The Dust and the Roar Read online

  “You were plenty angry and so fucking sexy holding that knife, challenging me. You took my breath away. My words.”

  “You took my breath away too. That moment when you grabbed my knife I looked you in the eye and I knew this was a chance to do and be what I really wanted. And I wanted you real bad.” She took my other hand in hers. “I wanted your mouth, I wanted those long arms around me, holding me tight, holding me down. I wanted to know what you’d feel like on me, inside me.” Her body pressed against mine, and my blood caught fire.

  “You been with other guys since your husband?” I asked, my voice rougher than usual.

  “A few. But it was all grabby hands and quick—”

  I squeezed her hands hard, and she let out a soft grunt. I couldn’t handle picturing her fucking other guys, getting off with them.

  “Deciding to be with you was different,” she said. “I enjoyed my freedom of choice with you because I really, really wanted to be with you. It was a rich choice. Not a ‘what the hell, he’s sexy.’” She reached up and her lips pressed against mine once, twice. “But I didn’t count on still wanting you so damn bad.”

  “You really thought one night would be enough? Such a tramp.”

  She punched my side, and I laughed. A lock of hair fell over the side of her face.

  “I still feel good to you?” I swept that piece of hair away, my hand lingering on the base of her throat.

  A delicate smile grew on her lips. “You feel amazing.”

  We kissed slowly, our arms encircling each other, pressing our bodies close.

  “This may have started out as a one-nighter,” she whispered in my ear, “but I really like you, Wreck, and I’m not letting go.”

  “I feel the same.” I held her there in the sun, on the side of an empty rural road, the earthy smell of the soil, the rustling of the wheat in the wind filling our senses. “I appreciate you defending me and my brothers to your family, but I don’t want you to be in that position again.”

  “You’re a good man, Wreck. I’ll always have your back.”

  My heart squeezed in my chest. “And I’ll always support you, Isi. Whatever you want to do with your life is for you to decide, and whatever it is, it isn’t dumb.” I held her tight and kissed the top of her head. “They’re your dreams, and you deserve to make them come true.”

  That day I held in my arms a smart, determined woman, her hair burning copper in the blaze of the sun, eyes gleaming. My Isi was a dream I never knew I had until right then.

  And at that moment, in that field of wheat rippling in the current of the breeze, I knew my dream had come true.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Isi stood on top of the bed in my one-room apartment, adjusting a purple and blue cotton tapestry I’d helped her hang on the wall. Looked like it was from India with all sorts of crazy, swirling designs and shapes.

  “It’s paisley,” she said, fingering the edge, tugging on it gently. “You like it?”

  “Sure.”

  “No, you don’t.” She let out a laugh, glancing at me over her shoulder.

  “I do, baby, ‘cause you picked it, you put it there. It’s colorful. This place needs it.”

  “For shit’s sake,” she said, moving toward me where I stood at the edge of the bed.

  “What?”

  She jumped into my arms, and I held her up as she brought her legs around my hips, a hand digging in my hair. I loved it when she did that, and I’d grown it out to my shoulders even though it was a pain in the ass, just to feel her tugging on it. When she kissed me, when she wanted to tell me something important, when I ate her pussy.

  “You’re so good to me.” She planted a firm kiss on my lips and pulled my hair back into a short ponytail. “So good. I can never get mad at you.”

  “You looking to be mad at me?”

  “No, no, no.” She hugged me, burying her face in my neck.

  My hand rubbed up and down her back. “I like being good to you. It’s easy. No other way to be with you, baby.” I kissed her and flung us both on the unmade bed.

  “Hey!”

  I’d gotten us a new mattress, and that felt like the best kind of commitment when I’d paid for it at the store in Rapid. I kissed her breathless, grinding my hardening cock into her and making her squirm, lighting us both up. The mattress underneath us felt like the best-damned decision I’d ever made.

  “Dang it, the hash browns!” she said.

  I released her, and she darted from our bed to the small stove where her home-made hash browns sizzled in bacon fat in my dad’s old cast iron pan. “They’re ready.”

