by J. Saman
Jake grins, taking me in. Stepping forward, he pulls his sodden shirt over his head before removing his jeans. He approaches me, slowly, methodically. When he’s standing before me, he whispers, “Take off your bra and panties.” I suck in a shaky breath but do as he requests. “Your hair is beautiful. I don’t care which color it is. I noticed you when you were blonde and fell in love with you when it was brown. If it were reversed, it wouldn’t have changed the outcome.” And then he reaches for my hand, leading me into the shower that could easily fit two more people comfortably. But right now, it’s just us. And it’s perfect.
Simultaneous groans fill the air as the warm water hits our frozen skin, but before I can say or do anything else, he yanks my body into his arms and kisses me. Jake’s mouth hungrily consumes mine, his hands exploring every dip and curve of my body. “I love you,” he whispers against my lips.
“I love you,” I whimper against him, my hands becoming as frantic as my voice.
“Tell me you’re mine, Fi. Tell me you’re not leaving me again.”
“Never,” I moan as he finds my clit with the pad of his thumb, his fingers pumping in and out of me. “Oh God, yes, Jake.”
“Does that feel good?” I can only nod. “So fucking beautiful,” he says reverently. “Your skin is turning the most perfect shade of rose.” He continues to tease me, torture me until he’s on his knees in front of me, looking up. “The most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen,” he whispers, almost to himself. That’s how light his voice is.
Jake leans in and takes my peaked nipple into his mouth, squeezing my other breast with his large hand. I cry out, back bowing as my hands fly down to tug on his hair, forcing his head to stay exactly where I need it to.
He chuckles against me, eliciting a wave of chills to erupt across my overheated skin. My legs are already quivering. “You’re so close, aren’t you?”
I nod, my eyes at half-mast.
“I know you. I know you inside and out.”
My body hums into him as his mouth glides down the taut expanse of my stomach until he reaches my pussy.
“I’m going to fuck you with my mouth, and after this pretty pussy comes on my tongue, I’m going to spend the rest of the night buried inside you.”
“Now,” I moan. “I need you inside me now.”
“Not yet.” Jake kisses my mound and then moves lower, raising my left leg up and tucking my knee over his shoulder for better access. He runs his nose up and down. Licks me once before pulling back and driving me insane with his teasing buildup. “I can’t get enough of the way you taste. Of the way your body writhes and clamps down around my fingers and tongue.” He inserts two fingers inside me and I can hardly breathe. “So hot and wet. Just for me. Only for me.”
I moan so loud, my voice cracks with the effort, my head falls back, pressed against the marble of the shower.
“God, everything about you makes me hard.”
“Please, Jake,” I beg, unable to stand it another minute. I’m too wound up, Too tightly coiled.
“So fucking mine,” he breathes into me, blowing on my clit one last time before he sucks it into his mouth, his fingers pumping in and out at a faster pace. I shatter, screaming his name over and over again until I’m sagging against the wall of the shower, boneless and spent, but not nearly done. Jake stands up, holding me against him. “Here or bed?” he asks softly, running his fingers down my hair.
“Both.”
He nods in agreement, lifting me up into his arms and entering me in one smooth motion. He groans, closing his eyes for the briefest of moments, savoring the way this connection feels, because it’s too intense not to.
I watch him, then close mine.
“Open your eyes,” he commands before I can fully sink into this all-encompassing sensation. “This is not the moment to keep them closed. Watch me as I watch you. Love me as I love you.”
Jake begins to move, our bodies connecting over and over again in a perfect rhythm. He’s giving me everything. Fucking me with abandon. It’s mind-blowing. It’s intoxicating. It’s everything I never knew I was missing. And when we come, my eyes are still on his. I know we don’t have it all figured out. I know we still have obstacles ahead. I know it won’t always be this perfect. It’s life. And life is ugly and brutal when it’s not beautiful and serene. It can be hard as hell and money doesn’t change that. Money doesn’t make that bite sting any less. At least not when it really comes down to it.
My life has been broken, shattered repeatedly.
But I’m ready to put it all back together. To fix all my broken ugly parts. And Jake will be with me, holding my hand the entire way.
Epilogue
Three years later
* * *
Fiona is a mess today. An absolute wreck of a woman. For any other person, turning twenty-five would feel different. It would almost feel pretty cool, knowing you’re now officially in your mid-twenties. Old enough to know better. Young enough to still do what you want.
But not for her.
She’s been on the phone all day with lawyers, dealing with her inheritance. An inheritance she doesn’t want much to do with. She sold off the majority of the shares of Foss first thing, giving up ownership. Then there’s the Foss money. And the Ramsey money. I don’t know the exact amount, but I know it’s big.
Big enough that she’s been pacing around her office in our new house for the last two hours, rubbing that spot on her back that bothers her so much, and worrying her lip with her teeth. We bought this house about two months ago. A casino is not a place to raise a family. It’s not the place where a child should grow up. And considering my Sunshine is thirty-eight weeks pregnant, almost to the day, we moved out of my rooftop apartment. It wasn’t right for us anyway. Never exactly felt like home.
