by K. Street
Presley batted her lashes, the picture of doe-eyed innocence. “Why, I wouldn’t dream of it.”
She turned back to the truck, squeezed the trigger on the spray nozzle, and rinsed away the dripping suds before pivoting back to me.
“On second thought.” She stood with her feet shoulder-width apart, holding the sprayer like a gun.
“Now, listen here, woman.”
She pressed the trigger. A burst of water hit my chest.
“Oops.”
“Payback is a bitch, sweetheart.” I charged toward her.
She scrambled backward, compressed the nozzle, and drenched me from head to toe before sprinting around the truck, hose still in her grasp.
I rushed to the bucket, reached inside, and grabbed the thick sponge. Cold, soapy water ran down my hand as I circled the truck, chasing after her.
She neared the front driver’s-side tire just as I skirted the tailgate. Then, I pitched my weapon, slapping her square in the ass.
Presley squeaked in surprise.
I ducked back around the passenger side and crept low to the ground.
“You can run, but you can’t hide,” she taunted. Bursts of water shot over the truck like a heat-seeking missile.
I snuck up behind her. “Says who?”
Before she could drown me, I scooped her up in my arms. She squealed and flailed as we fought over the hose.
We stumbled onto the soft grass in my front yard. My feet slipped from underneath me, and we both toppled to the ground.
I rolled us, so Presley was pinned to the grass beneath me. Then, I wrestled the hose from her grip and adjusted the setting to mist while she squirmed.
“I told you, sweetheart, payback is a bitch.”
“Ryder—”
Her words were cut off by the droplets of liquid raining down over the top half of her body. She sputtered while I soaked her.
“Who’s the man, baby?” I released the trigger.
Presley’s hands went to her face, wiping away the water. Defiance flashed in her eyes. “You wish.”
“Have it your way.”
She wriggled as I rotated the round mechanism, each click seeming louder than the last. When it was positioned where I wanted it, I bent low until our mouths were a mere inch apart. I shifted our legs, spreading hers wider, and then I braced my weight on one forearm while I slipped my other hand a few inches from her center.
Water streamed from the hose.
“What are you—”
I silenced her with a kiss.
My dick grew hard as steel in my black swim trunks.
I released the nozzle and then pressed it again.
Press. Release.
Press. Release.
I imagined thrusting inside her.
Presley’s hands went to my nape. She writhed under me, chasing her pleasure instead of trying to escape.
For a few long seconds, I kept up a constant stream, and then I cut off the spray before she had a chance to topple over the edge.
“Who’s the man, baby?” I asked her again.
“Y-you. You are.”
Satisfaction tugged at the corner of my mouth. “That’s right. And don’t you forget it.” I rose to my feet.
“Ugh,” she groaned. “So not fair.”
“Fare is what you pay to ride a bus.”
“What?”
I chuckled. “It’s what my mom used to say. Whenever I complained that something wasn’t fair, she would say, ‘Fare is what you pay to ride a bus,’ and it stuck with me.” I held out my free hand to Presley. “Come on. Let’s finish this.” I nodded at the truck. “Then, we’ll go inside, and I’ll finish you.”
She slipped her small palm into my larger one and allowed me to pull her to her feet.
A shower, two orgasms, and a walk with Turtle around the block later, Presley sat in one of the bar chairs at my kitchen island. I poured us each a glass of lemonade and set hers in front of her. Then, I took a long drink of mine before placing it on the counter and stepping over to the oven. I turned it on, making sure to crank the temperature.
“Can I help with anything?” she asked from her perch.
“Not yet, but you can help me with the salad later.”
The utensils rattled as I plucked a wooden spoon from the metal container on the counter. I grabbed the knife from the butcher block and a cutting board from the cupboard, setting the items on top of the counter across from her.
Presley’s phone rang.
Mom flashed on the screen as I reached for two potatoes from the large bowl that doubled as a produce holder.
“You going to answer that?”
“Nope.” She declined the call.
“Why not?”
“Because I’m not in the mood to talk to my mother.”
“She can’t be that bad.” Using the handle of the wooden spoon as a guide, I began cutting thin slits into the potato.
A hollow laugh slipped from her lips. She lifted her glass to her mouth, halting before she took a sip. “Trust me, she is.”
“Want to talk about it?”
She took a long drink before answering, “Not really.”
I knew I should let it go, but I pushed anyway. “Why?”
“Can we just drop it?”
“No. We can’t. Presley”—I set the knife down—“how can you be all in if you won’t talk to me? Do you know there isn’t a damn thing I wouldn’t give for my phone to ring and for it to be my parents on the other end?” I tried and failed to keep the edge from my tone.
“Do you know what I wouldn’t give not to feel like a constant disappointment to mine?”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “And I would be just another way you disappointed them?”
“That isn’t what I’m saying.”
“Then, what are you saying? Have you even told them about us?”
When she refused to meet my gaze, I had my answer. I picked up the knife again and continued cutting. After I sprayed the potatoes with olive oil and sprinkled them with sea salt, I put them on a baking sheet and shoved the pan into the hot oven, closing the door with more force than necessary.
