Chapter 4
brUCE
Our panting breaths fog up the already steamy windows of my old truck. There’s even a handprint smashing what’s left of the felt cushion of my headliner where Allyson used it as leverage to impale herself harder, deeper on my cock as she cried out my name, making me feel like a fucking god.
It’s not the first time we’ve fucked or made love.
We’ve done both dozens of times, at every available opportunity we can find.
But this will be the last time for a while, and I want to enjoy the afterglow of the moment—her still straddling my lap, my softening cock still inside her warm, slippery pussy, and the floral perfume of her filling my nose where I have it buried against her neck in the mess my hands have made of her hair.
I wrap my arms around her a little tighter, squeezing her to me and wishing we could stay like this a little longer.
She’s under my skin, on my skin, in my very veins.
God, I love this girl. And not in some high-school kid puppy-love way, though we’re in that sweet spot between our birthdays that put us both at eighteen. I love her with everything I am.
Honestly, that isn’t much, but she’s never seemed to care that I’m just a dumb jock with plans of either playing ball or farming.
That’s the only two options for a guy like me, but not my Allyson.
She’s fucking brilliant and can do anything she puts her mind to.
I’m proud of her already, and she hasn’t even left for college yet to start her pre-law studies.
“You leaving in the morning?” I murmur against the soft skin of her neck between kisses.
I’m sorely tempted to mark her, leave a big, glaring hickey on her milky skin to fend off any assholes at her new school, but I hold back .
. . barely. Her dad would kick my ass, or well, he’d try and I’d be obligated to let him get a good shot in because I mostly deserve it for defiling his daughter.
But I really don’t have time for that because football practice starts this week.
Two-a-days for all of August in preparation for my senior year of high school, starting on the varsity team.
It’ll be the distraction I need because Allyson will be far away at State for her freshman year.
Not there to cheer for me on Friday nights.
But I know she’ll be cheering from her dorm.
We’ve already made plans for Friday night calls so I can give her the play-by-play of the game, not that she cares about football or even understands it, but she cares about me.
It’s the same reason I watch court shows with her and listen to her talk about legal this and legal that when I don’t understand even a quarter of what she’s saying.
She nods. “Yeah. I’m going to miss you, miss this.”
Her voice is quiet and sad, and I don’t want her to leave like that.
She deserves to step into this new phase with all the excitement in the world.
She’s earned it. She deserves it. So I lighten the mood intentionally for her sake, even as it pains me to do it.
I thrust up into her, pulling her down tight and grinding her hips against mine.
“You gonna miss this dick, baby? He’s definitely gonna miss you too. ”
I soften the crudeness with a low laugh and a sexy wag of my eyebrows.
She giggles, and I can feel her inner muscles squeezing me. I groan at how good she feels and wonder if we have time for another round before curfew. It’s not as if her parents can ground her, anyway. She’ll be gone.
She’ll be gone.
Her palm smacks against my bare chest, teasing, “You’re awful, you know that? I’m trying to have a moment here and you’re making light of it.” She’s smiling, or trying to, but I can see the worry beneath.
I can always read her like a book, have been since before we even talked in Speech class my sophomore year.
She’d been a junior and stunning. The quintessential blonde, blue-eyed cheerleader, but instead of being a mean girl, she was kind and good-hearted.
She gave a speech about baby ducks once and I’d been done for.
Okay, it wasn’t actually about ducks but about pollution and its effects on the environment, but all I’d seen were the fluffy little yellow ducks she’d been flashing slides of.
Her impassioned plea for us to do something had stirred something in me beyond just my dick, which she’d already been starring in fantasies for since day one of the school year.
“I’m not, Al,” I tell her soberly, stroking her cheek. “I swear. Tomorrow, I’m gonna be bawling like a fucking baby that you’re gone. But I want you to go start our life together. I’ll be there soon, and we’ll make good on all those plans we have. I promise. I love you, baby.”
She wiggles, my flaccid cock sliding out of her, and I almost mourn the loss, but she turns, sitting sideways on my lap.
I can feel the warm mess of our combined juices leaking out of her onto the denim covering my thigh, and I like the way she’s marking me.
I wrap my arms around her, cradling her as she lays her head on my shoulder.
