I Choose You (The Billionaire Brothers Series)

by Cole, S. Ann

  From the bed, I heard the ocean crashing on the sand, the whistling sound of air passing through trees leaves, and the faint and somewhat annoying croaking of crickets. Brilliant stars sprinkled across the sky’s sheet of blackness, a half-moon looming close to the horizon, its glow reflecting in waves on the unsettled waters below.

  It. Was. Heaven.

  My cellphone had yet to ring since Trevillo handed it to me, so I shrugged and leaned over to set it on the nightstand. That’s when it decided to ring, Jahleel’s name flashing across the screen. I wasn’t sure I was prepared to talk to him yet, but his calls were making Trevillo irritated, so I might as well get this over with.

  “Hi, JK.”

  There was nothing but silence for a long moment, but I knew he was on the line. This was Jahleel.

  “Bad girl … ” he trailed off, remaining silent for another moment, then, “I’m sorry.”

  “You don’t need to apologize, JK. It was a mistake. None of it should’ve happened. I never should’ve used you.”

  A sigh flowed down the receiver, and I couldn’t tell if he was being serious or sarcastic when he said, “Yeah. A mistake.”

  “Will we ever be able to go back to having a normal, non-awkward relationship?” I asked.

  He scoffed, and this time he sounded miffed. “How the fuck can we? You just upped and disappeared out of my life! I went from seeing you everyday to not seeing or hearin’ from you at all. Me and you, Krissy, we can get through anything. But we can’t do that while we’re apart.”

  Taking a deep breath, I dropped the news that might possibly break us for good, “I’m moving out.”

  As expected, there was silence. Long silence. But when he finally spoke, his response took me by surprise. “He loves you. So I know he’ll take care of you. I’m happy you’ve found someone to save you from yourself.”

  “You really mean that?” I asked, mouth hanging open.

  “Yeah, bad girl, I do.” He sounded genuine. Like, genuine genuine. Wow!

  “Thank you, JK,” I replied, smiling now. “That may be the nicest thing I’ve ever heard you say. Ever.”

  “Yeah, but, he can’t take you away from me completely. I need to be able to call you, see you, and hang with you. So, you need to let him know that. Or else, I’ll fight … I’ll fight dirty, and I’ll win. You know it.”

  I knew he was dead serious. He fought his own parents to keep me by his side, and he’d won. Won us a house. Not only that, but if he’d been aggressive and less subtle with me, I probably wouldn’t have fallen in love with Trevillo. I would’ve chosen him, because, in the end, I always did. He knew it, and I knew it. But we skimmed around our feelings for each other and ended up letting other people in, prying us apart. For good.

  So, even though the situation was sticky, precarious, and sensitive, I agreed. “I know. But it’s not easy for him to get over right now. So I have to give that issue some time. We’re actually in the Caribbean at the moment. You know, cooling off steam.”

  “Where?”

  “Jamaica,” I squealed in excitement. “It’s so beautiful here, JK. You’d love it!”

  Again, he grew quiet for a long, long time, then, bam! “You’re marryin’ him.” It was a statement, not a question.

  “Whoa, where the hell did that come from?” I asked, fuddled. “I said I was moving out, that’s all. How the hell did marriage drop into this?”

  “Bad girl,” he sighed, “I’m not as daft as you think. Ain’t gotta hide it from me. I told you, I’m happy for you.”

  This was ludicrous. “Listen to what you’re saying. We’ve haven’t been together long enough to — ”

  “Guy’s a billionaire who has everythin’ he wants and can have anyone he wants. You cheated. A blow to his high and mighty ego. Yet he still wants you. Obviously because he loves you. He’s going to do whatever it takes to keep you, bad girl. He’s not going to risk that shit happening again, trust me.”

  My mouth was agape as I listened to the cynical, screw-anything-that-walks Jahleel being so insightful on relationship stuff. This wasn’t him. He didn’t give a shit about anything. Anything. Or anyone. “JK, are you okay?”

  “What?”

  “You just don’t sound like … you.”

