Blue by You by Rachel Gibson Read Free Book Online

good she felt. How beautiful. The hot push and slick pull and the fiery friction grew.
    “Kasper!” she called out.
    “Yes. Come for me, cher,” he breathed into ear. “Beautiful girl.”
    She couldn’t recall anything feeling this good. She couldn’t breathe. She didn’t need to breathe. She just wanted more. She moved with him, meeting his thrusts until the fiery friction spread from her thighs and flashed across her skin, and her whole world blew apart.
    When it was over, when it was Kasper’s turn to cry out and call her name, when his breathing tickled her ear, and his hips stopped, she felt different. When her brain cleared, and all the pieces of her world came back, she felt changed. The pieces the same yet altered somehow.
    “You okay?”
    She nodded. She was the same person, only different. She’d made an adult decision. She hadn’t considered anyone else’s wishes but her own. Anyone else’s wants and needs, and the world hadn’t ended.
    He lifted his face and looked into her eyes. “Say something.”
    She was no longer a virgin and felt no regret. “How many more times can we do that?”
    He smiled, slid out of her body, then back inside. “As many as you like.”
    The answer was three. They had sex three more times in the old live oak. Three more times until the sun slipped low enough to cast the first shadows of night. Three more times until Kasper stood and helped her dress.
    “Maybe we should carve our initials into the tree like Abigail and Thomas,” she said, and zipped up the back of her skirt. Kasper glanced up into her face, then returned his attention to the front of her blouse. He concentrated on the buttons and didn’t say anything. For the first time since she’d climbed the tree, she felt like she’d been too bold. Stepped over an invisible line. Weird, considering she’d been naked most of the day. “Only without the heart, of course. More like tagging,” she assured him.
    “I don’t have a knife.” He finished the last button near the base of her throat.
    “Oh.”
    “I’ll meet you here tomorrow around noon.” He smiled and pushed her hair from her face. “You bring your gorgeous self and maybe a blanket. I’ll bring a knife.”
    At exactly noon the following day, Blue crawled up into the oak tree. She dragged a blanket with her and sat beneath the old carved heart. She waited in the muggy air, and as the sun got hotter and slid west. She waited in the heat and humidity. She waited until she knew he wasn’t coming.

Chapter Four
    2013
    “Excuse me.” The director of tours for Dahlia Hall, Patricia, stood in the doorway of the small office Blue shared with Carolee in the converted carriage house. “Tina McCoy just clocked out.”
    Blue looked up from the spreadsheet she and Carolee were going over at Carolee’s desk. “That makes three times in the past month she’s left early.” She glanced at her watch. “Her last tour begins in five minutes.”
    Carolee frowned. “Cramps again?”
    Patricia shook her head. “A ‘weird eye’ this time.”
    If Tina didn’t make such a good Scarlett O’Hara, she would have been fired the second time she left early. “Time for you to get in the dress.” She pointed at her friend. “I did it last time.”
    “Wish I could help you out.” Carolee pointed to the stack of work on her desk. “I have to finish the month’s account receivables.” She frowned. “Sorry.”
    No she wasn’t.
    Blue sighed and headed out the door. “Fire Tina,” she said, and moved toward the big house. Tourists wandered the gardens, and she said hello before she moved through a back door and walked past the employees’ break room to the dressing room. A replica of Scarlett O’Hara’s white-and-green barbecue dress hung in a wardrobe closet. Granted, Scarlett was from Georgia, and this was Louisiana. But one thing she’d learned was that to most tourists, a Southern belle was a Southern belle, no matter what state she hailed