by L. D. Davis
When Leo and I returned to the house later, I started to head toward the bedroom, but he gently grasped my hand to stop me. He nodded toward the back of the house.
“It’s a beautiful night. Let’s take a walk on the beach.”
I smiled. It was a beautiful night. The moon was high and bright and despite the city lights, stars were visible, twinkling in the dark sky. I let him guide me outside, but I had to pause.
“As much as you would love to take these shoes off of me later, I can’t walk through sand in three inch heels,” I told him.
He smiled. “I’m not disappointed,” he said, kissing the little dip just under my bottom lip. “I still get to unwrap the rest of the package.”
After all of the sweet things Leo always said to me, you would think that I would have stopped blushing and smiling like a shy little girl, but he had that effect on me, more so then than before. Despite the fact that we hadn’t seen each other much since Chicago, our relationship had bloomed into something new and wonderful, but remaining familiar at the same time. Once I made up my mind, really made up my mind about Leo, something inside of me shifted and burst open. I was overflowing with emotions for him. I couldn’t go more than a few hours without texting him or talking to him on the phone. Every night I fell asleep only seconds after hearing his voice in my ear on the phone, and a few times we fell asleep together while Skyping. When we were together, I couldn’t stay away from him, couldn’t stop touching him and holding him and kissing him. If he had to go take care of any business, I almost always stayed behind to get my own work finished, but the moment he walked through the door, I would stop typing, mid-sentence sometimes, before saving my work and hurrying to be in his arms.
“Sit down, dolcezza.” He led me to a chair.
I sat down and Leo dropped to one knee in front of me and began to carefully remove my shoes. He was enjoying it so much that I wondered aloud if he had some kind of foot fetish.
He smiled. “No, not really, but I like your feet. Especially in a pair of heels. The first time I saw you in a pair of heels was in tenth grade for the homecoming dance.”
I laughed. “Tack had a fit! It was one of the last times he paid enough attention to care, but he said no sister of his was going to homecoming in fuck-me heels.”
Leo laughed, shaking his head. “Yeah, they were hot. Fire engine red with a strap around your ankle. What were they, like three inches?”
“Three and a half. I couldn’t walk all the next day.”
“I remember, but what I remember most is dancing with you that night.”
My shy smile returned. “Really?”
That night my date got kicked out of homecoming for trying to spike the punch, which was so in itself cliché that I refused to even speak to him for weeks after that. Leslie was busy with her cheerleading friends pretending to admire each other’s dresses, hair, and makeup. Leo tugged on my hand until I got out of my seat and danced with him. The songs were fast at first, and Leo was being ridiculous and grandiose in his dance moves, but grudgingly, I was having a good time. When “Always and Forever” by Heatwave came on, Leo and I wordlessly and easily shifted into slow dancing mode. I put one of my hands into his and the other on his shoulder while his other hand gently grasped my waist. We kept a respectable distance apart; he was my best friend’s boyfriend after all. Leo sang the entire song, spinning me around and guiding me across the floor more than necessary. I giggled and smiled, and when he urged me to sing with him, I did. He couldn’t hit the high notes at the end very well, but that didn’t stop him from belting the song out, drawing attention from half of the room. The whole thing had been so fun, and silly…and sweet and romantic. I was too young and I didn’t see it then, but had my life been a movie, it would have been one of those defining moments that made the audience sigh.
I blinked out of the memory when I heard Leo absently singing the song under his breath as he removed my second shoe. He carefully put my shoes on a table and pulled off his own shoes before he extended his hand to me. I stood up and laced my fingers with his and we walked out onto the sand.
There was a breeze coming off of the ocean, blowing the skirt of my dress about my ankles. It was…perfect. The moonlit beach was relatively private, so we saw no one else as we strolled along the water’s edge, getting our feet wet in the surf.
Spontaneously, I walked a little deeper into the water, soaking the hem of my dress. My arm was extended backward, holding onto Leo’s fingers. I took another step and his hold on me slipped until only our first two fingers were linked. One more step and his hand fell away. I walked into the water until small waves were crashing over my knees. My dress billowed out around me, appearing to be some kind of floatation device. I turned around and looked at Leo, standing on the beach watching me with his hands in his pockets. My Roman god, with the moon shining in his hair and on his strong body.
There were only a few feet of water between us and as sappy as it sounds, I already missed him, already regretted the space between us. What was I going to do with a whole sea between us for six weeks? I had lost so much time with Leo over the years, and I was going to lose more time. I wouldn’t shirk my commitments, but for a moment, I wished that I had a normal job and was home with my guy at the end of every night.
“I don’t want to go,” I called out to him. “Can’t you come with me?”
“You have your commitments and I have mine, dolcezza,” Leo said with a sad smile. “Come on out of there. I want to talk to you.”
“We are talking,” I said, being cheeky.
“Don’t make me come in there and get you,” he said with an air of danger that made my toes curl into the floor of the Atlantic. “Come on. I want to talk.”
I frowned. The last time he wanted to talk, he never got around to it and I had found out about Leslie. Was what he had to talk about going to be another blow to our relationship? Despite my reservations, I made my way out of the water. As soon as I was within arm’s reach of Leo, he held out his hand to me. I took it and he pulled me to him.
