“Uh…congratulations, son,” Adam murmured.
“Yes. Congratulations, Gabriel,” Maggie echoed.
I smiled. I mean, what else could I do. The entire thing sounded like a badly scripted soap opera. I turned to Shane and held my hand out for the marketing file. “Gimme, ma’am.”
Shane walked over to her desk, picked up the marketing file and walked it over to me. I took it as I leaned in to kiss her cheek. “Hey, Sis,” I greeted late.
She cocked her head and studied my face. “You look like shit, Gabriel,” she said, chuckling sadly.
“I feel like shit,” I replied, honestly.
“It’s been a couple of days, Gabe,” she reminded me. “I think it’s safe to go to her now.”
Again, because we were family, and I had no shame in front of them, I said, “I think I’m scared of my reception. I can take anger. I can take rage. I can take sadness. I can take a lot of reactions from her. But I pray I don’t get indifference, or I don’t know what I’ll do.”
I could hear Adam clearing his throat. I wasn’t sure if I was making them uncomfortable, but they’d need to get over it. Embarrassing moments are what it meant to be a Buchanan.
I looked over at the man and smirked. “Any advice for a man whose wife wants to divorce him?”
He glanced over at Maggie and laughed a little. “Uh, fortunately, I’ve never been faced with an argument big enough to throw around threats of divorce, but Maggie has been mad as hell at me a few times in our lives.” Maggie chuckled, but didn’t add any of her cents. “So, the only thing I can tell you when faced with an angry woman…well, you can cup your balls, drop to your knees, and beg for forgiveness. Orrr, you can take control of the situation and her, and show her the real man inside you, that she seems to have forgotten is in there.”
Maggie looked over at him. “That’s your advice?”
I laughed and winked at Maggie. “Thanks, Adam. That sounds like perfect advice. I think I’ll keep that in mind later tonight.” I hope Justice was ready, because I was coming for her.
Chapter 19
Justice~
Much like a couple of weeks ago, I ignored the buzzing of my phone. And then I ignored the ringing of it, too.
Besides Gabriel, there’s only one other person who would call me, and she was here at the bar with me. So, that meant the calls and texts could only be from Gabriel, and I was having too good of a time to let him ruin it.
Beatrice and I were four beers and two tequila shots in when I finally ended my Gabriel tale and told her all. She was shocked, flabbergasted and stunned by my little love story, but she didn’t disappoint. “Jesus Christ, Justice,” she uttered. “How did you manage to keep this all to yourself all these years?”
I shrugged a buzzed shoulder. “I never had real friends growing up. I was used to solving my own problems. I guess I just kept with tradition.”
She turned on her barstool and leaned into me. “Okay,” she began, “don’t think me a total classless whore, but you gotta tell me, Just. Is Gabriel as good in the sack as he looks like he should be?”
I let out a drunken laugh because the answer was pathetic. “I don’t know,” I answered, honestly. “I’ve never slept with anyone else, Bea. He could totally suck, and I wouldn’t know it.” She blinked twice and then busted out laughing. Soon we were both laughing like loons on our barstools.
When she finally got herself under control, she wiped the tears from her eyes and said, “Oh, my God, Justice, that is too funny.”
I stopped laughing, but my grin spread across my face. “It is not funny,” I argued. “It’s sadly true. I have no one to compare him to. He could be packing a small dick and not be able to fuck worth a damn and I wouldn’t know any better.”
She raised a brow as she shook her head at me. “You’ve been fucking the man for six years, Justice,” she countered. “Even if you have no other experience, you wouldn’t still be fucking him if he wasn’t making you cum on the regular.”
She had a point.
Besides, I’d never been a sheltered virgin. I knew the basics, and I knew the average penis was between five and six inches. Gabriel was packing a whopping nine. And, save for that one time, he’s never failed to make me orgasm. So, yeah, it was probably safe to say that he was good in bed.
“It doesn’t matter if he’s good in bed or not,” I continued, as her eyes widened at my words. “I’m sure I can find someone just as hot in the sack at whatever he’s been able to do.”
