Chapter Fifteen
Tyler
“I’m going to head over to the art studio and grab our paintings before anyone shows up this morning; do you want me to grab some breakfast?” I whispered as I woke up next to Kelsi in the hotel bed.
“Yes. Lots of food and coffee,” she said without opening her eyes.
“I’ll be right back.”
Kelsi didn’t answer me, but she grunted and turned over in the bed. I stood there for a moment just looking at how beautiful she was. Even after staying up most of the night, she still looked amazing. Her red hair was swept to one side, and her tanned skin was barely covered with the 1,000 thread count hotel sheets.
It took a little psychological motivation to get my butt moving, but the idea of the art studio owner seeing our naked artwork was enough to motivate me. I could only assume he was comfortable with the naked form, but I couldn’t assume he was all right with guests having sex in the middle of his studio.
I arrived just before dawn and had the art studio cleaned up and looking exactly as it had looked when we arrived, but as I gathered our paintings as was about to leave, the owner showed up for the day. He was a nice man who had been more than willing to loan me the studio for the evening and I knew I had to stay and talk to him for just a little bit before I went back to Kelsi.
“Did your evening go well?” the store owner, Heath, asked.
“Yes, it did. Thank you again for loaning me the studio.”
“How did your paintings turn out?” Heath asked as he pointed to the two canvases in my hands.
“It was very a titillating evening. I better get going, thanks again.”
“Can I take a look?” Heath asked and grabbed at the canvas before I could stop him. “Very promising. Your friend is an excellent artist.”
Heath took a moment to look at Kelsi’s painting of me, and I could have died right then and there. His face was serious as he moved the canvas closer to him and looked at the brush strokes. I could only imagine what he must have thought. After examining the first painting, Heath looked at the one I had started of Kelsi.
Unfortunately, I had barely started the drawing of her before I got distracted by her fabulous body. I shifted my attention to the cars driving by as I waited for Heath to make some sort of comment about my work.
“You care about her,” Heath said as he continued to analyze the drawing. “She’s very beautiful.”
“Thank you. Okay, I better get going.”
“Come back anytime. I’d be happy to let you use the studio.”
“Okay, I will. Thanks again,” I said as I started to walk down the sidewalk.
“Next time I’ll make sure to turn off the security cameras, though,” Heath hollered after me.
I didn’t turn around. I couldn’t stand the thought of looking him in the eyes and trying to figure out how much of the security camera footage he had seen. Did he see it? Did he have some sort of app that he could watch his studio with? Oh, man, I couldn’t believe what had happened.
By the time I picked up breakfast from the restaurant in the lobby and made it to our room, I was almost in a full fit of laughter as I thought about the security cameras. It was so funny, yet so embarrassing all at the same time.
“What’s so funny?” Kelsi asked as soon as I walked in the room. “Oh, no, did he see the paintings? Man, that is so embarrassing.”
Kelsi was curled up on the bed with a robe wrapped around her and dripping wet hair. She looked like she was texting someone on her phone and I assumed it was her parents who had watched her son the previous night. She was even more beautiful than she had been the night before, if that was even possible.
“Well…” I started to say as I set our paintings down on the chair in the corner of the room.
“Oh, he did see them. I’m so embarrassed,” she said as she covered her eyes.
“Worse than that.”
“Worse? What could be worse.”
“Security cameras,” I said as I crinkled my nose and closed my eyes.
I couldn’t bear to look at her when she realized what I was saying. The room was completely silent though, and she hadn’t made a noise at all since I told her. I had expected her to yell or scream or do something.
When I opened my eyes, Kelsi was sitting there with her mouth open and the best expression of shock I’d ever seen. She wasn’t smiling, she wasn’t laughing, and she certainly didn’t appear to see the comedy in the situation at all. Instead, Kelsi looked like she was in some sort of trance as she stared straight ahead and didn’t respond to me at all.
“It’s okay,” I said calmly as I moved over toward her. “He’s used to seeing naked bodies. They paint them in his classes all the time. He even looked at your painting and told me he thought you were an excellent artist. It’s fine, no big deal,” I continued to say as I rubbed her arm gently.
“He saw us having sex?”
“I’m not sure. He just made a statement about the security cameras as I was leaving. I didn’t want to turn back and question him to see what he knew. If he hadn’t already seen the footage, he was about to.”
