by Juliette Poe
He was excited about it. I used that enthusiasm to insist he learn how to net the fish and then take the hook out. Like he did this morning, he recoiled at my suggestion and politely said, “No, thanks.”
“I’ll say it again…” I laughed at him. “You are absolutely freakin’ precious, Ryland Powers.”
It was a slam at Ry and his manhood once again but this time, he didn’t let it go. It was a gauntlet expertly thrown at him, especially since we’d had sex quite gloriously all day and into the night. Now that we were intimate with each other again, there was no way Ry was going to let me question his prowess as a man.
He put aside his disgust at touching the fish, and then listened to my instructions very well. I was quite proud of him for learning how to release the fish, even though I had to suppress a laugh when he leaned over the boat’s edge and vigorously rubbed his hands together in the water to get the slime off. He then held them up to his nose, gave a sniff, and grimaced.
So yeah… that’s why his shower took longer.
My heart stutters when his bedroom door opens. He stands there in nothing but a damp towel wrapped around his waist. His room is on the third floor. It’s the only guest room up here and has its own adjoining bathroom. It used to be the twins’ room, as it was the old attic converted into a bedroom when Mama and Daddy found out they had two babies coming in addition to the two kids they already had.
“What are you doing in here?” Ry whispers as he goes to the bedroom door to make sure it’s closed. Whether it’s subconscious or not, his hand goes to the towel and tightens it almost protectively.
“I’m here to steal your virtue,” I say, not in a whisper, and only to make Ry more nervous.
“Will you cut it out?” he hisses at me, pointing at the door. “Now get out of here and get back down to your room.”
“Why?” I ask simply, and then peel back the covers so he can see the tiny, peach-colored negligee I’d put on with practically see-through matching panties. He hisses again, but it sounds different this time. I notice a bulge under the towel with a smile.
Ry’s expression is filled with lust and frustration. He takes two steps to the bed and says in a low tone, “Because your dad doesn’t like me and he has a gun. So get going, Trix.”
I shake my head and run my fingertip down the center of my chest. “Not going.”
“Trixie,” he says as his eyes cut to the bedroom door and then back to me. “You’re seriously going to get me killed.”
Leaning up on one elbow, I smirk at him. “Ry… you’re on the third floor. My parents’ room is on the bottom floor on the opposite side of this huge house. They’re asleep. We’re fine, and besides that… we’re adults. They know we have sex.”
“But not in their house,” he points out.
My hand shoots out and snatches the edge of the towel that’s tucked in to keep it secure. I whip it away, taking a very long, slow look at how turned on Ry is.
He merely growls and insists, “We’re not having sex in here. The damn bed is squeaky, and the floorboards creak.”
I come up to my knees and scoot my way across the bed to where he stands at the edge, his erection now standing quite proudly and looking very lonely.
“Fine… we won’t have sex. But we can do other things,” I say mischievously. My hand encircles him. Giving him a soft squeeze, I add, “I have something I can do to you right this very moment. All you have to do is stand very still like you are now.”
“Jesus, Trixie,” Ry practically wheezes as I put my mouth on him.
And to his credit… he stays very still and lets me do all the work. The bed and the floorboards don’t creak or squeak once.
♦
My chest is heaving as Ry kisses his way back up my body. He’d just spent a very long time underneath the covers returning the favor to me. Ry’s mouth drags along my stomach, my breasts, up the side of my neck, to where he finally kisses me on the mouth.
“You still taste so damn good,” he murmurs as he hovers over me.
“Ditto,” is all I can manage to say as there seems to be precious little air in my lungs.
Ry chuckles, wraps his arms around me, and rolls us to our sides so we’re face to face. “And now you should get back to your bed.”
“No way,” I say as I snuggle into him. “I’m sleeping right here with you tonight.”
