My mother gasps and my father mumbles something under his breath, before Jared sets me down on the floor and my parents give us their congratulations. We tell them our plans of getting married today and after their initial shock, my mother starts immediately throwing a few plans together.
We never do get to go to bed, and by breakfast we have a wedding planned and a hotel booked for our honeymoon night.
My father ran out to get bagels earlier, so we're all eating quickly before getting ready for the big day.
Apparently this is the last time I am allowed to see Jared before the wedding, so my parents and sister give us a few minutes in the kitchen alone. Jared's leaning against the counter top and I walk over to him and hug him tightly. I haven’t had any time to be nervous, but if I were nervous, Jared's arms would ease any fear I have.
"I love you, Billy. I will love you for the rest of my life."
"I love you, too."
★★★
The wedding is a quick ceremony, given by the justice of peace at the courthouse. My parents, Winnie, Scott, the rest of Jared's brothers, Jared's sister-in-law, Angela, his parents, Kelly, and Tawny are all in attendance. It's not the type of ceremony little girls dream of, but it's perfect for us.
I wear a simple white dress Tawny produced out of nowhere. It's beautiful and fits perfectly so I don’t even ask her where she found it. Sometimes it's better not to know. Jared wears a black suit, no tie and his collar undone. His hair is still buzzed close to his head; both of us really love the shaved look.
The one thing that made our wedding perfect was our vows. Neither of us had time to write them so it came from the heart, and what we were feeling in that moment.
"Autumn, I vow to love you and cherish you forever. Not just in this life, but in the afterlife, too. I'll follow you anywhere and worship you for the goddess you are. You've completely changed my outlook on life and made it better. You've given me things, shown me love I never imagined someone could feel for me. You love me unconditionally, through the good and the bad, and I love you just the same.
"I promise to let you win all of our fights, even if it kills me inside because I'm right. I promise to never go to bed angry with you, I'm willing and selfless enough to have wild make up sex with you to accomplish this."
I laugh at him as a tear slides down my cheek.
"I promise to let you have the last slice of pizza, to leave the toilet seat down, to consult you in all decisions regarding the two of us, and to stay faithful to you. I know you wonder how I can give up the lifestyle I loved so much, but you don't see yourself the way I do. I met you and you flipped my world upside down. You made me see all the things I wanted for my future, and the best part is you had no idea you changed me.
"I look at you and everything suddenly feels right. Just your presence comforts me. Just your touch can ignite a flame inside me, and only your love can heal the fire. I'll never want another woman again, because you're my other half, my soul, and I promise to continue to show you that for the rest of my life. I want you to never doubt my love for you because no one has ever loved a woman as much as I love you. I love you, Autumn Idol Adams."
"I love you, too," I whisper, sobbing happy tears.
"Jared, from the moment I met you I felt an instant attraction. I was drawn to you and I couldn't control it. It wasn't just your looks, it was an internal chemistry drawing me to you. You've shown me so much kindness and love since that first night I walked into your house, and I hope to make you feel the same way.
"I vow to love and cherish you, too. I'd go anywhere with you, for you, and because of you. You've been my rock, my solace, and my best friend. I guess that's the real trick, that's what makes me a winner, because I get to marry my best friend. My love for you is all consuming. If you only knew the depths of how I feel about you, or how much I think about you, it might just scare you off. I'm so in love with you and I don't ever see that changing.
"You're right, I don't know why you picked me, but I'll be forever grateful you did. You changed my life for the better and opened my eyes to what love really is.
"I promise to love you, consult in you, fight with you, make love to you, respect you, and share my day with you. I promise to be your rock, your shoulder to lean on, and continue to be your best friend. In good times and in bad, I will always be there for you, Jared. You're my world, and I promise to make you feel that for the rest of our lives. Eternity isn't a long enough time to spend with you, but I guess it will have to do. I love you, Jared Stanley Reynolds."
