Oklahoma Sky

by Jillian Neal

  "Callie, it's Ford. I know it's only been a couple of hours since we were together, but I couldn't stop thinking about you. Guess I wanted to prove that I really am going to call you. I had fun tonight. More fun than I've had in," his pause spoke volumes, "well I don't even know how long. Sleep well, sweet baby. I'm picking you up at five tomorrow night. But I'm probably going to call you again before that. Night."

  Torn between bouncing out her glee by jumping on her bed and immediately calling him back, she chose the latter. Besides, jumping on her bed naked would definitely horrify Nana. Ford had just gotten divorced from an awful woman who'd been cheating on him. Callie didn't want him worrying about why she hadn't answered her phone.

  He answered on the first ring. "Hey there." A note of sleepiness hung in his tone.

  She cringed. "Were you asleep? I didn't mean to wake you."

  His chuckles were just as addictive as his grunts. "Nah, I wasn't asleep. I'm in bed though."

  "Me too. Well, kind of. I was in the shower when you called."

  Another one of those grunts. So far, she liked talking on the phone to him almost as much as she liked being in his arms.

  "Did you get dressed before you called me back?" rumbled from him.

  Her breaths came much too quickly all of a sudden. "No."

  "Damn, baby." His mattress gave an audible squeak. The rustle of his sheets reached her ears. "My bed still smells like you."

  For as long as Callie could remember, she'd worn watermelon-scented lotion. She loved the smell. It reminded her of Holder County summers. Bringing her arm to her nose, she inhaled and grinned. She'd just put some on after her shower. "Do you like that?"

  "Way more than I should." More rustling and another breath-laced grunt.

  "Ford, what are you doing?" She finally gathered the courage to ask.

  "Trying to figure out how to sleep when I'm harder than concrete and twice as heavy."

  Another dose of sticky wet heat gathered between her thighs. Her nipples tightened. She ran her free hand over them, thinking of Ford, taking her own breath away. "If I were there," fell from her lips.

  "If you were here, we sure as hell wouldn't be taking things slow, and I told you I'm a man of my word. I'm gonna do right by you. I'll take care of this."

  Oh my god. They were miles apart, and she swore the only other time she'd ever been this aroused was when he gripped her thigh, rough and ready up on that water tower and kissed her like he was signing a deed to her body. "You're making me wet again." It was somewhat easier to say things like that to him when she wasn't in his physical presence.

  "Damn, baby, when you say things like that,” he rasped. “What are you doing to me?" Now his tone threaded towards desperate, almost starved. It hurt her that he was in need, and she couldn't be there to ease it. The sounds of the sheets and squeak of the mattress turned rhythmic.

  "Are you...?" Her question dissolved as she fully understood what he was indeed doing, and he was doing it to thoughts of her, to her scent. A heady sense of feminine power filled her. "I want to get on my knees for you." She let her eyes close and the fantasy form fully in her mind. "I want to know what you taste like."

  "Christ," ground from his mouth, but she wasn't certain if he meant it as a curse or a prayer. She was good with either. "Keep going," he demanded.

  "I want to lick your slit until I know the flavor of you. Oh god, I want you to make me take you deep." Her breaths staggered from the thought. "I want to suck you, to feel you get even bigger in my mouth. I want it to be all because of me."

  "It's all you, baby. All fucking you," came from him in an agonized groan. Finally the sound of flesh on flesh reached her. "Wanna make you suck me. Wanna hear you moan over me." That was followed by another desperate grunt.

  Her own hand drifted down to the need gathering between her thighs. "It makes me even wetter when I suck you." She had no idea how she knew precisely what he needed to hear, but she was too far gone to consider her words. She teased at the apex of her slit drawing a soft gasp from her own lungs.

  "You keep your hands on me. I make sure of that. If you touch yourself, I'll bind them behind your back. I take care of that wet pussy. Only me," he ordered as he lost the ability to maintain his self-control.

