Autumn Adventure (Summer Unplugged #6)

by Amy Sparling

  Autumn Adventure

  Part 6 of the Summer Unplugged Series

  Amy Sparling

  Copyright © 2015 Amy Sparling

  All rights reserved.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover art from shutterstock.com

  Cover design by Amy Sparling

  First edition April 2nd, 2015

  Chapter 1

  This might be the first night of my first (and only) honeymoon, but as I walk onto the private jet my new husband has rented for the occasion and run my fingers along the smooth vanilla-colored leather of the seat next to me, I am absolutely positive that this is the best honeymoon in the world. Not even a Kardashian could top this. I mean, yeah they’re all vastly more wealthy than Jace and I will ever be, but there’s one thing I have that the Kardashian clan doesn’t.

  Jace Adams.

  I plunk down into one of the six massive seats on the jet. I’m still in my wedding gown and once my body sinks into the plush chair, exhaustion overtakes me.

  “This chair must be straight from heaven because it is so freaking comfortable,” I say, closing my eyes and running my hands up and down the armrests. Jace sits in the chair across from me, swiveling until our feet touch. “No sleeping just yet, Mrs. Adams,” he says, smiling when he calls me by my new last name. “You have to choose our first destination so we can tell the pilot where to take us.”

  Did I mention that Jace has carved out three entire weeks from his work schedule so that we can spend a full twenty one days traveling around the country, doing whatever we want as we celebrate our wedding? Yeah, because that’s currently happening. Suck it, every other honeymoon ever.

  I toss my head back and look at the ceiling of the jet, squishing my lips to the side of my mouth while I try to think of a place to go. Up until a few moments ago, our honeymoon destination had been a secret because Jace was wanting to surprise me. I figured he had planned a trip to a beach resort or something, but as usual, what he actually planned far exceeded my expectations. He rented the jet, which came with his long time pilot friend, and gave me the reigns. Now, fear overwhelms me as I struggle to think of somewhere to go. When you have the entire country as an option, it’s hard to choose.

  Finally, I get an idea.

  “Los Angeles!”

  Jace’s head tilts to the side quizzically. “LA? Why?”

  I shrug. “Well, when we went to visit your parents, I had all these visions of going to LA and seeing the Hollywood sign and stuff, and then we didn’t do that at all because they lived in San Francisco.”

  “And you had absolutely no knowledge of the geography of the state of California,” Jace says with a laugh. “LA isn’t really as cool as it looks in the movies, but, if that’s where my wife wants to go…”

  I nod enthusiastically. “Please, can we? I want to see some celebrities!”

  Jace laughs and then walks up to the front of the plane, sliding open a door to the cockpit. “Take us to LA,” he says, followed by, “Yep. That LA.”

  When he returns, he leans over and gives me a kiss before taking his seat again. “What did that mean?” I ask, referring to his conversation with Christopher, our pilot.

  “He just flew in here from LA, so he thought it was funny that I told him to go right back there,” Jace says. He yawns, which makes me yawn, too. It’s been a long freaking day. I mean, when I woke up this morning I was still a single woman. Now I’m married.

  I groan. “I’m sorry I picked LA. It’s actually kind of a stupid place to go first.”

  Jace shakes his head. “No way. This is a spontaneous trip. Your first choice is the best one because it’s what you really want. We’re going and it’ll be awesome.”

  I smile and grab his hand from across the small aisle between our chairs. “So what’s behind that other door?” I ask, gesturing to the door behind us. “Is it the bathroom? Because I’m sure I’ll have to pee before we get there.” At the sudden thought of how much soda I had at our wedding, my eyes go wide as panic makes my stomach tighten. “Please tell me there’s a bathroom in there?”

  Jace laughs and shakes his head, standing up and walking toward the door. “Babe, there’s a lot more than a bathroom back there.” He pulls open the door with a flourish of his hand and suddenly I’m on my feet in my wedding gown, my mouth open like I’m some kind of fish underwater.

