“Hey,” I reach out and touch him on the arm. “I’m sorry. I was teasing. When you pulled up at the house my first thought was that this truck might seem more at home on dirt roads, so the fact that we’re on one now made me laugh.”
“Are you sure you’re comfortable with this?”
“Yes.” I gently pull one of his hands off the wheel and wrap it in mine. “Absolutely. I want to see what you have planned.”
His thumb brushes along the back of my hand absently, and he smiles a little. I’m glad that that’s his response. The fact that he’s willing to abandon the surprise at a moment’s notice in order to make me feel comfortable actually makes me feel safer. Even though I never felt unsafe.
We pull up to a small trailhead next to a tree covered hill. The sun sets late in the summer, so we still have hours of light left. “Hiking?”
Jon helps me down from the truck and grabs a pack from the back which he slings over one shoulder. “It’s not that far. I wouldn’t take you on something too strenuous in a dress.”
I make a face. “I can handle it.”
He grins and takes my hand again. “I don’t doubt it. But this hike is more about the view than anything else.”
Together we walk up the trail, and he’s right, it’s not a bad hike. A gentle slope that doesn’t take a lot of effort. And soon we break out onto the top of a ridge that overlooks the valley and the river. The sunbeams slant across the sky, lighting everything up gold as the sun starts to sink. The Nashville skyline sits in the distance beyond an ocean of brilliant green.
“Holy shit.”
Jon tugs on my hand. “Almost there.”
A short way down the path there’s a pavilion made of glass where there is an even better view. Cushions line the wooden floor on top of a plush rug. There’s a small table in the corner with a couple of candles already lit. Low benches along the walls. It’s…beautiful.
“Did you set this all up just for tonight?”
He smiles as he pulls me inside and sets down the backpack. “I know that it would be more romantic if I said that I did, but no. The property belongs to a friend of mine, and given what you do and what I do…and the concerns that you had, I thought it might be better if we dine somewhere with privacy.”
“That is so much better than murder,” I say, laughing.
“I thought so.”
I look out over the view, still stunned by how gorgeous it is. Tennessee is beautiful, I knew that when I took the job. But I haven’t exactly had a lot of time to venture out and explore it.
From behind me, Jon brushes a hand down my arm. “I brought dinner for us,” he says. “But now that we’re here, I’m wondering if food can wait for a while.”
I turn to face him, aware that he’s so close, and this time there aren’t people waiting for us on the other side of the door. “What did you have in mind?”
A tiny smirk. “I thought maybe we could make out like teenagers for a while and then I’d woo you over my simple picnic.”
My body remembers the way he kisses, like honey and fire. I want that. Want to feel it. Hell, I’ve been dreaming about it long enough. “Yes.”
Jon has me against his body a second later, mouth slanting down on mine. It’s like no time has passed since we spent that night together in the club, not like it’s been a month and a world between us since then. I gasp into his mouth, making way for his tongue so that they can dance together.
Oh fuck, it’s better than I remembered. His arms come around me, locking me in place, and it feels so impossibly right. Just like I hoped that it would but also like I hoped that it wouldn’t.
It doesn’t make sense for us to fit like puzzle pieces when we just stumbled into each other out of the blue. Just two people who happened to be in the same place, at the same time. Things like that don’t just happen.
And yet, as his body presses against mine in all the right places, just like it did the first time, I know before the words leave his mouth that neither of us just wants to kiss. It’s too much, all at once, after not seeing each other and not knowing if we ever would again. So many days of longing, of thinking this, right here, would be impossible, that it would remain just a memory and fantasies. Now, to finally be in his arms, there’s no way to stop the flood of desire.
“More?”
“More,” I manage to gasp out.
The cushions that are on the ground make more sense now as we move together, utterly lost in each other. It’s so easy to get tangled with him, hands sliding up my thighs so my dress rides up around my hips and higher.
