by JA Huss
I lower my head so I can make a face about the gross nuggets and not be seen. Fucking Asher. That was not some special request.
“And I had them put special sheets on your bed. Nothing but eight hundred percale for my wife.”
Oh, God. My hand involuntarily reaches down to scratch my leg. The sheets are threadbare, which makes you think they’d be soft, but they’re not. They have all those little pebbles on them. They’re terrible.
“And I even requested the Mercedes of wheelchairs. I stood in line all night in the supply room to get this baby.”
I have to turn to see what he’s talking about. There’s a nondescript folded-up wheelchair in his hands. He flops it open and waves his hand over it.
“Your chariot is here.” And then he winks at me. “OK, fuck them, huh? You don’t need to say shit, right?” He wheels it over to me and parks it parallel to my bed so I can ease into it. “But sweets…” He leans down to whisper in my ear and I get that familiar tingle, a chill of excitement that races down my spine from the tickle of his breath. “You’d make me so happy if you’d say something.” His fingertips reach under my chin and gently lift my head. “Anything.”
I look him in the eyes for the first time since I woke up from surgery. He looks tired. And sad. He’s smiling. Every time he comes in here, he’s smiling. He’s putting on a front though, I can tell. I feel like I know him better than anyone in my whole life. Even though we’ve only known each other a few weeks, I feel… connected to him. And I realize that I don’t want to push him away. I don’t want to be alone and silent. I can’t go through that again. I can’t
So I speak.
“OK,” I croak out. My voice cracks a little and Vaughn rushes to offer me a cup of water off the bedside table. I take a sip and try again. “OK.” It’s just two letters. Hardly my best work—not even one hashtag—but definitely my most pithy when it comes to getting Vaughn Asher’s attention.
His face lights up immediately and that makes my stomach flutter. He’s in like with me. And I’m in like with him. We’re married. He is, in fact, my husband.
“What kind of fairytale is this?” I say it out loud, but I really didn’t mean to.
“It’s real, sweets,” he says back, as he plants a kiss on my cheek. “It’s real. Now tell me how to make you happy right now.”
I drop my head and cry. I hate to cry. Crying is the weakest thing in the world because it does nothing except make you feel worse.
Vaughn sits down on the bed next to me and I hear the click, click, click of the doctor’s shoes as she exits the room.
“Grace,” he says as he pulls me into an embrace. “You can tell me anything. I’m your own personal secret-keeper. Nothing you tell me can hurt you.”
“I’m sad,” I whisper, trying to pull myself together.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry he took you and my security wasn’t good enough—”
“No,” I cut him off. “That’s not why.” I look up at the great Vaughn Asher. His eyes are glassy and his smile is gone. “I’m sad about…” But I can’t say it. It wasn’t even a baby. The nurses all told me that when they came in that first night. Not even a baby. Just an empty sac of nothing.
So why do I feel like crying just thinking about it?
“You know what I’m sad about?” he asks as he lays me back on the bed and then joins me.
“What?” I turn to look at him and the tears stream down my cheeks. I bite my lip to stop the sobs, but they break through anyway. “What?” I ask again, because he looks shell-shocked.
He manages a tight smile and then blinks a few times. “I’m sad…” He stops to take a deep breath. “I’m sad that I imagined a whole life with you and that life included a baby. I mean, back before they told me it wasn’t going to be. I imagined the doctor visits. The shopping. You slapping me and cursing my name during natural childbirth.” I laugh at that and he smiles. “Just kidding. I’d never be able to watch you in pain. So good God, please. Take the drugs when they ask you, OK?”
“When they ask me?”
