by Fallon Hart
“Griff, I’m here,” she whispered, pressing a soothing hand to my chest. “I’m okay. You can stop snapping and snarling.”
Emotion welled up in my throat, and I couldn't speak. My wife seemed to understand.
“I know.” Scarlett kissed my jaw. “I was terrified too when you ran into that house. But we’re okay.”
I clasped her face, feeling myself lose it even though I’d been trying so fucking hard not to. “You almost died today,” I choked out.
Tears slipped down her beautiful face. “But I didn’t. You saved me.”
"You saved yourself." And there it was. I couldn't protect her. I couldn't even bloody save her.
"You. Saved. Me." Scarlett pressed a sweet kiss to my mouth. "Knowing you needed me to fight. It gave me what I needed. Being loved by you made me strong enough to fight."
Fuck, I didn’t deserve her.
I buried my face in her neck and shuddered against her as the emotion became too much. We held onto one another like that, never easing our ferocious grip, until the only thing that could relax our embrace was the pull of exhaustion.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Scarlett
It took many weeks for my jumpiness to ease whenever I left The Patrician. For those first few months I abided by Griff's need to have security with me when I went out on my own, but as I grew mentally stronger, they started to feel restricting. Reluctantly, I talked my husband into giving me some freedom again. He hated it. He worried. However, it was what I wanted, so he gave that to me.
The nightmares faded over time and Griff was there to help me beat them back until they did. I knew the bad dreams upset him. We talked about going to therapy. After all, Griff had seen a man who had once been his friend blow his own head off.
Yet, somehow, we got through it without talking to an outsider. Instead, we spoke to each other.
We needed that deep connection, especially because the gossip rags weren't the only ones to pick up the story. My husband and I found ourselves on national news, and it wasn't easy. I was already a nervous wreck and having paparazzi around did not help. With his connections, Griff succeeded in getting a court order to keep the particularly persistent ones away.
Eventually, the sensation died, and I started to feel more like myself again.
Still, I avoided the society pages. Which was what I was doing, flipping past the page in the newspaper, as I ate breakfast with my husband. It was mid-summer and life was finally finding some kind of equilibrium again. Griff sat beside me reading a newspaper too, and I’d just taken a bite of toast when I nearly choked on it.
“Are you alright?” My husband frowned in concern.
I nodded and took a sip of coffee to wash the clogged piece down. Then I waved the newspaper at Griff. "Have you seen this?"
“What is it?”
Staring at the headline, suspicion crept over me.
"A story about Bryce McKellan. A story stating that he's just lost eight figures he invested in a new app. It turns out he somehow failed to realize the idea for the app was already under patent in Japan. The patent, unfortunately, was discovered days before Bryce was set to launch the app. Several investors in ongoing projects have subsequently pulled out, and stocks have fallen drastically." I looked at my husband.
He stared determinedly at his paper. “How unfortunate.”
I narrowed my gaze. “How does someone as smart as Bryce miss a patent?”
“Well,” his lips twitched, “things can go missing for a while.”
I knew it!
“How did you do it?”
"I'm not saying I did do it." He shot me a look, his dark eyes filled with amusement, "But if it were me, I'd pay someone at the patent office to misplace the digital and hardcopy files of the patent. I'd then pay the patent owner to keep his silence until the perfect moment. Say… days before the app was to launch. If it were me."
Laughter bubbled in my throat. “You’re wicked.”
“I never said it was me.”
“Mmm hmm.”
The amusement in Griff’s eyes died. “No one fucks with you, Scarlett, and gets away with it. You deserve justice for what he did.”
I reached across the table and squeezed his arm. “Thank you.”
“You don’t need to thank me for that.” He closed his paper and stood. Holding out his hand to me, he continued, “But you might want to thank me for this.”
“For what?” I asked.
“Let me show you.”
Griff led me through the penthouse to one of the smaller guest rooms off the kitchen. Except when he led me inside it was no longer a guest bedroom.
It was an office.
The bed was gone, and there was now a sitting area with a comfortable armchair and footstool by the fireplace. There was sofa adjacent to it with a little coffee table in the middle.
In front of the window that looked down onto Fairfield Street was a desk in white oak. Sitting on it was my laptop, a vase of flowers, the photograph of my parents I’d kept on my nightstand, and beside it my favorite photo from my and Griff’s wedding.
And bookshelves.
Bookshelves filled with lots of books.
“How… what?” I gazed around, my heart racing a little.
Griff seemed to enjoy my reaction. “I thought it was time you had your own office so you can finish that book you’ve been writing for months.”
Tears filled my eyes. “Griff… I love it.”
My husband drew me to him and pressed his lips to mine. “Good.”
I glanced over my shoulder at the books. “Where did you get all these?”
“Your online wish list. It was quite extensive.”
“Quite extensive?” I pulled out of his arms and hurried over, trailing my fingers over the shelves and shelves of commercial fiction that wasn’t literary enough to make it into the library downstairs. “Griff, this is every book I’ve added to that wish list for the last five years.”
When I turned around, he was right there, pulling me into his arms again. "Happy?"
