A Date With the Other Side (22 page)

“That’s why I didn’t go to college. I didn’t want to fail.” She took a sip of the wine, rolled the sweetness around her tongue. “But you know, sometimes I wonder if failing isn’t better than always wondering.”

“But failing out of college isn’t as detrimental as failing as a husband or father. In that case, you’re screwing up another person’s life as opposed to just your own.”

Shelby set the glass in the weeds and rolled onto her back, peering up into the limitless sky. “Maybe we are more alike than I thought.”

“Shelby… I’m leaving, you know.” He settled down closer to her, his thigh pressing against her arm.

It wasn’t unexpected, and she had thought all along she was okay with it, but when he said it out loud, she didn’t want to hear it. “Soon?”

“No. I don’t know. It could be. There’s some politics involved in this transfer and I don’t know when I’ll be sent back to Chicago, but it will probably be sooner than later, and when it happens, I’ll be leaving and not coming back.”

Shelby folded her hands across her tummy and kept her eyes trained on the sky, dropping into inky black darkness. “I know that, Boston. I’ve always known that.”

“I just wanted to be honest. Because whatever happens between us, this is all there is. Right here, right now.”

“Then we’d better make the most of it.”

Boston was leaning toward Shelby to claim that promise in her eyes, when a rocket launched into the sky and exploded over their heads in a purple cascade.

“Ooh!” Shelby said and jerked back away from him, propping her head up with her arms and smiling in delight at the fireworks.

Personally, he could care less about what was happening in the sky, focused as he was on what was occurring right there on the blanket between them. When Shelby spoke, when that wistful expression broke over her face, he wanted her, totally and completely and in all the ways that mattered.

He wanted her to be his, and that just couldn’t ever happen under any circumstances for whatever reason. It was insane even to contemplate.

But he’d told her the truth, that he was leaving, and his conscience could be clear that he’d never misled her. So when he made love to her, she would be there with him, and they’d enjoy each other for the short time they had.

“Look at that one!” she said, pointing up. “It looks like Christmas lights. And that one is crackling, like grease in a hot pan.”

And he still couldn’t drag his gaze off her long enough to appreciate a greasy firework. Draining his wine, he watched her watch them, the wonder and enthusiasm in her voice and on her face creeping into the jaded corners of his heart and warming it.

He had the sneaking suspicion that he was starting to fall in love with her.

Contrary to what he’d always assumed, he didn’t feel weak and frustrated, jealous and distracted. He just felt, well, good. Like he’d finally stopped running that race for just a minute and was standing on the sidelines admiring the view.

God, he needed something stiffer than wine. He was starting to feel freaking poetic.

So he ditched the glass in the weeds and lay on his side next to Shelby, dropping his hand onto the dip of her stomach. Corn plants were lazily swaying behind her and he almost laughed. He could honestly say he’d never made it with a woman in a field of corn.

Instead, he kissed the spot on her shoulder where it rounded the corner to her upper arm, startling a squeak out of her.

“What’re you doing?” She continued to watch the sky, but her breath had already picked up speed, her mouth parting in silent invitation.

“Kissing you.” Boston tasted down to her elbow, flickering out his tongue to slip into the crease there.

Shelby wiggled. “That tickles.”

With a quick shift, his mouth was on her waist, and he shoved her shirt out of the way, licking across the length of her and dipping into her belly button.

“Oh, stop that.” Her tone of voice wasn’t very convincing, even when she added, “I’m trying to watch the fireworks.”

“So watch them,” he murmured, nibbling across her abdomen, his fingers popping the snap on her ancient denim shorts.

He shifted his leg across her calf for better leverage, and let his thumb drift beneath her shorts, trailing over the front of her panties. They were crisp white cotton, glowing in the dark field, and he pictured her golden brown curls beneath the fabric. The fireworks sent a labyrinth of color over her body, and he brought her T-shirt up to her shoulders to better view her.

There was no bra to slow him down, just ripe round breasts and taut nipples. When he slowly drew one into his mouth, Shelby shuddered, eyes resolutely trained on the display in the sky. He sucked harder. She whimpered.

