Chapter 10

ChapterTen

Blaste

Shilohand I spend the rest of the day at the lake, which looks the same way it did in my time. Just water, trees, grass and sky. That familiarity relaxes me and we spend the afternoon lying in the grass, side by side facing each other, talking about millions of things, big and small. We speak about Shiloh’s father, the book she’s been dreaming of writing. She recites me lines from the first draft she’s been working on and I find myself eager to read the rest. It’s good. It’s as perfect as she is. I tell her stories about me and my brother getting into trouble and how the ranch operated seventy-four years in the past.

She asks me if I’ve ever had a crush on another girl.

I tell her the truth, which is that I might have felt physical interest in girls during my teens and early twenties, but it was nothing but a water droplet compared with the vast ocean of feeling I have for her. I can’t even remember the names or faces of the romantic prospects who came before. They’re just a dull echo and she’s…unfiltered vibrance.

This is when I make the mistake of asking Shiloh if she ever had a crush.

It makes me realize I should have just said no when she asked me, because the jealousy that hits me like a rockslide is painful and unwelcome.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, propping herself up on a bent elbow.

“What’s wrong?” I roll onto my back, finding the clouds are tinged in red. “You just told me you had a boyfriend.”

“In eighthgrade.”

“Exactly. Less than five years ago,” I snap. “I don’t like it, no matter when it was.”

“You’re being silly. He moved to Michigan. We aren’t even Facebook friends!”

“I sure as hell hope not!” I sniff. “What’s Facebook?”

“Honestly, nothing. Something civilization could do without.”

My gut is churning with acid. The panorama of nature in front of me looks distorted and one dimensional. Someone has tightened up my ribs. “Did you kiss him?”

She looks relieved. “Nope. Just some innocent hand-holding. A few hugs.”

“You hugged—” I sit up abruptly, jumpy, worried I’m going to throw up my tacos. The image of my girl in someone else’s arms is like being hit over the head with a metal mallet. I bet the motherfucker still thinks about her as the one who got away. “I guess I’m going to Michigan to kill him. Which way to the train?”

“I hope you’re kidding.”

“Nope.”

I start to stand up, but Shiloh pounces on top of me with a look of baffled amusement. I allow her to pin me down, even though I feel like my heart is going to tear itself clean out of my chest. I don’t think I could ever stop her from touching me. Or deprive myself of the privilege. Her body on top of mine is like being completed. Melding with the other half of my soul. Everything inside of me is captured when her thighs straddle my hips, her hands taking hold of my wrists and anchoring them over my head. Her hair is in a gorgeous tangle from the wind, her cheeks a little red from the sun. Beautiful. And damn, from here, I can see clear down the front of her dress to those bouncy little titties and I’m already starting to stiffen in these new jeans.

“You’re being ridiculous,” she says, rubbing her nose against mine.

“Shiloh, I am going to be a jealous maniac over you until the day I die,” I inform her. “Watch me.”

“You don’t have to be. I’ll never want anyone else.” She raises a haughty eyebrow. “Besides, I have the right to be a lot more jealous than you.”

“What? Because I bedded a few…” I stop in time to correct myself. “Ladies of the night.”

“Yup. And nice save.”

“Thank you. I’ve really grown since I met you.” Smiling against each other’s mouths, I grind my hips upward. Slowly. Feeling her breath skitter out across my lips. “Hear me right now, Shiloh, I will stab myself in the heart before I touch anyone but you ever again. I only want this mouth.” I lean up and lick the seam of her lips. “I only want this body. This heart. This soul. I’d wither away without your touch and taste, sugar. Jealousy is a waste of time when my eyes will only ever see you.”

“Likewise,” she whispers, gently pressing my lips apart and giving me her tongue, wrestling it slowly with mine, her tight pussy started to get restless on top of my fly after only a minute or so of kissing. God, yes. We start to get into it and I’m aching to pry my wrists free from where she has them pinned above my head, but I’m going to let her keep me like this a while longer, because I sense how much she’s enjoying the chance to explore without me taking over right away. Just when I’m starting to breathe hard and formulating my request for her to unzip my fly, she stops kissing me, pressing her forehead against mine and looking me square in the eye. “Blaste?”

