Chapter 29
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Gideon
I wanted to take Autumn into the storeroom and shut everyone out. We’d be locked in and I’d have her naked and against the wall in less than a minute. But that’d have to wait. I was behind the bar with her. She was tucked against my side, where she belonged. My ring was on her finger and I’d put mine back on.
Her family had congratulated us, then the various employees of the distillery. Christmas decorations hung in the corners, snowflake lights were around the windows, but the decor didn’t annoy me now that I was with my wife.
The claps on the back had been extra hard from her brothers, but I deserved it. They were my brothers now too. My family had grown from me and Dad to a large, thriving crew that had accepted both of us when we’d been less than our best. The Baileys turned their Christmas party into a celebration .
“I can’t believe you’re here.” This was the third time she’d said it.
I lifted her hand, the one with the giant diamond she was almost too paranoid to wear. Her sisters had made her leave it on instead of putting the ring in the box and locking it up for the night.
I brushed my thumb over her warm skin. “Believe it, firecracker. I’m not leaving.” I leaned my head down to murmur in her ear. “But I’d like to leave with you.”
Her eyes heated. “Let’s go. Wynter can close up.”
“Your family’s here.”
She twined her fingers in mine. “They won’t want to see what comes next.”
I laughed as she grabbed her coat and dragged me out the door. We left on a wave of hoots and hollers.
“Here.” I handed her the keys. “We’ll come back for your car tomorrow. I want to see your land. You might as well drive.”
“It’s dark out.”
“We’ll go again when it’s light out.”
“The road out there is probably blocked.”
She was missing the point. I needed her to know that I was invested in us. I also needed her. We reached the driver’s door and I tugged her toward me. Her coat collar puffed around her neck and her hair was a red halo around her face.
She was my very own snow angel. “You know where there’s a good place to stop so you can crawl over to my side and get on top of me.”
Her eyes widened. “Oh.” She snatched the keys out of my hand. “Load up.”
The moon was high and there were very few clouds. Still, it was dark on the Baileys’ property. I couldn’t make out much more than a white landscape with brown grass poking through. We were on a gravel road in the middle of nowhere.
She stopped by a stretch that looked like it could be a turnoff to a long driveway or a narrow road if it was plowed. After she backed in so we were firmly off the road, she killed the lights. “This is the access road. The guys use it for hunting and there’s a fishing nook on the edges we sometimes use. I can’t wait for you to see it in the spring.” She gnawed at her lower lip and gazed into the rearview mirror that showed nothing but darkness. Something was bothering her.
“You can talk to me.”
Her expression softened. “I love the simple beauty. It’s such an outdoor oasis, I never planned to build a house on it.”
“Then we won’t.”
She peered at me. “As simple as that?”
“As simple as that.”
Her lips curved into a smile and she unzipped her coat. “You say all the right things.”
“Not enough, but I will. I promise.” I shrugged out of my coat and tossed it in the back seat with hers. I had brought very few of my things. I’d get all new stuff. “Now get over here.”
My erection was getting uncomfortable. Watching her wiggle out of her winter coat was a personal striptease.
I helped her clamber over the console and I leaned the seat back as far as it’d go. Finally, her weight rested on me. Neither of us moved. Her hands were on my shoulders and her hair hung down .
I drank her in. “You’re so fucking beautiful.” I cupped her cheek. “I don’t deserve you.”
“Gideon.” She turned her face into my hand. My heartbeat hammered in my cock but I wanted to savor her. She was mine for eternity, but I had to have her now.
“I was a shell before you.” I thumbed a puffy ball on her sweater. She was cute in the sexiest way. “Without you, I was an ass no one wanted to be around.”
I lifted her sweater enough to expose the creamy mounds of her breasts. The dashboard lights created a halo around her. I palmed each of them. This road probably didn’t see much traffic but I wouldn’t undress her all the way, just in case. “I can’t wait to peel every inch of clothing off you, but right now, I just want to be inside of you.”
“Good thing I wore a skirt tonight.”
I leaned forward to tongue her nipples through the thin fabric of her bra. Her tight little buds teased me. I’d give them more attention later. “I’m not going to last much longer.” I slid my hand up her boots. She could keep those on later too. When I got to her underwear, I slid my fingers underneath. “I don’t want to take the time to get these off.”
The heat coming off her seared my fingers. I pushed through her wet seam and pushed inside. Her walls clamped around me. She arched her back and rocked into me.
I ripped open my pants with my other hand. There was barely enough room between us. When I finally freed myself, I paused. “I don’t have a condom.”
She kept rolling her hips, her eyes shut, bliss painting her expression. “That’s okay. We can do other things for now.”
“I plan to sink deep into you, but I need to know if you want that too. I need you to know there’s been no one but you. And I need to know if you’re ready for this.”
She stilled and her gaze flew to mine. “You’re serious? You’d be okay if I got pregnant?”
“Fuck, yes. And once I got my head out of my ass and realized I was letting fear keep me in the past, I got more than okay. I want kids—with you. I want to raise them—with you. And I want them to have the big fucking support system that’s your family and my dad.”
She brushed her hand down my cheek and stroked my bottom lip with her thumb. “I want that too. And I want you inside me.”
A growl left me. I slipped my finger from her and yanked her underwear to the side. I pushed in as she ground down.
“Fuck,” I groaned.
“Gideon,” she gasped, her eyelids drifting shut.
When I was fully seated, she met my gaze. My emotions were mirrored in her eyes. This was intense. I could feel everything. Every little ripple.
“You’re so fucking wet.” All the sensations were amplified and it wasn’t just because we were skin to skin. There was nothing between us. She had all of me.