  "Yes," she whimpered both from his command and his loss of restraint. "I want you to make me drink you," she begged in a tone she barely recognized as her own.

  "I will," he assured her before his harsh male shudders became apparent via the noises she could make out. "Make you take it all down your throat, sweet baby. I'll make you tell me how good it tastes." Another groan. "Fuck. I'm coming."

  She'd done that. She'd turned him on so much he'd done this over the phone with her. This rough, rugged cowboy who thought he could be an old-fashioned gentleman for her. She'd worn him down just a little. It had been all her.

  For a few seconds, only the sounds of his heavy breathing filled the phone. Then she heard several rough scrapes in succession and finally determined he was pulling tissues from a box. "That was incredible." She wanted to make certain he felt no shame over what they'd just shared.

  "Yeah, but it was only incredible for one of us. I don't like that. I know I came off a little rough, but I'll never be a selfish lover, honey. I can be gentle if you want. I don't have to be like that. It's just...it’s been a long time. I didn't know what I was saying."

  She grinned at that. "Trust me, you have no idea what you just did for me, and I like your rough side. I can't wait to experience in person."

  "Yeah well, I'm not sure what just happened qualifies as taking things slow." Disappointment rang his sleepy tone now.

  "Maybe not, but it was perfect. Are you still picking me up tomorrow at five?"

  "Isn't that what I said?"

  "Yeah." She hoped he could hear her grin over the phone.

  "Then that's exactly what I'm going to do."

  It wasn't until Callie was drifting slowly off to sleep with thoughts of Ford taking up almost all available space in her brain that she realized two things—she still hadn't gotten her grandfather's folder back and she still hadn't talked to Derrick. Damn.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Checking his watch for the fourth time, Ford grinned and fished his phone out of his pocket. He'd been circling the mustangs housed on Holder Ranch, checking the wild horses to make sure they were all good, before he headed back to the barn to clean out his feed truck.

  The sun was slowly crawling across the endless pasture painting the indigo skies in deep shades of auburn. It was his favorite time of day, and he hadn't been able to think about anything but Callie all night anyway.

  The uneasiness wasn't letting up. Why the fuck did he jack off with her on the phone? He'd never even done that when someone was present in the room with him, much less over the phone. Being vulnerable with her like that was idiotic. Hadn't he learned that after being married to someone like Meritt?

  She answered with a whimpered hello on the fourth ring.

  He couldn't help but chuckle despite the awkwardness twisting in his gut. God, she was adorable. "You still asleep, sweet baby?"

  That got him a huff. "It's...only seven in the morning."

  "I know. I waited until late to call. I've been up for three hours."

  "Dear god, why?"

  "Got a ranch to run, remember? Besides, I miss you." Dammit. What the hell was he doing? He knew he sounded completely insane, but for some reason he struggled to keep his shields up with her. She was the first thing in years that made any part of his life good, and he didn't know how to stop from holding on with both hands for as long as he could. Ford just needed to make sure he hadn't blown this all to hell. He wanted to make sure he hadn't frightened her.

  Her sleepy tone took on that sweetness he was growing addicted to. "I miss you, too, but you know you're not supposed to tell me things like that. You're supposed to be all aloof and make me wonder if you really like me and make me doubt myself."

  Oh
, he liked these early morning conversations. She was even less guarded. He liked how she seemed to exist on the edge of an impulse constantly, but she was usually a little afraid to make the leap. Maybe if he taught her that he'd catch her when she wanted to fly, she wouldn't be so afraid. "That's what I'm supposed to do, huh? Men are dumbasses," he informed her.

  She laughed, and again he wanted to devour it. "You're a man."

  "No, honey. I'm a cowboy. I'll let you go back to sleep."

  "No, I'm getting up. I've got to get something done this morning. Just need a pot or two of coffee."

  Ford took another sip of his own coffee. "Now, that I can get behind. I still have your file folder. Do you need me to bring it out to the farm before I come get you tonight?"

  He could hear the smile in her sleepy tone. "Are you trying to come up with an excuse to see me earlier?"

