As her laughter receded, I withdrew and gathered a fortifying breath, zipping my zipper and searching for my shirt.
She glanced over her shoulder and I noticed she’d freed her elbow from where it had been trapped in her dress, pushing it back through the sleeve. A smile lingered on her lips, but her eyebrows drew together with a question.
“What are you doing?”
“Take off your boots,” I ordered gruffly, recovering my shirt and pulling it over my head.
She only hesitated for a second before I heard the zipper of her boots release and I glanced at her legs. Beneath the boots she’d been wearing long pink and black striped socks that reached almost to her knees. I dug my fingers into my thighs to keep from touching her legs, or rolling the socks down her sculpted calves.
“Duane?”
I lifted my eyes to hers, she was waiting for me to give direction.
“Take your panties off, Jessica.”
She hesitated, then asked, “What about the dress?”
I shook my head. “Just the panties.”
Her wide brown eyes studied my face for a beat and then she was lifting up her hips. I closed my eyes so I didn’t have to see her shimmy out of her underwear, but I imagined her sweet center exposed and I nearly reached for her. When she finished, I felt her hesitate next to me.
I opened my eyes, found her staring at me. Her cheeks were flushed. As I suspected, she was again waiting for me to give direction. The fact she was so willing and trusting strengthened my resolve.
“Climb on my lap.” My voice was softer this time.
She immediately did so, and reached for my fly at the same time.
I stilled her hands. “No. Leave it be.”
“But—”
“Shhhh…” I slipped my fingers beneath her skirt, savoring the skin of her legs. Her hands came to my shoulders for balance, and her eyes grew hazy as I brushed the back of my knuckles up her inner thighs.
“Duane,” she pleaded, both choking on and swallowing my name.
Lights from a passing car in the distance dimly illuminated the interior and I saw the Road Runner’s windows were completely fogged.
I stroked her with the tip of my middle finger and her thighs clenched, her eyes closed, and she stutter-sighed. Moving one hand around to her ass, because she had an amazing ass, I held her in place and touched her again, parting her, entering her once then teasing her with control and precision.
Watching Jessica was a revelation. Yeah, I was sporting angry wood at this point and my dick envied my hand, but how she responded to me, how she moved and sighed and pleaded, wound itself around my chest, filled my lungs. I experienced something akin to wonder.
She’d been right. It didn’t take long. When she gripped my wrist as she panted and rocked on my lap, her mindlessness at my hands made me want to give voice to my possessive and claiming thoughts.
Your body is mine.
This is mine.
You are mine.
I didn’t, though. Even as I felt her glorious body clench around my fingers and watched her come apart in beautiful waves, I swallowed the words.
Because she was mine.
But with an expiration date.
CHAPTER 15
“The traveler sees what he sees. The tourist sees only what he has come to see.”
― G.K. Chesterton
Jessica
I saw Duane at church.
Reverend Seymour held two services every Sunday: the “fast service” at eight, and the “leisurely service” at ten.
Bethany Winston, when she was alive, and all the Winston boys went to the fast service. It lasted for an hour, tops. My momma called it fast-food religion. She complained loud and often about the regular attendees, calling them Catholics parading as Baptists.
My family had always attended the 10:00 a.m. service. It lasted anywhere between one and a half to three hours, and community worship was the name of the game. Sometimes it felt like everyone in attendance spoke at least once—asking for prayers, or saying a special prayer, or giving witness. Even after church was over, it was still going on. Groups of people met in the hall. They socialized, ate doughnuts, held prayer circles, and drank weak coffee.
For this reason I’d hardly ever seen Duane at church, and I likely wouldn’t have, except my daddy unexpectedly woke me up early Sunday morning for a heaping helping of fast-food religion.
I suspected he was anxious to get Sunday service out of the way because the Cowboys were playing the Patriots at noon. This suspicion was confirmed when I spotted the fixings for nachos and a six pack of Corona in the fridge—my father’s version of wild and reckless behavior.
We arrived a few minutes early and sat in the back. Duane and three of his brothers—Billy, Cletus, and Beau—arrived a short time later and strolled to one of the middle pews. At first I was struck speechless by the sight of them; four tall, fine-looking men, with broad shoulders and narrow hips, dressed in their Sunday uniform of black pants, white button-down shirts, moving with an intrinsic kind of swagger, grace, and confidence in their step.