Chapter 5 Travis
TRAVIS
The black waitress uniform hugs Kendra’s luscious hips. The curve of her ass is a mouthwatering sight. I take another sip of my coffee, but it doesn’t quench my thirst.
It’s been over twelve hours since I kissed Kendra’s pouty lips. But the taste of her lingers, filling up my senses. The imprint of her lips on mine, the memory of her teeth tugging my lower lip sends heat skittering over my body and blood thundering in my ears.
I thought I could resist Kendra. I thought this thing between us was stoppable. But now that I’ve had a taste, I realize how na?ve I’ve been.
The pull I have towards her is overwhelming. It's bigger than her or me or her brother. I want to feel those lips on mine again, and to hell with the consequences.
I’ve been sitting here watching her work for the last two hours with my laptop open in front of me. I’m supposed to be doing inventory, but there’s no way in hell I can keep my eyes off this woman.
I’m mesmerized by her, by the way she moves with the tray in the air, making her hips sway, the smile that lights up her face when she speaks to customers, that damn strand of bright pink hair that falls over her eyes and that she keeps tucking behind her ear.
I want to take that hair, wrap it in my fist, tilt her neck back, and kiss the hell out of her.
When I came back to the office last night, Kendra was gone. I don’t know what I would have done if she’d still been there. Claimed her in the office, probably.
There was something between us last night, something real. But today, Kendra’s barely said hello. She’s avoiding me.
Does she regret kissing me last night? Does she regret kissing an old man? There’s only one way to find out.
The last of the lunch customers leave, and Kendra clears their table and resets it for dinner.
There’re a few hours before Kendra’s needed for the night shift, and as she goes out to get her purse, I corner her in the hallway.
“Kendra.”
She spins around and takes a small step back when she sees me, her hands going up as if pushing me away even as her eyes widen and her lips part.
My eyes dart to her plump lips, and my mind goes blank. All I can think about is kissing those peachy perfect creations.
“Did you want to see me?”
Her voice pulls me out of my fantasy, and I remember why we’re here. “Get your coat.”
Her eyes narrow, and she tilts her head. “Why?”
She doesn’t trust me, or maybe she doesn’t trust herself around me. The thought has my cock twitching.
“I’m taking you for a ride.”
Her eyes go wide, and an adorable pink blush creeps up her neck. I chuckle, realizing what I just said.
“On my bike.”
She turns away, embarrassed, and I love that her thoughts went to a dirty place.
“I haven’t had lunch,” she mumbles.
I know she hasn’t, because I’ve been watching her all morning. While pretending to work, I’ve been following her every move. I can’t help myself; I’m obsessed with this angel with the pink halo.
“I’ve packed a picnic.” I hold up the bag of food I had Maggie prepare for me.
“Oh.” Her mouth forms a perfect, dick-sized O, and I have to keep moving or she’s going to notice the wood in my pants.
“Come on. I know a good spot.”
She pulls her eyebrows together like she’s going to protest, but I don’t give her a chance. I grab her coat from the lockers and snatch the purse from her hands.
“Hey!”
She follows me down the corridor and out to the bright sunshine of the courtyard. It’s a beautiful, crisp spring afternoon, the perfect day for a ride.
“Are you always this bossy?” she asks when she catches up to me.
We reach my bike, and I stash the picnic in the saddle bags and help her shrug on her coat. “Only when there’s something I want.”
“Oh,” she says again.
Pink creeps up her neck, and it’s adorable how quickly I can make her blush. But she takes the helmet when I hand it to her.
Me and Quentin always had bikes growing up, and she’s ridden with her brother before. But this is the first time I’ve felt Kendra on the back of my bike. Her thighs pressed against mine cause my nerves to go into overdrive.
She holds the side of the seat, and I pry them off and place them around my waist.
“Hold onto me. It’s safer.”
Which is bullshit, but if she’s on my bike, her arms are around me.
We head onto the road, and it’s pure bliss. The sun on my face, the bike humming beneath me, and Kendra on the back. Life doesn’t get much better than this.
The road snakes uphill into the mountains. On one side, the cliff falls away to a canopy of trees and the commercial pine forest below. On the other side, it’s a steep bank and wild forest.
After about twenty minutes, I take a dirt road that leads to one of my favorite walks on the mountain. Five minutes later, the dirt road doesn’t end as much as peter out, the track giving way to undergrowth and scattered bush.
