Forever & Always: The Ever Trilogy (Book 1)

by Jasinda Wilder

  An image of strong, sure hands and dark serious eyes flashed through my mind: Cade’s hands, Cade’s eyes.

  I blinked, and met Will’s eyes, blue eyes blazing with heat. Saw his hands on my waist, strong hands, yes, but clean, soft hands. Cade’s had been roughened by work, callused.

  Why did that matter? It was Will’s hands on me, not Cade’s. And that was fine, right? Cade was my pen pal, Will was my boyfriend. End of discussion.

  I pushed the niggling wondering doubt from my mind and closed my eyes and touched my lips to Will’s. Sparks flew, heat billowed. My skin tightened and my mind whirled and my stomach flipped. The kiss deepened, and Will’s hands slid up my sides and skated across my ribs beneath my bra, tempting and tantalizing. My own fingers were dancing up his back and across his chest and over his shoulders, touching bare skin beneath his shirt. I couldn’t breathe and didn’t care. This was exciting, a daring adventure I flung myself into willingly. I arched my spine and sucked in a breath, swelling my breasts, and now Will’s palms were brushing the round of my bra. I felt my nipple harden, felt his touch stutter and stop so the bottom edge of his palm rested on the hard nub, dragged back across. Lightning sizzled inside me, threatening to arc and bolt if only he touched more, touched skin.

  I almost made a noise of disappointment when he slid his palm away and up my chest to my shoulder, but oh, yes, okay, he was brushing the strap down, freeing the weight of my left breast, and now his fingers were tugging the edge of the cup away and our kiss was a fiery maelstrom of lips and tongues and I felt so adult, so alive, so energized by the knowledge of what we were doing that I couldn’t contain it all.

  Now the other strap was sagging around my bicep and he was pushing the cups down and my boobs were free and his palms were slipping over skin and I was on fire, gasping into his mouth as his fingers touched a nipple and brought it to diamond hardness.

  My T-shirt was still loose and draping over his hands, shielding me from view, mine and his. What if I took my shirt off? I thought about it, and the notion made me dizzy. It would be a huge step. Letting him touch me was one thing, somehow, but intentionally taking my shirt off to show him my body was another.

  Before I could second-guess myself, I broke the kiss and stripped the shirt off. Will sucked in a deep, sharp breath as my pale flesh was bared to the moonlight streaming in through the sunroof of his car. He grinned at me and peeled his own shirt off, and now it was my turn to gasp at the sight of his rippling, sculpted abs, and the elastic band of his Calvin Klein underwear peeking out above his Hugo Boss jeans. I ran my hands over his chest, let my fingers trace the lines of his abs, and he just watched me touch him. And then his thumb dragged slowly across my nipple, sending a bolt of pure arousal through me.

  I arched my spine and tipped my head back, and his palm closed over my boob and lifted the weight, cupping it, gentle and knowledgeable. I knew he’d done this before, that much was clear in the way he touched me, especially when he reached behind me and unclasped my bra with one hand in a single, deft motion.

  He met my eyes as he brought the lace and silk away, and I held his gaze steadily, telling him silently that it was fine, even though my pulse was a wild tribal drumbeat in my chest and I wanted desperately to cover myself, but I didn’t, because Will’s gaze was frankly appreciative, taking in my skin and my breasts with greedy hunger.

  And then he rolled toward me, leaning over the console between us and kissing me, hovering over me so his chest brushed the tips of my boobs. With one hand he fumbled for the seat controls and leaned my seat backward so I was lying down and he was above me, and his fingers were tracing lines on my belly, stopping at the button of my jeans, and I knew what he was asking.

  “Not yet,” I whispered. “Not that far, not yet.”

  He kissed my neck. “Sure thing, Ever. Maybe I could just…touch you a little, though? I know ways to make you feel really good.”

  I knew what he was referring to. I might have been a virgin, but I wasn’t ignorant. I’d touched myself, of course. Discovered the various ways to make myself come, and I could imagine how good that would feel when someone else was doing it to me. But…that would be as good as admitting I was willing to have sex with Will. I knew that’s where it was going, of course I did. I knew that’s what he wanted. And a part of me wanted it, too. But there was also another part of me that wasn’t sure. Both about whether I was ready at all, and whether Will was the right person to have my first time with.

