Chapter Nine
“Not sure who kicks more in their sleep, you or the dog,” Aiden roughly whispered in my ear as the morning sun fell across his wide, firm bed.
I smiled to myself, leaving my eyes closed, as he nuzzled the nape of my neck, nipping lightly before sucking some skin between his teeth.
His hand slipped into my boxers, wrapped around my plumping cock, and began a slow, glorious rhythm that soon had me panting.
His hips rocked into my ass, nothing separating his dick from my hole but a few thin bits of cotton.
“Waking up with someone is nice,” he growled beside my ear as I blew apart.
He did a bit of arranging as I fought to return to earth, freeing his dick from his shorts before tugging my boxers down enough to wedge his hot cock between my ass cheeks.
“Yeah, do it,” I groaned and was rewarded with a grunt followed by a splash of warm spunk on my lower back.
With a soft sound of pleasure, he smeared his cum up and down the valley of my buttocks, making me squirmy.
I had just busted a nut, but if he had pushed into me, I would have come again. Probably more than once.
“Good morning,” he whispered as he held me to him, a firm hand on my belly.
“Morning,” I replied, letting my gaze soften as his spunk began to cool. “This is a much better way to wake up than having a shotgun blast as an alarm.”
He chuckled. “Glad to hear it.” With a soft peck on my neck, he eased away, taking his warmth with him.
Lady leaped down to the floor. Aiden gave her some love and sweet talk.
I just lay there in his bed like a wet sock, even though I knew I had plans for the day.
Plans that would only start after chores.
Chores that were already late. Ugh. Baker would be flinging dirty looks at me this afternoon when we were carving pumpkins. “Come join me in the shower.”
I rolled onto my back. Aiden stood in the sunbeam.
He looked like the sun god Apollo. He held out his hand, and I took it.
We kissed all the way into the bathroom after we hurried to let Lady out into the big outdoor pen to do her business.
Once she was back, we latched onto each other and didn’t let go until we were drying off.
I couldn’t stop touching him. Even though I’d just come twice—a handie plus a BJ in the span of maybe forty minutes—as we toweled each other off in his steamy bath.
Breakfast was a quick meal: some canned food for Lady and bagels with cream cheese and coffee for the humans.
“Are you going to be at the fire hall tonight for the Halloween party?” I asked into my nearly empty mug of dark roast.
“Yeah, definitely. I always drop by after the kids are done making the rounds.” He stood at the counter, wearing jeans and a tee, no socks, dark brown hair damp.
Casually sipping his coffee. Not sure how it was possible to still want him, but I did.
When his eyes met mine, I saw the same low flame of want.
“You need to stop looking at me that way, or we’ll never get our weekend started. ”
“I know.” I sighed and knocked back the last dregs of my coffee.
“I have chores yet, and then we’re carving our jack-o’-lanterns for tonight.
Granny says we don’t get any kids so far out from town, so we’ll just come to the party.
Dahn is going to make the rounds in town, then party, then go to his friend’s house for a sleepover.
Baker was saying something about going to some bar for a spooky karaoke event afterward, but should he be at a bar? ”
“He’s solid. And I know the place he means. Paddy’s Jumping Pony. Out on the highway, just on the other side of the township line. Pretty tame place for the most part.”
“Hmm, well, okay if you think he’ll be above temptation.” I placed my mug in the sink and turned to find him right behind me. He pulled me into his arms for a long, coffee-tinted kiss.
“Temptation is right here in my arms.” My dick twitched. Just. I slid my arms around him to cradle his ass. He rocked forward. Lady barked twice. A solid reminder of reality. “Guess that means we better break this up?”
“Guess so. See you at Jumping Pony then?”
“Wouldn’t miss it.” He stole one more kiss before we broke away from each other. “Go. Before I miss my nine o’clock appointment with Kristy Biggs and her sheep. They’re hauling her two ewes in for some fecal work to avoid a call visit fee.”
Right. Real-life work. “Okay, I’ll head home. Until tonight.”
