Rodeo Rancher

by Lauren Wood

  Cali waited for the right time and then struck out like a cobra after its prey. Her hand gripped his and made him look into her downtrodden eyes. The desperation that she conveyed was of a woman that needed a helping hand. “Tell me that you hear that.” Her words were rushed and her hand was taken away too soon. Sebastian looked at this hardened woman, but there was something soft that he couldn’t recognize. “I don’t know what I’m doing here. I feel that everybody is judging me and looking at me.” She didn’t come out and say that she needed a friend, but Sebastian could see the signs like they were written across the wall.

  For some reason, Cali decided to go with a wounded bird persona. It was perfect to make Sebastian think that she was the one in need of saving. She was giving him the chance to come to the rescue on his metaphorical white steed. If she could convince him that he was her saving grace, then maybe they had a chance to get to the meat of the matter of his own problems. “I feel almost sick for trying to fool him like this, but it’s better in the long run. He can’t know the truth. He needs to think that I am that bird with a broken wing. He needs to be the one to mend me and to give me a reason to go on. I’ve done my best to sow those feelings into him with one look, but how can I really be sure that it’s working.”

  Sebastian looked at this woman and then a fleeting thought of desire crept down the left side of his pants. He had no problem getting excited and a woman with no clothes did that to him in spades. The only thing that was truly missing was a connection and not just two writhing bodies getting to know each other intimately on no more of a level than physical. He had even resorted to paying for it. It was easier that way and there was no entanglement or drama. It was a transaction of a business variety that took place for 1 hour of his day. He would get those feelings under control for that 1 hour and then he would sit and stew over how stupid he had been.

  Sebastian wheeled his friend back to his room and then literally had to turn his back. He couldn’t let Michael see any kind of weakness or the terrifying expression on his face of the prospect of losing him. He swallowed hard outside the door and then stood tall with a defiance to not let his emotions get the best of him.

  He was half expecting to see that woman gone upon entering into the common area. He was surprised to see that she was curled up in the Lotus position rocking back and forth and watching nothing particular on television. “I don’t know about you, but this place is fucking depressing. If I had to stay here all the live long day, I would probably hang myself from the highest part of the building. I only come in here to see a friend and to make sure that these people are getting what they deserve. You look like you have a story to tell and maybe a walk in the fresh air will clear up some of those cobwebs.” He didn’t offer his hand, but his obvious invitation was put out there.

  Cali watched him go back out the door and down the stairs to the street level. She followed like that of a trance or maybe of a pied piper luring the rafts from the sinking ship. His brisk pace would be more than most could take. She had discipline and stamina and didn’t mind showing it. She had found that boot camp was an eye opening experience. She had felt slightly overwhelmed and there were those that thought that she couldn’t measure up. It was there disinterest that had fueled her into fulfilling the most demanding task. She had toned and hardened with more muscle.

  She would never give the impression of a stick thin waiflike model on the runway. It wasn’t what she was made for. Her physical makeup was a genetic disorder. Her parents could only have one child and they doted on her hand and foot from the moment that she was born. Her mother and father had long been deceased 15 years ago in a boating accident during an otherwise uneventful family vacation. She was lost at sea for almost a day before a fishing trawler picked her up. They never did find the bodies of her parents and they were declared dead. The funeral was a somber moment and one that was met with a child that could barely keep it together.

  Her aunt sent her to a therapist and that was her first taste of where her life would ultimately go.

  Sebastian decided to test this woman and began to move very quickly into the park. He pushed himself to the limit, feeling the constricting motion of his chest rising and falling with each breath. He didn’t have to look behind to know that she was keeping pace. He could hear her breathing and the slapping of her footsteps. She wasn’t breathing heavy and this was obviously not something that was a stranger to her.

  “I’ve always found that running helps me to get away from things. I sit at one of these benches and I contemplate where I’m going.” Sebastian sat down and looked at the still waters and felt this sort of calm come over him. He had been in too many scrimmages. He walked away when his commander had asked him for one last favor. He didn’t feel right about it, but he needed time to find perspective. Too many things were weighing him down like an anchor around his ankle. There were times that he felt like he was walking in quicksand and going nowhere fast. “I look at all this and I know exactly what I was fighting for over there. Our freedoms should never be taken lightly and people may not understand our dedication to fighting for those freedoms, but they don’t have to. There are only a few of us in the grand scheme of things that know what it is to put our lives on the line every single day.”

  Cali sat down beside him, giving him his space and knowing that he had that strong confident attitude. It was hard to deny that the tattoo of his platoon’s number and that of the skull and crossbones in the middle of the United States flag on his shoulder was a telling moment. Cali looked at this man and at first felt sorry for him, but then there was a modicum of interest to learn more about this man. He was that mysterious dark haired handsome stranger. His eyes had this cloudy surface like there was always something on his mind. The images of death must have haunted him something fiercely, but so far nobody had been able to get him to open up about anything.

