“An attorney from the states has no jurisdiction here. Nobody does.” He takes a few steps back. “Mitch Townsend, you say?”
I nod eagerly.
“Nice to meet you.” He lifts his hand before speeding down the hall.
He takes all of my hope with him.
Max
I give a series of hard blows against Hudson’s door. I have to take a piss, and it’s a hundred and twelve fucking degrees out here, literally.
Indian summer. Two weeks into fall and you’d never know it. Hotter than hell. It says so on the gnome thermometer flashing his bare ass at me. Apparently Candi has a thing for miniature elflike creatures as evidenced by the fact she has them splayed all over the property. I don’t know which is worse, her collection of miniature mutants mooning the houseguests or the steering wheel graveyard of my brother’s that continues to thrive. Not to mention the fact Hudson has managed to add a tire monument to his long list of automotive offenses—a stack of necrotic oversized donuts that rival the pyramids in girth and stature.
The door cracks open, and I push my way through.
“What the hell took so long?” I ask, ditching into the bathroom. It occurs to me as I’m relieving myself that the mane of blonde hair blown up like a beehive didn’t belong to my bonehead brother.
“Sorry, about that,” I apologize to Candi as soon as I get out.
Her arms are folded against her waist semi-pissed at my not-so-neighborly entrance. She’s wearing four-inch heels, one long tank top stretched over the Himalayas with no sign of any kind of bottom, and it registers she’s dressed to greet the Shepherd she’s a little more intimately fond of. I avert my gaze like pulling out of a fire, but she leans in on my shoulder and purrs a strangled hello.
“Whoa.” I hold my hands up and stride over to the kitchen.
Lately it feels like whenever I’m around she’s hitting on me. Then again, she probably hits on everyone—no reason to think I’m special. Like I’d pay her any attention. I’ve got Lee. No time for three dollar whores. No offense to Candi. It just so happens that a “three dollar whore” is the garden-variety girlfriend for my brother.
Hudson struts in through the back door and nods over to me. “What’s going on, little bro?”
“You tell me.” He called while I was lying prone in Townsend field. There’s a leak in the irrigation line that’s turned the earth into soup and has already cost Lee and me a quarter acre.
“You fix the line? Hey, you want a beer?” Hudson’s face softens.
Asking about the line? Plying me with liquor? I smell a financial burden brewing. Hudson’s kindness always comes with a price tag.
“No thanks. Line’s all right for now. Think I torqued my shoulder though.” I rotate it clockwise a couple times before following him into the dining room and grabbing a seat at the table. Candi clicks her heels in the opposite direction, taking her hormonal self upstairs, and suddenly it becomes too quiet.
“Spill,” I say. “I need to get home.” It’s baby-making night. Lee’s ovulating—she called me twice to remind me, which is sort of ironic since I end almost every day making love to Lee anyway. It’s a pleasure, a treasure, anything but a chore.
He scratches at his scruffy hair, long and matted as a lion’s mane. “I need some cash, dude.”
“What’s new?” I pull his beer over and take a swig before sliding it back. “There’s no way in hell I’m lending you anything that even remotely resembles currency.”
His features darken as if there were more to the story, but he’s not laying down all his cards just yet. “I’ll pay you back.” His eyes bulge unnaturally revealing an entire network of crimson railroad tracks. I’d like to believe those were hard won, from tears, but thanks to the jars of weed he has stored out back, I know better. “Twice what I owe you.”
“No, you won’t. What happened?” I don’t need to ask. I already know. He lost another bet, but I want him to verbalize what a loser he is. I want him to squirm like the sack of shit he’s panning out to be.
“It was rigged.” He shakes his head. “I swear. I’m not messing with those bastards anymore.” He swipes his fingers over his eyes. Good God, he’s actually harnessed the ability to manufacture tears. Who knew I’d be treated to a performance piece? “You gotta do this for me. Just one more time, I mean it.”
“What’s the damage?”
“Seventy-five.”
“Shit!” I slam my palms over the table, and the walls rattle like thunder. “It took a whole lot of convincing to get Lee to dip into our personal savings to bail your ass out of hock just three weeks ago—fifty grand I just gave you. Are you some kind of fucking moron?”
