Page 16 of Making a Mountain Man

I settled my fingers over the keys and started writing everything that came to mind.

Every community has its moral code. Doing something wrong within a community can and should be called out, reprimanded and/or penalized depending on the nature of the incident. What if that community is the entire world via the internet? Worse, what if the people within that internet community feel safe behind a wall of anonymity and are willing to call out, threaten and ruin the life of a person for something that would normally barely be a blip on the radar?

Franny set a cup of tea next to me on the table and I kept writing, rewriting and scribbling on a notepad. An hour later I had a half-assed draft of something I thought I could work with. I’d need to do some research to add real numbers and stats into the story. I’d also have to see if Wesley would be willing to provide a quote for the piece. Not because I wanted this article to shine for the sake of my career, but because I wanted him to finally have a say.

I became aware of faces peering over my shoulder and I gave Agnes, Bill, Henry and Franny each a chance to read what I’d written. I got four nods of approval before they headed towards the driveway. I guessed that meant they trusted me to do what needed to be done.

I hadn’t seen Wesley since I’d been typing. I stretched myback and started looking for him. It didn’t take long. He was standing in front of his bedroom closet, the bed was covered in boxes, hangers, hats and clothes.

“Wesley,” I started, but I didn’t know how to finish the sentence. He had resigned himself to having to move before the article was even out.

He turned to face me, shoulders slumped in a way I wasn’t used to seeing. I had no idea where we stood, but it didn’t stop me from moving across the room and putting my arms around him. He hugged me back without hesitation and I sank into the heat of him. I could get used to this way too easily, but the man was literally packing. His first round with the media had broken him. If I wanted him, I’d have to help put him back together.

“I want to show you what I wrote, but first I want us to forget about this whole thing. At least for a little while.” With his arms still around me I shoved the boxes off the bed, irrationally angry that they were there in the first place. They hit the floor, one after the other, scattering on impact. Only when the bed was a place for sleep and sex and not packing, did I sit on the edge and pull him towards me.

Neither one of us spoke as I scooted up the bed and rested my head on his pillow. He crawled his body over mine. He was wearing another faded pair of jeans and a white t-shirt. The material was soft under my hands where I slid them up his back and pulled his mouth to mine.

Chapter 14

Wesley

As she had since we were kids, Jill pulled me out of my head and into the moment. Her technique was different now, but the result was the same. I sank my weight onto her, feeling each muscle relax as she worked her lips over mine. Chaos was about to descend on my life.

Again.

But with Jill under me, her hands caressing my back and my cock lengthening against her thigh, we had all the time in the world.

Was I eager to get her naked?

Always.

But now wasn’t the time for frantic groping and pistoning hips. Right now it was a fantasy of what could have been.

“I need to feel you,” she murmured, pulling at the collar of my shirt until I rose to my knees and tugged it over my head. Her hands roamed reverently over my bare chest, tangling in thehair of my happy trail before coming to the button on my jeans and popping it open. Before her hands could wander too far, I pushed up the hem of her shirt and kissed my way from one hip bone to the other. Her skin was soft against my stubble and the way she sucked in a breath under my touch had my cock getting impossibly harder.

I took my time removing her clothes piece by piece, my mouth roaming over every new inch of exposed skin. Her taste was sweet. She was soft and pliant and smelled feminine in a way I couldn’t identify. Flowers, vanilla.. hell, I had no idea. All I knew was that it smelled like Jill and Jill was starting to smell a hell of a lot like home.

Once she was fully naked, she tugged on my elbow until I was on my back and it was my turn to be the canvas for her to paint with unspoken promises. Her mouth and hands worked me over, slow and methodical. Licking at my nipple, gripping my biceps and finally straddling my waist.

She let one hand rest against my chest as she leaned over to grab a condom from my nightstand. I took the opportunity to study her, to look up at the woman who had gotten me through so many hard times as a kid. The woman who was now trying to get me out of another one.

She’d lied to me, or not told me the truth. There was no way around that. The sting of betrayal had been potent when I’d first learned that she was a journalist. A part of the very group of people who had taken my life, turned it upside down and shaken it like a snow globe. The fact that she had tried to kill the story had me willing to forgive. The fact that she was actively trying to counter the damage any other story could do, had my heart wanting to believe things that would never be.

I took the condom from her hands and rolled it over mylength. Slow, sexy foreplay was all well and good but a man could only take so much. Right now there was a gorgeous naked woman on top of me, looking down at me like I was something special. She pushed up onto her knees and wrapped her delicate hand around the base of my cock before positioning it at her entrance. She held my gaze as she lowered herself onto me and her eyes fluttered shut.

“Hell, you feel so good Jill.” I said, pressing my head into the pillow as she started to circle her hips. Again, it was slow. The kind of sex that could feel like a promise of more to come or a reluctant goodbye. I suspected that it was something different for each of us.

She rose up and slid down my length causing sparks to burn through my veins and settle into a persistent heat at the base of my spine. “I won’t last long with you doing that,” I almost added the wordbabeto the end of the sentence but cut it off.

She sighed as her breasts came to pillow against my chest and I started to move us together. My hips coming to meet hers. My thighs burned as I continued to move but it was a welcome distraction from the way my balls were drawing up against my body, ready to empty inside her before she was done.

I slid a hand between us, seeking out that little bundle of nerves between her thighs that I hoped would get her to the finish line before I crossed it alone.

“Yes, I’m so close,” she whispered against my neck. I fought to keep my strokes steady rather than start thrusting in and out like a man possessed. The last thing I wanted to do was mess up the rhythm and have her not finish. Her body started to shake a moment before her inner muscles clamped down around my length and I was done. My orgasm rolled over me in waves that crested hard every time I thrust up into her wetheat. I continued to move inside her until we had both stilled and were breathing hard.

“I needed that,” Jill said, laying beside me on the bed and kissing my shoulder.

I shuffled down to lay beside her and linked my hand with hers. It would be so easy to picture this being my everyday life. To go to sleep in this bed every night with this woman by my side and wake up to her face. I turned to study her, a face that I had grown up with that had only gotten more beautiful in the decades we’d been apart. Fuck, I was getting all sentimental. That would only make it harder when I had to go. I pushed a lock of her hair off her face and she opened her eyes to meet mine. They were even more impossibly blue up close. It had always felt like they saw more of me than I intended to show.

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