‘Fuck,’ he hissed, as he slowly slid inside me. He ran his hands up under my blouse, his fingertips caressing my skin, making me shiver as my skin came to life under his touch and the material of my blouse was gathered up around my shoulders. He reached around to slide his hands between the desk and my breasts, cupping them, slipping his fingers inside the lace to free them and squeeze them tightly. I gasped as he leaned forwards, feeding me the last few inches of his cock as his lips skimmed my cheek and moved to my ear. ‘You’re mine, Ellie Davenport,’ he whispered. ‘There’s nowhere on this body that I haven’t kissed, licked, sucked, or fucked. And you know that it will never be as good with anyone else, don’t you?’
I nodded my agreement, wishing he’d remove the tie and plunge his tongue into my mouth, fucking it as hard as he was about to take me from behind. That wish was soon recanted as his fingers pinched my nipples and he pulled back then slammed into my rear, making me scream as a feeling of bliss tore through me. I sincerely hoped his director next door had taken an early lunch.
We made our way through The Domville hand in hand, Andy a few paces behind us. My legs were still shaky from our passionate and raw fucking only half an hour earlier. Luckily I had some makeup in my clutch and was able to freshen up quickly in the bathroom of Dan’s suite. He’d had to abandon his tie due to the teeth marks and wet patches on it from where I’d got over enthused from his attentions. We headed towards the orangery at the back of the hotel, accessed through the grounds. It was usually reserved for weddings, but when it came to any of his family, Dan spared no expense. I smiled at him as we heard the sound of children’s laughter drifting through the double doors that led to the garden. The glass doors parted for us and I hissed through my teeth to feel the nip of the autumnal afternoon in the air. We followed the pathway to see that it didn’t seem to bother the children at all, they were all squealing as they jumped up and down on the bouncy castle under the close supervision of the hotel staff. Jonas was on there, with James’s grandchildren, but I couldn’t see Oliver or Eva.
‘Leave him,’ I said to Dan as he made a move to fetch him. ‘He’s having fun. He’ll come in when he’s ready, definitely when food is served. The boys have your insatiable appetite.’
Dan grinned and winked at me, squeezing my hand and making me blush. We headed into the beautifully decked-out framed glass room, with fairy lights everywhere the eye could see, large Chinese glowing lanterns hanging from the vines above us. Pink, purple, and white balloons adorned all of the round tables at the far end of the room that were set up with white linen tablecloths, silverware, and crystal glasses. I laughed when I saw Oliver staring, his eyes on stalks, as he took in the vast array of sweets on the old-fashioned sweet stall we’d hired, for children and adults alike. His face fell when he saw us approaching, knowing he was about to have some limitations placed on him.
‘Please, just a few,’ he begged. I was so proud he’d waited for permission. He was so much better behaved and obedient than his brother, who was turning out to be a real handful.
‘Don’t overdo it, you can have more later,’ Dan warned. ‘You have Eva’s party food coming soon and you know how much you love sausages.’
‘Will there be sausage on sticks and sausage rolls?’ he asked, his face lighting up.
‘Of course there will,’ Dan laughed, patting his head. ‘Plus peanut butter and jam sandwiches, cookies, and ice cream and jelly for you youngsters. We’ll be having a slightly more sophisticated afternoon cream tea. Where’s your sister?’
Oliver pointed over in the direction of where some small tables had been set up full of colouring crayons and paper, then turned his attention back to the sweets.
‘Look at that,’ I sighed, resting my head on Dan’s shoulder. Eva was sitting scrawling on a chair next to Logan Steel. There were only four months between them and we were due to head over to America in February to stay with Lucas and Summer for his second birthday. He was the spitting image of his father, gorgeous looking with dark hair and serious grey eyes. ‘Do you think they’ll fall in love one day?’
‘Over my dead body,’ Dan chuckled with a shake of his head. ‘I don’t ever want to imagine her having sex, let alone the kind of kinky sex Logan’s father used to get up to, if he follows in his footsteps. Eva,’ he called. She dropped her crayon immediately, her bright green eyes, framed by Dan’s long dark lashes, searching the room when she heard his voice. She broke into a huge smile and slid off her little chair and ran towards us. Brooke had dressed her in the outfit that Eva had chosen before bed last night. Pink tights, a pink long-sleeved top with a black glitter tiara emblazoned on the front, a black mini skirt, and a pink headband to sweep her long dark hair off her forehead.
