When I felt her start to tighten around me, when I saw her legs quiver and felt her stroking rhythm get erratic and wild, I finally let loose. I plowed into her, dick hammering and balls swinging against her ass. She moaned my name and scrambled to find something to hold on to as I pounded into her so hard it started to move her farther up the bench. Her slick skin squeaked on the vinyl but neither one of us stopped to readjust.

I took her harder and more viciously than I had ever taken another woman and I knew I was driven by the fact that I didn’t want her to be able to forget me when it was time for us to go our separate ways. I wanted to fuck her better than any man that may come after me could.

I felt my orgasm start to coil and wind into a spring that was beyond ready to snap at the base of my spine. “Dixie.” It was a warning but it was also a plea. I never wanted her to get shortchanged when we were together like this, not after all the big promises I’d made to her about giving her the time of her life in the sack, but her demanding and serious way of fucking me back was unraveling me and blowing all my restraint to hell. I wanted to give her what she deserved, but she was just as determined to give me all the things I didn’t deserve.

She gave a wobbly smile and I saw her toes point and stiffen as her body broke under mine. The rush of pleasure from her orgasm pushed me ruthlessly into my own.

I’d had more than my fair share of sexual experiences since I lost my virginity when I was fifteen. But none of them compared to this one. None of them would be remembered because this one was the only one that felt like it mattered.

Sex with Dixie had proven to be different, deeper than any other sex I’d ever had, but I hadn’t realized until this minute that that was because she made it as much about me as I tried to make it about her. I wanted her to come first, figuratively and literally, but she wanted us to come together. She wanted to make sure that it was as good for me as I tried to make it for her.

I let her legs drop and watched as gravity pulled her body away from mine. Sex looked good on her. Sex with me looked perfect on her.

I let my gaze drift over every satiated, satisfied inch of her and couldn’t stop one of those grins she’d forced me to find from pulling at my lips.

“You glisten good, pretty girl.” And I wasn’t so sure anymore that I was going to be able to hand her off to someone else that might take better care of her if that meant I didn’t get to see her shine anymore.

THE REST OF my workout was put on hold since all my muscles felt like they were made of taffy and my bones had the rigidity of water after Dixie was done with me. She was yawning and barely able to keep her eyes open, so I walked her back to my childhood bedroom, but there was no way I was going to sleep. Not with my brain swirling around the information she had given me about the dating app and not with the realization that letting her go and handing her off to someone else might not be as easy as I’d once had myself convinced it would be. I was used to guarding my heart but somehow she had slipped under those ironclad defenses and imbedded some of her optimism and unshakable belief in the territory inside of me I thought was toxic and contaminated. Everything needed sunlight and care to flourish and grow. Dixie had both in spades and was relentless in her quest to turn my insides from something barren and lifeless into something that flourished and thrived with light and color.

After her breathing turned steady and even, I maneuvered my way out from under her freckled limbs, pulled on the black track pants I’d snagged from Jules, and quietly made my way through the house towards where the master bedroom was located. The silent journey was one down memory lane as well as down the hallway. It felt like yesterday that I’d been creeping down these same floors searching for comfort during angry storms or when I’d had a bad dream. Even after mom had passed, Jules was always there, always with an open door, ready to offer comfort and soft words that made everything in the world seem better. I’d always thought he could keep all the monsters at bay until we lost another amazing woman. It was then I realized there were some things even the bravest men couldn’t battle, so instead of staying to fight I chose to flee.

I didn’t make it to the bedroom because the sliding back door was open and the rich scent of a lit cigar wafted in from the outside. There was a big deck on the back of the house, where the barbecue to end all barbecues lived, and ever since I was little Jules had liked to sit out there with his feet propped up on the rail, smoking a stogie after a particularly long day at work. The smell was one of comfort and fond memories. It was one that made me feel like no matter how much had changed, more things, the important things, had stayed the same. The smell held regret and remorse for all the nights I’d missed it, missed the simple, quiet times with the man who raised me.

I pushed the door open wide enough to accommodate my shoulders and made my way over to the chair that was next to the one Jules was lounging in. The only light was coming from the half-moon overhead and the cherry glowing at the end of the cigar clamped between Jules’s teeth.

I propped my feet up and crossed them at the ankles, copying his pose without even thinking about it. I’d been emulating the man my entire life, tried to live up to all the big examples he set, but when it came down to it, I’d failed at being the man he raised me to be.

“I need you to dig up whatever you can on some people named Erikson. Joseph and Marie. I have a friend,” I used the term loosely, “in Denver who is dating a cop and I’m going to see if she’ll look into them as well. Dixie met the son online and went on a date that went sideways. It sounds like they might be our culprits.”