Marriage (Red, White &) Blues (Unexpectedly Married #2)

Chapter 11

Chapter Eleven

S o not having a job turned out to be a good thing once Candice dropped off the travel itinerary. Mrs. Parker hadn’t been lying. This first leg of the tour involved Blake and me attending fundraising dinners around the country and support rallies in the important caucus states. If we didn’t think his parents were serious about coming after the people we care about, I’d have told them to shove the travel plans up their collective asses.

There was one part of our busy schedule, however, that I absolutely looked forward to. We had a stop in Michigan for a fundraising dinner.

I called Pen as soon as I found out. “You’ve been neglecting us again,” she scolded when she answered the phone.

“I didn’t mean to. It’s been crazy, what the campaign.”

“I know, that’s something, isn’t it? Ant and I were laughing so hard when we saw you standing with that family at his press conference—sorry, Glor—but it’s true. You’re sweet and so kind. And they had you wearing gray! My colorful Gloria in gray? It was nothing short of a travesty of justice. Gerald is fuming, too.” Gerald was Ant’s dad. “He wants so badly for Ant to be running.”

“There’s still time,” I teased. “Ant’s not old enough to run yet.”

“Bite your tongue, woman!” she snapped into the line and we both giggled. “He’s tried to get Ant on board with County Commissioner. And when that state senate seat unexpectedly opened up, his eyes glazed over. Once again, my husband had to remind him that he wouldn’t like the results if Ant did run.”

“And that’s why he’s fuming?”

She snickered. “Yes. He’s totally jealous that Robert Parker got his son to run and on the right side.”

“Well, I was hoping you, Ant, and Si would be free. We’ll be arriving in Detroit on Thursday for a couple of luncheons and a big fundraising dinner on Saturday night. But I was thinking, maybe we could get together on Friday so you all could meet Blake in person? You know he’s looking forward to meeting all of you.”

“You’re coming to town on Thursday? Are you serious? Even if it doesn’t work, we’ll make it work. Hold on.”

The next thing I knew, we were on a conference call. “Gloria?” Ant said. “Good to hear your voice.”

“Hi, Ant. It’s good to hear yours, too.”

“Woman,” Si scolded. “You promised no more disappearing.”

“I didn’t,” I defended myself. “It’s just been… I got married… we ended up on CNN and TMZ… Then we had to join a press conference to support his brother’s bid for the presidency.”

“Yeah,” she said, “and what’s that about? Brockton Parker? Since when would my sweet, full of life and love best friend throw her support behind a man like him?”

“There’s a lot to unpack with that, but I don’t want to do it over the phone. Anyway, since then, we’ve been forced to attend all these luncheons and dinners in different states. It’s legit been weeks since I’ve slept in my own bed.”

“Okay, well, I’ll let it slide for now.”

“Blake and I will be in Detroit on Thursday. I was hoping we could all get together Friday night since you all get the weekend off.”

“Barbecue at our house?” Ant asked. “Does Blake eat barbecue?”

“Does he eat barbecue?” I asked, mock-affronted. “Do you think I’d marry someone who didn’t? I have my standards, Ant.”

As everybody laughed, he asked, “Is it okay if I invite Cormac and Wendy?” Cormac was a good guy. He and his wife, Wendy just had their first baby. Even though a McCain, too—Ant’s first cousin—only Ant ever invited Cormac to anything. Like me with the Parkers, the McCains felt that Cormac had married below his status. I now had even more in common with Wendy.

“Heck yeah, invite them. I haven’t seen Corm or Wendy in so long.”

“Remember Pete’ll be in town on business, too,” Pen said and I heard Sierra groan. What was that about? Pete lived out west in Oklahoma, I think. He was Ant’s best friend from Brown. He’d given Pen a little bit of trouble back when she and Ant first got engaged—you know, the protective friend bit—but they’d worked out their differences once he realized that Pen wasn’t Gretchen, and actually loved Ant, like her entire life loved him.

“Great,” Pen said. “Then we’ll make it happen. I’m so excited,” she squealed. “I get my Gloria back!”

“ We get our Gloria back,” Sierra corrected her. And wow, that kind of made me tear up.

“I have to go now, guys. Blake and I have a stupid rally to attend.” I rolled my eyes. It made me feel better that even if they couldn’t see said eyeroll, they felt my pain.

“Hang on, girl. Friday you’re with family,” Ant said. Friday, Blake and I would be with family. Ant was so right. Not a born family, a made one. We were all misfits in one way or another and that bond made us closer than friends.

