“Tell me what you need, baby,” I said, repeating his words from last time. His eyes, heavy-lidded with need, winked at me.
“You,” he said. “All I need is you.”
Everything wrapped around my heart and squeezed. It was the perfect time to say the words. To tell him everything that was beating down the walls of my heart.
“How do you want me?” I asked instead. Because—me.
In one move, he had his shirt off and on the ground, and his jeans followed when he stood. Sweet Jesus.
“Lie down,” he said. I didn’t move, standing across from him. “What?” he asked.
“You are—breathtaking,” I said, drinking him in.
He crossed the inches and touched my face with one hand, kissing me slowly, maddeningly, letting our bodies melt together without groping. We fit. We fit so well. By the time we broke the kiss, we were both shaking.
“Please lie down,” he said against my ear. “I need you so fucking bad.”
I dropped slowly, kissing my way down until his cursing sounded painful, and then I lay on his clothes and he came with me, kissing my nipples one by one. He raised my leg as he kissed his way up my neck.
“This the position you want?” I whispered, my whole body on thrumming mode.
“I want all of them, Lanie,” he said against my lips. “But right now I just need deep.”
Fuck balls, he was going to kill me yet. All the blood left my brain on his words, and anything that was left departed when his fingers found me. When the head of his dick played at the opening. And when he sank so deeply inside me that I couldn’t tell where one of us began and the other ended.
“Nick!” I exclaimed on an inhale, arching off the ground as if I could get closer, be a part of him somehow.
The primal growl that shook his whole body emanated through me. His fingertips dug into my thigh and he raised my leg higher, over his shoulder, giving my thigh a playful nip with his teeth.
Nick sank into me again, closing his eyes as he started a rhythm.
“Jesus, you feel so good, Lanie,” he breathed, barely forming the words. “So fucking tight.”
I wrapped my free leg around him and used my hands on the ground as leverage, moving with him. He hit everything, filling me so completely there was no way to say anything back. I had no words that would do it justice. He was everything I’d never experienced. Including the burning look in his eyes as he watched me. Watched me as he made love to me, because that’s what it was. I knew that’s what it was because I’d never done it.
“Are you okay?” he asked as we moved faster, exertion popping the muscles in his neck. “Are you comfortable?”
I could have done this on a bed of nails and been just fine. I was riding a wave. A beautiful, building, crescendo of a wave. When he put my other leg over his shoulder and increased the pounding, the wave took steroids and began to lose its mind.
I arched off the ground, fisting handfuls of grass in my hands. “Oh God, Nick, keep doing that, I’m—”
I couldn’t breathe; I couldn’t talk. I could only feel my mouth wide open, and if I was dead, then hallelujah.
“Fuck, Lanie,” he forced through his teeth. “I can’t stop, I’m gonna fucking blow.”
Freaky sounds came from my throat at the same time the most majestic roar came from him. Loud and feral and branding. He was marking his woman. And I liked it. As the second mind-blowing orgasm of my day shattered me into a million pieces, I liked being marked as his. That had never been me. What did that say about me now?
That I’d just been truly and thoroughly fucked for one thing.
And that I was head over heels in love.
Holy hell.
We came down in a tangle of limbs, heaving oxygen into our lungs and holding each other for dear life. It didn’t get more basic than that. Two naked creatures mating in the woods. There was something weirdly comforting about that.
When we could breathe, I felt it, and I knew he did too. That moment. The awkward thing after first time sex when the adrenaline calms down and you don’t know what direction to go.
Nick lifted his head from my shoulder and looked into my eyes, and warmth spread throughout my insides. It was still there. Sex hadn’t changed it. He was going to say something profound, and this time I was going to say it back. Because I could now.
“Marry me again,” he said. “For real.”
“There’s gonna come a time when beauty fades and senses go. Your body goes to shit and all you’ve got is what comes out of your mouth. Make it amazing.”
Chapter Eighteen
My hands went to his face and my eyes burned. That went past profound right into taking breath away.
“What?” I said. “We don’t have to Nick, we’re there.” I wiggled my left hand. “We have rings, we have a license—”
“We have signatures on a paper, and your ring is glass,” he said, smoothing my hair back. “I meant what I said. I love you, Lanie. I want to look in your eyes and say those words for real.”
Two tears trickled back into my hair. I felt like the Grinch when his heart grew ten sizes that day. I was overcome with so much everything.
“I l—”
“Lanie, you back here?” came a male voice in the distance.
Nick and I both stiffened in a fight or flight moment of oh shit. He instantly spread out his body to cover mine.
“Who is that?” he whispered.
“I don’t know,” I whispered back.
“We used to wander around back here when we were kids,” said a then familiar voice. “Both their cars are here so I’m thinking—”
“Alan?” I hissed. “What the living hell?”
“Scramble over there and pull your dress on,” Nick said, rolling off me. He grabbed his jeans as I crawled to the relative shelter of the fireplace, rolling onto his back to yank them on.
