Averill _A Secrets Novella

by D. B. James

  “Holy shit, you guys are taking us to Cancun?” Tessa exclaims while jumping up and down.

  Brant remains oddly silent.

  Tessa is still making a scene, although now she’s moved out onto the dance floor and is having the time of her life. Maybe I didn’t have to warn her to act surprised because if this is only acting, she’s laying it on awful thick.

  “I’ll, uh, go deal with her and give you two time to talk this over,” I offer before leaving Rhys’ side to go handle my crazy friend.

  Never once did it cross my mind, but what if Brant truly doesn’t want to go? I know it’s a huge interference in his life, but it really is meant as a gift first, a matchmaking attempt second. My feelings won’t be hurt if he goes and doesn’t make the most of his time there with Tessa. It’s their choice in the end, and all I want is for my two best friends to be happy. If they end up together, it’d be golden. If they choose to live their lives separately, I’m okay with it—as long as they’re happy.

  Tessa was there for me when I badly needed a friend. She was my lifesaver when I was drowning. In essence, she helped save me from myself. When I met her, I was severely depressed and hiding from Smith, not to mention I had lost my lovebug not long before. Her rays of sunshine helped me make it through my cloudy days until I was strong enough to branch out on my own.

  Reaching out, I gently grab Tessa’s arm as it’s flailing into the air, about to go over her head as she shouts another, “I’m going to Cancun, bitches!” to whoever is listening.

  “Come on, Jessie Spano, they all know you’re excited. How about we have someone take you home where you can sleep it off for a while before getting up to pack. Our flight is leaving pretty early, and we could always swing by to pick you up.”

  Pulling her arm out of my grasp, she turns around and starts dancing again. It’s like she didn’t hear a word I said.

  “Yo, Crazy Pants McGee, I’m getting you a ride home. Let’s go. I’m leaving with my husband because we need to have some rockin’ wedding night sex. I’m tired of waiting to rip his suit off his amazing body. In case you need it broken down in simple terms, I want to lick him like a lollipop. Now quit acting like a loon and let’s make like a tree and leaf already.”

  There, that wasn’t too harsh, at least I don’t think it was. Who knows how many drinks she’s had tonight; once she left the bridal table after dinner, I wasn’t keeping track anymore.

  She spins faster than I think she intended and ends up sliding in her heels. It’s all I can do to keep her from falling all the way to the ground. She grabs both of my wrists and luckily, she’s able to steady herself.

  “Woo, that was close. Now that would’ve been embarrassing.” She glances up and I know she sees the glare of irritation in my eyes. A few minutes ago, my eyes were filled with love and joy; now I’m sick of her drunkenness. Why didn’t I notice it when I hauled her halfway across the tent? Maybe she’s not drunk and is acting like an idiot purely out of excitement.

  Before I can utter a reply, she fires off a few questions of her own. “Who the hell is Jessie Spano? And I’m offended by you calling me Crazy Pants McGee—we all know that’s Justin’s nickname in this group. I’m not drunk, and you didn’t need to tell me you want to lick Rhys—I knew what you meant when you said you wanted to rip his shirt off.” Pausing to take a breath, she turns away from me to head back toward Rhys and Brant. “I was simply expressing my excitement. You rained on my parade, Av,” she whispers before walking away.

  Okay, maybe I was a little harsh.

  We’re in the elevator taking us to our honeymoon suite for the night before I get a chance to ask Rhys what was bothering Brant. The ride over to our hotel was spent doing other things.

  “Did he open his gift or keep staring at it like it was going to explode?” I ask. Rhys is eerily quiet. Where’d my outspoken husband from ten minutes ago disappear to? Usually it’s me who takes some time to think my words over before voicing them out loud. It’s saved me from inserting my foot into my mouth more times than I care to count.

  I wait in silence as the elevator dings with each floor we pass.

  Some wedding night this is turning out to be.

