18. Colton
EIGHTEEN
COLTON
“Who’re you?” I ask, voice breaking as I peer groggily through one eye, a sharp pain splintering my gut.
I don’t know if that pain is from hunger or broken ribs, but at this point, it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters but getting out of here.
“Where’s Kinleigh?” I croak, watching cautiously as the man moves around the room, leaving a towel next to the exposed pipe, which he pulls out easily.
He nods to the soap and towel, slipping his hand beneath the stream of water, thick plumes of steam starting to fill the tiny space. “Shower,” he says, looking me square in the eye.
I’m weak and wobbly on my feet, but I won't say no to a shower, even if another man has to be in the room. Washing away a few layers of captivity filth will help me sort my wild thoughts, maybe. It’s definitely worth smelling better.
“I’ll unshackle you to get your clothes off, but if you move on me, Forrest says I’m to kill you,” the man adds as I slowly lift from the bed, still wearing sweats, a flannel and my vest.
At some point, Kinleigh–or maybe this man–came down while I was drugged and beaten and put socks on my feet.
He moves toward the stairs, reaching up to take a brown bag off the step he left there, which was out of my sight until now. Placing the bag on the ground, he retrieves a key from his pocket and slides it into the lock at each of my wrists, then repeats to free my feet. I strip naked in two minutes flat, using most of my energy, hoping to be reinvigorated by the hot water.
“I can’t turn my back to you, but while you’re cleaning up, you can rest assured my focus is on that bag,” he adds, nodding toward it as he stashes the key back in his pocket.
Slowly I hobble under the steam of warm water, a reprehensible moan allaying the last few days of pain and mental anguish. I don’t make a habit of making moaning noises in front of men when I’m naked but in this situation, I don’t care.
The water feels so goddamn good.
“Where’s Kinleigh?” I ask as I lather up, not wasting what is probably limited time to get clean.
The man, who becomes more familiar the longer that I stare at him, is busy putting together a sandwich for me, gathering ingredients one at a time as he digs around in the grocery sack.
He doesn’t answer me, and I sift fingers and soap through my hair, watching dark water pool at my feet as blood and dirt break free.
“I know about the trafficked women,” I say instead.
His hands cease movement and his eyes find mine.
Still, he doesn’t say anything to me, only returns to making the sandwich. He uses a plastic knife to spread mayo across one side, carefully layering meat on top.
“My sister and my best friend know where I am, they know I’m missing,” I breathe, the water losing warmth quickly.
I make sure everything is as clean as possible and as I grab for the towel, the man gets to his feet, setting a plate on my bed. The sandwich he made is on it, with some chips and fruit. Next to it, he drops three bottles of water.
“I cleaned your bucket,” he says, approaching me as I quickly redress in my sweats and flannel.
He takes the towel, instead handing me the cuff which I hold with one hand. Briefly, I consider whether I can kill this man and get free, and while I realize I have almost no energy right now and I’m almost sure Forrest broke two of my ribs last week, I also realize… This may be my only chance.
And all of this goes far beyond righting mine and my father’s wrongs for the sake of Carsyn. Now there are women and children who need to be saved.
And Kin.
She needs me.
I grip the cuff and rear back, swinging it down in his direction, hoping to damage the top of his skull. If I can, I can knock him senseless for long enough to pop him a few more times, and knock him out.
As if seeing it play out behind my eyes, the man’s hand soars up, colliding with mine. He shoves my arm down, taking the cuff with him. Slippery with bare feet on the filthy, wet cement, the man easily overrides my frame, sending my sore back careening into the wall.
With his wrist locked beneath my chin, pressing heavily against my ambling throat, his face close to mine, he says, “I don’t want to kill you, Colton.”
With that, I stand silent as he reshackles me, going upstairs to shut off the water. When he returns, he brings a cup of steaming coffee.
His voice is almost hard for me to hear and his lips barely move when he quietly offers, “He won’t let her come down anymore.”
