by Rebecca Foxx
He was still trying to figure out what that image meant, twenty minutes later when he walked through the door of his Greenwich Village apartment.
Aviva was sitting on the couch, remote in one hand, and with the other she rubbed her big belly. Marco still couldn’t believe that there was only one baby in there. If he didn’t know better, he would have sworn that she was pregnant with twins.
Marco went over to the couch and kissed her gently on the lips. Then he put his head to her stomach and listened for the slightest bit of noise that his baby girl was making in there. He still hadn’t quite wrapped his head around the fact that he was going to be a father. He wished that he could somehow speed up time. The next three months would be full of anxiety and excitation. And if everything went well then the real challenges would come flying at them.
But they felt ready. This was the life they had yearned for.
“Guess who called when you were out?” Aviva asked. She had a mischievous gleam in her eyes. Their phones were constantly ringing. It seemed like everyone that either of them had ever known had been trying to contact them lately.
He sat down on the couch and rested his hand on Aviva’s thigh. “Don’t make wait too long,” he said. “You know that I can’t stand when you do that.”
“Susan,” Aviva said, pausing dramatically. “Icarelli. Christopher’s wife. She wants to know if you’d be interested in doing a charity event alongside Christopher.”
“Absolutely not,” Marco snapped. “I have no interest in being around that guy. I know that things are not as intense as they used to be. But I’m still not interested.”
“I told her that you would love to do it.”
“What!” Marco screeched. “Why did you do that?”
Aviva put her finger to her lips, signaling for him to quiet, then she looked down at the large baby bump. Marco looked away with a guilty expression. He sighed heavily, then put his hand on top of Aviva’s.
“Maybe you’re right, babe,” he said. “Now that I’m going to be a father to a beautiful baby girl, it’s probably time for me to get over this stupid feud.”
Aviva smiled. She took his face in her hands and kissed him tenderly on the lips. Then she wrapped her arms around his neck.
Marco squeezed her tightly to him. He loved the feel of plump body. He had never felt more fulfilled in all of his life. And he was sure that there were many more great moments to come.
THE END
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Beverly Hills Effect
Chapter One
Cecilia Richards moaned and rolled onto her side, relishing in the touch of her husband’s sure, strong fingers. If there was ever a way to wake up, this was it. Moving slowly from a deep sleep to sensation of his hot skin pressed against hers.
There was something special about going from sleep to wakefulness in this particular way. All of the walls a person built up around herself, all of the hurt and anger that closed her off to a man’s touch, those things weren’t so bad when she was waking up.
Her defenses were down and it allowed her to feel things just with her body, without her head getting in her way.
She felt his hands sliding into her hair, moving it aside so that the nape of her neck was exposed. Every inch of skin he found there he placed his lips upon, hot breath and slightly chapped lips gliding down her neck, down her spine.
His hands snaked around to the front of her, thumbs moving tauntingly over her erect nipples and tweaking them in a way that made them beg for the feel of his rough tongue. It had been so long since they had been together in this way and she was amazed that her body remembered his so well, that it still responded the way it had when they were young and without the cares of day to day life weighing them down.
Her back arched, her backside pushing teasingly into the steadily growing length of his member, and it was his turn to moan. His hands moved down, sliding down her ribcage, caressing the length of her hipbones and then circling around the part of her body that was just waiting to explode at his touch. This felt like getting rid of a curse, this being together, and she made the conscious decision to pay attention only to her physical sensations.
Leave the rest to handle later, afterwards. Maybe this really was the best way to mend things. Maybe things would improve.
That was when she heard his phone ring, vibrating maliciously on the top of his swanky glass covered nightstand. It was shocking how quickly he retreated from his exploration of her body.
With astounding immediacy the hands that had been so needily moving across her skin were simply no longer there. She was wide awake now. She was awake enough to feel the loss of his touch acutely, and for all of her resentments of him to come washing back over her with a force that made her feel physically ill.
This man she had married, who seemed to have more loyalty to his cell phone than to his wife. She must have been a complete fool to believe that a little bit of morning feistiness could actually change anything. She should have known he wouldn’t follow through.
“Blake Richards here.”
She grimaced at the sound of his important business man voice, rolling her eyes and sitting up in bed. She held the sheets up to her chest, wrapped them around her body to make sure that she was as covered as she could possibly be.
Only moments before she and Blake had been as intimate as two people could be, and now she was behaving as if he was some kind of a stranger. Unfortunately, this was a lot more in keeping with the way their normal interactions went. This was what their marriage had been reduced to.