Jared leans in until his lips are at my ear, "You want to be mine forever?"
I move to look up at his sparkling gray eyes and smile at him before whispering, "I'm already yours forever, just now it's official."
This is our small private moment, the one thing our families can't hear and I love that we got to share something between just the two of us.
When the ceremony is over we have dinner with everyone in attendance at an Italian restaurant before parting ways. We drive to The Four Seasons where Jared rented the honeymoon suite. We take the elevator up to our room. The smile on my face has been there since we said our vows. I've never been happier in my entire life. Jared's my husband and best friend. All those other girls may be able to lust after him for the rest of their lives, thanks to the power of the internet, but I get the real thing.
Strawberries and Champagne are waiting for us in the room, but we can get to that later. Right now I need my man.
"Come here, Mr. Reynolds."
"Yes, Mrs. Reynolds."
He walks to me and kisses me adoringly on my lips.
"So, will I be referred to as Mrs. Boner when we're in public," I mumble against his lips.
Jared chuckles and pulls away, "The only way the word boner and you will be used in a sentence, is if I'm the one saying it to you."
He pulls his suit jacket off and starts to unbutton his dress shirt, "I got a wedding gift for you."
I look up at him, excited. "You did? What did you get me?"
He pulls off his dress shirt and then pulls the white undershirt off that was underneath his clothing, revealing his amazing tattooed chest.
"I had a few hours to kill while you got ready, and I've actually had this planned for a while," he says, pulling me into the bedroom of our hotel suite. He turns me around and slowly unzips my dress, lifting it up and over my head. I turn and face him and his eyes practically bug out of their sockets.
I'm wearing a white corset, matching panties, and thigh highs attached to a garter belt. "Is this my wedding gift?"
"Yes, do you like it?"
"I love it," he says huskily, before devouring my mouth with his. I push against him, breaking the kiss. I'm just as eager as he is to start our wedding night, but I want to see what his gift is to me.
"You can have my gift as soon as you show me yours."
"Oh, I'll show you mine," he says suggestively and starts to unbuckle his belt.
"You know what I mean."
"Okay, okay... but as soon as I show you, I'm spreading you wide and tasting my gift."
"I can't wait." I can feel myself getting wet just talking about it.
"Like I was saying earlier, I had a few hours to kill so I called up my buddy, the one who's given me most of my tats, and told him I needed one as soon as possible. He came by and did me up and it's my favorite tat to date."
I look over his body, but I don't see any bandage. "Where's your bandage?"
"I'm not ever covering this tat up unless it's with clothing. So, babe, come and find it."
I walk over and search his body for new ink. His arms look the same, I walk around to his back, but I see no new ink. I make my way back to his stomach and chest and gasp when I see his new tattoo. The tattoo artist has somehow mended his broken heart tattoo, and in the middle of it are the words "Autumn's Bitch".
I laugh and look up into his smoldering gray eyes, "I believe the original said 'Billy's Bitch'."
"You got to tweak yours, so I tweaked mine."
"I love it," I bring my hand out to delicately trace over the script on his chest. "I love you."
"I love you, too."
We make love several times that night, careful of Jared's new tattoo. Jared falls asleep before me and I just stare down at him for several minutes, in awe of my life. I feel like the luckiest person on the planet. I've found my soul mate, my sexual and spiritual counterpart. It doesn't matter how we got here just as long as we get to stay this happy forever.
As I watch my husband sleep peacefully, his chest moving up and down from each breath, I know I will stand by him for the rest of our lives, support him in every endeavor. He's my heart and I'll love him forever.
The End
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Chapter One
Dibs
“I’m going to leave now,” I yell from the front door of my parent’s home.
It’s Friday morning and I’ve been in my parent’s home for two days. I came home to visit my mother for her birthday. I don’t even know why I try. She’s only said a handful of sentences to me in the last forty-eight hours.