  Will. I intentionally thought of him as Will, but in the back of my head, he was always Billy. In my private thoughts, he was Billy. And I’d written to Cade and referred to him as Billy. What was the significance? I didn’t know, but there was a significance. I just wished I could figure out what it meant.

  All these thoughts raced through me, and all the while Will was kissing my shoulder and my throat and my clavicle and my breastbone and between my boobs, and I was frozen by the heat of his lips on my skin, and by the fact that now he was kissing the slope of my breast and closer, closer, and now I did gasp aloud, almost a moan, as his lips closed over my nipple and drew a bolt of lightning from me.

  My body betrayed me. My body refused to do anything except respond to Will’s touch. My hand wouldn’t stop him as he unbuttoned my jeans and drew down the zipper and slid his fingers under the elastic and found me waiting for him, hot and wet, and my voice wouldn’t rise from my throat to tell him to stop because my body liked it, even though the doubts still raced through my brain and my heart was unsure where it was or what it wanted, but my body didn’t care because my body was in control; or rather, my body was under the spell of Will’s touch, and I was letting it happen.

  His fingers found the perfect place, and now my hips were bucking and I was moaning and he was doing something else to me between my legs with his hands, something I’d never done, and now everything inside me blew up, just detonated, and I couldn’t help the noises coming from me.

  Will chuckled. “God, Ever, you’re noisy, aren’t you?”

  “S-sorry,” I breathed.

  “No, it’s cute. It’s…hot.”

  Now that adrenaline and arousal and post-orgasm chemicals were blasting through me and leaving me, something like shame hit me. I pushed his hand away and sat up, shaky fingers hunting for the control to bring the seat upright. Had I really just let Will finger me? Oh, god. Did that make me easy? Did he think I was going to be an easy conquest? What if he just wanted my cherry, and then he’d not want me anymore? Ellie Myers had had that happen to her. A hot, popular guy had acted all interested in her and dated her and lured her step by step into sex, kiss by kiss and touch by touch, and then after he finally got her to sleep with him, he’d dumped her, and she’d been devastated. She’d just wanted Brian to like her, because Brian was a basketball star and a senior with college prospects and hot as hell, and we all knew how it was going to end, because that was just how Brian Washington was and everyone knew it but Ellie.

  Was Billy that way? There weren’t any rumors about him, not like with Brian. I’d never heard anybody at school talk about getting with him. He didn’t have the reputation Brian did. Billy was mysterious, seeming uninterested in the popularity game, but he was all the more popular for all that, especially because he clearly came from big money and was hot and talented. But was he a player?

  I just didn’t know.

  I was pulling my clothes on while all this bubbled up in my head.

  “Hey, are you okay?” Billy—Will—dragged a hand through his spiky blond hair and peered at me in concern. “Did I…did I rush you?”

  I shook my head and shrugged as I tugged my T-shirt over my head. “No, I let you do it. Now I’m just not sure…I don’t know….I don’t even know what I’m saying. You didn’t rush me, and you gave me plenty of opportunity to stop you, and I didn’t. But now I’m—I don’t know.”

  Will found his shirt and pulled it on. “I get it. That’s how I felt my first time, too. During, it was great.
Afterward, I was all mixed up.”

  “That wasn’t even my first time, not really. Not—not all the way.”

  Will shrugged, fiddling with a loose thread on one of his belt loops. “No, but I was just saying I know how you’re feeling. To some degree, anyway.”

  I decided to just go for it, tell him what I was feeling and see how he reacted. I could sense a lie pretty well, I thought. “I’m just wondering…have you done this a lot? With a lot of different people?”

  He rubbed the back of his neck. “Yes and no. It’s complicated. See, number one, I’m seventeen. I missed a year of school. Well, I didn’t miss it, I was just out of the country getting tutored privately, and the U.S. school system wouldn’t count some of what I did, so I had take junior year all over again, even though I should be a senior, age-wise and according to what I’ve studied. And…while I was over there, in Germany, with my parents, I had a girlfriend. We…were together for almost a year and a half, and we did…well, it was like with you and me. She was my first, but I wasn’t hers. She was older than me. Eighteen when we met, and I wasn’t quite sixteen. And Elsa…she taught me a lot. So I’ve done it a lot, but not with a lot of different people.”