“I’m going to curl up into a ball and stay under these covers forever,” she said as she slid under the crisp white sheets.
“Oh, stop. It’s no big deal.”
“I’m officially a porn actress. My parents will be so proud.”
“You’re not a porn actress. He’d have to sell the footage and make money off of it for you to get that title.”
Kelsi quickly threw the sheet off of her and sprung back up into a sitting position. The smile on my face widened as I saw the distraught look on her face.
“Do you think he’s going to sell it?” She asked seriously.
“No.” I laughed. “I don’t think anyone wants to see a grainy security porn tape.
“So, you admit it! It was a porn tape!” she exclaimed as she finally gave in to the comedy of the situation and started to laugh.
“I’d make a porno with you any day of the week,” I said as I grabbed her and pulled her toward me.
My fingers slid up and under her robe as I played with her body a little bit. She didn’t push me away, she pulled me closer and spread her legs so I could have easier access to her. The delicate touch of her soft skin was enough to have me throbbing with desire for her again.
Even though we had been up most of the evening making love, I couldn’t get enough of Kelsi. I wanted her again. My whole body throbbed with the memory of what she felt like, and I couldn’t stop myself.
Kelsi didn’t appear to want me to stop either. Her moans were getting louder and louder as my fingers played with her. Slowly, I untied her robe and lay her back onto the bed. Her smile welcoming me toward her as I slid out of my clothes as quickly as possible.
“What time do you need to be home?”
“By the end of the work day,” she said with a huge grin. “I took the day off.”
“Oh, I like that.”
“I thought you might.” She giggled as I climbed on top of her naked body with mine. “This has been the most fun I’ve had in a really long time.”
“We should go out to the river,” I softly said in her ear as I moved.
“Your river?”
“Our river,” I reminded her.
Kelsi and I had a part of the local river that was pretty much just ours when we were younger. It was so far toward the back of my family property that no one bothered to go out there. In high school, we would go there and sit for hours while we watched the water and talked about our dreams for the future. It looked like it was going to be a warm day, so the river wasn’t totally out of the question, although the hotel room was perfection for the time being.
Our love making continued on for much of the morning until we finally decided we wanted to head over to the river and relax. Kelsi and I weren’t the type of people who just sat back and relaxed anymore, so I wasn’t sure how our afternoon was going to go, but I couldn’t wait to spend it with her.
“Are we riding out there?”
“Nah, I was thinking we should take the four-wheeler. How do you feel about that?”
“Can I drive?”
“No, you can’t drive. It’s my four-wheeler. You’ve been trying to get your hands on that wheel for 15 years now,” I joked.
It was the truth, though: Kelsi had been asking to drive my four-wheeler ever since we first went out on it. I didn’t have a problem with her driving it by herself; my issue was if we were riding together and I had to sit behind her. Guys didn’t ride in the back, or at least that was what I always thought growing up.
When we arrived at my house, I took Kelsi straight to the barn in the hope that we would avoid my mother and sister. If we stopped to talk to them, the afternoon could have dragged on so late that Kelsi needed to go home. No, I wasn’t going to risk it, I wanted her all to myself for the rest of the afternoon.
“I think you should let me drive,” Kelsi said seductively as she pressed her ass against me.
She grabbed my hands and wrapped them around her like I would do on the four-wheeler if we were riding. But instead of just holding onto her, Kelsi slid my hands under her shirt and cupped her breasts with them.
“I’m getting convinced,” I admitted.
“You could hold onto those two beautiful tits while I drove,” she whispered seductively.
“I suppose if you really wanted to drive, I could give up my man card for a few minutes.”
“Just because you’re not driving doesn’t mean you have to give up your man card. There is a distinct benefit to not driving. It means you can spend your time being occupied by anything else you’d like.”
She pressed her ass back against me and urged my body to ignite again with desire. I quickly moved my hands to her hips and thrust myself against her as if I was going to take her right there in that barn.
“I like to be in charge,” I demanded.
“Oh, big strong Tyler has to be in charge,” she mocked me. “How about this?”
Before I could even figure out what she was doing, Kelsi had spun around and pressed me back onto the hay behind us. She quickly climbed on top of me and used her knees to pin my arms at my side. Although I clearly could have pressed her off since she was half my size, I decided to go along with it for a little bit. Kelsi seemed to enjoy the idea of being in charge, at least for the moment.
