Second Chance at the Riverview Inn (Riverview Inn)

They were less than three weeks away at this point, and the truth was that her days were really full. With so much growth, she was trying to anticipate problems she couldn’t even imagine. “They’re good.”

“How about your dirty auction?”

“My bachelors? They’re excited. Everyone is. One of the fire fighters is donating driving lessons for teenagers. Billy is donating free oil changes for a year.”

“Billy?” he said, his voice sharp and she didn’t want to read too much into it, but the guy was radiating some jealous vibes.

“One of the bachelors.”

“You’re not thinking of getting your oil changed, are you?” he asked. Poor Billy, she thought, everything he volunteered just sounded dirty.

“I just got mine changed,” she said, surprised by her own audacity.

“That’s right, you did,” he said.

She laughed and shifted in the bed, pulling the blankets up around her hips.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“Bed!” she said. “It’s midnight.”

“You’re in your bed right now.” His voice dropped and she felt goose bumps ripple over her skin. That blanket was now too hot. “I think I just figured out a way you can thank me.”

“Is this the part where you ask me what I’m wearing?”

“What are you wearing?”

She glanced down at her pink tank top and her sleep shorts covered in bright red lips.

Not very sexy.

“Not much,” she said and he laughed, groaning in his throat. “Where are you?”

“In the hallway outside the rehearsal space.”

“Oh,” she said, the goose bumps vanishing. That wasn’t very sexy.

“But…” She heard his boots against concrete as he walked. Then there was a door opening and then clicking shut. “Guess where I am now?”

“I have no idea.”

“Our closet.”

Our closet. Oh God, she really liked this guy. “That might have been one of the most embarrassing moments of my life,” she said, trying to push her feeling down into something manageable, but they were like the dogs when called, wild and full of animal love.

“Listen, Helen. I will dig into that with you tomorrow, but right now we’ve got about ten minutes before I have to get back on stage and I’m thinking about something else.”

“What are you thinking about?” she whispered.

“Listening to you come.”

And just like that, the picnic was gone and so was his concert rehearsal. The farm. The distance. It was just him and her and this desire that came up out of nowhere. Her body was ready.

She rolled over onto her side, slipping her fingers under the waist of the sleep shorts, over the curve of her belly, down between her legs. Where she was already wet, just listening to his voice over the phone. She’d been wet every night listening to his voice. Trying to go to sleep keyed up and half in…love? Lust? Something.

“Tell me,” she whispered. “What would you do if you were here?”

His laugh was pure wickedness. Dirty talking phone sex was a highwire act. Too much thinking and it was ridiculous, but with his voice and the way he made her feel, the words pussy and cock and fuck you so good and fill you up were perfect. Beyond perfect. They were a filthy dream come true.

“Are you close?” he asked.

She made a sound in her throat, a gasping purr. Words completely beyond her.

“Come for me, baby,” he said, and it was just right. Just perfectly right. And she was coming. Seeing stars, shooting through the universe to his side in that closet. She wished more than anything that he was with her. Or she was there.

“Helen?”

“Hmmm?”

“Can you take a selfie, right now, and send it to me?” he asked.

Oh, that was hot too. She lifted her phone above her head and flipped the camera so she saw herself on the screen. She was flushed and her hair was wild around her head. The strap of her pink cami was down one arm and she looked a little naked and a lot satisfied and, well, beautiful.

She took the picture and sent it.

“Yep,” he said after a second. “Exactly how I imagined you.”

Micah

Dinner break always took place around midnight. Catering brought in Caesar salad and fries and steak and he thought of the Riverview Inn and that dinner that Alice made.

He had to say something to Helen. At this point, the lie of omission was just a fucking lie. They’d been talking nearly every single night for weeks now. There’d been phone sex and conversation. They’d even watched an episode of some television show she loved while on the phone with each other.

He hadn’t said anything, convinced it was something he needed to say in person. But he was falling for her so hard. He wondered if she’d told Jonah and Daphne that they were talking, because Jonah would not like that. But, well, a disapproving father was not the biggest of the obstacles between them.

He glanced down at his phone where he’d turned his screen saver into the picture of Helen after the first time they’d had phone sex. She was ethereal in the glow of that lamp, her post-orgasmic flush making her all rosy. He could stare at this picture all day.