CHAPTER 12
ACE
My woman has been keeping her own at the final table. It’s been more than a little impressive to watch. I’ve sure as fuck been hard since I watched her get dressed earlier. Fuck, I’m always hard around her. That’s just how it is and I wouldn’t want it any other way.
Quincy Wells does something to me that no other woman has done. I crave her constantly. Even the distance between us right now is too much.
I wish she could have sat on my lap while playing. But I would have spent my time glaring at the other celebrities around the table.
At least that fucker Aaron Holt is gone. I saw the way he looked at my Hollywood, and I didn’t like it one bit. Not one fucking bit.
She didn’t take his shit and she sure as hell saw through his famous golden boy bullshit. I puff my chest up a little at the memory. The way she brushed him off was sexy as fuck.
Now is not the time to think about that.
Not when my woman has been playing aggressively like she’s on a fucking mission to take down every other person at the table to bring home the tournament win.
But I see her flagging. I don’t think the cards have taken a turn, they love her just like everyone else she meets, but she’s ready to be done.
I don’t blame her.
It’s possible I’m not helping because I can’t take my eyes off her. I’ve been watching her try not to shimmy in her seat more than once.
There’s no doubt in my mind that if I were to slide my hand between her thighs and under the scrap of lace covering her pussy, I’d find her drenched.
For me.
Always for me.
She’s not ready to see it, but I’m not letting her go. I was serious as fuck when I told her she’s mine last night. But she’ll understand soon enough.
I can’t tear my eyes away from her, she’s so fucking gorgeous. The lights hit her blonde hair and illuminate it from the inside out. It looks like she’s glowing.
Maybe she is.
My attention snaps to the cards when the dealer shows the turn. I take in my woman’s face and know what she’s about to do.
“I’m all in,” her voice is clear, almost mischievous.
I don’t pay attention to anything other than her face as the rest of the players throw in or fold.
One corner of her mouth twitches at the river and I swear she’s preparing herself to stand up.
It hits me right in the middle of my chest—she knows she’s about to lose the hand.
She probably knew before she went all in.
My cock goes rock fucking hard.
She’s taken down by trip Jacks and if I hadn’t spent so much time studying her while playing, I might believe the pout. With a smile and good lucks given to the rest of the table, my woman stands and turns toward me.
I’m struck again by how much of a goddess she is.
Her hips swing as she heads right toward me even though she should probably be going to some green room somewhere.
When a man approaches, she unclips the microphone pack and hands it to him.
He opens his mouth, but she shoots him a glare, and he swallows hard before disappearing back into the production darkness.
Her voice is soft when she’s standing in front of me, “We have one more night together.”
Is that disappointment I hear in her voice?
I could allow myself to feel it too, but I don’t. Because she’s not going anywhere. I just need a chance to get her to see it.
My hands come up to cup her face, my gaze roaming over her features. The sadness in her eyes deepens the longer I don’t say anything.
“Come on, Hollywood,” I murmur, “I’ve planned something special for us.” My eyes roam over her, my mouth going dry at how it hugs the curves of her body. “I’m not wasting your outfit,” I tease her and wink.
“Okay,” her voice cracks slightly, but she clears her throat and tries again, stronger the second time, “okay.”
I whisk her away, choosing one of the restaurants in the hotel known for being romantic, dark, and perfect to hide my woman away for one more night. As she sits, I eye her, loving the way she lets herself shift in her seat now that she’s not playing at the poker table.
Knowing I affect her, and make her want so much it’s hard for her to keep still, is fucking heady. I don’t take the responsibility lightly.
A woman like Quincy Wells could have any man she wants, but here I am sitting across from her. It’s a chance that I’ll never squander.
“You do look delectable tonight,” my voice is a gentle rumble, streaked with need.
She hears it from the way she shivers slightly and her brown eyes darken. I fucking love seeing that look on her face.
I love her.
Her eyes roam over my shoulders and the way my cut wraps around me. Her voice drops an octave, turning sultry, “You look pretty good yourself.”
Trying not to preen is fucking impossible. The way she smiles at me is worth it. Over dinner we talk about nothing. About everything.
I tell her stories about my brothers which make her laugh. She tells me about shooting in locations which left her exhausted, but inspired in new ways. I’m hanging on every word because it’s impossible not to.
“When I went out to the cliffs to shoot a scene,” her voice is wistful, “I felt so small. So insignificant when compared against something so massive, something that is beauty without trying and that simply exists.” Her mouth turns down and I hate it.
“I think it’s when I really started to take stock of who I am and what I want. ”
I make a humming sound, biting my tongue because I want to tell her right where she belongs. But that’s not the plan. I need time to show her; it’s the only way she’ll trust it.
And I know just how to get her to agree to a chance for this to be real.
I’ve already told her this is real, but I can almost feel her trying to justify what she thinks is coming next, before it’s happened, because she wants to guard her heart.
I get it, but I’m not letting her get away with it. Not today, not ever.
When we’re done, I pull her chair out and offer her my hand. The way she slips her hand into mine without hesitation now, like it’s natural, has my heart clenching.
She stands, her eyes freezing me in place. “Take me back to my room and fuck me until I forget my name and what it feels like to be under all of those lights,” she demands, but I can hear the plea underneath it.