I offered to take her out for dinner, have a spa day, or just chill out and have a movie marathon. She didn’t want to do any of those things, she wanted to just sit and stare out the window all day. She’s stuck in the past, unwilling to move on from her mistakes.
After hassling her a little more about choosing something to do, my mother reluctantly agreed on the movie marathon. I put on the latest blockbuster starring Matthew McConaughey, and joined her on the sofa in our family room. It was going great for the first fifteen minutes. Then she got up to make a cup of tea and never came back. Luckily, I had Piper there with me. We finished the movie without my mom, before starting our afternoon task of cleaning the house.
I hadn’t been home since Christmas and by the looks of the house, it hasn’t been cleaned since Christmas. I cleaned up month old take-out cartons, cigarettes overflowing the ashtrays, and dust in every crevice of the house. My mother had dirty laundry everywhere. It was just her clothes though; my father’s clothes seemed to get washed.
My father.
I haven’t seen him at all this visit. He works over eighty hours a week, not because he has to, but because he is dealing with my sister’s death in his own way. My mother lives inside her head, and my father works himself to death. No wonder I’m so fucked up.
“I’ll wait in the car,” Piper says to me. “Bye, Mrs. Greyson. I’ll see you again soon!” She yells as she grabs my bag from my hand. She turns around and starts to walk towards my Volkswagen Beetle. I follow behind her; I’m not about to wait in the doorway for a response that will never come.
I open the door to the driver’s side as Piper throws our bags in the backseat and hops in the passenger seat. I start my vintage Beetle, praying, like always, that it will start. I let out a deep breath as I hear the roar of the engine. I peel out of the driveway, never looking back.
“So… that was interesting,” Piper says hesitantly as she turns the radio on low.
“Interesting doesn’t even describe it. She is like the walking dead. I swear she gets worse every time I see her. She used to be a ghost of her old self, now she’s not even that.”
I turn up the radio, trying to convey the message that I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I head out on the highway to begin our three-hour journey back to school. It’s summer break, but Piper and I decided to stay on campus to work for the summer. Neither of us has any urge to rush home.
Piper is a military brat. Her mother passed away when she was a toddler; her sergeant father raised her. They moved to a new base every year or two and she’s even lived overseas. Her father was never around so she was raised by a bunch of young men on base. Although she received little attention from her father, she received a lot of attention from the men on base, which she loved. She lost her virginity at fourteen and never looked back.
I heard this story the first time I met her freshman year. It was the first day of class and we were both running late. I made it to the lecture hall at the same time she did. When she spotted me at the door, she tugged on my arm and dragged me to a seat in the back of our psychology class. It was an introductory class and we both felt like we didn’t need to listen, so we talked the whole two hours. She told me how she lost her virginity and I knew we were kindred spirits. I lost my virginity at fourteen, too.
Piper and I were outgoing balls of energy, destroying everything in our path. It felt good to have a partner in crime who was down for anything. She didn’t look at my crazy ideas as crazy; she wanted to know when she could get in on the action. By sophomore year, we were living in an apartment off campus and waitressing together at Ryder’s Bar and Grill.
“So what’s the plan for tonight?” Piper asks enthusiastically.
“We both close tonight over at Ryder’s, so find out who’s throwing a party. We can head over when we’re done with our shift.”
Piper gets busy texting on her phone while I try to drown out the music coming from the top-forty station on the radio. Piper and I have a completely different taste in music, but I try to appease her. She hates my love for 70’s classic rock.
“Dave’s throwing a party at his house or we could go to Club Dive,” Piper mumbles as she continues to play on her phone.
Dave works with us over at Ryder’s Bar and Grill. He is what’s called a townie, but he also attends Eastern with us. He lives in his parent’s three-bedroom ranch that they left him when they moved away. It’s a little run down, but the perfect party house.
“Let’s go to Dave’s,” I say enthusiastically. “This way, we don’t have to worry about the possibility of not getting served, and we don’t have to go to another location to hook up. We can use one of his bedrooms tonight.”
