by J. D. Brick
I sigh theatrically and grind my crotch into hers. I still think there’s something squirrelly about Jason. But I think there’s something squirrelly about Lugner too. Maybe I just can’t stomach insecure assholes. And maybe my gut isn’t infallible when it comes to someone I care about the way I care about Keegan.
“Okay.” I press harder, and she catches her breath and moans, tipping her head back against the wall and giving me a look that sets my dick on fire. “Want me stop this too?”
And then we both almost jump out of our skin as a uniformed police officer pushes the door open and starts down the stairs, pulling up short when he sees us. I’ve stepped back from Keegan, and neither one of us is undressed, but we probably look guilty as hell anyway.
“Do you two need some help?” The officer stares at me suspiciously.
“No, no, we’re just on our way down, thanks.” I take Keegan’s arm, and we run down the stairs, laughing like crazy when we finally emerge into the cold sunshine.
“Oh my God, that was so embarrassing,” Keegan says as we reach the Coupe. I hit the unlock button on my key and open the door for her. As she settles into the seat, I run my fingers over her cashmere-covered breasts and kiss her.
“I can’t wait to get you home,” I say, then close the door and walk around to my side. I’d just clicked my seatbelt into place when Keegan asks me about Bootstrap.
“What was all that heir apparent stuff about? What’s Bootstrap Enterprises?”
I twist a strand of her hair, then tuck it behind her ear. “It’s the company my old man started years ago. His whole thing was that he pulled himself up by the bootstraps. He was always so proud of that.” I shake my head, then turn the key and sit there a moment as the car purrs to life. I stare at the road ahead. “The whole conglomerate is now worth about half a billion dollars.”
I turn to look at Keegan. Her eyes widen. “Wow.”
“But it’s nothing to do with me. I want nothing to do with it. Like I told you before, I'm on my own.”
Keegan puts her hand on my arm. “Blue.” She rubs her thumb on my sleeve. “I know you think you’re somehow responsible for . . . the guys, whatever happened to them. But I don’t believe that. It’s just survivor’s guilt.” I shift my eyes back to the road. I can’t look at her. “I want to help you through this,” she goes on. “But I only want you to tell me the whole thing when you’re really ready to.”
The road gets blurry. “I know all this has happened unbelievably fast between us. I know it seems crazy to jump into it so completely. But I think it’s real. And I think it’s special. I feel so good when I’m with you, Blue. I feel so strong and confident and like I can handle anything. I’m not trying to freak you out or come on too strong, but. . .”
I’m frozen, my hands clenching the steering wheel. “Blue,” her voice wavers, “just say something.”
I unstrap my seatbelt and take her in my arms, burying my face in her neck, in her hair. We stay like that for a long time, me kissing her over and over and saying things I probably shouldn’t. Things that will make it impossible for me to walk this relationship back or end it without a lot of pain. Not that I can ever imagine wanting to walk it back. Keegan has me; she has all of me. I’m at my best with her. I’m the kind of man I want to be when I’m with her.
She needs me; she wants me. And I am never going to give her up.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Kaleidoscope
Keegan
When I was a kid, I had one of those old-fashioned kaleidoscopes, a gift from my Grandpa. It was made of brass. Grandpa seemed delighted to have a granddaughter who was such an anachronism—a 90s kid fascinated by something invented in the 19th century. For a while, I carried it everywhere, holding it up to my eye and getting a thrill from all the different patterns and colors that tumbled into view.
But then I took it to school one day and tried to show it to my technology-jaded classmates, who laughed me into a humiliated silence. When I got off the school bus at the ranch that afternoon, I ran straight past the main house to the river and threw the kaleidoscope into its muddy waters.
The way I saw myself that day—out-of-date, out-of-sync, weird—is pretty much the way I see myself still. Except when I’m around this sweet, troubled boy burdened with an odd name from a distant time. Maybe that’s why Blue and I have such an instant and intense connection. Neither one of us quite fits in.
