When Fate Isn't Enough

by Isabelle Richards

  I know he’s trying to poke fun, but he’s right. I have no idea how to respond. I was such a naïve, trusting girl, and I’ve morphed into a jaded, hard woman who keeps everyone at arm’s length.

  “Shall we open presents tonight or tomorrow?” I ask to change the subject.

  “At this rate, I won’t get there until New Year’s, so it won’t make much difference.”

  “Don’t be silly! Just tell me where you hid my present, and I’ll open it tomorrow morning. It’s important to keep with tradition,” I tease. I walk over to the desk and start looking in the drawers.

  “Stop snooping. Your present is with me, so you’re out of luck, luv.”

  “Fine,” I growl, abandoning my search. “Hurry up then. I made dinner!”

  “You? Made dinner?”

  “Yup,” I say, walking to the kitchen to stir the stew. “Try not to sound too shocked.”

  “Just so you know, there’s a fire extinguisher right next to the stove. The emergency number in England is 999. When the kitchen catches fire, call 999 right away, as the fire brigade is a ways away.”

  “Ha. Ha. Ha. I won’t burn down your house.”

  “Try to remember it’s been around for six generations. It’s an albatross to me sometimes, but I’m not sure I want to torch the place.”

  I walk back to the study and curl up on the sofa. “Have some faith. Anyway, the ghosts won’t let me burn it down if I tried,” I insist.

  “Too right! Oh, traffic is moving. Maybe there is hope for me to deliver your presents tonight after all.”

  “I’m going to get back to my book then. I’m in the middle of a steamy scene where he’s … delivering his package.”

  “You naughty, naughty girl. You’ve given me lots to think about for the rest of my drive. Cheers.”

  *******

  “Wake up, luv,” Gavin coos in my ear.

  I’m so warm and comfortable, I don’t want to open my eyes. Gavin is wrapped around me, and I feel the hot lick from the flames in the fireplace. The warmth draws me back to sleep while Gavin’s kisses on my neck urge me into consciousness.

  He looks down at my pajamas. “Funny, I pictured your outfit quite differently during our conversation.”

  Damn, I meant to change but must have fallen asleep. I give him a shy smile and shrug. I try to think of a witty comeback. Something sexy and provocative, but my brain is still asleep. “I … changed?”

  He kisses that spot behind my ear that sends jolts to my core. “While I do find it sexy when you wear my clothes, do you know what I think looks sexiest on you?”

  “What?” I whisper.

  “Nothing at all.” In one swift moment, he pulls my sweatshirt over my head, and pushes my sweatpants down. After my clothes have been removed, his hand clutches my neck possessively, almost too rough. The way he’s holding my neck forces me to look at him. “You were a very naughty girl, Lily. Teasing me like that whilst I was driving.”

  I bite my lip. “I’d say I’ll never do it again, but then I’d be lying.”

  He picks me up aggressively, throwing me over his shoulder. Gavin’s never shy in the bedroom, but the way he manhandles me, it’s almost barbaric. I’ll have to remember to push his buttons more often. He carries me down the hall to the billiards room and places me on the edge of the pool table. Digging his fingers into my hips, he abruptly flips me over.

  He runs his hands over my backside, occasionally dipping his fingers between my thighs. Not far enough to touch anything but close enough to drive me crazy with need. “Thanks to you, I drove over one hundred kilometers with a raging hard on. All I could think about was how I was going to fuck you when I got home. I could barely keep my eyes on the road.”

  “What’d you come up with?” I ask.

  “Driving with a hard on is dangerous.” He slaps my ass, the sound echoing against the stone walls of the room. I jerk, not because it hurt, but rather because it shocked me. Gavin doesn’t strike me as a spanker, but I should know better than to assume anything with him. This man never ceases to surprise me. He gently rubs the spot where he’d slapped.

  He bends over me, his erection grinding into my ass. After sweeping my hair to one side, he whispers in my ear. “You have no idea how hard it was, driving—”

  I interrupt him. “How hard was it?”

  “Naughty girl.” He slaps again, harder this time. That one had to have left a mark. While he rubs away the sting he says, “I almost had to pull over and release myself. That’s how hard my cocks was. But I wanted to save it for you.”

