Heart of the Hunter (59 page)

He was no worse than I was. I’d masturbated while spying on him through my bedroom window. I wasn’t about to tell him that. I would literally die if he ever found that out. I had to play it cool. I’d pretend to be a little shocked, even though I was secretly thrilled at the thought of him hiding up here, jerking off, fantasizing about me.

I tried to picture his cock, what it would have looked like while he stroked it to orgasm using pictures of me. Then I shook my head and forced my mind back to the present.

“Are you upset?” he said.

“I don’t know, Grant.”

“You shouldn’t be. It was a long time ago, and it was really innocent. I swear I tried to resist. I just couldn’t help it. I was young, my hormones were raging. You know how it is.”

“I’m not upset, Grant. I understand. It’s just, it’s surprising is all. I was used to thinking of you in a certain way, and now I find out that you’ve got my prom photo in your porn stash.”

“It’s not like that, Lacey.”

“I know,” I said, softening my tone, “but Grant, what am I supposed to feel? We’ve known each other our whole lives.”

“Feel whatever you want to feel.”

I laughed. “You obviously don’t know women very well, giving advice like that.”

He smiled.

“We should get back to the party,” I said. “They’ll be looking for us.”

A jazz quartet had started playing, and we could hear the romantic music through the slatted walls of the barn. I felt awkward and I wanted to escape the uncomfortable situation.

I’ll admit I was thrilled to find out Grant had had a crush on me, even if it was years ago. It made me feel a little less guilty about all the fantasizing I’d done about him, but it was still definitely very uncomfortable. It was as if I’d invaded his privacy, even though he was the one with my photos. This was his private place. He was allowed to think what he wanted in the privacy of his own mind, wasn’t he? I shouldn’t have looked in the envelope. It was his, not mine, even if the photos in it were of me.

I stood up.

“Don’t leave,” he said. “Not yet.”

“Grant,” I said. “I’m not upset. It was harmless, a few photos. It’s understandable, I suppose, given the circumstances of our life back then.”

I felt awful for being so hypocritical. I mean, I’d basically done the same thing he’d done. I’d taught myself how to masturbate, inspired entirely by him. But there was no way in hell I was going to admit that to him.

“We should get back to the wedding,” I said. “They’ll notice we’re not there.”

“They’ll survive without us,” he said. “Please don’t leave yet, Lacey.”

I looked at him. I knew him better than anyone else in the world. Apart from my father, I’d spent more of my life with Grant than with anyone. But as I stood there next to him, I realized just how rarely it was that he ever asked me for anything.

“All right,” I said. “I’ll stay a little longer.”

“Thank you,” he said.

He looked thoughtful, like he was remembering something.

“I know this is awkward,” he said, “but you have to admit, I had pretty good taste in girls.”

I laughed, more out of relief that he’d lightened the mood, than at the humor. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I could have had pictures of anyone up here. I could have had Playboy, or pinups of nude girls, or even straight up porn.”

“But you chose me?”

“Damn right, I did.”

I smiled. “Well, we did spend a lot of time together back then.”

“I wish we could have spent more time together.”

“Yeah,” I laughed, “and ten dollars says I can guess what you’d have liked to be doing.”

He laughed.

The awkwardness had left. It gave me the confidence to ask a serious question. I cleared my throat. “I always thought you’d have gone for one of the popular girls. The hot crowd.”

“You
were
the hot girl, Lacey.”

“No I wasn’t. What about the cheerleaders? That whole group?”

“You’ve always been out of their league,” he said.

“Come on.”

He looked genuinely shocked. “Are you kidding me, Lacey? Those girls couldn’t hold a candle to you. Every guy in the valley knows that. They still can’t hold a candle to you.”

“You’re just being nice because you feel bad.”

“Screw that,” he said. “You were the most beautiful girl in the valley, and you’re even more beautiful now than you were then.”

I looked at him but looked away quickly. It was like all my best dreams, and all my worst nightmares, were coming true at once.

