Rebel Soul: (Rebel Series Book 1) ((Rebel Series))

by J. C. Hannigan

  “Yeah, I will,” I answered. I could feel Elle’s mom’s eyes boring a hole into us. She was listening, watching our every movement.

  “I’ll see you there.” he smiled as Sue started towards me. He nodded at her in acknowledgement before he led his nephew away to the picnic tables.

  “Seems like someone has an admirer. Who was that handsome devil?” Sue asked, smiling in that motherly way she had.

  “Just a guy,” I muttered, dropping my eyes.

  “That’s Braden’s older brother,” Elle supplied helpfully.

  “That’s Brock? The same Brock that…” Sue let her sentence hang between the three of us. There wasn’t a need to finish it; we all knew she was referring to the bush party where Ezra’s cousin had attacked me.

  “Yeah, the one and only.” I sighed.

  “Tessa’s sad because her dad has forbidden her to be around him because of the whole ‘jail’ thing, but she really likes him. Like, a lot. She doesn’t like anybody so, it’s a big deal,” Elle added, again supplying more information than I was comfortable with. I shot her a look, but she shrugged. This was how Elle was; she could talk to her mother about anything and she never left her in the dark.

  “Elle, take this empty pot back to Braden for washing,” Sue instructed, thrusting the pot at her daughter.

  I waited until Elle had disappeared with the pot, worrying my lip. “Sue, you knew my mom. Do you think she’d agree with him? Do you think she wouldn’t let me see Brock because of…well, that stuff?”

  Sue was thoughtful, pondering my question. “It’s hard to say, pumpkin. Your mom would have never wanted anything bad to happen to you, but your mom was also a huge believer in love. She was a lot like Elle in that regard. She believed in soul mates and eternal love and all that crap.”

  “What, you don’t believe in it?” I questioned, taken aback by Sue’s rather cynical answer.

  “I believe in love, sure.” Sue laughed lightly, her eyes crinkling when she smiled at me. “But I believe that there is all kinds of love out there and that it’s possible to experience love more than once. Different kinds of love, mind you.” She paused thoughtfully, her eyes regarding me. “I was the cautious one. Your mom, she was a genuine, loving person. She only saw the good in people and animals alike and she didn’t believe love should be rationed or calculated. It’s why she was so wonderful at rescuing broken horses… and people. Take your daddy for example.”

  “What about him?” I frowned, absently ladling some more chili into a bowl for another person. I barely looked up when I passed it to them.

  “He was what she called a rebel soul.” Sue smiled sadly. “He had been knocked around by life quite a bit. He was a troublemaker and as reckless as they come. But your mom…she saw past all that bad boy crap and saw the man underneath. The man he could be if given the opportunity, if he was given a little love.”

  “My dad was not a rebel.” I rolled my eyes.

  “Oh, you may not believe it now when you look at him; he’s as still as the calm before a storm. But he used to be the storm, and the only thing that tamed him was your mom. Falling in love with a good woman will do that to a man,” Sue added over her shoulder as she walked away, leaving me with my whirling thoughts.

  * * *

  I stayed behind to help Sue pack up, even after Braden and Elle had taken off. I was hoping she’d tell me more about my mom and dad, but she didn’t. That was Sue, though. She’d give you a little bit to get you hooked, and then she’d fall silent, leaving you frothing for more details.

  “Go on, get outta here. That boy isn’t going to wait all night for you,” Sue finally said as if she’d heard what direction my thoughts had taken. She smacked me with the towel she’d been using to dry off one of the huge pots that had housed her chili.

  “Fine.” I dropped my towel and walked away from her table, leaving her to carry her dishes to her truck.

  Workers were about to start the bonfire and the crowd was growing. I spotted Elle and Braden sitting on a huge blanket on the grass. She was resting between his legs, her head against his chest, and he was whispering something to her that made her smile. I paused, watching them for a moment, and realized just how happy my best friend was when she was with him. She glowed. She sparkled from the inside out.

