"Okay, Maverick. I trust you." Her words are so soft that I almost can't hear them.
"Not completely, but you will."
Her fingers tighten again, tugging on my hair. The tiny bit of fear I had seen cross over her expression clears. She looks at me now with the love I hope to hear her one day confess to me, completely open and unguarded. She allows me to drink in my fill of what she's showing me before closing the distance and pressing her lips to mine. The touch is brief, but no less intimate.
"I trust you, Maverick, but that doesn't mean I'm not scared. I'm working on it, but it's going to take a little more than one night for me to be able to stop worrying that this is all just some dream that I'm going to wake up from only to find you gone again. I just need some time to let myself believe you're really here and offering me everything I ever wanted."
I nod, pressing our lips back together. "That's all I'm askin' for, but I'm tellin' you right now that if this is a dream that we're ever going to wake up from--no matter what, I'm still goin' to be right here, right where I belong. Where I've always belonged."
19
LEIGHTON
"Next Boyfriend" by Lauren Alaina
Maverick didn't tell me much about what we were doing today. All he said was to wear jeans and my boots. It was days like this that you forget summer had already started. It had been a mild May for Texas standards. Even now, with June already halfway over, the temps were still comfortable. It was only a matter of days until we started feeling triple-digit temps, though, and when that happens, I wouldn't be caught dead in jeans.
I throw on a tank top, pull on my favorite jeans, and make quick work of pulling my boots on. I can feel the anxiousness to get back to where Maverick is waiting as my heart kept thundering. I didn't want to be away from him. I know, logically, that I shouldn't feel this intense about him already, but he isn't a man I just met. Sure, we've been apart for ten long years, but when he touches me those years fall away and I feel like the same sixteen-year-old that knew with everything she was that he would be hers forever.
It would be so easy to let my thoughts linger with those fears, doubts, and concerns that had been swimming in there for the past month. It damn sure would be easier, but he isn't the only one who's sick of living with regrets.
This is our second chance. He might have been on to something last night when he said it was our time to take what we weren't meant to have ten years ago. We were meant to come back to each other, I know that deep in my bones, and I'm going to make sure I give this every chance to succeed.
I smile to myself and stand in front of the mirror that is on the back of my bedroom door. "My God, we're going to have a beautiful future," I tell my reflection, letting that declaration fill my body with the knowledge that I'll do everything in my power to make it happen.
I'm all in.
No more looking back. It's time, together with Maverick, to start living for everything.
Maverick's voice calling out through the house makes me smile. "Did you get lost, darlin'? I know from Quinn that you women think you need to spend hours on end in the bathroom doing whatever it is that has you comin' out lookin' just like you did when you went in, but you could knock me on my ass without all that, and Leighton, I'm pretty sure your cat/beast is tryin' to figure out which part of me is gonna taste the best, so please hurry, darlin'."
I snicker to myself. My thoughts going from funny to X-rated with one beat of my heart. "I could probably tell Earl which would taste the best, if you want me to help him out," I call back before I can stop myself from letting my erotic thoughts out.
I hear a crash in the distance. Silence follows, but not for long. Right when I'm about to open the door and go investigate what is going on, it's pushed open and a panting Maverick is filling the space. His chest is heaving. The now-wrinkled, dark blue button-down that he's had on since he showed up last night is untucked and hanging at his sides, the stark white undershirt pressed tight against his chest. When I'm finally able to move my gaze from its fixation on the bumps his abs make against that white shirt, his expression looks wild.
Wild and out of control with a little bit of panic mixed in.
"Are you okay?" I question, trying to shake the lust-fueled thoughts from my mind. I take a step toward him and he finally comes out of whatever trance had him glued to the spot.
"You can't say shit like that to me, Leigh."
"Uh, shit like what?"
"If you say shit like that, I'm going to forget that I'm supposed to be a gentleman and take things slow. If I let myself forget that, I'm not going to be able to hold back anymore."
I appraise him, dragging my eyes over every mouth-watering inch. "How much slower can we take something that's been building for twenty-six years?"
My words seem to only egg him on. His chest still heaving, but now I can hear the force of his breaths leaving his lips. "Darlin', I'm hangin' by a thread here. I went years without wantin' or needin' another woman. All you have to do is breathe and I feel like I'm goin' to come out of my skin with my need for you. You have no idea how much I want you. I just need you to work with me here. I don't want to screw this up between us by rushin' you to the bed."
Oh, wow.
Logically, I understand what he's saying. I do. Hearing him admit, again, that he hasn't been with anyone in years does something powerful to me. That being said, I wasn't kidding either. You can't rush something that's been more than two decades in the making. "I appreciate that, Mav, I do. But you can't make decisions like that without talking to me. For fifteen years, even with the ten that you weren't actually present, I always wanted you. I've been with two other men in that time and even they couldn't break through the part of me that only wanted to share that with you. So, while I get what you're sayin', I want you to hear me when I tell you I'm sick of wastin' time."
His eyes close and he drops his chin to his chest, looking pained as a groan escapes his lips. I hear him mumbling, but with the way he's standing, I can't make out what his words are. I shouldn't push him, but the memories of our night together a few weeks back have made it impossible for my body not to crave him when he's near.
