by Amy Brent
“I mean y’all are not teenagers anymore,” he said, the humor draining from his face to make room for a scowl that made me lean back in my chair. “Y’all can’t just run off to the barn to fool around and then get back to business anymore. Teenagers have hormones. Adults have feelings.” He narrowed his eyes at me again. “You get my meaning now?”
“Yes, sir,” I said, swallowing hard. “I believe so.”
“So, I’ll ask you again. What’s your plan regarding Shelby?”
I blew out a long sigh and spread my hands. “I’m not sure I have a plan.” A sharp pain bit at my guts. I put a hand to my side and tried not to wince. “I mean, to be honest with you, I didn’t expect to need a plan until I saw her walk into that hospital room a few days ago.”
Alvin Lee’s head bobbed, like he understood. He was an old cowboy. He’d ridden the circuit back in the day. He understood the lure of the road and the ride. But he also understood the love of a good woman, even though it was something he’d never really had.
He finished off the bottle of water and set it aside, then brushed the knuckle across his lips and gave me a firm look. “I’m just gonna say one thing on the subject and then I’ll shut up,” he said. “If you love her, hang on to her for dear life because there ain’t too many women like Shelby. But if you’re just messing with her to pass the time, well, son, it would be best if you heal up and move on quick as you can.”
“Yes, sir, I understand.”
He got up from the table, plucked his hat off the rack and worked it between his hands for a moment. He set his hand on the screen door, but paused before pushing it open.
“I reckon you know that if you break her heart you’ll have to answer to me,” he said without looking back at me.
“Yes, sir,” I said. “I understand.”
“All right then.” He set the hat on his head, pushed open the screen, and went out the door.
I blew out a long breath and rubbed my eyes.
What was my plan regarding Shelby?
I had no fucking clue.
CHAPTER TWENTY: Shelby
It was Wednesday already and I hadn’t mentioned the Monsanto job to Luke, even though I had to leave on Sunday. I had told Cody about the job and made him swear that he wouldn’t say a word, not even to Daddy, who would want to make a big deal over it.
“You ain’t told Luke yet?” Cody asked as we stood at the sink washing the dinner dishes. I glanced out the window over the sink. Luke was moving around pretty good now, getting out of bed and walking around the house, sitting on the porch. I could see him standing at the corral with Daddy, their long arms draped over the top rail, shoulder to shoulder, chatting like old pals. They were watching one of the cowboys trot a new pony around the corral.
“I’ll tell him when the time is right,” I said.
“When’s that gonna be?” Cody asked, holding out a dripping plate for me to dry.
“Soon,” I said. “Stop pestering me.”
“No time like the present,” Cody said, nodding out the window. “Here he comes. Dry off your hands, put on a smile, and tell him what’s going on. You owe him the truth, Shelby. You need to tell him tonight.”
“You’re right,” I said, drying my hands on a dish towel. “You got this?”
“Who do you think did the dishes while you were at school?” Cody said with a grin. He glanced out the window. Luke and Daddy were almost to the porch. “Go on. Tell him now.”
* * *
“Sure is a nice night,” Luke said as we walked hand in hand past the barn where we’d first made love. I resisted the urge to drag him inside and rip his clothes off. We hadn’t made love since he’d been home and even though he put on a brave face, I knew his side still hurt him something fierce. The scar was healing up, but one good romp in the barn could send him back to the hospital. I wanted to fuck his brains out, but not at the cost of popping his stitches again.
We walked past the barn where the pastures started. About thirty yards out, at the top of a hill, was a giant elm tree that we used to climb when we were kids. It loomed dark and large as the sky behind it turned purple.
“Can you make it to the tree?” I asked, squeezing his hand.
“I think I can,” he said, giving me a sideways smile.
I looked up at the stars that were starting to come out as we walked through the tall grass, trying to find the right words to tell Luke about the job. I had already played the conversation over and over in my mind, but I knew reality rarely mirrored imagination.
