Across the Horizon

by Aly Martinez

  But no matter how long I stood under the two heads of Tanner’s shower, scalding water raining down over me, I couldn’t wash it away.

  He was lounging on the bed like a Greek god, waiting on me when I emerged from the bathroom dressed in a pair of little blue workout shorts, a white fitted tank, and the sneakers he’d told me to put on. I couldn’t lie—the shoes were multipurpose. First, for whatever he wanted to show me in the backyard. Secondly, to run from his mom if I needed to make a break for it. Jeesh, Tanner had said I was scary. His mom was terrifying.

  Thus, when he told me she was cooking us breakfast and wanted to “re-meet me,” I once again stared longingly at the bedroom window, wondering how badly it would hurt if I jumped.

  Begrudgingly, I agreed to breakfast, and surprisingly enough, when we walked out of the bedroom arm in arm, his mom was a different person. She had a wide smile and a gentle, teasing demeanor she’d clearly passed to her son. She apologized for snapping at me and then sipped coffee while making us the most unbelievable cream-cheese-stuffed French toast. After tasting her food, I was seriously going to have to step up my game from tuna noodle casserole.

  We laughed a lot over breakfast. His mom told me stories from Tanner’s youth. Most of them were embarrassing. All of them were hilarious. And Tanner rolled with it, eating with one hand and holding mine with his other. I found out that Tanner paid his mom to clean his house, do his laundry, and shop for his groceries. It was their compromise when he’d insisted that his parents retire early and allow him to take over all of their bills. Well, Tanner said that it was their compromise. Lynn said that her son was helpless in every room of the house outside of the kitchen, so whether he paid her or not, she was still going to be there a few times a week to make sure he didn’t drown in dirty laundry. She also said that helping out made her feel like she wasn’t freeloading on her son.

  Tanner’s father didn’t share this worry. In a deep exaggerated voice, Tanner made us laugh by impersonating his father. “I don’t give a damn if I am freeloading on my son. That kid freeloaded on me for eighteen years. I’d have a mansion in Maui by now if it weren’t for those boys wasting all my money on food and shelter.”

  I had to admit I was a tad jealous of Tanner’s family. They were so dysfunctionally functional, the way a family should be. Love was blazing from their eyes as they talked about Porter and his two kids.

  By the time Lynn Reese was ready to leave, all had been forgotten about the way we’d first met. Tanner and I walked her to the door, where she pulled me in for a hard hug and whispered, “Sometimes fate brings you to a place in life for a reason. It’s not up to you to figure out what that reason is. It’s only up to you to decide what you’re going to make of it.” It seemed like such a profound comment even if it did confuse me.

  With one last smile, she threw a wave in the air and yelled, “See you later, Tootsy!”

  “Bye, Mama,” Tanner called back, his arm coming down around my shoulders.

  I rested my hand on his stomach and kept my gaze on Lynn as she backed out of the driveway. When her car disappeared into the distance, I craned my head back and asked, “Your mother calls you Tootsy?”

  “Shut it,” he rumbled, but a lip twitch gave him away.

  “Come on. I want to show you something.” He took my hand and jogged around the side of his house with me in tow.

  Tanner had a lot of land for a place that close to the city. Thick trees curtained off areas so that they couldn’t be seen from the hammock on his porch, and in all of the time that I’d spent there, we’d yet to go exploring.

  We didn’t have to go far before a massive playground came into view. The ground was completely covered corner to corner in rubber padding. There were monkey bars, a rope net, rings, lots of hanging ropes, and a huge crescent-shaped ramp at the end. It was far too tall to have been made for Tanner’s niece and nephew, but I was confused what else it could be.

  “Tada!” he said, waving his hand out like a showcase model.

  “What is this?”

  He looked at me like I was crazy. “My Ninja Warrior course.”

  I twisted my lips. “You have your own Ninja Warrior course in your backyard? That seems a bit excessive, even for you. You overcompensating for something, Reese?”

  He rolled his eyes and dragged me over to the angled bars. The first set went up, meeting at the peak with a set that went down, shaping it like a roof.

