by Rose, Aubrey
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO
Brynn
“Life itself is the most wonderful fairytale of all.”
Hans Christian Andersen
The thunderstorm took both of us by surprise. I was sitting inside with a book. Eliot had been outside gathering more wood for the fire when the sky boomed through the branches overhead and rain began to drip down.
“It never rains in Southern California,” Eliot muttered as he came up the steps. “That’s what they all told me.”
“You look good with wet hair,” I said, ruffling his dark hair. Drops of water flew from the ends.
“I wanted to have dinner by the ocean,” Eliot said.
“We’ll have dinner inside,” I said. “No problem.” But Eliot looked out toward the dark clouds with worry.
He started a fire in the small cast-iron stove in the cabin and forgot to open the flue. Smoke poured out of the front of the stove and Eliot burned a finger when he pulled the flue open.
“Ow!” he cried.
“Put it in cold water,” I said.
“There’s no cold water,” Eliot said. “The bottles are all in the car.”
“Then just go outside and stick it in the rain, silly!”
Eliot strode outside onto the porch and I followed. He leaned against the porch rail as far as he could, reaching his finger into the rain.
“The wind is blowing it the other way,” Eliot said, leaning farther over. “It’s not—ahh!”
A gust of wind in the opposite direction had decided to prove him wrong. He stepped back, but not in time to keep the sweeping rain from dousing him head to toe. I couldn’t help but giggle at his hair flopping wetly over his forehead.
“You look kind of like a wet rat,” I said.
“Ahh!” He shook his head like a dog, spraying me with flying droplets.
“Stop!” I cried, laughing. “Eliot, you’re getting me wet!”
“That will teach you to laugh at me!” Eliot said. He grabbed me around the waist and lifted me up off of the ground.
“Eliot, you’re SOAKED!” I kicked out with my feet helplessly, and he carried me down the steps and right into the middle of the rainstorm. I had forgotten how strong he was, but he picked me up with ease. The air was filled with rain as soon as we left the shelter of the roof. I squealed as the cold water hit me, clenching my eyes shut.
The dress I had just put on for our dinner clung to my knees, the wet fabric tight against my skin.
“There,” he said. “Now we’re both soaked.”
And then he kissed me.
Before Eliot, I had not known true warmth. The searing heat that spread through my body with the simple press of his lips on mine was incomparable to any sunlit day in California. Even with rain streaking down my back, my longing for him burned so that I thought steam would come off of my skin. He kissed me and kissed me, and water ran through my hair and down my skin, washing me clean.
“Brynn!”
“What?!” I tugged away from his grip, but he held me tight.
“I love you!” Eliot was grinning like a crazy person, and his smile was infectious; I couldn’t help but laugh. His white shirt was soaked all the way through now, and I could see the muscles of his broad chest through the wet fabric.
“I love you too!” I cried out. He took my hands and pulled me closer. I wriggled happily in his embrace. He placed his hand on my cheeks and looked me from eye to eye, his face inches from mine.
“Brynn, you are the most wonderful person I have ever met. Do you know that?”
If I blushed, I hoped the rain would hide it. The bright love in his eyes warmed me as he continued.
“You inspire me, Brynn. You keep me sane and you drive me wild. I did not want to be part of the world anymore...not until I met you.”
“Eliot—” I wanted to stop his words. Compliments always made me a bit itchy. But Eliot would not stop.
“Let me finish,” he said, kissing my nose and smiling at me. Water trickled down my face and he brushed a droplet from my cheek. “Don’t worry, I know not to lecture you for too long.”
“I was scared when I met you, Brynn,” Eliot said. I looked up to see if he was joking, but his face was completely serious.
“Scared?” I whispered.
“I was frightened by how much I wanted you. After years of keeping to myself, you showed up and… and I couldn’t keep to myself anymore. I had hidden my loneliness for so long that I had forgotten what it was like to feel longing. I wanted you so badly, Brynn.”
Now I was blushing for sure, but Eliot continued as though he didn’t notice.
“I know that things won’t always be perfect, but I am going to try my damndest. I’m going to try because you deserve nothing but happiness.”
Tears rose to my eyes. My life had been one sorrow after another for so long. And now, thinking of my grandmother, I knew that she would want me to try to be happy too. Thinking back over the past year, there were so many bright spots of happiness, and all of them happened with Eliot.
“I love you more than anything,” Eliot said. “Of all of the infinities I know, there is not one that comes close to describing how much I love you.”
He knelt in front of me then, one knee to the muddy ground, and I forgot how to breathe.
“Marry me, Brynn,” he said. “Make me the happiest man in the whole world.”
My hand lifted up as if of its own volition, and when he kissed it the earth itself seemed to shiver, wind tossing the branches wildly overhead. Rain streaked down and mixed with my tears as Eliot slid the ring onto my finger. The center diamond sparkled brightly against my skin, but I couldn’t even see the rest of the ring, I was crying so hard.
“Yes,” I whispered through my tears. “Oh, Eliot, yes, yes, with all my heart yes!”
I threw my arms around him as he was standing and almost knocked him over. Eliot laughed and spun me around, the rain pouring down all around us. He kissed me deeply and then pulled back, his thumb brushing my lip, his dazzling blue eyes locked on mine.
“I am so lucky to have found you,” he said.
“Luck?” I said, arching my eyebrow. “As I remember, I found you, and luck had nothing to do with it.”
“Didn’t you tell me once that you only bought me a coffee because you found the money on the ground?”
