Mack 9. A Ways to Go

After boarding up the window, cleaning up after dinner, and making sure the house was secure, there wasn't much else to do but sit there, and read a good book by candlelight. Mackenzie however, had stayed in the bathroom, calling out for me for a short while until I told her that the hot water was still working. After that, the shower had run non-stop.

"Do you think she's okay in there?" Jennifer asked.

"Yeah, yeah. She'll be fine. She's just having an upset stomach is all."

"Oh," Jennifer said, getting up off the couch to re-stoke the fireplace. "Did you find out anything more about what happened between her and Brody?"

"No," I said, shaking my head.

"I wonder what that's all about."

"Me too," I said quietly.

"Daddy?" Jennifer asked, still staring at the fireplace. "You're not mad at me for...bringing her home, are you?"

"What? No. No, I'm not mad. Why would you think that?"

"No, I was just wondering," Jennifer said. "I know a lot of things have changed, and...it used to just be me and you...."

"Yeah," I said, giving her a heavy sigh to show I felt the same way. "But, it's okay with the three of us."

"I know," she said, but it felt like she wasn't exactly feeling it.

"Is everything alright?" I asked then.

"Yeah," she said, and then she glanced at me, a smile on her face. "Great."

"You wanna come sit with me?" I asked, putting my seat up and setting my book aside.

"Yeah," she said, and she hurried over from the fireplace and sat down next to me, squeezing in beside me in my oversized recliner. I put my right arm around her shoulders and pulled her in tight like always, and she shifted her upper body to tuck in against me and put her head on my chest. She smelled like smoke and steak, and hair conditioner, and hard work all mixed into one. I put my cheek on the top of her head, pressed it there, and enjoyed just sitting there with her for a moment.

"Do you think I look like mom?" Jennifer asked then.

"Mmmm, a little," I said.

"The boobs for sure," she said.

"I wasn't thinking about your breasts," I said softly. "No, I think you have her cheekbones and her eyes. Definitely have her eyes. And her nose. And...her ears."

"I've got your chin," she said quickly, "and your dimples."

"Yup. We all get that from Great Grandma Bertie," I said.

"Great Grandma Bertie," Jennifer replied.

"Yup," I said.

"I wonder where Mackenzie gets her dimples from."

"Well, her parents, obviously," I said.

"Yeah, but if we get our dimples from your side of the family...."

"Jennifer," I said with a heavy heart. "I know they might not have taught stuff like this in school but, she's not your sister." Jennifer laughed and shook her head. "You are. It doesn't work that way."

"I...oh my gosh. I can't believe I said that," Jennifer said awkwardly.

"I'll never forget the woman I saw in the paper, who said while most people may question who their father is, she questioned who her daughter's mother was."

"It...wouldn't it be her?" Jennifer asked.

"YES!" I said, laughing.

Jennifer laughed with me and then we sat there watching the fire as the candles burned low, and then we heard Mackenzie start screeching from the bathroom.

"Sounds like the hot water ran out," Jennifer said with a knowing chuckle.

"Yup, sounds like it," I said.

"I'm going to go get ready for bed," Jennifer said, shifting her body around. "Thanks."

"For what?" I asked.

"For being the best dad in the whole wide world," she said, and she kissed me, her lips so soft and tender against mine. She pulled away and stood up, her hand trailing down my leg to my kneecap and then off as she spun away.

"Goodnight," I said, calling after her.

"I love you," she called back.

"I love you too," I said, and then, I stood up and went to the fire, putting another log on and moving the spark shield into place. As a second thought, I shifted some of the coals around, put on another log, and moved the shield back in. With the board in the window not being entirely airtight, I could feel the heat and the cold competing for dominance in the front room.

As soon as I entered my room, I let out a full-body shiver. It was cold. Super cold. I set my flashlight down on my dresser, lit the candle I had set there on a dinner plate, and then switched the flashlight off before heading to my closet.

The candle didn't provide the best light, but it was enough for me to see where the extra bedding and comforters were, and I quickly pulled them down, whipped them onto the bed, and then piled up the comforters. Tonight, I would use two. As I inspected my handiwork, I remembered the linens from this morning, and that they were still in the washing machine. With a grumble, I grabbed my flashlight, blew out my candle, and went to the laundry room to check on it.

