Chapter 34
Hayes
The house was quiet.
When I had first moved to the estate as a grieving kid, the house had felt far too big. It had echoed. The rooms were well constructed and insulated but had always felt too drafty because I was alone.
But it didn’t feel drafty today.
The doorknob to my bedroom clicked and turned as Catherine let herself in.
I liked that she didn’t knock.
“Hey,” I said as I looked up from my phone. “How was it?”
Catherine, Hallie, and Savannah had gone out to Pony Up to blow off a little steam. Levi volunteered to be their designated driver, and Mason offered to hang out with Zach so Hallie didn’t have to hurry back.
I stayed in because I needed a quiet night. I needed space.
Now I needed her.
It was something I hadn’t really experienced before, craving someone’s presence. Instead of finding peace in solitude, I found it in her.
“We had fun,” Catherine said with a tired smile as she slipped in, quiet as a church mouse, and closed the door behind her.
I let out a slow whistle as she padded across the room with her high heels in hand, taking in her long legs, short shorts, and scandalously low tank top. “Look at you, Mrs. Wilder.”
Her cheeks flushed, and she bit back a smile. “I apologized to Mildred’s portrait on the way up,” she said with a snicker. “Pretty sure the way I was dancing tonight was not befitting of a Wilder woman.”
As soon as she neared the bed, I reached out and smoothed my hand up the back of her thigh. She looked like sin. “You look good enough to eat.”
Catherine smirked. “Don’t threaten me with a good time.” She leaned down and pecked my lips. “But I need to shower before I get anywhere near a bed. I smell like beer, sweat, and a bar that didn’t get the memo that indoor smoking was banned, like, twenty years ago.”
“Did Savannah and Hallie make it back alright?”
“Yeah. Levi took Savannah home first, then dropped Hallie and me off here.”
Hallie made being a single parent look easy, but I had a feeling it was anything but. She deserved a night out.
“I’m glad you had a good time,” I said. “You deserve some fun.”
She cocked her head. “It doesn’t bother you? Me going out without you?”
“Why would it bother me?”
Catherine averted her gaze. “Sometimes people have a problem with stuff like that.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “And by ‘people,’ you mean other men you’ve been with.”
She shrugged.
“Cath, listen to me. I’m a homebody. I don’t expect you to be one too. I just expect you to come home to me.”
Her nervous expression softened. “I can do that.”
I cocked my head toward the door. “Go shower.”
“You can join me,” she teased on her way out.
The offer was tempting. Instead of joining her, I let myself into her bedroom right when I heard the water cut off.
Catherine came out of the bathroom wearing a towel that was tucked between her breasts and a towel around her hair. Her cheeks were pink from the steam. Summer freckles were sprinkled across the bridge of her nose.
“Sleeping in here tonight?” she asked as she pawed around for some pajamas.
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“I didn’t know if you needed to decompress by yourself.”
I stood behind her, trapping her between my chest and the chest of drawers. “Don’t get me wrong—I needed a few days of quiet and normalcy, but I want you more.”
Catherine arched, teasing the front of my plaid pajama pants with her ass. “How do you want me?”
The devil lived in those seductive words.
I smiled against the tip of her ear. “I’ll give you three guesses,” I said as I connected each lingering droplet on her shoulders with kisses like I was making constellations. “So you can show off how well you know your husband.”
“Do you want me like”—Catherine let the towel fall—“this?”
My eyes slid down the gentle curve of her spine to the two dimples that dotted the small of her back and suddenly it hurt to breathe.
Catherine was statuesque—all long limbs, regal posture, and a stalwart presence. Her strength was only outmatched by the gentleness in her heart. She was like the gilded roses that adorned the estate’s iron gates.
I didn’t dare touch her. I wasn’t worthy of holding that kind of perfection.
Catherine reached behind her head and wrapped her arms around my neck. The position forced her to arch her back, pressing her ass flush against my hips and pushing her breasts out. Rosy nipples turned to diamond points as they hit the cool air.