He pressed his thumb against her, deeper and deeper until he felt the moisture releasing from her, seeping through her panties. His erection was nudging painfully into her thigh, reminding him that it wanted part of the action too, but he ignored his own ache, enjoying the pleasure he could give Shelby.

Enjoying the pinch of her fingers into the blanket, the glassy desire of her wide-open eyes, the rich little moans that were coming faster and faster now as he slipped under her panties to cup her. Working her breast harder, he just let his hand rest on her, feeling the heat and dampness of her curls, until she thrust her hips off the ground in a blatant invitation for him to move.

“Do you want this?” he asked, sliding his finger along her clitoris and down into the hot wetness below.

“Yes.”

Out of vanity, out of jealousy, out of deeper emotions than he cared to admit, he asked, “I make you feel good, don’t I, Shelby?”

And he sank inside her.

“Yes,” she moaned, breasts arching up toward him, nipple brushing against his lips.

It was an offer he wasn’t going to refuse. He bit her.

Lightly, but with enough force that she jerked beneath him and said, “Oh, Lord, Boston!”

Her hips had fallen wide open and he stroked inside her with one finger, then two, feeling her stretch to accommodate him, growing slicker and slicker, while he teased the tip of her nipple, rolling his lips back and forth.

Glancing up, he saw her head tilt back, her mouth forming a moan, before she said breathlessly, “Take my shorts off.”

If he did, he’d be in her faster than she could say foreplay. “No. I want you to see that I can make you come with your clothes off, and with your clothes on, and with me inside you…”

And before he could even finish the thought, she was gone, letting out a cry as her body broke, her hips thrusting to meet his fingers, nails raking across the blanket. He kept his head between her breasts, breathing in the salty scent of her warm flesh beneath his lips, while he kept his fingers still and let her ride out her pleasure.

But the minute she relaxed back, her eyes drifting shut, he pulled back, ripped his shirt over his head, and undid his jeans. The noise alerted her, and when she saw what he was doing, she wiggled her shorts and panties down to her knees.

Boston paused to remove them the rest of the way caressing down her knees and calves, feeling the smooth firm muscle. “Nice clean shave.”

A strangled laugh left her mouth. “Thanks.”

“Take that rubber band out of your hair.” He wanted to see all that hair loose.

While he sat back and shoved off his jeans, Shelby went up on her elbows and reached into that pile of hair, jerked once, and snapped the band right out of her hair. It fell to her shoulders and below, big bouncy waves, thick and lustrous.

The sight about ripped the air right out of his lungs.

She was so feminine, so beautiful, that he could only shake his head. “Damn, you are incredible.”

A smile flashed at him, while the slow and leisurely one or two rockets at a time Cuttersville Fourth of July celebration continued. He had his boxers off in record time and didn’t bother to wait. He slapped a condom on with more force than finesse and looked up as Shelby tossed her shirt to the side.

She lay back on the blanket, hair spread around her, chest rising and falling with quick staccato breaths. Then she slowly and carefully dropped her legs wide, exposing her to him, and her arms opened, a come-hither look on her sexy face.

She didn’t need to ask him twice.

Boston moved between her thighs, and used one hand to open her swollen sex to him. He nudged at the entrance, teasing himself with her soft wetness while Shelby gripped his forearms and begged.

“Please, please…”

He couldn’t wait another second. With his own groan, he drove into her, thrusting her back against the blanket. Too late, he remembered it had been three years since she’d had sex, and the wince she fought to cover up reminded him. As did the tightness of her body, caressing him, wringing an agonized curse from his mouth.

“I’m sorry.” Boston bent to her and kissed her mouth softly, holding still inside her as he watched her face.

“I’m fine.” She pulled his head back to hers and kissed him this time, her tongue licking at his lips, demanding entrance.

He opened his mouth for her, and the kiss went hotter, her hands in his hair, and Boston gripped the smooth skin of her back and rolled them both over, still embedded in her.

Shelby lay across his chest, her breasts pressing over him, her hair tickling his chest. Without moving inside her, he kissed her again, over and over, stroking her dewy flesh, cupping her backside until she started to thrust and grind against him.

