Down the Aisle (A Dare Me Novella) (Entangled Brazen)

by Christine Bell

  She sank onto the bed and swung her legs over the side. He knelt next to her and began unbuttoning her blouse, stopping to drop a sucking kiss to every inch he exposed. “I love when you wear clothes like this. You’re my own sexy schoolteacher.” Another kiss, this one over the peach silk of her bra. “When you’re getting dressed in the morning, walking around in your skirt, putting on your earrings, fixing your lipstick, it takes all my strength not to follow behind you and undo all the things you’ve just done.”

  He lifted her arms high over her head, and picked up the cuffs clicking one over her right wrist then the other over her left.

  “Leave your hands over your head,” he said.

  Her stomach was exposed now, and the icy blast from the air conditioning sent a shiver through her. He leaned in to trail his fingers over ribcage, and then lower. He unzipped her skirt, pressing his lips to her calf as he slid the fabric down her body.

  “I want to tie your legs open wide,” he said, his voice silky as he slid her panties off. “And then I want to fuck you until you scream.”

  She’d been on the business end of that promise before, and it wasn’t an idle one. Her legs started to tremble as he picked up one of the restraints and looped it around one ankle to tie the end to the bed rail.

  Okay, not too tight. That wasn’t so bad. Grasping her other foot lightly, he ran his thumb over her insole as he looped the second length of silk around her ankle. She swallowed hard as he used it to spread her legs wide. Then wider.

  She resisted the urge to fight him. To close her legs and hide herself from his heated gaze.

  “You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. Don’t hide from me,” he ground out. Heat and wetness rushed to her core at his words, and she relaxed, letting her muscle go limp again. She trusted him and needed more than anything to let go. Take this break from reality for just a little while.

  “There you go. That’s so good, babe.” His soft praise made her go weak inside, and she let her eyelids drift shut. His fingers were like feathers, drifting over her skin, so light, like a whisper. When they drifted between her legs, she held her breath. A low buzzing sound reverberated through the room.

  “Oh!” The sensation was electrifying. A pulse of energy directly on the bundle of nerves was almost too much. She moved her hand to stop him but the cuffs pulled at her wrists. And then the urge to move away was gone. Pleasure radiated from the vibrations, between her legs, down her thighs. She strained toward it now, unable to look away.

  He climbed onto the bed, positioning himself between her legs, thick cock bobbing as he moved. He laid the vibrator so it stayed in place against her clit and jerked his jeans farther down his thighs.

  “Just for a second,” he bit out. “Need to be inside you for one. Second.” He leaned down to rest on one forearm as he slid the head of his cock into her. The breath whooshed out of her lungs, and she thrust up toward him. If he came the rest of the way in, and the vibrator kept doing what it was doing, she was on track for the mother of all orgasms.

  But he didn’t. He played with her, working the thick head in and out, using his hand to massage her with the vibrator until her whole body was quaking. Heat collected at her center and a pulsing need began to throb low in her belly.

  “I’ve been thinking about this for a week. Getting inside you. Your legs wide open for me.”

  His voice was lower than the Galen she knew. Dark with need, and it was driving her insane.

  He pulled away, and she whimpered at the loss, but it was short-lived as he jerked forward, sliding all the way in. The click of a button and suddenly the pulses from the vibrator increased, stealing her breath in tandem with Galen’s thrusting hips. He hammered into her, hard and deep, and the sensations all melded together until she was a mass of ache and need.

  “Mmm,” she moaned, the tension coiling tighter, the heat flaming hotter. His teeth closed over the cord in her neck, and she screamed as the waves crashed over her and light pulsed through her.

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he chanted, riding it with her, slamming his hips against hers as he came.

  Their labored breathing filled the room as they came down from the high, and she slung her cuffed arms around his neck as he pulled away and turned the vibrator off.

  “That was a very nice surprise to come home to,” she said, nestling her nose against his warm shoulder. She hadn’t felt this relaxed in ages.

