Fast Ride

by Nancy Warren

  She resolved to get Doc alone for a few minutes tomorrow and get his advice. After all, this going along with being Wes’s girlfriend was his prescription. It wouldn’t be right to end the charade without professional medical advice. Or at least, that was the excuse she gave herself.

  She sucked it up and opened her eyes for her first actual lie to Wes. As she gazed into his strong, sexy face and caught his wickedly taunting gaze, she could have sworn he was teasing her.

  She pulled out one of her fantasies. “Once, we were out in the middle of a wheat field. No one could see us; the wheat was so high that when we lay down we were invisible. But we could see the sky, so blue, and feel the sun shining down on our bodies.” She had to stop for a breath, warmth suffused her chest as she pictured the two of them out there, hidden but exposed, imagined the sound of the wind shushing through the nearly ripe grain, the smell of the earth and the crops in the air, the feel of the crushed stalks like a coarse mat beneath them.

  “Screwing in a wheat field, huh?”

  She nodded, forcing herself not to blush.

  “Just the two of us?”

  “Yes!” What did he think they’d done before he lost his memory? Had orgies? Swapped partners? Sex outside was as wild as she got, and she was about to explain that in no uncertain terms when she saw the glint in his eyes. “You’re teasing.”

  “Uh-uh. I’m making sure I get it right. I wouldn’t want to screw up our secret games. We’ve obviously done a lot of this in the past. I don’t want you to be disappointed.”

  “Oh, I won’t be.” After last night, she was certain he’d never disappoint her as a lover. She only hoped she could fake being confident and outrageous enough not to disappoint him.

  “I need to take my bike in to get fixed,” he said.

  “But you can’t drive yet.”

  “I know. I figure the bike and I are both pretty banged up. Hopefully we’ll be fixed around the same time.”

  She nodded. “I guess you use Changing Gears.”

  “Changing Gears?”

  “It’s a bike shop. They’re semi famous. The word is that they can get any bike ever made for their customers and they can fix pretty much any bike too.”

  “Sounds like my kind of place. Okay if we drop off the bike on our way out later?”

  “Sure.”

  Dinner was a simple, high-cholesterol affair. Gertie didn’t believe in low-cal diets, she believed in hard work to keep her arteries clear. So far, it seemed to be working in spite of meals like tonight’s: fried chicken, oven-fried potatoes, cornbread, and fresh peas and chard from the garden – both dripping with fresh butter.

  It wasn’t fears about her cholesterol level that had Nell picking at her food, but the nervous anticipation churning in her stomach.

  It was one thing to imagine making love in the great outdoors. In the privacy of her head she could be as wild as she wanted—but in reality, there were all sorts of logistical details to fuss over. The first of these being the possibility that one of the good people of Harleyville might stumble onto the two of them cavorting around in the buff. Then there were bugs, dirt, prickly plants, animals to worry about. And the biggest detail of all—where the heck were they going to do it?

  She should simply call it off. But every time she glanced up, there was Wes looking at her with barely banked fires in his eyes and that would spark her blood so she couldn’t contemplate the possibility of not making love to him out in the wild—which, with his savage appearance and rugged body, seemed like his natural milieu.

  “I’ll do the dishes, Gertie.” She jumped up the minute dinner was over.

  “I’ll help,” Wes said and joined her at the sink.

  “You don’t have to do that.”

  “It goes quicker with two,” he said, nudging her as he said it so it was clear he wanted to get on with the after-dinner entertainment in the great outdoors.

  She shivered and squeezed dish soap under the running water.

  The man used washing dishes as shameless foreplay. He stood too close, rubbed against her every chance he got, leaned across her instead of stepping around and generally teased her until she was so rattled she could barely stop herself from breaking all the china.

  She tried to frown him down and encountered such smoldering heat in his gaze that she gulped and turned back to the sink.

