Caleb’s Salvation

by Doyle, S

  No, we didn’t need to talk about it. Actions rather than words. I turned toward her and pulled her the rest of the way on top of my body. Her legs intermingling with mine, her hands planted firmly on my chest. I cupped her face and wished I could see her expression in the darkened cabin. Surprise probably. Anticipation certainly. Vivienne hadn’t been coy about her attraction to me. It had always been there. The way she looked at me, the way she worked not to touch me. The times she couldn’t resist, like when I smiled at her.

  I kissed her. A gentle push against her mouth. A question I wanted answered. When she opened her mouth to my tongue I knew, I had my answer. Sweetness, softness, everything that was Vivienne with that edge that showed her strength. The sense that she wanted more than she was taking. That she was willing to let me lead as long as I took her where she wanted to go.

  What did she even know about sex? I wanted to ask but I didn’t want to stop kissing her to find out. Five nights I’d cared for her. Five nights I’d slept next to her and it seemed like it was always supposed to end up this way.

  I didn’t think about her age or my age. About why this shouldn’t be happening. About what it might mean to open myself up to the potential for more pain. I only knew I could no longer resist.

  I’d only smiled at her once. This creature who’d pummeled through all my defenses. All my scowls. And still she didn’t shy away from me.

  I rolled her underneath me, wanting to her to feel my weight. Wanting to press my cock against her middle so she would understand where this was going. That I was going to fuck her, that I was going to fuck for the first time in seven years because of her.

  Only her.

  “Caleb,” she whispered in breathy little pants even as I ran my hand up her thigh. So fucking soft. Cupping her ass, her cheek barely filled my palm.

  “Caleb… Sam.”

  Sam? Oh, the kid. I bent to whisper in her ear. “He’s fast asleep.”

  “I know but…oh,” she moaned as I gently found her core and slid a single finger inside.

  The heat. The fucking wet, delicious heat. I’d forgotten what this was, what this felt like. It felt like my head was going to explode I was so turned on. I kissed her again. I wanted my tongue in her mouth, my finger in her pussy.

  I couldn’t actually fuck her. I didn’t have a condom, but making her come, hearing my name on her lips, would be satisfying enough.

  “No, Caleb… I just can’t. Not with Sam.” She squirmed away from me but didn’t leave the bed.

  I sighed and rolled onto my back. Then I sucked on the finger I’d just had deep inside her. Her quiet gasp filled the room.

  Once she could see I didn’t plan to push her, she snuggled back against my side.

  “I’m sorry. Maybe it seems silly…”

  “Don’t worry about it. Sarah would never let me fuck her, either, when Emily was a baby and slept in our room.”

  Her hand then reached out and dropped over my heart. I placed mine over it.

  “I think now would probably be a good time to tell me about her,” she said quietly.

  “Yeah.” Because if I was going to do this thing. If I was going to break seven years of abstinence for a young woman I had no business wanting but did anyway, then she was probably entitled to that story.

  Also, she needed understand when I did finally fuck her, it was going to be rough, hot and fast that first time.

  She settled her cheek on my chest, her hand still resting over my heart, her thigh wedged between mine. My dick was still rock hard but telling this story would take care of that.

  “I’m listening,” she whispered.

  “I met Sarah when I was getting my graduate degree in chemical engineering at Stanford. She was just finishing law school there. We were set up on a blind date and I could tell the first moment she looked at me, she wasn’t sure what she was getting into. I grew up on a dairy farm in Oregon, all rough edges and blunt talking. And she was your typical California girl. Blond, beautiful and smart as hell. So damn vibrant. She was definitely too good for me, but that didn’t stop me from going after her and, somehow, I managed to win her over. Got married in our twenties, waited a few years to have Emily. I was working for an oil company in L.A. Sarah was working as a junior prosecutor…”

  “You were happy,” Vivienne concluded.