  I groaned, a hand over my dick. “So was I.” I folded my hands underneath my head and watched her make us cheese eggs in another pan. Light filtered over her beautiful coppery brown hair as she popped slices of bread into the toaster. Hints of gold reflected in her long, thick locks, and a warmth bubbled in my veins. I could watch her all day.

  “Stop staring at me and set the table, lazy bones.”

  “Say please.”

  “Purdy please darlin’,” she said in a heavy southern accent. Grinning, I got up and got the dishes and forks and napkins on the table.

  After we ate, we got on my Harley and took a ride up to Sylvan Lake. There was no better feeling, Isi riding with me on my bike, the two of us zipping and zooming on the smooth road in the crisp, cool air. The great rock formations around the blue water looked like some giant had shaped the slabs of stone. We got back to Rapid in time to catch a new movie Isi wanted to see—“E.T.” After, we stopped for ice cream at Drake’s and hung out with Georgia.

  We got back to my apartment, and it was twilight already. She lit her candles, took out a couple of small paperbacks she’d brought with her and read me poems in her beautiful deep voice. The words of Ginsburg, Bob Dylan, Rilke blended with sage and cinnamon. Whiskey filled Dad’s old glasses.

  “How did you get the name Isadora? Is it your grandma’s name? Some eccentric great aunt?”

  “No. My mother named the three of us for great artists. She had high hopes for us. Jimmy was for James Joyce, Leo was for Leonardo Da Vinci, and she named me for Isadora Duncan, the dancer.”

  “Can’t say I know who she was.”

  “Ah, she was something else. At the turn of the century, she broke with traditional ballet and created her own dance. She was into natural rhythms and movement. She improvised moves, she was emotional. All done barefoot and scantily clad.”

  “Oooh, she sounds like a rule-breaking rebel.”

  “She was brave. Traveled all over the world and danced and taught and lived a colorful life. She didn’t believe in marriage either. A true free spirit and a revolutionary of her time.” Isi let out a sigh. “Lots of personal tragedies though.”

  “Revolutionary, huh?”

  “And a great artist.” Her smile faded slowly. Did she want to be a great artist? A trailblazing revolutionary? She sure as fuck was an amazing singer. That was natural, raw talent she had. A gift. I didn’t want her to sink into self-doubt or depression about her life going nowhere. I wanted to break open that cage she’d gotten stuck in. She deserved to be out there trailblazing with her gift, living a colorful, rule-breaking rebel life.

  “Sing for me, Is.”

  “Wreck—”

  “Baby, sing for me.”

  She grabbed her guitar that was by the window and strummed. Her eyes lit up as she sang Stairway to Heaven.

  “My rock n’ roll babe.”

  A grin broke over her face as she kept on playing her guitar.

  “Baby, I don’t know what kind of dancer you are—”

  “Not the greatest.” She let out a laugh. “Which was a disappointment to my mother.”

  “Isi, you have a gift.”

  She blushed. Had no one ever told her that? She knew it, though. She did. But it was different if someone else, someone you care about recognized the real, hidden you. It was exciting, it was a relief.

  “What your uncle
said about you “dilly-dallying”—that isn’t true.”

  “Isn’t it?” She put the guitar down. “Working at the store, trying to hold it together when it’s struggling to stand, but it’s the right thing to do. I take off on Saturday nights and chase parties with Leo if he’s in town, and if I can get in a singing gig at one of those parties, then that’s a really good night and a really good time.”

  “It’s more than a good time, though, isn’t it? It’s everything to you. It’s your escape. Your chance to shine and feel free. And you haven’t had a chance to run wild with it yet. To live it.”

  Her eyes widened at me.

  “How does he know, you’re wondering?” I whispered.

  She only nodded.

  “That’s how I feel about riding. About being part of the club. I almost got a job at the same gravel factory my dad worked at all his life. For what? Put food on the table, pay the electric bill, yeah. But there’s more to life than that, and I want that more. I knew it’d kill me, Is. That dust he came home with every day, I didn’t want it on me. Dust from the road, though—hell, yeah. That’s where I live and breathe.”

