by Reid, Penny
"Oh shit!"
"Jenn?" That was Cletus's voice.
I turned my head toward the door, blinking against the harsh light until three figures came into view. Cletus stood at the entrance, Billy and Roscoe behind him. I whipped my head around to the bed and found Beau sitting up, rubbing his eyes.
"Jesu—"
"Beau!" That was also Cletus, but he was closer now.
The next thing I knew, Cletus rushed over and unceremoniously tore the comforter off the bed, sending his brother Beau’s head back against the wall. Shielding me from view, he eased me down to the floor and wrapped me in the blanket, clutching me to his chest. His heart was pounding, just like mine.
But when I chuckled at the absurdity and insanity of the last few moments, he did not.
Had I just climbed into bed with Beau? And wrapped my arm around his body? And touched his underwear? Fallen out of the bed and flashed three of Cletus’s brothers? Had that just happened?
Kill. Me. Now.
Except . . . not Beau. I hadn’t flashed Beau because he hadn't looked yet. But he'd certainly gotten a handful.
KILL ME NOW!
"Jenn." I felt Cletus’s chest rise and fall with a deep breath. "Are you okay?"
"I thought you were in here, asleep." I don’t know why, but now I was laughing harder.
"No." Came Beau's groggy voice. "That was me."
I peeked at Beau. He sat in the bed in nothing but Tarzan underwear, his red beard, and a sleepy, sorry smile. I kept on laughing. Beau joined me.
Cletus, again, did not. "Well she knows that now, don't she?" The question was harsh, and his next words held the sharp edge of a threat. "I'll deal with you later."
"Deal with me? About what? I didn't do anything!" Beau stopped laughing and now sounded completely awake.
I looked to Cletus. He’d lifted his eyebrows, his mouth a stern line, his eyes glinting with malice.
"Now might not be the time to try to reason with him,” Roscoe suggested. “You were just in bed with his girlfriend.”
"I thought she was Shelly!" Beau moved to the end of the bed, placing his feet on the floor.
My laughter subsided. Too tired to be mortified, too sleepy to do anything but yawn and lean into Cletus, I inhaled through my nose and smelled him, and he smelled exactly like I’d expected.
Just. Wonderful.
"Come on." Billy cleared his throat. "Let's give them some privacy."
I heard Beau sigh. "Fine. Fine.” Sheets rustled, the bed gave a squeak. "I'll sleep in Roscoe's room, even though it's as bright as a tanning bed in there."
“How would you know how bright a tanning bed is?” Roscoe asked from somewhere behind Cletus, like he really wanted to know. “You’d just burn.”
“I never said I’d used one.” Beau’s tone was surprisingly conversational as he unfolded from the bed and shuffled out of the room. “It’s an analogy. Haven’t you ever heard an analogy before?”
“No. Never.” Roscoe’s sarcastic reply sounded further away.
"Aren’t you sorry you didn’t just go to Shelly’s or sleep in your own room?" This question came from Billy and was the last I heard from Cletus’s brothers before the door clicked shut.
My humor left me then, and—to my surprise—I didn’t feel terribly embarrassed. I felt only exhaustion and gratitude that I was finally surrounded by Cletus.
But I did feel moved to say, "Don't do anything to Beau, it's not his fault."
Cletus said something, a gruff collection of words I didn't understand. He fitted his arms behind my legs and under my back, lifting me. "Have you slept at all?" I couldn’t decide if the question sounded irritated or concerned.
"No."
He kissed my forehead. “What are you doing here? Why aren’t you asleep at home?”
“Because you’re here, and I miss you.” I heard the unintended vulnerability in my tone as the honest words left my mouth before I could catch them, which—despite my sleepiness—made my middle tense uncomfortably. I wanted to ask, Don’t you want me here? But I didn’t.
We’d been mostly separated for weeks. I’d broken a lot of promises. It was a question I wasn’t sure I wanted him to answer.
Cletus laid me down on the bed, and I opened my eyes. He also looked exhausted. "What about you? Have you slept?"
His eyes, stormy and upset, didn’t meet mine. "No. I gave Beau my room ’cause it's darker, and I took a shower. We just got home a half hour ago."