  “Were you around when everything happened with Ellie Myers and Brian Washington?” I asked.

  Will nodded. “Yeah. That was shitty. He’s a douchebag. I heard him talking about her the day before I guess she actually slept with him. He was just…bragging. About how she was following along like a little puppy. Telling the guys in detail what she looked like naked, how he’d gotten her clothes off, how he’d gotten her to go down on him, and all that. How she was a brown-bagger.”

  “A what?”

  He didn’t answer right away. “The kind of girl you put a bag over her head when you’re banging her. It’s a shitty-ass phrase, and I hate it. I’m not like that, Ever. I swear.”

  “I guess I just don’t want to be like her. Everyone knew his rep, knew that’s what he did. Even I knew he was a player, and that he was playing her. But…with you, I don’t know. You don’t have that same kind of rep, but—”

  “Look, Ever, I like you. I really do. I’m not gonna tell you I love you to get you sleep with me. I’m not in love with you, not—not in a forever kind of way. Just honestly. I’m attracted to you, and I like you, and I like spending time with you. If you want this with me, great, awesome, but if you don’t, tell me. And don’t think that just because you’re not ready that I’m gonna ditch you. If you need time, that’s fine. I’m not rushing you or pushing you. At least, I’m not trying to.” He turned to look at me, and I saw nothing but honesty in his features.”

  “So then what is this, between us?”

  “I don’t know. We’re dating? We’re just…I don’t know. Does it have to be something defined? Does it have to be one true love to do what we want to do together? If we both want it, and we both agree, what’s the problem?”

  “Nothing, I guess.” I watched clouds drift across the face of the moon. “I just never thought about it, but now I am. I don’t know what I want. When we’re…making out and whatever, I’m all into it. I like it, and don’t want to stop. But then after, I wonder if it should mean something. I mean, like you said, I like you, and I’m definitely attracted to you, but am in love with you? I don’t know. I don’t think so. Should I be? Or what if, like you said, we just do what we want to do, because it feels good? It does, too. But shouldn’t it mean something?”

  Will took my hand, twined our fingers. “But—why doesn’t it mean something, just because we’re not, like, star-crossed lovers or whatever? We don’t have to be in love for it to mean something. Right?” He squeezed my hand and gazed at me intently. “And we don’t have to do anything. I like going out with you. I have fun with you. Just…it’s up to you, okay?”

  I nodded, and Will put the car in drive, pulled out of the parking lot of the park that had become our usual spot, and drove me home. We didn’t talk on the way, just listened to fun. and held hands and watched the Bloomfield Hills mansions whisk past us in the midnight darkness.

  After he dropped me off, I tiptoed past Eden’s studio door, not wanting to explain what I’d been doing, knowing she’d sense it on me, and closed my bedroom door behind me. I stripped off my clothes and stared at my naked body in the full-length mirror in my walk-in closet. What did I want? Should I go all the way with Will?

  No answer came to me from the mirror, from my reflection. Only my pale white skin and heavy breasts with their wide, dark areolae and thick pink nipples. My privates. I touched myself, remembering how Will’s fingers had felt.

  I took a shower, dried off, put my hair into curlers for the next day. I got into bed and found myself unable to fall asleep. I kept going over what I’d done with Will, how it had felt, what we’d talked about. When I finally drifted into the twilight of almost-sleep, I dreamed of hands touching me, lips on my skin.

  In the dream, even though my eyes were closed and I couldn’t see, I knew I was naked. I was bare to the air, to his touch, his kiss. I knew, too, that he was naked as well. In the dream, I was nervous. I was going to make love to him. With him. But somehow I knew it wasn’t my first time, or his. It was dream-knowledge, there without source or memory. Yet we were both still nervous, scared, trembling together. His touch wasn’t sure and knowledgeable and skilled. He was hesitant, hungry and needy but seeking, wondering. Wondrous. As was my touch, my hands on his body, my lips on his skin.

