No Trespassing

by KD Robichaux

  I don’t know why, but something urges me to feed into her speech, giving her even more ammo. “We have matching tattoos.” I look up at her again and see her eyebrow arch. “I never knew he had it, because he always wears long sleeves on the show, but he has my exact tattoo on his forearm.” My French manicure-tipped finger traces along my own skin, where his ink was wrapped around his ripped arm, remembering how I had traced it after we made love.

  “So you’re telling me that out of the infinite number of symbols, sayings, pictures, or whatever, in the entire universe, the man you got trapped down in the catacombs with, in which y’all made this great, huge discovery, just so happens to have your exact same tattoo, which you grew up with all over your house?” Her jaw drops as I nod and bite my lip to keep from letting any more tears out.

  Her sudden and swift swat upside my head nearly makes me fall forward off the edge of the bed, from the surprise of it, rather than the actual force, although it didn’t feel very good nonetheless.

  “What the hell, Rin?” I whine, rubbing my head and straightening back into my Indian-style position.

  “Yeah, exactly, Em! What the ever-loving hell is wrong with you?” she screeches. “Can’t you see it’s fate? Y’all are clearly meant for each other. Nothing else explains it. The woman who wants nothing more than to be an archaeologist for locations here in the US, but who has a vast amount of knowledge of all things Egypt because she’s the daughter of famous Egyptologists, gets trapped down in the New Orleans Catacombs with the rock star of American history documentaries. And when their nerdy powers combined, they were able to make one of the greatest discoveries in the history of ever?” Her voice is excited as she flails her arms about.

  “Well… I don’t know about the history of ev—”

  “The fucking history of ever, Em!” she cuts me off. “People have been looking for that ring for over a century! And you found it, woman. You. Your first time finally making it into one of these goddamn locations after two years of begging, pleading, and flashing your tits—”

  “It was one time!” I interject, but she ignores me.

  “—and you use tiny, impossible little clues to figure out that the Ring of Atlantis, the very symbol you both freaking have permanently tattooed on your bodies…” She hops up onto the bed, jumping on the mattress and making me bounce to my feet between the beds. I can’t help but smile up at her antics. “…is down there with you, basically screaming, ‘Please! Find me, bitch! Get me out of here!’”

  She leans down and grabs both my hands, hauling me up onto the bed with her, forcing me to jump along with her. God only knows what the people below us are hearing. And then something hits me, and I stop bouncing abruptly, the look of shock on my face surprising Erin into halting too, as she asks, “What? What is it?”

  “One of the properties of the symbols, Rin. Intuition, the most mysterious of the three. The other two being protection and healing. The ones who wear the symbol become sensitive to certain communications they wouldn’t have otherwise been aware of. It increases your intuition and ability to connect with higher levels of consciousness, and what some people believe are Spirit guides.” When she gives me a confused look, not quite picking up what I’m throwing down, I make it clearer. “When have you ever known me to throw caution to the wind, and be like, ‘Yo, I’m going to break into this secret location, since I got told no once again’? Never. That’s when. But something possessed me that night. I didn’t even give myself a chance to think. I was in the bathtub, for God’s sake. And my happy ass got out, got dressed, and hauled ass to those catacombs like a woman on a mission.”

  An all-white grin spreads across my best friend’s beautiful face as she realizes I’m trying to tell her that I’m starting to believe her fate theory, only it’s backed up by my belief in the Atlantean Ring’s power. “You’ve got to go to him, Em. You’ve got to get over this fear of the limelight and go get your guy. He’s meant to be yours,” she conveys, squeezing my hands between us.

  I hop off the bed, looking around the furniture for where I unconsciously set down my hotel key card, but stop as Erin clears her throat. I glance up at her with a questioning look.

  “Um, Em, you gonna wear that?” she asks, her eyes staring at my chest.

