Foolish Expectations

by Alison Bliss

  Then he heard her mutter, “Oh, yeah, that’s the spot.”

  Nash steadied himself against the door. Motherfucker.

  He wasn’t sure if he was pissed she hadn’t waited for him or turned on that she was apparently about to make herself come. But then his dick twitched and grew even harder, giving him his answer.

  Nash groaned quietly, and his stomach tightened. He was half-tempted to listen to her finish herself off, but… Like hell. He wanted to join that party, wanted to see that wild, glazed look in her eyes, wanted to hear her panting his name as he delivered the pleasure she sought.

  But as he twisted the knob, a man’s rough voice muttered, “You like it right there?”

  Nash paused. There was another man in his bedroom…with his fucking wife!

  Fire shot through his veins, and he barreled through the door to find a young guy in overalls standing on one side of the bed, leaning against the wall, while a fully clothed Bailey stood on the opposite side.

  She squeaked and her hand flew to her chest. “Jesus, you scared me!” Then her eyes lowered and she covered her mouth and giggled. “Oh, my God. What are you doing?”

  Nash glanced down, realizing his dick was still hanging out of his pants and he was holding Bailey’s panties in his hand. Sonofabitch. He twisted away from the man, shoved his junk back inside, zipped up his pants, then shoved the panties into his pocket before turning back to face them. “What the fuck is going on here?” he growled.

  At his tone, Bailey’s brow rose suspiciously. “What is it you think is going on?”

  “I’m not in the mood to play guessing games. Just answer the damn question.”

  Her gaze narrowed and she pursed her lips. “No.”

  “No?” Nash clenched his teeth and his hands fisted at his sides. “What the hell do you mean no?”

  “You heard me. I don’t know what has you in such a snit, but until you apologize for speaking to me like that, I’m not answering jack shit.” She crossed her arms.

  The man in the overalls raised both hands in surrender and shook his head. “Hey, man, I’m just here delivering a dresser. I didn’t do anything, I swear.”

  Nash glanced past him at the new dresser against the wall. “Where’s your delivery truck? I didn’t see one outside.”

  “The lady had me park it around back so I could bring the dresser through the kitchen. She said it would be easier. We’d just gotten it into place when you came in.”

  “We?” Nash asked, turning a sharp eye onto his wife, who only stuck out her stubborn chin more.

  “Well, yeah. Your wife—”

  “Is pregnant,” Nash said, rudely cutting him off.

  The man’s eyes widened. “Well, it’s not mine.”

  “No shit, it’s mine. Now get the fuck out of my house.”

  “Nash!” Bailey exclaimed as the delivery man hightailed it out the door as fast as he could. The moment they heard the front door swing closed, she glared at him in disgust. “What the hell has come over you?”

  “Me? What’s wrong with you? You shouldn’t be moving heavy furniture in your condition.”

  “Oh God. Stop being so dramatic. I didn’t even lift the stupid dresser. I just helped him scoot it across the floor.”

  “I don’t care. You should have waited for me. I would have moved it for you.”

  “Well, I didn’t. Sue me for trying to get it done before you got home.” She motioned to the bed, where her two large suitcases lay side by side. “I wanted to unpack now so I could spend the rest of the evening with you.” She turned away from him and huffed out a breath.

  Shit. He’d left work early because he’d wanted the same thing—to spend time with her. But he’d screwed everything up. Feeling like an idiot, he walked up behind her and touched her shoulder. “Bailey, I’m sorry.”

  She pulled away. “For what exactly? Yelling at me or thinking I was screwing around on you?”

  “I didn’t think you were—” She cast a challenging glance over her shoulder at him. “Okay, fine. Damn it, I heard you grunting and groaning, then heard a man’s voice. What the hell did you expect me to think?”

  “You should have trusted me.”

  Her hurt tone punched him in the gut, and he cringed. “I know.”

  “You also shouldn’t have spoken to either of us that way. That poor man didn’t deserve it, and I sure as hell didn’t.”

  “I know that too.” Testing her receptiveness, he reached out once more and ran his finger along her arm. This time, she didn’t retreat from his touch. “I’m a jackass. Will you forgive me?”

  “Maybe,” she said, half-smiling. “But I need to know one thing first.”

  “What’s that?”

  She looked at him dead-on, her face serious. “Why did you run in here with your dick hanging out of your pants? Were you trying to intimidate him?”

  Nash laughed, then ran a hand through his hair. “I found your panties laying on the floor in the hallway. I thought maybe you were trying to tell me something.”

  Bailey giggled. “They must have fallen out of my suitcases when I carried them in here.”

  “You picked them up yourself?” He wanted to beat his head against a wall. “Damn it, Bailey. Those are fucking heavy. Do I have to tie you to the bed when I leave for work so you don’t overexert yourself?”

  Glancing down at the large bulge in his pants, she said, “I have a feeling that if you tied me to a bed, it wouldn’t keep me from overexerting myself. Probably would only make it worse.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Nash leaned in and nuzzled her ear. “I made dinner reservations for us tonight. Why don’t we go out to eat and then come home and find out?”

  “You’re on, but I need a quick shower first before we go.”

