by Ashlee Price
Her blue eyes were watering and her face was getting a little pink. She knew what was happening, and for a moment I wondered if she was going to give me the answer that I wanted. It had never occurred to me that she would say no until that very moment.
She kind of nodded to the question that didn’t need an answer and waited for the one that did.
“I don’t want to go on another day without you with me.”
“I am with you now, Drake. We don’t have to do this.”
I pushed through and pulled the ring out of my pocket. When she saw it the waterworks really started to come, and I knew that she was going to say yes. “Marry me, Erin, and make me the happiest man in New York.”
There was no pause, just a nod of her head and a smile. I couldn’t believe it, but she had said yes!
Chapter 6 – Erin
Everything was magical. The wedding was like a fairy tale, and I couldn’t ask for a better Prince Charming than Drake. I had to pinch myself a couple of times throughout the day just to make sure that I wasn’t dreaming. Of all of the things that I thought would happen in my life, being with a man like Drake and getting everything that I wanted had never entered into the picture. I knew that there was never going to be more love in me than there was then.
It all happened in a blur, the ceremony and the reception. We kissed and danced, my mind hard-pressed to keep up with everything. I was still not sure if it was all real, but it started to be real when he took me home and into the bedroom. Now it was all real, and I could feel my body starting to respond. I had been running on need for too long. I needed him, and when he put his hand out to me, my own was shaking slightly as I took it.
“Now you are my wife.”
He said it as though he was as shocked as I was about it. The way he looked at me was priceless, and when I was finally pulled into his embrace I knew everything was the way it was supposed to be. His chest was hard against me, and for a time I was just content to stay in his arms. His lips moved down to mine and the trembling stopped. He was the rock that I needed, and I trusted him more than I trusted myself. Drake knew me.
When he pushed me away so that he could unzip the back of my dress, my hands were shaking. I knew what came next. The night before we had been away from each other. It was the first time since we had been back together that I hadn’t had his touch. My body acted like it was craving him, and when I was bare in front of him, I could barely look at his eyes. I knew what I would find there.
He covered my body when I lay down, and he was naked above me. I still loved to see the hard ripples in his abs and feel the harder biceps under my fingertips. I couldn’t get over the way he felt above me. He drove me crazy long before he leaned down to kiss me. His body pushed mine into the mattress, and only then was I able to catch my breath.
His mouth was hungry, moving from my mouth, to my neck and then down the valley in between my breasts. My body started to tense, stomach tightening under his kiss as he moved his way down my body. I knew where he wanted to go, and my thighs pressed together to stop him. I was so turned on that I was already too sensitive to take that kind of thing.
“Pease, Drake, I can’t.”
Drake looked up at me for a moment, and when I opened my eyes I could see the need in his own. It was suffocating and intense. His hands went to either side of my thighs and pried them apart. Then he moved his body in between my legs. I knew then that I was not going to be able to tell him no. I never wanted to tell him no again, and it was one of those moments that he wasn’t going to allow it. While Drake was gentle with me most of the time, there was now a look on his face that was a bit much to take. There was no telling him no, and when his head moved down to disappear in between my thighs, it wasn’t long before I was screaming out his name over and over again.
He knew when the begging was real and when I really couldn’t take anymore. As he smiled down at me, I felt his lips and barely saw him moving down to kiss me. I could feel his need pressing against me, and my own whimper as he entered me ever so slowly. It was like magic to feel him opening me wide and stretching every inch.
My eyes slammed shut and I couldn’t watch him anymore. All I could do was feel. He was overwhelming me with everything. Each stroke in was like a release of drugs to my brain, and soon I was just as loud as I was before, begging him for more. Then it was enough, too much, and I was exploding underneath him.
His lips silenced my moans and screams, while his hips pressed deep to fill me with his need. It was hot and burned my insides as my breath tried to slow down. Did he know what he was doing to me? When I finally opened my eyes again, he was still inside of me, staring down at me with a look of love that brought a thickness to my throat.
“God, I love you, Erin. So much.”
I just kind of nodded and accepted his lips against mine. My insides clenched him hard and he drove deeper, making me squeal.
“If you keep doing that, Erin, I will not be able to stop myself.”
I kind of smiled and squeezed him as hard as I could. He was too much, but I still wanted more. I didn’t have much sense that way when it came to Drake.
~The End for Now~
EPILOGUE TO THE PRICELESS ONE - ERIN
The sky was clear and my mind was a million miles away. I knew that I had to tell Drake what I had found out. He was going to be thrilled; I wasn’t worried about that. I was worried about everything else that he was dealing with at the moment. I knew that it was a lot for him to take. He was in court that very moment with his father over his inheritance and the family business that he’d been promised. I knew it was all because of me and Drake not bringing up the prenuptial agreement. I told him I would sign it, but as a matter of principal he wouldn’t let me.
