by Madison Faye
I look at her, and I grin as I start to yank the bandages off.
“What?” she says shyly, glancing at me as we pull away from the garage.
“You,” I grin. “Just, you.”
She blushes, biting her lip in this way that makes me want her even more.
“My bag?”
She nods. “From the trunk of the wrecked car? Got it.” She snorts. “I mean, was it that important to get a duffle bag full of shoes, jeans, and t-shirts?”
I smile. “Yep.”
She’ll know soon enough.
We head to Aria’s apartment first for her passport and as much as she can pack in five minutes. Then we roar to the airport, the traffic low this time of night, and we get there in great timing. While I was picking at my damn Jell-O, I used my phone to grab last minute tickets, which cost me a small fortune, but it’s fine.
Believe me, it’s fine.
“Jack, how are you…” she frowns as pull into the long term parking lot, and I grin.
“How am I going to get on that plane?”
She turns, nodding quietly. “I mean, that detective said the FBI—”
“Do you trust me?”
Her eyes lock with mine, fire sparks between us, and she doesn’t even hesitate.
“Yes,” she whispers.
I smile. “Then let’s get out of here.”
I grab my bag in one hand, her hand in the other, and we race inside the departure’s terminal. I march us over to the ticketing window, and Aria’s jaw drops when I ask about upgrading to first class.
“Jack—”
“We, uh, we do actually have two available!” the airline worker smiles brightly. “They, well, they’re a three-thousand-dollar upgrade from your current seats.” She winces. “Each.”
“Great, book it.”
She blinks and smiles before she starts typing away on her keyboard, and Aria tugs on my hand.
“Jack, how—”
“Actually,” I growl, turning so only Aria can hear me. “For this flight, it’s Winston.”
She arches a brow, but before she can open that pretty mouth and ask, I’ve turned back to the airline employee. “And that’ll be cash, if that’s okay?”
She blinks in surprise. “Oh, uh, yes! That would be fine, Mr—”
“Churchill.”
“Oh you’re fucking kidding me,” Aria groans next to me, and I have to hold back the chuckle.
I smile at the airline employee and slide her Aria’s passport and my fake one, along with six thousand in cash from my pocket.
“Okay! Well, you’re all set then! Enjoy your trip!”
I smile, thank her, grab Aria’s hand, and then we’re off. Security is a breeze—I mean this isn’t the first time I’ve walked through an airport under a fake name, even if I’m not usually carrying what I’m carrying in the lining of my duffel. It feels like we don’t stop moving until we’re right in front of the gate with the boarding call going out over the intercom.
It’s there that I stop, taking both her hands in mine as she turns to face me.
“You’re sure about this,” I growl, my eyes burning into hers.
“Too late now, isn’t it?” she giggles jokingly, smiling at me.
But I frown, shaking my head. “No, Aria, it’s—”
“I’m sure,” she hisses. “Jack, I’ve never been more fucking sure of anything in my life.”
She steps into me, her hand goes to my cheek, and she leans up on her toes to kiss me softly. I growl, and my arms circle her as I dip her low and kiss her like a damn queen right there at the gate.
“There wasn’t anything more for me here,” she says quietly, pulling away. “And working with this organization sounds amazing, and whatever we have there, we’ll make do—”
She frowns as I start to chuckle.
“What’s so funny?”
I grin and kiss her slowly again before I pull back.
“Make do?” I wink at her. “Baby, I didn’t just leave the mob with two holes in me.”
She frowns. “What else—”
“This.”
I glance around, unzip my duffle bag, and then slip my hand along the inside seam for the hidden catch. I find it, pull it open, and then unzip the hidden plastic zipper there. I open the lining up, grin, and then turn the bag so that Aria can see. Her jaw drops as her hand flies to her mouth, her eyes wide in shock.
“What the fuck is that?”
“That’s twenty million of Victor Lombardo’s ill-gotten gains.”
Her face goes pink, her eyes bulging as she looks up at me in disbelief.
“What?”
