A Wild Ride (Jessica Brodie Diaries #3)(42)

“God no! No offense Jess, Willie—I love ya, but no. Please no. I like the simple life.”

“Are you calling me simple?” Lump asked in mock anger.

“Yes!” Adam grinned, smiling with soft eyes at Lump. “And I love you every second for it!”

Lump shared a minute with him while the rest of us smiled and sipped our wine. It was good to see them happy. Even better to see them happy with each other.

As William and I entered his—our house, he stepped me in the entryway as he closed the door. He then stepped in front of me, bracing his strong arms to either side of me, and doing a wall push-up, lowering his body against mine. He pushed his body into me as he opened my mouth and probed with his tongue. He deepened the kiss as I ran my hands up those muscular arms to his outstanding shoulders. I let go of my worry, of the “what if’s”, of the stress of furniture shopping and how it would all work, and focused on William’s soft lips; on his hard c**k rubbing against me through his jeans; on his playful tongue, swirling and flicking me into a fervent desire.

He backed off the kiss slightly, leaving his body firmly pressed against me. “Welcome home, baby.”

In that moment I decided to forget all my moaning and make it work. William was sharing his home with me; eager to share his home with me. What’s more, I wanted this. I wanted to unite our lives more firmly. Granted, it wasn’t optimal, what with everything being in his name, but I’d worry about that down the road. Right now I would make this place habitable—no more statues and pictures of live stalk—and I’d see how I felt after that.

In the week to come I wanted to get a start on furniture shopping, now having a need to fit in to my new home, but with William and I having different, and equally crazy schedules, it was impossible. Work was keeping me insanely busy because they were dangling another promotion in my face. I wanted to show them what I was made of, but there was so much dang work to get finished that a normal work day just wasn’t enough. Then I had the dance lessons, gym, and self-defense. Half the people in my dance class thought I was getting abused by William because of the hands-on self-defense I was learning, and the other half thought I was having great sex. 50% were correct, though it had nothing to do with the bruises.

After a particularly exhausting day, I arrived home ready for a glass of wine and a thrilling movie that didn’t require brainpower. I walked into the house in a daze. And then stopped abruptly.

What the...?

Everything was gone. All furniture, all pictures, all decorations...everything! The kitchen was devoid of decorations, glasses and plates, but did have the cookware.

In the bedroom there was a futon, my paintings and my pictures, and a couple paintings of Williams. There was also the big flat screen TV that used to be in the living room. Oh, and clothes. Dresser, night stands, everything else was gone.

I heard the door open and rushed out to meet William wandering in the door looking tired and haggard. He saw me and smiled, then looked past me to the living room and sagged.

"Forgot about that," he muttered.

"What is going on?" I asked, incredulous.

"Well," he said heading toward the kitchen for a beer. I waited for him to open it, have a minute to himself to have a sip, then head out to me.

“You wanted to be on equal footing, right? We go 50/50 on furniture as if we were just getting out of college and moving in to a place together. You have nothing, so I donated all my stuff except what I couldn't part with. You're welcome."

It wasn't often I got this wry humor. But then, we usually didn't see each other right away after one of us had a hard day. Welcome to living together...

Must tread lightly.

"Thank you, William!" I stepped to him and hugged him. He put his arms around me tiredly.

"Only problem is that I had a shit day today and now I have no couch to sit on."

I followed him into the bedroom where we sat on the uncomfortable futon together.

"Oh," he continued, "and I left all the cookware. It is top quality so I figured you could just deal with it."

Yikes. Someone needed some alone time.

"Do you want me to run to Target and get you a chair?" I asked, faking genuine.

Often times if you feigned going the extra mile you were rewarded by a better disposition. Occasionally, you were also rewarded with having to follow through. Which sucked.

William chuckled and laid down, pulling me with him. I rested my head on his chest, his cologne mixing in my nose and arousing me. It never took very much to get me in the mood. I slid my hand down his chest, heading for the pot of gold, only to be thwarted by his hand landing on mine, stopping my progress.

“Need to relax a minute, love,” William said, his deep voice rumbling in his chest. “And get something to eat. I’ll happily take you to the moon later.”

I laughed and snuggled into him.

I spent the next several weeks shopping for furniture one piece at a time—I didn’t have much choice, after all—trying to make the various rooms come together. It really wasn’t my forte but I was making it happen. Most of the time I had Lump or Gladis, or both, trailing around helping me with colors and styles. Sometimes William went, though he wasn’t fond of all the options, and helped very little.

William didn’t care about the furniture, but was ecstatic that I was a permanent resident in the house. Coming home with me cooking us dinner, or surprising me with a meal and candle light after a long day, was what he had apparently wanted for some time. It seemed funny that it took me this long to resign myself to something so natural. We rarely got on each other’s nerves and craved each other’s presence as much now as when we first started dating.