  He laughed this time. Heartily. “I’m good. Never been better. I feel better … ”

  “Better?” I didn’t understand.

  “I’ve loved you since the day my parents brought you home, Krissy. And I’ve never stopped loving you, but you never loved me back how I wanted you to. It was painful. I couldn’t save you. I couldn’t make myself into what you wanted because I never knew what you wanted. You lock everything inside and I wanted to be the one that you spilled your heart out to … “

  His words picked up speed and his breathing grew heavy, as it sounded like he was pacing back and forth. “But it took sayin’ the words to you that night, to make me realize … while I love you, I’m not in love with you like I am with her. With her, things are diff — ”

  Jahleel abruptly stopped talking, as if realizing that he’d spilled far too much. Either that, or was he just realizing he was in love with whoever her was.

  “You’re shitting me,” I whispered. Shocked.

  “Fuck,” he said, lower than a whisper.

  Yep, that ‘in love’ shit had just dawned on him.

  “You’re not gonna tell me who ‘her’ is?” I prodded, even though I was ninety percent sure who she was.

  Refusing to spill another drop more of information, he just chuckled.

  But I pushed, “Do I know her? Who is she?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” he replied. “Not because I’ve just discovered … dammit … ” He trailed off, and I could sense him shaking his head in disbelief. “Not ready for all that sissy-boy crap yet. I like being free. Fuck that love shit.”

  “Are you freakin’ kidding me, JK?!” I yelled at him. “You can’t do that!”

  He snorted. “Watch me. You know me better than anyone else.”

  My heart sank for the girl who’d managed to capture Jahleel’s heart and didn’t even know it. “But you — ”

  “Done talking ‘bout this, bad girl. Gotta go.”

  “Can’t you at least — ”

  “Take lots of pictures,” he talked over me. “Bye!”

  Then the line went dead.

  What a freaking asshole. Not even love had the power to change him.

  After scowling at the phone for about five minutes after he hung up, I tossed it onto the nightstand and looked out to the balcony. Trevillo was still standing out there in the same position, staring out at the ocean. I knew he heard everything on my end of the conversation.

  Throwing back the covers, I eased out of bed and started towards him. I was wearing one of the negligees he’d packed in my luggage. Violet, lacy, covering just a portion of my ass, with a thong underneath.

  When I got up to him, I wrapped my arms around his middle from behind and pressed my cheek against his back. Deciding to give him the first words, I kept quiet and listened to the ocean waves roll into a rumble, crash onto the sand, and drew back from the shore with a fizzling sound.

  “Feel better after talking to him?” he asked after a while.

  Eyes closed, cool breeze caressing my skin, I told his back, “I’ve been better, Trev. I’m just waiting on you.”

  Trevillo moved my hands from around him and pulled me in front so I was facing him, my back against the railing. He shifted his feet wider apart so his exceptional height wouldn’t be towering a mile above me. His hands came up and cupped my face, and his lips kissed mine.

  Cleaving our lips apart a minute later, he took a breath and looked deep into my eyes. “You make me feel things I can’t even give a name to, Krissan. An inundation of intense, ineffable feelings, I … I don’t know what to do with them. It’s kinda frightening, actually.”

  Bringing my hands up to cover his on my face, I told him, “Just give them to me, so I can giv
e them back to you. We can share them. All of them. But please, don’t repress them. Don’t bottle them up. I need them. All of them. From the most intense to the tamest. Give all of your feelings to me, Trev.”

  His eyes remained on mine, searching, and the heat in his gaze that used to paralyze me was back. Finally, he was looking at me like that again. He was coming back to me. And I was more than ready to receive him.

  Sliding a forefinger under my chin, he tilted my head back, leaned down, and dragged his tongue in a leonine lick down the center of my neck. Oh shit, his signature swipe. He was definitely back.

  Gently, his teeth sank into the flesh at the base of my neck. He kissed his way back up to my lips as his hands reached between us for the slim strings which held my negligee together. One tug, and it fell open, while his tongue explored the depths of my mouth in the most ravishing way.

