Lily's Dream (Unexpected Lover Series) (8 page)

 Lily woke first to find Andre looking
at her face. “That was the most incredible sexual experience I have ever had.
Making love is different from having sex because I love you so very much.” “And
I love you so very much. I didn’t know what making love was until I made love
with you,” replied Lily.

“Let’s shower,” suggested Lily.” I’m all
sticky.”

Andre picked her up and sat her in the
chair he had put in the shower for her. As they soaped each other, she
exclaimed, “Andre, your back is all scratched. What happened?”

He laughed and replied, “You happened.”

Embarrassed, Lily replied, “I’m sorry
Andre. I’ll try not to do that to you again.” “I loved it, darling Lily. You
can really be a sex kitten when you’re aroused. Believe me, I enjoyed every
moment of it. I’ll start calling you my sex kitten.” Lily smiled a smug smile
and continued soaping him.

After rinsing and drying themselves,
Andre dried Lily’s hair. She reminded him she needed clothes from her
apartment. He pulled a clean shirt out of his closet and gave it to her to put
on. He chuckled and said, “This will make my favorite things easier to get to.”

Lily replied, “That is what I was
thinking. It will be too distracting for you.”

He replied, “I will be strong. Anyway,
I’m hungry. We aren’t going out tonight so let’s be casual. I’ll order in food
and we can watch TV or something.

After their meal, Andre refilled their
glasses of wine. He walked around the apartment and was obviously distracted. Finally
he sat down next to her on the couch. “Lily,” he said, “I got a present for you
yesterday but I haven’t found the proper time to give it to you.” He pulled a
small black box out and said, “You know I love you so much, I want to spend the
rest of my life with you. I want to marry you. Lily, will you marry me?”

He opened the box and Lily gasped when
she saw the beautiful diamond ring inside. “Andre, you know I love you as much
as you love me. Of course I will be so happy to marry you and spent my life
with you.”

He took the ring out of the box and
slipped it on her finger. She looked at it in amazement. It had a large diamond
with two slightly smaller diamonds on each side of the band. “It is the most
beautiful ring I have ever seen. Thank you, my love.” They kissed and Andre
relaxed. “I can’t believe you were so nervous about this,” Lily said. “You know
I love you.”

“I don’t know….I was afraid you’d say
no,” Andre responded.

He pulled her over into his lap and they
snuggled for a while as Lily admired her engagement ring.

Before long, he began to
investigate his favorite
things.

In a few more days, Lily was able to put
her weight on the sprained ankle and, to her relief, finally could walk on her
own. By this time Andre had moved all her personal belongings upstairs to his
apartment. Her sewing room would remain in her apartment for use there but his
apartment was now their apartment.

Lily asked Molly to meet her to get
started on sewing again. Jacqueline had sold all of the
Lilly Collection
she had on hand and needed more dresses. She declared that she even had a
waiting list.

When Molly saw Lily, she immediately
noticed her engagement ring. “Wow! That is the most beautiful ring I have ever
seen.” She hugged Lily and said, “I wish you and Andre all the happiness in the
world.”

Lily told her, “The silly man carried it
around for two days because he was nervous about asking me to marry him. He
said he was afraid I would refuse. Anyway, we straightened that out and are so
very happy. He has moved all my stuff into his apartment except for the sewing
room. He is allowing me to come down here to sew.”

Molly laughed at the idea of confident
Andre carrying around the ring for two days because of uncertainty that Lily
would accept him. “When is the wedding to be?” she asked.

“I don’t know. We haven’t discussed
that. I think we’re just enjoying each other right now. Jacqueline is asking
for more dresses so we have to concentrate on dresses. We need to work out a
routine where you and I can get more dresses done so obviously I need to teach
you to do more than cut. So let’s get started.”

They had been working all day and were
making great progress when Andre walked in. “It’s time to stop for the day,
don’t you gals think? I want the undivided attention of my fiancé,” he said as
he went over to Lily and kissed her passionately.

“Yep, I think it’s time to stop sewing
for today, Lily. Take him upstairs and give him some attention,” said Molly
with a grin, saying, “I’ll see you tomorrow,” as she went out the door.

He took Lily’s hand and led her upstairs
to their apartment. He took her in his arms and began kissing her. They were
interrupted by the ringing of the telephone. Andre frowned when he looked at
the number calling and obviously was not pleased with what he was hearing.

He turned to Lily with a resigned and
displeased expression on his face. “Well, Lily, you are going to have the
privilege of meeting my parents. They are arriving tomorrow and we are meeting
them at the Hyatt Regency for dinner tomorrow night.”

