Chapter 40 Violet
Chapter Forty
VIOLET
Eight Months Later
“The dress is gorgeous, Vi. Just gorgeous.” Lia sighs dreamily and holds up my silk wedding gown.
She convinced me to go with a bouquet of purple flowers and green leaves. Her green dress will be perfect with those colors, too.
“You don’t think the purple’s too on the nose?”
“Fuck that.” She pours a glass of wine and hands it to me.
I can’t believe I’m getting married tomorrow.
“You know, I never was someone who dreamed about getting married.” But I sigh. “Now, I can’t think of anything else I’d rather do more.”
“I think it’s got more to do with the man than the ceremony.”
I curl up on Lia’s sofa as Lia hangs my dress back up. “You don’t think they’ll get Cade into trouble, do you?”
“It’s Cade. I’ve never seen a man so in love as him. Or a girl as in love as you are.”
“Yeah, but…” I look at her and set my wine down, not really in the mood.
I’m nervous, so I’ve been feeling queasy all day. For the past week, actually.
I swear the closer we get to the wedding the more my stomach is rioting. Nerves that something will happen and burst the bubble, that’s all. Nerves.
“But what?” she asks.
“I know Jack’s changed a lot, but that guy knows how to party, as does Enzo. He called it making sure Cade celebrates his last night as a free man properly.”
I shudder.
I get my phone from the coffee table. “I’m texting him.”
Me: behave or else.
Cade: Enzo here. He’s at the bar. Cade’s in good hands and you don’t need to worry.
Lia mutters something as she clearly reads the texts. “You know what, we should go out, too.”
I sigh. “A nice idea, but I think I want to stay in.”
“Nonsense.” She stomps off to her room and comes back with a red dress, throwing it at me. “Get dressed, we’re going out.”
“But…”
“But nothing. It’s your last night as a free woman.”
I laugh shaking my head. “No way, I don’t care about any of that. I can’t wait to marry Cade.”
“Come on. Let’s go out. You have this pretty dress, you left here, and there are shoes, too. We need to paint the town or just get a drink. For me?” She pleads.
And it breaks my resolve of just sitting and doing nothing. “One drink. I don’t want a hangover or to look like death on my wedding day, I don’t even have a veil to insist on never lifting.”
“We won’t go far, and we’ll get an Uber, so you don’t have to walk further than front door to car and back again.”
“I said I’ll go.”
We get ready, and sure enough, there’s a car waiting for us.
Lia even insisted on putting on makeup and to appease her, I do.
I push open the door to the bar, and I almost squeal as I turn and send eye daggers at my best friend. “You sneak!”
Gianna and Macy are there, fancy cocktails in their hands, and I’m so happy. They both look good,
Gianna is even prettier, and she’s put on weight, so she’s a healthy size.
I hug all three of them.
Lia pushes the drink in my hand when we all part and whispers, “I know you didn’t want to make a big deal, but they wanted to help celebrate your wedding. Properly. We’ll all be there tomorrow, but this is just us. Are you okay with that?”
“Of course, I am.” We clink glasses and start to drink.
It’s a good evening, and it blurs a bit around the edges as they all start talking about the wildest things they’ve done.
Lia starts, her story isn’t much. “I made out with three different guys in college and then had a threesome with them. So good.”
“I pass,” Gianna says.
“I let my boyfriend put me on the St. Andrew’s cross and whip me and then force orgasms.” Macy beams, clearly thinking she won.”
Lia winks at me.
“Well, I met a guy, someone I hadn’t spoken to, let him put cameras in my place to watch me and then let him play out a rape fantasy on me. And we got wilder from there.”
“Oh. My. God.” Macy gapes at me. “Does Cade know?”
“Yep, and I’m marrying my kinky stranger tomorrow.” I gulp down my cocktail as they all cheer, and Macy grins.
“That’s wild,” Gianna says. “I really haven’t done much of my own free will, but…wow.”
“I’m not shocked,” Macy says. “I knew there was a deviant lurking under all that innocence.”