  “That’s okay. We’ve got two hours before we have to leave. Plenty of time for you to get ready.”

  She flipped open the suitcase closest to her, grabbed some clothes, and then headed for the bathroom. A moment later, he heard the shower door open and the water turned on. He considered joining her, but knew they’d never make it to dinner on time if he did. So Nash settled on the edge of the bed to wait for her.

  “You know, if you would have just let me help you unpack these when you first moved in, you wouldn’t have had to carry them in here.”

  “I told you I would just wait until the new dresser arrived. I didn’t want you to have to move your clothes to make room for mine. It was just temporary. Didn’t kill me.”

  No, but he might if he caught her lugging around anything that heavy again while she was pregnant.

  As he sat there, something in her open luggage caught his attention. A newspaper, neatly folded in half, stuck out from beneath her clothes with the word “Sutherland” in bold black ink. Nash slid the paper out and opened it.

  To his surprise, it was the article that had started the entire argument between him and his father. Aaron Sutherland had given an interview to a reporter where he’d named Nash as the new head of the legal department for Sutherland Industries…before his father had even asked him if he’d wanted the damn position.

  And he didn’t. Not in the least.

  His father knew he would turn down the position. Taking that job would have come with too steep of a price. But where his tyrant father was concerned, business always came before family, and this had been his way of trying to force Nash into the position. Or what his dad referred to as “taking his rightful place in the family business.”

  But Nash had never wanted to be like his father. He didn’t aspire to have some fancy corporate job in Houston. In law school, he’d dreamed of opening his own practice in a smaller town, one where he could get to know his clients on a personal level and help those individuals solve their legal problems, ethically and without a large financial burden. That was much more gratifying than protecting a corporation’s assets.

  Because he’d never wanted to ask his dad for anything, Nash had used the inheritance he’d received from
his grandparents at age twenty-one to pay for law school, purchase his home, and open his business in Flat Rock, Texas. Nash made a decent living. He wasn’t rich by any means, but…well, he couldn’t give a shit less.

  The moment he’d seen the article, he had marched straight into his dad’s office, tossed the newspaper on his old man’s desk, and very clearly told him to go fuck himself. Because he’d had enough of Aaron Sutherland trying to control him.

  But why did Bailey have a copy of it? She hadn’t even known Nash back when the article came out, much less his father.

  He wanted to ask her about it, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not after the stunt he’d just pulled. The hurt in her voice when she’d told him he should have trusted her had damn near killed him. The last thing he wanted was the mother of his unborn child to think he didn’t believe in her. Even if she did have a track record of keeping things from him.

  But that was all in the past, wasn’t it?

  They were married now. Husband and wife. And they were growing closer and closer with each passing day. Their first week had been busy, consisting of furniture shopping, picking out their baby’s first outfit, and arguing at the car dealership for an hour before she finally relented and let him buy her a new car to replace her old one he’d sold.

  And just yesterday, Bailey had gone to lunch with his mother and couldn’t wait to get home to tease him about the half-naked childhood photos his mom had shared with her. Then he’d made them popcorn and held her hand on the couch while they’d watched a movie together. Things were great between them. So there was no way he was going to screw it all up by making her feel like he was giving her the third degree.

  He’d asked for her trust and she’d given it, opening up to him more and more each day. Nash wasn’t willing to jeopardize that over some stupid newspaper article.

  “Nash, I’m almost done, but I forgot to grab a towel,” Bailey hollered over the sound of the rushing water. “Would you mind getting me one?”

  “Sure, no problem.” He slid the newspaper back into her suitcase just how he found it and headed to the bathroom.

  The mirror had already fogged over and the scent of her coconut shampoo infused with the rising steam. Bailey stood in the shower, just beyond the frosted glass door, running soapy hands over her breasts as the water trickled down to the notch between her slender thighs.

  Desire shot through him, hard and fast, and presented itself in the form of a rapidly growing cock. One he very much wanted to fuck his gorgeous wife with. So instead of fetching her a towel, he quickly stripped off his clothes and stepped into the shower behind her.

  Surprised, Bailey turned to face him, glancing down at his swollen member. “What are you doing?”

  “Looks like we’re going to be late for dinner.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Two weeks.

  That was how long Bailey had been married to the man of her dreams. Not only did he treat her like a queen, but he made it his mission in life to satisfy her every need—in and out of the bedroom. She couldn’t imagine a more perfect husband than Nash Sutherland. And thankfully, he was all hers.

  So what if their relationship had developed a little differently than a normal couple’s? The undeniable connection they shared had bonded them in every sense of the word, and it was the best feeling in the world.

  Bailey snuggled deeper into his chest as Nash’s fingers roamed up and down her bare back, evoking pleasant sensations of tenderness and affection. A sigh of contentment escaped her lips.

  “Can I ask you something?” he asked softly, sounding unsure of himself.

  After a curious glance to his expressionless face, she nodded.

