Chapter 13 #2
I bend, pressing my lips to hers. “That’s why I want to.
You don’t care about how much money I have.
Come on. It’s been ages since I’ve gone anywhere—not since the guys and I used to take trips in the offseason.
But now that they have families, we don’t do that.
Let me give you another first, Eden. Let me take you to the ocean. ”
“Really?” she asks, her eyes watering.
“Yes, really.” I roll off her, my cock weeping at the loss of her heat, but this is more important. Grabbing my phone from the nightstand, I tap at the screen, pulling up the airline. “There’s a flight leaving for Florida at three.” I glance over at her. “Can you be ready and packed by then?”
“Foster,” she says, sitting up, using the sheet to cover her nakedness. Damn shame if you ask me. “We can’t.”
“Oh, baby, we can, and we are. It’s nine now, so we have to be at the airport no later than one.”
“I’ve never flown before, Foster. I’m so out of my element right now.
I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know how to pack.
I’ve never taken a vacation in my life, unless you count the trip to Gatlinburg I took with Carrie for her bachelorette party weekend.
We rented a cabin, drank lots of wine, and ate too much junk food. ”
“It’s fine. Anything that you forget, we can buy while we’re there.”
“Foster, I can’t afford this.”
“It’s your birthday weekend, and it’s on me.”
“You already gave me my present.”
“Well, this is the rest of it,” I tell her.
“I can’t let you do that. Flights are so expensive, and yes, I make good money, but I have to budget and be frugal, and this trip is not in the budget.”
“This trip is on me,” I repeat.
“I don’t even own luggage. I packed in a backpack when I went with Carrie,” she says, her voice small as she looks down at her hands, twisting them in the sheet.
“Fuck the luggage. We’ll go shopping when we get there, and buy everything we need,” I say impulsively.
“Foster,” she whines. “No. I can’t let you do that.”
“Please, baby, I want to do this. I want to be there when you see the ocean for the first time. I want to experience that through your eyes. I can afford to do this, Eden. I don’t feel obligated or pressured; I want to. Please let me. It can be our joint birthday celebration,” I tell her.
“That’s not fair if you're paying for it all,” she counters.
Putting my phone on the bed, I turn and lift her onto my lap. The sheet falls away, and she gasps, but I keep it from her, gripping it in my fist. “I want this with you. I want to give you this. Please let me.”
“Foster, it’s wrong. I don’t want your money.”
I smile, a true, genuine smile, one that I know the guys have been seeing from me lately.
One I can’t contain. “I know that. That makes me want to take you even more. Just a few days. We’ll stay on the beach, eat, drink, bury our toes in the sand, maybe take a boat ride and look for dolphins or something.
I don’t care what we do when we get there.
I want to take you to the ocean. Give me this, please. ”
“You make my heart race,” she blurts, her eyes going wide at her own confession.
“Yeah?” I ask. My hand finds its way to her bare chest, and I roll one hard nipple between my thumb and forefinger, before giving the other the same treatment. “What would you say if I told you that you make my heart race, too?” Because she does, and I can’t explain, or even begin to understand it.
“I know this is impulsive, but I’m not ready for my time with you to be over.
I know I’ll still see you when you’re here to work, and that we’ll still have our visits with the kids, but this is something altogether different.
It’s last night, rolled into today, rolled into a trip we both want.
It’s extending whatever happened last night.
I’m not ready to let you go yet,” I confess.
Those last words are whispered, and the look on her face tells me she’s shocked, but my words also touch her, if the softness in her eyes is any indication.
I’m shocked, too.
I never open up like this, but with Eden, I can’t seem to help myself. For once in my life, I’m not going to think about it. I’m not going to analyze it to death. I’m just going with what feels right, and spending time with her, giving her another first, feels right, and that’s what I want to do.
“Okay.”
My heart skips and then starts back up at a jackhammer pace. “Yes, you’ll go?”
She smiles. It’s slow and sinfully sexy as she sits naked on my lap. “Yes, Foster Vaughn. I’ll let you whisk me away. Just… be patient with me, okay? I don’t like heights, and I’m not sure how I’ll be.”
“You’ll be with me, Eden, and I’d never let anything happen to you.”
“You can’t promise that.”
“I can,” I say fiercely, because there’s this urge inside me, this feeling that I need to protect her at all costs. It’s heavy and persistent, and fuck me, but I’m up for the challenge.
“So, Florida?”
Slipping my hand behind her neck, I pull her close and guide her mouth to accept mine.
I kiss her slowly and easily, letting her feel what her agreeing to this trip means to me.
“Yeah, baby, we’re going to Florida,” I say, breathless from our kiss.
“I’ll book our tickets, and all you need is your phone, a charger, and anything else.
Maybe your Kindle to read on the plane. We’ll buy what we need there. Including luggage.” I wink at her.
“This is insane. You know that, right?”
“That’s part of the fun, baby.”
“Something tells me this is impulsive for you, too,” she says, smiling up at me.
“It is, but it’s also exciting, and I want to share this with you.” I kiss her again, because now that I can, I don’t want to stop. I don’t know how I’m going to stop. “Do you need anything from your place?” I ask her.
“I-I don’t know. Toiletries, makeup, my phone charger, I don’t know,” she says again.
“I have a backpack we can use for your Kindle, or your purse is fine, too. We have the same phone, and I have an extra charger. No pets or house plants, right?” I tease, because I know she’s always wanted a dog, but never got one, and the house plant, well, I’m just joking with her.
“We’re really just flying out of state with nothing but the clothes on our backs?”
“We are. It’s a grand birthday adventure.”
“Foster, this is already a birthday I’ll never forget.”
“Well, we’re taking that a step further.” I kiss her again, this time just a quick peck. “Now, get dressed. We’ll stop and eat breakfast on the way to the airport.”
“We have lots of time, though, right? I need to shower, and I prefer not to wear the clothes I worked in yesterday,” she says, wrinkling her nose.
“Yes, we’ll stop by your place so you can shower. Then we’ll get some food and head to the airport. You can grab clothes out of my dresser to wear until then. Help yourself,” I say, as she climbs off my lap. “Let me book our tickets, and then I’ll take a quick shower.”
I quickly book two round-trip first-class tickets, because we’re doing this up big.
Hell, if I had more time, I’d charter a private plane, but she’d really give me a hard time over that.
It would have given us complete privacy, and maybe we could have joined the Mile High Club.
I make a mental note for next time. I don’t spend frivolously.
It’s not like I can’t afford it, but I don’t want her feeling even more guilty than I know she already does about me paying for this trip.
Once the tickets are booked, I toss my phone to the side and stand from the bed, stretching my arms over my head.
I catch her watching me in the mirror of the dresser, and her face heats.
The blush flows down her neck, and I wish I had enough time to kiss every inch of it.
I remind myself that we have a few more days—five to be exact—to enjoy each other.
“Thank you,” I say, coming to stand behind her and wrapping my arms around her.
We’re both naked. My cock is hard, nestled between her ass cheeks, and she smells like me, or is it that I smell like her?
We smell like each other, and every minute that passes, I want more.
More of this moment, more of her. Just more.
“Thank you, Foster. This is the most incredible thing anyone has ever done for me.”
“Thank you for going with me. We’re going to have a great time.”
“Of course, we will,” she says, her eyes meeting mine. “We’ll be together.”
Her words wrap around me like a hug, filling in the cracks of a lifetime of missing affection.