Did I really expect Luke to just forget about bull riding and move to Houston with me?
Did I really expect him to never climb onto the back of another bull at all?
Did I expect anything of him other than great sex?
Did I expect anything at all?
We reached the tree and Luke turned to sit on the ground.
“Need help?” I asked, holding Luke’s hand as he lowered himself slowly to the ground.
“No, ma’am,” he said, wincing. “I am quite capable of sitting down on my own. Though getting up might be another matter.” He sat down and leaned back against the tree with his long legs stretched out and ankles crossed.
I sat down beside him and leaned my head on his shoulder. This was the closest we’d been in days without someone watching us. Immediately, I could feel the heat growing between my legs. I could feel my nipples pushing against the thick padding of my bra. I wanted him so bad I could already feel him inside me, but I knew we had to be careful. His stitches were still mending. And Daddy could show up anytime.
“This is nice,” Luke said, brushing his lips against my forehead. “You wanna fool around?”
“Do you think we can without putting you back in the hospital,” I said, putting my hand to his cheek and brushing my lips to his. I glanced toward the house at the bottom of the hill. I could see the lights on in the kitchen and front rooms. Where we were, under the night shade of the old elm, I was pretty certain that we couldn’t be seen.
My hand slid over his thigh, just an inch or two away from his cock, which if past experience held true, was already growing hard and thick inside his jeans. I put my lips to his ear and swirled my tongue around the rim.
“So, what are you plans?” Luke asked of out of the blue. My hand froze on his thigh as I pulled back to look him in the eye.
“Plans? What do you mean?” I held my breath, wondering if he had somehow found out about my job. I pulled my hand back from his leg and laced my fingers together in my lap.
“I mean, you know, do you plan on staying here on the ranch or maybe getting a job somewhere else? I’m not sure where a body has to move to work on seeds.”
“Well, I haven’t given it much thought,” I said, lying through my teeth because I wasn’t prepared to tell him the truth. I glanced at him sideways. “What about you? What are your plans?”
Luke stared off toward the house. He brought up his knees and rested his elbows on them. I could just make out his profile in the darkness. He said, “Reckon I’ll get back on the circuit someday.”
I frowned at him. “Is that for sure what you’re gonna do?”
His shoulder went up and down against mine. “Don’t really know,” he said quietly. “Reckon I won’t make any firm plans until I know that I’m well enough to ride again.”
“That’s smart,” I said, wrapping my arms around myself as if I were chilly. I wasn’t. I just didn’t know what to do with my hands.
“I can’t imagine you’d stick around here,” he said. “You have your degree now. I’m sure there’s a bunch of companies that would love to scoop you up.”
“Well, I’m not sure about that,” I said. My stomach started to sour. I could taste the bitter hint of bile in my throat. I hated lying to him. It was twisting me into knots. I took a deep breath and decided to tell him the truth. It had to come out sooner or later. Now was as good a time as any.
Then I felt his hand on my leg.
�
��What are you doing?” I asked, smiling, suddenly breathing hard in response to his touch. He turned toward me with his hand sliding into my crotch. My pussy was scorching hot for him. I could feel the juices pooling in the crotch of my cotton panties. He squeezed my pussy and my juices soaked into my jeans. I spread my legs and sighed.
“We can talk plans later,” he said, his lips on mine. He swirled his tongue around my lips, then pushed his tongue into my mouth. “Right now, I gotta have you or I’m gonna bust right out of these jeans.
“Stop, let me do the hard work,” I said. I glanced toward the house again. I could see Daddy through the window of his study, smoking his pipe and reading a book. I didn’t see Cody, but figured he was smart enough not to have followed us out to the tree.
Under cover of darkness, I pulled off my boots and shimmied out of my jeans and helped Luke shimmy out of his. He lay back against the tree with his rock-hard cock in his hand, stroking it slowly, waiting for me to climb onboard.
