Ever After (3 page)

But I also felt strangely liberated.

Chapter 5

On the way home, I was quiet again. Nick had actually driven me in his Jag, and I sat in the passenger seat and just stared out the window. But he was holding my hand the entire time.

We finally got home, I mean Nick’s home, and all that I wanted to do was to crawl into bed and put the covers over my head. I didn’t want to think about Mr. Lucas or my mother. And I also couldn’t bring myself to address the mountain of homework and studying I had to do. I was late starting my courses, because of my abduction and my recovering from my broken leg, so the schoolwork was more piled up than ever. I hobbled my way up the bedroom without a word, and just stared at my assignment book. There were research papers and drafting projects and reading assignments that I had to get to. And those were just make-up projects and assignments. I would be assigned more tomorrow in my classes, so I would have to get to the on-going assignments on top of what I had already missed and would now have to make up.

I promptly had a little panic attack just thinking about all of that, on top of all that I had just unearthed at the therapists’ office. My lungs started to constrict and I felt like there was an elephant sitting on my chest.

“Nick,” I cried weakly. “Nick, help me. Help me please!”

Nick was dashing up the stairs, and he had his inhaler in his hand. He knew, without my saying a word, just what I needed at that moment. I needed to be able to breathe. Just breathe.

I sucked on the inhaler, grateful for its life-giving properties, and then just sat there on the bed, shaking. “I don’t think that I can do this,” I said.

“What, honey?” he asked.

“I, I, I’m overwhelmed. I don’t know what to do. My mind, it’s just so confused right now. I have all of these feelings and emotions now. This rage. This burning, white-hot, rage inside of me. Rage that I barely registered all of these years. At my mother, at Mr. Lucas, at fate in general. And now I get home, and all I can see is how behind I am in school and how behind I am at my job. I can’t do it. I just can’t do it.”

At that, the tears started again. Nick sat down next to me, and put his arm gently around my shoulders. He kissed my forehead lightly, and ran his strong hands through my hair. “Scotty,” he said softly. “You can take a break from school. I have pull at the University, and I can help you take a sabbatical without penalty. I think that you need that.”

I shook my head. Was that what I needed? A mental health break from school? I was scheduled to graduate at the end of next year, and taking a sabbatical would mean that I would be a semester behind.

But if I stayed in school, could I handle it all? The trial, the therapy, Aaron, my mother? On top of my demanding assignments and work load? Could I?

Not if I wanted to emerge from this semester with any semblance of sanity.

“Okay,” I said. “I think that I need this time to focus on my personal issues. I’ve never dealt with them before. I think that I used school and work to try to avoid thinking about all of that. But, now that I’m going to face them, I need to give my mental health and Aaron and everything more attention. But I still want to work for the firm, though.” That wasn’t a question, really. There was no way that I would give up my internship. There was too much danger that I would just be replaced, even if I did have Nick on my side. And then where would I be?

Nick nodded his head. “That’s the best decision for you, I think. You can always pick everything back up in the fall semester. The classes that you’re taking are offered every semester, at least most of them. Those that are only offered once a year, you can take next winter. You’ll graduate a little bit later than you had planned, but I think it’s necessary for you right now to just take a break.”

I looked at Nick’s blue eyes, and felt comforted and grateful to him. I put my hand on his leg, and stroked it longingly.

He tickled my nose a little bit with his, and then kissed my forehead again. Then he kissed me on the lips, his soft mouth lightly teasing mine. He bit my lower lip a little bit, and his tongue interlocked with mine.

I could feel my breathing coming faster and heavier, as I laid down on the bed and Nick laid down next to me.

I still had to contend with my bad leg, but I had been going to the doctor, and the cast was to be removed, finally, that coming week. I was very much looking forward to that, as it impeded my lovemaking with Nick. We had to find ways to work around it, and we did, but I really couldn’t wait until it was gone.

Nick’s smooth hands were on my belly now, making their way to my bra. He unhooked the bra in the front, and I felt my breasts spill out. We were still fully clothed, and he lightly ran his hands on my nipples while he kissed my neck. Then he put one of his hands on my thigh, and stroked it, while moving it higher and higher until he got to the elastic part of my panties. Without removing the underwear, he lightly fingered my clit and butt. I moaned a little bit, feeling myself get wetter and wetter with every flick of his fingers inside of me. He unbuckled my jean skirt, and slipped it off of me, while he unbuttoned his own pants and tossed them aside.

He was soon out of his underwear, and he slid off my panties slowly, while his tongue made its way up and down my thigh. I moaned loudly as his tongue finally made its way inside of me, as it darted in and out, and then he was stroking my genitals with his mouth gently. I exploded in orgasm, from his touch and from his delicious mouth, which was penetrating inside my vagina. He made his way, with his tongue, up to my bare breasts, lifting up my top in the process, and bringing it over my head.

