Ride: A Bad Boy Romance (14 page)

Now Mae’s just moaning, her forehead against her upper arm. Her hips are moving in time with my thrusts like she’s hungry, desperate for as much of me as there is.

I keep going. I try to take it slow, but God it’s hard. I’m fighting not to lose control as Mae moans and writhes in front of me. I swear I’m afraid that I’m going to wake up from a dream any second now, because this feels almost impossibly good.

Suddenly she takes one hand off the gate and reaches backward, twisting her torso around. She puts her hand on my arm and then kisses it softly. I sink myself inside her as far as I can, watching her eyes fill up with pleasure.

“Jackson,” she says, pushing back against me.

She blinks, like she’s not quite sure what to say, and she bites her lip for a second. I bite her shoulder, because even now, totally inside her, I have the urge to mark her as
mine
.

“Yes, Lula-Mae?” I growl. It feels like the world is dissolving.

She pauses, then half-laughs. Like she’s
embarrassed
about what she’s about to say.

“Harder,” she finally whispers, and blushes.

My balls tense up. The knot inside me tightens, and I feel her squeeze around me.

“You want me to fuck you harder?” I ask, my lips brushing against her ear.

She swallows and nods, looking at the ground.

“Lula-Mae, I am balls-deep inside you right now,” I whisper. “You’re moaning like there’s no tomorrow, and in a minute, you’re gonna be shouting down this whole building, if last night is any indication.”

I bite her earlobe, and then thrust into her once,
hard
, and she groans.

“You don’t have to be embarrassed if you want me to fuck you harder,” I say, and I curl my fingers into her hips and thrust again, driving hard and deep.

“Oh!” Mae shouts.

I keep going, each stroke fueling the fire inside me hotter and hotter.

“Oh
god
, Jackson,” she whispers.

I think her knees buckle, because the next thing I know, we’re unstable, leaning against the gate, and then moments later we’re both on our knees in the sand. I feel almost like an animal, like this is the purest, rawest expression of lust I’ve ever felt.

Right now I don’t care if someone comes in and we get caught. I don’t think the National Guard could stop me from finishing, from making the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen lose her mind and come so hard she
screams
.

She’s hanging onto the gate and I’m hanging onto the gate, and it’s banging back and forth on its latch.

“Slow down,” she gasps.

“Make up your mind, Lula-Mae,” I growl, but I do what she says. I’m squeezing one of her hips in one hand, and I feel like I’m holding on by a thread but I keep going. At the end of every stroke she pushes back against me and moans, louder and louder.

“Jackson,” she gasps. “I’m gonna come.”

“Say my name again,” I tell her. “I like the way you say it when I’m fucking you.”

“Jackson,” she says, and this time her voice has a raw, desperate edge to it. “God, Jackson. I’m so close. This feels so
good
.”

My cock twitches, and I know I’m not gonna last for much longer. Not if she talks like
this
, fucks me this enthusiastically.

Mae whimpers, and now her muscles are tightening around me. She’s panting for breath.

“Let me feel you come,” I say. “Lula-Mae, I
need
to feel you come.”

“Oh god,” she says, and then her muscles clamp down around my cock. My vision gets blurry.

“
Jesus
, Jackson,” she says, louder this time. “Jackson, god
damn!
”

Now she’s nearly shouting, but it’s just sounds. Her muscles are contracting around me and I get swept under, still desperately thrusting into Mae. I come so hard I think my ears pop but I can’t even tell because Mae’s biting her hand and shouting anyway, her eyes squeezed shut.

I feel like I come forever, like she’s draining me. I’m still moving a little, long after I’ve finished and gone soft, my lips against her shoulder, my arm around her waist.

We’re still on our knees. Mae leans her forehead against the metal gates and takes a long, ragged breath.

“Lula-Mae Guthrie, you are gonna be the death of me,” I murmur.

She exhales, her belly tightening under my arm.