  In the dream, darkness faded. Eyesight returned, as if floating upward from the bottom of a pool, no, from the deepest depths of a fathomless ocean, and I saw him beside me. Not above or beneath, but beside. Touching, kissing, holding, together.

  And it wasn’t Billy. Awareness hit, the strange way it does in dreams. Before I was able to make out his features, I knew, instinctively, inside myself, that it wasn’t Billy—and my dream-brain thought of him as Billy, not Will.

  It was Caden in my dream.

  There were no doubts with us, only tender needing aching dreaming perfect wonder. And meaning. Deep significance in each touch, each kiss.

  His eyes were blazing bright and clearest sunlit amber, fixed on mine, serious and sad, yet hot with desire and need. His mouth opened and his lips moved, and he said my name in a whisper that echoed throughout time, out of sync with the motion of his lips.

  “EVER…”

  The dream faded, and I was left aching with emptiness. I wanted to hold on to the dream, to the comforting swell of belonging I’d felt in Caden’s dream-arms.

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  Caden

  Henry was restless. He was a huge young stallion, over seventeen hands high, black with three white socks and a thick mane. Powerful, spirited, and eager to please, Henry was often difficult to keep under rein because he simply wanted to run, run until sky met land in a permanently unrolling horizon. Gramps hadn’t been sure I was ready to ride Henry—whose full name was Henry V, an homage by Grams to Shakespeare—but I’d convinced him to let me try. So over the last few weeks I’d been learning to ride Henry and to make him understand that I was boss. I’d been thrown twice, and nearly broke my arm the last time, but now he was finally getting the picture.

  I’d finished moving the herd of green-broke mares to the hilly pastures at the northern edge of the property, near the river, when I saw her. She was sitting by the bank with an open book on her lap and a sleek dun gelding I recognized as belonging to Miguel tethered to a stake not far away.

  I let the herd drift and reined Henry to a stop, wondering who she was. Thick black hair loose around her shoulders, fluttering in the slow breeze, dark-tanned arms bare, wearing a sleeveless white shirt printed with purple flowers and a pair of faded jeans, well-worn feminine cowboy boots crossed at the ankles.

  I swung off Henry and held his reins in my fist as I approached her. She turned the page of her book, and then after a moment stuck a ribbon in her place and shut it. When she turned to face me, I recognized her. Or rather, I saw th
e immediate resemblance to Miguel and figured she had to be his daughter.

  She was beautiful, and I was tongue-tied.

  “Hola—I mean, hello.” She was soft-spoken, with a thick Hispanic accent.

  “Hi.” I stood a few feet away from her, holding on to Henry’s lead, letting him browse the grass.

  “You are Caden, sí?” She stood up and brushed off the seat of her jeans. “Mister Monroe’s nieto? Son of his son? I do not know the word.”

  “Grandson. Yeah. You’re Miguel’s daughter?”

  She shook her head. “No, not daughter. He is my tio. Uncle? My name is Luisa.”

  “Oh, okay.” I held out my hand, and she took it. Her hand was tiny, soft, and warm. “Nice to meet you, Luisa.”

  “Nice to meet you.” She said the phrase as if repeating what I’d said.

  “So, did you move up here, then? Or…”

  Luisa nodded. “I come here to live with Tio Miguel. To go to school in America.” She pulled up the tethering stake and we walked along the riverbank together, leading our horses.

  “So how long have you been here?”

  She gazed out at the hills, and the herd of mares nosing at the green grass. “Um…since two weeks. Your abuelo, he will hire my papa in the spring, tio says. Until then, I live with tio.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, I heard Gramps talking about hiring some hands for foaling season.”

  “Foaling…season?” Luisa glanced at me in confusion, her expression asking for clarification.

  “When mama horses have their babies. It’s usually between February and April.”

  “Oh. This. Yes.” She nodded as if familiar.

  “You ride a lot? Back home?”

  Luisa shrugged. “Oh, sí. My family, Miguel, Papa, my abuelo, we work on the same rancho for many generaciones. I grow up there, ride the caballos, bring the potros, the baby horses. Foals, you say it?”

  “Yeah, foals. Baby horses. So you know horse ranches, then?”