by Piper Page
I felt ill. “Adrian, I’m so sorry. This is my fault. That’s why you had the car pick us up and you stayed away, isn’t it? You were trying to protect me. Adrian, Giovanni would never hurt me.”
“I know that now. He loves you. He’s just in a really bad place in his life.”
I laughed a sarcastic laugh. “Tell me about it. I’ll talk to him. We’ll straighten it all out. He can’t help it. Being involved with these types is all he’s known. My father had dealings with them too, but nothing to this extent. I mean, I know what my father was involved with was wrong, but he would never make a bad deal or threaten a man’s family. His tactic weren’t like that, I think because he had his own family to protect. Maybe Giovanni needs a family.” I was wondering out loud, just letting my thoughts stream out verbally into the suite.
Adrian turned away and looked up at the ceiling. “That’s the next thing. If I had known, maybe I would have done things different, but I swear I didn’t know. Baby, I would never hurt you, never would I do anything that would upset you.”
I braced myself for what he was about to say next.
“The other night when they cornered me, I recorded what Giovanni was saying with my phone. He gave up names and details of crimes, big crimes involving men higher up than him and his boys. He used them to intimidate me, and in doing so he incriminate himself and the others. I saved it all on my phone.”
I sat up straight and looked down at him, heart racing. He kept his eyes on the ceiling.
“I played that recording for the police, and they arrested Luca, Nick, and the others.”
I turned away and gasped. All of a sudden I couldn’t breathe. I could feel the tears flowing down my cheeks. I always knew that Giovanni would be arrested one day, but to know that Adrian had made it happen, I didn’t know what to feel. Was I mad, and if so was it fair to be mad at Adrian?
I felt Adrian’s hand on my shoulder as he sat up behind me. His mouth was on my bare shoulder. His breath was warm and comforting on my skin. I pulled the sheet up around my body like a protective shield.
“I didn’t know he was your brother,” he whispered. “When he came into the locker room tonight, he was prepared to get his revenge—that’s when he told me who he was to you. I didn’t know what to do, but I knew I cared for you and what it would do to you if he got arrested. I told him how to get away. He didn’t get arrested, Mallory. He’s out there somewhere. Hopefully, he’ll make a turnaround in his life. I didn’t know what else to do. Please forgive me.”
My hand slipped up and covered Adrian’s hand on my shoulder. I squeezed his fingers between mine and pulled them down to my mouth, kissing his hand. “You did what you had to. You could have let them arrest him, but you didn’t, and I don’t know if I can ever thank you enough for that. My brother has had a hard time since my parents passed away. I hope he finds his way, and maybe one day, he’ll be a new man.”
I knew I could deal with this. I had been prepared to never see Giovanni again just a few days ago, I could move on, better knowing he might just be okay. My brother would let me know he was okay, when he could. I could never blame Adrian for any of this. He could have high-tailed it away from me for Giovanni’s actions. Who would want to be mixed up with something as criminal as my brother and his mob?
I wiped my tears away and slid up next to him on the bed, letting him cradle me in his arms as we lay back down together. It felt safe and wonderful, and I wanted to stay here forever safe and out of the eyes of any problems on the outside.
“I want to tell you one more thing, something that Giovanni made me realize and admit tonight.”
Oh God there was more. I didn’t think I could take any more news. My head could not take any more information today.
Adrian’s lips drew close to my ear. “I love you, Mallory.”
My heart came to a dead stop, my breath froze in my lungs and I was positive I was having a seizure. “What did you say?”
He moved from my side and put the weight of his chest on top of my rib cage. His green eyes searched mine. “I said I love you.”
“Really?”
He nodded.
“I love you too! I’ve never loved anyone like this before,” I gasped.
He sealed our confessions with a kiss and he wrapped me in his embrace there in the king sized bed, in our own private penthouse heaven, bathed in the moon light. We lay spooned together, and I could feel his breath in my hair. “I think we should get married.”
My eyes shot open. Did I fall asleep and dream that? Alcohol, sex, and confessions had me hallucinating.
