25. Gavin
TWENTY-FIVE
GAVIN
We rode horses. We ate food and brought out birthday cakes for both Josie and Penny. There was the absolute destruction of Josie opening up her birthday gifts, thrilled to receive a few a couple days early, and there was laughter from everyone. My favorites were from Penny when she’d laugh so hard she leaned into me on the couch, and I could inhale her perfume, absorb her happiness, and know Josie was so distracted by gifts and shiny paper she didn’t notice our brief moments of touches.
Now, the night was coming to an end. I stood back and watched Penny tearfully hug her sister goodbye on the front porch, and I hoped we had many more days exactly like today in our future.
Except for maybe, without all the crying women.
“She’s really sweet,” my mom said, standing next to me. “I like her. She feels good here.”
“She loved it. Thanks for making her feel so welcome.”
“How else would I make someone feel?” My mom gave me a curious look, truly baffled by the idea that someone wouldn’t love being around her.
I threw my arm over her shoulders and kissed her temple. “You’re the best, Mom.”
“Sounds like those two girls need a dose of that in their lives.”
Maize did most of the talking about their mom, and like she seemed to know where that invisible line was in bashing her and praising her, for Penny’s sake, she walked the tightrope. She said enough, though, to give my parents a fairly decent impression of what their lives had been like, and most of it, I noticed was when Penny was occupied with Josie or Goldie, who wouldn’t leave her alone.
“Bye, Gavin. Thanks again! You’re the best!”
“Get home safe, Maize!”
She was at Bryce’s truck, who was taking her to the airport. Unsurprisingly, the two of them fit together seamlessly. I had no doubt that if Penny and I had made this work, Maize and Bryce would become thick as thieves, full of pranks and making sure everyone dissolved into laughter in their presence. For only knowing him for twenty-four hours, they were strangely close.
“Think anything will come of that?” my mom asked.
“Nope.” They were close, but it was easy to see it was a kindship, more brother and sister than anything else.
“Really?”
“She wants to fly. Bryce wants to spread his roots. Too different, but similar. Thanks for letting Maize stay here. And for keeping Josie tonight.”
My mom rolled her eyes and pulled out of my one-arm hug. “Maize was a pleasure to have, and all I need to know about tonight is that Josie has everything for school tomorrow.”
Like I’d tell her anything more. “If she doesn’t, Penny will bring it.”
“You’re going to have to tell your daughter soon, you know. She wants this bad enough.”
The truck backed away, kicking up rocks and making Penny jump back so she didn’t get sprayed. Goldie danced around her legs and jumped up to her waist like she knew Penny needed the extra love as her sister waved goodbye through the passenger window of Bryce’s truck.
“I will. Need to make certain, is all. I don’t want to move too fast, screw things up.”
“The only way you could screw things up is by not loving her the way she deserves, and I already know that’s what you want.”
Mom patted my shoulder and walked toward the front door. “Go get your girl, Gavin, and don’t let her go.”
That was the plan, for sure.
Penny stayed on the driveway, hands on her hips, head tilted toward the dark sky. She was lit by the moon and the distant floodlights of the barn, giving an ethereal, angelic glow about her, and as I headed toward her, kicking at stones so she knew I was coming, she didn’t move.
“You okay?” I asked and tugged her close to my side.
“She’s happy, and I had a wonderful day, so I’m focusing on that.” Penny rested her head on my shoulder and exhaled like she could bear the weight of her sister’s goodbye as long as I was next to her.
I stood up straight, stronger, and took what she gave me.
“Today was really beautiful. Almost feels like a dream. Thank you.” She twisted her neck and met my eyes. “Thank you for giving it to me. I’ll never forget it.”
I kissed her forehead and brushed her nose with mine. “First of many, Penelope Pesco. How about we get you home?”
Josie was inside, tucked into bed and waiting for bedtime for stories from Grandma. Bonus to her staying here, I got out of the nighttime reading routine. Not that I minded it, but I’d been told far too many times I didn’t read all the voices right like Grandma, so I knew Josie was in good hands.
“I should go say goodbye to everyone.”
“Caleb and Emily and Landon are gone. Dalton, too. Mom’s upstairs with Josie and Dad won’t be offended. Let’s get you home.”