He walked me to the farm truck, holding the door for Lady to leap up and stealing one more kiss before closing it after I climbed behind the wheel.
“I hope we can do this again sometime soon,” he said as the rattle of a truck and small trailer carrying bleating sheep interrupted our goodbye.
With red cheeks, I gave the Biggs family a nod and backed out to make my way home.
Mrs. Biggs eyed me openly as I crept away.
Probably news of our hookup would reach my family’s ears before I made it to the ranch.
***
As it turned out, Mrs. Biggs didn’t need to announce my all-nighter with Aiden.
Pulling up to the goat barn, I couldn’t have hidden my arrival if I had wanted to.
The old truck backfired, which brought people rushing out from every building on the property.
Baker from the horse barn, Dahn and Dodge from the goat barn, Linc and Bella from the dress shop, and Granny from the house.
“Glad to see you decided to join us,” Baker called as I slid from the truck and tossed him the keys.
“Now leave the man be,” Granny shouted at Baker from the porch, her recently dyed plum hair tied up with a yellow ribbon. “Ain’t like you never came tumbling in after an all-night party sporting love bites the size of my buttermilk biscuits on your neck, Studebaker Bastian!”
Lady made a beeline for the goats. Willy stood his ground on the other side of the fence as Dahn eyeballed my hickeys. Face hot as blacktop in August, I gathered up the dog and went inside the house, stepping gingerly around the pumpkins all lined up on the front steps.
“Don’t pay no mind to them turnips. Get yourself in here and have some breakfast,” Granny said before giving my brothers the two-finger I’m watching you motion.
“Pretty sure all of us had a few suck marks on us at one time. Back in my days as a Vegas showgirl, I once spent the night with a famous musician who left me covered in smooching spots. One was right beside my hooter and—”
The front door swung open behind us, saving me from hearing more about the ’60s singer who kissed my grandmother’s hooter. There were things that would haunt me forever. That dark night with Bella being the top with any graphic details of Granny’s wild sex days on the strip.
Bella appeared at my side, smelling like a spring garden, gold hair in twin plaits. She smiled up at me as her arm slid into mine.
“I will want to know everything,” she whispered as Granny went on about pompadours and skinny tie-wearing men. “And I mean everything!”
“Okay,” I softly replied, easing into the mudroom to get Lady’s check cord.
Bella waited in the doorway as I hooked the leash onto Lady’s new yellow collar.
I’d be glad when the cone came off. Not as glad as Lady though, I was sure.
Kneeling beside the dog, I glanced up at my friend.
“He’s really nice. To me, you know? He says he likes my intensity. ”
Her green eyes grew thoughtful. “Just go slow, honey, okay? He seems very nice, but he also has a reputation.” I made a face. “I’m not putting down what you two are doing.”
“Good, because we’re both just enjoying ourselves. I know we can’t get involved with anyone.”
“I’m sorry for making your life such a sewer.”
“My life is good. You’re the sister I never had. Stop being so hard on yourself. We had to leave.”
“I had to leave. You could have stayed.”
“No, I could not have stayed with you in danger. I go where you go. That’s what friends are supposed to do. I made a decision. He would have come looking for me first, you know that. He knew how close we were. Always hated me for that, I think.”
She fell silent for a minute. We’d hashed this out a hundred times since early spring. Nothing would change, nothing could change, and I was resigned to the choices I’d made.
“Friends aren’t supposed to keep each other from finding someone special.
” I shook my head. This was a familiar discussion between us.
Her guilt was huge but totally unwarranted.
“Right.” She drew in a shaky breath. “If things get good with you and Aiden, promise me you won’t stop seeing him because of what might happen. ”
“I promise.” It was the fastest way to make her less pained.
I hated seeing her hurt in any way. She bit down on her lower lip before leaving me to my thoughts.
I sat down on the floor to breathe in the scent of fabric softener from the running dryer.
My head was really itchy this morning. Too many conflicting things tumbling around in my skull.
Just like the dryer. Wish it were as easy to sort things out in my head as it was after the buzzer sounded and the clothes were taken out to fold.
