Evelyn
Speaking briefly as we left town, neither one of us uttered a word once we hit the outskirts. The radio played “How Country Feels” by Randy Houser low in the background. Windows rolled down, we fell into a comfortable silence as we drove along.
In awe, I looked out the window at the country around me as we drove. I couldn’t believe the beauty in what I was seeing. Small rolling hills swept up only to sweep back down and start all over again as we wind through the Kentucky countryside. Rock walls older than anything I had ever seen in California lined the road between us and the greenest Kentucky bluegrass I had ever seen. Horses ran in the distance where big old southern homes, complete with huge white columns like something you’d see out of Gone With The Wind, stood back on the property we passed by.
Huge southern front porches and big tobacco barns completed the picture. At times, the rock walls would give way to beautiful white or black picket fences. A low fog hung around as when we would dip low into a sort of little holler on the back roads, only to have us come out of it when we would drive back up the next rolling hill. A magical sort of leftover spell from the rain an hour or so before. The humidity was light and barely noticeable as we drove with the breeze drifting around us through the cab of the truck.
I look over at Noah, who is smiling and tapping his fingers along with the beat on the radio. A comfortable peace about him I had never seen in California. A kind of peace I was beginning to feel for the first time in my life as I stopped chasing and allowed myself to be fully engrossed in the moment knowing I had nowhere else to be but here with him, driving this back road in a state I never thought I’d ever visit in my life. For the first time in a long time, I could breathe. Just like my pier in Huntington Beach. Oddly enough, it felt like coming home. An eerie feeling hits me and settles in, almost like Kentucky has always been a part of me.
I look out the window once again at the beautiful scenery that surrounds us as we drive with the sun beginning it’s decend. Beautiful reds, purples, and blues shoot through the low hanging clouds as we continue on and on without a care in the world. I couldn’t remember the last time I didn’t have a care in the world, and to be honest with myself, I may never have.
“Is it everything that you thought it would be?” Noah asks breaking the silence.
I smile as I close my eyes, and let the wind sweep across my face. Opening my eyes once again, I look out over the beauty I still can’t believe I am seeing as I say, “No! It’s better!”
Glancing his way, I see him smile contently before he gestures to the road ahead of us. “Just a little bit further, I got a spot I used to drive out to all the time when I needed space to think as a kid.”
“You need more space than this?” I joke as I raise my hands and point to the country surrounding us. “There is no space like this where I come from.”
He laughs. “Yeah, something that I tried really hard to get used to while I was back there. But it was still never the same.”
“This is gorgeous, Noah. I mean absolutely stunning. Why would you ever try and get used to something that just didn’t suit you? I mean this … this is you. I see it, you’re where you belong. Why would you stay..” I trail off not wanting to complete my rambling, already knowing the answer to my stupid question.
Looking at Noah, I see his jaw clench harder and his hands grip the steering wheel a little tighter. And although I knew it before, it all makes a lot more sense now seeing how much someone was willing to give up. Seeing first hand the sacrifices one could and would make for the person they loved so much. But then, what happened to make it all change? There is still something unsaid, something not told that would make the picture a whole lot more clear. I just hope that truth is somewhere out in these Kentucky hills we keep rolling through to where ever it is we are headed.
A silence fills the cab of the truck, but unlike the peaceful silence a few minutes earlier, this one is built on tension. A tension that grows as we travel further along. At times, I feel as if it is lifting, only to be weighed down with the magnitude of the tension between us a few moments later. Just as the sun is almost at its settling spot, Noah turns on his blinker and turns the truck down a gravel road. Stuck between trying to find the words to say, and almost letting them escape my lips, I sit there in his truck growing fidgety and needing to walk off the steam that has been building in our budding anxiety the last few minutes. Finally coming to a stop at a clearing overlooking the rolling hills below us, Noah puts his truck in park.
Trying not to sound shallow, I say, “You sure do like your parking spots to watch the sunset, don’t you?”
