Chapter 9
"Aria!"
This time, I didn't stop at the call of my name. I stepped on, my high heels sinking into the soft, damp earth as I made to cross the vast gardens.
"Aria!"
The steely undertone to the masculine was unmistakable.
I stopped but refused to turn around.
"Where the hell are you going? Leaving your own engagement party? Leaving me?" Justin grabbed my arm, swinging me around to confront me suspiciously.
"Air!" I spat out furiously. "I was going out for some air."
Justin stared down at me. His expression was not entirely visible in the moonlit night, an otherwise romantic setting wasted on a couple without romance and a couple who literally only coupled.
I reached out to grasp the gigantic stone draped across my dainty finger and moved to toss it back at him.
"Oh, no you don't! There is no way you are walking out on me this time. I won't let you." The quiet menace in his voice was now actually threatening. So much so that I stumbled back a step, triggering his own advance as he moved to swiftly close the distance between us 'til there was none left at all.
"What do you want with me?" I moaned out pitifully, the despair I was feeling welling up recklessly. I shoved back to break free, but his hold only got tighter. His grip on my shoulder was unnecessarily rough and painful. I felt sure that the bruises forming would be visible in my sleeveless dress.
"Let me go," I muttered, struggling against his hold. I lifted both palms up to push at his chest like mad.
"Let you go?" he murmured darkly. "Never!"
His grip on me tightened, and I was rattled some more.
"I will never let you go," he said through clenched teeth. "Do you hear me? I want you for my wife!"
I felt the tears prick at my eyes before the waterfall started. Helplessly weak, I went lax in his arms to slump up against him as sobs started to rack through my not quite fragile frame.
His arms went around me then, and the menace left his voice as he began a barrage of soothing nothings cooed into my ear. The gentle flow of his soothing words was a sheer contrast to the harshness of before.
I didn't understand.
Did Justin care? Or didn't he?
Did I care?
Buried as I was, face first against a massive torso, I did the only thing I could. I used the time between the racking sobs for some quiet reflection. But my thoughts were too muddled at first. Then, I felt Justin's hands pushing through my tumbled hair to rake through it. Again and again, I felt his strong fingers part through it like waves. The effect was strangely hypnotic. Soothing. Entrancing.
I stopped sobbing, which was good. Only I had stopped thinking, too. The wrenching tightness in my chest became suddenly too much to bear. It was almost as if my heart were trying its level best to leap out of my chest and land with a splat at his feet.
That thought made me oddly sad, so its rapid beats slowed down to sluggish thuds of an irregular beat. A stone was surely trying to wedge itself in. Helpless to do anything else, I rubbed my chest to his, willing the pain away.
"Here? Does it hurt here?" Justin questioned me huskily, his hand reaching up between us to splay across my heaving chest. I felt him rub—not at my tits as I would have expected him to do, but at the exact point where my heart suddenly began trying its level best to fall onto the palm of his hand.
I knew then he understood my aching heart. Understood it because he felt it, too.
My own hand crept up between us to cover the exact spot on his. The rapid thuds I felt hammering in his chest echoed in my own. Sending him a tentative smile, I leaned my head back down to place my ear over it. The sound of his beating heart was oddly endearing. I felt my lips twitch up in a ridiculous smile as I rubbed at the spot, doing my best to soothe his ache away just as his hand was soothing mine away.
His lips reached down to brush over my forehead.
"You never said," I murmured out breathlessly, feeling excited and overwhelmed all at once.
"I told you five years ago. It's not my fault you choose not to remember or to believe either," he muttered pointedly. I shivered. The disappointment in his tone was obvious, but I found myself caught up in the other timbre to it.
Warmth. Pure unadulterated love.
Justin Kay loved me.
"So are you going to say it?" demanded Justin with only the slightest note of impatience seeping into his tone.
I smiled at him and murmured a lazy, "Say what?"
His hand rubbed threateningly over my derrière. I bit my lip to hold back a chuckle.
"That you love me," said Justin pointedly through gritted teeth.
"But I said it already," I murmured petulantly before giving him a demure look from beneath my lashes. Then added tauntingly, "Five years ago." I grinned, throwing his own words back at him.
The growl of pure impatience that rumbled down my ear had a deliciously enticing effect that I was sure wasn't intended. I shivered.
"Don't make me throw you over my knee," he threatened warningly. That just raised my hackles.
"Oh, so you can fall back on a five-year-old drunken declaration, and I can't?" I all but hissed out at him. "I won't tolerate double standards. What's good for the goose is good for the gander ... or whatever. "
Did I just call myself a goose? I had wrenched myself out of his arms mid-torrent and now stood hands on waist and feet stomping in indignation.
His sigh was clearly audible.
"We have guests. We should go in. We can trash this out later tonight ... in bed."
I didn't miss his very obvious innuendos; they just riled me up further, so I opened my mouth to let loose another tirade, but his own open mouth crashed down on mine instead.
We tongue wrestled for domination a bit before our overwhelming warmer feelings got the better of us.