  "Maybe, but I thought I was supposed to be aloof."

  "I take that back."

  "Good. Because I'm a lot of things, but that ain't one of them." He had no idea where his newfound confidence had come from, but he was thrilled it was attempting to make a return. Something about being on the ranch, on his turf, bolstered him.

  "Good, but I don't need the folder before tonight really, unless you just want to come out here. Let me make sure my dad isn't going to be around."

  "Why can't I talk to your daddy?"

  "Why would you want to?"

  Ford didn't have an argument for that. Abe Monroe wasn't good for much as far as he was concerned, but it bothered him that Callie held the same opinion about her blood. If he ever found out that Abe had done anything to her, he'd have plenty to say about it.

  He reminded himself that he'd always had a tendency to get ahead of himself. He wanted to ride before he took time to saddle the horse. Plus, he'd promised her they'd take this slowly. That's what he needed to do. Whatever her relationship with her father was, it wasn't really any of his business. "If you're sure you don't need it before tonight, I'll be there at five. I need to round up the mustangs and get them moved to another pasture. That's an all-day job."

  "Do you mean like wild mustangs? Do you have those on your ranch? How does that work? I thought you all raised cattle."

  "We do, but the government pays us to let the mustangs live on a few of the pastures we're not using for cattle. As long as they're here they stay safe, but they can still run wild. We look after them, and we have the land to support them. They're beautiful but ornery to move. I'll bring you out here and let you see them sometime."

  "Can I take pictures of them?"

  "Of course."

  "You're kinda awesome."

  "Gonna have to figure out how to get you to remove the kinda out of that statement, sugar. I'll see you tonight."

  Callie wriggled free of her sheets still beaming from her phone call. "A girl could definitely get used to that," she informed her old butterfly stuffed animal as it tumbled from her closet when she opened the doors. "And this girl needs to not get used to it because she is going to be Nina Morales's new intern." Callie firmly believed that if you told the universe what you wanted, it would help you get it, even if she saw absolutely no possible way that Ms. Morales would ever choose her. Half of her submitted portfolio had been of pissed off pets.

  Despite her spoken words, she wondered if working with Nina was what she really wanted anyway. She shook that off. If she could get some amazing shots of wild mustangs out on Holder Ranch, that would be fantastic for her portfolio, and her portfolio was all she needed to be focusing on. She was just going to help Ford get over his awful ex-wife. He needed her, and that was such a nice feeling. Maybe he'd even be able to help her move past her mistakes with Derrick.

  Resolute in her decision, she dressed and headed to the kitchen for coffee. As soon as she was caffeinated, she had to call Derrick and make him listen to her. Callie eased down the hallway listening for any voices in the kitchen. If her dad had dropped by for breakfast, she'd find something to do in her room until he left. He never failed to ruin a good mood, and she had no intention of dealing with two men who refused to listen to her all in one day. Derrick would be more than enough.

  Pleased that she didn't hear anyone, she slipped into the empty kitchen and poured a mug of steaming coffee. Nana made the best coffee. There wasn't a coffeehouse anywhere in California that could out brew her grandmother. When the warm liquid brought that sense of peace she'd been searching for, Callie was so thankful to be home. This pit stop was the best idea she'd ever had.

  When she was staring at the bottom of her second empty mug, she knew she had to get on with this. Tucking herself back in her room, she listened to the phone ring and then Derrick's stupid voicemail message play. "Hey, you're talking to the D-Man aka Noob_Slayer69, your go-to gamer guru. I don't phone so hit me up on a DM."

  Grinding her teeth, Callie considered doing just that. Maybe if she messaged him, he'd actually read what it said. But breaking off a four-year relationship via direct message was an awful thing to do even if you really couldn't stand the guy anymore. On the other hand, she had exhausted all other available resources.