But this place does. Especially the back of the house that has an entire outdoor living area. It flows effortlessly from the inside and has a fireplace, outdoor kitchen, outdoor living room with a crazy television set up Maddox likes possibly more than I do, and a pool. A big fucking pool with a waterfall and Jacuzzi and a shaded area, because Fiona says all that sun is not good for children’s skin.
Whatever. I still have way too much to learn about this baby stuff.
The best part of this house is the view. We can watch the sunset over the mountains every night, and if I don’t go to get her now, we’ll miss it. The sun sets early this time of year, and even though it’s not exactly warm out, I’m hoping she’ll go for a swim with me. Maybe even let me make love to her under the waterfall.
I make my way through the house, past the remaining boxes we have yet to get to, until I’m hovering on the threshold of her office. She’s still pacing back and forth between the window and her desk, but instead of that spot on her back, now she’s rubbing her belly.
She’s so pretty it hurts.
I notice she moved her texts books into one corner, some open, some closed. I wish she had called me to do that for her. I don’t like her lifting. Almost immediately after coming back to Vegas, Fiona started taking classes at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas. Evidently, she wasn’t kidding around when she said she wanted to be a social worker who helps abused women and children. It’s become her passion. Her focus. She has another year or so on her bachelor’s degree and then, knowing my crazy, tenacious girl, she’ll start in on her masters.
I have a feeling this inheritance of hers is going to go to setting up some sort of facility.
As for us, I married her six months after she came back. Honestly, I couldn’t get her there fast enough. I was done chasing and she was done running. We didn’t do it Vegas, it felt like too much of a cliché. Instead, I took her back to Baltimore where my mom still lives, and we had a quiet ceremony there. Just close friends and immediately family. It’s only gotten better from there.
“Sunshine,” I bark just loud enough to get her attention. She spins around on her heels, now rubbing that sore spot on her back again. I tap my watch a
nd she nods.
“I have to go, Charlie. Just please do what I ask and stop giving me guff about it. You’re my lawyer and this is what I want to do.” Fiona ends the call and sets her cellphone down. “I’m opening up a shelter.”
I nod. I knew it, I mentally fist pump into the air.
“It’s going to have a lot of crap in it I can’t even begin to think about.”
“Come on, baby. Let’s go have a swim and a fuck.”
She lets out a snort. “Always so romantic.”
“That’s me, remember?”
She rolls her eyes, crossing the room until she’s in my arms, her large, round, beautiful belly with our child growing in it pressing against me. “Yeah, I remember. I shouldn’t let the tattoos and motorcycles fool me.”
I kiss her sweet soft lips and whisper, “You got it. Happy birthday, Sunshine Turner.”
She laughs into me. “That’s what I’m calling the place. Sunshine.”
“Yeah, I don’t know. We might need to work on that one.”
She shrugs a shoulder and takes my hand, letting me lead her away from her stress. We get to the edge of the pool and I start to strip her down. I’m hard. I’ve been hard all day just thinking about this. Actually, I’m hard any time I think about her.
“Mine,” I whisper into her as her maternity dress billows onto the hardscape. She shivers, because as I said, it’s not warm out. Or maybe it’s me that makes her shiver. Regardless of the reason, the pool is heated just enough for the water to feel amazing.
“Yours,” she whispers back to me. “Now get naked.”
“Whatever my wife wants, my wife gets.”
I give her an impish grin, but before my pants hit the ground and definitely before we enter the water and I enter her, she lets out a loud, “Ohhhh.” She looks down. I look down. There is a very large pool of liquid at her feet. She looks up. I look up. Our eyes lock. “Shit,” she says, and I laugh. Fiona Foss-Turner does not swear. Hardly ever. But she’s learning to do so more. I’m helping her with that. Swearing keeps people sane.
“Well, I guess we’ll have to put this fun moment of water kink on hold then.”
She nods and gnaws on her lip nervously.
“Are you hurting?”
She shakes her head.
“Have you suddenly lost your ability to speak?”
She nods this time, and I wrap my arms around my nervous girl. “We’re going to be fine, Fi. Let’s put back on your clothes, I’ll get your suitcase, grab you a towel or something to stick between your legs so you don’t get…fluids in my car and then we’ll go to the hospital.”
“Okay,” she whispers. “I’m scared. And excited. And I might just be freaking out, because now it is starting to hurt a little.”
I cup her face in my hands and I look directly into her eyes. “We’ve got this together.”
Eighteen hours later, the doctor places a tiny, slimy, baby boy with a cream hat on his bald head, wrapped in a white blanket with pink and white and blue stripes on it, onto Fiona’s chest. Fiona is exhausted but smiling and crying a lot of happy tears.
“What should we name him?” she asks softly, reverently. Names. Oddly enough, we never really discussed those. We don’t do a lot of future talk. It’s been more about living in the present for us.
It’s taken a while for Fiona to adjust to life. To live it without fear. Not an easy task when that’s all you’ve ever know. But my brave girl puts on her brave face and tackles the world on a daily basis. It’s one of the many things I love about her. So yeah, names. Shit. I probably should have put some genuine thought into that.
