“No,” he murmurs after a moment. “I want to be inside you when I come. Stand up, baby.”
I release him with one last sad lick, then get to my feet. He cups my face and pulls me close in a fierce kiss, then cups my ass with his hands, squeezing tight. “Wait here. I’ll get the condom.”
“Should I think about getting on the pill?”
“Nah,” he says. “Won’t do any good. Wait here.”
Weirdly enough, my feelings are hurt. The pill won’t do any good? Is that because it takes a month to kick in? And . . . we’ll be done by then? Pain stabs through me at the thought. I don’t want to be done. I don’t ever want Clay to leave me again. I don’t know how I’m going to cope—
Stop it, I tell myself, closing my eyes and leaning into the shower spray. You promised yourself you’d live in the moment, remember? You weren’t going to worry about tomorrow.
Easier said than done, of course.
But then Clay returns, condom on, and gives me another fierce kiss, and I’m swept up in the passion of the moment. He wants me. I can feel the hard length of him pushing against my stomach as we kiss. There’s no question he wants me. Maybe the attraction can grow into something deeper again.
If not, then I’ll deal with that when that day gets here. Until then, I know what I’ve bought into. It’s a contract, nothing more, and I can enjoy it just as much as him.
I wrap my arms around his neck and return his kiss with a fierce intensity of my own. He grips my hips, holding me tight against him. “Turn around,” he whispers after a moment. “Put your hands on the wall and present that pretty ass to me.”
I shiver at his delicious words and do just as he says.
A moment later, his hands go on my hips and he thrusts into me, hard and sharp. I suck in a breath, shocked at how good it feels, how full. I’m always amazed by that first push into me, no matter how many times we have sex. It’s like my body forgets just how incredible it is to be filled by him.
His hands go tight on my hips, and I know this isn’t going to be a lengthy session of lovemaking. We’re both too keyed up for that. I brace my hands as he thrusts into me again, as hard as the first time. Then again. Over and over, he rocks into me with possessive determination, until my fingers are curling against the tiles and I’m crying out his name. The slow, elusive orgasm I’ve come to think of as the “belly” orgasm begins to build, and I whimper, “I’m close” to let Clay know that he needs to keep moving just like that.
But he doesn’t—he pushes into me deep and his other hand goes to my pussy. His fingers spread my folds and in the next moment, he’s rubbing against my clit, and thrusts into me once more.
I shatter.
He doesn’t stop, and it feels as if my climax builds on another. With every circling touch of his fingers around my clit, every thrust, it feels like I’m coming anew, and I sob as the orgasms fly into one another. Clay comes a moment later, his hand finally moving away from my clit, and he tangles his fingers in the curls covering my mound, as if claiming it for himself, and buries his face against my neck.
“Nat,” he breathes, and I wait for words of love. I wait for him to tell me that he loves me, so I can tell him how I feel.
But he just presses a kiss to my shoulder, and I realize I’m going to have to keep waiting.
Chapter Fourteen
One Week Later
Clay
“Quit squirmin’,” I tell Nat as she shifts on the seat next to me. I put my hand on her thigh, letting my fingers graze close to her pussy, because that usually distracts her. Today, not so much.
She just squirms even more, craning her head to look out the window of the sedan as we drive down the highway. “I’m just nervous.”
“What about?”
“Everything,” Nat tells me breathlessly. “You’ve poured so much money into this and I just want it to look right. I want everything to look good. I want you to get your dollars’ worth out of it. I want to feel like— Oh look! There’s the billboard!” She presses her fingers to her mouth and practically glues her forehead to the window as we pass by a large advertisement on the side of the interstate. It’s a black-and-white picture of her father in a sailor hat from one of his movies, and the new logo. The sign reads CHAP WESTON HOLLYWOOD MUSEUM AND MEMORABILIA—NEXT EXIT!
Doesn’t look like anything I’d ever be into, but Nat’s eyes gleam with happy tears and it makes me feel good.
Also makes my dick hard, but I don’t say anythin’ about that. Ain’t the time.