“Did you hear me?”
I turned my body in his arms so I was facing him. “Am I dreaming?”
“If you’re dreaming, then I am too, and we’re sharing the best damn dream I have ever had.”
“Did you just ask me to marry you?” Was this real?
“I did. I want to marry you, make you my wife, and,” his hands drifted to my lower abdomen, “I want to spend every night trying to put a baby right here.”
I could feel the tears streaming from my eyes to the pillow. Happy tears this time, overwhelmed tears. It was all too much to absorb. I kissed him and sniffled. He laughed and kissed my tear soaked cheeks.
“We can get married, have kids, buy a great house, or even live in yours, if that’s what you want.”
The thought of us living like my parents had, together with two kids running around in the yard, was a fantasy I’d never entertained, but right now, it became my only goal in life. I held his face. “Yes, sir, yes please, all of that, I want all of that with you.” My cheeks hurt with how wide my smile was.
He pulled me close and hugged me, kissing my head and my hair. We drifted back into comfortable sleep, only to wake up and kiss again. Until at last we were both sound asleep, holding one another.
When the sun began to rise and break into daylight through our windows, I squinted against its brightness. Adrian was awake already and watching me. “Good morning, kitten.”
“Good morning.” I yawned. “Want to take a shower with me?” I stretched my body out to its petite length alongside his long form. His body never ceased to amaze me. He drew me into a strong embrace.
“I’d like that very much. Maybe we can try a repeat of last night.” He smiled with a devilish grin.
“I like that idea, a lot.” I rolled to my side and off the bed onto my feet. Adrian leapt from the bed and swatted my backside as I walked to the bathroom to start the shower. I yelped and laughed. I didn’t think I would ever get tired of his hands on my body. Who would have ever guessed that virgin Mallory would be ex-virgin Mallory, dating a star quarter back on her way to being Mrs. Quarterback in such a short amount of time? Leslie was going to have a cow. I wondered if she had spent the night with Emmet.
“Adrian, did Emmet call you last night?” I called from the bathroom over the sound of the running water. I reached in to the jetting spray and adjusted the temperature.
“Was he supposed to?”
“I was wondering if Leslie was with him or if she got home safe.” I yelled, then dropped my voice when Adrian appeared in the doorway with his phone in his hands.
“Hi,” he smiled, kissing the tip of my nose.
“Hi.”
“I don’t see his number,” Adrian said as he scrolled through his voice mail messages. “Oh wait maybe this is him from Leslie’s phone. I don’t recognize the number.” He hit play before I got a look at the digits
“Hey there buckaroo, Mr. All Star, winning Maverick Man, it’s Mike.” Adrian rolled his eyes.
“The owner of our team,” he mouthed, coving the phone and answering me when I gave him a questioning look.
I nodded and listened.
“I hope you’re recovering from a great party and a fucking superb game. I knew you could pull it out for us. Your face is going to be all over the news stations. This is big, baby.”
I wasn’t sure how I felt about this faceless voice. He sounded l
ike a jerk, or as Adrian had said, a “rich prick”.
“Listen, I know you’re all jazzed up and celebrating, but my phone is ringing off the damned wall. You are hot, man. We got offers for everything from razors to luxury vacation spots that want to use your face and personality to promote their brands. You’re looking at some nice pay days, my friend. Call me when you get this, as soon as you get this. We have a lot to discuss. Contracts, percentages, raises, endorsements, this is big big big.” The line went silent.
“Is he serious?” I asked.
Adrian was still starring at the phone.
“Adrian?”
He sent out a yelp of pure joy that echoed and rebounded off the Italian bathroom tile. His strong arms picked me up and swung me around, both of us totally naked and thrilled with life. Was this real, was this going to be our lives together? He set me down and kissed my face, repeatedly.
“It’s all because of you, baby.”
I smiled. “I think you had a lot to do with it.”
He lifted me into the shower. “We did it together. From now, we do everything together. Always.”