Jon’s mouth is on my neck, exploring, and I’m reaching deeper for him. I find the buckle on his belt and work it loose before tossing the belt aside. In the club there was urgency, but it’s not the same now. Right now I feel like if I don’t get him inside me, I’m going to spontaneously combust. I can’t fight the feeling that he’ll disappear from my life all over again.
Yanking open his pants, I reach down into his boxers. I slide my hand down his hard length. He’s hot and straining against the cotton boxer briefs. When I rub my palm up and down the swollen head, he moans against my skin. “This wasn’t in the plan,” he says. “I didn’t bring anything.”
“Pull out,” I tell him. There’s no way in hell I’m letting a condom stop me right now.
Jon looks at me, eyes dark with arousal and lust. “You’re sure.”
“Fuck me. Right now.”
He doesn’t wait for me to say it again. Pushing my panties aside and lining himself up with me, Jon thrusts deep in one stroke, and I can’t stop the cry that comes out of me. It’s so good. So perfect. I can’t breathe.
There’s no hesitation in his movements, no restraint. Which is exactly what I need—what we both need. He kisses me again, swallowing my moans as he drives into me again and again. My body remembers this, being stretched open by him. Taken. But it feels different now. Desperate and real.
This is what he wanted in the club when he told me to go faster, and I said no. This heady, unrelenting pleasure. Now part of me thinks that I should have said yes to that because I’m already panting, wrapping my legs around his hips and holding on while he fucks.
Pleasure sings down my spine, rising quicker than I thought possible and spinning between his body and mine. I have an image in my mind: Jon sweaty from victory after one of his fights, dragging me into the locker room and fucking the rest of his energy out into me. Would he be this ferocious? More?
I shiver at the thought, fingers digging into his shoulders. My body is on the edge of bliss, and there’s no way for me to hide it or hold it back. We’re both going over together.
He props himself us and hitches my thigh higher, so now he’s dragging deeper in and out of me, hitting me at an angle that grazes my g-spot with every thrust. His face is red, and his teeth are gritted as he pumps into me furiously. His forehead rests against mine and his hot breath mingles with mine, our eyes locked on each other. Watching his face contort, seeing the exertion in his features is enough to push me over the edge, “Oh, fuck.” The words slide out of me in one long moan as pleasure eclipses everything. I see white, body shuddering and shaking, squeezing down on him while I arch into his body. Delicious, deep, explosive.
Jon is still fucking me hard and raw, and a few seconds later he groans in my ear, the sound nearly feral. He sits up on his knees and strokes his cock, throwing his head back as the first jet of cum splashes hot across my stomach. It’s amazing to watch him come, eyes closed and body taut even through his clothes, shudders wracking his shoulders as he finishes.
He doesn’t speak after, just leans down and kisses me again, softer this time. Even though we were comfortable before, there’s no tension now. Familiarity with each other’s bodies is how we started. I should have known we’d need to break that kind of tension.
When Jon pulls back, he’s smiling. “Dinner?”
6
Jon
Holy hell, I almost lost control. Sadie f
elt so good that I didn’t want to pull out. No, I wanted to bury myself deeper until all she could feel was me. I wanted to finish inside her like some kind of claiming ritual to show her that she was only mine.
The thoughts were so close and so real that they shook me. Because I still feel that. I want that. It’s impossible, given that we barely know each other, but deep down I know that I want Sadie in a way that I’ve never wanted anyone. Not even Kristy.
She looks so beautiful laid out on the floor, her hair pooled around her head and her skirt revealing her toned thighs and stomach. I find a towel from my bag and gently wipe off her tummy. “Sorry about that,” I tell her. She just laughs and closes her eyes, luxuriating in her post-orgasm bliss. After I’ve cleaned her up, we put ourselves back together before I grab the backpack I brought and start unpacking the food and arranging it on the table.
“Holy crap,” she says. “When you said picnic, I was picturing something like sandwiches and chips, maybe a nice cheese and a baguette, but not…” She sweeps her hand over the table that’s now set with several steaming plates.
