by E. J. Noyes
“Back ’atcha. Some days I’m out the door before dawn and not home until eight at night. Or later. When I’m on call I could leave our bed at ten p.m. and not come back until two a.m. or possibly not come back until the next night or leave multiple times and come back again.” Laughing I added, “I’m really not selling myself very well, am I…”
“I’ve been sold on you for a little while now.”
“Flatterer.” I caressed the backs of her hands. “And as for Europe, I’d happily spend my vacation time bouncing around the circuit with you.”
A dubious eyebrow went up. “Really? You’d use up all your free time to follow me around while I’m competing in the same places every year? It’s not like you can skip off to check out the sights.” She smiled wryly. “Well you can, but you’d be seeing them by yourself.”
“Sure I would. I love familiarity and routine. When I was a kid I’d spend part of my summers at a friend’s little cabin by the lake. I loved it, couldn’t wait to sleep in my same vacation bed and see my same vacation friends and do my same vacation activities. One year my parents tried to change our summer plans and I lost my shit. You already know I like to eat the same breakfast, same lunch and something from my same rotation of dinners.” Shrugging I added, “You’re gonna have to do better than that if you’re trying to get rid of me.”
“What about the cold here and your leg? You’re going to hate winter, especially if you’re getting up in the middle of the night for after-hours calls.”
“What about it? I’ve worked in Kentucky and cold places before. It’s a compromise I’m willing to make.” I sighed, feigning exasperation. “Geez, Caitlyn. What more do I have to do to prove to you that I want to try and make this work?”
“You’ve already proven it,” she whispered. “It’s just…I’ve been thinking about this all day and—”
“And what?” I gently prompted.
After a long silence she admitted, “I’m scared.”
“Of what exactly?” I murmured.
I could sense how hard it was for her to verbalize, and I sat quietly until she was ready, stroking the backs of her hands with my thumbs. After an eternity, she whispered a tearful, “I don’t want to mess this up. I don’t want to be the one who’s going to screw up this, this…gift.”
“Why would a screw-up be entirely on your shoulders?”
“We talked about it, about…us,” she uttered helplessly. “My life is not flexible. You’re going to have to just fit in with the way I am.”
“I’ll fit in. I want to fit in. All relationships have give and take, compromise, flexibility. And given my excellent performance in Rio, my position as the USDF veterinarian is solid. Which means I’ll get to come with you to all the big competitions anyway. Perfect solution. I’ll make a witty encouragement sign to hold up in the stands, and everyone will know who I am because you’ll talk about your girlfriend the team veterinarian and our story of childhood enemies, now equestrian lovers traveling the world together will make all the horse magazines and shit.”
“Wow, you really haven’t thought about this at all, have you,” she deadpanned.
“Not at all.”
Caitlyn’s smile faded and her question came out so softly I had to strain to hear her. “You really moved here for me?”
“Absolutely, yes, without a doubt. But you’re not the only reason and I think it’s really important you know that.” Her obvious confusion made me pause and think hard about how I should frame my words. “I figured out a few things during our time apart, or at least part of why you were so reluctant, and maybe a way I could help you with that.”
“Oh? And what is this thing you figured out?” It came across light and teasing but her expression gave away her trepidation.
“Not to get all psychoanalytical on you, but I think after everything with Elin and other relationships you’re worried that you’re not enough to keep a woman interested, keep her happy, keep…I don’t know, a spark or whatever going. Which is utter bullshit, by the way, because what Elin did was on her, not you.”
“I know. And my knowing that was confirmed by the fact she’s still doing it.”
“Right.” I shrugged. “I just thought if I showed you I’d moved here for you, but also for myself because of a great job that has the bonus of workin’ with a close friend, then it might help you feel more comfortable, less pressured to make everything perfect because it’s not just me here for you. Well it is, but also not. Argh.” I rubbed my face. “You know what I mean, don’t you? I just can’t figure out how to say it.”
