His gaze trailed from her and moved to FADE, who sat in stony silence only giving him a curt nod as a beautiful woman whispered furiously into his ear. FADE nodded to her, absently rubbing her back, but didn’t move to greet him nor his sister. Akchiro ground his teeth at the insult, not to him but to Flower. He would tolerate no slights toward her. He stepped forward just as the woman moved from FADE’s lap and hurried over to them.
“Hey, y’all!” She hugged Flower to her and smiled up at him. Her eyes shone with genuine warmth and made her beauty transcend the space. “He’s so handsome.” She giggled softly into Flower’s ear, not really trying to whisper. “Hi, I’m Delightful.” She stepped back from Flower and bowed to him. She was indeed a delight, he thought, returning her bow.
“Pleasure.” He smiled to her.
“FADE’s leg is paining him and he’s grumpy as all get out, otherwise, he would be over here.”
Akchiro nodded, not quite believing it but deciding not to push the issue yet would address it at a later time. Hurting or not, you greeted your family and guests with respect.
“Dinner is served!” Grace chimed as she, servants, and her husband brought the food out.
The food was delicious but far different than anything he’d ever had. “Can you cook like this?”
He fought the smile that threatened when Flower rounded huge outraged eyes on him. “Can I cook?”
He chuckled at the way her Southern twang made the last part of her words arch higher. Again, he found that he was smitten with her. More so now than before. He saw the real her. She wasn’t cautious of restrained around her family. He wondered if she would ever feel this safe with him again. Where she could just be his Flower again. When they could just be like before when they binged watched her shows. His only interest had been in holding her. He’d watch her while she watched The Walking Dead and Jane the Virgin—smiling when she did and rubbing soothing circles on her back when one of her favorite characters was killed on the zombie show. He cherished those moments then and knew that he was responsible for why they didn’t happen now. He’d been busy, yes, had rebuffed her offers partly because of the grueling work schedule, but part of him didn’t want to open himself up to the despair that consumed him at her leaving him. He resolved then to do better for both their sakes.
“Oh, darling, Flower can cook something awful! Flower, why haven’t you cooked for this man yet?” her mother chimed in dragging his attention away. He didn’t miss the scowl her father didn’t bother to hide.
“I have, Mom, just nothing like this yet.” Flower rolled her eyes. She had indeed been trying to make dishes that were similar to his usual fare and she had been doing a remarkable job. Every night she googled a new recipe so that she could make him something. He knew she was busy establishing her company during the day, so it told him more than her words ever could. She’d once remarked that cooking was how their family showed love and when he came to her apartment in the evening, his heart swelled when she’d prepared something for him.
“Well, it’s not like he deserves it.” Mr. Carrington threw his napkin the table in disgust.
“Wowwww.” Ghadi leaned back and cupped his hands over the back of his head. “Dad.” He shook his head.
Akchiro reined in his urge to quirk his eyebrow at the scene before him but instead schooled his face into a blank mask. Seeing this type of emotion on full display was a novelty to him. The blatant disrespect, however, had to be challenged.
“Mr. Carrington, why is it that you feel I’m undeserving of Flower?” He felt Flower tense at his words. They’d sat side by side at the table, with Ghadi on her other side and FADE and Delightful opposite them, with their father to the right at the head and their mother beside them, and Willow at the opposite end to his left. She’d been relaxing back languidly, scrolling on her iPhone as permitted after dinner was over. Now she sat up erect, her face ashen and still as a gazelle that had caught a lion’s gaze. Akchiro was intrigued to see how this would play out.
“Dad.” FADE acted as if he too had much to say with his eyes looking between him and Flower. To him, Akchiro did arch his eyebrow. He knew this man’s barely restrained antipathy wouldn’t take much to be released, but he also knew that he would do nothing to upset his parents and sister. Akchiro made a point to settle the remaining issues with the man before the IPO settled.
