“About the chapel, yes. But, babe, you never have to worry about me telling anyone about that night in its entirety. No one needs to know the details.”
She smirked and pinned me with her comical stare. “Trying to keep it a secret how fast you blew your load?”
With my hands pressed into the mattress on either side of her head, I lowered my forehead to hers and whispered, “Nah. I was trying to save you from the embarrassment of people finding out how when you were on top, riding my cock like a motherfucking pro, you whipped your hand in the air and called out, ‘ride ’em cowboy.’”
Her eyes widened and she released a gasp. “No, I didn’t.”
“Oh, yes you did,” I mumbled against her lips. Leaving her in her state of shock, I lowered my mouth to her neck, then her chest, before slowly cupping her breast and massaging it with my fingers. The perfect handful. The urge to be inside her superseded anything else. But as soon as I squeezed her tit, she flinched and cried out in pain.
“Sorry, they’re sore. I should be getting my period soon. I’ve been feeling it come on but it hasn’t yet.” When I started to back away from her, unwilling to cause her more pain, she gripped my shirt in her fists and yanked me back down. “I haven’t gotten it yet…which means we’re good. We can have sex. No need to freak out over the dreaded P word.”
I wagged my brows at her but crawled off her body anyway. Her knitted brows said it all, until she realized I only meant to back away enough to remove my clothing. And just before I found myself over her once more, she lifted herself onto her elbows and asked me where my ring was.
“It’s at home.”
“I want to put it on you.”
It took me a second, but then it made sense. “You have a thing for men wearing wedding bands?”
“I have a thing for my husband wearing absolutely nothing but his wedding band.”
And if I hadn’t been seconds away from filling her completely, I would’ve hauled her over my shoulder and dragged her home just so she could slide my band over my knuckle, where I’d keep it forever and ever.
“I love you so much, Jelly.” It was meant to be this sweet, monumental moment, but when she smiled and stared into my eyes, I couldn’t see past the sheen of tears lining her baby blues. “Why are you mad? What did I do wrong?”
“I’m not mad. Quite the opposite, actually. I’m happy. I didn’t think I’d ever feel this content, but I do. You, Holden, make me feel so complete, it’s like my heart will burst. And I’m pretty sure you’ve made me feel this way before, because it’s familiar. Being with you like this, my heart pounding against my ribs, not from fear or angst, but from so much love it’s almost unbearable.”
“Are you trying to tell me you’re in love with me?” I teased, hoping to make things easier for her.
“No.” Her one-word reply stilled my heart. But then her explanation revived it. “Every action has an opposite reaction. So if I’m in love with you, that means there’s an option to be out of love with you. And that’s not possible. If anything, I’d say I indefinitely love you.”
I lowered my lips to hers and slowly slid into her tight heat, waiting for that sigh to pass her lips once I fit all the way in. When she gave me that, I swallowed it and said, “I indefinitely love you, too.”
Epilogue
Janelle
I gripped Holden’s hand and tried to suppress the need to hurl. I was so nervous and just wanted to hurry up and get this over with.
“I don’t get it…you’ve said you were the life of the party when you were away at college. So what’s the difference now? Why do you all of a sudden not want the attention set on you?” He held my gaze in an attempt to calm me down.
“That’s different. This is my family. Around my peers is one thing…but these are people I can’t escape. They have the ability to hurt me more than anyone else.”
“You have nothing to worry about, babe. Yes, they are your family, which means they aren’t going anywhere.” He kissed me on my cheek and then opened his car door, leaving me to follow him.
The nausea only worsened when I glanced through the window along the front of the office, and I saw that my entire family had already arrived. Holden met me around the front of the car and laced my fingers with his, shoving his left hand into his front pocket. Ever since coming back from New York, we always wore our bands—except Sunday afternoons at my parents’ house. Rather than take them off now, we hid it. Which only made my stomach flip and flop even more.
Everyone knew we had started to date, but that was as far as we let it go. Anytime Mom would start talking about weddings, I told her I would never walk down the aisle, so she needed to give up on the dream. I could easily tell her the one thing that would get her to shut up, but I just wasn’t ready to offer that up yet. And honestly, walking into the office, facing the entire lot of my family members, I didn’t want to tell them now, either. I wasn’t ready to let the cat out of the bag just yet.
“Are you ready for the grand opening?” Christine met us by the door, just outside The Newest York Events office. Balloons clung to the handle, along with streamers, all colored blue and pink.
“This is your gender reveal—not my grand opening.”
We had been back for four weeks, and almost every second of that time had been spent working on getting my business up and running. Luckily, I had Holden to help, considering he’d basically done this same thing—he hated it when I said that and had to point out how a certified public accountant firm wasn’t at all the same as my event planning. I simply rolled my eyes and waved him off, telling him he could believe what he wanted.
Matt and Christine obviously knew about us, but we had sworn them to secrecy. We explained how we wanted to tell everyone at once, but I personally didn’t want to do that until we had the business far enough along to share it all with them at once. They agreed, and somehow, I’d convinced them to use their gender reveal “party” to kick-start the opening. Apparently, neither Christine nor Matt thought there needed to be some big to-do when revealing the sex of their baby. I convinced them otherwise, under the stipulation that we share the event—half baby surprise and half grand opening for the family. They also made me swear to tell everyone about Holden and me being married. I begrudgingly agreed—not because I didn’t want to share my news, but because I would’ve been happy keeping it our happy little secret for just a little bit longer.
“I already told you, Janelle…” Christine lowered her chin to pin me with her serious stare. “This isn’t about us. It’s not about the baby. This is about you and your store and your big news with Holden. I understand that you didn’t want it to be all about you, but honestly, I don’t want this to be a big deal.”