“I like this side of you,” I softly spoke as I looked up at her. “You should show this more often.”
“Shhh, I’m trying to decide if I want to seduce your right now or wait until we get to the river.”
“The river? You wouldn’t dare.” I laughed. “Are you the same girl I once took to the movies and she refused to kiss me in front of anyone? You can’t possibly be that same girl.”
“I’m a new woman now. I’ve got big plans for taking advantage of you while you’re here in town. You don’t know what’s going to come next.”
Eventually, she allowed me up and climbed onto the four-wheeler so she could drive. It was clear I didn’t have a say in this, and for the fun of it, I decided letting her drive wasn’t all that bad of an idea. I climbed behind her and wrapped my arms around her waist and slightly under the fold of her t-shirt.
“Drive safely,” I yelled as she punched the gas and we took off.
“I’m not making any promises,” she hollered back.
The wind whipped through Kelsi’s hair and it was going all over the place and getting in her face. I reached up and grabbed it with one hand, pulling it back like a ponytail, but holding onto it like I was in charge. This was a great compromise for me: I got to pull her hair and play with her, and she had to do all the work of driving.
We were going rather fast as she went up and over a small hill and slammed down into a puddle on the other side. As mud flung up all around us and covered our faces, Kelsi screamed out in laughter and just kept driving. She was having a blast, and so was I. It was odd how so many years had passed, yet it felt like just yesterday we were on this same four-wheeler driving out to the river.
“I’m jumping in,” Kelsi exclaimed the second we pulled up to the river. “Come in with me.”
“The water has got to be freezing,” I tried to protest.
Kelsi wasn’t having it though, and she grabbed my hand and pulled me into the river, our muddy clothes still on us. The second my feet felt the frigid water, I wanted to turn back and chicken out on the idea, but Kelsi kept moving forward, so I did too. When we were made it to the middle of the river we were both shivering and trying to decide if we were going to dip under the water or not.
“On the count of three,” I said as I grabbed her hands. She just shook her head in agreement and looked me in the eyes as I started to count. “One…two…three…go!”
We both quickly dunked our heads under the water and then popped back up and ran toward the side of the river. Even though the weather was nice, our wet clothes had us feeling cold as we found a sunny spot on the bank and cuddled up against each other for warmth.
“Maybe that wasn’t the best idea?” Kelsi laughed. “We don’t have towels or anything.”
“It was fun, though.”
“Yeah, it was.” She laughed and tucked herself in even closer to me. “How long do you think it will take for our clothes to dry?”
“A few hours if we keep them on. Maybe we should take them off and hang them over the tree branches. There’s a blanket in the back of the four-wheeler; we can wrap up in that while we wait.”
“Always prepared, isn’t that the Boy Scout motto?” She giggled as we both started to take our clothes off.
“Yeah, I might have dropped out in tenth grade, but I learned the important things. How is the river down at your ranch? Is it still narrowing?”
“Yep, I’d love to drag out the big debris and get it flowing through there better, but that’s low on the list of a million things I need to do. And who knows if I’ll even be keeping the place.”
“I’m really sorry about everything that’s going on with your farm. What do you think your parents want to do?” I asked as I wrapped her up in the small blanket we had.
“They want to retire. The ranch isn’t as exciting to them as it once was and Kendall doesn’t want any part of it. I’m the only one interested in keeping it, and I’m not even sure I really want it either. I’m in love with the idea of what the ranch could be, not what it actually is right now. I don’t want to get stuck running a dying ranch for the rest of my life. I want to run a thriving business; I just don’t know how to turn things around.”
“I could help you if you’d like. We could look at the books, analyze what’s been going on and see if there are some areas where you could improve. But to really build up the ranch you’ll need money.”
“I know. I just need to decide if I want to put that kind of work into it or if I want something else for my life. I never considered the other options, and it’s entirely possible I’m meant to do something besides working on a ranch.”
“Like be a painter,” I said as I posed for her.
“Maybe not a painter, but I could teach art and paint in my spare time or something like that. I don’t know. I just know I need to look beyond what I’ve been focused on for the last few years. I’m actually a little excited about the future now.”
“I know where you’re coming from. I’m looking at stepping back from my own company and trying to decide what my next big adventure is going to be. It’s an exciting time, even if it is sad because of my father.”