  I look down, seeing my breasts being fondled by mummy hands, and jump, forgetting I had changed into pajamas. “Shit!” I squeak, and run over to my open suitcase, rummaging through before slipping on a pair of houndstooth-print leggings and a super soft, long-length black tee. I find my black flip-flops in the zipper pocket and slide them on my feet, then turn and grab the key card off the desk before hustling toward the door, stopping as my hand touches the handle.

  I spin to look at Erin, disappointment suddenly coming over my face, until she says, “738, babe. He’s right across the hall.”

  “How did y—”

  “I asked Mr. Gold.” She smirks and flips her hair over her shoulder.

  I run and jump up on the bed, smack my lips against her cheek with a loud kiss, and then hurry back to the door and open it. “I love you, my hetero life partner,” I call, hearing her laugh as it closes behind me.

  I pause for a moment, leaning back against the door to my room, and stare at the one directly across the hall. My heart pounds in my chest, as if it’s trying to break free and run away.

  But everything Erin and I just talked about fills me with bravery, enough to keep all the doubt at bay, and I take the two steps forward to knock on his door.

  Chapter 15

  Dean

  I step out of the shower, wrapping one of the towels around my waist then using another to swipe over my hair a few times, running my fingers through it to guide it back into place. I toss the extra one over the shower door then turn out the light to the bathroom. Just as I’m about to step into the bedroom itself, there’s a light knock on the door.

  I grasp, turn, and pull the handle, fully expecting it to be Watson, who has a tendency to come chat before he goes to bed, but standing there, framed in the doorway, her hand still up in the air from where she was knocking, is my beautiful Emmy.

  Her eyes go wide and her cheeks flush as her gaze falls to my bare chest, then lower, where my towel wraps low on my hips. I feel my dick jump at her attention, and her brows lift before her eyes snap back to mine.

  “I uh…” She doesn’t say anything else, just continues to stand there, hand still raised, and it’s not until I see her fist start to tremble that I move.

  I open the door wide, wrap my arm around the small of her back, and haul her against me, lifting her so I can step back inside to close the door then press her to it. Her shaking stops and I feel her relax, her small body growing soft as it molds against my front. Her reaction surprises me, as it did on the way back from dinner. As much as she’s ignored and avoided me, it’s not the response I expected from her.

  I cage her in with my arms and press my forehead to hers. “What are you doing here, love?” I breathe, trying to keep the emotions out of my voice. I’ve tried to stay strong since the moment I saw her at the Louvre. I’ve done my best not to show her the mess of a man I’ve become over the last two months without her.

  How much she had upturned everything in my life. Two episodes have been filmed since I last laid eyes on the love of my life. Production was slower than it had ever been. Countless takes having to be made, because my mind would suddenly go blank on what I was supposed to be talking about, and then all that would fill the empty space was our time down in the catacombs. I had never heard the word “Cut!” so many times on a single location, and it was all because I couldn’t concentrate on anything but the sheer terror that filled my girl’s face when all those people and cameras turned toward her after we were rescued. Or the look of—what was that? Hurt? Jealousy? Anxiety?—something, that came over her perfect features when we were met by a crowd of my fans outside the hospital. I didn’t know, and it was one of the things that spent time circling inside my brain over and
over and over again. Along with the vision of her fleeing as I gave in and signed autographs for a couple kids there with their mom. By the time I realized she left my side, all I saw was her dark hair disappearing into a cab at the taxi stand before she was ripped away from me.

  If it weren’t for Mr. Watson, God knows what I’d look like right now. He forced me to eat and work out with him every day, keeping to my usual routine. On days I didn’t want to do anything but sleep the time away, he dragged me out of bed.

  I’m whipped. I know it, but I don’t care in the slightest. After finding her, I don’t give a shit about much else. All I want in the world is to be with her. Part of me wanted to be mad at her. And an evil voice in my head wanted to make her into a bad guy. She left you, just like your mom did. But I couldn’t. She warned me. She told me her fears right there in that hidden mausoleum. She’d confessed everything that scared her about being together outside the catacombs. So I couldn’t hold any sort of grudge.