  “Ridiculously. We had it all. Good jobs, sweet kid. We were still hot for each other seven years into our marriage. Then I got a promotion, but it meant being away for weeks at a time on an offshore rig. We fought about it, but I couldn’t walk away from the opportunity. Something that would put me on the fast track to senior management. It put a strain on our relationship, but I had no worries we were strong enough to overcome that. But one trip got extended. I was going to be gone for six weeks. She flipped out and said that was too long for Emily to go without seeing me. I got so angry at what I thought was a guilt trip, I told her to come down and fucking see me if it was so damn important.”

  I could feel Vivienne get tense around me, but I suppose she needed to know that about me, too. I hadn’t lied about that. I was still rough edges and blunt talking.

  “I said exactly that. Come down and fucking see me. And she did. Packed bags for her and Emily. Put her in the car and drove from L.A. to San Diego to surprise me with a visit. Halfway down a tractor trailer blew out a tire and sideswiped into oncoming traffic. Sarah and Emily were killed instantly.”

  This time it wasn’t tension. Vivienne was trying to squeeze me to give me comfort.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, and I could feel the tears leaking out of her eyes and onto my chest.

  “Me, too. Every day. Only I never got to tell her.”

  That was the reason for my self-punishment. My exile from society. In an angry fit, I told my wife it was her responsibility to see me, her responsibility for my kid to see me. I’d had this precious, precious thing. This perfect family. These lives that were my responsibility and I fucked it up.

  “You have to forgive yourself, Caleb.”

  “Don’t ask me to do that. Because I won’t. Ever.”

  Hubris. That was my sin. Thinking I could have more than everything. And that sin cost me all of it. No, I didn’t have any intention of forgiving myself.

  But I was going to give in to something I hadn’t thought I ever would.

  I wanted to fuck Vivienne, so I was going to fuck her. I wanted to kiss her and sleep in this bed, so I was going to do that, too. If I felt guilty, that was my guilt to suffer. If I felt dirty for betraying Sarah, then again, that was my pain to suffer.

  None of that, however, could touch Vivienne.

  She’d done nothing other than unknowingly seduce me. Nothing other than make me care when I hadn’t thought I had any care left.

  But seven years was a long time.

  Vivienne didn’t say anything. She just wrapped herself more firmly around me as if she were a blanket. Or possibly a shield.

  It was sweet.

  And when the kid woke up in the middle of the night, I got out of bed to settle him before he could wake her.

  12

  Bud’s

  Vivienne

  I buzzed around the tables, dropping off beers and picking up tips. I was grateful for the work, not just because I needed to start making money again after missing so many days, but because it gave me something to think about other than Caleb.

  Caleb, with his broken heart that, after all this time, he wouldn’t let himself heal.

  Which seemed such a shame. Because the man who’d watched over me, taken care of me and Sam while we were sick, that was a man who deserved a family. Deserved a child he could play the airplane game with anytime he wanted. Who willingly got out of bed at the first hint of stirring so that I could sleep.

  I’d watched him in the dark pull Sam out of his crib, change his diaper and snuggle him against his chest, until Sammy couldn’t resist the lull of the rocking and drifted off in Caleb’s arms.

  Then Caleb
had come back to bed and I drifted off into his arms, too.

  Drifted off only to have sex dreams. Dreams of Caleb on top of me, inside me. Dreams that felt so real I woke up with an orgasm. Because that had to be what that feeling was. An all-over delicious body yawn.

  My first one. With Caleb. Even though he didn’t know it.

  The door to Bud’s opened and like everyone did every time, we all looked to see who was coming in. As if some night there might be a surprise when there rarely was.

  Tonight, it was just Caleb. Alone. He gave chin nods to those who reached out to him, but he made his way to the bar instead of a table. I took a few orders, trying not to stare at him, trying not to wonder what anything between us meant.

  Because I didn’t know. I’d lost my mother but had never felt connected to her in a way that her leaving crushed me. I’d lost my father but his version of love had always been so judgmental and restrictive it had been hard to offer him any affection in return.

  Did I pity Pop? Yes. Did I worry about him? Yes. Did I miss him? No.

