Running Home (18 page)

Grabbing a towel from the hall closet
, I opened the door to the bathroom and stuck my head in. I knew Walker was already in it, because I heard the water running from my room. “Are you going to be done soon? I really have to pee.”

“Just go pee
, Carmen, it’s nothing you haven’t done in front of me before.” He laughed from behind the dark blue shower curtain. It was the truth; this man had seen more of me than most of the men I slept with. I hesitated at the door for a second, before the urge hit me stronger. Dashing over to the toilet I tried to pee quietly, as it was a little awkward using the toilet with him in the shower. I quickly flushed the toilet and went to wash my hands.

“Can you pass me my towel
, please?” I grabbed the navy blue towel and pushed it behind the shower curtain. “Thanks,” Walker replied, as I turned on the water to scrub my hands

I decided to brush my teeth
, as the shower curtain pulled back and Walker climbed out of the tub, in full fabulous glory. Okay maybe it wasn’t the Full Monty type deal, as the towel was tightly wrapped around his waist, but still it was a sight to be seen. The heat of the water had turned his skin red, and the drops of water still dripping down his well-built shoulders trailed down his mouthwatering abs. I watched as the water droplets kept seeping down his chest holy hell, he was hot.

“Are you going to get in?” He asked
, as his voice snapped me back from drooling over his marvelous, god like body.

“Huh?” I managed to muster out.

“Shower, Carmen, get in the shower,” he demanded of me, taking his hands and running them through his wet dark hair. I could only nod my head as he exited the bathroom. This was Walker I was drooling over; my best friend, Walker.
Get it together Carmen; he isn’t into you like that.
But if he was I would ride his body like an amusement park that was open all night long.

My shower took a little longer than
expected; I couldn’t shake the vision of Walker with just a towel wrapped around his waist. I had to take matters into my own hands and let the image he graced me with earlier do the rest; giving my body full release and satisfaction for the day.

I braided my hair to the side and smeared lotion all over my skin. In the couple days since my release
, the color was starting to return to my skin. Now, all I had to do was get my curves back. Before my stint of being locked up I was getting into makeup and hair, but now being back at home I could care less.
However, I could go for some mascara,
I thought,
as
I narrowed my eyes and stared at my reflection. Tucking the towel under my arms, I headed back to my room, only to realize my clothes were gone.
What the heck,
I thought to myself as I glanced around the room.

“Have you seen my clothes?” I yelled at Walker from the r
oom. I swore I left them on the old chair.

“In here,
” he hollered back. That’s odd; I wonder why he had my clothes. Peeking into his bedroom, I noticed Walker standing over an ironing board as he pressed my white t-shirt; my jean skirt was already neatly laid on the bed. There he stood in all his domestic glory, ironing my clothes without his shirt on. He was going to kill me if he continued to grace me with his jaw dropping body
all the time.

“Your clothes were a wreck,” h
e commented as he handed me my white shirt and unplugged the iron.

I stepped into the room and snatched the shirt
from him. There were a hundred-and-one reasons I should just say thanks and walk away. But all I thought about doing was slamming his body on the neatly made bed, in his perfectly clean room and messing up his world a little. Even with all the reasons not to, I could only find one reason why I should; love.

“Your Everything” Keith Urban

Walker

Carmen just stood in my room with a shocked look on her face, and I was totally confused as to why. All I was doing was ironing, isn’t that normal of any single guy? “You okay, Car?” I asked as she continued to stand there.

“Yeah, sorry.” She made a quick retreat and shut the door to
her room. Did she really think Mom still came over and did my laundry and house work?
Crazy girl
.  Standing in front of my closet I pulled out a clean pair of khakis and a long sleeve blue button up for church. I normally didn’t do the whole church thing. In fact, I usually requested to work Sundays so I could get out of it. But since I didn’t report back to work till tomorrow, and Grams asked Carmen to go, I figured I would go too. She was going to need another person in her corner when she faced the ‘Sunday morning crowd’; anything was easier than getting judged by them.  The crowd never missed a Sunday service unless they were on their death bed; they always made sure their donation to the collection plate was noticed, and never overlooked an opportunity to belittle or judge a fellow member. Some Christians they claimed to be.

I dressed quickly
, and went to get my shoes from the front hallway closet. Slipping my dress shoes on, I did a once over in the mirror above the old fireplace.
I don’t look half bad;
I snickered to myself, as I smoothed my hair down once more. A noise came from the hallway, and I turned to see Carmen standing awkwardly in the hallway.

Her tan was slowly returning to her body
, and even though her curves were not like they use to be, she still looked all women. I held my breath for a second to gain composure. My mind was filled with naughty things I wanted to do to her. Run my hands up her smooth skin on her legs, push the little jean skirt up on her thighs, and slide her panties over to the side. I wanted to touch her, feel her, taste the sweetness I knew she had hidden between her legs.