“Just-”
“So, what if he has a big dick,” I went on as if I wasn’t shocking her. “I’m sure if I look hard enough, I can find another man who’s just as gifted. As a matter of-”
“Justice!”
I leaned back and my brows rose. “What?” Bea just let out a deep sigh and shook her head.
And that’s when I knew.
Goddamn, motherfucking, hell.
I felt his hand run up the middle of my back until he clasped the nape of my neck in his large hand and squeezed. I could sense him leaning in and it was confirmed when I felt his breath on the shell of my ear. “If I were you,” he seethed, his voice dark and deadly. “I would choose my next words wisely, Justice.”
I shivered at the heat in his voice. Gabriel was pissed, and I sort of couldn’t blame him. No matter how we came to find ourselves here, I was his wife, and he had just overheard me talking about screwing other men for comparison.
I suddenly felt ashamed.
I was married-no matter how it came to be-and I was acting like I wasn’t. The very least I could do was wait until we were divorced to start…start behaving as if I wasn’t.
My stomached turned with alcohol, liquor and remorse as I remembered that I still wasn’t wearing my rings. It was one thing to be at work and not wanting anyone to ask questions; it was another thing to be at a bar drinking with my ring finger bare.
I wanted to find enough anger and resentment to convince myself that I didn’t owe Gabriel anything, but drunk or not, I recited wedding vows and I was rubbing them in the dirt.
I kept my eyes focused on Bea. “Wh…what are you doing here?” How did he find me?
“You have your locations on,” he informed me. “It wasn’t too hard to find you.” He squeezed my neck harder. “Sounds like you have quite the night planned.”
I turned my body to face him, but his hold on my neck was so firm, I couldn’t move. It wasn’t until he relinquished his hold on me a few seconds later that I realized it had been a power play. I looked up at his magnificently fuming eyes. “Wh…why are you looking for me?” Bea let out a small cough, but I ignored her.
“I tend to worry when my wife doesn’t answer my texts or phone calls,” he replied, his voice filled with controlled anger.
I was about to ask why was he calling me when Beatrice chimed in-out of curiosity or to diffuse the tension, I wasn’t sure. “Hi,” she said, smiling at Gabriel. “I’m Beatrice Easton, Justice’s friend.”
Gabriel worked his jaw and I could see him fighting to be cordial. His eyes finally left mine as he looked over at Bea. “Hello, Beatrice,” he said smoothly. “I’m Gabriel Buchanan, Justice’s husband.”
Bea grinned at him. “Yeah, I heard,” she replied. “I gotta admit, though. I’m kind of disappointed there was no Elvis. I mean, if you’re going to go drunken Las Vegas wedding, you gotta have an Elvis.”
Gabriel’s voice held no warmth. “I’m not sure what all Justice has told you, but the circumstances of our wedding do not make our marriage any less legal and binding,” he growled.
Bea threw her hands up in a surrendering motion. “Oh, hey,” she said, her buzz killed just like that, along with mine. “I have a pretty good guess as to what you’re thinking there, Husband-Man, but let me let you in on a little knowledge. Along with your snazzy Las Vegas wedding, Justice also told me about your lovely six-year courtship, so if your wife is sitting here without her rings on, talking about looking for dick…well, it’s
not because I dragged her here, that’s for sure.”
Gabriel stepped forward until he was standing next to me. “An admitted mistake I am doing my best to rectify,” he snapped back.
Bea leaned back and smiled. “I sure hope so,” she replied. “Justice is an amazing woman, and even though all the evidence points to you being a dick, I don’t think you are.” I looked up and saw Gabriel cock his head at her; not sure where she was going with her ramblings. “I think she should give you a chance.”
I gasped and narrowed my eyes at the traitor. “Beatrice!”
She looked at me and shrugged. “That’s just my opinion, though.” And then the hussy winked at me.
“So, then, you don’t mind if I drag you guys out of here?” Gabriel asked, completing ignoring the fact that I was not in agreement with Bea.
“What? Why me, too?” she exclaimed, clearly losing focus of her betrayal.
