by Afton Locke
Mother pointed at the water. “Look at those ducks. Maybe you can include them in your painting.”
“I’ll try,” Rose replied as she mixed a lighter shade to build texture and highlights into the water.
Between brush strokes, she sneaked glances at her mother—who never seemed to close her eyes—on her left and the bushes—where Leroy must be very impatient of waiting by now—on her right. It was a wonder she managed to paint at all with so many distractions.
Her lips and breasts tingled with frustration, needing to feel his mouth on them again. Why wasn’t Mother asleep yet? Leroy couldn’t stay away from his work forever. Rose shook her head. What was the use? Without Father’s permission for Leroy to court her, they had no future.
The bushes rustled again. Leroy must be ready to leave. In desperation, she yawned herself, hoping it would be contagious. Moments later, Rose grinned when her mother yawned too, one followed by another.
As soon as Mother’s eyes closed, Rose set down her brush and walked toward the oak tree. Leroy appeared, wearing a brown homespun shirt a couple of shades lighter than his skin. He scooped her into a powerful hug that embraced every cell in her body. The big wooden buttons on the flaps of his shirt pockets pressed into her. For a moment, she wasn’t sure she could breathe. When he released her, her fingers and toes tingled with warmth.
“Was I too rough?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No, I just have to get used to it.”
In her family, hugs were rare, and when they did occur, bodily contact was kept to a minimum.
As he had yesterday, he carried her up to the sturdy bough.
Finally nestled on his lap, she curled her fingers around the back of his neck. “I’m sorry. I thought she’d never fall asleep.”
He glanced at his wristwatch. “I’m afraid we haven’t got much time. The saw at the lumber mill broke and had to be repaired.”
She frowned. “What?”
He took off his cap and hung it on a nearby twig. “I mean the lumber delivery that was supposed to come yesterday is coming today instead. I’ve got to be back at Pearl Point before one.”
“Then how long do we have?”
“About fifteen minutes,” he replied. “Twenty if I ride that bike extra fast.”
“Where is your bicycle?”
“Hidden in the bushes,” he said.
She clasped both sides of his face, wanting to make the most of their time together. The skin here was as fiery warm as the rest of him she’d touched so far. How could the man be so hot all the time? It was as if he had a coal-burning stove inside him. She traced his cheekbones and slid a finger down the arrow-shaped nose that seemed to point straight at her heart.
“Even though it’s only been one day, I missed the hell out of you, sweet girl.”
“I missed you too,” she said before offering her mouth to him.
Despite their limited time, he kissed her leisurely, letting wet flesh slide against wet flesh from one end of their mouths to the other. Her chafed breasts swelled and ached for his touch under the scalloped collar of her cream blouse as she pressed her chest to his.
“We’d better not do anything besides kiss today,” he said.
“Right.”
But her hands found their way inside the coarse fabric of his shirt after unbuttoning one of the wooden buttons. The sensation of his rough spiral chest hairs against her palms soaked her bloomers again. The more she touched, the more his scent wrapped around her and squeezed her as tight as his arms. It was a potent, spicy mixture of the hard work he’d done all morning and his desire for her.
Birds fluttered in the limbs of the tree, filling the air around them with staccato chirps and flashes of movement. She laughed while she brushed away an inchworm that dropped onto his shoulder. It was as if their passion had awakened every creature in their tree to a frenzied fever.
He turned her so her back was against his chest, running his hands down her hips and across her thighs. Her sensitive skin twitched beneath her skirt. There was no time for words. Just this. His body touching hers, filling it with satisfaction and yearning at the same time.
It wasn’t fair they only had fifteen minutes while she had to give a lifetime to some unknown white man her father would select for her. When Leroy slid the hem of her beige skirt above her knees and farther, she knew she should stop him. But she was as frozen as the tree limb they sat on.
“Your bare legs make it so easy for me to touch you,” he said.
She wore socks because they were more comfortable, especially during the summer. His touch was beyond…comfortable. Her breath caught when his fingers played with the inner skin of her thighs below her bloomers.
“They’re old-fashioned, aren’t they?” she asked.
“I like old-fashioned,” he whispered in her ear as his fingers skated over the cotton fabric and inside the elastic bands rimming her legs.
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” she said, “especially with Mother so close by.”
“Pull them down,” he told her. “She can’t see us with all these leaves around.”
“But if I try to wrestle them off, we might fall out of the tree.” Her words sounded feeble even to her. She didn’t know what he was about to do, but knew she needed it with the core of her being.
“I just want to look at you,” he said. “When my grandmother was living, she used to hang her bloomers on the clothesline. They were open in the middle. Why aren’t these?”
“I don’t know.”
She cried against her fist when he ripped the seam between her legs and parted it. Looking down, she could see her thatch of brown hair and Leroy’s dark fingers playing over it. He barely touched her, but the stirring of just one hair sent lightning bolts shooting through her core.
“Y-you said you were just going to look,” she pointed out.
He exhaled a groan that made the air around her feel even hotter and more humid.
“Now that I’ve seen you, I can’t help touching your pretty flower, Rose.”