“We shouldn’t have done that,” she whispers.

“
Now
you’re whispering?” I whisper back.

“Better late than never?” she asks.

J
ackson kisses my shoulder again
, through my shirt, and then pulls out. Even that sends a tiny shock through me, and I stay still for another moment, forehead against the cool metal.

I think I’m shaking. I’m not sure I can stand. I know for a fact that I’ve got a half-ton of rodeo sand in my pants right now, since they’re around my ankles.

I hear the snap as Jackson pulls the condom off, then zips his pants.

“Be right back,” he says, his voice low, and then he walks out of the chute.

I grab the next bar on the gate and stand slowly, half pulling myself. I take a deep breath, run my hands through my hair, and then shake the sand out of my jeans as well as I can, considering I’m still wearing them.

When Jackson comes back in, I’m re-fastening my bra, and he watches as I reach through the neck of my shirt and re-arrange my boobs.

“What?” I ask, but I’m laughing.

“Nothing,” he says, tucking his shirt back in.

After a second, we survey each other, and I nod at him.

“Like you just took a walk,” I say.

“You look like you’ve been taking pictures for three hours,” he says.

“Good,” I say.

This was
unbelievably
dumb, but I can’t think about that right now. I still feel like I’m floating away on clouds, like I just want to curl up next to Jackson and feel his body next to mine.

Not in the cards.

He steps closer to me and slides a hand down my back. I tilt my face up and then he’s kissing me again, slowly and gently. Almost
thoughtfully
, like he’s considering my lips carefully.

When we finally pull apart he kisses my forehead.

“Maybe tomorrow we ought to get a fleabag motel somewhere else,” he says. “You can wake up those neighbors all you want.”

I laugh and feel myself blush.

“Sorry,” I say.

He just chuckles.

“I don’t mind at
all
, Lula-Mae,” he says. “It’s the rest of creation who you’re waking up.”

I have
no
idea where this is coming from. I’ve had boyfriends. I’ve had casual hookups. I’ve had good sex before, but I’ve never been a screamer.

Until now, I guess. Apparently Jackson’s dick turns off the part of my brain responsible for keeping the volume down.

We stand there for a long moment in each other’s arms. I turn my head and look out the gate toward the sandy arena, and I think:
tomorrow’s the last night
.

I go home the morning after, and Jackson goes... somewhere else, and that’s it. This is a casual sex relationship with a clear end-by date.

“You get enough pictures?” he asks, his voice rumbling through his chest.

“Yeah,” I say. “There’s only so many you can take of an empty place.”

Then I look from him, to the dark arena, and back. The whole pavilion has a roof but the sides are open, and the moonlight is just starting to slice in from one side, cutting across the sand.

“Wait,” I tell him. “Stay there.”

I detach myself and walk to my camera, still mounted on the tripod. I set it by the entrance to the bucking chute. Jackson watches me with his hands in his pockets as I mess with the settings and switch from one lens to another.

I take a test snap. It’s Jackson, just watching me, and the second I see it I know I can never, ever show it to anyone else.

He’s not looking at a photographer. He’s looking at his lover, and it couldn’t be more obvious.

Technically true, just not fit for print.

“Did you always want to take pictures?” he asks.

“No,” I say, still fiddling. “Not until college, actually.”

“What did you want to do before that?”

“I was gonna be a lawyer,” I say.

“Why a lawyer?” he asks.

He tilts his head and I take another shot, trying to get the balance right between the moonlit sand, the gate, and Jackson in the shadow.

“Lawyers make a lot of money and people respect them,” I say. “It was that or a doctor, and I’m a little too squeamish to be a doctor.”

“You’re covering a rodeo and you’re squeamish?”

“Not
that
squeamish,” I say. I hit the shutter again. “But I don’t think I’d like reaching into peoples’ guts all day.”

I adjust the lens.

“What about you?” I ask.

