Connor zipped up his coat and turned to walk back to the car – without her; he left her standing there alone to straighten her clothes and feel like a fool.
“Aren’t you going to wait for me?” she called out.
He stopped and turned and looked at her. “Come on, then. Hurry up.”
She hurried. She pulled herself together and ran to him, searching his face for even the slightest clue that he didn’t completely despise her. “That was pretty sucky of me, huh?” she finally said. “I’m just really confused, Connor.”
He didn’t reply; he started walking again.
Kaylie kept pace with him, afraid to say anything more.
When they reached the car, a light snow had begun to fall. Connor opened Kaylie’s car door for her and held it. She slid into the passenger seat and then looked up at him, smiling hopefully. “Thank you,” she said.
“You’re welcome, Kaylie,” he replied. He closed her car door and went around to the driver’s side. He got in and closed his own door. He turned the key that was still in the ignition and – nothing. He tried again. “Great,” he spat. “This is just great.”
“What?”
“The battery’s dead.”
“Oh no, you’re kidding.”
“No, I’m not kidding.” He tried the ignition again – nothing, just an ineffectual click. “Shit.” Connor got out his cell phone. “Give me the number for the auto club; the membership card’s in the glove compartment.”
Kaylie complied, feeling that somehow this dead battery was her fault. “I’m so sorry, Connor,” she said.
He took the card from her and dialed the number.
“I need someone to come out and jump my battery,” he said into the phone. Kaylie stared morosely out the window while Connor gave the auto club their exact location. “You’re kidding,” he said. “Why so long?” A frustrated pause; Connor tapped his fingers angrily on the steering wheel. “Okay, then. Well, obviously, we’ll be waiting.”
He closed his phone. “It’s going to be at least half an hour,” he told Kaylie. “And probably more like forty-five minutes. There’s no one closer. In the auto club’s opinion, we happen to be out in the middle of nowhere.”
Kaylie looked at him apologetically. “I’m sorry, Connor. I really am.”
“Why should you be? You don’t work for the auto club.”
“You know what I mean. I’m sorry about the whole thing, about what just happened out there.”
“And what did just happen out there, Kaylie?” He studied her now unflinchingly. “Do you want to explain yourself?”
“If you’ll let me.”
“I’m letting you. Who’s stopping you?”
“You’re not being entirely, well, you know—”
“What? I’m not being what – considerate of you?”
The way he emphasized the word “considerate” made Kaylie feel three years old. “Point taken,” she conceded quietly. “That was inconsiderate of me, to put it mildly.”
Connor sighed. “I don’t want to fight with you, Kaylie. We were having such a great time. Why would you do that to me? Since when is this just your marriage, huh?”
She had no adequate answer for that.
“And not just the way you shoved me away from you so rudely – and never would I do a thing like that to you, Kay. But this baby thing – it’s getting out of control with you. What were you trying to do, trick me into creating my own kid? Like I wouldn’t want to be there with you if a thing like that could maybe be happening, after everything we’ve been through about this already?”
“I just . . . I don’t know. I guess I was just . . . I’m thirty-two years old already, Connor,” she finally sputtered in defeat. “I am so tired of waiting for you to be ready.” God that came out sounding mean she thought; why am I being so mean?
Connor fell silent. They said nothing more for a while. They sat and stared out at the falling snow. It had gotten heavier; their footprints into the orchard were already obliterated.
“It’s cold in here,” Kaylie finally said.
“I know it is. The heater’s not on.”
“I know that, Connor. I’m just saying that it’s cold.”
They both heard it and saw it coming through the snow at the same instant.
Connor said, “What the hell is that?”
“It’s a tractor,” Kaylie declared.
It was a tractor, all right, with a man in a bright orange cap driving it. He was coming toward them, down the dirt road that was now snowed over.
“I wonder if there’s some sort of farm house up that way?” Connor said.
“I don’t know,” Kaylie said, “but maybe he can help us get this car started?”
