by Milly Taiden
“How much have you had to drink, Pete?”
“It’s Peter, actually, and we’d just opened the bottle, so—”
“Great, so you can drive. Time to go.”
“Finn!” Beth yanked on his arm, pulling his attention back to her. “You can’t kick my guest out.”
“Do you want him here when I’m grovelling?”
That was not what she expected him to say. “Grovelling?”
“Begging for you to take me back? Making a fool of myself? Which you’re going to love, so then there will be some kissing, which will lead to—”
She held up her hand. “I get the picture,” she hissed. “So let me get this straight—you’re not interested in a relationship until you see me with someone else? Because that’s pretty fucked up.”
Behind Finn, glass clinked on her granite counter. “I’m going to go anyway,” Peter said with a trace of laughter in his voice. “You guys seem like you’ve got some stuff to work out.”
She stepped into his path. “No, stay. Please. Finn will go—”
“Finn will not go,” the oaf said, referring to himself in the third person. “Finn has a lady to win back and doesn’t really care at this point if there’s an audience or not.”
“Stop it.” She turned and pleaded. “We can…I don’t know. Why don’t we have coffee tomorrow or something? This is all just a bit much. I’ve had a brutal week.”
His eyes softened and he stepped closer to brush his hand over her cheek. “You’ve had a bad week?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I’ve got all the time in the world.”
Peter cleared his throat and muttered a goodbye. This time she didn’t try to stop him. When the front door clicked shut, she wearily moved away from Finn in search of her wine glass. “Show me what you brought.”
He silently handed over the folder. Inside was a new take on the campaign targeting 30-somethings. It took her breath away. Couples. Sexy, passionate couples. Gay, straight, inter-racial, young and old. All tied together with a dark, seductive branding that she could almost taste it was so perfect.
He came up behind her, his chest hard and strong against her back, and he traced her earlobe with his lips before whispering. “I hope we captured it.”
“What?” she breathed.
“Your community. With a marketing twist, of course.”
She allowed a weak laugh. “Of course. It’s fantastic.”
“I’ll present the whole thing to Evan next week but I wanted you to see it first.”
“Thank you.” She held her thoughts at that small whisper, not wanting to break the spell of the moment with all the questions spiralling through her head and her heart.
“That’s just the start.” His voice was low and rough and oh so hot, she had a hard time not reading erotic promise in his tone and his words. “Now for the grovelling.”
“No, Finn, don’t.” A dam broke and she couldn’t bite her tongue any longer. “I’ve missed you so much and I desperately want you to stay. For the evening and for the night if you want. But I’m fragile here and I don’t know if I want to hear…”
He turned her around in his arms and took her mouth. His kiss was firm and deliberate, confident that she’d bow to his will. And she would, oh boy would she, but first she wanted to ground whatever it was they were going to do in some reality.
She slid her hands between them, relishing for a moment the firm ridges of his body under the fine weave of the dress shirt before pressing them apart. “I’m not a fool, Finn. A woman can’t change a man into what she wants him to be.”
He gripped her shoulders. “But a man can change. Just a bit, just enough. With the right motivation.”
“There’s no motivation in the world that can convince you of the value of a white picket fence and two point five kids.”
“I want you.” He kissed her again, proving his point. She sighed and kissed her way along his jaw. She’d missed this, being close to him. Missed his smell and his hard, enveloping warmth.
But it would be even harder to let him go months down the road. “You want me, just me?”
“Why isn’t that what you want to hear?”
“Because you wanting me means I’m the one that needs to change. Accept a half-life.”
“Would loving me really not be enough?” Didn’t he know that she already did? She knew how hard it would be to walk away from the love of her life. She didn’t need to guess at that pain.
“It would. Oh Finn, of course it would. For a while. But in time I’d come to resent you, and that love would turn to hate. I’ve hated you before—”
“You never hated me.”
She allowed a half-smile. “No, I suppose I didn’t.”
He tugged her closer and drifted a sweet kiss over her forehead. All the passion they’d shared, and that scant touch undid her. Hot tears threatened her lower lids and she closed her eyes in protest. No, she wouldn’t cry. Wouldn’t be weak in this moment when she needed to be strong for herself.
“I could tell you I want a minivan full of kids, soccer balls and popsicle sticks littering the floor. I’m a half-decent salesman, I could make you believe it, too.” His regret was palpable. She should appreciate his honesty, but at the moment, it was hard to focus on anything besides the giant knot in her throat. “But that isn’t the future I see.”
“I know,” she whispered. “It’s okay.” It would be, someday.
“If our kids play soccer, they need to go to practice in your car.”
She pressed her lips together and swallowed back a sob. He needed to stop talking, stop caressing her arm. She needed to get away from him and— “What?”
He laughed, and she pushed hard against his chest.
“Finn, that’s not funny. That’s actually an incredibly asshat thing to say to me.” She scrambled away from him, fury shaking every cell in her body. “I’m trying to be the bigger person here, let you live your stupid, empty, childless life, and you’re making fun of me.”
“Well, we can’t very well rectify that if you’re standing all the way over there.”
“Rectify what?”
