Chapter 17 #2
It had been so long since Benji had heard her laugh genuinely, loudly and freely, instead of that stilted chuckle she used when it was expected, and every time the sound fell from her lips, he had to fight his impulse to turn and look at her, to watch the joy spread to her eyes, lighting them from inky pools that a man couldn’t trust to lake water that he couldn’t resist diving into.
Before, Sierra had always had a smile on her lips and a laugh ready to go.
She hadn’t just been a fun person. She had been funny too.
And then After, there had been so much between them that Benji hadn’t thought to try to make her laugh.
All that bubbly warmth and humour had simply vanished.
It had been there one day and then gone the next, and among everything they had suffered, neither of them had thought to try and find it again.
Distracted by his thoughts, Benji didn’t see Markus lob a huge mud ball right at him. It hit Benji in the chest. He released a winded oomph and belatedly dived behind the Jeep, seeking cover.
He hid for a few minutes, buying time before he could make it back to the mud patch, but when Mav started wheezing with exertion and bent over to try and regain his breath, everyone immediately stopped.
Nobody said anything. Benji relinquished his cover behind the Jeep. Sierra and Poppy stepped out from behind the oak tree. Markus dropped the huge ball of mud he’d been forming in his hands.
Nina ran her hand over Mav’s back, her big eyes filled with worry. ‘Mav? Are you okay?’
‘Yeah.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Just embarrassingly unfit.’
‘All right, line up for hosing off!’ Benji shouted, calling attention away from Mav. He ambled over to the hose, turned the spigot on at full pressure, and turned around to where the group, shivering with cold, were lining up.
He started with Mav and Nina, and as soon as he was done, he said, ‘Neens, why don’t you take Mav in, get him showered and warm.’
‘I’m fine,’ Mav argued.
Right as Nina said, ‘I could use a hot shower.’ She shivered dramatically. ‘It’s freezing out here.’
Mav’s eyes snapped to her. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Just tired.’ Nina cast a pleading glance at Sierra.
Sierra stepped in seamlessly. ‘You two go on up. Benji and I will get Poppy clean.’
‘And then we’re going riding,’ Benji added.
‘Is that okay, Poppy?’ Nina asked.
‘Yeah, Neens!’ Poppy squeaked. ‘I really wanna go riding with Uncle Benji!’
Nina smiled. She held out one hand for Mav. ‘Let’s go get warm.’
Mav didn’t argue this time, and Benji hoped his friend, who was used to being infallible, hadn’t overexerted himself. He watched Mav hobble inside, Nina’s arm around his waist, before turning back to the group. ‘Markus?’
Markus held his arms out, closed his eyes like a martyr about to be sacrificed, and said, ‘Hit me, babe.’
Benji opened the hose and doused him, and the moment Markus was sufficiently clean he hurried inside, leaving Benji, Sierra and Poppy.
He hosed Sierra off first, but when he turned to get Poppy, he couldn’t bring himself to do it. The kid was covered in mud and shivering, and even though her grin was wide and happy, she looked so cold. ‘Si, why don’t you carry Poppy inside to her shower, so she doesn’t have to get hosed off.’
Poppy giggled. Her teeth chattered. ‘It’s really cold, Sisi,’ she said, and turned those Hunt eyes on her aunt.
Sierra scooped the muddy five-year-old up immediately. ‘Okay. Let’s go get warm.’
Benji stayed. He started at his booted feet, hosing the caked mud off. He was so focused on his task that it took him a few seconds for him to register when Sierra called out to him.
He looked up.
She stood on the porch steps, Poppy in her arms. Even soaking wet, she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. And seeing her with Poppy – how natural she was – always hurt. It made him remember why he had wanted babies with her. ‘Yeah?’
‘Why don’t you use my shower?’
‘Thanks, Si.’ Benji tried to bank his smile.
It was, after all, a completely reasonable suggestion, one she would have made to anyone covered in mud and standing in the cold outside.
But to Benji, who had once lived in the ranch house with her, it was so much more.
It was an invitation back inside, and maybe he shouldn’t read more into it than that – but he desperately wanted to.
He finished hosing off and climbed upstairs, making sure to stay on the path of towels someone had already laid down. He opened Sierra’s bedroom door tentatively, bracing himself for the memories, only … There were none.
She had taken their pictures down. The only one that remained was a framed photograph of Ava and James Hunt, which sat on her nightstand. The body pillow was there, but other than that, there were no reminders of them, of everything they had been through – including all the good times.
The room, with its white bed set, beige carpet, and eggshell curtains, was sterile. So unlike Sierra, who had always chosen dark, bold colours – deep reds and hunter greens and navy blues.
Benji wondered over it as he walked into her bathroom, turned on the shower, took off his clothes, and stepped under the scalding water.
He supposed, to an extent, he had done the same – eradicated any memories of that future they had prepared for and then never lived.
But where he had boxed up Sierra’s pregnancy photos for fear of upsetting her, she had boxed up him.
