Better for Us

by Vanessa Miller

  “I thought you were cheating on me. I could never have married a cheater and I certainly didn’t want my child fathered by one.”

  He was angry now. In two long strides he closed the distance between them. “You should have asked me about it. You don’t just run off with a man’s child and never say a word to him about it. What kind of person are you?”

  He could tell that she was itching to scratch his eyes out. But instead, she took a deep breath and said, “I’m the mother of your child and I am the woman you married.”

  “You’re the woman I was tricked into marrying,” Noel threw back, as he headed for the bedroom.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To pack,” he flung over his shoulder.

  Ryla marched into their bedroom. “You are not going to leave me during our honeymoon.”

  He opened his mouth to say something, but she cut him off. “You told me to enjoy the journey during our engagement. I have done everything you asked, from uprooting Jaylen and myself from our life in Houston, to planning a pretend wedding with you. So now all I’m asking is that you let me have my honeymoon.”

  He wanted to reject her flat out. But as he considered what she said, he had to admit that Ryla had a small point. She hadn’t given him much of a fuss with anything he’d asked her to do. He put his clothes back in the drawer and decided to hear her out. “What’s on the agenda for the day?” Noel said, still slightly irritated.

  Ryla jovially clapped her hands. “Well, breakfast was first on the agenda.” She pointed toward the terrace. “You’ve already finished off yours. The next thing...”

  The doorbell rang. Ryla smiled. “I’ll be right back.”

  Noel flopped down on the bed as he tried to figure a way out of the trap that Ryla was surely setting for him. If things had turned out differently for them, Noel would be floating around the hotel room, thrilled that he was finally married to the woman of his dreams.

  But Ryla had deceived him. She had hurt him in a way that he couldn’t conceive of getting over anytime soon, no matter how hard he tried.

  Ryla popped her head into the bedroom. “The second thing on our agenda is here, so come on into the living room.”

  Reluctantly, Noel followed Ryla. When he entered the living room, he noticed that the furniture had been pushed back and two massage tables had been placed in the empty space. He turned to Ryla and said, “I don’t think couple’s massages are such a good thing this weekend.”

  “Come on, baby, you need this.” Ryla grabbed his arm and moved him over to one of the massage tables. “You’ve been working hard on the campaign and on the planning of the wedding with me. We need to loosen those muscles so you can relax.”

  Maybe Ryla was right. The stress of the campaign had been wearing on him. “Okay, let’s do it,” Noel said as he leaned against the table.

  The masseuses gathered their materials and then instructed Noel and Ryla to take off their clothes and lie down under the covers.

  Ryla stood and began undressing in front of him as if she’d spent a lifetime doing it. Noel wanted to change his mind. A massage was a bad idea...a really bad idea.

  Chapter 20

  Ryla had a whole day of events planned for them. After the massage, they went to the pool for a swim. Lunch was served to them poolside. And she enjoyed every minute of it, because Noel was once again on his best behavior.

  “So, what’s on the agenda after this?”

  “We have a few hours of free time, so we can read a book, or we can go to our room and take a nap together. What do you think?” As she said the words, she was leaning toward him, giving him ample view of everything her two-piece swimsuit didn’t cover.

  “Free time sounds good.” Noel took a sip of his iced tea. “You go ahead and take that nap—I’m going to the business center to check my emails.”

  “Noel, you’re on your honeymoon. Why on earth would you waste time checking emails?”

  He put his drink down and with a stone face told her, “This is your honeymoon, Ryla. You made all of these plans, so I hope you enjoy them.” He stood. “I’m going to get a little work done.”

  “Okay, but don’t be too long. We have an event-filled evening,” she called after him, trying to keep her enthusiasm up as he exited the pool area.

  He waved his acknowledgment of her words, but kept walking.

  Ryla slumped back into her lounge chair. She only had this night left to convince Noel that they should stay married. But he was not helping at all. Maybe she’d been wrong for assuming that Noel still loved and cared for her. Maybe she should give up before she made an even bigger fool of herself.

  Ryla went back to her big lonely suite, took her e-reader out of her purse and began reading a romance novel until she drifted off to sleep. In her dreamland, she and Noel were walking on the beach, hand in hand. They came to the spot where they had left their blanket and Noel sat down and pulled Ryla into his loving arms.

  He hungrily kissed her and Ryla kissed him right back, not caring who saw them on the beach. They were in love and they needed each other.

  “Wake up, Ryla.” Noel nudged her.

  Ryla shot up as if an alarm had gone off.

  “You were moaning. You must have been dreaming something hot and heavy,” Noel said with devilment in his eyes.

  “That’s for me to know and for you to want to find out,” she said as she scooted off the bed. “What time is it?”

  “A little after five.”

  Ryla became frantic. “I slept that long! Oh, my goodness. I need to shower.”

  “What’s going on?” Noel asked.

  “We have dinner plans. I need to get dressed.” She ran into the bathroom and jumped in the shower. Don’t mess this up—this is your last chance with Noel. She planned to walk out of this hotel, hand in hand with her husband tomorrow morning. So she needed to work it tonight.