“Why not?”
“I will. I just—”
“Are you ashamed of me? Is that it?” I cut her off.
Her head whipped up. “What? Of course I’m not ashamed of you.”
“Then, what is it? Explain it to me.”
“The relationship I have with my parents is nothing like the one you had with yours. My mother has certain expectations. Standards I’ve struggled my entire life to live up to. No matter how hard I try, it’s never enough. I certainly don’t want to listen to my mother berate me for what she deems as another one of my poor life choices.”
“I see. And I’m a poor life choice.”
She remained silent.
“Because I’m basically a single parent or because I’m a struggling artist?”
I wasn’t a struggling artist. Not by a long shot, but Presley didn’t know that.
“Both.”
“At least I know where I stand. I’m good enough for you to fuck, but that’s the extent of it, huh?”
“I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“Ryder …”
“No worries, baby. Maybe I’ll like being your dirty little secret.” Sarcasm dripped from my words.
Hurt slashed across her features. She shoved out of her chair and ran from the room.
Fuck.
“Presley, wait,” I called after her.
She didn’t turn back.
“Damn it!” I slapped an open palm on the counter.
Turtle lifted his head and cocked it to the side.
“Don’t you start with me.”
The dog huffed.
Somewhere in the distance, a door slammed.
Today had been perfect, and it had taken less than twenty minutes for it to turn to utter shit.
At least she hadn’t left.
&
nbsp; I entered the open living area and headed down the hall, stopping at the closed French doors that led into my bedroom.
“Pres?” I lightly knocked on the door. “Can I come in?”
“It’s your house.” Her words were quiet, but I heard them.
I twisted the knob and stepped inside.
Presley stood in front of the glass wall that overlooked the pool deck.
I wrapped my arms around her from behind and whispered against her hair, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. Forgive me.”
She didn’t lean into me, but she didn’t pull away either.
Several long minutes passed before she finally spoke, “I understand why you’re upset, but you don’t get to make comments like that.” She stepped out of my hold and turned to face me. “You don’t get to cheapen what we have. I’m not ashamed of you. Did you ever stop to think that I’m protecting you? This”—she gestured between us—“is precious to me, and it’s still so new. My relationship with my parents, especially my mother, is complicated. One of the reasons I moved here was to put space between me and them. Just because someone gives birth to you or raises you doesn’t give them a free pass to dictate your life or the choices you make once you’re an adult. However, that certainly doesn’t stop my mother from trying.” She laughed without humor.
“Shit, babe. I had no idea.”
“How could you? It’s not exactly my favorite subject.” She crossed her arms, dropped her head, and stared at the floor. “My whole life, I’ve never been good enough.”
Presley looked so damn defeated that it broke something inside me. Her words from all those weeks ago came back to me.
“… when you’ve been made to feel average your entire life, it’s hard to see yourself as anything else.”
Suddenly, I was pissed for an entirely different reason.
Growing up, I had been raised in a home with an abundance of love, compassion, and acceptance. Under a roof where dreams were nurtured and the belief that if I worked hard enough, nothing was outside the realm of possibility.
It was beyond my comprehension that anyone, let alone her parents, could make this beautiful creature standing before me feel like she wasn’t good enough.
I pulled her against my chest and wrapped my arms around her. “I’m sorry, baby. I’m so fucking sorry.”
Her arms circled my waist. “For my own mental health, my parents need to stay in their little box, Ryder. I’ll share the details of my life with them on a need-to-know basis. Right now, they don’t need to know.”
“Fair enough.”
Her relief was palpable.
I tipped her chin, brought my mouth to hers, and kissed her softly. “Are we good?”
“Yeah.” She snuggled into me.
I breathed her in, filling my nose with her intoxicating scent. Sweet mint and slightly woodsy with a hint of citrus. A combination of my body wash and the lotion she’d unearthed from her bag and put on after our shower earlier.
The urge to protect her swelled within me.
As I stood there, holding her, I realized how happy the sound of her laugh made me. How much I missed her even after we spent a whole day together.
She was the last person I wanted to talk to each night before I fell asleep and the first one I wanted to talk to each morning when I woke.
I loved her.
I loved a thousand things about her.
I loved how she rambled when she got nervous yet somehow managed to weigh her words before she spoke them, even when she was upset.
I loved how she’d turned me down for a late lunch two weeks ago because she’d already made plans with her grandpa to catch the early-bird special and play a game of checkers.
Last Thursday evening, she’d dropped everything to help Zeke with his family tree project for school. Presley had shown up with construction paper, half a dozen glue sticks, and glitter.
The memory washed over me.
Zeke and Presley sat at the kitchen table, surrounded by a rainbow of paper scraps. While he carefully cut out the simple tree I had drawn, Presley cut out the photographs. When it came time to glue the pictures to the apples made from construction paper, Zeke pushed the photos of our parents to the side.
“If you don’t like those pictures, maybe we can find different ones,” Presley gently told him.
