Her lips curved up at the corners. I skimmed my fingertips across them, tracing the lush bow shape before kissing her.
“Believe me?”
She nodded.
“Good. Give me an hour, then we’ll launch an official surgeon search.”
“What do you need an hour for?” The light in her blueberry-blue eyes told me she knew exactly what we needed to do, and it sure as hell didn’t include inviting a third person to our party.
She drew my shirt the rest of the way off and we fell in a slow tumble to the floor, where a priceless Persian rug padded our fall. I used to put great value on the monetary worth of my surroundings. In the absence of my mother or father, my things had become my family. Only now, Ella had become not just my family, but my everything. I adored her. I worshipped her.
I finally, finally possessed her.
Resting on my elbow, I dragged a pillow from the chair, placing it beneath Ella’s head.
I shimmied her free of her white panties and khaki shorts.
I cupped my palm to her belly’s gentle swell. “I can’t wait for you to have my baby.”
There she went again with her smile while stroking the hair on my forearm. “I feel the same. Would you want a boy or a girl?”
“Doesn’t matter. I’ll love both.”
“Uh-huh. Well, I want a little girl just like Darcy to play dress-up with.”
“On second thought, no girls.” I vehemently shook my head. “I have enough to worry about with you. No way could I handle a mini-Ella.”
She laughed. “Are you ever getting naked, or just planning on torturing me forever?”
“Promise, you won’t have a baby girl?”
“Yes, sir. Only boys are allowed in this womb.” She patted her belly. “Hear that, future babies?”
I rolled my eyes. “Trust me, I’ll be thrilled with any little bundle you want to give me. But if that’s something you want to do, we’ll probably need less talk and more action—if you’re on board. Otherwise, guess I should grab a condom from the bathroom.”
“You sure talk a lot.”
“This is important. We’re not even married yet, and a kid is a big deal, so if you want to hold off, I completely under—”
She twined her arms around my neck, pulling me into a kiss.
I lost my balance, dropping my full weight against her. In the time it took me to push myself up, she was groaning, arching her hips up while pulling me back down. The crush of her breasts against my chest served as an erotic kick-start, revving my cock into high gear. After fumbling with the waistband of my cargo shorts, I wriggled free of them and my boxers.
“Wait,”—I had to say before venturing further—“just to confirm, we’re in agreement on the baby-making issue? Full speed ahead?”
Her eyes shone when she nodded. “Nothing would make me happier than to make a baby with you. Boy or girl, I’m all in.”
That was all I needed to hear.
When our lips next touched, the action felt somehow more intimate than a mere kiss. Our union had a goal. A dream. Maybe she’d get pregnant today. Most likely not. Either way, we’d have fun trying.
Accompanied by the ocean’s dull roar, bathed in late afternoon sun, I kissed a trail down Ell’s abdomen, winding my way between her legs. I nipped and sucked at her inner thighs, then parted her, tonguing her clit, tasting her, breathing her in, spurred on by her every moan and the way she’d fisted my hair.
Her eventual O rocketed through her. She cried out, stiffened, then moaned in release.
I was excited for my turn and settled between her legs, testing her to find her wet and ready. I slid all the way in, pumping an easy rhythm. The feeling was indescribable. Given a thousand words, I couldn’t have done justice to this physical ambrosia. So I didn’t even try.
I just felt. And kissed her. And thanked God and whoever else might be listening for the blessing of finding her. Our meeting had been pure chance—one in a million. If my jet hadn’t crapped out, if I hadn’t decided to stay behind, we wouldn’t now be together. I wouldn’t now be inside her, living a dream.
—
“I’m starving,” Ella said in front of the fridge thirty minutes later.
“How do you have the energy to eat?” We’d gone at it again in a position she’d suggested that still had me breathing heavy.
“Aw, poor baby…” She’d found a bowl of strawberries and set it on the kitchen’s center island. I sat at the table, and she made her way to me with a berry in hand. She brushed it against my lips. “Open up. If you’re too weak to eat, I’ll feed you.”
“What if I’d rather have steak? Christ, woman, you gave me one hell of a workout.”
“Complaining?”
