Free The Whip by Karen Kondazian

her.
    Beelzebub whinnied in protest, tossing his head.
    “No,” shouted Charlotte, grabbing the reins back. “Don’t pull on him like that. You’ll wreck his mouth.”
    “What do you know?”
    “A horse’s mouth is very sensitive, just like yours or mine.”
    They were standing very near each other. Lee leaned into Charlotte, his gaze traveling down the curve rising in the front of her shirt, then up to Charlotte’s lips. “Oh?”
    “Yes,” she answered. “You should always ride with more legs than hands. If you yank too hard on the bit it hurts him. He won’t feel the feel anymore. His mouth can get numb and pretty soon he’s no good because he won’t respond to the reins. ‘Cold mouth,’ is what Jonas calls it.”
    “Your mouth ain’t cold…is it?”
    “Stop it, Lee. I’m busy.”
    She stepped back. She could feel the rough stable wall behind her.
    “You weren’t too busy last week for it. Let me see if your mouth can follow the feel.”
    Lee stepped forward to kiss her. He was staring at her mouth as if hypnotized by it. Charlotte turned her head away and licked her lips. She saw its effect on him: a wild agitation that seemed to flicker all through his body. Curious to test her powers, she licked her lips again, slower this time. He seized hold of her wrists with a pincer grasp.
    “Charlotte,” he groaned.
    She tore her arms away from him. “Stop. You’re hurting me.”
    Jonas heard Charlotte cry out. He appeared from inside the barn, taking it all in.
    “You come to help today, Lee?” he asked.
    “Nah.” Lee turned and shuffled away, pausing to give Charlotte one last quick glance over his shoulder. She met eyes with him and for a moment they stared at each other. Then he turned his head down, spat on the ground and left.

Nineteen
    That night, Charlotte slept as she always did , with Beelzebub. She slept under a blanket on a small pile of hay in one corner of the stall. The stallion snorted from time to time. Under his lids his eyes were moving back and forth, back and forth. Charlotte’s sleep was also restless that night; something in her dreams of Lee kept not happening.
    Just short of midnight she woke to the sound of a low melodious whistle nearby. She opened her eyes and saw light. Looking down at her over the front of the stall, grinning his lopsided grin, was Lee, lantern in hand. She realized at that moment that she was not surprised. Hadn’t she been waiting all night for him? Hadn’t she known he was coming?
    Awake now, Beelzebub’s nervous hooves started to dance towards Charlotte’s head.
    “Beelzebub,” she hissed. She rolled out of reach just in time to avoid being stepped on by the stallion. She let herself out of the stall.
    “What are you doing here?”
    Lee placed the lantern on the ground. She saw he had a small bundle with him, tied together with rope. He gave her a wan champion’s smile.
    “They finally kicked me out. No more work here. Let’s go,” he said.
    “Go? Where?”
    “Anywhere.”
    Charlotte slumped against the stall, her blanket wrapped around her.
    “I’ll take care of you,” he said. “Didn’t I always take care of you?”
    “I can’t,” she said in a tiny voice. It had all just washed over her, the dreams she’d had, what she’d thought of doing with him.
    “Why not?”
    “I can’t leave Jonas and Beelzebub and the horses,” she added.
    “Who the hell cares about them?”
    “I do. I’m not going to run away.”
    Lee turned around and punched the stall door hard with his hand. The stallion pinned his ears and whinnied. For a moment it looked as if Lee might hit Charlotte too. But instead the intensity drained from his face and was replaced by an icy casualness. He leaned in very close to her. “You owe me,” he said.
    He reached out his hand and pushed it under the blanket and touched her long nightshirt, an old man’s nightshirt, where one of her breasts strained against the fabric. At this he sucked in his breath. When