I, of course had an inside-out, fitted sundress with no damn zipper that was difficult to get on standing up, in air conditioning, with all the time in the world. I pulled it right-side out—I hoped—and struggled wrangling it over my head, while Nick pulled down on it. No bra. No panties. He tugged his own shirt on, it twisting around his shoulder.
“Your underwear,” Nick whispered hurriedly.
I kicked them under a pile of leaves and sat on the bench, still hidden from view.
“Lanie!” Alan called again.
“What?” I asked, standing again and stepping out from behind the fireplace, putting on a very perplexed look.
I had no idea what my hair looked like, whether I was covered in dirt or not, or if I had anything on my face. I didn’t care. I wanted him to leave so I could get back to my conversation. It only took me a lifetime to get there. I felt a tug on my backside as Nick pulled down a section of my dress that didn’t make the trip.
Alan and Bryce were halfway down the path with their backs turned as if they were about to give up and head back. Damn, we should have waited them out. Both their heads swiveled back my direction.
“You are here,” Alan said. “What are you doing back there?” Nick rose up behind me, and Alan physically stepped back, dislike morphing his features.
“Whatever I want to do on my own property,” I said. “What are you doing here?”
“Nick,” Alan said, ignoring my question and saying his name like it tasted rotten. “How appropriate to find you here.”
Nick looked around. “Well, I live here right now, so I guess it is.”
“Right now is the key part of that sentence,” Alan said.
Nick nodded, eyes wide. “Yes, right now,” he emphasized slowly. “We live in California. We’re being forced to do this,” he said, circling with his hands. “By Lanie’s aunt.”
“You’re not being forced to do anything,” Bryce said, his oily voice making my skin crawl. “But you’re sure as hell going all out.”
“And what are you babbling about?” I aske
d, hands on my hips.
Bryce held out a bent and dog eared piece of paper. It had some sort of stain in one corner.
“Your fake marriage,” he said.
“I can assure it’s very much real,” Nick said, speaking up. “So if that’s all you came to harass us about—”
“It may be technically real,” Alan said. “But not for the five years you claimed.”
Nick looked at me, a mock frown dipping his eyebrows. “Did we claim five years?”
“You live in Sage,” Bryce said. “Lanie’s in Louisiana. Where the hell is all this California crap coming from?”
Okay, we were running out of bluffs.
“What are you so busy and concerned with, that you have time to worry about me?” I asked. Either of them, really.
“I’m concerned that you got hitched for the sole purpose of defrauding a will.”
“We did not,” I said.
“Last month,” Bryce said.
“Okay, so what if we just got married,” I said. “What difference does it make?”
“It’s a lie,” Alan said. “You lied under oath.”
I lifted an eyebrow, pretending to think. “Nope. There was no oath.”
“For all intents and purposes, you got married under false pretenses,” Bryce said. “Under duress from Ruby’s will instructions. Making your stay of three months here invalid.”
I walked up to bald and bulbous Bryce.
“No, my aunt said that my husband and I needed to stay here,” I said. “So I obtained a husband and we’re staying here.”
“Jesus, it sounds like you bought him at Walmart,” Alan sneered.
“No, I picked him up in a parking lot for a steal,” I said, listening to Nick chuckle behind me.
“You got married for the purpose of keeping this house,” Alan said. “Plain and simple. It’s no different from when people get married for green cards. It’s fraudulent.”
“What are y’all doing back here?” All heads turned to where Carmen was picking her way down the rock path on heels that had no business there. “Shit, I’m switching to flats. I don’t care who says they’re unprofessional.”
“Oh good,” I said, pointing dramatically. “A lawyer! Aunt Ruby always said where’s a lawyer when you need one?”
Carmen snickered. “Yeah, right.”
“This is a private conversation about family,” Alan said, as Bryce’s head started to glow.
Carmen stopped picking and looked at him. “And you’re family?”
“Well, we are all God’s children,” I said. “So come on, Carmen, let’s hold hands.”
Alan huffed out a breath. “So were you in on it too?” he directed at her. “You could be disbarred.”
My heart stuttered a bit on that. He was actually right, and bluffing I hoped. Because I would die right there if Carmen lost her license because of me.
“I’m not sure what you’re talking about, but it doesn’t matter,” Carmen said, then turning to me. “Do you want to retain my services?”
I blinked. “Sure.”
“What do you have on you?”
I reached in the little pocket of the dress and my fingers closed on a dime. I held it up like it was hidden treasure. “Perfect,” she said, plucking it from my fingers. “I’m Lanie’s attorney and with that goes confidentiality.”
Oh, I loved her.
“You’re full of shit,” Alan said. “And she’s a fraud.”
“And she’s about to lose everything,” Bryce blustered.
“No, actually, she’s not,” Carmen said, pulling an envelope from her bag. She wiggled it at me. “Got some interesting mail today.”
“From?”
“Aunt Ruby.”
