Kristen Ashley - Breathe

His lips twitched but I wasn’t joking. Valerie bought me expensive stuff all the time. It was sweet. It was over the top. But she started to get upset when I demurred so I stopped doing that and it was now tradition.

He moved from his end of the cart to my end of the cart, stopped in front of me, lifted a hand to slide the hair off my shoulder and curled his fingers around my neck.

Then he dipped his face close and muttered, “Only my girl says the word ‘outlandish’.”

“It is in the English language, Chace. I didn’t make it up. I’m sure others say it too,” I told him, going for tartly but it came out breathily because he was close, his face was still warm but his gaze was intense.

“How embarrassed are you gonna be after I make out with you in the spot where I first saw you?”

Oh my.

“Um… you say that like it’s a given you’re going to do that,” I remarked.

“It is,” he replied.

“Chace –” I started but his hand at my neck pulled me to him and up. His other arm curled around my waist then his mouth was on mine and I had no choice (though I wouldn’t pick another one) but to neck in the grocery store aisle with Chace where he first saw me.

When he was done, he turned me toward the handle of our cart, moved in behind me and put his arms around me, his hands beside mine on the handle. He started us forward and I wasn’t embarrassed even though other patrons were grinning at me.

No, all I could process was thinking grocery shopping was simple. It was every day.

But it was one of the best things you could ever do.

Chace

Five hours later

In his sleep, Chace sensed the light going out.

Faye was done reading.

Before he could hook her around the waist, he felt her shift into him.

He knew what that meant.

Her hand glided up his hip to his waist.

He knew what that meant too.

He grinned, curled his arms around her and rolled to his back, taking her with him.

Her mouth went to his neck.

“Done?” he whispered into her ear.

“Kind of,” she muttered against his neck, her lips gliding down.

His hands slid over the satin of her nightie at her back. “You wanna use me, honey, you gotta do all the work. I’m wiped.”

Her lips slid up as her hand stopped playing with his chest hair and moved up his chest, his neck and her thumb came out to stroke his jaw.

“That’s too bad,” she whispered in his ear. “Because, see, the hero in my book just did all this stuff to the heroine while she was naked and on her knees then –”

She shut up because Chace’s arms closed tight around her, he sat up and cats scattered.

The instant he was up, he growled, “On your knees.”

“You sure?” she asked, her musical voice lilting and playful, cute and fucking hot. “If you’re tired we can sleep.”

He lifted her off him and planted her in the bed on her knees.

Then he shifted to his knees behind her, his hands moved to the hem of her nightie, he yanked it up and off and felt her soft, sweet gasp in his dick.

Then his hands glided from her waist to her belly, one going up, one going down.

“You wanna act it out or wing it?” he asked the skin of her neck.

“Wing it,” she breathed when his hands hit two particular spots.

He grinned then muttered, “Right, baby.”

Then he winged it.

Half an hour later, they came simultaneously, Faye impaled on his cock, her head twisted, forehead pressed into his neck, one of his arms wrapped around her belly, his other hand at her breast, his eyes aimed over her shoulder and down, watching her touch herself while he fucked her.

It was sensational.

Then again, with Faye, from the very beginning, it always was.

Months later, the night before Chace and Faye’s wedding

“Told you, you’d make it legal,” Deck said.

Deck was sitting beside him in a rocker on his front porch, his feet, like Chace’s, up on the railing, legs straight, ankles crossed.

They were both staring at the dark plain, the hazy lights of Carnal the only thing that lit it. He hadn’t even turned the porch light on.

Chace didn’t reply.

“You didn’t waste any time, brother,” Deck continued.

Chace disagreed. After pulling his girl out of that box, he wanted to marry her the next day. A year and six weeks’ wait was way too fucking long. Faye agreed, they’d talked about a Christmas wedding and were both all for that until Liza stuck her nose in. Then their small, intimate Christmas wedding somehow became a huge, summer wedding and that somehow, Chace reckoned, was because his Faye actually wanted that and more, she liked planning her wedding with her sister. They were having a blast. So he let it go.

He also let it go because Liza could be pushy and nosy but she also loved her sister and Faye had an idea of exactly what she wanted. Which was exactly what she was going to get, Liza was making sure of that.

Therefore, at that moment, in his backyard there was a floating deck with an arch sitting on the spot where Faye had been buried and tomorrow they’d stand on it and get married.

Faye’s idea, her way of getting rid of that memory.

It was a good way.

Also tomorrow, tables, chairs, tents, a dance floor, another floating deck that would hold DJ equipment and a shit load of flowers and bunting would be delivered.

Luckily, Silas Goodknight was a smart man who loved his daughters deeply. Therefore, he’d been saving for a good long time to give them the weddings they wanted. Not to mention, Chace’s Mom had horned in and demanded to pay for the cake, catering and booze. After a word from Faye, Silas had given in. So the hit Chace’s trust fund took to take care of Miah and Becky didn’t mean his girl wouldn’t have exactly what she wanted on her day and they’d have to worry about their kids’ educations.

She would have what she wanted.

Exactly.

Everything she wanted.

And their kids were covered.

Now, she was at her parents’ house and he and Deck had come back from Bubba’s where they spent a number of hours with the boys having drinks. Not a bachelor party. That shit was shit and he’d made it clear to Deck he didn’t need any of it and furthermore did not intend to be hungover when he made Faye his legally, in the eyes of God, standing in front of a reverend, surrounded by friends, family and God’s country. So it was just that at Bubba’s. Drinks with the boys.

“You aren’t gettin’ any younger, man,” Chace pointed out, his meaning not veiled.

“Not a lotta girls like Faye,” Deck muttered and, surprised, Chace looked at him.

“You want a girl like Faye?”

“Nope,” Deck replied, took a drag off his beer bottle and kept his eyes on the plain. When he dropped his hand, he went on, “And yep. What she’s got inside, that sweet, that strong, can’t be beat.” Deck looked at him and Chace saw the white flash of his smile. “Though, bigger tits, shorter skirts, tighter tops and high heels on more than just special occasions wouldn’t go unappreciated. Just as long as all that comes with class.”

Chace got him but he couldn’t miss it. Deck made an art of playing the field and it wasn’t regular, it was frequent. But Chace didn’t miss the fact that the few who had even a modicum of staying power were high maintenance and beyond ballsy. Deck, like Chace, enjoyed the simple life. But Deck, like Boyd Newman, liked the challenge of a woman who brought high-class and not a small amount of drama into his life. Unfortunately, he had yet to find one who could do her own thing and find a compromise so they could fit together in their way like Liza and Boyd had.