  Braden tipped her chin up gently, bringing his lips to hers tenderly. They were completely lost to the world. Watching them made my heart ache a little.

  I used to think that Elle’s romantic heart was just finding love where it didn’t exist, turning fairy tales into truth, but after watching the two of them together, it was obvious that she was living and breathing it. She was in love, and it was getting harder and harder to dislike Braden. He wasn’t the same guy when he was with her; he was a changed man. I couldn’t help but reflect upon the things that Sue had said about love.

  Their quiet, stolen moment was interrupted by a little boy racing towards them. He dove onto Elle and she let out an audible gasp before they teamed up and started tickling him. He giggled, squirming around on the ground and pleading for them to stop.

  “You’re going to make him pee his pants!” a female’s voice shouted from directly behind me, startling me. I turned, seeing Brock and Becky Miller approaching. She was dressed in jeans and a plain blue t-shirt, her dark hair pulled up into a messy ponytail. She looked exhausted. “Excuse me,” she said, brushing past me to join Braden, Elle and her son on the blanket.

  Braden and Elle stopped tickling the child, but he kept giggling in Elle’s arms. She was laughing too and Braden was staring at her with a smile on his lips, like she was all he could see.

  “Hey,” Brock muttered, stepping closer. His breath was warm on my neck, prompting Goosebumps to erupt on my skin, and I took a shuddering breath.

  “Hi again.” I smiled timidly. I didn’t know how to act around Brock now that it wasn’t just the two of us alone, especially after the talk I’d had with Sue.

  “Shall we?” he asked, tilting his head in the direction of the others. I bit my lip and hesitated, looking around. There were a lot of people here tonight; a lot of people who knew my family, a lot of people who would eagerly start flapping their gums about the Armstrong girl hanging out with ‘that Miller boy’.

  I wanted tonight, and I didn’t want the possibility of my brothers showing up to ruin it. “How about we go somewhere…more private?” I asked nervously. The fear of rejection was lurking just beneath the surface. I took a deep breath, trying to drown out that fear with oxygen.

  Brock’s eyes heated as he looked at me and then he nodded. “Alright, I know a place where we can still see the fireworks. Come with me for a moment.”

  I followed him to the blanket, and we came to a stop in front of it.

  “Becky, you know Tessa, right?” Brock questioned.

  “I’ve seen you around.” Becky smiled warmly. “You’re related to Tommy and Gordon, right? I went to school with them.”

  “Yep, I sure am,” I said, trying to keep my tone friendly and light. I glanced around the fairgrounds, trying to see if any of my brothers were going to walk over and ruin the night with their terrible attitudes. At least I didn’t have to worry about my dad finding me on a blanket with the Millers, he hadn’t been to the community bonfire since before my mom died. It used to be their thing.

  “Are they coming tonight?” Becky asked, still trying to make small talk. I could feel Brock’s eyes on me, watching me, waiting for my response.

  “Probably for the fireworks,” I answered, shrugging.

  “Is your car unlocked, Becky?” Brock asked, cutting her off before she could say anything else.

  “Yeah…”

  “Okay, I’m going to put Aiden’s car seat in it.”

  “You guys aren’t sticking around for the fireworks?” Becky asked, surprised.

  “They’d rather set off their own,” Braden joked, smirking.

  Becky shot him a dirty look over her shoulder and turned to face us again. “A
lright, that’s fine. Thanks so much for watching him today, Brock.”

  “No problem,” Brock said. “You should probably think about finding a more dependable sitter, though. I’m happy to help out whenever I can, but I’ll be busy this week milling with Grady.”

  “I know.” Becky sighed, her face falling momentarily. I went to ask her what kind of hours she needed a sitter for, after all, I was in the job market, but Brock grabbed my hand. It felt like an electric current pulsed through our skin at the contact, and I couldn’t think about anything other than that feeling.

  He led me away from them, weaving me through clusters of people until we reached the parking lot. Then he dropped my hand long enough to pull the car seat out of his truck and track down his sister’s car. Once he’d secured the car seat in it, he turned to face me. Anticipation and desire danced across his features.