There’s no one else here, and that’s what I like about this spot. Most tourists go to the other side of the mountain where the town of Hope is. It’s close to the lake and the ski fields and numerous hiking trails.
On the Wild side, we’ve got the sawmill and the forestry that feeds it, and beyond that pure wilderness.
The path isn’t sign posted, and you won’t find it on a tourist map. It’s an old tracker path that only the locals know about.
Kendra slides off the bike and tugs the helmet off her head. She tosses her hair and runs her hands through it, letting the gold and pink locks fall back into place.
I must be staring, because she takes a strand of the pink and twists it in her fingers, making a face. “Pink seemed like a good idea in Kentucky.”
“I like it.”
I take the strand out of her fingers and tuck it behind her ear, loving the way she looks up at me all wide-eyed.
“Come on. The path’s this way.”
We set off through the undergrowth, and I pick up the faint track.
As we walk, I probe Kendra about the last few years.
I’m curious as to what she’s been doing all this time and why she stayed away.
As far as I know, Quentin’s only seen her a handful of times when he visited her in whatever small town she was currently living in. I worried about her as much as he did.
“What were you doing in Kentucky?”
“Waitressing, mostly.”
When I last saw Kendra, she had big dreams. She was going to go to college. She was going to study literature.
“What happened to college?”
“Life happened.” She shrugs, and my heart breaks for her. For the innocent girl who’s been through such pain.
We walk in silence for a while, listening to the noises of the forest. When Kendra speaks, she’s so quiet I can barely hear her.
“After the accident, I couldn’t focus. I didn’t want to be away at college. It seemed so stupid, studying classic literature. What was the point? And all the stupid sororities and the drinking. I did one semester and gave up. I just didn’t want to be there.”
I can understand that. It was the same for me after the first tour in Iraq. When I came back and went into a bar and there were plenty of guys my age, young men getting wasted on tequila shots. It seemed so frivolous.
“You ever thought of going back to college?”
I want that for her. I want her to have her best life, not one that she fell into because of grief.
“Maybe, but not to study literature.”
“You don’t enjoy reading anymore?”
Kendra always had her head buried in a book. Romance mostly, judging from the bare-chested men on the covers.
She laughs. “Are you kidding? Reading has been what’s gotten me through the last few years. But I want to do something more meaningful than write romance.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I’d like to study psychology, be a therapist. Help people in some way.”
She says it shyly, like it’s the first time she’s expressed her wishes out loud. I take her hand, and she glances at me but doesn’t pull away.
“You’d make a great therapist. You should do it.”
She bites her lower lip and smiles. “Maybe I will.”
The conversation moves to other things.
Kendra asks me all about the bar and the MC club. And it seems like no time has passed before we reach the clearing.
There’s a break in the canopy where sunlight filters in, and I spread the picnic blanket on the forest floor under the warm rays. Kendra plops down next to me, her short skirt riding up her thighs.
I grab the food and hand her a sandwich.
“You like chicken sandwiches?”
She takes it and we talk as we eat, the conversation flowing easily.
Maggie packed a large piece of apple pie and we share it, taking turns at scooping it up with a bamboo fork.
When we’re done eating, Kendra lays back on the blanket and exhales deeply.
“I can see why you come here. It’s peaceful.”
Her hair fans out over the picnic blanket, and her eyes close.
I prop myself up on one elbow, drinking in the sight of her. For a long time, neither of us speaks. We listen to the bird sounds, and I watch her breathing.
One of her eyes peeps open and then narrows when she sees me watching her. “You don’t have to take Quentin’s instructions quite so literally.”
I frown at her, not sure what she’s talking about. “What do you mean?”
She props herself up on her elbows and looks at me.
“I know he told you to watch over me while he’s away. And that’s why you’re in the bar when I’m working and why you’ve taken me out today.”
Her words cut me. She thinks I’m only here because Quentin asked me to keep an eye on her.
“And I’m sorry I threw myself at you last night. It was silly. I was caught up in the moment…”
She trails off and looks down, a telltale blush creeping up her neck. She brings her arm up to smooth her hair, and I catch it in mid-air.
“Quentin’s got nothing to do with it,” I growl. “I brought you here because I want to spend time with you. And I kissed you last night because I’ve been wanting to kiss you for the last six years.”
“Oh.” Her mouth pops open. “So this has got nothing to do with my brother?”
At her mention of Quentin, I sit up and run my hand through my hair.