I burst out laughing.
“I meant about you.”
“Oh, you meant me?” he says, cupping the back of my head.
His smile is back, and I have to close my eyes and open them again in order to believe it’s real. And all for me.
Steel’s nose grazes mine, and his hand cupping my head tilts it. My lips part as his soft lips press against mine. He’s really here. At first he didn’t seem real, like I might’ve been imagining his return, but now his kiss puts any doubt of hallucinations out of my head.
His lips are the most wonderful feeling in the world, and make all the pain and loneliness of the past few months vanish.
A pick-up flies past us, bringing me back to reality.
I put my hand on his chest, and say, “We can’t here, we’re not far enough out of town.”
“What’s the matter with the town?”
“It’s small.”
“And full of people who don’t mind their own damn business?”
“You got it. Is your car parked in town?”
“Don’t got a car, I hitched.”
“Okay, at least we don’t have to worry about it.” How can he not have a car?
Putting my car in gear, I carry on down the country road. I intend to go to Woburn, the nearest big town, just to make sure no one sees us. It won’t take long. Thirty minutes max, once I get back to a decent-sized road.
“Where’re you staying?” I ask. I don’t want him to stay at the one motel in town, everyone will figure out who he is sooner rather than later, and someone will probably confront him. Most likely my father.
“Haven’t figured that out yet.”
“Huh?”
“I just got to your town this morning, and I’ve been hanging out on the street.”
“Good thing you didn’t do that, my father might have seen you and kicked your ass.”
“What the hell went on here after I left?”
“You don’t even want to know. Let’s just say, my father freaked out and the whole town’s talking.”
“So leave,” he says.
“I can’t just leave.”
“Sure you can.”
17
Stranger in a Strange Land (Steel)
“There’s a place up here we can get a coffee at and talk,” Emily says.
“Sounds good to me.”
We carry on driving down the country road, eventually turning left onto a main road. The closed space of the car is filled with her rosy scent. It’s exactly how I remembered it, and each inhale makes me want her more.
“Did you freak too, like your dad?” I ask.
“What do you think?”
“I think you didn’t, not after the way you yelled my name in the bunkie.”
Her cheeks turn bright red and she stares at the road ahead of her.
“I’m just kidding, Goldie, it wasn’t just the way you yelled my name.” She’s the only person I’ve ever talked to, really talked to, instead of just shooting the shit. I’m sure it was the same for her.
“I knew there was something more between us,” she says, her voice quiet and hard to hear over the noise of the car.
I reach over and put my hand on her thigh, the way I did that evening in The Zipper. The warmth from her leg fills me, washing away the freezing cold stuck in my bones from the three days it took to hitch here.
We spend the rest of the twenty-minute drive talking and laughing. It’s like we’ve never been apart. Or like we’ve known each other forever.
The coffee place looks like a truck stop, the kind of place I feel at home in after all the years spent on the road, going from town to town and state to state. I get out of the car and glance down the road, tall signs advertising gas stations, fast food joints and motels line the street.
We each have a drip coffee and sit on opposite sides of a booth. We continue to talk, through three whole cups of coffee.
“What are your plans?” Emily asks, changing the subject.
“My plans?”
“Yeah, how long are you staying in town? Are you still working at the carnival?”
Fuck if I know, I haven’t thought that far ahead. All my focus has been on getting back to her.
“Don’t know. All I was thinking about was finding you.”
“Well, you found me,” she says with a coy smile while tilting her head.
Plans don’t matter much to carnies. I feel like a fish out of water.
“My plan was to find you and now I’ve done that, it’s to be with you.” Emily’s eyes sparkle and she hooks her foot around mine under the table. Her actions cause a huge smile on my face. “And that’s my plan.”
“I like that plan. But where are you going to stay?”
As if I’ve thought that far ahead. Doesn’t she get the way I live? Looking out the window, I see a Motel 6 sign down the road.
“Figure I’ll stay at a motel while I figure out what we’re going to do.”
“Isn’t that going to be expensive? I mean, how long are you going to stay there?”
“Don’t matter how long I have to stay there, as long as it’s near you, I’ll pay the price.”
What am I going to do? Find a nine-to-five job? The same jobs I’ve been criticizing my whole life?
“Shit,” Emily says, pulling her phone out of her purse. “I didn’t text my parents, they’re probably wondering why I’m not back from the coffee shop.”
“What business is it of theirs?”
“I don’t want them to worry. Normally, I would’ve been home hours ago.”
“I hope you’re telling them you won’t be back anytime soon.” She’d better not rush off on me.
“I’m telling them I’ve gone shopping at the mall. They won’t expect me back soon.”
“Say you’ve gone with your friends.”
“I don’t do much with my friends anymore. Not since that night.”
“Fuck, seriously?” Am I that hated just because I’m a carny?
“We’re still friends, just not as close. They didn’t support me when I said I was going to find you. All they did was try to stop me.”
I lean back into the booth and look up at the ceiling, Papa Smurf’s words rattling through my head, ‘You’ll find out the hard way that you’re from a different world than her, and the outside world don’t approve of us.’
