Trish, Just Trish (14 page)

“Tony,” I started to protest, but he lifted
and took me with him, bringing both of us to our knees. His
movements grew faster… faster. His hips worked harder, one hand
squeezed my breast as the other held my face turned to his. Our
kiss never broke and our breathing grew louder, until we both cried
out in pleasure.

“I don’t understand you. You go from wanting
nothing to do with me for two years, to wanting me pregnant,” I
said softly after we calmed. He’s situated himself on his back and
wrapped my body around his. My cheek was on his chest and our legs
tangled. His fingers drew lightly on my shoulder.

“I don’t understand it either, mi reina, but
we’ll figure it out together,” he responded.

Had things been different, I’d probably
already be living here with him on this ranch. We’d be married and
have a least one baby. But things weren’t different.

How would it even work if I got pregnant
with him living here and me back in Clear Lake
?

I wanted things to work between us, I wasn’t
naïve, but if I didn’t try, I’d never know how things could have
turned out. And I’d sworn to myself that I wouldn’t make the same
mistakes I did before. When or if the was going to end, I wanted no
regrets.

“I love you,” I whispered.

His body stiffened and the hand that
caressed my shoulder froze. He heard me and he didn’t say anything
back, but I never expected him to. I wasn’t going analyze this. I
was going to sleep, and in the morning, I was going to regroup.

“Mi reina,” I heard whispered at my ear.
Fingers caressed my cheek and I opened my eyes to meet Tony’s. He
was dressed.

“What time is it?” I asked, still half
asleep.

“It’s ten.”

“In the morning?” I shot up and grasped the
sheets to my chest when they started to fall away. Tony dipped, his
hand wrapped around the back of my neck and he drew me close. He
nibbled at my throat before he pulled away and pushed the hair away
from my face.

He studied me.

“I’ve missed you,” he said, and his fingers
drew down the sheet to expose my body to his eyes. He touched me,
and I when the sweet spot between my legs clenched, I realized just
how sore I was.

I kept quiet.

“I’ve missed waking up to this. I regret not
taking this sooner,” he said, his expression filled with wonder.
“Come on. Have breakfast with me before I leave. I have a meeting
in Houston, so I’ll be gone most of the day and I want to spend
some time with you.”

I must not really be awake.

“Really?”

“Yeah, preciosa. Really.” He stood then,
walked to my dresser and opened two drawers before finding the one
that held my sleep shirts.

“No panties. I want to know you’re bare
under that when I look at you.” He handed me the shirt and bent to
kiss me. His lips lingered. “Do whatever you gotta do. I’ll wait
for you in the kitchen.”

“Okay,” I breathed, completely shocked. I
didn’t know what happened after I fell asleep, but whatever it was,
it was huge… and it scared the shit out of me.

I thought about the sudden change in Tony’s
attitude as I put on my shirt, walked to the bathroom and went
through my morning routine.

By the time I made it to the kitchen, I
still hadn’t figured out the reason for his change.

“I had Larry bring breakfast tacos; ham and
egg,” Tony said and I stopped walking.

He remembered
.

“I didn’t know if they were still your
favorite, so I had Larry bring kolaches too.”

“Thank you,” I said as I stook in the
kitchen entryway.

He caught my confused expression, stood up
from the chair and walked to me.

“It’s going to be okay. We’ll figure this
out,” he said looking down at me like he meant every single word. I
blinked a thousand times to keep myself from crying. I was sick of
crying.

“If you cry again, I won’t like it and it’ll
piss me off,” he grumbled in a tone that said he really didn’t want
me to cry, but the last thing he’d be was pissed. I could only nod.
If I opened my mouth, without a doubt, I’d cry.

We spent the rest of the morning together
and by the time he had to leave for his meeting, I didn’t want him
to go. I just got him back and he was leaving me.

“Do you have to go?” I asked as I leaned
into Tony for a hug.