I knew what I had to do. I knew I had to climb down that ladder and pretend nothing had happened, that I’d never seen the photos. I could take it as the complement it was, but it could never go any further than that. The next time I found myself awake in my bed, alone, fantasizing about Grant, I could picture him pleasuring himself over my prom photo, but that was it. I had to climb down that ladder and never look back. Some fruits are forbidden for a reason.

“You look very beautiful in that dress,” he said.

I looked down at myself. I was exactly the same fit as my mother, and I must have looked just as she had on her wedding day. It brought tears to my eyes to think of it.

“It’s my mother’s,” I said.

He nodded. “I know, Lacey.”

Chapter 6

Grant

I
COULDN’T LET HER LEAVE.
I don’t know what had come over me, I don’t know what I was thinking, but one thing was certain, I had to keep her up there with me. If I let her slip through my fingers now, I’d never have another chance like it.

I’d forgotten about the photos, but now that she’d found them, I figured it must have been fate. God wanted her to find those pictures. That’s what I told myself.

I looked at her. She was stunning. My cock throbbed with desire. I wanted to rip her dress off and slam her down against the hay. I wanted to make her beg me for mercy. Fuck. Do you have any idea what it’s like to be secretly in love with a girl for pretty much you’re entire life, and all the while, you’re certain that you’ll never be able to be with her?

It’s torture.

I wanted to touch her. I wanted to caress her hair. I wanted to taste her sweet, honey lips. Just once.

I knew it was wrong. I knew it was a betrayal of the trust her father had placed in me, but I didn’t care. At that moment, I lost all control of my thoughts. I wanted her like a starving wolf wants a lamb. No amount of reasoning could turn me away from what I wanted.

“There’s a clasp at your neck,” I said.

She looked at me, startled. Her hand went to the back of her neck, where a mother-of-pearl clasp held the straps of her dress secure.

“Yes, there is,” she said, nervously.

“Open it,” I said.

Her eyes widened. She was shocked. But I couldn’t help it. The heart wants what the heart wants. People often suppose that men are simple creatures, with simple appetites, but I’m here to tell you that nothing is further from the truth. In some ways we’re simple, sure, but our hearts are every bit as complicated as women’s. Our emotions are every bit as deep.

I’d lusted for Lacey for years, I’d crushed on her intensely for vast swathes of my life. But this was more than lust. This was beyond mere desire. This was a yearning in my soul that I couldn’t control. My voice was speaking not just for the present, but for all the countless nights in the past I’d spent craving the warmth of her body.

I’d spent my life waiting for her. No relationship I’d ever been in had lasted more than a couple of weeks. I was Lacey’s, heart and soul, and something inside me wanted to make her mine.

“Grant,” she whispered. Her mouth formed the word but her voice made no sound.

It was our only chance. Never again would I have her in a situation like this. The music wafted in from the warm night outside. The flame from the lamp made the shadows look as if they were dancing to the intoxicating jazz. Faith and Jackson’s wedding had created a romantic magic that filled the night air completely.

“Just this once,” I whispered.

“What?”

“I’ve known you seventeen years, Lacey. Seventeen years I’ve stopped myself from making a move. Seventeen years I’ve treated you like family.”

“I know,” she said, her voice trembling.

“So don’t you think I’ve earned one night?”

“What are you talking about?”

“One night of pleasure, Lacey. One night of passionate love. Tomorrow, we’ll pretend like it never happened.”

“We won’t be able to pretend,” she said.

“We will,” I said, desperate to persuade her. I wasn’t sure if I was right, I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be able to get the taste of her lips out of my mind once I kissed them, but at that moment I’d have promised her anything. “I swear to you, nothing will change, Lacey. We’ll go on as before. And this one night of lust will be our little secret.”

“I don’t think I can,” she whispered, her eyes filled with tears.

I didn’t know if she meant she couldn’t make love to me, or she wouldn’t be able to forget we’d done it afterwards, but my cock was pulsing with desire. I could smell her perfume and the shampoo in her hair. I could see the glistening light on the wetness of her lip. There was no way I could resist. I had to have her.

“Give me one night, Lacey, and I swear I’ll never ask you for another thing in the world.”

Her head was shaking, she wanted to say no, but she was hesitating. She was on the cusp.

“I don’t know, Grant. You and the brothers and Faith are the only family I have.”

