Return To Big Sky

by Jade Cary

  Our bodies naked, intertwining, we lay tentative caresses over each other, tender kisses over soft parts, practiced delving into secret places untouched for ages, except by my own hand. The mating ritual was slow and tender and sacred; me beneath him, eyes locked, the care and the desire so evident, the lover savant brought me to heel, to heights, to heaven and then back again. And when I felt the ache, deep within me, I let go and it wasn’t like before; it wasn’t like ever. I came from the deepest depths of me, head thrown back, a wonton scream on my tongue, his name on jagged breath in the dim light of that moon-filled room. Jed stilled with the intensity he felt, buried so deep in me as he touched the sky. I rode wave after wave, and when one died, another came. I sobbed against his shoulder as yet another one crested and brought me crashing to earth. Gripped tight, sheathed in everything I was, Jed roared his climax into the blue Montana night.

  In those many dreams I had of how it would be, the fantasy did not do justice to the truth. There would not be a one-time, a first-time, a last-time—not with this man. And as I lay in his arms, his soft caress against my arm, our ankles entwined, a sheet between my toes, I wondered how I would transition the life I knew to the one I never should have let go.

  “Baby,” he whispered against my neck. “Baby girl. I want to baby you, coddle you, protect you.” He nipped at my shoulder. “Own you.”

  “I should object,” I said softly, “But I don’t want to just yet.”

  He chuckled. “My baby girl,” he drew out on a whisper against my ear.

  “Mmmm. I like that.”

  “Me, too. Feel here how much.” He took my hand beneath the sheet and I took his veined erection in my hand. I stroked and he grew longer, harder in my hand. My womb convulsed. My legs fell open. My body had a mind of its own, and I’d had no idea. The moon was high and bright, and the smells of the evening meal stopped drifting through the windows long ago. I was floating, the man next to me my magic carpet

  His arms tightened around me and his mouth found mine. The kiss was hard, soft, possessive, tender. He found my breast and he cupped gently and stroked his thumb across a taut peak, then followed with his mouth. My hips jerked. My breasts had never been an area of extreme pleasure, but somehow Jed had coaxed something from me I hadn’t known existed. His mouth worked, taking my nipple between his lips and pulling, sucking, growing the small bud to twice its normal size. He hovered over me and took one, and then the other until I was digging my heels into the mattress and offering myself up to him. I couldn’t breathe.

  “Please Jed…”

  “Please, what, baby?” He trailed his hand down the flat of my stomach, caressed from hip to hip and settled between my legs, his palm cupping me.

  “Please,” I whispered. My knees were cocked and my legs were spread in wanton fashion. I would beg him with naughty language if forced. I pushed my hips up into his hand and he moved it with me, so that nothing touched me except the outline of his palm over my aching sex. I started to reach for his hand when he pressed his lips to my ear.

  “Uh uh.”

  My head was spinning. He tapped his finger over the sensitive nub between my legs.

  “Oh…oh, God…” He moved it around, tapping my inner thigh, the tender crease between bottom and thigh, my core; and my hips, raised in offering, followed his finger like a hungry kitten, begging for a drop of milk from his bottle. The tapping digit found me again and I pressed up to meet each connection.

  “Please, Jed…”

  He tapped and caressed, moving slowly, spreading my arousal. I took his head in my hands and attacked his mouth, my tongue gliding over his lips and plundering him like a starving animal. Jed took it slow, paying attention to the soft cries, the restrained jerk of my hips, and how wet I got as he glided a thick finger inside of me and moved it with an expert’s grace. He found the spongy button behind my pubic bone and he tapped and stroked until I was jerking my head from side to side in a fantastic display of ecstasy that shocked me. I bucked my hips up sending him deeper. He broke the kiss.

  “Still.” His fingers stopped moving until I complied. “Good girl.” He started up again. I was going to lose it, and I was not in charge.

  “I’m going to…oh, Jed, please…”

  “You’re going to what, Chan?”