  I defiantly look over my shoulder at him. “So are you going to talk my ear off all night, or are you going to give it to me?” Maybe that wasn’t the right answer. Seeing this side of Gavin is so sexy, and I want to play along. But it seems even my dirty talk makes me sound like a snarky bitch.

  Slap. “Always so fucking cheeky.” This time he doesn’t rub away the sting. I hear his belt unbuckle and the soft swoosh of his pants falling to the floor. Without warning, he slams into me. I tilt my head back and moan.

  He has one hand on my hip and the other on my shoulder, his fingers digging so hard into my skin they’re bound to leave a mark. With the depths he’s reaching inside me, the pleasure is well worth the pain.

  My forearms are resting on the edge of the pool table. The felt is chafing my wrists with each powerful thrust. It burns, but I don’t want him to stop.

  He finally starts to hit the money spot, and tingles begin in my toes, promising an orgasm. “Ah,” I moan. “Don’t stop.”

  Suddenly, he pulls out. Panting, I wait a moment, preparing for him to slam into me again. But he doesn’t. What the hell? I’m about to ask him if everything is okay, when he flips me over. Now that I’m facing him, I try to read his expression to anticipate what’s going to happen next, but he gives nothing way.

  “Are you punishing me by not allowing me to come?” I ask.

  He harshly pushes me, causing me to fall back on the table. Gavin being Gavin, he puts a hand out to make sure I don’t hit my head. He may be playing the bad boy role at the moment, but he can’t hide who he is at heart.

  Once I’m lying down, he hooks both of my knees and pulls, so that my knees are bent and my ass is at the edge of the table. “This is for me, not you,” he says before diving between my legs. He swirls his tongue around my clit. I start to moan, but last time I did that he pulled away, so I stop myself and I bite my lip.

  He’s taking his time. Slowly licking and sucking, as though I’m a delicacy he’s trying to savor. I gasp as he slides two fingers inside me. The more attention he gives my body, the more I ache to come. Desperate for more, I grind my pelvis against his tongue, creating the frenzied friction I crave. Unable to hold it in, I moan in ecstasy.

  The son of a bitch pulls away again.

  I open my eyes and see him sitting on his heels with a Cheshire grin. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “I told you it was for me, not you.”

  “Oh yeah?” I reply as I slide my hand down my stomach to my wet core. I’m so worked up it only takes a few seconds before I scream with my release. I open my eyes as my body comes down from the high. I flash him a shit eating grin. “That was for me, not you.”

  He jumps up from his crouched position, and places one hand on either side of my shoulders, hovering over me. His hard cock brushes against my thigh. I came seconds ago, but I’m already yearning for more. “You may have enjoyed that, but trust me, I enjoyed every second as well.”

  Lowering his head, he takes my nipple into his mouth. My body is still sensitive from my orgasm. Each lick sends a shockwave through my body. He teases me by running his dick along my thigh. I push my pelvis toward him, but he pulls away.

  I close my eyes, struggling to find the patience for this game. Just as I take a deep breath, he grabs my hips and pushes them back on the table. “Watching you make yourself come is one of the sexiest things I’ve ever seen,” he says. “But not as sexy as when you come
undone all over my cock.” I gasp as he plunges into me.

  I close my eyes and let my head fall to the side. “Open your eyes,” he says as he grabs my chin so that I’m looking at him. “I want to watch you come.”

  He sure is putting those abs to work. He pounds into me so hard I worry he’s going to break the damn table. He changes his angle, now hitting my g spot. I keep my eyes fixed on his as the wave builds. My whole body tenses, followed by the euphoric release.

  Spurred on by my orgasm, Gavin picks up speed. I can tell by the devious gleam in his eyes that he wants to push me to another orgasm, but I know I don’t have it in me. I squeeze my core with every ounce of energy I have. He gasps as he drops his head back. “You’re gripping my dick like a vice. You’re going to make me come”

  “Eyes on me, Oxford.”

  His eyes meet mine as he finds his release. Breathless, he collapses on top of me. “Who knew I could get traffic to work in my favor?” I say with a chuckle.

