The Boss(hole) by Penelope Bloom
Adrian
Fucking tent. I’d initially tried to brute force the thing. It had unfolded aggressively and somehow managed to invert itself. It took me a few minutes of struggling to fix that, but then I couldn’t figure out how to get the final compartment to unfold. I was grunting when Jules walked up with a set of directions in her hands.
“I’ve taken a look at these and concluded you’re doing almost everything completely wrong.”
I grinned. “Believe it or not, I used to go camping all the time as a kid. All this survival stuff was kind of a hobby, actually. Feels like another life.”
“Didn’t use tents much?” she asked, grinning.
“Not like this,” I admitted. “We always had simpler stuff back then. The cheaper ones weren’t so complicated.”
“Well,” Jules said, glancing at the directions and then reaching past me. Her chest pressed into my arm as she reached for something by my ankle. She tugged and there was a metallic click. The last section of the tent popped open. “There,” she said. “You were missing a latch.”
“What next?” I asked.
“Oh?” Jules raised an eyebrow. “Is the caveman ready to consult the directions full time now?”
I glared. “I didn’t think I’d need directions for a tent. You just unfold it and stick it into the ground. Now that it's not inverted, I’m sure I can figure the rest out.”
“Be my guest,” Jules said. She folded her arms and watched with an amused expression while I tried and failed to figure out what to do next. I was halfway into hammering the edges of the tent into the dirt when she brought out a vinyl baggie of stakes I hadn’t noticed. “Before you break it, you are supposed to use these.”
I had to admit defeat and let Jules help me with the rest of setting up the tent. It turned out she wasn’t just an impressive personal assistant, she was a natural outdoorswoman. She got our tent going, then set up the cooktop I’d bought.
We teased each other, mostly in the form of her laughing when I failed to figure out how to do something obvious. All my knowledge of plants, animals, and survival techniques apparently didn’t extend to setting up expensive camping equipment that was all far more complicated than it needed to be.
Maybe the process should’ve been frustrating, but all I could do was be impressed. She really was quite the woman, and I was reminded of how I needed to make sure I never took that for granted. I had no idea how this thing between us could last, but I wanted to savor it while it did.
We spent most of the afternoon hiking through beautiful natural trails. Our favorite was a long, upward trek up the mountain. At one point, we had to hop across slick pebbles and an icy stream to continue. Jules managed the crossing, but my foot slid on the last rock, and I fell on my ass in the ankle-deep water. It was worth it to see the way she laughed until her sides hurt.
We were both still smiling about it when we reached the end of the trail, which took us straight to the base of a waterfall. There was a challenging trail up to get a closer look that had us climbing up steep rock faces, but nothing so tall it was particularly dangerous.
By the time we finished our day of hiking and were back to our tent, we were both comfortably exhausted and ready for dinner.
I wasn’t the best cook, but I knew enough to put together a simple meal of pasta with some veggies and a white wine sauce. Jules helped me roast a chicken over the fire, which went poorly. Neither of us apparently knew the finer points of outdoor cooking and we ended up burning the chicken to oblivion when we took our eyes off it for a couple minutes.
But the pasta turned out delicious, and the two of us drank what was left of the white wine we’d used for the sauce.
“Not bad,” Jules said. We were both sitting in outdoor chairs we’d set up around our fire. She set the plate down at her feet and sat back, sighing with relief. It was a comfortably warm night, and we’d gotten lucky with bugs. I knew certain times of year could be miserable, but somehow, we seemed to have dodged them for the most part.
I poked the smoldering, blackened chicken we’d set in the leaves by the fire with my stick. “Not good, either.”
She laughed. “We should probably get rid of that so a bear doesn’t come or something.”
“We can hike out and set it somewhere away from camp. A wild animal would probably enjoy this.”
“Look at you,” she said. “I didn’t take you for the type to care about the welfare of animals.”
“It’s like I said. This stuff used to be a big part of my life,” I said.
“How’d you go from all of this to the business world, anyway?”
“That’s just how things go sometimes, I guess. Life gets in the way of dreams.”
“That’s depressing.”
I got up, sticking my hand out for her to take it. “You’re right. Let’s go donate this chicken to nature and talk about something else.”
It was late and most of the campsites now flickered with fires of their own. Families sat out roasting marshmallows or cooking dinner. Intermittent spurts of laughter echoed into the darkness.
I put my arm around Jules, pulling her into my side as we walked. I held the destroyed chicken with my other hand. I’d speared it with a stick to make it easier to carry and keep from burning my hands. Even though it had been sitting for almost half an hour, it was still hot as hell.
“Is this really going to work?” Jules asked after we’d left the sounds of the campsites behind.
“It’s not that complicated. I’ll just set the chicken down somewhere and an animal will find it.”
“Us, I mean. Like what happens if your plan works, and Coleton goes down in flames? Do we ride off into the sunset together, or do you ride off into the sunset and I’m left waving goodbye?”
“To be honest, I haven’t thought about what comes after. I’ve been driving towards this for so long. I guess I don’t even know what I want after. I just know I want Russ Coleton to regret what he did.”
We stopped by a lake. It was a beautiful little spot. Trees hemmed it in on all sides and we had to walk down a steep slope to reach it. The moon was out in full and covered the lake in silver, shimmering light.
“I still don’t even understand how this wound up happening, for the record. Us, I mean.”
“Are you trying to say I’m not charming?” I asked.
Jules laughed. She hugged my arm, looking out over the water with me. “You’re no Prince Charming. No. But I’ve been around the same kind of powerful man for so long. I guess you were just so different that I couldn’t stop myself from being fascinated by you.”