“I hope so. I’ll see.” Connor opened his door and got out. He walked toward the tractor that was now coming to a slow stop.
The farmer called down to Connor, “I couldn’t help noticing that you seemed stuck down here.”
Connor wondered what else the guy hadn’t been able to help noticing, but right now, all Connor wanted was to get the car started. “My battery’s dead,” he called back.
“I figured as much. I’ve got a charger up at the barn.” The farmer got down off his tractor and walked over to Connor. “I can either bring it down here and give you an emergency boost that’ll at least get you to a service station, or, if you aren’t in too much of a hurry, we can take the battery up to the barn and leave it connected for a little while, it’ll totally recharge you. You won’t have to pay me anything. It’s up to you.”
“Where’s the nearest service station?” Connor asked, noticing that the farmer didn’t want to look directly at him. Christ, Connor thought to himself, he did see us. And then Connor wondered if the farmer had been alone, or if there had been other people watching Kaylie and him have sex out there in the bone-dead orchard, where there was not so much as a speck of a leaf clinging to any of the trees.
“Oh gosh, I’d say about eight miles,” the farmer said. “If it’s even open. It’s not always open in bad weather. Rick, the owner, lives pretty far out and doesn’t like to risk getting stranded down here in bad weather.”
“I can understand that,” Connor said. The snow was already clinging to Connor’s hair, to his eyelashes, even.
The farmer said, “I got tools in the tractor. It’s no big deal taking that battery out. Let’s just take it on up to the barn and recharge it.”
“You’re sure it’s no problem?”
“No problem at all. I take care of all my own vehicles around this place.”
“Thanks,” Connor said. “How long will a recharge take?”
“About an hour,” the farmer replied. “Maybe a little longer. It’s a pretty powerful little box. There’s a gauge right on it, tells you when it’s done.”
Connor could see the Flyers game disappearing in the distance. Even if they made it to the arena on time, this was more than a snow fall, it was a storm. With the battery acting up they’d be crazy to drive all the way to Philadelphia and back. “I guess I’ll take you up on that recharge, then. Let me just double-check with my wife.”
Connor opened his door, reached down and popped the hood, and said, “Looks like we aren’t going to Philly today. This guy’s offered to recharge our battery for free, though. If you don’t mind hanging out here for about an hour?”
“But the game – you already bought the tickets. You were looking so forward to it.”
“It’s too risky, Kay. We can’t drive all the way to Philly and back in this weather. Besides, if I don’t get the battery charged here, we’ll just have to stop somewhere up the road and do it, if we can even find a place. And then we’ll have to pay.”
“I don’t mind waiting here, that’s all right with me. I just feel bad for you – missing the game.”
“I’ll get over it,” Connor said. “Hand me that card from the auto club again, will you?”
Kaylie handed him back the card.
“I’m g
oing to go up to this guy’s barn with him, but I’ll come back and sit with you while the battery’s charging.”
“Okay, honey.” Connor shut the car door again and was gone from view. The snow had nearly covered the windshield now. Kaylie couldn’t see anything anymore, and she could barely hear the men talking outside. Eventually she heard the sound of the tractor heading back up the road.
One more hour in the freezing cold car, she thought. Well, now they’d have to talk things out. She wouldn’t be able to stand it, being stuck in the car, all snowed over, and the two of them arguing, or worse – not speaking to each other . . .
With the car battery wedged under the tractor’s seat, Connor rode shotgun beside the farmer, clinging precariously to the slippery tractor. He didn’t have gloves on and his fingers were freezing. As the tractor made its slow, steady way up the road, Connor could see, even through the falling snow that the farther one went up the road, the easier it was to see the damn orchard. It wasn’t even that much of a hill, but it was enough of a steady incline to get a perfectly clear view of everything below.
Well, Connor thought, so what if he saw us? At least that clear view helped the guy see that we were stranded, and he was decent enough to come down and help us.