  I bit my lip, shy. I was no stranger to talking to a lover, but with Jed, it all felt new. I closed my eyes.

  “Tell me. Tell me what you’re going to do.” He kept his finger inside but stopped moving. “Open your eyes, Chandler.” I did, and met his tender gaze. “Talk to me,” he whispered. “I want to hear you.”

  “I’m…I’m going to come, Jed.”

  “Damn right you are, honey,” he whispered in my ear. “I’m gonna watch you do it.”

  I released a gush of moisture that soaked his fingers, and I felt the electricity between my legs build, that familiar zinging prelude to climax.

  “God,” I breathed. I attacked his mouth as a jolt of fire spun through me. Jed pushed deep inside of me with his fingers and I tightened around them. He was enjoying this as much as I was. His eyes told me so. He smiled and hovered over me, balancing on his left elbow as he took his fingers from between my legs. Even as I knew what I would get instead, I still missed them. He kissed his way down my body, took his time, like he had loads of it. The low bed table light reflected off the ridges of his shoulders and marked shadows under shoulder blades and across his lower back. My legs wide, bare feet atop his shoulders while he held me open with his hands, his tongue and lips breathed life into me. His touch was like a satin cloud caressing my soft points, and then his rigid tongue entered and stilled. My protest in the guise of a high-pitched moan was rewarded with a slap to my bottom and the slightly upward curl of his tongue. And then it was gone and his feather-soft lips were on me again, and I believed I would have offered all I had for that moment, and the one right after, and then the one after that, again. The fire rose, building, higher, higher, and it spread across my belly and down my legs and across my breasts and his mouth left me to press against the inside of my thigh, and it was the most exquisite torture.

  “What are you doing to me?” I whispered.

  He touched the tip of his tongue to the rigid bud between my lips and I thrust my hips against his mouth. He laughed as he withdrew his mouth from me; my punishment, my reward.

  “I’m never going to get away from you, am I?”

  “Not if I have anything to say about it.” He held my bottom in his palms, and when he lifted me to his mouth, I soared

  “Fuck me, Jed…please.”

  He came up from between my legs with a smile. “Oh, it’ll be my pleasure, sweetheart.” He moved up my body and took himself in hand. He slid through my wetness until the tip of his penis found entrance, and then he glided slowly into me, taking his time, savoring every inch of feeling.

  “Take my mouth,” he ordered. “Taste yourself.” I licked the taste of me off his lips and he fed me fingers that had been inside me moments ago. I took them like I was starving. I felt wanton, reckless, sexy.

  I raised my hips and took his full length inside me, feeling every inch of him. He moved in long, slow strokes, building me back up again, saving himself for one more turn around the block, one more ride, one more chance at the perfection I did not believe he could duplicate. And yet, as he moved his hips in expert rhythms and circles I found myself there again. I took him deeper. He stilled and his head fell back. He bit his lip and slowed his breathing and I knew he was stalling, for me.

  “I will fuck you, I will make love to you, I will do anything you want me to do, but this doesn’t end here. I want you in my bed—every night you have remaining here, and every night you’re here after that. Do you understand me?”

  “I understand you,” I whispered.

  “I—don’t—do—goodbyes.” He plunged hard and deep with every word, as if there was a chance I’d misunderstand. He moved slowly, gliding deep and then pulling out, only to plunge in ag
ain. The way he handled me, the way he controlled it all without making me feel controlled, the way he would always give me what I needed, along with what I wanted. How to love a man like this and not loose oneself? That was a question for tomorrow.

  I met him on a down-thrust, and a soft “I love you,” bled from my lips into his ear. And then I came so hard I sobbed.

  A Plan

  “What do you think?”

  I sat on an oversized leather chair with my feet tucked and a Mexican hot chocolate laced with bourbon on the table next to me. We were full of last night’s forgotten Chile Relleno and forgiveness all around. For that I was grateful.

  “I don’t think there’s money in it,” Jed said.

