Fuck, I love this woman.
“Love you, beautiful.”
Opening her eyes, her gaze meets mine over her shoulder as her hands move to the top of the desk and I help her stand. Turning to face me, her hand comes up and her fingers run along my jaw.
“I love you, and I only want you, Carter,” she says softly as her gaze searches mine.
Fuck, I have never felt like this before. She drags all of my primal instincts to the surface. I need to know she’s mine, because I’m all hers. She owns me...every part of me.
“You own me, Fern,” I confess, wrapping one hand around the back of her neck, the other around her waist, so I can drag her flush against me.
“Ditto.” She smiles, looking up at me, and I can’t believe she’s mine. Her skin is still rosy from her orgasm, her eyes heated with desire and love. She’s so damn beautiful. Leaning my forehead against hers for a brief moment, I then lead her into my private bathroom and get both of us cleaned up.
“I need to talk to my dad for a minute. Wait here, and when I get back, we’ll go get some food then head home early,” I tell her, leading her over to the couch.
“Is everything okay?” she asks, and I nod, kissing her forehead then mouth.
“Everything’s fine. Lay down and rest. I’ll be back in just a minute.”
“I’m not tired.”
“Fern.” I growl her name, thinking she’s going to put up a fight about staying in my office.
“I’ll stay here, but I’m not tired, so I’ll finish working on my final.”
“Good,” I agree, gaining an eye roll from her. Giving her one more kiss, I leave my office, walk down the hall to my dad’s, and enter without knocking.
“What did you need?” I ask, shutting the door behind me and walking toward his desk.
“Have a seat.”
“If this is about Galvin, I already know,” I tell him, running a hand through my hair, pissed that I need to apologize to the guy, even though I still don’t want him, or any man for that matter, close to Fern.
“It’s not about Galvin, and trust me; I know what that was. You should have seen me with your mom back in the day. If it wasn’t impolite to piss circles around her, I would have done just that to keep other men away.” He chuckles, earning a smile from me.
“So what’s it about then?” I question, taking a seat in front of him.
“Fern’s grandmother was found this afternoon, and she was taken into police custody an hour ago.”
“So it’s done.” I breathe a sigh of relief.
“Not quite. We still have to prove she was responsible for what happened to Fern, and the man who was arrested claims he doesn’t know who the woman was. And the girl that led Fern into the car says she wasn’t involved and believes Fern was lying because they fell out as friends.”
“Fern saw her. She’s a witness,” I protest.
“She also has a reason to lie. You have to think about this like a lawyer, not like the man in love with the victim.”
“Fuck,” I growl, knowing he’s right. Her attorney would use Fern’s relationship with me and her grandmother as a defense against her.
“Is there anything else we can go on? Anything else that will put her away for good?” he asks, sitting back in his chair.
“Fern’s mom disappeared. If we could track her down, maybe we could show a history of instability.”
“When did she disappear?” Dad asks.
“Shortly after Fern was born, from what I understand. I have people looking into it, but so far they haven’t come up with anything.”
“I’ll put a call into Nolan and get Bernard’s information from him. If anyone can find out where Fern’s mom disappeared to, it will be him,” he says, referring to a lawyer at another firm’s security detail, the same man who was able to figure out who was after his wife before she ended up hurt, or worse.
“I’m gonna get Fern home. Send me an email after you speak with Nolan and let me know what he says. I don’t want Fern to know what’s going on until we have a better idea of how we’re going to proceed,” I tell him, standing.
“Just take care of her and my grandbaby for now, and I’ll handle the rest,” he says, getting up from his chair and walking around to where I’m standing, patting me on the back.
Chapter 12
Fern
Looking over at Carter, I make sure he’s asleep before getting out of bed and picking up his shirt from the floor, covering myself with it before going down the hall to his home office.
I know he’s hiding something from me. Ever since we got home from the office, he’s been on edge, but he refuses to talk to me about whatever it is that is bothering him. I know he doesn’t want to stress me out right now because of the baby, but seeing him so worried is worrying me.
Turning on the computer, I wait until it loads up then sign into his email. I have no idea what I’m looking for, but tonight, when his phone pinged with an email alert, he picked it up all too quickly and went into the other room with it. Then, when he came back into the living room where I was working on my final, he seemed even more on edge, but refused to tell me what was wrong. Scanning the emails, I notice there are a lot of unread ones with subject lines like:
Can we meet tonight? I haven’t felt you inside of me for so long.
Call me. I’ll be in town this weekend. I miss your cock.
Let’s hook back up soon.
I sent you pictures of my new Brazilian.
Clicking through the emails one at a time, I answer each one without thinking, telling the women they obviously need to give up because he’s not interested, and then I tell them that desperation is not attractive. Ten minutes into my email tirade, I’m startled when I hear his phone begin to ring from across the condo.
“Oh, shit,” I whisper when the computer, which is obviously hooked up to his cell phone, rings as well, with the caller ID showing a woman’s name, a woman who I just emailed. Pressing decline over and over on the screen, I suck in a relieved breath when the call disappears.
“Fern, what the fuck are you doing?”