‘Daddy,’ she cried, lifting up her arms, beyond excited to see him. She adored her father, almost as much as he adored her.
‘Happy Birthday, my beautiful Princess,’ he murmured, sweeping her up and kissing her cheek.
‘Kiss, Mummy,’ she called, pursing her pretty pink lips as she leaned towards me, clinging to the edges of Dan’s waistcoat.
‘Happy Birthday, darling,’ I smiled, kissing her and running my hand through her thick, silky smooth hair. ‘Are you having fun?’
‘Yes,’ she nodded seriously. ‘I have presents.’ She pointed to one of the tables near the ones that had been set up ready for afternoon tea. There was a mountain of them, all wrapped in an assortment of bright colours with ribbons and bows and tags with glitter.
‘Lots of presents,’ he agreed. ‘You’re a very lucky girl. Why don’t you go and sit with Logan again while we go and say hello to everyone?’ Dan set her down and we watched her run back to take her place. Logan put his arm around her and kissed her on the lips, and Eva immediately wiped her mouth and screwed up her face, making me laugh. ‘Jesus, talk about starting young!’ Dan muttered, looking none too impressed. ‘This is the last time I’m leaving her on her own with him.’
We headed through the opening in the thick stone wall to the internal bar, to be met with a chorus of greetings. Everyone was already here. Dan’s parents, Magda, Lucas and Summer, Mr. and Mrs. McAdams, Brooke and Molly, John and Edward, and Theo and Florie. Chris, Conn, and James were here with their wives, and even Stuart and his wife had made it here before us. The happy atmosphere of my loved ones chatting and laughing almost bowled me over.
‘You guys,’ I moaned, fluttering my hands in front of my eyes, overcome with all of the support and love being shown to Eva on her second birthday.
‘It is cause for a grand celebration,’ Luiza announced as she came over to kiss me, thrusting a glass of champagne into my hand. ‘Not only is our beautiful granddaughter two, but our daughter-in-law is a walking miracle. We nearly lost you that night, Ellie.’
‘We did,’ Dan confirmed, kissing my temple as he squeezed my hand. ‘And not for the first time. I warned you that you’re through scaring me, Ellie Davenport. We’re going to live a long and uneventful life now, surrounded by our friends and family. Hopefully one day, when we’re old and grey, we’ll be here celebrating our fiftieth wedding anniversary, or the birthday of one of our grandchildren.’
‘Do you really think that will happen?’ I asked, smiling up at him. Why was I always surprised by the fact that he took my breath away every time he gazed into my eyes? Or made my heart race and butterflies release in my stomach? I really hoped I’d hold onto that passion for him for the rest of my life. There was no better feeling in the world, other than hearing my children tell me that they loved me.
‘Why not? I’ve made so many wishes when it comes to you and my children, and they have all come true, why shouldn’t we have our own fairy tale happy ever after? No one deserves it more than us.’
‘Well said,’ Daniel called. ‘I know it’s my granddaughter’s birthday, and I’ll be raising a toast to her when we sit down to eat, but for now I’d like you all to raise one to my son and daughter-in-law. They’ve had so much thrown at them in their lives,
both together and apart, but it’s only made their bond and love for each other stronger. May they have nothing but peace and happiness for the rest of their lives.’
‘To Dan and Ellie,’ Brooke called, raising her glass and blowing a kiss in my direction.
‘To Dan and Ellie,’ came a chorus from the rest of our loved ones, making me cry. Dan held my chin as he wiped away my tears.
‘See, how can fate argue with that?’ he whispered, dipping his head to kiss me.
‘It can’t,’ I replied, clutching his strong biceps for support as my legs turned to jelly from his tender kiss. ‘To our happy ever after, and that of our children, too.’
We headed out with the rest of the guests to take our seats for Eva’s birthday tea. I reached down to pick up my silver locket and kissed it. Mum and Dad might not be here, but in Jonas and Eva it was like they were in spirit, and I knew how proud they would have been to see me now with such a beautiful family of my own.