After collecting my towel and his bag of supplies, the man disappears up the stairs, leaving me to wonder if she’s okay. Is this man lying? He’s clearly part of the operation as he’s helping Forrest take care of a goddamn captive, so he can’t be a good person. It’s possible that he’s lying. Maybe Kinleigh is… He doesn't want me freaking out down here, he doesn’t want to deal with it. Maybe she’s fine.
I know she’s not okay until she’s in my arms.
What’s he playing at by telling me she won’t be down? Off-camera and quietly, no less. Maybe, like Kinleigh, he’s caught between two worlds. Though she hasn’t signaled she’s stuck here or being held against her will, she’s not willingly here, helping her father while being abused by him.
But then again, she no longer speaks. Without words, without any form of tangible communication, without knowing what she does or does not understand, it’s next to impossible to know where she’s at mentally.
Emotionally, though, everything that makes me Colton Beckett—every hair on my head, every molecule of DNA, down to the very last fiber of my clothing–is convinced that the love of my life loves me too.
Still.
I finish the sandwich and small plate of food left for me by the stranger, and sink into my cot, all thoughts going right back to her . With the shower and the food, plus two of the three bottles of water I’ve already drank, a small calm comes over me.
I don’t know how I’m going to get out and free those poor women. Relieve my sister of her stress and put my father’s past and his demons to bed. Find Kinleigh and help her.
I don’t know how.
I consider that the man who came down today potentially drugged me as my eyes grow heavy and my breathing falls shallow, but I’m too calm to pay it mind. Instead, I drape my linked hands over my belly and slip once again into my favorite memory ever.
Hovering over Kinleigh in the setting sun, looking down between our bare bodies, grass lapping at her hip bone, my toes sunk into the earth. I can still see my cock, sheathed for the first time in my life, notched at her entrance. I’ll never forget the way my breathing quickened, how fast my heart raced as I pushed inside, tearing through her virginity, sinking into her welcoming warmth. Feeling her thatch of soft curls against mine as I moved in and out, watching her eyes flutter, her fingernails leaving traces of our encounter along the tops of my shoulders, and down my back.
I only ever made love to her just the one time, and though the years have brought me many encounters, making love to Kin is the only sexual memory I revisit. The only fantasy that gets me going, that makes me feel something true and tangible. Something real..
And I cling to that warm memory as unavoidable slumber claims me.
TEN YEARS AGO.
I will not let my nerves get the best of me, not today. Today is far too important. Special.
I smile down at Kinleigh, who is stretched out on our blanket on her belly, her hands working tirelessly on her chain of dandelions. To anyone else she may just be a girl in the grass tying flowers, but smiling up at me with nothing but beauty and grace, my whole world is on that blanket.
She’s my best friend, my girl, my heart and soul. I’d say she’s my everything but that doesn’t quite reach far enough. Because Kinleigh is more than everything.
“Quit standin’ over me and get down here,” she says with an adorable smile on her lips.
We come out here nearly every day, and have for years. I’ll never forget the first time Kinleigh and I ventured out here. We were in second and third grade, respectively, and too young to ride alone. We walked all the way out here through the grass, talking about our most and least favorite foods. By the time we made it, we were so tired we laid down—right where Kin is now—and made it our official spot. The flop spot, we called it, as we both flopped onto our backs, staring up at the hot sky, panting and laughing, surprised at how much work it was to cross the pasture.
“C’mon and flop.” She grins, pulling me from my clear reverie.
I feel it all when I’m with her, and sometimes I’m so overwhelmed by my love for her that I just… stare. I look at her and see what life can be, what it should be, what it will be once we’re together on our own.
“I’m coming,” I tell her, lifting my hat off my head, setting it at the foot of the blanket to rest. “Does your dad think you’re coming in late today?” I ask, having been too nervous to talk details when we rode out here.
Charlie and Murphy are tied off at the tree, not more than twenty feet from us. I peer over at them nervously, knowing they’re still there, but needing to keep a watchful eye.