"I don't want the first day of our ride together to make it look like I only want one thing from you, Leigh. I let the desire I have for you take the lead that night, and as much as I want and need that from you again, you have to let me prove to you that I want more than just to fuck you raw."
"I'm not really sure what to say to that," I tell him, my voice coming out thick and hoarse with want.
"Darlin', give me today. You want to keep pushin' my buttons, do it, but until the day I know you've given me all of you with complete trust with your heart, I'm not goin' there--no matter how much I want it."
I stare at him. "We're not going to have sex?"
He shakes his head.
"Even if I want to?"
He shakes his head again.
"Even if I tie you to the bed and make you?"
His eyes darken.
"It might be hard, to get you on the bed and tied up and all. I mean, you've got almost a foot on me, but I could probably figure it out."
A noise, deep in his throat, rumbles through the air.
"I really want to feel you inside of my body again, Maverick Davis."
And that's what breaks him.
He pushes from his spot with a shove against the hold he had on the doorknob and frame. I don't even have a second to pull a full breath into my body before it's knocked right out by the force of his large frame colliding against mine.
One large hand pushes into my hair to hold my head where he wants it, the other hits me right on the ass, flexing. His mouth crashes against mine in a bruising kiss. I can't get close enough to him. My hands push up and under the unbuttoned shirt. I drag my nails up his cotton-covered chest and around his neck. With little effort and one hand, he pulls me up his body until my legs are locked behind his hips.
He doesn't move from our spot in the mid
dle of my bedroom. He just continues to kiss me with so much power that I'm half convinced I might melt right here in his arms. It's the most intense, insane kiss I've ever experienced.
When he pulls back, long minutes after he took me in his arms, I'm drunk with pleasure and half a rub against the bulge pressing against my jean-covered center away from coming. His hooded eyes looking deep within mine while pressing his forehead against mine.
"Not until I have your heart, baby."
With that, he presses his lips back to mine briefly before helping me detach myself from his body. No words are spoken, but the expression on his face is full of carnal desire. There's no doubt in my mind that by walking away and denying himself what we both want that it's costing him greatly.
I want so badly to run after him and tell him my heart is his, just so he'll take me right here and now, but I know that I still have the tiniest bit of fear still inside me that he's going to leave again, regardless of what he tells me. I'm not sure what it's going to take to convince myself otherwise, but I know until that doubt is gone, I won't be able to give him all of me.
And it looks like that means I'll have to do without all of him, for the time being.
Lord have mercy.
An hour and a whole lot of heated glances and stolen kisses later, we're in his truck and headed out to the main road. He hasn't spoken much and I'm a little worried I've made him mad with my failed seduction attempt. I look over at him, his Stetson now back on his head, and wish I could see his eyes clearly. Judge what's on his mind.
We were close as kids. We grew apart, but we were still as close as teenagers can be when one is secretly in love with the other--or I guess, now that he's opened up to me, both are secretly in love with each other. His moods were never hard to gauge with one look into his eyes, but what was going on in his mind has always been a secret. I realize the only way I'm going to know for sure what he's thinking is to ask. It almost comforts me knowing that part of him hasn't changed, regardless of how annoying it still might be.
Don't be a baby, Leighton. Communicate. Tell him what's on your mind.
Easier said than done. I look back over at him, his forearm flexing as he steers the truck. The only way we're going to move forward is by doing it together and without constantly fearing the next unknown move. I know this, but damn if I can't get my mouth to move.
"I'm sorry," I tell him long minutes later, softly, but loud enough to be heard over the hum of his large tires against the asphalt. There. I did it.
He looks over, reaching off the steering wheel long enough to tip his hat up, giving me his eyes. "For what?"
"I shouldn't have pushed you."
He looks back at the road, not speaking.
"I just want you to know that, while I'm sorry I pushed you, I don't regret it or what I said. I want you to know that. I mean, I understand if you aren't ready."
I see his shoulders move as he gives a few silent chuckles.
"Well, you don't have to laugh at me. This is hard enough to get out as it is, cowboy."
"I'm not laughing at you, darlin'."
"Then what's so funny?" I snap, losing my patience and throwing my hands up in the air.
His shoulders continue to move. "It's funny that you think I'm not ready. I've already been inside you, darlin', and I was ready to get back in there the second you came around my dick. It has not one damn thing to do with me not being ready."
"You don't have to be crude."
"I'm not, Leigh. I'm being honest with you. It's not that I'm not ready, it's that we aren't ready. I want you to believe me when I tell you that I'm here for good, and until I can prove that to you, I'm not taking it there. I don't want to build what we're starting with a foundation of just sex, even if it's the best sex I've ever had."
"Such a charmer." I laugh. "I hear what you're saying, but how are you going to judge when we hit this invisible point of acceptance in our relationship?"
"No clue, Leigh. I reckon we'll both know when we get there. It might be a week, might be a month, hell--it could take less or more than both of those, but until I stop seein' you glance at me with worry that it might be the last time in your eyes, I'm goin' to keep tryin' to prove to you that I'm here for good."