‘Thank you,’ I whispered to Dan as I squeezed his muscular thigh under the table.
‘For what?’ he asked, his green eyes filled with love as he gazed down at me.
‘Making all of my wishes come true. Who’d have thought the grumpy woodcutter that I met one cold winter would actually turn out to be my Prince Charming after all?’
Epilogue
Fifteen years later ~ 27th December
Ellie
‘Think we can get away with sneaking off for a few minutes?’ Dan asked as he slipped his arms around my waist while I topped up my glass of wine. I spun around and put my arms around his neck, smiling up at him. Age had improved him, like a fine vintage port. He still had a full head of thick hair, but where it had once been black, now it was tones of salt and pepper. He had fine creases around his gorgeous, deep, soulful eyes, and he didn’t stride as fast as he used to, but he was still in incredible shape. I kissed him, amazed that after twenty-two years, such a simple act could still have such an effect on my body.
‘What did you have in mind?’ I asked, giving him a coy smile.
‘It’s the twenty-second anniversary of us having sex,’ he whispered against my lips, the heat of his breath making me long to kiss him properly. ‘The night you fell in the loch and got that scar on your arm.’
‘It is,’ I confirmed, touched that he remembered little things like that after so long. My scar was faint and silvery now, like the one on my temple from falling down the stairs, and the one on my leg from my bullet wound. I saw the three of them as one scar for each of my children, a mark I had to bear for the pleasure of having them in my life, and I displayed them proudly now, unlike my emergency caesarean one, which remained hot pink and jagged to this day.
I looked over Dan’s shoulder at the lounge, at the houseful of people laughing with the fire roaring, the Christmas tree twinkling in the background. We’d had an amazing festive season, though it had been sad not to have some of our loved ones with us. Mr. and Mrs. McAdams had moved into a retirement home, paid for by Dan, and they were far too frail to come. We’d made a trip out, with all of the children, to visit them yesterday, as well as Theo and Florie in their home on the loch. John and Edward had retired in September and were currently on a world cruise. Lucas and Summer were in California, as they had some public engagements that they couldn’t get out of. We’d had a pretty tough year and were looking forward to putting it behind us. Sadly, both Magda and Mr. Davenport had passed away, within months of each other. Magda had been battling cancer for a long time, and having not complained about her symptoms, by the time we realised that she was ill and got her diagnosed, it had been too late to help her. All we could do was try and make her last few months as comfortable and pain-free as possible. But it had been heart-breaking to watch her decline. Mr. Davenport had died peacefully at home, after spending the day with Luiza, Dan and I and his grandchildren. Dan had taken it hard, the children too, but being there at the end, having a chance to say a proper goodbye, had softened the blow.
I smiled as I looked at Brooke and Molly. They had their arms around each other’s necks as they slow danced to All I Want For Christmas Is You. Just like Dan and I, they were showing their age, but were still as in love as ever. They continued to live with us on the island, except when the McAdams moved out, they’d moved from the boathouse to the larger cabin up the hill. At our insistence, Luiza had moved in with us. She was in her mid-eighties now, though didn’t look a day over sixty-five. Much as her and Daniel had squabbled, they’d been deeply in love and she was lost without him. Dan and I hadn’t liked the idea of her being all alone in that sprawling mansion, so we’d moved her up here to be with us. We’d sold our mews house, and used his parents’ home as a base whenever we visited London. We went at least twice a month now, given that Oliver was at university there, studying IT, of course. He was a natural, so talented and intelligent. He’d passed all of his exams early, so instead of being in the middle of his bachelor's degree like most twenty year olds, he was in the middle of a master's degree and couldn’t wait to finish, to start working for his dad officially. He’d already come up with a number of new ideas that had impressed Dan to no end. We’d purchased him a two bedroomed apartment in Canary Wharf, oddly enough in the very same building that I’d lived in with Zac all of those years ago. It even had the same layout, which felt a little odd each time we visited, but Harry, the kind old doorman, had long since passed away.