“I know you’ll just love Blake,” I said, hoping they didn’t hear the catch in my voice.

“I know we will, too,” Pen said softly, meaning she definitely heard the catch. I hung up when my husband entered our bedroom of the hotel suite where I’d been talking. He’d been on a business call in the office. Yes, this suite had bedrooms and an office.

“Ready to go, babe?” he asked.

“Just let me grab my purse.”

“You know how much I love you?” He pulled me in for a kiss. A romance novel special. My heart still speed, my toes curled and I wanted nothing more than to have him tell me to be his good girl right this second. Alas, our commitments beckoned.

After he let up, I told him about our plans. “You finally get to meet Pen, Ant, and Sierra.”

His smile lit up the room. “When?”

“This Friday. Pen and Ant are hosting a barbecue at their place for us.”

“Oh, man… I can’t tell you the last time I got invited to a barbecue. That sounds amazing. We should bring something.”

“Well, if you want to help me, after the luncheon, we could head to the store. I could make my grandma’s ko?aczki cookie recipe. I used to make them for Si and Pen when we were in school. They loved them.”

“You haven’t baked me any of your grandma’s recipes.”

“We haven’t exactly had the time. I mean… I suppose we could spend less time in the hot tub.”

He covered my mouth with his hand. “Hold your tongue, woman.”

“That’s what I thought,” I said, or I tried to say, but he still covered my mouth, so it came out rather garbled.

“What are ko?aczki ?”

“Oh, you’ll love them. They’re made with a cream cheese dough that allows them to bake up super flaky. I normally made my pastry filling from scratch, just like Grandma taught me, but given our time restraints, we’ll probably have to buy a readymade one.”

“Well, then never mind,” he teased.

“If you want to peel all the plumbs, we’ll need…”

“Readymade sounds great .”

“Somehow, I thought you’d change your mind.”

“Elephant in the room. What about your mom?” he asked. “We going to see her?”

“Probably not. I don’t know that I’m ready to talk to her yet. None of you understand. I gave up my dream schools, I gave up dream jobs because she didn’t want to be alone, and then she lies about her boyfriend?”

“Whoa—I get it. I just don’t want you to regret anything. We’ll try again next time.”

“Thank you for understanding.”

“Babe, you’re my wife. Your happiness is my priority.”

“Fair warning, you keep up this doting husband bit and I’ll be forced to reciprocate.” He showed me his dimple as I held my hand out to him. “Now, come on, let’s go make this rally our bitch.”

I hated these rallies. Today, we found ourselves in—I checked my itinerary—Nebraska. The car drove us to this huge plowed field, where a stage had been erected. As the car drove us around to the back of the stage where they’d set up the security area, I saw food vendors and merch vendors. People who’d probably been waiting in line for hours filed in wearing flag shirts and flying American flags. They acted like this was a rock concert rather than a political rally.

Did I say I hated rallies? If I didn’t yet… I hated rallies.

While Brock spoke to the most important potential voters, i.e., the ones with the most money to donate to his campaign, Emily and the kids standing silently behind him for support, Blake and I were tasked with making nice with the people Brock wouldn’t be caught dead interacting with. We shook hands, took photos holding babies and I got my butt pinched too many times by drunken men who stunk like beer, with roaming hands. The whole time I kept a smile on my face as I urged them to vote for Brock. Ugh!

Friday couldn’t get here soon enough.

Finally, at the tail end of a very long week, and with a sore bottom, we made it to Michigan.

When we disembarked the plane, I was met with a voicemail from my mother. Instead of calling back, I responded with a quick text.

Me: Can’t talk now. Been busy. Hope you and Carl are well. I’ll call when I’m able.

That would just have to do because I had no idea what to say to her now. She spent the previous year growing away from me and I’d spent the remaining time making sure it stuck. I found the idea of calling around for insurance quotes more appealing than talking to my mother. Good thing our schedule kept us busy.

Rather than stay in a hotel, I took my husband home. Don’t get me wrong, we checked into the hotel like a good little Blake and Gloria, but I wanted him to see where I’d grown up. My home, or what used to be my home before this whole Vermont adventure. But as stupid as this sounded, I wanted my husband to meet my dad. My dad still lived in the walls of that house. In the yard. In the very foundation.

Blake rented us a car to get us there—I mean, if you called a Porsche Cayenne a “car”—seeing as my Outback still sat parked in the garage.

Turning into the driveway, it felt like stepping into a different world. “I love this,” he said. “I can picture you running around the front yard with your curls bouncing as you played.”