“Going to get me killed,” he mutters, but he doesn’t argue further. Instead, he stuns me when his eyes turn a bit triumphant and he asks, “Have there been any men in your life who have managed to get that kind of orgasm from you the way I do with my mouth?”
He wants his ego stroked, because let’s face it… what he did just now was beyond fantastic. He’s also fishing for information for the missing eleven years, and since I have nothing to hide, I tell him, “No one has ever made me feel the way you do in bed.”
I expect that to flatter him. Instead, his eyebrows draw inward and his tone is slightly clipped when he says, “What about out of bed? Anyone ever made you feel the way I did?”
My hand comes to his face, and I sweep my thumb along his jaw. “No, Ry… no one has ever made me feel what you and I had in or out of bed.”
I hadn’t realized how tense his entire body was until I feel it relax against me. He gives me a beautiful and blinding smile. “You haven’t had a serious relationship since us?”
I shake my head slightly, and it’s a little bit of an embarrassment that I wasn’t lucky in love. “I’ve dated casually over the years, but nothing serious. Maybe six months tops is the longest relationship I was in.”
“I’m sorry,” he says softly, and the look of sympathy on his face is unbearable.
“Why?” I ask with a shrug. “It’s not like I didn’t enjoy myself with the men I dated.”
And I immediately regret those words. I said them to hide my shame over Ry ruining me for any other, and I knew it would rub his nose in it to cover my shame.
“Maybe we should talk about something else,” I say hastily.
“It’s okay, Trix,” Ry says gently. “Both of us were expected to move on. It was okay to fall in love with someone else or not fall in love at all. There were no rules we had to play by, okay?”
I nod my head and swallow hard. “I just… I just… it’s just you’re a really hard act to follow, Ry. And the pickings around here aren’t great. It’s not like I was the town floozy sleeping with everyone.”
He chuckles and leans in to give me a quick kiss. “I’d never think that about you. And if it’s any consolation, there’s never been anyone like you either… in or out of bed.”
My lips curl up and my grin splits wide. “Really?”
“No one has come close,” he assures me.
And once again, I have to wonder why we didn’t work out.
CHAPTER 15
Ryland
A short knock on my door has me instantly awake, and I’m aware of several things at once. It’s just breaking dawn as best I can tell from the blue tinge to the room, Trixie is snuggled up against me—thankfully under the covers—and Catherine is sticking her head inside the door she’d just opened after the short knock. Luckily, she doesn’t look at the bed but keeps her gaze lowered to the floor.
“Trixie… Ry… it’s time to get up,” she says softly, and that confirms she knows her daughter is in my bed even though she hasn’t looked our way. “Gerry is down at the water well. The pump is broken. He needs an extra pair of strong hands, and Colt is out in the fields.”
Trixie turns in my arms and raises her head off the pillow as she faces her mom. “Okay, Mama… we’ll throw some clothes on and get down there to help out.”
“Thanks, honey,” she says before closing the door.
I groan and shut my eyes. “Well, that was embarrassing.”
Trixie’s already throwing off the covers and rolling out of bed. “No, it wasn’t. We’re adults. Get over it.”
I open my eyes and watch her pick her panties off the
floor, and then they’re sliding up those long, glorious legs that I spent some beautiful time between last night. She’s grinning at me when my eyes travel up to meet hers.
“Shake a leg, Ry,” she tells me as she turns for the door. “Just throw on some jeans, a t-shirt, and your tennis shoes.”
“Farm life,” I mutter as she walks out the door and I roll out of bed.
Trixie is in the kitchen by the time I get dressed, looking even more beautiful than in her peach negligee. She’s one of those girls who was born to wear jeans and cotton t-shirts the way supermodels wear haute couture on the runways. It’s just her, and it only adds to her magnificence in my opinion.
“Ready to go?” I ask Trixie, who is sitting at the island with a cup of coffee in her hand.
“Actually, I’m going to stay here and help Mama with breakfast,” she says. “But you can go on down to the well. It’s about three hundred yards out the side kitchen door. You’ll be able to see him when you step out.”