“It was always rodeo,” he says. He turns his head and looks toward the arena, a really good shot. “Been hooked ever since I was a kid. It’s all I ever wanted to do.”

“I never really
wanted
to be a lawyer,” I say. “I just wanted... I don’t know. I wanted more than Lawton had to offer.”

Jackson nods.

“When I’m not traveling I live in a trailer on my parents’ ranch,” he says. “It rattles like hell in the wind and freezes in the winter and leaks in the rain.”

“Haven’t you won enough to get something better?” I ask.

“Sure,” he says. “Most of my friends from home have settled down. They all married their high school sweethearts and now they’ve got two kids and a dog and a mortgage in Sawtooth.”

Sawtooth is his hometown, in the middle of nowhere, Wyoming.

“But you wanted more?” I ask.

He runs a hand through his hair. I shoot it.

“I don’t know if I wanted more, exactly,” he says. “Just different. Now I wonder if I’m stuck in the exact same kind of holding pattern that got them.”

“Jackson, you’re about to become the biggest star the rodeo world’s ever seen,” I say.

“Maybe,” he says.

“Maybe,” I say. “But a week and a half from now, your face is gonna be on newsstands from California to New York City. Is that different enough for you?”

“I think so,” he says, and then leans against the wall of the chute, crossing his arms in front of himself. “But the closer I get, the more I wonder if I should have just married Cassie, settled down, gotten work on a ranch. Have a steady, quiet life.”

“Who’s Cassie?” I ask.

“High school sweetheart,” he says. “She’s married now, two kids and one on the way. At least, that’s what my mom says. Mom gives me lots of Cassie updates.”

“She think you should have married Cassie?”

I adjust the exposure and snap two more, holding my breath. My stomach squirms, and I ignore the twinge of jealousy.

“She thinks I should have done anything that wasn’t riding bulls,” Jackson says.

“Understandable,” I say.

There’s a moment of silence. Jackson’s looking at the arena and I’m looking at him, trying to be objective, but between the light, the way he
moves
, and his perfect handsome face, I’m also just staring.

“I feel that too,” I admit. “I go home and my friends are getting married, having kids, and I see them and think, what does that feel like? To be satisfied with what you’ve got and not always be reaching for the next thing?”

Jackson looks over at me, face serious, arms crossed.

“Are you asking me?” he says.

“No,” I say. “I don’t think you know either.”

He just smiles and ducks his head.

“You got me,” he says.

“I don’t think you’d be happier with two kids, a wife, and a job,” I say softly. “I think you’d be wondering what would have happened if you’d given this a shot.”

Far away, the gate creaks open. We stare at each other, wide-eyed.

“Go,” he says, his voice low. “I’ll cover for you.”

My heart skips a beat, but then it thunders back. I shake my head.

“Face the arena and grab the gate,” I say. “We’re having a photoshoot.”

He does it. I snap away blindly, and then a few moments later, I see another man rounding the corner.

“You’re still here?” Wayne’s voice says.

“Jackson came by, so I decided to get a few shots before tomorrow,” I say.

“Jackson’s here?” Wayne asks.

I point into the bucking chute.

“Hey Wayne,” Jackson calls out. “I think I ought to hire her for my nudie calendar.”

Wayne rolls his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he says to me. “He swore he’d behave.”

I can barely keep the smile off my face.

“He’s all bark and no bite,” I tell Wayne. Wayne peeks into the chute and Jackson waves.

“Watch yourself,” Wayne tells him.

“On it,” Jackson says, grinning.

Wayne nods at me again.

“Have a good night,” he says.

He walks off, around the arena, out of sight. I snap a few more photos.

“We should go,” I tell Jackson once Wayne’s out of earshot, and start putting my equipment away.

Jackson saunters out of the chute.

“No bite?” he says. His hazel eyes are flashing, and I laugh.

“I can show you
bite
,” he says, his voice lowering to a dangerous register.