The linens looked nice and clean, They didn't require a lot of agitation when you let them sit and soak in detergent all day long. I grabbed the crank, gave it a good whirl, and then reversed direction, before grabbing the cast iron pot off the dryer and headed to the kitchen. I filled the pot quickly and then adjusted the tap to give as slow a drip as I possibly could. It was the only way to prevent the pipes from freezing, and even then, it wasn't guaranteed.

I headed back to the front room, noting the bathroom was now empty, and Jennifer's door was closed. I hoped they were warmer in their room than I was in mine, but I expected that. Jennifer's room was in the dead center of the house, with no windows, and only a single vent to keep the air from getting musty and stale. It was always ten degrees hotter in Jennifer's room than anywhere else in the house, and now, without electricity, I hoped it would be even warmer.

As soon as my pot of water was boiling, I took it back to the laundry room, toed the drain valve on the bottom of the washing machine, and started cranking. The water drained and I spun the linens until they were almost dry before pulling them out, one by one, to dunk them in the boiling water. I slipped on my hot water gloves, for doing dishes, and wrung out each item before hanging them, from the wires I'd put in the overhead a couple of summers back. Halfway through the load, I had to go dump my water and boil another pot, but by the end of it, all the linens were hot and fresh, hanging by the wires and filling the laundry room with a thick blanket of steam. It felt good. Good enough that I stripped down to my birthday suit, tossed my clothes in the washing machine, and then traipsed through the house, nude, back to my room.

Switching the flashlight off, I checked my watch and saw it was two a.m. in the morning. Time for bed. I shuffled forward, touched the edge of the bed, and crawled onto it. My hand touched something firm and living, and I immediately stopped moving. "Is there someone in my bed?" I asked.

"Uh-huh," a voice said from up by my pillows. I shook my head. "Who is it?" I whispered.

"You have to ask?" Jennifer replied.

"What's going on?" I said, crawling the rest of the way, and then slipping under the comforters quickly.

"Nothing," Jennifer said, sliding over to press her back up against me. "It's...nothing."

"I don't mind if you sleep in here," I said quickly, not wanting her to feel offended.

"I thought you wanted me in here?" She said.

"I do," I replied, sliding my arm around her tummy and pulling her close. "I do. I'm just tired."

"I can tell," she said, snuggling back against me.

My hand moved across her tummy again, and whatever she was wearing, shifted with the passing of my fingers. It felt much lighter than the last thing she had on, much less durable, thick, or silky.

"What are you wearing?" I asked.

"Something new," she said teasingly. "Don't worry. It was only five bucks at the thrift shop," she said, and I felt her press her buttocks up against my pelvis, and my cock hanging there. Her cheeks were warm and firm, barely covered by the same material, and my manhood started its slow rise to prominence.

I pulled my hips back, not wanting to touch her with my privates, but she turned her head and spoke to me. "Why are you pulling away?"

"I...I just."

"It's fine," she said, one hand slipping behind her to touch my hip. Gently, she coaxed me back, and then, to my shock and surprise, she reached between us, took my cock in her hand, and pressed it between her butt cheeks. "It fits right there," she said, turning her head back straight. "I can't tell you the number of times I woke up and felt that jabbing into my side, or my leg, or whatever. Put it back in the holster and let's go to sleep."

"The holster?" I asked, chucking at her use of the word.

"Yeah, the holster," Jennifer replied, wiggling her butt back and forth. "The holster."

I closed my eyes, kissed Jennifer on the back of the head, and was out in no time flat. I didn't know exactly when I'd fallen asleep, but after a few hours, the cold began to creep in, consuming everything that had, or made heat. I woke then, my toes freezing, and my left arm completely numb.

As gently as I could, I pulled my left arm free and then waited for the feeling to come back, along with blood flow and the biting tingling feeling that accompanies such a thing. Once the pain had passed I slowly slid to the edge of the bed and slipped out from beneath the covers. I thought the air smelled a little smoky, but that was normal when I was burning wood in the fireplace. Trying to make the least amount of noise possible, I went to the door, opened it, and grabbed the flashlight off the dresser in the process. As soon as I was outside my room, I clicked the flashlight on and noticed the house was filled with smoke.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck," I said, hurrying to the front room. I swiped the light across the fireplace and knew at once what had happened. We hadn't put enough wood on the fire, and it had burned down, and then gone out. Without the fire to lift the air up and out the chimney, the wind outside had gotten the best of it, pushing a steady stream of incredibly cold air back down the chimney, and into the house. The little bit of smoke coming off the coals ended up being pushed into the house, rather than going up the chimney.

