504 Lovers Ridge: A Cherry Falls Romance Book 18

by Adriane Leigh

  Poppy

  “Bacon—sausage—-pancakes—what’s your pleasure?” Maverick lifted me off my toes, both of us fresh from a morning shower where he ravaged me with his tongue and every hard inch of his muscled body for over an hour.

  He was an animal, totally relentless, my beast.

  “You are my pleasure.”

  He laughed at my joke, his broad chest crushing me to his marbled body, sending a thrill to my toes. Being wrapped in his arms with just a thin towel separating our naked bodies made me salivate.

  Maverick wasn’t just big, he was mountain-man big. The cut of his jaw was vicious and taut, my fingers skating across the plains of his stubbled flesh sent fireworks shattering through my veins. Maverick took masculine to a barbaric level, the sharp cut of his eyes and thick beard instilling fear like I imagined a Viking would on distant shores as they pillaged their way through villages.

  “I don’t know what I did to deserve you—” I gasped into his mouth when his full lips swallowed the rest of my sentence.

  He tugged the towel, sitting me bare-bottomed on the granite kitchen island before he pursed his lips away and held my chin. “I’ll never be good enough for you, but until the day I die I’ll never stop tryin’.”

  “I’m glad you feel that way—”

  “You’re the only thing that chases the darkness away.”

  He cut me off with more fevered kisses. I felt him, hot and hard, pressed between us, the urge to get lost in him tingling through my nerves.

  My heart hammered with the confession that was locked on my lips. I couldn't let him continue, not now, not after this morning, not after what he’d just said.

  “You chased the rain clouds away—” he hummed, kissing down my neck in a hot trail.

  “Maverick—I—I love you so much and I’m afraid to tell you this one thing, but I know no matter what you won’t be upset—”

  “Upset?” His body went rigid beneath me. Every muscle clenched and bunched, the warmth in his eyes suddenly cut to darkness like he’d seen a ghost.

  He’d flipped to a stranger before my eyes.

  “Maverick...” I swallowed, cradling his cold palms in my own warm ones and then sliding them against my abdomen. “I’m pregnant.”

  Long beats of silence hung between us.

  I searched for the familiar warmth and caring I’d become used to.

  It was all absent.

  “Mav?”

  His eyes flinched, pupils growing large before his hands dropped from me and he shoved them both in my hair. He clenched his teeth, anger coursing through his body before a look of devastation rolled like a thunderstorm through his eyes.

  “Mav—”

  “Don’t call me that, please.” He breathed at my ear, a shudder of fear trembling through my veins.

  “W-why?”

  He pushed himself away from me, dropping his hands from my face to his sides before he sucked in two fierce lungfuls of air and then pulled on a pair of work pants that hung over the kitchen chair.

  He shoved his red flannel over his shoulders and buttoned it quickly before he clutched his winter jacket and shoved his feet in his boots.

  “Mav—”

  He paused, hand on the door knob as the winter blast of morning air rushed through the kitchen. “She called me that.”

  And with that the door slammed and Maverick left me alone.

  Again.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Poppy

  Maverick was still gone.

  For three hours I simmered and wondered what to do, the tiny double-pink-lined positive pregnancy test still wrapped in napkins and shoved deep in my purse.

  Not the beautiful announcement I’d planned in my head, and he’d done so well before that. Everything was so perfect, his tender words and caresses lulling me into a false memory of who this man was.

  And now that I knew, now that I’d seen his true colors, he had more than hell to pay.

  By the time the sun was setting and the shadows in Maverick’s cabin had grown deep and dark, I was on edge and ready to hike wherever to reach him, or search this house up and down and free it of its demons.

  I started a fire and brewed hot cocoa on the stove an hour ago, but nothing could keep me calm without him here.

  I was just thinking of grabbing my keys and heading back to my own apartment for good, when faint strains of violin music swept through upstairs. It started off slowly, the romantic notes haunting in the way they clung to the damp night air, but as the tune played on, the notes grew more shrill and fevered.