  “Oh, my God,” I murmur, making my way to the door. Behind it is a luxurious living room area. A flat screen television, a couch in the same fancy leather as the seats, a fully-stocked bar, a sink, and another door that probably leads to the bathroom. Jace opens it and I follow him.

  Nope, it doesn’t lead to the bathroom. It leads to a bedroom. A queen sized bed with a big fluffy duvet that looks as soft as a cloud. Another television, and then another door. That one leads to a bathroom.

  “Wow, this place is amazing.” Somehow, the words manage to come out of my mouth despite its sudden problem with staying open in awe and fascination. “We don’t even have to fly anywhere,” I say, sitting on the bed which is just as comfortable as I had imagined it would be. “Let’s just stay in this plane for three weeks.”

  Jace’s gaze turns seductive at the thought of what I’d just said. He walks toward me slowly, stopping when he’s in front of me while I sit on the bed. I look up at him and give him my best seductive look in return. He better be thinking what I’m thinking.

  Just in case he’s not, I reach up and start unbuttoning his dress shirt. I have to stand up as I get to the buttons on his chest and when I reach the top one, Jace slips his arms around my back, tugging the ribbon corset bow that’s tied at the base of my dress.

  A second later, my dress loosens as he works his fingers through the ribbons, making the bust of the dress begin to fall outward. I slide my fingers up his chest, feeling his rock hard abs as I push aside his shirt and let it fall to the ground.

  It’s funny how my incredibly expensive gown took my mom and best friend thirty minutes to put on, and only needs thirty seconds for Jace to have it pooled on the floor around my feet. I help him remove the strapless contraption that is my form-fitting bra, and then Jace lowers me onto the bed, sliding his body slowly up mine until our eyes meet. My skin tingles at the touch of his, a sensation I doubt I will ever get used to, no matter how long we’re together.

  “I’m so glad you married me,” Jace whispers before kissing me. My hands travel up his biceps, which are rigid while he supports his weight on top of me. His arms aren’t the only hard thing I’m thinking about right now.

  I bite my lip, trying to hold back the desire coursing through me, but then Jace dips his head into my neck, kissing my flesh delicately at first, then with passion as his tongue grazes across my skin, down to my collarbone. Chills prickle over every inch of my skin, and my fingers dig into his back.

  “I’m glad I married you, too,” I whisper, shuddering as Jace’s fingers slide down my side, stopping when he grabs my hip. I draw in a deep breath as I feel him press against me. My lips touch his ear, and I make my request between gasping for air. “I’m yours, Jace. So take me.”

  Chapter 2

  The weather in California must be the same temperature as it is in heaven year-round. Unlike the scorching hot, hair-wrecking humid conditions in Texas during this time of year, Los Angeles is a perfect seventy-two degrees with clear, sunny skies. We step out of the plane at the private airstrip near LAX and I let my head fall back, as my eyes c
lose and I take in the beautiful weather. Already, my hair looks amazing with the low humidity. And it hasn’t even been washed yet.

  Jace rents a car and we hang out in the front seat, still parked at the airport while we try to figure out a place to stay.

  “Just about every hotel in LA will be awesome,” Jace says, leaning over to look at my phone screen as I search for hotels. “Do you have anything in mind?”

  I shake my head. My ignorance of just about everything is starting to make me sad. Jace is so worldly and experienced and I just suck at everything.

  “You okay?” he asks, nudging me in the shoulder with his chin.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I say, continuing to scroll on my phone.

  “Liar, liar,” he says. He takes my hand and I look up at him. He’s wearing a blue Oakley shirt and jeans and yet he looks just as gorgeous today as he did in his tuxedo last night. I can’t help but smile when I look into his gorgeous eyes. I sigh. No sense in keeping things from him—he’d only find them out eventually.

  “I just feel so stupid not knowing anything about, well, anything, and you’re so smart and have been everywhere and know everything.”