  When she got out of the shower, she put lotion over her body and then threw on a strapless lavender-and-black evening gown that accentuated her curves and complemented her honey-toned complexion. She just hoped she would be able to get Noel to take notice of her, since nothing else she’d worn this weekend seemed to do anything for him.

  She entered the living room just as the doorbell rang. Noel was seated on the sofa, watching television. “I’ll get it,” he said.

  “No, no. You just go and get ready. I’ll take care of everything out here.”

  When he turned toward her, she noticed the appreciation in his eyes for what she was wearing. There was hope.

  “So, I need to put on something dressy for tonight, huh?”

  “Please, if you don’t mind.”

  “Okay, I’ll be out in twenty,” he said casually.

  “Make it thirty,” she said as she opened the door. Two waiters stood behind the door; one was pushing a cartload of food, and the other carried linens for the table. Ryla directed them to the dining room table, as if they hadn’t been there and done this a hundred times or more for other guests.

  Three musicians stood directly behind the waiters. One carried a flute, one, a violin and the other, a cello. “Come in, gentlemen. And thank you for being timely.”

  “It’s your honeymoon,” one of them said. “We would never make a bride wait.”

  She wished Noel felt the same way. “Thank you for being so kind to us.”

  She went back to the bedroom to give everyone time to set up. Noel was still in the shower. She noted the black suit and lavender shirt that he’d laid out on the bed. She smiled at his effort.

  She wrote a note, asking him to meet her in the dining room, then left the note on top of his shirt. Ryla went back out to make sure the setup was moving along. She had ordered lobster, garlic potatoes and asparagus. The linen had been put on the table with
a fresh bouquet of roses. As she leaned over and smelled them, she remembered how Noel had filled her aunt’s porch with rose petals the night he proposed to her.

  She took the roses out of the vase and began sprinkling the rose petals in front of their bedroom door so that Noel would be walking on the petals as he entered the room. She continued sprinkling her trail of rose petals from the bedroom door all the way to the dining room table.

  “Ah, madam, you are a true romantic,” one of the musicians said.

  “Thank you,” she said, as the waiter handed her the vanilla-scented candles she had asked them to bring. Ryla set the candles in candleholders that she’d placed around the room earlier that day. As the waiter lit the candles, she dimmed the lights.

  By the time she finished setting the mood in the room, the waiters were putting dinner on the table, and the musicians began to softly serenade her. The bedroom door opened, and Ryla turned and watched as her man sauntered over to the table and stood in front of her.

  His eyes danced over the room. He swayed a bit to the music. “When did you plan all of this?”

  “Right after you invited me to spend the weekend here with you.”

  He stepped back, looked at everything again and then gave her another once-over. “You’ve done well.”

  “I’m glad you like.” She grabbed her chair, getting ready to pull it out.

  Noel removed her hand from the chair. “Excuse me,” he told her as he pulled the chair out, allowed her to sit in it and then pushed it up to the table. “I think this is my job.”

  “What’s got you being such a gentleman?”

  Noel sat, and the waiter put napkins in his and Ryla’s laps. “If you can go through all this trouble, the least I can do is be civil.”

  No, the least you could do is love me like you once did. She nodded and then asked, “Would you like to say grace?”

  “Certainly,” he said as he grabbed hold of her hands and prayed.

  They then ate their meal and enjoyed pleasant conversation, while the music serenaded them. Ryla was having such a good time with Noel that she forgot that she needed to try to win him over with this meal—rather, she found comfort in being herself. This was Noel, after all, and if anyone knew her, he did.

  She had hoped that he would ask her to dance when they finished eating. But as they continued to sit and talk while the music played, Ryla thought she’d have to take matters into her own hands. “Would you like to dance?”

  Noel peered over at the musicians and then turned back to Ryla. “I guess we should. I mean, we don’t want them to think we didn’t enjoy the music.” Noel stood and held out his hand for Ryla.

  “Thank you, sir.” She took his hand and waltzed onto the makeshift dance floor with him.

  As he put his arm around her and began to sway to the music, the song changed and suddenly they were dancing to the instrumental version of “At Last.” Noel leaned back and looked at Ryla. “Did you tell them to do that?”

  “It is our song, baby.” Her hands were caressing his back as they continued to sway to the music. “We danced to this song last night in front of a roomful of people. But I want you to know, in the privacy of our room, that I’m glad that you are finally mine...at last.” She sang those last two words into his ear and felt him melt a little in her arms.

  When that song finished, Noel held on to her as the music switched to the instrumental version of another love song. “This is nice. I wish I had thought of it.”

  “You came up with some good dates, so I wanted to take care of the honeymoon.” Leaning her head against his chest, she felt his heart beat faster, and she knew that she was getting to him. He was beginning to see her as the woman he not only had married, but desired.

  She lifted her head and asked, “Do you want me to send everyone away?” Please say yes...please say yes, she silently chanted.

  He released her so quickly she had to grab onto the table or risk falling on her backside.

