by Mia Madison
Some rich looking kid her own age. Soft as cookie dough and dressed in a pale pink polo shirt and off-white knee length shorts, deck shoes with no socks. Christ. That’s what she was in a rush to meet? They must be close because of the way he’s leaning in toward her, using all his powers of persuasion about something. I can tell even from a distance.
Caila is looking up at him and a bolt of pure rage flies to my gut. Jealousy. I can’t stand that he gets to talk to her like that, like he’s telling her what to do and she’s listening. I can’t see the expression or the look in her eyes but I can feel the intensity there.
I can’t stand it.
I turn back to return to my truck before the urge to kill that pussy overwhelms me. The sandwich I was going to grab, having missed lunch working on Caila’s car, can wait. Even though I’m ravenous. I can’t walk by her seeing her with another man.
Christ, you’re being ridiculous dude.
This is a small town and she’s the fucking queen of it. You aren’t going to be able to live here and not run into her with some other guy. It’ll be a husband some day, god forbid. The thought that another man will own Caila in that way, forever locking out any other man – me - from claiming her, burns me all to hell.
She should belong to me.
There’s no logical reason why, other than I want her more than I’ve ever wanted any woman in my entire life.
There’s something about her and I know she’s too good for me. Anyone would say it – who does he think he is, that dirty mechanic, going after Caila Ferris? Her body is perfect of course, the tight little curves sending my cock into a tailspin since the day I first saw her. But her smile is so cute, with a hint of naughtiness behind it, her confidence is wanton, and there’s an intelligence too that I don’t notice much in other women.
What do you know about women, you idiot?
Yeah, I’m turning into a sap because it’s been too long without one. And that’s not about to change with Caila.
I grit on my jaw and act like a man, turning back toward Caila and the guy. I’ll walk past her, nod my head in recognition. That’s if she even notices me. Perhaps she’s smitten with pasty boy and won’t even take in my presence.
I steel myself and stride toward her but the atmosphere has changed. Even people passing by the pair on the street are veering a slightly wider berth around them. Like they don’t want to get involved with something.
Caila and the kid are arguing now. A lover’s tiff that makes my blood pummel through my veins. My lips press tight together just thinking of how he might be giving her a rough time. That urge springs up again.
Just calm down and mind your own damn business Rand. Keep it cool.
I keep walking, getting closer. Trying to avert my eyes but Caila, without knowing it, holds me trapped just by being close. I can’t take my gaze off her. When I get close, her eyes snap to mine and she startles. I see the anger and irritation that’s settled there and how it suddenly changes to something else when she looks at me. Something softer and filled with, no, I’m imagining the desire pooling there.
“Hey, look at me,” the dude shouts at her.
Caila’s eyes stay fixed on me, widening, her lips part slightly.
“I said look at me, you stupid tramp.”
The asshole grabs her arm, pulling on her hard to retrieve her full attention but I’m already storming toward them. I come up on them and yank his hand off her, pinning his arm in my fist as he jerks in surprise.
“What the -?” he yelps. “Who the fuck are you?”
“A friend,” I snarl, wishing I could break his elbow, just snap it at the elbow for speaking to her like that. For laying his hands on her without using his softest caress. “Here to advise you to treat a woman right.”
“Mind your own fucking business, greaseball,” he snarls.
If it wasn’t the middle of the afternoon I might think the kid was drunk. But he’s just got that entitled air you see nowadays in twenty year olds that have grown up with everything. Geez, I sound like an old man. And it doesn't mean I want to shove my fist in his face any less.
“I make it my fucking business when a man puts his hands on any woman. Are you okay, Caila?” I ask her.
Her eyes are huge and round, glistening slightly. If he makes her cry, I will deck him and put him on the ground. But she nods her head, staring at me constantly.
“Sure?” I ask.
She nods again and as I walk away to go about my business, add for the asshole; “Don’t let me see you touch her like that again, unless you feel like sampling my touch on you.”
“You know that asshole?” the douche is asking her. “He called you Caila. You know him?”
He’s mad as hell and I’m glad about that. Just so long as he doesn’t take it out on Caila.
When I come out of the sub shop, the street is empty. I look up and down but there’s not a sign of Caila and I can’t dismiss the sinking feeling. Who knows when I’ll get to see her again.
I looked over every inch of the old Lincoln and it’s been cared for, not likely to break down again any time soon. Perhaps I should have done what a lot of guys in the trade do and fixed it so’s something else would go and she’d have to bring the car in again. Not that there’s even a guarantee of that seeing as it’s her father’s car. Better just put her out of my head.
She’s got a boyfriend, judging by the possessive stance the brat held over her. I can’t for the life of me understand why she lowers herself for a guy that treats her like that but maybe that’s her thing. I know some women like to be pushed around. My sister always went for idiots like that as well.
Knowing I’ll never stop thinking about her, I reconcile myself to having Caila as the girl of my dreams. Not to mention all my fantasies, and head back to the garage.
I’m under an Eagle Mark three, fixing the diffuser and forcing myself not to think about Caila. Every time I remember how that kid pulled her arm, my blood rages up again. Shit, I need a new valve on this. When I unscrew the connector beside the air valve, a leak spurts all over my hands, running down my forearms.