“When? How long do I have?” a pause, Blake waiting to receive the information he needed to proceed, “Shit. Ok. Next time give me more time, alright? You know I don’t like these last minute trips. No, no, I didn’t say that. I’ll be on that plane and you know it. Just next time. Alright. Fine, that’s fine. Just let them know I’m coming and make the necessary reservations.”
He hung up the phone without giving the person on the other line a proper goodbye and threw his pillow over his face, groaning as if he was the most miserable man in the world. As if she would ever believe that. She knew her husband.
As far as she could tell, he practically lived for times like this where they called him up and told him they needed him desperately, that he was the only one who could fix whatever current crisis the company was having.
“Well babe, looks like I’m heading out of town today. Pretty much immediately. Sons of bitches don’t know how to do a damned thing without me being there.”
He didn’t seem to notice that she was already out of bed and into the bathroom, readying the massive shower for a nice long soak. He was talking to nobody and it didn’t seem to bother him one bit.
“L.A. this time, again. That city is a trip, you know? Nothing quite like it, is there?”
“I don’t know,” she replied quietly and only to herself, “I’ve never been there. I’m not the one who gets to fly around the world every other day.”
“Anyway, I’ve got to go as soon as possible. Flight is all cued up and everything. I’m going to need you to make that shower quick, babe. I need to get in there and get out or I’m going to be late. Can’t have that, you know.”
God, if he could only see the look on her face right now. Her eyes were wide with rage and disbelief. What a selfish man he was, thinking only of what he wanted and when he wanted it done. She wasn’t even aloud to take a shower without him intruding with his more important business.
It was beyond maddening and there was nothing she could do about it but comply. Not yet. Not until she was ready to talk things through with him, hash them out until the bitter end. And now was not the time for that. Instead she did as he asked, showered as quickly as humanly possible and wrapped herself in a big, thick towel. Blake swatted her butt affectionately as he moved past her into the master bath, not realizing how angry sh
e was.
That made the whole thing even more annoying and as soon as he was in the shower with the water running she let out a loud groan of frustration. The only thing she had discovered that helped keep the animosity at bay was exercise, and as early as it was, she could already tell this was going to be a day with a whole lot of that. She slid on her running clothes, not even bothering with putting on real clothes.
What was the point? She wasn’t going to be able to do anything else with her day until she calmed herself down. She didn’t even bother to wait around to say goodbye to her husband. He would, in all likelihood, be gone by the time she got back from her run.
She had no idea how long he would be away this time and as sad as it was, she honestly didn’t care. That was how fractured their relationship had become. It seemed to her like the kind of broken a couple simply couldn’t come back from.
She hadn’t spoken to him about it, hadn’t even spoken the words out loud yet, but she knew where the two of them were headed. Divorce. It was such an ugly word, which seemed fitting to her, really. Why should it be a pretty one? No, it shouldn’t. It was an ugly word for an ugly thing.
Cecilia had never in a million years believed that she was the kind of woman who would wind up in this position. She had honestly believed that when she got married, it would be forever. It seemed so naive to her now, the fact that she had ever thought a thing like that.
The longer she staid married, the more clear it became to her that nothing was necessarily forever. Things could be broken much easier than most people could possibly imagine. It just wasn’t often talked about.
She stepped out the front door of their massive home and took a deep, slightly shaky breath. Regardless of the shambles her marriage was in, she was grateful to live in this beautiful Colorado town. Denver wasn’t where she grew up, but it was most definitely her home.
She never planned on living anywhere else, and for that she was actually grateful to Blake. She would never have moved here if it weren’t for him and his job. She owed him for that, even if it wasn’t enough of a reason to stay together.
Cecilia started off on her run, focusing on the in and out of her breath and attempting to sweep all other thoughts from her mind. She counted each pound of her feet on the pavement, counting her steps methodically. It comforted her.
She loved the predictability of it, it made her feel safe. As long as she continued to push herself, she would move forward. There was some small solace in that. She would run until her husband left for his business trip, and when he returned she would tell him that she wanted a divorce. There was no other way. She had run out of options, was at her wit’s end.
She felt tears begin to well in her eyes but refused to acknowledge them. Let them fall. It wouldn’t change anything. Nothing would.
Chapter Two
“CeCe? Celia? Where’d you go, babe? Are you playing hide and seek? Because I’ve always been good at that game and you know it.”
Blake looked around their master bedroom quickly, half expecting to see his wife hiding behind the bed or something. He saw her towel tossed casually aside on the floor and smiled to himself. It wasn’t like her to do something that messy, which meant she must have been in a hurry to take it off. Maybe she was waiting for him, still interested in finishing what he had started before she even woke up.