  “What happened between you and Doug? I mean, I know you said you caught him cheating on your wedding day, but…”

  Bailey hesitated, but with Nash being her husband, he had a right to hear the whole story. “I married him, which was stupid, since I knew something wasn’t right between us. Against my better judgment, I went through with it, anyway. After we said our I dos, the entire wedding party moved to the adjoining reception hall where the guests waited for us. I didn’t know almost anyone there, except for a few of my coworkers. The rest were Doug’s family and friends.” She looked up at Nash to see if he was paying attention and found him staring at her, hanging on her every word.

  “Go on,” he encouraged.

  “Doug’s pretentious mother had insisted I wear one of those poofy, Cinderella-type dresses, but I knew I would get hot after a few dances. So I compromised by bringing another gown with me. Thank God I did. About an hour into the reception, I practically had a heat stroke and went to the dressing room to change into the other dress I’d brought, which was much shorter and cooler. It was the one I was wearing the night I met you.”

  “Man, I loved that dress. You looked sexy as hell in it, but I couldn’t wait to take it off you.” Nash leaned down, brushed his lips against hers, and then smiled. “God. It makes me horny just thinking about it.”

  “That’s exactly the reaction I’d hoped Doug would have when he saw me in it.”

  Nash’s eyes narrowed, and a muscle ticked in his jaw. “Okay, fast forward through things like that or I’m going to go find Doug and kick the shit out of him.”

  “Okay, okay,” she said, giggling at his jealous streak. “So by the time I got back to the reception, Doug was missing in action. Apparently, he’d told his mother he wanted to make a toast to our guests, so she handed me a microphone and asked me to find him. He’d been knocking back glasses of champagne, one after another, so I think she worried he’d make an ass out of himself.”

  “And he still managed to do that.”

  She shook her head furiously. “No. Actually, I did that for him.”

  His brow quirked. “What do you mean?”

  “I found him in the kitchen. His pants were around his ankles, and he was balls deep in his secretary. Neither of them had heard me come in over all the dirty things he was spewing to her. I was in shock, of course. So I did the only thing I could think of. I turned on the microphone. When they still didn’t notice me, I hit the button on the automatic partition window, which separated the kitchen from the reception hall. As the partition lifted, all the guests witnessed what Doug was doing, including his mother. Before he could get his pants up, I slapped him and walked out.”

  Nash shook his head in disgust. “Your ex-husband is a stupid sonofabitch.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “So how did you end up at Rowdy’s?”

  “I stormed out of the reception before realizing I didn’t have my cell phone or my car, and I wasn’t about to go back inside to ask someone for a ride. Besides, all of my things were already moved into Doug’s house and I wasn’t going to go back there. I had nowhere else to go. I just needed to think, to figure out what I was going to do, so I started walking and ended up at the bar.”

  “So why didn’t you just get the marriage annulled? It would have been cheaper and quicker than a divorce.”

  “I’d planned on it, but then…I met you.” Guilt sloshed around in her stomach and a frown tugged at her mouth. “After what we—I mean, what I did…well, I just figured I wasn’t any better than Doug. Even if the marriage meant nothing to him, I was legally his wife. What I did with you was wro—”

  “Don’t.” There was no mistaking the warning in his tone, but Nash wrapped his hand gently around her neck and tilted her face up to his. His eyes held only tenderness. “Sweetheart, don’t ever say what we did that night was wrong. It wasn’t. It was fate, stepping in to make things right for you, for us. All of us. We conceived our child that night.”

  Bailey closed her eyes and rested her forehead against his warm lips. “I know. I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just…” Her words cut off and she sighed heavily.

  “You didn’t want to be a hypocrite?”

  She cringed, but nodded. “Yes.”

  “Do you still love him?”
r />   “No, that’s the thing. I never loved Doug.”

  Nash’s mouth fell open. “But that day at your apartment, I asked you if you loved your husband. You said you did.”

  “I lied. I needed time to figure things out for myself, but you kept pushing. I had to tell you something to get you to give me some breathing room. Besides, I only thought I loved Doug. I wanted the security of marriage and thought that once we were intimate, my feelings would deepen. But anything I felt for him flew out the window the minute I stepped into that kitchen. I never even shed a tear over him. I was pissed about what he had done, but I wasn’t heartbroken over losing him. Before I’d made it to the bar, I’d already realized how un-in-love with Doug I truly was.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “What? You don’t believe me?”

  “It’s not that. It’s just…you were a virgin when I met you. You must have thought a lot of the guy if you were saving yourself for your wedding night.”

  “Hardly. I wasn’t doing that for him. I know this is probably going to sound silly, but I…I wanted my mother to be proud of me. She was the reason why I waited. It had nothing to do with Doug.”

  “Then why did you sleep with me? What changed your mind? I didn’t push you into doing something you didn’t want, did I?”

  “No, not at all. You were wonderful to me.” She smiled at him. “I had never had a guy treat me the way you did that night. I felt a strong connection to you, and I knew that was what I’d been waiting on all along. I needed you to touch me.”

  “You have no clue how much I wanted you that night. But, I swear, all you had to do was tell me no, and I would have kept my hands to myself.” He kissed her forehead.

  “Nash, I don’t doubt that for a second. I also don’t regret anything that happened—between us or walking in on Doug while he was screwing around on me. Even if I could go back in time and change it all, I wouldn’t. I just want to keep moving forward…with you.”