  So I had no understanding for what Caleb was suffering. I only knew that when Sam had been so sick and I’d felt so helpless to make him better, I’d had this ungodly fear I’d never come close to feeling before.

  Caleb had that fear realized when he lost his daughter.

  So that I understood. And that I knew could be soul crushing. Pair that with losing his wife of seven years and the pain was nearly unimaginable.

  I could see how deep the wound went now and I knew it wasn’t healed.

  But what I didn’t know was where that left me. He’d kissed me, he’d wanted to have sex with me before I stopped him. He slept in my bed like it was an expectation for him to be there.

  We’d been doing what felt like this strange dance for months, where I moved right while he feinted left. And now suddenly he was right on top of me and I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to handle that.

  Except that orgasm had felt really, really good.

  Could it be as simple as that?

  It certainly wasn’t with Sammy’s father. I’d been motivated to rebel, to experience, to lure someone into changing my life for me. That’s all that experience had been about. Nothing so simple as pleasure. In fact, there’d been little of that.

  But I didn’t need that anymore. I had a life, a job, a child, a home. Friends.

  I’d changed my life for myself.

  Was I allowed to have a lover?

  Slowly, so he wouldn’t know how completely fixated I was on him, I made my way to the bar where he was sitting. I tried to keep it simple so I bumped his shoulder with mine.

  “Avoiding tipping me by going directly to the bar? Feels a little cheap, Caleb.”

  “Woman, I’ve been giving you no less than twenty dollars a night in tips every time I’m in here.”

  This was true. And when he said tips, he meant the money I just kept from him because I knew I could. All part of our dance.

  “No guys tonight?”

  “No. Jackson’s in Nome with Kate and Eli’s with Shelby.”

  “Heard from Ark at all?” I’d only known Ark for a few weeks before he’d left Dyson. But like Jackson and Eli, he’d been a regular at Bud’s.

  “Actually, yeah. He called to tell me he and Olivia are married. No big to do. Just immediate family down in Mexico for a destination wedding.”

  “Oh, well, that’s exciting. Seems crazy, though. Like it was only a few months ago that he got all riled up any time she came into town.”

  “Yeah, well, sometimes it happens like that. Knowing Ark, he wouldn’t have wasted any time once he knew what he wanted.”

  “Makes sense,” I muttered. Again, having no clue really how anything did happen. The fact that I was standing here next to Caleb not knowing a darn thing to say proved that.

  “You going to eat?” I asked him, rubbing his back gently, just like I did with Sammy when I wanted to soothe him. “You should eat. You probably lost a lot of sleep taking care of me and Sammy.”

  “Nothing I couldn’t handle,” he turned then so he was facing me directly. And it was there in his eyes again. That pain inside him that I could somehow feel in my chest. I wanted to hug him. I wanted touch his cheek and rub it until he could feel how much of his burden I would gladly carrier for him.

  “Why did you come here tonight?” I asked, feeling the weight of his attention on me. Knowing that he wanted something from me and not knowing if I was willing to give him what he needed. Because, in the end, it might crush me.

  “For you.”

  He reached out and circled my wrist. Watching now as his thumb brushed along the sensitive skin there. No secret this time, no pretending he wasn’t doing exactly what he was doing.

  I took a breath, feeling him in every pore of my body but still in some ways not understanding. “I don’t understand. Why did you suddenly change your mind about me?”

  “I didn’t change my mind. I just stopped fighting myself. I want to take you back to your cabin and fuck you, Vivienne. I’ve wanted that since you got off the damn plane.”

  I nodded before I could talk myself out of it. For whatever reason, I knew Caleb needed me. To soothe him, to hold him, maybe to heal him if he would open himself to that. And all those things I wanted to give him.

  I also wanted to make love. I wanted to know what it was like because, with Caleb, this wouldn’t be some fifteen-minute event in the back of an eighteen-wheeler. This would be Caleb doing what he did best, and that was taking care of me.

  “Bud,” I called out because he was in the kitchen. “I’m leaving for the night.”

  It wasn’t as late as I usually stayed but after being sick, he’d probably thought I’d hit my limit.

