I didn’t need her to. I had my mama for that. At least, I used to. She’d been gone for a good while now, but that didn’t change that every time I thought about her, I imagined her right there in the kitchen cooking up something to sustain her husband and eight hungry sons.
I never wanted Shannon to pretend she was anything other than herself. I didn’t need her to act like she was delicate and soft spoken, or that she wasn’t strong, capable, and independent.
I wanted her for exactly what she was. Shannon took on the world with courage and strength, never backing down to anyone or hesitating in facing something that stood in front of her. She never let someone stand over her or tell her who she was supposed to be.
They didn’t need to. She knew exactly who she was and lived that with every fiber of her being in a way that inspired me. Being near her filled me up when I felt empty and reminded me that there was so much more than what I trudged through when I wasn’t with her.
She could make the entire world disappear, and in that moment, it was all I wanted. She laughed and dropped the last of her clothes to the ground before jumping bare naked into the water. Her squeal when she hit the water told me it was cold, but that was exactly why we were there. After a long day of intense Montana heat beating down on us and sweat making dirt and dust stick to our skin, a dip into the cool clean water of the swimming hole sounded like a little slice of heaven. I wasn’t about to let her enjoy it all by herself.
I stood at the edge of the water, watching her as I desperately tried to free myself from my jeans and shirt. Working all day made my boots mold to my feet and I fought to kick and pry them off as I wrangled with my belt. Shannon laughed and dipped down into the water again, swimming a bit away from the shore like she was luring me in. She rose up with her back to me, her hair hanging wet against her glistening skin. Her head turned and she gave me a sly smile over her shoulder, twisting just the tiniest bit to show off the side of one breast and the hint of a taut tan nipple before disappearing into the water again.
I finally got my boots off and shook my jeans from my foot so I was as bare as she was. That one last slinging movement threw off my balance and I stumbled at the edge of the water, finally pitching forward to splash down. The sudden blast of cold against my skin was glorious, cutting through the salt and dirt and sweat, bringing my body temperature down and cutting through the fog in my mind.
I loved this place. My family’s ranch was beautiful and the envy of many a person in Green Valley, but of everywhere on the sprawling sixty square miles, this one spot was my favorite place to be. Especially right now.
Trees grown up wild along the edge of the water touched branches to create thick pockets of shade. The occasional willow bent low and dipped down into the water, making little grottoes of even deeper shadow. Rocks jutted out from the grassy shore and dotted the deepest, widest parts where the water flowed faster to rejoin the creek.
And Shannon was there. That was at the top of the list of reasons I loved it. This was where we had spent most of our time together, and when I imagined the swimming hole, it was with her grinning at me, naked and unashamed in the heat of summer. Cuddling up around a campfire to watch the ice flow and stare at the swirl of colors across the sky in the winter. Breathing in fresh sweetness and seeing the creek swell with snowmelt in the spring. Getting the last dip of our toes into the stinging chill as the ranch turned gold around us in the fall. This was where we marked the seasons, where we hid away from everything else. It was where we breathed in each other and I could just be.
She was giggling at me when I broke back up through the surface of the water. I shook my head and she cried out as the droplets hit her. She retaliated with a splash of water and I splashed in return. Before she could go for another, I darted toward her through the water and wrapped my arms around her waist. She glided through the water toward me and her naked body felt warm and perfect against mine as I gathered her close for a sweet, tender kiss that made her sigh.
I was the only one who knew that sigh. Everyone knew who Shannon was, but only I got to see her this free, this unhindered. With me, she had nothing to hold back, no shame, no secrets. I offered the same to her.
Her fingers raked through my hair as she pulled back from the kiss and stared into my eyes.
“What was that for?” she asked.
I gave her a questioning look. “You complaining?”
She smiled and wrapped her arms around my neck again, nestling closer. “Never. I’ll take as many kisses as you have to give me.”
I took the invitation and leaned in for another, letting just the tip of my tongue graze her bottom lip. “I needed this.”
Concern replaced some of the glimmer that left her eyes. She bit her bottom lip and held me closer, almost like she was trying to shield me. “Things have been hard at home?” she asked, her voice a little quieter now.
I nodded. My arms tightened around her waist, finding comfort and stability in having her close. Even as vulnerable as I was, naked as the day I was born, I was safe there in the water with her. My heart, my mind, my body were all guarded and protected in the shade of the trees and the deep afternoon sunlight.
“It’s getting worse,” I confessed. “All the time. Dad is getting angrier with each passing day and the forgetfulness is getting really bad. But he doesn’t want to admit he’s getting forgetful. He wants to think he’s just as sharp as he’s always been. When he does forget something or puts something down and can’t find it, it pushes him over the edge. If anybody even sideways mentions that he’s not thinking like he used to, he flies into a rage and no one can get him under control.” I shook my head. “Watching him deteriorate like this isn’t easy.”
“I know it’s not,” she said. “I can’t even imagine how hard it is to see him getting like that. But you’re doing everything you can for him. That’s all anyone can ask.”