  “Hurry up and wash those dishes. I’m dying to get my hands on you,” he said softly, rubbing his torso across her back as he reached to put a dried plate away.

  “Gertie,” she called to the woman who was in the next room with the television blaring, “I’m going to take Wes for a ride tonight. All right if I borrow the truck?”

  “Drive careful. And don’t wake me if you come in after nine.”

  “Okay.”

  She turned to find Wes leaning against the kitchen counter looking big and rugged and wonderfully male. “I’ll just brush my teeth and freshen up,” she said.

  “I’ll meet you out front.”

  She’d been racking her brain to think of a place where they’d be unlikely to be disturbed, but she was coming up blank.

  With a shrug she decided to take a back road and see where it led. This was her fantasy and she was finally having a chance to fulfill it. She couldn’t waste time being a wimp.

  So she brushed her teeth, combed her hair, and tried to get in touch with her inner wild woman. She grabbed her purse and then as she thought ahead to possible scenarios, turned back to her bedroom and changed her jeans for a white denim skirt. She gnawed her lip for a second and then, with a spurt of bravery, slipped off her underwear.

  Chapter Six

  Nell felt like the bold and daring woman of her fantasies as her own naked thighs slid against each other. A breeze rode up her skirt and wafted over the heat in the center of her body as she hoisted herself in the driver’s side of Gertie’s truck.

  If she’d known how hard it would be for the two of them to haul the damaged Harley into the truck bed she’d have worn old jeans and a work shirt. They heaved and grunted the thing up a ramp that Wes had rigged from an old 2X12. Finally, the bike was in the truck bed and Wes had tied it in place with rope. As she started the truck and pulled out slowly she was pleased to see the bike stayed in place.

  She’d never been to Changing Gears but she knew where it was. The building was a low, one story cinderblock building in a non-descript beige. It hid behind the main business area as though trying to keep a low profile. However, the store drew customers from all over the world and there was some mumbling around town that the proximity to Changing Gears was one of the reasons the Hog Squad had settled in Harleyville.

  She pulled into the lot and found only one bike in the parking lot. She’d done a Google search of Changing Gears and knew there was still fifteen minutes until closing. Either an end of the day customer or the owner must belong to that bike.

  As they jumped out of the truck and headed around to the back, Wes said, “That is a classic Indian. One sweet ride.” She marveled that the man who couldn’t remember his own name could identify the make of a motorcycle from across a parking lot.

  As she let down the tail gate a man came jogging out of Changing Gears’ front door. He looked like a character from Sons of Anarchy with long, stringy hair, tattoos, a stained leather vest, old jeans, boots and a nose that had been broken so many times it resembled a walnut.

  “Lemme help,” he said, and she was happy to let the two men haul the beast down from the truck and into the store. She held the door open for them feeling that a woman in a short skirt and no panties couldn’t be expected to do much more.

  The store owner touched the bike much the way Doc Greenfield had touched Wes after the accident, with care and gentleness and a big dose of intuition. “She took quite a tumble,” he said after a while.

  “Can you fix her?”

  “Of course,” he said, like that was irrelevant.

  “Good as new?”

  The guy gav
e him a strange look. “Good enough for what you need,” he said. “I like your other bike better.”

  “My other bike?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So I’ve been here before?”

  The guy seemed like he didn’t hear. Maybe thought a man who had to ask if he’d been here before was too dumb to have a conversation with. “Okay, sign here and here.”

  While they filled out paperwork, Nell browsed the store. Not that she was in the market for leather chaps or official Harley water bottles or a new helmet, but browsing gave her something to do.

  “You should try the helmets on,” Walnut Nose called out to her.

  “Oh, I don’t plan to ride a motorcycle thanks,” she said.

  “Sure you will. Try the blue helmet on the second rack. Two down from the top.”

  He was in front of her so fast it seemed like magic. He reached for the helmet, took it down and put it right on her head as though he didn’t hear her saying that she didn't need a motorcycle helmet. Finally, she gave up and let him adjust the straps and nod, pleased with himself. “That’s perfect.”