“Normally I’d give you a speech about using sex as an escape, but who am I to stop you from getting off. You deserve a good lay tonight.”
I look at her from the corner of my eye and we both burst out laughing. Only Piper could joke around with me like this, and not think I was a total slut.
“In all seriousness, you need to stop fucking Mikey. He’s really into you and I’m starting to think he doesn’t understand the term friends with benefits.”
I pull my hand from the steering wheel and drag it through my long brown hair. “I know, but sometimes he is my only option. It’s slim pickings in this town during the summer. I want to make sure the guy I’m with has all his teeth. Plus, Mikey knows what I like,” I wink at Piper.
“Gross! He’s like my brother, I don’t want to know about how good he is at getting you off,” Piper groans, slapping me on the arm.
“You shouldn’t have brought him up then, Pipe.”
Pipe is my nickname for her. It started off as a joke the first time I saw her getting high, but then it stuck. Thankfully, she doesn’t do that stuff in front of me anymore.
“Okay, Contessa,” she drawls out my full name, and I roll my eyes. “I just want to make sure you’re aware that Mikey has feelings for you.”
“Noted. I promise to try and stay away from him, but that just means I need to find someone hot tonight. After the past two days, I need a release.” It feels good to feel loved for those several minutes, even if it’s a false sense of love.
“Sounds like a plan. Just drive us through these crappy cornfields and get us back to Eastern. We’ll have enough time to shower and bring spare clothes to Ryder’s. Then tonight, we’ll get drunk off our asses. This way, almost any guy will look hotter to you than Mikey.”
I take my right hand that’s resting on the center divider and flick her boob with my fingers.
“Fuck! That hurt, you bitch.”
I let out a small laugh at her dramatics. “You deserve it. I want real hot, not beer goggle hot.” I look
over at her as she rubs her breast where I just flicked her, “And I get dibs. I don’t care if you see the hottest guy first because he’s mine. Got it?”
“Yes, Princess Tessa, he’s yours. After what I witnessed the past few days, you deserve the hot guy, tonight. I get the hot guy next time.”
“Deal,” I say, sticking out my hand as we shake on it.
Piper turns the music up in the car and we drive the rest of the way, singing top-forty music at the top of our lungs. The drive through rural Illinois is boring, but with the music blaring and my best friend in the passenger seat, the drive goes by quickly.
When we finally pull up to our apartment complex, we have an hour before our shift starts at Ryder’s Bar and Grill. I started working at Ryder’s in October of my freshman year. I needed a job, and Piper had started there when school started, so she put in a good word for me. My boss, Ryder Wyatt, was the owner of the place. He inherited it when his uncle died eight years ago. Ryder made a few changes to the menu, fixed up the building, and changed the name. He was a great boss and I guess I could even call him a friend.
Piper and I get out of my car and rush up the two flights of stairs to our apartment.
“I call shower!” Piper yells out, as she opens the front door and makes a dash down the hallway.
“Son of a bitch! You better make it a five minute shower,” I yell back to her. I throw my keys on the table next to the door and kick my shoes off into the corner of the entryway.
Our apartment is a small two bedroom. There’s a kitchen that can occupy one person at a time, a living room, two bedrooms, and one bathroom. It’s not the best off campus housing you can get, but the rent is cheap and the neighbors don’t complain when we throw parties.
I grab a soda from the fridge and go into my room to pick out an outfit for later tonight, and grab my uniform. By the time I’m done choosing the sexy outfit that will grab every guys attention, Piper is out of the bathroom. I rush in there before she tries to come back. Locking the door, I turn the shower on and strip out of my clothing. I step into the shower and let the warm water hit my skin. It washes away all the anxiety and emotions from the past two days with my parents. When I’m done cleaning myself, I feel refreshed and ready for the night.
Changing His Game Page 22
