“It wasn’t so much something I wanted to ask you, but tell you… Thank you. For everything you’ve done for me the last few weeks. It means a lot to me.”
Grasping my hand, she gave it a gentle squeeze. “Anything for you, sweetheart.” Her knowing brown eyes met mine. “I know things haven’t been easy for you lately. Losing a child is not something I’ve ever had to face personally, but I do know what it’s like to have my heart feel like it has been shattered into a billion pieces. So, if you need anything, even if it’s just a shoulder to cry on or someone to vent to, I’m here for you. Always.”
“Th-thank you,” I whispered.
After she left, I slowly finished the meal she’d brought. The yogurt was accompanied by a sandwich and a light salad, along with fruit juice and a cup of coffee. I ate it all, surprising myself at how hungry I was, then placed the tray at the foot of the bed before going into the bathroom to shower.
Since Theo was gone, I took my time, enjoying the feel of the spray on my muscles. When I walked back into the bedroom a long while later, it was to find Theo standing by the window, his arms crossed over his chest as he glared out at the late afternoon sky.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, already starting to worry about whatever had put that fierce look on his face.
Turning his head, Theo skimmed his gaze over me from head to toe and back again, appreciation in his dark eyes. Seeing me seemed to relax him a little, and he unfolded his arms, spreading them wide and silently beckoning me.
Without hesitation, I walked into his outstretched arms and wrapped my own around his waist. “What’s wrong?” I repeated.
“Just work stuff, baby,” he murmured, kissing a trail down my neck, causing me to shiver deliciously. “You have more businesses than I anticipated, and the changeover isn’t going as smoothly as I would like. But I’ve sorted it out.” His teeth nipped at my shoulder. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you woke. I wanted to stay in bed and make love to you all day.”
I didn’t even care about all the businesses and money he and his dad said I had inherited. If he wanted to deal with them, I wasn’t going to stop them, but in all honesty, I wanted nothing to do with them.
“I’m not opposed to you doing that all night,” I said with a coy little smile as I looked up at him through my lashes.
His groan sounded like it was being torn from him. “Fuck, I want nothing more than that. But I have a request.”
“Anything.”
“Let’s go to my apartment. It’s in the city and closer to your university. I would like to make that our home until we find a house—if you want a house. The apartment is two floors. I combined the one I stayed in before Mom and Pops married and Pops’s personal apartment into my own space.” He stroked both his hands down my back, distracting me. “There would be plenty of space for babies.”
Butterflies fluttered in my stomach at the way he said “babies,” and I melted against him. “Sounds perfect,” I assured him. “But why the sudden move?”
He sighed. “Because I want to make love to you day and night without having to worry if my mom is going to walk in at any moment. Or if Sofia will barge in without knocking. I want to fuck you in the living room, and bent over the kitchen table, or up against the wall outside the elevator. But there are way too many people running around this house for me to do any of those things.”
I pressed my thighs together, trying to relieve the throb deep between my legs as my mind filled with all kinds of decadent images of us fulfilling all of those fantasies. “Okay. Then let’s get me moved in.”
His entire body seemed to relax. “Yeah?”
I nodded, grinning up at him. “If we hurry, you might get the chance to fuck me in all those places before the end of the night.”
Epilogue
Tavia
Three Years Later
Nervously, I sat in the back of the limo, waiting for the jet to taxi over to this side of the private airport.
I hadn’t seen Raven since the previous Thanksgiving when Theo had surprised me with a trip to Northern California to visit the people whom I had lovingly come to think of as my extended family. In the past three years, we’d gone to visit at least two or three times a year, but this was the first time Raven was coming to me.
With the summer vacation having just started, Nova and Garret were coming for their usual weeks-long visit, but Raven and her husband were also joining Flick and Jet this time to attend our wedding. Something I was still having a hard time believing was actually happening.
Over the previous Christmas, Theo had taken me to St. Petersburg, and it had been one of the most beautiful places I’d ever seen. The snow on the ground, the lights, all the amazing architecture. And to see it at night… It was dream I didn’t know I had come true.
And there, with the colorful lights glittering off the snow, Theo had proposed to me.
I got butterflies in my stomach just remembering the tears in his eyes as he’d asked me to be his wife. How I’d whispered “yes” a hundred times, my own tears streaming down my face until he kissed me quiet. It was a moment in time I was never going to forget.
As soon as we’d gotten home, his mom and aunts had been ready to start the wedding preparations, and I’d gotten lost in the fun of dress shopping, cake tasting, venue hunting with the woman I now called Mom as easily as I called Theo mine. But she would be sitting on Theo’s side on our wedding day, and I felt like I had no one to sit on mine.