“I do know what you mean. And it’s incredible, really. But that scared part of me still wonders what if it doesn’t work out?” Her eyes widened and she hastily amended, “Not that I don’t want it to but in a hypothetical shit world where it doesn’t, how are we supposed to work around each other if you get sent out for my consults or whatever?”
“If it doesn’t work out in this gross hypothetical shitty world then I’m sure we could be mature enough to work together for regular vet consults or USDF stuff. If it doesn’t work out then I’ll still have a great job at LakeVets. One out of two ain’t bad, though I’d prefer to keep both of the reasons I moved to Kentucky. Sweetheart, my job is the same regardless of whether or not we’re sleeping together. And I mean, you managed not to kill me when we were kids and you hated me, right?”
Her answer was a quick and smiling, “For the millionth time, I didn’t hate you.”
“Okay, disliked and were confused by. Better?” I played my fingers over her thigh, delighting in the tightening of muscle and her quick inhalation.
“Yes, better.”
I stroked higher and judging by her frustrated sound, it wasn’t high enough. “I prefer to look on the bright side. We both want it to work, so we’re going to do everything we can to make it happen.” I stilled my hand. “Caitlyn, I fell in nerdy, hero-worshipping love with you when I was fourteen years old. Now, that feeling of being in love with you is so strong I feel like I can’t exist without you in my life and I’m going to do everything I can to make sure you know that every day.”
Caitlyn pushed me backward onto the couch and when she lay full length on top of me to straddle my thigh, the firm muscle of hers pressed between my legs. “Starting now?” she gasped.
“Yes. This very instant.” I cupped the back of her neck to pull her down for a kiss.
The intensity of her response would have startled me if I hadn’t felt so desperate myself. Caitlyn’s tongue parted my lips and when I opened my mouth to her, I felt her quick intake of breath. I grabbed her ass, pulled her more firmly against me. Hands slid under my shirt and up my stomach to cup my breasts and when I sat up, she moved with me.
Clothing was an unwanted barrier and we quickly helped each other out of it. “Do you want to move to the bed?” she mumbled against my neck before she gently nipped under my jaw.
“No.” Moving was the last thing I wanted. Losing the connection of skin on skin, the sensation of our hands and lips reconnecting was unfathomable. I felt as if I should say something, tell her just how much I’d missed this feeling. How I’d missed seeing her, touching her, listening to her. But I had no words that were adequate so I let my body speak for me and I knew she wouldn’t mistake what it was saying.
Judging by her loud groans and gasps, Caitlyn’s desire was as intense as mine. Every time we’d had sex before it’d been frantic, as if we’d both been desperate to absorb as much of each other as we could. This time, despite our hunger, we were slow and soft. No less passionate, but it felt like we’d both relaxed into one another, relaxed into knowing that we could have tomorrow, and all the tomorrows after. Our kisses were languid, our caresses careful and calculated. We took our time relearning each other, indulging until I felt I might shatter into a million pieces with the intensity of the sensations of being with her.
Even as we relearned things, there were those that needed no reminder. She knew how I loved that touc
h of teasing teeth on my nipple, the soft caress of tongue to follow. And every time I begged her to keep going, she’d chuckle as if it were the most obvious thing in the world and that she wouldn’t stop until we were limp with satisfaction.
Without warning, Caitlyn abandoned her lavish attention to my breast and rolled off the couch. She knelt on the floor, then tugged and manipulated my legs until I sat up and leaned back. The anticipation of her mouth on me had my abdominals quivering and the wet heat of my arousal felt slick against my skin. She kissed her way slowly up the inside of one thigh, then the other as her fingernails traced patterns on my calves. After an eternity of torment she finally took me in her mouth. I arched against her, reached for her but Caitlyn took my hand and guided it to my breast, her fingers over mine teasing my nipple as her tongue played through my heat.