We made love in the shower under the forceful spray of hot water, another new experience for me. Each time I made love to Adrian was like a new dream, and a new experience that I wanted to repeat, over and over again.
Chapter Twenty
Adrian
The scent of lilies and bleeding hearts drifted in and out through the air of the building. It filled my nostrils and lifted up into the empty spaces of the vaulted ceiling. There was no noise, except that of the harp strings that were being plucked somewhere above us in a balcony by mysterious hands of a person we didn’t know. It could have been an angel, and maybe it was. I stood staring at the backs of various heads—Emmet was to my left, fidgeting in his dress clothes, and Leslie was to my right, looking adoringly down the rows of people and Mallory was standing at the beginning of the church aisle. Her face beamed at me as she began the walk that would take her from Miss Mallory Rosella Basso to Mrs. Adrian Maxwell. I watched her like she was the only other person in the room. There was no Robbie taking video, my parents weren’t sitting in the front row with my mother dabbing at the corners of her eyes, and the whole team, including the Coach and Mike Richardson weren’t trying to angle their oversized bodies into the small church pews.
Mallory kept her bright blue eyes trained on me. The flowers in her hand were a dead giveaway as to how nervous she was as they trembled in her fingers. My mother’s sapphire pendant glittered on the silver chain around her exposed throat and highlighted the sweetheart neckline of her wedding gown. She looked as gorgeous today as the first day I had laid eyes on her. I knew she was happy, even with the fact that it wasn’t her father’s arm guiding her down the aisle or Giovanni’s. Instead, it was a beaming Mr. Alika. He actually cried when she had asked him to give her away to me. I realized then that he thought of her as much as a daughter as she considered him a father figure. The two of them reached the end of the runner and waited for the minister to speak.
“Who gives this woman to this man?”
“Me, I give her to him,” Mr. Alika said with his broken English, loud and clear, then wiped his eyes with his tux jacket sleeve. He kissed the back of Mallory’s hand and then placed it into mine, threw his hands in the air, out of joy or tradition, and then scuttled back to his designated seat.
The minster continued on after the twitter of laughter subsided. Before I realized it, Mallory was handing her bouquet over to Leslie for safekeeping, freeing her hands and Emmet was handing me the blue Tiffany’s box that held our rings inside its confines.
I held her hand in mine and slipped the gold and diamond band onto her left ring finger. “Mallory, you are my world, my life, my forever love,” my voice cracked, and I cleared my throat, trying to keep my wits about me. “I will be here for you when you are happy, when you are sad, angry, or scared, you will never face another emotion alone. We’re in this together, and I’ll forever love you with all that I am. I love you,” I breathed as I finished my vows, happy to have finished without crying.
Her eyes were glistening with moisture and I could hear my mother sniffle loudly from her seat.
“I love you.” Mallory whispered as she placed a matching gold and diamond band on my matching finger, next to my Super Bowl ring. “Adrian, I never knew the feeling of being loved so much by one single person until I met you.” Her voice quivered. “You are my love, and you are my life. I will trust you with all my dreams, all my secrets, and all my desires. I want to grow old with you, by your side, because we are in this together. I look forward to learning more about you every day, and I’m so thankful for the way you keep me safe and happy. I love you more than life itself. I love you.”
The minster ran through the words he was prescribed to say. I barely heard them—I was lost in Mallory’s face. He pronounced us man and wife, and I swept her into my arms and kissed her with every emotion in my body. The crowd erupted in a round of applause. Emmet pounded me on the back with the flat of his hand, “Best play ever, Maxwell.”
“Definitely a fair catch,” I whispered back at him.
Mallory was still holding my hand, but she was wrapped in Leslie’s embrace. The two of them were crying like school girls. I like Leslie. With her odd, quirky, smart mouth, I still liked her, and I was glad that Mallory had her as a friend. Mallory and I moved together down the aisle and hugged my parents. My mother held my cheeks and slathered my face with a multitude of kisses. My father shook my hand, and the pride I saw in his eyes was better than any winning game I had under my belt. My teammates took turns hugging, kissing, and patting us on our backs, and by the time we exited the church we were thoroughly doused in the love of our friends and family.