  “What do you want from me?!” I shouted, ready to confront whatever hell was fighting me for the man I loved.

  The wind chose that moment to blow in a window, the loud thud as the hinge came loose and one corner of the window banged against the wall sent a chill through my blood. A gust of wind, stronger than the first that’d knocked the window off its hinges forced the curtain into a whirling dervish before it reached the corner desk, a pile of paperwork spinning on the current.

  A single white page fell softly to the bare wooden floor like a feather.

  Something eerie crawled to life inside of me, the sudden silence as the curtain calmed.

  I crossed the distance to the desk, bending to pick up the sheet of paper.

  I realized then it was a letter.

  My eyes crawled to the stack that sat on the corner of the table.

  They all started with My Dearest, Mav: or Mav, My Love:

  I rifled through the pages, afraid to read them, but desperate to know what they might contain. I wanted to know this man in ways that he didn't yet seem able to tell me. I wanted to help him, but how could I if I didn't know how?

  I scanned the first love letter, confirming at the bottom that it was signed by Aspen's mom. The next few letters talked about how they met while he was playing football and she was a cheerleader, and then later how excited she was when she found out she was pregnant. She loved him desperately.

  And then the focus of her letters turned to her unborn baby. Tears welled in my eyes as she talked about picking out nursery items and practicing baby lullabies on the violin at the window in the new nursery.

  Physical pain clogged my throat like claws, air vacating my lungs as I dropped the letters to the desk, stacking a single book on top so the wind wouldn’t steal them.

  Strings of violin music started in my ears, dancing to the currents of the curtain like they matched invisible harmonies.

  I felt not so alone, even though I knew I was the only human here.

  “Please let him go, whatever hold you have over him after all of these years, it’s killing him…” I dropped to my knees, hands covering my face as a wave of emotion trembled through me. This man had lost so much, everyone had lost so much. “Please, let him go,” I whispered like a prayer, “you have to let him go.”

  The violin notes ended then, the faint notes fading to quiet.

  I stood from the floor, backing out of the room and moving down the stairs. Frustration tunneled through me as I shoved my boots on my feet and threw open the front door. “Maverick Wright, if you don’t grow up, I swear to God you will regret the day you met me!”

  Silence hung heavy, the wind rustling the leaves, before I heard footsteps coming from over my shoulder.

  A shudder of terror crackled through me, awareness that I wasn’t alone crawling up my spine.

  “Regrets.” His voice curled through me. “I have so many.”

  He spun me in his arms, moonlight highlighting all the hard angles of the man that I hated I loved.

  “I hate you, Maverick.”

  “I love you, Petal, I don’t deserve you, but I love you.” He dropped to his knee and pulled a ring from behind his back. “I’ll sign everything I own over to you right now to prove it.” The diamond was big, the facets cutting the moonlight into fractured rainbows as tears pooled into my eyes.

  Trembling, he pushed it over my left finger and then kissed it softly
. He flipped my wrist, swiping the pads of his thumbs along my skin tenderly before kissing up my arm and standing to full height. He pulled me into his arms, cradling me close and holding me so fiercely he nearly stole the air from my lungs.

  “Marry me. Today—tomorrow—I don’t care when. I had to find you the best, I’m sorry I walked out earlier, but I went to ask your dad for your hand, and I needed the best ring I could find to show him I meant it. I’m sorry I left. I had to prove I was worthy of having you.”

  “Maverick Wright,” his name on my lips felt right, felt like home, “I don’t know what to do with you.”

  “Say yes.” He caught my lips with his. “Please say yes.”

  “I love you, I love you, I love you, yes.”

  He swung me then, our lips connected as he hauled me back into the house and laid me down on his couch. He molded us together, his wild outburst of animalistic need matched only by my own need for him in return.

  He was my wild Viking, my barbaric king, my everything.

  “You just made me the happiest man alive, Petal,” Maverick hummed at me. “I feel like I’ve known you for a lifetime and yet we have so much catching up to do.”