The silence between us felt intimate somehow. It wasn’t an absolute silence—there were plenty of gasps…groans…low moans—but no words. We’d been unashamedly vocal every other time and afterward when I was alone, the exact tone of her “Fuck me, yes…harder, yes, please, there…right there…” would send a thrill of excitement through me. But now it felt as if we’d found another way to communicate. Caitlyn’s mouth softened and the sensation of her lightly sucking my clit had me grinding myself into her, begging her for more.
Instead of more, she pushed herself up and straddled my thigh again, rocking herself forward against me. Despite the frantic movement of her hips, our kiss was slow and deep. She sucked my tongue and reached down to slide her fingers through my folds, pressing against my clit before slipping inside me. My head fell back against the couch as she teased and stroked, slicked and circled. She kissed me, sucked my neck, licked my collarbone, and the whole time she kept up that sweet torture on my clit, holding me right on the edge of climax. And when I thought I might come apart, Caitlyn just…stopped. Her touch withdrew and all that was left was the slow soft movement of her lips against mine.
In the wake of her attention I’d been dimly aware of her wet arousal against my thigh and now she’d stopped fingering me, the evidence of that arousal was plain. Her breasts rose and fell in long, slow breaths, almost as if she was forcibly trying to calm herself. When I reached between her legs to find what I most craved, she raised herself up before settling slowly onto my fingers. I groaned at the wet heat of her, leaning forward to bury my face in her neck. Her fingers came back to me and as we moved together, the heat spreading through my body had me pressing my mouth to her neck as I tried desperately to hold off until she was ready.
I wrapped my arm around her waist and surrendered, kissing her as I came, trying not to dislodge her from my thigh. Within moments Caitlyn’s nails dug into my arm and she cried out her climax, a glorious unashamed sound of pleasure. I tightened my arm around her waist, steadying her. Steadying myself. Our bodies were slick with sweat, her hair disheveled and escaping from its loose ponytail. When I felt I could speak again, I carefully pushed hair back from her face. “So…you’re happy I moved here?”
Caitlyn’s smile was slow. “Insanely happy. Because now you’re going to cook me dinner.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Caitlyn
In the three months Addie had been living with me, she’d slotted seamlessly into my life and I into hers. Somehow we’d found our shared ground—the place where I could do my things, she could do hers and we met comfortably in the middle on everything else.
If she was home while I was in the barn, she’d wander down from the house to either watch me ride or help Wren and Brandon with feeding horses or general maintenance around the place. And it never seemed like she had to have her veterinary hat on. She was just someone who loved horses, and if she spotted something vetty that she thought worth mentioning then she did. I’d learned to accept that sometimes she just had shit days and it was nothing to do with me, and that she needed some time alone to buffer work and home. Taking things personally had always felt like a sport for me, but Addie’s love was helping me to change my perspective.
I woke just before my alarm, gratified to realize she was still in bed, and asleep. She’d left for a call just after midnight and slipped back in a little after four a.m., which I was starting to learn was actually a quiet on-call night. We’d reached an agreement fairly early on when she’d tried to sleep in the spare room on her on-call nights so I wouldn’t be disturbed and I’d nixed the idea after one night—all-hours calls, her in and out of bed and then more calls were nothing compared to being in bed without her where I kept waking anyway because she wasn’t there.
She had to go in at eight to complete a half-day of work after her two-night run on call, and wanting to let her absorb as much sleep as she could, I smothered my urge to snuggle up to her and kiss her bare shoulders. To suck the smooth, warm skin of her neck. To slide my hands down over her breasts and belly to give her a proper wake-up. That was something reserved for those weekends when she didn’t have to work or I wasn’t competing and we had the luxury of a slightly later start.
Addie always slept as if sleep was the most important thing she had to do that day, and having seen the hours she worked, I understood. I slid out of bed, dressed and left the house as quietly as I could. After about twenty minutes aboard Dimity I heard her truck leaving. So much for her sleep.