He must realize the fabric was damp and the scent of her was strong from being trapped under it. This was too personal, too embarrassing. How could she sit in such an unladylike position with her mother so near?
She clutched the ripped halves of the seam, determined to close it again. “Leroy, you should stop. Only married people do this sort of thing.”
“Then marry me,” he demanded.
“You know I can’t.”
“You’re mine, Rose, marriage or no marriage. That makes touching you all right.”
His determination and the traitorous stirrings of her own flesh overpowered her common sense. Undeterred, he parted her hairs with his finger to reveal the swollen nub that ached so much. While he stroked it with a fingertip, electric sensations she’d never experienced before made her legs twitch.
“Leroy, please—”
“Please, what, sweet girl?”
She shook her head, letting the hair tangle across her face because she didn’t know. Stop? Don’t stop? Either choice was too excruciating to bear.
Rose continued to observe as his finger slid down to the seeping folds and back up, carrying moisture with it to coat the protruding button.
“You smell so sweet,” he whispered into her hair. “I can’t wait to—”
“Fuck me?”
His hand stilled. “What did you just say?”
“That’s what you want to do to me, isn’t it?”
Or was that what she wanted him to do to her? Not that it mattered. They shouldn’t do such a thing.
Leroy took a deep breath as if he’d been holding it. “I want to know where innocent little Rose learned such language.”
“The streets of Baltimore. I got lost while taking a walk one day and accidentally saw a man and woman…in an alley.”
He rested his palm between her legs, moving it just enough to steal her breath. “And what did they do?”
“She was bent over with h
er skirt pulled up and he was…behind her…fucking her.”
Leroy wiggled his hips a little, making the leaves around them tremble. “Did he thrust in and out like this?”
A muscle deep inside her tightened. “Yes. I know the words because the man used them all.”
She didn’t bother mentioning she wasn’t allowed to take walks by herself. After that, she didn’t do it again, but the memory stayed with her. Afterward, she woke up wet inside with a strange fluttery feeling down here as if that man in the alley had visited her in her sleep.
Leroy’s fingers caressed and explored her folds. “Imagining you watching that makes me so excited, Rose. Someday I’m going to bend you over and fuck you the way that man did the woman.”
Perspiration covered her brow as she pictured it.
“Do you hear that?” he asked.
Slippery sounds emanated from her spread legs where he touched her. If Father found her doing this, he’d probably kill Leroy. They had to stop, so why couldn’t she move? Her legs trembled, held open for so long, but she couldn’t seem to close them. Maybe she did belong to this man.
When his finger slipped into her channel, she imagined it was his penis instead. It felt as huge as a log, but there was no pain. Just a tight pleasure that threatened to split her in half. Her white cream clung to the dark skin of his finger as he slid it inside her, deeper and deeper.
Finally, she couldn’t look anymore. Her neck had grown too weak to support her head, which fell back on his shoulder as she closed her eyes. As if he knew exactly what she needed, he quickened the pace.
The tree and everything around them disappeared as Leroy’s slick thrusting filled her world. Her legs twitched even harder, scraping the heels of her shoes on the tree bark. Not knowing why she did it, she thrust against his touch.
“That’s right, Rose. Squirm for me.”
The more the pressure inside her body mounted, the harder she pushed with her hips. The lump of his hard cock was hard as a rock against her lower back, but she barely noticed. Something strange was about to happen.
“Leroy, what—”
Instead of answering, he used his other hand to pry apart her swollen lips while the other finger continued its relentless motion. When she looked again, she barely recognized herself. Her flesh, reddish and slick with cream, swelled around Leroy’s fingers. The nub that had been the size of her pinky finger was now as big as her thumb or maybe his.
Her thoughts collapsed all at once as the breath left her lungs. A delicious tingle emanated from his fingers, ignited a bone-jarring explosion that flipped her head back and made her teeth click as her jaw snapped shut. Then another and another…
When it was over, she clung to the arms circled in front of her, wondering if she and Leroy had fallen out of the tree.
“What happened?” she asked as if awakening from a long sleep.
He pulled aside the damp hair at her neck. “You came. Luckily, you didn’t cry out and wake your mother.”
“People come when they make love, don’t they?” she asked.
He nodded. “We did make love, in a way.”
Together, they settled her skirt back in place and she yawned, for real this time.
“I feel so good, so complete.” She curled back against his embrace. “Did it make you feel good too?”
Leroy’s heart raced against her back, but it slowed to match the tempo of hers as the humid heat of the afternoon wove a sleepy spell over them.
“Watching your pleasure felt real good,” he said. “Now do you see how right we are together?”
She nodded, closed her eyes and imagined his body melding with hers, one color blending into another as the paint did on her palette. If she hadn’t been his before, she was now. No man had seen what he’d seen and touched what he’d touched. If she could help it, no other man ever would.
A sudden movement eventually roused her out of sleep. She gasped when she realized where she was, up in a tree. It wasn’t the safest place to fall asleep. Squirming in Leroy’s arms, she turned to gaze at him. When she saw the even rise and fall of his chest and closed eyes, she realized he’d fallen asleep too. His powerful face looked so angelic and boyish she couldn’t resist pressing a kiss to his cheek.
