WILD RIDE

by Jones, Juliette

  But then I heard soft, heavy footsteps, out on the balcony.

  I eased myself off the bed – carefully – and wrapped the sheet around me. I walked out to see who was there. The slanted light of the day looked strange, after all that had happened. It looked stunning. Muted rays and clean opulence, edged with possibility.

  I was a different version of myself, with new eyes.

  I approached the scene slowly, but not shyly. My bare feet padded across the plush carpet without sound, and I liked it that way. I’d taken the wildest ride of my life with the two men I was about to face and they were, in actual fact, complete strangers to me. I knew almost nothing about them except they’d both been quarterbacks in a Sugar Land high school, now ran a couple of businesses and were in the process of getting obscenely rich.

  And that they were exceedingly gifted in the ways and means of pleasing a woman.

  There was a bond there, though, that was forged in steel. It didn’t really matter what happened next. Or if I never even saw them again as long as I lived. The night I’d spent with them was going to take its place as one of the shining jewels in my secret crown. If I ever felt dull or down, I could call on it and remember how beautiful they’d been and how damn good they had felt. Taboos and regrets were as useless to me as my lonely past. I was going to use what they’d given me – that feeling of being alive and young and free and as femininely powerful as it was possible to be – every day for the rest of my life.

  Before I reached them I internally braced myself for whatever their reaction might be. They were headed in one direction and I was bound for something else, we all knew that. We’d had some fun and now it was time to get on with the real stuff. Like getting to Austin with no wheels on a hundred bucks. Attempting to find an old acquaintance who may or may not even be in Austin, let alone willing to let an unannounced visitor crash on her couch for the foreseeable future.

  I pushed all that to the back of my mind. There would be plenty of time to immerse myself in the reality of the daunting road I had ahead of me, with too many pitfalls to name. For now, I was here, wrapped in Egyptian cotton and holed up in what was probably a $1,000 a night suite. Might as well enjoy it while it lasted.

  I walked towards the balcony, and I stood near the open sliding-glass doors.

  It was Nate sitting there. Alone. He didn’t notice me at first. His earplugs were connected to the iPad he was scrolling through. He was wearing jeans … and only jeans. And those aviator sunglasses that gave him a badboy edge, a vibe which his very-dark two-day stubble accentuated. His dark hair was back to its usual order. It had a barely-there wave to it and caught the lightest hint of off-gold in the sunlight. His deep-bronzed, powerfully-built chest was dusted with dark hair. The quilted muscles of his six-pack were clearly defined, drawing my eye lower, to the tantalizing line of hair that led south, hidden below the waistband of his low-slung jeans. My gaze lingered on the strong solidity of his thighs. His ankles were crossed and his bare feet propped on a low table.

  He was, in a word, spectacular.

  I wanted to sink my teeth into all that beefy beauty and feast on him. Again.

  Only then did he notice me. He looked up, taking a minute to run his eyes over my face, my long, mussed-up hair, the long sheet I had wrapped around most of me. He removed his earplugs and set his iPad to the side. He folded his ridiculously manly arms across his ridiculously sculpted chest. “Hey,” he said. “You’re awake.”

  His voice funneled hotly into every shadowed corner of me. Damn him. I thought I might be immune to all that in the bright light of day, without the whiskey buzz or the acute sense of desperation.

  “Yeah.” I guess it might have been natural to feel foolish. Embarrassed, maybe, after all that had gone down the previous day and night. I felt neither of these things. I was too busy appreciating the view. A weird echo of a song we’d listened to yesterday chorused somewhere in the back of my mind. Wild horses couldn’t drag me away.

  The inaccuracy of the sentiment wasn’t lost on me. Wild horses could drag me away. A light dismissal was probably the next order of business, once he’d checked his investment stats or whatever. Within a couple of hours I’d be back on the side of the Texas highway, thumbing my way to the next town. Then again, his Texan chivalry might kick in. Let me drive you down to the bus depot in my shiny red Mustang. Ticket to Austin’s on me, sweetheart, since it’ll barely make a dent in this big-ass roll of Ben Franklins I’ve got stuffed down my pants.

