by Marie Force
Chapter Eleven
“What do you feel like doing first when we get to Austin?” I ask her after a comfortable period of silence.
“I really need to hit the gym, even if it’s just for half an hour. I haven’t worked out in days.”
“You never have to talk me into that.” It’s another of many things we have in common—our obsessive commitment to fitness.
After we arrive at the Four Seasons in Austin and check into our enormous, elegant suite, we change and head directly to the fitness center, where we spend an hour sweating off any remaining stress we brought with us. We’ve worked out together so often that we exchange few words as we spot each other through the weightlifting portion of the program, going through the paces like the well-oiled team we are.
Again, I’m struck by the fact that it took me so long to accept that she is my destiny. All this time, we’ve been dancing around the truth while slowly but surely becoming essential to each other. I like to think of myself as a pretty sharp guy, but this situation is proof that I can be as obtuse as the next guy when it comes to women. Or I suppose I should say when it comes to the woman who matters most. The rest of them weren’t all that mysterious to me. I knew what they wanted, and I gave it to them.
Everything is different with Lauren, and the funny part is that it always has been different with her.
“Remember the time Bruce the Dick Dickenson tipped your lunch tray over in middle school?” I ask her when we’re in the elevator on the way back to our top-floor suite.
“How could I forget? You got suspended for beating him up in the cafeteria.”
“I’d do it again in a New York minute. He made you cry.”
“Because I didn’t have the money to buy a second lunch, and I was starving.” She looks up at me. “What made you remember that?”
“I was thinking about how far back we go, and how we’ve always been special friends.”
“Yes, we have. You were the first person in my whole life who ever defended me. Did you know that?”
I’m struck dumb by her heartfelt words. “No,” I say gruffly. “I didn’t know.”
“I spent most of my childhood cleaning up my mother’s messes. She was never there for me. I saw my dad once a year, if that. He was never there for me. The day you beat up Bruce the Dick was the first time anyone ever stuck up for me. I’ve never forgotten it.”
“You know what I remember most about that?”
“What?”
“That I wanted to kill him for making you cry. I was twelve, and I think if the teachers hadn’t pulled me off him, I might’ve actually killed him. I’ve only ever felt that way two other times, when Wayne put you in the hospital, and again last night.”
She wraps her hands around my arms and leans her head on my shoulder until the elevator lands on our floor.
I open the door to our room and let her go in ahead of me. When the door clicks shut behind us, I say, “Hey, Lo?”
She turns to me. “Hmm?”
“I wish I’d never given Wayne the chance to hurt you, that I’d done something… about this, about us… a long time ago.”
“We weren’t ready for this then. We would’ve messed it up.”
I shake my head. “No, we wouldn’t have.”
She takes a few steps to close the distance between us, sliding her arms around my waist.
I rest my hands on her shoulders and gaze down at her, feeling like I’m truly seeing her for the first time, even after all these years.
“You have always been my hero, Garrett. Even when I was married to Wayne, you were the one I leaned on because I knew you loved me no matter what.”
“I did love you,” I whisper. “I do love you. I love you so much. You’ll never know how much.”
“I’ve always known, and I love you just as much. I have for as long as I can remember.” Then she kisses me, and I lose myself in her, surrendering to the pull to her that is too powerful to resist. I’m done fighting it. I don’t want to fight. I just want to make her happy and keep her safe every day for the rest of our lives. As she wraps herself around me and nearly brings me to my knees with desire, everything else fades away and there’s only her.
Without breaking the kiss, I lift her and carry her to the nearest flat surface, which happens to be the dining room table in the fancy suite. I lay her out on the table and bend over her, my cock snug against the heat of her core. For the first time in the six years since my father died, I feel like I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be with the person I’m supposed to be with, and I finally have the answers to the most important questions.
Lauren.
She’s the answer to every question.
I break the kiss and gaze down at her, noticing that she seems as stunned by the desire pulsing between us as I am.
“I probably stink,” she says with a wry smile.
I shake my head. She always smells good, even when she’s sweaty. “I definitely stink.”
“No, you don’t.” She squirms restlessly under me, letting me know what she wants as badly as I do. With one arm propped on the table, I remove her shorts and then my own.
“Garrett,” she says, her urgency fueling mine.
I grasp those ass cheeks that are the stuff of fantasy and angle her to accept my cock. I pause for a fraction of a second, only long enough to make her moan, and then I slam into her, going all the way to the hilt in one thrust.
She comes immediately, her fingernails sinking into my back and her internal muscles massaging me intimately.
I wait her out, and then I start to move. I’ve never fucked her as hard as I do now that I’ve given myself permission to love her, to want her, to need her. I need her so fucking bad. The words pour out of me in a flood of thoughts and emotions that can no longer be contained. I, who rarely talks during sex, let go with every thought inside my head. “I love you so fucking much. Every beat of my heart is for you—only you—and it always has been. No one will ever love you the way I do.”