“You aren’t repulsed by our meager dwelling?”

“I know you aren’t being serious.”

“No,” I said, smiling at him. “I’m not being serious.”

I showed him around the house. Blake stopped to take in all the pictures on the walls. “This was my dad.” I pointed out a prominent picture of the first man I’d loved. He would’ve loved Blake.

“Somehow, I expected him to have red hair.”

My father had brown hair.

“Don’t be disappointed,” I said, “but my mom has brown hair too. I get this”—I held up a lock of my hair—“from my Grandma Brianne.” I walked him over to a picture of my mom’s mom hanging on the wall. “And this”—I dragged him a bit farther down the wall—“is my Grandma Maria. She’s who taught me to cook. Grandma Brianne died when I was little. Grandma Maria moved back to her little town in Poland after my dad died. I was going to visit her when I went to Europe, but I got sidetracked by a devastatingly handsome Vermont man.”

“We still could have gone to visit.”

“You don’t know Polish grandmas, Blake. She would’ve assumed you wanted to marry me. Trust me, it wouldn’t have happened in Tanzania. It would’ve happened in Poland. We hadn’t even?—”

He cut me off by kissing me. I loved when he did that. “After the tour, we’ll visit her. I want Grandma Maria’s approval.”

“ Okay, ” I responded all dreamy-like because my husband’s kisses still did that to me.

We relaxed at the house while I let him look through family photo albums. Then we went to the grocery store so I could cook for us. I made chili and cornbread with all the fixings. Eventually, we had to leave for another rally.

I didn’t mind this rally so much, though. Sure, I left with a sore bottom again, but we were back in Michigan amongst my people. And when we woke up in the morning, we’d reached Friday !

Despite a stupid luncheon we were forced to attend, Blake and I stopped at the store again so I could make ko?aczkis . And in a few hours, I’d be drinking beers with my best friends.

Getting Blake into the kitchen to help me bake just proved how much he loved me. I highly doubted the man ever made himself so much as a bowl of cereal. It was no wonder he had a cook. I found this out the hard way when I asked him to measure me out a cup of flour. It took him ten minutes to find the “cup” he thought would work the best. I kept myself busy with other prep work and thus didn’t notice my lack of flour until I really needed it.

“Blake, honey, the flour?”

He handed me one of those Coca-Cola fountain glasses with flour in it. “You didn’t specify which cup you wanted.” He shrugged. “I got the best grip on this one.”

What did he say? It didn’t quite register until I looked between the glass, a covered-from-his-head-to-the-waist-of-his-trousers-in-flour Blake, and the counter with various flour-coated mugs and glasses before it clicked.

I didn’t want to laugh, but come on. This man graduated from Harvard. He made his family’s corporation billions of dollars a year.

“Okay…” I tried and failed to hold back my giggle. “This—” I picked up the metal one-cup measuring cup next to my workstation. “This is a measuring cup for dry measurements.”

“ Oh… ”

“See, they come in different sizes.” I held up each one telling him the size. “These are measuring spoons.” I did the same with the spoons. “And this is for measuring liquid.” I showed him the glass four-cup spouted Pyrex vessel that we always used.

His face turned a bit pink. “I’ve never had to…”

“I get it. I just forgot you were raised differently. C’mon. We’ll do this together.”

By explaining each step to him, my assistant baker came alive. And then well… my alpha baker came alive. He spun me in his arms and the intensity in his eyes just about soaked my panties. He yanked up the drab pencil skirt I still wore, bunching it around my waist, then dropped to his knees putting him right at eye level with my sex. He ran a finger between the elastic of the pink lace and the bare skin at the juncture of my thigh.

“These are pretty,” he said right before ripping the fabric down my legs where I instinctively stepped out of them and he threw them over his shoulder to land on the floor by the refrigerator. “But they look better on the floor.”

“Are you kidding me?” I whisper-shouted. “This is unsanitary,” I finished, even as my heartbeat broke speed records and my legs began to quiver.

“Don’t move,” he ordered.

“Blake, really…” My protest fell away when he lifted my leg over his shoulder, dragging his lip over his bottom teeth and his smoldering brown eyes turned positively sinful while looking me over as if trying to decide where to start. He breathed in deeply causing his nostrils to flare and his dimple showed when a deliciously slow smile spread over his face. A full-body shiver rolled through me.

He gave my bottom a light smack. “I said don’t move.”

My grip on the counter turned my knuckles white. He moved his gaze to my hands and this seemed to please him given the way his smile broadened and a very horny devil shown through.