“A full-on Italian meal?” I laugh. “I’m not used to having an assistant yet, but he can make things happen when I need them to.”
Inside the bag were two plates of pasta puttanesca, still hot thanks to the thermal bag it traveled in. There’s also a toasty garlic bread crusted with parmesan and soaked in truffle oil. I place the cloth napkins and cutlery on the table. A perfectly aged bottle of Bordeaux rounds out the meal, and I pour us each a glass. But before I reach out my hand to Sadie to help her off the floor and pull out a chair at the table for her, I have second thoughts. She looks so peaceful and relaxed lounging on the floor. I don’t want to disturb that scene. So I bring everything down off the table and place them on the floor, including the candles, and we dig in like that, nestled in the cushions, candlelight dancing across her rosy face, her feet in my lap.
“So what did you think of the interview?” I ask. We haven’t seen each other since it aired.
She makes a little face. “It was good. And it’s doing really well. It’s been the number one viewed clip on our website all day. I wish I had been able to do it.”
“You know I never would have told anyone.”
“I know,” she sighs. “But then even if you hadn’t and we’d wanted to see each other again, we would have been in the same situation. People would question how I’d landed the interview.”
“I’m not so sure,” I say, smiling. “I think we could have spun it the exact way that we’re going to spin this.”
One eyebrow lifts. “Oh? What even is this?”
“I’m not entirely sure, yet, but I know it doesn’t end here on this hillside tonight.”
She looks at me searchingly, quiet for a moment. “Okay, so what’s your plan. How are we going to spin this? How do we even know that we’re going public?”
I brush past that part. “Simply that we met at the interview, hit it off, and fell deeply and madly in love with each other at first sight. You know how everyone loves that kind of story.”
Sadie smiles slowly. “They do love that, but I don’t know that they’ll buy it.”
“I guess we’ll see.”
“Let’s see how the rest of the date goes before I commit to saying that I’m deeply in love with you.”
I take a bite of my pasta while watching her. That’s all I can ask, I suppose. “The sports reporter didn’t ask all your questions,” I tell her.
She looks surprised. “How did you know?”
“Because you handed him like four pages of notes, and there was no way the questions that he asked covered that much paper.”
“Yeah,” she admits. “He did skip a lot of them.”
“Ask me now.”
Sadie straights up. “Really?”
“Of course. I don’t have anything to hide. I’ll even be on the record if you want.”
A laugh. “On the record? You’re nuts. You’re not the subject of a story. Certainly not my story.” Then she looks a little nervous. “And besides, I had to…research you. To write all the questions. In this totally bizarre way we are strangers but I know so many personal details about you. I feel bad about that. It seems unfair.”
“I figured you’d have done some digging before the interview. Don’t worry about that. I understand it’s your job. And besides, I’m the one who initiated this. I kind of forced your hand at cyber-stalking me.”
She smiles, but then her face turns pensive, even a little sad. “So it seems like you had a rough childhood.”
“A little,” I say smiling. “It could have been worse. That’s one thing I learned. That it can always be worse. But yeah, it was rough. My parents died in a car accident when I was pretty young, and they didn’t have any other family, so I went into the foster care system.”
Sighing, I sip my wine. “I wish that I had the kind of perfect story that some kids have about the best foster family ever, but I don’t. They were in it for the money. But there was a roof over my head and food on the table.”
Sadie smiles sadly. “I saw juvie charges.”
I laugh. “Yeah, I didn’t exactly run with the right crowd back then. I’m glad that I got out of that. Not everyone gets that lucky and walks away from their bad choices and sets a new course.”
“What allowed you to do that?”
She seems genuinely curious and bright eyed. I know that if the sports reporter had asked me any of this shit that I probably would have torn his head off. These aren’t happy memories that she’s bringing up. But with her, I don’t mind talking about it. “Guy named Frank. Retired cop. He got me when I was about to go to juvie again. And…I don’t know. The judge saw something different that time. Instead of sending me to jail, he sent me to Frank for martial arts training and anger management. He…taught me how to use my anger. Control it.”