Maybe no one in her life approves of me, but she does, and that’s all that matters.
Emily sets her phone on the table and says, “What are we going to do?”
“I’m getting real tired of having this table between us. Let’s go check into my motel.”
We get back in her car, and I direct her to the Motel 6. It’s forty bucks a night, and that’s going to add up fast. I don’t want to blow my savings on it. I’m going to have to find another solution.
Sliding the key into the lock, I open the door. The overpowering smell of Lysol hits me, but at least it’s clean. Other than that, it’s your standard two double beds and ugly pictures on the wall motel room.
“Are you finally going to show me the rest of your tattoos?” Emily asks with her killer smile as she goes through the doorway.
It’s all I’ve been thinking about all these months.
“Wait here, I need a quick shower.”
“Okay,” she says, shrugging.
I have expected her to ask to join me, but then I realize this is Emily, the good girl. Who’s still a virgin.
Stepping into the hot flow, I stand still while I let the water wash over me. After three days of hitchhiking in big-rigs, I could stand here all day. But I don’t want to keep her waiting. After ripping the paper off a tiny bar of soap, I thoroughly clean myself and shut off the water.
My clean clothes are in my backpack, which is still in the bedroom area. With only a towel tied around my waist, I leave the bathroom.
Emily is sitting back on the bed, looking at her phone. Good, I’m glad she’s relaxed and not perched on the edge of the bed or
something.
When she notices I’ve come back in the room, she looks up. Not very far up, her eyes seem to be stuck on my abs. When I take a step in her direction, her eyes move down to my legs. I realize she’s seeing the tattoos on my lower legs for the first time, and stay still while she examines them. My dick is twitching under the heat of her gaze, the towel shows each little movement.
This wasn’t my plan. I didn’t bring her here expecting anything from her. I just want her. The last thing I want is for her to feel pressured.
The television remote is on the desk behind me, and I turn and grab it. Turning the tv on, I flip through the channels until I find MTV. Coldplay is playing, which is perfect even if they are old.
“Do you have any more under that towel?” she asks.
Am I going to show her the rest under my towel?
“You’ll find out,” I say, turning to face her. “Now come over here and kiss me.” I stay where I am but hold out my hand, beckoning her.
Emily flies off the bed and into my arms. Exactly the way I’ve been imagining all these nights alone in my bed.
Holding her close to me, I inhale her rose scent and let it soothe the frustration of the time we spent apart.
I kiss her silky hair and down along her cheek. Tilting her head to mine, my mouth connects with her soft lips. Emily gasps and submits to my touch. My tongue probes her mouth, and before long her own tongue is twirling with mine.
All these nights I’ve been thinking how I can make her first time special for her, and now I finally get to. Shit, I almost forgot to show her something.
I pull my lips away from hers and say, “Hold on, Goldie, I did something I want to show you.”
Her brow furrows in puzzlement as I move away from her and to my backpack. I rifle through the papers, my passport, and birth certificate until I find the piece of paper I’m looking for and pull it out of the bag. I step back to Emily and place it in her hand.
“What’s this?” she asks, confused.
“It’s a test I did to show you I don’t have any STDs or anything.”
“This is from October.”
“That’s after the last time I was with anyone. The last time I was with you. Now I know you, I could never look at another woman.”
“What happened to the party every night?”
“The parties were pretty boring without you there,” I say, chuckling.
Emily flings her arms around me. Speaking into my chest, she says, “Thank you for this.” She hesitates before continuing, “I haven’t been with anybody else, either.”
I know that already, Goldie. Your pussy is all mine.
18
More Than Words Can Say (Emily)
Steel’s clean scent envelops me, and I take a deep breath to savor it. He tucks my hair behind my ear. The warmth from his hand helps to ease the tingling in my tummy. But the heat from his body pushes the tingles straight down between my legs.
He brushes his finger down my cheek before using it to tilt my chin. His mouth crushes against mine, and all the tingling between my legs flies throughout my whole body.
Every single night since the carnival, I’ve gone to bed sad that I hadn’t found him, and tonight I won’t be thinking that at all, instead I’ll be elated that he found me.
Though I didn’t wake up this morning thinking today would be the day I’d be in a motel room with a mostly naked Steel. It’s all so fast, but at the same time, so right.
In the back of my head, it seems like I should be more nervous, but I’m not. Everything feels exactly as it should. In the months I spent longing for Steel, I sometimes wondered if my memory of that one night was wrong.
My friends and family told me over and over that I was being silly, and that one night could never mean so much. But after the hours spent with Steel today, I know they were wrong and my memory was right.
The test he did for me proves it. That was so sweet of him. It makes me crazy happy to know that all these months he’s been thinking of me the same way I’ve been thinking of him.
And now I’m in Steel’s arms. I never want to leave them.
I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I’m a little nervous. I have no idea what to expect, or even what we’re going to do. But at least this time he doesn’t have his jeans to hide behind.
Already his erection is digging into me. It seems so big. Huge in comparison to Connor’s.
