Happiness and relief like I’d never known before rendered me completely speechless for once in my miserable life. All that came out was a laugh, and then I swept her into my arms for a sultry kiss.
One more chance, Ben. Don’t fuck it up.
Chapter 39
TORI
Being with Ben had never felt so good. After that kiss in the kitchen, my knees had gone weak and I’d pulled him into my bedroom by a fistful of his shirt.
Kari would be home soon enough, but I didn’t even care if she heard us. It wasn’t like she was some blushing virgin who would never recover from the knowledge that her sister was making love to a man in her own bed.
In fact, if I knew my sister, and I was pretty sure I did, she’d be waiting with energy drinks and snacks afterward. Especially since I now knew she’d been rooting for Ben. He had no idea how lucky he was to have her in his corner.
Without that little chat we’d had before he’d arrived, I wasn’t convinced that I’d have given him a chance to explain. It helped to get someone else’s perspective on things sometimes, and getting Kari’s was just what I’d needed.
I’d have to remember to get her a massive thank-you present. If she hadn’t told me what she had when she had, I might not have the man I was starting to realize I might love after all back in my arms.
Undressing him was an experience I took the time to savor. Despite the urgency in my body and the ache between my legs, there was no rush.
After he kicked the door shut behind us, I slowed our kiss until it ended, then lingered with my lips only fractions of an inch away from his for a few seconds. Starting with his jacket, I pushed my hands underneath it where it hung open from his shoulders and slid it down his arms.
Neither of us made any attempt to catch it or stop it from hitting my floor with a soft thud. His lids were heavy as he watched my every move, but he seemed to understand what I was doing and was happy to let it happen.
The only thing he did was to kick off his sneakers while I hooked my fingers into his belt and loosened the buckle. A quiet clink of metal and the sudden give in the leather told me I’d gotten it free, even as my gaze was locked on his.
He sucked in a deep breath when the backs of my fingers made contact with the skin beneath his waistband, but he still made no move to hurry me up. When I felt the disk of his button, I managed to get it undone without any embarrassing fumbles or pinching him accidentally.
Focusing my attention on his shirt next, I lifted it to expose his deliciously toned abs and wordlessly accepted his help when he pulled it off over his head. Those tattoos of his still intrigued me, and I ran my fingers gently over the cross on his ribs.
“Do these mean anything?” I whispered into the silence of my room.
Ambient noises could be heard from the street below, but it felt like we were in our own little bubble in here. He smiled, but his heart pounding under my hand when I rested it on his chest gave him away.
“Some of them do. The others I only got because I liked the look of them. None of them mean nearly as much as the one I’m getting tomorrow, though.”
“You’re getting another one tomorrow?” I asked, frowning slightly.
“Yep.” He smirked. “I made the appointment on my way over here. I figured it was time to get one that meant something to me personally. The others that actually mean something are all about professional failures and successes.”
“What are you getting tomorrow?”
“Your name on my dick,” he said, then laughed at whatever look of horror I must’ve given him. “Joking, baby. I’m getting today’s date on my wrist. Just the numbers, but it’s the only one that will be somewhere visible in everyday life.”
“Why today’s date?”
He lifted one shoulder, snaking his arms around me before kissing each of my eyelids and smiling down at me. “Because one way or another, I knew today was going to be a fresh start for me. Obviously, I was hoping it’d be the day you gave me one last chance and that said chance will end with you as my wife, but if you didn’t, it would forever be a reminder of the day I lost the love of my life. I wanted the reminder so that every time I saw it or someone asked about it, I would remember why I was trying to become a better man.”
“You sure do know the right things to say to melt a girl’s heart, don’t you?”
The corners of his mouth pressed in, and he gave his head a quick shake. “Not just any girl. My girl. Yours is the only heart I care about.”
“Holy hell, I swear you’re going to get me pregnant just by talking like that if you don’t shut up soon.”
A strange excitement illuminated his eyes. “Really? I think I’ll just keep talking then.”
“Whoa, you need to slow down there, mister. You’ve already talked about rings and proposing today. Are you sure you want to add children to the mix too?”
“More than anything,” he breathed before kissing me but kept talking just like he’d said he was going to. “When the time is right, I want everything with you, Tori. I’d take you down to city hall and marry you right now if that was what you wanted, but I’m also willing to wait as long as it takes for you to want the same things I do.”
“I do want the same things you do, but you need to know it’s going to take me some time to process all this. I need to learn to trust you, and I don’t want to rush into anything.”
“Take all the time you need, baby. I meant it when I said I would work every day to make things right between us. There’s no rush. Not ever.”
When he kissed me again, it was softer but deeper. Not just physically deeper but emotionally too. It was like I could feel him pouring everything he felt into me. Like he was giving me his heart for safekeeping.
I couldn’t do the same thing because he was already in possession of mine. As much as I’d fought it, as much as I’d tried to tell myself it hadn’t or wouldn’t happen, I’d fallen for him too. I couldn’t even pinpoint exactly when it had happened, but the way I’d felt while he’d been explaining things had let me know that it absolutely had.
