Chapter 34
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
EMMETT
Clipping Blake into the back of my G-Wagon, I slide into the driver’s seat and wait for Billie to finish up stressing over whether she has everything packed for the next couple of days.
“Do you think fifty diapers will be enough?” she asks, dropping into the passenger seat beside me.
Allowing myself to touch this girl is equivalent to a river breaking its banks, and as I take her chin between my fingers and smile against her lips, I realize that the rush of adrenaline every time we kiss is only getting stronger.
“Fifty diapers will be enough.”
We fall into a deep kiss, one I never want to end.
Two nights away is not nearly enough.
“How long will the drive take us?”
Leaning across the center section, I wrap my hand under her perfect ass, so damn tempted to lift her into my lap and reenact all the things we did last night in my bed.
There’s a baby on board, Emmett.
“We’ll be there before lunch,” I say, setting a soft kiss against her forehead.
When I pull back and crank the engine, there are more questions in her eyes.
My lips are back against hers. “What’s eating at you?”
She sighs quietly, soft pieces of hair framing her face. She isn’t wearing an inch of makeup today—mainly because I kept her busy until we were rushing to hit the road.
Her hands are twisting in her lap, and I break them apart and kiss across her knuckles.
“Where’s that anxious brain taking you this time?”
Almost like she’s searching for answers elsewhere, she turns her head to stare out of the windshield.
“As soon as I ask you the question, it’s going to sound about as juvenile as it does in my head.
” She focuses back on me. “And given that there’s already a huge age gap between us, I’m thinking that I should probably keep my mouth firmly shut. ”
I study her for a beat, wondering where the hell this is going.
“Does it honestly feel like we’re fourteen years apart to you? Because other than my aching knee and graying hair”—I narrow my eyes at her—“along with the wooden money in my wallet … it doesn’t feel like we were born in different decades at all.”
She tips her head to one side, and I wait patiently for her response, heart beating a way faster rhythm than before.
“Yeah, that’s true actually. You can be quite immature.”
My fingers tickle her ribs, and she throws her head into the rest, attempting to grab any part of my black henley, desperate for me to grant her a reprieve.
“Okay, okay!” she pleads. “You’re a silver fox and mature gentleman.” She bites down on her bottom lip, mischief twinkling in those pretty green eyes. “Both in and out of the bedroom.”
My jeans tent because I’m a horny fucker for Billie Quinn and her bratty mouth.
“What were you going to ask me before you got in your head about our age difference?”
Her flushed cheeks are a similar crimson to how they were last night when I pulled a third orgasm from her body. We’re the perfect combination in bed since Billie likes to ride me and I can’t take my eyes off her beautiful figure.
My plan is for her to ride my face as soon as Blake goes down for the night.
She hesitates for a moment, and I unclip her belt and pull her into my lap.
Fingers tangling through my hair, Billie peers down at me. “I thought we were supposed to be at the cabin by lunch?”
“This is more important,” I volley back, hitting the button to warm her seat for the journey. “Ask what you were going to, or I’ll never order pineapple pizza again.”
She drops her forehead to mine. “That’s fighting talk, Mr. Richards.”
My cock twitches. “Ask your question, or we’re going back upstairs.”
Billie breathes out slowly. “What are we, Em?”
Pressing my head back into the rest so I can get a better look at her, I cup Billie’s face in my hands.
So much goddamn beauty.
Deep down, I knew this moment would come, whether it was me asking or her. At some point, everyone wants to know where they stand with each other.
When that time came with Maria, our conversations centered more around hockey and the pressure it would put on us.
The dangers to my relationship with Maria had nothing on the land mines Billie and I will face.
Like the hurt and betrayal that my best friend is going to feel when we ultimately step out into the open together.
The rage my ex-wife will likely embody when she discovers that I fell in love with her best friend’s daughter.
Regardless of all the odds, Billie and her baby girl aren’t just what I want for my future; they’re the only route forward I can see.
