HIS (A Billionaire Romance Novel) (29 page)
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Authors: Kat Jackson
NINETEEN
Paris
is cold in the winter. You never really think about that when you’re looking at pretty pictures of the Eiffel Tower and the quaint, narrow streets paved with cobblestones. It all looks so warm and inviting, and yet here I was, being forced toward shelter by the crisp and biting wind stinging my dark skin.
The dress wasn’t helping.
I shuffled up the steps of the huge church in the sheer, but billowing white folds of cloth. It draped beautifully over my frame, but did nothing to hide my obvious pregnancy. The strapless bodice was especially troublesome, as it exposed my expanding cleavage to the frigid air. At this point, I would have traded the whole outfit for a pair of yoga pants and one of Nathan’s big stretchy white t-shirts.
It was my fault, of course. I was the idiot who had to go outside for a breath of fresh air just a few minutes before the wedding. I’d taken on the Irish mafia, almost single-handedly dismantled a sex-trafficking ring, and exposed the corruption running rampant through my city’s police department, and yet nothing seemed so terrifying as walking up the steps and through the doors toward my destiny.
Everyone was waiting inside to start, cradled in the warmth of the cathedral. I was happy to see them, and obviously elated to be there, but this had all happened so fast… Was I ready? Could we truly be a family?
I thought back to everything that had led up to this moment. Unsurprisingly, Nathan didn’t want me returning to the force after I’d recovered, especially once I’d testified against the Captain. Right or wrong, cops looked after their own, and there was enough corruption to ensure I’d never see another promotion—or worse, that backup might not arrive next time I needed it. He told me I could oversee his security team, but that was just an excuse to keep me close while he found a suitable ring.
And what a ring it was.
I glanced down, the oversized diamond sparkling wildly in the colored light that streamed down from the stained glass windows. It was a platinum band with a sixteen-carat monstrosity situated right in the center of it. I wasn’t the kind of girl who spent her life dreaming of her wedding day, but on the occasions in which I had contemplated it, I never once imagined I’d have a ring or a dress as beautiful as this. Sure, it had to be custom-tailored to fit over my eight month pregnant belly, but that was a problem money
could
solve.
I looked away from the ring and toward the people staring expectantly at me from the pews. This was it. My moment. I almost laughed at the beauty of it all.
Everyone turned to watch as I stepped onto the red carpet leading to the altar. The organ began to play its marching tune, filling the space with warm, reverberating tones that disturbed the butterflies once lying dormant in my stomach.
Here comes the bride…
I tried not to look at the crowd, instead focusing on the man waiting for me just a few feet away. Nathan looked incredible. He was standing at the end of the aisle, that goddamn smirk spread wide across his handsome face, shifting in anticipation as he watched me steadily approach. I’d gotten used to looking at his thousand-dollar suits and his shoes that cost more than my car, but this was on a whole other level. There wasn’t a stitch on his clothing that had been made by a machine. It wasn’t just hand-tailored; it was molded, every fiber of the cloth handcrafted for this very moment. Ours were a pair of outfits suitable for a prince and a princess, worn by a billionaire and an ex-detective who wasn’t quite ready to wear several million dollars’ worth of diamond jewelry and a dress too pretty to sit down in.
I took my first step toward him, clutching my bouquet to my chest. I didn’t have a father to give me away. He’d left while I was still in elementary school, which either was because of, or had led to my mother’s addiction—I’d been too young to tell. Only a few distant relatives had come in his stead, and as much as I appreciated their support, I wasn’t about to let my uncle’s third cousin walk me down the aisle. Like everything else in life, if I was going to do this, then I was going to do it alone.
A certain solemnity hit me, just for a moment. I wished my mother could’ve been here, and Jenny—or at least, the versions of them I held so near and dear to my heart. In my mind’s eye, they were always sober, happy, and at peace, always living the best days of their lives. Nothing could have made this day any more perfect except for their smiling faces beaming at me from the pews. I felt a pang of regret sting my heart as I envisioned them doing just that.
I couldn’t let them bring my moment down. Nathan and I had decided back in that shitty Peachtree Overlook apartment that there was no use in hanging on to ancient history. We couldn’t change what had happened back then to either of us, but we could certainly change our futures.