I didn’t think I’d be so nervous.
I kick off my boots and lie down next to her, on my side to face her. She rolls onto her side, and then we’re both propping our heads in our palms, grinning at each other, like the lovesick fools I know we are.
“Yeah,” she says after she fixates on my lips for a moment, her cheeks growing pink. “I told him I’d be in later than usual.” She leans in, sweet vanilla and oranges overtaking my senses as she sinks her lips to mine. When she pulls back, her eyes have gone hooded and her bottom lip is pinched between her teeth. “I’m ready.”
The crotch of my blue jeans tightens at the sultry way she tells me she’s ready to have sex.
With a curled knuckle, I push a strand of wild hair off her face. “You sure?”
We’ve talked about this a lot. Kinleigh asked me two years ago if I’d want to have sex with her soon, and I told her I didn’t think we were ready. I truly didn’t. Hell, at that point, my hands had stayed over the clothes, and the extent of our physicality was hand-holding and neck rubs. And a lot of ignored hard-ons and long, steamy showers at home.
A few weeks ago, Kinleigh told me she was ready. And despite the world around me always telling me we’re too young to hitch our wagons together, I knew that as soon as I made love to Kinleigh Conway, I’d need the world to know she’s mine.
It’s why I’m nervous today. I reach into my pocket as I bring my mouth to hers, hoping the long, heated kiss is enough of a distraction. My fingers connect with the metal, and I tug it from my pocket as she leans back. Sitting up, Kinleigh reaches for the hem of her shirt but I stop her, holding out the ring.
Her eyes don’t move, staying locked on the thin, silver band pinched between my fingers.
“It’s not much. It doesn’t have a stone, and it’s thin, but it’s real silver,” I recite nervously, remembering all the things the woman at the jewelry store told me to be proud of. It’s real, you came to a jewelry store, it’s what the ring means not how much it costs.
Kin reaches out, eyes wet, and takes the ring from me, sliding it onto her delicate finger. A shiver rolls through me watching her put it on, and the air between us grows heavy with an electric buzz unlike I’ve ever felt. I’ve loved Kinleigh for as long as I can remember, and though it’s not an engagement ring, it feels like we’ll be together forever because of it.
“It’s a promise ring,” I hear myself say, a slight tremble in my tone. “It means I’m promising myself to you, and when I can, I also promise to take care of you.”
She looks up from the band she’d been studying as if it were the most precious stone in the world. “I love it,” she says, tipping forward, crashing into me, looping her arms around my neck.
She sighs her happiness into my mouth as we kiss, and before long, we’re standing up, grinning like fools at one another as we slowly strip off our clothes.
I’ve been around Kinleigh in the lake every summer since I can remember. I’ve seen her in her swimsuit, and I’ve had the honor of using my fingers to make her come a few times before. But I’ve never seen her naked, in broad daylight, and I’ve never had her alone and naked on the cusp of making love, either.
She blinks down at the pile of garments, and I follow her lead, looking at our discarded items a moment, too. Knowing my role is to take the lead, I close in on her. As I collect her in my arms, she reaches between us, boldly claiming my erection with her hand.
Groaning, I crash my mouth to hers as she strokes me, something she’s never done before. Sure, she’s rubbed me over my denim on the couch while we pretended to watch a movie, under the privacy of a blanket. And I’ve held her hand to my cock while I fingered her before, wanting her to feel how big and hard she makes me. But her gripping and stroking, feeling her lithe fingers explore the vein only I’ve touched and traced? Feeling her thumb swipe the bubble of precum on my head, using it as lube as she strokes me again and again? Otherworldly.
Breaking our mouths apart with a raspy groan of despair, I blink down at her, finding her eyes wide with excitement.
“I like feeling you,” she whispers to me, and holy hell.
I like her touching me, too, but just as much, I like that she wasn’t afraid to say it.