“Yeah, sweets. When. There’s babies in our future, Mrs. Invisible Man. Lots of them. We just got married. We’re just hitting our stride. Bad things have happened over the last few weeks. But the good things will outweigh them soon enough. So don’t be too sad, Grace. Don’t let the sad take over your life or make you afraid. Don’t let it stop the words.” I look up at him and I know he’s been talking to Bebe or my parents. They must’ve told him how I clammed up last time. “Don’t let those bad things steal away your future. Or make you hide behind a Twitter handle. Or force you into a fantasy life because reality sucks. Because I’m gonna be here with you. From now on, when life comes at us, we’re gonna fight it back together. We’re gonna grab it by the horns and ride the fuck out of it. So please, Grace. Please. I’m begging you. Don’t be afraid. And don’t be too sad.”
I lean up and kiss him. His hand cups my face and pulls me close. This is the first kiss we’ve had in forever and it feels different somehow. It feels special. Passionate. Real. “Please take me home, Asher.”
He smiles at my use of his last name. It’s not an insult. It’s… familiar. When I look closely, I can see the tears in his eyes. “Where’s home, Grace? Just tell me where home is and I’ll take you there.”
“Home is…” I look up at Vaughn. He’s not the man I dreamed about. He’s disappointed me plenty of times. He’s as far away from my imaginary prince in the Land of Far, Far Away as they come.
But I’m not complaining. Because he’s better. He’s better than anything I could ever have hoped for. He’s romantic and tender. Commanding and kind. He’s protective and loving and generous and… mine.
He’s all mine.
“With you,” I tell him. “As long as I’m with you, I’m home.”
Chapter Eighty-Seven - Vaughn
#Just #What #The #Fuck
I CLOSE the limo door after helping Grace get in the back seat and walk around to my side. My phone buzzes in my pants and I grab it from my pocket, thumbing the accept tab as I bring it to my ear. “Yes.”
“Vaughn Asher?”
I stop walking. “Who is this?”
“Is this Mr. Asher? Because what I have to say can only be said to him.”
“Who. Is. This?”
The woman on the other end of the phone huffs out a breath of air. “Carey Keefe. And I’m going to assume you are, in fact, Mr. Asher?”
Keefe? Why does that sound so familiar?
“I’m the editor-in-chief at Buzz Hollywood?”
Oh, fuck.
“You still there, Mr. Asher?”
“I don’t have time for this, so what do you want?”
“You do have time for this, Mr. Asher. Take my word on that. Because I’ve got pictures of you here on my desk. Actually, pictures of your wife, as well. Pictures my head gossip reporter got off Twitter.”
Fuck again. “I’m going to ask you once more, and then I’m hanging up. What do you want?”
I can almost hear the smile on the other end of the phone. “No denial, huh?”
“What’s to deny? You say you have pictures. Three seconds and you get the beeps.”
“OK, wait. I’m wavering between allowing my reporter to publish these and making her bury the story. In fact, we had a huge fight over it. She really has it in for you.”
“What’s new? That bitch has been after me for years.”
“Right. I’ve noticed that it seems a little… how should I say it… personal with her? Do you know each other?”
Do I know her? I ponder this question for a moment and then Grace knocks on the back window and silently asks me if everything is OK from inside the car.
“I just don’t have time right now.”
“Mr. Asher, if I don’t get the story behind this, I’m going to let my reporter go to print with whatever she wants. And believe me, this spreadeagle selfie of your wife is not even news-worthy compared to what she’s got on you. So I�
��ll give you twenty-four hours to get your poor wife settled back home. And then I need a phone call and a personal meeting. Twenty-four hours.”
She gives me the three beeps.
I let out a long breath of air and continue my walk around the car. I open the door and slide in next to Grace with a huge smile.
I’m an actor. It’s what I do.
“Everything OK?” Grace asks.
“Perfect, sweets.” I lean over and kiss her, then drag her up to my chest until she scoots down to lay her head in my lap. “Perfect.” I play with her hair as we make the trip south to the airport where the jet is, and by the time we get there, she’s asleep again.
I carry her to the plane, set her down gently on one of the couches, and then help myself to a beverage as the pilot performs the pre-flight check.