That was what I was moving toward now, I realized: my future. My heart swelled as I began to step toward him in time with the music, tears brimming in my eyes as I let go of my guilt. I walked away from the ghosts of my mother and Jenny, and I reached out for Nathaniel Hale.
With every step, the one that followed seem to come even easier. I walked past the rich and the famous and the row of cameras capturing the event for the evening news. A real Cinderella tale, they’d say: a pretty detective from the Bronx finding her billionaire prince. They’d talk about how lucky I was.
And they’d be wrong.
Nathan Hale was the lucky one. He’d found the woman who could love him for all of his strengths and all of his flaws—of which there were many, I reminded myself with a grin. He’d found someone who could satisfy his most secret desires and make his dreams come true.
That was why I was marrying him. I was doing this because every single day, he made me feel like I was worth all of this. Every challenge we faced, big or small, every danger we’d overcome and every dollar spent—I was worth it.
And I couldn’t have loved him more.
His eyes sparkled with the same tears I was holding back as I stepped up onto the platform. The priest said the words that would bind us for all eternity, but I wasn’t paying attention. My whole world consisted only of the one man who had become a bigger part of it than I had ever anticipated. When Nathan whispered his “I do,” it barely even registered. My reply was just as simple, the two words slipping out breathlessly and effortlessly from my lips.
The priest closed his book. I could hear the smile in his words as he said, “You may now kiss the bride.”
We collided, the world melting away in that moment as our lips made their first contact as husband and wife. Everything around us was simply a farce. The fairy tale wedding, the dress and the church and the pretty faces—none of it mattered. The only real thing was
this,
our love and passion. Nathaniel Hale belonged to me, and I to him, and as our kiss stretched on and on, I was in no hurry to return to reality.
Everything else could have gone to shit. The church could have burned down around us, for all I cared. This was perfection, and nothing could ever compare.
“I love you, Sandra,” Nathan said, his lips finally parting from mine.
“I love you too,” I whispered in reply, smiling as I stared into his glittering eyes. “Now, can we get out of here before these cameras see things unfit for broadcast?”
“What about everybody else?” Nathan said, glancing past me at the crowd as if he hadn’t noticed them before.
“We’re in Paris,” I replied, laughing. “Let them eat wedding cake.”
Everyone in the room erupted into cheers as Nathan lifted me from the floor, my billowing white dress pouring over his strong arms as he carried me to the doors at the side of the cathedral.
“Well, don’t just stand there,” Nathan shouted over the noise. “Grab some champagne and enjoy the party!”
The room cheered again as we burst through the doors and into a short hallway leading to a sunlit path. Cold wind bit into me again, now infiltrating from beneath my dress as Nathan carried me outside the church. I shivered in his arms, but quickly found myself thrust into the backseat of a long, black limousine that was waiting for us. The heated seats immediately brought relief to the chills sweeping through me.
Nathan just stood there at the door, letting the cold in as he stared at me, my legs awkwardly kicked up over the seat. I leaned forward, grabbing at his tie and pulling him in through the door, laughing as the chauffeur closed it behind us. Nathan tried valiantly to get the blacked-out divider up as the amused driver looked on. The window was closing too slowly as I ripped at Nathan’s belt, straddling him in my dress and lowering myself around his raging erection.
“Slow down,” he chuckled. “We have all night and if you’re not careful, we’ll have a baby with French citizenship...” He gripped me and moaned, shuddering as our bodies once again came together, though this time felt like it meant so much more than the last.
“You didn’t marry a slow girl,” I playfully replied, rocking my hips and driving him deep within my yearning body. He grunted softly, his hands gliding up my back to pull at the laces holding my bodice in place. “Besides, a marriage isn’t official until you consummate it.”
“What is this, the sixteenth century?” Nathan said, laughing even as I drew myself against him and worked his throbbing shaft with every ounce of my being. The sensation of his cock slipping inside drove me wild. The fire between us only flared brighter as we explored our newly formed marital bonds.
“Just make love to me, Nathan,” I told him, placing my hand gingerly on his cheek. “No witty comments. No stupid grins that you can hide behind. Take me like it’s the very first time. Make me yours all over again.”
We reveled in each other’s passion, basking in the knowledge that we would be together forever. A love like this didn’t come to an end. Though I didn’t say it out loud, I knew in my heart that not even death could separate us.