  Oh, hell. Absolutely avoid all thoughts of every big thing stuffed down his pants. Immediately.

  “How’d you sleep?” he asked, pulling a second chair closer to where he sat. He patted it. A friendly gesture. Inviting. Chitchat and coffee before eviction was gentlemanly.

  “Very deeply.”

  His mouth quirked at one corner. I wasn’t sure why this might have been funny to him. My hand ghosted to my hair and I realized only then that I might have checked my look in the mirror before confronting them. Or him, as it turned out.

  “I like it,” he said, and that quirk at the side of his mouth was downright wicked. “Coffee?” He’d already placed an extra mug on the table, next to the coffee pot and his own cup. Again, the gentlemanly thing to do.

  “Sure. Thanks.”

  He poured me a cup and held it out to me.

  “How’re you feeling?” he said, and I sat down in the chair next to him. The sheet slid from my legs and I adjusted it, covering my thighs to my knees. I wasn’t sure why I felt all demure this morning. He’d already seen, touched, tasted and penetrated me several times over. Weirdly, I felt triumphant at the thought. Without the buffer alcohol provided, Nate Walker was even more impressive, if such a thing was possible. There was a ferocious alpha quality to him that, if I’d happened to meet him in a bar or at a party, would have intimidated me like crazy. Quarterback material for sure. His look was sort of fighter pilot meets CEO.

  “A little sore. And pretty damn fine,” I couldn’t help admitting. I’d been blatantly honest with him, and both of them, all the way through so far, and I figured I’d just stick to that paradigm. He was too perceptive to play games with anyway. We barely knew each other but we were already way past pretenses. In a way, this was liberating. And, oddly, connective. I was both meeting him for the first time and greeting him as a lover who’d shared more searingly intimate moments with me than any other person on the entire face of the planet. Cal’s shortcomings were too numerous to list, now that I knew better. Even Riley hadn’t touched me the way Nate had. As deeply and … thoroughly. Twice. And that thing he did with his mouth and his tongue, too, my God. “I guess I slept in a little.”

  “You were tired.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “Big day.”

  My eyes met his through the reflective barrier of his sunglasses, and he smiled. An unassuming smile. Reserved, even. And that little note of sincerity and of quiet sensitivity when he could have been smug or self-satisfied was … unexpected. My stomach did a weird little flip. I liked the shape of his teeth, too: square and straight. And white, but not that eerie, manufactured white that seemed to be all the rage on TV. A clean, natural-looking white. He couldn’t have been anything other than American.

  “Where’s Riley?”

  Nate’s smile faded at the question and I almost regretted asking it. “He’s meeting with some clients today.”

  “Right.” He continued watching me as I took another sip of my coffee. “And you? You didn’t have to meet with the clients, too?” From memory, that had been their plan, but I might have been wrong about that.

  “I decided to sit this one out. We’ll meet up with them for drinks tonight. And dinner.”

  We’ll. I pushed that little glimmer of hope right back down into my soul where it belonged.

  “I wanted to make sure you were okay,” he said. Again, unexpected. That edge of protectiveness that made my spirit want to unfurl, to open up and reach out to him like a flower seeking sun.

>   “I’m okay,” I said, pausing at his attentiveness, his genuine curiosity and concern. I wasn’t used to it. Cal wouldn’t have noticed if I’d been struck down with the plague, never mind suffering from an emotional vulnerability of one kind or another; he just didn’t have that kind of gauge built into him and I’d become accustomed to the bland, neglectful indifference. I’d come to think such a thing was normal. Now, under the watchful gaze of Nate Walker, I felt myself fall just a little deeper. But I brushed it off. Useless, giddy daydreams would not help me dig in and get myself where I needed to go. “You just go on and do whatever it is you need to do. I’ll – ” I almost said something like, I’ll just get my stuff and be on my way, but I couldn’t quite do it. Not yet. And I was distracted by the little furrow between his eyebrows that had appeared as soon as I’d brought up the subject of Riley. I remembered the tone of their voices last night, as I’d fallen asleep. They’d been arguing about something. “Is everything okay –” I almost felt it was too personal a question to ask, but then a crazily intimate visual flashed through my mind – “with you and Riley?”