We’ve been going around and around, me and Blue—like brightly colored pieces of glass in our own kaleidoscope—starting that afternoon in Detective Lugner’s office. Things feel kind of magical, suffused with color and light and red-hot heat, even though winter has set in with a vengeance. You can guess where the heat comes from. We are rarely apart for more than a few hours, and we haven’t spent a single night away from each other.
I had no idea how it would change me, being made love to by Blue Danube. Night after fucking night. In his room. In my room. Behind my closed office door in the newsroom. In the Coupe. On the back deck when no one else—except for Max—was home. Almost in the kitchen; we were interrupted by Hunter and Megz walking in the front door.
Yeah, I can say fuck more easily now, not that that’s any kind of accomplishment. But I still prefer making love to having sex or fucking or any number of other phrases we Millennials use to describe the act. Because that’s what me and Blue are doing. We’re making love in the literal sense, creating something that hasn’t been here before. I guess you’d call it my sexual awakening. I walk around all day awakened, attuned to some buzz in the air I’ve never noticed before, this sexual energy that seems to be stuffed into every air molecule and dripping down the walls of every room I enter.
During classes, I have to force myself to stay focused. It’s so easy to drift off into daydreams featuring Blue’s mouth, Blue’s hands, Blue’s everything. Sometimes, I drift away anyway, only to be jolted back to reality when someone speaks to me. I’m pretty sure I often have an orgasmic expression that tells everyone what I’m thinking about. I’m a walking, talking, life-sized loin. But I don’t care all that much. I am on fire, body and soul, and nothing else seems to matter.
After classes, I race back to the Embassy, even when I only have a spare half hour in the afternoon. I can’t wait to see Blue. He makes me feel more alive than I have ever felt before, like any other head-over-heels romance novel heroine. And being with him definitely helps me handle the stress of everything else.
I’ve stopped hearing from the stalker. It’s weird. Just like that, it all stopped. Maybe the creep finally got whatever he had against me out of his system. But Blue and I are both still on edge every time my phone buzzes or rings. And he doesn’t want me walking to my car at night, when I’m usually the last one left in the newsroom. So he shows up just before 9 PM every night and waits for me to finish. If Jason is still there, they’ll usually scowl at each other, but to my relief, it hasn’t gone any further than that. Jason made pointed comments about my “controlling” boyfriend until I told him to cut it out. Now, he completely ignores Blue, and is cool and businesslike with me. He’s apparently jealous. But it’s not going to do him any good.
Blue has been making good on his promise to tutor me in music during the rare moments of free time I have. I am deliberately a dense student. I get a kick out of watching him try to patiently explain something. Sometimes, his voice fades away, and I get lost watching his face, admiring his passion for music, certain of his goodness. Even when it’s freezing outside, we crawl out the window on to the roof, holding blankets, and cuddle up under the stars. It’s our special place.
One night, very late, Blue said he had a surprise for me, and when we were settled in our spot, he pulled the guitar to his chest and began to play a song I instantly recognized. The theme music from Somewhere in Time. He played it slowly, tenderly, each note coming off his fingers and chipping pieces out of my heart. It’s an unlucky person who doesn’t have at least one song that can do that. My mother used to cry
every time she heard the Somewhere in Time theme song or watched the movie. When Blue was playing, I closed my eyes and saw her face—on the couch next to me, in the car on the way to yet another doctor’s appointment, and finally, in the coffin, looking so unlike herself.
I brought the blanket up around my eyes. I didn’t want Blue to see me crying. I just stayed like that, shivering a little, until he finished the song. Then I felt his fingers pull the blanket away, and he took my face in his hands. His warm lips kissed my wet cheeks. I could see his breath rising into the cold air. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I taught myself to play that song. I thought you’d like it.”
“I do like it. I love it. I love that you went to the trouble to learn it for me.” And then, as easily as if I’d said them dozens of times, the words slipped out: “I love you.” And just as easily, the words came back: “I love you too.”