“The childless thing.” He took off his blazer and tossed it halfway across the room, his broad shoulders bunching and stretching his shirtfront as he did it. She gaped at him, still trying to process what was going on as he popped the first button on his shirt, then the second. The thin dusting of dark curls she loved to tangle her fingers in sprang into view, then his washboard stomach.
“What are you doing?” She pressed the flat of her palm to her belly. Now was not the time to get turned on by Finn stripping. Oh god, not the belt.
“Getting naked.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re having some communication difficulties, and I want you to see just how serious I am about making babies with you.”
Whoa. “I think I missed something.”
“Two kids. I’ve done the research, I can’t fit three across the backseat of my car. And I’m not trading it in.”
“Research?”
“You should probably stop talking and take off your dress.”
“Why?”
“Dress. Off.” He didn’t wait for her to comply. Two big strides and he was across the room. He slid one finger along the v-neck of her wrap dress and with the other hand started working at the belt tie.
“Finn, stop.” She wrapped her hands around his wrists. “I don’t want to make a baby today. This is crazy.”
He stroked his hands around her waist and pulled her hard against him. “That’s our deal. You make me crazy. And I love you.”
“You love me.” She whispered the words, then laughed at the absurdity of the situation. “I love you too, but—”
“No buts. I love you, I want you, and whenever you’re ready, I want to plant a baby in you. And then another, if you’re game. There won’t be any drink boxes in my car and crayons will be very carefully monitored—”
�
�By you?”
“By me. My neuroses are my own. I won’t make them yours.”
“I’ll monitor crayons for you.” The tears she’d been holding back now slid down her face and she tipped her head back and laughed. “I’ll buy stock in wet wipes and Mr. Clean Magic Erasers.”
“You like the ad campaign?”
“I love it.” She laughed as she cried. “Pass the folder over, I want to look at it again.”
He shook his head. “In a minute. I have something else to run past you first.” He thumbed away a teardrop and kissed her cheek.
She wiped her face with the backs of her hands. “I think I like the idea of getting naked better.”
He grinned. “This will be worth it. And then we’re definitely getting naked. You had a bad week?”
“Finn, you’re giving me conversation whiplash.” She stroked his chest. “It’s getting better, anyway.”
He kissed her again, this time more hungrily, and she lost herself in the taste of him. He licked her lower lip as he eased back, sending a shiver down her spine. “Okay, one last thing. Dinner with Peter tonight, what was that all about?”
“Just friends, I promise. I was…lonely, and I bought enough food for an army, and he was the only person I could think of that might be free.”
His face fell. “Shit. I’m sorry, my girl.”
“You’re here now, that’s all that matters. Hey, do you want to go to Canada Day party with me? Fireworks on a farm out in the country. Carrie Nixon’s husband is organizing.”
“Sure.” He smiled down at her, pure indulgence written on his face. She laughed at the insanity of it. “What?”
“You want babies?”
“I want you to have my babies. Yeah.” He nudged his erection into her belly. “I’m hard just thinking about it.”
“Holy crap.”
“But you’re right, today isn’t the day for that. We can get started on that in a few weeks maybe. First…”
He took a step back and she bit her lip at the glory of her man. Tall, broad, strong and utterly in love with her. He stood before her naked from the waist up, silky dark hair swirling on his chest and forearms. Muscles dipping here and there, begging for her tongue. She moved toward him but he held up one hand as he dug in his pocket with the other. It wasn’t until he pulled something sparkly out and twirled it on his finger before sinking to one knee with a cocky-as-all-get-out grin that she realized what he was doing.
“You didn’t think I’d just casually toss out the babies line and hope that did it for you, eh?”
More laughing and crying at the same time. Beth had a feeling that was going to be the rest of her life. “It really did it for me, I gotta tell you.”
“Mmm, I can’t wait to find out just how wet that made you.”
“Finn!” She gasped.
“What? Is there a rule that proposals can’t have a bit of dirty talk in them? I’ll edit this part out when we tell people how this went down.”
“You better,” she whispered.
“Beth Stewart, you are the most delicious woman I’ve ever met. You drive me mental and push all of my buttons, and there’s no one else I’d rather go to sleep on a couch with. Or in a bed, or even a tent if you insisted. You push me to remember my soul and in doing so you renew my faith in humanity. You’re kind and hard-working and really, truly beautiful. I’m particularly fond of your legs. And I’d like to wake up tangled in them every morning for the rest of my life. Will you do me the great honour of becoming my wife?”
“Yes. Yes, yes, yes. A million times yes.” She closed the gap and pulled him up to stand over her as she slid on the ring.
He lifted her fingers to his mouth and pressed an open kiss to each of her knuckles. “There are some things in life we can plan for. And there are others that just need to be a leap of faith. I wasn’t planning on falling in love with you, Beth. But I did. And it happened a long time ago. I’ve wasted enough time being pig-headed. How quickly can you plan a wedding?”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled his mouth to hers. After kissing her fiancé senseless, she turned and led him upstairs to her bedroom, dropping her dress in the hallway.
***
EPILOGUE
Three months later
“That’s my girl.”