  She ended the call and then immediately phoned him again. Eventually he'd answer. It was barely six in the morning in LA Surely, he'd want to stop the noise if nothing else. But seventeen rings later, she wasn't so confident. Fine. She opened Twitter. Since he was one of the only people she followed, she accessed his page quickly and scanned through his latest tweets where he'd complained about the lack of ketchup. He’d then asked his followers to keep watching Twitch to see him on there soon. His followers, most of them women who loved to flirt with him, responded with offers to bring him ketchup. A few others had called him a dumbass.

  At least someone saw through his bullshit. Another eye roll made Callie's head ache. When she got to a message box, she paused. Breaking up with him this way was something her mother would do, and she just couldn't go there. She quickly typed a message telling him that she needed to talk to him immediately and shut down the app. She repeated the same message and sent that via text. There, now he had to see it somewhere.

  Boredom swept in quickly. It almost always did. She didn't like sitting still for too long. An idea sprang to her mind pushing the boredom away. Grabbing her Canon, she headed for her car. She knew precisely what she wanted to shoot that morning.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Ford checked his watch again. He'd texted with Callie a dozen times that day, and still couldn't make sense of why it felt perfectly natural. He knew he had to be coming on too strong. He was fucking this up, but damn if he could stop himself. It was soothing that every time he texted her she responded. She seemed happy to hear from him. It was so different from his experiences with Meritt. He'd inhaled every response like a drug that would soothe the last twenty years of his life.

  She'd sent him a few photos she'd taken of the old water tower. He didn't know anything at all about photography, but the girl made rust patches look like works of art. She seemed to somehow capture the rebellion that was housed with the water in that tower. That breathless moment that occurred when you took a seat up there high above to stare out at whatever version of the world you were able to understand.

  People took pictures all the time. It wasn't special anymore. But what Callie did was on a whole other level. She'd even sent him an image of the fading spray paint that had said many things in the last few decades. It generally sported the Maxwell High graduating class's year. She'd shot the overlapping numbers in a way that he was able to see the stories play out in the chipping paint. She made idiotic teenage pranks tell the story of the kids trying to leave their mark on the world.

  Ford wondered if she noticed the FH and MK initials he'd carved in with his pocket knife. He'd tried to create a past for their relationship that had really only existed as a quick hookup in the back of his truck after the rodeo.

  The initials were somewhat obscured by the sheer number of class years that had been spray-painted
over his carving. If she'd seen them, he wondered if Callie knew that was him. If only he could've seen the future from way up there on that tower the day he made the marks. Would he have done anything differently? He'd been an idiot from the beginning. Meritt had never been anything but a lesson in the fact that people don't change. You can't save someone who's determined to drown. Carving their initials into steel didn't keep them from eroding. They couldn't stand the test of time.

  At three fifteen, he told himself it didn't make him a complete pussy if he started getting ready for their date. He didn't want to be late. He'd been pacing for the last fifteen minutes, so it was a relief just to let himself do what he'd wanted to do for the last several hours.

  But when he stepped out of the shower and slung a towel around his waist, he heard voices he recognized in his house. Grinding his teeth, he stomped into the living room. "What the hell are you doing here?"

  Jamie and Maddox, one of his many cousins, were seated on his sofa with cold bottles of beer they'd taken from his fridge. They stared up at him like the answer to his question was obvious.

  "We're here to talk you out of this date," Maddox informed him.

  "Get out," Ford demanded.

  "Man, just listen to him," Jamie pled. "He knows what he's talking about."

  Ford loved his cousin, but as far as he was concerned Maddox was an idiot who didn't recognize something good when it had been handed to him on a silver platter. Ford sure as hell wasn't taking advice from him.

  Maddox however was going to give it, it seemed. "You got tricked by Meritt, but you were all in. You wouldn't listen to any of us when we tried to tell you that she was a grade A bitch and wasn't ever gonna change. Now, you're going to go throw yourself all the way in with Abe Monroe's daughter and get your gnads stomped to pieces again. I'll give her that Abe's an ass, but her mama left him without so much as a word. She's got leaving in her blood. You can't overcome that. I don't want to watch you walk around here looking like death's great-grandma for another two years."