Until Forever (Providence Series Book 3)

by Mary B. Moore

  Finishing up, I flushed and was just standing to wash my hands when Brett came in and carried me to the basin. He really was so different to the rumors, and the guilt of judging him hit me all over again.

  It would be a shame when I was healed and able to return to my own apartment. I loved our time together, and the way that he looked after me and looked at me made me feel like more than just an asset for the first time in my life. The husband that my parents had picked out for me, Henry, was a banker and had licked his lips when he first saw me. He also had a bad reputation and was well known to have mistresses all over France. He disgusted me!

  Brett carried me back out to the bed and made sure that my leg was supported by the pillows.

  “I’m not holding you back from work, am I?” I asked as he lay down beside me. “I can manage if you need to go to the office.”

  He just shook his head and picked up the remote. When he lifted his arm, I cuddled into him, and we started watching the movie that we’d discussed the night before. I knew that I had feelings for him and that he wouldn’t return them. If we were meant to be friends it would be hard, but I enjoyed being with him, so I would do it. As my grand-mere always said, c’est la vie; sometimes the decisions hurt, but they were for the best.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Cole

  Three months later…

  Ebru’s Mom was recovering slowly, and after everything that we’d been through I figured my girl needed a vacation. She had shown me Louise’s journal, and in it, there had been plans for them to tour around Australia and New Zealand once Eb had finished getting her qualifications. I’d been planning the trip for the last five weeks and tonight was the night that I was going to kidnap her and take her to the airport. Maya’s Dad had been awesome and helped me get all of the necessary paperwork sorted out, and Luke was lending me his company’s jet. We were stopping for two nights in Dubai too. I was going to spoil my baby rotten. I also had another surprise for her while we were away, I just hoped that she liked it.

  Ebru

  We were currently on a beautiful plane flying somewhere. Where? I wished I knew because I’d always hated surprises, but Cole looked so excited right now that I couldn’t bring myself to yell at him.

  I’d gotten home and found a bunch of cases by the door. Initially, I’d had a moment of panic that he had become sick of me and was going to ask me to leave, but then he’d walked up to me and told me to get changed into the outfit that he’d left on the bed and to meet him where we were currently standing. We’d already had a refueling stop in Frankfurt, but he was very quiet about where we were headed to after we took off again.

  This led us to now, and no matter what I said he wouldn’t tell me where we were going.

  “We are beginning our descent into Dubai International Airport. Please fasten your seat belt’s and prepare for landing.” The Captains’ voice said over the intercom.

  “Dubai?” I looked at Cole to see him grinning at me. This had been one of the places that I’d always wanted to see, and that Louise and I had planned to visit.

  “Yup. It’s vacay time!”

  Looking at him in shock still, I was trying to find the words to show how much this meant to me, but none seemed strong enough. He’d never know exactly how huge this was, and God I wished that Lou could have been here to experience it too.

  Three weeks later….

  We were back on an airplane, headed towards New Zealand after just under three weeks spent touring around Australia. We’d started in Sydney and had then headed to Canberra to see Maya’s family for a couple of days. Her parents were a blast, and her Dad had been looking up micro pigs and what he’d have to do quarantine wise when their posting to Australia was over. Cole had smugly told him about his new piglet, who was staying with Maya and Ren, and Lasco had upped his search for the perfect piglet.

  After seeing them, we’d headed towards Queensland and the Gold Coast, which was just so beautiful that I hadn’t wanted to leave. This was another of mine and Louise’s plans and dreams for when I’d graduated, to tour around Oz. The fact that Cole had found this out and had made it happen just blew me away, and I knew that no matter what I did from now on, I would never be able to do anything that would match this for him.

  This morning, we’d gone to the airport to catch the flight to our next destination. I had been thinking that maybe he was taking us to Bali like Luke and Isla, but when we’d been queuing for our flight, it had said Auckland.

