Chapter 36
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
L ucy could have gotten used to waking up with gentle kisses trailing up her shoulder blade and along the back of her neck. Honestly, it had been a long time since she woke up cocooned in such a huddle of safety and security.
And then she cracked an eyelid and saw the clock read 6:04 a.m. On a Sunday. After the marathon sex they’d had, she’d been hoping for a sleep in before round…five? Six? She’d lost count.
She turned to Joel with a languid roll, her arms coming up to loop around his neck. “Are you trying to kill me?”
“I had a title to earn.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “What was it again?” Another kiss. “ Sir ?” This time, she felt his smile curve through his kiss, and she rolled over onto him, straddling his hips, propping her elbows on his pecs.
“Hmmm,” she considered. “I’d say you’re getting there, but a few more practice rounds wouldn’t hurt.”
When he moved, lightning quick, reversing their rolls and pinning her into the mattress, she shrieked.
“I’ll try to be a faster study then,” he growled against her neck before sucking hard on a spot above her collarbone, probably leaving another mark. It wasn’t the first one he’d left on her and she loved that he left marks of his untamed passion all over her.
Lucy giggled as she writhed under his weight, enjoying the ease between them, the carefree banter that had always existed before. “Also, why are we up? It’s the crack of dawn on a Sunday . That’s torture, Joel.”
Some of his weight lifted off her as he propped himself up on his arms. When he tipped his head to the side, his hair flopped over his forehead, making him look younger, more relaxed. Less austere and more…what a healthy and well-off thirty-two-year-old should look like. Happy, content.
“You said you had a flight back to San Francisco at nine. I thought you’d want time to get ready.”
She shoved him off with the force only panic could induce. “Oh shit! I forgot.” Lucy rolled out of bed searching for something that wasn’t—she glanced around her—shredded golden fabric on the floor? Memories of what they’d done last night assailed her. In their desperation to be together, they’d made quite a mess.
Joel tossed something white her way, a t-shirt that was his. When she tugged it over her head, it fell down mid-thigh. “I need to be at the airport in an hour. I need to shower, and pack, and— Am I coming back here soon? Should I leave a toothbrush? Why have we not talked about this?” She twirled around the room, like the answer would magically appear on the walls.
They’d talked about him coming to San Francisco intermittently to keep up appearances. But that was before. Before their talk, before last night, before she had fallen head over heels for him…again.
On her third spin around the room, collecting discarded segments of clothing—her dress was toast, her thong no longer recognizable for what it was—Joel caught her by the shoulders and dipped his head so he could level her with a stare. She focused on those eyes like they were the magnet for her inner compass, pointing her due north again.
“Don’t worry,” he said, his voice steady and sure. “I took care of it. You don’t have to worry about anything. Grab a shower if you want, put a few things in your suitcase, and come to the kitchen for breakfast before we go.”
Why did everything sound easy when he said it? And what did he mean— “We?”
Letting go of her, he sauntered over to his closet, buck ass naked, pulled out a pair of gray sweatpants and tugged them on. No underwear, just him, his six-pack and his dick print, minding their own business. “I’m coming with you,” he told her conversationally. “I have business meetings set up, things I need to organize back home.”
“You do?” When had he planned that? Last she checked, Portland was his home base.
“Lucy, we’regetting married in a couple of weeks. You’re my wife.” This was all said very normally, like there was no contradiction there at all. “You’re stuck with me, I’m afraid.”
“For a year?” She almost whispered it. Last night had been soul-changing, earth-shattering, and they’d aired important things the night before that, but they hadn’t actually discussed how that changed their fake engagement situation.
The youthful, relaxed look she’d admired a moment ago in bed disappeared. The patient, quiet control returned, etched into the alluring structure of his face. “No,” he said, cupping her face in his wide palms, stroking his thumbs over the skin under her eyes. “A little longer than that.”
She melted against him, wrapping her arms around his torso as she hugged him. When he pulled her tight, she let the tears flood behind her closed eyes. When she was with him like this, she believed anything was possible. And she so desperately wanted to believe that they were.
After a long moment, he kissed the top of her head. “Shower, change, eat. I’ll meet you in the kitchen in fifteen.”
It took her twenty-five (men had no idea how long it took to blow-dry hair), and when she walked into the kitchen, pulling her suitcase, Joel was there, holding a cup of coffee toward her like he’d promised.
“I made pancakes.” He beamed.
“Real ones?”
His smile fell as flat as a pancake.
She chuckled. “The ‘Just Add Water’ kind don’t count, Joel.”
“They will when they’re in your stomach and you don’t pass out from hunger at the airport.”