I shook my head in wonder. “How did I get so lucky?”
“I think that’s my question.”
God, I loved this man. I kissed him. I kissed him with everything I had.
When I found myself pressed up against the bookshelves, our breaths mingling as we tried to catch them, I smiled into his eyes. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He squeezed my waist. “I can’t make up for what happened to you, Scarlett, but I’m going to try my very best to make sure life is never anything but fucking fantastic for you going forward.”
Grinning, I tightened my hold on him. “I want to say thank you properly.”
His eyes glittered. “Why don’t we Christen the desk?”
Desire and anticipation flooded me. “Oh, yes, please.”
EPILOGUE
Scarlett
September
The waves tickled my feet as I walked along the beach and the peace was overwhelming. There was no one else around. Just me. The sand. The waves.
As I walked, I began to feel this sensation pooling in my lower belly. This need.
Confused, I looked around, but I couldn't see anyone.
I couldn’t see anything but the waves, lapping.
Lapping.
That sensation between my legs grew stronger. More needful.
I found myself sitting down in the wet sand, lifting my dress to my waist, spreading my legs and letting the waves rush between them.
I moaned as desire tightened in my gut, pleasure zinging down my legs, and the feeling grew more tangible than a wave. It felt like a tongue lapping at my pussy.
I tensed.
It was a tongue lapping at my pussy.
My eyes flew open, seeing first the ceiling above our bed and then as I felt the strong push of fingers inside me I looked down. My husband's head was between my legs, his eyes on me as he fucked me with his mouth.
The silk nightgown was bunc
hed around my waist, and he'd pulled down the neckline in my sleep, so my breasts were spilling over it.
"Oh my God." I threw my head back, luxuriating in the decadence of this wake-up call.
He ate me with such voraciousness I came a mere few seconds later.
And then Griff was braced over me as he pushed inside me.
“Happy Anniversary, my love,” he groaned against my lips as he glided in and out of me.
I clasped his handsome face in my hands and lifted my hips to meet his slow thrusts. “Happy Anniversary, baby.”
One year of marriage.
Who could believe it?
We kissed, sliding our tongues together in a deep tangle of earthy, morning lust as Griff took his time making love to me.
When we came, it was together, my inner muscles rippling around him in waves as his cock throbbed and pulsed, his cum filling me with a flood of warmth.
It was lazy, sexy lovemaking and I loved it.
In fact, I couldn't make up my mind if I loved it more than when we fucked hard and rough.
I guess with Griff I just loved it all.
When my husband rolled off me, he moved across the bed and yanked open the drawer in his nightstand. I took that time to pull the neckline of my nightie back up and push the hem back down. Rolling back to me Griff bent his elbow on my pillow and rested his head in his hand. Then he handed me a small velvet box with a bow on top.
It looked like jewelry.
Ooh.
I bit my lip and grinned. “For me?”
“You know it.” He kissed my nose as I took it.
“What could it be?” I mused as he caressed my stomach.
“Open it and find out.” He tickled his fingers over the silk covering my nipple.
“Stop it,” I laughed, trying to pull away.
“Then open the box.”
So I did.
The ring glittered in the light. “Oh Griff,” I breathed.
"It's an eternity ring," he said softly, reaching for my left hand as he slipped the ring out of the box. It was a white gold band set with alternating diamonds and aquamarine gemstones. Griff pushed it over my ring finger, and it sat beautifully against my engagement ring. "I thought about getting something more precious like emeralds. But these stones are the exact color of your eyes."
Which at the moment were filled with tears. “Griff, it’s beautiful.” I turned to him in wonder. “Thank you.”
He squeezed my hand in his. “The last time I slipped a ring on your finger I didn’t say I loved you. But I want you to know that I loved you even then. I knew I loved you when we stood outside that prison and you’d just found out Mel had deceived you. I knew it then because I couldn’t stand to see you in pain. Your pain was my pain.”
I reached for him, the rings sparkling on my finger as I caressed his face. “I knew I loved you when you found out the truth about who I was. I didn’t want to admit it either. But I knew deep down… because I was so afraid of losing you.”
Griff kissed me. Hard. Until I was on my back again and his hands were pushing my legs apart. “Stop,” I huffed and laughed as I broke the kiss. “I still have to give you your present.”
“This is my present.” He mouthed my breast over the silk, laving at my nipple.
"Actually one of your gifts is part of that, but first," I playfully shoved him aside and reached into my bedside drawer. "Isn't it funny we both kept them in here?"
“More proof we spend too much time together,” he teased, rolling off me to give me room to move.
“No such thing,” I harrumphed.
I pushed up to sitting to reach for the envelope and wrapped present and handed him the envelope first.
“You didn’t have to get me anything,” he muttered.
I ignored that silliness.
He opened the anniversary card, and the airline tickets and a key fell out. Lifting them up his brow furrowed. "Open tickets to Tahiti." He picked up the keys and quirked an eyebrow.
"Do you know that money you gave me?" Not too long after the horrendous encounter with Pete, Griff announced he was opening a bank account for me. Inside it was a scary amount of money I couldn't hope to get through, and he told me I was to use it for whatever I needed.
