CH 32 - #tugofwar
#tugofwar
Madison
I woke up, still reeling from the catastrophic night I had with Luke. Lying in my bed, I stared off into space and replayed each scene in my mind.
How did things get so out of control and so quickly between Luke and me?
Or maybe all of this was to be expected, considering how quickly we fell into each other.
I still loved Luke, but knew he no longer felt that way toward me.
I saw it and the disgust in his eyes at Midnight Rodeo.
I was disgusted with him, too. I hoped he gave Sierra the fuck of her lifetime last night.
One thing was certain: I would never let him put his dick inside me again.
I threw the covers off me and got out of bed, going to the bathroom.
After using the toilet, I stared at myself in the mirror as I washed my hands and kicked myself for getting involved with Luke.
I knew better than to have done it, but he won me over by his incredible good looks, cowboy charm, and knightly chivalry.
He made me feel things I’d never felt before.
Now, I knew it was all a ploy on his part.
I was nothing more than another notch in his leather belt.
When I walked into the kitchen for a much-needed cup of coffee, my mom was there. She looked up from making a fresh gallon pitcher of sweet tea and stared at me.
“Hi,” I grumbled.
“Hi.”
“Where’s Meredith?”
“Gone.”
I snapped my head back. “What?”
“She’s on her way back to Dallas. She left you a note.”
Our mom pulled it from her back pocket and handed it to me.
Madison,
I love you, but get your head out of your ass before it’s too late with Luke. There’s still a chance for you and him if you’d put aside your temper and he’d put aside his pride. It’s going to take you making him do that.
-Your big sister
I set her note on the counter and looked at my mom.
“Meredith told you everything that happened last night?” I asked.
“She told your dad and me both. You and Luke need to grow up. You’re acting like teenagers.”
I took a deep breath. “Mom, I shouldn’t have gotten involved with him.”
“Bullshit!” she yelled, surprising me. She’d always kept her anger in check.
“You and Luke are both hurting from your pasts. You came together and quickly fell in love, which I understand, but the two of you are so ill-equipped to move beyond your past hurts. You’re projecting them onto each other and destroying the love you so clearly share.
If you didn’t love Luke and he didn’t love you, neither of you would be acting so extremely. ”
“Mom, he hooked up with his ex-girlfriend last night.”
“You don’t know that.”
“If you’d seen them on the dance floor at Midnight Rodeo, you would know they did. They were all into each other.”
“Or was that just you assuming they were because you were hurting like Luke was after seeing you dancing with two different men?”
My mom and I stared at each other as my mind spun, considering what she’d just said. “I’m getting some coffee.”
“Then you might want to consider apologizing to Luke again.”
“I didn’t do anything wrong!”
“How wrong did seeing him dance with his ex-girlfriend rub you?”
I shook my head and stepped around my mom, desperately needing some caffeine.
Once I’d brewed my cup of coffee, I took it outside to the front porch and sat in one of the rocking chairs.
When I looked up, I saw my dad, Bella, and Luke at the corral.
Luke had Bella in his arms on Casper, riding her around.
Damn it.
THE NEXT DAY
“Mom, Dad, I’m going back to Dallas in the morning,” I told them as they sat in their recliners in the living room, Bella sitting in my Dad’s lap.
“Running away from reality?” my mom asked, not cutting me an ounce of slack.
“Call it what you will. I need to get back to the environment I’m used to and my work.”
“Then leave the cowgirl hat and boots that Luke bought you here. Keep denying that he made you happy and that you made him happy. You two keep doing this stupid dance, wasting your lives on pettiness and misunderstandings. Or… Use the backbone God gave you, Madison, and go talk to Luke. Sort all of this out.”
“It’s too late.”
She shook her head at me, her eyes full of pain. “Damn your stubbornness, Madison.”
“Whatever.”
I left the living room, holding back my tears, until I’d reached my bedroom. Then I threw myself across my bed and cried. Once I’d composed myself, I got up and got dressed to take a run. I needed the physical release.
With each step I took, I thought about what my mom had said. She was right about Luke and me. Especially me. I was her daughter, so she knew me better than anyone else.
Walking back down the ranch’s long driveway, having ditched running because I was hurting so much inside and could hardly breathe, I stared at the dirt driveway ahead of me on my right. If I took it, it would lead me straight to Luke. I didn’t take it, though. I kept walking.
As the sun was setting and I sat on the ranch house’s front porch with a glass of whiskey in my hand, I reconsidered going to see Luke and talking all of this out between us.
Then he drove by me, heading to the barn where Casper was.
