Pater Familias

Thanks, readers and reviewers! I've been quite sick for awhile and not able to do much, but I'm getting back into the swing very slowly.

I took her to a shooting range, as promised. The place teemed with people. I found a clerk, registered our weapons and led Sakura to a stall. “Really, you should practice drawing your gun quickly,” I informed. “But, do it unloaded.”

She giggled. “Right.”

Smiling, I asked her to load her gun.

Sakura accomplished loading the gun, though I could tell this was her first firearm. She wasn’t exactly clumsy, but she didn’t have any speed, either. I put the protective earmuffs over her head and pointed to the paper cut-out target. I’d set it to close range.

Sakura pointed and fired until her clip emptied. The target swung close so we could remove it.

“Not bad,” I told her. “You have a good grouping at the heart.”

“I was aiming for the head,” she admitted, blushing.

“Oh dear.” I put a fresh target on the line. “Do you have sight problems?”

“No, but I’m not naturally left-handed, remember? And, I see better with my right eye.”

I made a mental note to examine her vision. Also, I’d see if I couldn’t fix her right hand. It shamed me I hadn’t thought of it before now.

“Pistols are not usually made for left-handed people, anyway,” I said. “But, mine is. Try it.”

Sakura looked down at my gun and then back up at me, her eyebrows up to her hairline. “Holy fuck, Hojo,” she swore. “You could take a man’s head off with that thing.”

“Oh, easily,” I agreed, thinking of the past. “It made an exit wound in Valentine sufficient to necessitate me removing a large section of his bowels. How fortunate for Lucretia that her lover is no longer full of shit.”

Sakura bent over double, laughing so hard she was utterly silent. After a moment she gave a gasping inhale and stood up, eyes shining. “You are terrible,” she mock-condemned. But, she took my gun. “Does this thing kick? It looks like it’ll kick.”

“It’s got quite a recoil, but you should be able to control it.”

She trusted me. Nodding, she raised it and fired. She blew the head off the target. “Wow. Having a left-handed grip really does help.” She winced. “It’s hard to control.”

I picked up her gun as the next target loaded. No need for the machine to bring the old one back when the shot was so obvious. “If you hadn’t had a bit of mako-augmentation, I’d have never let you attempt using it. It’s too strong for an average woman.”

“I am not average.” She leveled her steely gaze upon me.

“I know you aren’t, Blossom.”

I pushed the target setting back to maximum distance. “I want you to practice with your gun until you can do this,” I said, pointing and firing. The hole appeared right between the eyes. I fired eight more times, putting the bullets through the original hole. “You should be good, if you mean to carry a gun. No sense wasting time, ammunition, and effort. If you mean to kill someone, kill. If you mean to hinder, slow, or stop, do so.”

Sakura looked at my paper. “I’ll never be this good.”

“Never say never. Reload.”

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“Why are you so good with a gun?” Sakura pulled the straw out of her Mako-Mint milkshake, letting the noxious, half-frozen sweet ooze down the plastic and back into the cup.

We sat in the mall food court. I’d ordered a frozen yogurt smoothie, dark chocolate. Every time I took her out I felt like I took out a teenager. She could really eat for someone so slight. This was her third Mako-Mint in an hour. If I didn’t get her out of here soon, her sugar rush would make her even more like a teen. Still, I could tell Jules his invention found success. There seemed to be a lot of young people drinking his creation besides my increasingly jittery woman.

Thank Shiva I had experience with rowdy adolescents. Still, I wouldn’t be able to hose her off or make her hit a treadmill for an hour. One didn’t do that to a prospective lover.

“I mostly got good because I helped Syvas hunt game. After that, I acquired more skill by using dart gun tranquillizers in the lab.” I lifted my spoon. “Open up and try something actually good and good for you, pretty.”

Sakura, eyes twinkling, parted her luscious lips. I spooned the frozen confection into her mouth slowly. I thought of her swallowing down my cock and felt the aforementioned member stiffened.

“Mmmm, oh damn,” Sakura groaned. “That is good.”

“See?” I licked the spoon, hoping to taste her on it. “No need for a sugar-bomb.”

She looked at me a long moment. “Every moment I’m with you, I think about how you’re different from every other man I’ve known.”

“Extrapolate.” I felt curious. In the past I hadn’t cared if someone talked about me, showed me myself. Now, I did care. I wanted to know my red and black, my highs and lows.

“You have class.” Sakura put her elbows on the table and leaned closer. “You treat me like a lady even though we both know damn well I’m not. I could be a nervous virgin, for all the care you put into my seduction.”

I couldn’t help grinning. “So, I’m seducing you every moment, Blossom? Not bad for an old man.”

Sakura dipped her head a moment, seeming to fight a smile. “I didn’t mean it like that, but yeah. Yes, Hojo, you’re seducing me every moment that I have your attention. Do you think anyone else has ever fed me?” She straightened, tossing her mane of shining red. “I think you even treated your prostitutes well.”

“A man who mistreats a prostitute either has a death wish or a lot of money.” I didn’t want to talk about my whores. They didn’t belong in this conversation or with my company. “But, my dear, you are a lady. Exposure to cock doesn’t change that. I don’t care how many dicks you’re intimately acquainted with, as long as you don’t re-acquaint while you’re giving me the time of day.”

“Yes, you don’t take it well,” she murmured. “You have nothing to worry about. You know that.”

“I won’t worry once I show you how to look at a ceiling properly.”

Sakura’s mouth dropped open, but I saw her humor.

“Or,” I went on, “how to look at the back of your own head.”

She let out a little gasp. Squirming a little in her seat, she blushed furiously. I smelled her excitement.

Not long now.

Good.

I had a large appetite for feminine flesh, and she filled every requirement I had, plus some I hadn’t known of until meeting her.

I put another spoonful of chocolate into that open, tempting mouth. “You might be asking yourself why I couldn’t keep Lucretia if I’m so marvelous in the bedroom,” I continued. “It’s simple. Lucretia is one of the coldest people I know. From me, that’s quite a distinction.”

“I don’t think you’re cold at all, Hojo,” Sakura murmured.

“You’ve never faced me behind reinforced plexi-glass, my dear,” I answered. “But, since you never will, it’s hardly a concern.” I offered her another measure of my dessert. “Still, I might find reason to strap you to a table.”

Shivering, Sakura accepted my offering.

No, not long now.