Chapter Eighty-Seven
Nathan
The first town we came to didn’t do anything to improve Bree’s optimism. It was no more than one dusty strip with a gas station, a windowless bar, and a few shops that may or may not have been open in the last decade. Luckily, because the town was on the fringes of the border, there were a lot of people like us just passing through.
“Look,” Bree said with an expression close to a smile.
I followed her nod and grinned. “The Sunset Motel? Really?”
“Were you looking forward to a night under the stars?” Bree asked.
I glanced up and almost said yes. The stars were a bright scattering. It was a new moon so the tiny distant lights stood out even brighter. The desert would provide a good cover.
Then I looked at Bree. Her attempt to smile had faded, and she looked deadly pale. The only warmth I saw in her exhausted face came from the orange neon of the motel sign.
“Let’s get a room,” I said. “Why break with tradition now?”
Bree’s shoulders relaxed an inch, and she led the way through town. Our only other stop was a small bodega, the entrance glittering with hundreds of twinkle lights. I lifted a dozen strands up so Bree wouldn’t catch her hair. She gave me a tired nod and passed by.
The little town had forged a truce between us.
Inside, Bree listlessly walked up and down the tight aisles. I nodded to the clerk, grabbed a basket, and piled it high with the fresh peppers, tomatoes, and cilantro that had obviously come from a nearby garden. I found a can of black beans and a bag of fresh-made tortillas.
Then I cleared my throat. Bree looked at me, confused. “What?”
“You have the cash, dear, remember?” I asked.
The clerk was not too bored to notice the large stack of bills Bree pulled from her pocket. I ground my teeth. If the cartel hadn’t already put out an alert on us, every opportunistic criminal in a five-mile radius would hear about us now.
I added an avocado and a bottle of tequila to our basket and plunked it on the counter in front of the clerk. He tore his eyes off Bree and the stack of cash only long enough to ring us up.
“Would one of those bills help you forget our faces?” I asked.
Bree sucked in her breath, worried that my comment had made us stick out too much. She shoved the wad of cash back into her pocket and held out just enough for the groceries.
The clerk nodded to me, his eyes on Bree’s pocket. I reached over and plucked another bill out and handed it to him.
“Have a good night,” he said. The bill was folded and gone before I could stuff our groceries into a brown paper bag.
Checking in at the new motel was easy because of the driver’s licenses and passports the cartel had given us. By the time we unlocked the door and dumped our groceries on the table, I could feel the tension leaving my body. I knew it would leave me exhausted, so I stretched out on the bed.
“Why don’t you shower first?” I told Bree.
She nodded and disappeared into the bathroom. Minutes later, she reappeared, wide-eyed and dripping wet.
“Something I can help you with?” A warm spark of hope ignited inside me.
Bree shivered. “Every time I put my head under the water, I think I hear footsteps coming to the door.”
The motel room door was on the opposite wall as the bathroom, but I knew what Bree meant. Her body and mind couldn’t stop looking for signs of danger. It would be weeks, maybe even years, before the stress wore off.
“I could shower with you,” I said.
I expected Bree to roll her eyes and stalk back to the bathroom, insulted, but she just shivered and nodded. I followed her into the steamy bathroom and stripped off my clothes.
Bree was already under the hot stream of water when I joined her in the tight motel shower. Her breasts brushed against me as she reached up to scrub shampoo into her hair. She didn’t even notice the effect the light touch had on me.
She rinsed her hair and turned around to scrub her face. I put my hands on her shoulders and started to rub in deep, circular motions. Bree moaned and stood transfixed by the relaxing massage. I flexed my hands and dug out every tense pocket of her shoulders and back.
When her sounds changed from exhausted relief to pleasurable sighs, I left off the deep massage and stroked my hands up and down her back. Water sprayed down the front of her, running in rivulets between her breasts. I looked over her shoulder, my excitement becoming apparent as she leaned back against me.
Bree settled against my chest, and I let my hands circle around to stroke her belly. Very slowly, I let my hands drift up, cupping her firm breasts, rubbing the tips until she squirmed against me. Her breath came and went in passionate pants, and she leaned back to allow me more access to her body.
I let one hand slip down to her hip, pulling her back as my hard arousal pressed between her backside. Bree liked it and propped one knee to the side to let me slip farther between her legs.
The triumph of surviving our day turned to lust, and I had to fight myself not to bend Bree over and ride us both up and over the edge too quickly. Instead, I took a deep breath and turned her around.
Bree slicked back her wet hair, her nipples brushing my chest as she did. This time, her eyes widened as the motion sent bolts of excitement down through her body. I cupped her backside in my hands and savored each tremor.
“Thank you,” Bree said. She wrapped her arms up and around my neck. “Thank you for not giving up on me back there.”
“I could never give up on you,” I told her.
Bree kissed me, long and slow until I thought I might burst. Then she leaned back just far enough to look me straight in the eyes.
“Why? Why can’t you give up on me? You might be better off,” Bree said.
I kissed her, drawing her steamy, wet body to fit against mine. “I don’t want to be better off. I just want you.”
Bree teased us both by slipping one foot around and up the back of my calf. The movement opened her right where my body throbbed, looking for entrance. I nudged her opening and felt a shiver of pleasure run through both of us.
“Why?” she asked again. She held her hips back, teasing me.
I caught her lips and kissed us both dizzy. “Because I love you.”
The words sluiced away with the shower water but I could still feel their mark between us. Bree was still and then her arms pulled me closer.
“I love you, too, Nathan.”
Her leg slipped higher, and I couldn’t hold back any longer. I lifted her up, hands gripping her thighs as I pressed her to the shower wall and drove deep inside her. Bree cried out, a triumphant mix of survival and ecstasy.
We had made it. We’d escaped the cartel and survived the desert. The only thing left was to survive our own all-consuming passion.
It overtook us and dragged us to new heights, and when we crashed down, we came together.