“You want me to go help your dad… by myself?”
Catherine, who is at the stove flipping bacon, giggles. Trixie merely grins. “I’ll be blunt… My daddy apparently wants a moment of your time. He wants it alone. He’s specifically asked you to come to the well and help him out.”
“He’s going to kill me, isn’t he?” I ask as I turn toward the door, not expecting an answer because it wasn’t a serious question. Since Gerry Mancinkus has been the most aloof person I’ve met since coming here, I figured we’d have a showdown at some point. Both women giggle this time.
Might as well get it over with.
“I’ll bring coffee down in a bit,” Trixie calls after me. I throw a hand up over my shoulder and wave an acknowledgment as I walk out the side kitchen door.
Gerry Mancinkus is bent over some type of rusty-looking pump. The cover is off, and he’s got a wrench cranking at something on the inside. His head lifts as he hears me approach, and I’m surprised when he says, “Morning.”
“Morning,” I answer back. “What can I do to help?”
“I don’t need any help,” he says, and this doesn’t surprise me. After all, he wants to “talk” according to Trixie. He’s silent for a few moments, and I watch him work, marveling at the strength in his arms for a man in his sixties. His skin is dark brown from time spent under the sun, and I see a tattoo on his bicep peeking out from just under his t-shirt sleeve.
After he finishes tightening whatever it was, he straightens up and wipes his forearm over his sweaty brow before turning his eyes to me. “I’d like to know what happened between you and my daughter after law school.”
My body tightens imperceptibly, and my mind sort of races because I didn’t think he’d come right out and ask me that. I thought he might poke around the fringe, or ask me if there was anything going on between us now.
I stall for a moment. “She didn’t tell you?”
Gerry shakes his head. “Hasn’t told anyone that I know of. Definitely not her mother, and I don’t think her brothers or her sisters. Maybe Pap, since they’re really tight, but I’m not sure.”
“With all due respect, sir, why are you asking me and not Trixie?”
I expect him to get mad at my impertinence, but his expression becomes chagrined. He takes his hat off, scratches his head, and puts it back on. “I guess because it’s too late to ask her. I should have asked her eleven years ago when she moved back to Whynot with a clearly broken heart. But she didn’t say anything then, and Trixie has a way of brushing you off when she doesn’t want to talk about something. And I never pushed it, and well… I guess I’m a little ashamed at asking her now since it’s probably eleven years too late.”
I can’t help but asking. “But why ask me now?”
“Because frankly, there’s happiness in her eyes that I don’t recall seeing for a very long time. Years, in fact. I couldn’t help but notice it started right at the exact same time you came into town.”
Whoa.
That packs quite a punch to my senses. My return is making Trixie happier than she’s been in years?
I don’t hesitate, and I tell Gerry exactly how it played out. “About halfway through our last year of law school, Trixie and I started making our plans for the future. We had our single goals, of course, like getting a good job, but it was only natural we talked about how we fit into each other’s lives with those singular goals. We were both getting offers from Hayes Lockamy, so I suggested we find a place in Boston together. She agreed.”
Gerry nods. “She told me and her mama that she was looking at staying in Boston. Catherine was heartbroken, of course, but she never did anything but offer her full support for whatever Trixie decided.”
“We spent months ironing out those plans,” I continue. “Even found an apartment we were interested in leasing.”
“So what changed?” he asks.
What had changed?
I had just finished my last class of the day and walked into the apartment. Trixie was in the living room curled up in a large, ratty armchair we’d found at a yard sale, staring out the window.
“Hey, babe,” I’d said and walked over to kiss her on top of her head.
“Hey,” she said softly, and I immediately knew something was wrong.
I squatted down by her chair, put my hands on her legs, and asked, “What is it?”
