7

The Good Girl

The next night, I get on the bike again. And the next night. And the night after that.

I tell myself not to, but the roar of the motorcycle calls to me. I sneak out of the house while my family sleeps. Even with my father wanting Cassius Gunner and I to be close...well, he does not want us as close as this.

I pray for forgiveness, but why is this is something I should ask forgiveness for? It's okay to be friends.

And then there's all the places Cassius Gunner takes me. The east side, where he's from, is not a good idea. He's on probation and could be recognized. So we go to the west side.

He takes me to a bookstore, where I wander the shelves in blissful agony. We sit in a corner where he reads a poetry collection to me and buys it for me against my protests. I hide the book under my mattress.

He takes me to an arcade. My heart seizes when we find an archery game booth. I hit each target and grin too wide for my mouth. The man working the booth says I'm a natural, and I fall more in love with the bow than I did as a child.

He takes me to a tavern where we listen to a band play a mix of rock and folk. He tries to get me to dance, but I'm shy in front of strangers. I don't say yes until I notice the way other girls are looking at him. Seeing their glossy locks, I take off my headdress. We dance like we did in the cabin, this time with orange and blue spotlights on us.

Afterward, I mention how warm it is. Without warning, he unfastens one of the snaps at the top of my dress and splits it open, revealing a slice of my collarbone. His finger curls over my skin, lingering for a moment. He stares at me and no one else.

He says, "That's better."

I shiver.

I don't care for the noise or rushed pace or the sorrowful sight of a homeless person bundled up on one street, but I like the carefree, creative, and studious diversions this world contains. Cassius Gunner describes a vast park, and other pockets of nature throughout the city, and markets, and local churches that also practice my faith, and outlying areas where farms welcome anyone and everyone, only an hour's drive from the skyscrapers. I like it enough to scare me.

We go out for only a couple of hours at a time, but I'm exhausted during the day. So is he. It takes its toll on our work. I begin to worry that people will notice.

Beyond the wheat field, the landscape has officially changed. The trees ripen with fall colors of gold, amber, and rosy red. The breeze seduces my bangs out from under my headdress. I squish wheat to my chest when I see him with my father. Papa is showing him around the tractor and pointing out the different mechanisms. Cassius Gunner keeps his arms crossed, but he's listening, snatching clandestine glances at my father. It's a temporary image that wills a grin from me. I enjoy seeing them together.

I turn away to find David's shadow aimed in my direction from across the way, taking in the whole spectacle, and remorse pinches me. I keep my head down. It stays down until I hear my father leave Cassius Gunner alone.

I cart my bundle over to where he's tying unruly knots to secure the bales. I tap his back. His boyish face travels over his shoulder. "Hey," he says.

Mutely, I offer the stack to him. As he takes it, our fingers connect, and tingles take over my body. Hit me in places I never knew existed. They give me bad thoughts. Very bad thoughts. We stay that way for too long. Catherine and Mary prance through the field. So do Elizabeth and Tommy and the Masons and dozens of others. Everyone is close by.

Cassius asks, "Are you quiet because you're feeling religious this morning? Or has my bike wiped you of energy?"

"What we're doing is dangerous. It’s … bad."

"Only if you want to go for another ride. And bad is good, baby."

"I can't anymore. I shouldn't. I'm with..."

David. Who's approaching us.

Him moving through the field stops me from finishing my sentence. I muster as dedicated an expression as I can, but it doesn't faze him. His attention is solely on Cassius, who reads something into David's stance.

The instant David reaches us, he spits, "Stay away from Annabelle."

"David," I hiss.

"Stay away from my girl—"

“She’s not your girl,” Cassius roars.

People begin to stare. Catherine and Mary feast on the scene with an absurd amount of envy. My sister watches me with new interest.

Cassius Gunner tilts his head. "She isn't a puppet. And she isn't invisible. She's standing right here." He looks at me squarely. "You can decide for yourself who you want to be with."

"And you'll let her, I'm sure," David says.

