Page 27 of Billion-Dollar Attitudes

Our bodies writhed against each other rolling in motion like the waves hitting the shore. As his lips parted from mine his breath increased and I clung to him, biting gently into his shoulder as my orgasm reached closer to its peak. Our bodies moved without thought. He lowered his head to my shoulder, pressing his mouth into the crook of my neck as he thrust faster and faster, his breath sliding down my skin. I gripped tightly to his shoulder as he erupted, taking me right along. My body heaved against his, and he pulled me tightly to him as our passion intertwined, surging through every part of my body.

I shut my eyes tightly, feeling him pulsing inside of me as I clenched and shook beneath him. As we circled around our ecstasy, finally relaxing into each other, I kissed his shoulder and enjoyed his arms still tightly holding me, our bodies still one. After catching our breaths, he slowly rolled to the side, pulling me against him. He kissed the top of my head and looked down at me, a sparkle in his beautiful eyes. Everything in me wanted him to know my secret right then and there. Everything in me wanted to have no more lies between us, to have nothing but clear air and a future, but I knew it wasn’t the right moment. I wasn’t even sure there was a right moment anymore.

“What are you thinking about?” he asked.

I shook the thought from my head and chuckled. “Isn’t that supposed to be my line?”

He smirked. “You just looked so deep in thought.”

I shook my head. “No. Just content. Comfortable. Safe.”

He kissed my head again and let out a deep sigh. “Good. Hopefully in the future keeping you girls safe won’t include an ass whooping, but I’d take it if I need to.”

I poked out my bottom lip. “Poor thing. You literally will be that little girl’s hero forever. She might not remember why when she gets older. But she’ll remember you being there when she was scared.”

“I’d do anything to keep you safe. And besides, it gets me naked with you, so hell yeah.”

Laughing, I rolled my eyes, turning on my back with his arm beneath me. “I was really shocked when I turned around and saw you standing in the doorway of that office.”

He burst into laughter. “I almost peed in my flip flops.”

“Of all the things to happen,” I replied with a smirk. “Of all the companies for me to get a job. Of all the cities and office buildings.”

“Fate,” he replied.

The word echoed through my head over and over again. I never believed in anything like that, but it was so much of a coincidence, and our connection was so strong, that it was hard not to think some cosmic, deep seeded, fate had twisted our lives so that we would come back together at this time. When we were these people, both ready for life, both forgetting until we saw each other that we were already in it. This was life.

And I had made a huge mess of it. That was for damn sure. I wanted to groan and curl into a self pity ball, but I stayed clinging to Daniel, feeling his breath as he drifted off to sleep. I wasn’t long after him, feeling the warmth of the blankets and the cool ocean breeze trickling over my sun burnt skin. I should have closed the windows, but it was all too perfect.

I fell into a deep dreamless sleep, waking what felt like days later. However as I opened my eyes I could see, it was still dark outside. I reached my arm out to the side but found an empty bed next to me. I turned my head, startled by the lack of comfort in Daniel’s arms, and then paused, hearing voices from the living room. I carefully got out of bed and slipped on a tank top and sleep shorts before poking my head out, seeing the gleaming of the television from the living room. I tiptoed to the back of the couch and looked down, having to forcefully stop myself from cooing at what I found.

Daniel was lying on the couch with Harper lying, dead asleep on his chest. Both were passed out, not even hearing me creep in. Harper’s body moved up and down to Daniel’s rising and falling breath. She looked so very tiny next to him. It seemed I wasn’t the only one comforted by him. She must have woken up in the middle of the night and he got up with her without waking me.

My heart rippled in my chest as I took the throw and laid it overtop of them. They even looked the same when they slept, their foreheads slightly wrinkled, their mouths just a tiny bit parted. His hair was wild and all over the place, and hers was too, only longer. He was holding her hand and she was clutching her little fist around his thumb, barely able to close her hand around it.

Instantly regret came over me. Had I robbed Harper of the last almost four years of a man like that in her life?

No.

Daniel had grown up. Even though I didn’t know him well back then, I could tell he had grown leaps and bounds from the wild college boy scratching and clawing to get out of college and start his life. He was comfortable in who he was. He was settled. The wild streak was probably still there, but he chose to sleep on a couch with a little girl who he didn’t even know was his, protect a woman that had pushed back against his emotional advances, then go party with all the rest on the beach in the middle of summer.

Still, watching them sleeping I couldn’t help but wonder what could have been, and what the future would hold for us. I knew earlier that night that there was no question about it. If I could save our relationship, I would. I didn’t know how to tell the truth about Harper, or when, but I did know I couldn’t imagine not having Daniel in our lives. We had been connected for the last four years, even if neither of us realized it.

Maybe we were fated.

Maybe it was the universe bringing together what should have been.

Maybe happiness as a family isn’t as crazy as I once thought.

No matter what the reason, I wasn’t sure that even fate could keep us together if he found out my secret. I wasn’t sure that kind of betrayal could ever be forgiven. I did what I thought was right, and it probably was the right choice then. But now things were different. I just feared I had let it all progress far too beyond the reckoning point to not destroy both him and myself.

I headed back to bed with heavy thoughts, hoping the warm kiss of the morning sun would bring more clarity because my heart was already breaking.

Chapter Eighteen

Sicily

So, I’m going to head over to the rental and pack up my stuff and my driver is meeting me there. There’s a whole lot of food in the house and the renters told me to take whatever I wanted with me because the housekeeping crew won’t be able to get out until next week. They don’t want the food to rot.”

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