by Anna Paige
“That’s awesome, Ali. I’m so glad you’ll have time to get away but are you sure you want to spend it here? I mean, what about getting alone time with the Groom-To-Be? A weekend getaway?”
“Pfft. He wants to spend the weekend in D.C. helping Spencer with whatever they’ve been plotting. He’s practically giddy at the idea of being able to attend the business meetings Spencer has set up, which means I am all yours for the most part. And I do believe I owe you a glass or two of that expensive Italian wine you like as payment for making that vein in my mom’s forehead bulge. I’m betting dollars to donuts that she needed a Botox booster because of you,” she giggled, suddenly buoyant at the thought of her mother’s displeasure.
“Well then, sounds to me like you owe me a whole damn bottle.” I smiled, the idea of a night out with my best friend having momentarily wiped every worry from my mind. I’d give her the weekend to try and dissuade me, just like she asked.
And on Monday, I’d do what I knew had to be done.
Spencer
THURSDAY MORNING FOUND me laying quietly in Talia’s bed, listening to her soft breathing and running my fingers through her long blond curls in a way that caused her to sigh in her sleep. It was something I did often, having learned early on that she adored having me toy with her hair. Each time I did it, she practically melted into a puddle. It was amusing and arousing at the same time. Like Talia herself.
She managed to keep me in a near-constant state of arousal, had me laughing more deeply than I had in years, and continually found ways to endear herself to me without even trying. She dazzled me at every turn. I was so lost to her that I had no hope of ever finding my way without her.
And no intention of trying.
I’d never fallen so fast in my life. Not with anyone, not even the woman I’d eventually married.
My fingers paused briefly as they slipped through Talia’s silky strands, the inadvertent conjuring of Ivey’s face making me grimace. I didn’t want her here in this place with us, even if only in my mind. She tainted everything she touched and I wouldn’t let thoughts of her ruin the deep feeling of contentment I’d awakened with this morning.
I returned to stroking Talia’s hair and rerouted my train of thought to avoid the particularly wide chasm known as my marriage. Instead, I focused on the flutter of breath across my bare chest, the rise and fall of her shoulders, the smell of her shampoo. It took all my willpower not to crush her to me, and I’d never been much of a hugger. I couldn’t help myself with her, though. Even with her wrapped around me like a cat, I wanted her closer.
Yep, I was a goner.
I tried not to think about what would happen once I had to return to Richmond full time. It would be a challenge but I knew we could work it out somehow. We had to, even if it meant fewer mornings like this one and a lot more driving. I’d put a million miles on the Chevelle to get to her, and a million more on my truck. Fuck, I’d buy myself a helicopter and fly here to her every night, whatever it took to get back to this spot.
Aside from the two surprise projects I was already working on, I’d been digging into available spots in Richmond where Talia could open another location of Canary. She’d already mentioned wanting to expand, so I figured why not look into possibilities that were a little closer to me? And if she decided not to open a Richmond location, no big deal.
We would make it work, no matter what.
Talia stirred against my chest and snuggled in closer, the arm draped across my waist pulling tight as she mumbled, “Morning, love.”
Two words was all it took to make my heart race, just two sleepily spoken words. “Good morning, sweetheart.” I kissed the top of her head and stroked my hand up and down her bare back. “Sleep well?”
“Mmm...” she muttered, throwing her leg across my hips and using her thigh to graze my erection. “Sure did. Maybe too well, because I seem to be having some trouble waking up.” She rolled her leg up and down my cock. “Do you know of anything that might get me going this morning?”
“Coffee, perhaps?” I teased in a husky voice.
She shook her head against my chest before her hand took the place her thigh had just vacated. She stroked me once and gave the head a firm squeeze, making my hips buck involuntarily. “No, I think I’m still too drowsy to walk to the kitchen. Whatever it is, it has to happen right here, right now. Any other suggestions?” Her hand moved to cup my balls.