“It’s twenty million, baby,” I say quietly with a shrug. “Figured we could live pretty damn well on about a million in Vietnam for the rest of our lives.”
“And the other nineteen?”
I grin. “Want to open a hospital?”
She stares at me, her chest rising and falling, her pretty lips in an o-shape.
“You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Completely,” I growl before I pull her close. The loudspeaker announces boarding one more time, and I look into her eyes as I lean in close.
“I love you, Aria Linetti,” I growl. “And I want to steal you away to paradise, keep you there forever, marry you, and live my whole life with you in my arms. If that even sounds a little okay to you, then I’d love if you—”
“I love you too,” she gasps, hugging me so tight and leaning up to crush her lips to mine. “I don’t even know you, and I know this is insane, but I love you.”
Fire roars through me as I hold her in my arms and kiss her like she’s mine.
Because she is—now, and forever.
We get on that flight, we leave our old lives behind, and I know it’s going to be okay. Of course it is—I’ve got twenty million cash in a suitcase, a brand new life ahead of me, and the woman I love in my arms.
Epilogue
Jack
“You out already, Jack?”
I glance up at Etienne, and he chuckles at the look on my face.
“I’m joking, get home to that wife of yours, I feel like I’ve been looking at you for two days straight.”
I chuckle and nod my chin at him. “Yeah, well, I’m sick of looking at you too, buddy. And for fuck’s sake, take a shower.”
Etienne laughs and flips me off as I turn to head out into the bright midday afternoon sun. I sigh as the warmth washes over me, and even as bedraggled and bleary-eyed as I am, I can’t help but grin.
It really is paradise here.
Etienne is with Just Cause—a Frenchman and one of the construction managers I’m helping with laying out the project. We break ground on the new clinic in a month, and there’s a shitload of stuff to check off the lists before we do. But we’ll be ready, I know it. See I’m no doctor, so this is my part to shine—the money, for one, but also putting in the muscle and grunt work. Once these four walls and a roof are up, and once we take on the patients who need this place, it’ll be Aria’s turn to be away from home all night putting in the sweat.
And goddamn am I already proud of my wife for the work she’s going to do here.
We’ve been in Vietnam a month now—a month of paradise, of endless time in bed together, and of just living life for the very first time. I think it’s both of us who feel that way, too. Back before, in my old life, I was stuck in a loop—an endless cycle of something I didn’t have my heart in anymore. Or if I ever had it in at all. Working for the mob was ripping me apart inside. Doing their dirty work and shedding blood for them was going to break me if I stayed.
Aria might not have been nearly as low and as on the verge of snapping as me, but she was in the same boat about being stuck. Guess we bumped into each other at the perfect time.
When we first landed here, it was touch and go. The FBI got involved with the Lombardo family back home, and with me missing, they got real interested in having a little chat. Or, you know, putting me behind bars.
Vietnam won’t extradite, but with the goddamn FBI breathing down their necks and the US ambassador and State Department getting involved, it did get hairy there for a second.
But Etienne and the rest of the Just Cause crew had my back, big time. They got their lawyers involved, and they made damn sure we were able to stay. Yeah, I mean, the nineteen-million-dollar investment didn’t exactly hurt things in that department, but hey, it is what it is.
I’m a new man—no longer a killer, no longer a spiller of blood. Now, I’m going to right—or at least try to right—some of the pain I’ve put into this world. And if that means backbreaking pre-construction work, sweating my ass off, and spending a night away from my wife? Well, then that’s what it takes.
Right, yeah, Aria and I got married, the second damn day we were here. It’d have been the first, but I had to actually propose first, on the beach outside the cabana we’re renting until our house is built. And after she said yes? Well, the next twelve hours were spent in bed screwing each other’s damn brains out, so technically, it was the second day here when we got married.
And speaking of screwing each other’s brains out…
I growl hungrily as I head down to the white sand, turn left, and start jogging. Our cabana isn’t far from the job site, and even when it’s hot as fuck outside, I like a good run to get my blood moving. In less than fifteen minutes, I’m rounding the last little beachhead and laying eyes on our temporary home. I get closer, and my cock is already hardening as I spot her, standing out on our little porch in a bikini, wrapped in a sarong.