  “That dust isn’t dirt. It’s your fairy dust.”

  “Fairy dust?”

  “Your magic.”

  “Being onstage with a band is yours.”

  Her face crumpled, and she hugged me, her breath hiccuping. I held her close and rubbed her back. I didn’t have to ask her if she was okay. I knew. She was letting it out, and it melted everything inside me to be the one holding her. For her to lean on me, to shed all that bullshit and feel accepted for who she was.

  “On that note, I have something to tell you,” she said, sitting up, facing me.

  “What is it?”

  “The guys, the Silver Tongues, we’ve been singing together off and on for the past two years.”

  “Right. Things are still good with them?”

  “So good, they asked me to join the band.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  I whooped. “Honey, that’s great.”

  “You think so?”

  “Don’t you?”

  Her teeth scraped over her lip. “Yeah, but I thought maybe you wouldn’t be big on the idea.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s one thing singing a few songs with them once in a while, but to be part of a band, to practice, write songs together, perform regularly … I didn’t think you’d be into me doing it.”

  “I’m fucking thrilled.”

  She squeezed my shoulders. “You are? Really?”

  “Yes.”

  She hugged me. We held each other on the big armchair by the window where we’d moved it to see the stars outside. She kissed me, and our kisses grew wilder, deeper. Our need for each other became a raging, hungry thing.

  “If I’d met you sooner and you were with your ex, I would’ve stolen you from him,” I said against her throat.

  Her hand slid past the waistband of my warm-up pants and wrapped around my bare cock, which was already hard for her. “Oh, I bet you would have.”

  “No stopping me.” My cock throbbed and stiffened even more in her hand.

  “That’s what I like about you, Wreck. You make a decision, you’re all in. Right there. No wishy-washy anything about you.”

  “No dilly-dallying?” I asked.

  She laughed. “And no grandstanding necessary.”

  The force of our desire was building, building, pushing through my veins. “Baby—”

  “We’re going to break this armchair.” She giggled, the sound of her amusement tinkling like the copper wind chimes she’d brought and hung above the window.

  “Don’t care,” I gritted out, ripping off her tee. “Want you.”

  She clambered off me, stripped off her jeans, and climbed back on top of me. Taking my stiff length in hand, she tucked me into her wet, wet heat. My heart pounded in my chest at her firm touch, at her over me, taking me in slowly, savoring every inch. Taking from me.

  Gripping her hips, I rocked inside her steadily, stealing her breath, filling her deep. She let out a groan and met me thrust for thrust. She didn’t close her eyes. She held my gaze as we moved together.

  “Take me, baby,” I breathed.

  She rode me, she moved faster, and her moans got louder, urging me up a high cliff all our very own.

  “You’re so beautiful, Is. So beautiful.” My hands roughly twisted her tits, and her hands clutched at mine, keeping them there.

  Her head fell back. “Wreck! Oh God, Wreck…” She throbbed all around me, and I blew.

  After, I swept her up in my arms and took her to the bed where she fell asleep curled up in me. But I couldn’t sleep. My fingertips lingered on that set of scars on her body. They were scars, and there was more to their story. I’d give her time to tell it. But if I ever got wind of her ex, I’d fucking kill him.

  “No one ever hurts you again,” I whispered to my Isadora in the dark. “Nobody.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Months went by, and Isi and I had settled into a nice routine together, spending as much time as possible at my place. Since I lived right in town and only two blocks away from the store, she was here with me in my bed most nights.

  We got dressed to get to work. I threw another couple of T-shirts into my duffel bag. The guys and I were going on a run this weekend, leaving this afternoon. Spring had sprung early, and the weather was going to be clear this weekend, so we were all hot to get back on the road finally. Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” blared from the neighbor’s house where two teenage girls had it on constant replay for weeks now.

  “I’m going to buy a house,” I said.

  Isi shoved on a boot. “You are?”