  He was more honest with me than I expected. “He’s a little irritated with me. He’ll get over it.”

  I waited, taking another sip of my coffee, watching his face. He’d tell me if he wanted to tell me.

  “Last night was a one-off,” he finally said.

  I agreed with him, without voicing it. Very soon, we would go our separate ways.

  “Generally, I don’t share,” Nate said. He ran a hand through his hair as though the topic was putting him on edge. The motion mussed his hair up and the sight of its unruliness reminded me of how it had felt in my hands. Grabbing fistfuls of the coarse silk of it as I cried out in the cataclysmic throes of an ecstatic, whole-bodied release.

  I started to offer my understanding but he interrupted me before I could begin.

  “I told him I don’t want him touching you again.”

  I just stared at him, a little dumbfounded, if you really want to know.

  No, Riley wouldn’t be touching me anymore. Nor would Nate, Cal or anyone else. I’d be too busy working three jobs as I tried to get myself through a few college classes – if I even got in – and scraping together enough cash to pay the rent on the couch I’d be sleeping on – if I was able to locate it.

  My shock at his pronouncement and his suddenly-tense vibe brought the conversation to a screeching halt. We sat there in an awkward silence for a few seconds. I thought of Riley, how he would have spliced right through all that and cracked a joke or made some off-hand sexual innuendo. Even so, I didn’t wish for him. I focused instead on the shape of Nate’s mouth as he lightly bit into the soft flesh of his lower lip. He seemed almost … nervous, but the fleeting impression barely touched his macho demeanor, and it passed quickly.

  “Would you like to have lunch with me?” he said.

  My stomach did another one of those funny little flips as our eyes met.

  “You must be hungry,” he commented, like I needed to be talked into it. Like I might refuse him.

  “I am hungry. Famished, in fact.” It was the quiet eagerness as he awaited my answer that burrowed into some fissure in me. I loved how aware he was. Emotionally layered. Intellectually complex. It was refreshing. In comparison, Cal was thick as a goddamn brick. Nate simmered with a perceptiveness I found myself wanting to dive into and swim around in. Here he was, this drop-dead gorgeous hunk of a man, with a red convertible and an investment portfolio – not to mention his other phenomenal endowment, beyond anything I’d ever seen or imagined – sitting there all expectant in that staunch way of his. Awaiting my acceptance of his offer. Of lunch. With him.

  He wasn’t just hot, he was adorable. It seemed an unusual mix and one that I was so intrigued by I thought I might already be half in love with the brute. Probably just those lingering endorphins amping me up.

  And he was still waiting.

  “Yes.”

  “Yes?”

  “I would love to have lunch with you, Nate.”

  He smiled again. A sort of humble, self-satisfied happiness. Damn.

  “I might just have a shower first, if you don’t mi—“

  “You don’t need one now. I gave you a shower last night. And I like your hair like that. All … curled.” Curled was an understatement. My white-blond hair hung almost to my waist and in its natural state it was straight at the top, then turned wavy at the tips, almost coiling at the very ends. I often straightened it, just to feel a little more … sophisticated, which was pretty much ridiculous. I sure didn’t need to pretend I was anything but a down-on-her-luck hick when I was serving up drinks at The Rusty Nail. Still, a girl has to indulge her own sense of pride and respectability every now and then, even if it’s all but irrelevant. It was never for them that I made the effort, anyway. Not for Cal, in the end, or the friends I rarely saw or the slurring, slovenly customers. It was for me.

  I watched him. I was used to taking orders of one sort or another from men, and this didn’t feel like one. It felt like a wish. A sexy, hopeful request. There’d been nothing harsh about his tone, just a soft, masculine appreciation. Last night I’d felt almost crazed in my desire to please him. And my body remembered that urge, like an echo. If I hadn’t already felt inclined to follow his directive, what he said next didn’t just sell me, it melted something inside me.

