by Amy J. White
I descend the stairs to the foyer where my keys sit on a half-moon table next to the door. Because of the rain, I grab my umbrella, open the door and step out on the porch.
In the distance, I see Ryley’s car sitting in the driveway in front of her parents’ garage. Immediate plans involving anyway I can get out of what I fear can be a disaster of a reunion shoot through my brain as quick as the flashing lightning.
Before I talk myself out of it, I open my umbrella and step onto the law. Grass squishes beneath my boots with each wide step. I feel like more like a man walking towards the gallows than one just heading for dinner with an old family – what? Friend? We barely spoke – friend.
Once I reach the gate, grabbing a hold of it, I stop for a second. My eyes lock on the lit window across the street. It’s not too late. You can still call this off.
I take in my calloused hands, messy work boots and rugged jeans. What could I possibly offer her now?
The gate whines and shrieks as I push it open. We both messed up in high school. I kept my mouth shut, she shattered me. Way to try to justify it. This is all on you. You should’ve said something, asshole.
With that logic, I forced myself ahead. It was my fault. There was no secret as to how many girls wanted me in school. Senior prom was the hardest. Invitations, gifts, letters. It overwhelmed me.
None of it mattered. I wanted Ryley. She was the only one who didn’t throw herself at me, supported me with a subtle stare or shy “hey” we exchanged in the hall. Those meant more than any of it.
Stopping next to the road separating our two houses, I look left and right, then trudge across to the Dorseys’ lawn.
I must have blacked out in all the memories whirling in my head because the next time I come to, I’m standing at the front door ringing the doorbell.
The porchlight comes on. The doorknob clicks and the door slowly opens, making the anxiety I feel grow with each dragging second.
Finally, the face I wanted to see since high school comes into view. Ryley’s looks, though unchanged, slam me in the gut like the hardest fist.
Her brunette hair is styled in long waves with reddish highlights that come out to play when the light hits them the perfect way. Those gorgeous Hershey kiss eyes appear to shine in the porch light.
Gone are the hints of freckles, replaced by flawless skin one expected to find on a woman who spent time in the city. Skin kissed by the sun begs to be caressed. That long neck pleads for me to pepper it with kisses. To top it off, she’s wearing her own button up plaid shirt with a white tank top underneath and distressed blue jeans. The shirt sits across her breasts in such a way I can see the tops of her perfectly rounded breasts.
She’s beautiful. Definitely not the girl next door anymore.
My jaw clenches as the needing cock between my legs takes immediate notice. I’m doomed. So fucking doomed.
“Hey,” Ryley says like she used to in the hallways, a timid smile on her face. “You look nice.”
“Yeah,” What the? Yeah? “So do you.”
We stare at each other like we’re in our own little world. Every fantasy I had plays in the theater of my mind. I have to find a way to get this woman naked and underneath me.
“Ethan!” Helen’s high pitched voice ends the moment. “RyRy, don’t just stand there, let him in!”
RyRy? I cover a smile at the cute nickname.
Helen directs us both into the house.
It’s been a while since I last came in here. The thin hallway is a tight fit for someone of my stature, but I make it work. My eyes latch onto Ryley’s ass outlined by those distressed jeans.
Images of tearing them off to see what kind of panties she wears accompanies my – albeit creepy – staring and admiration.
Before we reach the living room where Thomas waits, I move the heel of my hand to adjust myself, hoping no one notices. Heaven forbid Thomas does. I might be able to hold my own in a brawl, but that man would snap me in two if he chose to. Especially when it came to his daughter.
Ryley’s father moves to make room on the sofa capable of seating only two, offering me a place to sit. Helen directs Ryley to sit next to me.
She seems hesitant which causes my gut to lurch with the fears from earlier. It didn’t help her parents’ blatant attempts at getting us close together.
“I’ll head in the kitchen and finish dinner. Thomas will work the porch grill, won’t you honey?” Helen’s wink doesn’t go unnoticed.
Thomas clears his throat, stands and goes to the back door, leaving Ryley and me alone.
“Sorry about this,” Ryley leans in to whisper. “I tried talking them out of it, but you know how my mom is.”
Boy, did I. Helen Dorsey had a reputation in Buchanan. She had a heart of gold, willing to help anyone who needed her, but the woman also had a head for town gossip. Nothing involving scandal, who knocked up whom or any other juicy town news escaped her.
“It’s uh, it’s fine.” Come on, talk, for God’s sake.
“So, um, how’ve you been? I heard about your dad.” She angles her body towards me, placing her hand on my leg. “I’m so sorry, Ethan. If there’s anything you need, please tell me.”
You under me, does that count as a need? I blink away the thought. “I’ve been okay. Working the horses as usual. It’s fine. We all knew the old man would work himself into an early grave. What about you? Why’d you come home? I thought you’d be ruling the courts by now.”
Her head lowers, shoulders drawn up. In her lap, she clasped her hands, fiddling her thumbs over her knuckles.
Just like I thought. Something bad happened. How bad, well, I’d find out.
Chapter 3
Ryley
It takes everything I can not to reach out to stroke that beautiful face staring back at me. Ethan is no longer the handsome boy I pined after since we were kids. No, what stares back at me is none other than the most beautiful man I have ever seen.