  “You up for a drive?” he asked.

  Always, I wanted to whisper. Instead, I smiled and nodded. He took my hand again and led me back to his truck.

  I climbed into the cab, noticing for the first time how clean the interior was. Most guys liked to use their vehicles as portable garbage bins. Not Brock. “Where’s your dog tonight?” I asked, remembering the yellow-eyed creature that had come to my rescue two nights ago.

  “He’s at home,” he answered, looking at me briefly before pulling out of his parking spot. He drove about five minutes down the road before turning onto another unmarked road. He drove up the steep incline, the four wheel drive truck handling it with complete ease. I could just imagine my old Ford climbing at a turtle’s pace.

  It took five more minutes, but the hill finally peaked. Brock gave me a lopsided grin, daring me with his eyes, his hand on the gear shift. I knew what he was thinking before he did it, and I grinned in response as he lowered the gear and stomped on the gas, doing a perfect donut. The wind from the open window blew my hair around my face, and I threw back my head and laughed. Dust blew all around us, and he did several loops before twisting the steering wheel and driving forward. He braked, parking so his truck bed was facing the north side of the hill.

  He grinned at me again before climbing out from the cab. He opened the back door, grabbing a huge blanket from the floor. Shaking it off, he threw it into the bed of the truck. “Are you coming?”

  I climbed out too, walking around to the back to join him. He was already standing in the truck bed. He held his hand out to me and I took it, settling onto the thick blanket he’d laid out for us.

  We were high enough up that we could see over the treetops to the fairgrounds below. I watched the flames of the bonfire licking the dark sky, trying to reach upwards towards the stars.

  “I missed this view,” Brock remarked, settling beside me. His eyes never left the sky when he spoke.

  “I bet Alberta had nice views,” I said, brushing my tangled hair out of my eyes.

  “Yeah, but it’s got nothing on this one,” he murmured, his eyes fixated on my face. The look we exchanged was heated, charged with intensity. The kind of sensation that evoked a smoldering desire in my lower abdomen.

  Then, he was moving to me and I was moving to him. His hands found my face, framing it, and he kissed me with everything that he had. It was a searing kiss, full of heat and longing, that stoked the burning embers of desire.

  I moaned, moving against him. He dropped his hand to hook beneath my thigh and tugged me up onto his lap. I could feel him, hard beneath me. His hands were roaming all over my body, exploring every last bit of me, touching me over my clothes and lavishing me with his hands while he set me on fire using his lips and tongue.

  He broke the kiss, moving his lips a fraction away from mine and smiled with his eyes closed. “Jesus, Tessa,” he breathed. “What are you doing to me?”

  “Basically, whatever you’re doing to me,” I muttered, just as breathless. In the background, in the silence of the night around us, I could hear the fireworks going off, cracking into the sky and illuminating the dark night with multiple colours. I couldn’t drag my eyes away from his to watch and I didn’t want to.

  Brock smiled, his eyes still focused on mine. They seemed to peer straight into my soul and I couldn’t help but wonder what he saw, what he was thinking.

  “I’m thinking that I don’t want this night to end,” Brock said in a low voice and I blushed. I hadn’t realized I’d asked him out loud.

  “I’m thinking that I agree. I’m also thinking that we need to finish what we started this morning…” I whispered, feeling his cock move beneath my thigh as if it was struggling to free itself of the denim.

  Brock’s lips crashed against mine again and he kissed me deeply before pausing. His hands tangled in my hair and tugged it so that I had no choice but to turn my head and expose my neck to him. He sucked on it, kissing and tasting my skin, while I fumbled with his belt buckle.

  “Woah.” he laughed, his free hand stopping my quest. “I didn’t exactly have time to go to the store yet…I wasn’t planning on this…”

  “I’ve got you covered.” I grinned mischievously, pulling a condom out from the back pocket of my jeans. I’d grabbed a box from the gas station outside of town after leaving Brock’s place.

