by K. M. Scott
For a moment, she didn’t seem to understand everything I’d said was a joke. I didn’t get a pout or a frown this time. Now I got that pursed lips look she only used when she was either really concerned about something or really angry.
Sliding my hands down her sides, I let them come to rest on her waist and leaned forward to kiss her. “You know I’m kidding, Nina. I would never do that to anyone, even for this room, and none of the Richmont staff would do that.”
She let out a sigh and shook her head. “Tristan Stone, I swear I think you’re insane. I thought you really did something to that man. So where did he go?”
I had to laugh at how serious she took me sometimes. “There was no man. Or maybe there was, but he wasn’t forced out of the room or anything like that. We had reservations for a week beginning tonight, and that’s all I know.”
Her frustration with my teasing finally bubbled up to the surface. She pushed me away, causing me to fall back on the pillows, and crawled off me.
“You’re nuts. I’m going to look at the view again, and when I come back, I hope you aren’t going to tell me you forced some housekeeper to work overtime just so we could have this room.”
Nina walked back out onto the balcony, and through the curtains I watched as she looked out at the beautiful city below. The first time I brought her here, I wanted to show her how much I loved her, but even more, I wanted to impress her.
All these years later, impressing her had fallen away as a reason I did anything for her. Now, I did things to show her I loved her.
To show her I couldn’t live without her.
I walked over to the doors and pulled back the curtain to watch her. She’d been to Venice more than a few times since that first trip the summer after we met. For most people, nothing about the view from our hotel room balcony should have been interesting, but like she had all those years before, Nina saw wonder in everything, no matter how many times she’d seen it.
She turned around and smiled. “Tristan, I know it sounds hokey, but I want to take a ride in a gondola this trip.”
“Okay. I’ll set it up for tomorrow.”
“And I want to eat at that restaurant we ate at when we brought the kids that time. Do you remember the name of it? It was right on the canal with incredible views.”
I couldn’t remember the name of the restaurant, but no matter. We’d find it and have dinner there while we were in Venice.
“Okay. We can look around tomorrow and make reservations,” I said as I stepped out onto the balcony. The warm Venetian air covered me, and I slid my arms around her, pulling her to me. “Whatever you want. Your wish is my command.”
She turned in my hold to look back at me and smiled. “You’re the best husband in the world. You know that?”
Nuzzling her neck, I closed my eyes and reveled in the scent of her perfume still on her skin after a day of traveling. Soft and flowery, it made me think of those first days of our life together. Whether anyone could think I was the best husband in the world was debatable, but I always wanted to make her happy.
Even in the beginning, when I couldn’t tell her the truth about who I was or why I’d sought her out.
“No funny comment about my saying you’re the best husband in the world?” she asked as she leaned her head against mine.
I hugged her closer to me and whispered, “Nothing funny to say. Some guys have it, and some don’t.”
Nina turned to look at me and smiled. “Now there’s the husband I’m used to. Confident and cute. That’s you, Tristan, you know that?”
“Confident and cute?” I said, repeating her compliment. “I like the first one, but I’m not sure anyone would ever call me cute. All these years I’ve been working on ruggedly handsome. Cute feels like I’ve fallen fall short of my goal.”
“Hmmm. Well, then how does this sound? Confident and gorgeous.”
I let out a heavy sigh, like what she said made me unhappy. “I’ll take it, but it’s not ruggedly handsome.”
She turned around in my arms and looked up at me, rolling her eyes. “I think you’re gorgeous, but if you want ruggedly handsome, that’s going to require buying an ax. Maybe cutting wood in the backyard. That kind of thing. Those guys are ruggedly handsome.”
Grimacing at the thought of swinging an ax at a log in our backyard, I shook my head. “Ruggedly handsome might not work. I guess I’ll have to settle for gorgeous because I’m not loving cute.”
Nina cradled my face and kissed me softly. “So confident and gorgeous. I’m glad we could clear that up while we’re here in Venice on our second honeymoon. What’s the next order of business, Mr. Stone?”
I didn’t answer her question and instead took her in my arms and began to dance right there on the balcony of our Venice hotel room. The warm humid air made the night feel perfect for two people in love to forget the rest of the world existed and just silently dance together.
With all the worry about her health scare and learning to live with her illness, on top of planning our secret renewal of our vows and the party for our family and friends, we hadn’t stopped to just hold each other yet. But now that the wedding was over and it was just Nina and me, I wanted to close my eyes and ignore everything but her.
“I love dancing like this with you,” she whispered as she lay her head on my chest.
“Me too. I wish we’d done more of this over the years.”
I didn’t know how long we stood on that balcony just slowly swaying back and forth to the silent song that played in my head. I could have stayed there just like that for the rest of time and been happier than I could ever describe.
After a while, Nina tapped her finger on my chest. “I think there’s someone watching us over there. They’re a few rooms down.”
I opened my eyes and smiled down at her. “I don’t care. It’s not like we’re standing here with no clothes on dancing. It’s no crime to dance with your wife out on your balcony.”