“Not him. He doesn’t think I’m ever doing enough. No matter what I do, things just keep getting worse.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. She leaned in and gave me another kiss. “I’m so sorry.” She kissed me again.
“It’s not your fault,” I said.
“It’s still hard. And I still wish you didn’t have to go through this. All of you. None of you boys deserve to have to go through this and I hate that you are. It breaks my heart. You all are doing everything you can and working so hard. I wish you didn’t have to feel this way.”
Letting out a sigh that felt like it was coming from the deepest depths of me, I rested my forehead against Shannon’s for a few seconds. I pulled her up against me, aching for a distraction from the turmoil of my thoughts. It was too much to manage in that second. I carried it every day, bearing it with the weight of the work I did, the pressures of everything around me.
As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t deny what was happening. My father was fighting a losing battle against his age. The years were ravaging him and turning him into someone we didn’t recognize. It was tearing us apart and chipping away at his ability to keep working on the ranch.
Right then, I couldn’t take it anymore. Just for a little while, I needed a break. I needed to not think about everything else and the realities of life that pressed in around me every day. Pushing everything else out of my mind, I kissed her again.
My tongue slipped into her mouth and I let my hands stroke along her body. Her skin was smooth and soft, making it easy to slip one hand between her thighs.
Shannon gasped as my fingers found the most sensitive parts of her. She clung to me, her mouth running along the side of my neck. I supported her with one arm around her waist as I explored her curves and dips with my fingertips, reveling in the soft moans that each new touch brought. Those sounds drowned out everything else.
After a few moments, I used my arm around her waist to lift Shannon up. She wrapped her legs around me and I carried her over to the willow nearby. The rock beneath it was flat and cool, and I sat her down on it, kissing her more
deeply.
Her hips rocked against me and the hard peaks of her nipples pressed into my chest. The chill of the water contrasting with the growing heat of my skin created a sensation that lit up my body. My tongue tangled with hers, and I parted our bodies just enough to cup one of her breasts in my hand, kneading it before ducking my head down to catch her nipple in my mouth.
Shannon arched into the feeling of my mouth and let her head fall back as she let out a groan. Her thighs parted wider as she offered more of her body for my touch. A second later, her hand touched my belly. Her fingertips traced the muscles and ran down to my hip. My mouth fell away from her breast and I drew in a sharp breath when her hand wrapped around my surging erection. Her mouth caught mine and I closed my hand over hers to guide her to stroke me in a smooth rhythm, which I soon picked up with my fingertips in her slick folds.
Everything else might press down around me until I felt like it was going to crush me but not here. Here, Shannon and I created our own world.
Chapter 12
Shannon
Now…
It had been so long since I had felt the bracing, invigorating rush of the water against my summer-heated skin. I had almost forgotten how good it felt to just forget about everything, forget I was supposed to be a full-grown, responsible adult, and jump into the swimming hole.
Of course, I would have told anybody who wanted to listen that I was a full-grown adult back all those years ago when Jesse and I spent as many of our afternoons together there as we could. Back then, I thought I understood the world. I thought I knew exactly who I was and had my life planned out in front of me.
I thought I was as much of an adult as anyone else, and nobody could have told me any differently. After all, I finished school with good grades. I had plans for my future. Most importantly, I had Jesse. The two of us were going to take on the world together, and everything was going to work out just fine because we were grown.
We knew everything we needed to know. We already saw the challenges and stresses of the world and tackled them day by day. Watching Jesse’s father struggle more and more, collapsing mentally and physically under the devastation of age and illness, only made us feel more adult. We couldn’t think of anything else that could be harder, anything else that would challenge us or that we couldn’t handle.
Of course, I knew better now. Almost a decade under my belt taught me just how little I actually knew back then. Sure, my age said I was an adult. I could vote. I could walk into a store and buy cigarettes. I could walk away from home and do what I wanted without my parents being able to say anything. According to the law, I was grown. But I was still so much a child. Both of us were. Even after everything we’d seen and experienced, we had no idea what the world actually held for us. I could see that so much in Jesse.
He stood on the edge of the water just like he had so many years before and stripped out of his jeans and white T-shirt. I watched him without hesitation. I didn’t need to hide it.
He was even more incredible to look at now than he had been when we were so young. I admired the lines of his body, the chiseled muscles, the tendons and veins that stood out along his arms and across his chest. My eyes slid down his belly to the deep V-cut of his hips. My fingertips tingled with desire to touch those muscles and let them guide me down to where the trail of coarse dark hair from his navel lead.
Even the cool water wasn’t enough to stop my body from heating up. I was getting hot and bothered just looking at him and remembering the way we used to be when we came there together. I bit down on my bottom lip, trying to control myself as he jumped down into the water with me.
He surfaced with a sexy smirk playing on his lips. There was something on his mind. I could always tell when the gears in his head were turning and I could see them now. I slid a little closer to him through the water and tilted my head.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked.
“When we used to come here together,” he said. “Do you remember? Do you remember that afternoon when we came here and stayed so long we missed dinner? We watched the stars come out?”
