Changing Everything

by Molly McAdams

  Last night had been that intense.

  Putting most the food in the small fridge and leaving the rest out, I leaned my hip against the counter and folded my arms across my chest as I watched Paisley sleep. There were so many things I hadn’t told her while we were in the shower that had been begging to be voiced, and those thoughts had only grown louder while I was out getting food. But standing there watching her, I didn’t know how I was supposed to keep them in anymore despite how rushed they seemed.

  I slipped off my shoes and walked quietly to the bed as I pulled off my clothes. Climbing onto the bed, I pressed my lips to hers before making a trail down, and felt her stir awake when I passed her breasts.

  “Hey,” she mumbled huskily, and lightly dragged her fingers through my hair. “Did you get food?”

  “I did.”

  Her breaths became louder when my kisses hit her lower stomach, and after a few seconds, she decided, “It can wait.”

  Propping myself up on my elbows, I settled my body between her now-bent knees, and traced imaginary circles on her stomach. “You’re not on birth control.” It wasn’t a question, but she still shook her head. “I didn’t wear condoms last night.”

  The corners of her mouth tilted up for a second. “I know.”

  “And I didn’t buy any when I was out just now.”

  Her eyebrows slanted down over her dark eyes, and she asked, “Why not?”

  “Jason told me you were ready to get married and settle down. Was that true, or was he saying that because he was hoping it would make me realize what I could lose?”

  “That’s true,” she answered, drawing out the words to sound like a question.

  “I wasted a lot of time with you, Paisley, I don’t see a reason to wait for anything with you.”

  One eyebrow lifted, and a sharp laugh burst from her chest. “Are you saying you want to knock me up, Eli Jenkins?”

  “I’m saying I’m trying to start on everything I mapped out for you in the shower, and everything I wasn’t sure how to say.” I glanced down to where I was still tenderly touching her stomach before meeting her gaze again. “I want to have a family with you, and I want to marry you. I want to love you for the rest of my life, Paisley.”

  Her wide brown eyes slowly filled with tears, and a beautiful smile covered her face. A line of tears fell down her cheeks when she shook her head subtly. “Eli, it has only been one month since you realized you were in love with me. I have been dreaming of that future with you for years, but for you and for us, we need to wait. We can’t just get married right now.”

  “Why?” I asked impatiently, and earned a light laugh from her as she gently ran her fingers through my hair.

  “Because I want you to be sure that is something you—”

  “I am sure,” I said honestly, cutting her off. “I told you, Pay, I feel like I’ve been waiting for this for years.”

  “And I have,” she reminded me. “If you asked me—and I mean seriously asked me—there is no way I would be able to say no to you, Eli. But I think you’ve felt like you’ve been waiting for this for years because when you realized how you felt, you were immediately faced with not being able to have me. Those first two weeks, you were scared you wouldn’t get a future with me, and now it’s only been two more weeks that we’ve even been together and you haven’t had to worry about us. I want you to give it some time until the newness of us has passed before you decide that getting married to me is something you actually want.”

  I studied her face for silent moments, and watched as the small trail of tears continued to fall. I knew exactly how long it had been since she’d shown up at my door to tell me she’d chosen me. But I wasn’t going to change my mind weeks, months, or years from now. When I started to tell her that, I stopped abruptly, and my eyes widened. “Paisley,” I whispered. “Are you still afraid that I’m only with you because I don’t want to lose my best friend?”

  She shook her head quickly, and admitted, “I’m still afraid that I’m going to wake up tomorrow, and I’ll be in my bedroom worrying that you’ll have a girl in your bed when I come over for our Sunday morning, and all of this will have been a dream.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” I promised her. “I’m going to make sure you wake up every morning for the rest of your life knowing exactly how much I love you.” With a reluctant nod, I said, “If you really want to, we can wait another month to get married.”

  Paisley laughed softly and tugged at my hair. “A year.”

  “Fuck no.”

  “Language,” she chastised. “A year,” she repeated.

  “And if I got down on one knee right now and asked you to marry me?”

  “I would set the date for a year from now.”

  I groaned and dropped my head on her stomach. “When I thought about this conversation, it went a lot differently in my head.”

  “Oh yeah?” she asked teasingly.

  “I thought you were going to have me drive us to Vegas today,” I admitted against her skin, but still didn’t look up at her.

  Paisley was quiet for a couple minutes. She just continued to run her fingers through my hair, and just when I looked up to see her expression, she said, “People just wouldn’t understand. They wouldn’t know our story even if they know us, and they just wouldn’t get it. I’m pretty sure Kristen and Jason wouldn’t even agree with us doing everything so soon.”

  “Who cares about anyone else? I don’t give a fuck what other people would think. I care about what you think, and what I want with you.”

  “But they would all give us their opinions. They would constantly be telling us how stupid we were, and they probably wouldn’t show up to our wedding.”

  My face fell. “You don’t even want a big wedding, Pay. And again, who cares about anyone else?”

  Her eyes widened and her hands stopped moving. “How do you know I don’t want a big wedding?”

  “Because you’ve said that at every one of our friends’ weddings.”

  “You remember that?”