Not that it matters. He’s perfect. His mouth is already latched onto Fiona’s nipple, because my little champ is mad smart and knows where the good stuff is and how to get it. Fi’s head is cast down, watching him in wonderment as he feeds from her body. I’m watching both of them, because this is the moment, I realize. The moment where everything comes together and it’s all just so…perfect.
I am my beloved and my beloved is mine. Those are the words we spoke at our wedding. It’s a Hebrew saying originally, and I can’t think of a better way to express this swell inside of me.
I kiss Fiona’s forehead and I kiss my nameless son’s forehead. He smells sweet. Like baby powder and sugar and something that feels so strongly of home my chest constricts, and I have to swallow down the sudden urge to cry.
He’s a little red and puffy, especially around the eyes, but I assume that won’t last. His eyes are a blue-gray color and that won’t last, either. I’m hoping he gets Sunshine’s green. He’ll be tall, I think. And strong like his daddy. Yeah, this kid is going to kick some serious ass. Probably score some, too. I snicker at that. Who knew having a kid would be this fucking amazing?
“Toby,” Sunshine says, and I immediately shake my head.
“Guys named Toby don’t ride motorcycles. Guys named Toby get the shit kicked out of them by guys who ride motorcycles.”
I hear one of the nurses chuckle off to the side and it reminds me that we’re not alone in our little bubble of tiny Baby Turner.
“What if I don’t want him to ride motorcycles? They’re dangerous.”
I roll my eyes at that, knowing she can’t see me, but she tilts her head up at the last second and catches me.
“No motorcycles,” she says in a stern, motherly intonation that is beyond sexy.
“We’ll talk about that when he’s older, but Toby is on the veto list.”
“All right, big daddy, you come up with one.”
I lean down and whisper into her ear, “I’m going to make you call me that at some point.” She giggles and pushes me away. “Zac? That’s tough, right?”
“Zachery?”
“Too formal. Zac Turner. Short. Strong. Badass. What do you think?”
“I like it. What about a middle name?”
I think on this for a moment. “Henderson.” I finally come up with. Her brows furrow in confusion. “I picked you up on the side of the road outside Henderson. It was the moment that changed my life. Where everything started falling into place. It was the moment that gave me you, and now him.”
“Henderson,” she repeats, this time with something close to awe in her voice. “Welcome to the world Zac Henderson Turner. Who knew running away and getting stranded on the road to Vegas would get us here?”
*** The End
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End Of Book Note
Alright people. It’s that time again. That time where I’m super depressed that the book is done and I write a ton of (non-edited) babble. Except, this time, I have a lot to say. Like a lot. So if you’re totally done with me, you can move on to the chapter excerpt part.
THANK YOU! As always, you readers are what rock my world and I love and appreciate you endlessly!!
If you know me, then you know, I don’t usually do suspense. Is this book suspense? No idea, but we’ll go with it. I write weird twists. I write characters who are REAL. I write flaws and reality and ugly that turns into beautiful. But this book is so different. I feel like I keep saying that with every new release, but it’s only because I get bored like an ADHD rabbit. I know I should have gone with boy meets girl, boy loves girl, boy loses girl after he fucks up and then boy gets her back. But I didn’t want that for Fiona. I wanted her to always be sure in the love Jake was giving her. So I left trope lines behind. Don’t hate me. I’ll come back to you, I promise. I love my tropes too.
Before I get started, I’m going to apologize for lack of female friends. I missed them and I kept thinking…hmmm… where can I add one. Oh right, I can’t. Because Mia/Fiona would not have opened up to one. It just didn’t work and I’m sorry for that, because I feel lik
e she could have used a girl to get real with. I have plenty of that coming in the next books.
Now that I got that over with…this book. Let’s start at the beginning. It’s a compilation of 3 (yes, I fucking said 3) books! Fully written books at that. Sigh. It started before I wrote Forward (my first book which I released in 2016!). In fact, one of the dudes in the first story was named Levi. Anyhoo, I wrote that original story in two different forms. And I could never get it to come together. One was a love triangle (it wasn’t great). One was where the MH was an FBI agent and it just came down to him lying to our lady a lot and I hated that. So I ditched it no matter how many times I tried to fix it. Did I mention we’re talking like 80k words each time? Yeah, that sucked.
Third time, I started writing a story where this girl ran away from her abusive finance and found herself in the damn Rocky Mountains with the best man in the world. Like I seriously fell in love with him. This is where Maddox spawned from and in case you missed it, I love him too. But this story… it didn’t work either. Actually, I’m taking a lot of that book and putting it into the 3rd in the next series I’m working on.
Moving on. I went on a girls’ weekend to Vegas. The idea grew and then after a conference in the same city a few months later, I spent the entire flight home writing the first two chapters. And once I got rolling, I never looked back.
Ryan, Claire and Luke. Ha, did you think I forgot about them? Never. I miss them like they’re my long lost family and I’ve been seriously considering writing a story about their kids who I wrote into the epilogue of Start With Me. There is so much potential there. We’ll see. But I missed them so hey, they’re there. And they just…fit into this. If you haven’t read me before, those characters are part of my Start Again series.