“The way you left my daughter, the state you left her in then, coming here and having her resign from CC.” It was obvious that the man would not be deterred. “And if I had my way, she’d have never took up with you again.”
“Daddy.” The soft, firm words stopped Mr. Carrington as he stood to leave the table. “The very day that Akchiro came to CC, I was meeting with a banker to get funding for my own venture. I promised FADE I would stay with the company until they were back on solid ground. Well, this IPO is exactly that. Furthermore, Akchiro didn’t leave me, I left him. He only found me after he found out my real name. Then he came to me.” She released a deep sigh. The silence was loud as the information wafted at the table. “So, if there’s anyone undeserving of anything, it’s me, not him.”
“Oh, baby, don’t say that,” Her mom stood up and smacked her husband on the shoulder. “I told you to behave yourself!” Then she moved to come around where Flower stood, but Akchiro had already stood at the sound of anguish that pierced her words. His heart ached for her and the torment she held inside. Did she blame herself for the company’s decline or felt responsible for the attack on her brother? He knew what they implied on that first day, but since then he’d taken a deeper dive into the matter after her firing, having interviewed both her brothers, and knew there was nothing she could have done to prevent it. The security team was rated five stars. No one could have anticipated the plot that had unfolded.
He had considered asking her back, but he saw how much joy she found in what she was doing now. He didn’t want to interfere with her dream. He knew he’d done enough throwing her life topsy-turvy but had resolved to let her find her own way.
“It’s fine, Mom.” Flower’s muffled words reached him as he looked to the curly head she’d nestled into the neck of her mother. He couldn’t hear the soothing words her mom whispered into her ear, but he saw her nodding.
He stood rigid, waiting until she disengaged from her mother. When her eyes reached his, he felt his heart seize at the hurt he saw there before she cut her eyes down and away. Shame was also there, even a tinge of fear. Remarkable that she should have those emotions when surrounded by her family. He could only surmise then that he was the cause. And that more than anything slayed him.
“Guys, I know you worry about me.” Flower stepped around her mom stood beside him, their arms almost touching, “Akchiro is an honorable man, and I chose to be with him in Tokyo and I choose him today.” Words could never have been spoken that would have galvanized him more. He looked down at her. He still saw the shadows, yet he saw something else—hope. He took her hand.
“I believe your father was right, I am not worthy of you,” he whispered to her. She squeezed his hand in response.
* * *
She chose him. Her words played over and over in his head as he drove, switching lanes on the near-deserted road. Their hands hadn’t left each other’s from the moment he interlaced hers in his until he took the wheel. She shifted the skirt of her dress, which was riding up, as the twilight made shadows dance across her skin. He felt his dick harden at the flash of skin.
Unable to resist, he touched her thigh. The softest moan he ever heard had him glancing her way. The way she rubbed her thigh against his hand had him pulling off to a side road. He turned onto a darkened path and flipped a quick U-turn so that they faced the road. He shut off the ignition.
“Is there something you need, Flower?” He gave her thigh a firm squeeze.
“You.” She’d canted her head a little to the side.
He slid his seat back as far as it would go. “Come here.” He unbuckled his seat belt
. His dick was pounding its own beat. He heard the slide and snap of her seat belt. He didn’t know if waiting was an option. He grabbed her waist, helping her over the console.
“Akchiro,” she moaned against him. He had to put a tight rein on his control because at the moment all he wanted to do was pound into her pussy until he laid claim to what she had chosen to give only him. The need to possess her roaring in his veins was overshadowed only by his need to protect her. He felt her breath against his neck, and his dick pulsed even harder. Then she pressed her hot little pussy against him. He grabbed her hips and ground up into her heat.
“You’re so hot,” he groaned against her neck, sucking her skin into his mouth. She swerved her hips down onto him.
“I need you inside me now.” She nipped his chin then bottom lip. Reaching between their bodies, she unbuckled then unzipped his pants, releasing him into her hand. Slowly she worked him, pulling his essence to the tip then smearing it with her thumb.