  “But I don’t need—”

  “It’ll be here when you do.”

  When they left Changing Gears the sign turned out as the truck doors slammed. “That was one strange dude,” Wes said.

  “Oh, yeah.” He glanced at her. “That blue helmet did look good on you, though.”

  The dusty red pickup rattled down the lane she’d chosen at random, leaving a plume of dust in its wake. Cornfields marched on either side of the road and she hoped this back lane led somewhere or she’d not only feel foolish—she’d lose her nerve.

  Wes traced circles around her bare knee which didn’t help either her nerves or her driving ability. She bounced over a pothole she’d planned to avoid and a stone hit the truck sounding like a bullet.

  “I like this skirt,” Wes said, as he slipped his hand beneath it.

  “Thanks,” she replied, hearing her own voice low and husky in reply. His hand inched higher and she tightened her hands on the wheel. Higher still, drawing idle patterns on her inner thighs that had her holding back a moan.

  And finally, he worked his way up to where she was wet and hot and already open for him.

  “You forgot your panties,” he said in a low growl, his fingers parting her folds.

  “Silly me,” she gasped, sliding her legs wider apart and hitching her hips forward to give him easier access.

  He eased a finger inside her, slow and deep, and she nearly ran them off the road. As they hit the gravel shoulder the truck bumped up and down, up and down, causing her body to bounce on his embedded finger. Up and down, up and down, until she thought she’d fly apart right then and there.

  “I have to tell you, you are one bad driver,” he said with a quiver of humor.

  “If you don’t take your hand away, we’ll both be picking unripe corn out of our teeth.”

  “I knew I should have driven.”

  “I’m an excellent driver,” she told him, groaning slightly as he pushed into her a little deeper. “Most of the time.”

  “What’s the matter, honey? Am I making you nervous?” He pressed his palm against her mound so she wanted to grind herself against him.

  “I’m going to kill you,” she whispered. “If you don’t kill me first.”

  He chuckled softly, and she could tell he was enjoying her torment. She wanted to reach over and give him a taste of his own medicine, but she knew that if she took even one hand off the wheel she’d be in serious trouble. He seemed to sense how close she was to the edge, because, while he didn’t withdraw his hand, he didn’t move either so she felt like a pot about to boil over.

  Would this road never end? She felt hot and quivery and she was having trouble concentrating since lust seemed to have flooded her brain, drowning out any ability to think, plan, or reason. She’d got the pair of them into this; it was her stupid fantasy; now it seemed to be turning into a nightmare before her very eyes. The road went on and on and on with nothing but dusty cornfields to the right and left.

  The good news was they seemed to have the road to themselves. And she had a blanket. And a pickup truck. Well, she’d wanted to be spontaneous. She guessed it was time to accept that spontaneous didn’t always work out quite the way you planned it.

  At the next intersection, she turned right into a narrow rutted lane, pulled to the side and cut the engine.

  He glanced around and she did the same. Through the dusty windshield she saw nothing but the big red ball of the setting sun, rows of dark green cornstalks as far as she could see, and not a hint of a building or vehicle or animal or man. Not bad, she decided smugly. Not bad at all.

  He turned to her. “This is it?”

  She had the advantage of being able to tell him anything she liked about their supposed relationship before his accident, and she called on the privilege shamelessly. “You never complained before. This is what we like to do. Find a quiet spot, crawl into the bed of the truck and … make love under the stars.”

  His middle finger was still deep inside her body, a fact she hadn’t forgotten for a second and which he reminded her of by moving, cupping her mound and driving his finger deeper. “Or we could do it right here in the front seat,” he said, leaning over to kiss her, deep and wet.

  But this was her fantasy damn it and she wanted it her way. “No. Under the open sky. Trust me. It’s what we love to do.”