  He chuckled, pulling away from her grasp to gently untie her and unlock her cuffs. “I’m glad you liked it.”

  She had. And she didn’t even have to face the dreaded paddle. She felt like she’d dodged a bullet there.

  “And hey, we can just bring the rest to try on our honeymoon.”

  She eyeballed him, wondering if he was serious.

  ”That would be an interesting security check,” she admitted with a grin.

  “It’s totally happening, so get your pretty head around it.”

  He pulled her onto his chest, and she snuggled in close, listening to his heartbeat slow as he nodded off. She hugged him closer for a second and breathed in his scent.

  Paddle or no paddle, one thing was for sure: she never really had to fear. Galen would take care of her. She knew it with all her heart. That kind of love was rare, and more than enough to hope for in a lifetime even if they never had a baby. But she couldn’t deny the little squeeze her heart gave at the thought. They still had one person considering them for a possible adoption, so it wasn’t like they’d lost hope yet. Everything was going to be fine. She was sure of it.

  And still, sleep was a long time coming.

  …

  When she woke up the next morning, Lacey found herself nose to nose with a note on the opposite pillow. She stifled a yawn and then opened it.

  Went for a run before it got too hot. Be back with bagels.

  Perfect. She scooted to the side of the bed and rose gingerly to her feet, both surprised and relieved that, aside from a slight headache, she was hardly hung over at all. That’s what the love of a good man did for you. She smiled as her thoughts went back to the night before. From coming to The Meat Market to make sure she wasn’t miserable to making her breakfast and setting her up with water and aspirin before bed, Galen had taken care of her the way he always did. The way she hoped she did for him. Plans for a fancy lunch spread filled her head as she made her way to the kitchen for her morning coffee.

  He’d loved the pasta salad she’d made for Cat’s picnic a few weeks ago, so that and roast beef sandwiches on thick slices of fresh pumpernickel from Balducci’s would be perfect.

  When she passed by the telephone and noted the blinking message light, she picked it up to listen while she made her grocery list. Galen liked Swiss on his roast beef, so—

  “Hi, Galen, Lacey. This is Stella Martin.”

  She dropped the pen in her hand and gripped the phone more tightly. Please god, please…

  The deep sigh that rang over the line said it all and sent her stomach into a nosedive, but she forced herself to listen to the words. “I tried your cell phone, but it went straight to voice mail too. I’m sorry to tell you that Sarah has made her decision and unfortunately, has selected another family. Now remember, sometimes it takes several—”

  The rest of it was nothing but jumbled sound as she set the phone down on the counter. Again. They’d tried and failed again. The first time, with Katya, she’d just changed her mind altogether about the adoption. That had been rough. She closed her eyes to ward off the pain of that memory. But this time, what did this other family have that she and Galen didn’t? Was it that they weren’t married yet? Or maybe she’d just tried too hard at the interview? She recalled Sarah’s face from their meeting three weeks before, and she’d seemed to like them. What could have gone wrong?

  Tears filled her eyes and spilled over. How strange that just a year or two ago, she’d never even given a second thought to the possibility that having children would be anything other than an at-will
prospect. She’d stop using birth control, and then she’d get pregnant. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. Then, lather, rinse, repeat until she’d have a houseful of kids running around, creating laughter and chaos wherever they went. How could she have been so naive? She’d done everything according to plan. Gone off the Pill in order to give her body a chance to get regulated again for a while, and even started taking pre-natal vitamins. She had all her ducks in a row so that her body would be in the best possible shape for them to start trying right after the wedding. And then? Her body had betrayed her. Her monthly schedule that had been like clockwork while she was on birth control became a crap shoot, and she knew something was wrong.

  She pressed a hand to her stomach and blinked back the tears. And worse, how was she going to tell Galen? They’d been so hopeful this time, and the wedding was only a week away. How could she tell him now?

  She wouldn’t. Better to wait until after the wedding. There was no point in ruining his day. If he felt anything like she did after hearing the news, putting it off for a few days was a kindness she wished Stella had given her.