Carefully, we lie down on our spread blanket, Kin on her back beneath me. I rise to my knees over her, my dick in my hand, my eyes roaming the uncharted, velvety terrain of her virgin body. My chest becomes so explosively full at the sight of her laid bare for me that heat threatens to prick at my eyes, but I smile at her, diverting the emotional burst from feelings into action.
“I’m going to go slow, okay?” I ask, because that seems to be the thing to say before sex.
It hurts for the girl a lot the first time or two, that much I’ve learned from movies and television. I pump myself, the urge to spill everywhere quickly climbing my spine as Kin watches me, eyes hooded, her hands coming to cup her breasts.
I’ve never looked too far ahead. And it’s hard to get a glimpse of your life when you’re seventeen. Most days all I can think about is Kinleigh’s soft lips and riding my horse in the open air of my favorite place: Wyoming.
As I lower myself, my elbows caging her shoulders, on the cusp of being inside of her, in Kinleigh’s eyes, I see everything; our glorious future.
Lazy Sunday mornings where the kids wake us up, climbing over our tired bodies, digging into our blankets, cozying up with us. Our daughter would look just like Kinleigh, and she’d stroke her small fingers through the beard I’d likely have, and she’d say, “Wake up, Daddy.” Kinleigh’s bare feet would hit the hardwood, and I’d look past our daughter to see her bouncing our son on her hip, her eyes still tired with sleep, but her smile effervescent as ever.
Baseball games mid-week, three of us huddling around an open picnic basket as we watch our boy hit his first home run. There’d be a drop of ketchup in the corner of our daughter’s mouth, but the smile she’d beam for her brother would be so contagious. Kin would grin at me, wiggling her lean finger toward the field. “Our boy hit a home run!” she’d cheer with proud tears clouding her vision.
Cool evenings in the pasture, Kin between my thighs as we ride alone, the kids safe and asleep in their beds. We’d make it a nightly habit to check the stables together, making sure everything was safe for the night. She’d go barefoot, because we both like it when I carry her to and from the horse. Something romantic and magical about it. I’d stroke my rough hand down her thigh, beneath her gauzy nightie, and she’d press her back more firmly to my chest, wordlessly telling me how much she enjoys my body, and my touch. Even after years and years of being together.
Endless nights of passion. Early mornings, middays in the barn, nights where I’d wake up unable to be settled until I’m inside of her—we’d have a lifetime of fiery passion, making love so frequently that people in town would eventually whisper, “They can’t keep their hands off each other.” That’d be us. Year one of marriage or year twenty. Forever, I’d want her and she’d want me.
And as I reach down and take my cock, sheathing it and readying myself to find her warm center, I see all of it.
“I love you,” I mumble, so overwhelmed with it all that a slight tremble tumbles through my shoulders, and Kinleigh spots it.
She reaches up, sifting fingers through my hair. I kiss her inner wrist, and she smiles. “I love you more.”
I take a breath, and look down, watching, as I press my slick, sheathed cockhead into her sweet pussy, groaning at the first feel. I didn’t know what it would feel like to make love to Kinleigh, to use my body with hers the way God intended, but whatever I imagined alone in my room beneath the sheets or with my eyes squeezed shut in the shower—this is so much more.
She gasps as I press into her, her tightness nearly strangling my head. She’s so tight. I mean, tighter than my fist has ever been. And warm and wet, too, unlike lotion or lube. She begs me for more and my mind is so loud from my pulse that I can only nod in response, pushing my hips forward to give her another few inches.
Each slide deeper, my groans grow bigger. My gaze moves between the beautiful twist of pain and pleasure on Kinleigh’s face, and the place between us, where I coast in and out of her. This time when I look, there are streaks of red coating my shaft, and in the fuzz dusting her pussy, red smears.
My hips halt, and even though my brain knows what it is, I can’t stop staring, my cock growing thicker from the carnal evidence that I’m her first.
She cranes her neck from the blanket, peering down at the crimson that further ties us.