I cinched my arm around her waist, shoving her shirt up to bury my face between her breasts. For once, she wore no bra beneath the second T-shirt she’d pilfered from me. Knowing she trusted me to that degree made my cock grow all over again, which meant I’d need to eliminate her khaki shorts.
The doorbell rang.
“Son of a bitch…” I lowered her shirt. What good was having a security team if they didn’t stop people from intruding on my privacy? “I told Penny we didn’t want to be bothered.”
“You’re so mean.” She delivered a light swat to my head. “I think we’ve had plenty of alone time—besides, after all the nice things she’s done for me, I’m excited to finally meet her.”
“Be my guest.” Since I was too exhausted to move, I swept my arm in a grand gesture for her to answer the door.
The bell rang again.
“Well?” I asked. “Aren’t you going to get that?”
She popped a berry before flipping me a playful bird. “Next time you want to lay with me, remind me to just say no.”
“Lay with you?” While she sashayed her sweet ass down the entry hall, I laughed. “Wouldn’t that be lie?” I honestly didn’t know which was grammatically correct and I didn’t care. Using the table for leverage, I pushed my weary-ass bones up to formally introduce her to my housekeeper.
Only when Ella opened the door, she froze, then crumpled to the floor.
14
Ella
When I came to, the world was spinning, but not in a good way. “I’m going to be sick…” I ran to the powder room, knowing that when I looked in the mirror, the nightmare vision would be gone.
But it wasn’t. And I screamed in horror, backing into the corner between the toilet and wall, trying to make myself invisible.
“Ella…Precious, it’s been so long. Aren’t you glad to see me?” My husband, Blaine, reached for me, but I slapped him away.
“You’re not real.” I closed my eyes and shook my head, willing him away. “I know you’re not real.”
“Get the fuck out of my house,” Liam said. I’d never seen him angry like this. Another facet of this nightmare? Because I knew none of this could be real. The two men couldn’t exist in the same world.
“Excuse me, sir.” A uniformed police officer gestured for Liam to stay back. “We have reason to believe you’re holding this woman against her will.”
Liam was the one I wanted. I tried darting past the cop, but Blaine caught me. Like a wild animal, I kicked and punched and screamed, but Blaine was so much bigger than me that his tree-trunk arms easily held.
“Let her go!” Liam entered the fray, but three cops held him back.
There was so much shouting and accusation, and my head didn’t feel right.
The shock of what was happening hadn’t begun to sink in.
“Precious, you’ve got to calm down,” Blaine said. I recognized this voice. The one he used when he wanted people to believe he loved me. It was sick.
A man in a suit stepped forward. “Ella, my name is Dr. Carthage. I’m a psychiatrist. Your husband and parents have been looking for you for a very long time. They’ve been so worried. Are you okay? Do you remember your name?”
I screamed. And screamed.
The do
ctor shoved a needle in my shoulder, and then I slept.
I dreamt of Liam scooping me into his arms and carrying me to safety, but when I woke to find myself groggy and sandwiched between Blaine and a stranger at some airport, I knew something wasn’t right.
“You’re awake,” the stranger said. “Good, good. You were hysterical, so I gave you a mild sedative. Your parents will meet us in Memphis, and then we’ll drive the rest of the way to your home. They were very happy to hear you’re safe.”
“Who are you?” Why wouldn’t my head stop spinning?
“I’m your doctor. Remember?” His calm smile creeped me out.
“What’s wrong with her?” Blaine asked. “Is it normal for her to be this out of it? Do you think she could have amnesia?”
The stranger shrugged. “Anything’s possible. Until we get her to the clinic, and are able to perform tests, we won’t know anything for sure. My advice to avoid further conflict is to keep her sedated throughout the flight. We’ll sort everything else out once we’re in a safe environment. Here, there are too many variables for us to force the issue.”
“Where’s Liam?” I asked. “Why isn’t he looking for me?” I looked down at my hand. “Where’s my ring? We’re getting married.”
“Honey…” Blaine wrapped his disgusting arm around my shoulders. “You’re not making sense. You know you’re already married to me.” To the stranger, he said, “This is why I think she may suffer from memory loss. We were so happy. Then she was just gone.”