She rolled her eyes at me. “I know. I just feel sort of weird out here dancing while people are watching. Maybe we should go inside. What’s up next on this surprise honeymoon you planned?”
“We can either eat a late dinner, Mrs. Stone, or we can forgo food entirely and make love. I know what I want, but I’m open to ideas.”
Her slow smile gave me her answer, so I took her by the hand and led her back to our bed. We had a week here, and I’d be fine if we didn’t leave it the whole time we were in Venice. However, I had promised her that gondola ride and dinner at that restaurant, and she wouldn’t let a week in this city go by without visiting at least one museum. And I knew how much she loved visiting the shops to find gifts for everyone back home.
So we’d have tonight to enjoy one another.
“Just in case you don’t know it yet, I love this, Tristan,” she said as I eased her back onto the bed.
“Happy second honeymoon, Nina.”
I kissed her and felt that same feeling I always experienced when her lips met mine. Just like that first kiss all those years ago, she utterly consumed me.
“Tristan, do you have any regrets?” she asked in a quiet voice as I began to undress her.
Stopping after I tugged off her pants, I smiled. “Other than the fact that you’re not undressing me, no. Well, maybe one.”
Concern washed over her, but she didn’t have to worry. There wasn’t a happier man in the world.
“Actually, my only regret is we didn’t think of doing this second honeymoon thing years ago. We could be on our third or fourth honeymoon by now.”
My joke fell flat, and still she didn’t smile. “I’m serious. Do you have any regrets?”
Shaking my head, I tried to imagine who would regret having her in their life. “Not a single one. I married the woman of my dreams, and she made my life better than I ever dreamed it could be. How could I regret any of that?”
Nina beamed a smile. “I just wanted to ask.”
She sat up and began unbuttoning my shirt as
she gazed up at me with a look in her eyes I knew well. That’s what came from being with a woman for a long time.
“I’m glad you decided to join in,” I said, watching her as she tossed my shirt off to the side and moved to my belt.
With a twinkle in her eye, she looked up at me and said, “I couldn’t let you have all the fun.”
As I slid her shirt over her head, she pointed toward the balcony. “We forgot to close the doors. What if the wind blows the curtain open?”
I fumbled with her bra for a moment before tossing it aside. “Then the peeping Toms of Venice are going to get a show that includes a man making love to his wife right here on this bed. Any other questions?” I asked with a smile.
Nina lay back and giggled. “I honestly don’t know why I ask you things like that.”
Covering her body with mine, I eased down on top of her and kissed her softly on the lips. “I don’t either. We’ve been together long enough for you to know I don’t care who sees us.”
“I just never thought you were an exhibitionist,” she said as I slowly thrust my hips to enter her.
Whatever I was—a man who didn’t mind if anyone saw him making love to his wife or an exhibitionist—I didn’t care about any of that at that moment. All I cared about was how incredible Nina felt beneath me and how I loved being inside her.
She moaned sweetly and dragged her fingernails across my shoulders, sending a wave of desire coursing through me, and I kissed her hard and long, like I’d wanted to from the moment we walked into this room. Her tongue mingled with mine with a promise of what we could do for our second round after this, and her legs wrapped around my waist.
Digging her heels into the small of my back, she groaned, “Oh, Tristan, this feels so good.”
I buried my head into the pillow next to her ear and whispered, “I want you to come for me, Nina. Let yourself go, baby.”
Her hands moved from my shoulders down my back, her fingernails tracing the path over my skin, and she pulled me hard into her body. I loved when she shed her inhibitions, and even though I suspected she still worried about someone possibly seeing us naked on the bed at that moment, it didn’t seem to stop her from moaning loudly.
“Oh, God…Tristan…”
The sound of her pleasure echoed off the walls, and I had no doubt anyone outside on their balcony could hear us. But I didn’t care. Two people in love all their lives had no reason to keep their happiness quiet.
When she came hard a few minutes later, I loved hearing her call out my name while she held me tightly to her. And when I came, I didn’t try to keep quiet about how fucking good it felt to come inside my wife.
That’s what loving the right woman for all your life entitled a man to.
I rolled off her and looked over at her with a smile. “I’m thinking the peepers heard us.”
Nina turned onto her side and propped her head up on her hand. “Well, I guess we’ll find out if they stop us in the hallway and say something about it. And you know what I’ll say?”
“No. What?”
She leaned over to press a kiss onto my lips and said with the sweetest smile, “It’s okay. We’re on our honeymoon.”
That was my Nina. We’d been through ups and downs in our life together, but in the end, she was that same girl I’d met so many years before with all the sass that could fit into such a tiny woman and all the love that had made my life more wonderful than I ever dreamed it could be.
I pulled her to me so her head rested on my chest, and we lay there making plans for what we’d do next. Whatever it turned out to be, whether that night or for the rest of our lives, I knew we’d be fine because we had the one ingredient necessary for a happy life. We’d always had it.
Love.
And as the saying goes, we lived happily ever after.
In spring 2013, Tristan and Nina came into my life and changed it forever. In 2018, their children began telling me their stories, and then, Tristan let me know he had more to say. All of Me is that story, Tristan’s love letter to Nina.