  She leaned against the granite countertop for support as she ran over what the next steps would be for them. They’d explored so many options already, and it seemed like every door was slammed louder than the last.

  They’d just keep trying.

  Resolved, she straightened and grabbed the list from the table. Galen was a fighter, and this last year, he’d taught her to be one, too. They would get through this together.

  Still, she couldn’t stop that ugly, insidious little voice that whispered…

  What if you can’t?

  …

  “Cinnamon raisin, plain, sesame, I got ‘em all, baby.”

  Galen tossed the bursting paper bag onto the kitchen island and tugged Lacey’s ponytail from behind. She turned off the faucet where she’d been rinsing their breakfast pan from the night before and faced him.

  “Uh, yeah, sounds good.”

  The lightness in his chest that had been there all morning disappeared when he saw her face. Gone were the pink cheeks and the soft smile playing around her full lips while she’d slept that morning. Her eyes looked sad now, her shoulders were slumped, and her voice was dull.

  He pulled her into his arms and squeezed, pressing his nose into her hair and breathing in her familiar scent. “What’s the matter, babe? Talk to me.” Please.

  She hugged him back, but stiffly, and then pulled away. “Just the stress of the wedding and the new job all at once. I’ll be fine in a week or two once things die down.”

  Lies.

  The still-warm bagel he’d scarfed down on the way home sat in his belly like a rock. Whatever she was saying about it now, he knew that Lacey had been looking forward to their wedding day since he’d first proposed. Sure it was a busy time for them both, but she’d always been the type of person who thrived on this shit—organization and lists and lace. And she’d been over the moon when she’d landed her first teaching job. This should’ve been the happiest time of her life. Was this all about their baby trouble, or was something else happening here? Had she changed her mind? He swallowed hard and decided that he’d been patient long enough. Time to push her into talking to him.

  “I don’t buy it, Lace.”

  She bit her lip and made a show of getting herself a bagel from the bag. “What don’t you buy? This is a stressful time. It happens.” She shrugged and tore the bread in half before stuffing a hunk into her mouth.

  “Is this about the baby or is something going on about us that we need to talk about?”

  She chewed for long enough that he wondered if she’d ever stop, and then she swallowed before meeting his gaze. “I’m fine. I’d be even finer if you stopped asking me what’s wrong.”

  And maybe I’d stop asking you if you didn’t have tears brimming in your eyes half the time, he wanted to shout.

  But he didn’t.

  Instead, he stared at her helplessly, and she glared back, arms crossed over her chest defiantly. Good. He could take mad a lot easier than sad. If only he believed that’s what it was instead of a bone-deep despair that she was unwilling to share with him.

  He glanced at the kitchen clock and swore under his breath. “I’ve got to call Shane and cancel. I was supposed to help him install a bathtub today and—”

  “No, go!” She cleared her throat and lowered her voice, running a hand through her hair. “Don’t cancel. You should definitely go help him. It wouldn’t be right to bail last minute like that.”

  The relief on her face at the thought of getting rid of him for a few hours made his stomach clench again, and in spite of his instincts warning him to tread carefully and give her space, he couldn’t help but press a little.

  “Why?” He kept his eyes locked on her telltale face. “We can do it another day. I’d rather be with you.”

  I’d rather be with you too, he willed her to say. That would have been the instant reply a few months ago. Now, it was just dead air between them, and his gut pitched so hard, he wondered if he might be sick. Finally, she spoke.

  “I’d…rather be with you too,” she swallowed hard, “but there’s still a lot to be done. I was going to head out and pick up the groomsmen’s gifts anyway. We’ll meet up for dinner later, okay?”

  The words were right this time. She even managed a strained smile when she said them. But that long pause before she’d answered…That hesitation was killing him. Was that how things were going to be now? She wouldn’t talk to him, she didn’t seem to want him around, and the only time they’d slept together was when she’d been half in the bag.