“Fuck,” he groaned, pulling her dress open and her bra down, reveling in the hardened tipped mounds of her breast. He lifted her bottom with one hand so that he could suck one tip into his mouth and with the other hand he teased the other. Then he sucked one tip hard and pinched the other at the same time. He could feel how she’d wet her panties were for him. He never wanted a woman this badly. She cried out, gasping against him as he took her lips, fucking her mouth ruthlessly. He ran his hand up and down her body, pressing her closer to him, and he reached between their bodies, moving her panties to the side. He notched the head of his dick at her entrance, rubbing back and forth, hitting her clit.
“You want me.” he looked up into her beautiful face and knew he wanted to see her break apart for him in ecstasy for the rest of his life.
“Yes,” she gasped on a cry, sliding against his length, taking him inside. His breath caught at the hot vise gripping him, his heart caught at the look of pleasure encasing her features.
“Fuck me, Flower.” He didn’t care if it sounded like he was pleading with her as she rode his dick. Over and over she took him inside of herself, riding him with wanton abandonment, swerving her hips, moaning for him, calling for him, asking him to let her come for him. His heart pounded, emotion flooding him as he felt his orgasm began to surge. He sucked his thumb into his mouth, wetting it, then touched her hot, not-so-little clit protruding between her lips, rubbing in ever smaller circles as she slammed down on him, meeting his upward thrusts until he felt the her come spill forth from her down onto his dick. Taking that slickness, he thrust up into her over and over. “That’s right, come for me, that’s my beautiful Flower.” He felt her arms wrap around him at the same moment his orgasm hit and he pumped his release deep into her.
Chapter 18
“It was good of you to come when you did. You are almost past twelve weeks. Have you decided what you want to do?” Dr. Ahmed’s dulcet tone did nothing to calm the words banging around in Flower’s head at the moment. The words sounded instead as if they had been spoken into a megaphone during a silent prayer service in her little home church. The words ricocheted through the room into her head, pounding into the brain and body like the bullets that almost took her brother’s life. She couldn’t make sense of them.
She felt herself nodding, but it was like cotton was clogging every orifice in her head. She could hear, but it was muffled, she could see, but it was through a blurry haze, and she could talk if only she could unclog her throat but that would mean she’d have to stop sobbing first. Her body was racked with them. She felt herself shaking. There was no consolation to be had. What the ever-living fuck?
“Do you want me to call your mother?”
Flower stopped and thought for a moment then shook her head. She didn’t need her mother knowing this right now, especially today of all days. She looked down at the paper hospital gown she wore that was riddled with teardrops. Her nose felt stuffy. She knew she probably looked a mess and a half. No, mom didn’t need to see her like this. No one did.
On cue, her phone buzzed. She didn’t need to look at it to know who it was. The same person she would have face about being twelve weeks pregnant. Which would put them right around the time she made her declaration of claiming him, she’d gotten her period soon after, so she never thought it was a false period. It had been light and three days rather than the normal five, but she chalked that up to stress of having to deal with optioning a script.
“I was taking contraceptives.” Her head pounded as she typed a quick, OMW! into the phone. She felt like a thousand knives were in her skull. She thought maybe she was going to pass out. Easing back onto the table, she curled into a fetal position. What was she going to do? How was she going to tell him? Should she? He was leaving as soon as the IPO was completed. He maybe had a few weeks tops. Then he was going back to Tokyo. And he hadn’t asked her to come…
They were in a good place. Great even, after the dinner at her parents. They’d even gone back every Sunday as a couple. Her dad still grumbled, but everyone accepted that they were together. Even though her heart threatened to cleave in two, she still felt that if they were to part that she had done it right this time. Now this. They were back to watching her shows now that things weren’t as busy with the IPO and Takeda Industries was again under his tight reign. She’d cooked for him more things that she grew up with and he loved her peach cobbler but promised never to tell her mom that he thought Flower’s was better. They made love at the same pace, and some nights he just held her. They talked about the mundane and the sublime. He seemed just as happy as she was, maybe even more so—now this. She had no idea how he would respond and was more than a little hesitant to say anything.