  “I’m not thinking about that right now.”

  “Well, you should.”

  “Look, I don’t know anything about this, except how to build it and what it’ll do for my brother—hell, I’m not even sure of that part. I haven’t done any medical research; I wouldn’t know where to begin. I just know about the transformation in that kid as soon as he got up on Mugsy. I know there are places that do this, and for all sorts of issues—physical, mental, emotional, behavioral—but none are in Montana. Not like what I’m proposing.”

  “Do you know what Montana has to offer?” Jed asked.

  “Something similar to my idea at a facility that boards, trains horses and offers lessons,” I said. “It’s a small, additional service they offer.”

  “The cost?”

  “It’s subsidized, I think.”

  “How many acres do you need?”

  “I don’t know yet. It depends, I guess, on what we want to accomplish. Do we have residential and non-residential access? Do we offer overnight or week-long horseback trips? Do we add the farming aspect to the program—after all, the Culver is a feed farm. My idea extends beyond a horse and rider circling the corral. I envision more than that. If we use the Culver, all the profit goes to Charlie. That’s what I want.” I sighed and rested my chin in my hand. “There are a few things I haven’t thought about.”

  “That’s okay,” Jed said. “That’s why we’re talking. Have you thought about accreditation?”

  “No.”

  “Becoming affiliated and certified or accredited with an organization that supports special needs can bring credibility and additional financial support. That’s important.”

  “I understand. That makes sense.” I snatched my yellow legal pad off the end table and scribbled notes.

  “We can apply for non-profit status and get grants and donations.”

  I scribbled faster.

  “If we hire the best therapists, have an on-staff doctor or physician’s assistant, and offer classes and support for parents and families, that’ll draw people from out of state, which means we’d have to offer a residential program. Scholarships for families in financial need…” Jed went on, almost to himself.

  “Maria, what do you think?” I asked.

  “I am overwhelmed, mija. I think it’s wonderful.”

  Carlos leaned against the wall in the dark of the hallway. “Hi, there.”

  He smiled. “Hi, there.”

  I went to him. “How much did you hear?”

  “Everything. What does it mean? Like a camp?”

  “Sort of. We’re just getting ideas together now, honey, but…I think this idea is a good one, if you’re up for it.”

  “I want to understand.”

  “Why don’t you sit down and help us think it through. I want your thoughts.”

  You would have thought I’d offered to send him to the moon for a week.

  Later, down by the banks of the Madison, under a late moon and a star-filled sky, on my back and nude atop a thick, soft blanket, while Jed placed post-coital kisses across over-sensitive breasts, I blessed him for his strength, his wisdom and his intelligence. In answer, he kissed his way down my body and back up to my mouth, then took it like he owned it. He laid his head against my bare breast.

  “Interesting segue into Carlos’s portion of the will,” he whispered. The sit down with Charlie had included discussing Dad’s will. The discussion was probably premature as far as Jed and Maria were concerned, but I thought the timing was perfect.

  “Are you confident he understands?” I said.

  “I’m confident he trusts you and me above all else. We need to be right and thorough about this, Chan. He’s taken it all to heart, which he does with too many things that end up not coming together. That boy adores you.”

  “Same.” I made lazy circles over his bare shoulder blade. “What’s his middle name, Jed?”

  “Carlos. His first name is William.”

  “After my grandfather.”

  “Mmmhmm.”

  “I fly out Wednesday.”

  Jed’s head came up, and even in the near dark, I could see his eyes afire. “Did you purposely not tell me ‘til now so I wouldn’t try to talk you out of it?”

  “No. I didn’t want this.”

  “What?”

  “This, like I’m leaving you all day at the Pre-school for Serial killers or something.”

  “Is that some kind of mommy reference, because if it is, Daddy will show you different.” He hooked one hand underneath me, capturing my butt. Liquid heat coated my thighs at the word Daddy. I didn’t know why, but it hit me dead center. I’d never be able to tell him this, of course. It was too…weird.