Coughing a little, I hurried to the fireplace, pulled the spark screen aside, and began sifting through the ash, pushing the coals into a neat little pile towards the back. I grabbed a hand full of scrap paper, and a small kindling pack I kept underneath a nearby table, and tossed it on top of the coals, and then began loading small one-inch sticks on top. In moments, the fire was relighted, and I grabbed a small metal shield I kept nearby, in case I had to put the fire out, or couldn't trust it to do its job properly, and put it across the front of the fireplace, and then lifted it, allowing it just an inch of space at the bottom.

Immediately, the air was drawn in through the bottom, and the heat, with nowhere else to go, forced the air up the chimney, causing an accumulating effect. Soon the bottom edge of the shield was whistling as the air was sucked into the fireplace and up the chimney. I pulled the shield away, grabbed a few more larger logs, and piled them on.

"Daddy," I heard a voice call out from behind me. "What's going on?"

"The fire went out," I said, putting another log on top.

"There's smoke in the house," Jennifer said, and I turned to see her waving a hand in front of her face as if she could get rid of the stuff.

"It'll go away as the fire burns," I said, and then I had to do a double take, seeing the sheer two-piece nightie she was wearing. Her breasts stood out from underneath the thing, it providing absolutely no coverage whatsoever, leaving nothing to the imagination.

The thin black frilly edge of the material hugged just an inch off her nipples, not even covering the bottom half of her breasts, and her bottoms weren't much better. Her midsection was bare, and I could see the curve of her hips, the way her stomach contoured down to a gentle slope, a bit of a bulge over her lower abdomen and uterus, and then the plunge into her panties. Beyond the sheer panties, I could clearly see her clean-shaven mound, and I drank in the sight of her tiny upper crevasse, and the little fold of inner lips peeking out from inside her slit. Lower still, the panties hugged her sex tight, disappearing between her thighs into darkness.

"Daddy," Jennifer said, waking me from my trance. "Put the net back."

"Oh, hold on," I said, turning back to the fire. I grabbed two short stubbly logs and put them on one side of the fire, and then put another two on the opposite side. I knew they wouldn't burn for a very long time, since the fire was going to be in the middle, and then, I piled the logs on top, orientating them front to back, so as the fire burned, the logs would fall and slide toward the middle, feeding the fire, rather than letting it go out. "I think that will do it," I said, pulling the spark screen back into place.

"Put the shield up too," Jennifer said, pointing. She was right. I should have done that the first time. I grabbed the two smaller shields and placed them at the edges, and then the main shield out further. Now, even if a spark did get past the grate, it would bounce off a shield and land on the firebricks, and not the rug. The shields, in turn, would heat from the radiant energy, and the heat would radiate through the house, but it was much safer this way.

When I got up, Jennifer was gone, and I assumed she'd gone back to bed, so I hurried into the kitchen and grabbed a quick drink before coming back to bed. As I climbed in and reached out, I found Jennifer half-laying, half-sitting, in bed, facing me.

"You okay?" I asked, sliding in and putting my head on the pillow.

"Yeah. Are you?" She asked. Her voice sounded hurt, and a bit angry.

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said, sliding my hand underneath the covers toward her. My hand met hers, and she held my fingers there, away from her, as if preventing me from touching her. "Alright," I said, slowly sliding up to my elbows and resting myself on my pillow. "What's going on?"

"I...Just forget it," she said, pulling her hand away.

"Noooo, come on," I said softly. "I'm not trying to get you mad. If I did something wrong, tell me," I said, pleading a little bit. "With everything that's happened in the last couple of days, now is not the time to start bottling things up," I said.

"Where did you go?" She asked then.

"When?" I asked.

"Just now. After I walked out of the room," she said.

"I went to the kitchen, to get a drink," I said softly, and then, "why?"

Jennifer remained silent for a few seconds, and then I realized what was going on. Jennifer was jealous.

"Sweetie. I went to the kitchen to get a drink," I said again.

"What did you drink?" She asked, but I could tell she felt ashamed and embarrassed by her behavior.