And so, the days before Thanksgiving melted into each other. I met Frasier Bryson at an Embassy party where Blue performed so well I swore I saw tears glinting in Bryson’s eyes. After the party, we hung out with Bryson and the rest of the band on the back deck, downing tequila shots and “shooting the shit,” as Blue put it. He sounded a little starstruck, just being around his hero. Kendra was there too, with Henderson of all people. Turns out she’d been absent from the Embassy a lot because she’d been spending time with my rappelling friend. They’d met at a party a few weeks earlier. Every time she went all moon-eyed staring at him out on the deck, I couldn’t help squirming. It was so unlike the Kendra I knew. Not that I knew her all that well. But I didn’t trust Henderson. Because Blue didn’t trust Henderson.
Kendra and I were in a state of détente, to use a term I learned in my American History class. Not friends exactly, but no longer enemies. I’d discovered that I liked Kendra. And on the rare occasions when I wasn't attached at the hip to Blue, I think she liked me. Or maybe she just tolerated me. But I was pretty sure she didn’t hate my guts any longer. Out on the deck, she’d even drunk whispered in my ear her lewd intentions with Henderson. “It’s about time some of the fucking in this house was being done by me.”
“Oh. Kay, Kendra.” I’d put my arm around her for a moment. Seemed like the thing to do.
The morning after the tequila-shot shit shooting, Blue woke up screaming. I’d been lying curled up next to him—my legs tangled in his, the way I loved to sleep—when he bolted upright in bed and looked wildly around like he didn’t know where he was. My cottonmouth and hammerhead hangover made me slow to respond, but I finally was able to sit up and put my arms around him. I pressed the side of my face against his back and closed my eyes against the cruel sunlight coming through Blue’s bedroom window.
“It’s okay, Blue.” Hoarse as a bullfrog, I swallowed a couple of times, wishing I’d stopped after one shot. “It’s okay.” I let my face ride up and down along with his rapid breathing. We stayed like that for a few moments, neither one of us saying anything. Then Blue gently pulled my arms away from his body and headed for the bathroom. Just before he closed the door, I saw the pained look on his face. I heard the shower start running. We usually showered together.
I rolled off the bed and stood at the bathroom door, my hand raised to knock. But I didn’t. Instead, I went upstairs and got into my own bed, pulling the covers tight around my neck and staring at the ceiling. Just before Blue woke me up, I’d been dreaming about my old kaleidoscope. I was standing by the river getting ready to pitch it into the water. But then I raised it to my eye for one last look inside. And then the dream got really bizarre: I could see Blue and me inside the kaleidoscope, tumbling around and around, grasping each other for support. At first we were smiling and laughing, the kaleidoscope colors whirling around, sealing us in, protecting us. But then, the mirrors inside it began to crack and shattered into pieces around us.
That was the only occasion during that time, though, that Blue’s memories or guilt or whatever it was still gripping him so tightly broke through, at least when he was around me. For the most part, things were good. I was in love. I was succeeding at the paper and doing well in my classes. We lost one donor to the Daily because of the vandalism, but the rest stayed with us. And I began to thrive as editor; we broke a big story about some shady financial dealings involving Ikana’s president’s that was picked up by the national media. I was even interviewed on CNN.
For the first time, I think I’m doing a kick-ass job.
I’ve even started to thaw toward Virginia, if only a bit. She found out about the stalker when Pastor Seth Adams called her to complain that I falsely accused his son. Virginia and Seth go way back, but not in a good way. She hates his guts, and the feeling is apparently mutual. They ended up in a screaming match, which naturally made my grandmother determined to prove it was Tyler. “It’s not Tyler,” I told her over and over. She finally seemed to accept that. But she did appear to be genuinely concerned that someone was stalking me. She chewed me out for not telling her about it. She also told my dad about it, and he called me up and chewed me out, too. For some reason, all that ass chewing made me feel good.
