by Maggie Way
“No, we didn’t get that far because Cherokee dropped, remember? That horse…umm, your horse…is going to kill himself if they don’t put a guard on the feed shack. Just sayin’.”
“Duly noted.” He stroked his fingers up and down my thigh. “Do you have any family here? I’d like to invite them to our annual picnic next weekend. That is, if you’d honor me by going as my plus one.”
“My mom passed away last year. My dad is who-knows-where, and I have a brother who I don’t speak to for despicable reasons. How’s that for jacked up?”
“I don’t judge. When you meet my bunch, you’ll see some crazies as well. I have an older brother that looks like a founding member of ZZ Top. Don’t laugh, I’m serious.”
I laughed, and then I started sneezing.
“You getting sick?”
“Oh no, I was sick last week with an ear thing, but I’ve finished my antibiotics, and this is just allergies to all the pretty flowers blooming, the hazards of working outside.”
After spending the last twenty-four hours with him all tangled up in each other, when he drove me to my apartment, sadness claimed me at the thought of being away from him. How could I feel something so quickly with someone I didn’t even know?
Fear began to seep in. It was that same fear that had ruined every chance at a relationship before. Maybe it was the fear that had held me back until I met Flynn.
Who names their kid Flynn?
“You’re fidgeting,” he said.
“I know. It’s that weird feeling creeping in.”
“The one that makes you doubt what you’re feeling? Because I’ve got that same virus. Tell ya what, go pack your clothes and follow me. You’re coming to stay at my place. We’ll go through this together.”
Without any reservations, I knew I wanted to be with him. “I have to shuffle the work truck back to the clinic. You mind helping me?”
“No.” Flynn followed me inside and hung up my wet clothes while I packed yet another bag.
As crazy as it sounded, if he’d asked, I would’ve moved in with him that very moment. In a way, I was doing that in small doses, and it was strange and exhilaratingly sexy at the same time.
I knew my friends were going to think I was freakin’ nuts and simply reacting to being virgin-esque for so long.
He followed me to the clinic, and while there, I ran in to check on all of the animals. Then we went back to my place, so I could get my car. I followed him to his home and got a big kick out of parking next to him in the garage. It was too comfortable, too quick.
When he opened the door, his Golden Retriever went crazy and tackled me to the ground.
“I think you’ve met my best friend already, but I don’t know if you recall me telling you his name, and unless he’s trying to champion the Bush Bean’s commercial, he hasn’t learned to talk. Meet Simon and just so you know, he’s a sex maniac. That’s what he is,” Flynn teased. He helped me up from the floor and led me to the empty closet where he left me for a moment to find some hangars for my clothes.
Simon followed, close on my heels.
“What’s in the box?” I asked, being nosy was one of my strong suits. I supposed that was what helped me bond with animals. They were all curious and never bashful about it.
“The remainder of Courtney’s things. It’s been eight months, and she hasn’t come to get them. She still has a key; it’s not like she doesn’t have access.”
My gut clenched. She still had a key. Okay, that didn’t sound like closure to me. “Wait a minute, she has a key? Look, maybe you aren’t ready to go forward, maybe…”
Flynn took both of my arms and pulled me down to his lap to join him on the bench. His eyes moved from side-to-side searching mine. He was waiting for the right answer? Or possibly making sure the words he picked didn’t send me packing.
“She chose the pageant stuff as her life and was dedicated to making Miss America, but the farthest she got was top ten. When I asked her to marry me, she said no. Later, she said she wasn’t in love with me, and I realized I wasn’t in love with her either. We talked off and on for about three weeks after she finally moved out, but she never came back, not even to drop off her key. She lives in California now and is trying to make it out there. She was too young, and we were in the wrong stages of our lives. She wanted to travel and do broadcasting. I wanted to stay home and have a family.”
“You said you’re thirty-two. How old was she?”
“Twenty-six when we broke up. We were together four years. There’s been no one serious since her. I’m more than ready to move on.”
“I am too.”
He began to unbutton my dress, and I couldn’t wait. I unfastened his pants and slipped my dress over my head. That’s when he gasped.
“You were naked under there?”
“Uhm, hmm. You like?”
“Fuckin’ turn on, as if it could get any better.”
I climbed back on his lap, and he stopped me again.
“Condom. Be right back.”
He pushed me to my feet, and I gripped his arms to stop him. “I’m on the pill. Convenience thing, just never stopped them.”
He paused and searched his thoughts for a moment while staring at the floor. Then, he looked straight into my eyes. “You’re sure about this? I know I’m safe,” he said with an enduring smile.
“Yes, I’m safe too.”
I climbed him and rode his cock on that bench, but there was something about the barrier being removed that took our existence to the next level of intimacy. I couldn’t get enough of him. When I climaxed, it was beyond exhilaration, and something inside me grabbed hard and held on. Riveting.
I rested against his chest and he held me tightly without moving. Our breathing was sporadic for several minutes. We were quiet, but the feeling of being in his arms completely sated was beautiful. When we returned to ourselves, I slipped off of him and turned on the shower. When the water started to flow, it reminded me of the pink hair. I caught myself, covering my mouth to hide my giggles before I burst out laughing. He noticed.
