Page 71 of Hale's Pawn
I roll my eyes. “Why does everyone think I can’t cook? I was a belle, dammit. Anyway, besides all that, I have something to give you!” I say excitedly. “Wait right here.” I run up the stairs and retrieve what I need.
I make it downstairs and Oran is trying to sneak a cupcake. He sees me and winks. I laugh and exchange the cupcake for the envelope. “Here.”
Oran gives me a look and opens it up. He reads through it but says nothing. The silence is deafening, so I decide to talk. “I know that it’s not much of a present, but I wanted to get you something different. Bethany J’s Home for Abused Women and Children and men too, they have their own home, but I just… I thought that this would be a great way to remember her, and Jamie too,” I say.
“Jamie?” Jagger asks.
“Yeah, that’s what the J stands for. I know about the heart, Jagger. I know who it belonged to. Maybe that’s why no matter how hard I try to fight you, we always seem to not hate each other as much as we say. I’ll always be grateful to Jamie and your entire family for giving me a second chance to live. I won’t fail him, Jags. I promise.” Jagger has this look in his eyes and before I know it, he hugs me tight.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?” Jagger asks.
“Because you wouldn’t have treated me normally. You wouldn’t have fought with me or anything else. You would have treated me like a fragile thing. I just wanted a normal childhood.”
“Dammit, Ains…” Jagger hugs me even tighter and I hug him back for the first time ever.
“You’re crushing me,” I whine and he lets go, but I don’t get a chance to relax because Oran pulls me into a hug so warm and tight, I can’t complain.
“Thank you, baby. Thank you for this. For the birthday surprise and everything else. I won’t ever forget it. I love you.”
I smile. “Wait! One more thing.” I let go of him and go back to the pantry where I had to hide the damn gift or else Oran would have noticed ii there. I grab the huge poster and walk back with it. “Here,”
Oran cocks a brow and looks at the poster covered in black wrapping paper. “Should I guess or open it?”
“What do you think?” I say sarcastically.
Oran smirks and unwraps it slowly. He doesn’t say anything, just sucks in a breath. He looks up at me sharply and then back down at the poster. Jagger whistles as he takes in the whole picture and Karessa gives me a double thumbs up, letting me know it’s a great gift. I smile. Oran still hasn't said anything and this is the second time he’s hushed up with his gifts. “Who took the picture?” Oran asks.
I shake my head and try not to laugh. “It was a female photographer, like I always use, Oran. I figured you wanted another one to hang up in your walk-in.” I wink.
Oran grins from ear to ear. He sort of says something, but I can’t hear him right because it’s like he’s grunting his words. Like, did he forget how to speak? Jagger chuckles. I move closer and look at the picture of myself again. I got inspiration from Tupac’s bathtub picture, but instead of gold jewelry, we used orange rose petals to cover my private area. I’m in a tub full of orange petals and bath foam. My legs are hanging over the sides of the tub, my breasts are bare and they can be seen very easily. One of my hands is buried in my hair as if I’m pulling it and I have a finger in my mouth. All in all, I’m staring at the camera. The caption at the bottom is borrowed from the title of Ariana Grande’s song God is a Woman.
“I love you more than you think, Oran. Happy birthday, old man,” I say to him.
That snaps him out of whatever he was thinking about as he looks at me. Oran does something unexpected, he wraps his hand around my throat and my eyes flutter as I stand on the tips of my toes. Oran chuckles. “See how good your rewards are when you treat me just as good as I treat you?” he teases, and before I can say a word, he pulls me in for a scorching kiss that has me gripping his wrists with both hands. Oran takes it up a notch and lifts me off the floor a bit. I moan into his mouth and then he switches the kiss to so tender that I whimper. He reluctantly lets me go. “You’ll regret that old man jab later,” he taunts. He places me on my feet and gives me a quick peck, and instead of stopping, he does it two more times. “Let’s go get some grub, baby,” he says pulling me towards the table.
ORAN
As if my birthday couldn’t get any better, the next day, I get to wake Ainslee up as early as I want. The first thing that’s done is I make her go on a morning run with me.
“Oran…” Ainslee calls my name.
I turn around and slow down as I run backwards. For someone who can kick ass, Ainslee is not a runner. She looks at me like she wants to knock me out. I take a page out of her book and I pull my cell out. I record her struggling to get to me. “Come on, baby, it’s not even that bad. Look, I stopped and I’ll wait for you, then this is over,” I coax her.
Ainslee’s eyes light up and she runs towards me but as she gets close, I run again. “Baaaabe!” she cries out and I laugh hard. I stop running and I can’t stop laughing.
“Okay, okay, I’ll be good. I promise.” I capture her little pout that she always has and then I stop recording as soon as she makes it to me. “See, I always keep my word.” I kiss the top of her head as we begin walking towards the villa.
Ainslee shoves me and I put my phone away. “Run,” I say and Ainslee takes off, laughing as I chase her. I catch her right as she’s about to open the door.
Ainslee laughs hard and I turn her to face me. I capture her lips in a kiss, pushing her against the door. I groan into her mouth as her hands find their way into my hair. I pull away and kiss her a couple of times before letting her go. “We’ve got shit to do, baby, let’s go.”
We make it in the villa and we get ready for our day. I decide to show Ainslee that she can share our lives a little by posting the video of her as my story on Instagram. I learned that trick from Jagger. I make it even worse for her because she thought I forgot about her provocative posts. A picture for a picture. I move to the bathroom where she’s showering. The shower is foggy so you can’t really see her. I stand in front of the mirror with my white shirt clinging to my upper body and I snap the picture. I try to think of a clever caption and the only thing I can think of was a simpleHale’s Pawn. There’s multiple meanings to it, but mine is simple; although it’s rare to see a pawn checkmate, they surely can. Ainslee thought I was her pawn, but she’s mine. To move diagonally or directly, either way it doesn’t matter, because my pawn can only move forward.
I take Ainslee sailing and I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so animated before. I’ve now promised to do it as much as I can with her. Teaching her isn’t as easy with this little-ass leopard print two-piece bikini, but I do my best. After that, I let Ainslee experience my love for water sports, from the jetpack to jet skiing, hoverboarding on the water, and her all time favorite one now, subwinging. Basically like flying underwater.
By the time we get back to the villa, Ainslee is wiped out. She’s still bouncing on her feet like the Energizer Bunny, but just at a lower rate. “Hey guys,” Karessa and Jagger greet us.
“Hey!”Ainslee says with excitement. “Girl! I had so much fun. I tried all these different water sports. You ever been subwinging?”