20
LEIGHTON
"Poison & Wine" by the Civil Wars
"You know, we could have just walked."
Maverick laughs, his hand tightening around mine. He doesn't speak, but the silence is comfortable. I've had a smile on my face since he parked his truck and demanded I don't move until he comes to open my door. My smile might be a little manic, but I can't help it. This Maverick--the one I've had since I opened my door last night--is the one I thought I had lost forever. There is no longer a guard up, keeping him from everyone around him. The heaviness he's worn since his late teens isn't anywhere to be found.
He really is giving me all of him.
And all of him is beautiful.
"We could have, but where's the fun in that?"
I look over my shoulder at his truck, the one that was perfectly clean when we left my house, and my smile grows when I see the amount of mud stuck to it.
"It's been a long time since I went muddin'. Quinn and I used to go all the time, but then things at the shop picked up for her and the PieHole kept me busy . . . we just hadn't found time. I forgot how much I loved it."
"I have claw marks on my arm that tell me a different story, darlin'," he says with a laugh.
"Oh, hush. That ride just took me by surprise."
His deep, bellowed laughter rings out around us, and I feel like my heart might explode. When was the last time I saw this? His unabashed hilarity. I don't even care that I'm the butt of his laughter. I would gladly get back in the truck, take the trail, and scream all over again.
And boy, did I scream.
I completely get why he's laughing.
Saying I was taken by surprise is a big understatement. You would have thought I was about to come out of my skin the first big mud hole he hit. And true to his words, when I look at his forearm, there are bright red nail marks present.
"You done, cowboy?" I smile.
He holds up his other hand, his shoulders still shaking. I just lift a brow and wait for him to stop, my smile growing as the seconds tick by.
"Do you have any idea what you do to me?" he suddenly asks.
I shake my head.
He closes the distance between us. "Darlin', if that's the kind of reaction I get from a surprise ride through the mud, I can't wait to see what happens when we really get dirty."
My jaw drops. "Maverick, I'm going to need you not to say stuff like that when you've made it clear you're not going to do anything about it."
His free hand comes up and cups my jaw, his expression shifting. His eyes darken, as his smile turns mischievous. "Soon," he whispers with promise.
"Yeah, yeah."
"Promise me, when we get there, I'll get those claws back while you scream like that again. This time in my ears, though."
I groan, a little annoyed and a whole lot turned on. Shifting my feet, I try to ease some of the tension between my legs. "You have got to stop talking like that."
One side of his lips turns up and he winks. "That's not a promise I'm willin' to make."
I narrow my eyes. "Then do something about it."
"I'm workin' on it, darlin'. You keep puttin' these thoughts in my head, though, and I can't help but use them to build this up so it's the best damn ride you've ever had."
"God," I say with a gasp. "Stop."
"Come on," he chuckles. His eyes still hold the passion I had just seen blazing, but his tone is playful rather than seductive. When he turns from me, he has to pull my arm softly to get my feet working again, my mind still thinking about the possibility of other surprise rides we will take together.
I have no doubt the claws will come out and he'll get me screaming again.
It takes me a second, my mind still fuzzy, but when we
stop walking a few minutes later, I realize where we are. I know, if the trees weren't blocking my view, I would see my house just to the west of where we're standing. A few hundred acres in the other direction is the Davis ranch.
And in the middle of it all is an achingly familiar field that I know still blooms bright in the spring with the most beautiful patch of bluebonnets around. My father had planted them years and years ago, a gift for my mother when she mentioned how much she wished we had them closer to our family land.
With spring over, now the field waits with weeds and grass, for the next time it'll be painted in stunning color. If I close my eyes, I can see the beauty that will be back next year.
It's one of my favorite places in the world.
Or it was, long ago.
When I'm finally able to drag my eyes from the patch of land spread out before us, and look at Maverick, he's so still. His eyes roaming over my face, waiting with rapt attention to see my reaction to where he's brought us.
"Do you know why I brought you here?" he questions, his serious tone breaking me free from the trance my memories held over me.
I swallow thickly. "It's been a long time since I came out here, Mav."
He drops my hand, then lifts up and removes his hat. When he pushes his hand into his thick hair, I take the time to really look at him. By all accounts, he looks relaxed, but I know better. The dusting of stubble covering his jaw can't hide the way it's ticking as whatever's going on in his mind plays out. I don't need to see his eyes to know he's working through the words he wants to say. After a few silent seconds, he squares his shoulders and places his hat back on his head.
"Do you remember coming out here with me?" he asks softly.
I nod. "Of course I do."
"I think the last time we were here I had just turned fourteen, maybe fifteen. Quinn had come home around lunch after spendin' the weekend at your house. I remember because I had just taken a bite of my sandwich when I got the old man's hand against the back of my head. He knocked me so hard just for askin' if he would take us to the old drive-in movie place on Buckley that night that I saw damn stars go off in my head. I was used to bein' on the receivin' end of his anger, but I still haven't got a clue what set him off that day. Quinn had just walked in a few minutes before talkin' about how beautiful the fields over here looked now that the bluebonnets had started bloomin'."