Our lives together had become the making of romantic fairytales. The Mavericks had gone on to win the Super Bowl, and now, here we were on February fourteenth, putting a cap on what was already an amazing month. I had enough contracts lined up to let Mallory stop working, if she wanted, or to keep going, if that was her desire with no pressure about money for bills or needs. We planned to remodel her house and live it in, raise our family in it and someday entertain our grandchildren in it. We didn’t hear a peep from her brother’s connections, and I figured they were all laying low after hearing about the arrests of the four mobsters. Every day I woke up next to Mallory was better than the day before.
The limo door was open and waiting for us outside. I helped hold up the length of Mallory’s dress as she climbed in before I sat down next to her and closed the door, popping the lock to secure the doors.
“Hi, Mrs. Maxwell.” I sighed.
“Hi, Mr. Maxwell,” she smiled. “I am so very happy, Adrian. Thank you.”
I leaned over to kiss her and she pulled me close, attacking my mouth with her lips.
“Let’s make it official right now,” she said and it took me a moment to realize what she was suggesting. Over the last few months I realized I not only had a gorgeous woman in my life, but I had created a nymph that reveled in my aggressive, dominating touch. She had blossomed into everything I ever wanted in a woman, and she pleased me to no end.
“We have guests on their way to a reception in honor of us, kitten.” I gave her a wary glance. Daring her to try to convince me.
She pouted and then purred, giving me sultry, sexy, wanting eyes. I could feel my body betraying me. I stretched my legs and adjusted my tux trousers.
“I’ve never done it in a back seat.” she whispered, tracing her finger over the folded material that hid the zipper of my pants.
My eyes went wide. I had forgotten that fact. “Well, I guess that means we need to remedy that little fact right now.”
Mallory wiggled in her seat like a high school girl waiting to receive her prom queen crown. I unbuttoned my black slacks and freed myself from their confines, my body ready for whatever she desired, right there in the back of our wedding limo. Her body bent forward in a mass of tul
le, satin, and crystals that glittered in the hollow of the vehicle. She wrapped her wedding-ringed finger around me and stroked the tight skin. I closed my eyes and leaned my head back, soaking up the touch of her fingers. She applied the perfect pleasurable pressure and pushed me toward a dangerous edge. This was our wedding day—I should hold my deviant monster at bay, but I knew she would not want that.
I opened my eyes and looked downward. Her sky-blue eyes were watching me, begging me to tell her what I wanted from her. “You know what I want, kitten.”
A sensual smile spread across her lips before she parted them and took the full length of me deep into her wanting mouth. My hardness was coated with warm, glorious, slick moisture, and she worked me over until my hands were tangled in her wedding day hair, and my hips were driving upward off the seat. The sounds in the cabin of the limo were sounds no one should hear unless they were indulging in those intimate actions themselves. I sighed, a heavy breath of frustration and relief washing over me when she popped her lips from my skin. Thankful for the reprieve to gain my sanity and control of my body back, I looked at her with concern and questioning.
She gave me a playful, spirited look. “We aren’t consummating my mouth.”
“Ahh, good point, my love.” My hands eased my pants down toward the carpeted limo floor. The cool leather of the limo seat was shocking to my heated, bare skin. I watched as Mallory sat back up and gathered the material of her designer wedding gown up and around her thighs. She crawled up over my seated form, a smooth bare thigh on either side of my lap as she kneeled over me. Her fingers had gotten skilled, and they worked with swift ease as she pulled the white silk panties she wore under her dress to the side and slipped me into her wet, waiting, ready sex. I reached up to kiss her, to search out her mouth, devour the taste of myself in her married mouth. I moaned into the space between her lips when I felt her rock and clench against me. She ground her body downward, and it took all my strength not to explode inside her. I didn’t want the sensation to end until she had her fill.