I’m completely out of control, and the funny thing is, I know it and don’t care. I don’t care that I’m laying myself bare before her, surrendering to the fifteen-year slow burn that erupts like fireworks in the night sky. “I want to marry you and have babies with you and watch them turn into obnoxious teenagers with you. I want every day and every night and every morning with you. I want to sleep with you and make love to you and fuck you and devour you and protect you from ever being hurt again and have every fucking thing with you.”
A broken sob erupts from her, stopping me in my tracks. “Baby, don’t cry. Please don’t cry.”
“You have n-no idea how long I’ve waited to hear you say th-those things to me. Of course I’m going to cry.”
I gather her into my arms, lift her off the table and drop into one of the chairs that surround the table. She settles on top of me, my cock still deep inside her as she gazes down at me.
“I love you, too. I love you as so much more than my very best friend, and I think I have since you beat up Bruce the Dick for me.”
I tighten my hold on her and bury my face in the elegant curve of her neck. “We’ve wasted so much time.”
“No,” she says, “we were busy getting to a place where we were ready for this.”
Cupping her ass cheeks, I lift her slightly and then let her drop back onto my cock. I do it again, raising her a little higher this time before letting her fall. Each time, she expels a breath when she lands, and her muscles flutter around my cock.
Tears continue to slide down her cheeks, and I brush them away with my lips.
She gazes into my eyes as I look up at her in a moment of utter clarity. All this time I’ve been running toward something, but it wasn’t what I thought it would be. I don’t need a big fancy corporate career in a city far from home to feel whole. No, all I need is this tiny woman with the big personality, a heart of gold and a love that will last forever.
I grab the back of the tank top she wore to t
he gym and work it up and over her head to gain access to her breasts. Holding one in my hand, I take her nipple into my mouth and suck hard, running my tongue back and forth across the tight tip. The combination has her riding me frantically, chasing her orgasm. I keep it up until her inner muscles clamp down on me and take us both flying off the cliff, and this time, the sense of falling is the greatest feeling I’ve ever had.
I’m falling for her. I have fallen for her, completely and totally, and the fall doesn’t seem so scary when I take it with her.
She clings to me in the aftermath, her chest tight against mine, her face wet with new tears that dampen my face, too. Or maybe those are my tears. Who knows, and what does it matter?
“Did you mean it?” she asks in a small voice after a period of silence.
“Every word.”
“Garrett,” she says on a long exhale. “You really want to marry me?”
“That’s the very least of what I want with you, if you’ll have me.”
“If I’ll have you,” she says with a laugh as she pivots her hips. “I believe I already have you. Right where I want you.”
My heart expands almost painfully in my chest, testing the boundaries of this newfound ability to love so greatly. Until now, I had no idea I was even capable of such powerful emotions. Growling playfully, I nip her neck and squeeze her ass cheeks. Have I mentioned that I’m obsessed with her ass? “You’ve gotten me very dirty. How about a shower?”
“Yes, please.”
I pick her up and carry her to the bathroom.
“Oh my God,” she says of the giant claw-footed soaking tub that occupies half the bathroom. “That tub! Can we?”
“Of course we can.”
I continue to hold her until the water is warm and then step into the tub with my precious cargo still in my arms. She adds some bubble bath from the basket of luxurious products provided by the hotel and then relaxes into my embrace.
“Is this a dream?” she asks.
“No, baby. It’s not a dream. It’s a dream come true.” I think about the daylong meeting planned for tomorrow and wonder how or when I’ll tell them it’s all for naught. I feel badly for wasting their time, but I would’ve felt worse about canceling at the last minute after they went to so much trouble to arrange everything.
I want to tell Lauren why I really came to Austin, but again, what does it matter when I’m not going to take the job? She doesn’t need to know that I ever considered leaving Marfa for something bigger or supposedly better than what I have there. I wouldn’t want her to think that she kept me from chasing my dreams. My dreams have changed. It’s that simple.
I wash and condition her hair, and then she does the same for me with scrupulous attention to detail.
“What kind of a wedding do you want?” I ask her.
The question causes her to freeze, her gaze shifting to meet mine, as if to check whether I’m for real. I’m so for real. I’ve never been more for real in my life. “I… um, I don’t care. Whatever you want.”
“No way. Don’t do that. You know exactly what you want and you probably have for years. Spill it.”
“If I could have anything I wanted—”
“You can.”
“I’d want to do it at the Paisano,” she says, referring to the local hotel that is a national historic landmark. “I’ve delivered flowers to countless weddings there, and every time, I picture my own wedding there someday, which is silly since I’ve already been married.”
“Tying the knot with Wayne fucking Peterson at the courthouse doesn’t count as a wedding.”
“No, but unfortunately, the marriage was legal. Biggest mistake I ever made. You know that, right? I never should’ve married him or even dated him. But you were away at college, and I couldn’t live with my mom anymore. I just couldn’t. He seemed like a better alternative.”
“I get it, babe. I’ve always understood the why of it, even if it broke my heart to hear you’d married him.”
“I never intended for that to happen. I didn’t know you thought of me that way. If I had, everything would’ve been different.”