I peered down as Catherine looked over her shoulder. The corner of those cherry lips turned up. “Did I get it right?”
“Yes, you did.” I wrapped my hands around her hips and peppered the crook of her neck with kisses. “Gold star for you,” I murmured as I caressed the divot where her hip dipped into her pelvis, making goose bumps race across her skin.
“Are you teasing me?” Catherine asked as she rolled her ass against my hard-on in response to my wandering hands.
I chuckled. “Pretty sure you’re the one teasing me, sweetheart.”
She molded against me, matching my form like a missing puzzle piece. “No. Just giving you a reminder of what you’ve got.”
“Trust me. I know exactly who I get to hold.”
She stretched her head out to the side, giving me more room to kiss her neck.
“I’m holding my wife. And no one will ever be more precious to me than you.” I turned her to face me and cupped her chin, drawing her attention to my eyes. “No one.”
Catherine eased onto her toes and brushed her lips against mine. “Show me.”
I kissed her, light as a feather, then nipped at her bottom lip. “You sure you’re not too tired?”
“I think I should be asking you that,” she teased. “It’s past your bedtime, old man.”
A bark of laughter slipped free as I walked her backward to the balcony doors. Catherine’s back hit the glass, but the doors weren’t latched. They swung open, letting the cool evening breeze float inside as we stumbled out.
Catherine laughed. “Hayes!”
I caught her around the waist before she hit the railing, bringing us chest to chest.
“Old man, huh?” I said with a laugh as I palmed her ass and squeezed. “You better hold on, sweetheart. It will be my pleasure to show you a trick or two.”
“What are you—”
Before Catherine could finish her question, I had her back pressed against the railing, then dropped to my knees in front of her.
“Someone could see,” she gasped.
“No one’s gonna see,” I reassured her. “Hallie’s side of the house faces the other way. No one’s around. Just you, me, and the stars. Let them adore you the way I do.”
Catherine gave a nod as her painted toes curled against the smooth stone balcony. She wrapped her fingers around the railing like the ivy that clung to the wrought iron.
“Open your legs for me.”
She did, but not nearly wide enough for me to appreciate every sacred piece of her.
“More,” I said as I cupped her pussy in the palm of my hand.
She slid her feet an inch wider.
“Not enough,” I grunted as I hooked my arms behind her thighs, then threw them over my shoulders.
“Hayes!” she squeaked as she clung to the railing for dear life.
I shifted forward, pressing her back securely against the railing. “I’ve got you,” I said as I held on to the balcony rungs, letting her sit on my biceps and shoulders. I pressed an open-mouthed kiss to her soaked pussy. “Attagirl.”
“Hayes…” This time, my name wasn’t shrieked in fear. It was whispered in choked reverence, the same sound people make when they reach a summit and turn around to see the view they climbed and ached for.
In that moment, I made it my life’s purpose to hear Catherine say my name like that as often as I could.
I slid my tongue through her sex, teasing and sucking on her clit until she was panting. Slowly, one hand fell from the railing and tangled in my hair. Her body shifted and settled as she trusted me to hold her.
The night breeze was velvet soft as it danced along our limbs and through the trees. Her whispered pleas were twice as gentle. Golden hair spilled over the railing as she arched and rocked in pleasure.
My muscles ached, but there was no way I was letting her go. Lights from the bedroom turned her perfect breasts into beacons. Fireflies danced in the darkness in waves of shimmering sparks, glorifying her radiance.
A desperate cry slipped from Catherine’s mouth as her thighs tightened around my ears. “Make me come,” she begged. “Please.”
I shook my head and nipped at her clit.
“Hayes.” My name was a broken cry. “Please.”
“Not yet,” I mumbled into the crease of her thigh. “Don’t rush me when I’m kneeling at my altar.”
Her other hand released from the railing, and she clung to me as I lapped at her entrance. “That’s my girl. Trust me to hold you. Trust me to make you feel good.”