Fuck, this woman does all sorts of things to me.
She saved me, for sure. The bullets and the knife wounds, yes, but she saved more than that. She saved my very soul, by seeing me for me, and for whatever reason, falling in love with me.
…Personally, I like to joke that it was my cock that won her heart. She doesn’t really fight me on that one either.
Aria turns and spots me as I jog closer, and a smile spreads over her face.
“Hey, you,” she calls as I get to the base of the stairs. But I never stop, and she shrieks and giggles as I bolt up the four steps and scoop her into my arms. She keeps laughing as I kiss her, until the kiss gets hotter, and deeper, and she knows we’re playing a new game now. She moans, and when I carry her right into the cabana, she whimpers.
I kiss her fiercely and hungrily as I march towards the bed and throw her down across it. My eyes tease over her, an animalistic snarl of desire on my lips as I yank my sweaty t-shirt off.
“I should shower first,” I growl.
“Don’t you dare,” she moans, undoing the sarong and tossing it aside.
I grin, and she gasps as I crawl onto the bed over her. My lips find hers, and I kiss her deeply as my hands slide over her curvy body. I pull the tie at the front of her bikini top, and it falls open, spilling her full breasts out against my chest. Her hard nipples drag over my muscles, and I groan in anticipation as my hands slide to cup them. My fingers tease her nipples, and Aria coos softly into my lips.
My hands slide down her body, over her hips to tug the ties at the sides of her bikini bottom. I kiss my way lower, down her neck, down over the slope of her breasts until my tongue is dancing over one nipple and then the other. Her back arches as she moans eagerly, her fingers raking through my hair. But there’s much more of her to taste.
I kiss down her belly, loving the way it caves beneath my lips. I kiss and bite and suck lower and lower, until her breath is coming faster and she’s trembling in anticipation. My big hands grab her thighs, pushing her legs wide apart as I sink between them, my eyes on my prize—her pretty, pink, dripping wet little pussy.
I move in, and when my tongue drags slowly over her, she moans eagerly.
“Oh fuck, Jack!”
“Miss me?” I growl.
“God yes,” she moans.
I grunt, plunging my tongue into her cunt and tasting her sweet honey before I start to slide it up to her clit. I suck the little nub between my teeth, swirling my tongue over it as my fingers stroke her silky lips. I ease two fingers into her molten hot cunt, curling them to stroke against her spot as I bat my tongue back and forth across her clit.
Aria squeals in pleasure for me, arching her back and thrusting her hips to meet my tongue. I growl into her, rocking my fingers in and out while I suck her little button, until she’s thrashing in the sheets. I slide my mouth lower, pulling my fingers from her and replacing them with my tongue. I plunge it deep, my fingers tease her clit now as she moans for more. And then, I slide lower.
My wife gasps in naughty delight when my tongue dances over her tight little asshole. She whimpers, and this deep aching moan of pleasure falls from her lips as I swirl my tongue around her tight ring. My fingers slide back inside her pussy, my thumb rubbing her clit as I tongue her ass until she’s shaking all over. Her stomach tightens, her thighs squeeze my head, and when I growl and push my tongue deep, she suddenly explodes for me.
Aria moans, shuddering on the bed as my tongue and fingers drag the orgasm out of her. She squeals, her fingers sliding into my hair and gripping tight as I growl and lick her through one climax into another, until she’s gasping for air.
I pull back, but it’s only to shove my shorts and boxers off, and my fat, thick cock springs free. She coos eagerly, her face still glassed in orgasmic bliss as I crawl back onto the bed between her legs. I grab her hips, and she squeals as I flip her over onto her front. My hand comes down with a sharp smack, spanking her pretty ass as she moans and pushes it back and up towards me. I groan at the sight of her curvy ass, her tight little asshole, and that sweet, heavenly pussy pink and glistening nestled between her thighs.
