9. Marigold
Nine
Marigold
T here’s nothing worse than being lectured by a complete jerk and knowing, on some level, that he might be right. Flint’s words ring in my ears as I stomp around the bedroom— his bedroom, the one he offered me so easily—peeling off my sodden layers one by one and flinging them down with a splat.
A tourist, he called me.
Just a tourist.
Awesome! Guess I know now what the bar boss really thinks of me. I’ve been wondering for weeks, hoping so desperately that he sees me as someone important to him, maybe someone he’d want to keep, but instead Flint has declared me completely temporary.
My heart gives a painful throb.
Maybe if I stay angry, I’ll never have to feel the knee-shaking force of how much that hurts me. Maybe if I cultivate this bitterness, Flint will never realize that I’ve been pining after him like the world’s biggest love struck idiot, hoping for so much more.
“Jerk,” I mutter, trying to keep my anger up as I hop on one foot to tug off my soaking sweatpants. As my wet clothes peel away, my bare skin comes into view—mottled from the cold and covered in goosebumps. “ And he listens to old man music.”
Yeah, even when I wrack my irritated brain, it’s hard to come up with reasons to hate Flint. But they must exist, right? Just need to stay angry and think of some.
There’s a towel hanging on a hook on the bedroom door, and I wrap myself up like a pissed-off burrito, then fling the door open and stomp to the bathroom. Flint’s gaze is heavy on me as I come into view, but I don’t turn to look at him. Don’t even breathe again until I’m in the bathroom, the door-slam drowned out by another roll of thunder.
Just a tourist.
He doesn’t want me to stay. Need to get that into my brain, even if the thought makes my stomach cramp and twist.
Just a tourist.
Vicious rain pelts the roof, the cabin walls, the bathroom window. Lightning flashes, dazzling the mountainside, and my whole body shivers at the recent memory of how icy that rain was—like a million needles digging into my skin. How quickly my clothes soaked through, and how easily the wind blew me left and right. Like a dried leaf tossed on the breeze.
In all my life, I’ve never felt so vulnerable.
I fumble for the shower, cranking it on and praying for it to heat up fast. I’m shivering so much beneath this towel, it’s like my skeleton is vibrating, and these vivid memories of the storm aren’t helping.
So… maybe Flint was right.
It was dumb to go out in the storm; dumb to worry so much about a man who thinks I’m just a tourist. I mean, I might as well have declared my love for him through a loudhailer, it was so freaking obvious in that moment. Who did I think I was, crashing down the mountainside like that in search of my man? A female Rambo? What was I gonna do when I found him?
And Flint didn’t want it. He bundled me back inside the cabin like a badly-behaved child, and scolded me for going out in the storm at all.
Yes! Stay mad.
Mad… and confused.
My jaw is tight as I step under the hot shower spray. At first, the stinging drops are almost too much to bear, so intense against my frozen body, but I force myself to stay in the warmth until feeling prickles back into my skin. I come back to life slowly, still shivering as I turn slowly beneath the shower, giving myself an angry pep talk. Need to keep this rage alive.
Because Flint is a jerk. Even if what I did was risky; even if I don’t know the mountain trails as well as a local yet. Even if Flint was clearly scared for me, so anxious to get me safe again that he could barely speak, he’s still a jerk.
Probably.
But by the time the bar boss knocks on the door, I’m slumped against the shower tiles, too exhausted by my freshly broken heart and too annoyed with myself to move, possibly ever again.
The door opens a crack—just enough for Flint to speak through the gap. “You okay in here? Getting warmed up?”
A sigh gusts out of me, but I can’t bring myself to answer. Speaking a single sentence would be a gigantic effort.
There’s a pause, then the door creaks open wider by another inch. Flint’s next question comes louder, like he needs to call for me across a great distance rather than this cozy little bathroom. “Mari? You okay?”
Nope. No, I’m not.
And when Flint curses and flings the door completely open, I’m too tired and sad to even bother covering myself. I just stare at the bar boss, buck-ass nude, my chin wobbling with the effort not to cry.
“ Marigold.” Flint looks stricken, lunging for the shower cubicle. When he yanks it open, warm droplets start flecking his new set of dry clothes, but he doesn’t seem to care. He’s staring at me, scanning every inch of me with worried eyes, trying to figure out why I’m slumped against the shower wall and limp with despair. “What happened?”
“I’m not hurt,” I mumble, but Flint’s not listening. He yanks his t-shirt over his head and steps into the cubicle, jeans and all.
Strong hands stroke down my shoulders, my arms, my waist, so much colder than the shower as they pat me down for some invisible injury. The shock of those icy fingers wake me up again, make me stand straight against the tiles, because shoot, Flint hasn’t warmed up at all. Even with dry clothes on and the log burner out there, his hands are cold enough to steal my breath.
And— enough .
Enough of this.
Enough trying to stay mad. Enough letting my exhaustion drag me down. Flint is cold, damn it, and even if he just unknowingly broke my heart, I still want him safe and warm. Nothing else really matters.
Suddenly all business, I drag him fully under the shower, reaching up to angle the spray at his chest. A red flush spreads across his skin where the water makes contact, and then I’m fussing over Flint and Flint’s fussing over me , and all the while there’s barely room in this cubicle for all our limbs.
“You’re hurt,” Flint’s saying, still working his way over my body, squeezing gently as he goes. The storm rattles the walls, but we’re safe inside this cocoon. “Tell me where you’re hurt.”