Even the mention of my father brought my mood plummeting down. I had come to terms with the fact that he was dying, I just couldn’t come to terms with the idea that I was going to be left on this planet without him. I valued talking to him; I needed to have his voice on the other end of the phone when I had a hard decision to make in my life.
“What’s the matter?” Kelsi asked. “You look like you’re someone else right now.”
“It’s going to be hard. Losing my father and eventually my mother. It’s stupid, but I hadn’t really thought about losing them before. I went about my life knowing they were getting older, but I didn’t stop and actually let it set in that someday they wouldn’t be here. It sucks.”
“I know what you mean. We spend 20 years trying to get away from them and then when we turn into adults, we suddenly like them again; by the time they get old, it’s hard to imagine not having them to talk to.”
“This is going to come out really corny so just hang on until I’m done saying it. I’m really glad we hooked up while I’ve been home,” I started to say and saw the raised eyebrow from her. “No, I don’t mean hooked up as in slept together. I mean I’m glad we are talking and friends again. Okay, and I’m also glad we hooked up.” I laughed.
“Me too. I don’t remember you being this damn irresistible in high school.”
“Oh, I was irresistible. You just had some sort of superpower and were immune to me.”
“I’m glad we have some time together, too. I’d stopped believing that there were decent guys in the world. It’s nice to know you guys still exist, even if you live in Alabama full time.”
“You know, I might not be staying out there. The handoff of my company seems to be working out very well. I could technically live anywhere I wanted,” I said as I held onto her shivering body and we watched the river.
I wasn’t sure why I had said I could live anywhere I wanted. It wasn’t something I had planned, but I guess I didn’t want her to think I was just using her while I was in town. Although I knew it was possible I was using her, and when my father passed away, I’d go back home and never see her again. But I felt different about Kelsi. I was connected to her more than other women, and no matter what happened, I didn’t want her to feel bad about our time together. I valued it very much, even if it didn’t lead to a future together.
“There will be plenty of time to talk about life later on. Right now, I need to know what the heck kind of animal is that?” Kelsi said as she pointed to what looked like a giant rat of some sort.
“I think it is an opossum.”
“Really? I’ve never seen one up close, that’s crazy.”
“How would you feel about going on another date with me this week? Assuming my father stays stable and everything else is going all right with your family.”
Kelsi smiled as she looked at me and then back at the opossum. She seemed to like the idea, so I continued on with my offer.
“How about I pick you up on Friday night and we go down to The Mic?”
“That’s a karaoke bar,” she said as she turned and looked at me.
“Yep, I thought it would be fun. You’re such an amazing singer, and I really do love to listen to you. We could have a drink, eat some horrible bar food, and sing the night away.”
I thought it sounded like an amazing idea, but Kelsi seemed less than thrilled by the idea. She automatically started to shake her head back and forth.
“I don’t sing in front of people anymore.”
“Well, we will change that. Everyone loves your singing; it will be fun.”
Kelsi continued to shake her head no, and I was starting to get the idea that she hadn’t been doing any of the things she used to love, just like I hadn’t. We had both drifted so far apart from the loves of our lives, we had been swallowed up by life.
“I haven’t sung in front of people either, but I’m up for it if you are. We could sing a duet and really knock the socks off of this town,” I joked, but it was clear Kelsi didn’t see the fun in my idea.
“Maybe we could go bowling or something,” she suggested. “You know they totally redid the bowling lanes; I think you’ll really like them.”
“No, I think we need to get you singing. You used to love it. My God, you would sing while we were cleaning up the football stadium for our community service hours. I’m not taking no for an answer on this. I know you’re scared, but we have to at least go.”
“I’ll go, but I’m not committing to any singing just yet.”
“I’ll take that, for now. But I think you’ll want to get up there once you hear me singing. Everyone in the place is going to be begging you to get me off that stage,” I joked. “I’ve got an ability to clear out a room with my singing.”
“You are pretty horrible, but you loved it so much.”
“I didn’t love singing at all in high school,” I explained. “I only signed up for the musicals so I could be around you.”
“What? But I thought you liked the theater and musicals?”
“I did, but not particularly because of the art of it all. I liked them because you were always there. I’d go to a million shows if you were the one with me.”
Kelsi burst out laughing as she grabbed onto me and we fell back into the grass. The warm sun of the day beat down on us as she slapped my chest.
“All these years, I actually thought you loved the theater!”