she had to. He was just like any other man.

Cries of “G’day, Patto” resounded around the room. He was still the local hero who almost made it to the Olympics in athletics. Maz only remembered him as the twenty-one-year-old boyfriend who screwed around on her.

“Are you okay, Maz?” Merlene gave her a worried look.

“Yes. Why?” She was so all right she was rigid with it.

“You’ve overfilled the glass and it’s running down onto the floor.” Merlene pulled the tap handle from her.

Maz looked down at her jeans leg. It was soaked with beer. She had been so tense she hadn’t even noticed. “Sorry.”

“No worries.” Merlene grabbed a cloth and was mopping up liquid on the countertop. “Do you want to go home?”

Oh yes.
Running and hiding would be an excellent idea. The only problem was Amberwarra Falls was a small town and she would meet him sooner or later. “I have to face him sometime.” As Maz said the last word, the him in question appeared.
Oh lordy. He’s still gorgeous.

“Put your tongue back in, darl.” Merlene nudged Maz’s arm.

Maz shook herself accordingly. They were over a long time ago and while lust was natural it was not to be acted on. Not with Joe.

“Maz.”

No one said her name like he did. She had never forgotten the low, husky timbre of his voice. And those lips…what they used to do to her. He had the ability to kiss for hours. Maz had always thought that more intimate than actual sex. It would make her feel all boneless and completely his. When Joe kissed her, she was his to do whatever he wanted. Maz gulped as she remembered how powerless she had been under those lips.
Oh boy, focus. You were twenty, for god’s sake. You thought everything was exciting back then. Remember Cheryl.

“Joe.” She acknowledged him with a nod as if he was any other customer.
I have to keep this together
. Her plan had been to treat him like anyone else. Of course he wasn’t. This was Joe—her first and only lover. He had marked her for life. Other gorgeous men had come and gone in her life and Maz had thought “what if?” But unlike some of her peers she wanted more. Maybe that was old-fashioned. Maybe she was just picky. Until Joe came back to town Maz had been scared to name it.
I’ve always wanted Joe.
A sudden vision of her on his cock slammed into her mind.
Whoa.

“W-what can I get you?” Hopefully she was the only one who noticed that stammer. On automatic, she picked up a glass. She remembered what Joe drank. Maz had forgotten nothing about this man.

“Beer’s fine.” He leaned in and lowered his voice. “You set me up, Marilyn.”

Uh-oh
. Joe only ever called her that when he wanted to prove a point. Maz could see why he was but surely he could see why she did it? “Yes, I did.”

“Did it feel good?”

“Yeah, it did.”

Joe sized her up. “You must have loved me a lot to have done that. Do you still?”

“Nope.”

“Really?”

“Yep.” She placed the beer before him.

“So you go around sucking a lot of men’s cocks?”

Maz knew what he was trying to do and she wasn’t about to feel silly for what she did. “Technically I didn’t suck. I licked.”

Merlene came over to them. “Everything okay here?”

“I was just telling Maz how good she looked.”

“Thank you.” She could feel his eyes on her as she went about her tasks.

“Have you signed up for the gym?”

Maz snorted. She was no gym bunny. Her idea of working out was the mega crossword puzzle in the
Amberwarra Sentinel
and even then she rarely finished it due to lack of patience. “Nope.” Maz pulled another beer, for no one in particular, just to keep her hands busy. The head had too much creamy foam on it but too bad. That was the best she could do under the circumstances.

Joe smiled. “Why not?”

“I don’t like to sweat.” The minute Maz said it her mind went back all those years ago to when she had done some pretty hot, sweaty and naked things with Joe. Maz clamped her legs together tightly as the memory of hard, hot cock shot into her mind. “Besides I’m happy with how I look.” She wasn’t slim but then she wasn’t overweight. Maz had heard Dusty and Blue describe her as plump. She had rolled her eyes when she heard but Merlene had assured her that was the equivalent of “hot” in their language. That in itself freaked Maz out. While she liked the two older farmhands, she didn’t want them considering her at all.

Joe’s eyes did a slow perusal of her body. “You don’t want to tone up?”

Maz knew he was trying to bait her. She wasn’t about to fall for it. “I’m plenty toned.”

“Yeah, I always like soft women.”

“Soft?” Maz considered herself as hard as nails. His betrayal had made her that way. Maybe it was foolish to feel like that but seeing Joe with another woman had hit her hard and even now it was not something she could forget.

“Yeah.” Joe leaned in once more and lowered his voice so only Maz could hear. “Remember how good it was when I had you on your knees and I fucked you from behind? The feel of your soft ass still haunts me, Maz.”

She swallowed hard and felt the heat rush to her face.
Oh yes, I remember.
“Well I have buns of steel now and the thigh-high rule is back in force.”

