Chapter 220
Brady was standing in the open doorway of my bedroom. To my surprise, he wasn’t dressed in his usual suit but in a pair of jeans, a button-up shirt, and sandals instead.
Brady looking all kinds of sexy.
“How long have you been standing there?” I asked, my voice full of anger.
“Long enough,” he said. “Did you get that out of your system?”
I lowered my hand, hung up the phone call, and crawled off the bed. “What the fuck, Brady? Where have you been all week?”
“I’ve been busy.” He crossed his arms against his chest, avoiding my gaze.
“That’s bullshit,” I said. “You used a photo of me from high school? After I opened up to you about how hard of a time that was for me? And you said you would be here for me during all of this. And instead, you just disappeared. You didn’t warn me that these very personal photos would be all over town. What the fuck?”
He pressed his lips together and nodded. “You’re right. I fucked up.”
My shoulders sank. I hadn’t expected him to say that. “Oh. Yeah. You did-”
“I should have asked permission for the high school photo of you. I was only planning on using it for the initial meeting, but we landed one of the hardest advertisers, this woman Meredith Plier. She said it was that photo that sold it for her. That people will relate to.”
“You could’ve just told me that. I probably would have freaked out, but I would’ve said yes eventually.”
“You’re right.”
He was quiet, and there was a moment of awkward tension between us that I hadn’t felt around him before. “What are you doing here, Brady?” I asked, my voice softer and calmer now.
He pulled a check out of his pocket and handed it to me. “To show you what one week of advertising has done.”
I took the check, and my jaw dropped. It was addressed to me. “Holy fucking shit? I don’t understand. There’s not even enough product for these yet. I have to make more.”
“It’s the pre-sale orders,” Brady said. “And you don’t have to make more. You just need to disclose a list sharing the ingredients to my company, and the manufacturer we’re working with will handle the rest. And, don’t worry, I’ll ensure the formula has a patent to protect your intellectual property.”
“Oh…okay.” I knew I should be thrilled. This was the most money I’d ever been paid at once for anything in my entire life. And after one week…I couldn’t even start to imagine what would happen in a month. “So you just came here for work?”
His eyes narrowed, and he shifted uncomfortably. “That was my initial intention.”
I sensed a “but” coming.
He sighed, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that he looked sad. “Will you come with me somewhere?”
I hesitated, a slow smile spreading across my lips. “No, I have a pretty packed schedule. My boss needs me to go somewhere with him.”
He attempted a smile, but I could still feel the tension behind it. “I’m not your boss, Tess. We’re partners.”
I nodded. “Yeah, Brady…I’ll go with you. But where are we going?”
He’d said it was a surprise, and at first, that had excited me. But then, on the drive, he didn’t utter a single word, and my initial excitement turned into confusion.
When the car finally stopped, he opened my door, and I stepped out into the afternoon sunshine, the smell of salt filling the air. Sailboats rocked back and forth in the tide of the marina.
“So this is why you’re wearing sandals,” I said with a laugh. “I didn’t know you owned anything but dress shoes. What are we doing here?” I asked, his air of mystery a mixture of curious and strange.
“I wanted to take you on the water.” He pointed down the dock to a large sailboat at the very end. “That’s my baby.”NôvelDrama.Org owns © this.
“On a sailboat? I would have taken you as a yacht man.”
“Oh, I have a yacht,” he said. “But trust me, sailing is so much better.”
I stared at him, realizing I needed to confront the uneasiness stirring inside me. He was saying all the right things, but his tone was flat, monotonous. Something was going on, something he wasn’t telling me.
What if he had found out about the pregnancy, and this was his way of getting rid of me? Take me out to sea and push me over the side. It was a ridiculous thought…but did I even know this man that well?
“Is anyone else coming?” I asked.
“Just us,” he said.
“Okay,” I hesitated.
He helped me onboard, my first time on a sailboat. I was surprised by how close we were to the water, how the subtle roll of the tide could rock it so effortlessly. As Brady untied the ropes, he yanked on chords to lift up the sail billowing the sail out over the water. “Ready?” Brady asked.
“Yeah,” I said, and then we were off.
It was a moderately windy day, and a heavy breeze carried us toward the horizon, the air rushing against my ears, salt whipping my face. It was exhilarating, but I was distracted the entire time by Brady’s silence. Something was definitely off. He sat across from me the whole time, quiet and morose, fixing the sail and barely smiling.
When we’d reached a fair distance offshore, he turned the boat into the wind, dropping the sails so that the boat stalled. We rocked back and forth, and my heart started to pound.
He crawled across the boat, ducking under the mast so that he was kneeling in front of me.
“What’s going on, Brady? You’re acting differently.”
I’d never seen him so silent. He pressed his hand against my cheek and pulled his face down to meet mine. His lips were dry to the touch, and as his tongue slid into my mouth, he devoured me, consuming me with all his passion. His hands tangled into my hair, and his hips pressed against mine, his erection thick and hard in his pants.
My confusion quickly shifted to passion, and I leaned back against the side of the boat, his body hovering over mine. His lips trailed down my neck, and goosebumps coursed over my skin, my pussy becoming wetter by the second.
I leaned back. “You can talk to me, you know that, right?” “What if I don’t want to talk right now?” he whispered.
I ran my fingers through his hair. “Then what do you want to do?”
“Fuck you in the cabin of this boat.”
My stomach swirled at his words. “I can get on board with that.”
“On board,” he snickered. “I see what you did there. C’mon.”
He tossed the anchor over the side of the boat, took my hand, and guided me down the steps into the tight cabin. He didn’t wait another moment, his hands sliding under my shirt, ripping it off me.
As he unhooked my bra and wrapped his lips around my nipple, I ran my fingers down his back, distracted, as I glanced around the cabin. There was a twin-sized mattress, a small kitchenette and toilet, and a handful of books, one open and folded upside down on a small table beside an empty coffee cup.
“Do you stay here sometimes?” I whispered.
Instead of answering me, he lifted his lips to mine. I wanted him to talk to me, to tell me what was bothering him, but I sensed that now wasn’t the right time. He unbuckled my pants faster than he ever had before. His desire for me radiated off him like electric energy, his touch hungry, yearning for me.
We fell back on the bed, and he kissed his way down my stomach, his hands sliding my legs apart. His tongue pressed against my pussy, the warmth of his lips making me moan as he sucked my clit.
“I want you,” I whispered.
At my words, he shoved two fingers deep inside my pussy, lifting upwards with his fingers and hitting my G-spot.
“Oh, fuck,” I cried out.
His tongue moved faster, quicker, each lap speeding up with the pace of his fingers. I picked my head up to watch him, and his eyes met mine with a ferocity I hadn’t seen before.
“Fuck me,” I said. “Please, Brady. I want all of you.”
He crawled up the bed until he was hovering over me, then shoved his dick deep inside me, a hard thrust that had my back arching. He pounded harder, half a dozen thrusts, so deep that my breath was ripped away from me.
I gasped as pain shot through my inside. “Too deep,” I whispered. “Brady, hold on.”
“I’m sorry.” He paused, pressing his forehead against my shoulder. I could feel an emotional pain rippling across him.
“It’s okay.”
His eyes met mine, and I could see the pain in them, the emotion weighing heavy in his eyes. “I’m sorry I disappeared on you.” “Thank you for saying that,” I whispered.
“Please, don’t go anywhere,” he whispered back. “I need you, Tess.
More than you know.”
When he kissed me again, my heart skipped as I realized something.
“Brady,” I whispered, terrified at my next words. “I’m not going anywhere. I need you too.”