Irritated, Noah reaches for his door handle and says, “Yeah, something you West Coasters wouldn’t know the half of!”
He jumps out the cab of the truck and walks off towards the view in front of us. I sit there for a moment, hatred for his comment raging inside of me. Sadness and a need to understand take over and I am out of the truck and walking towards him knowing I might regret what I am about to say.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I yell, but he doesn’t budge. Moments pass, then all at once he turns quickly around to meet me head on. A fire in his eyes that can only mean one thing, we are about to finally have this out and I couldn’t be happier since I had to come across the country to do it.
“Why’d you come here, Evelyn? What? Did your dream to run off to L.A. not work out as you planned?”
“I didn’t go to L.A. asshole!” I scream throwing my hands up in the air. “Damnit! I didn’t go. I called them and told them thank you, but no thank you. Something you would have known if you stuck around longer than five damn minutes before running off!”
His eyes are wide, his face in shock. “You didn’t go?” He echos me, shaking his head like he is trying to shake away the truth. He keeps his eyes closed as he says, “I don’t believe it.”
Feeling defeated, I have no idea what to say to make him trust me. No idea why he is so against trying to let me back in. Searching for any way I can make him believe me, I stand in front of him wrestling with all the words in my mind and trying to pick the ones that would hold the most power. The bluntest truth to make him finally see that I didn’t choose L.A, I chose him.
Before I can say a word, Noah’s shaky voice settles over me through the evening and gives way to a little bit of the truth I have been searching for. “I heard you! I heard you talking to Gwen in the hospital. You said we couldn’t work. You said it was time to let go, that nothing and no one could make you change your mind.” He grits out his response through clenched teeth. An admission, a statement which finally makes me see things a little clearer. “I heard you, Evelyn.”
Shocked, I stand there, trying to rewind time and put together the pieces of what he is talking about. I thought he didn’t come to the hospital?
“You heard me?” I ask frustrated. “You heard me?” I hear myself question again sternly. All of a sudden the conversation comes flooding back to me. Quickly I try to figure out the best way to explain it, to try and make it seem legit and not a made-up story that what he heard was me talking about L.A. Not him. Not the man I knew that moment I couldn’t live without. I walk a few steps towards him and see him stiffen as I get closer. A look of fear in his eyes. Fear of what I am about to say. Fear of me getting to close. Fear of letting himself go.
“What you heard,” I begin genuinely, slowly and sternly hoping he hears every word and lets it sink into his thick brain finally so he can understand the truth. “What you heard Noah, was me telling Gwen I couldn’t make L.A. work. That what I needed, I found. In you. That L.A. wouldn’t be the same. That my world was forever changed and all I hung myself up on since, God knows before I can even remember, pales in comparison to having you by my side. What you heard, was me finally realizing that my road didn’t lead there anymore. My road, it leads to you, Noah.”
His eyes glaze over. His stance softens. But there is still hesitation there. Still, something guarded.
“You said it was time to say Goodbye?” He questions, as he takes a step closer and I inch forward as well.
“Yeah, to a dream. A dream I thought I wanted. A dream I wrestled with and tried to make work my whole life. But then I realized, my greatest dream of all came along and hit me straight in the heart, and I didn’t have to work for it at all.”
His grin greets me, as he wraps his arms around my waist. “You didn’t go?” He questions again, as if he needs to hear it a third time.
I roll my eyes, which awards me a bigger smile from the man I love in front of me. “I didn’t go, Noah. Although, that still doesn’t stop the fact that you did? You left me all alone after my accident with only a note?” I question him, hurt, anger, sadness and a sort of playfulness lacing my tone as I laugh. A sorry attempt to mask the way I am feeling inside.
He rests his head against mine and smiles, “I did do that, huh?” He asks. I nod my head slightly. “Well, I guess I have some making up to do.”