  Trev’s way.

  I was so aroused I could barely breathe.

  In the next second, he spun me around with one quick flip so I was facing the ocean. “Hold on to railing.”

  As I did, his fingers swept the negligee off my arms dropping it to the floor in a silent flutter. I felt his tongue at the nape of my neck, moving down slowly, down my spine. He hooked his thumbs into the sides of my thong, and as his tongue traveled a path straight down my back, his thumbs pulled down the string of underwear. His tongue continued its trek down between the crease of my ass just as the thong dropped at my ankles.

  As I stepped out of them, I felt him move in the opposite direction as he straightened up and brought a hand around to cup me.

  “She’s drenched … ” His words came quieter than a whisper, as if meant to be his thoughts instead of being said out loud.

  By this time, I was breathless. Eager to have him inside me.

  I felt him shift behind me, and one big palm pressed on the center of my back as an indication for me to bend over. When I did, his thick, wide crown prodded at my entrance as he husked, “Krissan?”

  A moan was my reply. “Mmnh?”

  “I’m gonna fuck you now. Real hard. So hold tight to the railing, okay?”

  “Okay,” I said in a gush of air, lust, and anticipation.

  “And, Krissan?”

  “Hmmnh?” I moaned again in reply, legs trembling now.

  “I love you.”

  There wasn’t a chance to respond, because he was surging into me at the tail end of his words.

  At the sudden intrusion, a cry forced up my lungs, flew through my lips, echoed in the air, bounced off the ocean waves, and came right back to me.

  “I like that,” he growled. “I like that you’re fucking feeling me.”

  His hands firmly gripped my hips to steady me, and he began pounding me, hard and fast and even harder. Trevillo style.

  He was back.

  Trevillo Marco-Dean Sex-God Nelson was back.

  A session of fierce, penetrative sex wasn’t exactly an appropriate time to smile. But, knowing he couldn’t see me, I grinned.

  I fucking grinned.

  Chapter 33

  K. Kingston

  Carpe Diem

  Waking up to a new day in an open house on the beach side brightened with natural light, a chorus of tweeting birds, and cool gusts of winds whispering sweet nothings as it billows by was the single most amazing feeling on earth.

  Gratified and relaxed, I stretched and rolled over in bed. Trevillo wasn’t there unfortunately, but there was a note with a single white rose laid across it. Astonishment shook hands with curiosity at this romantic gesture from Trevillo.

  Trevillo didn’t do romantic. He did, “I’m hard, you’re wet, let’s fuck. Hard.” Full stop. So, this gesture surpassed the unexpected.

  I plucked up the rose and passed it under my nose in appreciation of its fresh scent as I sat up in bed to read the note. It was old English poetry. Words of Andrew Marvell:

  Had we but world enough, and time,

  This coyness, lady, were no crime.

  We would sit down and think which way

  To walk, and pass our long love’s day …

  But at my back I always hear

  Time’s winged chariot hurrying near …

  Now therefore, while the youthful hue

  Sits on thy skin like morning dew,

  Let us roll all our strength, and all

  Our sweetness, up into one ball;

  Thus, though we cannot make our sun

  Stand still, yet we will make him run.

  “Huh,” I said out loud to no one in particular.

  If my memories of literature classes — poetry analysis, to be exact — back in school were accurate at the moment, I was sure this poem is about a man convincing his mistress to give up her virginity before time runs out. My virginity had long since been, well, not ‘given up’, but thrown out there. Given the thoroughness with which Trevillo screwed me last night, into breathless enervation, I would imagine he’d have gotten the memo by now that I wasn’t a maid.

  Flipping back the sheets, I swung my legs out of bed at the same time Trevillo ambled into the room wearing gray sweat pants, hanging low on his hips. He seemed surprised I was awake, as if I wasn’t supposed to see him or something. When I walked up to him and thanked him for the rose and poem, he gave me an uneasy smile and pressed a kiss on my forehead.

