Chapter Twenty-Five
S ometimes, I was an idiot with idiotic plans.
I’m not sure why people kept trusting me to come up with them.
Take my plan to let Grace have whatever space she needed after the kidnapping.
Sure, I stayed by her side as much as I could, but I’d made a stupid plan to keep my hands to myself.
I kissed her, hugged her, cuddled her. I couldn’t get enough of her, and it drove me crazy.
So, when she walked out of her room in some kind of green, frothy concoction with flowers and vines draped over her every curve, I immediately conjured up another crazy plan.
I’m not even sure where this plan came from.
I just knew that when I saw her in that flimsy, flowery thing meant to bring grown men to their knees in worship, I would give her anything.
“Do you like it?” She had asked. What the hell kind of question was that?
Did I like it? I couldn’t imagine liking anything more than her in that scrap of lace.
I realized that I forgot to say anything when she continued on in the shy way she does when she doubted herself.
“I saw it after my divorce and thought it would make me look like a fairy and that it would be fun and romantic.”
That sentence it what led me to this plan. Thankfully, no one would be blown up this time.
“I have an idea,” I said instead of saying something sweet like you look amazing, “put a dress on. There’s somewhere I want to take you.”
I could see her deflate a bit more. I really am an idiot. “I’m fucking this up. You look amazing and you’re putting all kinds of ideas in my head. If you can trust me for just a little bit, I promise it will be worth it.”
It was the first sensible thing I said since she walked out of her room.
She hesitated at first and then nodded her head. She’d chosen to trust me, and my chest swelled with pride.
Somehow, I got us out to the car to enact my possibly brilliant, possibly insane plan.
I gripped the steering wheel tight and tried my best to focus on the road.
Just the thought of what I’d imagined enough to drive me to the edge of sanity.
Grace wasn’t helping either. She put her hand on my thigh and started trailing her fingers up and down.
Seems she had the right idea and was determined to break every last reservation I had.
“Grace, if you don’t stop that, we won’t make it somewhere private,” I warned.
She just laughed. “We were already somewhere private.”
I smiled. She was right. I got my idiot self into this and I had to live with the consequences.
We passed under one of the few street lights in the area while I smiled at her and it lit her whole face up with golden hues.
I’m not sure street lights are supposed to be romantic, but the light danced along her hair in just the right way.
She was perfect and I couldn’t believe my luck that she sat here with me.
I had given up. I thought the military and war would be all I had.
I’d willingly accepted my inevitable solitude.
Yet, here I sat with the most beautiful woman in the world, driving me insane with the slow trail of her fingers on my leg.
I didn’t know what I did to deserve someone like her, but I would do whatever it took to keep her.
The small, intimate, and most importantly, private clearing came into view, shielded by tall tress draped with Spanish Moss. The cover added another layer of privacy to the remoteness of this place. I wanted Grace to feel free and comfortable.
I parked the car to block the only road in and out of the grove to ensure we would be left alone, and then led us over to the stream of moonlight that shot down into the clearing. I had just enough sense to grab a thick blanket before we left and spread that out over a soft patch of earth.
“Oh, wow. I see why you brought me here.” Grace said, delicate and sweet, like she didn’t want to disturb the peace and serenity of the place. The wonder and awe I could hear when she spoke further enforced that I chose correctly.
Maybe not such an idiot after all.
She stepped into the moonlight, and I lost all sense of time and place, consumed body and soul with Grace. Without preamble, she stripped from the dress she had donned before we left and slipped off her shoes. She stood in that shaft of moonlight. A goddess grown from the earth itself.
She lifted her head to the sky and spread her arms wide, greeting the moon as an old friend.
A smile stretched across her lips and I knew I had to have her.
I knew that nothing I had experienced before would compare to what was to come.
I just stood there watching her. God, she was beautiful.
The moonlight graced her delicate skin, her hair cascaded down her back, and that damn skimpy lingerie brushed against her in places my palms itched to trace.
I gave her a moment longer to bask in the moonlight, just watching as it played along her skin, before I gruffly said, “come here.”
She didn’t hesitate and a warm glow spread through me at her trust and confidence in me. I pulled her in the second she got to me, unable to wait any longer once she was within reach.
The smooth expanse of her skin met the rough callous’ on my hands and a low groan escaped me as I ran my hand along her belly and around to her back.
I pulled her in tight. My other hand still grasped as if I meant to lead her in a dance.
Maybe later. For now, I just brought that hand up to my neck before leaning down to capture her lips with mine.
This wasn’t a soft exploration. Neither was it a barely contained explosion.
This was passion, pure and simple. A spark turned to a flame and then a blaze.
I traced her lips with my tongue. Grace arched into me and moaned as she tangled her hands in my hair.
I led us down to the blanket I had spread out.
Her hair fanned around her as I leaned over her and traced my lips down her jaw.
“Anders,” she whispered in a voice just for me.
She opened her arms, and I gladly sank into her soft embrace.
The heat of her surrounded me and burned away the last vestiges of the lonely and lost man I had been, leaving someone whole and new and so in love with the woman below me it hurt in the best possible way.