  “This room is too small, and we have no privacy. Plus, I’m not a fan of the neighbors’ music choices.”

  Isi let out a laugh. “Not into funky pop?”

  “Bottom line, I want to scream your name when we're fucking, not be thinking that the whole house is listening to our bed banging the wall.”

  “My gentleman, so conscientious.” She fluttered her tongue at me, winking, and a slash of heat burned through my insides. That tongue had just done a number on my cock.

  I brushed her lips with mine, stroking the smooth skin of her jaw. “A few weeks ago, I saw this cabin up in the woods. It’s deserted. It was somebody’s hunting cabin. It’s not small and not all that big, and I like it. Needs some work, but I can fix it up with the guys’ help. Good foundation, solid wood details. I still have the money from the sale of my dad’s property. It’s perfect for you and me, baby.”

  She stilled. “Wreck … since my divorce, I’m not—”

  I put my fingers against her lips. “I’m not making big plans. I’m living in the now, ‘cause now feels fucking good. I want you to be comfortable, babe. It’ll be our place.”

  “Our place,” she repeated, but she didn’t sound convinced. Or comfortable.

  I brought her in for another kiss, her body stiffening in my hold. “What’s the problem?”

  “All this time we’ve both been good with being together. You’re talking about buying your own place, about us there and it being “ours,” and … it’s a step, a step in a direction.”

  “That makes you uncomfortable?”

  She took in a breath, not letting it go, barricading it inside herself.

  “Maybe,” I said, “what’s freaking you out, is that it’s not making you uncomfortable.”

  Her shoulders dropped, and my eyes held hers. “Maybe you want it so bad, you don’t know what to do with it, and it’s freaking you out. I get that. I’ve never been in a relationship before. My parents were a crap example of how this should go, so yeah … but I know that what we got is good. So I’m willing to take a step in a direction. At the end of the day, Is, I want my own place. I’ve got the money. I’m not some kid hanging out anymore, you know? I want a bigger place where I’ll be more comfortable, and where we’ll be m
ore comfortable together. That’s what this is.”

  She took in a breath. “After my divorce, I kept a tight schedule at home with Dad, the store. A lot to do, a lot going on, and I wasn’t interested in dating or relationships, except for getting laid once in a while—”

  “Is—”

  “But—” She stopped herself, pressed her lips together.

  “Go ahead,” my voice softened. “Say whatever you’re thinking. Go on.”

  “I feel safe with you. I never expected to trust a man again. To trust myself with a man. Not ever.”

  What the fuck did her ex do to her?

  “But a part of me feels like I’m getting on a plane to go to some faraway, foreign country and I don’t know the destination, and I don’t have a passport.” She slid a hand across her chest. “I got this breathless feeling just now. This panic.” Her hand moved to her throat.

  “With other guys, you could control the situation. Pick ‘em, do your thing, take off.”

  “But I don’t want to take off now,” she said.

  “What do you want?”

  “I want to be with you,” she said, her voice hushed. “I want to belong, to you, to us. Because that belonging between us is all hope and sweetness—”

  “Sweetness, huh?”

  “Yeah.”

  “It is. It’s very real.” I licked my lips. “Is that how it is when you’re singing?”

  “Yes,” she breathed.

  “You need to stop treating your singing like getting laid.”

  “Huh.” Her head jerked slightly. “Cheap thrill? In and out? Drive-through?”

  I took her hand in mine and squeezed it. “What we have and your singing are about what Isadora Dillon wants. It’s about who she is, and you letting that bloom like a gorgeous sunflower in the summer sun.”

  A sound escaped her mouth.

  “It’s true, baby. Those things are not about taking care of your dad, your brother, your house, the store, whatever the hell else. It’s about you. And you do not have to feel bad about that—I think you already know that, but living it is different. Don’t push it away anymore out of sight in some drawer or stash it on a shelf. You don’t have to steal moments to explore it or enjoy it anymore. This is your time now. You don’t have to be perfect for anybody, or make do with what little is left over for you at the end of the day.”