53. Oh, we totally had cavities
Chapter 53
Oh, we totally had cavities
Ariana
I feel like a weight has been lifted now that Luca knows everything. And he still loves me, still wants to hold me, so I feel like I can fly.
But talking security shit with Dad over breakfast clips my wings. It’s for the best and mostly self-imposed, but it still sucks ass.
“You’re an adult, Ari. I’m not going to force you to stay behind these walls. But I would feel better if you don’t go out often. And you have to follow the protocol we’re putting in place. You, too, Lil.” Lil and I lock eyes, then nod at Dad. “None of us are leaving without a security detail. Not me, not your mom, not Becca, and not Luca.” Luca’s hand is already tight in mine, but I squeeze it tighter.
Then Dad drops a bomb. “I’ve activated the trackers I had put in your molars.”
“Damn it, I knew we didn’t have cavities!” Lil exclaims.
“You did. Two birds, as they say.”
Maybe I should be mad, but I’m not. It’ll make sneaking off to drive Bruce a whole hell of a lot harder when shit gets back to normal if they aren’t deactivated, but I guess we’ll deal with that later.
Shortly after breakfast, I’m pouring my third cup of coffee. And for once, Luca doesn’t seem to be counting. Or he’s just letting it go today. Either way, I’ll take it.
“Luca, we have some business to attend to,” Dad says as he comes into the kitchen.
My eyes go wide and my heart drops to my toes. I don’t want him to go anywhere, not with my DNA donor possibly lurking around. I don’t trust Fred Mitchell to not go after someone I love. Luca takes a few steps toward me and cups my cheeks in his hands. My hands rest on his chest, and I sigh. Being close to him, being in his arms, calms me. Calms my soul. I look up into his beautiful blue eyes.
I won’t make him promise to come home. I can’t. I know how shit can go wrong. I still feel guilt over how everyone else was affected the day I was taken. The day Fred killed me. So I put my hand on the back of his neck and pull his head down to mine. Our lips meet in a sweet kiss, but there’s a promise of more to come later in it. “Be careful and safe, please,” I whisper.
He nods and kisses the tip of my nose. Dad kisses Lil and me on the top of our heads. Then he kisses Mom in a way that makes Lil cringe.
Lil wraps her arm around my shoulder as we watch them walk out the door. “Do I need to find another distraction?” she asks.
Mom holds her hand up. “You girls need to clean up all the distractions that didn’t work yesterday, please. You were like tornados going room to room.”
“We’ll take care of it, Mom.” I give her a hug, then finish my coffee before starting the rounds.
Pool cues and balls get put away, darts get taken out of the board (and the wall, thanks to Lil’s shitty aim), and the air hockey table gets turned off. We empty the popcorn machine and fold the blankets in the theater room. The shitty canvases we painted get laughed at as we clean up the art studio. I put mine away to show Luca later. It’s supposed to be him and it’s terrible, but I think it’ll make him laugh.
Books get put back on their shelves. The karaoke machine goes back into the cabinet. We pick our swimsuits up off the bathroom floor and hang them to dry. Our bowling shoes and balls go back to their homes. There’s no flour to sweep up because Becca already cleaned the kitchen. I feel bad and I offer to do the dishes after dinner, but she scoffs and shoos me off.
It doesn’t take as long as I want it to, though. “Now what?” I ask.
“We know what finally worked last night,” she shrugs.
I roll my eyes. “We’re not getting drunk and high. It’s noon.”
“Fine. How about lunch first?”
“Okay,” I laugh. “Lunch. But still not getting drunk and high today.”
“We’ll see,” she smirks and cocks an eyebrow.
After some sunshine and a swim, I bake a black forest cake that smells amazing. As usual, Lil hangs out in the kitchen with me, playing music and dancing around. I love baking with some good music blaring. We’re both licking spatulas of extra frosting from the bowl when Luca and Dad get home.
I drop the spatula and run in their direction. Luca barely has time to prepare before I’m jumping into his arms, but he catches me effortlessly. My arms loop around his neck, my legs around his waist, and I bury my face in the crook of his neck while his arms wrap around my hips. I breathe him into my lungs, feeling better in milliseconds. Dad chuckles as he walks past us.
“Miss me?” I can hear the grin that I can’t see on Luca’s face.
“Nope, not at all.” One of his hands moves to squeeze my ass cheek, making me squeal. I rub against his cock a little bit in retaliation.
He groans. “Fuck,” he whispers into my hair.
I smirk and lower my feet to the floor. He holds up a bag. “I got you chocolate bars.”
“What?” I take the bag from him and find it full of my favorite kind. “You’re fucking amazing.” I grab his hand and drag him with me to Lil’s closet. I put the candy in a drawer, and turn to find Luca glancing around nervously. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong, baby.” But he’s totally lying. I thread my fingers through his and lead him to my room, then close and lock the door behind us.
I rarely come in here. Sometimes, I wish I could be like a normal fucking person and sleep in my own goddamned room by myself. But I push that aside right now to focus on Luca.
“Why are we in your room?”
I shrug a shoulder. “You looked like you wanted privacy.”
He leans down to kiss me. “How do you know me so well?”
“I just do.”