He slinks back with an infuriating look. “They threatened the fields.”
My mind goes blank. It’s like his words chaffed my brain and took all my rational thoughts with them. I bunch his shirt up by the neck and shake the holy shit out of him. “You stupid little prick.”
Candi races in screaming. She tries to break up the love fest by digging her press-on nails into my neck. I give a hard shove and knock Hudson backward onto the floor.
“Last fucking time!” I bark.
Hudson pulls his lips in a line and doesn’t respond to my rage. He knows he won.
I don’t say anything else, just walk out the door.
I sit outside the beach house a moment before getting out of the truck. The lights glow silent inside, bleeding a resolute peace out into the street. Hudson had my blood boiling all day. I need to cool off, pull it together before I snap for good. Putting the fields in jeopardy far exceeds a boneheaded move. I’ll have to move him to Greenland to get rid of him, ship him off to the North Pole—China before he jeopardizes Lee and the kids.
I close my eyes a moment. He’s going to get us all killed if he’s not careful, and God knows Hudson is a lot of things, but careful isn’t one of them.
The searing night air covers me like a blanket straight from the dryer, hot and smothering as I head toward the door. Lee races downstairs soon as I walk in, jumps up and kisses me wet on the mouth.
“That fixes everything,” I say it warm, rolling my cheek in her hair.
“Shh.” She presses her fingers to her lips and bites down a smile.
“Both of them?” I mouth.
Lee nods as I take in her beautiful face. “They swam in the pool at Kat’s until they were ready to pass out. Eli hasn’t made a sound.” She’s wearing the white silk robe I gave her for Christmas, the one that hardly covers her bare bottom. She’s all hot and bothered, probably wet for me, too. I run my hand up over her thigh and circle around the front to confirm my theory. My fingers smooth over her soft skin before dipping down to her moist slick, and a dark laugh gurgles from my chest.
She doesn’t ask if I’m hungry or how that cracked line panned out in the field. Lee is all business as she leads me upstairs, and I can get damn well used to this.
Who needs a warm meal when you can have a smoking hot Lee waiting for you at home?
I slip a dirty smile in her direction. Hell, I am used to this. Lee is the wife that other guys dream of and probably quite literally.
The bedroom flickers with candlelight. The shower is already running, so I strip my clothes off in front of Lee’s watchful supervision, nice and slow.
“Don’t take your eyes off me,” I whisper, no smile.
“Oh, I won’t.” She meets my ultra serious demeanor, a smile playing on the edge of her lips. “I don’t want to miss a second of the show.”
Lee wants a girl this time. She read some book that promised her a daughter in exchange for scalding her husband’s balls in the shower just before lift off.
“Aren’t you coming in?” I peel off her robe and run my hands over her smooth shoulders. Lee bounces up on the balls of her feet. I evade the kiss she was eager to give me and run my tongue over her bare tits instead.
“Oh”—she gives a dark laugh—“is that how you’re going to play it?”
/> “Yes.” I pull back and take her in. Lee is a goddess that should be venerated. I should drop to my knees each time she’s in the room, and I’ve fought the urge on more than one occasion. “That’s how I’m going to play it. Now come in with me.” I pull her close to the shower. My fingers dig into her waist just enough to make her giggle.
“And boil myself?” She hikes her brow deep into her forehead. I love it when she does that. It makes her look criminally insane, and God knows I love her brand of crazy beneath the sheets. “No thanks.” She wrinkles her nose. “I hear the burn unit isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.” Her lips give a dangerous curve as she scratches at my chest. Her hand slides down, her fingers drip like honey as she strokes my dick until it feels like it’s going to burst right out of my skin. Lee spins me around before things get too out of control and shoves me into the oven.
“See what I do for you?” I let out a growl as the knife-sharp blades sizzle over my skin. “I’m enduring third degree burns for you, Lee.” I lather up like its some military exercise and shake my balls at her while she supervises. She belts out a laugh while holding a towel at the ready. I jump out as fast as I went in, numb from the hellfire—the lava blast that melted my skin. Lee rubs me down, anxious and quick as if my sperm had some timer attached to them. She gets on her knees to dry off my legs and looks up at me like she’s about to beg for something.
