Chapter 9
”...if you knew then, why did you fight it so hard?”
Cuddled together under the blankets, I”m enjoying feeling August”s hot skin against mine while we talk quietly-- and seriously-- into the early hours of the morning.
He says he knew his heart was no longer his the moment he saw me on the hillside picking wildflowers.
Literally how he said it too, ”I knew my heart was no longer my own.” Swoon.
”It hurts my feelings that you don”t remember that day well, fiore. I did nothing at all to fight it.” He chuckles softly and kisses the top of my head.
I”m wrapped around him, with my head on his chest, his arms banded around me possessively while one hand strokes the small of my back.
”Uh, you threw me in my car and barricaded yourself in your mountain fortress as soon as you found out I was a virgin. That”s what I remember.”
”And young, Zephyr. There is a lifetime between us. The years you see in your future are already in my past. I know how easy it is to look back with regrets and I don”t want to be one of yours.”
”You keep talking about regrets and past mistakes, August. What happened in your past that makes you so sure I”m going to regret whatever I do in my twenties?”
Uncurling from his chest, I wiggle so I”m eye to eye with him with my head beside him on the pillows.
”Were you really in the mafia? What did you do? Are you hiding out, is that why you live up at the plant?”
August fixes his eyes on me in the dim light. The corners of his eyes crinkle with the smile on his lips.
”No, fiore. No mafia. I”ve never even seen the Godfather. My mother is a school teacher, my dad”s a plumber. I grew up in a small town in upstate New York.”
I swear I”m not disappointed. I mean, the whole dangerous past fantasy is hot as hell but this man is going to be the father of my children-- it”s probably better if he doesn”t have a violent, criminal past.
The twinkle leaves his eyes and his face goes sad. August picks up my hand that”s been drawing lazy designs over his inked chest and laces his fingers through mine.
”I was young, impatient, and filled with greed. When I graduated with my four-year degree, I was offered a job as a private contractor for a company that operated in Iraq. They offered me more money than I could make in the states with only my bachelor”s degree and the extent of my vetting of them didn”t extend beyond assuring that their offer was legitimate.
”I took the job. I made a lot of money. I was able to pay off student loans that many of my classmates still struggle with today.
”It was only a few months before I started to suspect that the company was involved with the wrong sort of people-- but I stayed anyway.”
His voice goes remorseful at the confession.
”I worked for them for two years before problems started and my colleagues began to disappear only to return in pieces.”
I can”t help the gasp. This was not a story I”d expected, even in the darkest of my scenarios.
Before I can say anything, August presses his lips to mine with a kiss designed to shush me.
”The company had made enemies that weren”t the sort of people to confine their battles to the courtroom. We were taken over and my contract was due for renewal. The new leadership very much wanted me to stay on. I very much wanted to leave with my head attached.”
”What happened? I mean-- you got out, obviously.”
”But it took the US military”s help and many weeks of investigation while it was determined whether or not I was a threat to national security. I spent a year with family in Italy before I it was safe to come home.”
”At least you picked up the accent,” I tease, drawing a finger along the side of his mouth.
”And I did learn the fine art of Italian swearing from my cousins while I was there.” August kisses my fingertip and laughs gently.
”I was the age you are now when I took that job. That”s how I know what foolish decisions we can make in our youth. I”m afraid that you will wake up one day and realize that I am nothing but a fantasy that is best left in your past.
”You will break my heart that day, fiore. You will leave me a broken man.”
”I want to marry you and have a family with you, Augustus,” I point out plainly, ”that”s a big difference from ”escaping terrorist overlords.” I think your odds are on this bet are way better.”
He only gives me enough time to watch the smile spread across his lips-- the smile that takes his eyes with it, creasing those sexy crinkles at the corners, the smile that says he”s not fighting me any more-- before he”s on top of me, pinning me under his weight with his cock hardening against my thigh.
”I will give one year, fiore.” Kiss. ”One year to change your mind. If you haven”t broken my heart by then, you will marry me.” Another kiss. ”You”ll marry me on the hillside where I found you.” Kiss. Slower, savoring. ”When the wildflowers are in bloom again, on a day when the sun is shining as brightly as the faith you have in me.”
Then he slides into me, this time asking a saint I”ve never heard of for strength to last till I stop screaming.
* * *
Augustus
Zephyr leftthe shower minutes ago, with my cum leaking out of her, saying something about breakfast.
Seeing as the only thing I ate last night was fiore”s sweet pussy, breakfast is a promise that has me rinsing quickly and searching her bedroom floor for my clothes.
Underwear, pants, socks, and shoes are found but my shirt is nowhere among them.