  My brow pinched together. “Of course I do. Just because I wasn’t catching on to what you were waiting for from me, doesn’t mean I wasn’t listening to you.”

  She watched me in awe for a few seconds, then said, “I’m still not marrying you until a year is up.”

  I exhaled heavily and nodded. “I can wait a year to marry you as long as you’ll still move in with me.”

  “As soon as my lease is up in four months.”

  “No. That is definitely too long.”

  Paisley laughed softly. “We can do a week at my apartment, then a week at yours, and continue doing that until my lease is up.”

  “Better,” I agreed, then mumbled, “Does this mean I need to go back out and buy condoms?”

  “Maybe you should have just gotten them your first time out,” she suggested, and I sighed in defeat.

  “Okay. I’ll be—” I cut off when Paisley grabbed my arm and pulled me back down onto her when I’d started getting up.

  “I’m kidding. I brought some with me; they’re in my bag. I just wasn’t really thinking about them last night or this morning until you brought them up.”

  I placed a kiss on her nose and got up from the bed to grab her bag. “You can’t blame me if you get pregnant from last night.”

  “I doubt I got pregnant last night.” She laughed softly. “But, oh my God, I can see your mom’s reaction now if we got pregnant before we got married.”

  “Then I guess it would be Vegas or the courthouse for us,” I grumbled like it would be a hardship to marry her.

  Paisley just rolled her eyes. “I may not have ever talked to your mom as your girlfriend, but she’s always known how I felt about you, and I know for a fact that she would kill us if we didn’t have a huge wedding.”

  I was no longer surpri
sed by anyone else knowing; I knew I’d been the only one blind to Paisley’s feelings. “Did you ever tell her that wasn’t what you wanted?”

  “No . . .”

  “Then who cares what she wants.”

  Paisley choked out a laugh. “Eli! She’s your mom. You’re supposed to care, just like I do.”

  I crawled back onto the bed with her and held her stare. “Tell me exactly what you want when I finally force you into marrying me.”

  Her eyebrows rose. “Force me, huh? Thanks for the fair warning,” she teased, but then the humor in her eyes and smile changed into something softer. “I just want you. I don’t want anything big, I just want simple. I want to wear a white dress, and I don’t want to have to be around a bunch of people after. I just want it to be you and me, like we are right now. I don’t want a ring—”

  “Fuck that,” I balked. “I’m getting you a ring.”

  “Language, and I don’t want one! You told me to tell you exactly what I wanted, and I’m telling you.”

  “If you don’t let me get you a ring, how are people supposed to know you’re mine, Pay?”

  When she spoke again, her voice was nearly inaudible. “I’ve always been yours, Eli. My love for you has never been a show for everyone else. It’s always been just for you; that’s not changing now.”

  Well fuck. She just had to go and put it like that. “No ring,” I conceded with a sigh.

  “If you want, I’ll get a tattoo.”

  “You hate needles.”

  She shrugged and smiled mischievously. “I’ll get a portrait of Lurch on my shoulder or something.”

  I dropped my head onto her chest, and my shoulders and back shook from the laugh I was trying to hold back. Once I was sure I could keep a straight face, I looked back up to her. “If you get Lurch, I’m getting a troll with purple hair.”

  Her eyes widened and her head shook slowly back and forth. “No,” she mouthed. “But, that’s what I want. I just want simple; I just want us.”

  “Then that’s what it will be,” I assured her. “Anything you want, Paisley. Always.”

  Epilogue

  October 4, 2014 . . . one year later

  Eli

  “YOU’RE FUCKING KIDDING me.”

  “Language!” Paisley hissed. “And whatever it is, I doubt I’m kidding.”

  I walked through the cottage and into the bathroom where Paisley had just stepped out of the shower, and held up the box in my hands. “Condoms? Pay, you are out of your damn mind if you think I’m wearing condoms anymore.”

  She held out an arm like she had no idea why I was getting mad, but laughed when I was done. “It’s a habit to make sure I have them since someone conveniently forgets to buys them or throws them away when he finds my stash.”

  “Is it so bad that I want to be able to look at you walking around with a big pregnant stomach?”

  A small laugh burst from her chest, and she walked forward to wrap her arms around my neck. “It was because we weren’t married. Your mom is already mad enough at me for having a small ceremony and nothing else. The last thing I needed was her giving me the same lecture she gave your sister when Kash informed everyone right after the wedding that Rachel was pregnant with twins.”

  My face fell. “Do we really have to talk about that right now? I’m still not okay knowing that my sister has had sex; you don’t have to make it worse by reminding me that she’s pregnant.”

  “Fine, we’ll act like she got pregnant all by herself. No sex involved.”

  My eyebrows pinched together, and just as I started to tell Paisley how much that didn’t make sense, I huffed. “Huh. Yeah, I like that actually. But none of that matters right now. What matters is that you’re my wife as of four hours ago, I’m not wearing condoms anymore.”

  “You don’t have to,” she crooned, and kissed me softly. “Like I said, it was habit.”

  “I’m burning these,” I grumbled against her lips.