  “I have to go back and settle a few things, Jed. I have some projects that need attention, some clients that need tending to. May I go, please, without a lot of dramatics?”

  “What time?”

  “Flight’s at three p.m.”

  “So you’ll leave the ranch around eleven. When will you be back?”

  “A week, no more.”

  “Figure out how to work from Montana, Chandler. I won’t do this from across the country.”

  I sighed. “I know.” I rose up and pushed him onto his back. “I have been here over a week and already I’m planning to uproot my life for you. Give me a moment, will you please?”

  He yanked me on top of him and used his feet to separate my legs. Both hands seized my ass in a death grip. A crisp fall Montana chill caressed my shoulders and back. That I was surprised he would not allow me to best him for more than a few seconds went to my complete inability to accept the Neanderthal for what he was: a Neanderthal. In one sweep, the blanket was tossed and I was bare to the moon.

  “You want a title for your Poor Me memoirs, here’s one for you: Give Me a Moment: How I Uprooted My Life for Home and the Man I love.” He swatted my ass. “Cut the shit and do what you need to do. Your life is not in The Big Apple anymore, babe. It’s in Big Sky country.”

  I reached between us and grabbed his cock. “How about this one: Poor Me: My Return to Big Sky, The Last Best Place.”

  “You have a plan for that, sweetheart?” he asked, his lids heavy.

  “Let’s see.” I disengaged my legs, straddled his hips, and guided him inside me. “Oooh,” I said with wide-eyed surprise. “It fits.”

  “Like Cinderella’s shoe.” He jerked his hips and impaled me. I could do nothing except throw my head back and groan.

  “Worry me again like you did today, lady,” he said in my ear, “and I’ll spank that beautiful ass ‘til you can’t breathe.”

  With those words, I trust my hips up and moaned. “You’re very controlling.”

  “I love hard, Chan. I protect what’s mine.”

  “Do you…love everybody…hard?”

  He stilled inside me and met my eyes. “No, sweetheart. Only you.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. You’re mine.” He moved inside me again. “All…mine.”

  Betraying me again, my body screamed its climax into the fall night.

  I drove the truck through the gate of the Culver Ranch, past streams and outbuildings, silos and storage barns. I parked next to a modular home where the ranch manager, Eddie Muenster, resided.

 
; Charlie got out before me and unhitched the door of the horse trailer and we got the two horses saddled—Mugsy for me, and a sweet horse named Doolittle that my dad had put Charlie on years ago, unbeknownst to the boy’s mother.

  “Doo is like your Gwendolyn, huh, Chandler?”

  “You mean he’s your first horse—yes, I suppose so.”

  “You think now that you’re here mom won’t care so much that I’m likin’ to ride?”

  “I think she’s coming around, honey, I really do.” I got up on Mugs and Charlie did the same. “Follow me.”

  We rode across a narrow trail and followed a swift moving stream to the edge of the property—about five miles in. The view of the fields—some fallow, others green and high—was breathtaking.

  “Look out there at the view, Charlie, and tell me how far you can see.” He squinted, swiveled his head to one side, then the other.

  “I can see to those mountains ahead, and to the right to the end of that field, and to the left to those mountains there.” He looked at me, hoping he’d given the right answer.

  “Well, that’s all yours. All of it belongs to you. Daddy left all of it to you.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Huh. What am I supposed to do with it?”

  “Well,” I said, feeling as overwhelmed with what I inherited as he did. “That’s a good question. What would you like to do? Would you like to live here on the land? Would you like to learn more about what happens here at the Culver and work it someday? Do something like what we discussed last night?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Oh, honey, you don’t have to decide now. You don’t have to decide anytime soon. It’s all just something to think about.” I paused. “Charlie, someday…” Nope, that wasn’t how to start this. “Honey,” I tried again. “I leave day after tomorrow--Wednesday.

  “Chandler…” There was panic in his eyes.