“You make me that way.”
I gripped her hips. “I’m never leaving you again.”
“Promise?” Her gaze was dreamy as she lazily rode me.
“Never fucking again.” I slid my hand around and put my thumb on her clit .
A full-body shudder racked her and she moaned.
“That fucking sound. Do you know how much I dreamed of you?”
“Not as much as I dreamed of you.” Her pace picked up.
She was heaven on me and around me. Her needy noises, that cotton-candy smell that left me a starved man while I was in Vegas, and this lush goddamn body. Energy coiled at the base of my spine, cinching everything tight. I concentrated on her; otherwise, I’d be a finished man.
Her breathing hitched. “Gideon. I’m so close.”
“You need to come,” I said through clenched teeth. “I’m not going to last.” It was a damn miracle I’d made it this long.
A cry escaped her lips and her rhythm grew erratic. Finally. I increased pressure on her clit and dragged her head toward me. Thanks to the cramped cab of the pickup, there wasn’t much distance to cover before I could capture her mouth and thrust my tongue inside.
She spasmed, the early stages of her climax hitting. With my tongue, I matched the short thrusts I was making in the crowded space. She went taut and threw her head back.
I dropped the gates on my release. Lightning shot through my body, striking every inch of skin as my release poured out of me.
“Fuck. Autumn. Fuck .”
She convulsed around my cock, gripping and milking. I squeezed my eyes shut and gave myself to her. This was my woman. My wife.
Autumn
We’d recovered after our first round in the pickup, then he’d traded places with me and driven us home. Sprinkles got some quick pets from him before he locked us in the bedroom and ravaged me two more times. Now, I rested my head against Gideon’s bare chest and traced my fingers over the planes of his abs.
I was married.
I was married married. This wasn’t pretend. Not just a deal. It was Gideon and me embarking on a life together.
“What made you change your mind?” I shouldn’t question it, but I also knew he’d talk to me. What he’d said in front of everyone at the bar had made him wide open. It was time for us to complete this connection between us. “About kids?”
His chest rose, paused, then fell. “When I talked to Dad, I told him I was afraid of being like him.”
I kept swirling my fingers over his skin, sensing he wasn’t done speaking yet.
“Being here, with you, it unlocked a lot of memories,” he continued. “Good ones. I can’t believe I’d forgotten so much. But going back h-home—to Percival—was the key. Images of me, Mom, and Dad rose relentlessly in my head. Same with visiting you at school. The school program. Goddamn trick-or-treating.” He shook his head. “Talk about a trip down memory lane.”
I caught the way he’d faltered over the word home . “Is it going to be hard? Not having Percival in the family? Never mind. Of course it will be. ”
“Yes and no.” He went quiet. I flattened my hand over his beating heart. “It’ll always be the home where I grew up. Those memories are mine. I don’t have my grandfather’s voice in my ear, telling me how I should feel about it. I loved that place. I always will. Do I wish it was still in the family? Yes, but it sort of is. It’ll pass down to our kids in a way.”
It would as long as Bailey Beef decided not to sell it. But Gideon’s name wasn’t on any of the papers.
He hugged me closer to him. “When I left home at eighteen, Bourbon Canyon didn’t pull at me anywhere close to the way it has for the last month. That was fucking miserable. I tried to ignore it. To continue on my stubborn path. Then you sent those fucking papers. I wasn’t willing to give you up,” he ended on a growl.
“I was going insane waiting for them to appear in my inbox.”
“There was a reason I hadn’t told my lawyer to send those papers, firecracker, and that was because I still wanted to be married to you. Being married to you in a different state meant you were still mine. Then you woke me the hell up. I’ve had blinders on my entire life and you pulled them right off.”
I wiggled into him. It shouldn’t be possible to get closer to him.
“When I told Dad I was scared of being a father, the fear just drained away.”
“Like speaking it out loud took the power away?”
“You remember the party he threw?”
I rolled up to an elbow. He feathered a hand over the tresses of my hair and draped it over his chest. “Yeah?”
“The emotions I felt when I returned were big. Powerful. And my first urge was to have a stiff drink. It scared me, Autumn. With how I feel about you? Fucking terrifying.”
I made the connection without him explaining it. He worried that if something happened to me, he’d be no better than the dad he’d condemned for years.
I pressed a kiss to the hot skin of his pec. “I’m sorry.”
“I talked to Dad about that too. I’m not saying the fear isn’t still there, but I can handle it. I have you to talk to. Him. That’s two more people than I had when I met a sassy redhead on the elevator at Silver.”
I laughed. “Just keep talking to me. If you quit, I’ll sic my family on you.”
He shuddered. “I don’t think I’d stand a chance against your mom.”
“None of us do.” I cuddled against him again. “So... househusband?”
“You’re worried, aren’t you?”
“Maybe a little.” Would there be a day when I didn’t think this was too good to be true?
He didn’t answer right away. I’d asked him at the bar, but I had to hear the specifics. I had to know there’d be nothing to worry about. He had to be as happy as I was.
“I’ll hang out with Dad.”
I smiled. He said it so simply. There was too much time to make up for between them, but they weren’t going to waste more.
“Then, I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Maybe your brothers need a hired guy.”
“You’d work for my brothers?”
“I liked moving cattle with them. I know a thing or two about farming, and rumor has it they want to start planting in the spring.”
Astonished, I blinked at him. “But will you be happy?”
He took my hand. I’d left the giant diamond on. I’d swap it after. Or not. I was becoming a diamond girl. “With you? Always.”