About fifteen minutes later, Connor opened the car door again and this time he reached in and popped the trunk. “I think we have a blanket of some kind in back and a roll of paper towels. Are you all right?”
He said it with such unguarded affection, Kaylie smiled. “I’m all right,” she said. “Just a little cold.”
Connor tossed his cell phone onto the front seat. “I cancelled the service call. That farmer is going to call us when the battery’s done charging. He offered to let us wait up in his barn, but under the circumstances, I thought we’d feel more comfortable just waiting here in the car.”
“Under what circumstances?”
“I’m pretty sure he saw us, Kay. He was just too polite to say anything.”
“Wow,” Kaylie said uncomfortably. “That’s kind of ironic, isn’t it? The park ranger in the spring, and now some farmer in a snow storm. We’re not too good at this ‘sex in the great outdoors’ stuff, are we?”
Connor studied her face for a second before answering. “We do all right,” he finally said. “Maybe we need more practice, what do you think?” Before she could answer, he’d closed the car door again.
Why had he said that, she wondered; and why was she feeling that spark again? Connor didn’t seem angry with her at all now.
In a moment, she heard the trunk slamming closed. Then the back door opened this time. Connor tossed in an old blanket and a roll of paper towels, and then he slid into the back seat. Kaylie watched him unroll a wad of the paper towels. He began drying off his snow-covered hair.
“Well?” he said to her. “Aren’t you going to get your ass back here? We had a little unfinished business, didn’t we?”
“We did?” Kaylie couldn’t believe her ears; was he talking about having more sex?
“We did, didn’t we? I don’t think you came yet, wouldn’t you like to?”
Kaylie was delighted. “Yes,” she said doubtfully. “But that guy . . .”
“Don’t worry about that guy. I think he’s already seen more than he cared to. To be honest, I think that’s why he’s calling me on the phone when the battery’s done, instead of coming back down to get me in person: he must think we’re a couple of sex addicts.”
“Shit,” Kaylie said, finding it funny now. “Do you think he really saw us?”
“I think he really saw us. I was up there, Kay, and it’s a pretty clear view, even in the snow.”
“Oh my god, I was practically naked!”
“I know you were. I saw, remember?”
Connor took off his wet coat and laid it over the back of the driver’s seat. “I’m freezing,” he said. “But I have an idea of how to kill an hour and get warm at the same time. Of course, the idea kind of hinged on you getting your ass back here already.”
Kaylie couldn’t refuse him when he talked to her like that.
“Besides, I have a little bone to pick with you,” he went on, helping her slip over into the back seat.
“I know, honey,” she said. “I’m sorry.” Kaylie’s heart was on fire again. Did he really mean to see this through? Was it going to happen? Of course it didn’t mean she was going to get pregnant, but she sure as hell was going to try. “I guess the shared body heat will do us both some good, huh? It’s pretty cold in this car.”
“I think we’ll manage,” he said.
They were in an odd twilight. All the windows were snowed over now. It was neither light nor dark, and they seemed cut off from the world. Connor unfolded the blanket and tucked it over the two of them. They sat snuggled close together in the back seat. He said, “I can’t decide . . .”
“You can’t decide what?”
“If I should take off my pants or not. They’re wet and very cold.”
“Then take them off,” she said. “What’s to decide?”
“The thought of putting them back on again in an hour makes me feel even colder.”
“I see. Well, if you take off yours, I’ll take off mine; does that make you feel less cold? We’ll kind of be in it together.”
“Yes, together,” he said. He looked at her seriously for a moment. “Kaylie, I want you to know I’m sorry.”
“My god, for what? What do you have to be sorry for?”
“For letting you get so fed up with me dragging my feet all the time that it made you – I don’t know – not trust me anymore. I’d made a vow to myself, you know? Of course not, how could you know? I never said a word about it, I tried to, but it never came out. It always got stuck in my throat. But I’d made a vow to myself that the next time you told me you were ovulating I wasn’t going to start a fight about it. I was going to make myself be okay with it and just move ahead with this already. It really killed me – what you said before.”