"Grape soda," I said, reaching out to take her hand into mine. She let me take hold of her fingers this time and didn't fight me for control. "I took one out of the laundry room so I didn't have to open the fridge," I said and then added, "It wasn't as cold as it normally is, but real damn close."

Jennifer leaned over and gave me a quick kiss, and then quickly slid back across the bed, apparently deciding she wasn't mad anymore.

"Did you just smell my breath?" I asked, playfully acting as if I was appalled.

"Yes," Jennifer said admittedly.

"So I passed," I said.

"Well, you don't smell like Mack's pussy," she said softly.

"Since when? No, never mind. I keep forgetting," I said, wrapping a hand around her belly and pulling her tight against me. "You know exactly what her pussy smells like."

"I do," Jennifer said smartly, rubbing her ass up against me as if trying t turn me on. "She keeps it clean, but she also doesn't like to use perfumes or deodorants, unless it's beside her pussy."

"Well, I guess I learn something new every day," I said thoughtfully.

"She's not dirty," Jennifer said then. "She's not...how can I say this? She's not dirty, but she likes to be nasty."

"Nasty can be nice," I said.

"Yes," Jennifer agreed. "Mack's pussy smells...natural. There's that little hint of...tang."

"Putty-tang," I said with a chuckle.

"Yeah. Puddin-tang. Whatever. She smells like she should," Jennifer said.

"How did we get on this topic of conversation?" I asked.

"I don't remember," Jennifer said, and then she put a hand against my thigh. "Stop moving."

"I'm not moving," I said, trying to hold completely still.

"That's not...you?"

I slid my hand down, feeling, and realized it was me. My cock, harder than life, was pressing between Jennifer's thighs, and I'd thought it was between my hip and her buttocks.

"Sorry," I said, yanking it out and pressing it firmly back against my lower abdomen.

"I, uh...I didn't mean you had to move it," she said quietly.

I put my head on my pillow and Jennifer pressed her body back against mine, closing the gaps wherever they were. Gently, she grabbed my hand that was around her tummy and pulled it up between her breasts, holding it flat against her collarbone and neck. Silently, she relaxed her head and it came to rest against the back of my hand, and then, a few moments later, she was fast asleep. I listened to her gentle breathing as long as I could, but the rhythmic sounds and the rise and fall of her chest lulled me to sleep just a few minutes later.

The fireplace worked magnificently. All through the night, from the moment I'd restocked it, repositioned the logs, and clear into the morning, it kept the house nice and toasty. I didn't wake up for a single minute, and in fact, I had some of the best dreams I had ever had, recounting endless nights with several beautiful women I'd never taken the opportunity to mess around with.

Kendra had been the focus of one such dream, and while she was always the very proper and authoritative figure at work, in my dream, she was a sex doll, willing to do whatever I wanted, no matter how dirty or depraved. I dreamed of taking her in multiple ways, calling her disgusting names and forcing my manhood into her repeatedly, even when she said it hurt, or she was sore from how many times we'd been doing it.

Cathy, surprisingly, had only made a subtle appearance in Slumberland, giving me a disproving look when she found out I'd been fucking Mackenzie, Kendra, Denise, Amber, Heather, Trisha, and of course, Yolanda, Jennifer's third-grade history teacher who'd always blushed whenever I showed up to parent-teacher conferences.

When morning finally arrived, the sun shone through the bedroom window, illuminating the covers, and I opened one eye, looked around, and then spoke, my voice hash and dry. "Jennifer?"

"Mmmm," came her response, and the comforter moved, and then peeled back to reveal Jennifer's face, a serene look of happiness splashed across her eyes and mouth. "What time is it?" She moaned.

"I don't know," I said, pulling my hand up to look at my watch. Something hard slapped me in the face and I groaned, holding my face. "What the fuck is that?" I asked.

"Oops!" Jennifer said, and she searched the sheets for a moment and then pulled something up and reached over to my arm.

"What is it?" I asked again.

"Nothing," she lied, and she came up over my body, her breasts hanging directly in my face. "Hold on a second," she said.

I didn't see how I could do anything but hold on. Her right breast pressed against my face, and her nipple slid across my lips. I could smell her skin, her beauty, her softness, the scent of her body filled my nostrils.

"Almost got it," she said.

I turned my face and she turned with me. Her left breast took its turn, pressing against my face. I felt whatever it was on my forearm was gone, but she still wasn't moving. I turned, and she turned. She was messing with me!