I wound her hair around my hand and pulled her head back so that she met my eye. “How about if I pin you to this bed and bury my face between your legs? Huh? Would you like me to eat you until you come all over my face and then flip you over and grind my cock into you until you beg for mercy? How would that be? Would that wake you up or should I start by filling that hot mouth of yours with my cum? Whatever you think would do the trick, baby. I’m all about giving you what you want.” I smirked at the lust in her honey-brown eyes.
Without looking away, she squeezed a drop of pre-cum from the head of my dick and slowly lifted her hand to her mouth, licking it from her fingers with a sigh. “I want it all, Spencer.”
I leaned down a fraction and tugged her toward me, my hand still tugging her by the hair until my mouth was a hair’s breadth from hers. “Ask and you shall receive, my love.”
I STOOD IN the kitchen a long while later, sipping my coffee and listening to the sound of the shower as Talia readied herself for the day. I couldn’t help wondering about the change in her these last few days. Not that I was complaining, not at all, but I had noticed a huge surge in affection and arousal these last few days. She’d been quick to put her arms around me or take my hand from the beginning, something I was surprisingly flattered by, but this was different.
Her hugs were a little longer, her grip on my hand a little tighter, and she got this look on her face sometimes when we were making love. Those moments when our eyes locked as I moved inside her, those were the times when I noticed it most often. It was a fleeting expression, some unnamed emotion passing over her features before disappearing behind her sweet smile.
I’d seen it again this morning, longer this time than before. We’d settled into a slow rhythm after the more vigorous activities, her on her back beneath me, looking up at me with equal parts love and lust. It had been perfect... until that damned look crossed her gorgeous face and made my heart drop. She’d taken longer to recover this time but eventually tucked it away and smiled up at me as she whispered that she loved me.
When I repeated those words back to her, I poured every ounce of my affection into it, willing her to take it into her heart the way she was taking me into her body. I was silently pleading with her to believe me, though she’d never expressed any doubt.
All because of that look.
It haunted me still as I stood there, sipping my cooling coffee and hoping that all she needed was a little pick-me-up, one that I knew my surprise would provide. Talia already knew Ali was coming into town tomorrow, but she wasn’t aware that Ali was so central to my plan.
I found myself getting excited despite my apprehension over Talia’s odd behavior.
She was going to love what I had planned. I could hardly wait.
Unfortunately, that was still two days away and I had a lot of shit to wade through in the meantime. Particularly high on that list was a reaming from Clay about hiding my relationship with Talia. Ali obviously couldn’t be expected to withhold that kind of information, I wouldn’t have even asked. So as soon as Talia told Ali, Ali told Clay, and I got a string of shitty text messages that told me exactly how affronted he was that I hadn’t confided in him.
I countered that he’d kept his relationship with Ali from me but knew it wasn’t the same thing.
He’d continued to bust my balls for another ten or fifteen texts before agreeing to discuss it when next we saw each other. I knew I was going to have to put up with a lot of shit talk but I kind of welcomed it. Truth be told, I missed the fucker. Not that I’d ever dare tell him that.
&
nbsp; That’s not to say that Brant was poor company, he was just different company. We’d never had the easy rapport I had with Clay because Brant was so quiet by nature.
Well, except these last few weeks. Recently, he’d been acting so much like Clay it was fucking scary...
Wait a minute...
Shit.
God, I was so dense.
I’d been so focused on work drama and my relationship with Talia that I didn’t see what was right in front of my fucking face. How could I not see what he was trying to do?
All these months with Clay off on his own, we had been handling things at work as best we could. Brant handled the last big project on his own so we didn’t really spend too much time hanging out, aside from at the office. Now that I thought about it, we never really had. Not without Clay.
Clay had always been the most social in our group, the most comfortable in a crowd and the first to start a conversation. We’d sort of given him the lead on those things years ago and now, without him there to be the link between us, we were on unsteady ground. Clay was the outgoing one, I was the serious one, and Brant was the quiet one. Take out Clay, and we had no fucking idea how to relate to each other.