“We both have our regrets, Lo. I should’ve said something. Do you know how many times I’ve thought about Christmas break my senior year of college when you told me he’d asked you out and I didn’t say anything? I should’ve told you then not to go out with him, but my life was still a gigantic question mark at that time. I had no idea where I was going to end up or if I was going to get a good job or anything. I didn’t think it would be fair to tell you to wait until I worked out my shit.”
“I would’ve waited,” she says, tipping her head back so she can see me. “If you’d given me the slightest encouragement, I would’ve waited for you.”
“I’m sorry that I didn’t. My only excuse is that I was young and dumb and thought I had all the time in the world to work things out with you. There was never a time, even when I dated other people, that you weren’t right there, in the back of my mind like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow or something like that.”
“Awww, that’s so sweet.”
I scowl at her. “I am not sweet.”
“You are if I say you are. And not only are you sweet, you’re poetic, too. I’m the pot of gold at the end of your rainbow.”
I make dramatic gagging noises that crack her up. “Shoot me now.”
“No, thank you. I’d much rather kiss you.”
“I’d be fine with that.”
She turns over to face me, and I hold her close for a soft, sweet kiss that has my heart racing and my cock throbbing once again. How does she do that so easily? I sweep the wet hair back from her face. “Did you ever picture the groom at your Paisano wedding or just the dress and flowers?”
“I never dared to picture the one man I would’ve chosen if I could have anyone I wanted.”
“Why not?”
“I was afraid to go there, like I might jinx it or something.”
“Do I know this guy?”
She laughs—hard—and I fall even further than I already have. I keep thinking I’ve reached the full potential of how far I can possibly fall only to discover there’s more. So much more.
Her fingers sift through my hair, straightening it. “He has the most gorgeous dark hair and eyes so brown they almost look black until the sun hits them just so, and then you can see the speckles of gold. His skin is always tanned, even in the middle of what passes for winter in West Texas. He has muscles on top of his muscles. He’d do anything for anyone and has proven that time and again with the way he takes care of his family and friends, always putting the needs of others ahead of his own. He’s so smart that his clients can’t imagine having to run their businesses without his help. And on top of all that, he’s the sexiest, sweetest, best man I’ve ever known, and I’ve been in love with him since the sixth grade when he beat up the bully who made me cry.”
Nothing in my life has ever humbled me more than she just did. “He’s a very lucky man to have had someone like you love him for so long.”
She shakes her head. “I’m the lucky one.”
“We’re both lucky.” I kiss her again and notice how much different it feels to kiss her now that I know she loves me and she knows I love her. It’s bigger, somehow, greater… “So a wedding at the Paisano as soon as possible?”
She nods. “That would be perfect.”
“I’ll get you a ring, and we’ll make it official. Soon.”
“You don’t have to. Let’s spend the money on the wedding.”
“You can have both, and I want you to have a ring.”
“Where will we live? Your place or mine?”
“Either is fine with me, or we can sell them both and get something together. Whatever you want.”
“Are you always going to be this agreeable?”
“Are you always going to be my wife?”
“That’s the goal.”
“Then yes, as long as you’re my wife, I’ll be your agr
eeable husband.”
“My husband,” she says on a long sigh as she lays her head on my shoulder. “I can’t believe this is happening.”
“Believe it, baby. We’re going to have it all, everything you’ve ever wanted and things you haven’t even dreamed of yet.” I would do everything within my power to make sure of that.
“What about babies?” she asks in the small voice that’s far too reminiscent of the months that followed Wayne’s attack.
“As many as you want. And I don’t want you to ever be afraid to ask me for anything. You own me. You always have. I’m only sorry it took me so long to figure that out.”
“This was the way it was meant to be. I believe that.”
“I need to get you out of this tub before you turn into a prune on me.”
“We can’t have that.”
She gets up first, and I follow her into the shower to rinse off the bubbles. Then I wrap her in a big white fluffy towel and thoroughly dry her.
“I’m going to dry my hair real quick, or it’ll be huge.”
“I like your hair huge.”
“Said only a man from Texas.”
“You know it, darlin’,” I say in an exaggerated drawl. “We like our women easy, with big breasts and bigger hair.”
She snaps the towel at me and just misses my junk. “Pig.”
Laughing, I jump out of the way and cover the family jewels with my own towel. “If you want babies, sweetheart, you’d better be nice to my boys.” We stand together at the vanity, me shaving while she dries her hair—naked. I can’t take my eyes off her beautiful tits, which jiggle with every move she makes, and it takes a lot of movement to dry her long hair.
“You’re going to cut yourself again if you keep staring at me rather than the mirror.”
“I’d so much rather stare at your luscious tits than my ugly mug.”
“I’m quite fond of your ugly mug, and I don’t want any more blood. Pay attention to what you’re doing with that razor.”
It’s all so… domestic. Even though we’re far from home, she may as well already be my wife for the way she keeps me centered and grounded. That’s a role she’s played for years without me even realizing it. I feel sort of stupid that it took me so long to open my eyes to what was right in front of me.