  Finally, she speaks, and it’s the sweetest sound I’ve ever heard. “I’m sorry, De—”

  My lips crash down on hers, both my hands coming up to hold her neck and jaw as my tongue slides between her lips, hearing and feeling her sigh. All the emotions I’ve felt over the past months without her come pouring out of me in that kiss. I show her, rather than tell her, how much I’ve missed her, how much I want her, how much I need her. And as she reaches up to wrap her arms around my neck, what little control I have over the feelings rushing inside me snaps.

  I lift her, her legs instinctively wrapping around my hips, and my hand moves to cushion the back of her head right as I slam her back against the door. It’s like I can’t get close enough to her. I grind against her, my towel coming loose and falling at my feet, and I can feel her heat so close, her soft, thin pants doing nothing to hide the fact she is wet for me.

  She whimpers, and I pull back to let her catch her breath. Her eyes meet mine, the look of desperate passion in their depths matching what I feel on the inside.

  “I have to tell you something,” she whispers, and I shake my head. I don’t want to hear her words. I’m too scared she’ll tell me to stop, that she’ll tell me she can’t be with me and just wanted closure or some bullshit. No, I don’t want to let her speak, so I lean in to kiss her again. But she turns her face away, squeezing her arms more tightly around my neck. “Dean, please. Let me tell you before I lose my nerve,” she begs, and I close my eyes and nod, holding my breath and tensing to take the blow. “I love you.”

  My brow furrows and my eyes slowly open to meet her gaze. Unshed tears glisten there, but her face is full of tenderness. “What?” I need to hear it again, to make sure I hadn’t just heard what I wanted to.

  She blinks her watery eyes, and I watch her focus move from mine, to my lips, then back up again, a smile tugging up one corner of her full lips. “I love you, Dean,” she says quietly but clearly. “I don’t know how I’m going to deal with all the attention, all the crowds of fans always surrounding you… but I’ll figure out a way. I can’t… I can’t keep crying myself to sleep every night. I can’t keep seeing your face everywhere, knowing that you want me, and me be the only reason we aren’t together. Do you…” She glances at my chest, hiding her face as her hair comes down like a curtain. “Do you still feel the same way you did in the mausoleum? Do you still want to be with me?”

  I lift her chin to meet my eyes then move her hair out of her face, tracing her lower lip with my thumb. “I never make a promise I don’t intend to keep, love,” I tell her, and press a tender kiss to her lips. “I love you too, Emmy. I’ve never told anyone that before, and I mean it to the depths of my soul. I’ve loved you since the very second I held you in my arms that very first time in the catacombs. Maybe even before then, when I walked in on you dancing around the chamber. I love you, Em,” I repeat, and she lets out a sound that’s half-sob, half-laugh, but her face shows nothing but relief and happiness.

  “Now that that’s all clear,” I lean forward and whisper against her ear, knowing she loves to feel my breath there, “I’m finally going to make love to you…” I pull back to grin at her, watching her smile spread, as I add, “In a bed.”

  Two years later

  SURROUNDED BY DEAN, my parents, Erin, Nox, Ricky, and Calvin, with the added bonus of my new friends Mr. Watson and Mr. Hosea, I managed to make it through the unveiling gala without a hitch. There were a few times I started to feel overwhelmed by all the attention, but Dean seemed to sense it before I even realized it was creeping up on me, and held me close until the feeling passed. He likes to say he’s so in tune with me because of our Atlantean Rings, but I have a feeling there’s a little more to it than that. I believe in soul mates, and on top of that, I know with everything in me that Dean is mine.

  At the end of that gala, Dean’s producer pulled us aside. He had an offer for me I never saw coming, and with our relationship being so new, I knew for a fact he didn’t propose the job just because Dean and I were together.

  “Action!” the director calls from across the cave, snapping me back to the here and now.

  “I’m Dean Savageman,” my love says, hanging from his harness above my head, smiling down at me.

  “And I’m Emmy Savageman. And this is…” I turn toward the camera to speak my line.

  And in unison, we say, “No Trespassing.”

