Lumbersexual (Novella) by Leslie McAdam Page B

ass, keeping his eyes on mine, a big hand under my lower back, holding me to him, the other bracing him up.
    And this time I got to see him come.
    A tendril of his light hair fell over his brow and into his eyes.  He closed his eyes and then forced them open, forced himself to look at me.  A vein pulsed on his neck.  His cheeks tensed over his high cheekbones and his jaw tightened.  Then he squinted, his breath came fast, and he opened his blue-green eyes and locked onto mine, holding me into him, pushing up into me so hard.  I could feel him spilling into me, the condom catching it, but the pumping, the passion, this moment, all mine, just for me.
    He gave me himself.
    Then he collapsed onto me and hugged me tight, burying his head in my neck.
    I didn’t know what to think, except that I was profoundly moved.  I’ve never had anyone give themselves to me like that.  I’ve never had anyone let me in like that.  I saw him, and he saw me.
    Absolutely vulnerable.  Absolutely intimate.
    Mine.
    That moment was mine.
    My contented bear sleepily kissed his way up my neck to my lips, and curled up next to me, his mouth on my shoulder.
    “Hate to say it, babe, but I think it’s time to get up and go to work.”
    He was right.  I hated to leave, not wanting this moment to end.

    We showered at his house, then he took me to mine to get dressed in my uniform.  He waited in the living room, not giving a shit that the entire house knew that I stayed at his house last night.  I added that to another reason why I liked him.
    Then he drove both of us to work, telling me that he’d take me home that evening, too.
    When we walked into the ranger station, Amanda took one look at Court holding my hand and her eyes narrowed.  Then she plastered that beauty pageant smile on her face.  “Hi, guys!”
    “Amanda.”  Court stated it like a particularly tragic accident.  Thank God.  But she didn’t get the hint.  
    “Court, I was wondering if you wanted to go into town and get pizza sometime soon.”
    In front of me.  Seriously?  But before I could open my mouth to call her out on being rude, Court took care of it.
    “Can’t.  I’m taking Maggie.”
    First I’d heard of it.  But damn, while I hated her for coming on to him right while I was standing there, I adored that he stuck up for me.  This morning meant something to him too, right?  “Sounds good,” I said.
    Her eye twitched in a way that was downright unpleasant, then the fake smile reappeared.  “Next time, then.”
    “Thanks for the ride, Court.”  
    That’s what she said.
    Stop it, Maggie.
    I went to the back office to meet up with the crew and go to the site we were monitoring today.  
    At the end of the day, I returned a few minutes early.  Court wasn’t done, so I sat at a computer in the back office and checked my email for the first time in days.  I heard the door open and looked up, smiling, thinking it was him.  But it was Amanda.
    She pulled up an office chair right beside me, and started speaking in a rush, her eyebrows lowered, her voice almost a whisper.  “Listen, Maggie.  You need to know that Court has been with me for years.  Five years.  Every summer he finds a new fling, and at the end he comes back to me.  Every. Single. Time.  I am the only one for him.  So you can have your fun for now, but know that he doesn’t mean it.  He’s been mine for years.  He’s still mine.”
    I stopped breathing.
    No.
    This wasn’t true.
    He . . . He . . . No.
    But even though my intellect told me that she was a conniving bitch—and had her own problems of staying with a guy who dumped her every summer—my imagination feared that what she said was correct.  Because this was just for the summer.  We both knew it, even if we didn’t say it.
    She raised her eyebrows conspiratorially.  “You know it’s true.  You can tell.  A woman knows.  You know when a guy is into you and when he’s just using you.”  She leaned in,