Damn him and his reasoning.
He set a stack on a plate and carried it to the table for her. “A simple thank you wouldn’t kill you, wife,” he muttered as he shoved the maple syrup across the table.
Giggling, she wrapped her arms around his waist like she had earlier, and dropped kisses across his chest and over his heart. “I’m kidding, Sir .” She slid that one in for bonus points.
A satisfied growl emerged from his chest.
“Thank you. I mean it.”
He grunted in approval, then headed toward the hallway. “I’m going to shower quick, then we’ll go.”
T wenty-five minutes later, they were in the Taycan, cruising down the highway toward the airport. But when they arrived, they didn’t veer into the parkade for domestic flights. Instead, they peeled off a side ramp in the opposite direction of the main terminal.
“Aren’t we supposed to be going that way?” She pointed backward at the passing building.
“Change of flight plans,” Joel murmured, keeping his eyes on the road.
“Are you kidnapping me?”
A grin cracked his stupidly handsome, freshly shaven face. “Now that’s an idea.”
They pulled into the private parking area, and a car park attendant quickly appeared to take their cases out of the trunk. Joel was greeted with enthusiastic smiles and professional courtesy that one only acquired when they had a certain amount of zeros next to their reputation. And because she was with him, Lucy was treated in kind.
Soon they were walking down the tarmac to a jet with the Morgan logo painted on the tail. This was obviously the private jet Vanessa had been carted back from Vancouver in.
A young, friendly faced flight attendant greeted them as they climbed into the plane. “Good morning, Mr. Morgan. Good morning, Ms. Barone.” She welcomed them with a beaming smile.
Lucy didn’t bother speaking until she was buckled into a lush, cream-colored leather seat. “Okay, Moneybags. We’re going to have to talk about this.”
“Talk about what?” Joel asked, his voice neutral as he took his seat across from her.
“About the fact that we just boarded a plane with your name on it, and the entire staff knows my name. ”
“You’re my wife, Lucy?—”
“Fiancée,” she hissed under her breath, leaning forward to catch his eye. No one knew they were married, and she didn’t want to advertise it now and be left explaining their unique history to the flight staff, or worse, paparazzi.
Joel met her in the middle and grasped her jaw, pinning her with a sharp gaze. “Wife.” The way he said it made it a done deal, and if they hadn’t been married already, she would have ascertained that he’d secured the deed with his tone alone. “I expect them to know your name. And as for this.” He gestured around them without breaking eye contact. His tone was faintly resigned when he said, “Get used to it. I had to.”
In so many ways, he was an unassuming billionaire, living in an older apartment above a bar in downtown Portland. He drove a luxury sports car, sure, but the rest of him was all subtle power, and she couldn’t help but feel he preferred it that way. Maybe there was more than one reason he’d opted to avoid San Francisco for the last little while. In Portland, he could be inconspicuous. Normal. Unassuming. Himself. There he definitely appeared well-off, but not obscenely wealthy. He could hide more easily, in his privacy.
But Lucy had a feeling, now that they were heading back to home turf, that was going to change.
“You can really afford anything, can’t you?” she asked, narrowing her gaze at him.
He met it, head on, something almost sorrowful passing through his eyes. “Not anything,” he replied.
She wanted to say so much more, but the flight attendant came over and instructed them about take-off procedures. Once they were in the air, she decided to let the topic drop. It clearly wasn’t his favorite, and they’d had such a perfect morning, she didn’t want to ruin it.
So instead, she toed off her shoes, propped her feet on his lap, and asked him what party favors he wanted to give their wedding reception guests. A small frown folded his lips downward as he absently took one of her feet in hand and rubbed his thumb up her arch. Lucy did her level best to swallow the moan that rose in her throat, but damn, that felt good.
“Honestly, sometimes I wish we could elope,” he told her, and despite her scrutinizing his face for signs that he was trying to be funny, he came across as dead serious.
“You’re joking, right? That would defeat the entire purpose of this, not to mention Maria would have a fit.” Her brain could not conjure an image of her mother’s reaction if they had eloped. One reason she had dreaded sharing the truth four years ago was because she knew her mother would have a conniption when she learned they had a Vegas wedding.
Joel’s sigh was heavy, tired. “Yeah, you’re right. Wishful thinking.”
“You’ll find most thoughts are wishful when my mother is involved.” She eyed him cheekily. “Get used to it. I had to.”
Joel snorted then leaned back, shifting his focus out the window as the plane gained speed. His thumb continued caressing up and down her arch in a slow rhythmic motion, and between that, the white noise, and a mostly sleepless night, Lucy felt her eyes droop.