Then Virginia surprised me with an invitation to the ranch for Thanksgiving. She’d even invited my dad. It would be the first time she’d seen him since my mom’s funeral. “Buick will be there too. I was able to get his sentence commuted.” She left me stunned by that. Virginia had once said Buick could rot in prison for all she cared. Not quite believing it, I’d texted the last number I had for my brother: Are you really out? And he’d replied: Yep. Just moved back to ranch. Old lady had a change a heart I guess.
So here we are, in Blue's car on Thanksgiving Day, speeding toward the Cooke Ranch. I only agreed to come if I could bring Blue with me. We’re going to spend one night at the ranch, then go to Tulsa to have a delayed Thanksgiving with Blue's mom on Friday. I am nervous about meeting his mom. Blue says she’s almost as sweet as me.
He is driving, with me in the passenger seat and Kendra in the back. I persuaded Kendra to come with us at the last minute, after she’d drowned her sorrows in a bottle of Jack the night before, then walked in on me and Blue, slamming my bedroom door against the wall, too wasted to even notice that we were scrambling to cover up. Henderson had dumped her.
I didn’t think Kendra should be alone in the house over Thanksgiving break. Hunter and Megz left Wednesday for Oklahoma City, his hometown. Megz is the one sore spot in my life at the moment. She’s acting like a stranger. Worse, she’s acting almost like we’re enemies. She and Hunter are still hot and heavy, but they spend most of their time in her dorm room. When we do encounter each other at the Embassy, Megz looks right through me or else she shoots daggers with her eyes as if I’ve done something terrible to her. I tried talking to her. I tried texting her. But she ignores me. I just can’t understand it.
I look in the backseat at Kendra. She’s curled up into a ball, her head leaning against the window. She is hung over and miserable, her green eyes bloodshot. “You getting enough heat back there?” I ask, holding my hand in front of the car’s vents. The temperature dropped overnight, and a light snow has been falling all morning.
“Yeah, it’s fine.” She’s still looking out the window, but she feel my eyes on her. She sits up and stretches her arms over her head. “Don’t worry about me—what is it Blue calls you? Bar girl? I’m tough as nails, bar girl. If I can take some asshole’s fist smashing into my face for five years, I sure as hell can handle being dumped by some douchebag.”
Flinty words, cocky attitude. But not fooling me. Blue says she escaped an abusive marriage, but he doesn’t know why she seems to have no family to go home to for the holidays.
“It never came up,” he said when I asked him.
“And you never thought to ask her? The whole time you guys were together, you never asked about her family?”
He’d shrugged, a little defensive. “We weren't together very long. Actually, we never were together. We just had sex sometimes.”
Men.
I must have smiled. Maybe I made some kind of sex-fiend sound. But something makes Blue look over at me, and his eyes light up as he runs a finger down my cheek.
“Do you two have any fucking idea what it’s like for me to sit back here and watch you?” Kendra punches the back of my seat. “Well I’ll tell you, it’s nauseating. Absolutely vomit-inducing.”
“Sorry, Kendra.” Blue puts his hand back on the steering wheel, but throws a quick told you so look at me. He hadn’t wanted me to invite her along.
“And another thing. . .” Kendra’s words trail off as she stares at the massive gate looming before us. I’ve seen it so many times, it doesn’t even register. But I have to admit it’s pretty impressive. Huge logs make up all three sides, and they are set in stone bases. A large, wrought-iron sign—Cooke Ranch—hangs from the top. The Cooke brand is carved into each log, along with 1893, the date the ranch was established.
Blue pulls through the gates and follows the road as it climbs a ridge and then curves around a hill. The tires slide on the slick, icy surface. Blue brakes carefully as we come around the curve. It has stopped snowing. The sun’s just broken through the clouds, and the river that winds through Rosewood Valley sparkles in the sunlight. Even in the winter, with the grass a dull brown and the trees stripped of leaves, it’s a beautiful sight.