How long had they slept? He said they’d only have twenty minutes together. The time they’d spent awake had to be at least that much. She reached for his wrist and looked at the watch, which read a quarter to two. The fairies must be up to mischief again for putting them both to sleep.
“Leroy.” She shook his shoulder. “Wake up.”
His eyes opened slowly. “Not yet. I’m dreaming about Rose.”
“It’s no dream,” she said, shaking him. “You’re late for work.”
His eyes widened as he looked at his watch. “Aw, hell. Why did you let me fall asleep?”
“We both did.”
His face contorted with a grimace. “Caleb is going to kill me.”
“Will you lose your job?”
He buttoned the shirt button she’d undone earlier. “I hope not.”
“I knew we shouldn’t have done things married people do.” She clenched her fists in frustration. If only her body hadn’t led her astray.
“It was beautiful.” He grabbed one of her wrists. “I’ll never regret it and neither should you.”
After a hasty kiss, he carried her down the tree and hurried away. She didn’t even get a chance to ask him if he planned to ever come back. She would come here every afternoon to paint, regardless. They’d already created so many memories to sort through.
Mother was still snoring, oblivious to her daughter’s loss of innocence. With her mind spinning and her legs quivering when she walked, Rose seated herself in front of her easel and struggled to resume her painting as if nothing had happened.
* * * * *
Leroy peddled so fast in the hot sun his breaths came short and sweat plastered his shirt to his back. It was no use, he realized. No matter how fast he rode, he was still inexcusably late.
With each revolution of the pedals, he struggled to think of some excuse to tell Caleb. He sure couldn’t tell him the truth—that he’d had his fingers buried in Rose Wainwright’s sweet cunt all afternoon and had fallen asleep. Caleb only had to smell him to know what he’d been doing.
By the time he pulled into Pearl Point, he was sure the lumber truck would be long gone. Maybe it would be late again, he hoped. Instead, he saw Caleb and one of the shuckers bent over the unloaded pile of lumber as they stacked it.
When Leroy parked his bike, he walked over as quickly as he could, ready to work. Maybe Caleb would be too tired and focused on the job to notice or care how late he was. The man’s metal watchband glinted in the sun as he threw down the board he was holding extra hard.
“Well, look who decided to show up,” he said.
“I’m real, real sorry I’m late, sir.” Leroy picked up a board, deciding not to make up an excuse. “Now where do you want this?”
Caleb turned to the other worker. “Reese, you can get back to shucking now.”
Nodding, the young man slipped away. Leroy wished he could too to escape the pair of blue eyes drilling holes in him.
“If you weren’t family, I might have fired you today.” Caleb put his hands on his hips. “I’m too damn old to unload and haul lumber.”
Leroy nodded. “I promise it won’t happen again.”
Which also meant he’d probably never see Rose again, but what choice did he have?
“You’re damn right it won’t. If you want to mess around with a woman, do it after hours. If she won’t, find one who will.”
Leroy realized the men had been stacking the lumber into piles by size, so he continued.
Caleb wiped his sweaty brow. “I know I’m being harsh, but I have to be. We ran at half production last winter because the infrastructure wasn’t built. If Pearl and I want to have a life here, I can’t afford to have another season like that.”
“
I understand.” Shame and heat built up under Leroy’s collar. He knew he deserved this tongue-lashing, but hated it all the same.
“I need someone I can count on,” Caleb continued, “If you can’t do it, I’m going to have to replace you with someone who can.”
Hearing his hoarse plea reminded Leroy how important family and honest work were. The heady scent of Rose’s parted legs had made him forget it. Now he didn’t know what the hell to do. This job pulled him in one direction and Rose pulled just as hard in the other.
For the moment, he was thankful he still had his job. Later, when he was in his bunk for the night, he’d think about the fact that he’d probably lost Rose for good.
Chapter Five
At dinnertime the next day, Rose took her seat and simply stared at her ham and potatoes.
“Aren’t you hungry, dear?” Mother asked.
Father frowned as he cut the meat on his plate. “Painting usually gives you a large appetite.”
“The painting you did of the water is beautiful.” Mother buttered a roll. “Could you paint the ducks for your father’s study? That is, if it’s all right with you, Charles.”
He answered with an elegant shrug. “Yes, ducks would do quite nicely.”
“Then ducks it is,” Rose replied.
Forcing a smile, she made herself swallow a forkful of mashed potatoes. Her parents mustn’t know why her heart sat low in her chest as if it were a rock. She’d gone to the riverfront today to paint. Fortunately, Mother had decided to stay home to do some cleaning.
Rose had waited and waited for Leroy to arrive, but he never did. The opportunity of finally spending some time alone with him today was wasted. Had he gotten in trouble at work for being late the day before? Or had he finished with her now that she’d shared the secrets of her body with him? Surely he could have stopped by briefly to let her know what was going on.
Dare she hope he might come tomorrow? Or was their brief interlude over? Not knowing was the worst part. Maybe Father was right. As long as she let him arrange her life, she didn’t have to think or feel. All she had to do was follow along. Anything would be better than this emptiness.