“Lies!” I spit on him. “I hate you! You carved me like a turkey!”
All around us, people were staring.
“Doctor,” Blaine said, “Can you give her any more happy juice?”
“Of course…” Out came his syringe, and out went my lights. I wasn’t asleep, but so very sleepy.
I looked up to find myself surrounded by policemen, which I thought was funny since I for sure hadn’t been speeding because I hadn’t driven anywhere.
“There’s my old smiley girl,” Blaine said. “I knew you’d come back to me.” He kissed the crown of my head and I knew I didn’t want him to touch me, but I wasn’t sure how to get him to stop. It was all so confusing. Where was Liam, and how come we were at a commercial airport instead of his private hangar? He wouldn’t be happy about me flying with strangers. “I knew you’d come back to me.”
The stranger who said he was a doctor smiled. “That’s nice. See? We’ve already made progress.”
We sat for a little while with Blaine and the doctor-stranger chatting. I was far too busy concentrating on the torn vinyl in the armrest of my chair. The tip of my pinkie finger fit just right in the hole. The yellow foam padding peeking through made my finger bounce when it hit. That made me smile. Only I knew I wasn’t happy, which was awfully confusing.
Suddenly, there was shouting.
I looked up and there was Liam, running my way, shouting my name. “Ella! Ella!”
Airport security chased after him. Were they having a race?
Two guys lunged for him, but he kept running. “Ella!”
“Liam!” I was so happy to see him. Maybe he knew where to find my ring?
“This is bullshit!” he cried. “You can’t just take a woman from her own home!”
“Sir,” one of the security guys said, “if you don’t calm down, we’ll have to escort you from the premises.”
“Fuck you!” he shouted, before punching the guard who’d grabbed him. “He’s kidnapping her! Are you blind?”
“That’s it…” One of the security crew talked into a shoulder-mounted radio. Three other guys zip-tied Liam’s wrists before hauling him away.
“No!” I cried. “Don’t take him! I need to know about my ring!”
I tried standing, but my knees buckled.
Blaine caught me, helping me back to my chair that had the hole in the arm. Only I didn’t want to be there, but with Liam. I knew wherever he was, that was where I was supposed to be.
“It’s okay, Precious…” Blaine rubbed my tight neck. “We’ll be home soon, then everything will make sense. You want to see your parents, right?”
I nodded, because I missed my mom and dad. But something about them wasn’t right. How could I even be sure they were alive? Because if they were, they wouldn’t let Blaine just take me like this, right? Didn’t they know how bad he’d hurt me? How much he’d scared me?
The doctor said, “As soon as we board, I’ll give her another small dose that should allow her to sleep. Sound okay?”
Blaine nodded. “I think that would be for the best. Our marriage was like a fairy tale. The fact that she not only doesn’t seem to recognize me, but seems afraid of me, is quite distressing.” He chuckled. “Maybe I need one of your shots, too.”
The stranger-doctor patted his forearm. “Promise, you’ll be fine. Clearly, if your marriage was as idyllic as you’ve described, yet she’s been away from your marital home for nearly a year, she’s suffering from a form of psychosis or even amnesia, but as I mentioned earlier, it may be some time before I’m able to arrive at an official diagnosis. Rest assured, she won’t leave my clinic before she’s one hundred percent the woman you remember.”
Blaine smiled. “Wonderful. That’s exactly what I’ve wanted.”
What about what I wanted?
What about Liam? I loved him, right? But if that were true, how could I still be married to Blaine? He was a monster. But if he’d hurt me, why was he telling this stranger how happy the two of us had been?
Nothing made sense. I was so tired.
Blaine rubbed my shoulders, but in my mind, Liam touched me, Liam loved me.
I opened my eyes, expecting to find Liam, but when Blaine greeted me with a smile that failed to light his dead eyes, then whispered, “I love you, Ella. We’re going to have so much fun once you’re home,” I screamed.
I shouldn’t have bothered.
Dr. Feelgood held his syringe at the ready.
When I struggled, Blaine was all too happy to pin me down.