  As I’m thinking about how much I still want to rip his clothes off, he answers. “He’s upset about the cost.” It’s all he says before the elevator doors slide open to our floor. “I believe this is us, wife.” He gestures his hand out sweepingly in front of him. “After you, beautiful.”

  If he wants to change the subject, we can change the subject. I’m all about riding the Rhys train tonight.

  “Rhys?”

  “Yes, babe?”

  “As much as I’d love for you to need me badly enough to want to rip my dress off…please don’t rip my dress off.”

  I’d like to be able to keep it. Granted, I’ll never wear it again, but maybe someday our daughter will, or our son’s fiancée. Maybe that’s all wishful thinking, but I’d like to keep my dress in one piece.

  He places his hand on the center of my back, gently leading me down the hall toward our suite. He leans in close to my ear and whispers, “Don’t worry, I have plans for undoing these buttons, each and every one.” As he’s stressing the words, his fingers are dancing their way up my spine—he’s swiftly unbuttoning my dress while we’re walking. He has three buttons undone before he hauls me back against his chest, his breaths coming sharp and deep. He places both of his hands on my hips as the hard planes of his chest press into my spine. “Can you feel what you do to me? Do you feel how much I want to devour you? Own you?” Before I can answer him, he presses his erection harder into my ass, causing a moan to escape from my lips. At the same time, he moves my hair to the side and sweeps his tongue down my neck, blazing a trail down to the three buttons he’s undone. “I want to lick every single inch of your body as I expose it. What are you wearing underneath, Tiger Lily?”

  “Oh, nothing much,” I taunt.

  “Are you teasing me, my little minx?”

  Biting my bottom lip, I keep from answering him—for now. He’ll find out soon enough what’s hidden underneath the swathes of white satin and beading making up my dress.

  After ordering the corset, panties, and thigh-high nylons especially for the occasion, I want the reveal to be nothing short of remarkable. My normal retailer I use for the store was more than happy to make me a custom set in amber—the color of Rhys’ eyes. Normal brides may opt to wear the traditional white, ivory, or maybe the palest pink, but not me. It’s not like there was ever a doubt in my mind that I’d be thinking about Rhys all day today, but I wanted to be absolutely positive he was with me, always in my thoughts. Knowing the shared color of our eyes was beneath my dress when we vowed to always love one another…I can’t begin to describe how it made me feel.

  “Lucky for me, I’ll be finding out in less than two minutes,” he says while moving his hands from my hips to unlock the door to our suite.

  As I attempt to take a step into our room, Rhys places a hand out in front of me, stopping my path. “Hold up, Av. I’m not skipping this tradition—I will be carrying you over the threshold.”

  Words almost escape my mouth but when Rhys takes advantage of my shock and picks me up, the sound is lost upon my breath. He walks us inside and places me gently on the bed, and words find me again once I’m able to catch my breath.

  “I’m kinda digging this caveman side you’re displaying. A girl could get used to being carried around all the time. Maybe you should carry me around the airport in the morning when we leave for Cancun, and when we need to go grocery shopping once we’re back home. Yeah, that sounds pretty awesome. You’ll get in a fantastic workout, and I’ll have the pleasure of wrapping myself around your incredible body in public. We both win.”

  “Tiger Lily, if I’m carrying you around in public, we’ll be kicked out of wherever it is we’re going because I’ll be doing some very un-public-like things to my new bride.”

  “Oh.” Now the blasted word fina
lly comes out.

  “I have no complaints about carrying you around in private,” he says while winking. There he goes with his stupid damn wink again, and here I go getting all mushy inside from said stupid damn wink, again.

  “Are you going to finish undressing me or what? I mean, I could always curl up and go to sleep. It has been an extremely long day after all, and I didn’t sleep much last night because a certain snoring hunky brute of a man wasn’t sharing my bed. It’s the damnedest thing.”

  Without saying a word, he begins tearing off his own clothes while I watch from my perched position on the bed. I’m not ashamed to say I’m enjoying every second of his striptease. He tosses his shirt over his shoulder and it comes extremely close to a lit candle, making me a tad bit nervous.