Them. Changing the very colours of her bedroom was another reminder of her runaway grief.
Instead of facing it, instead of dealing with it, she had just painted over it, sterilized it.
And not for the first time, Benji worried that she was a storm waiting to strike, and he hoped that he was strong enough to weather her.
He was so lost in thought that he didn’t hear her come in. He jumped a little when her first shoe hit the floor with a wet slap. His heart lurched in his chest, but when Sierra started stripping her wet clothes, it broke into a full gallop.
‘Nina came in to help Poppy anyway,’ Sierra said distractedly as she lifted off her soaked sweatshirt with a loud squelch to reveal the black lacy bra from the night before.
Her cold nipples were visible points beneath the muddy lace, and Benji’s mouth watered with the urge to lather them with his tongue until they were peaked with need instead.
‘It’s amazing watching them bond,’ she added, completely oblivious to his fevered lust.
‘Yeah,’ he agreed without taking his eyes off her. ‘It’s been great,’ he added distractedly.
He used his hand to swipe at the fog on the glass so that he could keep watching her.
His body hardened with every piece of clothing that she removed, and by the time she opened the door and climbed in with him, not even her mud-streaked face or the quick slap of air she let into the shower was enough to cool his raging need.
Sierra shivered. ‘Holy crap, I’m freezing.’
Benji stepped out of the hot spray and pulled her under it instead.
He nestled her back against his chest as he reached up to adjust the shower head so that the water covered her completely.
Sierra hurriedly rinsed off, but with every movement, she squirmed against his erection, and when she angled her head over her shoulder to give him a saucy look, he dropped his lips to hers and kissed her gently.
Benji sank into the kiss. He brought his hands to her breasts and cupped them, skilfully but gently teasing her sensitive nipples until Sierra was making a humming sound in the back of her throat.
She ground her ass against him in small circles, whimpered his name, one long, ‘Benji,’ and it was that, his name on his woman’s lips, that had the thin rein he had on his control tugging tight – always.
He kept his left hand on her breast even as his right stroked down her side to her hip, and then to her slick heat. He slid his middle finger through her seam, groaned when he felt how hot, how ready, she was. ‘Fuck, Si. You’re so wet.’
Sierra purred her approval and pressed herself against his hand.
Benji didn’t ask what she wanted this time. He knew. He slid two fingers into her, and when she began to move her hips in small thrusts, he increased his pace, pumping in and out of her until she was panting loudly.
The hot water lashed at them, heating them though neither of them felt the cold anymore. Steam fogged the glass doors, enveloping them so that they may as well have been the only two people in the world.
Benji curled his fingers inside of her as his other hand cupped her breast, his fingers gently rolling over her nipple. ‘You’re so goddamn sexy, Sierra.’
‘Hmmm,’ she replied.
‘Watching you makes me so hard.’
She moaned at that.
‘Feeling how wet you are makes me want to eat you out.’
‘Benji. Oh, God.’
‘Come for me, love,’ he demanded.
And she did. She gripped the back of his neck and arched her back on a long moan.
The orgasm rocked her. Benji felt every tremor of it as it rippled through her and into him.
He slowed his strokes and helped her ride out the wave, and when she slumped against him, he repositioned her so that her back was against the tiled wall.
He knelt in front of her and lifted her leg so that it was draped over his shoulder, used his thumbs to spread her for him, and then he satisfied his own greed by licking through her.
Her hot, salty taste filled him, driving him wild.
Sierra’s head fell back against the wall. Her hand found his hair and gripped.
‘What do you want, Sierra?’ he asked.
Her eyes popped open. She looked down at him, on his knees in the spray, and she grinned. She turned, placed her hands on the wall, and sent him another provocative look over her shoulder. She didn’t even say anything, only bent over, giving him a full view of her.
Benji’s blood blazed. And, still, he didn’t immediately hop to his feet and pump into her.
He gripped her ass with both hands and angled his head so that he could taste her salty heat again, and it was only when she was moaning with the threat of the second orgasm that he pushed to his feet and, with one powerful stroke, buried himself in her.
The intensity of her closing around him stole his breath.
Sierra braced her forearms on the wall, supporting her weight, and Benji splayed his hands on either side of them.
He scooped her wet hair off her back so that he could kiss the side of her neck, and when the urge to brand her filled him, he didn’t fight it.
He sucked her soft skin into his mouth until he left a red hickey in his wake.
Sierra only looked back at him, her eyebrows raised mockingly.
‘You’re mine,’ he told her. ‘And it’s about fucking time everyone remembered it.’
Sierra grinned. She pressed her hips back, taking him impossibly deep.
Benji’s vision wavered. He linked their fingers, pressed them against the warm tile wall, said, ‘Hold on.’ He slowly withdrew until he was at her entrance and then pushed back into her in one powerful stroke.
Sierra cried out, ‘Yes!’
Benji couldn’t help it – he grinned. Because she might not have known it, but she was coming back to him. Slowly, but surely. Sparks of her were starting to burst through again, and they were bright and hot and dazzling.