When I open the door to see him standing there, my heart performs its own version of a marching band behind my ribcage. Broad shoulders outlined beautifully behind the plaid shirt Ethan wears causes me to bite my lip at the sudden moistening happening in my panties.
His trim waist leads my eyes down to long, muscular legs that end in work boots looking like they have seen many hard summers since I left.
My God, how much of an idiot I was to leave him that night. I tighten my jaw, fighting the urge to pull my eyes away from his longing, pent up gaze. I let myself began thinking of any way I can to get him in bed with me like I had so many times back in high school.
As we walked into the living room, I felt his burning stare pushing into my back. Scrutinizing every detail of me under a darkened stare I know is just as hungry as mine is when it roams over his perfect body.
When my parents take us into the living room, they reveal an under-handed tactic to push Ethan and I together, leaving us alone to “talk.”
I can only think to apologize for what I know has to be the most awkward thing my mom – the town gossip girl – has done. It isn’t what I’m thinking though.
Instead, I’m silently thanking my parents for letting me have this time alone with him. We small talk about the loss of his father and the work he does on the horse ranch, until Ethan brings up my time in New York. My heart shatters all over again and I find all I want is for him to hold me, assure me it’s all going to be okay.
Will he though? After what I did to him the last time we saw each other?
I swallow the nervousness to ask, “How have you been?”
It isn’t what I want to ask, but I venture to guess it’s better than rushing headlong into trying to talk about the pain I knew I left him feeling.
With a laugh I knew was forced, Ethan replied, “About what you expect in a place like Buchanan. Nothing too eventful aside from the regular small town gossip.”
If I didn’t think the moment could get anymore awkward, I soon found it became more so when my parents came
back in. They look at us, both with our heads angled away from the other, then at each other.
My mom bursts out the nervous bellow of a “Sooo,” dragging the word out as long as she can before going on about how the food is ready.
Of course, the two of them push us to sit next to each other, and then my mom drops the worst bombshell in her arsenal.
“Ethan, are you seeing anyone now? I don’t believe I’ve heard anything about you having a special woman on your arm.”
Quickly, I swallow the tea I have in my mouth. “Mother! Will you please stop?!”
Beside me, I hear Ethan gag on the mouthful of steak he just put in his mouth. His eyes are wide like someone punched him in the gut.
My cheeks can’t burn any hotter the longer I listen to my mom pressure Ethan to talk about his love life as though I’m not in the room.
Unable to take anymore, I abandon every ladylike thing I had shoved into my head as a little girl when I jump from my chair, hands landing on the tabletop, jostling the plates, cups and silverware.
“Ryley Anne Dorsey, don’t talk to your mother like that!” My dad says.
Stop it, he’s watching you. Stop. He’ll think you’re insane. “You two should be ashamed! I came back here to get some help with the devastation from New York, not to have the two of you play cupid!”
I can’t stop. It hurts too much. I feel like a failure and not only because I’m making myself look like an idiot in front of the man who only has to glance at me, and my panties get wet. I have no idea what he’s thinking. I’m terrified he has no interest in me as anything more than a friend, no matter how my brain tries to recall how we reacted to one another at the door.
Tears sting the corners of my eyes as I storm out to the front porch to sit in the rickety swing. My heart feels like it’s going to drop through me to the ground for someone else to stomp on it with as much force as they can muster.
I blew it. He’s going to think I’m nuts. That I’m unstable. He’ll never want me now. The tears break free in uncontrollable sobbing, falling to the clasped hands between my drawn together knees.
Squeaking of the front porch boards alerts me to the new arrival before the shutting of the storm door. My lips draw into a tight line at the thought my dad has come to scold me some more for how stupid I acted.
Boots appear in my line of sight. They aren’t my dad’s. He’s here.
I look up to see beautiful, perfect Ethan Ryder is standing in front of me with a look of concern in his beautiful hazel eyes.
Without a word, he sits next to me, freezing every word I think of on the tip of my tongue.
Chapter 4
Ethan
After the disaster in the kitchen, I pleaded with Ryley’s parents to let me go talk to her instead of Thomas. She doesn’t need to be scolded nor does she need someone shoving someone down her throat.
I don’t doubt the sexual spark we experienced at our front door meeting that seemed to have been snuffed out when her parents pulled their clumsy angering trick on us. Truth is, I fought not laying into the two of them myself.
Ryley needs things taken slow. She needs to be helped to heal from whatever hurt her in the city before I can even hope to reach her heart.
Remembering what I do about Ryley, I followed the path she took to the front porch to find her exactly where I thought I would. The image that meets my eyes tears at my heart.
Gorgeous Ryley sits on the swing, her head down while tears drip on her clasped thumbs. My own hands grow moist with sweat as they open and close. Saliva is replaced with dryness in my mouth with every attempt I take to try and find anything I can say to help her feel better.
She has to think she ruined any chance with me. I’ll show you, baby girl, it’s the exact opposite. But first, let me heal you.