“Why do you look so worried?” he asked softly, pressing away a worried crease between my eyebrows with his thumb.
“The last time you wanted to have a conversation, Rohanna beat you to it,” I said warily.
He looked apologetic and regretful. “I’m sorry,” he said. “But I promise you that it’s nothing like that.”
I let out a small sigh of relief. “Then talk, Pesciano.”
He smiled and nodded his head obligingly. “Of course, Miss Tackard. You sure like saying my last name.”
I shrugged. “It rolls off the tongue.”
“Really,” he arched an eyebrow.
“Really. Kiss me and I’ll prove it.”
I didn’t have to tell him twice. He cupped my cheek in his hand and brought his lips to mine. My lips moved slowly against his for several moments before his tongue sought entry. I opened for him, gladly accepting him. After a couple of minutes, Leo pulled back and looked into my eyes.
“You’re right, it does roll right off of your tongue.”
“If you ever doubt it again, I will gladly demonstrate it some more,” I said.
“I’m glad that you like saying my surname,” he said in a panty-burning voice as he held onto the fingers of my left hand. “Because you’re going to be using it a lot when you marry me.”
Something cool and round slipped over the tip of my ring finger. I froze, staring up at him with wide eyes as the metal eased over my first and then second knuckle. Slowly, he raised my hand to his lips. I stared at my hand in stunned silence. At some point, probably while we were kissing, he had taken the ring out of his pocket unnoticed. Dumbly, I wondered how I didn’t realize that there had been something in his pocket, or how he didn’t lose it in the endless grains of sand.
Even though it was night, the moon was substantially bright and I had no problems seeing the large oval cut center diamond with several smaller diamonds to each side, or the gleaming
platinum band they sat on.
“Leo,” I whispered as my emotions rushed in like a tide.
His hands found my waist and I met his eyes. His gaze was so heavy it made my knees weak.
“Tabitha, I waited a long time for you to come back into my life. I’ve waited a long time to feel again the way that only you can make me feel—stripped down, bare, and raw. You are more than my other half. You are in my bones, in my blood.” He pulled my body flush with his. “You are marrying me, Tabitha, amore mio. There is no question about that.”
“Well, I already said yes,” I replied, wiping away tears.
“I don’t need your permission,” he came back at me with a smirk. “It’s not like you truly ever had an option.”
“I’m not sure if I want to punch you or kiss you.”
“You don’t have an option in that either,” Leo said, and then he consumed me with his kiss.
The blazing passion was instantaneous. It was like the ring on my finger magnified the crackling energy between us, intensified the heat that was now rushing through my limbs and straight to my core. When Leo’s hands possessively curved around my neck, shocking shivers raced down my spine. We kissed as if the world was ending on that night, and it was the last thing we would ever do.
I wanted him and I could not and would not wait. I dropped my hand between us and squeezed his denim-encased cock. Leo growled and grinded into my hand. The kiss grew maddening, rough, and demanding. When Leo bucked hard against my hand, I stumbled back slightly, but tripped over the hem of my wet dress. Leo didn’t let go as he fell with me, he didn’t take his mouth away from mine. I fell back onto the wet sand where the waves were lapped at the beach. Leo didn’t crush me when he followed me down, careful to brace himself on his arms on either side of my head, but his body was on mine, grinding against me. The sea reached for us with its warm tendrils, washing over our legs and halfway up our bodies.
When Leo finally broke away from my lips, we were both breathless and panting loudly and obscenely. He pulled hard on the thin straps of my dress, tearing them away from the fabric as he feverishly yanked on the top to uncover my breasts. When they were free, Leo groaned and cupped them in his hands as his tongue moved across my throat. His teeth bit into my neck, making me shriek, but I didn’t want him to stop. The pulling, pinching pain of him marking me fueled the inferno inside of me. His fingers pinched and plucked at my nipples as he marked me again on my clavicle. Then his mouth was on my hard and sensitive peaks, holding my breasts together so that he could suck them both into his mouth at once.
“I need to feel you,” Leo growled after he had sucked and bit on my nipples until they were sore. “I need to be inside of you, feel your pussy squeezing my cock.”
Leo got on his knees and began to push my soaked dress up. He pushed it up to my hips and then reached for my panties. I let out a surprised cry when he tore them off of me, tore them into pieces with inhuman growls. As he went to work releasing the button and zipper on his jeans, waves of water splashed over us, over my open wide legs and onto my pussy, but no amount of water could put out the fire inside of me.
Leo pulled his pants down just below his ass before losing patience and settling over me. There was no preamble, no soft-spoken words, no preparation. With one hard thrust, Leo buried himself inside of me to the hilt. When my scream began to pierce the night, Leo’s hand came over my mouth, absorbing the noise.
“Scream again,” he panted as he pulled out and thrust into me again, hard and swift. I did scream again, and again.