“Walker
, is this okay?” She asked again, her eyes filled with worry. I instantly snapped out of my lustful desire and tried to remember what she was asking.

“What?” I asked,
as the embarrassment was hard to hide on my face.

“Um
, is this shirt too tight……… you know, with my boobs and all?”

“Nope
, your boobs look amazing…….I mean, great……..shit I mean nice………..Fuck, your boobs are fine,” I finally managed to blurt out. If that hadn’t given away my desire for this woman, then I don’t know what would.

“Are you sure? Most of my old cloth
es don’t fit, because of these things,” she said while, looking down at the pair of remarkable silicone attachments on her chest. I never had a thing for fake tits, but hell, they looked down right sinful on her. Even with her thin frame, I couldn’t stop from staring at them; I just wanted to reach out and touch them. However, it would come across as sexual harassment and that is never a good thing for an officer of the law.

“
It’s fine, Carmen, you look great,” I tried to reassure her, as I walked over to the end table and picked up the keys. “You ready?” She nodded her head, and I held open the screen door for her to walk out.
Down boy,
I told myself as I watched her walk out to the Bronco. Staying away from her like that was going to be harder than I thought. I didn’t just want her back in my life; I wanted to call her mine.

We parked the B
ronco in the church parking lot. “You ready to do this?” I asked, as she sat staring out the window.

Her face was a
dead giveaway to her feelings; she was scared and I didn’t blame her. We sat in silence for a few minutes as people started to file into the small church. If you didn’t come to this service you were at the other small church on the other side of town. This would be her first big outing in town. I know it had already gotten around town that she was home, but was unsure as to the rumors and gossip that came with it. Given her reputation when she was younger, I knew the comments were not going to be nice, and if I could shield her from the hatred that was going to be slung her way I would desperately try. I would give anything to take the horrible things and animosity she was going to get this morning away, but I know she was an adult now. No longer could I hide her from the harsh reality of what people thought about her, I didn’t even do a great job of that growing up.

“
Let’s do this,” she mumbled softly, while opening the door and slipping out of the Bronco.

I took a deep breath and followed suit, making my way around the truck to stand by her side. I glanced over at Carmen standing next to me
, and offered her a little smile. Her eyes broke my heart; I could tell she was on the edge of crying. I reached over and grabbed her hand. Lacing our fingers tightly, I gently kissed the side of her head and gave her hand a squeeze. “I’m with you every step of the way,” I whispered into her ear.

“I love
you,” she mouthed.

My heart swelled as we walked to the front steps of the church. I knew she meant the meaning of love in a different way, but in my head I wanted to believe it was something else.
I wanted her to be able to walk around this town with her head held high. I wanted to be able to hold her hand under different circumstances, with no other reason other than the simple fact of love. I would take anything this amazing, loving, compassionate, and caring woman would give me. Even if it was just holding hands for emotional support, I would gladly take it.

The church was buzzing with people talking and milling about as we stood in the middle of the double doors leading to the chapel area. I squeezed her hand and started down the walkway, noticing Grams sitting a couple pews back from the stage. A hush quickly fell over the building as people stared to turn and gawk at the two of us walking down the aisle.

“Well
, isn’t that obvious,” Carmen murmured as she latched on to my hand tighter.

“Let them stare;
you have every right to be here.” I stated firmly. I wasn’t going to let this town run her away again; she was here and never going anywhere again. I smiled when I caught the eyes of Grams as she scooted down in the pew. I motioned for Carmen to slide in, as I flashed a smile at Mrs. Elderbush, who sat in the row behind us. “You doing okay?” I whispered to Carmen. She stiffly nodded her head and kept her eyes trained forward. You could hear her name being mentioned all over the small building. It’s not like they didn’t know she was back in town, but a place this small always needed something to talk about. I learned that after Sadie left.

“
It’s nice to see you again, Sadie,” Old lady Beth said as she turned around in the pew ahead of us. Carmen gave the old coot a blank stare as she tried to place who Sadie was.

“This is Carmen, Beth. She went to school here
, and is Mrs. Montgomery’s granddaughter,” I reminded the crazy old bat. She sat there for a second as she tried to register what I just told her.

“Did you have a nice wedding then?” She breaks the silence and asks.

“Wedding?” Carmen turns and mouths to me.

“This isn’t Sadie
, Beth. This is Carmen,” I said again, this time slower.

“Well fine, I don’t need to know abou
t your wedding then.” She scoffed and turned around in her seat. Carmen looked back at me with questioning eyes, as I silently cursed myself for not talking about this sooner.

“You were married?” She quietly hissed.

“No, it didn’t happen. Can we talk about this later?” I begged with pleading eyes. She nodded her head and turned back to face the front; her hand immediately pulled away from my grasp.
FUCK,
I thought silently as Grams looked over and glared like she could read my thoughts.  “Sorry,” I mumbled, it had to get better later.