Her features soften as she gazes up at me. “I love you so much, Max.” She shakes her head as if she’s sorry about something. “Thank you for doing this for me.”
“Hey.” I pull her up and lead her backward into the bedroom. “Who says I’m doing this for you? This is all about me, girl,” I tease. Hudson and that insane scene from earlier pop into my mind. I’ll tell her about Hudson after I make her breakfast in the morning. It’s the last time, I swear. He can sell himself on the streets after that for all I care. It’s the fields—my family that I’m doing this for.
She belts out a laugh “Silly me. I thought this was about us.”
“It’s always about us.” I dot a kiss over her lips before pressing in a little deeper, my tongue strokes over hers with a fevered rush. “Because there’s no one better than us.”
“Nope.” She bites down over her lip and holds her gaze to mine. “Now I’m going to fuck you Max Shepherd, and you’re going to have to take it like a man.”
I depress a smile in my cheek but don’t say a word just let Lee pull me over to the bed by the fingers.
Lee pushes me onto the mattress and flips on some raucous rap music just low enough to set the mood, and it takes a minute for the ex-rated lyrics to set in.
“Damn, you’re a nasty girl, Lee.” I roll into the center of the bed and pat my stomach for her to take a seat. “Most women would prefer something sleepier—weepier,” I muse. She jumps on my chest, landing her knees on either side of my face. I catch her hand and gently graze on her finger with my teeth.
“I’m not most women, Max,” she sways with her eyes closed. “I can feel it. This is the night we’re going to make our baby.”
Stella and Eli blink through my mind uninvited. I try pushing them out, but they keep resurfacing. The last thing I need is a lingering image of the kids before manhandling my beautiful wife.
A seam of moonlight falls over her, and she lights up the room like some ethereal queen. Her body bleaches out pale as stone, her curves glow with the kiss of moonlight enunciating her beauty.
Lee shakes out her hair, rains it over my face in soft waves before straddling herself hot and wet onto my lap. She rocks side to side with a grin on her face before attacking me with the grace of a wrestler. Lee has the championship hanging in the bounds, and she’s in it to win it. I fight it just enough to hear her grunt and push before turning her over, pinning her arms up over her head and melting kisses over her eyes, her nose, her lips.
“What do you want Lee?” I moan into her ear while her breathing grows erratic. Her skin is hot to the touch. I let out a little laugh as she grinds her hips into mine. “Use your words.” I kiss her temple. It’s the same phrase we say to Eli ten times a day.
“You’re funny Shepherd.” She runs her tongue up the side of my neck and a groan gets buried in my chest.
“Damn, Lee.” I tuck my face in her neck and take in the clean scent of her hair. “Tell me what you want?” I like teasing her like this. I’m not above making Lee beg on occasion.
She reaches up with her mouth and gives my ear a solid bite.
“Whoa.” I pull back, my chest trembling with a laugh. “You want a piece of me?”
“Just one.” Her lips curl up on the side.
“Which one?”
“The one that paralyzes your vocal cords.” Her knee glides up and gentle clips my balls. “Fuck me, Shepherd or I’m going to have to call in the reserves.”
“I’d tell you to watch the language but you know I like it.” My chest rumbles as I crash my lips to her. “In that case—” I push her knees back and thrust in without warning.
A strangled sound gets caught in her throat and her eyes roll back. Lee lets out a little laugh.
“Look at me.” I push in deeper as I get up on my elbows. “I thought you said you didn’t want to miss a minute?”
Her lids flutter open as I pull out slowly then thrust back in with a marked aggression, repeating the effort until she chokes for air.
“You win.” She pushes me in by the small of my back and lets out a gut-wrenching moan.
“God, I love you, Lee.” My body begins to lose it. I rail over her until I’m blind with pleasure. Hours feel like they stroke by but it’s just been minutes. A moment in Lee feels like the sweetest eternity. She lets out a strangled cry and pulls me in by the hair. Her hot mouth glides over mine as she writhes beneath me. “Shit,” I whisper. “I’m coming.” A hard groan kicks from my gut as I tremble inside of sweet, beautiful Lee.