With one more plunge of his syringe, the doctor ensured I could only scream on the inside.
15
Liam
“Aw, come on, man!” I smacked my palms so hard against the industrial-strength conference table in the airport jail’s legal counsel room that it skidded an inch, scraping the beige vinyl floor. “This is complete bullshit, and you know it. How the hell can some guy Ella’s terrified of trespass in my home—having a goddamned police escort bypass my own security team—drug her, take her, and then have me locked up in here?”
“For the record,” Garrett said, “it was the fact that you struck a TSA agent that now has you facing your second round of Battery Against Peace Officer charges in a week. Considering you were barely out of your cell from when you struck the detective, some overzealous, fresh-out-of-school junior prosecutor could have you doing major felony time in a state pen.”
“But you won’t let that happen, right?”
Garrett snorted. “Dude…I’m good, but you’re not exactly helping your case. Sorry, but they won’t even grant you a bail hearing till Monday. As soon as we’re done chatting, a bailiff standing right outside that door will haul you to the city jail.”
“That’s not gonna work. That monster’s got Ella, and I have to get her back—now. They took my cell, so call Mason and have him ready the jet. We’ll leave for Tennessee as soon as you get me sprung. Fire my present security team and hire a fucking army of mercenaries—ex-SEALs, Army Rangers. The best money can buy.”
“Liam,” he said, leaning in, bracing his palms against the table, “hear me, and hear me well. I don’t know what kind of hold this woman has over you, but let her go. From everything I’ve read, she’s one sick puppy. I tried telling you while you were in Arkansas, but you conveniently never answered your cell. I pulled a few favors and found out Ella was institutionalized for claiming her husband carved up her tits, then—”
“He did! I’ve seen her scar
s. He’s sick, and should spend the rest of his life behind bars—if I don’t kill him first.”
“No.” Garrett glanced over his shoulder. Checking no one else was listening? “Wherever you’re going with this—stop. All signs point to your girl being the one with the problem. Even her own parents believe she did the damage herself. Think about that. This Blaine character was able to take her from your house with the local law’s full support because you were harboring a missing person. With her sketchy psychological past, as her husband, he has the legal right to have a doctor sedate her if there’s a fear of her harming herself or others. If she freaked to the degree you told me, then that’s exactly how she wound up getting hauled off in a straightjacket.”
“There wasn’t a straightjacket. Her husband just shoved her in the back of a limo while the cops who should’ve been helping me fucking restrained me.”
“Slow down, and take this from the beginning.”
I closed my eyes and forced a deep breath. In my mind, there it was, playing out all over again. “It was like a movie scene. Some guy appears at the door, and then bam—your life’s never the same. Ella and I were at the beach house, settling in for the weekend, when the doorbell rang. We teased back and forth about getting it, but she beat me to it by a minute. By the time I got there, she was screaming—I don’t just mean a shriek, like she’d seen a snake or spider, but a guttural scream that made me sick. I charged for her, but Blaine—”
“Wait—how did he even find you?”
“Goddamned paparazzi led him right to us. Remember the pics they took at Willow’s funeral? That was all the bastard needed to make the connection. He charged in here, acting the part of having just been reunited with his long-lost love. In his role as her dutiful husband, he even brought a psychiatrist and cops along for the ride. He must have known Ella would freak, as the doctor nailed her hard with sedatives under the excuse that she’s dangerous. I call bullshit. Blaine knew exactly what he was doing. I tried so damned hard to keep him from taking her, but the cops held me off until they drove away.” I forced a deep breath. “Of course, I followed them here with my security—even though they’re a bunch of incompetents. I held back to watch where Blaine was taking her. I bought a ticket on their flight, then met up with them at the gate. The bastard traveled with his own rental cops. I had my guys, too, but Blaine must have alerted TSA to keep an eye out for me. They tried stopping me at security, but I just took off running and left my team to fend for themselves. I had to find her, you know? Only by the time I got to her, she was drugged to the point that she could hardly hold up her head. I tried fighting off the airport cops, but it was over before it even started. They put my hands behind my back in zip-ties and hauled me off. That’s it.”
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