After We Fall(38)

 

In the driveway, Jack opened the passenger door of his pickup for me and I climbed in. He got in the driver’s side just as I was pulling the bottom of my dress down as far as I could. I thought about asking Jack if he had a handkerchief, but he didn’t look like the type.

 

“What are you doing?” He gave me a funny look.

 

“Trying not to get the seat sticky,” I said, feeling heat in my cheeks. So much about sex was embarrassing.

 

He chuckled and started the truck. “Don’t worry about it. Really. Tell me where you’re staying?”

 

I gave him directions, and we were silent again on the two-minute ride. Thank God, I thought. Because the more he talked to me in that sweet, serious voice or smiled or laughed or showed me there was a gentleman inside that rough exterior, the more I liked him.

 

I didn’t want to like him.

 

When he pulled up next to the cottage, I opened the door. “Thanks for the ride.”

 

“Margot, wait.” He put a hand on my leg. “Don’t go yet.”

 

It’s better if you don’t touch me, Jack.

 

“Yes?”

 

“It’s not personal, my objection to your ideas for the farm. I can tell you’re good at what you do.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

He took his hand off my leg and rubbed his jaw. “I just don’t want things to change.”

 

“Even if the changes make sense? If they’ll bring in more money eventually? If they’ll make people happy?”

 

He didn’t answer, but I saw the stubborn set of his jaw return.

 

Sighing, I pushed the door all the way open and got out. “Goodnight, Jack. Thanks for the ride.” I shut the door and walked to the door, and he waited until I was safely inside before pulling away.

 

Another display of courtesy.

 

Damn him.

 

 

 

Later, I lay in bed, listening to the waves through the screens and struggling to process tonight’s surprises. The way Jack had apologized. The way he’d agreed he’d been mean and unfair. The unexpected—and vehement—insistence that he drive me home. The shock of that first kiss, when he’d grabbed me by both arms, his frustration giving way to passion all at once.

 

You’re going to take it.

 

My stomach hollowed as I recalled the way he’d driven deep inside me, so deep it had hurt. Never in my life had I experienced anything like the way that sharp twinge had started to feel good. How could pain accompany pleasure like that? How had two opposite sensations merged inside my body, so seamlessly that I couldn’t tell where the pain stopped and where the pleasure began? Which was which?

 

And I’d screamed and panted and gasped and clawed at him like an animal. He’d drawn something out of me, a part of myself I didn’t even know was there, a part that existed only to want so ferociously, I could think of nothing else—not our crude surroundings, our nonexistent relationship status, not even our privacy. I never once worried about how loud I was or felt ashamed of my desire or stopped to fret that well-bred ladies should not appear to enjoy sex so unabashedly. (Bet I was the first Thurber woman to fuck a farmer in a forest.)

 

I’d loved every minute of it. Even his O face.

 

Was sex with Jack always like that? I wondered if the mad desperation of it was due to the fact that it had been so long for both of us or if he was always so rough and aggressive.

 

You’ll never know. Understand?

 

Out of nowhere, Old Margot made an unwelcome appearance.

 

You both agreed it was a one-time thing. Leave it alone.

 

I frowned, waiting for New Margot to speak up and defend my right to another mind-blowing orgasm, but that scone cold bitch said nothing.

 

See? Even she agrees. There is no universe in which you and Jack Valentini make any sense whatsoever. Fine, he’s not the jerk you thought he was this afternoon, but the reasons you need to forget about him still exist, not to mention that he’s made no secret of the fact he’ll be glad to be rid of you when you’re gone. Finish up your work here and get back where you belong.

 

Sighing, I rolled over onto my stomach and closed my eyes. Old Margot was right. In ten days, I’d be back in my world, and this would just be that craziest-thing-I’ve-ever-done story I looked back on and laughed about.

 

Or cried about. One of the two.

 

 

 

 

 

Seventeen

 

 

 

 

 

Jack

 

 

 

I lay in bed that night, waiting for the guilt to assault me. For my conscience to prick me. For my ghosts to haunt me. For regret, for tears, for a bitter taste in my mouth. All the familiar things that usually accompanied a sleepless night.