Jumping, my eyes go to the door and I see Carter standing there in all his naked glory, with a frown on his face and his phone in his hand.
“Just surfing the web,” I grimace, trying to watch him while looking at the computer so I can shut down the screen before he sees what I’m really up to.
“Really?” He raises a brow, taking a step toward me. I stand from the desk, debating on whether or not I should accidently push the computer onto the floor.
“Yep, that’s all,” I say, raising my hands above my head then cover my mouth, pretending to yawn. “Let’s go back to bed. I’m sleepy.” I pout, hoping he finds it cute enough to follow me.
Looking down at his phone when it beeps, he scans it quickly then looks at me again. “You’ll be happy to know that Mandy said she’s not desperate.”
“That’s good for whoever Mandy is. I mean, no woman should be desperate, right?” I shrug like I have no idea what he’s talking about.
“Why were you going through my email?”
“What?” I squeak.
“You heard me. Why, Fern?”
“I don’t know,” I tell him honestly, letting out a deep breath.
“You have nothing to worry about when it comes to me and y—”
“I know that,” I cut him off before he can say more. I trust him completely, and really, I don’t know what came over me a few minutes ago. Well, that’s a lie. I needed to stake my claim on him.
“Then why?”
“You’ve been acting strange since we got home, and then when you got an email this evening, you left the room and refused to talk to me about whatever it was, even after I asked you repeatedly. I guess I was hoping I could find out what it was that was bothering you and help in some way,” I confess all in one breath.
“Your grandmother was arrested and taken into custody today.”
“What?” I breathe.<
br />
“There’s not enough evidence against her to keep her behind bars.”
“No,” I whisper, laying my hands over my stomach, sitting back down in the chair behind me, and feeling tears fill my eyes.
“This is why I didn’t want you to find out about it until we were able to find something more solid to hold her there,” he says, coming to his knees in front of me, holding my face between his palms. “I won’t let her hurt you,” he assures me, running his thumbs under my eyes, catching my tears as they fall.
“I want to help. How can I help?” I ask, wrapping my arms around his neck as he lifts me from the chair and carries me down the hall to the bedroom.
“Bernard is on it. He assured my dad that he will find your mom, so hopefully she can be a character witness against your grandmother.”
“I think she’s dead,” I tell him—something I have been feeling for years now. His body stills and his arms tighten around me.
“Why do you say that?”
“I don’t know. I just always felt like she would have come for me if she wasn’t. She had to have known what her mom was like. She wouldn’t have left me if she didn’t have to,” I say on a sob.
“It’s okay. We’ll figure it out. I promise. Tomorrow, I want you to sit down with Bernard and me and tell us anything you can remember,” he says, taking off my shirt before he lays me on the bed and gets in with me, tucking my head under his chin.
“I can do that.” I nod into his chest. If my grandmother did kill my mom, I want to know where she is so she can be put to rest. And if she didn’t kill her, I hope I can talk to her and ask her why she left me, knowing the kind of person she was leaving me with.
“Let’s get some sleep,” he murmurs, pulling the blankets up around us.
“I’m sorry about your email,” I tell him, pressing a kiss to his bare chest.
“No, you’re not, but it’s okay.” He chuckles, pressing a kiss to the top of my head, making me smile before I float off to sleep.
~*~*~
Waking up, my heart is pounding hard in my chest as I recall the dream I just had.
“What’s the matter?” Carter asks, getting up on his elbow and looking down at me.
“Bad dream,” I say, rubbing my eyes.
“It’s probably just the hormones,” he says, running his hand over my hair. “The baby book said that sometime they could cause bad dreams.”
“It felt so real.” I shake my head, trying to erase the memory of it.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asks, gathering me against him, and I nod against his chest.
“I was sitting outside on the grass in a big backyard with flowers all around me. It was the middle of the day, and I was little. I could barely walk, but I stood up and wobbled to a dirt pile in the yard. I started to cry when I saw the dirt was covering my mom. When she wouldn’t move, I reached down into the grave and took her necklace....then I woke up,” I say, feeling sick.
“I think stress and the questions about your mom have your imagination running wild,” he says, gently kissing my forehead.
“What if it was real though?” I ask in a whisper, lifting the necklace up and running my fingers over it. “My granddad had to know I took this from his drawer. He had to know, and he didn’t ever question me about it. And he never asked anyone else either.”
“He knew it was something that was meant to be yours.”
“I don’t know,” I mutter. I can’t get rid of the feeling it wasn’t a dream but a memory. I close my eyes.
“You don’t believe it was a dream.”
“I don’t,” I say, opening my eyes back up to meet his.
“Where could this have happened if it wasn’t a dream?” he asks, studying me while his hand runs gently over my stomach.
“I don’t know. We didn’t have a yard in the city, and I don’t remember having one when I was younger, or going anywhere that was like the place in my dream,” I tell him, wishing I knew if it was real or not.
“Come with me,” he says, getting out of bed and handing me his shirt to put back on as he puts on a pair of sweats. He takes my hand and leads me out of the room and down the hall to his office. Sitting in the chair I was in last night, he pulls me down onto his lap then clicks away on the screen. Not knowing what he’s doing, I wait for him to tell me what he’s looking for.
