21. Brooks
Chapter twenty-one
Brooks
Sydney got on all fours in front of me, her face in the pillows and her ass straight up, showing me her juicy cunt.
“I want you to pull my hair and fuck me from behind.”
Gods, I wanted nothing more. I lined up with her and slammed home, fucking her hard and quick, just the way she wanted. My hand found her hair and wrapped around the strands, pulling them harder than I normally would, but she seemed to like it as she screamed out. It echoed across the field, and I loved knowing I was the reason for it.
My hand came around her front and played with her clit. “Come for me. Squeeze my cock the way I like it.”
I knew she was close, but my words pushed her over the edge. This position made her even tighter, and it didn’t take me long to follow her, slamming home into her once more before coming deeply. I didn’t knot her since it was getting late, but coming inside her anytime felt just as sweet.
I pulled out when we were done and grabbed the towel I’d brought to clean us both up. Once we were righted, we lay back in the truck, wrapped up in each other. It was fully night now and the stars twinkled above us. If it weren’t for the blankets surrounding us, it would probably be cold, but it wasn’t.
It was perfect.
Everything was perfect, and I knew right then what I needed to do.
I turned my body to face Sydney. She was still looking up at the stars, wonder in her eyes. When she said the stars were hard to see from the city, I knew I had been right to bring her out here. Hopefully she liked it enough to consider staying.
Sydney finally noticed my staring and turned so we were now facing each other. Her legs were tangled in mine, and her green eyes sparkled in the light.
“I need to tell you something.”
She paused. “What?”
I took a deep, steadying breath.
“These past couple of weeks have been… life-changing. There’s something about you that makes me feel whole. I’ve never felt this way about anyone before. Only you.”
Tears sprang to her eyes, but I continued. “I know you probably wouldn’t want to move here right away, or maybe ever, but I thought we could take it one step at a time. Maybe I could visit you in the winter when it’s slow, and you could come here in the summer. Whatever it is, I want to try to work it out, because I think I’m falling in love with you.”
Sydney sat up, pulling away partially as she did. I followed her motion.
“I need to tell you something too.”
I took a deep breath, hoping against hope that she felt the same. “Brooks… I’m not the same person I was before I stepped into this town. I want to work it out. And I think I’m falling in love with you too.”
I smiled. When I went to pull her close, she put her hand out. “There’s more. Preston blackmailed me.”
My stomach sank. “What do you mean?”
Tears poured down her cheeks as she explained it all. Preston threatening her, the blackmail, her plan to sabotage us.
When she was done, it felt like my entire world had been shattered. We both sat in silence for a while, neither knowing what to say.
What was there to say? She wanted to ruin my family’s farm. The one I’d worked my entire life to make better.
“So is that what this is? You getting close to me so you could use me?”
“No,” she replied quickly. She reached for my hand, and for some reason, I let her. “You have to believe me. This wasn’t planned. You weren’t planned.”
“So if you hadn’t fallen in love with me, you would have sent my farm to ruin?”
She shook her head and dropped my hand. I didn’t know what to believe any longer. Part of me understood the awful situation Preston put her in. I knew how hard she had worked for everything she had, and seeing all that crumble around her…
But how was I ever supposed to get past this?
“Is that why you freaked out? When you saw Preston and Gwen?”
She nodded. “He cornered me later and reminded me why I was here. I worried how far he would have gone if Gwen hadn’t shown up. I have no idea why she was there, but I feel like she saved me.”
“Well, she’s his wife, so that tracks.”
Sydney gave me a weird look. “No, she’s not.”
“Yeah, she is. We all remember being shocked that she had gotten married to that dickbag after college.”
She looked even more confused. “No, after college he married Vanessa… something. She went to school with us.”
I absorbed this new information. “Wait, so he’s married to someone else?”
“Yeah. And they live in the city together.”
My eyes widened. “He’s always taking business trips there.”
“ Business isn’t what he’s doing there. But it doesn’t matter, other than the fact that I feel bad for Gwen. She seems so nice.”
She was nice. My anger bubbled over for everyone Preston was trying to fuck over in this situation. But with that anger came clarity.
“If we can prove that’s what’s going on, we could probably get him to back off. Blackmail him back.”
Sydney paused as she wiped her nose. “Yeah, but how? I don’t think they’ve posted any photos. Even their wedding was a private thing with very few guests. Preston covers himself well, the slimy bastard.”
“I don’t know.” I really didn’t. Everything felt like such a mess, and I didn’t know how I was going to fix it. Though I appreciated Sydney’s plan to keep the farm safe, how was I going to keep her safe?
“I think we should go back,” I said. I needed to wrap my head around everything.
“I understand,” she whispered.
We packed everything up and drove back in a tense silence. I wanted to say something—anything—reassuring, but I just couldn’t.
Not until I found a way out of this.
When we got home, it was quiet. I’d had Bridget pick Chicken up so he wouldn’t be there. I thought we’d be celebrating, but that wasn’t the case.
“We need to talk—"
“I think I’m going to bed,” she said. Before I could answer, she went into the guest room and closed the door.
I knew I should have knocked, tried to talk to her, but instead I slinked off into my own room and stared at the ceiling, hoping to figure out what to do.