“I need to give you some background
although I don’t like to talk about it. My father is Andrew Nelson, owner of
Nelson Construction and other companies. My name is actually Andrew Nelson, Jr.
oldest son expected to take his place in the family business. I graduated
college with a degree in Civil Engineering but things fell apart.

Throughout high school and college, my
steady girlfriend was Eleanor Morton, daughter of my father’s best friend. I thought
I was very much in love with her and she said she loved me. We talked of
marriage right after college graduation. My best friend since high school was
David Peters. To my shock, Eleanor and David eloped the very day after
graduation. Both sets of parents were furious and I was left to take the blame.
My mother ranted and raved accusing me of all sorts of things to cause Eleanor
to leave me for David. My father stayed out of the fray.

I was hurt and home was very unpleasant
so I just left. I never wanted to see or hear from any of them ever again. I
didn’t contact them. I had never been close to my parents, anyway. My father
was always away on business so my mother ran the household. We weren’t exactly
a loving and caring family. I have a brother and there was plenty of rivalry
and competition between us. It’s sad, really. I had absolutely no trouble
breaking the family ties. Fortunately I had a trust fund from my grandfather on
my mother’s side. I felt so free…from parental control and high expectations. It
was wonderful.

“I had totally lost my trust in women
and for a long time didn’t even consider dating. But eventually I started dating
occasionally but never the same woman twice. Then one day I walked into
Jacqueline’s shop and saw a woman I couldn’t get out of my mind. I knew I was
in big trouble when I was so jealous of the idea of her dancing with another
man and got a hard on when I danced with her. I knew by then I loved her……I
think you know the rest for, of course, you were the beauty in Jacqueline’s.”

Lily had been sitting spellbound listening
to Andre’s story.  “Do you mean that you never dated anybody else in high
school and college but Eleanor?” she asked.

“Pretty much. We were considered a
couple. A lot of girls indicated interest in me and I’m sure Eleanor had
chances to date others, as well. Looking back, I think it was habit and we were
both very influenced by controlling parents. I am so thankful that she ran off and
we didn’t get married. We were so young and hadn’t really experienced life.”

“You have been very quiet. What are you
thinking?” asked Andre.

“I’m wondering how in the world you went
from civil engineering to being one of the best and most famous hair dressers
around? That’s a big jump.”

“It was just one of those unplanned
things that happen in life. I wanted to get as far away from anything my father
would want me to do. I saw an advertisement for a new class beginning at a
local beauty salon. The other people looking at the ad were commenting about
the excellent teacher and how hard it would be to get accepted. I couldn’t
think of anything that would make my father madder than his heir and eldest son
being a hair dresser so I decided to apply. I don’t know why she accepted me
into the class but I found that I liked it. Making someone look pretty appealed
to me so I started taking all the classes I could. I found a salon for sale so
the rest is history.”

Lily thought she could easily understand
why he was accepted. A tall, handsome male would be a magnet for women and
Andre was very good, too. She was shocked to realize that she was the only
woman he had dated steadily except for Eleanor. He could be a real lady’s man
but instead was sweet, kind, considerate and all hers. She could understand now
why he was so hesitant about asking her to marry him. He feared rejection as
Eleanor had rejected him.

“No more questions,” Lily declared. “I
love you so much and will never, never leave you,” said Lily and kissed him
with all the love and passion she possessed.  He responded with gusto and started
removing her clothes.

It was some time later that he
remembered to tell Lily his parents had told him they were bringing a surprise.
“I can’t imagine what this
surprise
could be. Something unpleasant, I’m
sure.”

The following evening, they were dressing
for the dinner. Lily looked through her dresses and asked for Andre’s advice. “I’d
like for you to wear something with your beautiful beading, cocktail dress
length and not too sexy.” “How about this one?” she asked. The dress was violet
with a straight skirt slightly flared at the hem and a geometric design along
the skirt and coming straight up the middle of the bodice and around the neck.
“That’s perfect,” said Andre. “Wear your bracelet on your right wrist and we
will raid Molly’s box for short diamond earrings.”

They entered the dining room holding
hands and Andre immediately spotted his parents with a woman sitting at their
table. “Oh, no,” he exclaimed. “Guess who that woman at the table is?”  

“My guess would be Eleanor, their big
surprise,” Lily said.

As they approached, Andre’s father and
Eleanor stood up. His mother remained seated with a frown on her face. Andre
obviously inherited his looks from his father who was tall and fit with the
same blue eyes. His, however, were shrewd and watchful. His mother wore a
beautiful blue designer dress with a diamond broach, diamond earrings and numerous
rings.  Eleanor was not a pretty woman. Her features were too strong for
prettiness but she was attractive in her own way. Eleanor was obviously expecting
to be a wonderful surprise and was reflecting the shock of everyone that Andre
had brought a date. Lily was very curious to see Eleanor and was surprised that
she was not pretty. She had auburn hair, sharp brown eyes, and an air of
superiority about her that suggested she thought herself special.

