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She picked Bou’s old riding jacket out of the coat closet, and I opened the door. As she passed, I wondered what she wore beneath that dress. Would there only be a thin layer of lace or silk separating us?
On my bike, I sank down, and then she climbed on behind me. Her breasts pressed against my back. She snaked her arms over my rib cage, interlocking her fingers. Her chin rested against my shoulder. Every deep breath of hers brushed against my neck, slipping down my veins until my jeans were too tight against my cock and the pressure on my balls set my spine to tingling.
Focus on the ride, Cook. The lean. The destination.
We would be in Phoenix and in public, so I should be able to control my raging hard-on there.
I hoped.
Thankfully, the wind in my hair and Arizona highways kept me focused until I pulled up to a park holding an art festival. Maddie slipped off the bike, removing her helmet and brushing out her hair. I swung off my bike and hung her helmet from one of the handles as she looked around.
Maddie turned to me, her smile dimming. “You should’ve told mewe were coming here.”
“Why?” I asked.
She reached down and tugged on the hem of her dress. “Because I wouldn’t have worn this.”
I stepped closer to her. “I like that. I wanted you to wear it.”
Immediately, a red flush covered her cheek, and she ducked her head. My heart sped up as I worried she might get on her knees here. I took her hand, pulling her toward the festival. She quickly came along, almost skipping.
“Show me what kind of art you like,” I said as we entered the festival.
Vendors lined either side of the sidewalk, more down across a park area. Their white tents kept out the relentless sun. The forms of the art were different, even down to the how people photographed from colors to sepia to monochrome. Maddie stopped at every tent that had photography, studying the artwork and style like others would study for a math test before we moved on.
I took a card from every vendor she gravitated toward, slipping it into my back pocket.
While she avoided several other forms of art, she marveled at the watercolor and charcoal art. She slid her fingers over several sculptures—the ones not under glass—and wooden carvings, like she wanted to learn how to craft those too.
I curled my fingers across hers, holding her back so she didn’t run from one vendor to another. But still, I gave her the option to choose which ones we visited. Her eyes sparkled with joy, lit up by the colors and the buzz around us.
A giggle erupted from Maddie’s mouth over something she particularly liked, but when I went to look at the price, she pulled me in another direction. I barely had enough time to slip another business card in my back pocket.
At the center of the park, we found several artists crouched over the sidewalk with a rainbow of various chalks. Hues splashed against the chosen canvas. Blue skies and red desert leaked from the chalks onto the tan cement.
“Cook, come see!” Maddie pulled on me.
I marched along behind her, unable to see what she looked at. She halted at the edge of a growing crowd.
One of the chalk artists was hunched over on the ground, nose near the pavement, stretching the eyes of a portrait of someone else in the crowd. Other artists had created landscapes and intricate abstract designs. A few more returned to their current works too, scraping the chalk across the sidewalk. Colors bled into one another, chalk flowers near blooming on top of each other and the desert and sea meeting halfway across a crack.
Suddenly, Maddie dropped my hand, and before I could grab her, she dropped to her knees. What the hell was she doing? She grabbed a piece of discarded chalk and started to draw. I stepped back and watched her scribbles blossom into a design.
Delicate like lace, she brushed the chalk across the pavement, then her strokes intensified until she was scratching so hard at the ground it seemed like she was tearing up a layer of concrete. The muscles in her arm and her back tensed.
She’d put on a little weight, but her elbow was still so pointed that it looked like it might tear through her skin. Her bare knees were pressed against the sidewalk, probably hard enough to leave bruises.
The bite of the sidewalk didn’t seem to bother her, so I let her work.
Already, her artwork was better than some of the other artists, both those who had drawn on the sidewalk too in chalk and those trying to sell their canvases.
Rocking on her knees, she looked down at her drawing. Her shoulders were slumped forward, her head bent. She looked stiff, like one of the molded statues we’d passed. I almost reached out to touch her, wondering what she was thinking about, but then I dropped my hand. I would pick her up and carry her back to my motorcycle, but then I finally looked at what she had drawn.
The darkened shadows swirled into abstract artwork with depth that sent a chill down my spine. The dead eyes of the darkened form stared straight into my soul. It struck me in the chest. I balled my hands into fists, glancing over my shoulder as though I’d catch someone sinister watching us.
Had anyone noticed her painfully personal artwork?
But the crowd only cooed over her skills.