Meanwhile I’m yanking at his belt, determined to get his legs warm too. “Take these off. Who showers with their jeans on?”
“Marigold.”
“It’s like you want wet clothes.”
“Marigold.”
“God, this belt is stiff. Help me, will you? I’m a poor idiot tourist and I can’t work your rugged back-country clothes.”
Flint sighs heavily, then undoes his belt with a creak of leather. A moment later, with his sodden jeans and boxers kicked beneath the sink, he steps back into the shower fully nude and cages me against the tiled wall. My hands automatically reach up to cling to his rock-solid forearms.
Not gonna look south.
Not when it would be so obvious.
But let’s just say that something down there is big enough to make my tummy flip. Thank god for peripheral vision.
“Listen to me,” Flint says. He’s scowling, and this is his stern boss voice, the one he uses when drinkers at the bar get too rowdy. It sends another wave of goosebumps prickling over my skin. “I shouldn’t have said that, Marigold.” He ducks his head; forces me to meet his eye. “I didn’t mean that. I just—the thought of you out in a mountain storm makes me lose my damn mind. Okay?”
Steam is thick in this small bathroom, and it hits me belatedly that we’re naked . We’re both completely nude, our slippery bodies crowded together in this small shower, while the final dregs of anger swirl down the drain.
How many times have I daydreamed about this?
How many times have I hovered outside the bathroom door, hearing the spray drumming inside, and ordered myself to be brave, to knock, to call through the wooden door and ask if the bar boss wants company?
So many times—and now we’re both here, frozen and electrified by the storm, our bodies warming up steadily beneath the hot spray. So, so alive. And maybe Flint doesn’t love me the way I love him, maybe he wants me to move along on my travels eventually, but there’s one part of him that can’t lie. One part that says he does want me, physically at least, and it’s bobbing between us in the steam-clogged air.
I reach for him slowly. Give him time to move back or say no.
“Mari,” Flint chokes out as my fingers wrap around his cock. His hips twitch forward, thrusting into my grip, and he’s thick and long, a vein running up the side of his shaft. The skin is surprisingly soft, sliding easily around the rigid flesh beneath.
Never touched a man like this before. Never run into a storm to rescue someone either, or got my heart broken. This is a big day of firsts.
“Fuck,” Flint mutters, crowding me closer to the wall. His hands ball into fists against the tiles, and he’s still pinning me, caging me, that scowl etched on his handsome forehead. “ Fuck . We should—we should talk about this.”
But what’s there to say? We’re both alive, both safe, both warming up under the hot shower spray. And my rational brain may still be freaking out, but my animal body is good to go, a heavy pulse thudding between my thighs.
“I don’t expect this,” Flint says, his voice thick with the effort of holding back. “Only do this if you want it too, Marigold. Wait, are you sure you’re not hurt?”
I’m definitely not injured, at least not in the way he thinks. And how could I not want it? Flint is so strong, so rugged, older and stern and handsome and sweet and god , I’ve craved this for so long.
Maybe I’ll be moving on soon. Maybe this will be my only chance.
“I’m fine,” I say, sliding down the tiled wall to drop to my knees. Flint inhales sharply as I go, but he doesn’t stop me. “I do want this, I promise.”
And we both hurt each other’s feelings tonight and made each other mad, but when I lean forward to kiss his cock, I do it with nothing but eagerness and warmth. There’s a bead of fluid at the tip, and it tastes salty when I lap it away. As thunder rumbles across the mountains and lightning strobes the night sky, I take Flint’s shaft in both hands and throw myself into making him feel good.
“Christ,” Flint mutters, burying his hands in my wet hair. The pads of his thumbs rub at the base of my skull, smoothing away some of the tension there as I lick and kiss my way along his length. The worst of my stress headache seeps away, and I lose myself in sensation. “That’s it, sweetheart. Just like that. Shit, you feel good.”
So does he. You know, I always figured a blow job was something you do for someone you love, because you want to make them feel good—not something that you get a direct reward from. But here I am, squirming and wishing for his touch, so worked up from this already that I’m panting for air.
This is the best. If Flint were mine, I’d do this every day.
When I suck his shaft past my lips, Flint’s groan rolls through the bathroom like thunder. When I bob and suck and hollow my cheeks, he grunts and grips my hair tighter, tight enough that my scalp prickles and my pulse throbs between my thighs.
Cold? What cold? I’m so molten, my body doesn’t even remember the storm, while hot water courses down my shoulders and back and swirls around my knees before draining away.
“Good girl.” Flint’s low praise makes me shiver from head to toe; makes me suck him deeper and try to please him with all my might. My slurping noises would be embarrassing, except I can feel in every shudder and twitch just how much this turns him on. “God, your mouth, Mari. Your perfect mouth.”
Before he comes, Flint’s cock swells even bigger against my tongue, and he tugs gently on my hair, muttering a warning. Drawing a deep breath through my nose, I ignore him and keep going, pumping my hands as I suck and lick and moan.
I want it. Want it all.
His come spurts against my tongue, salty and warm. Eyes fixed on the bar boss standing over me, I swallow down every drop, even though it goes on and on—then rock back on my heels and show him my tongue.
Flint barks out a shocked laugh, shaking his head.
I wink, and my voice is raspy. “Something to remember me by.”