Those blue wells sweep across my face and assess my hazarded expression. He shakes his head dismissively at David. “Fuck off before you say something you’ll regret." Cassius goes back to knotting bales.

David frowns. "Oh, really?"

"That's enough," I scold, my cheeks on fire.

"Because from what I hear, you Gunners tend to get pretty close to the Chastes."

Cassius stops.

"Can't imagine you'd be much different from your father. Too weak of a spirit to fix yourself without help, is that it?"

Cassius turns.

"Did you inherit his problems as well?"

Cassius balls his hand into a white-knuckled fist. "Come closer and say that to me."

"Just keep your hands to yourself."

"I don't touch what doesn't want to be touched."

"I'm going to need a better answer than that."

"You're also going to need stitches in a second," Cassius warns him.

My father cuts into the space between them but doesn't say a word, just peers at one man, then the other, locking eyes with them. My father works his magic with that one look. Elsie and I have buckled under it many times. It's a magnificent, reproachful, disappointed look that one doesn't forget. It breeds humility.

David hangs his head in shame. Cassius Gunner glares at his shoes, his anger still running like a motor.

My father touches my elbow, and then David's, silently leading us away. David refuses to glance at me. I don't know what I would say if he did. He's my friend and my future, but the memory of the motorcycle ride last night envelopes me with such tenderness that I'm uncertain whether I'm doing my heart a favor by our union, or I’m breaking it.

Accident-prone Tommy has broken another bone, this time by tripping down the stairs. Elizabeth needs to go see him, not only to heal, but also to calm him down. He's always been a dramatic fellow, bellowing over as little as a paper cut. There's no telling what state he's in now.

Elsie, who's been learning Elizabeth's craft, needs to go to Tommy's house. Ever the protective parent, my father will accompany her in Elizaebth’s truck. It's a far stretch out to that part of the area.

It's also the first real storm we've had this season. The strength of the downpour and the wailing wind concern me. It's the sort of rain that causes floods over certain lanes. But Elsie is dedicated, and Elizabeth made it all the way over here just to get her in the first place. I'm envious of their relationship. Elsie looks up to her.

My father pats my shoulder and tells me to go ahead and eat supper without them. It could be a long night.

It turns out to be precisely that. I glance out the rattling window as if my glare alone will plug the storm. Three hours have passed, which means my family must be blocked from returning. The main route is undoubtedly a river by now. It isn't the first time this has happened, nor will it be the last. They'll most likely have to wait until morning, and we have no phone, so they can't call me.

Thunder spears the sky. I stir my lukewarm pumpkin soup, past the time when I should have eaten. Angry weather and I don't compliment one another.

I've been so concerned about my family returning, and being left alone, that it's only now I remember Cassius still hasn't been served. He might not have leftover fruit or vegetables from the last batch we gave him. I chew on my nails. He must be hungry by now, but it's a very wet and slimy walk to the cabin, and the lightening continues to snarl down at the earth.

I fill a container and grab my coat and an umbrella. Not one minute after I leave the walkway, my shoes and dress are caked in mud. I waddle like a lost duck. The umbrella flips inside out, and I stomp my already soiled feet as the wind tears the apparatus from my fingers, and my body is instantly drenched.

I'm watching the umbrella dash away when another slice of thunder punches the tree beside me. I glance up as the monstrous girth of a branch drops from the sky, aiming for my scalp and thus my very existence.

Something hard rams into my side. It's knocks the breath from me as I crash into the ground. The side of my face gets plastered into the mud. Then a pair of hands yank me to a sitting position.

Cassius lets go only to frame my cheeks. He's just as drenched as I am. Behind him, I see the branch that would have killed me on the ground. I'm too numb from the speed at which everything happened to be traumatized.

"You okay?" he calls to me over the torrential rain.

I twist my head over my shoulder. I'd almost made it to the cabin but hadn't noticed. I wipe my eyes and nod.

"Are you an idiot?" he adds.

"I was bringing you supper."

"For fuck's sake, Annabelle!"