  “Glad you liked it. I’m just here to get … something. Breakfast is ready. But grab a shower first. After eating, join me out on the beach.”

  The flatness of his tone as he spoke and the tenseness in his posture made me take a step back and avert my eyes.

  Great. Distant Trevillo was back.

  Last night had been so good, and now … ?

  Nodding, I turned and started for the bathroom, but halted when he caught my wrist and pulled me back to him.

  Raking his fingers backwards through my short hair, he said, “I like when you wash your hair, brush it back from your face, and leave it to dry on its own. Do that today, okay?”

  “Okay,” I quietly agreed.

  No-frills hair was something I did only when I had no hot tools to style my hair, or I was short on time. But, whatever would make him come back to me, I’d do.

  His head lowered, and his lips touched mine. Then he released me. “And no make-up. At all.”

  “Okay.”

  I continued to the bathroom, leaving him to get whatever he came for. Denuded, I hopped into the shower and spent longer than usual, washing my hair and finger-combing it backwards, just as Trevillo had requested.

  By the time I stepped out of the shower, there was another note on the double-sink vanity with a red rose laid across it. Not curious this time, but flattered, I picked up the rose and passed it under my nose; the red had a stronger, inkier scent than the white.

  Leaning my hip against the vanity, I read poetry stolen from William Shakspeare’s Carpe Diem this time:

  What is love? ‘tis not hereafter;

  Present mirth hath present laughter;

  What’s to come is still unsure:

  In delay there lies no plenty, —

  Then come kiss me, Sweet-and-twenty,

  Youth’s a stuff will not endure.

  After reading the poem over for about five times to draft its meaning, I realized it fell under the same theme as the earlier poem: making use of youth and time.

  This side of Trevillo was rather new to me. I was used to the man who would flat-out tell me whatever was on his mind. No beating around the bush. Still, I adored this romantic side of him. Now, if only his demeanor would go in accord with his words and gestures, we could have a fun, romantic vacation. But his constant slipping in and out of himself was wearing me out. One minute he’s himself, the next minute, he is tense and distant.

  Tightening a towel around me, I exited the bathroom. Back in the bedroom, there was a white, flared-hem dress laid out on the bed along with black lace underwear. The dress was cutesy, yet flirty with a sweetheart neckline. I bounced around when I took i
t up and saw a neat mauve bow at the back. It was so me.

  Being restricted from make-up and styling my hair, I slipped on what was provided for me to wear and headed downstairs for breakfast.

  When I found out from Sally I was eating breakfast alone because Trevillo had already eaten, I was deflated. I was also getting irritated, because I wasn’t sure how long I could wait for him to get over his goddamn issues.

  Sally served me a Jamaican dish of Ackee and Saltfish with fried dumplings and plantains. Unlike anything I’d ever tasted before, I ate it all like a starved animal.

  A grin spread across Sally’s face when she came to clear my plate and found it wiped clean. “I was worried you wouldn’t like it,” she confessed in fluid, eloquent English, not at all incomprehensible like Neville’s. “It warms me when foreigners enjoy a good Jamaican dish.”

  “It was really good,” I complimented, wiping the corners of my mouth with a napkin.

  Nodding appreciatively, she said, “Wait here, Miss Kingston.”

  Anxious to go find Trevillo, wherever he was, I didn’t want to wait. But I did as she asked and waited as she disappeared then reappeared with a gold tray and set it down on the table in front of me.

  On the tray, was another note and — no rose this time — a delicate white feather laid on top of it. So simple, yet for some reason, it made my heart expand.

  Picking up the feather, I, for no thought-of reason, brushed its whispery ends across my cheek, and I was instantly reminded of the first time Trevillo brushed the tips of his fingers across my cheek.

  Anger melted, I took up the note and read poetic words now stolen from John Gray:

  Youth’s the season made for joys,

  Love is then our duty;

  She alone who that employs,

  Well deserves her beauty.

  Let’s be gay,

  While we may,

  Beauty’s a flower despis’d in decay.

  Let us drink and sport to-day,

  Ours is not tomorrow.