‘Do you think Oliver’s having sex?’ I asked Dan as he moved behind me to look at our family. Oliver was kissing his girlfriend of one year, Lottie Le Grand. He was besotted with her, which was understandable. She was a stunning brunette with the most unusual vivid amber eyes. She was attending the same university, in the second year of her bachelor's degree, studying French, Italian, and Spanish. I smiled as I remembered Oliver ringing me last year to tell me he’d met the girl that he was going to marry. He was so sure of his feelings for her, just like I’d been with Dan. We’d offered to accompany Oliver and Jonas back to London next week, for the start of the new term, and we’d been invited to go and spend the weekend with Lottie’s parents, Lulu and Luc, whom we’d not yet met in person. Oddly, Lulu was an old friend of Lucas’s. It was such a small world.
‘Of course he’s having sex. Look at them, they can’t keep their hands off each other,’ advised Dan, making me cringe. I didn’t want to think of my sweet, innocent boy doing that, but he was an adult now, it was inevitable. ‘Jonas too,’ Dan added as we looked over at him, playing some game on his iPhone. That or texting one of a long line of girls he seemed to be in touch with. ‘God only knows how many girls he’s got on the go at uni, he’s a smooth talker,’ Dan said confirming my thoughts exactly.
‘Just like his dad,’ I added, giving Dan a shoulder bump and making him chuckle.
‘He was gutted that Autumn Steel wasn’t coming over this Christmas. Look at him, he’s still sulking. He has your pout.’
‘He does,’ I laughed, clutching my heart as I looked at my eighteen year old, the middle child of my brood. He was the spitting image of my dad and definitely took after my side of the family with his blond hair. He’d started university this year, thankfully also picking the same one as Oliver, so he’d moved into the two bedroom apartment with him. It eased my concerns about my two boys living so far away, to know that they had each other. They were still inseparable to this day, the best of friends. Jonas didn’t have Oliver’s mind for IT, but he was very clever too. He had a real strategic mind, so he’d chosen Business Studies as his major. Dan was hoping he’d want to take over the running of operations at Davenport Technologies while Oliver remained in charge and oversaw the development of projects.
‘I think he kissed Autumn last time Lucas was over,’ Dan mused, making me gasp with horror.
‘Don’t! She’s only fifteen. Lucas would kill him if he even thought Jonas was looking at his daughter.’
‘Like I’ll kill that bloody Greyson Austin if he keeps texting mine,’ muttered Dan w
ith a low predatory growl. I laughed and tipped my head back and kissed him again. When it came to Eva, Dan’s protective side went into overdrive. She was seventeen now, but he treated her like a twelve year old sometimes, putting far too tight a leash on her.
‘You need to ease up on her a bit, she’s nearly an adult and she could do a lot worse than Greyson. He’s respectful, charming, confident, and I tell you, if I was thirty years younger, I’d be batting my eyelids at him, too. I don’t normally go for blonds, but phew!’ I laughed as Dan gave me a disapproving scowl. No one would ever be good enough for his princess. ‘I really thought that her and Logan would start dating, they’ve practically grown up together.’
‘Exactly. I think they’re too close, they see each other as siblings,’ Dan confirmed, his arms around me tightening as he kissed my neck.
I looked back over at Eva as she laughed with Luiza. She was a real mix of Dan and I. She had his dark Brazilian hair, eyebrows, and lashes, then his defined bone structure, but she had my small straight nose, heart-shaped lips, and bright green eyes. She turned heads whenever we went out, but she was a good girl, she hadn’t even kissed a boy yet. That was probably due to her being enrolled at an all girls’ boarding school for her AS levels. I missed her terribly in term time. We were really close, she was like a best friend, not just my daughter. While she hadn’t kissed a boy yet, lately she’d admitted that she couldn’t stop thinking about one boy in particular. The one Dan was liable to kill if he kept making advances to her. Greyson Austin, the grandson of Dan’s long-term lawyer, Robert Austin. Greyson’s father, Gabriel, had hosted a joint charity ball with Davenport Technologies for sick children. We’d all gone and Eva had looked stunning in a jade green off-the-shoulder ball gown. In the limo on the way back to Luiza’s, Eva had confessed to me that when she laid eyes on Greyson, it was the first time that she’d actually wanted a boy to kiss her, though she’d politely declined when he’d tried. She’d eventually agreed to give him her number when he refused to leave without it. Every time she got a message from him since, her face lit up. I imagined that’s how I looked, how I still looked, each time I saw Dan.
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