He helps me up, and we sprint into the cabin, where my teeth begin to chatter. Cassius takes the soup container from me, which I've somehow managed to keep a hold on, and then tosses me a small towel. I wash up over the water basin and then station myself by the wood stove, swallowing the fire's heat with my body and soul. Outside, the storm slaps everything in its path, with energy to spare.

"Take your clothes off."

Cassius’ words paralyze me. He's stripped off his sodden shirt, his large bulging muscles flexing in the orange light. This is the most alone I've ever been with a man.

When I don't respond, he glances over at me, appraising me up and down. I'm self-conscious of how my wool dress clings to my silhouette but reeks of goat. I fret over which of these details he notices more.

Rummaging through his clothes, he tosses me a pair of pants and a button-down shirt, then turns around. It's a frenzy as I dry myself and jump into his clothes. I draw the line at removing my undergarments, especially since they're merely damp. When I'm settled, I look like I've shrunk while the clothes have remained the same size.

He wheels back around and smiles. "You look sexy-hot in that getup."

"Stop it."

"You should wear my clothes more often. I want to know my clothes are grazing your breasts, like I'm holding them."

“You’re disgusting,” I hiss.

“Disgusting is a level-up from prick. I’ll take what I can.”

I hate how much I love the way he talks to me, the way he tells me he thinks I’m sexy and that he wants me.

I don't want him to see how much I love it, so I collect my wet dress, stockings, and headdress and hang them over a chair.

Cassius heats the soup over the wood stove, then sits on the floor and gobbles it quickly. I was right. He is hungry.

I also see that while I was changing, he swapped his pants for dry ones, too. But he's shirtless. As he twists to stoke the fire, the dandelion tattoo blazes over the width of his shoulder blade.

I perch across from him. "Why did you choose a dandelion?"

He shrugs. "It was a signature design of my father's. He used to make sugar cookies to decorate the cakes. He liked to prove the most unlikely things could be beautiful."

I haven't seen the tattoo up close. "Is it...is there a scar there, too?"

"Not under this one. Just the one on my wrist."

We listen to the downpour and rolling thunder. He taps the spoon inside the empty bowl. "The first time Mom hit me was right after Dad died. Her moods had changed. Something snapped in her because she's not...not right in the head anymore. I guess it's the grief. I guess she doesn't know where else to direct her anger. It's like she doesn't see my brothers or me. Not really… I was in the café closing up when it happened. She accused me of taking money from the register, which I didn't, so I made a smart-ass comment. The slap shocked both of us. It didn't stop her from doing it again or from finding new ways to punish Dylan and me."

Cassius studies the wrist tattoo. "I wanted Dad's name to be kind of a shield, I guess, from my mom."

It's a challenge for me not to despise the woman. "My mother used to ignore Elsie and me," I confess. "She'd leave us alone sometimes. She didn't touch us, but it still hurt. She didn't hug us or my father. I don't..."

"Tell me," he urges.

"I don't miss her." My chin wobbles. "She didn't deserve us."

He nods. "I'm making things hard for you here. That whole drama with Asshole." His eyes are bright and wild and beautiful. "Should I go easier on you, Annabelle?"

I refuse to respond to that. I'm in his room, in his clothes, at night. "David was wrong to say what he did. It's not like him. He didn't mean to be cruel, Cassius. You should have held your tongue, too."

"The loudest men are usually the weakest."

"You've been talking with my father," I observe.

Cassius chuckles. "He kicked my ass with that line."

My own chuckle arches into a yawn.

"Take the bed," he says. "You're not going back out there."

I don't argue as I curl into the quilt. The bed smells like him: sweetened spices and wood and leather. He doesn't hide the fact that he's watching me, and I don't hide the fact that I don't mind. Storms make me nervous. I feel better knowing those blue orbs are on me...

I wake up hugging his pillow. It's still dark and brutal outside. And he's gone.

Sitting up immediately, I scan the room and find him in a chair, painting that same spot on the wall again. I relax and sigh out loud.

His brush halts, then resumes its business, slathering blue to create a night sky. I rise and shuffle to his chair, and an unfamiliar ache rushes through me. It's the hill where he took me to see the city. The grass, the skyscrapers, the lights. The only thing missing is us.