Another kiss against her swollen lips pulls a whispered confession from my own. “We’re so fucking good together. That’s what we are.”
“But …” She massages her fingers into my scalp. “When you say together, do you actually mean that we’re dating, or are we stuck in a—”
“You’re my girlfriend, Mama,” I cut off her anxious rambling. “If that’s what you want, too, then I’m yours.”
She presses her mouth against mine, and it feels like the Fourth of July just came early.
Her voice is buoyant, almost giddy when she bursts out, “I can’t believe we’re doing this. You, me, and Blake. We’re actually going to give us a shot.”
I’m burning to tell her that this isn’t “a shot” to me even though I totally get why she’s viewing our relationship like that.
“Can I update my social media with a profile picture of us together and tell the world that I’m officially dating the NHL’s hottest hockey player?”
I pull off my glasses and set them on her face. Jesus, she looks fucking cute in them. Especially when she wears my favorite smile.
“When we get home, I want to talk with Scott and Freya.”
Billie worries her lip at the thought, and I hold her face again in my palms.
“This is my mess to clean up, Bill. And the fallout is my responsibility to bear.”
She shakes her head at me. “I want this as much as you do, and that means I need to be there when you talk to my parents.”
My girlfriend is even cuter when she’s determined, even if she’s also wrong. There isn’t a chance that she could want us as much as I do. I’m a fucking boy obsessed, and I’ll happily wear that badge with honor.
“I get that—honestly, I do. But trust me when I tell you that your parents will want to murder me for this, and it’s going to take some time for them to wrap their heads around the fact that I’m in …”
The sentence dies on my tongue, burning to be voiced.
“And then there’s Maria,” I eventually tag on.
Billie stiffens at the mention of my ex-wife.
When she tips her chin up to look at me, I don’t fucking like where this is heading.
“What’s going on, Billie?”
Like she wants out of the conversation and car, she moves to climb off my lap.
I drop my hands to her thighs, holding her place against me. “Talk to me. Please.”
“I don’t want to cause trouble. It’s probably nothing.”
My hand is back under her chin. “That’s not going to be good enough for me, I’m afraid. I want to know all that’s happening in here.” I tap the side of her temple. “Every. Single. Thought.”
Delicate fingers pluck at my henley. “I don’t think Maria likes me all that much, and that’s been particularly apparent since I returned from Austin.
” She looks up into my eyes, an ocean of thoughts swirling in them.
“I’ve always had the impression that Maria thought there was something going on between us.
I felt it that time you came for Christmas before I left for college, and that was only confirmed when you told me that she accused you of flirting with me.
” She chews on her lip. “I’m not a home-wrecker, Emmett.
Sure, I thought you were hot when I was younger, but we were only ever friends. ”
Taking her hand in mine, I kiss her palm and then place it over my tattoo.
“We’ve always been friends, Bill, and we always will be. Let me handle Maria. Whatever personal thoughts or conclusions she wants to draw about us have nothing to do with the truth. You know that, and so do I, and that’s all that really matters.”
“Apart from when she shoots death stares across the dining table.”
Billie’s words cut me because the thought of anyone—even Maria—being mean to her makes me want to tear the world apart.
They also hurt because I know the chances of us all sitting around a table again after I tell Scott that I supported his family through a financial crisis and then took his daughter to bed are slim to fucking zero.
“Promise me that it’s going to be okay?” Billie asks me to make an impossible statement. Not because I have doubts over us, but because of all of the above.
Capturing her mouth with mine, I let her lips soothe away my anxieties for us both.
“I promise that I will always be here for you and Blake. That I will care for you and be right by your side when you need me the most. I promise you that I’m nothing like Tucker Price and that my ex-wife will never get a chance to pin any of this on you or tell lies about what we were in the past. And I promise”—I heave in a heavy breath and fill my lungs—“tonight, when our baby girl has gone to sleep and the stars are the only thing lighting up a clear night sky, I will make you feel every vow that just left my lips.”