“Touch me,” she breathes, once settled against the blanket again, her eyes dark with lust. “The way you did by the camphor tree a few months ago,” she whimpers, bearing down on my length slightly.
Goddamn, I get a flash of Kinleigh broken in on my cock, bouncing in my lap, screaming my name, her perfect tit in my mouth, my hands in her hair. And this is just the beginning.
The time she’s mentioning is the last time I fingered her. She told me she didn’t want me to “go inside”, and now I’m glad I never did. She unbuttoned her jean shorts and kissed the Coke from my lips before whispering, “Touch me really gentle, and I’ll come for you .”
Come for you.
I’d known Kin since we were kids, and while we’ve been a couple for ages, I was always raised as a gentleman. When Kinleigh let me touch her, I knew I had to give her an unforgettable orgasm. But I never put words to it. I just tasted the side of her throat as I drug one blunt fingertip across her swollen little blossom over and over until she was squirmy and moaning, cupping my cock over my jeans.
Hearing her say come was a revelation that day, one I’ve been turning over in my mind since. And now, I get to make her come again, this time while I’m inside her.
I reach down and drop my thumb to her clit, finding her so slick and achy that she cries out at first touch. I seal my mouth to hers, not wanting her cries to echo through the pasture when her father is home. But God do I love how a pleased and sated Kinleigh sounds.
“Yes,” she whimpers, as I think about my grandmother’s marmalade, and the little gristle bits in gravy that I hate, and all the cow patties I’d have to scoop if my own father knew I was out here foolin’ around.
I sink my hips forward as my eyes fall shut, the slick glide of my cock in and out of her pussy has my fingers trembling and my toes curling.
“Come with me,” she breathes, and my eyes flicker open to find Kinleigh’s cheeks full of color, her eyes wide, mouth parted in a wordless, pleasured cry.
I move my thumb a bit quicker, turning tight circles as she begins to fall apart beneath me.
The first milking of my cock from her tiny pussy is something I’ll never forget.
“I’m coming,” she whimpers, staring into my eyes as her wet channel clenches all around my cock, over and over, begging for me to spill.
I do, grunting louder and more feral than I ever have, thrusting faster to chase her orgasm as mine billows through me.
"Oh," she moans when my cock throbs, flooding the condom, and her moan causes another healthy ribbon of release, sliding up the rubber, making my shaft hot and slippery.
She strokes my pecs and I pump in and out, coming for what feels like much longer than normal, but when I’m finally through, I kiss her lips, burying the onslaught of emotion that hits post-sex.
“I love you,” I pant, peppering the adoration against her lips in between wild kisses that I plant on her throat, jaw and lips.
When I lift my face from her nook, our bodies slippery with sweat, I find a naughty expression on her face. “We had sex.”
My heart flip-flops from the truth of her words. I can’t believe it.
I grin. “I know.”
She bites into her bottom lip. “Can I see it?”
My brow furrows as I slowly slide out, taking my time to give her body the least shock. “See what?”
She pushes to her elbows as I rock up to my knees, my fingers coming to rest on the rubber ring at the base of my cock. She reaches out, stopping me. Tipping her head to the side, a lazy smile curls her lips as she studies the full end of the condom.
I realize just then that she’s never seen cum.
I want to tell her she can analyze my cum and the source anytime she likes, but before I can find nice words that don’t make me sound like a pervert, she places her fingers on the ring. “Can I take it off?”
My cock twitches, thickening at her words. “Sure.”
I’ve never come inside a condom either, so this experience is a first for the both of us in many ways. She slides the condom off and peers inside at my cum.
“Now that we’ve made love,” she says, still staring at my load. “I want to give you a blow job.” Her excited eyes come to mine. “I want to taste you.”
I smile at her as I pass her, her clothing, checking the sun to see how much time we have left. Less than an hour, I’d say. I watch her get dressed and make her a promise. “We’ll do it all.”
She looks at her ring. “We do have forever.”