“What do you mean?”
“Before – when you said that you were thirty-two already and tired of waiting for me to be ready. You made me feel like a little kid, like an immature little kid. And I realized I’m thirty-five already; when the heck do I think I’m going to be ready to start a family with you? I love you. I want us to have a family. What is my problem? I was thinking about it as I was riding on that guy’s tractor, going up to the barn. You are so ready and all I ever seem able to do is work and then obsess about hockey.”
“That’s not true, Connor. That’s not all you do.”
He tossed aside the blanket and kicked off his wet shoes. “You’re right,” he said. “That’s not all I do.” He unzipped his frozen jeans and began tugging them off. “You know, I think I’m actually less cold with them off?”
Kaylie watched as he took off his underwear, too. He wasn’t erect anymore; he looked positively freezing. “Get back under the blanket. You’ll catch pneumonia like that.” She threw the blanket back over him.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” he said, snuggling under the blanket again – it really was cold in the car. “Didn’t you offer to make a little deal, pants-wise, or are you chickening out?”
“I’m not chickening out.” Kaylie threw off her half of the blanket, kicked off her own shoes and then wiggled out of her pants, then out of her panties. She was already so cold that the leather car seat didn’t feel that much colder. “Are we crazy?” she said.
“I don’t know. Maybe. Now what are you doing?”
“I figure I might as well, right?” Kaylie had taken off her down jacket and now she was pulling her sweater off over her head.
“I think you are nuts. Now you really will freeze.”
“No, I won’t. I’m planning on being under you, and you’re usually pretty hot.” She unclasped her bra and took it off. Fluffing her down jacket into a loose pile, she used it as a pillow for her head. She lay down on her side of the seat. She didn’t mind at all th
at she was cold. With her knees up, her thighs open, she knew he had a perfect view, one that was likely to get him in the mood quickly. “Too bad we can’t turn on the radio,” she said. “This is not very romantic, is it?”
“Maybe not romantic,” he said, pulling off his own sweater in a hurry; indeed, getting in the mood; he wanted to be completely naked with her. “But it’ll be memorable. Besides, we can make up for the lack of romance later.”
“Really? You already know you want to do it again later?” It felt like too much to hope for; he really was trying to make a baby with her.
“We’ll be snowed in for at least the weekend, Kay.” He stretched out between her legs, lying on top of her, trying to pull the old blanket over both of them. “We only have two days, three maybe, to surround that little bugger that’s up inside you and nail it, right? Perfect timing, this snow storm.”
“Thank you, Connor.”
“Please don’t say it like that, like I’m doing you some huge favor. I love you, Kay.”
She felt his cock coming to life against her belly. She didn’t want to waste time with foreplay; she wanted to get down to business – get life going. She reached down for his cock and coaxed it to an erection. He leaned close and kissed her, feeling his whole body beginning to stir.
She said quietly, “This time, you won’t have to ask me.”
He didn’t have to say “ask you what,” because he knew what, and the thought of coming in her now was intensely appealing to him. This added dimension of new life, of creating life, of melding who he was with who she was, creating something entirely new and unpredictable that could stand alone from them and thrive on its own – it was suddenly too compelling, too unbelievable for words – making babies, how crazy and inexplicable it all seemed. But he wasn’t afraid. Connor kissed her again, this time roughly, passionately as he worked to get his cock up inside her.
She assisted him in his mission. Still holding on to his cock, she helped him ease it up into her. She was already wet – in fact, had been wet since the moment he’d told her to “get her ass into the back seat.” She’d known this was coming, that she’d be lying under him, that he would be on top of her – the old-fashioned way. It suddenly seemed so erotic. Kaylie raised her knees high as his cock pushed in and opened her. She moaned sweetly. He was very hard now. She hugged him closer to her and held on tight. “Really fuck me, Connor,” she said right in his ear. “Fuck me hard; I need to feel it hard today.”
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