I unbuttoned his dress shirt, which revealed his rock hard abs and chest. I ran my fingers over his silky skin, and pinched one of his nipples. I brought his face to mine, and my mouth devoured his hungrily. Our tongues were intertwining, and I felt him bring his manhood close to my opening. He reached over for a condom, and I grabbed his wrist a little forcefully.

“I want to feel you,” I said. “Skin to skin.” My words were meaningful, because there was the unspoken desire to have his child. It was something that I had actually been thinking about since my miscarriage only days ago. I didn’t bring this up to him, but I knew that it was something that he was wanting as well, because he had expressed that desire to me before.

Maybe that would be a mistake, to bring a child into the world before I had a chance to really wrap my own head around what had happened to me in my life, but, at the same time, it just felt right to me. It felt right to me, and I knew that it felt right to him, so I just wanted to do it.

“Are you sure?” he asked, putting the condom back in the drawer.

I said nothing, but just nodded my head vigorously, and kissed him some more. I could smell just the faintest hint of raspberry on his breath, and his lips were like butter, they were so soft.

Then I gasped a little as he entered me slowly. This was a different sensation for me. It felt much more authentic and natural this way. He filled me up with his hardness, inch by glorious inch, and I felt myself burst underneath him. He moved rhythmically, his thrusting coming deeper and faster, and then he backed off and slowly started moving inside of me. His hands were playing with my breasts, and he tongued them lightly as he continued to move inside of me. Then I felt his entire body shake, and he groaned and laid down on top of me. Both of us could hardly catch our breath, and I could feel his body heating up as he laid on top of me.

“That was great,” I said. “As usual.” I never thought that love-making could be like this. I thought that I would always associate a man being inside of me with something evil and dirty, but it wasn’t like that, at all, with Nick. I was able to consume myself completely when he made love to me, and not even think about the sordidness of what had happened to me in my past.

“Oh, it was,” he said. “But I’m not done with you yet.”

I smiled, as he flipped me over. And then I gasped as I felt his tongue lightly rimming my butt. He spread my legs open wide, as his tongue ran from my butt to my vagina and back again. I could feel his fingers in my backside opening, and then his hands were gripping my ass tight, as his tongue was once again slowly licking my rear. He kissed my lower back lightly, and then his tongue started running up my spine. He paused when he got to the back of my neck, as he lifted up my hair, and I could feel his warm lips and tongue on my nape. He reached around so that he was feeling my breasts, and he entered me again from behind. As he filled me up, bringing me to the height of ecstasy again, I cried out.

“Oh, don’t stop, please don’t stop,” I moaned. He was drilling me now fast and hard, his enormous penis sliding in and out, in and out, and I felt my wetness on my hand as I reached down to grab his manhood. The orgasm was coming, I could feel it, and it was something that was going to be major. It finally happened, my entire body feeling flooded with pleasurable feelings and warmth. The sensation radiated throughout every synapse of my shaking limbs, as the blood rushed in, making me feel warmer by the second. The feeling lasted longer than usual, and it was even more powerful than normal as well. I could feel myself start to shake beneath his weight, and he laid down on top of me.

He was still inside of me, as he explored my body with his hands. He kissed my neck again, and flipped me over on my back. He cleared away a tendril of my hair, and kissed my forehead longingly. “You have no idea what you do to me,” he said. “No earthly clue. If you knew how much I wanted you, at all times, you might be a little bit scared.”

I smiled. Me, scared of Nick? No way. He was the last person that I ever would be afraid of. “Right,” I said. “Trust me, there have been some truly scary people in my life, and you’re not one of them.”

He smiled back. Then he looked at me a bit tentatively. “Scotty, I do have to ask, though. What’s with your wanting me to make love to you bare back? Are you thinking about what he had discussed earlier?”

I felt a little bit embarrassed, really, as I literally sprung it on him without warning. He probably thought that I was just being careless. But, as I thought more about it, it wasn’t as
careless as it might have seemed. After all, I had just had a miscarriage. My chances of getting pregnant right after that would probably be miniscule.

“I have been thinking,” I said. “I mean, my life is really complicated right now, so maybe this isn’t the best time. But, it would be wonderful to have a child with you.”

Nick’s face broke out in a huge grin as I said that. “I was hoping you would say that. Of course, I would have to make an honest woman out of you, but that’s just a formality at this point, I would say.”

My heart soared as Nick casually talked of marriage. That was something that we really hadn’t talked about seriously yet, although there were plenty of hints that the two of us getting married would be on the near horizon.

“Well, there is that,” I said. “I mean, I wouldn’t ever want to think of conceiving a child with somebody that I didn’t love and didn’t feel stable with. But I think that you’ve proved yourself to me, just with your actions in taking care of my mother and saving me from that awful monster. I think that I’m finally beginning to feel that you might stick around some.”