I rarely include playlists for books because while music is a huge part of my life, individual songs usually don’t attach themselves to my books. Possession in the Club X series has a playlist, and the entire Corrupted Love Trilogy has one, but other than that, they just aren’t something I usually do.
As soon as Tristan began telling me this story, the song Perfect by Ed Sheeran seemed to appear in my life on a daily basis. A bit of explanation: I don’t tend to listen to anything current in music, so this song popping up all over the place in my world was noteworthy. I honestly had never heard the song until 2018, a year after it was released to huge love from fans, I’m told. I’ll take people’s word for it, but to me, the song is a quintessential expression of Tristan’s feelings for Nina. In his eyes, she’s perfect. She was his salvation, the proof that he could love again and not lose everything if he did.
Then as I got into writing All of Me, I kept hearing Starting Over by John Lennon. This wasn’t terribly surprising since I’m a huge Beatles fan, listen to their channel on Sirius XM every time I’m driving somewhere, and it’s been one of my favorite songs since it released in the early 80s. I was just thirteen and finding how much I loved Lennon’s songs when he was murdered in December 1980. Starting Over appeared on Double Fantasy, his last album with his wife Yoko Ono that released the month before he died, and I loved the song from the first time I heard it.
I’ve never been able to listen to Starting Over without crying. It’s a love song that seems so full of hope for the future, and then Lennon was cut down in the prime of life. When I began hearing it as I was writing this book, for the first time I associated something happy with the song. All of Me is very much a new start for Tristan and Nina.
It is not a new start for the series, however. All of Me is the end of the Heart of Stone series. I’ve loved writing Tristan and Nina, Gage and Jordan, Ethan and Summer, Tressa and Killian, and Diana and Cole, but it’s time to say goodbye. Even as I type this, I’m tearing up. I love these characters. They’re real people to me. I’m very protective of them and their stories, and it’s been a true honor being the one they chose to write them.
But now it’s time to go. To all the fans of the Heart of Stone series, thank you. Thank you for believing in the kind of love that is nothing less than unforgettable. This book is dedicated to you.
K.M.
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About the Author
K.M. Scott writes contemporary romance stories of sexy, intense, and unforgettable love. A New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, she’s been in love with romance since reading her first romance novel in junior high (she was a very curious girl!). Under her Gabrielle Bisset name, she writes paranormal and historical romance. She lives in Pennsylvania with a herd of animals and when she’s not writing can be found reading or feeding her TV addiction.
Be sure to visit K.M.’s Facebook page at facebook.com/kmscottauthor for all the latest on her books, along with giveaways and other goodies! And to hear all the news on K.M. Scott books first, sign up for her newsletter today and be sure to visit her website at www.kmscottbooks.com
Books by K.M. Scott:
Crash Into Me (Heart of Stone #1)
Fall Into Me (Heart of Stone #2)
Give In To Me (Heart of Stone #3)
Heart of Stone Volume One Box Set
Ever After (Heart of Stone #4)
A Heart of Stone Christmas (Heart of Stone #5)
Return To Me (Heart of Stone #6)
Forever With Me (Heart of Stone #7)
Heart of Stone Volume Two Box Set
Hard As Stone (Heart of Stone #8)
Set In Stone (Heart of Stone #9)
Silent As A Stone (Heart of Stone #10)
All of Me (Heart of Stone #11)
Temptation (Club X #1)
Surrender (Club X #2)
Possession (Club X #3)
Satisfaction (Club X #4)
Acceptance (Club X #5)
The Complete Club X Series Box Set
If I Dream (Corrupted Love #1)
If You Fight (Corrupted Love #2)
If We Fall (Corrupted Love #3)
The Corrupted Love Trilogy Box Set
Crave (Addicted To You #1)
Adore (Addicted To You #2)
Shatter (Addicted To You #3)
Claim (Addicted To You #4)
The Addicted To You Box Set
In The Darkness (Project Artemis #1)
After The Storm (Project Artemis #2)
Behind The Scenes (Project Artemis #3)
The Project Artemis Box Set
Hard Work (Standalone)
K.M.’S BOOKS ARE IN AUDIOBOOK TOO!
Books by K.M. Scott writing as Gabrielle Bisset:
Vampire Dreams Revamped (A Sons of Navarus Prequel)
Blood Avenged (Sons of Navarus #1)
Blood Betrayed (Sons of Navarus #2)
Longing (A Sons of Navarus Short Story)
Blood Spirit (Sons of Navarus #3)
The Deepest Cut (A Sons of Navarus Short Story)
Blood Prophecy (Sons of Navarus #4)
Blood Craving (Sons of Navarus #5)
Blood Eclipse (Sons of Navarus #6)
Blood Ascendant (Sons of Navarus #7)
The Sons of Navarus Box Set #1
The Sons of Navarus Box Set #2
Stolen Destiny (Destined Ones Duet #1)
Destiny Redeemed (Destined Ones Duet #2)
Love’s Master
Masquerade
The Victorian Erotic Romance Trilogy