  “I know that you're only trying to help, but it’s not doing any good. I still feel like somebody is watching me and that I should be aware of my surroundings at all times. That’s always a good idea for everybody, but most people go through life like they are sheep. They are penned in like animals in cubicles and they drive home in a progression of a death march. None of them really know what it is to live by the seat of their pants. You never know when your time might be calling.” Cali had done her research and had poured over detail after detail of what a soldier went through and how they would act upon coming home. “I see something in his eyes, but I don’t want to push too far this first time around. It’s better that I do most of the talking. It will give him a license to believe that I am letting him in. If I’m able to do that, then maybe he will mimic that same response.”

  “I don’t know why I feel so comfortable around you. Maybe it’s because I know that you’ve been through the same thing in some form or another. I wish that I could put my finger on it, but there’s something different about you. You’re not like the other girls that have walked through those halfway house doors. For the most part, they are caustic or they are fucking horny and can’t take their hands off of me. I understand the sentiment and it’s a byproduct of going into battle. It’s something that we all have to get used to. You’re always looking for that next big fix. Some find it with drugs or alcohol, but there are others like me that get that rush between somebody’s legs.” He had never said that to anybody and even now, he was regretting it. He didn’t like that he was showing the cracks in his demeanor. His own mortality had become something of an albatross around his neck. He had woken too many times from a deep sleep in a cold sweat hanging onto the edge of the bed as it spun out of control. It was not what he wanted, but he had learned to live with it. It wasn’t easy and he didn’t expect it to be.

  Chapter 3

  It took a moment for her to collect her thoughts and then she came up with an explanation for not climbing in between the sheets with any man that was willing to give her the time of day. “I did get heavily into medication, but I was able to ki
ck the habit. I was under the same mentality of when I was serving my country. I wasn’t going to allow pills to become an enemy. I vanquished that foe like I did with anybody that was there to cause me harm. I protected myself by shying away from addictions in general. I learned a long time ago that I had an addictive personality. Smoking in the girl's room was my first taste of doing something that was particularly naughty.” “I think that I’m getting through to him, but maybe I should back off and let him come to me. I don’t want him to feel that this is any kind of ambush, although essentially it is. It’s his blue eyes that sparkle with a life that has faded because of the things that he had to do.”

  “I see something in you that’s familiar, but I’m not sure what to make of it. I find you intriguing, Kelly.” I had given him a name that was close to what it was in reality. I needed to build this character. The only way to do that was to have a semblance of the truth. Cali and Kelly were so similar in pronunciations that it wouldn’t be all that hard for me to answer to either one. “What I need right now is something purring between my legs. I need to feel the hot vibration underneath me and then to have that strong piece of machinery fall victim to my eager hands.” “He’s licking his lips and he obviously thinks that I’m talking about sex. I’m going to show him I’m just the kind of bad ass that he would want to be a part of.”

  They raced each other back to the halfway house and Sebastian was quite shocked to see that she was riding a Harley. It was black with these blue electric flames spreading across the chassis. “I never took you for the biker mama kind of girl. I suppose you don’t really know what’s hidden underneath the covers, until you turn the page. I guess we have more in common than we thought.” He went to his very plain looking Harley Davidson and climbed aboard. He looked to his side to see her tucking in her hair underneath a helmet. Even through the tinted glass, he could almost see her green eyes staring into his soul.

  They drove side by side down the highway and it wasn’t lost on Sebastian the way that she rubbed her crotch along the seat of that beautiful piece of machinery. It was obviously having the effect of something arousing. It was very rarely known that a guy has that same problem, but in different ways. His balls are constantly being buzzed with a sort of electric vibration that would travel up the length of the shaft. He had found that driving a motorcycle at full tilt and screaming at the top of his lungs was a good way to release frustration.

  He turned the throttle and moved away from Kelly. He looked back to see that she was pushing that bike up a notch. They were really playing a dangerous game, swerving around curves with the bike leaning to the side. It was clearly dangerous and could lead to catastrophe for the both of them. Thankfully, Cali had ridden with an old boyfriend.

  Cali could feel the excitement burning through her veins and that feeling easily punctuated between her legs. She had felt this way before, but it felt like a lifetime ago. His leather jacket and steely blue eyes was doing nothing to cool down the temperature between them. They arrived at a beach that was closed for the next couple of months. It was close to the season where bronze bodies would be bouncing up and down in teeny bikinis and whatever was the trend of the day.

  He turned off the motor and lay back on his seat with his helmet hanging from one hand. He had his eyes closed and was enjoying the sun beating down on his face. He sensed a slight shadow and opened his eyes to see that Kelly was looking down on him like an angel from heaven. “This is my special place, but it’s only available up to the summer months. I don’t like crowds and my solitude is very important to me.” Her leather jacket was open and he could see the hard nipples making quite the indentation through the black sweater. He was almost certain that she wasn’t wearing a bra and mistakenly made the first move by grabbing onto both of those orbs.