I’d worked three horses when she came back a little after twelve. The riding schedule had a very specific event on that afternoon, and after I’d finished up with Dougie, I jogged back up to the house to find Addie at the breakfast bar nursing a cup of coffee. Her smile was luminous. And exhausted. She offered a husky, “Hey, babe.”
“Hey yourself.” I checked the level of coffee in her mug—adequate—then leaned down to meet her for a kiss. “Did you eat breakfast?”
A headshake.
“Do you want to talk about your night?” Another thing I’d learned was that she liked to discuss her rough nights, her hard cases, her difficult clients. Though discuss was a loose term. Mostly it was just her rambling, unpacking things so that she could move on while I offered as much support as I could in the form of mhmm’s, ahh’s, I see’s and a lot of kisses.
Another headshake, though this one had a knowing smile. “Later.”
“Are you hungry?”
Addie often existed in the space between ravenous and too tired to cook, and as much as I could, I fed her. And she never declined my offerings which was perhaps not the smartest thing. She’d taught me how to make huevos rancheros and I’d almost perfected it. By perfected, I mean I could cook and assemble the ingredients in approximately the right way without burning the house down and she rarely grimaced while eating.
At her, “Starving” I pulled out a carton of eggs and jars of salsa, pico de gallo and bean mix that Addie made up in her free time. “We can change the ride for another day if you’re not feeling up to it?”
She finally verbalized something more than a single word answer, her voice quiet and rough with fatigue. “I don’t wanna change it.” Addie smiled, apparently picking up on my You look like your eyes are barely open expression. “Babe, you’ve had this on the schedule for weeks, and you’ve moved your usual training around just trying to line up with my roster.”
All true, but I’d still change it again if she asked me to. The stubborn set of her jaw told me she wasn’t going to change her mind. “Okay then, if you’re sure.”
“I’m sure. Today I will ride a horse.” She flashed her dimples. “I’m not gonna ride him very well, but that was a given regardless of how much sleep I’d had.”
“You’ll be amazing.”
“Dubious,” she rebutted, but she was still smiling. After a long silence, during which she watched me try not to screw up her first meal of the day, she moved to my side while I poured two eggs into the pan. Addie slid behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist. She pulled me against her, pressed herself to me. Teeth lightly raked my skin followed by soft, soothing lips. Her words were muffled against my shoul
der. “Do you know how hard it is to leave you in bed, all naked and warm and enticing, while I go out into the cold night to save a colicky horse?”
I turned my head and was rewarded with a lingering cheek kiss. “Probably about as hard as it is for me to leave naked and warm you in bed so I can train some horses first thing in the morning.”
She kept kissing my cheek, playfully pretending to nibble my jaw. I twisted around in the circle of her arms. “It’s very hard to concentrate on your breakfast when you’re doing that. And you know how much I need to concentrate when cooking.”
“What do you mean?” She adopted a faux-surprised expression and drawled, “Baby, I love surprise pieces of eggshell in my food.”
“Just for that, you’re getting runny yolk.”
“Well it’s always fifty-fifty as to whether I’ll be gettin’ hard or runny so that’s really an empty threat.” Addie kissed the side of my neck and stepped away before I could swat her. She leaned against the counter, quietly drinking coffee while I finished making her breakfast. When I’d heated the tortillas, Addie set her mug down. “How were the children this morning?”
I glanced back over my shoulder. “Dimity was Bitchy McBitcherson, and Dougie was really good. He’s starting to get the hang of trot poles and has some great elevation over them.” A quick check of the pan told me her meal was ready. “Dew was very confused and a little indignant about the fact he was groomed then put out into his field without being worked.”
Addie pulled a plate down from the cabinet above her head. “Did you tell him we were going on an adventure?”
“I did. His response was asking if he could have a carrot, so my guess is he’s not as excited about it as we are.” I assembled her meal and passed it to her. Once we’d both settled at the table, I asked, “Are you nervous?”