“No.”
Presley and I exchanged a look.
I knelt next to my brother and mussed his hair. “Hey, bud. What’s going on?”
Zeke shrugged. “Nothing.”
“You don’t want to make Mom and Dad part of your project?” I asked.
He shook his head.
“Why not?”
“ ’Cause.”
“Because why?”
“They’re dead.” His tone was so matter-of-fact that it was like a roundhouse kick to the gut.
One look at my face must have conveyed I didn’t have a clue where to go from here.
Presley angled Zeke’s chair toward her.
“Zeke”—her voice remained steady and gentle—“just because people die doesn’t mean they stop being your family.”
“Uh-huh. Davey telled me that.”
“Davey from your class?”
“Yep.” Sadness overtook him. “Davey said that family are the people who live in the same house. And him said that my mommy and daddy live in the dead people garden, so they wasn’t my family anymore. Then”—a fat alligator tear rolled down his cheek—“Davey telled my teacher, Mrs. Arnold, I didn’t have a family, so why do I get to do a family tree? And then the teacher moved his name clip from the green light to yellow light.”
By the time Zeke’s words sank in and my shock wore off, Presley had pulled Zeke onto her lap.
She lightly hooked a finger under Zeke’s chin and brought his gaze up to meet hers. “Zeke, do you want to know a secret?”
He nodded his head.
“Every family is different. Some kids live with their grandparents. Or an aunt or uncle. Some families have two daddies or two mommies. Other kids live with their older sister or brother—”
“Like me!” he blurted out.
“Yes. Just like you. And you know what all those families have in common?”
“What?”
“Love.”
“Love?”
“Yes. And love is what makes you a family. Not where you live or who you live with.”
“Really?”
“Absolutely.”
“At school tomorrow, I am going to walk right up to Davey and tell him that he is wrong. And I will tell him that he is a doo-doo head. A giant, stinky doo-doo head.”
It took every ounce of self-control I possessed not to laugh.
“Maybe you shouldn’t call him a doo-doo head,” Presley suggested. “If he tattles to Mrs. Arnold, you might have to move your clip.”
Zeke scrunched his nose and considered Presley’s advice. “All right. I will only call him a stinky doo-doo head in my brain.”
We all laughed, and then Presley helped Zeke finish his project.
The next morning, when he took it to school, there were seven apples—each with their own photo glued onto his family tree. He hadn’t just added our parents, but Mimi and Pop, then me and Zeke and Turtle too. In the grass, he had drawn stick figures of Carter, Kendall, Brucey, Ben, and Presley.
I asked Zeke, “What made you add the Clynes and Mr. Ben and Presley to your family tree project?”
“Because a family is all the people I love.”
The memory faded, but the raw emotion left in its wake furled around my heart.
Inching back, I cupped her face.
She peered at me through her long, dark lashes, and I found myself at a loss for words.
I wasn’t good when it came to words.
They didn’t come easily for me. Not the way creating art did.
Words were so fucking overrated.
Dropping my mouth, I caught her bottom lip, lightly tugging the soft, plump full
ness between my teeth.
But I needed more than a little tease.
I slid my tongue past her lips, tasting her sweetness. Sugar and lemon coated my taste buds. I took the kiss deeper, cradling the back of her head in one palm while my other hand traveled lower. Knuckles skimming her cheek, then along her neck, and over the curve of her breast.
I rested my hand on her hip and kissed my way down her neck.
“Pres,” I whispered against her ear.
She took a step back. With her eyes trained on mine, she raised her arms above her head and waited.
I reached for the hem of her tank. The backs of my fingers languidly skated over her skin, causing a wave of goose bumps to appear as I removed her top.
Next came her bra, followed by her shorts and panties.
Wordlessly, I led her over to the bed and pulled back the bedding. Then, I stripped out of my own clothes and reached for the nightstand drawer.
Presley’s hand shot out to stop me. “I’m on the pill.”
“I know, baby.” It wasn’t news to me. I had seen the distinct round dispenser more than once, but I never wanted to pressure her. Not using a condom had to be her decision. “I’ve never gone without one, and I’m clean. I need you to be ready. To trust me. That’s why I’ve never brought it up.”
“I trust you.”
The air between us shifted.
Our bodies bare and souls fully exposed.
No more words were necessary.
My hands went to her hips, and I eased her down onto the mattress.
Presley edged up the bed, resting her head on the pillows. She reached for me then, urging me closer, but first, I needed to make sure she was ready.
I pressed my finger against her lips. Without any prompting, she sucked it into her mouth, swirling her tongue around and around.
I withdrew my finger and slipped it into her warm, wet pussy, biting back a curse.
My rock-hard cock wept.
Unable to wait another second, I lined my dick up with her entrance. Then, I reached for her, weaving our fingers together and resting our hands on either side of her head, and I slowly pushed inside her.
Our gazes locked in a wordless conversation.
I pulled almost all the way out before filling her again. And again. Every measured stroke an unhurried cadence.
I worshipped her from the inside out.