I curse the heat and heel myself to roll out from under the car then sit up to wipe my forehead of sweat. When I open my stinging eyes again, there’s a pair of the shapeliest thighs, making a perfect cross right in front of me.
“Caila, what happened?” I ask, tipping my head up to look at her, forcing myself to avoid the soft flesh at the top of her legs and how the crease makes me think of how sweet she must taste. “Is the Lincoln okay?”
“Um, it could be making a rattle again,” she says.
“A rattle?” I grin, knowing it wasn’t making any noise before.
“Yeah.”
“Seriously, where?”
“I’m not really sure.”
I sit where I am and gaze up the length of her, drinking her in. I’ve never seen a more perfect woman. And I’m pretty sure from the look in her eyes that there’s nothing wrong with the car.
“I did such a thorough special job on that car, I’d be surprised if she breaks down again in the next decade,” I tell her, my throat husking.
I’m so glad to see her again I’d like to pull her down into my lap and hold her there. I must be completely nuts.
“You did?” she murmurs, softly. “A special job? For my father?”
She’s so petite my head comes up to her waist and I’m exactly at the level of those gorgeous thighs and everything I want between. Not that I want her just for her body but right about now it’s damn appealing.
“Not for him, no,” I say.
Is this happening?
The heat rising between us is enough to melt mercury. It can’t be one-sided and only coming from me. Caila is looking at me like she wants nothing more than for me to rip down those tight little shorts and ravish her with my tongue. If she was mine, I’d do that for her and a whole lot more every single day. If she belonged to me completely.
But she isn’t and I have to keep t
his professional. I don’t have any desire to be run out of town.
Chapter 4
Caila
I can’t get over wondering what the hell ever attracted me to Boone. Not when there’s a real man up for grabs. But how do I let Rand know I’m interested? I can’t just go walking into the garage where he works and anyone could be dropping off a vehicle. I’ve acted like such a little brat around him I’m sure he thinks I’m too young and too… bratty.
Damn.
Sometimes you let a side of yourself come out that isn’t the real you, but then you’re labeled like that permanently. It’s like the Internet – sits there with you forever. And If I did get up the courage to go strutting into the garage, I know I wouldn’t be able to stop myself shivering with lust. Which would probably make me all gawky embarrassed.
I don't know why he has this effect on me – I normally have no trouble being a brazen strong girl around guys. With Rand I’m silly putty. I look at him and my body sparks to life like a live wire connection. My nipples harden under the thin fabric of my shirt. I have to squeeze my thighs in an attempt to stop the squelching arousal that pulsates with a determination to have what it wants.
I need to see him again. It’s like a relentless itch that I can’t reach. I drive to the garage, thinking I can say the car is broken again.
When all I could see of Rand was his large boots sticking out from under the car he’s currently working on, I feel pretty self-assured. Leaning up against the side of my father’s car, my legs crossed at the thigh, arms casually crossed shelving my perky tits on my forearms. I think I must look pretty good, even if that sounds a bit cocky.
But then Rand slides out from under the engine and sits up on the pulley thing to wipe something out of his eyes and my heart fails me. Along with the backs of my knees. His hair is mussed. Some locks of the luscious dark curls are sticking together from the sweat. My heart rate picks up so fast I can hardly gasp at the sultry air. Then he looks up at me and his initial surprise is swiftly replaced by a broad grin.
His mouth fascinates me. The easy smile stretches like a horizontal gash across his chin, no turn ups at the edges. I can’t take my eyes off it, wondering how it would be to have my own mouth under that slash of firm flesh. When he smiles his eyes light up like beacons, filled with a zillion promises and invitations I know I wouldn’t refuse. If only he’d ask me.
But I get the feeling he never will.
He probably thinks I’m too young. And too dumb, after seeing me with Boone. What must he have thought of me for ever going out with a guy like that? Sometimes I do to much to try to make my father happy.
That can be the only thing that ever kept me with Boone and I wonder again what I ever saw in him. Why didn’t I detect his aggression earlier? It was certainly buzzing around him. I know now he’s a man that could never win me over. For all that anger, he could never protect me in a real sense. And he doesn’t excite my body either. Sex with Boone is kind of mechanical in truth.
I never feel my body is being adored and reveled in. I never feel like I can let go to the pleasure and completely lose myself in connection with a real man. The smell of masculinity, the hard muscle stretching his leather skin, the chiseled jaw where manly stubble roughs his skin and mine when he kisses me. I wonder how it would be with the mechanic because he has all that to spare.
Rand’s gaze pummels into me, so intense I feel like I’m being fucked by his eyes. Tingles fall through my body and I don’t feel so sure of myself now. I’m trembling, I realize. Sure he can see right through me and laughing to himself at the girl having a secret filthy crush on a sweaty, filthy, hard-working older man.