She peered at me with a cheeky grin. “Your place or mine?”
In all the nights we’d made out and kissed and snuck them on porches and front entryways, I’d had her on my couch, but I wanted her in my bed. I wanted to wake up with Penny in my arms and beneath my sheets. Someday, I’d stay at hers, but this first night?
I wanted to claim that.
Fortunately, Penny didn’t put up much of an argument, so we pulled into my driveway and I beeped the locks on my truck after I opened the door and helped her out of it. Her hand slid into mine like it belonged there and we hurried to my front door where I punched in the code to the front door lock.
“It’s twelve twelve to make it easy for Josie to remember, in case you ever need it,” I told Penny as the lock disengaged and I opened the front door. Not the best code for home security, but it worked for now.
She followed me in, and as soon as we entered, we tugged out of our coats and boots and then… stood there.
There wasn’t the mad rush to sneak in a kiss or hurry her to my couch. There was desire, absolutely, but it was only eight and now we had all night to take our time. To be with each other, in whatever way that ended up working out without the rush of Josie waking.
It wasn’t a night to push her past her comfort zone. It was a night we could finally enjoy being together, watching a show or movie, talking, laughing… and yeah, I hoped there’d be kissing. A lot of it and maybe some more touching than we’d done, but the finish line wasn’t the goal.
Finally having this time was.
“This feels weird,” Penny admitted, nibbling on her bottom lip. “I feel like I should be pressed up against the wall by now.”
“I can make that happen.” I took a step toward her to prove it and when I got closer, she lifted her hands to my chest and stopped me.
“Maybe in a minute? For now, I want this.” She slid her hands up to my shoulders and leaned in close. She closed the gap by wrapping her arms around me and hugging me.
It was so simple, but my own arms rose and wrapped around her lower back, pushed up her sweater so my hands could meet her skin, and we stood there, hugging, soaking each other in.
It might have been better than our first kiss, and as Penny hummed, a light and low sound as she relaxed into me, I buried my face in her hair and enjoyed it.
Funny how in my rush to have sex and fondle and grope and touch and learn how everything worked in my teenage years, the hug was the most overlooked physical intimacy of all.
And yet, as we stood there, I wasn’t sure there was anything that warmed my soul more than Penny giving me her trust, her body, and relaxing into me, needing me for mere comfort.
Eventually, she relaxed her grip at the back of my neck, and I let her go. “Want something more comfortable than those clothes?”
She glanced down at her jeans, dusty and dirty from horses and the land all over her and chuckled. “I hadn’t even noticed I was so dirty. And probably smelly. I could go home really quick?”
She smelled like hope and fresh starts and forevers wrapped up with a tiny little red bow, and there was no way I was letting her out of my sight for a minute. “No way. Come on.”
I led her to my bedroom and flipped on the light. Knowing there was the possibility she might stay there, I’d taken extra care this morning in making the bed, straightening the dark green cover and arranging the cream pillows against the simple but old and mission-style wood headboard. I’d helped my dad make it when I was fifteen and I’d get rid of that bedframe on my deathbed.
I opened dresser drawers and pulled out flannel pants, both for her and myself, then reached into another drawer. I chose a Colorado Blizzards T-shirt, the name of Caleb’s team for her, then reached into another drawer and grabbed a simple gray shirt for me.
“You can use the bathroom. Shower if you want. There’s a whole drawer of Josie’s hair ties in there if you need them,” I told Penny. “I’ll go use Josie’s.”
I had my fresh clothes in hand and was turning toward the door, when Penny whispered, “Wait.”
“What do you need?”
She glanced at the clothes on the dresser, back at me, the clothes in my hand. For a moment, I considered this was too fast, too much for her. Maybe she’d be more comfortable in her own home.
Then her lips curled at the corner, mischief and nerves battling for first place in her expression. “We could share? The shower, I mean, not the clothes.”
Wow. Damn . That wasn’t what I expected. My body liked the idea. A whole hell of a lot. “Penny… I want that, I do, but we don’t have to do anything tonight. And?—”
“How very sweet of you to care about my virtue and my comfort, Gavin. It is, I appreciate it. But what if that’s what I want?”
Then nerves of my own be damned as well. I’d give her anything she ever asked for, especially if it was me .