As his tongue explores deeper into my mouth, his hand slides down the back of my sweater and settles on my jean-clad butt. A moan escapes me as he squeezes it.
Following his lead, I run my hands over his naked chest. No matter where I touch, his muscles under my hands are rock hard. Everything about this man is perfection.
Steel’s hands grip the hem of my sweater, and leans back from me. I lift my arms over my head to allow him to take it off. He reaches around behind me and undoes my bra before pulling it off and letting it drop on the floor.
His eyes slide over my breasts and torso before capturing my own eyes in his.
“You’re beautiful,” he says.
Wrapping my back in his arms, my bare skin presses against his for the first time. The feeling is electric, and my skin prickles with goose bumps. I want to feel all of my body against his, and start tugging at my belt.
“I’ll do it,” Steel says.
Without any warning, he scoops me from my feet and cradles me in his arms, and I gasp. My heart beats at a million miles a minute as he takes the few steps to the bed and lays me down in the center of the bed.
“I started eating a lot of candy apples to remember how sweet and juicy your pussy was on my lips.”
I laugh, and his words ease my nerves.
Another slow song, Ed Sheeran I think, comes on MTV.
Steel undoes my belt and jeans, and slowly pulls them down my legs. The anticipation of him touching me has made my panties sopping wet.
Once my jeans are off my feet, he kisses from my baby toe up to my knees and then all over as much of my thighs as he can. I close my eyes to try to commit every little kiss and my body’s reaction to him to my memory.
He pauses what he’s doing to say, “Every time I thought of you, remembered your taste, my cock got so hard it hurt like hell.”
His words wash over me, quickening my breath and causing a throbbing between my legs.
By the time Steel reaches my upper thighs, the rest of my body is fluttering as much as the zillion butterflies between my legs. Each time he kisses my thighs, I rock my hips, wishing, hoping he’ll move his kisses along. It seems like an agonizing amount of time has passed and my pussy is begging for his attention.
Steel’s finger brushes over the fabric of my panties, and a high-pitched moan flies from my throat. He groans in reaction.
Hooking a finger into my panties, he yanks them off and makes a funny sound.
My eyes shoot open and I lift my head to see him.
“Nice tattoo,” he says, and smiles.
I’d been dying to tell him about my rose tattoo, but wanted him to discover it for himself.
“I did it for you,” I say, embarrassed.
“Now your body matches the way you smell,” he says, and kisses it.
“Huh?”
“You always smell like roses.”
I giggle. I always wear rose perfume, and can’t believe he noticed.
“Are you going to show me the rest of your tats now?” I say, propping myself on my elbows.
“I’m busy,” he says, and kisses my mound, sending heat coursing through me and making me forget all about whatever it was we were talking about.
I flop down off my elbows and sink into the bed as his lips and tongue take control of my body. He kisses all around my mound and through my folds, but avoids my clit. Every cell in my body is worked up and desperate for release.
“Please,” I try to say, but it comes out as a breathy gasp.
Steel growls, the noise only heightening my need. He flicks my clit with his
tongue, and I squeal. Without waiting, he slides his fingers into me and sucks my clit into his mouth.
It forces me to moan and squeal as my body bubbles into a frenzy. I fist and knead the bedspread in my hands. He keeps going, bringing me higher and higher until I crash. Heat explodes between my legs, sending a rush of pleasure to my toes, fingers and head. The intensity forces me to squeeze my eyes shut again.
“Steel,” I moan.
After I calm, he moves up over my body, stopping along the way to kiss my breasts and neck. I’m vaguely aware of the music on MTV.
His kisses stop, and I open my eyes. He’s hovering over me, his nose almost touching mine. Our eyes connect for a moment, before he kisses the tip of my nose.
“You’re sure you want this?” he asks.
“I’ve spent every minute since October wanting this.”
“Good, but I’ll warn you now. I’m going to be gentle on you this time, for you, but only this time.”
I gasp at his words.
His mouth crushes onto mine, and we kiss. Steel brings his hips closer to me, his hard dick lies up against my mound, the towel still between us.
As he moves his hips, his dick pushes against my clit, drawing all of the heat in me back between my legs. I moan through his mouth.
We’re getting close, he’s going to enter me soon, once he gets rid of that towel. Part of me starts to worry, to wonder what it will be like or if it will hurt. But I force those worries away and focus on the incredible man on top of me.
Steel pulls his head away, and asks, “Want to see the rest of my tattoos?”
“Now?”
“You don’t want to take my towel off?” he says, rolling off me and onto his back.
My eyes widen and with a coy smile say, “Definitely.”
Moving onto my hands and knees, I move over him. His massive erection creates a bump under the towel. I decide to start at the bottom edge and quickly work my way there. I push my hands underneath it and slide it up, kissing each of the tattoos I find.
There’s an eagle on the top of his left thigh, and some kind of tribal design wraps around his right thigh. They are both incredible hot, like the rest of his tattoos. I’ve even come to love the one on his neck.
Carny: A Bad Boy Small Town Romance Page 7