My sweet Nat worries about everything and I want her to enjoy herself today. It’s been real apparent to me that my Nat has been stressed. She worries about her father, who’s been increasingly demanding in his requests that she spend her time with him instead of passin’ him off to nurses. She worries I’ve thrown too much money away on this silly contract of ours. She worries my family’s gonna think she’s usin’ me for my money. She worries I’m not gettin’ enough out of this to make me happy. Nat’s always been a sweetheart who thinks of others before herself, but this constant state of agitation is worryin’ to me. She ain’t gonna make everyone happy, so I’m not sure why she even wants to try.
I’m happy. She’s happy. That’s all that matters to me.
I let my hand play on her thigh, rubbing my thumb back and forth over the soft floral material of her skirt. She’s wearin’ one of those typically “Natalie” light-colored sweaters over a little floral dress that falls to her knees, and it makes me wanna flip the skirt up and expose her pretty ass. Maybe I’ll distract her and joke that we haven’t explored anal yet, and it’s in the contract. Lord knows my poor baby needs distractin’.
Suppose I could always have the driver find the nearest hotel and distract her for a few hours in my favorite kinda way. I like that thought. So does my dick. I’m pretty sure Nat would like it, too—one of the things that’s so amazin’ about her is that she’s just as excited for me to touch her as I am, every damn time. I thought maybe once we got the initial torrid bouts of fuckin’ out of our systems, things would slow down.
Not so much, though. If anythin’, it’s been gettin’ worse. Now all it takes to get me hard is a whiff of her perfume, or a hint of her smile. Nat laughing? Dick hard. Nat sighing? Dick hard. Nat glancin’ over at me in the car like she just did? Dick instantly hard.
Doesn’t take much. I’m crazier about the girl than I ever was, and I thought I was insanely in love seven years ago. Doesn’t hold a candle to how I feel about her now. All of this has just kinda reinforced that she’s meant to be mine. That we’re meant to be together forever.
I slide my hand a little higher up her skirt, my pinky finger awful close to the promised land. Nat only sighs and shifts her weight in her seat, as if she wants my hand there, too.
And I think a bit harder about gettin’ that hotel room. Though I guess it ain’t a good idea—I don’t have condoms on me. I think back to her mention of the pill from the other day. Didn’t really think about it too much because every time it comes up, I’m wantin’ to be deep inside her. But truth of the matter is, I don’t want her on birth control.
I wanna be deep inside her, fillin’ her up with my seed. I want her belly to be rounded with my baby, like Ivy’s is with Boone’s. I want us to be a family. I want to make her mine permanently.
Birth control just seems like that’d delay things. So I shoot it down every time she suggests it. When she’s ready, we’ll discard the condoms and I’ll slide into her, as bare as anything, and fuck her the way she should be fucked.
Damn it, I’m getting uncontrollably hard just thinkin’ about that. Wish she’d let her hand wander over to my cock the way mine’s wanderin’ toward her tasty little cunt. Maybe she’d let me fling that skirt over my head and I could lick her for a while here in the back seat—
“Oh,” Nat says, distractin’ me from my filthy train of thoughts. “It looks so good. Look, Clay!” She reaches out and takes my hand in hers, squeezin’ my finger
s.
As we pull up to the front of the museum, I have to admit, it does look a hell of a lot better. The house itself has been given a fresh makeover, lookin’ clean and new. The grounds have been landscaped into a pretty impressive set of gardens. One section is covered in flowers and has a sign stating that it’s straight outta a scene from Little Tiki Princess. There’s one long row of hedges that’s been shaped into a submarine from another Chap Weston movie. There’s even a bunch of sculpted bushes set up to look like the Hollywood Hills with a smaller-scaled Hollywood sign nestled in ’em. Nearby, there’s a bunch of cutouts of scenes from Chap Weston movies that people can put their faces in and have photos taken of themselves. It’s touristy crap, but Nat looks so pleased. She keeps makin’ these happy little gasps every time she sees things.