  “That is so not true, babe. I’m not smarter than you are. Not by a long shot.” I give him a sarcastic look but he keeps talking. “I know motocross and California and that’s about it. Everything else in life, we’ll get to learn together. I mean, I’m psyched for us to have our baby and buy a house but I have absolutely no idea how to do either one of those things.”

  “Really, Jace?” I say sarcastically, giving him a look. “You don’t know how to have a baby?” I pat my belly, which is still pretty small but growing every day. “Seems like you did a pretty good job in knocking me up, so I think you know a little bit about the subject.”

  He starts laughing and reaches over, putting his hand on top of mine on my stomach. “You know what I mean. Once this kid comes out of here, I’ll have no idea what to do.”

  “Something tells me you’ll figure it out,” I say, unable to hide my smile.

  We search for hotels again, and then something catches my eye. “The Pink Palace?” I scroll some more and read about the Beverly Hills Hotel, a famous and legendary hotel that’s over a hundred years old. And the best part? It’s pink. I read aloud from the website, “It’s located in the center of Beverly Hills and is surrounded by tropical gardens and exotic flowers. Oh my God, Jace,” I say, looking over at him.

  “That sounds amazing,” he says. “Let’s go.” He types the hotel’s name into our rental car’s GPS and I buckle my seatbelt, smiling ear to ear as I get ready to drive down the famous streets of Hollywood for the first time in my life.

  I wish I could say that driving through California and checking into our hotel, which is actually what they call a private bungalow, was an amazing experience that I’ll remember for a lifetime. Instead, I fell asleep the second we pulled out of the airport.

  I wake up some time later when Jace has my car door open and is reaching for my hand.

  “Was I asleep?” I ask stupidly as I let him pull me from the car. We changed clothes on the plane, but I was so tired from the day’s activities that I only had the energy to don a pair of yoga pants and a blue tank top with rhinestones along the neckline. Ugh, that is so not clothing good enough for Cali-freaking-fornia!

  Jace laughs. “Sleeping? More like in a mini-coma.”

  We walk through an astounding garden filled with exotic plants. The floral scent overwhelms me and makes me wish I could bottle it all up and make it a perfume. For all I know, that might have already been done. I make a mental note to go shopping for fragrances in LA before we leave.

  Jace opens the door to our suite and guides me to the bed. It’s a four-poster, canopied and piled high with the most luxurious sheets and down comforter you could imagine. But I don’t even have time to admire the way the bed closes around me like a cloud, because I fall asleep just moments after my head hits the pillow.

  I wake to the smell of coffee. Jace and Becca, though I love both of them to death, are crazy addicted to coffee. I’m only a partial fan of the drink, probably because I usually fill my cup with lots of sugar and cream and then drink entirely too much and I become jittery for the rest of the day.

  Luckily, I’m nearing five months pregnant and my morning sickness is just about gone. Jace must know that, or else he’s forgotten because he hasn’t made coffee in front of me in a while because it’d make me puke the moment I smelled it.

  I open my eyes and stretch out my tired limbs, admiring once more how ridiculously soft and fluffy the sheets are. I wonder if they let you buy them from the hotel.

  “Good afternoon, Sunshine!” Jace calls from across our bungalow. I can’t immediately see him because this isn’t just a regular hotel room—it’s like an apartment that’s a thousand times better than the real apartment we live in back home. I sit up on my elbows and scan the bungalow, finally finding Jace in the kitchenette, spooning sugar into his coffee.

  He’s shirtless with messy hair. Damn, a girl could get used to waking up to this.

  “Did you say afternoon? What time is it?” I look at the nightstand for my phone, but it’s not there. After how badly I passed out last night, I’m not sure where any of our stuff is.

  Jace walks over to the bed, holding his coffee. He’s wearing just a pair of black boxers and it makes my skin tingle just looking at him and how freaking hot he is. Just as quickly as I think it, my mind wanders to how fat I’m getting with the pregnancy. I can’t help but frown and pull the sheets up higher, blocking my belly from view.