  When I was seventeen, Lou and I had planned out our dream trip and had been determined that it would happen once I’d graduated from college. So far, Cole had fulfilled all of our dreams, and now he was doing more.

  “So, you know where we are,” he said as we got into the vehicle that he’d rented. “But what you don’t know is where we’re going.”

  Looking at him, I said the words that I’d only said once before, “I trust you.” And I meant them.

  Slamming on the breaks, he turned and looked at me with a scowl on his face. “Don’t make me want to fuck you when I have to drive, Eb. It’s not fair! Have you ever tried to drive with a hard-on? What if I grab the wrong thing?” I burst out laughing at how indignant he was over his hard-on. “Uh huh, you laugh. When we stop, you’re fixing my problem.”

  That stopped me laughing, not because it was a bad thing, but because now I was in the female version of the same predicament as he was. His snort proved he knew what he’d done. Asshat! I still loved his stupid, irritating ass, though.

  Ebru

  Two weeks later…

  I was going to kill him, painfully…and slowly. I hated that asshole’s guts!

  “Come on baby, you know you want to!” he said as he was strapped into the harness that would lead him to his death.

  “I really don’t,” I shook my head and backed away from the evil man who was holding one of the harnesses out for me too.

  “Come on, don’t be a chicken.” That’s it, he was going to plummet to his death anyway, so what would it hurt if I was the one who pushed him. “Ah, ah, ah…no, you’re not allowed to do that,” Cole wiggled his finger at me as I glared at him.

  “I’m not doing it!”

  “Yes, you are. Harness her up.”

  I had no option but to go to the reaper who was hot, but pure Satan, and get strapped up.

  “Okay, I’ll go first and then once I’m on the ground, you jump.”

  It had all seemed so idyllic up until now. We’d visited so many beautiful places and had even gone up to the top of Mount Cook in a tiny airplane and had walked around. When he’d said that we were headed to Queenstown, I’d looked it up on my phone and had been excited when I’d seen the photographs. We’d arrived last night, and when he’d said he had plans, I’d expected more of what we’d done the whole time we’d been on vacation. But no - the asshole had to bring me fucking bungee jumping.

  “Right baby, I’ll see you at the bottom.” He stood at the edge, about to meet his maker.

  “Cole, I really don’t…”

  “It’ll be like your dreams in the journal. Louise wanted to go to the top of Mount Cook, and you wanted to bungee jump,” he turned and faced me with a huge grin before falling off the edge backward.

  Oh, fuck no! “THAT WAS LOUISE!” I screamed, because I was the one who wanted to go to Mount Cook.

  Knowing that he’d done this for that reason, I couldn’t back out now. Oh, fuck my life! I was terrified of heights.

  Cole

  I was pretty certain I’d heard her scream when I went off the edge of the ledge. I’d chosen this bungee facility for a reason, and she was about to find that reason out. I’ll admit, the second that I started to fall, my heart went into my mouth as the ground rushed towards me. Four hundred feet had sounded so easy when I’d booked it, but when your head was speeding towards the ground, it really wasn’t.

  I hit the end of the chord and bounced up and down for a couple of minu
tes before throwing my arms over my head and yelling. “That was fucking awesome!” The two guys who were there to unhook me burst out laughing. “Now, don’t forget the plan yeah?”

  I looked up and saw Ebru holding onto the bungee guys leg as he stood there laughing. I was starting to doubt the plan that I’d made, but it had been her writing in the journal. I knew my girl’s handwriting anywhere, and she’d clearly said that she wanted to go bungee jumping while she was here.

  Fuck, what was I gonna do if she backed out? I had this planned!

  The next second, she was over the edge, and we heard her screams quite clearly at the bottom. About half way down, she changed from a scream to some sort of cuss word extravaganza show. I’d never heard anything like it, and judging by the laughter from the two guys behind me, neither had they.

  “Cockfuckshitfuckerbastardmotherfuckinghumpingpieceofshiiiiiiiiiit.” I’d say that she was about one hundred and seventy feet away from us, and we still heard it all perfectly.