  “You’ve got me to yourself for at least the next nine months.”

  Maverick paused, hands suddenly cradling my belly. “How far along are we?”

  “The size of a pea.” I sank my teeth into my lips, watching his tender movements as he touched me.

  “My Sweet Pea and Precious Petal.” He dropped kisses along my stomach, tasting me with the tip of his tongue. “I'll never love anything more.”

  He was kneeling at my feet. One tentative hand reached out and cupped my bare ankle.

  I swallowed and hummed, “Yes...”

  “Hmm, yes what?” he questioned, running his hand up the back of my calf.

  “Yes, please touch me.”

  He groaned, both of his warm palms were on the backs of my calves. He leaned in, pushing his mouth against my core.

  I swallowed a wicked sigh when his hot breath seeped through the fabric and his hands slid up under my panties to cup my ass. I gripped his hair and tugged gently.

  “What do you want? I’ll do anything.” His words were serrated with emotion.

  I didn’t know what to tell him. So I said all I could manage at that moment. “You.”

  The breadth of his palms slid over my panties, his long fingers gripping the edges as he dragged them down. I braced myself as he tugged them to my feet then paused, waiting for me to step out of them. He removed his touch for a moment, and suddenly, I felt alone and naked, even though I was still wearing a shirt.

  “Lift your shirt for me,” he instructed.

  I gripped the hem and pulled it up to my waist and waited. I didn’t have to wait long because he was there immediately as his hands cupped my ass cheeks. His open mouth pressed a hot kiss just above my pelvic bone as I sucked in a deep breath.

  “You are so fucking beautiful, you hurt my eyes.” He smoothed one of his palms over my ass cheek, moving down my left thigh. He bit the skin gently as he moved above the small patch of hair covering my sensitive mound. When his palm reached the back of my knee, he gently tugged it, so I let him raise my leg, placing it over his shoulder.

  Gripping his head, I made sure I was steady on my other foot. I moaned as he dragged his tongue in a hot stroke across my lower abdomen.

  “Oh god,” I sighed, pushing myself against his mouth. He nuzzled his nose against my throbbing center, then inhaled deeply before a loud groan escaped his lips, raising a hand to push a long, thick finger between my swollen wet lips and stroking softly.

  “I want to worship you every day,” he confided as he pushed his finger deeper into my needy body.

  “Yes,” I moaned as I ground myself down on his hand. His wet lips traced a sensuous path across my quivering flesh. Holding on tight, I nearly exploded when his tongue finally reached my swollen clit. He manipulated it, flicking his tongue back and forth over my wet nub. I couldn’t help the way my hips started to thrust against him, almost as though I was fucking his mouth.

  And then I started to beg.

  “Please,” I implored.

  He shifted lower, his wicked hot tongue sliding through my soaked folds. His hands held me in place as he flattened his tongue against my aching skin and licked like I was his favorite dessert. He moved his mouth back to my clit and sucked it between his lips and that was all I needed. I groaned and pulled his hair, releasing in a rush all over his tongue.

  Against my blissfully abused body, he confessed, “I’m yours.”

  EPILOGUE

  Maverick

  “Winchester!” I called as the old hunting dog barreled off into the sunflowers.

  “Winnie!” Storm called out, his tiny toddler voice bringing a smile to my lips like nothing else.

  “You tell him, son.” I patted my boy on the shoulder as he stood, each of us in matching red lace sneakers and linen pants, crisp white button-down shirts flying in the breeze. My boy took the cake for cuteness, the little man-bun Poppy had been wrangling his long waves into capturing everyone's heart he came across.

  “We can start without the dog.” I shrugged at Aspen.

  “Daddy, I wanted to talk to you first—” She hoisted Storm onto her hip. The two of them had a special relationship, more than twenty years apart in age and priceless to each other. “I just wanted to say I’m so happy for you—I know Poppy made you wait for this wedding day—”

  “Three years!”