Soon, my grandfather’s information is there, detailing every account and piece of property he owned before his death. Moving through the list, he stops on a house that my grandparents owned in Connecticut around the time of my birth before selling a few years later. Pulling the address from the list, he pastes it into the internet search bar and the house pops up on a website. Clicking on the link, pictures of the home come into view, and my breath leaves me in a whoosh when I see the backyard that was in my dream.
“That’s the yard,” I tell him, running my finger over the image of the flower-covered backyard.
“I’m gonna make a couple of phone calls. Why don’t you go get something to eat?”
“I can’t eat right now.” I frown, wondering if he’s crazy.
“Fuck, when did you start talking back?” he asks.
“Here,” I say, picking up the phone and handing it to him. Then I turn on his lap, resting both my legs over his, and lay my head on his chest, not wanting to push his buttons too much by laughing at him.
“Fuck,” he growls, wrapping one arm tightly around me then the phone starts to beep, and a few seconds later, he’s talking to his dad. After that, he calls the police in Connecticut where the house is located, and then he calls a judge in the same area. I don’t know how many people he talks to, but I watch the time tick away on the clock for two hours before he puts the phone down and folds his arms around me. “Now, we wait.”
“What’s going to happen?”
“They’re going to send a forensics team to the house to scan the backyard. If anything comes back abnormal, they’ll dig and call us if they find out anything.
Nodding against his chest, I close my eyes and pray.
Sitting at the kitchen counter on one of the barstools, where Carter planted me, telling me I needed to eat, I look at him when his phone begins to ring. Wrapping his arms around the back of my neck, he searches my face—for what, I don’t know—then kisses my lips briefly before picking up his phone.
“Hello? Yeah.” He closes his eyes then wraps his hand around the back of my head and pulls me into his chest. I know I was right. I know it wasn’t a dream without him having to tell me so. After a few more words I don’t really hear, a loud bang sounds in the quiet condo and I know he just threw his phone into the wall. As he wraps his arms around me, I hear his heart beating rapidly in his chest.
“It was her, wasn’t it?” I ask, and his arms tighten.
“We can’t know for sure until they do DNA testing, but I can’t imagine it being anyone else, beautiful,” he says, sounding gutted.
“She killed her,” I tell him as wetness covers my cheeks. “She didn’t leave me on purpose.” I cry in relief and sadness then wrap myself around him as he picks me up and carries me across the room. He then lays me down in the bed, holding me tightly as I cry for a mom I never knew.
Chapter 13
Carter
Watching Fern walk across the stage at graduation, I can’t help but feel proud of my beautiful girl. Three weeks ago, forensics confirmed her mom was the woman buried in the shallow grave in the backyard of the house in Connecticut. I knew she needed to know if her mom had left her or not, but I didn’t know how much that information was effecting her until she got the phone call verifying what she already believed.
The police were still building a case against her grandmother, but between what was found at the burial site and her history with Fern, it didn’t look like she would be getting out of jail until she was taken out in a body bag. We would never know if her grandfather knew about what happened, but I want to believe he didn’t.
Stand
ing up from my chair, I clap loud and yell as her hand wraps around her diploma. Turning, she looks at me and presses her fingers to her lips, sending a kiss my way, and my eyes land on the new ring on her finger and I smile.
A week ago, I dragged her to the courthouse, much to my mother’s disapproval. I couldn’t wait any longer for her to be my wife, and I told my mom I was just keeping up with tradition. Neither of us cared about having a big wedding, and really, all I needed was everyone to know she belonged to me.
~*~*~
“Where are we going?” Fern asks, turning on my lap to look at me.
“I already told you it’s a surprise,” I remind her with a kiss once again as my hand roams over her stomach that is now sporting a small bump.
“Can I have a hint?”
“Nope.” I smile then dig into my pocket for the blindfold I put there before we left home. Covering her eyes before we reach the airport, I lift her out of the car then carry her onto the private jet and into the backroom, laying her down on the bed.
“Are we on a plane?” she asks as I nibble my way down her body, settling myself between her legs. Lifting the bottom of the dress she has on, I pull her panties to the side and distract her with my mouth and my cock until we land in Jamaica two hours later.
“We’re here, baby,” I say, kissing her neck and waking her up.
“Where’s here?” she asks with a smile, running her fingers through my hair.
Leaning down, I ignore her question, pressing a kiss to her mouth then lifting her out of the bed. I help slip her dress back on over her head then take her hand and lead her to the front of the plane, giving the pilot a nod before stepping down the stairs of the plane, hearing Fern gasp behind me. “Welcome to Jamaica,” I tell her, wrapping my arms around her once we’re both on the tarmac. As she lifts up on her tiptoes, I meet her halfway, kissing her deeply.
“I can’t believe you brought me to Jamaica,” she says excitedly.
Kissing her once more, I then lead her over to a car that is waiting for us.
“This is so beautiful,” she says, stepping out the glass door to the balcony that leads to our private pool. Watching her lean her face back and close her eyes as the sun shines down on her, I see the outline of her body through the white material of her dress and feel myself grow hard.