  As she hit the end of her chord, there was a ‘guh’ sound from her and the screaming and swearing stopped, until she bounced up the way again. “Make it stop. Mother fucking cock sucking shitting fuuuuuuuhuhuhuh,” the last bit came out as she bounced up and down slowly, coming to a stop upside down.

  Walking up to her, I turned her around to face me. “Did you love it?”

  “You’re a dead man. A fucking dead man!”

  I couldn’t help laughing. “Okay baby, but you got to live your dream! It was worth it.”

  “That was Louise’s dream you shit face. Not mine!” She yelled the last bit to my forehead as she glared at my chin.

  “Ah, see, I could have sworn that it was yours,” this was problematic, but fuck it I was here now, so I was going to do it. “I have a question to ask.”

  “I don’t ever want to see your shitty face again.”

  “Now baby, it’s over now. And there will be some awesome photographs as well as videos to show everyone when we get home.” We’ll just put hers on mute.

  She continued to glare at me as she hung upside down. “Let me down.”

  Crossing my arms, I looked at her while I tapped my chin. Maybe I was goading the dragon, but I had to get her to agree, and if I let her down now she’d walk away and I’d have to come up with another plan. “Mmmm, nope. Tell me that you’ll listen to my question.”

  “No!”

  “Then I’ll get Brad to reel you up and then drop you down again until you say you’ll hear me out.” The guys behind me burst out laughing. I looked up and was relieved that there wasn’t anyone waiting as I saw Brad give me the thumbs up. I had some time.

  “You dare!” She hissed. “You dare!”

  Shrugging, I made a point of taking a few slow steps backward, looking up at Brad, and then making a spinning motion with my finger. He had no clue what the hell I was doing, but it got Ebru’s attention.

  “No, no, please for the love of shit. I’ll listen, I’ll listen.”

  “Are you sure? I mean, we can either leave you hanging until all of the blood rushes to your head, or as I say, Brad can do it all over again.” I felt kind of bad blackmailing her, but this was the most important moment of my life.

  “I’m listening. Please, just get it over and done with!”

  Walking slowly back to her, I made sure that there were only a couple of inches between our faces and stooped down a bit until we were eye to eye. “Ebru Dhyana Wells, will you marry me?”

  I lifted the open box up between us so that she could see the diamond ring that I’d been carrying around for the last two months.

  She froze and stared at the diamond that was glinting in the sun. In fact, she stared and stayed quiet for so long that her face had started to go a deep red, and I was starting to worry that she would pass out from blood loss. Or blood to the brain, whatever it was called.

  “Well?” I was nervous. I’d been rehearsing the begging speech in my head in case she said no. It just wasn’t an option to not walk away from here with the ring on her finger. “Do I need to get Brad to wake you up a bit with some bouncy bouncy?” That snapped her out of her stupor and she burst into tears and nodded her head. At least I think it was a nod, it was hard to tell. “Is that a yes?”

  “Yes,” she squeaked, and I put the ring on her finger and stood up to kiss her. Unfortunately, Spiderman lied - it’s almost impossible to kiss someone properly upside down. It just didn’t work, so I had to stand back until after they’d lowered her and helped us out of our harnesses before scooping her up for a kiss.

  I heard a round of applause behind us and remembered that I’d chosen the facility that was actually over Queenstown itself, so there were a lot of spectators. “She said yes!” I yelled, and threw my fist up in the air.

  Pulling Ebru back to me, I grinned down at her. “You’re a dead man,” she ground out through her smile. Ah, that’s what she said now, but that was without a doubt the most romantic moment in the history of man. She loved every second of it.

  “I can’t wait to watch the videos that they took of our jumps,” I threw my arm over her shoulders and started steering her towards the office. “This is definitely one to show the kids and grandkids. We’ll just say that the sound broke on yours.”

