Natural Attraction (29 page)

It was at this point that I heard a shout from the front gates
that the leaders of the eighty kilometer ride were about to come in.  They were coming at speed, racing for line honors.

I watched ‘em round the last corner, two men on big chestnut geldings, gallop
ing hell-for-leather towards the timekeepers.  Neither of ‘em taking any notice of their surroundings, they were both focussed on the prize of first place.

I have often wondered how two men could be so competitive when all they were going to win was a
woolen rug, a plastic trophy and a couple of gift vouchers for stock feed.” 

He pauses again as I see anger shoot across his face before he takes another breath and continues.

“Jess never saw it coming.  She was still leaning over the side of her horse waiting for her docket as they tore towards the timekeepers tent where the finish line had been officially marked.  I saw Jess’s horse spot the geldings flying towards him and he panicked, spinning around desperate to save himself from what he thought was an attack.

Being a good rider, Jess hung on tight and I almost thought her gelding was going to make it out of their way in time but they were moving so fast.  One of the geldings swerved, but the other did not. 
He and his rider t-boned Jess’s horse at forty kilometers an hour.  I remember watching her gelding go down with the chestnut slamming into his side and then jumping over the top of them. 

Her gelding rolled over with her underneath and then managed to right itself. 

Somewhere amid all this mangle of horses and hooves, Jess received a helmet shattering blow to her head that put her in a coma.  She died three weeks later when I was forced to make the decision to turn off her life support.  That was the hardest decision I have ever had to, and ever will, make in my life.”

I am dumbstruck. 

I watch as he battles to contain his emotions and he grinds his teeth together savagely.  His eyes are blank as he looks through me and relives the horror of what happened to his wife. 

I imagine the horror of having to watch her linger for another three weeks before making the heart wrenching decision to let her die.  My heart splits as I feel the pain he is carrying knife through my own heart.

Not knowing what to do next I lean forward again, this time not to kiss him, this time just to wrap my arms around him and squeeze like I have never squeezed another human being before.   I slam my ear up against his heart and listen to the wild thumping as he clamps his arms around me and hugs me back.

“I am so sorry.” I whisper to his chest, not even sure if he can hear me over his own deep breathing as he fights to control his emotions.

We stay sitting, wrapped tightly, hugging for what seems like hours.  The toll of telling me his story has worn Jax out and he falls asleep.  His chin gently rests on the back of my head.  It is only when my body can finally no longer uphold its position, my aching joints screaming at me to move that I gently try to unwrap myself from Jax’s arms. 

He mumbles and wakes, clamping down harder on my body.

“Don’t leave me.”

“I’m not, we need to go to bed,
I can’t sit on your lap all night.” I respond softly.

“True that,” he mutters as he lets me go so I can lift myself off his lap. 

I am about to walk towards the spare room to get my night wear when he leans forward and grabs my hand to stop me.

“There’s one more thing I need to tell you.”

He looks brokenly up at me.

I stop and turn, focusing my attention on him once again.  Wondering what else could be important enough that he wants to get it out now.  What could be important enough that it cannot wait?

“She had life insurance.  Lots of it.  With the big payout, I bought a half share in dads company, Walker Civil.  I also bought this place.  I then made several property investments, plus bought some shares.  With several steady incomes, I will never have to work again.  I will never have to worry about money for as long as I, or probably even my children, live. 

Teagan’s parents have never forgiven me for turn
ing off that machine.   They think I did it for the money.  I can understand why they might think that.  Sadly, if they truly understood me, they would know they are wrong.  They would know there is
no way
I would ever have turned it off if I had thought there was even the remotest chance she might wake up.  The doctors were sure she was gone.  Teagan believes me, as does the rest of my family.  There will however, always be bad blood with Teagan’s parents over this.  They feel like I got rich off their daughter’s death.”

I feel myself blinking as what he is saying sinks in to my now confused mind.

They blame him?

“I believe you.  I
know
there is no way you would intentionally harm another living thing.” I whisper this as I look at his beautiful face and I watch the lines of stress slowly soften around his eyes. 

I can see he has been terrified I won’t believe him.

Of course I believe him.
 

This is the most tender, thoughtful guy I have ever met.  Animals flock to him and so far he has been nothing but honest with me.  I believe that animals sense the good in a person.  I have more than enough proof that Jax is not a liar and he never would be. 

I now understand why he is so hell-bent on keeping me safe.

Making a mental decision that I want to show him just how much I believe him, I reach out and take his hand gently in mine.  “Let’s go to bed Jax.”

I see Jax hesitate as he looks up at me.  Searching my face for a moment he realizes what I am saying and I see his pupils dilate and darken with lust. 

I hit him with a cheeky grin as for the first time since we’ve met,
I drag him
somewhere. 

I drag him to his bedroom.

Slow burn

We barely make it to Jax’s bed when I feel him tear his hand away from mine.  I feel both his hands clamp down on my waist from behind.  Strong, powerful hands easily spin me to face him as he pushes me backwards onto his bed.

“Wait here.” He growls from deep within the back of his throat before he spins and heads towards his bathroom. 

Feeling his absence from the room, my mind wanders.  This is a natural reaction as I deal with situations like this. 
Situations where I am alone, excited and nervous waiting for something big to happen.

With my mind in overdrive, rolling through all the normal performance and personal image concerns that come with
presex jitters, I start to worry.  Then I stop worrying as flashes of what I think Jax is going to look, feel and taste like naked override them.  Busy in my own head, it takes me a while to realize that Jax has been gone a notable amount of time.