  “L-let me get my wallet so I can give them a tip,” Noel stammered as he rushed to their bedroom. He came back out carrying several bills. He handed them off to the musicians and the waiters.

  One of the waiters said, “We’ll clean this up before we go.”

  “Oh, no,” Noel said, “just leave it. And someone can get it tomorrow.” He walked them to the door and quickly closed it behind them.

  “Noel, don’t push the people out like that,” Ryla said while laughing at him.

  As Noel turned back around and looked at Ryla, he knew he was a goner, but at that moment he just didn’t care anymore. He would wave the white flag, throw in the towel—whatever he had to do to be with Ryla tonight. His long legs carried him back to the middle of the room where she stood and he said, “I promised myself that I would never make love to you again. Loving you has taken too much from me.”

  She reached up and gently stroked his face. “Noel, please believe me when I say that you don’t have to fear loving me. I won’t ever hurt you again. I promise.”

  His head lowered and, before either of them knew it was happening, their lips met and, without any music, they slowly began the seductive dance of love. Growling his impatience, Noel swept her in his arms. With the precision of a soldier under military orders, he marched into their bedroom, where his strong arms released her onto the bed as if she were a precious stone. Then he seemed to release the male hunger within him as he tugged off his jacket and flung it to the floor. “God help me, Ryla, I tried to stay away from you, but I can’t. I just can’t.”

  His voice sounded so tortured. Ryla lifted from the bed and pulled him down with her, wanting to love the pain away. “And I can’t forgive myself for destroying our love unless you forgive me. I need you to forget all the bad memories of the past, Noel. Let this night be about consummating our new love.”

  Noel didn’t answer as he began to love Ryla as if it was the very first time for both of them. His caresses were tender and his kisses soft and unrushed. Then they experienced a night like no other, as husband and wife.

  Chapter 21

  Stretching and yawning, Ryla woke to a new day. She and Noel had shared a wonderful night of lovemaking and she wanted to spend the morning doing the same. Even though she was waking up, she was still too tired to open her eyes. Reaching over to wake Noel, Ryla’s hand went farther and farther to the other side of the bed until she opened her eyes and saw for herself that the bed was empty.

  She sat up, pulling the sheet with her. Noel was gone, but there was an envelope with her name on it on his pillow. Ryla was afraid to pick the envelope up. Why wasn’t Noel in bed with her? She hoped and prayed she wasn’t about to open that envelope and find cash and a thank-you note for a good time.

  Against her better judgment, she picked up the envelope and pulled the notecard out of it. Noel’s handwriting was recognizable to her immediately.

  Ryla, I need to get some things done back in Dallas. Please go to your house in Houston and I will contact you when the campaign is over so I can set up visitation with Jaylen.

  Did Noel just break up with her? Did he really leave her a Dear Ryla card? She jumped out of bed and walked every inch of the suite in hope that Noel was still there. But the suite was empty.

  “How could he do this?” she wondered out loud. “How could he just leave me like last night meant nothing?”

  He’d told her that he didn’t want to marry her, but she’d gone through with her crazy scheme to win him back anyway. And what did it get her? A husband who didn’t even want her in the same city with him. She collapsed down on the bed and let the river of tears flow.

  Was this how it felt for Noel when she left him? Yes, Ryla knew that she had wronged him by walking away as she had, but she had been a high-strung teenager, with issues. If she hadn’t been so young and naive, Ryla was quite sure
that she would have seen that Noel was nothing like her cheating father.

  After emptying a box of tissues, Ryla grabbed the toilet paper from the bathroom and blew her nose. She then lay back down and cried until she realized it was noon and she was supposed to check out an hour ago. She pulled herself out of bed, walked around the room, picking up clothes that had been discarded last night. She threw her suitcase on the bed and filled it with her things.

  After zipping her suitcase, she checked the dresser to make sure that Noel hadn’t left any of his clothes behind. When she saw that the drawers were empty, Ryla’s eyes began to tear up again.

  Her eyes were red and swollen, so she took her sunglasses out of her purse and put them on. She looked around the room one last time to make sure she wasn’t leaving anything, grabbed her suitcase and then left the beautiful suite, alone. Ryla tried her best not to cry as she exited the Four Seasons, but the tears came anyway.

  She wanted to just go home and get in her fetal position in her bed and stay that way until her life made sense again. But she had to pick up Jaylen. So she drove to Danetta’s house to get her little girl. She wished she could just honk the horn and that Jaylen would come running out, but she knew Danetta wouldn’t go for any foolishness like that. So Ryla got out of the car and rang her friend’s doorbell.

  Danetta answered the door, saying, “I see you and Noel took your sweet time leaving the hotel.”

  Ryla stepped in and drily said, “I didn’t feel like leaving earlier. I hope I didn’t mess up any plans that you had.”

  “Of course not, girl, I was just messing with you. Marshall went to work already. Jaylen and I were just hanging around the house.”

  “Can you get her so I can get going, please?”

  Danetta started to walk away, but then turned back to her friend. “Are you okay?”