Gabriel’s arm wrapped around my back, and my foolish body leaned into him. “Because I’m not leaving my wife’s best friend alone and drunk in a bar, Beatrice,” he explained calmly. But I knew the truth. Gabriel was being cordial and respectful, but the man was still pissed. He was just going to wait until we got home to unleash.
“I am perfectly sa-”
Gabriel held his hand up to stop her. “Get up like a good little drunken adventurer and follow us out or I will carry you, Beatrice,” he instructed, shocking the shit out of both of us. “I am doing my best to convince Justice to stay married to me. So, the last thing I’m going to do is leave her best friend behind in a bar just to hear about her being cut up into tiny pieces the next morning and having Justice really never forgive me. So….” He pulled out his wallet, nodded towards the bartender, and stepping in between me and Beat, dropped three one-hundred-dollar bills on the bar.
“Dude,” Beatrice deadpanned, eyeing the bills he threw on the bar. “How drunk do you think we are that warrants a three-hundred-dollar bar tab?”
Gabriel side-eyed her. “I don’t care if you guys only purchased one drink,” he retorted. “I will always pay for Justice and make sure she’s covered.”
Beatrice leaned her head to the side to look at me. “Look, I know he was a dick for six years, but come onnnnnnnn…”
I knew she was joking. And because we’d been friends for so long, I knew she wasn’t the type of person whose eyes twinkled over money or status, but her teasing comment put a huge spotlight on the fact that Gabriel was loaded. This is the first time we’ve ever been out in public together, and him overpaying my tab was making me hugely uncomfortable. I had been too mad in Vegas to make it an issue the first time, and too drunk to argue the rest of the time.
Ignoring Bea’s joke, I stood up, grabbed my purse and took out three twenties, tossing them on Gabriel’s pile.
“What are you doing?” he asked, eying the additional bills.
“Supporting myself,” I replied before walking out, leaving them to follow.
Chapter 20
Gabriel~
I was pissed.
That was a given.
But, right now, I wasn’t sure what I was more pissed about; the fact that Justice was drunkenly rambling about comparing me to other men, or how she paid for her drinks even after I already laid down enough cash to cover their tab.
Beatrice had filled the car with her chatterbox ways all the way to her place, but once we dropped her off at her apartment, the drive to Justice’s had been endured with loud as fuck silence.
Now, we were back at Justice’s apartment, and the second she had unlocked the front door, she had headed to the bathroom and was in the shower inside three minutes of our arrival. I had used her shower time to change out of my suit into a blue tank top and white basketball shorts. I was sitting on the bed when she walked out, and I almost broke a molar when I saw that she was dressed in a pair of pajama pants and a sleep t-shirt.
Once upon a time, Justice changed in front of me if she was wearing any clothes, at all.
I honestly wondered how much more of this I could take.
I watched as she removed the towel from her hair, and she started towel drying her rainbowed strands.
Christ, I loved that about her.
She had grown up poor and lived in a trailer park. She sported used clothes, and she had to work for everything she had. But her circumstances never dimmed her shine. Instead of worrying that rainbow colored hair or bright lipstick might make her seem weird, she embraced her varying expressions of herself.
“Why did you add money to the tab that was clearly covered, Just?” The talking about other guys took a backseat to the money, simply because there was no way she’d be fucking someone else, no matter how much shit she talked.
Her hands stopped mid-dry, and she looked over at me. She was silent for a few seconds, as if she was choosing her wording, but then she said, “I can buy my own drinks, Gabriel.”
This girl was going to be hell on my dental plan. “I never implied that you couldn’t,” I replied. “But, as the man in this relationship, I pick up the tab, Justice. Always.”
She turned to face me full-on, hair drying all but forgotten. “I’ve been paying my own way since I was old enough to hold down a job, Gabriel. That shit doesn’t just suddenly come to an end because you’re blessed enough to be able to scatter hundreds around with no consequence.”
