Chapter 10
BALTIMORE
Cooley Island, Florida…
In the early hours of the morning, Cooley Island was quiet and serene.
Wind blew, tickling the forest of trees surrounding one of the mansions on the island.
The sun wasn’t up yet. However, Maddie stood at the balcony overlooking the blue ocean that was in the backyard.
A little while ago she’d walked into Cooley Mansion to a plethora of gifts waiting for her.
Although there were many gifts ranging from diamonds to purses, she opened every single one of them. She cried through every single gift.
I walked up behind her and wrapped my arms around her. “Everyone’s asleep,” I said, then kissed her neck. She leaned against me and inhaled a deep breath.
“What is this place, Baltimore? Better yet, who the hell are you?”
Chuckling, I snuggled her neck and drew her even closer. Maddie knew the protector, the house husband, and the gentle giant who had a soft spot for Genesis. It was time for her to meet the businessman, the heir, the billionaire.
“I told you I’d let you get to know everything about me. This is a part of me. Cooley Island has been in my family since I was a toddler. We come here for family reunions, birthday parties…and weddings. This is where I want our wedding to be.”
She glanced at me out of the corner of her eye.
“What?” I questioned. “We can’t only be lovers, Maddie. We gotta be best friends, partners, business partners, husband and wife.”
Her eyebrows drew together in confusion. “Business partners?”
I nodded. “In the near future, you’ll see what I’m talking about. For right now, I wanna take this time to answer any other questions you have about my family.”
She smirked, took another deep breath, then looked out over the water. “Your family’s real estate firm seems to be doing well. I’ve been to many places. A private island isn’t on that list.”
Grinning, I replied, “Glad to be ya first.”
She clicked her teeth, then chuckled.
“I guess you wanna know what the deal is, huh?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “If you’re not comfortable telling me, I understand.”
Playfully, I picked her up off her feet just to place her back down. She giggled and held on to me.
“I told you that if I can’t share everything with you, then this isn’t gon’ work.
I want you to feel just as free to tell me anything.
Yes, I know you better than you know me, but it was my job to know you, Maddie.
It was my job to pay attention to you. The moment I sensed the air shift between you and Duval, I wish you would’ve trusted me to handle his muthafuckin’ ass.
” I had to calm down after that last line.
I was about to make myself upset, and we were supposed to be in celebration.
“I couldn’t… If anything would’ve happened to Duval, Adir would’ve killed you.”
“Thing is, I would’ve been fine, baby. Above all things, Adir is wise. He knows that I move with intention.”
“I was too afraid to risk it,” she replied. We fell silent for a minute before she said, “I miss DJ. I raised him right and never thought he’d turn his back on me. Genesis isn’t even mine…”
“Yet, you love him,” I surmised.
“I love him,” she admitted. “I want to raise him without thinking about the mistakes I made with DJ. No child deserves to live in the shadows of another. I think about DJ every single day. There are times I have to lock myself in the bathroom and just cry for my son. Genesis doesn’t deserve to get a different version of my love and care just because I dropped the ball with DJ. ”
Turning her in my arms, I lifted her chin and wiped the tears there. Seeing her cry on this perfect, dark morning and beautiful island wasn’t what I wanted for either of us.
“You’re a damn good mother, Maddie. Do you think Adir would’ve ever suggested you adopt Genesis if he felt like you couldn’t. You were so broken that day, Maddie. Yet Adir saw the same thing in you, that I see in you. Patience. Love. Kindness. Gentleness. Meekness. And even joy.”
She sniffled and wiped her tears.
“Your joy was what Duval attempted to take from you. All those other things he knew would dissipate as long as he had ya joy in his hands. If he could break ya spirit, then everything else would just fall in line. DJ was his father’s son.
He made horrible decisions out of selfishness, hatred, and greed.
None of those things could ever describe you, baby.
You forget he had a whole ass daddy he idolized. ”
“You’re right. As much as I want to wear the weight on my own, I simply can’t. I shouldn’t.”
“Not in the least,” I agreed.
She took a deep breath, then turned back around to once again, face the waters surrounding us.
“So, tell me what it is your family really does,” she stated.
Laughing, I said, “Well… When I was one, my parents created one of the first cellphone apps to blow up. By the second year of the app going live, my parents were already being offered millions of dollars for a buyout. For a time, they held tightly to the app. Then, when I was eleven, they decided to finally sell it.”
