“Where do you want to marry, Julia? If it isn’t the cabin any longer, tell me. We can marry here in the living room, up here in our suite. Hell, we can marry out on the bay in a fishing hut. I don’t care. All I care about is officially making you mine.”
My gaze went to the diamond on my left hand and back to Van. “I’m pretty sure that I’m officially yours.”
His smile grew as he leaned toward me, crawling over me on his hands and knees like a lion stalking its prey. It wasn’t until our noses were nearly touching that his lips captured mine.
His tasted of the wine we’d been drinking as his tongue sought entrance. Palming his stubbly cheeks, I pulled him closer until his weight was over me. Wiggling beneath him, I took comfort in his presence. As if Van were my lifeline, I felt more alive when he was with me.
“Take me.” It was my only request. I didn’t want to think about leaving the suite or even about our impending wedding. I wanted what we had when we were here.
If Albert and Michael had been in the house since Friday night, I didn’t know.
Our meals came when Van slipped away for a few minutes, leaving me alone staring at the double doors. I knew enough about mental health to know mine was on the decline.
Phillip hadn’t hurt me, not physically and perhaps not emotionally as may have been his intention, and still I was plagued with the what-ifs.
What if he had?
What if I’d married him?
What if I’d turned away from Van and gone to Skylar?
I’d wake in the middle of the night, my skin dampened with perspiration and my flesh cold to the touch. Whatever or whoever I saw beyond the cabin’s windows was omnipresent in my dreams, a figure, a ghost. I couldn’t make out the particulars, yet I felt it—her or him. The sense that I wasn’t alone even during the times Van slipped away ate at me.
I tried to talk to him about it such as Paula had recommended, but the words didn’t form. My worries would add to his. I didn’t want to do that to him. Whatever was happening beyond this suite was on Van’s radar.
I knew it was.
His expression would sour as he read text messages. Now and then he’d slip into the small office, hiding behind the door I hadn’t checked the first night. It was a miniature version of what he had downstairs. A desk with computers and a view of the forest beyond the house.
Questions came to me, but I didn’t verbalize them.
In all honesty, I didn’t want to know more answers.
For the past two days, I lived in our bubble, pretending our snow globe was intact. The façade soothed me. I longed to linger in the glistening flakes of the silvery snow and the golden specks within Van’s gaze.
Reality wouldn’t leave us as much as I wanted it to. It would be waiting on Monday morning. As our time alone dwindled away, my desire was to hold on with both hands and savor the final seconds.
A chill scattered over my skin as Van pulled the blanket to the floor and tugged my satin pajama shorts down my legs. The cold was short-lived as he settled between my legs, his hardening cock pressed against my core.
How many times had we made love since our bath on Friday night?
I’d lost count.
As we came together on the soft blanket over the sofa in front of the fire, our passion simmered like the glowing embers beneath the burning wood. The heat was there, ready to burst into flames as Van filled me. My back arched and my hips lifted, taking him in and accommodating his familiar girth. His calm rhythm created a steady cadence. The rush we’d experienced upon finding the cabin violated had settled like the snow upon the bay.
There was a diamond on my finger and a marriage license in Van’s office.
We didn’t need to prove our adoration to anyone.
This was our world, our globe, and our bubble.
Outside forces had threatened to shatter what we’d built.
They failed.
The only true destruction could come from within. And as Van continued to fill me, moving tenderly in and out as his lips captured mine, and the stubble of his cheeks brought my nerve endings to life, I knew without a doubt I was home and safe. For my part, when this weekend ended, I’d face the world and do my piece to reinforce what we’d built and what our future could be.
My orgasm came like the igniting of a candle.