  “All right.” He eased his hand away from her and they both got out of the truck and went to the back. As he reached to pull down the tailgate she stopped him. “Doesn’t work. Gertie backed into a tree years ago and it’s jammed shut.”

  “Bad driving must run in your family,” he said as he clambered over the back. Once inside he turned to give her his hand, but what she could have managed in jeans, wasn’t going to be easy in a short skirt and no underwear.

  She propped her sandaled foot on the back bumper, making the tight skirt ride high. He grinned down at her, enjoying her predicament so much she decided to wipe the grin right off his face. She yanked the skirt to her waist, took his hand and scrambled up giving him a great view, which he took full advantage of.

  “I’m going to kiss Gertie when we get home,” he said.

  Oh, she was a wild woman all right, she decided as she pulled the picnic blanket out of the backpack she’d brought along and laid it out. Then she dug back in for a couple of beers and a handful of condoms.

  His eyes twinkled down at her. “You got a steak dinner and some candlelight in there?”

  “Yes,” she grinned, pleased with herself. “Candles, anyway. To keep the bugs away. Why don’t you come on down here beside me?”

  “Why don’t I.”

  He eased down by her side and kissed her slowly. The bed of the truck was harder than she’d imagined it would be, but the sky was as open-armed, making her feel free enough for anything.

  “It’s so beautiful,” she said softly, listening to the breeze rustling through the corn and the chirping of crickets.

  “It’s beautiful all right,” he said huskily as he swiftly unbuttoned her sleeveless blue shirt and bared her breasts.

  They tingled in the still-warm air, her nipples already hard with anticipation, her blood pounding from the teasing he’d subjected her to during their drive here. He cupped her breasts in his big hands and brought his mouth down to suckle.

  Her back arched beneath him and her own cry joined the night chorus.

  Needing to feel his skin against hers, she tugged at his shirt and he hunched his shoulders to help her pull it off.

  She’d wanted to go slowly, to savor the experience of making love in the great outdoors, but Wes had driven her too close to fulfillment and now she ached with a need that was almost unbearable. Her hips shifted and twisted beneath him and the burning between her legs intensified, even though he was only kissing her nipples, curling his tongue around each sensitive tip and then sucking them into his mouth. />
  Grabbing his belt, she undid it with trembling fingers, then unbuttoned his jeans and eased the zipper over the bulging hardness.

  Like her, he’d ditched his underwear and that pleased her inordinately as she encountered his hot, hard flesh.

  As though on fast forward, their movements speeded, becoming almost frenzied as the need escalated. He yanked his jeans down. They caught on his boots and so he left them around his ankles.

  As he turned back to her, he got tangled in the bunched denim and flopped half on his back. Taking that as a sign, she straddled him, knowing it was time to take matters into her own hands. If she left it to him and he teased her any more she wouldn’t be responsible for her actions. Murder was a distinct possibility.

  Leaning over his lean and hungry face, she nipped at his lip before kissing him, slipping her tongue in his mouth. Reaching between their bodies, she grasped him where he was so hot and so hard, slipped on a condom, and placed him at the entrance to her body, already pulsing in anticipation. Unable to hold back any longer, she slowly sank onto him feeling him fill her, stretching her wide.

  With hands splayed on his chest she rocked back and forth, adjusting, but the need for friction was too strong to be denied and she began to pump her hips, finding her rhythm, taking him deep, deeper, and then all the way until her muscles tightened around him and they both groaned.

  As she rode him, she stared out at the open road. The air tingled against her damp nipples and she felt as free and connected to nature as the hawk circling high overhead.

  Cars could drive by, planes could buzz overhead and she wouldn’t care, in fact the possibility of discovery only added to her excitement. She dropped her gaze to Wes’s and felt a jolt of connection so strong she gasped. She was connected to him physically, as close as a man and woman can be, but something outside of the physical zapped between them.

  She wanted their lovemaking to last forever; she wanted satisfaction now.