* * *
We all went back to the house, to the front porch. I for one, needed to sit, as my rope-climbing-then-suddenly-used-for-crazy-sex muscles were starting to whine. I couldn’t care less if Dumb and Dumbassery stayed, but they seemed hell bent. Bryce kept eyeing everything like he was appraising property, and I really wanted one of my missing shoes to drop on his head out of nowhere. Come on, Aunt Ruby, show me some skills.
“Evidently your aunt wrote another letter, to be mailed to me after month one of the arrangement,” Carmen said. “It came today.” She handed it to me and then held up her hands. “This, I honestly knew nothing about,” she said. “This was entirely on her.”
I paused, the envelope suddenly heavy in my hand. I wasn’t sure if it was good or bad. I wasn’t sure about anything. I looked at Nick, who was watching me from the porch rail, leaned back against it, his arms crossed over his chest. His wedding ring glinted at me. Mine.
I was sure about him.
I pried up the metal prongs holding the flap and opened it, peering inside. One piece of paper. Notebook paper. Pulling it out, I glanced at Carmen and then Nick again. His eyes burned into me with something that kept echoing in my head.
I love you, Lanie McKane.
No one had ever said that.
I swallowed against a shaky breath and blinked the carefully scrawled handwriting into focus.
My Lanie girl,
My heart squeezed.
You’re probably mad at me still, and that’s okay. I couldn’t have asked for a better daughter if I’d birthed you myself. You’ve been the joy of my life, and my only regret has been that my sister didn’t live to appreciate the gift she had in you. You are so full of life, Lanie, and have so much love inside you. So much to offer. But you keep it all locked down tight for fear of becoming something you’ll never be.
You’re not your mom, honey. Relax.
The words swam in front of me and I blinked tears free.
I know I pissed you off with the house and all. But my girl, your lying skills haven’t gotten any better with age. I forgive you for just trying to make a daffy old woman happy, but it just had to be done. And because I know you and how stubborn-assed you can be, I’m gambling that you finagled some way of coming up with a husband to keep this drafty old house. I’m also gambling that maybe something real happened along the way. If I’m wrong, I’m wrong. But I feel that I’m right. And you know how I get about my feelings.
Carmen chuckled, and I did too through my tears.
So since I’m feeling good about things, you should know that there’s no three-month deal. There never was. I stopped and read that part again. There never was.
“What?”
“Keep going,” Carmen said.
I took a deep breath and let it out.
And don’t fuss at Carmen because I didn’t tell her, either. The money’s yours, the house is yours; it’s already deeded over to you.
“Oh my God,” I breathed, gripping the arm rest of the rocker.
“Wait, what?” Bryce asked.
Tell the Clarks I’m sorry, but they’re all greedy blowhards and they can consider it payback for making me use the Porta-Potty that day when I came to visit their dad and the construction guys were doing the upgrade on that ridiculous house he couldn’t afford.
“Are you kidding me?” Bryce said, his shiny head, neck, and face going red.
They did come by all that entitled greed honestly, so I can’t blame them too much. My brother, rest his soul, was a son-of-a-bitch. Damn, I might have to deal with him again now.
“Are you gonna say something?” Bryce asked Alan, nudging him.
“Say what?” Alan said, disgust all over his face. “It’s done.”
“But she can’t do that,” Bryce said.
Alan raised his eyebrows. “She just did.”
Anyway, I did it all for a reason, Lanie girl. Remember me by living life instead of going through the motions. Quit being afraid. Life is messy. Love is messier. It’s what makes it all the more glorious when you get it right.
Everything in me wanted to look at Nick. To see if we got it right. But I couldn’t.
Now go enjoy your house. Live in
it, rent it, sell it, do whatever you want with it, but don’t let the Bowmans get their sticky little hands on it.
“Hey!”
Alan’s face turned three shades of purple, and Bryce stormed down the stairs, headed back toward Alan’s house.
I don’t trust them. They smile too much. And you know how I feel about people who play with bees. Just not right in the head.
“Amen to that,” Carmen said under her breath.
So do what you want to do, but do it with purpose and passion. And love, baby girl. Love with all you have.
Big crazy hugs and finger wiggles,
Aunt Ruby
I suddenly felt drained as I set the paper and the envelope on the small table next to me. The one with the chipped vase and the wooden bowl with the painted on flowers. That belonged to me. Free and clear.
“I think this was a rigged piece of bullshit,” Alan said, headed down the steps. He turned around and pointed at me. “Congratulations, Lanie. You won by out-conniving me.”
I met his eyes and swiped at mine. “There was nothing rigged, Alan. I’m hearing this for the first time just like you.” He waved me off and started walking away.
“It was survival,” Nick said, turning in Alan’s direction. His voice, silent till then, cut through the air. “Doing what she could to hold on to what was hers. That’s not conniving. Or anything whatsoever to do with you.”
Alan stopped and gave a sleazy grin that didn’t reach his eyes.
“How cute, taking up for the little missus. What did you get out of it?” Alan’s eyes narrowed. Somehow I felt the next three moves like a chess player, and I couldn’t move quickly enough. “Money? A piece of that ass? Free blow jobs every—”
“Nick!” I cried, as he was past the steps before I could blink.
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