Sorry for the wait! I will have the last chapters out a lot faster. I also highly recommend reading the first four chapters before this one so everything makes sense. -The Author
The long, quiet ride gave Esther an unwelcome amount of time to ruminate over the turn her and Grant's situation had taken.
Yes, she had agreed to let him use her but she felt manipulated by how he had extracted strangely captivating feelings in her body.
The way he exploited her body to get aroused and then humiliated her for it made her squirm with shame.
The ache between her legs and the wetness of his cum slowly dripping out of her was an uncomfortable reminder of their recent activity.
Grant stopped his horse, Sunshine, earlier than the previous days. The sun well over an hour away from setting.
"I need to dig for water," Grant explained without Esther asking. "We won't be finding any creeks for a couple days."
He slid off Sunshine and turned to help down Esther, but she ignored him and slid to the ground steadying herself with Sunshine's saddle. She winced from the impact but did her best to hide the pain.
Grant took a spade from one of his packs and started digging near a clump of desert plants. After about a foot down, the sand starting getting damp.
"If you're ever stranded in the desert and are digging for water, if you don't see moisture after digging about this far, it's best to look for a different spot altogether."
Esther looked into the sandy hole, but didn't say anything.
Grant studied her impassive face for a second, then returned to his digging. When he was satisfied with his work he sat back on his heels.
"Now we just have to wait," he said cheerily.
Esther kept ignoring him.
Grant got up and went to sit next to her, but she turned away.
"Are you angry at me?" he asked.
"No."
"It sure seems like you are. Is it because I called you a slut?"
"No."
"I thought we had a deal, Esther."
"I haven't stopped you from doing anything."
"Then what's the problem?"
"You might think it's laughable, but I still have morals. I agreed to this deal so I could get back to the father of my child and not live in sin. There's a big difference in me doing what I have to do and just plain, old sin."
"So by your logic, if you don't enjoy the sex it's less sinful?"
"I suppose that it is what I'm saying. In this situation at least."
"No one forced you to make this deal, or come all this way. You could have stayed home, let the kid start to show and deal with the consequences. There's monasteries and such for that kind of thing."
"It's not that simple."
"You mean this is the perfect excuse to get with Rob. And officially this time."
Esther's eyes flashed with anger at Grant.
"You wouldn't know anything about it. The closest you've ever had to love was a whore you paid to say how wonderful you are, I'm sure."
Grant chuckled. "I suppose you're not wrong."
His flippant response made her even angrier.
"You know what I think?" he asked after a few moments.
"What do you think?" she asked sarcastically.
"I think you're angry at yourself. I think you wanted me to fuck you today and you have no idea what to do with that. You want a man to touch you, to run his hands over every inch of your body. You want to be irresistible and can't handle being ignored but you also can't face what that says about your morals."
Esther moved to slap him but he caught her wrist in time.
"Don't do that again."
She pulled her wrist from his grasp and wrapped her arms around her legs, folding her knees to her chest.
"Okay, fine," Grant said standing up. "I hear you loud and clear. I won't try to make things nice for you anymore. From now on I'll be selfish so you can feel better about your choices."
Esther sullenly watched as he got a clean towel out of a pack and went to the hole he'd dug in the sand. Water had started pooling inside and he used the towel to sop it up and squeeze into a pot. He did this several times to collect enough to give Sunshine to drink.
After watering Sunshine, he brought Esther what was left of their creek water which she accepted with stony silence. He drank the desert water himself.
As night started falling, he lit a fire using a giant pile of dead weeds and dry grasses. Supper consisted of beans and hard biscuits.
After supper Grant pulled out his whittling kit, leaving Esther to her own devices once more.
She finally got bored enough to speak to him again. "Do you have an extra whittling knife?" she tried to sound nonchalant.
Grant motioned toward the bag next to him with his head. Taking this as permission to use it, Esther sat next to him and rummaged in the bag, finding a small sheathed knife and a few blocks of wood.
She held up a three by three inch square of wood. "Is this alright to use?"
Grant looked up, nodded, and returned to his work.
Esther decided she was going to make a simple duck like the ones that swam in the pond near her old home.
She started rounding the edges that met a corner to form the tail feathers.
"You're pushing the knife too deep," Grant interrupted her process. She didn't even realize he'd been watching her work.
"Whittling is more gradual. Work in layers and let the form emerge softly. And you're going to get quite the blister if you hold your thumb against the knife like that. Here,"he reached over and adjusted her hand around the knife. "Hold it like this."
"Thank you."
They whittled in silence, Grant occasionally getting up to add more dead branches and weeds to the fire. Esther looked over at his work and saw what was beginning to resemble an intricately shaped snake.
Her own duck looked rather pitiful by comparison.
"So what exactly is your plan once you get to Branden?" Grant broke the silence. "Will you just show up at Rob's house and hope for the best?"
"Well first I'll have to track him down. I don't know how big the town is. And I'll have to talk to him before his parents see me. They'e the ones who want him to marry that bitch," Esther clamped a hand over her mouth. She'd never sworn like that before.
Grant laughed. "No one out here to hear you cuss, Esther. Call that bitch a bitch all you like."
Esther smiled. "She might be a bitch, but her parents may very well be pressuring her to marry Rob as well. Just a big business opportunity for both families."
"Well that's life isn't it?"
"I didn't used to think so."
"So what's your backup plan if it doesn't work out?"
"It has to. And Rob is too honorable. He knows it's his duty to marry the woman who's carrying his child. It takes two to make a baby."
"But there's only one parent known for certain."
"I already told you Rob was my first and only."
"Well, not everyone knows that."
Esther was getting frustrated with the conversation so she stayed silent.
After almost an hour, Grant stretched his arms while yawning. "Alright, enough whittling," he said, collecting the knives and wood and packing them away. Esther yawned reflexively. She reached for her bag with her sleeping clothes.
"Hold up. I didn't say it was time to sleep. You're going to suck me off again but this time you'll do it properly."
Esther could only guess what that meant.
Like before, Grant found a rock to sit on and Esther knelt in front of him.
"Undo the top of your dress."
She undid the top few buttons and Grant pulled her sleeves down off her shoulders. He reached behind her back and unclasped her bralette, letting it fall. Her nipples stiffened from the cold, desert night.
"I'm going to watch your tits dance while I use that pretty mouth of yours," he said, unbuckling his belt and pulling out his dick. He stroked it a few times getting it to its full, over-seven-inch size.
Esther resisted a dry swallow.
Grant spit on his dick making Esther internally recoil.
"Open your mouth," he pushed his mushroom tip against her lips. She obeyed, and the sour, salty, and odd fleshy taste she wasn't accustomed to filled her mouth.