  He pushes up from the pool table and gives me a quick kiss. “One thing England has in abundance is traffic. Perhaps we’ll have to play this game more often.”

  His stomach growls. “Maybe after I feed you,” I reply.

  “Yes, I’m curious about this meal that you cooked. I can’t tell you how thrilled I was to drive up and see the house still standing.”

  I poke him in the stomach. “Shut it.”

  He stands, then collects our clothes from the floor while I run to the bathroom to clean up. While I’m washing my hands, he opens the bathroom door to deliver my sweats. Once I’m dressed, I meet him in the kitchen where he’s dishing out bowls of stew. I pour two glasses of wine while he brings the bowls to the table.

  I pick up my spoon and dig in. The first bite is heaven. Just like my mother’s. I notice out of the corner of my eye, Gavin watching me carefully. “Go ahead, try some. It won’t kill you.”

  He takes a bite, and a look of disbelief comes over his face. “This is pretty good,” he says.

  “Don’t look so surprised.”

  He pauses mid-bite. “The oven caught fire when you tried to make Cumberland pie. Not to mention –”

  I hold my hand up. “I’m well aware of my culinary failures. But this,” I say pointing to my bowl with my spoon. “This, I make well. So, tell me about today.”

  “It was stressful, but one thousand seven hundred and forty-three soldiers are home for the holiday.”

  I lean over and kiss his temple. “You’re a good man, Gavin Edwards. Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise.”

  “I’m not sure my employees would say that. About twenty of them were there with me until the last soldier boarded the last plane. They gave up time with their families to make sure the day went off without a hitch.”

  “If I had to guess, they were there because they wanted to be there, not just because it’s their job. Your enthusiasm is inspiring.”

  “And I pay bloody well,” he says before taking a bite.

  The rest of dinner is spent with him filling me in on the details. He spent part of the day at Heathrow waiting with families for their soldier’s flights to arrive. I love how his eyes sparkle when he talks about the families he met, and the touching moment when the soldier walks into baggage claim and finds the family waiting there. Apparently someone wanted to make a documentary of it, but Gavin refused. He felt those moments should be kept private.

  After we clean up the dishes, we climb back into our makeshift bed. Once the lights are out and we’re both quiet, he opens up about his time in the military. He doesn’t talk about it often, so I’m touched he feels comfortable opening up to me.

  His stories keep me captivated till dawn.

  “Sun’s coming up,” I say as I see it creeping over the horizon.

  “Hmmm,” he moans, possibly half asleep.

  “We have people coming over, and we need to get cooking. You’re the least toxic in the kitchen.”

  He responds with soft snores.

  Looks like it’s me and the turkey. God help us all.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Why didn’t I ever learn to cook? One of the many downsides of losing my mother young is I never learned how to cook things like a turkey. I have a cookbook, but it’s completely useless! Stuffed vs. unstuffed. Did I brine? What the hell is brine? I just need to know how many minutes per pound and at what temperature, but the damn cookbook is American, and my turkey is in grams and the oven is in Celsius. Fuck the damn metric system!

  Hazel’s gone, and Gavin is probably as useless as I am. My computer and iPad are both in the solarium where my very tired boyfriend is sleeping. However, I spy Gavin’s briefcase in the front hall. Digging around in it for his iPad, I find a little box. A little robin’s-egg-blue box. His briefcase slips from my hands as I stare at the little box of impending doom.

  NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. I have a turkey to cook and a kitchen to try to not burn down. I can’t think about little blue boxes. My cell phone ringing in the distance makes me jump and throw the box across the room as if it’s a venomous snake. Ignoring my phone, I crawl around searching for the box so I can return it to its hiding place, hopefully for a very long time. I give great consideration to “misplacing” the box. No box means no ring. No ring means no proposal. No proposal means not having to think about things that suck the oxygen out of my lungs. Instead, I grab the iPad and walk away, trying to pretend I never saw that box and that I won’t have to have a marriage conversation soon. Denial is beautiful.