  “Yup,” I heard him call back.

  “Want to finish your beer?” I asked Caleb, pointing at the half-filled glass in front of him. He stood and bent so he was close to my ear.

  “No. I can’t fucking wait to have you under me. But this can’t look like anything to my men. You understand me? You were sick, you’re leaving a little early tonight. Alone. I’ll stay here, finish my beer. I’ll leave alone, too.”

  I nodded. That made sense. He wouldn’t want people to think we were something when we weren’t.

  Dave used to make me do the same thing. Let him leave the diner first alone, then pretend I was going for a smoke break, even though everyone knew I didn’t smoke.

  I didn’t want to think about that, or how it made me feel, so I left Caleb and went behind the bar to get my stuff.

  I called out a goodnight to all the regulars as I left and started walking to the cabin. Once inside, I went through the normal rituals of getting out of my winter gear and stoking the potbelly stove. It was strange not to have Sammy in his crib, but of course, I wouldn’t have been able to do what I was going to do with Caleb if Sammy were here and not at Shelby’s.

  I thought about what I should do now.

  Take off my clothes?

  Get into bed?

  Wait for him naked?

  Instead I sat in the chair near the stove and wrapped my arms around myself. Wondered if this mistake was going to be worse than the mistake I made with Dave.

  Because I cared about Caleb and I had no idea how he felt about me.

  A few minutes later there was knock on the door and I jumped.

  I got up to open the door to him. He stepped inside the cabin without a word and shook himself free of the light snow that must have just started falling.

  I backed away and watched him strip out of his winter gear, only he didn’t stop with that. He sat on the chair and removed his heavy boots and socks. Then he stood and shucked the wool sweater he was wearing, the long-sleeved T-shirt underneath that. His jeans, his shorts…all of it until he was standing naked in front of me.

  My jaw dropped. I’d never seen a naked man. Not fully. I’d seen Dave’s thing but that wasn’t the same as having this tall, powerfully built man standing in front of m
e with a fully hard dick.

  Oh shit, he was huge!

  “I don’t…I’m not sure…that was fast.”

  He walked toward me and wrapped his hand around my neck, in my hair. “It wasn’t fair. I’d seen you when you were sick. I wanted you to see me, too. As I am. I’m forty-two, Vivienne. Not old, but not young.”

  I had no concept of what a forty-two-year-old man should look like. I only knew Caleb was beautiful. A smattering of hair on his chest, thick thighs. Strong arms that carried me around when I was ill as if I weighed nothing. And the erection pressing against my stomach wasn’t something he’d needed a pill to make happen.

  I was nervous, I was intimidated, but I was also thankful. Because in that moment, I felt like his true equal. Neither one of us perhaps perfect for the other, but both of us wanting to be here. In this time and in this place.

  Reaching up, I wrapped my arms around his neck. “You don’t scare me, Caleb. Now, why don’t you take me to bed?”

  He bent and kissed me then. Not in the way he had like he was a man dying of thirst and I was his oasis. This was more of a coaxing kiss, an asking kiss. Letting me decide if I would let him in. Which of course, I did.

  How could I not?

  “Vivienne, you need to know something,” he whispered against my lips.

  “What?”

  “I haven’t…I haven’t fucked a woman…since Sarah. Over seven years. I don’t know how much control I’m going to have when it comes to you.”

  It was strange but the revelation didn’t surprise me. Caleb had sentenced himself to prison when his wife and child were killed. Maybe understandably, but not justifiably. It had been an accident. A horrible and tragic accident, but something he would never be able to reconcile.

  Self-punishment, then, was an obvious reaction.

  It did raise a question, though.

  “Why me?”

  He pulled back then, looking into my face as if it were strange I would even ask such a question.

  “You need me,” he said. “I saw it in your face when you stepped off that plane and that neediness…it’s like a drug for me. All I wanted to do was take care of you, feed you, pleasure you. And I can’t shake it loose. Haven’t been able to for months. No matter how hard I fight it. So I’m done fighting.”