“How about some explaining?” I ask with a laugh.
“Words are cheap!” He says coming in for a kiss, but I pull away and not allow him the satisfaction. “I prefer to show you how sorry I am. How much I intend to grovel, on my knees. Preferably while you torture me in the most delicious of ways.”
I giggle, as he comes in for my neck. “Is that so, Mr. Stewart?”
A muffled response is all I get as my eyes roll back in my head and my toes curl at the moment I realize he is already getting his way.
His lips come up to my ear, “I want you,” he begins. “In my truck,” he says licking and sucking his way back down my throat. Coming face to face, his eyes hood over as he says sternly, “Now!”
Aroused and desire completely uncontainable, I manage to say, “You’re almost really good at persuading.” He smiles back questioning my motive. “But you forgot one thing.” His eyebrows lift as his hands sink lower and grab my ass, pulling me forward so I can feel the bulge in his jeans press against my core. I smirk back at him, knowing how bad this torture must be. “I don’t see you on your knees,” I tease.
Before I can process, Noah has me up over his shoulder and is carrying me towards the bed of his truck. Laughing, I try to wiggle out of his hands which results in a hard spanking from the man carrying me off to what I only hope is some much needed make-up sex.
“Stop wiggling woman.” I hear him playfully say. “I fully intend to wear you out right now. So get ready, because I’ve been holding this in for way too long.” He smiles setting me down at the back of his truck.
Laughing I meet his eyes, full of love when they look back at me for the first time in a long time. I let out a deep breath as I let myself get lost in them. As the tension and feelings of losing him leave and I find myself once again in his arms not wanting to ever leave his side. I know he feels the same, because he leans forward after a minute and says, “I’ve been waiting all night to do this again.”
His lips brush against mine, smooth and lightly at first. His eyes open to my own, as we both smile knowing as long as we are together, that is all that matters. His look glazes over as he picks me up and sets me in the bed of his truck. “Get ready Ms. Monroe,” he says climbing up and slowly beginning to hover over the top of me. “One time won’t be enough, darlin’. I fully intend to leave you breathless, shaky and begging for me to stop. Screaming my name this time won’t save you, it will only drive me harder, longer, faster. Because baby, I need you - want you. You’re it for me, and damn it if I’m letting you out of this truck before you understand that. ”
Grabbing his shirt, I pull him close and kiss him hard. Devouring his mouth, my hand drops to stroke the hard length of him now positioned between by thighs. I pull back as he lets out a moan and I slightly nip his bottom lip with my teeth. “What was it you said, Mr. Stewart! Talk is cheap! It’s time you put your words where your mouth is and show me.”
He smiles as his hand finds the warmth between my legs, “Gladly!”
Noah
Fully making good on every single word I threatened her with, we lay in the back of my truck a few hours later surrounded by moonlight and fireflies dancing in the fields across the rolling hills surrounding us. The sounds of night echo through the space, and for the first time in a long time, there is peace. Laying on our side, we are wrapped in a blanket I grabbed from the cab of my truck after two rounds of the best make up sex a man could ever ask for. Just as hungry as I was for her, she opened up for me like a dream that kept pulling me back under needing to experience her all over again. A connection once lost, and finally found once more, we lay together in silence occasionally looking up at the stars and then staring again into each other's eyes.
Her eyes are all I ever want looking back at me for the rest of my life, just like they are now. Satisfied, complete, whole, and in love like I only dreamed they would be once again. Occasionally, she smirks at me before glancing off again at the night sky in a sort of peace I don’t think I have ever seen about her. She pulls the blanket up higher, and I notice the chills running over her skin.
“I know a great way to warm you up darlin’.” I play with her, although know I don’t have the strength to make good on the threat if she really wanted me to.
She giggles. “My legs are still shaking from the last time you threatened me with that line, Mr. Stewart.” She teases, pulling the blanket closer.