I lift my camera bag to my shoulder, glance after Wayne, and then give Jackson a quick but hard kiss.

“I know,” I say.

* * *

T
he next day
goes by in a rush. It’s the last day of the festival and so everything feels like it’s amped up to eleven. There’s a sold-out, stuffed-to-the-gills crowd, and they’re tipsy and loud. After the rodeo there’s going to be fireworks, a concert, the whole shebang.

I’m just hoping it’ll be enough distraction for Jackson and I to sneak off somewhere. I’m forcing myself not to think about the fact that it’s going to be the last time, because this is
not
a relationship, this is
casual sex
, our worlds can never meet, he lives in a trailer in Wyoming and I live in Brooklyn. Et cetera, et cetera.

Hell, I almost forgot that this is his big night.

He’s riding Crash Junction, the only undefeated bull left in the country. Already this week, Crash threw one cowboy in three seconds and one in two. He’s notorious, and the crowd’s amped up.

Jackson doesn’t even
need
to ride him. Unless everyone else stays on their bulls and gets super-high scores, he’s headed for the Rodeo World Finals next month. If he does half-decently tonight, he’s probably going to finish Pioneer Days in first place.

I also try not to think about the buckle bunnies who’ll be lining up for him.

As we’re waiting for the bull riding to start, Bruce and I are standing in the press area. It’s more crowded than usual tonight — there’s a news crew, a couple papers, and even a rodeo blogger — but it’s still a welcome relief from the press of the crowd.

“Are you missing any shots?” Bruce asks.

I shake my head.

“I don’t think so,” I say. “I went through everything last night, so I think I’m good.”

He nods.

“I hate this part,” he confesses. “It’s like packing, when you think you’ve got everything you need, and then you show up on vacation and you’ve forgotten to pack any socks, except you can’t just go to the drugstore and buy a really good quote.”

I laugh.

“You can at least sort of make those up,” I say. “I get the perfect moment, but someone moves? Forget it. Gone forever.”

“That’s why I stick to writing,” Bruce says, and smiles. “It’s a little less dependent on outside conditions.”

After three days of being together most of the time, I think we might be having a personal conversation.

“Alriiiiiiight ladies and gentlemen!” booms the announcer, his voice thundering over the arena speakers.

Everyone in the stands cheers.

“Are you all ready for the final night of Oklahoma Pioneer Days?” he asks.

They are. Loudly, they are.

“I said,
are you ready?
” the announcer asks, and everyone screams, claps, cheers, stomps.

It goes on like that until the bull riding finally starts. The first cowboy’s bull runs out of the gate and throws him right away. Poor guy doesn’t even make it a second, and Bruce shakes his head next to me.

“The last night’s always rough,” he says. “They’re tired out and sore.”

Somehow, that hadn’t occurred to me. I’m starting to wonder at the luck of Jackson pulling the hardest bull tonight.

More cowboys ride. The knot in my stomach clenches as most of them get thrown, and fast. I watch man after man limp off, and now more than ever, I’m realizing how much this sport breaks the people who love it. I’m certain they all have stories like Jackson’s: compound fractures, shattered bones, pins and plates everywhere.

The crowd can’t get enough, though. The more men get thrown, the more they cheer.

Finally, Jackson’s next. When the announcer says his name, everyone in the stands screams. My heart pounds. My palms get sweaty.

I want him to stay safe and unhurt, of course. But more than that I want him to
win
, to ride this bull that no one else has, because I get it. I get
wanting
something.

By my side, hidden from Bruce, I cross my fingers. Even that feels wild and daring.

“This ought to be good,” Bruce says, leaning against the barrier.

Crash Junction is in the chute, and with a flush of embarrassment I realize it’s the one where we were last night.

No one knows
, I tell myself.
Calm down.

I think of Jackson saying
you’re gonna be the death of me
, his lips against my neck. His voice gentle and teasing. I force myself not to smile, even as a bolt of heat flows through me.