“And what if I’m not as different as you think?” I asked.
“You are, though. But I still don’t understand why you are interested in me. You could have any woman you want.”
“I told myself I wouldn’t distract myself with relationships until this was all over. I didn’t realize how long that would be when I made that promise to myself. Still, I had no trouble sticking to it until you came along. I wish I could put my finger on what it was, but you defy my self-control, Jules. You’re dangerous for me because you’re the only person who can make me forget how badly I want Russ Coleton to pay.”
“Is it my bubbly personality, maybe?” she asked. She was speaking low and sexy, with her hands on the hem of her shirt as she took a few steps back. “Or maybe you only want me for my body?” She tugged her shirt off, then shimmied out of her shorts, laughing as she tossed the shorts at my face. She kicked off her shoes and socks, then started wading into the water, then plucked off her bra and slung it toward the shore. She reached under the water and produced a soaked pair of panties a moment later, which she threw to join the pile of discarded clothes at my feet.
This damn woman. I looked over my shoulder, but I knew we’d hiked quite a distance from the campsite. I set down the blackened chicken on a stick and tore off my shirt, pants, and shoes. By the time the water was at my chest, I was as naked as Jules was.
She was still smiling as she waded in the water backwards. She’d dipped her head under so her hair was wet and slicked back away from her forehead.
I swam toward her, quickly closing the distance while she tried to doggy paddle away from me. I was a fast swimmer, and I caught her almost immediately.
I put my arms around her slick body, carrying her under one arm until I could get my feet on the rocky ground of the lake. Jules struggled against me, laughing while I toted her back. I had my footing, but she had to cling to me to stay afloat if she didn’t want to have to tread water. She wrapped her legs around my waist, chewing her lip.
My already hard cock was sandwiched between us. She felt it too and gave me a taunting little wiggle of her eyebrows. She put both arms around my neck, then began slowly moving her hips up and down, stroking my cock with her pussy beneath the water.
I took two handfuls of her ass, squeezing as I kissed her. She moaned into my mouth and her movements grew more feverish. The water started to ripple out from us as she kept grinding into me. I took her by the hips and slid her downward. I pushed myself up toward her, gripping my cock with one hand and guiding it inside her.
She buried her face in the crook between my neck and shoulder, moaning softly.
I fucked her until the water was bubbling from the motion of our bodies moving against each other. When we’d finished, my back was raw from where her fingertips had dug into me, and I was pleasantly exhausted.
“Well,” she said, clearing her throat. “I have to say I probably should’ve seen that coming, but I’ll be the first to say I didn’t.”
I grinned. “You thought you could invite me skinny dipping and not get fucked?”
“When you say it like that, it does sound unlikely.”
I kissed her, holding her close to me and enjoying the slick feeling of her bare body against mine. It was so fucking peaceful out in the water. The only sounds were the gentle lapping of crisp lakewater against our bodies and the rustle of trees in every direction. Out here, I could forget about it all. About needing revenge. About work. I could imagine simply walking away and laying it all down. Living a different kind of life.
“We should probably get back to our tent before we get too cold,” I said after a few minutes of peacefully holding her against me in the water.
“Do we have to?” Jules asked.
I grinned. “We should. We’ve got a drive ahead of us tomorrow. And I don’t want to keep you up all night.”
“Bad news,” she said. “I think that’s a bear standing on our clothes.”
“What?” I asked.
Sure enough, there was a bear devouring the chicken we’d stupidly left by our clothes.
“Wow,” I said. “That’s a black bear.”
“Okay, Mr. Former Outdoorsman. In your expert opinion, should we go ask it if we can have our clothes back?”
“Black bears are generally pretty timid,” I said.
“I forbid it,” Jules said, clutching me tighter. “I’m just starting to like you. I’m not about to let you go pull a naked Steve Irwin and try to shoo that thing away.”
I laughed. “You forbid it, do you? What are you going to do to stop me, exactly?”
Jules got a look of determination on her face. She dipped her right shoulder slightly and a moment later, I felt why. I went tense as she took me around my still hard cock in a vice grip.
I groaned. “Oh,” I said.
“Yeah, oh,” Jules said, grinning wickedly. “I’ve got you by the cock, and I know where to find your balls if we need to escalate this situation.”
“Alright,” I said. I grinned, then moved my hips against her hand, forcing her to give me some semblance of a hand job.
“Don’t turn this erotic,” she warned. “I’ll jack you off and go right back to threatening to squeeze your balls. I swear I will.”
I chuckled. “We’ll just wait until it finishes, then. It’s no big deal.”
“You or the bear?” she asked.
“Either,” I said.
We waited there, half wrestling in the water until Jules followed through on her promise, except I couldn’t stop myself from sliding inside her again and fucking her from behind after a few minutes of her hand on me. It was an interesting challenge in the water, but I was able to press her ass against me and hold her head above water while I did what I wanted with her.
I spun her to face me for a kiss when I was done, but she reached right back down and took me by the balls this time.
“Wow,” I said, trying not to panic. I didn’t know if she understood the pure power of literally having a man by the balls. A single muscle impulse from her could have me bent over in nauseating pain. I looked toward the bear and my stomach sank when I saw it was sleeping and three cubs were flopping around nearby. “Bad news. Black bears are kind of aggressive when their cubs are around. And that one looks like it’s sleeping. I think that’s your underwear it’s sleeping on.”
“What do we do?” Jules asked, still gripping my balls.
“We swim to that shore over there.” I pointed. “And we sneak our naked asses back into camp. It’s probably almost midnight. Chances are they’ll all be sleeping anyway.