“Cal, I’m there! Don’t stop,” she cried as she clung to him, lost in oblivion.
Never—he’d never stop.
Doubling his resolve, he called out, taking her higher as he met his release. He twisted one hand into her hair and wrapped the wet locks around his fist. He held her close, owning her every breath, her honeyed sighs, and her ragged cries of delirious gratification. He had always been one to give, but with Mabel, like a thief in the night, he took and took, pumping and grinding, unable to stop until he’d harnessed every ounce of pleasure from her body.
Breathless, they clung to each other, listening to the ripple of the creek and hum of insects suspended in the air. He stroked her cheek, and she sighed against his neck.
“What’s that?” she asked.
He turned and stared through the brush.
Shit!
“We need to go,” he answered, lowering his voice.
“Why?” she whispered.
He held her gaze in the darkness. “Because we might be trespassing.”
“Cal!” she exclaimed.
He covered her mouth with his hand. “It’s only sort of trespassing. I’m pretty sure we’re on the very edge of his property.”
“Whose property?” she hissed, batting away his hand.
He cringed. “The Stewart’s land.”
“Cranky Mr. Stewart!” she whisper-shouted.
“Is somebody out there?” a far-off voice—Mr. Stewart’s voice—called.
“We need to make a run for it,” he said.
“Cal! I don’t want cranky Mr. Stewart to see me naked! And what will people think if he finds us together?”
He moved toward the bank with Mabel in his arms. “That’s why we have to run.”
She pressed her hand to her mouth, but she was smiling from ear to ear. “This is insanity!”
It was. He was a grown man naked in a creek. Jesus! If Stewart caught them, the next town council would be damn awkward. But he couldn’t help meeting her goofy grin with one of his own.
He peered through the brush as a flashlight bobbed in the distance.
“If we go now, he won’t catch us. He’s too far away. We grab our clothes, then book it toward the truck,” he said, keeping an eye on the glow of the flashlight.
Mabel’s grin dissolved. “Does he have a gun? Is he going to shoot at us?”
There was a good chance that old Stewart did have a gun. You never know what you’ll run into in the country at night and most farmers carried one. But he didn’t want to freak Mabel out.
“Let’s start running and not find out,” he said, helping her onto the bank.
Like a pair of crazy kids, they sprinted away from the creek. He pulled on his jeans, wiggling to get them onto his dripping body as Mabel slipped on her shirt and jean shorts, then started running in circles.
“What are you doing?” he whispered, glancing over to see the beam of the flashlight moving closer.
“Cal, I can’t find my bra!”
He grabbed his shoes. “You’ll have to leave it.”
“Are you serious? I love that bra,” she hissed.
He checked for the light. Christ! Farmer Stewart could really move.
“We’ll come back for it!” he called, watching her bat through the tall grass.
Shit! They were so getting caught!
He was ready to throw her over his shoulder and drag her ass out of the field when she popped up.
“I found it!” she called, swinging it around like a lasso—or a target for Farmer Stewart’s shotgun.
He grabbed her hand. “Stay low.”
“This is private land! No trespassing! Who’s out there?” the farmer called.
Giggling like idiots, they ran to the truck. He fished his keys out of his pocket, started the old F-150, then gunned it. Bits of dirt and rock billowed behind them as they sped down the road, laughing their damn heads off. He drove for a few miles, then pulled over. On foot, there was no way Mr. Stewart could catch up to them.
“Why’d you stop?” she asked.
He tucked a lock of wet hair behind her ear then glanced at the M glinting in the moonlight against her skin. “I needed to look at you—to know that it’s real.”
“It’s real, Cal. It’s all real,” she said, lifting his hand and pressing a kiss to his knuckles.
“With you, I feel like the sky’s the limit. It’s like there’s nothing we can’t do,” he said, and the lightness of revealing that truth sent an amped-up electric charge through his body.
“I feel the same way,” she replied, and he couldn’t help but kiss her.
“Do you mean that, Mabel?” he breathed against her lips.
She held his gaze. “Cal, I’ve never been happier than I am right now.”
It was all he needed to hear. Her words had answered his prayers. She was his, and she was here, and she wasn’t going anywhere. He kissed her again. And while he treasured every kiss, this one was different. This kiss was a promise of a life that he’d never dreamed possible.
She pulled back and held his gaze. “We should do it, Cal.”
“Do what?” he asked.
“Go into the city. Help out with the food pantry, and work with Preston and Logan. Your first impulse is to say no. But hear me out. This could be something big for the town.”
He didn’t say anything.
“We’ll do it together. You and me,” she whispered.
“Okay,” he answered, his voice barely a whisper. He couldn’t say no to her.
“Yes? You’ll do it?” she affirmed with such hope and excitement infused into the words, it almost made him smile.
Almost.
While he wanted to be overjoyed that she’d put her heart and soul into making Eat Elverna a success, she didn’t know what he kept hidden in the darkest places of his heart. The pain. The tears. The utter helplessness. But maybe with her, he could let it go and allow the ghosts of the past to stay there, far away from the life he and Mabel would build in Elverna.
“Yes, let’s do it,” he answered.
“We’ll do it for the town,” she said, then kissed his cheek.
He nodded. “For the town,” he echoed, working to keep his voice from shaking.
He could only pray that this venture with the city chefs wouldn’t reveal the worst parts of him.
Chapter 6
Mabel
“It wouldn’t kill you to smile, Cal. We’re only driving up to Chicago. We’ll be back tonight, and you’ll have plenty of time to analyze your farming stats and stare at your whiteboard. Maybe you’ll finally tell me what that pink number means.”
1493.
That’s what it was when she checked it today. Here’s what she knew. Every day it increased by one, and despite her cajoling and pestering, he wouldn’t divulge its meaning.
He liked to pretend that he wasn’t a superstitious farmer, but this number sure seemed important. She just couldn’t figure out the reason.
She glanced at her broody farmer, but her attempt—well, more like her many attempts over the last one hundred and twenty minutes to lift his mood had crashed and burned. They’d been on the road for two hours, and he’d barely spoken two words. He was wary of city life. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out. But over the last two and a half weeks, she’d barely seen him without a smile on his face—and for a good reason. There was so much to celebrate in Elverna.