My eyes sting. I feel melancholic and desperate at the same time. "It's pretty."

He looks up. We're dry and warm and by ourselves, caught between a lovely picture and each other.

I gasp as he reaches out and pulls me down onto the chair. I land in front of him, my back against his bare chest, my hips caged in his thighs, but it feels right. It feels right to let him touch me. It's soft and intoxicating. And I'm doomed.

All around us, rain slams against the cabin. It covers the window in a blurry sheet. Cassius stares ahead, stretching his arm over me and swabbing the image in thick colors. The brush rubs, strokes, caresses the wall. And I'm mesmerized.

His muscles graze against my spine. His chin comes to rest on my shoulder. I angle my head, permitting him to lean further in, my blood racing when his lips skim the side of my neck, pausing every so often to nibble. My mouth parts, releasing a gust of air that I feel him breathe in. That very feminine place between my thighs bursts into tiny sparks.

He keeps painting as if nothing is happening. But he murmurs into my ear, because all at once everything is happening. "Have you known pleasure, Annabelle?" And I'm alert, and he continues, "Have you ever been touched?"

I've kissed David before — no tongue — but it has never been remotely as potent as the sound of Cassius’ voice asking that question. Reluctance prowls through my mind thinking of David, who trusts me, who has always been so essential. While a sweeter, hotter, stronger need spans the circumference of my heart, overpowering the reasons why I can't, why I shouldn't, why it won't last, why it can't last.

This man, however different, makes me feel a whole new kind of alive. His free arm slides over my stomach. His hand maneuvers into the gap between my pants and shirt, scorching the curve of my hipbone. His thumb traces circles over my skin. My heads falls back completely as I melt against him in surrender. The motions and the words and the half-light and the languid brush strokes and his body encase me deep, deep, deep. Oh, so deep into this moment.

I'm fully aware of what's about to happen. I'm going to allow it.

He hums against my ear. "Have you ever felt passion?" I shake my head. "Do you want me to stop?" I shake my head again.

My pulse exceeds the speed of sound as Cassius Gunner sets down the brush. He tilts my face up and back, toward his. He locks us in this position. Our eyes connect.

My body. His body. Heat.

My gaze. His gaze. Desire.

My mouth. His mouth. Passion.

Passion. I encounter it for the first time in that secluded cabin. As thunder pelts the distant landscape, we collide. His firm lips slant over mine and claim them, own them with the dizzying motions of his jaw. His tongue traces my mouth, top and then bottom, begging entrance. My lips spread like wings, desperate to be fed every succulent drop of him. My hand steals up behind me and climbs the wall of his chest, feeling his heart gallop beneath my fingertips, then clamp around his neck.

"Kiss me back," he says against my mouth. "Do it. Taste me."

My tongue meets his. And the kiss explodes. His velvety groan mingles with my petal-thin gasp. It penetrates the well inside me, creating a hot tide pool in my mouth and between my breasts, where pearls of sweat run down my skin. His fingers dig into my hair. My already disheveled braid comes undone. And I don't care.

"Oh," I mewl as he breaks away, peers at me, and shakes his head. He mumbles what sounds like a curse and kisses me again.

His mouth fastens onto mine. His hand clasps the back of my head to hold me in place. As our tongues ebb and flow, his other hand burns beneath the elastic of my pants, his nails lightly grazing my hip, drawing a whimper from me that he swallows whole.

Afterward, I sag against him while we catch our breaths. Speechless. Overwhelmed. Overheated. So much.

He brushes his trembling mouth across my forehead. The gesture brings us back to earth. My eyes drift closed to the gentle motions of him retrieving the paintbrush and resuming his task. In my delirium, I feel him carry me back to bed. I ask him to stay with me, and we gather ourselves under the blanket, and he encases me in his strong arms.

I babble something about hope. He holds me tighter, though he doesn't need to.

Because this is where I belong. In Cassius Gunner’s arms.

I hated David saying I was his.

But I want Cassius to shout to the world that I am his, and his alone.

Mine.