Page 85 of Ramsey & Emerson

“And you still don’t know how beautiful you are, all these years later,” I retorted.

Emerson rolled her eyes before saying, “You’re lucky that I’m starving.”

I grinned. “If that’s your way of picking your battles, I approve.”

Her lips twitched. “You’re such an asshole, Ramsey.”

I reached for her, then hauled her next to me. “I know.”

“Just for that, I should make you cater lunch for the rest of the week,” she chuckled.

“It’s Wednesday,” I pointed out. “Two days of lunch for your office will hardly break us.”

Emerson stepped out of my arms. “Keep talking crap, and I’ll make you do it for a whole month.”

Little did she know that I’d do it every day for the next ten years if she really wanted me to.

Chapter 8

Emerson~

Ramsey was pissed, but he was doing his best not to ruin lunch. Because we were both always so busy, this little lunch date was actually a big deal, and I could appreciate how he was trying not to let his mental defects win. Though we always went home to each other at the end of the evening, seeing him during the day was always a nice surprise, and it’d be stupid to ruin it over something or someone that didn’t matter.

As Ramsey opened the door to Dimitri’s for me, we waited for the hostess to greet us, and if I were a lesser woman, I’d be annoyed by how her blue eyes immediately widened in appreciation when she finally got a good look at my husband. Luckily for me, other women didn’t intimidate me, and I was a better person for it. I couldn’t imagine feeling insecure, threatened, or depressed every single time a woman shot Ramsey an appreciative glance. I mean, how stupid would it be to resent women for reacting to him the same way that I’d had when I’d first met him.

Like it happened yesterday, I could remember every second of when I’d first seen Ramsey, and though the memory wasn’t a pleasant one, there was no denying that Ramsey’s looks had made a huge impact on me that first night. They were probably also part of the reason that he’d been able to control everyone at Windsor so easily. No matter what anyone said, power favored the beautiful, and no amount of trying to make physical flaws acceptable was going to change that. In a perfect world, looks wouldn’t matter, but the flood of internet models and self-promoting websites still proved otherwise.

Nonetheless, through no fault of his own, my husband was six-foot-two of gorgeous masculinity, and that was just a fact. He had dark brown hair and matching brown eyes that gave him a seductive look about him, and if it weren’t for the scar that slashed through his right eyebrow and over his eye to the edge of his nose, you’d think that he was as warm as a cozy fire, though he was the complete opposite. He also wasn’t sporting any grey yet, but we were also only forty-three.

Then, as if that weren’t enough, there was his body and how he made it a point to use our home gym at least three times a week. Twenty-five yearslater, Ramsey still had a body worth drooling over, and I’d lost track of how many times my tongue had licked every rippling muscle on his sexy frame. Yeah, it got harder to keep in shape as you got older, but since Ramsey hadn’t ever let himself go, it wasn’t that hard to maintain what he’d always had going on.

There was also the big dick energy that followed him around wherever he went, and with good reason. Even having known no one else, I knew enough to know that Ramsey was very blessed in the package department, and he definitely knew how to use it to get whatever he wanted out of me. Nothing felt like Ramsey being inside me, and that was the addiction that made me justify everything that we’d ever been through.

“Would you like a table or booth?” the hostess asked, hugging the menus to her chest.

“What do you want, baby?” Ramsey asked absently, the question always an automatic one whenever we went anywhere.

“A booth,” I answered, not really caring, but I knew that a booth would give Ramsey what he needed right now.

“Of course,” the hostess replied before leading us through the restaurant until we came up on a booth close to the corner.

Trying not to laugh, I sat down, and Ramsey immediately jerked his head to the side, making me slide to the far end of the seat. I watched the hostess’ brows furrow in confusion while Ramsey unbuttoned his suit jacket before sitting down next to me.

When his hand automatically went to my thigh, our hostess asked, “Oh…uhm, were you expecting someone else? I can grab a couple of more menus-”

“That’s not necessary,” Ramsey said, cutting her off. “We’re not expecting company.”

She awkwardly placed the menus in front of us. “Oh, okay…well, if it’s more comfortable-”

Ramsey put his hand up to stop her rambling. “It’s more comfortable for me to sit next to my wife,” he informed her. “If I’m unable to touch her whenever we’re together, things become unpleasant. So, thank you for your escort and the menus, and she’ll take the cobb salad with the house dressing and a sweet tea. I’ll have a roast beef sandwich with no sides and another sweet tea.”

Her blue eyes just blinked at him in confusion before he grabbed the menus off the table to hand them back to her. To her credit, she recovered quickly enough, grabbing the menus as she said, “Uhm, of course. I’ll…I’ll get right on that.”

“You do that,” Ramsey remarked dryly, and it really was hard not to roll my eyes.

“You know, she’s not our waitress,” I pointed out. “She’s just the hostess.”

“Ask me if I care,” he remarked like an asshole as his hand worked my skirt up to rest on my bare skin.

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