Page 178 of Forbidden Billionaires: Vol. 2
I was pretty sure my favorite thing in the world was waking up with my limbs tangled up with his. I smiled and opened my eyes, staring at my husband. I was still getting used to thinking of him as my husband. He’d barely ever been my boyfriend, but he’d been my fiancé for a long time. And now? My husband. I loved him more than ever.
The morning light coming through the blinds made his skin almost glow. And there were shadows from his eyelashes, dusting across his cheeks. I didn’t care how unmasculine he thought my adjectives were. James Hunter was gorgeous. I ran my fingers along his tattoo, tracing the heartbeats. And then my hand wandered to his ribcage. I felt the scar beneath my index finger. I moved my hand lower, brushing my fingertips against the scar on his stomach. His perfect abs marred by the raised skin.
But I didn’t see it as a flaw. Just like the tattoo he’d gotten as his wedding gift to me, these scars were proof that he’d fought his way back to me. Fought his way back to the life he’d promised me. A life filled with love and laughter and us. I ran my finger along the scar on his bicep too.
Three scars. Three chances for him to stop breathing. But he’d kept breathing for me. I’d almost lost him. I’d almost never known what it was like to be his wife. And ever since then…I hadn’t taken a day for granted. Not one. I was going to take advantage of these next few months where we were still just the two of us.Us against the world.
James slowly opened his eyes and smiled at me. “Good morning, beautiful.”
I let my hand fall from his bicep. I knew he wanted to pretend it never happened. He didn’t want me to notice that every now and then he got out of breath. Or had to pause in doing something. James wasn’t weak. And I had no problem ignoring those moments, knowing that doing so was giving him more strength to keep going. He was a fighter. And I loved him for coming back to me. “Good morning, handsome.”
He reached out, pushing a strand of hair out of my face. “What do you want to do today?” he asked with a yawn.
He was doing so much better. But I still thought he should sleep in more. Give his body more time to heal. “You should sleep in.”
“I’m not tired anymore.” He grabbed my ass, pulling me into his side.
I laughed. “But I have a million things to do today.”
He pressed his lips together. “What happened to taking weekends off?”
We’d gotten into a good rhythm over the past couple of months. And that involved leaving work for the weekdays. It was the one rule we had in our house. No work on the weekends. The weekends were lazy days walking around Central Park or spent in bed. But not sleeping. No, we never got much sleeping done when we stayed in bed all day. I bit the inside of my lip, thinking about all the sinful things we’d already done last night. He’dsuccessfully gotten his hat trick. And as much as I wanted to repeat that…
“I have to call Justin,” I said. “Rob and Daphne are getting married in two weeks. It’s practically an emergency situation.”
James yawned again. “Isn’t that kind of their job to do all the planning?”
“You’re going to be his best man.” I lightly shoved his shoulder. “Which means you have to help. This planning is going to take an army to pull off. They’ll need all the help they can get.”
“Rob hasn’t asked me to be his best man,” James said.
“He will.”
“He might ask Matt.”
Was that a twinge of jealousy in his voice? “Nope. I don’t think so.”
“Technically they’re best friends,” James said.
“Brother trumps best friend. Trust me.”
James laughed. “How would you know? You don’t have any siblings.”
“You wound me, good sir.”
James smiled.
“I think of Rob as a brother. And I’m sure I won’t be Daphne’s maid of honor. But I can probably squeeze in as a bridesmaid since it’s so last minute. So I have bridesmaid duties.”
“She hasn’t asked you.”
“Pessimist.” I stuck my tongue out at him.
“The things I want that tongue to do this morning. Come back to bed.”
“Just let me give Justin a quick call. To at least set things in motion. Rob and Daphne need us. Even if they don’t realize it yet.” I climbed out of bed and grabbed my phone off the nightstand.
I clicked on Justin’s name and lifted the phone to my ear. He answered in two rings.