  He jumped, catching the first bar, and made quick work of climbing up while saying, “I come out here when I need to think. Porter and I also use it to settle arguments. You were complaining because you missed yoga yesterday, so I thought you might want to give it a go. It’s a great workout.”

  Licking my lips, I became enthralled with the flex of his triceps as his long, lean body swayed on his ascent down the second set.

  He dropped to his feet and glanced back at me. “Hop on.”

  Oh, there was something I wanted to hop on, all right, but it wasn’t the bars.

  “I’ve got a better idea. Take your shirt off and demonstrate the rest of it.”

  He smirked knowingly. “What is with you today? I haven’t seen you this horny since—”

  “Don’t say it!”

  He laughed, pausing to rake his teeth over his lip. “I was only going to say a few hours when I had my tongue at your nipple and you were begging me to fuck you.”

  My breath caught, the memory eliciting a moan. “Why are you so mean to me?”

  Shaking his head, he chuckled and moved on, jumping to catch one of the short ropes mounted to a long beam at the top. On the end was a smooth plastic handle hung at the vertical. It looked like it should have slid right through his palm, but with a practiced ease, Tanner held on and swung from one to the next all the way to the end.

  I walked down the course, the padded ground giving my steps an added spring. “You’re still wearing a shirt!” I called with mock—and a touch of real—annoyance.

  “I thought you didn’t care about my abs?”

  “What? Who told you that crap?”

  Smiling, he crouched into a runner’s stance while staring down the next obstacle. It was two walls that ran parallel to each other without any kind of grips. They were several feet apart, leaving me curious about how he was going to get through them.

  All at once, he sprinted forward, launching himself into space. His left foot landed against the left wall, propelling him to the right before he disappeared inside.

  With the sound of his feet echoing off the wood, I hurried to the other side just in time to see him exit—shirtless, like a magician.

  “Yesssss,” I hissed. Sliding my gaze down his chiseled pecs to his rippled abs, I trotted over to him. “Now, this is what I’m talking about. How about we aim for your pants next?”

  His skin was dewy with sweat, and his pulse showed in a vein at his neck.

  I circled my arms around his hips and pressed against his front.

  His chest heaved from exertion, making him breathy and raw as he said, “You gotta stop, babe. You’re killing me. Do you have any idea how bad I want you?”

  My nipples tingled as I hoped like hell it was as much as I wanted him. “Enough to finally let me taste that beautiful cock you always keep hidden from me.”

  Yeah, okay. I was done being patient with the sex thing. I wasn’t above torturing him at this point.

  His eyes flashed dark. “Jesus, woman.”

  I pushed up onto my toes, pressing a kiss to his lips, being sure to punctuate it with a sweep of my tongue. “I don’t want to go slow anymore, Tanner.” Boldly, I reached down and cupped his cock. “Unless you want to go slow inside me.”

  He tensed, letting out a cursed, “Christ, Rita.”

  But he didn’t move away.

  “What do I need to say to convince you?” I purred.

  He groaned. “It’s not what you need to say. It’s what you need to hear.”

  I quirked an eyebrow. “What?”
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  Finally, he stepped out of my reach. “We need to talk.”

  “Noooo. That’s the polar opposite of what we need to do. We’ve done nothing but talk. At the risk of sounding like Olivia Newton-John, maybe we should let our bodies talk.”

  His forehead wrinkled. “Is she that chick from Grease?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” I followed him forward and teased my hands up his chest. “Come on, honey.” I licked my lips. “We’re good together. Imagine how good we’ll be together.”

  He sucked in a sharp breath. Heat and indecision warred on his face, but there was something else there too. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. But it was there, lurking like a dark cloud in the skies of his blue eyes. And like a bolt of lightning, it struck me right in the core of my insecurities.

  I rocked back onto my heels. “Is everything okay? You know, with me and you?”

  “Yeah!” he replied immediately, looping his arms around my hips. He gave me a warm squeeze. “Absolutely. Why would you ask that?”