She gives a heated laugh in my ear. Her skin slicked with perspiration that matches my own.
“Do you think we made our baby?” She blows it out in a rush.
I lean up and take her in as the moon drips over her with its night magic in purples and blues.
“Nope.” I press a kiss over her moist forehead. “I think we’d better try again.”
I stay up half the night locked in passion, wrestling Lee, and the other half of the night dreaming of a sweet baby girl.
7
Freedom
Lee
The sky holds the color of butter while the heat flogs down over Mono like a punishment. It’s these last days of summer, bleeding into fall, that always manage to feel achingly dreadful. The colorless sky, the sauna-like heat, it all feels off, unnatural, and yet we need to accept what the world gives us, just bend over and grab our ankles—go for the ride. That’s how life works. I guess in the end there’s nothing we control unless you count the smile on your face, and even then it’s iffy.
The evening of Sheila’s birthday party falls on a Saturday. Max’s mother isn’t exactly known for her plethora of friends, but the few she does have gather at the Shepherd estate in honor of yet another birthday candle.
Last week, quite by accident, I bought her a vase that closely resembles a delicate part of the female anatomy—a labia to be exact. I didn’t even notice until Max pointed it out as I was wrapping it this morning, which led to interesting banter and an early morning arousal factor that landed us both in the bathroom—me with my legs spread wide while Max pretended to do a little juxtaposition.
We enter the Shepherd estate through the side yard, and the kids run off to play. Sheila makes sure the grounds are immaculately landscaped with rows of Italian cypress and miles of rolling green lawns. I spot her over by the porch speaking with an older woman, and we exchange a wave. I don’t even know how old Shelia is. She keeps her ages and stages close to the vest. She has her new boy-toy here who looks embarrassingly like Max, and this sends the not-so-high society of Mono a titter. The sun has almost set
, but the heat continues to imprison us like we’ve been abandoned in a sweltering car and can’t get out.
Candi and her overblown everything crashes into me on her way inside the house, leaving her boobs to ricochet from the effect. She’s probably experiencing a silicon meltdown and needs to step into the freezer just to maintain her composure, literally.
I want to say are those real, but instead I opt for, “How do you feel?”
Candi gives a dull smile before fanning herself with a paper plate. She’s wearing a tropical inspired two-piece and not much else. The world’s tiniest baby belly hangs from her middle proud like a trophy.
I’m not too thrilled that Stella and Eli are exposed to her questionable version of undress. I’m about a second away from throwing a blanket over her as a part of my parental responsibility.
“I’m sick. I’m so sick.” She reaches over to the dessert table and shoves a couple of brownies in her mouth. In typical Candi fashion, her actions don’t follow her words.
“It’ll pass,” I assure. “Most things do.” Not all things, but I leave that part out.
Max waves to me from under the patio, and I speed over before I entangle myself in Candi’s cleavage.
“Can it get any hotter?” I ask, falling into his lap. Max and his cutting good looks—I don’t think I could ever tire of laying eyes on this man.
“I think it actually gets hotter in relation to how close I am to you.” He dots my lips with a kiss. “You’re too hot for all of Mono to handle. I hate that other men get to look at you.” He gives a wry smile before passing me a bottle of water.
“Thank you,” I say, taking a sip. “And, for the record, you’re the only man I ever want to see me—clothed or naked.”
He tweaks my ribs, and I bounce with a laugh.
We watch Stella and Eli play in the kiddie pool while Sheila supervises from the sidelines. The pool belonged to Josh, but he hasn’t been around in years. Sheila never mentions him anymore. It’s like his name—his person, they never existed. Sometimes it’s easier to pretend that the people who disappear from your life were never in it to begin with. God knows I’ve stopped up a wound or two that way. An image of Mitch and his impossible smile flashes through my mind. I shake him away before he pulls me down to the grave and I end up in a catatonic ball on the floor. Lord knows I’ve logged far too many hours in that position.
The Solitude of Passion Page 12