"From plucking chickens?"
He sat on the edge of the bed and nodded, studying his hands. "Yep. Beau helped me move them to the church. They all fit, which is good."
I took a breath instead of speaking, examining his handsome profile, knowing we were both too tired to have a meaningful discussion about anything, but also wanting to be sure he didn’t mind me being here.
“Cletus.”
“Yes?” He swallowed, his eyes still on his hands.
Might as well cut to the chase. “Do you want me to leave?”
He gave me his attention then, his gaze cutting to mine, wide with what looked like surprise and confusion. “No. Of course not. Why would you ask me that?”
I licked my lips, reaching my hand out to him. “Just making sure.”
He didn’t take it. Instead, he frowned, looking me over, like my question made him angry, and stood from the bed. My heart sunk as he moved to the door and flipped off the light. For a split second I thought he was going to leave me alone in his room. But then I heard him return, felt him shake out the comforter and lay it over me. I listened as he placed a second pillow next to the one under my head and climbed into the bed.
He gathered me to him, his strong arms wrapped around my body, one hand at my hip, the other in my hair.
“I’m glad you’re here,” he whispered, like it was a secret. The words plus his voice made my lungs hot.
I smiled against his chest, relaxing into him. "Thank you."
"For what? Exposing you to my brothers’ bad manners?"
"No." I smiled wider, closing my eyes because I couldn't keep them open another second. "For helping Mr. Badcock. For organizing your family and plucking those chickens. For taking them to the church so they could be salvaged. For saving the man from ruin."
“I don’t know about that.” His fingers pushed into the hair at my temple. “His loss of income is going to be substantial, but I think his insurance will ultimately cover it and we’ll be able to sell all the birds. Billy called Mr. Johnson at the Piggly Wiggly this morning. They’re going to take them and sell them as a special, fancy organic offering, play up the local farmer angle. Says he can charge upwards of twenty dollars for each bird. But you’re right. Twenty dollars ain’t going to help when he usually charges ten dollars per dozen eggs, every day.”
A few moments of silence passed. I felt myself drift, aware but not aware. I don’t know how much time had passed, but at some point he used my hair as leverage to tug my head back while he dipped his forward. Even in my near dream state, I sensed that he was after a kiss. Lifting my chin, our lips met in the middle. A slow, soft press, warm and dizzying.
His leg moved between my knees and the fingers in my hair fisted, pulling roughly. I opened my mouth and he swept in, the hot slide of his tongue somehow both subdued and demanding. One of my hands was trapped between us, but the other automatically slipped under his T-shirt, searching for skin. His muscles moved beneath my palm as his hand in my hair untangled itself, slid over my shoulder, under the covers, down to my knee.
I moaned, arching my back, restless. But then he pulled his mouth away, removing his leg from between mine.
“Wait—”
“Shh. Get some sleep,” he whisper-barked.
“But—”
“Sleep.”
“I—”
“Sleep.”
Grunting, I drifted again, resurfacing when his hand caressed up my leg under my skirt.
He made a sound like he was in pain.
"What?"
His fingers bypassed my bottom and moved to my ribs, lifting my shirt. "I’m not going to take advantage of you when you're this tired." I got the impression he was talking to himself more than to me.
"Why not?"
He paused, held perfectly still, didn’t even seem to be breathing.
I lifted my arm to drape over his neck and yawned. "Do whatever you want. Take off all my clothes. Use me."
A tortured sounding sigh met my ears, then another, and my mouth curved into a hazy, answering smile. Even so, I could no longer stay awake. I was so tired. Very, very tired. Also, I was warm, and comfortable, and felt safe, and happy, and finally content.
And so I slept, dreaming of all the things I wished we were doing instead.
Chapter Seven
“I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote so many poems without signing them, was often a woman.”
― Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own
*Jenn*
I was naked.
I became aware of this fact gradually, mostly because hands were moving over my body unencumbered by clothes. Thinking I was still dreaming until teeth sent a sharp spike of pleasure pain from the center of my breast to low in my belly. I jolted awake, my eyes flying open.