Did I remember?
I almost laughed that he would even ask that question. Of course, I remembered. Nothing would ever take that memory out of my mind. It was etched so deeply; I could bring up every detail about it just by closing my eyes. I knew exactly the day he was talking about. We spent a lot of summer afternoons there, but only one was as incredible and amazing as that one. It was perfect in a way no other day of my life had ever been.
Sometimes, it was hard to think about that day just because of what was going on around us. Things were getting so rough for Jesse and I hated what he was going through. I knew he and his brothers were suffering every day and I felt so helpless.
I wanted to do something to make it better for them, but even then, I knew there was nothing I could do but be there. All I could do was offer him comfort and make sure he knew there was somebody in the world he could completely rely on. I knew he was going through a hard time, but I never believed it would get so much worse. That day, I thought I could comfort him into pushing through. I could love him into being able to handle what was happening. It would carry him through.
In my mind then, it was all just a difficult time. A phase. It was a really difficult time and they were struggling, but it wouldn’t last forever. It would be over soon.
I could feel it then. I knew it wouldn’t be much longer before Jesse and all his brothers came out the other side. Their father would eventually figure out what was really going on. He’d get over his stubbornness and stop digging his heels in.
I understood how he felt. Really, I did. He was proud. He used to be strong and sharp. He could handle the work of a couple men and had been taking care of eight sons and his family’s ranch on his own since his wife died. That all made him not want to let go. But he would. Eventually, he would.
He would know it wasn’t anything to be ashamed of and that he would be fine if he went ahead and let his boys take over. He’d concede that he could no longer take care of the ranch and decide it was time to hand everything over to Cassidy. He would lead his brothers, and everything would be good again.
But that wasn’t how it happened.
I closed my eyes briefly, bringing myself back to that day. “I remember,” I whispered, opening my eyes to look at him again.
I remembered every moment of it, every detail. I remembered making love in the water, how hot his skin felt against mine in the pool water. I remembered the chirping bees and the crickets and the lazy buzz of bees all around us. It was like music.
As we spent hours here together, those sounds melted and changed. The melody of the afternoon became a softer sound of evening, marked by cicadas and the call of night birds. Then even those sounds faded away and it was the rustle of wind.
I remembered collapsing on the shore when we were both spent, lying on our backs in the warm grass to stare up at the tree canopy above and just enjoy the rhythm of our hearts beating and the rush of our blood through our veins. We felt safe and loved. That moment was just proof of everything I believed, everything I felt about my future. We were absolutely certain that the rest of our lives would be just like that. Full and whole and perfect.
“I’ve missed you,” I told him.
It sounded like such a simplification when it came out of my mouth. Those words didn’t even begin to explain what I actually felt. Jesse being gone left an emptiness, not just in my daily life but in my heart, in my very being. Him not being there was like not having all of myself.
When he left, he took a piece of me with him. I’d heard people say things like that before and always felt like they were a cliché, like they were just something people said because it sounded good. It wasn’t until I knew what it was like to live every day without all of myself that I understood.
The hardest part about it was not just that he was gone. It wasn’t just that he carried part of me along with him. It was that he had
left. It was that I couldn’t save him. That pain was somehow sharper when I saw him again.
I’d pushed it all down over the years. The feeling never went away, and I never stopped thinking of him or longing for him, but I convinced myself to live with it. It became just a part of me, something that was as predictable about every day as waking up groggy and going to bed tired to my bones. And then he came back.
I saw him again and that part of me he was holding inside him flared up, reminding me harshly and intensely it was taken away. I missed him as much in the first few moments I saw him again as I did when he’d first left.
But there were no other words to say. Just I’ve missed you.
“I missed you, too,” he told me.
“And I worried about you every single day,” I confessed.
Maybe it wasn’t what I should have said. I knew Jesse wouldn’t like to hear it. Just like I expected, the corners of his mouth tugged down into a frown.
“Clayton told me you asked about me a lot,” he said.
There was no point in denying that. Every person who had anything even close to a connection to him had gotten an earful from me the entire time he was gone. And I wasn’t ashamed of it. I smiled at him.
“I probably annoyed the hell out of him. Cassidy, too.”
I didn’t need to wait long for his reaction. Jesse reached out and wrapped his hand around my wrist, pulling me toward him.
“I never meant to make you worry, Shannon. I just… I had to get out of here.”
The smile melted and I looked away, emotion suddenly sweeping over me. “I know,” I murmured.
Jesse placed a finger under my chin and turned my face, lifting it up so I looked into his eyes. There was something there, just around the edges, that I couldn’t quite define.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
I forced myself to offer some of the smile again. The truth was, I couldn’t really blame him for any of it. With what he was going through, he didn’t really have many options. I couldn’t really fault him for running when he felt like he had no other choice but to save himself from what was going on. When he couldn’t face things at home anymore, he had to do what made him feel like he could survive.
His Reckless Heart (The Montgomery Boys Book 1) Page 7