“If your side starts to hurt we’ll stop,” I said, turning my ass toward him and slowly squatting to lower my pussy onto his waiting cock. The breath caught in my throat when the head of his cock slid inside me. I squatted down a little more and more of him slid inside me. When he was in as far as he could go, I began to rock my hips back and forth, milking him slowly, like sliding over a saddle on a slow trotting horse.
“Fuck…” Luke moaned. “Now that’s the best medicine there is.”
He slid his hands under my ass to help take some of the weight off my knees. He dug his fingers into my ass and helped me rock back and forth. I moaned as the length of him slid in and out of my soaking cunt. I was gushing, dripping, covering his cock and balls with my juices. My tangy scent wafted through the moist night air.
“Jesus… Luke… I’m cumming… already…” I sighed, squeezing my eyes shut as his thick cock slid in and out. I brought my hands to my tits and gave them a firm squeeze. My rigid nipples pushed out from my bra and t-shirt. I rolled my fingers over them as the heat of my orgasm started to burn its way throughout my body.
“Shit… Shelby… cum… baby…” Luke said, panting the words, fingers flexing on my ass. “I’m… right behind you...”
I bit my lip to keep from screaming as the orgasm shot through me like lightning in a Texas thunderstorm, making me shudder as my body released wave after wave of slick cum down the length of his cock and balls.
Luke came with me, clenching his hands on my ass and pulling me down onto him as far as I could go. I heard him grunt like a bear as the heat of his hot milky orgasm filled my cunt. I could feel his heat burning from my clit to my nipples. His hard thrusts pushed the air from my lungs.
I braced my hands on my knees and struggled to catch my breath. I could hear Luke panting like a dog behind me. His fingers loosened on my ass. He started gently massaging the small of my back with his thumbs.
“Jesus Christ a’mighty, I needed that,” Luke said with a happy sigh.
“So did I,” I said, pushing myself up off him with a grunt. I turned around to squat over his deflated cock again, this time facing him. I put my hands around his neck and pressed my lips to his. “Your side okay?”
“Yes, ma’am, my side’s just fine.
“What were we talking about?” I asked, nuzzling my nose to his.
“Damned if I can remember,” he said as his tongue pushed into my mouth again. “Damned if I can remember.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: Luke
After a week back home at the ranch, I was feeling more like my old self. I wasn’t quite ready to climb back on a bull, but I had high hopes that someday I would.
Shelby turned out to be one hell of a nurse, although she could be a Nazi at times. We hadn’t managed to sneak off and have sex again after our night under the old tree, but she was sweet and attentive and waited on me hand and foot. It was kinda nice.
Course, it would have been nicer to take her out to the barn and let her ride my old pecker like a show pony. But that time would come. Right now, she seemed to have other things on her mind.
I could tell something was eating at her by the way she got quiet when I talked about getting back on the circuit and maybe taking her with me. She wouldn’t say yes or no when I asked her if she might come along. She’d just look me in the eye and say, “We’ll see.”
Then, Friday night, when I’d been home a week, we were sitting on the front porch swing after dinner watching the sun go down when she said she had something to tell me.
She had gotten a job, she said, one she’d applied for when she was still in grad school months ago.
It was her dream job, messing with seeds or something like that.
She had to be in Houston by Sunday night to start on Monday morning.
The company had rented her a place to stay, a furnished apartment downtown. She could live there rent-free for three months to give her time to find a permanent place.
I couldn’t recall ever seeing her so excited
She wanted me to come with her.
She was gonna make lots of money and could support us both.
What did I think?
Didn’t that sound great?
“Well, I don’t know what to think,” I said honestly. “I mean, this is kind of out of the blue.”
“Yes, well, I mean I know it is,” she said. Our legs were pressed together on the swing. My hand was on my knee. She reached over and covered it with her hand. “But think of it as an opportunity.”
“An opportunity to do what?” I asked.
“Well, to get off the circuit for good,” she said, squeezing my hand. “An opportunity to do something real with your life.”
I frowned at her. “I have done something real with my life,” I said.