“That would have played really well in the interview,” she says.
“I don’t think Frank would have appreciated the attention.”
“Okay, this may not be a very hard-hitting question,” she says, “but I have to know about the dogs.”
“Dogs?”
“On your Instagram,” she says. “You have a truly impressive number of dogs.”
A chill runs down my spine. “You found my Instagram?”
“Mhmm,” she swallows part of what’s left of her wine, and I refill her glass. “I was expecting more shirtless photos, if I’m really being honest.”
“I’ll have to up my game,” I say. “But they’re all my dogs.”
Sadie’s eyes go wide. “All of them?”
“Every single one. They were rescued from a dog fighting ring. And it…it didn’t feel right to choose just one. I know what it’s like to be forced to fight, and no one should be forced to, even if it’s life or death. Especially a dog that has no choice.”
She looks at me like she’s studying me. “Is that why you still fight? After the childhood you had, it doesn’t seem like something that you would want to do as a career. Didn’t you want to get away from it?”
“I wanted to get away from the violence in my life, but fighting in the ring is different. Now I get to choose how and where and when I fight. The rules are fair and defined. It’s a contest, not some desperate scrape just to survive.”
Sadie sighs, putting aside her pasta and scooting a little closer to me. “This is me me, not reporter me. I just don’t understand why someone would want to fight like that. To subject your body to all that abuse. I guess it’s just not in me.”
I pull her closer so that she’s leaning against me. I’ve already been inside her tonight, yet I’m still craving her touch. “It’s not an easy thing to explain,” I say. “I had so much anger, still have, and Frank helped me channel that into something productive. He taught me discipline and strength. It gives me something to reach for. And I’m good at it. It’s actually the only thing that I’ve ever been good at.”
“It’s defini
tely not the only thing that you’re good at,” Sadie says, smiling and leaning closer, leaving no doubt as to her meaning.
“Good to know.”
“Mmm.”
She seems more relaxed now. Happy, and that makes me more relaxed. I’m glad that this is so easy with her. But I need to know. “Did you see anything else on my Instagram?”
Sadie presses her lips together. “Yeah, I saw her.”
“Her,” he says. It’s not a question. And the word is loaded. “And no questions from your enquiring mind?”
“Well, a picture is worth a thousand words. And the absence of pictures is worth another few thousand.” She gives me a weak, almost pitying smile.
I press my lips to her temple. “Well I didn’t want you to have any doubts. We’re not together anymore. It’s been seven months. She was my fiancée.”
A tiny gasp. “I’m sorry.”
I chuckle. “I’m not. She left me for the drummer of Reign and Rage. He was a fan of mine, met her at one of my fights. Two months later…she left me a note with the ring.”
“Holy shit,” Sadie says. “I’m so sorry, Jon.”
“It’s in the past now. But I wanted you to know, I’m not a cheater. I wasn’t with her when we hooked up in Atlanta.”
She smiles softly. “That’s good to know.”
“Tell me about your family,” I say, changing the subject, trying to sound cheery. “Now that you know everything about me. Fair is fair. Spill all the gory details.”
“Well I’m sorry to disappoint you but I’m very boring.”
I laugh loudly enough for it to echo through the small space. “After meeting you in the way that I did, I am one-hundred percent sure that is not true.”
“No, really,” she insists. “Youngest of four siblings. They’re all married with kids and all so disgustingly successful. Something that my mother manages to remind me of on a nearly weekly basis.”
I tighten my fingers around her waist. “You’re the anchor of television news and your family doesn’t think you’re successful?”
Sadie snorts. “I come from a family of doctors. Not just doctors. Of surgeons. My parents, though they loved us, definitely fostered sibling rivalry in a way to make us compete and be better. Going into journalism was…I don’t know, my way of rebelling.”
Big Man’s Happily Ever After Page 19