Lily made her rapid assessment of the
three as Andre was introducing them to Lily. He introduced Lily as his fiancé
which caused eyebrows to go up. His mother said with annoyance, “We weren’t
expecting a fifth person so we asked for a table for four.”

“No problem,” replied Andre as he pulled
over a chair from a vacant table and squeezed it in around the table. This put
him very close to Lily but nobody offered to move their chairs. After their
drink orders were taken, his father said, “Well, Andrew, we haven’t seen you in
five years. How have you been doing?”

Andre replied, “I’ve been doing very
well, father. I like Miami very much, particularly the weather. You all need to
know that I have legally changed my name to Andre. I am no longer Andrew
Nelson, Jr.”

His father said, “Actually I had a check
done on you and already was aware of that. I also learned to my surprise that
you run a beauty salon and are doing very well financially, even own two
apartment buildings and other holdings managed by a financial advisor.”

Obviously curious, he asked, “How in the
world did you go from civil engineering to fixing women’s hair? That’s a
mystery to me.”

Andre replied, “It was just one of those
unexpected turns that life takes.”

Eleanor spoke up and told Andre, “David
and I were just playing a joke on you, Andrew. We never dreamed you’d just up
and disappear like you did.”

Lily doubted Eleanor was telling the
truth but if she was, it certainly showed low character to do such a hurtful
thing.

Smiling, Andre looked at Eleanor and
said, “I’m very glad you did because it completely changed my life and started
me down a different and happier path.” Eleanor looked very annoyed at this
reply as did his parents. Fortunately their drinks arrived to interrupt this
topic of conversation.

Andre’s mother said, “You will be
interested to know that your brother, Peter, is working with your father and
has recently been promoted to Vice President of the company.  Eleanor is an
executive of the company she works for.”

She turned to Lily asking, “And you, my
dear, did you go to college?”

Lily replied, “Yes, I have a Masters
Degree from Ohio State.

“In what specialty?” asked Margaret..

“Library Science focused on textbook
acquisition. The specialty is focused on subjects taught in universities and
the vast array of reference books available in each particular subject. You
have to keep up with the latest and make sure the library has them in stock,”
Lily replied.

“That’s interesting. Are you doing that
now?” asked Eleanor

“No,” Lily replied.

Their food order arrived and during the
passing out of their orders, Andre reached down to Lily’s leg which was
touching his and started pulling her skirt up, inching it higher and higher
until his hand almost reached its goal. Lily knew she was blushing and pushed
his hand away. “Stop that,” she hissed.

Andre’s mother had been observing Lily
and said,” That is quite a rock you’re wearing. Is it real?”

Lily replied, “You’ll have to ask Andre
since he gave it to me.”

Andre was both angry and surprised at
the rudeness of his mother’s question. He decided to ignore her.

Lily put her hand on his arm and said,
“There’s Jacqueline…” Jacqueline had also seen them and was walking over to
their table. Andre introduced everybody and Jacqueline took a look at Andre’s
father and said, “I see where Andre got his good looks.”

Lily surprised everyone by saying, “I
thought that, too.”

Andre’s father was obviously surprised
and flattered. “Good looking men obviously run in this family,” added
Jacqueline. “I heard about your ring but haven’t seen it.” Lily held out her
hand and Jacqueline said,” What a beautiful ring. Molly and I knew you two were
in love before you did. But it was entertaining. Have you told everyone about
the big spread on you in the paper, Lily?”

“No, but ……” Lily did not want to be the
center of attention and felt very uncomfortable. She looked at Andre for help
but he just held her hand and said, “Relax. Jacqueline will do what she wants
to anyway.”

Jacqueline returned with the newspaper
and spread it on the table for his parents to see. His mother pushed it away
after a glance at the picture but Eleanor and his father read the article.
“Very impressive,” was his father’s comment. “That’s a gorgeous dress you’re wearing
in the photo. You actually designed and made that yourself? It’s sexy, too,”
was Eleanor’s comment.

Jacqueline said to Lily, “I’m having a
business dinner with a Junior Editor of
Vogue Magazine
. They like to
highlight new designers occasionally and I think they’re interested in doing a
layout on you, Lily.”

“That would open new outlets for the
Lily
Collection
, wouldn’t it, Jacqueline?” asked Lily. “Yes, more than likely,” agreed
Jacqueline. “I can barely keep up with your requests now. What would I do with
more outlets?” moaned Lily. “We’ll talk about it later,” said Jacqueline as she
departed to return to her table.