We rage on for a few hours, but a deal’s a deal and I want to get home. Of course, the deal was with myself, but I want a perfect wedding day. So, Lia and I stumble from the bar to the Uber and from the Uber to her apartment.
Lia falls, fully dressed, into bed and is drunkenly snoring.
My nausea hits hard, and I run a bath, but it doesn’t help.
I want to blame the cocktails but unlike the rest of them, I only had three. They were enough to make me tipsy, but not to give me a hangover, so they shouldn’t be making me sick.
I dry off and dress.
I’m pulling on the big T-shirt so I can crawl into bed with Lia when something clicks in my head.
My period.
It’s late.
Like over a week.
I know Lia bought herself pregnancy tests in bulk because she was convinced a boyfriend who came from a large Catholic family had the kind of baby making genetics that could punch holes through all contraceptives.
He broke up with her, but I know she still has some.
I rummage in her medicine cabinet and find one.
Pee in a stick and three minutes later show me that my nausea had a reason to be.
I’m a fucking pregnant idiot.
My phone on the vanity starts to vibrate, and I’m in such shock I answer.
It’s Cade.
“Let me in, woman. I’m outside Lia’s apartment door, and I want to see you.”
I hurry from the bathroom and open the door.
Sure enough, there he is. In the building outside Lia’s actual door.
He grabs me and pushes me against the wall, kissing me, and I kiss him back everything in me on fire as I drown in him.
Holy shit. We’re pregnant.
He steps back and closes the door. He sways a little.
I’ve seen him drunk, I’ll put this on the more than tipsy but less than very drunk part of the scale.
Cade pats my hair. “So pretty and perfect. Whoever made the rule it’s bad luck to see the bride the night before the wedding’s a fucking moron. It’s been four hours apart. That’s too long.”
He picks me up and slides between my legs. “I’m going crazy without you. Where’s the bedroom? I want to bury myself in you so badly. I’ll do it right here.”
I laugh. “Put me down. We’re not at home. And I’m sleeping with Lia.” I struggle to get down. “Come on, Cade. Put me down, I need to tell you something.”
But he turns me and presses me once more against the wall, kissing me hard, biting, kissing, sucking, licking his way down my throat. “It can wait about…four and a half minutes because I don’t think I have my normal stamina.”
Fuck, a wild quickie. I’m so hot for him I almost help him get my shorts off, but regardless of the sexual excitement running through me, I fight him. “Put me down, Cade. Please. We need to talk. Now.”
He ignores me, and I know if he gets his hand any further in my pants, I’m going to let him just do it.
“Cade, please. It’s going to change everything.”
He stops. And then he puts me down and studies me. “What’s going on? Is everything okay? Are we okay?”
I’m still holding the stick, so I open my hand and show him.
My heart thuds hard.
“I’m pregnant.”
He stares at me, shock all over his features, then he looks at the stick and at me.
Cade grins and scoops me up, peppering kisses all over me, a joy everywhere on his features.
“You had me going. I thought…thought it was bad news, but this? We need to run away and get married. Is there a Vegas wedding style chapel in Atlantic City?”
“Cade. We’re getting married tomorrow. We can wait.”
“I’m not having a child out of wedlock. I’m going to be a Dad. That means responsibilities.”
He carries me into Lia’s living room and drops us both on the sofa, and he holds me.
I smack his arm and kiss him. “I’m pregnant, not giving birth.”
“I want to marry you now.”
“You can’t. You’ll have to wait.”
He kisses my throat. “But I don’t want to be apart from you.”
“After tomorrow, you won’t have to be.”
“I have special vows for you later, after the wedding. And a gift.”
I giggle. “I have vows for you too.”
“If we get married now then we can say them.”
“Tomorrow, Cade. And nothing will ever keep us apart after that.” I get up, pop the test in his pocket and take his hand, leading him to the door.
“Okay, okay, but I’m holding you to that.” He pulls me in for one last kiss.