“You want my mouth on you?” he asked and I knew he wanted it as his voice sounded lower and grittier than normal.

Slowly, I nodded my head up and down.

“If you cum, I stop, Glory—understand?”

“ W-what ?” I couldn’t have heard him right.

“I’ve been doing some research on this alpha lover thing.” He used his fingers to split the downstairs, flicking his tongue over my sweet spot. Oh, Jiminy Christmas, that felt good. It wasn’t like he’d never gone down on me before, but somehow, he changed the game here. “Withholding seems to be big with the alpha types. Today we’re going to see if they’re right.”

“With… holding ?” I asked but he sucked the whole nub into his mouth causing my mouth to fall open as I gasped for air. He used the tip of his tongue to circle it. My knees began to buckle.

“Keep it together or I stop, babe.”

Keep it together? He sucked and licked and nipped like he was enjoying a Gloria flavored ice cream cone. Oh, I sure as shit stayed unmoving but I felt like I was trying to finish the last mile of a marathon. My legs burned and at the same time turned to jelly. The fight to stay standing turned downright painful but I pushed through it. And my rat bastard of a husband changed things up again using two of his fingers, he plunged them inside me, bending the tips forward to hit the spot. That G lorious, G iving, G ame-changing spot. But did he stop there? No, he did not . Blake took his other hand, pressing down on my pelvic bone from the outside as he continued to suck.

And that was all she wrote. My entire body lit up like a 4 th of July firework display and it was quite possible that from the sound ripped from the bottom of my diaphragm, I wouldn’t be able to look any of the neighbors in the eye for the foreseeable future.

My husband stood up, spinning me to face the counter. I heard him unzipping his pants but when I tried to turn my head to watch, he brought his hand up to the back of my neck pushing down.

“You my good girl, Gloria?”

“Trying to be,” I said though it came out rough and panting.

“Arms out. You don’t hold on to anything. Understand?”

“Nothing,” I breathed. When did my husband become so wicked? He knocked my feet to shoulder width apart.

“Tilt your ass out.”

Maybe this made me prudish, but I’d never had kitchen sex before in my life. Blake entered me slowly, softly which felt nice but not what we’d been doing. I should’ve known he was just trying not to hurt me going in because soft totally disappeared from that point on. He held my ass cheeks spread wide to create more of a suction each time he rammed that meat hammer inside. I heard it and felt it. I smelled us. Our love making—no, our fucking— used all my senses. Yes, even my eyes as I tried to watch with the side of my face plastered to the counter.

Apparently, I liked it rough because the harder he pumped the more fizz built up in my belly, like shaking up an extra cold glass bottle of cola. Because I wasn’t allowed to grasp onto anything my arms swung wildly, knocking the bowl with the flour onto the floor, it poofed a white cloud into the air, covering us in the dust as it settled. I tilted my hips back to give him more of me. I needed to let go, but if I let go than this would end and I never wanted it to end. Spending the rest of my life with my husband roughly fucking me from behind seemed like a pretty great life, at least in the moment. Then he twisted his body going up and in at an angle and my entire body gave up the fight. I dropped to my knees, taking him with me as we were still connected. The wetness from him and me dripping down my legs mixed with the flour on the floor causing a sticky paste to form on the tile. It smeared on his pants and the bottom hem of my skirt.

I started cracking up once I found my breath. And even then, my chest still heaved. He rolled me to sit on his lap after pulling out, holding me, cracking up along with me.

“So, what do you think?” he asked, but kissed me before I could answer. “Alpha enough for you?”

When I looked around the room, flour coated just about every surface. I’d knocked the eggs— when did I knock the eggs ? The only things unharmed were the two cans of plums because they hadn’t been opened yet. Our luncheon clothes needed some major dry cleaning now. We both needed a shower—stat. “It was okay,” I teased.

But Blake’s eyes as he leaned in to kiss me again, so full of love and humor—God, that look just did it for me—it reaffirmed my decision to catch that redeye flight to Vermont and give this man another chance.

At the end of it all, we had a giant mess to clean up and had to drive about an hour out of our way to make a stop at the Polish bakery in Hamtramck and then it was off to Pen and Ant’s cookout.

And secretly, I couldn’t wait to meet alpha-Blake again. Which room would he pick next time?

Part of me wanted to share every dirty detail with Pen and Sierra, but the more I thought about it, the more I wanted this to be a beautiful secret between me and Blake.

Some things deserved to stay between a husband and wife.

My own dirty little secret.

How did I get so lucky?