Re-focusing my sex addled brain onto the most pressing issue, Jax’s
absence, I realize that I may in fact be worrying about nothing.  I realize that after some initial noises that sounded like cupboard drawers opening and shutting, it is now dead quiet in his bathroom and perhaps that is something
else
I should be worrying about.

It also occurs to me that perhaps he doesn’t want this and I have picked exactly the wrong time to push him into it.  Realizing the poor guy has just bled his heart out at me, I decide it is likely he just wants to spend some time alone while he recoups his thoughts.

I am such a fucking moron.

Horrified as I realize what I have done, I feel the blood drain from my face.  Then it slowly and painfully creeps its way back, burning every nerve cell in my face as embarrassment overcomes me. 

He’s probably in there trying to work out a way to come and explain he doesn’t want to do this.

Not too sure what to do, I sit up and look around his room considering whether I should follow him to his bathroom.  I wonder if I need to talk my misunderstanding through, or whether I should just leave him alone.  I also consider heading back to the spare room where we can both simply avoid the embarrassment.

Aware that I have made a horrible mistake, I start chewing on my lip and wringing my hands together on my lap as seconds slowly roll into minutes.  Trying to justify his silence in other ways, I start to wonder if perhaps I
am
just overreacting.  Unfortunately the niggling concern that I have caused his retreat to the bathroom stays deeply rooted in my mind and continues to sway my confidence.

I try to hold my breath to see if I can hear any more noise coming from the bathroom.

Perhaps he is going to the toilet?

I am met with silence as my nerves wind tighter and I feel my heart rate fluttering. 

Crap.

My body jolts as I suddenly hear what sounds like the lid of his bathroom rubbish bin slamming down.  I then hear Jax making his way back to the bedroom.  Realizing I have missed my opportunity to make a dash for the spare bedroom I panic.  I then realize I am stuck where I am so I take a huge breath, ready to make a heartfelt apology to him and try to salvage the situation as best I can. 

Staring at the doorframe I watch Jax’s huge frame appear.  To my surprise, his face is wearing an enormous shit eating grin.  Holding something in his hand, he looks across at me and instantly wipes the grin off his face.  He launches towards me yelling, “Fuck.  Ash.  What’s wrong?”

Almost
paralyzed by this unexpected turn of events I stare stupidly at him as he squats down in front of me.  He carefully studies my face, worried creases of concern etched above his eyes.

“Um...  What were you doing in there?” I ask sheepishly realizing somewhere along the way my imagination may have ran a little wild.

“Looking for condoms babe.  I usually just buy a couple from dispensers at pubs as I need them so it turned out to be quite the hunt.  Then I had to read the backs of the ones I did find lurking in the back of my drawers to check their expiry dates.  Sorry I took so long but lucky us, the mission was a success!”  He holds up two small packets for my examination.  “I had to throw a few out.  They were way out-of-date.  Tomorrow we are going to the supermarket to buy a new box.”

I let go of the big breath I am holding and almost feel like crying with relief.

“What did you
think
I was doing in there?”  The concerned look is back on his face.

“Trying to avoid me
,” I squeak.

“Why the fuck would I
be doing that?  I’ve been wanting to have at you since the first moment I laid eyes on you.  The only thing that was holding me back was me not wanting you to think I was chasing you
just
for your panties.  I wanted us to get to know each other and I wanted a chance to show you how serious I was about you.  The only thing I could possibly regret about all this is you having to witness that crap in the lounge-room.  I knew that shit was unavoidable, knew it was gunna hurt dragging it all back up again and that was why I was avoiding it.  That said, I’m fucking relieved to have that heavy shit over with.  It’s in the past and I recently decided it was time to step up and get on with living again.

You need to get this straight in your head.  A man doesn’t bring a woman into his home, doesn’t take her to meet his family and doesn’t build her dogs a fuck
ing theme park sized dog pen without expecting at least a little sugar don’t you think?”

I see Jax smirking at me as he starts wiggling the condoms in my face.

“Um… Sure…  Let’s
have at it
then.” I grin as I eye the condoms off before making a move to snatch at them.

“Ah – ah!
  Mine!” He growls as he springs upwards still clinging to the condoms, pushing me backwards onto the bed again.

As I feel my back slam against the bed, all thoughts leave my mind and my whole body fires to attention.  Every nerve and cell is ready to take whatever it is that Jax is about to dish out. 

I watch his eyes darken to the color of midnight as he slowly lowers himself to hover over me, hands either side of my head.  His chest lightly grazes against mine and his pelvis gently seeks to mesh itself across the front of mine.  My heart starts to race and I feel my body battling to supply enough oxygen to meet the needs of the fast flowing blood zooming to the surface of my skin.  All of my nerve endings spark to life setting my entire body on fire.

I feel moisture flood my panties and my mouth at the same time.  It’s as if both my mouth and my pussy have decided Jax is delicious, they are drooling, and they both want to eat him alive.

His mouth slams against mine. 

Hard.
  Soft.  Hot. 

His kiss blisters my lips and I open them wide to allow his tongue full access to plunder deeply.  The rich and sweet taste of Jax floods my mouth and I can't help let a soft moan echo through our mouths as my body takes over.  I lift my hips off the bed to push firmly against his.

I reach out to dig my fingers deeply into his hair at the back of his head.  His hair feels thick and soft and I dig my fingers through it to push him harder against my mouth.  I need him deeper, I want him as far inside me as I can get him.  I want to swallow him whole.