Tears filled Trixie’s eyes, and this caught me off guard as she was tough as nails. I immediately pulled her up and out of the chair, crossed to the couch, and sat down with her in my lap. My fingers wiped the wetness on her cheeks as I asked, “Trix… honey, tell me what’s wrong.”
She gave a little sniffle and blurted out, “I’m so, so sorry, Ry. But I don’t want to stay in Boston after law school.”
“You don’t?” I asked, completely confused.
“I want to go home,” she practically moaned out in pain. I’ll never forget that tone in her voice as it was something I’d never heard before. It was also the moment I knew we were over. The yearning was unbearable for me to hear, knowing that she wanted something so much and I had no damned clue.
“Just out of the blue, she changed her mind?” Gerry asks, dragging me out of my memories.
“I never understood it,” I tell him truthfully. “We talked and talked and talked about it. I tried to get her to stay. She even asked me to come to Whynot with her. Neither one of us would give in. Even after all the hours of talking, begging, and pleading we did, I never did understand it.”
Gerry just stares at me, saying nothing.
“I didn’t understand it until I came here,” I continue. “And saw her with her family and the deep love she has for you. And for this town, and the people she serves. It’s actually tangible. I can see it and feel it. What I’ve come to understand is that Trixie made the right decision to come back home. I may not have understood it, I may have been hurt and angry and probably bitter, but in hindsight… I get it now.”
Gerry nods in understanding, and then asks the question I’d been expecting. “And what are you two now?”
“I have no clue,” I tell him truthfully. “But we’re something. We just haven’t figured it out yet.”
“I brought coffee,” I hear from behind me. I turn to see Trixie walking across the grass with a steaming cup in her hand. She gives it to me and levels a bright smile, perhaps in apology that she practically fed me to the wolves this morning. I smile back at her before taking a sip, letting her know everything is okay.
“Daddy,” she says, turning to Gerry and pointing to a place in the grass about twenty yards away in the direction of the house. “There’s a copperhead back there. I about stepped on it.”
“Copperhead?” I ask curiously.
“A snake,” Trixie says, and my head snaps back to the patch of grass I’d walked over not too long ago.
“A snake?” I ask, even though I’d heard her perfectly well the first time.
“A very poisonous one,” she says, and my head snaps once
again to that patch of grass that Trixie walked over just seconds ago where she almost stepped on it.
Jesus… country living is scary as shit sometimes.
“Want me to handle it?” Trixie asks her dad.
“You absolutely won’t,” I blurt out, not wanting her to get anywhere near the poisonous snake.
She merely puts her hand on my chest and pats it. “So precious.”
“I’ve got it,” Gerry says and reaches his hand behind his back. I can’t say I’m surprised when he pulls out a pistol.
I’m proud of myself as I stay calm and in place, knowing that the bullet inside isn’t meant for me.
“Where is it?” Gerry asks as he walks in the general direction. Trixie starts to follow him, and I reach for her hand to pull her back. She merely tugs it away from me and continues with her dad.
I follow behind them cautiously, my eyes furiously scanning the grass in case they miss it. My heart rate is through the roof. I’ve never seen a real snake in my life.
“There it is,” Trixie says as she points to a spot about five feet in front of her. I freeze in place as I spot it, and then become instantly relieved as it starts to slither away from Trixie.
Gerry isn’t going to let it get away though. He marches along behind the snake, which moves faster and faster as it knows someone is hunting it. Gerry holds the gun out with one hand, the barrel aiming for the snake’s head as best as I can tell. But with the “S” pattern it’s making as it slithers along, Gerry has to sweep his hand left and right to keep the head in his aim.
I about jump out of my skin when the gun cracks loudly, and I see the snake’s body sort of flop in the air before falling to the ground where it lays motionless.
“Damn good shot, Daddy,” Trixie cries out exuberantly. She runs up to the snake and doesn’t seem the slightest bit perturbed when her father picks up its lifeless form by the tail and holds it up for inspection. “One shot… clean through the head.”