“Mmmm,” I growl, remembering her coming undone on top of me and knowing I would never see anything as beautiful in my whole life. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” I sit up and grab her clothes for her. I watch as she straightens up slightly and starts to pull them back on. I can’t help but notice as she covers up and attempts to hide some scars from her accident I hadn’t seen before. She grimaces slightly as she pulls her shirt over her head and I immediately feel like an ass and hurry to help her, hoping that I wasn’t too rough with her as we both took our tension and release from one another over the last several hours.
“Here baby, let me help you.” I humbly say as the realization hits I wasn’t there to help her like I should have been a few months back. A fact which makes me feel like the worst asshole to ever walk the planet. She smiles and accepts the help graciously like only she would, the perfect woman she is. I help her with her pants until she starts to laugh. More of a sweet gesture that entirely did not work out the way I planned as she wiggles and I try and jiggle them up her thighs making it harder than it needs to be.
“Noah, I am alright,” she says. “You don’t have to help me like I’m an invalid.”
Her comment makes me still. I stop and take moment before I stand to pull on my jeans. Buttoning them up, I pause for a moment as my thoughts take over before grabbing my shirt and throwing it over my head.
“Thank you though.” I hear her say quietly. I look up to see her staring back at me, concern in her eyes.
Wrestling with my mind, I look at her and wonder how I could have ever acted the way I did over the last few months. I let the fear of being rejected again get in the way of what I should have been doing, and that is taking care of her. Making sure she was ok. Helping her to her appointments and never leaving her side for one minute. I wonder how she even got through what she did and somehow still wanted to come across country to find the prick that left her at the hospital without even a word.
Evelyn notices my silence and shifts in the bed of my truck. “What’s going through your mind, Noah? I’d be lying if I didn’t say you’re starting to scare me a little.”
“God Darlin’,” I start as I drop to my knees at the bed of the truck between her legs hanging over the bed. “I am so sorry. I should have been there for you. For us. I mean, I am sitting here now and the past feels like a dream. But it was real. It was real, Evelyn. And I left you. I left you when you needed me most and I don’t know how you can even forgive me or even be sitting here right now after what I did to you.”
She laughs nervously. “Yeah, it was kinda shitty.�
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Laughing at her choice of words, I let them linger around us for one moment before continuing, “Kinda shitty?” I echo her. “It was more than that, baby. I mean I sat there in that waiting room not knowing if you were dead or alive. I watched as doctors would come and go, and paced the halls like a man on his last lifeline.”
I stand and start pacing the space in front of the bed of my truck instinctively like I am walking the floors of the hospital all over again and it all comes rushing back to me. Coming to a stop, I look at her as a compassion fills her eyes that I don’t deserve. “Baby, I thought I lost you that day. When I found out you were going to be OK, I almost ran back. I had to hold you, and then I lost you all over again a few hours later. All because I was a stupid idiot. Why would you ever forgive me for that?”
“I love you!” She confesses in the still of the night. “Did you know that?”
I smile, as emotion fills my throat and eyes and I try like hell to blink it back and be a man in front of the one woman I want to spend the rest of my life with. “If ever I doubted, I know it now.”
Smiling, she eases off the bed of the truck and stands in front of me. “So, what happens next?”
Grabbing her, and kissing the top of her head, I let time pause as I hold her before I answer. I want to stay with her, right in this moment and not let anything come between us again. My phone rings in the cab of the truck, and I grunt reluctantly. It rings a second time and Evelyn begins to laugh.
“Are you going to get that?”
I slump out of her arms and kiss the top of her nose before walking towards the cab. Grabbing my phone, I see it’s Rex and I remember the one place I forgot I told a few people I would be.
Hitting accept I am greeted with yells in the background and music blaring in the distance. An unwelcome intrusion on the night me and Evelyn are having and I find myself rolling my eyes as she rounds the truck bed and comes closer.
Devotion (Indecision Duet Book 2) Page 9