  Staring at her ring as we walked, she didn’t look up at me once as she said, “I’m terrified of heights. Always have been. When Louise said that she wanted to go bungee jumping, I was literally sick at the thought, so we agreed that I’d wait at the bottom for her. And you made me jump.”

  That was when I realized how much shit I was in.

  Ebru

  I couldn’t stop staring at the ring that was now sitting on my finger. I hated yellow gold and refused to wear anything that was made with it, so Cole had bought me a platinum ring with a diamond on the top and a band of diamonds on either side of it. If I’d been asked to choose my own ring, this was exactly what I’d have chosen. Now that my heart had been relocated to its proper place in my chest, after ricocheting between my brain and ass, I almost felt bad for what I was going to do to get my revenge on him.

  He was sitting on the bed watching the footage of our jumps on his laptop laughing, so I’d taken the opportunity to go into the bathroom and put on some special lingerie that I’d picked up. I’d also put the special surprise that I’d had for months in case he ever did something shitty on too. Did he deserve it seeing as he’d proposed? Maybe not, but at the same time I was terrified of heights, I couldn’t stress that to the world enough. Most people can stand on a chair or step ladder to change a light bulb, I’d freeze if I did that and panic about getting back down again. We all have our fears and heights was mine. So, yes, he deserved this.

  “Hey, honey?” I leaned against the door frame and waited for him to look up at me. All night he’d been nervously checking his drinks and food in case I chose that for revenge, and by the time we’d gotten back to the hotel room, I could tell he thought that I’d forgiven him. Stupid ass!

  “Huh?” His eyes were firmly on the screen of the laptop. Normally it was his iPad and whatever book he was reading that had his attention before bed; well, and me too. That’s how I knew that this plan would work so well.

  “Cole,” I made sure to lower my voice, hoping that I sounded seductive and not like Marge Simpson. Apparently, I got it right because he turned in my direction and his eyes went huge as he took in the lingerie that I’d bought from Scarlett. I’d grabbed it when I went upstairs to change before we left Piersville, and had kept it hidden in my bag the whole time. It was a skimpy, form-fitting and very short nightie which had lace over my breasts and along the bottom. Under it was a small matching thong.

  “Oh shit!” Bingo!

  Moving over to him, he put the laptop on the table never taking his eyes off of me. It was a struggle to keep the evil grin at my genius under wraps, but I did it. Crawling up the bed towards him, I straddled his lap and made myself comfortable, pressed up a
gainst him as close as I could get.

  “Fuck, Eb, you look…where did you hide this thing?” He ran his hands up and down my sides. The silk moving up and down my skin really felt good.

  “I was saving it for something special, and I figured that this,” I pointed at both of us, “was that something special.”

  As I leaned in to kiss him, he whispered, “I fucking can’t wait to have you as my wife. Knowing that you’re mine for the rest of our lives.” Well shit. I won’t feel guilty, I will not feel guilty!

  I kissed him softly and licked across the seam of his mouth, before gently sucking on his lower lip. His restraint broke when I did that, and he hugged me to him as he thrust his tongue into my mouth. Groaning when I sucked on his tongue, he moved us so that we were lying on the bed, with him on top of me.

  As he started to kiss down my neck, I gently pulled my nails down his back, knowing that it was his weakness. “Fuuuuck,” he groaned, as he got to my breast, before sucking the nipple through the lace. The roughness against the silk of his tongue had me almost forgetting why I was doing this as I thrust my hips up against him. When he moved over to the other nipple and did the same thing, I couldn’t help the loud groan that came out.

  “I fucking love you,” he mumbled as he kissed down the silk nightie. “Love, love, love, love,” he punctuated each one with a kiss to the silk. When he got to the bottom, he used his big hands to push the bottom of my nightie up until it was just under my breasts, missing the surprise. “These are very cheeky little panties,” he whispered, running his finger just under the edge of them. “We’ll go and get every color when we get home.”