  Cali took a step backwards with her hands up in defense. She wasn’t going to admit that it felt good and the way that his palms grazed her nipples had caused her to wonder what it would be like to just take him right here on the sand. “I don’t know what kind of girl you take me for, but I’m not an easy lay. I need a bit more than this and maybe you can turn it off and on like a switch, but I can’t.” Cali walked away from him climbing underneath the rope and then going out onto the sand. “I want him to chase me and to feel he has done something wrong. His apology will help him to make amends for his past. It was obviously a time of his life that he’s not very proud of. I just hope that I didn’t ruin things by walking away.” She was sitting there for maybe a minute and then she felt him over top of her.

  He put his hands on her shoulders and could easily see the mountains projecting from her chest. They were perfect and he had the flag to claim that territory for himself. “I didn’t mean to offend you and it was nothing personal. You can’t sit there and tell me that driving a motorcycle doesn’t do something for you.” Sebastian massaged her shoulders, making a point not to do anything that would be considered out of line. “I feel this connection to you and I only wish that we could express it in more than just words. I told you that I have a problem and maybe with you it’s not a problem. You could be the solution.”

  “I’m not going to say that I’m not tempted. Driving my hog does do things to me. I can see where I’m sitting here that the bulge in your pants is not exactly easy to resist.” “I thought that I would be able to keep this a meeting of the minds, but I believe that it might be better to give into his advances. A part of me believes that it’s a good therapeutic tool, but I’m also fucking hot and looking to get laid. I know that that’s not very becoming of my profession, but I can’t help being human.” Cali put her hand back and touched his own hand on her shoulder. She was wearing the kind of sweater that was stretchable and she moved it down over her naked shoulders. His hand abruptly grabbed hers and placed it up against his throbbing member. There was nobody for miles. Not even those scavenging for leftover goodies from last summer had ventured this far.

  “I don’t want to think about anything. You’re the one that is going to take me all the way. I don’t think that I’ve felt this way in a very long time and maybe I have been keeping people at a distance. I guess I never believed that they would truly know me inside and out and if they did, they wouldn’t want anything to do with me. I was thankful that I didn’t have a significant other when I came back or even children that would look at me differently when they saw that daddy wasn’t exactly the same man he was when he left.” Sebastian could feel her fingers getting intimately acquainted with his package. The way that she was squeezing him and running her fingers up and down the length through his pants was a good way to fuel the fire.

  “I’ve been looking for something to hold onto and maybe I have found it. Being with you changes things and I forget about my problems. I know that it’s only a temporary solution, but it’s one that I’m willing to at least take a chance on.” Cali pulled down the zipper from behind and could feel his obvious arousal pressing up against her skull from behind. She didn’t have to see what she was doing to fish it out into the open. It lay heavily on to her shoulder. The warmth of his skin made her turn and come face to face with the eye of the storm. She gave it a bit of her loving by lathing attention on the head, until it was glistening with her spit. “I never thought that I would get caught up in a romance with a client. If I think about this the right way, then he’s really not a client of Cali. It’s a small distinction, but one that I’m going to grasp onto with everything in me.”

  “Your lips feel like velvet and I can feel the heated surface of your tongue. I love the way that you do that.” He was still massaging her shoulders getting her into the right frame of mind and knowing that it would be sooner than later before they threw themselves at each other. “Seriously, I missed what it was like to have this kind of experience without having to pay for it. I never wanted the drama or the possibility of making them run. I can’t be trusted to do the right thing and sometimes I just need to take a step back. This is not one of those times.” He stepped
to the side and moved in front of her with this cock touching her lips.

  Grabbing onto it, Cali took it into her mouth and let it play to the back. She opened herself up to an otherwise unexpected event and now was going to go along with the flow. It felt natural to be taking him so deep and gagging on the last couple of inches with only one or two remaining. She pulled on his balls, drawing them down and away from a possible and imminent explosion. “After all the things that we’ve been through, it’s a wonder that none of us go insane and go walking into the blunt end of a chopper blade. It’s nice that we can find comfort in each other’s arms. I hope that this is more than just a casual get together. I would really like to see you again and I know that it’s presumptuous, but I need to know that you feel the same way.” “I hope that I’m not taking things too far. I’m not sure where Kelly begins and Cali ends. It surprises me that I can get lost in the Kelly side of things. It’s almost like I am dealing with a split personality.”

  “Walking on the wild side has never been something that I’ve been comfortable with. That is until I went to the military and I learned that living each day to the fullest was the only way to go. I began to see things differently. I do want to see you again, Kelly. I haven’t seen enough of you here. Do you suppose that we can do something about that?” His answer came in the form of her lifting the sweater to show him the product of growing up in a family that was top heavy on the female side. There was no bra and her melons showed no sag whatsoever. They were firm and uplifting. Doing those particular exercises had paid off in big dividends.

  She leaned back on her knees with her hands outstretched and straight with her hands on the sand. Her breasts were right there in the position that was basically telling him to slide in between the comfort of her valley. He did not hesitate for a second, pulling from her lips and dragging his cock down, until he was situated in between the folds of her flesh. She fell backwards laughing hysterically and then pushing a nice tight seal around his engorged staff.