I take my time walking towards her, adjusting the rock hard cock between my legs, trying to talk myself out of what I want to do. I want to fuck the feeling out of her, to show her what I think of her rather than tell her. Be patient, moron. Remember, she’s hurting. Think of her needs first.
When I finally reach her, she jerks her head to look up at me, making the pain more real to me the longer I stare into her swollen red eyes.
As they had at the front door, our gazes keep one another pinned in place for what seems like hours instead of seconds. I’m not sure what I’m seeing in her face. Her eyes look away, keeping me from being able to study them further.
“I’m sorry you had to see that,” She says in a melancholy tone.
I sigh silently, my cheeks puffing when I blow the air out. Sitting next to her, I lean forward on my forearms. What could I say to help her feel better other than, “It’s okay, I didn’t much like what they did to you either. Had I known, I wouldn’t have agreed to come over.”
Silence takes the place of our short conversation.
Looking at her, I take in the profile of her mostly square features, amazed at how much and how little she changed from the girl on the fence. My heart stammers in my chest as I reach a hand over to put it on her thigh, worried she might shove it away or feel the gesture is only out of pity.
She doesn’t do much other than to glance at my hand, then back at me. It relieves me to know she doesn’t feel the way I feared she would.
To keep whatever this was going, I said, “Ryley, I don’t know what happened in New York, but I want you to know I’m here for you.”
My hand on her thigh starts moving in soothing circles.
Again, our eyes meet, but this time it’s different. Sparks fly between us forming a magnetic pull drawing our faces closer until our lips meet in a tender kiss. Every pent-up emotion both of us battled during childhood come out in this one moment where I let myself brush my lips against hers.
Everything else faded into nothing with the pounding of my heart and the throbbing ache between my legs. I wonder if her interest in me is as strong as mine is in her.
I pull away to keep from answering the nagging call to watch what her face does. The sadness is replaced with a bright smile, eyes full of love and most of all relief. This is the moment I ask her. The moment I start moving her into more than a friend.
If she ever considered herself my friend, I don’t know.
Here goes everything. “Why not come over to the ranch tomorrow? We can spend some time with the horses. I can cook outside in the barrel smoker my dad made –”.
My thoughts are ended when she throws her head back and bursts out laughing. “You actually still have that?”
There she is. Ryley. My Ryley. Not the woman plagued by the events that happened in the city, but my Ryley I secretly watched all those years. That’s who she is. The woman I’m never letting go of again.
I answer her laugh with a half-chuckle. “Yeah. Couldn’t bring myself to part with them once my old man passed away. Actually, I make jerky with them and sell it at the local general store. You remember that place, right?”
Ryley covered a giggle. She doesn’t need to tell me she remembers. Most of us know all about the grumpy old store owner who chases kids with a waving Winchester rifle shouting at the top of his lungs in the cliché “You kids get offa my lawn” phrase.
“What do you say?” I ask. “Come over. We can do this reunion our way.”
Her lower lip slips beneath her teeth at the inner debate I see happening on her face. Nerves tingled into gooseflesh on the surface of my skin. Whether or not it was the brisk weather, I’m not sure.
Ryley’s shy grin accompanies her brushing a stray piece of brunette hair from her face. “Sure. I’d like that. It’s been a while since I’ve gotten to see the woods on the mountainside.”
My heart leaps. Once I get her into my house, I won’t let her leave until she knows without a doubt how much I love her.
Chapter 5
Ryley
I lie in bed after Ethan leaves replaying the moment on the swing over and over with vibrant details. My heart pounds behind my ribs hard enough to hurt from
the vivid memories of how he stared at me as we rocked on the swing.
After my performance at the dinner table, I swear he wanted nothing more to do with me. That he came outside to tell me he couldn’t believe what I’d done or how I’d gone off on my mom the way I did.
The heels of my hands meet my eye sockets. He can’t have said what he said. He can’t have touched me or kissed me. I must have been dreaming.
Dawn can’t come soon enough. I toss and turn in an attempt to get comfortable, wondering what the day will bring. Hoping that somehow what I saw in those eyes meant what I thought. That we were both wanting to start over and give us a try. Us.
The word feels foreign, almost surreal.
No matter what I come up with, I can’t explain the events that happened away.
Ethan pulls away from me with unimaginable love hidden in those gorgeous eyes. A smile brighter than a ray of light forms across his lips as I agree to come see him. Something about the way he looks at me ignites a flame within my body from the crown of my head all the way down to the tips of my toes.
I know that smile. It’s the one I saw in the man I dated briefly in New York.
Ethan’s eyes are darkened pools of a hidden desire I have never seen in him before though we had exchanged glances many times. He sees me as something more. Something I am excited to see blossom between us. Something I have dreamed of, craved and spent nights crying into my pillow at the thought of never having it.
“You’re going to want to wear something comfortable if you want to spend the day with me,” Ethan says with a gentle, intoxicating voice.
I feel dumbfounded at the movement of those lips I kissed only seconds ago.
“What time?” I ask on the tumbling organ I call a tongue.
Ethan tells me 8am, turns and walks away.
I watch the sway of those perfectly trim hips, venture up his muscular back then down again to his beautiful legs hugged by his blue jeans well enough for me to see the outline of his thighs.