"First off, that's not just my parents' home, that's our family home. It's always been a given that my brother and I will be raising our families there and maybe Lisa too according to what idiot she gets to put up with her ass. You're the only woman who's ever slept there and you're going to be the last. So it doesn't matter if it's tonight or a hundred nights from now, that's going to be home."
"The bottom line, you're not going back there where he's already invaded your space. You're not staying in a hotel because we don't know how long it's gonna take for them to find this hump, and I'm not sleeping on Cris' couch so I can keep an eye on you. That leaves my bed."
Traci
He says these things as if they're the most natural, as if I didn't just turn his life upside down. Why wasn't he running hard in the opposite direction? If he had any sense he would. "How can you be so sure of everything? Why do you keep insisting that we're meant to be together?" I couldn't resist asking one last time. Each time I convince myself that maybe he's right, maybe I should just go with it, that fear creeps in and threatens to choke me.
"One of us has to have our head on straight. Look let's get this shit over with once and for all so you don't have to keep asking me the same thing, because the answer's not going to change. You don't strike me as the type to sleep around and make no mistake about it we're fucking."
"Ah, I can't believe you just said that."
"It's the truth and since playing nice doesn't seem to get through to you, I'm giving it to you straight. As I was saying, I took one look at you and knew. If you need more time to think so be it, but you'll be doing that thinking from my home, my bed."
"I'm not really into self depravation, and I can't see me going out hunting down pussy elsewhere when the future mother of my children is already in my life. You get where I'm coming from?"
Not really, but was there really any point in arguing? His mom had already warned me about the men in the family and their penchant for going after what they want, letting nothing stand in their way. I kinda know what she meant, because this one was part bulldozer it seems.
"This is too much, try to understand where I'm coming from. Like you said, I don't sleep around, and I'm not in the habit of picking up strange men in bars … " He interrupted me before I could go on with my growing list of fears and uncertainties.
"You didn't pick me sweetheart, I chose you. Tell me honestly now, are you not even a little bit attracted? And before you answer, remember what happened in our bed not too long ago."
My face went up in flames as it has been doing ever since I met him. He sure knows how to get under my skin. If it's not with a look, then it's his mouth or just his closeness.
"I didn't say I wasn't attracted, but you don't just run off and marry everyone you find yourself attracted to. What if it doesn't work out, what then, what if there's all this build up in your mind and the reality is something else entirely?"
"You have a tail or something hidden under there?" He looked down at me lap making me blush.
"Don't be silly, of course not."
"Well what deep dark secrets are you hiding?"
"I'm not hiding anything I'm just saying."
"Look, I might've given you a break up until you came alive under me this morning. Before that I had already been hooked, but the way you reacted to me-baby, you cannot give a man that much of yourself and try holding back after. Not gonna work, not with me anyway. We're here, give me the key."
He held his hand out while I sat there in a quandary. Was this real, could this really be happening? When mom was ill one of the things she kept telling me over and over was to grab hold of happiness because life was so fleeting.
She and dad had shared a beautiful love story, one that she dreamed of for her only daughter. Something had happened, maybe it was watching her suffer, watching my dad go through what he did, I don't know what? But somewhere along the way I had stopped believing in fairytales. For the first time in forever, I wanted to, because he made it seem so possible.
"Let go baby, you don't have to do anything I'll do it all. If we fail it's on me, but I have no intentions on failing. I know with every fiber in my being that you're going to be next to me when I'm ninety." Not even a hint of doubt in that voice, and his eyes when I look at him, so full of love and promise and something more. That heat that I'd felt this morning under him, would I ever find that with anyone else? I doubt it.
"Promise me Wyatt." My heart was racing out of my chest. I think I'd known from the moment he pulled me down on his lap. As unorthodox as it was, I had shared more with this man in the last two days than I had with anyone else ever. I know what my heart wanted it wanted him. He asked if I was attracted, that didn't even begin to describe what I felt for him, it was so much more. But logic said it was too fast.
It was the knowledge that he wouldn't stop that made up my mind. The way he seemed willing to move all obstacles to get what he wants-and what he wants is me. This was nothing like Carl, his attention I did want. Did it really make sense to keep fighting it because of some old fashioned ideal of what falling in love should be?
I didn't have much to go on just what he'd shown me of himself thus far. I rewound the last two days in my head and could find no fault in him whatsoever, and though that in itself should be reason for pause, I wanted so badly to give in. It was time to stop thinking about everything else but what I felt, what I wanted, and I think I knew what that was, had known since that first kiss on that dance floor.
"Promise me Wyatt."
"What baby, anything."
"Promise me that you won't break my heart." The words came out in a broken whisper because I was a little embarrassed by what I'd said. But his reaction more than made up for it. He unhooked both our seatbelts and pulled me into his arms. "Never, I'll never give you reason to doubt my love for you."
He pulled back and looked into my eyes, and I might be being a bit fanciful but I could've sworn his weren't as dry as they had been. "I'm going to make you so fucking happy baby you wait and see." I could only nod my head, too choked up for words.
I didn't try to stop him from kissing me right there in a parked car in front of my stalwart boss' building. Instead I gave in to the passion, enjoyed the feel of his powerful arms as they held me like they'd never let go. This was love, if not what was? What more could I feel that I wasn't now, or hadn't felt in the last few days and nights with him?
He finally let me up for air and my eyes went straight to his lap where I could feel his hardness poking into the side of my leg. "Don't look at him baby, he's having a hard enough time behaving with you being so near." I'm sure my face was the color of flames but the grin I gave him came from my heart. This felt right.
I started to get out the car when a sudden thought hit. "Wait, I just remembered, I have a lease I can't break it." Now I was the one feeling disappointed.
"Yes you can, you're not going back there, is your landlord on site?"
"Yes his name is Jim Magee, he's very strict about these things though."
"Leave it to me, how much longer do you have on your lease?"
"Six months."
"I'll buy it out if I have to but we shouldn't have to."
"I can't let you do that."
"Forget it."
He didn't even let me finish my argument, just climbed out his side and came around to mine to let me out after stealing one last kiss as he leaned in the open door. By the time he lifted his head away from mine I was almost tempted to tell him turn us around and go back so we could finish what we started earlier in his bed. Only the lingering vestiges of my upbringing kept me from uttering the scandalous suggestion.
Chapter 7
Wyatt
I took her into the building after she gave me the keys to her place. She'd given me a look at the end there before I helped her out of the car, that if my interpretation was right, meant I wasn't going to have to wait much longer to get inside her. Not that there was ever any danger of that, not after the way she'd come alive under me. "Soon." Her blush told me I was right.