The Erotica Anthology

By Erin ORiordan

Erin O'Riordan has contributed smart, honest short stories, articles and film reviews to Playgirl, Hustler Fantasies, and quality webzines including Clean Sheets, The Erotic Woman, and Oysters & Chocolate. This collection showcases some of the short stories, along with an excerpt of her full length novel, 'Beltane (Pagan Spirits Book One),' from Eternal Press.

Also included is the exclusive, previously unpublished "Herbert."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Erin ORiordan
• Release date: Jun 11, 2011
• ISBN: 9781458077868

Erin ORiordan

Erin O'Riordan lives in the Midwestern United States with her husband and co-author Tit Elingtin. Her erotic stories, essays, and film reviews have been published in numerous magazines and websites. She loves world mythology for both its spirituality and storytelling value and refuses to choose any one faith. The ideal trap for Erin O'Riordan would be baited with dark chocolate, espresso drinks, and Christian Bale movies.Readers can view more of O'Riordan's work, including free samples, at www.aeess.com.Tit Elingtin has been described as "Cautiously Reckless" and a Renaissance man. He knows something about everything. He is truly a jack of all trades, master of some. www.TitElingtin.com

Book preview

1The Erotica Anthology

Erin O’Riordan

Copyright 2011 by Erin O’Riordan

Smashwords Edition

Visit Erin O’Riordan’s website:

www.aeess.com

Stories in this anthology have previously been published at The Erotic Woman, Clean Sheets, Oysters & Chocolate and Playgirl Magazine.

Contents

Herbert

2

Beltane

21

"Anatomy Lesson (A Tribute to Our Bodies, Ourselves)"

48

900

60

Innocent

75

Going With the Flow

92

Index of Websites

98

Beltane, The Novel (preview)

99

Herbert

Previously Unpublished

My first boyfriend, Shane, asked to borrow my car one weekend. He didn’t tell me where he was going. I knew right away that this wasn’t a good idea. I realized over the next week or so that Shane wasn’t a good idea. I broke up with him.

This levelheadedness when it came to the opposite sex has served me well. My second boyfriend, Phil, kept eyeballing my sister Francis. I gave him the boot. Phil was followed by Victor. Victor had a good run, but I also knew that the end would come sooner or later. When he left, I was sad, but not devastated.

After Victor came Steve. Steve stole my ATM card one weekend. I testified against him. He’s now serving six years on a similar charge.

I, Liv Stenke, am not a foolish woman. I’m not given to falling so madly in love with a man that I can’t see his flaws. At the age of twenty-eight, I was determined that no matter how fine a man’s body, no matter how earth-shattering the sex, I wouldn’t lose my head.

This was before I’d heard of Dante Sugar.

The first time I heard the name Dante Sugar, I was at the county records building on business. I was in the ladies’ room, freshening my rock-candy-pink lipstick in the gold-rimmed mirror over the speckled marble sink. Two women who worked in the county assessor’s office sat in adjoining stalls, apparently not realizing that I was there.

Guess who was at the concert in the park last night? the first said. Dante Sugar.

I wasn’t even sure she’d heard her right. Dante, as in the thirteenth-century Italian poet? Sugar, as in the stuff you sprinkle on your grapefruit in the morning? What kind of name was that?

The second broke out in a lascivious guffaw. Oh my God, she said.

The first woman chortled. What’s so sweet about Dante Sugar, anyway?

Oh my God, said the second woman, apparently of limited vocabulary. How about his sweet little ass? Or that sweet little sports car he drives around in? You’ve got to be kidding me. How could you look at Dante Sugar and not just want to ride him until you break it off? How can you even hear his name and not fall totally in love with him?

I heard his name, I said. That shut the women up quickly. And I’m not totally in love with him. As a matter of fact, this Dante Sugar sounds like an arrogant prick.

The name was stuck in my head, though. I repeated it to myself in the elevator as I checked my reflection in its mirrored ceiling. Dante. Sugar. Dante. Sugar.

I met Dante Sugar, three weeks later, at a company brunch. It was a formal occasion, held at the old Henderson mansion. I filled my plate carefully: a quarter-baguette with smoked salmon and brie, fruit salad, a lemon scone with clotted cream and key lime curd. I set my plate down at the mayor’s wife’s table and went to the bar for a coffee with cream and a mimosa. When I returned, he was at the next table with the mayor’s entourage. Dante Sugar was one of the mayor’s aides.

Dante Sugar sat, his large hands buttering a lemon scone. His polo shirt of soft gray heather, much too casual for the occasion, brought out his cinnamon-sugar color. His skin, like his last name, would not betray his heritage. He might have been Cherokee, or Palestinian, or b&w. His rust-brown hair curled gently. It hung in his face, partially obscuring long, dark, curling eyelashes and brown-green eyes, the backs of two sea-turtles.

His cinnamon lips parted. He said, I must ask the waiter for some orange mar-muh-lahde. His voice was thick as the condiment he requested

Oh, please, I thought. Mar-muh-lahde? Ridiculous. I must ask . . .? An affectation. He’s just as impossible as I imagined.

Yet the wall of my common sense had already begun to come down.

Dante Sugar rose from his chair, giving me a view of his sweet ass. Well, it was a little sweet, I had to admit. High and tight, voluptuous without being womanly in his inappropriately comfortable acid-washed jeans. In his back pocket, he kept something long, pointy, and concealed. A fireplace lighter, I thought, perhaps. Maybe he was an idiosyncratic smoker.

Arrogant prick indeed, I thought, as a server brought his orange mar-muh-lahde. Dante Sugar smiled as he bit into his scone, making eyes at the mayor’s sister-in-law.

When brunch was over, I said good-bye to my boss, my co-workers, and all the important members of the mayor’s entourage. I went out the side door. I was just about to go down the back staircase to the valets’ station when my path was blocked by the thick, muscular arm of Dante Sugar.

I’d like to fuck you, he said, by way of introduction. I’d like to see you on your back in the middle of my bed, with your legs in the air. I’ll bet you squeal like a bitch Chihuahua when you’re coming.

I stayed cool. Mr. Sugar, I said, that is the most disgusting thing any person has ever said to me. And even if one were to ignore its crudity, your choice of words would still seem utterly bizarre.

He smiled. His smile was devastatingly beautiful, his teeth impossibly straight and white. I didn’t hear ‘no,’ he said. He chuckled to himself. Then he leaned in and caught my whole mouth in a sticky mar-muh-lahde kiss.

That kiss told me more about Dante Sugar than a thousand of his poorly-chosen words ever would. It opened a window into his smarmy, shallow soul and let me