"Cletus!"
He made a sound of satisfaction in the back of his throat as he palmed my other breast, grabbing, massaging. "More of that."
"What?" I asked on a hitching breath because he was kissing a path down my body, his bushy beard and hot breath tickling sensitized skin.
"More of my name, said just like that."
I moaned, pressing the heels of my palms into my eyes, rubbing away the sleep.
"That sound is acceptable too.” I felt his lips smile mid-kiss, just below my belly button. “More of—"
Reba McEntire singing “I’m a Survivor” cut off whatever he was about to say. My face screwed up at the sound of my momma’s ringtone and we both stilled.
Now a sound of pure frustration rumbled out of him. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Ignore it.” I shifted, squirming beneath him, lowering my fingers to push into his hair. "Ignore it and just keep doing . . . whatever you were doing."
He placed another lingering, wet kiss on my lower stomach, his hands circling around to the back of my thighs.
The phone rang again.
He stopped, sighed, and I sensed him lift his head. I huffed, opening my eyes. The room was still dark, but I could make out his shape in the grayish dim, and I just knew he was naked too. A surge of charged, vibrating greed raced through me, a breathtaking yearning that drowned out the sound of my phone. It helped that this was his room and his presence permeated everywhere and everything—the lingering warmth next to me, the depression of the bed where he knelt, his hands on my legs.
I no longer heard anything but the sound of my heart, beating a selfish song, but he must’ve heard something because he said, “You know, I think I'll just turn off your phone.”
“Good idea.” I swallowed thickly, croaking out, “Turn it off.”
Cletus stretched above me, leaned over the side of the bed, and began searching the ground for my phone. My hands were immediately on him. God, he felt so good, his muscles in sharp relief beneath hot skin. The rough hairs of his chest, the trail leading down his defined stomach, everything about him was absolute and delicious perfection. I had the oddest thought, that I just wanted to eat him up. I bit his shoulder, my nails digging into the substantial curve of his firm bottom.
“Whoa. Wait. Jenn. Let me—let me . . . fuck it.” Abandoning his search for the phone, he turned swiftly and pushed me to my back, grabbing my wrists and holding me down as his hips settled between my legs.
“I need you.” I meant it. In the moment, I was desperate for him, for his body, like I might shatter from wanting. Everything hurt and everything felt good.
My phone vibrated and dinged, vibrated and dinged, vibrated and dinged as Cletus expertly licked and sucked and kissed my neck and shoulders, sending thrilling spikes of heat and anticipation to twist and tangle low in my abdomen.
And then, Reba.
I’m a Survivor.
Again.
Someone growled. Maybe both of us growled. I grit my teeth, deciding that my mother was going to pay for this interruption, and she might not survive my wrath. Perhaps Cletus’s famous vengefulness was rubbing off on me because he wasn’t rubbing anywhere on me and I wanted to scream.
Wiggling my wrists to free myself, I leaned over the side of the bed as he sat back.
“It’s in my bag, right here.” I grabbed the strap of my purse and swung it up to him. I didn’t wish to see her text messages. I didn't want to be pulled from the moment, once again, by another emergency. Likely, it was selfish of me to foist the burden of decision-making to him—whether to answer her calls or ignore them—but if I couldn’t exploit Cletus’s dubious moral code for my own benefit sometimes, then was I really living my best life?
Cletus reached inside my purse and ruffled around. Yanking out my cell, he then dropped the bag and tugged his fingers through his hair. The screen illuminated his stern frown, the determination in his eyes abruptly turning to confusion.
He blinked. "What the . . .?”
Darn it all! Where were his dubious morals when I needed them?
"Ignore it. Ignore her. Turn off the phone.” I sat up, shifting my legs under me and lifting to my knees.
"Uh, Jenn. You might want to see this."
“Turn it off and come back to me.” Coaxing him, I placed urgent kisses along his neck and the underside of his ear. My hands, ravenous for the feel of him, caressed down the hard planes of his perfect body.
"Do you get your milk from Farmer Miller?"
What?
OH NO!
Today was dairy day. The list I’d left for my momma included picking up butter, milk, and cream from Miller Farm.