Beth woke up on her wedding day with Finn’s voice in her ear and his erection sliding between her thighs. The perfect wake up. She arched her back, welcoming him into her body. “Do we have time?”
“We’ll make time.” He snaked his arms around her, pressing one into her belly and cupping a breast in the other. “Morning seems like the only time you’re interested now, so I’ll take what I can get.”
She was just six weeks pregnant, but fatigue had already hit her. It was a blessing they were having a luncheon reception because there was no way she’d be up for a late night of dancing. “It’s just the first trimester. That’ll pass.”
“I’m not complaining. I love morning sex.” He groaned as she swivelled her hips. “Do you think you can come like this?”
“If you use your fingers.”
“Tell me,” he panted as he picked up the pace. She grinned but he bit her earlobe. “Be a good girl and tell me what you want. Tell me how you want me to get you off. Tell me how. You. Want. To. Come.”
Each of his words worked just as well as a lick of his tongue or a stroke of his finger and he knew it. She moaned and arched even further, trying to angle her pelvis into the fingers that were teasing the hair on her sex. “Rub my clit…between two fingers.”
He did exactly as she asked, exactly as she liked. They’d learned so much about each other over the last three months, and not just in the bedroom. He’d moved into her townhouse and one of her kitchen drawers suddenly turned into a catch-all junk space. The neat freak had a dirty secret. And Finn discovered that she really wasn’t a morning person but she woke up at six to spend thirty minutes on the treadmill anyway. It didn’t take much to convince her to try alternate ways of burning off some calories at dawn. She switched her treadmill time to the evening when he’d spend at least an hour working after dinner.
“You’re thinking too much, gorgeous.” He pinched her nipple. “Focus or I’ll bite your neck.”
“Thoughts of you, I promise,” she gasped. “And you wouldn’t! My dress is strapless.”
“You don’t think I’d mark you?” His dark words did their job and she started to clench around him. He kept up his steady strum at the top of her cleft as he surged in and out. “That’s it. Come on me. Come for me. Come—”
And she did, exploding in his arms like a confetti cannon of joy. He followed with his own release, and thirty seconds later their alarm clock went off.
They laughed and kissed, sharing a happy, sweaty embrace, then they scrambled, each trying to get the shower first because it really wasn’t big enough for them both. Finn hated her small en suite bathroom—it was the only part of his condo that he missed, and she couldn’t deny him that one change. So while they were away on their honeymoon, the wall between the en suite and the next room over would be knocked down and both rooms renovated. They’d end up with a much larger bathroom with his and her sinks and an oversized shower. The former bedroom on the other side would lose its closet and some floor space but the new space would be just big enough for Finn’s home office.
Eventually they’d need to move but the townhouse would be big enough for them and one child. As Beth brushed her teeth and watched Finn soap up quickly, she smoothed her hand over her lower belly. Still just a bundle of cells but she couldn’t help but feel like one might be enough. She couldn’t imagine feeling more complete or happier than she did at that moment.
*
Finn’s family showed up an hour later with a couple bottles of champagne, croissants and a fruit tray. Next arrived Beth’s parents, who’d flown in for the wedding, then a make-up artist and a hairdresser. All the women disappeared upstairs and a few minutes later his m
other fluttered downstairs carrying his suit bag.
“You should get dressed down here,” she instructed. It made her anxious enough that Finn would see Beth before the ceremony. He decided not to torture her by sharing that not only had he already seen Beth’s dress, he’d seen the lingerie she was wearing underneath it and they’d taken the entire outfit for a bit of a test-run, a memory which gave him a bit of a hard-on even in mixed company. It would be wrong to give his mother a heart attack on one of the happiest days of her life.
And his. He couldn’t keep a grin off his face.
Not once in the last three months had he regretted leaping into a life with Beth. She got him, without judgement or complaint, except for when he packed up dinner leftovers when she’d secretly wanted seconds. And even then, when he packed those leftovers into a lunch bag for her the next day, he got a heated kiss as thanks, so she obviously didn't mind that much.
He stepped into the powder room on the main floor and changed into his suit, but his dress socks were upstairs in his dresser. He jogged halfway up the stairs and called out for Beth.
Giggles ensued and then her voice rang out. “Yes, darling?”
Fuck, he liked hearing her say that. “My socks.”
“Hang on.”
And he did, like a love-struck goofball, waiting for his wife-to-be to toss his socks over the bannister. When she did, he saw a glimpse of tulle and his breath caught in his throat. She hadn’t worn a veil when she’d modelled her dress for him.
“Hey, Finn?” Her voice floated down to him. “How about you guys go on ahead to the winery and we’ll meet you there?”
“You sure?”
He could hear the smile in her voice. “Absolutely.”
The photographer was arriving as they left, and she took a few pictures of him and his brother, then the two of them with their dad. His mom came outside to press a boutonnière onto his lapel, and the photographer’s assistant quietly appeared with a corsage for Finn to put on his mom’s wrist. She cried, they took another picture, and then they escaped into the car. Ryan’s son came racing out of the house at the last minute, so they needed to pause to move a booster seat from one car to the other, and Finn didn’t mind even for a second.