When he got out of his truck, he glanced in my direction and went on. My heart ached even more for him.
Thinking again about what my mom had said to me, I stood up and began walking toward the barn. When I reached it, I didn’t see Luke anywhere; then I looked up. He was in the loft, staring down at me.
“What do you want, Madison?” he asked gruffly.
“To talk to you.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“I beg to differ.”
“What do you want to discuss? Your interest in two other men?”
“How about we discuss your never-ending interest in Sierra? It doesn’t matter how good I am to you; you will always go back to her.”
“Bullshit on that!”
“Did you fuck her last night?”
“Nope.”
“Because you were so wrongfully furious at me?”
He shook his head. “Because all I wanted was you.”
“Then why did you turn to her?”
“Why did you dance with Justin and that other man?”
“Justin was nothing but harmless fun. I danced with the other man to get back at you because you looked so happy with Sierra.”
“I wasn’t. I just acted like it. Were you acting happy with your two dance partners, or was it genuine?”
“I was happy to be in Justin’s company as friends.
With the other man, Wyatt, the only thing I was happy about was his kissing me.
He knew who you were to me, that you were dancing with your ex-girlfriend a few yards away from us, and how much it hurt me.
Then he suggested I let him kiss me to push your buttons like you were doing to mine by being with your hookup girl. ”
“I haven’t fucked Sierra since before I met you.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I do. I’m not a liar, Madison. What you see is what you get.”
“I think I’m looking at a liar who wants to keep playing women.”
“Fuck you!”
“Fuck you too!”
I turned to leave, then turned back around, glaring up at Luke. “You’re going to die alone after playing so many women. My heart hurts for them.”
“My heart hurts for all the men you’re going to play, leading them on to believe what they have with you is something real. You just want a good fuck is all.”
I huffed. “Keep telling yourself that, country boy. And by the way, Bella and I are going back to Dallas in the morning.”
‘You can go, but leave her here. She loves me and this ranch.”
“She’ll forget you both.”
“No, she won’t.”
I turned to leave again, but stopped and looked up at Luke once more, still glaring down at me. Then I stomped up the steps, leading to the loft, ready to give Luke another piece of my mind. When I reached him, we stared hard at each other, our chests rising and falling.
“You’re such an asshole,” I said.
“You’re such a hurtful bitch.”
“Don’t you ever call me that again!”
“I will, just to piss you off!”
I slapped him, his face going to his right.
He immediately looked back at me, fuming.
I started to slap him again, but he caught my hand and stepped closer to me.
We kept glaring at each other, breathing fast, then Luke shocked me by kissing me.
I pulled my lips away from his and attempted to slap him once more, but he stopped me by grabbing my wrist, then the other, raising my arms above my head, and slamming them against the wall behind me.
“Stop!” he growled.
“No!”
“Hate me all you want, but don’t hit me!”
“I do hate you, you son of a bitch!”
“Say it again!”
“I hate you!”
He threw me over his shoulder and carried me to the bed of hay as I hit and kicked him, trying to break free. Then he tossed me onto the hay and immediately got on top of me, holding me down with his body weight and his hands tight around my wrists on either side of my head.
“Let me go!” I demanded.
Luke didn’t say anything. He just kept staring into my eyes. His were full of so much anger, as well as pain, like I knew mine were.
He suddenly kissed me again. I turned my head, breaking our lips apart. With one hand, he held my wrists together above my head and grabbed my face with his other hand, turning it back toward his and kissing me once more. This time, I gave in.
We started going at each other, kissing hard, Luke grinding his dick into me through his blue jeans and mine.
A moment later, he let go of my face and wrists.
I pulled his cowboy hat off him and threw it across the loft as we kept kissing, then he got up, pulled my boots, jeans, and panties off me, undoing his belt and jeans and getting back on top of me next.
We stared at each other again, neither of us saying a word.
Luke reached into his boxer briefs, pulled out his big dick, and thrust it inside me, groaning while I gasped.
He started fucking me fast and hard, our foreheads pressed together as I clung to him with my arms around his neck and my legs tight around his waist.
As he kept moving inside me, I could feel myself on the verge of cumming, then it happened.
I closed my eyes and moaned into Luke’s open mouth on mine.
He was seconds behind me, losing control.
When it was over for him, he lifted his head, both of us remaining quiet as we searched each other’s eyes.
Feeling my emotions rising, I pushed Luke off me, put my panties, jeans, and boots back on, and hurried out of the hay loft, running straight to the ranch house to start packing to go back to Dallas.