  “Thank God,” he growled, taking it from me and flipping me onto my back. He held himself up with one arm while he kissed my neck, his hand roaming underneath my shirt. His fingertips left goose bumps in their wake.

  My hands were just as greedy, tugging his shirt away so I could touch the defined muscles of his abdomen. They tensed beneath my fingers, and he took a shuddering breath as my hand traveled lower; his breath was hot on the sensitive skin of my neck. I slid my hand into his boxers, gripping his hard length.

  I’d never wanted anyone more than I wanted him. I didn’t care about the technicalities; I didn’t care that we had discussed anything aside from our desire for one another. I didn’t care about tomorrow or about the heartbreaking fact that we couldn’t exist in a world outside of our own.

  My shirt was off and I could feel the heat from his naked chest against me as he kissed me, his hands roaming the thin material of my bra, teasing my nipples through it. He went at a lethargic pace, as if we had all the time in the world or like he wanted to commit every moment, every touch of his fingers on my skin to memory. I could barely breathe when he ran his hand along my abdomen, past the waistline of my jeans and panties and stroked against my core once, finding me slick and wet.

  “Tess,” he exhaled, his voice strained. It was as if he was pleading with me, as if he was desperately fighting for control. My need for him was consuming me; I was pulsing and vibrating, ready to come undone simply from the tantalizing way he kissed me and the subtle brush of his finger.

  “I want you,” I whispered, looking into those lustrous eyes. I bit my lip as I lifted my hips, drawing his finger a little deeper into my core.

  He growled in response, deepening the kiss and changing the course from tender and slow to smoldering and passionate, heady with need. Our lips only broke long enough to peel off the rest of our clothes and for Brock to slide the condom onto his thick length. Then I was beneath him; he held himself up with his arms on either side of my head. His hands brushed my tangled hair out of my face and his eyes bore into mine. I felt him against my entrance, coating his head in my wetness and so many emotions rippled through me: sizzling desire, anticipation and things I couldn’t even begin to pinpoint. Brock swallowed hard, his emotions echoing mine as he sank into me.

  His breath escaped in a whoosh, and I closed my eyes against the sudden burning intrusion. It was uncomfortable; I had only ever slept with one person before, Ezra, and he hadn’t been as thick and long as Brock. He hadn’t been a man. But my body craved this, and when he pulled out I instantly missed the sensation of him in me.

  Brock was watching my expressions carefully, reading me. He brought one hand down, his finger playing with my clit as he slowly dove in again and again, until I was arching with the desire to meet eac
h of his thrusts, to have him fill me completely.

  His eyes were dark with lust, and they only darkened as he brought me closer and closer to the edge with each slow, deep thrust. He stroked my clit and I trembled, coming undone around him.

  He brought his hand back to hold himself up as he increased his pace, while I rode out my orgasm with each thrust until I felt another tiny tremor. His head dropped beside mine, and he thrust once more into me, hard and tense and breathing my name as he found his own release.

  Our hearts pounded in sync, and Brock lifted his head to look at me, a huge grin lighting up his face. “Holy fuck,” he exclaimed, his words echoing my thoughts. I smiled, biting my lip as he pulled out of me. I missed the sensation almost immediately.

  He discarded the condom and fell back down beside me, completely spent. He pulled me closer to him and grabbed the sides of the blanket, wrapping it around us so we were covered. I lay with my head against his shoulder and my palm against his pulsing heart.

  In the bed of his truck, we had a perfect view of the stars and the last few fireworks from the community bonfire.

  “I think this is my favourite fireworks show,” I remarked, biting my lip once the last of the words had fallen from my mouth. I looked up at him, waiting for him to freak out, but he was smiling in agreement.

  “Yeah, hands down.” He sighed, kissing the top of my head. His hand traced a gentle pattern against my shoulder, and his eyes never left my face. “What are you thinking?”

  “I don’t know,” I answered honestly. “My mind is kind of blown, to be honest. I’ve never…” I trailed off, flushing. I’d never had an orgasm during sex before. I was vastly inexperienced and I had a feeling he wasn’t, and that made me feel awkward and a little insecure.