Do I know her, Keefe asked.
Fuck, I wish I could forget her.
I’d do anything to fucking forget that night.
Chapter Eighty-Eight - Grace
#TakeThePlunge
THREE days in the hospital. Three hours on the plane. And with LA traffic, three hours to get back to Vaughn’s house in the hills.
Three is my unlucky number.
The limo pulls into the driveway and comes to a stop at an angle, trying to cut the distance from the car to the front door. But it doesn’t matter. Standing makes me dizzy. Walking is out of the question. I have to wait for Vaughn and the driver to get the wheelchair out of the trunk.
“Here, sweets,” Vaughn says as he positions the chair up to the car.
“I hate this.”
“I know, baby. Later you can try to put some pressure on it. There’s no broken bones, so it’s just a matter of good old-fashioned healing.”
But I don’t want to try to walk, either. I stepped on it accidentally when I got in the chair earlier and the pain was sharp and immediate. “I don’t want to,” I say.
Vaughn ignores me. I’ve been doing nothing but bitching since I started talking earlier today and I’m sure everyone around me is wishing I’d go back to my self-imposed silence.
I scoot myself to the edge of the car, then brace all my weight on my good leg and flop down in the wheelchair.
“See,” Vaughn says cheerfully. “Not so bad.”
Not so bad if you’re the one pushing. There are only three steps leading up to the front porch of the rambling one-story house, but even so, the effort required to get me up those three steps makes me want to curl up in a corner and die.
I’m so high-maintenance.
“Where to first, huh? Movie room? You can relax on the couch and I’ll wait on you. Delivery service is complimentary.”
He’s still smiling when I look up at him but it falters. That makes me feel bad. “Bed,” I say. “I’m so tired.” It’s not a lie, but I was tired on the plane too. And on the way home. In fact, tired is starting to be my new favorite phrase, because when you’re injured and you say you’re tired, people say you need to get some rest. And that means they leave you alone.
“You just woke up, Grace. You’re not going back to sleep. In fact, let’s go outside. How about a trip down the lazy river?”
“Hmmm.”
He chuckles as he pushes me through the messy living room where Felicity has hoodies and shoes lying all over the place, and then stops at the wall of glass that leads out to the pool area. The doors are swept open and the heat rolls over me like a blanket.
Yeah. Maybe that feels good.
“Put your arms around me, Grace. And hold tight.”
I do as I’m told and he lifts me out of the chair and cradles me in his arms as he walks over to the little foliage-covered archway that leads to the part of the backyard where the lazy river is. He turns sideways so we can fit through and then stands on the edge of the plunge pool. The lazy river is only about four and a half feet deep, but the plunge pool is exactly what it sounds like. A place to drop straight in, kick off, and shoot back up. “Trust me?”
I tilt my head up as my heart races. “It might—”
“Do you trust me, Grace? Never mind the rest.”
I look him in the eye as I nod. “Yes.”
He squeezes me harder and then steps off the edge.
We drop together. My mouth opens to scream, but then the cold water rushes in and shocks me silent. We drop swiftly. My wound stings from the impact or the chlorine or both and I’m just about to start flailing in protest when the soothing coolness takes over. Vaughn’s feet touch bottom and there’s a moment where we feel weightless. His knees bend and he laughs underwater. His joy fills my heart as we spring up and burst through the water.
We bob there. Vaughn’s feet are treading water trying to keep us afloat, and I start to wiggle again.
“Shhh,” he chastises me with a whisper in my ear. “Be still, sweets. I’ve got you. Relax. I will never let anything happen to you again. Never.”
I spit some water out of my mouth and do as I’m told for once. I relax. I rest my head against his chest and the second I do that, the arm supporting the weight of my legs drops away and they float downward. He adjusts me, slipping his hands under my ass so he can pull me close.
I adjust as well, wrapping my arms around his neck and resting my head on his shoulder. “I love you,” I say.
