by Rose Queen
I puzzle together most of her rambling, and it's the best thing I've ever heard.
"...and I'm sorry I didn't warn you, and I'm sorry I just ran off like that, but those girls wear far too much makeup, and I can leave if you want, but you have to know that I love you, I love you so much, I love you more than anything, and you should really change the price of your sourdough bread becau—"
My mouth swoops down and silences her. The response is instant. With a cry, she wrings her arms around my neck and thrusts her fingers through my hair. My tongue pries her lips open and flicks hotly against hers, and I groan into her mouth, tilting my head and stroking her lips with mine. We lose ourselves. I kiss her so roughly that I can hear the wheat fields shuddering in my ears.
A pair of shadows across the street whistles in our direction. "Hot!" they cheer while passing us.
Annabelle breaks away, her skin turning crimson as she remembers we're in public. I tell her to ignore the audience, and her answering smile is contagious. So I kiss her again until we're both breathless.
As we come up for air, she looks around. "This is a pretty place."
The café’s located in a good part of the city. A village-like area with a Euro flair. There are narrow tree-lined streets, squat buildings, and coffee houses. During the warm months, window boxes overflowing with flowers decorate the front of the building.
"Your place is much nicer than the café around the corner," she remarks.
I frown. "You mean Laroche’s?"
She clears her throat. "I may have gone inside for a while. To gather my bearings for this reunion."
"Annabelle...when did you get here?"
"Four hours ago."
"Four hours ago?" I demand. "You've been only a block away for the last four fucking hours? What were you doing?"
"Panicking," she answers. "Praying in secret. And eating three bowls of their lamb stew special. I was scared to find out whether I'd lost you. I didn't...I didn't know if things would be the same."
I brush my lips against hers. "And are they the same?"
"Yes," she whispers. "I mean, I think so. I hope so."
"Hmm." My fingers drop to the neckline of her blouse. "I think we need to find out." I pause until our gazes connect, then say, "Come back to me."
I discover that Annabelle has become an impatient girl. A loud, demanding girl. Her smoky moans pack the café. My name falls eagerly from her tongue, and it drives me wild. With the window blinds already closed, no one can see us as our bodies beat together in a frenzy.
I growl, my hips rocking into hers, which causes her body to jerk across the counter. She's intoxicating like this, naked and flush against the hard surface, thighs spread and clinging to my waist. Until her, I had no idea what it meant to really want someone.
We couldn't wait. We hadn't seen or touched each other in months. We'd stumbled into the café, tearing at each other's clothes. I'd barely managed to lock the door. It was clear we weren't making it upstairs.
My arm had lashed out and swiped the contents off the nearest counter. Flour canisters crashed to the floor. Coins from the tip jar rained across the linoleum. I'd picked her up and dropped her on ledge, wrenching her knees apart to stand between them, and our mouths found each other again.
That's when I remembered the condom. "Shit," I muttered.
Annabelle had laughed as I hauled my naked ass up the stairs to grab one. When I returned, there she was, nude except for the dark thigh-high stockings I'd purposefully left on her.
There she was. Waiting for me. Here for me.
I wasted no time. The tip of my erection sought out her moisture, and at the first contact, we whimpered. Our foreheads merged. I bit my lower lip to the point of pain and pulled back, then probed her again.
"Feel it?" I asked.
"Yes," she exhaled. "I feel it."
Her eyes pierced mine. The sight undid me. I'd grabbed the backs of her knees, lifted them, and slipped fully into her. Her body melted backward against the counter while I remained standing.
And now, I grind harder. She raises her hips to take me deeper, and I fill her to the brim. My shoulders are trembling. My back is beginning to sweat. I'm surprised the shaky sounds we're making aren't rattling the copper pots hanging above our heads.
Annabelle keens and reaches out for me, beckoning me closer. I bend and fall against her. I grasp the rim of the counter for leverage and use it to pound into her, my mouth falling open and a groan toppling out.