“I was thinking maybe I should make my hair permanently pink?”
“No way,” he said, twisting strands of my hair between his fingers.
“But I thought you liked pink?”
“You were hot in a funky kind of way, but I was never so thankful as to see pink suds in my shower.” He laughed and I gasped.
“So, you knew it was a temporary disguise?”
“Yep.”
That night, we cuddled on the sofa with Simon and watched movies. When I fell asleep in Flynn’s arms, it felt natural, just like it was supposed to be. I felt like I’d finally found my place.
But I woke up in the night, the strangest feeling of worry consuming me—fear of what lurked around the corner that would ruin everything.
Chapter Eight
Chloe
The next few days flew by as we both worked and rushed home to be with each other. We’d quickly settled into shopping, cooking, and being together. I tried hard to keep my new relationship from Zetta, but she could read me quite well, and my secret wasn’t happening.
“Who’s the guy?” she asked, leaning against my desk.
“I could play dumb, but you wouldn’t buy it, would you?”
“Nope, you’re glowing and you have been all week.”
“Flynn Davis of Davis Construction and he happens to be part owner of Cherokee.”
“Did you meet him out at the farm?”
“No, I met him at April’s party Friday night.”
“Seriously? You have to tell me everything.” She pulled up a chair and made herself comfortable.
I filled her in on the shenanigans of that night and the rest of the weekend. As I told the story, I found myself bouncing from happiness on one side and scared to death on the other. I kept waiting for the magic to end and the pumpkin to arrive.
“It’s closing time. Lock the door and let’s get out of here,” she said.
“You show up after all this time and say you’re ready to give up your old life for us?”
“I made a mistake, and I should’ve picked you and the baby thing—”
“Don’t talk to me about that. You say that now, but you have no idea. You said you didn’t love me. We didn’t love each other. I’ve moved on.”
“I guess you have. I saw dresses in the closet. Who do they belong to?”
“Just some bimbo I met at a bar. You don’t know her. She doesn’t run in your circle.”
“Give us a new chance, Flynn. You said it yourself that you still love me.”
There it was. The bomb I’d been waiting on to burst my happy bubble. I leaned against the wall and shuddered as if I’d been kicked in the gut by a horse. I didn’t belong in his circle. He’d said it himself. I was just some bimbo he’d met in a bar, with pink hair and an invitation on my shirt.
Quietly, I slipped my suitcase into my trunk and drove back to my apartment. It wasn’t long before he started blowing up my phone, so I turned it off and notified the answering service to reach me on my home phone.
The persistent shit started beating on my door, so I called my neighbor and had her tell him I’d left with bags in a taxi, and she hadn’t seen me since. He sat in his car parked by mine and watched my apartment for hours.
I lay across my bed and cried myself to sleep. When I woke up, he was gone, and it was after midnight. When I turned on my phone, there were several messages asking me to call him back, asking what went wrong, and then it must’ve dawned on him that I’d overheard his conversation with Courtney because he said he’d sent her away with her things and got his key back.
I was torn and otherwise numb. It was those tiny fractures of doubt that ruined a relationship. Did he really believe I was some bimbo he’d met in a bar? Who meets someone in a bar and thinks they’re gonna find happily-ever-after in twenty-four hours?
How dumbtarded could I really be?
I woke up tired and exhausted from a night full of emotional swings. One minute I was angry enough to take a bat to him and the next I was sad for what we could’ve had. I ignored his messages and went to the office. We were closed on the weekends, and it was an opportunity to clear my desk of clutter.
Penelope knew something was wrong because she wouldn’t settle down. She kept sniffing my breath. Cats were very intuitive to human emotions. When she screamed and jumped from my desk, I knew something was wrong.
Then he appeared in my doorway.
“Not taking my calls isn’t very mature,” he said, placing his hands on his hips.
“Calling me some bimbo you met in a bar isn’t either,” I barked. “How did you get in here?”
“You left your keys in the back door.”
“I guess the bimbo personality struck again,” I bit out under my breath.
There was a long pause where we just stared at each other. Finally, I was the first to break the gaze, and I started fussing with some papers on my desk. I didn’t want him there, and yet I couldn’t force him to leave. You didn’t just stop caring for someone regardless of how stupid they acted sometimes, but it didn’t mean I could forgive him for what he said about me.
“Are you done over-thinking what you thought you heard?” he asked as he approached my desk and planted his palms down to look me straight in the eyes.
“I know what I heard and the tone with which you said those things. You need to leave. Get out!” I yelled and pointed toward the door.
“I won’t beg. I did that for years with Courtney. You either believe me or you don’t. I care about you,” he said as he walked away.
I watched his car pull out of the parking lot through tear-stained eyes. It was the right thing to do. I’d been living a fairytale and should’ve known better. Fairytales are only for movies and sappy books and my life didn’t have that script which read happily-ever-after.