“Yes, sugar?”

“I…want to go back to the past with you.”

My heart shoots up to my jugular, hammering incessantly. We’ve been avoiding getting too deep into this discussion while getting to know each other, enjoying being together, but I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t been thinking about this. How to approach asking Shiloh what she wants, worried it won’t align with what I want. Worried it’ll shatter this perfect peace between us. “You do?”

“Yes,” she breathes, her thumbs pressing into my palms, expression serious despite her flushed cheeks. “I’ve never been happy here. I wander around feeling lost. I think part of me always knew you were out there.”

“Ah, Shiloh.” Happiness spreads like warm honey in my chest. “I was lost, too. Didn’t even know it until I saw you, but God, I don’t know how I was living before this.”

She nods, her eyes shining. Hesitates. “I’ve been thinking…”

“You’re making me nervous,” I say when she doesn’t continue right away.

“I’ve just been trying to think of ways to accomplish going back to nineteen forty-nine and I think…you’ll have to go back without me and—”

“No,” I choke out, my body beginning to shake. “Absolutely not.”

“Let me finish. When you get there, you’ll go back to the Wanting Tree and wish for me this time. The way it worked for your aunt and the ranch hand. She wished for her soul mate and he was drawn to the tree. We have the advantage of knowing what waits on the other side, so there won’t be any time wasted. I’ll be right behind you.”

“Shiloh, no. You’re basing this theory off some stories. I’m not risking us getting separated. For all we know, it only works once.”

“What is our other option? Stay here?”

“Yes,” I growl. “That’s exactly what we do. I’ll live in any time and place, as long as you’re there. I’ll stay. I’ll acclimate.”

“What about your family? You’re so much closer to them than I am with my mother. You want to go back—I can feel the pain you’re in.”

“It’s nothing compared to the pain I’ll be in if I can’t draw you back to forty-nine. Stop this. Stop. We’re not doing it like this. If we can’t find a sure-fire way to go together, it’s not happening.”

“But Blaste—”

“Enough, Shiloh!” My lungs are encased in ice. “I’m going cold just thinking about it.”

Her features soften, her hands flexing around my wrists. “We’ll stop talking about it for now,” she whispers, kissing my jaw, my cheeks, my mouth. Sinking us into a kiss. And I don’t know if it’s bad timing to make love to her, or perfect timing. All I know is I’m worked up and off-kilter after her suggestion and that unbalanced feeling leads to me attacking her lips with all of my fear and hunger at the same time, locking my tongue around hers and dragging her closer, the kiss turning breathless, eager, urgent. I free my hands from her overhead hold, my palms climbing the backs of her achingly smooth thighs, flipping up the hem of her dress, my fingers tangling in that tiny-ass thong, tugging the string between those soft lips and teasing, jerking it every so often to make her gasp.

“It’s high time you learn how to ride me, sugar.” I let the thong go with a snap and give her backside a nice, sharp spank. “Let’s go.”

Her hands are shaking as she reaches for my zipper, pulling it down carefully.

Biting her lip and moaning over the way my cock springs out, ready to go.

Whimpering, she starts to climb on top of it, but I stop her with a swat of her ass.

“I love the way you think, Shiloh, but you’ll be riding my face. You didn’t think I forgot my promise to lick it, did you?” I take her hips in my hands and jerk her forward, sliding my body downward in the grass to meet her halfway. Pre-come spews from the head of my cock when her mouthwatering core meets my mouth and I grab two handfuls of her ass, grinding her down on me, kissing that cunt the way I kiss her pretty mouth, turned on by her scent. “You still smell like my come, sugar. I love that. You’ll never smell any other way. A little bit of me is going to stay in your panties every time you pull them up and down. I’m going to be in you and on you. Always.”

Shiloh whines a yes, her hips beginning to lurch, testing the sensation, the position, and I invite her to revel by stiffening my tongue, riding her on top of it with my grip on her butt cheeks, until she surrenders with a mewling sound and starts bucking against my mouth in earnest, her thighs trembling around my ears. Getting fucked on my lips, my tongue, my chin. Anywhere she can rub her slick, sexy pussy. It tastes horny and innocent at the same time and that combination makes me ravenous. I devour her from below while jerking myself off, rubbing my thumb over the slippery tip of my cock, plotting how I’m going to shove this son of a bitch inside of her once she’s satisfied—because that’s what I do now. I keep this woman hot and happy. I keep her excited for my dick, because that’s where she lives now.

