Chapter 8
Joshua
“It’s this way.” I’d never been this nervous before, not during finals or my first business meeting or the time I’d pitched my idea to investors.
A row of fairy lights twinkled in the trees at the back fence. The gate itself stood open, half-in and out of darkness. Stars overhead, the moon out, round face pale and pocked, lighting the path to the exit.
“Out here?” Eve asked, keeping pace with me. She held the bottle of champagne I’d chosen out and two plastic glasses.
“I would’ve taken you to the Cowboys n’ Cuts,” I said, “but I figured you’re sick of the place already.”
“You can say that again.” She huffed a sigh, and I shifted my focus from the path out to our private little picnic spot under the stars to her.
Eve wore a loose dress, cleavage barely visible, and cowboy boots again. He hair was loose around her shoulders, dark and curled at the ends. I pictured myself running fingers through it, tilting her head back, kissing her for the first time while the moon played across her soft cheeks.
Christ, I had to –
My hip banged into the gate’s post and the plastic plates in the picnic basket rattled. “Shit,” I muttered.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” I said, “serves me right for not paying attention to where I’m going.” I tried for a laugh but it came out nervous. Christ, it was as if all my hopes and dreams rode on this one moment, and it was bullshit. No pressure. I had to remember that. No pressure.
I held the fence and gestured for Eve to exit in front of me, then followed her out. The row of fairy lights continued into the forest behind the farmhouse. I’d spent all afternoon stringing them up, picturing this moment with her.
The connection with Eve had been instant and unbelievable but she didn’t seem to share it. What if this was all for nothing?
“No pressure,” I muttered.
“What was that?”
“Nothing, sorry. Just thinking out loud. I do that sometimes.”
“Hey, me, too. It’s kind of awkward when other people are around and they hear you doing it.” Eve laughed, that pleasant tinkle that set me on fire inside all over again.
Finally, we reached the spot I’d prepared and Eve sucked in a gasp.
“Welcome to your picnic,” I said, gesturing to the blanket, the fairy lights in the trees surrounding the clearing, and the lanterns around it dimmed to provide just enough light but no intrusion.
“Wow,” she whispered. “Wow, this is incredible. I – how often do you do this, Joshua?”
“What?” I took her hand and led her to the spot.
“I mean, this is really well laid out.”
I frowned – was that what she thought? That I was a Casanova who romanced women on my ranch? “I did it for you,” I said, putting down the basket. I took the glasses from her and set them down on top of it. “I don’t – I haven’t dated in years. And not in Hope Creek.”
She worried her bottom lip. “That’s really sweet,” she said, softly.
Someone had to have hurt her in the past, if her first assumption was that this was my bachelor pad and I brought women back here for one purpose only.
“Sit,” I said, “please.” I took the champagne bottle from her, then worked the cork out. It gave a muted pop. I lowered myself to the picnic blanket and poured the bubbly into the glasses, then set the champagne aside in the cooler I’d prepared. “Here we go.”
We took a champagne glass each, clicked them together, then both drank way too deeply. She was probably as nervous as I was.
“Tell me about yourself,” I said, “I feel like I don’t know that much about you.”
“Oh, you know.” She waved her hand. “Not much to tell. I was a chef in New York, I moved here, that’s it.”
“Okay.”
Awkward silence and the air between us jellied with tension. She was close enough to touch, to kiss. I glugged back more champagne instead and tried not to think about it. This was supposed to be carefree and fun.
“Are you hungry?”
Eve swallowed and put down her glass. “Look, I owe you an explanation. I’m not really prepared for anything serious with you. It’s just – you’ve gone to so much trouble and you’re so –” She cut off and wrung her hands in her lap.
“What? You can tell me,” I said.
“You’re so gorgeous, and sweet, and I can’t stop thinking about you. I don’t want to but I do.”
“Why?”
“Because of all the reasons I just mentioned.” She blushed.
“No, I mean, why don’t you want to?”
“I’m recently divorced,” Eve whispered. “I – my ex was unfaithful and I’m not ready to move on with anyone else. I can’t when I don’t even know who I am anymore.” She crept toward me on her knees, peering up at me, desperate for me to understand her. “I can’t possibly be with someone when I’m too afraid to be myself.”
“I understand.” I hadn’t had the opportunity to have my heart broken to pieces or to love before. Every one of my relationships had been short and to the point. Any complications had only driven me into my work as opposed to my then-lover’s arms. But this was different.
I wanted to know more about Eve’s complications. I wanted to know everything.
“You’re not mad?”
“What? Of course not. How could I be mad?”
“I feel like I led you on,” she said. “I know you like me and I like you, too, but I’m just not ready. I should go.”
Eve made to stand up but I caught her wrist. “Eve, sit down. There’s no pressure here, okay? I’m not asking you to marry me and this doesn’t even have to be classed as a date if you don’t want it to be. I just want to spend time with you. As a friend, if that’s what you’re comfortable with.”