  “Fine.” She leaned back enough to unwrap the towel, and let it fall to the floor. Grabbing my pants, she unbuttoned them and pulled the zipper down, then pushed them off me. Once she had my boxer briefs down past my hips and was gripping me in her small hands, she said, “But do you mind waiting until after? After all, like you said, it’s been a whole four hours, and we still haven’t made this marriage legitimate yet.”

  I grabbed her up in my arms, and covered her mouth with my own as I turned to walk her into the bedroom. “I fucking love you, Pay.”

  “Language,” she mumbled halfheartedly, but soon the only sounds coming from her were incoherent words and erotic noises.

  Four months after our first weekend here at the Crystal Pier Hotel, Paisley’s lease ended and we officially moved in together. An entire two days before we announced our engagement—as our parents had been reminding us up until today. While our original plan had been to only have Kristen and Jason as our witnesses today, not one person in my family, or Paisley’s parents, had been okay with that or allowed it to happen. And even though my mom had tried planning a “surprise reception” that wouldn’t have exactly been a surprise, I’d finally gotten her to agree to stop pushing the reception issue about a month ago. Paisley didn’t want one and refused to let me tell my mom because she didn’t want to upset her more, but I’d promised Paisley she would have the wedding she wanted, and I wasn’t going back on my word.

  Even though it had been a joke between Paisley and me for the last year, we didn’t get married at a courthouse. We had a pastor marry us on our crest overlooking the ocean, and like Paisley had wanted, there were no rings, only two small tattoos that we’d gotten done right after the short ceremony. Paisley now had an outline of a small heart on the side of her wrist that went with the arrow I’d gotten on the side of mine.

  And after a couple hours on the road, we were back in the exact same cottage we’d been in a year ago. There was no one in the surrounding cottages, no one would be able to get ahold of us for the next week, and there was nothing for us to do but spend every day wrapped up in each other as we started our life together that was long overdue.

  THE END

  Coming soon, the must-read book for all Molly McAdams’ fans!

  Trusting Liam

  A Taking Chances and Forgiving Lies Novel

  When Kennedy Ryan moves to California, she never expects to come face-to-face with Liam Taylor—the intriguing man she hasn’t been able to forget. Somehow Liam managed to get Kennedy to let down her guard for a single night of passion that ended up meaning more than it was ever supposed to. Accustomed to disastrous experiences with men, Kennedy shields herself before he can break down more of the carefully built control she’s clung to for the last four years. But every time she sees Liam, she feels her resolve weakening.

  Liam Taylor has been asked to befriend his boss’s nieces. But what starts out as a reluctant favor ends up leading Liam to the only girl who ever slipped away before morning—a girl he thought he’d never find again. And now that she’s within reach, Liam’s determined never to let her go.

  When a secret from her past tests their relationship, will they be able to cling to the trust Liam has worked so hard to build?

  Available June 2015

  Prologue

  May 15

  Kennedy

  CRACKING AN EYE open, I immediately shut it against the harsh light coming into the room and bit back a groan as I felt the pounding in my head. Making another attempt—this time with both eyes—I squinted at the unfamiliar hotel room and blinked a few times, then let my eyes open all the way as I took in my surroundings. Well, as much of them as I could without moving.

  There was a heavy arm draped uncomfortably over my waist, a forehead pressed to the back of my head, a nose to the back of my neck, and an erection to my butt. What. The. Hell. I was naked; he was naked. Why are we naked, and who is
behind me? If I wasn’t seconds from screaming for someone to help me, I might have snorted. The why was obvious, there was a familiar ache between my legs, and my lips felt puffy from kissing and where he’d bitten down on them.

  I inhaled softly. He. Him. Oh God.

  Flashes from last night took turns assaulting me with the pounding in my head. Impromptu trip to Vegas with the girls after finals ended. Dancing. Club. Drinks. Arctic-blue eyes captivating me. More drinks and dancing. Him holding me close, and not close enough. Lips against mine. Stumbling into a room. Hands searching. His tall, hard body pressing mine against the bed—still not close enough.

  My eyes immediately went to my left hand, and I exhaled slowly in relief when I didn’t find a ring there. Thank God, the last thing I need is a marriage as result of a drunken night in Vegas. I rolled my eyes. The last thing I needed was a man in my life, period. And if my family didn’t kill me for it, I would have died from embarrassment if I had ended up with a ring on my finger after last night. Because unlike what everyone loves to believe so they can feel better about their own dirty deeds while in Sin City, what happens in Vegas doesn’t always stay in Vegas.

  Trying not to wake him, I slowly slid out from under his arm and off the bed to search for my clothes. Once I was dressed, I told myself to just leave, but I couldn’t help it—I turned to look at him in the light. I needed to be sure I hadn’t made him up.

  The images from last night tore through my mind again when I saw the large, tattooed arm resting where my body had just been. The muscles were well defined, even when he was relaxed, and the face had a boyish charm now that he was asleep. Such a difference from the predatory stare and knowing smirk I kept seeing in my mind. Before I could stop myself, I gently ran my fingers through his dirty-blond hair that, now in the sunlight, I could see had a red tint to it. And I knew if he opened them, those arctic-blue eyes would once again captivate me.

  But I couldn’t risk that.