  “Right, well, I think the timing is perfect, because the man you’ve become is unlike the one I used to know—you’re so happy—it was hard to visit you before, the cloud that hung over your shoulders every day…” Tears were filling her eyes. “I worried so much about you up here all alone.”

  “Aspen…” I pulled her into a hug. Storm wrapped both of his arms around us and went along with it. He was so good–natured, that kid, just like his mom.

  “A family was just what you needed, who knew?” My daughter kissed me on the cheek and then backed away. “Now,” she looked to Storm, “let’s go get your mommy down the aisle.”

  They waved and walked off down the small, freshly mowed aisle of sunflowers. My heart filled as I watch them go. My family. I only had to wait a minute before the strains of a guitar started and Poppy and her dad, Captain O’Henry, came around the pathway and paused at the end of the aisle.

  Poppy stood in a long and flowing white dress, her dad beside her. I never thought I’d see the day when that man walked Poppy down the aisle to me, but here it was. By the time they reached me, Poppy was wiping tears and Storm was standing loyally at her side, one tiny sneaker lace untied and a tiny ring pillow in his hands.

  “I love you,” I whispered when she was close enough to hear. She wiped at her eyes some more, and while she did I caught her dad’s gaze over her shoulder and passed him a wink and a silent thank you.

  After everything.

  Love had thawed decades of hate between us.

  The Captain nodded once and stood to the side, pulling a tissue from his pocket to wipe at his own tears.

  Emotional. Like father, like daughter.

  Storm ran underneath the long train of Poppy’s dress then, curling himself around her leg until Aspen came to the rescue and pried the little guy from her. I whispered a thank you to my eldest daughter, before swiping the rings at the last second, while Storm curled into his sister’s embrace and let her rock him into a sleepy nap.

  We exchanged rings and Poppy and her dad dabbed at more tears as the wind whipped off the bay then, rustling the sunflower petals like the chords of a love song.

  “You chased the storm clouds away.”

  Poppy laughed softly. “You’ve been saying that since Storm was born, but the truth is you chased darkness from my life, Maverick. We’re better together.”

  The officiant of our wedding cleared her throat then, pronouncing us truly married.

  “F
inally!” I scooped my wife in my arms, kissing her until we were breathless.

  “Hurt her feelings and I’ll put an all-points out for you before you can even make it down this ridge.” The Captain glared over Poppy’s shoulder.

  “He won’t ever give me a damn second—”

  “He keeps you on your toes.” Poppy caught my chin, pressing my lips to hers in another long kiss.

  “You make me lose my mind, Petal.”

  “In all the right ways?”

  “In only the right ways.” I kissed her again, unable to keep my lips off of her.

  “Good, I plan on keeping you on your toes,” she whispered in that way that made me want to whisk her away to our bedroom and never come out again.

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way.” I took that moment to unveil my surprise. A long, thin velvet-wrapped box.

  Her eyes widened, and then her mouth fell open when I opened it. A diamond tennis bracelet shimmered in the orange sunset. I pulled it from its pillow and wrapped it around her wrist, clasping it and then pressing a kiss at the lock.

  “I had the jeweler make this.” I fingered the bracelet as I spoke. “If you look closely the diamonds are designed in the pattern of flower petals and thorns, and the lock is a dove in flight. You are my Petal, and no matter how hard I try I’ll always be the thorn in your side.” She smiled as tears welled in her eyes. “And the bird is our boy—Storm chased away the clouds I carried for too long. I’m so thankful for both of you.”

  Poppy wiped at her eyes, linking our fingers together and walking down the path that led to the overlook where so many of the tumultuous moments of our relationship had happened. “You’re dramatic, Maverick Wright, wild and untamable. A total caveman sometimes, but you’re always so strong and capable and good at taking care of us. I love you bigger than I can show you and so much more than I can say. Thank you for being mine, for being ours.”

  Emotion welled at my eyes then. I wiped it away and pulled her into my arms. “Thank you for bringing the flowers back that night we first met—” I began to rock us back and forth as the sun set over the bay. “I hate to think where I’d be if you hadn’t.”