"Cassius," she gasps, each word accented by my movements. "Missed. You. Always."
I groan a second time from her words. And from her earlier rant. When she told me the bow was incredible. That she came here for me. That she loves me.
And I...I...I feel it in the spot where our hips are locked, my cock thrumming, her insides tensing. Her cries get louder, fiercer, greedier.
The instant she clenches around me, she throws her head back and shouts into the air. I let her ride it out, then pull her upright and kiss her. One more vicious thrust and I'm there with her. My length pulsates, my face presses into her neck, and my guttural moan hits her skin.
Together, we go limp. Her arms and legs fasten me to her while we struggle to catch our breaths. She knits her fingers into my hair. I rest my cheek on her shoulder. This has to be a fucking dream.
Playfully, I snap the top of her stockings against her thighs. "How many pairs of these did you bring?"
Her body shakes with a silent chuckle. "I learned that you're a painter. I learned that you're a baker. I learned you like rock music with a folk twist. I learned that you love your father and your brothers."
My eyes squeeze shut. Her speech takes me back to the hill, where I told her all those things I learned about her.
"I learned that you smack your lips when you sleep," Annabelle whispers. "I learned that you chew on your lower lip when you're surprised. I learned that you like fast vehicles and slow dancing. I learned that you're allergic to honey. I learned you have two tattoos—"
"Three."
"What?"
My head tips back. We were so worked up earlier that she must not have noticed, not even when she yanked down my pants. I twist, just enough to expose the tattoo on the inside of my hip. My eyes flit downward. She follows the movement and sees the green letters inked into the skin.
‘Duchess’.
She looks up at me, her eyes watery. I take her face in my hands. "I love you, Annabelle."
She chokes back a sob. "Say it again."
"I love you."
"Again."
I plaster kisses all over her face and neck, branding each spot with ‘I love you’s’ until she's giggling.
"Soooo," I begin, my fingers skimming her lower back. "Just to recap. You can spend every weekend here for the next two months."
"Mmm-hmm." She matches my touch by tracing the tattoo on my hip. "And then, I can choose whether to stay with my Order."
"Or?" I prompt.
"Or stay here. With you."
Mentally, I'm punching my fist into the air and whooping and clearing out half the closet for her. "So do we get married? What's the rule?"
She grins. "There is no rule after that. It's our choice. But I like the idea of waiting until we're ready. I'm okay with that. I just want to be with you. As long as you want me to be here, too."
I tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. "What else do you want?"
Her features shrink. This isn't easy for her. Nevertheless, I'm grateful to Mr. Chaste. He still trusts me enough to take care of his daughter. I won't let him down.
She meets my eyes. "I want to get back on your bike. I want to go to that bookstore again. I want to go to that arcade with the archery booth. And you said there's a park. And you said there's a church."
Good enough. She has time. We have time.
"Anywhere you want. But first..." I raise a mischievous eyebrow. For what I have in mind, at least for this first weekend, she might not have the energy for sightsee
ing. "You're here until when?"
"I suppose I have until Sunday evening—"
Annabelle belts out a startled laugh when I haul her off the counter. She tightens her legs around my waist and holds onto me as I sprint us up the stairs, where we have another mind-blowing reunion in my bed.
And in my shower.
For some reason, this girl loves me in the shower.
Epilogue
The Prick Next Door
I lift my head off the pillow and rub my eyes. It's an important morning. A year ago today, I met her for the first time. Seven months ago today, she came to the city to see me.
It's September. It's early, on my day off. The girl tucked into my chest is still sleeping. She rests on her side, the blanket pulled low and barely covering the blooming curve of her ass. Her back is gloriously exposed, with a curtain of dark waves falling over it. I never get tired of this sight.