“I have to finish signing some paperwork
with my attorney. It’s just some things left over from when my dad
passed away. It won’t take long.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” he said.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can, but I want
you to stay in the house.” I opened my mouth, but he kissed away my
protest. “Please. Being in town is one thing, but I’ll be two hours
away and already worried. I’ll go with you to see Starla when I get
back. Shane told me about your deal with her.”

“Is she okay?”

“She’s fine. I told Shane to check on her
this morning so you could sleep in.” He paused to cup my cheek.

“I want to know about your nightmares when I
get home. I won’t forget,” he finished and before I could respond,
he kissed me and walked out the front door.

Only an hour after Tony left, he called.

“Hey,” he said when I answered.

“Hey.”

“I forgot to tell you that I have a delivery
coming at two. Don’t open the door if Larry’s not with them.”

“Uhhh… okay. What’s coming?” I asked, and
thought it was odd that he had to call me about this. Everyone
seemed to take this Zacharias thing a little too far.

“You’ll know when it gets there. Be good.”
He hung up.

I stared at the phone for a minute before
hanging it up.

Be good my ass.

I went through his shit. That’s right, I
went through everything. His room was nice; really nice. He had the
exact same furniture I had in my room, bed, chest and dresser,
except his was a rich mahogany color instead of the oak in mine.
His bed had to be a California King and could easily hold multiple
people.

Don’t even go there!

I glanced in the drawers and found nothing
except boxers, socks and a thousand white T-shirts. His closet was
full; half with flannels, more T-shirts, these colored, and jeans.
The other half of the closet was full of suites and dress clothes
from when he worked at the bank… nothing good in there either.

Turned out, he did have his own bathroom,
but there was nothing in it but a bunch of manly stuff; cologne,
razors and shaving cream. Not that I wanted to find anything bad or
female related, but it made me feel good to know that if he was
having women, or BJ, stay with him, they left nothing personal
behind.

There were two other guest bedrooms and
those passed inspection as well… nothing juicy.

By the time Larry knocked on the door, I was
laid out on the couch catching up with my table-tossing chica,
Teresa on Real Housewives of New Jersey.

“Afternoon,” Larry said when I answered the
door. His southern accents was so cute that I wanted to pinch his
cheeks.

“Come in,” I said, and held the door open
for him. That’s when I got a glimpse of the large moving truck
parked out front. “What’s that for?”

Larry looked back at the truck and then
faced me again. “That’s the mattress Tony made me go all the way
into town to order. Thank gracious he said I could have it
delivered cause that thing there is a monster of a mattress and the
stable boys we got are puny.”

I didn’t hear anything he said after the
word “mattress”.

“What?” I asked just when I saw the movers
get out of the truck.

“Tony bought you a new bed, honey.” Larry
said. I looked in his eyes and knew that he knew the exact reason
for the new mattress. I didn’t know if I should feel embarrassed by
that fact or giddy that Tony remembered and wasted no time trying
to make me feel comfortable in his home.

It only took twenty minutes for them to
replace the old mattress with the new.

“He asked me to give you his credit card,”
Larry informed me randomly as I stood in the kitchen making him a
ham sandwich because he said he was hungry. I was becoming the
modern day Suzy Homemaker staying here.

“Credit card?” I asked and twisted my neck
to look at him.

“Tony said that you should order new bed
things online… well, he didn’t say bed things, but whatever y’all
them things… ya know, sheets and stuff. And he said if you needed
more clothes to order some too.”

I had no words. I really didn’t know what to
make of this. I didn’t need Tony’s money. I had a little saved, but
maybe he thought I didn’t since I lost my job?
Weird
. I
turned back to the task at hand and spoke, “Thanks Larry. I’ll
order a comforter set, but I can pay for it.”

It was his turn to remain quiet for a long
moment. “Uhhh… I wouldn’t do that,” he said uncomfortably and I had
to look at him again.

“Why?”

“Trish, I’ve known Tony since he was a baby
and I can easily tell you that he won’t like it if you pay.”

“I have to tell you, Larry, Tony’s not even
here and he’s ticking me off. What do you mean ‘let me pay’?”