  “I don’t know. You had this look in your eyes, and I got a strange feeling.” I shook my head, thinking maybe his constant rejection was messing with my mind. “Just forget I said anything. Sorry.”

  He dipped down and kissed my neck, murmuring, “You don’t need to apologize, babe. But as far as I’m concerned, we’re better than good, okay?”

  I nodded, feeling sheepish—and relieved. “Right. Maybe we should get back to me forcefully seducing you.”

  He chuckled and leaned away, the clouds clearing from his eyes.

  “Oh, I know. Let’s compete for it,” I said.

  “For what?”

  “Sex. You said this is how you and your brother settle arguments. Maybe we could give it a go.”

  He frowned. “I assure you Porter and I have never run the course to decide if we’re going to have sex or not.”

  “Good. Because…ew.” I turned and headed back to the bars. “But you and I can do it. If I win, we have sex. If you win, we can have your boring talk.”

  “Rita. You’re not going to beat me. I’ve run this course at least a hundred times.”

  I wasn’t. I knew this much. I could probably make it through the bars and the ropes, but I was screwed at the wall-tunnel thingy and the pegboard that came after it. But I was hoping that he’d be as turned on from watching me as I had been from watching him. It wasn’t like I had anything to lose. Tanner’s foot was still firmly on the sexual brakes. Nothing I was going to say was going to change his mind. But I might be able to do something…

  “Don’t underestimate the power of a determined woman.” I tore my shirt over my head and threw it at him. I was wearing a sports bra, but it was the cute, low-impact kind that dipped low in the front.

  “Fuck,” he groaned, his eyes immediately locking on my breasts like a heat-seeking missile.

  “Okay, so the person who gets farthest wins. If we both finish, best time. Sound good?”

  His mouth lifted on one side, popping the dimple. “It looks better.”

  I rolled my eyes. Seriously, why was he making me work so damn hard for this? He obviously wanted me as much as I wanted him.

  Whatever. I could do this.

  Drawing in a deep breath, I slapped my hand down on the red button that I hoped was connected to a timer and jumped onto the bar.

  I’d been right about the first two obstacles. I cleared them with relative ease. But the walls? Not so much.

  “Shit!” I screamed when I landed on my ass, gaining a better appreciation for the rubber matting.

  “Ohhhhhh,” Tanner drawled, popping his head in between the walls. “That’s rough.”

  “Shut up,” I shot back.

  When I walked out, he threw my shirt at me. “Put this back on so I can concentrate.”

  Ducking, I let it sail past my head. “Nah. I’m good.”

  He toyed with my fingers as we headed back to the beginning, but I slapped his hands away.

  When we finally reached the start, he didn’t even bother slapping the timer. He took hold of the bar, testing his grip before looking at me. “All right. Here we go. To recap, all I need to win is to get through the tunnel.”

  I folded my arms across my chest, pressing my boobs up, and replied snottily, “I can hardly wait to have your talk. It sounds so very stimulating. I wonder if I’ll be able to walk tomorrow.”

  He chuckled and swung to the next bar.

  “Can I get a clue what this talk is about? Is it possibly a dirty talk?”

  “Nope,” he said, going up one more.

  “Is it a good talk at least?”

  He turned to face me mid-swing, hollow fear staring back at me.

  “Tanner?” I pressed.

  His voice was soft when he finally answered, “No.”

  Chills exploded across my skin as I watched in horror as the clouds returned in his eyes. “It’s about us, isn’t it?”

  He stilled when he reached the apex of the bars. His dark eyes locked on mine, his face pale and his chest rising and falling with labored breaths that had nothing to do with physical activity.

  “Rita,” he whispered. And it was sad.

  Oh-so fucking sad.

  Anxiety mounted inside me. “Answer me.”

  I had no idea how this had gone from a teasing conversation to me being on the verge of a panic attack. But with every beat of my quickening pulse that he hung there, staring at me, and not saying a single word, my anxiety spiraling higher.

  My voice trembled. “Tanner, please. You’re scaring me.”

