Chapter Seventeen #3
He exhales deeply, like the weight of everything he’s been holding in is finally released. “Exactly. I know what my life was like without you in it. And now I’m excited to find out what it’s like with you in it.”
For a moment, everything else fades. The trees, the detour, even the absurdity of our being stuck in the middle of nowhere—it all slips away. All I can feel is the truth in his words, the quiet intensity behind them.
“Okay,” I whisper, my voice barely above a breath, “let's see what happens.”
Before long, the traffic ahead starts to move, and Linc eases off the gas, proceeding to the route. But as the forest clears, the rolling hills sweep across the horizon, and our easy silence returns, Linc’s GPS isn’t done with us yet.
“Incoming text message from Dominic Owens. ‘So , this is what it is, huh? I say take a short flight or road trip with your guys, you say you’ll think about it, and now you’re out there slipping and falling in love—’”
Linc jabs a finger at the screen, switching to music. Loud music.
He glances at me, blushing cutely. “Sorry about that.”
I bite back a laugh, loving every second of embarrassed Lincoln Bridges crushing on me. And there’s that word again. Love.
It feels like the elephant in the car, squished between us, and weirdly, I don’t mind the idea of us in love, seeing where this could go.
“It’s fine. My divas are calling me out, too.” I smile nervously. “So, I’m guessing right about now you’d love to change the subject to anything else.”
“Great guess.”
“Should we maybe talk about that theory you wanted to tell me about?” I trace the edge of my fingernail between my teeth, still studying him.
Linc glances at me, self-conscious and clearly uneasy under the weight of my stare.
I see the way you look at me.
Damn right.
“Yeah, about that…” He swallows. “Are you ready to have your mind blown?”
Among other things.
He pauses, then dives in, telling me about family dinner night, and I learn that his mom swooped in and took his dad from Cornelia.
I’m already speechless. But the kicker? Not only has Linc bought into my theory about Cornelia setting me up for a downfall, but he also believes he might be her second target.
My mind is officially boggled.
“It’s crazy, right?” he says.
The silence lingers, though, because how do I respond to that? She’s made us both her enemies. She wants to take us both down. So, what’s she waiting for?
I’m still considering what this means when we reach the glazier’s small shop in Dawsonville.
I haven’t said so much as two words to Linc as the guy sorts and examines the broken crystals, carefully determining the extent of the damage.
But I feel Linc’s eyes on me, stealing glances, as if he’s guessing whether he should’ve told me.
I’m too in my head to comfort him, though.
I can’t. Not when I’m still mentally reorganizing a puzzle where the pieces were closely shaped but shoved into the wrong places.
So as the glazier separates a half-dozen salvageable crystals and begins discussing the replacements needed with Linc, I step outside to catch my bearings.
A few minutes later, he joins me.
“Okay, so he said there’s about seven crystals he’s got to precision cut and shape to fit the exact specifications of the original design, but …
he won’t have them finished until the morning.
” Linc winces. “This was supposed to be a day trip, but what do you think about booking a hotel room for the night? We can leave first thing tomorrow,” he rushes to add.
“Sure, okay. I don’t mind.”
Linc takes my hands, his eyes searching mine. “Are you still thinking about what I said about Cornelia and my parents?”
Reluctantly, I nod. “I knew she was holding a grudge, but…”
“Listen, I honestly don’t care about that woman or what vendettas she’s harboring. My mom used to say, if you’re doing anything meaningful, people are going to come for you,” he says, inching closer. “It’s just what happens when you threaten the way things are.”
And I don’t know if it’s the somber tone of his voice or the fresh air after inhaling his pheromones for the last couple hours, or even all the alternate-timeline talk. But in this moment, everything starts to click.
All this time, I thought that I was the target, that I didn’t need anyone distracting me.
But no. It’s so much worse than that. This is about her—restoring the Livingston name, yes, but also wiping out anyone who stands in her, or Julian’s, way.
Me, the woman who dared to divorce her son.
And Linc, the son of the woman who took everything she wanted.
We’re not just obstacles. We’re her whole damn plan.
No.
A dogged determination creeps up my spine, hot and urgent. Because screw Cornelia and her manipulation.
My heart swells as I press a soft kiss to Linc’s lips because I damn well want to.
“I don’t want to hold back out of fear anymore.
” I tip up his chin to meet his devastating gray eyes.
“She can smear my name, destroy my business, try to blame the divorce on me—I don’t give a damn.
We can’t let her win. We get to choose this version of us. So, if you really want to try this—”
“Ebony, I’m yours if you want me.” He punctuates his beautiful words with a kiss, so slow, so intoxicating, that the world around us fades away.
It’s urgent, hungry, every brush of his tongue sparking against mine and tracing the outline of a story that’s been brewing for ten years in the back of my mind.
In the ache of my fingers. Nestled in that hollow whisper just behind my ribs.
I don’t know if this is love.
For damn sure it’s more than lust, though.
My whole body is a heartbeat, throbbing, pulsing at the feel of his hands cradling my face like he’s afraid to let go.
And I feel it, too. It’s like something powerful is drawing us closer, something beyond our control. A gravitational pull, every second pulling us farther from everyone, everything we know.
I’m weightless, suspended in air.
Every inch of my skin tingles with the heat rising between us. The warmth of our breaths mingling. Our lips brushing like tinder, setting me aflame.
“You’re my choice, Lincoln Bridges. I only want you,” I say into the kiss, my heart, mind, and every inch of my body bypassing the hike and swim and going straight for the unwritten quickie stop on the agenda. “I need to feel you right now.”
Apparently, that makes two of us.