Nick put his hand on my belly, and his finger slowly made its way to my breasts. “That means a lot to me, Scotty. Really, it does. That you are finally beginning to trust me. I hope you know that I will always have your back, too. Always.”

I knew that. He put one of his fingers under my chin, and his mouth was once again on mine. “You really taste good,” he said as he kissed me again. “That’s why I always love kissing you.”

“Is that the only reason why you love kissing me?” I asked him, as his lips once again started to softly feathering mine.

“Yeah. That’s the only reason why. No other reason.” He was smiling as he said that, and he lightly let his fingers stroke down to my genitals as he put a finger inside of me. I felt his manhood, which once again had grown to enormous proportions, and I stroked him up and down as he groaned.

He grinned wickedly. “Ready to go again?” he asked as I nodded my head vigorously.

As he filled me up, I felt the familiar rush and I really never wanted it to end. I knew that the incredible happiness and warmth that I was experiencing right then was just a chimera, an oasis in a life that had becoming increasingly chaotic and out of control. But that was all that I had right at that moment, so I willed myself to not think about what awaited me outside the confines of this bedroom.

There was only him and me at that moment. No darkness and despair.

Just him and me.

Chapter 6

Nick

I had to get back to work the day after I took Scotty to see Angie at the station. There was just not a choice for me, as the plans for the Chase project were accelerating, and I was also assigned some other lower profile structures that would prove to take a good deal of my time. A cathedral was on the drawing board, and since those are such intricate buildings, they took more time than one might think. Also an art museum in Senegal, of all places, and several different residential dwellings.

So, my plate was full, to say the very least. As much as I wanted to simply hang out with Scotty at the loft, that wasn’t feasible, I knew. She wasn’t working that day, and I was going to ask the partners, at her request, to put her on as more of a full-time intern. At least for this semester, as she and I decided that it was best that she take a little sabbatical.

She had talked to me about the possibility of upping her hours to around 30 a week, with the understanding that she might have to cut back more in the future, as her other responsibilities increased. I wanted that, as did she, and I had to admit that a large part of why I wanted her working more was that I just wanted her around me as much as possible. I felt that she needed that, especially during this period in her life, and I needed it, too. We had become like home base for each other, as we each found the warmth and comfort in one another that had been missing in our previous lives.

And, of course, she and I were going to have to find day care and a nanny for Aaron, for an indefinite period of time, as nobody really knew how long Loretta was going to have to stay out in the treatment facility in Beverly Hills.

I was juggling a great deal myself, which included the possibility that I would finally be able to have my girls come and visit a few times a year. Not that Rielle was being reasonable about that, finally. She wasn’t. Not at all. But my lawyer had finally made some inroads on the sticky issues that surrounded the reasons why April and Charlotte couldn’t visit me. Namely that I was much more stable than I had ever been before, so there was less of a danger that my girls would be privy to a less-than-savory lifestyle.

I sat in the back of the limo, reading through some new architectural proposals and some financial reports, when my phone started ringing and Ryan’s face popped up on the screen.

“Buddy,” I said. “What’s up?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to see how things are going with Scotty and the predator. You mentioned to me that she was finally going to see the police about it, and I was checking in to see how that went.”

“Well, it went okay, I guess. An arrest will be made any day now, at least I hope.” I didn’t express to him my fears that nothing was going to happen because of Mr. Lucas’ privileged position. But that specter was out there, I knew.

“Good, good,” he said. “You thinking any more about what he had talked about?”

I nodded my head, knowing to what he was referring. “Yeah. Plan B. I hope to hell it never comes to that, but you know, it might. It might.” I rubbed my temple. “Why do you ask? Have you thought about it?”

“Of course,” he said. “It’s not something that you take lightly, and it’s going to be something that’s tricky and dangerous. I hope that you know what you’re doing.”

I took a deep breath. “Yeah, me too. Well, I hate to cut you off, but we just pulled up to my building, and the architectural plans await.”

“You take care,” Ryan said. “I’m really worried about you.”

“Hey,” I said. “Stop. You know that, whatever I do, I’m going to go about it methodically and carefully. I never lose control and I never go into a situation where there’s a better than average chance of not making it out. I couldn’t do that to Scotty, not to mention you and my girls. So, stop fretting. I swear, sometimes you’re just like a woman,” I teased.

“Ha ha,” he said. “Well, if you need reinforcements, I’m here. You always have to know that.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I do. Talk soon.”

I hung up the phone and stared out the window. My life had spun off its axis since I fell in love with Scotty, in ways both thrilling and horrible. But one thing was always for sure – no matter how much chaos she introduced into my perfectly controlled world, it was worth it.

100% worth it.