I had worked like crazy to get my scholarships and put myself through school. After I graduated, I came home and took care of mom while she drank herself into oblivion and wound up in poor health. When she had the stroke, Lee, my worthless spoiled-brat brother was never around to help. There was no time for relationships between work and caring for her, but then, it was the daughter’s rite of passage to care for the ailing or aging parent, right?
When she passed away, I was the one who had to box everything up and say good-bye. I was the one left with all the bills and four cats to take care of. I was the one left with no one and a mountain of grief.
I was used to men walking out when it things got tough.
Zetta agreed to cover call for me for the rest of the weekend and told me to go downtown to the W Hotel and get myself a spa package. The Works, they called it. Oh, I needed the works, all right.
As they tried like crazy to rub the knots from my muscles, I cried harder and created more. Finally, the massage therapist told me I needed a counselor not a massage therapist before she disappeared.
When she returned, she asked me to sit up and held out a tray that held three shot glasses. “Take one, they’re chocolate shots, trust me on this.”
“Oh, no, you don’t understand. Getting drunk is what got me in this situation to begin with.”
“The chocolate flavor soothes, the liquor numbs. Take the shot and then we’ll talk.”
I took the first shot, then reached for the second. She left the room for a little bit, and while she was gone, the music played softly and the room was dark. Slowly, I began to relax and lay back on the table face down.
When she returned, her hands pressed harder into my muscles, but the liquor was calming me. I was beginning to no longer care—perfect.
“Tell me what you first thought of when you met him,” she asked. Her voice seemed distant, so the shots really were effective at putting me in a fog.
“I thought his dark eyes were beautiful and honest. I tried to imagine what it would feel like to have his lips on mine.”
“How did he make you feel?”
“Special. We connected and I just felt free with him.”
“Was the sex good?”
I coughed. No. She. Did. Not. A stranger was asking me about the sex? “Hmm, how do you describe amazing sex? So gentle at times and then hungry at others. Purely satisfying.”
“Do you think you were falling in love with him?”
“Yes, I was.”
She stopped her inquisition, and I could hear her humming, but it sounded far off in the distance, not right over me. I supposed the alcohol was taking effect, and I was becoming numb—possibly drunk.
She went quiet on me, but kept rubbing my back and the backs of my legs. When the massage began to feel different and almost sexual, I became alarmed.
Was it the liquor and I was imagining things? I abruptly sat up on the table, forgetting I was nude beneath the sheets and whirled around to find Flynn in the room. He was the one doing the massage. He reached up and placed a finger under my chin and lifted it toward his. His face came down a few inches away from mine.
“I love you, and I’m not taking no for an answer, not yet anyway.”
“Flynn, how did you…?”
“Zetta. She tracked me down through Glenn at Stuttgart, telling him it was an emergency. It wasn’t the other way around and me hunting you, but I’m glad she did. She said you were miserable and that you were here. I put two and two together. My mind’s been racing at how to fix this, and the only thing I could think of was to admit to myself that I’d fallen for you. I love you. I don’t expect you to believe me, but I do.” He wiped the hair from my eyes, and I took a good look at him. He was wearing a red T-shirt that had his compa
ny name on it.
Oh, no. “I missed the picnic, didn’t I?”
“You missed the softball game, but the barn dance hasn’t started yet.”
“I’m sorry, Flynn. I didn’t trust us enough to weather the storm. How can I have a relationship if I don’t trust it after a week?”
“Trust is earned, and it’s only been a week. Maybe we rushed things. Okay, yes, we rushed things, but I’m crazy about you, and I know you love me or at least the amazing sex.” He laughed.
“Oh, my God. You had her ask those questions, didn’t you?”
He nodded.
“Bad boyfriend, bad.” I shook my finger at him.
“Does this mean I’m your boyfriend again?”
“Does this mean I’m your girlfriend again?”
“Eh, for a pink-haired punk chick, you’ll do as a consolation prize.” He handed me a robe.
I elbowed him in the ribs and knocked the wind from his sails in time for him to chase me to the dressing room. The staff shushed us as we chatted while I grabbed my things and quickly dressed.
When we went to my hotel room to get my bag and the rest of my things, I needed him. I craved to have him inside me, to fill the void that pain and stupidity had created.
I pulled him down on the bed with me and kissed him hard.
With greedy hands, he removed my T-shirt and bra. I rolled to my back, and he pulled off my shorts and panties. When he stood up to undress, I felt the cold air cover my body. It was symbolic of our relationship and why things felt the way they did so quickly. He brought out the warmth in me and made me feel alive again.
When we made love…it was special. It wasn’t just sex. There were feelings, passion, cravings, and desires. We could talk about anything, and I wasn’t embarrassed. He could ask me to do anything, and I would, at the very least, give it a try.
Flynn was my match, and I finally realized it. I also realized I was the one who’d run when things got tough, not him.
I followed him to the house and changed my clothes for the dance. It took everything I had not to put the tank top and black skirt on for good measure. When I stepped out of the bathroom in a hi-low dress and cowboy boots, he whistled.