  “Rhys?”

  “Yeah, Mrs. Gallhagar?” Oh, it sounds so fucking sexy when he calls me by my married name.

  “I love every single thing you’re doing but, could you maybe not try to literally set this place on fire?” He quickly turns around, his gaze landing on the candles lit throughout the suite for the first time. I’m surprised he hasn’t said anything about not having to turn on a light, or about all the rose petals he laid me on spread out over the bedding.

  “Did you do this? I mean, have this set up?” he asks.

  A soft shake of my head in the negative and his mood swiftly changes.

  “If you didn’t do this, and I didn’t do this, who the hell did? No one else has a key to this room—I’m the only one.”

  Oh, wow. I figured if he didn’t do it, one of our friends did, but if he’s the only one with a key and none of our friends asked for access, it’s starting to creep me out. The hotel staff could have done it, but I doubt it. We didn’t ask for it, and it wasn’t offered to us as an option when we booked the suite.

  “Call down to the front desk and see if anyone was in our room before we arrived for the night. Let’s not jump to any conclusions—it was probably the maid or something,” I offer, my voice steady, not giving away the tremble I feel inside.

  Smith is in prison. Smith is in prison. Smith is in prison.

  If I keep repeating it inside my head, maybe it’ll settle my nerves. It’s not like my rapist would have snuck into our hotel and left a ‘gift’ even if he wasn’t behind bars for several lifetimes…so why does the thought keep running through my head?

  Rhys places a hand on my knee, instantly calming my racing thoughts. He’s always had a way of making me feel safe. With his other hand, he reaches for the phone on the bedside table.

  “Yes, I’d like to enquire about the candles and rose petals in suite 1702.” He takes a deep breath while the person on the other end speaks. He’s gently stroking my knee back and forth, comforting me while he listens. “Yes. Mmhm, okay. Thank you.” He places the phone back on its cradle before explaining everything to me. The second it takes him to do so is killing me.

  “Well?” My voice does indeed tremble this time; it can’t be helped.

  “They let a man up to the suite a couple of hours ago. They checked his license and cleared it with management before letting him in. He claimed to be part of our wedding party and wanted to surprise us.”

  Wordlessly, I plead for him to tell me who the man was.

  “They only let him up because he had an FBI badge. We can both rest easy and continue on with our night—it seems Justin has some romance in him. He’s who was allowed in to leave the candles and roses. The front desk clerk also said he ordered champagne and strawberries to be sent up upon our arrival. Those should be up in a couple of minutes, I guess.”

  Whew. Okay, it was someone we knew, and my frantic thoughts were for naught.

  “What should we do while we wait?”

  “I can think of a few things, all of them starting with getting you out of that dress.”

  Before the last word leaves his lips, I’m pushing up on my elbows and reaching for him. Our lips clash together, my hands frantic to rid him of the rest of his clothing. Unfortunately, before I interrupted him, he’d only stripped away the clothing on the top half of his body. I want him completely lacking all his clothes—now.

  Breaking our kiss, his lips continue on a path from my chin to my ear, and he gently nips my lobe before whispering, “We need to rid you of this fantastic dress before I start ripping it away from your beautiful body.”

  He proceeds to flip me over onto my stomach, his hands again finding the buttons along my back. For each button he undoes, his tongue leaves a trail down my spine, until he finally spies the top of my corset. When he does, he doesn’t utter a word, but his rough growl is approval enough.

  “Do you like what you see?”

  Another button.

  A lick.

  “Rhys?”

  Another button, followed by a lick from the top of my corset all the way up my exposed spine to my neck.

  “Mm, I think you like it.”

  This time he flicks a button open hard, and I hear it snap back and hit his finger. He’s not bothered by it in the least. He continues unbuttoning me faster than ever, licks forgotten in his haste to fully see what lies hidden beneath my dress.

  “I wondered all damn day why your legs had an amber shine to them whenever I caught a glimpse. Now I know.” This time his growl can’t be contained behind his lips, and it vibrates throughout his entire body, seeping into mine. It feels…possessive. “You have no idea what you do to me, Averill. None.”

