‘You’re killing me here,’ he said, in those stunning, suspended seconds before Ella’s eyes fluttered shut. She dragged herself higher, using his clothes as the rope, and the last thing she saw was his mouth opening to meet hers.
* * *
Ella moaned into his mouth. A small sound that might have been defeat or triumph, love or lust, all of it rolled into one sweet package. It sent the blood pounding through his body, most of it heading due south.
One of her hands found its way to the nape of his neck, kneading the muscle there, shaping his head to her.
‘Turn me inside out, you do,’ he muttered, taking another taste of her lips.
Jake bent his knees, slid himself up her body and heard her gasp as the thick ridge of him sought and caught that sweet junction between her thighs.
There were twenty firefighters in his top paddock, a bobcat or two and a light fire truck. He’d need all appliances down here, hoses trained on his porch, because if he didn’t put a stop to this, he and Ella were about to set this place alight.
Jake made a monumental effort to lift his head, to step back. He tried to bring her down with words. ‘The day I get you on your own … No kids. No brother of mine hanging around. You better look out for that day. I’m too old for making out in the back of a car or the bloody hay shed. That’s not half what it’s made out to be. Hay is fucking itchy.’
Ella’s chuckle died in her throat. ‘I wouldn’t know, Jake. I’ve never had sex bent over a bale of hay.’
‘Bent over the bale …’ He was on fire again, visions of Ella over one of the sweet-smelling rolled bales. Knickers around her ankles, hair in a mahogany mess and that famous swimmer’s bottom just asking for his hand to grip it, shape it.
‘Ella,’ he groaned again.
‘I want what you want, Jake. I have for months. Every which way, wherever you want. I’ve never felt like this. I’ve waited all my life to feel like this. With you, it’s amazing.’
Here’s him, trying not to scare her with the weight of how much he loved her, and then she came out with all that.
‘Sam’s inside,’ he groaned, so sorely tempted to taste her lips again. ‘Abe is up at the fire. They’re expecting us. Ollie has been asking all afternoon when Sam will be here.’
‘So let’s go. It’s okay.’
But she chased his lips like there was no rush in the world, and when her mouth found his, she kissed him like there was no Sam, no Abe, no Ollie. No one else in the world.
Jake gritted his teeth and put her from him. ‘Let’s call Sam. He’ll want to see the bonny. When the sun goes down it will be amazing.’
‘Bonny?’ Ella echoed, through lips swollen with his kisses.
‘Bonfire. Come up with me in my car. We won’t try to get the Mazda up there.’
‘Good plan.’
Jake hollered in the front door for Sam, and the boy came running. ‘Hey, Jake.’
‘Hi, buddy. How’s the arm?’
‘Pretty good.’
‘Ready to go?’ Jake said to them both and he whistled for Jess.
With seat belts on, he shoved the car in drive and they were off with Jess loping behind. At the crest of the first rise where you could see up to the back of the farm, Sam said, ‘Wow,’ and Jake checked the rear-view mirror to find the boy’s eyes wide, staring at the stoked fire blazing orange as the daylight died.
‘That’s a pretty big bonfire,’ Ella said, eyes shining.
‘Not much point having a small bonfire, I reckon.’
He parked about thirty metres off the action, and the three of them got out of the car. Jake had already laid out some deckchairs close enough to the fire to keep Ella warm, but not so close she’d be uncomfortable.
‘There’s Ollie,’ Sam said, rushing forward to his mate as Ollie’s dad waved.
‘There’s a sausage sizzle on the go, Sam,’ Jake said. ‘Someone will get you a bun and a snag if you go ask for it.’
‘Okay.’ Then Sam remembered his manners. ‘Thanks.’
Jake grabbed a beer for Ella and one for himself, and made sure she was comfortable. Then he sat beside her. He copped a bit of ribbing from the fire boys, but he had to expect that. There were a few elbow nudges, a couple of cocked eyebrows. If Ella noticed, she didn’t say anything, but her eyes stayed pretty much glued to the fire.
‘Has that effect, doesn’t it?’ Jake said, shuffling his deckchair closer to hers.
‘Can’t look away?’
‘Yup.’
‘You could never do something like this in the city. You’d have every cop and firefighter in the metro area breathing down your neck. Not to mention neighbours grizzling about the smoke on their nice clean washing.’
‘We’ve got more smoke coming from the barbecue than the bonny,’ Jake said.
The fuel burned hot enough to not cover them in smoke, and most of the sparks simply spiralled skyward in an orange plume. The smell of sausages and lamb chops was stronger than the scent of eucalyptus leaves and branches burning.
Simple things for a country life.
He was glad Ella felt the magic.
‘I sent my email off to Marshall today … about Sam,’ Ella said, voice pitched so low it was a struggle to hear it over the crack and snap of the fire and the searing wheeze of the flames. ‘I wrote it last night.’
Jake touched her shoulder, cupping the curve. ‘What did you say?’
‘I rang the network in Sydney where he works and asked for his personal email address. I told them my name, and that we were doing a squad reunion for Erik Brecker’s swimmers from 2004–2007, and wanted to invite him.’
It wasn’t quite what Jake meant when he asked the question, but he let Ella carry the thought through. ‘They bought that?’
‘I think so. The woman I spoke with said she’d even heard of me and of Erik. How about