I stood up and walked towards her. I stopped once I was standing directly in front of her. I looked down into her pretty blue eyes. “I’ve got news for you, baby. That shit came to an end the second you said, ‘I do’. I pay for everything moving forward, and if I’m not around, then you use my credit cards until we add you to all my accounts. Bec-”
Justice’s eyes rounded and she took a step back from me; her face pure disbelief. “Are you out of your mind?” She didn’t give me a chance to assure her I was very sane. “I am not…you’re crazy if you think…No. Just no,” she said, adamantly shaking her head at me.
I put my hands on my hips. “No, what?”
“I’m not taking your money, Gabriel,” she scoffed. “There’s no way in hell I’m touching your money.”
I definitely need to make a dentist appointment. “It’s not my money, Justice,” I growled. “It’s our money.”
She looked at me as if I just sprouted two horns on my head. “It is most definitely not our money, Gabriel. It’s Buchanan money and I am not a Buchanan.”
I had her back flat up against the wall before she could take her next breath. “I’m fucking done playing games with you, Justice,” I snarled in her face. “You are a Buchanan. You should have been a Buchanan years ago, but I was a jerk. I admit that. I admit that and I’m so fucking sorry for how I took you for granted all those years.” Her eyes started to shine with resentful tears, but I was way past letting her tears sway me. I was going to take motherfucking control just like Adam advised. “I plan on spending the rest of my days making it up to you, but from this second forward, you will stop talking about divorce, other men, or how you’re not a Buchanan or entitled to my money. You are my wife, Justice. And as such, I will always take care of you financially, emotionally and sexually. Me, and only me!”
Justice squared her shoulders and met me head-on. “And if I don’t? Then what, Gabriel? How are you planning to control me, exactly?”
I need all women of the world to stop right now and pay attention to this moment in time.
Do not ever challenge a man to prove he’s a man.
Nope.
Just don’t do it.
It will never end well for any parties involved.
A pussy will back down, or possibly, become cruel to make you feel beneath him.
A man?
A real man?
Well, he’s going to lose his motherfucking mind, exactly how I did.
I stormed over to the dresser in the corner and yanked open her jewelry box, spilling its contents all over the goddamn place, until my eyes found Justice’s wedding rings tucked in the pl
acement folds of the box. I jerked those sonsofbitches out of the box, stormed my way back to Justice-who, incidentally, was looking at me all wide-eyed and bewildered-grabbed her hand and jammed those motherfuckers back on her ring finger.
She closed her hand into a fist; trying to keep the rings on, or ready to deck me, I wasn’t sure. But her voice trembled when she tried to speak. “G…Gab...riel…”
I held her immobile against the wall, my body blocking any movement. I leaned down until my face was in the crook of her neck and my voice filled her ear. “Try me, Justice,” I whispered, as my hand came up and wrapped around her throat. “Because if there’s one thing you know, as evident by the money you tossed on the bar tonight, is that I have the money to ruin any man who comes near you.” I squeezed her throat, and praise Jesus, she couldn’t stop the little moan that escaped her lips. “I, also, have enough money to fight a divorce for-fucking-ever, Justice. For. Fucking. Ever.”
Keeping my hand wrapped around her throat, I pulled back so I could look at her face. Her eyes were closed, and she was biting her lower lip. I counted it as a victory because, while I might not know her favorite movie, I knew exactly what she looked like when she was turned on.
And Justice was turned on.
I planted one hand flat against the wall next to her head, while the one I had wrapped around her throat slid downward, over her tits, past her stomach and into the elastic waistband of her pajama pants. Her little scrap of lace offered no protection against my fingers. She moaned, and I took advantage of how well I knew her body.
Justice loved to get finger fucked.
She once confessed that it made her feel dirty. She liked the idea of being fucked without being fucked.
My fingers slipped inside her tight, wet warmth and I curled my finger, finding her magic spot easily. I’ve spent the last six years doing nothing but fuck this woman, I knew everything it took to make her shameless. Justice started moaning and her hands wrapped around the forearm of the hand that was inside her pants.
If You Could Only Feel (Buchanan Brothers Series Book 3) Page 10