But if that was the case, then where the hell was she? As far as he could tell, she wasn’t even in the room anymore. So then perhaps it wasn’t a game. Maybe she really had just left. He sighed and shook his head, knowing without even seeing her face that she was anything but happy with him.
If he had a dollar for every time something exactly like this had happened since they had gotten married, he would be a billionaire several times over. It was only at the very beginning, when they had probably been too young to get married in the first place, when things hadn’t been like this.
They had been married for going on twelve years now and things had gotten steadily worse until he and his beautiful wife hardly ever saw each other.
And dear god, she was beautiful. He had never seen a woman who looked quite so lovely as her, neither in the movies or in real life. When they met they had been in college and she had been studying to be a ballerina. She may have given up dance long ago, but she still had the lithe body and elegance that only a dancer possessed.
She had wide blue eyes with heavy black lashes and an expression that always managed to look vaguely surprised. She had thick black hair that fell below her shoulders and bangs that fell across her forehead, framing her face perfectly.
She was thirty-two years old and she didn’t look a day over eighteen, the loveliest woman he had ever seen. And she was nowhere to be found.
Blake sighed and threw on his suit, stopping briefly to check himself in the mirror. Everything looked just as it should, his sandy blonde hair perfectly in place and his honey colored eyes shining with the anticipation of yet another trip. But if he looked closely, if he really looked at himself, that gleam wasn’t the same as it had been a couple of years ago.
Things were beginning to take their toll. On him, on his wife, on the two of them together. When he had first started this job he had been over the moon the first time they sent him to L.A. And now? Now he just felt tired. He really just wanted to curl up with Celia on the couch and watch a shitty movie or something. That, frankly, sounded like heaven.
Grabbing the weekend suitcase that always staid packed, Blake made his way down the stairs of their impressive home. He had worked hard for this home, goddamnit, and he deserved to be happy with it.
He used to be happy with it, hadn’t he? At some point? He imagined he might be able to be still, if only he ever got to spend any time in the home he paid the mortgage on. CeCe had done a fantastic job of having it decorated it. She did a fantastic job at pretty much everything she did. That was only one small part of what made her so amazing.
“CeCe? Any chance you’re down here? In the kitchen, maybe?”
He winced, realizing how misogynistic that sounded. It didn’t matter that there was nobody around but him. He didn’t like to think that there was even a chance that somebody could think he believed his wife belonged in the kitchen.
Because he didn’t, not at all, even if that’s how he came across. What an unassuming bystander would not understand was how fondly he thought of the early days when he and Celia had been locked in a seemingly unending quest to outdo each other in the kitchen.
So many mistakes, so many shocking triumphs the two of them had experienced in that way, and every day Blake walked into the kitchen a little part of him still hoped that the game would have somehow picked up again. But just like it had been for such a long time, the kitchen was empty, bone dry and devoid of any kind of feeling.
So then she really had gone then. Probably off on another one of her runs, the only thing that seemed to make her happy these days. It would have been nice to see her before he left, even if it was for a short amount of time. He missed the days when she had jumped on top of him to keep him from being to leave her at all. Things hadn’t been like that with them for years.
Even so, pulling out of the driveway in his swanky BMW, Blake scanned the streets, hoping to catch a glimpse of her. He felt like if he could just see her, just give her a little wave, everything would somehow be ok. And so he looked and looked, even drove around the neighborhood a couple of time hoping she would be around the next corner.
Finally he had to go or just miss his trip altogether, but he left with a distinct feeling of dissatisfaction nestled deep in his gut where he could not make it go away. Something had to change. He should have known it before and maybe some part of him did, but he had always found away to ignore it before.
Well, he couldn’t do that anymore. Celia’s absence was louder than any kind of yelling she could have done. If he didn’t do something drastic and do it quickly, he was going to lose the love of his life. If he let that happen, he was going to lose
the only thing in his life that was actually worth a damn.
“Hey, thanks. I just need to get to the Ritz, fastest way you know how.”
“The Ritz?” the driver hired by his firm said in awe followed by a low whistle of appreciation, “that’s a swanky gig you got there. Lucky man is all I got to say, lucky fucking man.”
“Thanks, I guess you’re right. Just as fast as you can, ok? I’ve got a shit ton of meetings set up for the day and I can’t really afford to be late.”
The driver nodded, some of the friendliness going out of his face at the tone Blake was using. Great. Now he was managing to piss off total strangers in a matter of sentences. No wonder CeCe wasn’t happy.
He used to be fun. When the two of them had met he had been fun and spontaneous and all about making sure Celia felt like the most amazing woman in the entire universe. If that younger version of himself could see this version he had become, he would have sucker punched him. And it would have been deserved.