“Oh yeah?” Joe pulled a card from his pocket and flipped it on the bar. “I’d like to see your buns and we both know how long that rule lasted.”

Maz had meant the thigh-high rule when they first started dating to allow them to get to know each other rather than just rush into a wild sexual relationship.
I was so young and naïve then.
But now she was older and wiser and more able to enforce a rule. All Maz had to do was think back to the night when she had caught Joe out.

“Anything else you want?” There was a moment of silence between them that seemed to stretch out for hours.

“Come and check me and the gym out, Maz. If you’re game.” He winked and moved away from the bar.

Damn man. He knew she could never resist a dare.

Chapter Three

“Wait, wait, wait.” Maz pushed her hands against Joe’s chest. “What are we doing?” She was hot, trembling, hair all over the place and her naked butt was sticking to the vinyl of a pink exercise mat at the gym. She had gone there to answer a challenge, not to have sex with Joe. Yet there she was all naked and hot with the man in question. It was like the gap of fourteen years had never happened.

“You don’t know what‘s going on here?” Joe held her close, pushing up from the mat and sitting on his haunches. He kissed her hard and passionately.

The man was barely giving her time to breathe. One minute she had been all cranky and full of attitude and the next she was flat on her mat, naked and under Joe before she knew what was happening. It had amazed her how fast Joe had emptied the gym of people and locked the doors. As for her clothes? He had always been fast with his hands and the man could pull off a sports bra quicker than she could. Maz usually ended up with it wrapped around her neck. But not Joe. The fabric covering her breasts was replaced by his hands and a million memories flooded back.

“This is so wrong.”
Well, wrong-ish.
The whole naked thing was pretty good and exciting but that would lead to sex and Maz had already made too many promises to herself not to have her head turned once more by Joe.

Joe’s hands slid down to her bum to pull her closer to his erection. “You’re not going to quote the thigh-high rule to me are you?”

The thighs in question were parted by the hard cock at the entrance of her body. All rules had been thrown out the window. “We shouldn’t be doing this.” Even as she said the words, Maz rubbed her body against his reveling in the feel of his chest hair against her breasts.

“Why? It’s not wrong. You’re not involved with another man.”

“How do you know?” Was it that obvious?

“I asked around.” Joe’s eyes locked with hers. “In fact word is there has been no man in your life ever—except me of course.”

She pushed back from him, annoyed that he looked pleased with the knowledge. “Well ‘word’ is wrong.”
Damn word.
How was she supposed to come across all modern and sophisticated when everyone in town gossiped about her solitary state? “Anyway, regardless of whether I am or not, the thing is I don’t want you.”

Joe’s hand circled around and slid between her legs. He smiled as she jumped in response. “You’re wet.”

She closed her eyes for a moment, giving in to the sweet sensation of his fingers on her clit. “Joseph…” His name was supposed to come out stern but it was bordering more on a moan.

“Marilyn…” His mouth found hers.

It would have been against the laws of nature not to kiss him back. Maz’s arms wound around his neck and once more her body was tight against his. His cock was sandwiched in between them in promise of more and better if she allowed it. And Maz wanted to but how rational was that? He’d cheated on her. And while Joe didn’t know she knew about Cheryl, Maz still considered his actions cheating. What to do? What to do? Technically i
t
was a long time ago
.
They were older and wiser. Could anyone be expected to hold a grudge that long?
Good point.
And, he did owe her something for his betrayal.
And I need a damn good fuck
. That moment with him in the motel had left her empty and needy. Besides, who would they be hurting if she just lifted up and slid down on him?

“Condom?”

“Oh yeah.” He leaned back and picked up his discarded track pants.

Maz looked at him in surprise as he withdrew one from a pocket.

“I was hopeful.” He grinned at her as he worked the ring of rubber from its covering. “What?”

There were so many reasons why this was completely the wrong move for Maz to make. She didn’t sleep around. She was picky.
But this was Joe…
“This can only be a one-off quick fuck.” The words were out of her mouth before she could think.

Joe smiled, his eyes on hers. “For old time’s sake.” He worked the rubber down his shaft.

“Yes.” When he said it like that it made a lot of sense.

“To burn up calories,” he added with a chuckle as his hands went under her thighs to lift Maz up.

Well, in that case it would be insane not to have sex with Joe. She was doing it for her health. “Yes.” She kneeled above him, his cock poised at the lips of her vagina.

“Liar,” Joe murmured against her mouth.

“Whatever. Who cares. Just shut up and kiss me.” Maz pushed down over his cock. The sudden rush of hard heat made her dizzy. It had been so long since she had felt anything as amazing as this. Maz had never wanted another man since Joe. She had always known in her heart no other man could compete.