So now he was in court fighting with his father and I was sitting on a huge secret that was driving me crazy. I’d never kept anything from him in the year we had been married. We shared everything, maybe too much of everything, and now I didn’t know how to function with such a secret in my mind. I knew I had to wait until he was done with everything at court. After almost a week of hearings, I was hoping that today would be the day he would get an answer, one way or another.
Pushing back from the counter, I held the little bump that was in my stomach. I had been worried that wedded bliss had helped me gain a few pounds, but now I knew that it was our love becoming another person. It was what I had wanted the first time we were together, but I wasn’t sure how Drake was going to feel about it. We had never really discussed it, and it was a big deal. I worried how he would take it, and it just seemed like too much stress for him right now.
I looked at the clock for the fifth time in as many minutes. It was a little after six and the sun was starting to go down. I knew he should be home soon. He was always home about that time. Maybe he had gotten a verdict against him and was drinking away some of his worry. It wouldn’t have been the first time that he had done that very thing.
The dress on my body was black, sleek and paired well with the sky-high heels that I was wearing. I knew that it was his favorite and it was hard for him to be upset or angry when I was scantily clad. I can’t say that it wasn’t part of my plan, one that I hoped he would like. No matter what had happened in court, I was bound and determined to make his day a better one.
When I heard the front door open, my heart skipped a few beats and I held my breath to hear him. I don’t know what I was listening for, but I barely got turned around before he was coming up behind me, kissing the side of my cheek. “I missed you today.”
It was the first thing he said to me and I melted against him. It was what he made me do, even a year later. I stayed in his arms for a time and felt his heart beating against my back. I didn’t want to find out what had happened. I didn’t want the moment to be taken away.
He pulled away from me and turned me around. “What’s wrong?”
I didn’t know that my eyes were a little red and wet. While I liked to think that it was my mixed-u
p emotions that were doing it, I knew that it was just the way he held me, the way he loved me. Everything about him was too much and this was no different. I was supposed to be there for him and I was worried about my own needs.
Shaking off the thoughts, I asked him how his day had gone. There was a flash of some emotion on his face, but then he covered it with a smile. “It went better than I thought it would.”
He was being careful with his words and I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. I just waited for him to tell me everything. After a few moments, I went to the cabinet and made him a drink. It looked like he needed one, and I almost poured me one as well before I remembered the secret I was keeping.
Drake’s mind was elsewhere and he didn’t even really notice. I guess that I should have felt better that his mind was somewhere else. It left me in the clear and he wouldn’t guess what was going on, but I was ready to tell him and get the secret off my chest. But first I had to find out what had happened at court.
“So what happened, Drake? Did you win or did your father win?”
“Neither one of us won in the end. The judge closed the case without prejudice and we are going to try and work it out.”
I was trying to understand what he was talking about. Drake must have known that I didn’t get it, because he explained how their lawyers had decided that making everything public and on record about the business was just going to hurt them both. They needed to work it out and had a month to figure out a way to amicably take care of the business and the inheritance.
“Do you think he is really going to give it a shot?” I was hopeful, but what I had heard about his father – and the fact that he wouldn’t even meet me – told me that he was stubborn to no end.
Drake kind of sighed and then shrugged with a hopeful look on his face. I wanted everything to work out the way he wanted it to, but he surprised me when he said something about them wanting to meet me for dinner that night. That was a big change in everything that had happened so far, so I was hopeful that this was the first step towards the two of them working something out. But I would have been lying and crazy to have said that I was looking forward to it. I knew that his father didn’t like me. I just hoped it would go okay.
There wasn’t much time to get ready, but there was enough time for him to drive me crazy and make me beg for him to take me against the kitchen table. It was fast and hard, everything that I needed it to be at that moment. I came hard and screamed his name. It was a big release, even though what I wanted to say and do didn’t happen. By the end of it, when we were leaving the house and getting into one of the cars, I was relaxed about everything. It didn’t matter then that his parents hadn’t come to our wedding. All that mattered was that Drake wanted me. While I wanted it to all go okay, I was okay with it if it didn’t. How could I be upset about it when it was Drake that I wanted? We were going to be a family soon, and there was nothing that his father could do about it.
***
“Don’t be so nervous.”
“I’m not.” My tone sounded a little defensive, but I was trying hard not to show how I really felt about everything. I was more than a little worried about meeting his parents for the first time. I had been poised to tell him about the baby we were going to have, but like every day since I had found out there was something that held me back. I was worried about how he was going to take it, how the night would go, how business would go. For a moment I just wanted to leave and never look back.
“Baby, I know you, and I know you are nervous, but you don’t have to be. My father is not going to say anything mean to you. I wouldn’t let him. My mom will most likely be drunk when they get here. Trust me, it will be fine.”
I don’t know why he thought that his words would actually help anything, because they didn’t. It just made me feel worse, and I had to go to the bathroom when I felt the urge to get sick. I knew that it was the baby and my emotions making me sick, but I couldn’t help it. I didn’t know how to turn it off.