He still looks nervous, but it’s a calmer nervous. Then he does something I don’t expect at all and drops to one knee while pulling a small black box out of his back pocket. When he opens it, I gasp at the ring inside.
It’s pink. The stones, the metal, it’s all pink. The large stone in the middle and all the tiny stones around it are light pink. There are more pink stones on the fuchsia band and raised setting.
Holy fucking shit. It’s the most beautiful ring in existence.
“You made me believe in love when I was sure it was bullshit. You made me smile when I didn’t know how to anymore. You made me laugh when I hadn’t made that sound in years. You filled my gloomy world with light. I want your light forever, Ariana. Please, baby, marry me?”
Shit, I need to pinch someone because this is definitely a dream. A giant of a man, who is still covered in Disney Band-Aids and is afraid of frogs, is kneeling at my feet with a pink ring begging me to be his wife? His brow is slightly wrinkled, and his eyes are hard to read. Like there’s warring emotions behind them. Oh my god, he’s afraid I’ll say no.
I drop to my knees and take his face in my hands.
“You’re my light, too. You bring me out of the darkness when I get lost in the shadows. I didn’t think I would find someone who accepts me for me, Luca. All the things that are a pain in the ass about me, you roll with them. You replaced my chocolate bars when I got high and ate them all. You don’t make me feel weird about sleeping in Lil’s bed, you just crawl in next to me. And sure, you harass me about gross shit like water and salads, but you just roll your eyes when I don’t listen. You don’t actually try to change me. And you bought me a pink ring, Beefcake! Pink! Of course, I’ll marry you.”
His lips crash into mine. My tongue strokes his, earning a deep moan from him. His empty hand grips my hip so hard I’m sure I’ll have fingertip-shaped bruises, and god, that makes me wetter than I already was. I nip at his bottom lip as he pulls away. His eyes are dark with arousal, but he takes my left hand and slips the ring onto my finger. It fits like it was made for me.
“As soon as I saw it, I knew this was your ring.”
“It’s fucking perfect.” I can’t stop staring at it. I’m one hundred percent sure there’s a tracker already in it, or if not, there will be soon. I’m also one hundred percent sure that I’ll never take it off. Even if it’s the thing that gets me caught with the Maserati one day, I won’t regret keeping it on.
“I have to go back and pick up our wedding bands tomorrow. They’re engraving them tonight.”
I look up into those gorgeous eyes of his. “What are you having engraved on them?”
He smiles. “You’ll see. ”
Normally, I would hound him until he told me, but I want him to show me instead, so I’ll wait. I glance down at the ring on my finger again. “Is my wedding band pink, too?”
“They both are.”
My eyes snap up to his. “Wait, what?” My face pinches as I process what he said. “Your ring is pink, too?”
“They have to match, Minx,” he says, as if that’s the obvious answer.
“You’re going to wear a pink wedding band?” I ask, needing confirmation.
He shrugs as if it’s not a big deal. “My girl loves pink. Anyone who has a problem with my ring can go fuck themselves.”
I tilt my head and blink a few times. Does he not get that this is kind of a big deal? “What if I loved frogs?”
After thinking it over for a few seconds, he says, “I guess I’d suck it up and wear a ring with a frog on it. Now we just have to pick a date. Well, you have to pick a date, because I’d say tomorrow as soon as I have our rings in hand. But I don’t know how big of a wedding you want, and I know they take time to plan and—” I put my finger against his lips to shut him up. The poor man is rambling.
“I’ve never wanted anything big. I never even really dreamed about a wedding at all until I met you, and all that matters is that we have the people we love and who love us there.” I kiss him gently. “I’m not waiting long to put that pink ring on your finger.”
He stands, pulling me with him, and swings me around by the waist. “You’re so fucking perfect.”
“I love that you think that. We’re standing next to a bed I’ve hardly used because I don’t sleep in this room.”
He glances at the pink comforter. “You don’t sleep here, but you’ve used the bed?”
“A girl can’t always masturbate in the shower, Luca.”
His eyes are wide when they meet mine and he starts to say something, but he’s interrupted by the locked doorknob jiggling.
“What the fuck are you doing in there?” Lil yells, banging on the door. “Wait, do I even want to know? No, I probably don’t. But Mom wants to play a game before dinner, and she looks like she could use some family fun time, so get your asses out here.”
I tangle my fingers with Luca’s before opening the door. “What game are we playing then?” I ask. Lil is looking us over like she’s trying to figure out if we were just making out or doing more, but also like she doesn’t really want to know. But the moment her eyes catch on my finger, they go fucking huge.
“Holy mother of shit, what is that?” She grabs my hand to get a closer look.
“It’s a new car,” I deadpan.
“Jesus, I can’t even give Luca crap for this, it’s perfect for you. I can’t believe you said yes to marrying this asshole, though.” She gestures at Luca with her other hand and shakes her head as if she’s disappointed in me.
“I didn’t. I said, ‘hell no,’ punched him in the face, and put the ring on anyway because it’s so pretty.”
Luca snorts beside me. “Come on, let’s go try and cheer your mom up.”
“Just hold Ari’s hand up when we get downstairs. That’ll do it,” Lil says, giving up on hiding her smile any longer.