  The End

  For the past year, Jason, my husband, has had to live four hours away for work, only getting to come home to his family on the weekends. I've had lots of nights alone to fill, and most of it has been with work-it just so happens I have my dream job, editing romance novels. But on those rare nights, when I finished my work early, I would scroll and scroll through Netflix, trying to find something to binge-watch.

  One night, something caught my eye I had never seen before. Mysteries at the Museum? Rarely having time for TV, I don't bother with cable, so I had never watched this Travel Channel show before. But hey, I freaking love museums, so I gave it a shot. I'd just watch one episode to see if I liked it.

  Next thing I knew, I was on episode 8. I had stayed up until 3 in the morning hanging onto every word out of the handsome and intelligent host's mouth. Yes, not only did I have a newfound love of history, but I also had a new crush: Don Wildman.

  Come to find out, he was the host of quite a few Travel Channel shows, so when I finished devouring every episode of Mysteries at the Museum, I started on Off Limits.

  And that's when inspiration struck:

  The cocky, sinfully sexy TV host. The beautiful, sweet, and smart introvert with big dreams, who hates his guts. Something happens. They're trapped together. Somewhere underground, maybe? They have to work together, and end up making a huge discovery. And somewhere along the way, the enemies fall in love.

  I still had to write Wish Come True, book 3 in my Blogger Diaries Trilogy, but it was such a relief when nearly the entire plotline of No Trespassing hit me. After writing my real-life romance, I was scared I wouldn't be able to come up with a whole make-believe story. With my trilogy, I knew every character's quirks, every minute detail of the plot, every twist and turn… because it all actually happened! Would I really be able to turn around then and use my imagination to create a love story worth reading?

  In my heart, I believe I have. This time, I wanted to write what I personally like to read: Instalove. The alpha male and the quirky girl who needs a little bit of saving. A hero with a heart of gold, even though he may not show it on the outside, and the heroine who is actually worth a lot more than she realizes. Adventure. Soul mates finding each other. True love's first kiss. And even a little bit of magic.

  Dean and Emmy have filled me with so much joy, laughter, and heart-warming moments over the past few months, and I hope you enjoyed reading their love story as much as I loved telling it.

  First and foremost, thank you to my hubby and girls for letting me hunker down in my cave and do what I love. Even though I'm not one of those Pinterest
queen, Stepford wife kinda moms, y'all still love me, encourage me, and are proud of me just the same. It fills me with so much joy when my girls tell anyone we meet, “My mommy is an author,” with a look of wonderment on their beautiful little faces, like I'm some kind of superhero.

  Don Wildman, this book was dedicated to you, but I also have to say thank you. When I messaged you on Facebook to tell you about my story, I never in a million years thought you'd actually reply! But then you also generously offered any help I might need when it came to behind the scenes of TV production, and even sent this little fangirl an autographed picture. Thank you so much for that brilliant brain of yours. You inspired one hell of a hero.

  Laura Crain, my reader/fangirl turned one of my best friends on the planet. Emmy is 90% you, my love. Smart and gorgeous with quirks you can't help but to love. My birthday weekend you came to spend with me inspired so much of my story. Not only Emmy's personality, but also the part I was missing from the plot. What the hell were they going to discover down there? I had no idea. But then you randomly showed me one of the bracelets you were wearing while we were strolling through the mall, telling me a little story about this dude who discovered King Tut's tomb, and how everyone with him had died crazy, mysterious deaths, but he was the only one wearing this symbol, this “Atlantean Ring”, and lived to old age. And there it was. The final piece of the puzzle that was No Trespassing locking into place. Thank you for being you, because I wouldn't want you any other way.

  Barbara Hoover, Rebecca Allman, and Mandy Pederick, my editing partners in crime, you girls are invaluable. Thank you for all of your hard work making sure NT is as perfect as it can be. Your daily encouragement, along with my PA Extraordinaire, Franci, was the boost of confidence I needed to get this done. Hot Tree Editing is my dream team, and the greatest group of women I have the fortune of calling my tribe.