I’d ask how the fuck I managed to get a woman like this, but I don’t even know if I care. All I do care about is that I did, and now, I’m never letting her go.
I tease her eager pussy with my swollen crown, letting my precum drip all over her, making a fucking mess of her pretty pussy. Aria groans in protests at the teasing, looking back at me over one shoulder.
“Oh my God, you fucking teas—oh fuck!”
I growl, hissing in pleasure as I sink my cock to the hilt in her steamy hot little pussy with one stroke. Her jaw drops, her eyes rolling back in pleasure as she feels my full size stretch her just the way she likes. Fuck she’s so tight, and I groan as I feel her walls rippling up and down the length of me as I start to ease out.
My hands grip her hips hard enough to bruise as I suck in breaths of air with just the fat head of my cock inside her pink lips. And then, I slide right back in, burying my big dick to the hilt in her sweet heaven. Aria cries out in pleasure as I pull out again, only to drive right back in. I grind deep in her, and then slide out and back in, sawing in and out of her tight little cunt with my thick cock until she’s screaming into the sheets.
Her honey drips down my fucking balls, coating my cock in her slick heat until we’re both glistening with it. My teeth clench, and I grip her ass tight with one hand, spreading her open for me, and I groan at the sight of her puffy pink lips stretched so tight around my girth. Her asshole clenches, making me growl like a beast before I sink my cock right back in.
My free hand grips her hair, tugging it in fist just enough to make her squeal in pleasure. She thrusts back to meet me, and I know Aria loves giving up the control and letting me just fucking have her. I fuck her like she’s mine—mine to claim, and to take, and to fuck until she’s a whimpering, shivering puddle begging for more.
And that’s exactly what I do. I groan, thrusting hard into her, pounding her little pussy until she’s moaning like a banshee and rocking her hips back to meet every thrust. My big cock sinks into her slippery little pussy over and over, the world blurring around us until all I know is her, me, and where we join together. She starts to squeeze me tighter, and when she suddenly gasps and lets out this primal moan, I know she’s coming again.
She screams and thrusts back against me, and I hiss in pleasure
as I feel her little cunt rippling and spasming around me with her orgasm. I don’t slow or stop I just keep pounding her right through her climax until there’s no holding back any longer.
With a growl, I slide out of her, gripping my cock and pumping as my heavy balls draw up. Hot, sticky white ropes of my cum blast from my swollen cock, spraying across her ass and the backs of her thighs and coating her pretty little cunt with my cream. And I just keep coming, my muscles clenching, and the roar caught in my throat as I empty my balls across her skin. With a groan, I plunge right back in, fucking her messy, sticky pussy as she squeals in pleasure. I grunt, grinding hard against that spot inside as I grab her hips tight, and suddenly, I can feel her coming all over again.
I’ve just come but feeling the love of my life shatter for me one more time is all I need. With a grunt, my balls twitch again, and empty the last of my cum deep in her pretty pussy before we both collapse onto the bed.
We just lay there, panting for air and shaking in the aftershocks for God only knows how long. But at some point, I roll over gather her in my arms, and pull her tight to me. Aria murmurs happily, curling up into me and resting her cheek on my chest.
“What. The. Fuck,” she groans with a giggle. “You’re going to fuck me to death one of these days. Death by orgasm. That has to be a thing.”
I chuckle, kissing the top of her head as my hand slides down to cup her ass.
“I don’t think that’s a thing.”
“Nope, I’m a doctor, trust me, it is.”
I laugh deeply, and when she grins and looks up at me with those shining dark eyes, I lean down to crush my lips to hers.
“Still glad you came?”
She rolls her eyes. “I will always be glad I came. Best decision of my life.”
I grin. “Guess you must love me, huh?”
“Well, that big cock of yours for sure,” she giggles, sticking her tongue out at me as I roar with laughter and wrap my arms around her.
“But the rest of you is pretty easy to love too, you know,” she grins.
“All of you is pretty easy to love, baby girl,” I growl, kissing her softly.