  In the next heartbeat, his feet hit the ground. It took him four strides to reach me. One arm hooked around my hips, the other going into the back of my hair. He bent, tucking my face into the curve of his neck, and he kissed the side of my face everywhere his mouth could reach, all while murmuring in a sweet and low voice, “Shhh… It’s okay. Everything’s fine. It’s not a big deal.”

  But it felt like a big deal—even if I didn’t have the first clue what it actually was.

  My nails dug into his back when he caught my lips.

  I was the one panicking, but Tanner tasted like desperation. His tongue searched my mouth while his hands fisted in the back of my hair, the sting at my scalp igniting my body in a conflagration of need.

  He was the first to make the move toward the ground, and I followed eagerly, our kiss never breaking until I was flat on my back. And then it was only so he could shift his attention to my neck.

  He continued to chant various versions of, “Everything’s fine,” as he kissed and sucked his way down my chest. Roughly tearing my bra down, he popped both of my breasts free. I barely felt the spring breeze on my nipple before his hungry mouth sealed over it. He covered my other with his large palm, squeezing almost painfully before following it up with gentle kneads.

  “Oh God. Please. Tanner. I want to feel you, baby,” I begged, arching off the ground.

  And in the miracle of all miracles, he listened.

  His hand slid into my shorts, his dexterous fingers circling my clit. “Fuck,” he rumbled, sitting up to take my mouth again.

  “Yes,” I panted, mindlessly grinding into his hand.

  The heady combination of his tongue swirling and his fingers playing had a burning need building in my stomach.

  I raked my nails down his back as low as I could go, attempting to grab his ass as though I could force him inside me.

  He suddenly sat up on his knees, removing his hand. “Fuck. Rita, wait.”

  “No. No. No. No. No.” I followed him, chasing his mouth. “Don’t stop. Please.”

  He kissed me again before palming either side of my face to set me away. “I don’t have a condom. We gotta go inside.”

  No way was I giving him a chance to slow this down.

  “I’m clean. I got tested after… Anyway. I also started birth control approximately seven seconds after I came on your leg.”

  A slow smirk curled his lip, but it was his eyes that
showed a blistering vulnerability as they cut over my shoulder, staring off into heartbreaking nothingness.

  I paused my frenzy long enough to realize what I was asking of him. Tanner had made it clear that he had quite the track record of women lying to him or using him for their own agenda. Whether it be money, five minutes of fame, or just the thrill taking the great Tanner Reese to bed. He had more than the normal amount of risk associated when having unprotected sex, because I had a sneaking suspicion that not many women would tell him the truth.

  “Shit. I probably sound like every woman you’ve ever been with.”

  His eyes came back to mine—tragic, heavy, and broken. “No,” he whispered. “You sound like Rita.” He smiled, but the sadness in his eyes lingered. “It’s my favorite sound in the entire world.”

  “Tanner,” I breathed.

  But that was all I got out because his mouth came down on mine with a new, invigorated fervor, and in the next second, he pulled my panties and shorts down my legs, pausing at my feet to snatch my shoes off too. He kissed me deep, breaking it only long enough to strip off his own shorts and shoes.

  I gasped when the blunt head of his cock met my entrance.

  And then it was all Tanner. His searing, blue eyes held mine as he sank into me with a gentle dominance that was almost hypnotizing.

  He kissed me dizzy. He held my hand, pinning it over my head. He made me grin against his skin when he rasped a, “Fuck, why didn’t we do this sooner?”

  Pure Tanner.

  My moans echoed off the trees around us as he rode me hard and steady, his hips rolling and circling, his length stretching and filling me.

  I came on a sharp cry that he swallowed as though it were the last drop of oxygen on Earth. And through it all, his body never slowed, never stopped coaxing me through the high or the free fall back down.

  I could barely keep my arms around him when I landed back on Earth. But you better believe I kept my eyes open because there was nothing in the world sexier than Tanner Reese on the hunt to find his release.

  “Oh fuck, Rita. Oh fuck, baby.”

  I lost him when he buried his face in my neck shortly followed by the angry jerks of his cock as he emptied inside me.