  The iPad and I figure out a plan for the turkey, and I stick it in the oven. I make the sign of the cross in front of the oven, praying not to burn down the house or give us all salmonella. My phone won’t stop ringing, so I have to go on a treasure hunt to try to find it. In a house with so much stone and marble, sounds echo off the walls, making it hard to figure out exactly where my phone is. Eventually I find it in the library.

  “Where the hell have you been?” Em screams.

  “Sorry, I lost my phone, and hide-and-seek is next to impossible in this house. Once you get here, you’ll understand. It’s bigger than Sacred Heart was.”

  “Hmmm.” She’s trying to sound bored, but I know she’s curious. “I’ll be there soon, I think. The GPS says less than an hour.”

  “See you soon.”

  Over an hour and a half later, Em arrives. When I open the door, she says, “It’s a fucking castle, Lily. You didn’t tell me it was a castle.” Her driver brings in her bags and sets them by the door.

  She hands him a tip. He tips his hat and closes the door as he leaves. I glare at her. “You couldn’t have rented a car? You made the poor man work on Christmas?”

  “Don’t look at me like that,” she replies. “That man now has five hundred more bucks in his pocket to spend on Christmas. That’s how the economy works.” She hands me her coat. “Now, show me the loo. That drive from the airport is a bitch.”

  While she freshens up, I put together some nosh food and pour some juice.

  “When’s everyone coming?” she asks, munching on a croissant.

  “Between four and five, I think. We wanted everyone to be able to see their families. They do Christmas dinner here early, like around one. So I just told people to swing on by when they were done. Liam said he doesn’t know when he can get here. His parents host a big gathering with”

  “I’ve heard,” she says. “Eight brothers and sisters and their spouses and kids and in-laws. He was smart enough to say that he wouldn’t invite me because he knew it would make me miserable.”

  “You’ve been talking to Liam?” I can’t keep up with her love life!

  “Don’t start, Lily. I talk to lots of people. You said he was organizing the Yankee Swap, so we discussed it. As you know, Liam’s fun. I enjoy spending time with him, but there’s nothing more to it. Stop reading into it.” She walks over to the fridge and starts rummaging around. “Do you have any champagne to go with this juice? I’ll even take some vodka
if you have some chilled.”

  “I have no idea, but you can check. You’ll be drinking on your own, though. I’m still waking up. Too early for me to start drinking. If I start now, I’ll be asleep before everyone gets here.”

  She shrugs. “Yeah, you’re probably right.” A devilish look crosses her face. “Stay here. I have something for you.” She runs back to her bags in the entrance. When she returns she hands me a box wrapped in black wrapping paper.

  “What is this? You don’t do presents.” I shake the box but can’t tell what it is.

  “No, I don’t. But I had this brilliant idea and had to get it. As you can tell by the wrapping, this is not a holiday gift.”

  I tear the wrapping off and laugh hysterically. “What the hell is this, Em?” It’s a package of five dolls that look creepily like Gavin.

  She looks at me like I’m crazy. “What do you mean? It’s the Gavin Doll collection. There’s Tux Gavin, G. I. Gavin, Alpha CEO Gavin, Sexually Frustrated Gavin, notice the short running shorts, and Club Gavin. If you push the button on the back it goes ‘unce unce unce.’”

  I try to say “What the fuck,” but I’m laughing too hard to formulate the words.

  “You always describe Gavin like he’s a Ken doll, and I have a friend in the doll biz. Open it up. I made sure he’s anatomically correct.”

  My jaw drops. “You didn’t!” I tear open the package.

  She pulls out Sexually Frustrated Gavin and lowers his pants. “Since I don’t have first-hand experience, I had to guess on the dimensions. I tried to be generous. Was I right?”

  Blush scorches my cheeks.

  “What?” she asks. “Bigger?”

  I smirk. “Yeah, bigger. Much bigger.”

  She stares at the now naked Gavin doll. “Damn.”

  I grab the doll from her. “Stop ogling my boyfriend.”

  She dresses the doll and puts it back in the box. “Well, I’ve seen Gavin’s goodies, let’s see yours. Show me your porn.”

  “My what?”

  “The pictures Josie took. I’m dying to see them.”

  I give her a dirty look. “The pictures aren’t porn. They’re tasteful.”