She hesitated, then sank back down again. She rubbed her arm where goosebumps had risen.
“Are you cold? I can get you a jacket from the house.”
“No,” she said, “I’m not cold. It’s whenever you touch me.”
I stared at her and she matched me. Silence, apart from the chirp of crickets in the underbrush and the gentle whisper of wind in the leaves.
“Whenever I touch you,” I said.
“Yes.” She gulped. She was so close but so far away. I couldn’t make a move on her, no matter how much I wanted to. She wasn’t comfortable. She didn’t want –
Eve placed her hand on my arm. “Like this, see?” She ran it upward, over my shoulder and to my neck. “Look.” The hairs on her arm were raised.
My breath caught. “I see. Eve, I know I said just friends but when you touch me, it makes it… difficult for me to –”
“To what?” She searched for an answer in my expression, soulful, palm still against the side of my neck.
“To resist.”
“To resist what?”
“Kissing you, touching you, making love to you. Having you as mine.”
“Yours,” she whispered, and tears gathered. God, she’d cry now and it’d be all my fault. “Yours.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t –”
“Don’t apologize.” She brought her face closer, her lips eclipsed the picnic, the trees, the lights.
“Eve,” I said, and my breaths came out forced, sharp. “Eve, I don’t want to do anything you don’t want me to do. We just spoke about it.”
“I know,” Eve whispered, hot against my skin. She touched her forehead to mine and my resolve exploded.
I grasped the back of her head, smoothed fingers over her cheek with my other hand, then kissed her. Magnetic, instant chemistry. Eve tasted of champagne and country air. “Oh, god,” she moaned, into my mouth.
I wanted to offer to stop but I couldn’t if I tried. I’d dreamed of this since the moment she’d crashed into me with her Ford.
And Eve didn’t stop either. She was in my lap, now, her arms around my neck, kissing me back hard. Our tongues intertwined. I sucked her bottom lip, gently.
“It feels so right,” she muttered.
I couldn’t have agreed more.
She shifted in my lap and inhaled, sharply. “Oh,” she said.
“Sorry,” I replied but I couldn’t summon up the decency to be embarrassed on my raging erection. I could barely block out the thoughts of her naked beneath me.
“Don’t be,” she said, turning around. Eve straddled me, arms still around my neck, then tipped me backward onto the blanket. She kissed me again, eyes closed, the intensity increasing exponentially. She fumbled with the buttons on my shirt.
I broke the kiss. “Are you sure? Eve, are you sure?”
“Don’t stop,” she said, and the sheer desperation in her voice made me ache. Eve managed to undo one button, gripped either side of the shirt and pulled. A rip of fabric and the ping as buttons popped free. One hit the champagne bottle.
Eve’s lips found mine, then traveled lower, along the side of my jaw, down my neck to my collar bone.
On fire. I was fucking on fire. I slipped the straps of her dress from her shoulders and pulled the top half down. Two pale breasts popped free, pink nipples puckering in the cold night air.
“Good god,” I growled, and looped my arms around her, forced them toward my face. I took one nipple in my mouth and sucked, nibbled, tasted her skin.
Eve arched her back and bucked her hips against my crotch. My cock couldn’t take the confinement anymore.
I reached between her legs and unzipped my pants, brought it out, pressed it against the wet triangle of her underwear – lace panties. The sensation took me to new heights. My eyes rolled back in my head. “Fuck, you’re so wet.”
Eve didn’t speak, just shifted her underwear aside and rubbed herself against me. She was so hot, slippery.
I planted my hands on her back again and rolled over, trapped her beneath me as I’d dreamed of doing for the past few nights. “You’re beautiful,” I said, kissing the tip of her nose, her cheeks, her chin. “So beautiful.”
Eve wrapped her legs around my waist and caught my bottom lip between her teeth. She nibbled, then sucked, then kissed me again.
I couldn’t take another second without being inside her. I placed my cock at her entrance and pushed slowly, ever so slowly, until I was inside, then I buried myself to the base.
We cried out together. Eve tugged a handful of my hair. “Hard,” she said, “and fast.”
I did as she asked, anything to make her tighten up around me, to make her scream if I could. I pounded into her, blowing out breaths, kissing her between, my body shuddering for more, and her breasts pressing against me.
“Yes,” she whispered, “Joshua, yes.”
“Fuck. Say my name again. Please, say it again.”
She dug her fingernails into the back of my neck, fixed me with her gaze, overflowing with pleasure, desire. “Joshua. Joshua, I’m going to – I’m going to come.”
I lost it. I pounded into her, pulsed and released myself, even as she tightened around me. We were together, our foreheads touched, her heart beat against mine. This was how it was supposed to be.
This was what I’d missed out on all along.
“I think I’m falling for you,” I whispered, still buried inside her, the last throes of my orgasm racking me with belated shots of pleasure.
Eve didn’t reply. She closed her eyes and clung to me. At least, she didn’t let go.