Linc stalls for a moment before he tears away from me, leaving nothing but the lingering ache for him—an echo of a force I can’t ignore. He doesn’t hesitate another second, roughly grabbing my hand, moving with urgency toward the car parked along the curb.
We drive for five excruciating, high-speed minutes.
Then Linc skids to a stop in front of the first chain hotel he sees.
He exits the driver’s side and opens my door to help me out, then snatches up our bags from the backseat, tanking my delusion of us old-school pretzeling our bodies in the backseat, just wildly going at it and fogging up the windows.
But not Lincoln Bridges.
Not my man.
“One sec,” he says, his voice as tormented as I feel. He dashes inside to the registration desk and returns a moment later with a key, breathing hard, and I can tell he’s barely holding it together, which only turns me on more.
We barely make it into the simple, no-frills room before he drops our bags and starts kissing me again, hard and messy.
We’re a jumble of hands in hair and on skin, our breaths ragged as we tug at each other’s clothes until I’m in my underwear—an obstacle he doesn’t seem to appreciate as much today as he did last night.
Then he’s standing in front of me bare-chested, tattooed, and chiseled from the gods’ personal Pinterest board. Half naked. Hard. Beautiful.
Good Lord.
“Well…” I toss up my hands, surrendering, needing more than a minute. “That’s a funny way to propose, but sure, I guess I’ll marry you.” I giggle.
Linc snorts, barely containing his laughter. “Yeah?”
“I’ll just be over here, casually drooling.” I take a deep breath in, then release it slowly through my nose.
“Hey, you should see my view.”
“No, seriously,” I say, because he’s not understanding that it’s been over a year—closer to two, not counting Missionary Mondays—since I had sex, and I’m starving. “I guess I assumed, you know, with the job, you’d sort of need be fit. But my God… ”
Linc licks his lips, slowly, torturously, unzipping his jeans. He strokes his tremendous dick through his black boxer briefs. If he wasn’t before, I’m sure he’s well aware now, and absolutely enjoying what he’s doing to me.
“I’m glad you like what you see,” he rasps, his voice gruff, gravelly in my ears, watching me as he works himself to the shaft, hardening in his hand, and all I have to say is… Baybee …Julian Livingston III could never. AI Linc 2.0 and casting director Zeek could absolutely N-E-V-E-R.
I shake my head, correcting him. “ Love what I see.”
When I think he couldn’t possibly get better, with his free hand, Linc slips his hand in his back pocket, fishing out a condom, and I burst out laughing.
One condom?
“Baby, I can do you one better.” I hold up a finger, then rummage around my tote, a second later revealing “the box” in all its supersized glory. “Plus…” I grab the lube, lingerie, and LBD for good measure, like, Tell me what you need .
Linc snorts a laugh. “Oh, wow . All the above, please. Woman, you came prepared, huh?”
“Hey, safety first.”
Like a savage, I rip open the box, then tear the foil wrapper with my teeth. I lean in again, skating my fingers over his tapestry of tattoos, down the smooth ridges of his abdomen, gliding my hand lower to wrap my hand around his enormous dick and circling the head with my thumb.
A soft gasp escapes his lips when I roll it down his shaft.
And that’s it.
Linc lowers me onto the bed.
“Spread your legs for me.” He puts lube in his hands, rubbing them together before he drags his hand over my pussy, massaging and slipping his fingers inside until I’m aching for more.
Then, when I can’t take it a second longer, he hovers deliciously above me, centering himself between my trembling thighs, his mouth inches from mine.
We breathe into each other’s mouths as he stretches, fitting himself inside me, and I feel like if I died right now, it would be with a permanent smile.
Then he pumps.
Slow and steady at first, until I take every inch of him. He groans, quickening the pace, deep and hard, hands gripping my hips, in a dizzying frenzy until the sensation is so slippery, so heady, there’s only a symphony of shallow breaths and skin kissing skin.
I throw my head back, arching into his strokes, feeling all his roughness, seeing an entire constellation of stars just for us. I lose sense of time and space because there’s only us, like this, climbing together.
“Baby, I can barely breathe. Come for me.” He grunts, desperate and needy, opening his mouth and torching the skin of my neck and collarbone, then licking my breasts and dragging his fingers between my thighs as he continues driving inside me. “Hurry, I want you to come first.”
Every nerve ending in my body ignites, a slow burn that builds until the fuse finally snaps, and the aftershocks linger, pulsing through me.
The delicious tightening in my belly, the electric shiver crawling over my skin, the blissful, toe-curling current that radiates from deep—they all combine, leaving me heady with bliss, and my heartbeat syncs with Linc’s.
It’s overwhelming, all-consuming.
Then Linc lets go too, abs flexed and shaking in a series of spasms. He collapses at my side with a rough groan, tugging me into him.
He’s still struggling to breathe, eyes hazy, voice hoarse. “Ebony Grace…”
“Hmm?” I moan, molding my body to his as he buries his face in my neck, his warm breaths evening out as if he’s drifting to the edge of sleep. I’m euphoric in a way that leaves me breathless, suspended in warmth, my heart still playing the broken record.
Daring to find—
“I’ve never stopped loving you,” Linc says, and it scares the hell out of me.
I know I feel the same, and that makes me…vulnerable. I’m just starting to rediscover who I am, and already, I’m losing myself in him. And while once upon a time I loved my ex-husband, walking into a trap or not, in my heart I think I’ve always been in love with Lincoln Bridges.
So I remind myself that I deserve good things, even if they terrify me, then push the fear aside and say it anyway.
“I love you too.”
Saying it feels huge, like everything’s shifted, because loving this man? Nothing about this choice feels small or insignificant.
It’s going to change everything.