Lady spread herself over my lap, knowing, as dogs always did, what their humans needed most.
A hug, a kiss on the hand, and a few loving strokes of soft fur helped way more than meds ever could.
***
War can break out over the smallest thing.
Say, for instance, your older brother Lincoln trying to impress your friend Bella by poking fun at the youngest sibling.
“You don’t have to have a costume at all,” Linc said in that booming voice of his as we sat at the swayback picnic table cleaning out our pumpkins.
The sky was bright blue, the trees stunning red and gold, and the wind had a firm bite to it.
Winter was just a sneeze away. I looked up from my jack-o’-lantern, elbow deep, fingers filled with seeds and slimy pumpkin guts, to see him looking right at me.
Dahn, Dodge, Baker, and Hanley were on one side of the table.
Granny, Bella, Ollie, and I were on the other.
Lady was napping in the sun on her check cord, her nose pointed at the goats who were lined up at the fence blatting for pumpkin.
When we were done, they’d get the seeds and pulp, and in a few days, the shells.
They were great treats, chock full of fiber, vitamins, and protein.
The cows and horses would get some as well, just to be fair.
“What?” I asked and got a smirk from my bearded brother.
“You can just come to the town party as a vampire victim,” Linc quipped as he pointed at his neck then mine. Dahn snickered softly. My cheeks flamed. There were two love marks. That they could see. Two. And now they were all sitting here sniggering into their fucking pumpkins.
“You can come as a jerk pickle,” I snarled. I was doing my best not to curse since Dodge got upset if we cussed in front of Dahn. Baker snorted while trying to cut out a triangle eye. “A big, hairy jerk pickle with a dumb accent!”
Linc laughed. Baker laughed. Everyone on the other side of the table laughed.
It made me feel stupid, just like I had as a kid in school.
Some tiny something inside me snapped. I fisted the guts in my hand, jerked my fist out of the hole in the top of my scary jack-o’-lantern, and whipped it at the big jerk pickle.
My aim was excellent. The handful of seeds and slimy gourd guts hit him right in the face.
Bella gasped. Lincoln blinked like a stunned mackerel, seeds and goop sliding down his beard to his lap as the others roared in amusement.
“Gut fight!” Dahn bellowed then flung some pumpkin guts at his father.
Dodge ducked. The goo slapped Hanley in the ear.
With a cry of surprise, Hanley then flung some back at Dahn, who juked just in time to avoid the incoming mess.
Baker took it right on the kisser. Linc snapped out of his shock, pointed a goopy finger at me, and then the battle was on officially.
Lady picked up on the silliness, leaping about while flinging bits of shell this way and that.
Bella and Granny skedaddled to the porch, Bella shouting to be careful of her new dress. Ollie, still in his uniform, decided to use me as a human shield for a quick second or two.
“Anyone gets pumpkin on this shirt and I have to go home and change before the party, I’ll lock them up for assaulting an officer of the law with seasonal fruit.” Ollie waved a finger at us as he raced to his cruiser. None of us quite dared to test him.
Guts flew for a solid two minutes until our buckets were empty. Once the ammo was gone, we all slowly rose from where we’d been crouching, watching the others for any last-minute salvo. There were none. Everyone was a seedy mess.
“That escalated quickly,” Dodge said as he flicked a seed off the end of Dahn’s button nose.
“Guess you boys know you just wasted the makings for a pan of roasted seeds and some chili pumpkin soup,” Granny called from the front porch.
We all looked at each other, coated in guts, smiles playing on our grimy faces.
“Worth it!” we shouted in unison. Amazing how much better a man felt after slapping his brother in the face with slimy orange gourd innards.
Wish I’d had them around when I was a kid and I’d been picked on in school for being a weirdo.
Not to beat up Tommy Ianello, the bully of PS 804, as I eventually did that—took me until I was in high school, but I finally got him alone behind the gym one day—but these clowns would have been really handy for making me laugh when I felt like a loser outcast.