This man in front of me had given me every reason to hate him, but that wasn’t what I felt for him at all. Because he’d also given me a lot of reasons to go the other way. Everything I’d thought the other night had turned out to be true after all, and that brief but painful interlude with his ex hadn’t been anything more than what Kari had immediately identified it as.
A lie.
It wasn’t his fault she’d turned up when she had, and it wasn’t his fault I’d run out without thinking it through. If I had, I might not have left at all. I could’ve believed in him and in that certainty I’d felt about us a little more instead of tucking and running because of my insecurities.
I really just hadn’t had any fight left in me though, but luckily, he’d had enough fight left in him for the both of us. As much as I prided myself on being able to fight my own battles, it was really nice to know I didn’t always have to be the only one fighting.
Ben groaned into my mouth, bringing me out of my awed reverie when I thought of all we’d been through to get to where we were.
With a light tug of my fingers on his zipper, his pants fell to the floor. His underwear followed soon after, and then he was naked and gorgeous as hell, taking his time to undress me just like I’d done with him.
Since I was wearing no underwear beneath my old pajamas, it didn’t take him very long once the robe came off. He struggled with the knot for a few seconds but it finally came loose and was off in the same heartbeat.
Groaning again when he found me bare and wet when my pajama pants came off, he knelt down and breathed in before sending me flying to the heavens above with his mouth on me. We didn’t speak much after that, using our bodies to do the talking for us.
Ben was covered in a light sheen of sweat as he moved above me and then underneath me, refusing to give in until he’d reduced me to a puddle of post-orgasmic goo. When he finally allowed himself to find his own re
lease, it was with my name on his lips and his handsome face contorting in the sexiest expression known to womankind.
Snuggling into his arms after, I closed my eyes and smiled against his warm skin. “Would you ever have guessed we’d end up here when you were firing me?”
A soft laugh came out of him, and I felt the pillow moving against the top of my head when he shook his. “The interview actually wasn’t the first time I saw you. A few days before, Carl and I were having lunch at the restaurant where Kari works. I spotted you, and I couldn’t tear my eyes away from you. I sent you a ridiculously expensive dessert, but obviously, that didn’t get me very far.”
My eyes flew open, widening when I thought back to that day. “That was you? Oh God. I blamed it on Eliot. No wonder he was so confused.”
“I didn’t realize sending a dessert to a woman was something to be blamed for,” he said jokingly. “For what that thing costs, it should bring you your slippers in the morning. I really thought the least you’d do was come over to thank me.”
I burrowed deeper into his side but still sent him a playful glare before letting my eyelids flutter closed again. “Have you always been so insufferable and overbearing with women?”
“I’m only insufferable to you.”
Smiling as I draped my arm over his abdomen, I tried to wrap my head around the fact that this was really happening. Again. “Well, I suppose at least that means I’m special.”
He slid a finger between us and under my chin, lifting it before pressing a long kiss to my lips. “You’re the most special thing in my universe, baby. Believe it or not, you mean more to me than my company or my money, and those are the only two things that’ve meant anything to me for a long time. I love you, Victoria Mitchell.”
My smile widened, and a warm feeling swelled in my chest before it crashed over me like a gentle wave. I’d never felt anything like it before, but I knew what it was. I’d realized how I felt about him, but this was the first time I felt it all the way down to my soul.
It was an incredible feeling, more especially so because I could share it with him in that very moment. “I love you too, Benjamin Reed. From the way you came into my life, I never would’ve thought that I’d fall for someone like you. I just hope you’re ready for me to love you because I know now that while you can be a huge jerk at times, you’ve got a heart deep down inside. I’m going to remind you about it all the time.”
“You’re my heart,” he murmured against my lips, his eyes burning gold and blue in the early afternoon sun filtering in through my windows. “I’m happy to start showing it off more. Remind me of that as often as you’d like.”
I kissed him again, feeling happier than ever. As I kissed him, I felt hope igniting in my veins for our future together. If there was one thing I’d learned about us, it was that whatever happened, we’d face it together. We’d found our way back together no matter what so far, and now that everything was finally out in the open, there was no doubt in my mind that we’d stay together from here on out.
Epilogue
BEN
ONE YEAR LATER
I stared at the balance sheet open on my computer, shaking my head as I smiled to myself. When Tori was right, she was very fucking right.
Prosper Insurance had managed to show a greater profit than I’d expected, beating my projections from even before I’d fired such a large chunk of the workforce. Despite the cost of hiring everyone back, we’d beat even the highest estimates to become twenty-five percent more prosperous.
It was unbelievable, but then again, so was the woman spearheading operations over there. After a crash course with Carl and some mentoring from both of us, Tori had taken over as the COO of Prosper.
Bruce, her former boss, was one of the only people I hadn’t hired back. It hadn’t been because I was simply giving the position to Tori. We tried negotiating with him at the time, but he refused to come back on the conditions we’d given him.