Heat flowed and ebbed as we basked in our feelings for each other. It was strange, knowing that the feelings had been there for five long years, and yet, it was only the acknowledgment of them that brought about this sudden change to our kisses. It was no longer just vapid devouring of one another but a sheer appreciation and gratitude even for the freely given and the freely accepted.
A loving kiss.
A kiss with our hearts open to each other. Bleeding for each other added a new dimension to what I thought had already been way too hot to handle before. I was positively being scorched whole now, inside out, by his lingering attentions.
The languid slide of his tongue against mine had a slippery effect on the wet heat between my thighs. I found myself shifting more than a little restlessly.
"Soon, baby. I will rub it better," he murmured hotly. "I will have you soon." If anything, his words only served to spike up the heat even more. So much more that frustrations reigned when his moist lips finally left mine alone and bereft. I felt a little dose of revenge was in order.
"Okay, Justin Darling," I breathed out tantalizingly before wrenching away and skipping free of his instantly outreaching arms.
I threw back my head and laughed openly at the disgruntled swearing that flooded the silent night behind me as I made my way happily in to finally rejoice in my engagement party.
As far as engagement parties went, mine hadn't been too dull after all. I had actually begun to enjoy myself after my and Justin's nondeclaration of the depths of our feelings.
Also, the two flutes of champagne thrust into my hands one after the other did a lot to banish away any lingering boredom. So what if I didn't know half of the people here? So what if they didn't know me either? I decided, after slurping the last bit of the light golden drop from my tiny flute, that I would change that status quo. I would go mingle.
That, like nothing else, brightened up the party. Justin's own red, alcohol-flushed face always hovering over my shoulders made it all so much better.
We danced. We laughed. And we mingled. Of course, two hours later, I still didn't know half the people at that party and had even gone so far as to forget the other half that I did know.
"Come, baby," urged a deep voice beside me. "It's time to get to bed."
I mumbled out gibberish and waved him off. But his warm arms persisted about me, wrapping around me and hauling me up onto unsteady feet.
I allowed Justin to guide me along. Using his own unsteady body as support made for many falls and throbbing disappointments along the way. But despite it all, we made it. We made it to our bed in the end.
Falling uncomfortably into a heap, I was almost asleep again when Justin's prodding hand nudged me awake.
"Nope. Not like that. Strip out of your clothes first," he instructed, his words more than a little slurred.
"Do I have to?" I moaned out pitifully before batting at his questing hands moving to assist where I desisted. Through much fumbling and not a little elbowing, we were both without clothes and snuggled against each other beneath the comfy, thick coverings.
We slept then, deeply and sated, with our lot in life 'til the wee hours of the morning, which turned out to be not an hour later.
I woke up at that point to feel Justin thrusting against my core with some urgency.
"Justin?" I managed to mumble out inquiringly between thrusts.
"Take me," he urged huskily, "Take me ... all in." His voice heavy with sleep and hoarse with want was as hypnotic as his seducing thrusts.
"Feel me," he whispered hoarsely. His breath burned hot puffs of air against my sensitive ears. "Feel me ... inside you." His hips swivelled and moved in emphasis of each word. I moaned out loud and surrendered to his lead.
His need triggered my own, and soon, we were both in the throes of fulfillment. I sighed contentedly after as Justin moved to snuggle me back into his arms.
"Praise me," he murmured softly, each word dripping with smug if drowsy contentment. My lips tugged up at the corners lazily as I grinned sleepily over the audacity of his command. But I was not one to shy away from giving praise when it was due.
"You are a great, ..." I paused thoughtfully to ponder further, "dancer. Your hip thrusting is truly inspiring," I murmured mockingly.
The grunt he returned at that told me absolutely nothing. The light snores he emitted right after, however, said a lot.
****
Sunday was a day of rest.
So that was exactly what we and the rest of the occupants of the house did. But the penetrating sun that seemed to have battled its way through the drawn curtains didn't agree with that. So it was with some grumbling that I finally stirred.
I found that I lay flat on top of Justin Kay. A sleeping and reeking Justin Kay, who sent my senses reeling from the pungent smell of alcohol that drifted off his heavy breath. Heavy because I lay on his chest. I crawled off with some difficulty. It was difficult only because of my pounding headache and because of his arms wrapped around me like a vice.
I fell face first with a grunt onto the soft pillow as I finally managed to free myself enough to topple off. It was then that I realized I stank, too.
The usual routines of daily ablutions took twice as long, if not more, when hung over. I vowed then never to drink again. I was actually a little shocked that I had drunk so much at all. But then, I recalled the celebratory nature of the night before.
I couldn't help the lopsided grin that insistently tugged at my cheeks despite the ache from the effort. Justin Kay loved me.
Wrapped in a towel, I moved back over to the bed to stare down at his angelic face, angelic only because he was still fast asleep. Staring at him made my breath catch as warm feelings sent silly tingles down my spine and stirred my blood.
My heart thudded and swelled painfully 'til it matched my aching head. Then, I reluctantly moved away in search of medication to dull the aches in my head, not those of the heart. My heart ached with the overwhelming sweetness of my love for Justin. There was no cure for that.