  “Little blond mermaid,” he whispered. A charged, bonded jolt passed between us that I felt all the way to my toes.

  I think you’re beautiful, Nate. So beautiful.

  I feel like I’ve died and gone to heaven when I’m inside you.

  “All right,” I said slowly. “Can I at least get dressed?” I smiled at him.

  “I’d prefer if you didn’t, but people might stare.”

  I laughed a little.

  “We’ll find someplace casual,” he said. “Where we can just talk.”

  Within the first few minutes of meeting Nate Walker, I’d guessed that he was a complex character. I now knew him in the carnal sense – and these were beautiful, fresh-minted memories that kept playing across my mind in exquisite, knee-weakening detail. The thought of sitting down and getting to know him on a deeper level was delightful to me. I’d never done it this way before, but now I thought there was something to this jump-into-bed-with-a-stranger approach. We’d already hit the homerun out of the park several times over. We knew we were exceptionally compatible in bed. We knew we could give each other mind-blowing orgasms at the drop of a hat. Now, we could sit back and enjoy the intricacies of the game.

  For an afternoon, anyway.

  I stood up, gathering my sheet around me. “I’ll see if I can find something to wear, then.”

  He watched me as I retreated. I know, because I looked back at him. He’d taken his sunglasses off and was rubbing his face with his jaw. Torn, that’s how he looked. Like he was making decisions that ran deep.

  I went into the living area and found my bag. It was a small suitcase I kept in my car, with a spare outfit to put on after work, after I’d changed out of my Rusty Nail uniform, which consisted of short-short Daisy Dukes and a low-cut black t-shirt.

  There wasn’t much to choose from, but I found a light yellow sleeveless fitted shirtdress with little flowers around the hem. I hadn’t worn it for a while. The design itself was young, but when I put it on, it didn’t look particularly girlish. Not at all, actually. It hugged my curves almost too suggestively. But I couldn’t really be choosy at this point. My white sundress was still up by the pool, possibly. And there was nothing else in my bag except a pair of shorts, a couple of tank tops, and a toothbrush. I went to brush my teeth. As I did, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror.

  I felt almost startled by my own reflection. My hair was, as Nate had so articulately pointed out, a little wild. In a good way. In an artfully mussed, I’ve-just-had-the-best-night-of-my-life kind of way. Which I had.

  My eyes were bright. Unusually sparked, like a fashi
on photograph. On my cheeks were flags of pastel-pink. And my lips looked bee-stung from all the kisses. There were a number of barely-there bruises on my neck and my arms. From their hungry mouths and their gripping hands.

  My skin looked sun-kissed and there were sprinkles of freckles across my nose. Its golden tone offset the pale gleam of my hair. I didn’t have any make-up with me and I wouldn’t have bothered anyway. I had never looked better – or happier – in my entire life.

  Nate was waiting for me, leaning against the doorjamb with his hands hitched loosely into his pockets. He was wearing jeans, well-worn cowboy boots and a white polo shirt. His skin was the color of cinnamon. And the look on his face when he saw me just about blew my mind. It was the same look he’d given me when I was about to … to sit down onto his thick, rigid cock, guiding him and taking him into my body like I was starved for him. Like I could never, ever get enough.

  It was thrilling, somehow. Having these blazing little flashbacks flicker across my thoughts every time I looked at him. The shape of his lips as he innocently stood there reminded me of how he had felt. God, that mouth, and what it could do. The way his Levi’s hung off his hips, hugging his strong thighs. I didn’t know if I’d ever touch Nate Walker again, but the basest, most feminine impulses in me were reveling in the fact that I had, in the most thorough, intimate way imaginable.

  He laced his fingers through mine. For a second I thought he was going to take me to bed. Instead, he led me out the door and into the day.

  ***

  We walked out of the hotel and down the street. It was a central location and there were shops and restaurants as well as businesses and hotels. Dallas isn’t a city for walking, I would have guessed, but this was an area that catered for the dying breed of Texans who actually enjoy strolling around.