He squeezes me hard and places his mouth against my ear. “It’s about time you remembered, sweets.”
“I’ve loved you for years.”
“But that was the fantasy me. The good guy. This is the reality me.”
“Still a good guy,” I cut him off before he can say the rest. “You’re my prince. Thank you for coming to find me.”
He holds me one-handed now so he can swim us a few feet over to the edge of the pool where the steps are, and then sits down so we’re still immersed in water. “I was too late.”
“It was the perfect time.”
“You could’ve been killed.”
“Yeah,” I say softly. “I could’ve. But I think there was more of a chance of me getting killed if you showed up sooner. It happened the way it did because…”
He turns me around in his lap. My leg feels weightless in the water. I’m not in pain. The cold rush is still there, numbing it. Soothing it. “Because why, Grace?” He looks me in the eyes for that question and I know one thing about us right now.
Things have changed.
Yes, we’re married and there’s a whole lot of new things that come with that territory. But his expectations of me have changed as well.
He expects the truth.
“Tell me why it needed to happen that way.”
I know why, but it’s private stuff I’ve been holding in for a decade.
“Just say it, sweets. It’s only a few words. And once you say it, you can accept it. And once you accept it, we can move forward.”
I take in a deep breath. “Because…” This is therapy stuff. I know that. It’s a trick. That thought almost makes me laugh. It’s not a trick, Grace. It’s a technique to wrap your head around things. “Because… I needed to save myself.”
He hugs me so tight I think I might suffocate. “Yes,” he whispers in my ear. “That’s it. That’s all you need to say about it.”
“Why am I not affected by this, Vaughn? Why doesn’t it bother me that three days ago I shot a man? I killed a man. I think that makes me sick. I’m a sick, sick person.”
“That doesn’t make you sick, Grace. That makes you strong.” He kisses me again and then stands up and walks out of the plunge pool. My body gets heavy and I immediately want nothing more than to get back in the water and hide underneath its soothing surface.
Vaughn walks us over to the edge of the river, grabbing a towel from the little cabana as he goes. He tosses it down on the concrete edge and then places me on top of it. My leg hurts a little now and my clothes are sticking to me. “Lift up your arms.”
I do as I’m told and he peels off the man-sized white t-shirt. My nipples are erect and hard, my breasts f
irm and taut. I look up at my husband and he’s shirtless too. I watch his fingers as he unbuttons his jeans, kicks off his shoes, and then drops his pants. It takes both hands to get the heavy wet denim to cooperate and when he’s finally standing there naked, he puts his arms out and says, “This is me.”
And then he reaches down for my hand, like he wants to pull me to my feet. I hesitate because of the pain it will take to stand up. But then I decide to trust him and place my hand in his.
He pulls me up and I manage to keep the weight off my bad leg and just balance on the good one. Vaughn holds me steady for a second, and then he takes my hand and places it on his thickly muscled bicep. “Hold tight,” he says.
I do.
And then his fingers unbutton my shorts and he tugs on them for several seconds, rocking the sopping wet fabric over my hips until they plop to the ground.
He steps back a little and I let go of his arm.
I put my arms out like he did and say, “This is me.”
I’m pulled back into an embrace and I notice everything about this moment.
The sun is warm. The wind floats past my wet body, making it cool. There’s a bird singing a sweet song on a branch above our heads.
His heart beats fast. Mine beats faster.
His lips touch my ear so softly I shudder.
“This,” he says, “is us.”
Chapter Eighty-Nine - Vaughn
#MyVersion
“I KNOW you don’t remember the wedding, Grace. But it was pretty special.”
“How special could it have been?” she murmurs against my chest. “We were drunk.”
“We weren’t that drunk, I swear.” I scoop her up in my arms. She draws in a breath and I know the leg is bothering her, so I lean down and kiss her head. “Let me tell you all about it. How’s that? Do you want to hear what happened?”