My finger trails down her spine, my ring lightly scraping her skin. She sighs unconsciously. I press a kiss to her shoulder, get out of bed, and force myself into my clothes. Although night is usually the best time to do my art, today is different. Still, it's tough to be motivated when it requires leaving the warmth of my girlfriend's body.
Carrying my supplies, I head downstairs. It's good that this old building's got brick walls. It's Saturday, which means it's Dylan's job to open the café. He should be here in an hour.
It's chilly outside. I round the corner, halt at the side of the Gunner building, and survey the mural I'd begun a few days ago...well, it's actually taken longer than that to work on. The face has been in my head for two years, but I've only now gotten the courage to immortalize it.
I rattle the spray can. For the next forty minutes, there's nothing but the arc of my arm and the whiz of the paint hitting the brick surface. When I'm done, I release a breath that's been jammed in my chest for way too many seasons.
I step back and tilt my head. It looks done. It looks right.
"It's perfect." Her voice is cracked with sleep and affection.
I grin and wheel around slowly. She's standing there, her hair falling over her dark green t-shirt, hands tucked into the pockets of her jeans. I want to tell her that nothing's perfect, but that's just not true. The way her hips fill out the denim is perfect. The material disappears into a pair of brown lace-up boots that we'd discovered in a thrift store.
Annabelle likes thrift stores. She also like boots.
Her cheeks are flushed from sleep. I open my arms to her, and she rushes forward. As I lift her up, she wraps her legs around my torso and kisses me.
Annabelle likes to kiss. A lot.
We twist our gazes toward the mural, our temples pressed together as we stare at the wall. At my father's crooked nose and wide ears and easy grin. At the blue eyes I inherited from him. The face that has taken so long for me to paint.
Next to him is Mr. Chaste. His strong gaze and long beard.
Annabelle toys with my hair. "You brought them back together."
I guess in this small way I have. I've brought them back to the place where they met—where Annabelle and I live now. We get to see them every day. We get to miss them. But we also get to let go.
It was the magazine I found a month ago that jump-started my need to do this mural. My brothers and I had finally gone through Dad's stuff and found the old periodical. A specific page had been marked.
Ten years ago, a photographer had been allowed a rare visit to a Unity community to document the lifestyle. While there, the photographer had taken a snapshot of an eight-year old Annabelle Chaste while she'd been crafting her first toy bow. The caption had mentioned her name.
In the backdrop, Mr. Chaste had been watching her. The picture was published in a magazine, and my father must have found it on a newsstand in the city.
Annabelle didn't remember the photo, but when I saw it, I realized that I did. My father had shown me the picture when I was a kid.
"That's my friend's daughter," he'd said.
Her gorgeous frown had enchanted me. So had that small bow she held.
The night I got arrested, when I conjured up her face, it hadn't been a freak accident. It was an image that had eventually faded only to return subconsciously, but with grown-up features—at the time when I needed it most.
Right after Annabelle got here, I'd wanted to show her the mural I did of her beneath the bridge. But the neighborhood clean-up crew had already painted over it.
That's fine. I have the real thing now.
Still propped up in my arms, Annabelle yawns. She must be overly tired, having worked a double shift yesterday at our local sports center, where she teaches archery. It turns out, she's a virtuoso with the bow. It didn't take her long to perfect her skills. It made my fucking jaw drop when I finally saw just how good she was.
When neither of us are working, or when she needs a break from the city noise, we ride my bike into the countryside. She takes her arrow pack and goes scampering into the woods for hours while I sketch or listen to music.
There's a pick-your-own farm nearby. Annabelle is already on a first-name basis with the owners. It's not the same as the harvest, but we plan on going there a lot this fall. It works out well. It's a balance.
"You should go back to sleep," I tell her. "We have all day."
"No. I like it right here."
I smirk. Annabelle likes to be held. She likes museums and all-you-can-eat buffets. She likes dishwashers. She likes parks. She likes cheese buns. She likes flower stands. She likes indie folk clubs.