“All right then. You got it.” I reached for her and slammed my mouth to hers. Screw the taking our time and relaxing and watching a movie. We had the entire night for that.
I dropped my clothes and pressed my hands to the sides of her neck. She hummed into my mouth and met me with equal passion, equal need as I stepped backward into the bathroom. I flinched from the brightness and only stopped kissing her long enough to turn on the shower.
“Holy crap.” Penny gasped. She gaped, wide-mouthed and wide-eyed while she took in my bathroom. “This is, well, crap. This bathroom is a thousand times better than mine.”
“I renovated everything when I moved in.” And a large bathroom was necessary. I had a huge soaking tub, mostly because Josie might have been little when we moved in, but I figured someday she’d want bubble baths… which she loved these days. The shower was a walk-in at the far end, all glass walls, and as those walls started steaming with the heat from the water, Penny’s cheeks turned crimson.
“We could both fit in there,” she said, pointing at the tub.
“We could. Another night, though?”
“Okay.” She nodded and then licked her lips. She might have wanted this, but I was pretty certain she needed me to take the lead.
Slowly, so she couldn’t miss my intention, I gripped the bottom of my shirt. She’d had her hands all over my chest one night that now felt like years ago and I couldn’t wait to have her hands on me again.
As the shirt fell to the floor, that bottom lip made its way between her teeth again.
“Nervous?”
“A little. Mostly excited, and I think I could stare at your chest all day long.”
“You have a way of making me feel good. Come here.”
She stepped toward me, and I turned her around so she was facing the mirror. Leaning forward, I gathered one of Josie’s hair ties and then gathered Penny’s hair into my hands.
“I can do it,” she whispered, our eyes meeting in the mirror.
“I know.” I kissed the shell of her ear and received a quick inhale from her. “I know you can do probably anything you choose to do, but let me?”
“Okay.” Her hands twisted together in front of her while I gathered her hair. This time, I doubted it was nerves, but relinquishing her lifetime of taking care of herself to someone else. Oh, the things she’d need to get used to.
I worked quickly but paused long enough to kiss the back of her neck, barely exposed through the high collar of her sweater. Once her hair was up, in a messy knot at the top her head, my hands went to the hem of her sweater. “Can I?”
“Please,” she rasped. Her chest rose and fell with quickened breaths, and I took my time with her sweater, moving it up slowly, exposing her abdomen, brushing her warm and soft skin with my knuckles until she had to lift her arms. She disappeared for a moment and then reappeared, turning around and facing me.
She rested her backside against the counter and admitted, “I’m a bit nervous.”
I loved that she trusted me like that. Trusted me with her honesty and her vulnerability.
“We can stop. If it helps, the first time we have sex, I’m not making love to you in a shower.”
I wanted her relaxed in a bed, spread out so I could enjoy every blasted inch of her, but even wanting that, I was having a hard time not tearing off her simple cotton bra to see and kiss and lap at the nipples and breasts I’d only barely touched.
“No.” She shook her head. “I’m okay, and I want it, but that doesn’t mean I’m not nervous.”
“Like I’ve said before, I do anything you don’t like, all you have to do is tell me.”
“I know.” She leaned in closer, and I took the hint. I pressed my lips to hers and then jumped when her hands came out and pressed to my stomach. She settled them at my hips, thumbs brushing the button of my jeans.
“Take them off,” I whispered against her lips. As she worked, I relearned the feel of her body. The softness of her shoulders, the tenderness of her sides.
Her fingers worked at my button while I wrapped my arms around her and unclasped her bra. With care and slow movements, my own fingers trembling with the urge to take , I slipped off her bra straps and dragged them down her arms to where her hands were lowering my zipper.
Together, we pushed down my jeans, and the bra slipped from her hands.
“Turn around,” I told her and gently spun her in a circle so she was facing away with me. I brushed my hands up her body, around the curve of her breasts, ignoring the places I wanted to touch before my thumbs went to her underwear. Cotton, beige and simple like her bra, they hid everything and yet somehow, were more alluring than the silkiest strap of silk.
They fell to the floor with a flutter, and Penny shivered as I kissed her neck. “Go on in. I’ll be right there.”
She glanced at me over her shoulder, lips parted, pupils blown with excitement.