“They’re billionaires,” she whispered to the air.
“They’re billionaires,” I confirmed.
She gasped and glared at me over her shoulder. “You’re a billionaire, Baltimore? What the hell are you doing working for me?” She pried herself out of my arms.
I laughed and asked, “Are you really upset with me?”
“Hell, yes! What are you doing risking your life for me? Are you crazy?” Her voice escalated and took a ride on the predawn morning breeze. “You should be somewhere with a wife and kids, enjoying your damn life. You’ve literally just watched it pass you by, and for what?”
She really was upset, and I thought it was cute that she attached me to another woman. I brought her back into my arms and kissed the stupefied look off her face.
“What if I told you that the first time I laid eyes on you, I fell in love with you. I must’ve asked for forgiveness a thousand times for coveting another man’s wife.
Once I learned to stop coveting you, I realized that it wasn’t the fact that I yearned to have you.
It was the fact that I looked at you and saw pure beauty.
Then, I got to know you and realized it was a beauty that radiated from within.
You’re one of one, Maddie. You’re rare as fuck.
If I couldn’t have you, I was gon’ simply wait until the moment I had just an ounce of that feeling for another woman.
There was no settling after experiencing what I did the first time I saw you. ”
She blinked a few times, and the frown lines she possessed finally eased.
“The fact that you never saw me as anything other than the nigga who worked for ya family was so fuckin’ intriguing to me. You never noticed the way I looked at you. You never noticed how soft I was wit’ you compared to everybody else.”
A soft smile emerged. “I noticed once,” she said. “When you let me leave Heir’s dorm apartment without coming after me.”
Pleased, I smiled. “Precisely.”
Picking Maddie up by her thighs, I carried her as she wrapped her legs around my back and her arms around my shoulders.
I carried her back inside the house, through the maze of the mansion and to the master’s quarters.
The master’s quarters encompassed two floors of living space that catered to a man and his woman.
This property housed five master’s quarters, ten guest bedrooms, twelve bathrooms, three kitchens, and four powder rooms. This place was built with a generational family in mind.
Inside the master’s quarters, I laid Maddie on the king-sized bed covered in black linens. Undressing her wasn’t complicated at all. She wore her signature blue silk pajamas that created goosebumps on her skin as I removed them from her body. Underneath, she was naked.
The first place my lips touched was the spot below her navel.
I’d been craving the taste of this pussy again for too long.
She squirmed and ran her hands over my Caesar cut as my lips kissed everywhere but where her eyes begged me to.
She smelled so fucking good, and her lips were already wet as I spread her legs wide.
She jerked at the first swipe of my tongue, but I gripped her thighs, pushed them back, and pinned them to the bed.
Knowing she couldn’t run if she tried to, I gave her pussy the business.
Her melodic pleasure-filled voice sang loudly as I devoured her.
My tongue was saturated in her juice and slid teasingly across her quivering flesh.
I latched on to her clit and gave her ass a reason to scream in this bitch.
A flood released from her as her legs violently shook.
I smacked her thick thighs, palmed her ass, and buried my face in her shit.
This was the pussy games, and my tongue was number one in the league. I wasn’t missing a single drop of her.
Once I had her unable to breathe, I kissed my way up her shivering body, stopping for a second to suck her plump nipples.
As she writhed in ecstasy, I grabbed my dick and led him home.
Her long nails grazed my chest, then my shoulders as she steadied herself for my invasion.
Easing inside of her tight, wet heat felt unreal as fuck.
The deeper I went, the deeper I groaned. “I knew this shit was perfect,” I told her.
She moaned as tears rolled down her temples. I dug deeper, though.
“You’re so beautiful…” Her pussy clamped around me. “Sss… So sweet… All I wanna do is love you, Maddie. The way you deserve to be loved. I wanna be by ya side, wipe ya tears, and continuously declare that I got you in words and in deeds. Let me, Maddie.”
Shakingly, she whispered, “Okay.”
Pulling her legs up, I positioned them on my shoulders and attacked her lips as I slowly slid in and retreated.
We could’ve fucked hard and quick, but I wanted to savor this moment.
This was my first time with the love of my life.
Rushing it would be beneath me. I wanted to remember every face she made, every cry she moaned, every tear that fell, and every sound her pussy made as I plunged inside of her.
This moment was perfect. It was everything I hoped for. It was everything I vowed to never lose.