She whimpered, desperate for more but unable to form the words. Every little sound was music to my ears.
Catherine gasped as I pulled her away from the railing and stood. She wrapped her arms and legs around me while I carried her inside. Each step matched the synchronized beat of our hearts.
I didn’t bother closing the doors. Catherine’s hands roamed over my skin as I laid her out on the bed and climbed over her, meeting in a tangle of arms and legs.
“Hayes,” she whispered in a panic. “I need you to fuck me. Please. Right now.”
But instead of immediately sinking deep into her the way I wanted to, I cupped her cheek. “We have time.”
Catherine whimpered as she squeezed her legs together, trying to ease the hunger.
I cupped her sex, pressing my thumb to her clit to keep her on edge just a little longer. “We have time, Cath. I promise.”
“Not enough,” she croaked.
I kissed her, sliding my tongue along the seam of her lips until she let me in. “How much time do you want?” I asked as I kissed her temple, then the corner of her eye, then the corner of her mouth, and the dip of her collarbone.
“All of it,” she gasped when the swollen head of my cock pressed against her slick entrance and slowly slid inside.
“I swear to you, every minute I get after this one is yours. Every goddamn one. Just promise that you’ll give me all of yours.”
She nodded feverishly, desperate for me to move. “I promise.”
I didn’t believe in soulmates, but I believed in her.
I believed that whatever convoluted circumstances brought us together were completely irrelevant. I believed that Catherine was meant for me.
I believed that the detour she took to spend a summer as my wife wasn’t a detour at all. Rather, it was a fork in the road.
I believed that the ring I had put on her finger would stay there until our last breaths.
And should Catherine leave me waiting while she finished her time on earth, I’d linger at the gates of heaven, holding the door for her until she decided that it was time to join me.
I believed that the two of us would make it. And I believed that she did too.
Catherine buried her head in my shoulder as we made love. There was no other word for it.
Her body tightened around mine. We sank into a desperate rhythm.
This was the kind of love that became folklore.
I memorized every staccato breath and incoherent plea that fled her lips as we moved together.
Catherine’s fingers dug into my shoulders as her delicate features tightened in anticipation.
I stole a kiss and whispered sweet nothings as I snapped my hips into hers. “Come for me. I’ve got you, love.”
That one word was greater than every fear of fleeting time.
Love.
Catherine came with a cry of delight, bringing me over the edge with her. The world went silent except for our twin heartbeats and percussive breaths.
“You okay?” I asked as I nipped at the side of her neck where her pulse raced, then soothed the bite with my tongue.
Her beautiful, feathered lashes lowered as Catherine sank back into the pillow. “Yeah. You?”
“Better than okay,” I said.
Her smile was deliriously content. “I can officially check ‘balcony sex’ off my bucket list.”
I chuckled. “Technically, we didn’t go all the way out there. But I’m more than happy to oblige next time. I wouldn’t want to leave your fantasies unfulfilled.”
Her eyes crinkled at the corners. “I like the sound of that.”
“Of what?”
“That there will be a next time.” She trailed her fingers down my chest. “That we have time to explore all our fantasies.”
“Tell me one of yours,” I said as I eased off her and grabbed a handful of tissues from the box on the nightstand to clean up.
“You,” Catherine said as I knelt in front of her. “You are my wildest fantasy.” She was quiet as I cleaned between her legs and tossed the tissues in the little trash can beside the bed.
“Something on your mind?” I asked as I pulled her into my arms.
Catherine looked a little sheepish as she mulled over her thoughts. “I just…I never knew it felt like this. I thought it was supposed to be this big, sparkly moment. Or maybe something that’s angsty and tenuous. But it’s not. It’s…safe. Comfortable.”
I pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “What is?”
“Love,” she said simply.
I felt it too.
Love didn’t need big houses to grow. It sprang up in the cracks and crevices of our wounds. It defied mountains, climbing them without care or worry. It flourished in times of rain, and in the sun that always followed.