“You promise-promise?” she asks.
I nod, touching my chin to the top of her head.
The words pour out of her in one big run.
“I’m just scared, you know? School’s this big, new thing, and I’m not going to know anyone.
I’m probably going to get lost and never find my way to classes or back to the dorm.
I’ll end up sleeping in the quad under a tree and flunking out.
And you’re going to be back here, the literal big man on campus.
Rock of the defense, and so fucking sexy that every girl is going to try to hop on your dick.
And I won’t be here to fight them off. Don’t forget about me, okay? ”
I lift her chin with my thick finger and then cup her cheeks in my big, meaty paws. I’m not known for my grace and gentleness on or off the field, but for this girl, I could brush a butterfly’s wings and not hurt it. That’s how gentle I am with her. I meet her eyes, blue on near-black.
“Listen to me, Al. You’re going to take that campus by storm and make it your bitch.
” So I’m not exactly a romantic poet or a good pep-talker, but I’m trying.
“As for us, it’s you and me forever, baby.
There ain’t a girl here who can touch what you give me.
” I see the flare in her eyes and clarify.
“Not my dick . . . my heart. And there ain’t a single guy at that school who’s gonna love you like I do. ”
She presses her lips to mine, and it feels like a promise, a vow, sealing my words between us as truth. She tastes like love, like the future, like the sweet dreams only two stupid kids can have.
When she lays her head back on my shoulder, I just hold her, running my thumb up and down her arm and memorizing the moment.
It’s a turning point for us. Tomorrow, Allyson’s going to school, and it’ll be the beginning of a whole new phase for us.
The first step in the rest of our lives. I can’t wait.
I walk the fields at home for acres, watching the afternoon sun make its trek across the sky as I check on the crops.
Some more peaches are looking good on the trees, probably ready for Bobby and me to pick this week.
I need to check in with Shayanne to see if she wants them for one of her fancy recipes or if I should give them to Brody for the farmers’ market.
But mostly, my mind wanders to the past, flipping through memories like scrapbook pages in my mind. Allyson Meyers—the girl I loved, the girl I thought I was gonna marry, the girl who dumped me as soon as she caught sight of the fancy, smart city boys at State.
The girl who broke my heart.
Anger burns hot and bright in my chest, and I rub at the hard muscles there, even though I know it won’t do anything for the pain. The anger is the dark, bitter chocolate syrup on a shit sundae of hurt, disappointment, and disillusionment. Big words for a stupid cowboy, but there ya go.
I hear a guitar playing up ahead and almost turn back, knowing Bobby’s been working on a song lately and it’s giving him fits.
Farming’s always been this way. There’s a lot of hard work, sure, but when you get a break, time stretches out and you can get a little too deep with your thoughts.
I offered to find some rhymes and help, but like the asshole he is, he’d said he already knew how to rhyme cat and hat, as if that’s the extent of my capabilities.
Love that fucker, though I’d never tell him in those words because that’s not our way. Nah, I’d told him by sweeping his legs out from underneath him and holding him down while caterwauling my dirty version of a ‘cat in the hat’ song. Though it was probably more of an unofficial naughty limerick.
There once was a man so hick,
That he thought his leg was his dick.
So he swung it this and that way,
Everywhere, every day,
Proud when people said, ‘Look at that prick!’
So I decide interrupting him is all right and a fair shot at annoying him some more. “Incoming,” I shout.
As I round the last row of trees, Bobby’s poised with his guitar on his lap, leaning back against a tree. He’s got half a smile on his face, shaking his head. “Incoming? You dropping bombs? There are easier ways to fertilize the trees, you know.”
“Maybe,” I deadpan. “Though I wanted to be sure you weren’t serenading a friend. A naked one.”
I look around pointedly, seeing that he’s definitely alone, as usual.
He’s a hard worker, not much for screwing around with his life, with his music, or with girls.
“Want me to sing for ya again? Give you a little inspiration? I could be your muse.” I frame my face with my hands like I’m posing for a picture, mean mugging the whole time.
“Fuck no, asshole! I had to listen to two solid hours of Hank Williams and Johnny Cash after the other day to get my balls back where they belong. I don’t think I’ve ever cringed that hard.”