It felt like everyone was staring at us during the hour long service, and each time I turned to look I caught at least three pairs of eyes glaring back at me. I don’t understand people’s anim
osity to Carmen being back here. She never stepped on anyone’s toes or caused harm to anyone but herself back then. Sure she slept around, but it’s not like she was screwing anyone’s husband. We already had several home wreckers in town, and Carmen wasn’t one of them. I could only speculate the reasons why most women disliked her; Carmen was gorgeous. Her wild and carefree attitude, matched with her sultry good looks made her stand out in a crowd. She had charisma to die for and legs that were a mile long. Every man took notice when she was in the room, and that made other women’s blood boil. Now that she had her boobs done, it gave the women one more reason to snarl at her. It wasn’t the men in town I worried about; it was the vicious blood sucking women that would create the problem. I glanced down the pew and noticed Rick staring directly at Carmen’s chest. I was going to have words with that bastard later.

“
Let’s go say hi to the pastor and his wife, Carmen,” Grams said after the final song was sung, and people were starting to file out of the congregation.

“Okay.
” She smiled weakly, as Grams took her by the hand and pulled her to the front of the church. I noticed Derek and his wife starting to file out, and I figured I would go say hi while Carmen was busy playing nice.

“Hey
, Mason, how’s it going?” Derek commented as I walked up to shake his hand.

“Good. How are you this morning
, Rachel?” I asked his wife, as she tried to wrangle their youngest little girl.

“It would be bet
ter if this little monster let Mommy listen to the service,” she replied, while grabbing the youngster around the waist and excusing herself to walk out of the building.

“Don’t have kids,” Derek leaned over and whispered to me.

“That would require me to find someone to marry first.” I let out a nervous laugh; getting married wasn’t in the deck of cards for me.

“Whatever man, I see the way you look at her.”

“What are you talking about?” I glanced around, looking at the people milling about.

“Carmen.
You stare at her like she is a diamond in the ruff,” Derek said with almost smugness to his voice. I shook my head and rolled my eyes. As much as I would like that for Carmen and I, that’s not our future. I was strictly her best friend, and that was it; that was all there ever could be.

“Don’t try and deny it
, man. She is hot. A little too skinny for my taste, but none the less hot,” Derek commented as he wiggled his eyebrows.

“I’m telling your wife,” I snorted, glancing back at Carmen who stood there talking with the pastor looking all kinds of uncomfortable.

“Please don’t, or I won’t get sex for a month,” he whined, eyes pleading with mine to keep quiet. I laughed and clapped my hand against his shoulder. “See you tomorrow at work.”

“Good luck
, man,” He snickered, as he wandered off to find his wife and young spawn. I sighed and turned to go save Carmen from the preaching I was sure she was being subjected to.

We said the proper good byes and headed over to the Bronco. I watched as Carmen’s face went from a stressful smile to a soft and calm appearance. This was her big reintroduction to the town this morning, and I knew it couldn’t have been easy.

“Do you know what Amy said to me as I walked by her? She called me a hooker! I wanted to scream that I was an escort, but then I realized I did turn into a hooker in the end of it all.” She nervously laughed while trying to get her seatbelt to latch.

“Don’t let them get to you
, Carmen. It’s exactly like high school, they will say just about anything to crawl under your skin.”

“Oh
, I know, but it still fucking sucks,” she said with a sadness threaded through her voice. Her past was something she was going to have to come to terms with; it was always going to follow her no matter what path she chose to take in life. I started the engine and began the drive home, I needed to get the back pasture plowed before work tomorrow; amongst a dozen other tasks I put off these last couple of days.

“So
, you want to hear how many times someone mentioned you almost got married, Walker? I’m betting in one single conversation it was eight.”

My hands gri
pped the steering wheel tighter; I didn’t want to discuss this right now. “Yeah, maybe another day.” I said through clenched teeth; this was not happening right now.

“Well
, I take your frozen state as you don’t want to talk about it. I get that, Walker, I really do. But, just like you keep reminding me, we move forward with life, and that is obviously something you have yet to let go of,” Carmen quoted, sitting in the seat and looking all smug like. I let out a sigh and relaxed my hands a bit. Hearing your own advice spit back at you was never an easy task, especially when you had no intentions of dealing with it anytime soon.

Carmen was in the kitchen
, making a sandwich when I wandered back out after, changing into some work clothes. She looked incredible, standing barefoot in the kitchen making sandwiches. I knew it made me seem like a total pig thinking of her that way, but I couldn’t help it. What man didn’t want his woman in the kitchen cooking for him? To me, it was always a fantasy of mine.
Wait, his woman?
I’ve got to get outside and get on that tractor, mindless chores to clear the wants and desire in my head.