Finding no means of relief from the bathroom vanity, I tugged on Justin's robe and cinched it at my waist before moving silently and deliberately slow out the room and down the stairs. Despite my best efforts, I was still holding my head with both hands when I finally made it to the kitchen. There, what faced me sent the dull thud in my head into a raging warfare of pounding intensity.
"Dale?" I gasped his name with a loud groan.
"Hey," said Dale, draped in a robe and thankfully wearing pj's.
"Hi," I muttered, still holding onto my head for fear of it falling off and rolling out of reach.
The awkward silence after that was not unusual. It was always like this whenever we'd encountered each at family gatherings in the past. It had hurt a lot at first because before our breakup, we had been close. Our heads had perpetually been bent together in animated discussions. We had been that close.
But I saw now that those discussions had been animated only for me. Dale had never returned even the slightest of my affection. I had been in love with my own imaginings of him in my head, not who he truly was. Did I even know that person?
"Did you have something you wanted to say?"
I stared at him.
I realized I had been staring a good while only after his prompting. "Aria? "
I smirked at him then, ignoring the thudding pain in my head while not releasing the physical hold I had on my head.
"You're different," I murmured absently, already feeling ridiculously ecstatic that I was in no way bound to this ninny.
The smug look that crossed his face was puke-inducing as he preened himself to imagined praise. Perhaps I had not been the only one to imagine things in my past relationship. Perhaps Dale had had imaginings of his own about me. Did we all see what we wanted to see? Not what was real? Was it like that with Justin and me, too?
I ignored his grinning mug and went to reach for another type of mug, one into which I poured some aromatic brew of hot coffee.
"Here, try these," said a deep voice behind me.
I spun around in slow motion to stare at the vaguely familiar stranger facing me. In his hands was the capsulized life-saving tonic of pain relief. I hefted out a relieved sigh and reached out for it gladly. Popping it in my mouth, with some haste, I accepted the glass of water he also proferred and gulped the lot down.
"Thank god!" I murmured gratefully.
"You're welcome," said ... God?
I stared at the man before me with renewed interest. He certainly had the Adonis good looks purported to be the face of the gods so he could very well be.
"You are indeed my savior," I said theatrically, almost bowing my head in appreciation. Stopping in time when the pain made its searing-self known. My groan was guttural and heartfelt. His grin was swift and appealing. I was certain if I hadn't been besotted with Justin, my heart would have fluttered with interest anew.
"It was the least I could do," he murmured self-depreciatingly, "even if you did steal my coffee."
"Oops!"
I widened my eyes with false horror and not much regret. That was what happened if you left your freshly brewed coffee lying around unattended.
His chuckle was genuine, and I found myself smiling back at him.
"You know, if I had known you were so criminally inclined," said handsome, "I wouldn't have flirted so much with you last night."
Eh?
My baffled look had him roaring again in unbound laughter.
"She flirted with me, too," said another handsome Adonis, walking into the kitchen behind me. I gasped and spun around, feeling more than a little stunned.
"You don't remember, do you?"
Remember? All I recalled was Justin Kay. Always and forever Justin Kay. I tore my bewildered gaze away from their amused stares and took a deep gulp of the steaming brew still nestled between the palms of my hands.
Oh my God!
Memories of my flirting the night before came back to me with a vengeance.
"Why are you all so dark haired, dark eyed, and darkly brooding?" I had asked Ash the night before in a drunken slur while leaning back against Justin's familiar, hard chest.
It hadn't been flirtation. Not in the real sense. Ash, I now recognised, was the cousin whose coffee I had stolen. I sipped at it some more while peering over the rim of my mug.
"Harry and Ash," called out the love of my life, "stop harassing my fiancée."
I turned then to face my saviour, my reason for breathing and, in short, my whole world: Justin Kay. It was odd how a mediocre sense of understanding could change the perspective of one's entire existence. I had been free and living life to my own tune, but knowing how Justin felt about me changed it all. Knowing he returned my feelings spun my world on its axis.
I now lived for him, as he did for me.
Naturally, with Justin being Justin and me being me, that tender sentiment, or any tender sentiments, couldn't last for more than two minutes at a time.
"You could have fucking woken me up. God, I could use a pain killer, an honest to God atomic-powered pain killer," Justin groaned plaintively before reaching down to absently brush his lips across mine in passing. I looked down then to find my hands devoid of the morning dew-of-life I had been so carefully nursing. My eyes narrowed to find the red mug floating about the kitchen in Justin's grasp. The sound of the last of the ebon black brew being slurped out of existence made my heart spasm in sheer pain. And my head, too.
"That was my cup of coffee," I wailed out loud before wincing from the sound of my own voice hitting my sensitive ear drums.
"Was," Justin nodded agreeably.
The chuckles that filled the kitchen at that were all decidedly male. To have four men laughing at my expense was not conducive to a good start to Sunday.
I turned heel and left. My determined strides took me back upstairs, unheeding the lovely panoramic views that this exquisitely positioned mansion extended through its wall to wall glassed panelling. That would have to be appreciated at a later time.