She likes the church a few blocks away. It's bigger than what she's used to, but from the first visit, she instantly fell in love with the high ceilings, stonewalls, and stained glass. She met a new friend there named Rue. They usually hang out together after Sunday service.
Annabelle doesn't make me go with her, but her smiles widen whenever I do. I'm not crazy about religion. Sometimes we get into debates. Sometimes we lose our patience with each other. Sometimes we get testy.
She'll walk away. I'll find and tickle her.
Or I'll walk away. She'll find me and brush her lips over my jaw.
And then I'll take her in my lap. And then we'll talk. We're learning, figuring it out, and growing together.
Annabelle still likes planting things. She turned the café's roof into an urban farm. It looks crazy green, with mini fruit trees and planters full of herbs and vegetables.
In the summer, we spent a lot of time up there. Those evenings routinely ended with me draped across the lounge chair, completely at the mercy of her body, arching beneath her and hollering to the sky as she rode me.
The first morning after this happened, I'd left her a note on the fridge before I went down to the café. I'm going to fuck you on the roof again tonight.
She likes my sexy notes. Unfortunately, Dylan found it before Annabelle did when he stopped by to drop off a record he'd borrowed. She hadn't been able to look him in the eyes for a week.
My brothers like her. She likes them. Dylan has no clue how I won her over, which I guess is a compliment.
Bailey is a different story. He adores her, enjoys teasing her, even takes her to places he knows she'll appreciate. But in the beginning, it was awkward between him and me. I was more acutely aware of the hurt he concealed. It took him a while, but now he's hanging out with Annie a lot. He talks about her nonstop. I think it's going somewhere.
The sky shifts from grey to orange. Across the street, the smell of French roast wafts from a coffee house. Dylan should be on his way to open the café by now.
Annabelle's stomach grumbles against mine. "Hungry?" I ask.
"No," she lies, her voice muffled into my shoulder, hinting that she's got something on her mind.
"What's up?" I ask.
She raises her head. I tip mine back to stare up at her. We let our hands roam over each other. The desire to touch is constant.
"I did not see you coming, Cassius Gunner," she reflects.
My
nose rubs against hers. "Well, you won't see me going either."
"I love you."
"I love you more," I say. "I won't ever forget what you gave up for me."
"I would do it again."
Out of nowhere, I chuckle, and her brow furrows. "What?" she asks.
"It's just, I think you became more of a bad one than me."
Annabelle grins. She likes this idea.
We leave the mural and head upstairs. I decide to take a shower to warm up from the cold. I'm craning my head backward into the stream when the glass door swings open, and there's stands Annabelle, a ravenous expression on her face. She's wearing nothing but her bra and panties.
"Hey you." I watch her eyes travel up and down my body. "You look like you're getting ideas."
The last of her clothing falls to the floor. She steps inside, rests her back against my chest, and the contact of her bare form causes a riot inside me. Threads of hot water pelt our heads and trickle from my shoulders to hers, flowing over the olive skin and dripping off the peaks of her breasts. I want to catch those droplets with my tongue.
I've got ideas, too. She has no clue what she's gotten herself into sneaking into this tight, humid, soaked space with me.
"I used to think about doing this with you," she admits. "Back at the farm, whenever you used our shower."
"Did you like what you saw when you walked in on me?"
She tenses. I grin at the pink tint floating across her cheeks. My fingers wind into her hair and gently tug until I have full access to her neck, where I place soft bites over the pulse point.
"I liked it very much," she whispers.
"I'd hoped you would join me back then."
"You did no such thing."
"I got hard the minute I noticed you there." I feel goose-bumps pop across her arms. "If you'd stepped inside, I would have made love to you right then. Do you want me to now?"
She elicits a long, suffering moan. I take that as a yes and walk her forward until her chest hits the tiles. Lifting her hands above her head, I press her palms into the smooth surface, then inch her hips back toward me. We've never tried this position before.
"Don't let go of the wall," I order.