Even the parking lot gets a happy exclamation. “Look at how many spaces there are! Oh my goodness. If we had this many people show up, Dad wouldn’t be in debt anymore.” When the car stops, she takes my hand in hers and gives me an eager smile. “Come on, Clay. Let’s go see what else they’ve done!”
How can I refuse? I can deny this gorgeous woman nothin’. Even today, I’m supposed to be meetin’ with my brothers to go over plans for the purchase of new land that has the potential for oil, and I’ve still gotta catch up with Fred about the IntelligentCamo production. Doesn’t seem as important as makin’ Natalie smile, though. Everythin’ pales next to that.
I adjust my too-hard cock as we get out of the car and head up the walkway to the new “front” of the museum. I have to admit it looks vastly different than it did before. The signs are bright and new, the roof and paint have transformed the place, and everything looks clean and invitin’. Even the sidewalk has been freshly poured and has horseshoes peppered in the cement to give it a charmin’ kinda feel.
I can tell from the look on Natalie’s face that she loves it, too. She turns to me and the expression on her face is nothin’ short of joyous. “My father’s going to love this.”
Like I care what that old bastard thinks. I like him even less now that I know he deliberately drove me and Nat apart. She might be willing to look past what happened, but it still burns in my gut. Only reason I haven’t gone and punched the lights out of the old man is the fact that he’s eighty-seven, out of his mind . . . and is probably gonna be my father-in-law someday.
Natalie squeezes my hand as she leads me up the sidewalk, and when she opens the door to the ranch home, she gasps. “Oh my! Look at how beautiful and clean everything is!” She drags me forward, exclaiming as we go room by room through the areas designated as the museum proper. There are mannequins in gowns and posed in scenes, props well lit with a spotlight instead of relegated to a dusty corner, and it all looks like a real museum instead of just stuff in the front of someone’s house. I make a mental note to give Slocum a bonus, because he did a real good job and my Natalie is so damn happy. She holds tight to my hand as we go through the tour area, and then has to go through all the new items in the gift shop, exclaiming over mugs with printed sayings or new postcards like they’re somethin’ special. I endure it, even if I don’t see what the big fuss is. I know it’s important to her.
She turns to look at me after a time, and there are more tears shinin’ in her eyes. “Oh, Clay,” she breathes. “This is just how I imagined it would be when we tried to set up a museum. It’s so perfect.” Her hands go to the front of my T-shirt. “Thank you so much, truly. You don’t know how much this means to me.”
That’s the thing. I do know just how much it means to her. It means she has a fightin’ chance of bein’ able to support her dad with this place instead of scrapin’ pennies together. It means less to worry about. It means she might be able to have a life instead of givin’ everythin’ up to a cranky old man like some kinda martyr.
But all I say is, “Glad you like it.”
“I love it.” Her enthusiasm fades a little as she looks around the expanded gift shop. There’s a section that sells baked goods and coffee and has a few tiny tables set up like a miniature cafe. Slocum thought she might get more traffic through the gift area if she had a reason for them to linger, and I think it’s a good idea. “I’m just not sure how one person is going to manage all of this, though. I’ll need to be in three places at once.” She thinks for a moment, and then adds, “Four, actually. I’ve still got to look after Dad.”
The thought makes me ill. She still thinks she has to do all this herself? “Actually,” I drawl, “I’ve hired an actress to sell tickets at the front and give tours. She’ll take care of that aspect. Got a script memorized and everythin’.” I don’t mention that I’ve agreed to finance a movie she’s writin’ that will star her and it’ll end up costin’ a pretty penny. Nat would be upset. “And then there’s an employee to run the gift shop, and I talked to Slocum and a local baker is gonna use this section over here”—I point at the cafe—“to sell fresh goods. She runs the counter and charges a markup and you get fifty percent of the profits because you have a place for her to run her business. Works out for both of you. And then, of course, there’s a cleanin’ crew that’ll come by nightly to tidy the place up. It’s all taken care of.”
Her eyes widen. “Then all I have to do is take care of my father.”
Or me, I want to say. Or you can spend your time with me. “Mmm.”