Leaving the shoes and socks behind, I emerge from the bedroom to the sound of Zephyr arguing with a deep, male, voice that I recognize as her brother”s.
”...because the only button-down shirts Hayle ever owned are all flannel, that”s how.”
”I”m twenty-three, Cane. Legal adult. Grown woman. In my own house. You”re lucky I”m wearing anything at all. Maybe knock before you just let yourself in next time.”
”You said you weren”t coming back till we move you out of your place in Slow River next week. I thought I was supposed to water your damn plants.”
”You saw August”s car outside and thought you”d barge in here on one of your typical control-freak tirades. What are you going to do, Cane? Tell me I can”t have sex in my own house?”
That-- does not bode well for my safety, and I strongly consider retreating back to Zephyr”s room before I”m spotted by her brother. But this is a confrontation that has to be faced, even if I”d have preferred to do it under different circumstances.
Clearing my throat to announce my presence-- please don”t let fiore taunt her brother with any more images of me defiling his baby sister, I would like to live-- I step into the big room that is both kitchen and living room to discover what has Cane so outraged.
Zephyr is wearing my shirt. Possibly, only my shirt. It hangs to her knees, she could easily add a belt and call it a dress, but perhaps she could consider doing one or two more of the buttons to cover the view of her generous breasts as they bounce with her movements.
Now is not the time for me to be focused on that, not with Hurricane Hart, former professional football player glaring at me.
”August says you”ve already met,” Zephyr tells her brother. ”Be nice to him, don”t make your niece or nephew grow up without a father, Cane. It sucks, I know first-hand, remember?”
The man”s eyes widen on his sister with a look of horror at her implication.
”You are not helping my cause, fiore.” Skirting Cane”s reach, I join Zephyr in the kitchen, paying for the mug of coffee she hands me with a kiss.
”Go put more clothes on,” I tell her, doing my best to behave and not reach my hand beneath of the hem of my shirt to see what might not be under it. ”I”ll be fine.”
Zephyr gives me a withering glance, then shoots her brother a warning one.
”He”d better be,” she tells him with a wagging finger as she heads back for her bedroom.
I watch Cane watch his sister, knowing all too well what”s going through his head right now.
”Fuck her over and you”ll be the next body they never find up here, got it?”
”I have sisters too.” Is the best assurance I can offer him.
I remember the first time I caught Bella with a man in her house. She was twenty-six and he only made it out alive because she already had a ring on her finger.
My brother-in-law is a good man, but he knows he”ll go through the turbines up at the plant if my sister so much as asks.
Cane”s response is a grunt.
I reach for another coffee mug, lifting it in an invitation to the man I intend to also call my brother.
”Nah,” his eyes dart back toward the hall where Zephyr still hasn”t reappeared, ”she”ll fucking kill me if I stick around.”
I set the mug back on the shelf and try to breath my sigh of relief invisibly.
”Take care of her, man. She deserves at least one man she can count on not to leave her.”
I”ve heard her stories about the loss of her father and grandfather at an age too young to remember them, and Cane”s words remind me of what she”s said about the way her brothers handled their grief.
His own guilt for leaving the ridge for his career rings heavily in his words, as well as the anger he carries at the missing brother for having abandoned the family he”d left in his care.
”If Zephyr and I ever part, it will be her choice, not mine.”
Another grunt, this one more resigned.
Zephyr returns, wearing leggings with my shirt buttoned high this time.
”Are you staying for breakfast so you can hover over us all day?” She asks her brother as she pulls a carton of eggs from the refrigerator.
”No. Got shit to do at the camp.” He answers as he heads for the front door. ”Maybe you guys come get pizza with us after we move you back up here, yeah?”
”Sounds good, Cane.” Zephyr and I watch the door close behind him on his way out.
”Are you okay, fiore?”
She melts against my chest with a deep sigh of relief.
”That wasn”t how I wanted to spend our morning.”
I”m already working the leggings back down her legs.
Fiore proves to be excellent at multi-tasking, coming sweetly on my fingers while she cooks for us and riding my cock at the kitchen table while I feed her from my plate.
A nap, another shower, and a few hours later, I stand in the outdoor garden that stretches to the open meadow on the south side of her property behind the big greenhouse looking over the transplanted flowers from the day I first saw her only a couple of weeks ago.
We”ve been discussing plans for the future, her visions for our wedding, naming our children, and making me the happiest man alive.
”So that”s the plan,” she hands me the bouquet she”s gathered while she tells me my future, ”now we live happily ever after.”
”Si, fiore mio,” I laugh as I bend to her kisses, ”as long as your brother doesn”t kill me, we live happily ever after.”