Part of those conditions was that he would be obligated to attend several training sessions to update his skills and that he’d have to sign the Reed Global Code of Conduct. It was a lot stricter than what Prosper had put in place all those years ago, especially in terms of the way our teams worked together.
The behavior I expected of the people managing others was nothing more onerous than any other reasonably progressive company, but Bruce couldn’t agree to it. He claimed it was new-agey, Kumbaya bullshit that wouldn’t work. According to him, underlings and more particularly women, needed a firmer hand to get the job done.
Obviously, I hadn’t agreed with his assessment that women couldn’t be trusted to get their jobs done without a big, patronizing man behind them. Carl and I had terminated our negotiations with him immediately, and Carl’s team had managed just fine with Tori on the ground at the company.
Even while she was learning from Carl, she’d taken the initiative to help motivate the employees and steer the ship. They trusted and respected her, and it showed. To be fair, they had reason to trust her.
Almost as soon as she’d taken the reins, she’d come up with ideas about flexible work options and employee investment that had led to a major boost in productivity. Now I was staring at the proof that her idea from the interview had been right. She’d more than proven me wrong, and I couldn’t have been any prouder.
The last year had been a whirlwind, but it was also the happiest and best one I’d ever had. After Nic’s little stunt with the ring, she’d come sniffing around a few more times. My security followed my orders, and she’d never gotten onto the premises again.
When the judge finally ruled against her, Nic had gone off the rails right there in the courtroom. First, she’d accused me of having the judge in my pocket. Unfortunately for her, she’d started slinging the accusations before the judge had even left the court, and to say that she’d taken serious exception to the unfounded allegations was an understatement.
As it always seemed to go with Nic, though, she hadn’t stopped there. She’d launched herself at me next, right in front of the judge, bailiff, and some members of the public who’d been present waiting for their own cases to be called.
Screaming like a banshee about how I was leaving her supposedly penniless, she’d tried to take a swipe at me with her nails. When I ducked her attempted blows, she’d literally thrown herself on top of me and tried to kiss me.
Thankfully, Tori had come to support me in court and had seen the whole thing go down. Otherwise, I might’ve lost her when I tried to explain the lipstick all over my face and the torn buttons on my shirt.
It had all happened so fast that it was only after all that when our lawyers and even the court personnel finally stepped in. The bailiff arrested her on the spot.
Things happened fast after they hauled her off to the cells. As part of a settlement negotiated with my lawyers, I agreed not to press charges if she agreed to stay a thousand yards away from me at all times. It was reasonable under the circumstances, and so far, she was keeping up her end of the bargain.
I wasn’t delusional enough to believe it meant she’d never come after me legally again, but my team had assured me that she didn’t have any cards left to play. The divorce was final, the pre-nup stood, and unless she could find something other than our former marriage to base a claim on, she was dead in the water.
In the meantime, I’d made the best of the calm in my life and had finally gotten to replace that ring Nic had taken from me. As I thought about the monster of a rock that had taken up permanent residence on Tori’s finger several months ago, a knock at my office door interrupted me.
Carl stuck his head in, grinning as widely as I’d ever seen from him. “I have a little surprise for you, and we figured the best way to announce it would be in a way you would understand.”
Frowning as I wondered what he had up his sleeve now and who “we” were, I heard a sudden burst of music from the hall. Carl retreated and Tori came dancing in. The love of my life was dressed in a
skin-tight outfit the likes of which I hadn’t seen in over a year since she’d stopped candy dancing.
My pants instantly fit a lot more snugly than they had just a minute ago, my cock straining against the zipper. It took me a moment to realize she was dressed all in light blue and that her belly seemed to be a bit rounder and more pronounced than usual.
The song she was dancing to was familiar as well, the word “baby” emphasized over and over again. As she sashayed toward me, she suddenly brought her hands out from where they’d been behind her back, producing a cigar box in a fancy blue bow.
My mouth dried up, and it wasn’t just because of her dancing. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from her, but I also didn’t even bother trying to. Eyes tracking her movements as she smiled coyly and handed over the box, I opened it to find the cigars wrapped in blue paper that said, “It’s a Boy!”
So shocked that I dropped the box and sent cigars rolling all over the carpet, I ignored them and jumped to my feet. Tori laughed when I picked her up, swinging her around and staring into her lilac eyes with absolute awe and wonder.
“I’m going to be a father?”
She nodded, looping her arms around my neck and practically beaming at me. “I told you I was going to end up pregnant if you kept talking that way.”
“I can’t believe this,” I breathed against her lips before kissing her mouth, her eyes, her nose, and her jaw. “You’ve made me the happiest man on the face of this planet.”
A sudden round of applause drew my attention to Carl, who must’ve come back in after stepping aside for her to enter. He grinned and whooped, coming over to shake my hand. My brain felt hazy, and I moved like I was in a dream.
“Congratulations,” he said. “I’ll leave you two alone to talk. Also, don’t worry about anything. I’ve already had the rest of your afternoon and tomorrow cleared.”
Love Your Moves: A Billionaire Valentine's Romantic Comedy Page 24