My forehead fell to Cletus's shoulder and I whimpered, "Oh God, his cows aren't dead, are they?"
"No. But he's not selling milk, cream, or butter anymore."
An involuntary sound of helplessness slipped past my lips. It had taken me weeks to find a replacement for Nancy Danvish’s happy cows. "What?"
"According to your momma, there's to be a dairy cow auction in an hour. He’s selling them and most everything else on the farm."
"Are you serious?" I pulled the phone in Cletus's hands and twisted it to face me, reading through her messages.
Momma: Farmer Miller says he ain't selling milk anymore and someone just bought him completely out of reserves this morning. Furthermore, he's retiring!
Momma: He's selling these dairy cows today, at an auction. I'll call you. This is crazy.
Momma: JENNIFER! YOUR FATHER IS RIGHT NOW AT THIS MOMENT HERE ON THIS PROPERTY. MILLER IS GOING INTO BUSINESS WITH YOUR DADDY!! GET DOWN HERE NOW! I AM BUYING ALL THESE DAMN COWS!
"She's buying all the cows?" I glanced up to find Cletus staring at me, looking as confused as I felt.
"She can’t. The Miller Farm has Guernsey cows, twenty of them. They’re hard to come by in the States, incredibly rare and expensive."
"What is going on? Why would she buy all the cows?"
As the last word left my mouth, my phone rang—I’m a Survivor—and my forehead fell to my palm. Surrendering, I answered and pressed the speaker button.
"Momma."
"IT'S YOUR DADDY!" she screeched, making both Cletus and I recoil.
"Are you at the farm now?"
"YOUR DADDY. HE'S GOING INTO BUSINESS WITH FARMER MILLER! HE WANTS TO RUIN ME!"
“Calm down.”
"Don’t tell me to calm down, it’s just like him. This is just like him! Of course. Why didn't I see it?"
Cletus and I swapped a look, and I was happy to see he was still confused, because that made two of us.
"I don't understand what's happening, Momma. Can you slow down and tell me? Start from the beginning."
"Yo
ur evil, good for nothing, impotent, limp dick daddy is buying out local farmers. It all started with Nancy Danvish in the fall, and he is trying to ruin me! Do you understand that?"
"What does that have to do with Farmer Miller's cows?"
"There's an auction for the cows. Today. In one hour.” I could tell she was pacing as she spoke. “And I'm going to buy all those cows."
"We don't need cows."
"You need milk, don't you? For your cakes?"
I looked to Cletus for help, but his eyes were unfocused, staring beyond me, seemingly deep in thought.
"Yes. I need milk for my cakes, and butter, and cream for frosting and such. But—"
"And so I'm buying you the cows. Makes sense to me."
Cletus gently slipped his fingers beneath my palm and cradled the phone. "Ms. Donner, this is Cletus Winston. May I ask, is Principal Sylvester there now?"
Her voice dropped to a heated whisper. "Yes. The rat bastard is looking at me right now with a smirk on his ugly, evil face. And if he keeps on looking at me, I’m going to tear his eyeballs from their sockets and barbeque them on shish kebob sticks and shove them up his flat, wrinkly, old white ass!" She sounded like she was speaking through clenched teeth. She also sounded certifiably insane.
Again, Cletus and I glanced at each other and I got the sense we were both worried about the same thing.
“Uh. Don’t do that,” he said, sounding calm, his tone conversational. “Maybe wait for us in your car? Out of his sight, if it’s a bother. We’ll be right there.”
We’ll be right there? What? No!
A protest rose in my throat because we were naked, together, finally. Let her buy the cows. Let her shish kebob parts of my father. Let them work it out, or not. I didn’t care.
The side of Cletus’s mouth tugged upward a smidge, like he could read my thoughts. But I could tell by the look in his eyes that he’d made up his mind as he asked, “One more question. To the best of your knowledge, does Kip Sylvester plan to buy these cows?"
“Well, he ain’t gunna.” My mother’s dark declaration rang between my ears, foreboding and shrill. “’Cause I'm going to buy all those cows first!"
