“That’s ok,” I said. “Can I get another kiss before you go?”
“You don’t have to ask,” he said, licking his lips. “You can just take one, or all of them, especially if that makes you call me—call me a—”
My hand sliding behind his neck, giving me more grip to pull him close. There were inches between our faces. “Call you what?” I whispered. “A good boy.”
A shiver wiggled through him, like electricity, it zapped us closer. Our heads nearly butting, our lips locking and our tongues exploring each other’s coffee tainted mouths. I wanted my tongue to make a home inside him. A feeling worsened—or made better with all the caffeine energy swimming around in my mostly empty stomach.
If it wasn’t for the caffeine or dopamine rush, we might not have kissed that first time, we might not have even known there was something there, except for the spark which was undeniable, although mostly because he thought given where I was from and my profession, I would’ve hated him, I guess I had to prove him wrong, and what better way of proving him wrong than by showing him my true colors, even if they weren’t on the outside.
“You’re adorable,” I whispered just before he walked off, his legs nearly buckling at the compliments. I still didn’t havea read on him about the submissive lifestyle, but he certainly responded to the compliments like he knew all about it.
The horses seemed to be interested in the gossip, and I tried talking it out to them, especially Mary. She knew Jace the most, even if he had been absolutely terrified to come toward her that first day. He might’ve strutted right on over, but he was not confident at all in it.
Since the horses were responding well to their stalls and they’ve overcome their need to puddle and pile together. I was able to leave them alone within their stalls for short periods of time, which was helpful when it came to me going back to the guesthouse, preparing soup when Jace couldn’t, or forgot.
I just hoped the next time we could speak about what happened wouldn’t take an entire month, but then again, that was possibly mostly on me. I was to take on the dominant role, the Daddy, especially giving out stickers for a job well done.
We didn’t discuss what happened in the stable for another couple of days. A Friday. It was a warmer day, and people were arriving at the ranch to view the orange picturesque foliage with a short trip to the petting zoo.
Jace walked into the stables, panting. “I need you,” he said.
I was halfway through brushing Bramble and redressing some of the wounds that had healed but were still a little tender. “You want to talk about it now?” I asked, straightening my back out and standing tall.
“No, not like—” he blushed hard.
“I was kidding, how can I help?”
He sighed. “I need someone stationed at the coop to make sure people don’t try and steal the chickens,” he said. “I’m gonna be with the goats and alpacas, but I think there’s a school bus about to pull up.”
“A school bus?”
He nodded, pulling his hat off to fan his face. “Yeah. And I think we’re going to need all hands on. If you can step away from these guys for like an hour. Maybe.”
“I think I could stretch it to an hour, but you can’t be serious, they can’t be out here tryna steal chickens,” I said.
“Yeah, and my mom just told me about the truck load of kids,” he said.
I finished giving Bramble a brush down and put her back into her stall where she immediately slumped into the pile of hay on the ground. Not the same pile of hay, but it was in that same stall where we’d had that first kiss, and it felt like a million years ago.
The moment of solace with Jace in the stables was quickly squashed by all the loud screaming voices shouting about the animals. I took my position amongst the chickens as they flocked me, probably in their good graces since I hadn’t been stealing their eggs every morning. Then there had to have been about thirty elementary school kids rushing the fence toward the chicken coop.
Not much had me startled in scarecrow positioning, but seeing a hoard of kids was one of them. I never dealt with kids back in Texas, mostly because I never had any, and I was always too busy working to ever see my sister’s kids, but they moved to Cali shortly after the third one was born.
“I want one,” one of the kids shouted.
“Can we have an egg?” one of the girls asked, tugging on my hand. “My teacher, Mr. Chu said that eggs came from chickens.”
At that moment, a small man in a pair of bright yellow rainboots approached. “Hi,” he said. “That’s right, they do come from chickens, but they get collected in the morning.” He looked at me, nodding.
“That’s right,” I said, nodding in return. “Every single morning, they sleep in their coop, and—oh god, I’m not sure if they can pick them up.” I saw a girl corner one of the hens and coop her up into her arms. “Yeah, can you not pick them up, please.”
“Sorry, they should know better.”
The poor hen in her arms let out an alarming series of clucks, and I was sure she was being cussedout by the hen in distress. The teacher was quick to rush over, leaving me with the girl pulling at my hand with more questions.
“What do they do when it gets too cold?” she asked. “My mommy said they might not be out because of the cold weather, but I think it’s ok. Maybe not when it snows, I bet they couldn’t come out in the snow.”
I didn’t know. “I think they go into the barn in the winter to stay warm.” It was purely a guess, and I could’ve called over to Jace, but he looked far too busy dealing with the children trying to ride the goats.