I’m certain of it when he scoots his rolling platform across the distance between us and stops right at my toes. Involuntarily my arms uncross so my hands can fly back to the metal I’m leaning on for added support. He sits there beneath me, looking up the length of me and my heart is pounding so hard under my ribs it’s actually painful. I’m so aware of him, it’s like pinpricks in my skin. His face at that point where my thighs end, his mouth just inches away. It’s a damn good thing my legs are crossed because I’m getting wet there just from his closeness.
Little beads of sweat break out on my upper lip and my tongue is drawn without my permission to glide across them. Rand watches the pink point like it’s the most interesting thing he’s ever seen. My quivering increases when his eyes slide down over my chest, my hips. Reflexively, I press my thighs to squeeze the dampness pooling between them and his gaze is transfixed on the flesh molding together. Oh god, can we do this?
Right here in his garage?
I’m so hot, trickles of sweat run down the side of my neck and spine. I gulp down, trying to halt the rate of my breathing.
In another reality I see myself casually lifting one leg and draping it over his solid shoulder. My spread stretched open an inch from his wide lips. Oh god, stop thinking stuff like that. I just want Rand’s rough chin buried in my pulsating chasm, his tongue parting my folds. A shiver runs up my skin and Rand grins again, like he knows what I’m thinking. Like we’re sharing every image in a dual fantasy.
“This heat is getting to me,” I murmur, twisting my head side to side like that’s gonna help.
He grins again, a filthy provocative smirk.
“I know what you mean, Caila.”
Does he? I doubt that.
Wasn’t he meant to be the sweaty one? So how come he’s sitting there all calm and collected while I have a hot flash, grinning up at me his mouth just inches from where I long for it to be.
“You think it will break open any time soon?”
Damn what am I raving on about?
“I hope so. It would be great to get soaking wet and relieve this searing heat. Don’t you think?”
What’s happening? I can’t tell if he’s flirting back with me or actually talking about a rain shower. His eyes are always sparking so it’s difficult to be sure. What I’m in no doubt about is how much my body is yearning for his hard hands on it. Even if he is all dirty from his job. I don’t care. I want his hard heat compressing me, squeezing and stroking every part of me.
“Yes I’d like that too,” I say, the words falling from my mouth like a whimper.
“You would?”
“Yes,” I breathe.
It’s like the world of the garage has fallen away and there’s only Rand and I locked in this fantasy of being rained on, arms entwined in knots as our bodies writhe and slip over each other.
Where did this come from? This sudden insta-attraction for my father’s mechanic? I have no clue but it’s overwhelmed me like a flash virus and I have no control over it even if I wanted to.
“You know, I worked especially hard on that car,” he says, putting emphasis on the ‘especially’. Like he’s saying he did that for me. “If there’s something not right with it, I won’t send your father the bill.”
“Oh no, it’s not that. I’m sure it’s fine. Bill away.”
He grins up at me from between my thighs, I mean in front of them, oh god….
I don’t think it’s that he’s relieved about the money either. I think money’s the last thing in his mind at the moment.
“I -” I have no clue what to say, nervousness is making me babble. Anyway my lips are quivering too much to speak.
“Yes?” Rand says, waiting like I’m about to spout the most interesting statement.
“I just wanted to thank you,” I stutter out. “For sticking up for me earlier.”
“That’s okay,” Rand shrugs and just like that, he rolls away from me.
The heat surrounding me drops away in an instant and I’m left, half panting, up against my father’s car. Feeling as though I’ve been thoroughly taken without a single finger being laid on me.
What happened? He’s switched off just like that, all business. He powers his thighs to rise without needing any help from those huge dirty hands, then walks over to his tool bench.
“I
’m not going to stand by while a man gets rough with a woman, even if he is her boyfriend,” he grunts.
His back is facing me so I can’t see his expression but I can hear the thick tension in his voice gritting out through the words.
“Boone’s not my boyfriend,” I blurt out.
I don’t want Rand to think I’m with Boone. Or anyone else. I need to know whether he wants to be with me.
“He sure looked like he felt possessive over you,” Rand snaps, not turning around.
I walk across the garage and stand beside him. I barely reach his shoulder, he’s so tall and wide. And the heat emanating from him is there again, making it hard to inhale, or stand up without my knees giving way like melting ice poles.
“No one takes possession of me unless I want them to,” I say, turning my eyes up to Rand so he can be in no doubt about my meaning this time.
I need him. I need to know – does he feel the same?
Chapter 5
Rand
I look down at her soft eyes filled with longing, her mouth slightly parted and my cock unfurls in my pants. For all the world, I want nothing more than to pick her up and set her down on the edge of my tool bench. Then push those bare legs open like I’ve been fantasizing about non-stop since I met her and move between them.
Those shorts are so small there’s barely an inch of fabric covering her sweet mound. I wouldn’t even need to take them off, not at first. It would be easy to push my fingers under the denim and into her slick pinkness.
Is she wet for me right now?
I’d guess she is, judging by the way she’s looking at me, the way her pink tongue travels involuntarily over her lower lip. It would be no effort to slide one thick finger inside her hole and feel it clamp around me. Possessing me. The thought that I could be inside her tight pussy in moments and she wants that too has my dick fully erect and thumping to be free.