“How much is this all going to cost you, Clay? I worry you’re getting a bad deal here.” Her pretty blue eyes look worried. “We need to talk about this, because I know it’s not an open-ended agreement and I don’t want you to think I’m raiding your wallet—”
“Well, now,” I tease, pulling her against me. “Anal’s still on the table, you know.”
Her face colors bright red.
“Maybe not that, then,” I murmur, leaning in to nibble on one of her tasty little ears. “Maybe we find a quiet corner and I lift up your skirts and explore your pussy with my moustache, hmm? Been workin’ real hard to regrow it for you.”
I can feel her tremble against me. “My bedroom is upstairs,” she whispers.
Even better. I like the thought of pushin’ deep into Natalie on her girlhood bed. Makes me feel like a dirty scoundrel, all right. “Lead the way.”
She takes my hand in hers again and leads me through the back of the house, to a set of stairs along the back wall. We head up, and it leads into a long hallway that stretches across the second floor. She turns immediately toward the first door, giving me a small smile over her shoulder that promises naughtiness.
“I want to see my daughter,” calls out an imperious voice. “I know you’re keeping her from me!”
Natalie hesitates, and I know the moment is gone. Damn it. She looks back at me, concern on her face. “I should go see what’s going on.”
“You should let the nurses handle it,” I tell her, but it falls on deaf ears. Nat’s soft heart isn’t going to let her ignore her elderly father.
She releases my hand and heads further down the hall toward the massive set of double doors that clearly leads to Chap Weston’s room.
I sigh and cross my arms over my chest, followin’ behind her. Like I got a choice. I’ll go wherever this girl leads, if nothin’ else to protect her from anyone that’d try to take advantage of her.
She knocks on the door, and then waves me back, indicating I should stay out of sight. Well, fuck that. I stroll forward as she enters the room. “Hello?” she calls.
“Natalie?” Her father’s voice is strong despite his age. “Why did you leave me with these terrible people?”
I move toward the doorway, leaning casually just in sight so I can survey the situation. It’s easy to see that Chap Weston hasn’t deprived himself despite being broke. There’s a massive TV on the wall, his bed is a carved monstrosity on a raised dais, and there’s expensive lookin’ furniture all over the enormous room. Off in one corner is a minibar and a refrigerator, and a ten-foot-long fish tank full of colorful, exotic fish. Somethin’ tells me that if I went and
checked out Nat’s room, it’d be plain and sparse. But that’s how things have always been with Chap Weston and his daughter. He treats her like she’s one of the staff—unimportant and there for his convenience—and she lets him.
“Mr. Weston,” one of the nurses says, patience in her voice. “All I’m trying to do is get you to change into your day clothing. It’s not a good idea to sit in bed all day. You need to get up and move around. It’s good for your heart.” It’s clear from her tone that she’s had this conversation with him plenty of times before.
“I don’t want to get up,” Chap Weston snarls at them. “I want to wallow in bed like the forgotten old man that I am.” When that doesn’t elicit a response from the nurse, he turns to Natalie. “You see how they are? They act like it’s a crime for me to lie in bed. They harass and poke until I’m exhausted.”
“Dad,” Nat says in a gentle voice. She moves to his side and extends her hand to him. “The nurses are just trying to do what’s best for you. Alice is right. It’s not good for you to lie in bed all day. You’ll feel better if you get up and move around—”
He slaps her hand away feebly. “Don’t tell me what to do! You’ve abandoned me!”
“I haven’t,” Nat protests. “You know I’ve been busy, Dad. We talked about this last week. I have a new job and my new boss has been very understanding, but he needs me to spend my time with him.”
“Do I have to hire my own daughter to look after me?” Chap asks in a cranky voice. “Is that what this is coming to? I’m going to have to pay my daughter to spend time with her father?”
Oh please. What a dramatic old bullshitter. “You couldn’t afford to buy her away from me,” I call out, a cocky drawl in my voice. Nat shoots me an unhappy look, but I don’t care. Maybe I’m lookin’ to pick a fight with the old bastard. Maybe I’m just darin’ the guy to keep treatin’ Natalie like she’s thoughtless, because I want her to see what an asshole he is.