“Oh. Well, yeah, I suppose,” I said. “But secretly it was all just part of my master plan to marry a brilliant Hungarian prince.”
“Not a prince,” Eliot said, shaking his head.
“You’re a prince to me.”
“Then you’re my princess,” he said, leaning forward to kiss me again. “And really this was all part of my master plan to marry an American citizen so I could stay in California.”
“Oh! So I’m only good to you as an immigration ticket. Is that it?”
“Would you do that for me?” Eliot said, a twinkle in his eye. “It would be a wonderful marriage of convenience.”
“Convenient for you! Well, I’ve already said yes,” I said, pretending to pout, “but now I’m having second thoughts.”
“I could also kidnap you and take you back to my castle with me,” Eliot said. “We can go anywhere now that you’re my queen.”
“Princess,” I corrected. “Queen sounds too old.”
“Princess, yes, of course. A mathematical princess.”
“The best kind,” I said.
Eliot looked up at the sky, his hand shielding his eyes from the spray of rain. The dampness made the scent of pine even stronger here in the middle of the forest, and I inhaled deeply, leaning against Eliot’s chest.
“I wanted everything to be perfect so I could propose on the beach, but I guess the weather had different plans.”
“This is perfect,” I said, looking up to caress his face with my hands. It had taken me some time before I was able to look at Eliot without shame, to indulge in the sight of his face. He, too, had been reserved at first, and did not want me to look at his
scars.
“You’re right,” Eliot said, his eyes gazing at my figure appreciatively. “It will be fun to get all of these wet clothes off of you!”
“You planned this,” I teased, backing up toward the cabin. “Even the rain.”
“I’m just lucky,” Eliot said. “So very, very lucky.”
“We both are,” I said. I didn’t know whether I believed in luck or fate, or maybe both. What I did know was that I had been given too many second chances with Eliot, and I wasn’t ever going to lose him again.
I'm ready now to close the book on my mother's death. Not because I have all the answers, but because I know that even if they put away my mother’s killer in prison for life, the worst monsters will always be inside of me. I am strong, though, and now I do not have to face them alone.
Love isn’t a ring on a finger, or a vow that you make once. It’s a promise that you live, over and over again, every day until there are no more days. I was scared to love Eliot, just as much as he was scared to love me. The deepest loves can be hidden in the darkest pools, and it is hard, sometime, to reach out a hand when we don't know what's waiting for us.
Fairytales always end, but in real life you have to keep on living, and sometimes there is no moral to the story. I made my Nagyi a promise to hold her story in my heart like a jewel and keep it safe, just as I had kept my mother's story safe. Now they are both inside of me, and only I am left, and maybe someday Eliot and I will have a daughter who can keep my story and theirs, too.
So I sit, pen in my hand, and write for her. There is so much that I have to tell, and I know I will forget much of what happened. But for now, all I can do is tell my story and Eliot’s, and hope that someday there will be someone who will turn the cover to read the first sentence of the fairy tale I did not think would happen to me:
Once upon a time...
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***
Find out how Brynn’s story started in
Me, Cinderella?
One kind deed can change your life forever...
Brynn Tomlin could never afford to follow her heart. But when she sees a stranger shivering in the snow outside of the college library, an inexplicable urge leads her to buy him a hot cup of coffee. It's just a small act of kindness, a few words of conversation. Brynn should be focusing on her finals, after all, not on the man who looked up at her gratefully with piercing blue eyes.
He could have been anyone - a janitor on break, a graduate student, a bum. But the man standing outside in the cold turns out to be Dr. Eliot Herceg, one of the most brilliant minds in mathematics and heir to a fortune. After years of reclusive isolation, he now finds his heart awakening to the kind girl whose name he does not know.
Brynn has spent her life trying to forget her desires, and Eliot's deep wounds have taken nearly a decade to heal. After so much hurt, will either of them be able to open their hearts again?
Excerpt:
Before my mother died, she told me stories. I sat on her lap and listened to her spin golden fairy tales through the air. We never had much, but I didn't notice the cracks in our plaster walls when she talked about Cinderella putting on her crystal slippers and waltzing all night with Prince Charming.
"Once upon a time"...the stories always begin the same way, but from these beginnings my mother wove new tales that danced in all directions of the compass. She told me stories of castles and dragons, stories of men who flew above the clouds to reach the sun and gods who rained jealous fury upon their rivals. Stories of lovers whose passion rose above earthly desire and changed their fate to a different end than the world had meant for them. Stories of hope and of death.
None of those stories were true, but mine is.
***
Available now!
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Big Girl Backstage Pass - Book One in the Big Girl series
She's just a college girl who can't help but dream.
Shannon Locklear just won backstage passes to the hottest concert in LA, Wilder Side. She's thrilled to be able to meet the band backstage, and when the guitarist takes her aside, the sparks that fly between them could light a bonfire...
He's a lead guitarist who can't shake his inner demons.
Julian Bremmer is a musician struggling with alcohol and his band's newfound success. Girls throw themselves at him because he's a rock star, but all of the attention doesn't stop him from feeling empty inside. When he meets Shannon, he can't help but wonder if she's just the next girl who wants him for his fame...
Fate has thrown them together, but will the world pull them apart?
***
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The characters and events portrayed in this book are a work of fiction or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
MATURE CONTENT
This story contains sexually explicit material, and is intended only for persons over the age of 18. By downloading and opening this document, you are stating that you are of legal age to access and view this work of fiction. All of the characters involved in the sexual situations in this story are intended to be 18 years of age or older, whether they are explicitly described as such or not.