Apparently, Brant had decided being more like Clay would make things easier, and my stupid ass completely missed his efforts. He wasn’t trying to pick up Clay’s slack by hounding me, he was just trying to figure out how to be friends without the glue that usually held us all together. He’d even suggested we hang at Haven together, just as Clay usually did.
Annnd... I was officially an asshole. A stupid, stupid asshole.
I needed to call Brant.
I poured my tepid coffee down the drain and rinsed the mug, before placing it in the drainer.
Walking down the hall toward the bedroom, I realized the shower was no longer running. Ducking inside the bedroom to grab my shoes and shirt, I tugged the button-down on and called out to Talia. “Babe, I need to head out. I want to check in with Brant before my lunch meeting and I need a change of clothes from the hotel.”
The bathroom door popped open and she walked out amid a thick cloud of steam, wet hair dripping down her bare skin as she walked over, leaning down to press her lips to mine in a searing kiss that didn’t last nearly long enough to suit me. Steam rose from her damp skin and her breasts swayed softly as she stood back up. “If you’d brought all your stuff here to begin with, we might have had time for one more round before your meeting.” She smirked saucily and turned, looking back at me over her shoulder and giving me a glorious view of her heart-shaped ass. “Have a good day, gorgeous. I’ll see you tonight.”
She disappeared back into the foggy bathroom and I was forced to leave my shirt untucked to cover my semi. She was going to pay for that later, oh yes she was. I’d have her begging me to let her come...
Shit, what the hell was I doing? A few more thoughts like that and my shirt wouldn’t be enough to cover the raging hard-on I was conjuring.
By the time I reached my car, the blood had been diverted back to my brain and I forced the image of my dripping-wet girlfriend from my mind long enough to drive to the hotel. Barely. I parked in the garage adjacent to the hotel and dialed Brant on my way inside. He answered on the third ring, sounding surprised.
“Hey, Spencer. What’s up?”
“Not much, getting my shit together for another meeting. I had a little time to spare and thought I’d touch base with you. You keeping busy?” Although I was the one who thrived on staying busy, I knew Brant wasn’t one for idle hands, either. It made me wonder what he did when not at work or hanging with Clay and me. He tended to be vague with regard to his personal time, something I attributed to his quiet nature.
He blew out a breath and I heard faint rustling sounds before the distinct click of a door closing. “I’ve been finding ways to fill the time. Got a call from Kade last week, he wants me to do some custom work on the new tour bus so I’ll probably work on that next week. Too late to start on it this week anyway. Got parts on order and working on a few schematics while I wait. This one is for the crew, the band gets theirs in the fall after they finish touring, so I anticipate working on that one too, when the time comes.” Kade—lead singer of Thrill of The Chase—was one of our first clients. He’d been so impressed with the custom tech Brant had done in his house that he’d had him doing stuff for the band on and off for years. Brant was that good. “You know me, always coming up with something new. How goes the covert op with Clay? Everything coming together?”
I nodded to a few people in the lobby and made my way to the elevator, taking mental stock of everything still left to do before Ali’s wedding gift would be ready to present. “There are still a shit-ton of small things to work on and a few larger hurdles, but Clay being here this weekend for the meetings will help, I think. I may let him go to a couple on his own while I work on a side project I have going.” I exited the elevator a moment later and tapped my keycard against the reader. The door to my suite beeped its acceptance and I walked in, unceremoniously dropping my jacket onto the sofa and heading for the bar to grab myself a bottle of water.
“Sounds like you two will have a lot going this weekend, then.” Something akin to disappointment laced his tone.