“One night, Lacey, and afterwards, I’ll never mention it again. I promise you that.”

A single tear fell from her eye, flowed down over her cheek, and landed on her lap. It made a mark where it landed on the blue silk of her dress.

“I don’t think so, Grant.”

I put my finger over her lips. “Shh. Don’t say anything. If you climb down the ladder, I won’t stop you, and I won’t ever mention this again.”

She shut her eyes. She made to get up but then stopped. She stayed put.

I’d meant it. If she got up to leave, I’d have let her go. I wouldn’t say a word. But she stayed. She stayed, her eyes closed, her face so beautiful I thought I’d died and woken up in heaven with an angel.

She was mine. After so many years of lusting for her, she was finally mine. I felt like a predator that had finally trapped its prey.

I put my lips to her ear. “You’re still here,” I whispered.

She was trembling. I had the impression she was terrified of what was about to happen. I didn’t blame her. It was surreal, after years of thinking it was impossible, to finally give in to our desire.

She stayed absolutely still, her eyes shut, her heart pounding in her chest.

“I’m going to fuck you so hard you’ll beg me for mercy,” I whispered.

She gasped, her breath caught in her throat, but she remained absolutely motionless. My cock throbbed with longing. It was like a drug. Talking dirty to her, after everything we’d been through together, was so intoxicating. After learning to treat each other one way, after being utterly polite and familiar, there was something mind-blowingly erotic about talking dirty to her.

I put my hand to her cheek and brushed it gently. I wanted to shock her. I wanted to terrify her. I wanted to excite her so intensely with my words that she’d almost be orgasming before I even laid a finger on her.

“I’m going to slide my thick, massive, member into your sweet, soft pussy, Lacey.”

She gasped again, as if she was holding in tears. My cock throbbed, so aroused that I was afraid I might come before I got it inside her.

“I’m going to fill you up with so much come it will be dripping out of you for a week,” I said.

This time, she voiced a whimper.

It was all a game, but it was more of a thrill than anything I’d ever imagined. I could have stayed there all night with her, just whispering those sweet obscenities. Whispering those things to her was a magical, sexual release. They were the things I’d wanted to say to her since the day I’d set eyes on her, when she was seventeen and still in high school, and I was twenty-one and barely a man.

“I know you’ve imagined my cock, Lacey,” I whispered. “I know you’ve thought about what it looks like. What it feels like. You must have.”

She was so still, the air was so still, it was as if a ghost had entered the barn. She shivered from the sudden chill that seemed to have descended on us. It was weird. It was a warm night, but in the blue light of the moon, whispering those forbidden secrets I’d bottled up half my life, it felt cold.

I looked at her skin. It was so soft, so white, that I thought I could see her blood flowing beneath it. I saw the tiny, rhythmical tremor of her heartbeat in her neck. I moved my face to her skin, the coarseness of my stubble brushing softly against her cheek, and I inhaled deeply.

Her sweet scent flooded my nostrils. It was almost enough to make me cry.

I touched her, my rough hands looking rougher against the perfection of her skin. First I touched her cheek, then my finger slid down her neck until it reached the top of her dress. I could see the gentle slopes of her breasts and allowed my finger to trail through the valley of her cleavage and up the other side.

Lacey shuddered.

“I’ve wanted to see these breasts for seventeen years,” I whispered. “I’ve wanted to devour them the way a wolf devours its prey. I’ve wanted the delicious cherries of your nipples to ripen under my wet tongue.”

She whimpered again as I reached around her neck and opened the clasp, allowing the dress to fall down and reveal her naked breasts to my eyes.

It was my turn to gasp. They were more delicious, more succulent and seductive, than I’d even dared imagine.

“Oh my God, Lacey,” I sighed, before falling forward and taking a nipple into my hungry mouth. I sucked on the tender bud gently at first, but then increasingly ravenously. I was so hungry for her it must have frightened her, because she let out another quiet whimper.

I sucked the first nipple, and then the next, allowing my tongue to run over every inch of her breasts. I pulled her dress down to give me access to the entirety of her chest. Then, I leaned her back on the hay bail, and climbed over her.