“What are you talking about?” Eva’s tone brought my gaze back to her face. She was watching me with suspicion. I tried to smile innocently, but it backfired because she only seemed even more distrustful. I searched for something to say, a way to explain away my comment, but came up blank. “Tucker Carrington,” she hissed, “were you the reason I couldn't get a second date in high school?”
I cleared my throat and glanced around; this was not the place to have this conversation. “Let’s go home and I’ll make you some lunch,” I cajoled with my most charming smile.
Eva looked as though she was about to argue, but then she looked around as well and simply nodded. I helped her don her jacket, then took her hand as we made our way to the exit.
Once we arrived home, I guided her to one of the islands in the kitchen and boosted her up onto a stool. She was quiet while I gathered the ingredients to make her favorite cold pasta salad. Finally, she broke the silence. “Don’t think making my favorite food and looking all sexy while doing it is going to get you out of this discussion, Tucker,” she announced.
“Fuck,” I sighed in a low enough voice that she didn’t hear it. “Yes, I ran off the punks you chose to date in high school,” I admitted, a little louder. “In my defense,” I quickly added, “you were always choosing spineless little shits.”
“I think I owe Trevor an apology,” she mused before her head snapped up, and she glared at me. “What do you mean I picked the wrong guys?”
“First, not one of those little fuckers fought for you,” I explained as I finished up her lunch and set a bowl of pasta in front of her. “Second, if I hadn’t done it, Trevor or Justice would have.” Yeah, I was throwing my best friend and surrogate uncle under the bus, and I didn’t feel a second of guilt. Mostly because it was true.
Eva gasped. “Even my dad knew?”
I grinned and nodded. “Pretty sure it gained me some brownie points for when I told them I was going to marry you.”
“I’m going to kill them,” she muttered as she shoveled a bite in her mouth and moaned.
I clenched my jaw and grabbed to the edge of the island, squeezing so hard that my knuckles turned white. Being married for three months hadn’t done shit to help my raging desire for my wife, and that little sound had me fighting the need to lay her out on the counter and eat her pussy until she was screaming my name.
“It’s in the past, baby—”
“Wait.” Eva interrupted me, her head cocked to the side, and her face adorably screwed up in concentration. “You left for London the summer before my junior year, and...it didn’t stop after high school.” Her eyes found mine, and I considered going for innocent again, but what was the point? I wasn’t ashamed of what I’d done to protect Eva, or the lengths I went to in order to make sure that she would always be mine. I shrugged and leaned my elbows on the counter, bringing our faces inches apart. “I told you, baby. I was never far from you.”
“B-but…you were in London,” she sputtered.
I grinned and winked at her. “It’s amazing what money can buy. My eyes were always on you in some way or another. I have always and will always protect what’s mine.”
“Eyes? Like bodyguards and stuff?” She wrinkled her nose in such a cute way that I had to place a kiss on the tip.
“Yes.” I was about to confess to the cameras and hacking to security feeds but thought better of it after a moment. She didn’t need to know every single detail, right? Nor did I think it was the best time to confess that I still had eyes on her all the time. “Among other things,” I hedged. “Eva-bear, you are what I live for. The reason I keep breathing. If I hadn’t been close to you in some way, I would have lost my fucking mind. And if any man had touched you—” I break off and ball my hands into fists and growled, my mind imagining the painful death of any motherfucker who dared to lay a finger on my Eva.
She sighed and shook her head, but her cheeks bloomed with pink and the corners of her lips curved up. “Such a caveman,” she muttered as she went back to eating. When she didn’t say anything more, I raised a brow and watched her in silence. She eventually looked up from her food and smiled at my questioning expression. “I know your level of obsession with me could probably be considered unhealthy.” The flush of her skin darkened, and her eyes flashed with heat. “And I know I shouldn’t, but for some reason, I think it's sexy as fuck.”
“Language, baby,” I gritted in reprimand. Although the rigid nature of my muscles wasn’t from anger, I was trying to keep myself from losing complete control and fucking her like an animal on the kitchen floor.
“Oops.” She didn’t look the least bit contrite.
I stalked around the island until I was standing between her thighs. My hands palmed her ass, and I yanked her forward, pressing my hard cock against her pussy. “Are you trying to get yourself a blistered ass, Eva-bear?” It turned my girl wild when I spanked her ass or her pussy. Which could have made it a less effective punishment, but when I turned her tender globes bright red, she felt it every time she sat down the next day. Still, she liked to provoke me and knew exactly how to push my buttons.
Eva’s legs curled around the backs of my thighs, and her arms went around my neck, pillowing her perfect tits against my chest. She buried her face in my neck, and a second later, I felt the sting of a bite. “Maybe,” she whispered.
I was suddenly starving. “Are you done eating, baby?” I rasped as all of the blood in my body rushed south. She nodded, causing her silky hair to get caught in my scruff. “Good. My turn.” I carried her out of the kitchen and up to our bedroom where I spent the next several hours feasting until I was sated. I knew I would never have my fill of her, but it wouldn’t stop me from trying.
Epilogue
Eva
One year later
Our moms had quickly taken Tucker up on his offer to plan the wedding of my dreams. They were so excited that they’d gotten right to work on it the same day we got married. They’d been forced to wait a year to pull it off, though, because the little joke I’d pulled on Tucker when we got married turned out to be prophetic when we realized I’d gotten pregnant right away. Not that it was much of a surprise, considering how many times my husband pumped his come into me.
Since I’d refused to have my fancier—but not more romantic because nothing could top the moment Tucker stood up to my dad at the courthouse—wedding with a rounded belly, we decided to make it a vow renewal for our one-year anniversary. It was a good thing we hadn’t put it off any longer because I had one heck of an anniversary present for my sexy hubby, and I couldn’t wait to share it with him. But first, we had to get through this round of toasts before we could take the dance floor for our first “official” dance as a married couple.
My father-in-law stood and winked at us before beginning. “When I first realized my oldest son was falling for Eva”—Tucker’s frantic expression made me giggle because I knew he was freaked out by the possibility that my dad and brother would realize exactly how young I’d been—“I was a little worried about how it might impact the bond between our families if their relationship didn’t work out.”