“Actually, once my lunch meeting is over, there’s nothing else going on until tomorrow afternoon. That’s why I was calling. What do you say we all get together here in D.C. tonight? Clay will be on his own since Ali is planning a night with the girls. I thought it would be nice for the three of us to hang out. Clay probably won’t be back again until right before the wedding, so why not seize the day, you know what I mean?” I was smiling at the thought, the three of us hanging out for the first time in months. I had a feeling it would be good for all of us, but especially for Brant.
He was quiet for a while and I let him think it over while I tried to make out the background noises I was picking up from his end. Then again, it could have been static. He seemed to be moving around as we talked, so that was likely the noise I was hearing. His even tone held a bit of a smile when he said, “I think I can manage to get away for the evening. Thanks for the invite, Spence.”
“Of course. You’re in this too, you know. The business and the friendship.”
“I know.” His voice was hesitant, halting, like he didn’t believe it.
I moved to the closet to gather my clothes. “Look, I get it. Things are weird without Clay around. We built the company together and it’s always been the three of us. And it will be again. Until then, you and I need to find our niche. So how about we strike up a deal? I’ll work on being fucking quiet every once in a while and you try talking to me like Brant instead of channeling Clay. Who knows? We might just have a conversation that doesn’t revolve around work.”
He chuckled softly. “Deal. But if you try to get me to hold hands and sing Kumbaya, I’m selling my shares and moving to Canada.”
I scoffed, biting back a laugh. “No danger of that. Plus, you wouldn’t last a week up North. Too cold.”
“I can handle the cold.”
“Yeah, but there is a distinct shortage of mini-skirts and eye-popping cleavage in the snow. What would you do without that?”
“Wither and die,” he deadpanned.
Now I was openly laughing. It was true, the man loved a great view. He never knew what to say to them, but he sure as hell enjoyed looking. “Damn right you would. For whatever reason, all you have to do is look at a nice rack and the woman attached to it wants to give you the full show. I’ve never seen anything like it. Seriously, the last time we were at Haven, you didn’t say five words to that waitress before she was dragging you into the back.”
He was laughing his ass off now. “What can I say, dude? It’s a gift.”
“Or the best fucking angle ever devised,” I goaded. “I thought the ‘strong silent type’ thing was played out. Judging by your success rate, I guess I was wrong. Or maybe it only works in Richmond. Let’s see what these D.C. hotties th
ink of you before I make up my mind.”
“Is that a challenge, Spence?” He fought to sound confident but ended up laughing some more.
“Considering your track record, it’s not much of one, but yes. I’d like to see if your appeal is localized to one area or if it’s spread to a regional thing.”
“Guess we’ll see soon enough,” he joked. “Tonight D.C., tomorrow the world.”
“That’s going to take a lot of rubbers, dude.”
He cracked up all over again, and left me listening to dead air a minute later.
He’d never been one for drawn out goodbyes.
MY MEETING TOOK longer than I planned and I was left with no choice but to go to Canary to tell Talia about the evening’s plans. I was hoping to get a chance to call her before she left for work but long-winded businessmen tended to only get worse after a couple of boilermakers. I’d been ready to hang myself with my tie by the time they finally sloshed toward the front doors.
I glanced at the clock in my room as I changed out of my suit and into a pair of dark jeans—4:30. I fastened my belt, an accessory Talia seemed to enjoy removing, topping it off with the snug black t-shirt that she had practically salivated over the last time I wore it. Her reaction had instantly turned it into my new favorite.
I was sincerely hoping to entice her into a foray into her office while I was there. Not that she would deny me if I was firm enough about my desires. She thrived on my assertive nature.
But, before I could bend her over that desk, I had to make a quick trip to her apartment to drop off the final gift she would need for her surprise. The actual surprise wasn’t until tomorrow but I still had one last pre-surprise gift to give her before the big reveal—which I was leaving to Ali since she was in town for the weekend. It actually worked out perfectly that way.
I couldn’t help my smile as I picked up the final gift bag and headed for the door. I’d just pop in and leave it on her dresser so she would find it later tonight.