  What was happening to them, and how the fuck was he going to stop it?

  …

  “Remind me next time to ask you if you have the air conditioning hooked up before I agree to help you with any more projects, bro,” Galen griped, taking a long pull off a sweaty bottle of water.

  It was a hellish ninety degrees outside and at least five degrees hotter in the bathroom where he and Shane were attempting to install a fancy, claw-foot tub that Cat had decided was a “must have.”

  “Sure. And the next time you need me to move a sectional, make sure to tell me that it’s going to be an all-day affair since your wife-to-be will want to see it in every imaginable position, in every possible room of the house, before having us put it back where it was to start with.”

  Galen couldn’t fault him there. That had totally happened a couple months back and the beer and burger he’d supplied hadn’t made up for the emotional trauma.

  He yanked the sweat-soaked t-shirt over his head and used it to wipe his face. “You think you’ll be ready to move in by fall?”

  Shane and Cat had picked a turn of the century fixer-upper since Cat had always wanted to live in a haunted house and Shane had always wanted to do whatever Cat wanted.

  “Hope so. I’m getting sick of driving all over town back and forth.” Shane bent low and started piping caulk around the drain of the tub. “Plus, I think I found a dog, and we need the space. It’s a golden retriever that lives next door to my parents. The people are getting too old to take care of him and are looking to find him a good home. Cat is talking about pot-bellied pigs, and there’s no way that’s going down. If I get a dog now, I’ll have squatter’s rights and she’ll back off.”

  The words “back” and “off” weren’t in his sister’s vocabulary, but he let his buddy hold onto the dream.

  “Any news on the baby front?” Shane asked, looking up from his finishing work.

  Galen hesitated and shook his head before taking another swallow of water. He’d considered telling Lacey this morning about the email he’d gotten the other day, but there were still a million things that could go wrong, and the look on her face when he’d come home from his jog had only cemented the fact that she couldn’t take another let down. At least this time, if it didn’t work out, it would only be his heartache.

  So it was back to the waiting game. It seeme
d like they were always waiting for something lately. Ovulation, a phone call, a letter, an interview. Every month, when his broken-hearted fiancée walked out of the bathroom with that look on her face, he wanted take her away from it all. To just be like fuck it and forget the whole thing. If he could be with her forever, he’d die a happy man. But he knew how badly she wanted a family, and if he was being honest with himself, he’d never imagined his life any other way. So they kept on keeping on. Even when shit got hard.

  “Nothing yet. I think she’s still caught up with what happened when Katya changed her mind.”

  That had been a rough one, too. So close, yet so far. It had been their first try at adopting. They felt like the gods were smiling down on them when they were picked by a teenage mom-to-be who was due to give birth in the spring. A week before her due date, she backed out, saying that she and the baby’s father were getting back together and had decided to raise the child themselves. Lacey had been inconsolable, and they had seriously considered pulling their name from the list. But in typical delicate-on-the-outside, steel-on-the-inside Lacey fashion, she rallied and a couple weeks later, she was back in the saddle.

  Still, he could see a hairline crack in that steel that hadn’t been there before, and a part of him wondered how many more blows she could take before she shattered. But maybe this time…

  He shut off the hopeful feeling blooming in his chest and stood abruptly. “It’ll be fine. We’ll get through it.”

  “Well, we’re all pulling for you,” Shane said, and then, clearly unsure of what to say next, promptly changed the subject to baseball.

  As they talked and tossed insults at one another’s favorite teams, Galen’s thoughts went back to Lacey. It had been so hard to leave her, but until she was willing to open up, there wasn’t much more he could do. Maybe she was right. With only a week until the wedding, things were getting hectic. After that, they’d have some uninterrupted time alone for their honeymoon. He pinched his eyes closed and pictured him and Lacey, arms wrapped around each other on the beach. When he opened them, he was resolved. She could hide her head in the sand now, but they’d find their way back to each other in the same place they’d started. Puerto Rico.