“Well, I know, but I’m talking about doing something meaningful.”
I kept frowning at her. If this was her way of delivering “good news” she wasn’t very good at it.
I snapped a little at her. “Something meaningful, like working on seeds.”
She took her hand off mine. “Well, yes, something other than riding silly old bulls.”
I huffed at her. “Shelby, I have ridden a lot of bulls, but never one that was silly or old.”
“You know what I mean,” she said.
I shook my head. “No, ma’am, I don’t think I know what you mean. How about you explain it to me?”
She turned sideways in the swing to face me. “Luke, how long do you think you can ride bulls for a living?”
“I don’t ride bulls for a living,” I said honestly. “Hell, they’re ain’t much of a living in it.”
“Exactly, so why do you do it?” She let her pretty eyes go around my face, like she was searching for the answer. “I mean, you’ve done it for six years and the only thing you have to show for it is a body covered with scars and a couple of silly belt buckles.”
“Silly belt buckles,” I said. I was starting to seethe. I hadn’t been mad at anybody in a long time. I try to keep an even temper because I tend to do and say things I regret when I get mad. I dug my fingers into my knees and took a deep breath.
“Are you all right?” she asked. “Your face is getting awfully red.”
“Shelby, have you ever seen me mad?” I asked.
She thought about it for a moment. “No, I don’t reckon I have.”
I turned to glare at her. “Well, this is what mad looks like on me.”
She swallowed hard. “Well, I don’t think I like it.”
“Well, I’m sorry, but you brought it on,” I said, throwing my hands in the air. “Tell a man that he’s wasted his life doing meaningless things and this is what you get, Lil Sis.” I shook my head and tried to lower my boiling point a little. I didn’t want to go off on her, but goddamn it all, she was basically saying that I had wasted my life chasing a dream that didn’t mean jack shit. And now she wanted me to move to Houston and do what, keep house for her? No fucking way!
Before I could say anyt
hing more, she put a hand on my arm and gave it a squeeze. “Oh my lord, do you know what this is?”
I was still seething. I stared at the horizon and said, “A bunch of shit?”
“No, it’s déjà vu.”
That made me glance her way. “Deja what?”
“Déjà vu,” she said with a soft smile. “It’s when you get that feeling that you’ve already experienced something before.”
“You mean like us sitting here on this swing while you telling me how I’ve wasted my life.”
“Something like that,” she said, her fingers digging into my arm and giving it a shake so I’d look at her. “We had a similar conversation right here six years ago, when I was trying to get you to move to College Station with me.”
She was right. I remembered. I smiled and shook my head. “I’ll be damned,” I said. “You’re right.” I stared into her eyes and put my hand on top of hers. “As I recall, that conversation didn’t end well. And we didn’t speak for six years.”
“Because I was a stupid girl,” she said. Her eyes welled with tears. She cupped my chin with her free hand. “I thought my dreams were more important than yours. I wanted you to forget about what you wanted and just come with me.” She bit her bottom lip as a tear streamed down her cheek. “And I’m doing it again.”
I felt every ounce of anger leave my body as I put my hand on her cheek. “Shelby, I’m so proud for you. I know this is your dream job. I’m thrilled that your dreams are coming true. But you have to understand, I have dreams, too. They may not be as lofty as yours or pay anywhere as much, and usually I end up on my ass in the dirt, but it’s still my dream and I can’t ignore it. Do you understand?”
“I do,” she said, leaning her forehead to rest against mine. “I reckon we just have to figure out how we can both chase our dreams and not lose each other again.”
“Think we can?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said, kissing me even though her Daddy and Cody were milling around inside the house. “I think we can.”
EPILOG: Shelby
I left for Houston that Sunday night and started my new job on Monday morning. I was immediately in my element. They handed me a lab coat and showed me to the lab and my heart did a happy dance. It was hard to believe this little girl from a dusty Texas cattle ranch was now doing research and development to create hybrid seeds that would help feed the world.