I moved on top of him, steady and slow, gasping as he finally freed my breasts from their fabric prison. He buried his face between the swollen mounds, carefully kissing and touching, gingerly lapping at my sensitive nipples until they hardened under his tongue. For once he was letting me have control. It was how I knew that I
really
had him. He had finally surrendered to me as much as I had to him.
He tugged dress up and off my body, revealing my pregnant nakedness. He moaned, watching me ride him ever so slowly. I dug my nails into his shoulders and pressed my forehead against his, on the verge of collapsing as my new husband drove me to the brink of orgasm.
“I love you,” I breathed, shivering as a telltale current jolted through me, heralding my impending orgasm. I bit my lip, looking lustfully into his eyes. “I don’t think I can hold back, Nathan…”
“Don’t,” he commanded me, “You don’t ever have to hold back with me, Sandra. I love you. And that’s never, ever going to change.”
I let myself go, staring out the window at the streets of Paris as our bodies blended into one. I knew this wasn’t the end.
This was only the beginning.
I wanted to say thank you to all my lovely readers for all of your wonderful comments, reviews, and e-mails. I sincerely hope you’ve enjoyed this book as much as I enjoyed writing it!
Renowned bestselling author Kat Jackson is back with another full-length steamy romance novel!
Madison
I can’t be doing this… Not now… Not with him.
Preston Harvey is a wealthy asshole. He’s the living symbol of everything I hate in this world. I wouldn’t sleep with him if he were the last person on Earth.
Except… I just did.
I have a sickness… A
fixation
.
Preston
We are so fucked.
Our parents are engaged for Christ’s sake. Somebody is going to find out we’re doing this and there will be hell to pay...
When I gave Madison a job as my personal assistant, this was
not
the position I had in mind for my
soon-to-be-step
…
And now I can’t stop. I can’t ever stop…
I want this…
And a billionaire always gets what he wants.
This is a stand-alone novel with a HEA and does NOT end in a cliffhanger!
“I can’t do this,” I told her. “I can’t pretend like last night never happened. I need you, Madison, and not in the way that a brother needs his stepsister.”
I began lifting up the hem, revealing the creamy white tops of her thighs inch by inch until finally, I caught a glimpse of her underwear. I pulled my cock out and nestled it against her crotch. I felt my balls seize and I snarled in her ear. “I could blow my load right here, Maddy. I could soak these panties before dinner, and your mother and my father wouldn’t know a thing. You’d spend the whole night with my cum staining your panties... That’s what you do to me. You make me want to do the nastiest fucking things to you.”
Maddy shivered and looked up at me with hooded eyes. “Preston… Jesus, we can’t. What we did last night was wrong. I wanted it… We wanted it… But you know it can’t happen again.”
I pulled her panties open, letting the tip of my dick violate the space between them and her sweet, soaking wet lips. I thrust, overwhelmed by the sensation of being so near to her, of feeling my bulging head slip around in her honeyed nectar. “It has to,” I whispered. “Every time I look at you, all I want to do is get inside you again.”
I was so close. But Madison gently, yet firmly took me by the wrist. I could see lust in her eyes, but there was something else too. Maybe it was self-restraint…
“We can’t,” she repeated, and this time there was no “maybe” in her tone. I withdrew and she let her fingers brush mine. “I’m sorry, Preston, but think of what could happen if we got caught…”
I nodded. As frustrated as I was, she made sense. But dammit, I didn’t want her to make sense! All I wanted was to throw caution to the wind and bury myself in my darling little stepsister.
She fixed her skirt and helped tuck my cock back inside my pants, her hand lingering on its straining girth longer than she needed to.
“Let’s hope there’s wine tonight,” I said as her fingertips left me, her graceful body moving around the car and sliding into the passenger seat.
“I think I’m going to need it,” Maddy replied, trying to avoid my gaze as I sat down beside her. We didn’t say another word as her hand found its way to my thigh, giving me a reassuring squeeze.
A drink was definitely going to be required. Maybe a little buzz would help me forget, but as we drove, all I could do was try to ignore the heat radiating from her fingertips. My mind drifted, traveling back to the day she ran into me on the street with those big beautiful tears in her eyes… So perfect… So broken…