When I got back to the table I was a little pale and the rest of the dinner party was there. I knew I looked a mess and hoped that no one noticed. Drake did seem to notice, and sent me a questioning look, but there was nothing I could do.
I was introduced to his father and mother and got a stiff handshake from each of them. His father seemed to be studying me far too well, while his mother was as drunk as Drake had said she would be. It was strange at first, but it seemed like his father was making an effort, and before long I was actually enjoying myself.
The waiter came through with more wine and I put my hand over my glass for the third time. It was then that his father noticed and asked me why I wasn’t drinking. “You aren’t pregnant, are you?”
I kind of froze. It was not the way that I’d wanted it to come out, but when I looked at Drake, I knew that this was it. Apparently I was going to have to tell him right there in front of his parents. After I got over the embarrassment and reluctance of it all, I finally just agreed to it. Why deny it?
“Yes, I actually just found out a couple of days ago.”
Drake looked from me and then to his parents. I guess he wanted to know how his father knew, but I couldn’t tell him. If it was a guess, it was a really good one. Drake was shocked for a moment, and then he got a big smile on his face. I had been so worried about what he would do that I had forgotten that Drake was Drake. My husband was going to be happy. Of course he would be.
He moved to kiss me, and for a moment we both forgot that his parents were looking on. When I realized it, I kind of pushed him away and groaned to the growl in his throat. He was so sexy when he did that that it made me want to leave right then. It wasn’t for embarrassment that I was ready to be alone. Again, I was just going to blame it on hormones for the way my crazy body was responding.
The rest of the dinner went by at a snail’s pace. I knew that Drake and I had a lot to talk about afterwards. The only good thing out of it all was that his mother seemed to sober up some and wanted to talk about Drake when he was young. I learned a lot about him, and by the end of the evening everyone was far more relaxed. When we left, father and son did a little half-hug that was a step up from the dirty looks when it all began. I was going to see it as progress.
As soon as we got back to the car, Drake had this smile on his face that I couldn’t look away from.
“What?”
“You are pregnant?”
I kind of nodded my head and his hand moved down to my stomach. “I can’t wait, baby.”
I just smiled back at him, relieved. I don’t know why I worried so much. When was I going to learn that with Drake, everything was going to be okay?
~The End~
Bad Boy Exposed
Part 1: Camilla
Camilla Loring has the perfect life and the perfect job. She hasn’t found her soul mate yet, but she has a good feeling about Jesse, the new guy that she’s dating. It’s a fresh romance, and Camilla wants something perfect to wear to their third date. This is the date where she’s ready to see how compatible they really are, and the only thing missing is the dress.
When she goes to one of her favorite shops in the mall, the owner helps her find the perfect dress for her big night out. If Jesse doesn’t fall for her in this dress, there’s nothing else she can do! The blue garment is perfect, and when she slips it on she can feel how right it is.
Then something happens that will change her life forever. Nothing is ever going to be the same after her perfect world comes crashing down when the first gunshot rings out.
Chapter 1 – Camilla
“How are you doing, Marge?”
“Not too bad. What are you looking for today?”
I shrugged. We both knew what I was there for. Chandral’s only sold dresses, and the ones they carried were the type of dresses that were supposed to make men drool. I was there because I wanted to do the same thing.
“So who is the lucky guy?”
“Someone from work.�
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She assumed that I meant a colleague, and when she asked for details I skirted the question. I knew that I couldn’t admit that I was dating a client. That was not okay, and I didn’t even like to admit it to myself. It was unethical at the very least.
“Does he have a friend?”
“I can ask.”
Marge tossed her hair back, and I regretted cutting mine for the third time this week. I still didn’t know what I was thinking when I hacked it off into a bob. It was easier, lightweight, but I missed the simple things like she was doing then.
“Well, come on, Camilla. There are some new ones in the back that just came in. I know that you’ll like them. The blue is really going to make those eyes of your pop out.”
I’d been coming to the store for several years, since moving to the city, and I trusted her opinion. She dressed me better than I dressed myself, and I was more than willing to give up the responsibilities. Following her to the back room where the inventory was, I instantly knew which dress she was talking about.
“What do you think?”
It was beautiful. There were no two ways around it. The light blue material was heavily beaded in the most interesting pattern. The only thing that was hard to deal with – or imagine myself wearing – was the cut itself. It was long, but there were two slits on the side that made me blush. I wasn’t sure how that was going to be managed.
Marge must have seen my look, because she assured me that with my legs, it would be wrong not to wear it.
“It was made for you, Camilla. If I looked the way you do, I would rock this.”
I didn’t know if she was trying to convince me or just sell me something for the commission. It didn’t matter, because we both knew that I was going to try it on. I was still fingering the material because it was so soft.
“I’ll go slip it on. What would I wear underneath it?” I was still looking at the slits and trying to figure it out. Would I be able to pull that off, or was I going to have a major wardrobe malfunction? Both seemed possible.