“Go on.” I caressed her hip and gave her a gentle shove to get her moving in the right direction.
I waited until she was beneath the water, until it rushed down her back, giving me the perfect view of her curves and her backside with a barely visible birthmark above her right cheek.
Then I shrugged out of my boxer briefs. I was hard and swollen, and I squeezed my length until a quick sting of pain regathered my control.
Slow . I would do this slowly. Hell, I needed the reminder as much for myself as Penny. She was still standing under the water when I entered and stood in front of her. Eyes barely open, she looked away as I entered.
She’d been brave before, and the other night when she took what she wanted, but I also knew she needed to build up to that. “You’re beautiful and stunning, and I’ve wanted to be right here, with you now, from the moment I laid eyes on you.”
Her smile was sleepy, no less beautiful. “You glared at me and stormed out of the room moments later.”
“I went to Faye’s room and begged for Josie to be transferred to her classroom.”
She flinched at that. Hadn’t heard then how big of a jerk I truly had been. “You did? Why?”
“I was scared. I was scared to be right here, in this moment, with you and losing it.”
“Oh… Gavin.”
I kissed away her sadness and shoved down my own doubts. My own insecurities didn’t matter right now because they no longer existed. Reaching for my bodywash, I squeezed a healthy dollop onto my loofah and started washing her arms.
Her hand cupped my cheek, and she pulled down so we were face to face, almost nose to nose. “You’ll know I’ll do everything I can not to hurt either of you, right?”
“You wouldn’t be here if I were still afraid,” I assured her.
Acceptance lit her eyes, and I draped her arm over my shoulder, then began washing the rest of her body. I took my time, equally enthralled with the way she shivered and gasped and moaned when I touched her in places she enjoyed the most, and with the simple desire to learn her body, to memorize the look and feel of it.
Starting this with Penny didn’t come easy. It’d been a battle of my own internal wills, but as soon as I broke down and gave in to my fears, she swept them all away.
She was a woman who’d go to the ends of the world for someone she loved, and I would ensure that work was never in vain, never unappreciated by me.
Eventually, I’d cleaned all I could, and Penny took the loofah from me. “You haven’t even stepped into the water.” She giggled and spun us in a circle.
“I didn’t need to be wet to wash you.”
I was hard, though, and my length stood tall and long and thick between us. She avoided it as she retraced my own steps. Washing my back, my shoulders, and my stomach, she kept to the top half of me, and yet every few seconds, she tugged away from our kisses and glanced down.
“Touch me,” I said because it was clear she wanted to. “Take all you want from me, Penny, whenever you’d like.”
“You’re bigger than I remembered.” But as she said it, the loofah fell to the shower floor and her fingers wrapped around me.
I flinched at that first, hesitant touch and pressed my mouth to hers.
“Yes,” I grunted as she took that first firm pull of me. She stroked me until my blood was boiling, until her own whimpers drove me crazy, and I spun us around, pressed her back to the glass, and lifted her leg over my hip. Spread wide open for me, I looked down between us. Her hand, wrapped around my engorged head, and her own body spread open and glistening for me.
“Damn it,” I rasped and pressed my thumb against her center. She pulsed around me, collapsed her head to the glass, and her hand on me stilled.
Just as well. I wanted her to fall apart first. It also gave me the pleasure of watching every expression flutter across her face as I slid a finger inside of her. Her hips rolled, arched, and her hands reached out and clung to my hips. I worked into her slowly, watched as she flinched and then moaned. It wasn’t long before her sex clamped onto my finger and demanded more. With my thumb at her clit, I added a second finger, then brought one of her hands back to my erection and beneath to my balls.
“Cup them gently and squeeze. Focus on how you feel.”
She was quivering as the stood there, but she listened so well. “I’m going... I-I’m close…”
“I know. Enjoy it and let go, Penny.” With a few more firm circles of my thumb at her sex and the curl of my fingers, it didn’t take long until her body quaked and her cries bounced off the shower walls as she came. She went so gloriously wild, I wrapped an arm around her lower back to hold her still.
And with her hand on my balls, playing with them and moving back to my erection, I didn’t bother holding back, didn’t bother trying to wait.
I came all over her stomach, my hand, and groaned my release into her throat.