What would his family say? Him having a hafu child with a Black woman? Dating and the casual love affair may be looked at as his right as a captain of industry, but marrying outside of the Japanese elite? She could just imagine the fallout. Not to mention his mother, whom she assumed from Akchiro’s behavior and sheer reverence when he spoke of her, was a strict traditionalist. She doubted he would marry and start a family without his mother’s blessing. Flower closed her eyes at the thought. Marriage had never been spoken of…
“Flower, nothing is one hundred percent. I offered you the morning after pill the first time you came to see me. Though you used condoms, they are only eighty-five percent effective. There are plenty of condom babies out there.” Dr. Ahmed took a seat beside her and took her hand. “If you’re not ready for this, then you are just not ready. You are still a young woman, and there is nothing that says you can’t move on from this and have kids when you are ready and feel more secure in your relationship and life.”
“I just don’t know, I’m so scared.” She felt the hot tears rolling to the side of her face and pooling on the white tissue sheet used to cover the exam table. She cried as Dr. Ahmed gently patted her hand until her phone buzzed again, stopped, then started right back up. She knew that was her family. With Akchiro, one call was enough. He’d check on her and that was that. Her family was another story entirely. They weren’t going to stop calling until she reached the venue and they had her in sight. They had all become more careful with the fame her brothers had, then after the incident that almost ended FADE’s life, they had become hypervigilant. There were check-ins and calls that had become part of all their lives. Her family was also cognizant of her mental health after the bout of bone-crushing depression she’d experienced last year. Flower knew that she was on a good path and that what she felt now was not that. She had a healthy respect for what she had been through with her heart and mind and did not mess with it. She readily acknowledged her feelings and what they stemmed from. She would not be caught in that place ever again where she put on a brave face for everyone else’s comfort at great detriment to herself.
“I’ll be okay.” She sat up and taking the tissue offered by the physician who had seen her through so much worse when she miscarried in Birmingham after flying home once hearing about the attempt o
n FADE’s life. She’d been delighted when the physician relocated to New York and had immediately began seeing her. She dried her tears then pulled her Hermes bag over her lap and retrieved a makeup removing cloth and got to work cleaning her face.
“I know you will. This is a scary time for you, but it doesn’t need to be. I understand your fear and trust me, it is normal. What you went through last year when you lost your baby was devastating, coupled with the fact that your brother almost died as well as yourself, it was a lot to come to terms with. You are resilient and strong. You will get through this. I am always here no matter what you decide.” She patted Flower’s shoulder then closed the door quietly behind her.
Flower got dressed, swallowing back the salty tears of anxiety that threatened. Part of her didn’t want to face what stared back at her on the sonogram and printed out black and white in her hand. She wanted to crumble the photo and throw it away. She pressed it to her heart instead. The sensible part of her said to call the doctor back and schedule and appointment at the earliest possible moment, but her heart said something different. She remembered her devastation last year when she found out she lost her baby. A baby she didn’t even know she was pregnant with, whose father she still hadn’t told. Though it was water under a burnt and crumbled bridge, she felt guilty for not having told him. Maybe he would blame her too. She didn’t have the words. She maybe never would. She understood now that it wasn’t her fault. That there was nothing she could’ve done. But still…there was that niggling doubt that had burrowed its way into her heart, and she couldn’t shake it loose no matter what she did. No meditation, prayer, or consultation could make her think differently. And now? She dropped her head in her hands and took a deep, cleansing breath. Now she had to be at the IPO launch in less than an hour. Her family, Akchiro, and his brothers were waiting on her. She would deal with that first. Then she would hold out hope that she found a way to tell him everything and that he wouldn’t hate her.
Lotus Flower Bomb: The Mogul Series Book Two Page 16