“Oh. Oh. Ohhhh.” Shiloh’s lower body rolls faster, faster, and I help her grind down, her breath turning erratic. Then she stiffens, calling my name out to the lake and the sweetest moisture coasts down onto my lips, onto my tongue, like a gift from heaven. The taste of my girl’s gratification. There is nothing on this earth like it and never will be.

As soon as she’s done shaking, I slide out from beneath her. Sit up, turn around and get on my knees behind the hottest sight I’ve ever encountered. Shiloh on her hands and knees, ass exposed to the sunlight, thong twisted across her ass and pussy, pleasure dripping from her sex and landing in the grass. I make a sound like an animal that has encountered his mate in the wild, coming up behind her with my erection in hand, positioning it against her wet hole and slamming deep, my roar echoing through the trees, the landscape.

“I love holding you down and fucking you, sugar. More often than not, that’s what I’ll be hungry for.” I drag her hips higher, propping that tight ass against my stomach and angling her just right. Just right. “But by God, your body is going to know this cock from every angle.”

A shiver goes through her. “Yes, Blaste.”

Exhilaration prickles every inch of my skin. “That’s what I love to hear.”

I take her slow, but firm, on her hands and knees.

I fold myself over her and kiss her neck, the sensitive place beneath her ear, while I enter her wet cunt from behind, the base of my spine tightening like a corkscrew and it’s no wonder, because she’s a magical creature, her fingers twisting in the grass, her back arched, opening the cheeks of her backside so I can rub my thumb over her tight, little asshole while I’m pumping, my abdomen stitched up with pain trying to hold on to my come as long as possible, so I can enjoy her. The sight and snugness and scent of her.

I take my time, driving my cock to the hilt, working my hips in circles, grinding, then pulling out almost entirely, exhaling, slowly, fisting her hair and pulling her head to the side while I sink back into the tightness, feeling her muscles flex in welcome, groaning as her wetness increases, the sound of my cock punching forward slowly tangling with our increasing moans…and I start to move faster. No help for it. I press her cheek down into the grass and work us into a frenzy.

“You get me off like such a good girl,” I grunt, teeth clenched, my balls so stiff they’re not even swinging now, just plastered to my undercarriage, poised and ready to let loose. “You break me, Shiloh. Fuck, you break me. Baby, just stay still, just like that, it’s going to be rough for a minute.” She whimpers as I let the beast come out of me, taking her from behind with a savagery a man shouldn’t inflict on the woman he loves, but I can’t stop. I can’t, because she’s my love and my lust, all rolled into one. My perfect match. And she’s stripping me of my control so thoroughly that I’m bellowing her name as my peak speeds closer, blinding me, wrecking me. “Ohhh shit, shit, good girl, keep your ass up, almost there, almost—”

I tackle her into the grass, thrusting deeper than ever and shouting a curse as my come floods out of me, filling her perfect space, and I realize she’s trembling violently, too, her orgasm colliding with mine, and knowledge that she can climax when I’m fucking her that hard makes me so hot, another wave of pleasure rolls out of me, emptying me in a way I’ve never experienced before. And yet, my chest, my heart is so full, I blurt the words in my head. I say them out loud because nothing has ever been truer.

“I love you, Shiloh,” I breathe into the nape of her neck. “I love you so much.”

She reaches back and grips my hand. “I love you, too. I love you, Blaste.”

We tumble sideways into the grass and I draw her roughly into my arms, needing to touch her, soothe her, feel her. Hot pressure forms behind my eyes when I see her face and find her gazing back at me with so much love, so much devotion that I can only hold her, rock her and attempt to calm down. We stay like that for hours, but it feels like a matter of minutes, because no amount of time with her is enough. And when darkness falls and we fall asleep, neither one of us expects to be woken up by a voice.

A presence.

A familiar one…to me at least.

And that’s when the world around me starts to crumble.