There was no control from the beginning. Leo’s eyes were hooded as he looked down at me, his mind gone, only lust existing. He rammed into me without mercy. My fingers dug into the sand, and then into the flesh of his ass as he battered me with his well-endowed erection. My eyes found the moon and the stars and I felt like I was floating up into their depths, a ball of fire soaring into the sky to light up the night. I was ready to explode, to combust, and incinerate everything near me.
Leo’s grunts and growls were getting deeper and longer. His hand across my mouth was tightening and his other hand squeezed my thigh. I didn’t want to climax without him. I needed to feel his come mixing with mine. When he started cursing in Italian, I knew he was close. Suddenly, he took his hand off of my mouth, replacing it with his own swollen lips. Leo roared into my mouth as his orgasm rippled through him and as he slammed into me. I cried into his mouth, biting his tongue as my body erupted into pure heat as hot as the sun. Every aching part of me burned as his semen flooded into me.
“Il mio amore , sei la mia vita,” Leo murmured, breathlessly onto my cheek.
“Always,” I whispered.
I flew to London on an airplane, though with the natural high I was on, I could have flown to London without the use of the megaton tin box. We decided to keep the news of our engagement quiet until I returned from overseas. Leo wanted us to tell our families and friends in person, and I was okay with that. I was more than okay with that. I liked sharing something so monumental and life altering with only Leo, having our own little, warm, and fuzzy secret to talk about and smile about.
There were approximately two weeks between each of my engagements, but not only would the cost of flying back and forth have been ridiculous, but I wasn’t really thrilled about hanging in the air over water any more than necessary. Suzanna and I found plenty to do in each city, especially in London. We even spent three days in Paris, two days in Spain, and three days in Italy.
I talked to Leo every day, every opportunity that we had. He swore he was never letting me go so far out of his reach again. For my next tour, he would be coming with me, he vowed.
Originally, my plan had been to leave Australia a week after the signing. I had a list of things I wanted to see and do. Going to the Down Under had been on my bucket list since I was old enough to know what a bucket list was. It was something I was supposed to do with Leslie, something we had spoken about often as small children, and maybe mentioned it again when we were in college. Suzanna was a perfect assistant and great company, as well as some of the other authors that had attended the large signing, but not only did I miss Leo and the comforts of home, I was nostalgic and I missed my friend. I missed Leslie, the Leslie of old, my best friend throughout my childhood. I didn’t even know who she was anymore, the things she liked to do, the places she went, the kind of friends she had or how she liked to wear her hair or what her favorite pair of shoes were. She was like an acquaintance that I knew by face, and knew by name, but was otherwise a mystery to me, fading back into the crowds and then forgotten again.
As I looked down at the ring on my finger, I knew that she had to be the first person Leo and I told, and we had to do it in person. No, not we. Me. I had to tell her. I owed her that much at least. It was better to do it sooner rather than later. Knowing Leslie and her failure to answer my calls, I would have to track her down and show up uninvited. Feeling a sense of urgency to tackle that meeting and an eagerness to be with Leo, I left beautiful Australia a whole week early.
I didn’t tell Leo I was coming. I wanted to surprise him, but that’s the thing about surprises. Sometimes they backfire, and you’re the one who ends up surprised.
I landed in Miami a little before one on a Wednesday afternoon. The lunch rush hour had come and gone by the time all of my things were loaded into the back of my rental. I had made arrangements with Christina during my last layover in L.A. I couldn’t surprise Leo looking like a hot mess from traveling and wearing yesterday’s underwear. While I was sure my fiancé loved me unconditionally, I wanted to look pretty for our reunion. I was going to freshen up at her house.
Christina sat on the vanity of the bathroom while I showered, shaved, and washed my hair in record time. I told her about our engagement, which made her so excited I thought she was going to throw open the shower curtain and hug my naked, soapy body, which may have been awkward. She talked about the guy she was seeing, and his weird quirks. I was close with Ma
yson and Sandy, and even closer to Donya than I ever expected to be, but this blooming friendship with Christina felt a little different, in a good way, and I was glad to have a true friend before my move to Miami became final.
She retreated to the living room while I got out of the shower and dressed. She returned while I did my hair. Leo didn’t really care for women in makeup, but a little eyeliner and lip-gloss never failed me. I had dressed in a white sleeveless button up shirt, belted at my waist with a wide black belt, black skinny capris, and my prized pair of Jimmy Choo red patent pumps, raising my height by over four inches. Leo liked my hair down, so I wore it pulled over one shoulder. I thought I looked pretty good and Christina confirmed it. I didn’t linger long after that, but promised I would call her soon.
When I pulled into the driveway, I felt a little nervous, which was silly. I had no idea if Leo was even home. I had sent him a text after I landed, but he hadn’t answered. I wasn’t worried. Leo spent a lot of time at the building site for Leo’s On the Bay, and he often still went into the restaurant to help out there, and once in a while, he would go check out houses he considered purchasing and renovating. With the garage door lowered, it was possible he was home. Quietly, I unlocked the door and eased myself into the house.
Two things struck me at once: the distinct scent of Chanel No. 5 mixed with the distinct scent of Suave Strawberries and Cream, Leslie’s favorite shampoo, and the sound of Leslie’s voice from deep in the house.
Chapter Twenty-Three