He narrowed his gaze. “Yes.”
“Well, I talked to Quentin about investing in something.”
“Okay…”
"I bought you a villa off a little island in Tahiti… so anytime you need to decompress, destress, and fuck your wife's brains out in total privacy, you can do it surrounded by white sands and Tahitian blue oceans."
Griff stared at me for a second.
I deflated. “You hate it.”
He shook his head. “It’s perfect. The best time of my life was on that island with you last Christmas.”
Relieved I grinned. “Me too. That’s why…” I gestured to the key. “And you should see it, Griff. It’s beautiful. And all yours.”
“All ours,” he corrected, bending his head to kiss me in thanks.
“I got you something else,” I muttered against his mouth when it became apparent he was planning on kissing me some more.
He scowled. “The villa was more than enough.”
I laughed. "Well if you're sure." I ripped open the parcel, and his eyes dropped to the tube of lube and flew to me in comical round-eyed questioning. "I can just put this in the trash."
His voice was thick when he asked, “What’s that for?”
Nervous excitement fluttered in my belly, but I hid it with a teasing frown. "Well I was planning on gifting you my ass this anniversary but if you don't want it."
My husband growled and lunged for the tube and my mouth at the same time. He swallowed my laughter in his kiss, but soon I was panting with too much excitement as he hauled me onto my stomach. He pushed my dress up, caressing my ass and I felt his chest shudder against my back. "You're sure?"
I looked over my shoulder at him as he sank his whole body against me, his weight as erotic as the feel of his hard cock digging into the crevice of my cheeks. “I’m a little nervous but yes.”
“If you hate it, we stop,” he promised.
I’m not going to lie, it hurt at first, even with the lube. I’d never felt such overwhelming, burning thickness inside me before.
But between the uncontrolled expletives falling from Griff's mouth as he shook with lust, and the unexpected tug of desire in my belly as he glided slowly back out, I got into it.
It was pleasure-pain like I’d never experienced before.
I was soaked because I was so turned on by how hot for it Griff was.
That unexpected tug of sensation from his temporary retreat and the plunge of his fingers inside my sex somehow worked with the burning pain of his cock’s invasion.
I came, and it was good, but the rippling of my pussy around his fingers wasn't enough to truly satisfy me.
Griff, however, was cursing and groaning and muttering as he made love to my ass. "God, Scarlett, fuck me, fuck, you're so tight, so fucking unbelievably tight, fuck…. Fuck!" he tensed for a second and then I cried out at the unbearable swelling of his cock inside me.
I winced as he gently pulled out and felt his cum drip down between my legs.
“Jesus fuck, that’s hot,” he said, his voice guttural.
The tension released from my body and I sagged into the bed.
Griff stumbled out of it and disappeared into the bathroom. When he came back, I felt a warm washcloth on my skin as he cleaned me. His heat surrounded me as he braced himself over me. "You're quiet."
Hearing the concern in his voice, I turned to face him. "I enjoyed it," I assured him.
He smirked. “Not as much as me.”
I snorted. “There’s no woman alive who enjoys that as much as a man enjoys it. But we can do it again.” I caressed his face as he settled over me between my legs. “I like how hot it gets you.”
“I’m not going to lie,” he murmured, “It does. You’r
e tighter there than you can imagine… but the truth is…” he hesitated.
“The truth is?”
“Don’t get angry.”
“Oh God, what is it?”
His eyes blazed with possessiveness as he confessed, “I like knowing I’ve fucked every inch of you. That I’m the only man that ever has. That’s what makes me hot.”
“Why would I be angry?” I wrapped my legs around his back, drawing him closer. “I like that too.”
“It does make me very hot,” he started caressing my breasts. “But nothing makes me hotter than feeling your cunt tighten around me, to see your tits bouncing with my thrusts, and to come inside you as I stare into those gorgeous fucking eyes of yours. To fill you up as you look me in the eyes, turned on, telling me you love me.”
“Good,” I whispered back. “That’s the way I like it too.” then I reached back for the lube and chucked it back in the drawer. “But it’s there.” I grinned at him. “So you can fuck me in the ass anytime you feel like it.”
“God,” Griff groaned, burying his head in my neck, his bristled cheek scratching deliciously against my skin, “Your filthy mouth undoes me.”
He was right, it did. He was already growing hard between my legs.
“We need to get out of bed,” he muttered even as he rocked his erection against me.
"It's our first wedding anniversary." I reached between our bodies, clasped him in hand and guided him to my entrance. "We can make love all day if we want."
Griff pushed inside me and lifted his head to stare into my eyes as he moved. "I want."
If anyone ventured into the apartment for the next few hours all they would have heard was the sound of my husband giving me multiple orgasms.
The eternity ring was beautiful.
I loved it.
But the many orgasms and multiple declarations of his devotion were my favorite presents of the day.
◆◆◆
Griffin
As Scarlett and I walked into the restaurant, I glanced at her for the millionth time. There was a flush on her cheeks and a glitter in her eye that could only be put there by me. My wife had drained me dry that day.