  “If it’s anything like what you do to me, I know, but you could always show me again.”

  A knock sounds on the door, followed by a voice letting us know it’s room service.

  “Leave it,” Rhys yells as he continues undressing me. If he was in a hurry a few seconds ago, he’s in a furious rush now. Before another thought can pass through my mind, he has all the buttons undone.

  “Take my hand, I’ll help you stand up. I want to see the whole picture before I take off the rest of your fuckable amber underwear.”

  Without uttering a word, I place my hand in his and he swiftly pulls me up from the bed, my dress still clinging to my shoulders. With a quick pass of his hands, it falls in a pool around my feet. He sucks in a breath and stands there staring at me.

  “Well?” I ask while fidgeting.

  “Breathless, speechless, amazed—that’s how you make me feel in this moment, Averill—and lucky. I’m the luckiest bastard in the world because I get to call you mine forever.”

  The next thing I know, he’s on his knees in front of me, undoing the clasps hooked to my thigh-high stockings. He proceeds to roll them down each leg gently, without displaying the urgency I know he feels inside, the urgency I know matches my own. Once he has my legs bare, he pushes until the backs of them hit the bed. “Lie back,” he urges. He doesn’t bother removing my panties before his mouth is on me, his tongue sweeping up in one swift flick before his lips close around my panty-covered clit.

  My hands reach for him, my fingers twisting in his hair, pulling him closer to me, letting him know what I want. With one finger, he pushes my panties aside, granting him access to my pussy. His tongue flicks my clit in rapid-fire flicks while his talented fingers enter me. He doesn’t start off gently with one finger—not my Rhys. He inserts three fingers into my canal, instantly setting me off. My orgasm is fast and hard. Rhys sucks my clit into his mouth, massaging it the whole time I’m screaming his name, his fingers still pumping in and out.

  I’m still coming down from my high when I feel Rhys enter me. Glancing down, I see his pants are still on and he’s only pushed them down enough to give himself access. My panties are still pushed to the side.

  “I couldn’t wait another second to be inside you,” he rasps near my ear, his voice low.

  My answer is to kiss him, our tongues dueling, saying the things we need to say. We needed a fast fuck before making love—it’s been building up all day long.

  “I love you, Rhys Nathanial Gallhagar,” I whisper into his kiss.

>   “I love you, Averill Lily Gallhagar,” he whispers back.

  With those words, I know my forever will be spent exactly like this, loving this man and him loving me.

  Amid discussions with all parties, I’ve learned two things: the reason Brant is upset, and exactly how my husband managed to score such an amazing deal last minute.

  Brant is pissed off about our spending too much to send him on a “fancy” vacation. To set the record straight, Rhys nabbed their flights for super cheap, and even managed to get them on our flight. It leaves from Grand Rapids, with one short layover in Dallas to pick up more passengers and top off on gas. Though the normal rate is nearly two grand, it cost us less than a fourth of the original amount. Combined with their hotel rooms—separate, I might add—we spent barely a hundred dollars over the two grand for an initial flight…for everything.

  Basically, what I’m saying is, Brant can go suck an egg.

  And if he doesn’t like it, he can suck a whole dozen—or go fuck himself, whichever he prefers. The asshole is coming to Cancun whether he likes it or not. Okay, I guess I’d like for him to want to come. A happy Brant makes me happy. When he’s brooding like he was when we gave him the gift, it upsets Rhys, and if it upset Rhys, it upsets me. I want everyone to enjoy their time in Cancun, regardless of why they’re there. If he wants to sit around at the bar and drink tequila all day, he can.

  I’m on my honeymoon, so I know who I’ll be doing.

  The man of my dreams comes strutting out of the bathroom, steam following him out. He’s wrapped in a towel with another in his hands, roughly drying his hair as he strides toward me.

  “Hey, wife.” He smirks as he says it.

  “Husband,” I purr back.