“Now, don’t be angry. I just know that,
being a man myself, if I was trying to do something nice for my
wife and she went ahead and did it for herself, I wouldn’t like it.
Tony’s trying to do something nice for you.” He had a valid
point.

“But I’m not his wife, Larry; I’m his
ex-girlfriend at that,” I said and watched in shock as Larry shook
his head.

“Honey, that boy’s been hung up on you for
years.”

I opened and closed my mouth, but again, I
had no words. I wanted to know exactly what he meant by that, but
Larry was like Tony’s second dad or something. I couldn’t harass
him. So, I nodded my understanding.

Tony didn’t get home until almost seven
o’clock, and when he walked in the front door, I had no idea how to
greet him. The nerves that didn’t consume me this morning were
holding me back now. He’d changed his attitude toward me overnight
and I was uncertain of how he felt about me now.

I stood in the foyer and watched him watch
me.

“What’s wrong?” he asked with sincere
concern.

“Thank you for replacing the mattress,” was
the first thing out of my mouth.

He ignored that, closed and locked the front
door behind him, and headed straight for me. His hand wrapped
around the back of my neck and he tilted my head back to give me a
soft, yet deep closed mouth kiss. His hand untangled from my hair
and his thumb touched the apple of my cheek.

“What’s wrong?”

“I was worried you’d be back to hating me
again,” I answered truthfully and I hated to see him close his
eyes.

“I don’t hate you, Trish; far from it,” he
responded before sealing his lips over mine once more. His arms
wrapped around my back and he lifted me to my toes to deepen the
kiss.

When we finally broke free, I wasn’t hungry
for food.

“I made dinner if you’re hungry,” I
breathed.

“Who knew there was a domesticated Trish in
there,” he said through a huge smile. It hit me like a sack of
potatoes when I saw it. It was the first time I’d seen him smile
like that since I arrived.

I threw myself at him. He took a step back,
caught himself and I smashed my mouth against his.

When I finally let him go, he asked, “What
was that all about?”

“I missed your smile.”

He smiled again and I knew it was just for
me. “Come on.” He grabbed my hand. “Let’s go eat before it gets too
cold.”

After dinner, Tony walked with me to the
stable to check on Starla. Poor girl was in so much pain. I talked
to her and petted her while Tony watched.

When we got back to the house, Tony asked if
I wanted to watch a movie since it was still pretty early.

“Can we watch G.I. Jane?” I asked as I
looked through the movie selection.

“You really want to watch G.I. Jane?” he
asked with genuine interest.

“Well, just so you know, I have a major girl
crush on Demi Moore. The first time I saw that movie I was fifteen
and Lex dared me to try the one handed push-up thing. I fell flat
on my face.”

I smiled at the memory. “Lex called the
paramedics because my nose was gushing blood. It wasn’t funny at
first because it hurt so damn bad, but Lex was flipping out, and
crying…” I shook my head. “Good times,” I finished, still
smiling.

“I’m curious about this one-handed push-up.
I think you should show me,” Tony said through his own smile and I
waved the idea away with my hand.

“And break my face… I don’t think so.”

Tony thought on that. “Now that I think
about it, I’d hate to see anything happen to that adorable little
nose of yours.” He bent and kissed the tip. “Go put it on and I’ll
pull out the sofa bed,” he said, and I felt that stupid tingly
feeling all throughout my body like a giddy teenager. I didn’t want
to feel it, but I couldn’t stop it.

Tony walked away to get the blankets from my
bed, and as soon as he came back, right in the middle of the
previews, he undressed me. I undressed him and we got in bed.

I was still a little sore, but not enough to
stop this from happening. Tony had propped the pillows up behind
our backs so we were half-way sitting up. His arm was wrapped
around my shoulders, my head was on his chest, my arm draped over
his stomach and my leg thrown over his. We watched the movie.

That was all we did for the first half.

I took a quick glance in his direction and
his eyes were locked on the T.V. I couldn’t pay attention to it so
I lifted my hand to his chest and traced circles with my fingers. I
did this for a while until I bitched up let my hand travel down his
rock hard stomach. When I made it to the top of the sheet that
covered his waist, I peeked at him.