The way she wants to forget.
The way she wants it all to drift away.
I can give that to her.
As I lead her out of the restaurant and then up to her room, the tension builds between us with every breath we take. I don’t look away from her the entire time, my focus intent and filled with everything I’m afraid she won’t hear.
Not yet.
When we enter her room, I pull a pack of cards out of my cut and grin at her. “How about one more hand?”
I try, fucking try, to keep the question innocent.
Quincy’s eyebrow arches as she puts her hands on her hips. “What’s the bet? I can’t imagine you playing for chips.”
It’s not an accusation, not quite, but it’s damn close.
I can’t help but smirk, and the way my woman’s eyes heat is sexy as fuck. With a shrug of my shoulder, I offer, “You win, you go back to LA tomorrow like you planned.”
Somehow, her eyebrow manages to crawl even higher toward her hairline. “And if you win?” I can hear the suspicion in her question, but I’m not deterred.
“I win?” She nods slowly and then licks her lips. “You stay here.”
Her eyes widen as silence stretches between us. There’s the challenge of what I’ve just proposed, but there’s something more here too. She’s afraid of both outcomes. So am I, but I’m also confident the cards will fall on my side.
She pulls out a chair and sits at the small table while nodding to the other chair. “Okay, Ace,” she giggles at the glare I send her way with the use of my road name, “you deal.”
I take a deep breath while I sit. It’s hard not to look at her and only her while I shuffle and deal. When I look at my hole cards, I’m not thrilled, but hopefully I can work with them. Quincy gives nothing away and I fall a little deeper in love with her.
The flop helps, and at least I have something to show for all my bravado. It might win. It might not.
The turn. A pair of aces are showing on the table now.
The river. Now winning doesn’t feel so far away, the six working with the pair of sixes I’m holding.
Quincy’s eyes come up to meet mine and she nods toward my cards. “This was your idea, so you show yours first.”
“Full house,” I turn my cards over to show my pair of sixes. and nod toward the pair of aces on the table, “sixes and aces.”
She makes a humming sound and my heart stops beating in my chest. “Looks like I’m staying,” she muses and turns one card over, an ace.
I blow out a breath, my heart racing as I stand and practically leap over the fucking table between us. My woman is up in my arms, my mouth taking hers in a brutal kiss, before she even has a chance to yelp in surprise.
The way she melts against me is fucking everything. “Damn right you’re staying,” I growl against her lips. “Even if I lost, I wasn’t going to let you go.”
My words are my truth. A promise.
Quincy looks up at me from underneath her lashes. My hands move over her body as I stride toward the bed. We can figure out the details later.
Much fucking later.
“You’re mine,” I murmur, “all mine.”
Her arms wrap around my neck, her fingers playing with the hair at the nape of my neck. “Does that mean you’re mine?”
“Fuck yes,” I grunt, “I’ve been yours since the moment you walked into that poker game.” She smiles up at me as my hands find the globes of her ass and squeeze. Before I lay her down, I pause, needing her to know, needing to say it. “I’m all in, Quincy. I love you.”
It feels like the quiet confession reverberates through the room, echoing and bouncing back in a way that makes me want to run. I’ve never known love, not unless it was wrapped around pain, abandonment, and manipulation.
Her delicate fingers glide over my beard until she’s cupping my jaw in her hands. “Hawkins,” she shakes her head slightly, “I have no idea how you managed to get past all my fears and worries, but I fell in love with you.” My eyes widen as she takes a deep breath and lets it out, “I love you too.”
My control completely shatters.
I’m growling and grunting as I strip her, not giving a fuck when I hear the fabric keeping her from me rip in my hands. It only makes me want to get her naked for me faster.
She’s just as bad with the way she claws at me.
The moment I have her completely bare, I drop her to the bed. She starts to move, but I level her with a look that has her freezing in place while squeezing her thighs together.
“Open your legs,” I grind out, “let me see my pussy.”
Her legs fall open as I shed the last of my clothes and wrap my hand around the base of my dick. I stroke slowly as I look down at her. Then I’m crawling over her and sliding inside of her tight, wet heat.
Our moans fill the room, our bodies moving together. The rhythm feels so damn right that a lump forms in my throat. Emotions I’ve spent my life running from hit me in a way which makes me crave them instead of fear them.
So much gratitude.
So much fucking love.
We come together, both left panting with huge smiles on our faces. Because this is real. And she’s staying.
Much later, after my woman has fallen asleep on my chest, I slide out from underneath her, my curiosity not allowing me to let it go.
I didn’t notice at the time, but my woman never showed me both of her cards. And I have to know.
Walking straight to the table, still exactly how we left it hours ago, I turn her other hole card over.
An ace.
My eyes slide closed and I fall even deeper in love with my woman. My Old Lady.
Mine.
I’ll never allow her to regret what she did. She could have won. She could have left.
But she wanted to stay and I gave her a way to do it.
I pick the cards up and slide them back into the box. Except for one. I walk over to my cut and slide the ace, the one that could have changed everything if she had flipped it over as well, into the pocket of my cut and pat it once.
When I slide back into bed, Quincy reaches for me and tucks her body against mine while letting out a sigh filled with contentment. I wrap my arms around her and pull her impossibly closer.
Right where she belongs.