  Jace doesn’t notice my disposition change which is great because I am not in the mood to have a discussion about my many faults and how they bother me. “It’s six-thirty,” he says, sipping from a mug with the hotel’s logo on it. He turns on the television and sits next to me on the bed.

  “Six thirty at night?” I blurt out, glancing toward the window as if that can tell me anything. It’s still sunny out, but it’d be sunny no matter what time of day it is. “I slept all freaking day?”

  “Yep. Welcome to married life. Now we’re old and boring.” Jace lifts his mug as if he’s making a toast with me. I punch him playfully in the arm and force myself to crawl out of bed. “I can’t believe I wasted the whole day. And you’re the old one, not me. I will always be younger than you, no matter what.”

  I stick out my tongue at him and he responds by grabbing it between his teeth. Then we’re lying back on the bed, tangled up in the sheets and in each other’s arms. His lips taste like coffee and sugar and his skin smells amazing. I feel a little guilty that he’s had time to shower and make coffee before I woke up, but soon, Jace’s hand slips my tank top over my head and I forget all about that.

  Making love to my husband is the greatest thing ever.

  Chapter 3

  Even with all of the trips to the mall before our wedding, my entire wardrobe is too lame for our hotel, much less for the rest of California. Jace assures me that the black lacey dress I’ve chosen for dinner will be fine, but I feel so horribly under dressed. I have this frightening fear that every person who passes us in the hallway can instantly tell that I’m some uneducated country freak from the south.

  It’s because of these insecurities that we decide to have dinner at a restaurant in our hotel called The Polo Lounge. I order tortilla soup and pasta and Jace gets the filet mignon. The entire place is so fancy that I have a mini panic attack over which fork I should use. Jace, ever the handsome gentleman, laughs at me.

  “Babe, you’re stressing way too much about this. It’s just a restaurant. No one cares which fork you use.”

  “Yeah, well I’m going to Google it anyway,” I say, looking up the information on my phone. He may roll his eyes at me, but a few minutes later when I tell him he’s using the wrong fork to eat his salad, he drops it and grabs the right one. Ha!

  After dinner, we cruise through West Hollywood toward Los Angeles. It’s near
ing eight o’clock at night which makes it too late to do just about anything besides see a movie back at home, but Jace assures me there’s still plenty to do in LA.

  We walk hand in hand down the Walk of Fame and Jace takes pictures of me with the stars of Kaley Cuoco and Jim Parsons, two of my favorite actors. We visit a few museums and then grab a late night burger at In-and-Out and eat them in our rental car.

  “This is pretty good,” I say between bites.

  Jace nods and stuffs more fries in his mouth. “They should totally expand into Texas. I miss these things, bad.”

  It’s late, but we’re still wide awake from our weird wedding hangover sleep fest, so I only have to beg a little bit to convince Jace to take us to the beach. The drive is a little long, but and cruising down Santa Monica Boulevard has me singing the song All I Wanna Do by Sheryl Crow.

  When we get to the beach, I rush down the sand, eager to put my toes in the water. We have a beach in Texas, but the water is muddy brown and the sand is often full of old seaweed. It looks nothing like the beautiful Pacific coast.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Jace calls out as he jogs along behind me.

  “Why not?” I call back, narrowly missing crashing into a guy throwing a Frisbee to his dog. “I have my shoes off.” I wave the cheap sandals high above my head as I continue on my sprint to the water. It’s a warm summer’s day and all I want to do is feel the rush of the sea crashing into my feet.

  “Oh holy shit!” I call out, jumping back twice as quickly as I had stepped into the water. It’s freezing. Like, a melted arctic glacier freezing. “Why is it so cold?” I glare at the ocean as it crashes onto the shore, it’s beautiful clear water nothing but a fake lie of coldness.

  “I warned you,” he says, stepping up behind me and sliding his hands around my waist. “Why do you think everyone’s wearing a wetsuit around here? The Pacific ocean is cold as balls.”