“Oh, yeah, that’s it. Take what you want, Shelby.”

Her eyes locked with his, Shelby pushed herself back until she was sitting up, hair tumbling over her rosy nipples. She adjusted her hips a little, fussed with her wrists, brushed her thumbs over his chest. Then she lifted and sank back down, her eyes drifting shut, her cheeks flushing, little pants of pleasure slipping out.

Never in his whole life had he seen anything as sexy as Shelby finding her rhythm on him, riding him faster and faster. He ground his teeth together, dug his heels into the blanket, and forced himself to not do a damn thing.

It was worth every tense muscle when she ground that swollen button against him and yelled out loud enough to wake the dead, who probably weren’t asleep anyway. Shelby shuddered and pressed through her climax, eyes half closed, inner muscles trembling over him, and Boston fought his own release.

“No way,” she said with a shaky laugh, squeezing his shoulders. “I can’t believe that just happened.”

He was so goddamn glad it had. Reaching out with a growl, he buried his hands in the lush caramel strands of her hair and twisted them around his knuckles. He tugged her forward. “Come here.”

Shelby had barely recovered from her orgasm, in fact was still shaky and trembling, when Boston used her hair like a leash and jerked her down onto his chest. “What?” she managed, trying to prop herself up a little so she wasn’t squashing him.

“I’m going to roll you over,” he said tightly, jaw clenched and breathing hard.

“Okay.” She didn’t think he was actually asking permission, but she was feeling like she’d agree to do just about anything after he’d delivered twice in one night again.

Then he flipped her smoothly, returning her to her back on the hill. The slight incline had her sliding down a little until he pressed his chest against hers and held her in place. Hands still tangled in her hair, bodies still intimately connected, he sucked her bottom lip. And then moved.

With a raw determination, a hard territorial thrust, fingers fanning her hair out and inadvertently pulling. But she didn’t care, not when he was moving, not when he was sliding into her with reckless, out-of-control drives.

And Lord have mercy, when she wrapped her legs around his hard thighs, she saw the Cuttersville fireworks grand finale bursting over her head behind his shoulder, the loud booms drowning out all sound but the rush of his groans past her ear.

His forehead pressed to hers, his eyes closed, hot breath fanning across her nose, and she felt him come inside her with a last pulsing thrust that had her moaning with him. Boston made her feel like the sexiest woman he’d ever gotten naked, and as she lay back on the ground like an overcooked noodle, she realized that this was much more than she’d ever bargained for.

“Oh, boy,” she said on a swallow, seeking reassurance in his eyes that this was ordinary sex to him, standard procedure that didn’t mean anything at all about the state of her heart.

But he just nuzzled against her with his mouth, nodding. His black eyes locked with hers. “Oh, boy,” he agreed.

“Nice fireworks,” she ventured, sure she was wrong, and that no doubt he’d had cornfields full of sex better than what they’d just shared.

“Best I’ve ever seen,” he said, confirming for her that they could never do this again.

Boston showed up for the Saturday six o’clock Haunted Cuttersville Tour on July fifth, right on time but full of trepidation.

For one thing, there was a large crowd of twenty gathered on his front porch, waiting for him.

For another, after the incredible blanket bonanza under the stars the night before with Shelby, he felt a little bit like Red-Eyed Rachel had conked him on the head with a candlestick.

Shocked. Stunned. Dazed.

It wasn’t every day he realized he’d just about fallen in love with a woman. In fact, this was the first. And given the vague, glassy expression on Shelby’s face when he’d dropped her off the night before, and the single-syllable replies she’d given him, she had also been experiencing something other than unadulterated bliss.

Neither one of them had thought to suggest Shelby grab her toothbrush and stay over. Boston thought maybe they’d both known they’d had all they could handle for one night.

Having Amanda accompanying him this evening wasn’t helping either. She wasn’t doing anything that could be classified as annoying, although her lip gloss was a little blinding, but having her around was a reminder of Chicago, where he belonged, his real life.

And when he was in Cuttersville, and holding Shelby in his arms under a pollution-free sky, he didn’t want to be reminded of reality. He wanted to play small-town house for a while.