“Baby steps. We can’t dive in all at once. We are just at the reuniting stage of this story. Let’s take a moment to enjoy it.”
“And where? Where are we supposed to have this luxurious wedding?” she continued, not wanting to take my suggestion. Obviously her mind was operating at a million miles a minute, not that I blamed her.
“In New Orleans,” I said without pause. “At The Audubon Manor where we spent so many of our vacations. We loved it there.”
“Why not France or London? Or doesn’t your father want it to be—”
“My father has no say in what I do or where I get married,” I interrupted a little too harshly. “I have no intentions of leaving New Orleans. They can come to us.”
“This all seems unreal,” she said softly.
“Everything about our lives is unreal, Cheri. You know this. Nothing has changed.”
Cheri yawned and snuggled into my body. “I’m really tired,” she said against my chest. I tightened my arm around her tiny frame and pulled her in closer. “I just need to sleep. I can’t take this all in right now.”
Kissing the top of her head, feeling a bit disappointed that I couldn’t ravish her body again before sleeping, I said, “Yes, sleep, love.” Positioning my body to also get some sleep, I smiled when I could already hear the deep breathing of her peaceful slumber.
Chapter Five
Cheri
I was pretty sure I looked like a hooker sneaking out of the room with my heels in hand. It was in the middle of the night, but Spiked Roses was still in full swing. Without having Roman by my side, I completely felt out of place in this men’s membership only club and couldn’t wait to get the hell out of there.
“Well lookee here,” a thick southern accented voice called from behind me. “I heard a little blonde banshee stormed in here confronting his royal majesty like she owned the joint. I figured it was you, but I needed to see it with my own eyes.”
I spun on my heels and rushed to my old friend, Tennessee Charles, to give him a hug. I would recognize his twang anywhere. “What are you doing here?” I asked.
“I’m the house mum,” he said as he straightened his tie that accentuated his purple velvet smoking jacket. “I keep this place in line.”
“You’re a madam?” I asked with a laugh. “How in the world did you get yourself hooked up with a place like this?”
“No judgy from you, sugar pop,” he said with a smile and a look of pride in his eyes. “This is a great gig. This is a high class joint run by even higher class people.”
“If you say so,” I countered, still wanting to get the hell out of there, especially before Roman woke up and found me missing. “Just not my scene.”
“Well it’s not Mexico.”
“Costa Rica.”
Tennessee took a step back and examined me from my bare feet to the top of my head. “Latin food and booze did you good, girl. You look all spicy, and from what I can see, our good prince had a hot taste.”
My face caught on fire. Nothing worse than the walk of shame, especially being caught by an old friend you hadn’t seen in years.
The color of my face must have been bright red because Tennessee said, “No reason to be shy. He’s your fiancé and all.”
“Not yet,” I corrected.
“But soon.”
I rolled my eyes. “Why is this just assumed by all?”
He shrugged. “Because it’s your destiny. It’s always been your destiny.”
“Yeah, well what if I don’t want it?”
“Sugar pop, you have a life most would dream of. Or you will. Hell, if I could marry his majesty and wear a tiara, I would. Stop your bitching.”
“You’ve always said that to me,” I said with a smile. “And I’ve always told you that you don’t understand.”
“What’s not to understand? You get to be a princess. You get to marry a hot piece of royal meat, and you get to live the dream. I don’t see a down side.”
“Royal life. It’s dry and boring. Suffocating.”
Tennessee let out a loud guffaw. “Oh you have been gone for awhile. There is nothing boring about Prince Roman. Nothing at all.”
I looked around. “Because of this place? Am I supposed to want to marry him simply because he owns a club? That is supposed to fuel my bohemian soul?”
“Not just this place,” he said. “Though Spiked Roses does add flavor to the man.” He paused and studied my eyes for a few seconds. “You’ll see. You’ve been gone a long time, sugar pop. A lot has happened. That boy you played with as a child is now a man. A man who is in line to be a king. That royal path you think is so boring… it’s not. It truly is not.”
“What do you mean by that?”
He shook his head. “I’m not touching that, sugar pop. I know how to keep my tight little ass nice and safe.”
I chuckled. “What? Since I’ve been gone, Prince Roman became someone to be afraid of? Come on. Safe from what?”
“Not my circus, girl. You ask Prince Charming about his dark shadows. Not my story to tell.”
I rolled my eyes at Tennessee’s dramatics but decided to move on. “So how did you end up here? When I left for Costa Rica, you had found yourself a sugar daddy and were flying around the world.”
“Oh that was a few sugar daddies ago.” He stiffened his spine and lifted his chin. “And I decided it was high time I became some other person’s sugar daddy. It was my turn to earn my own money. And keeping the ladies here in line pays good. Pays better than pretending I found wrinkly balls sexy.”
I laughed as I instantly remembered how much I loved this eccentric, and brutally honest man. There were parts about my past that I definitely missed.
“Have you seen my mother lately?” I asked.
He nodded. “I saw her at a cocktail party about a month ago. She’s the same. The perfect, elegant butterfly who knows how to work a room. That woman is at every classy engagement in town. I wish to be her when I grow up—diamond bracelets and all.”
“Yeah,” I said, looking down at my feet. I wondered if anyone knew that it was Roman fronting her the money to be the socialite she was known as.
A loud crash of glasses shattering behind the bar caught Tennessee’s attention. “Well, duty calls. But, sugar pop, if you even dare start planning that wedding without me, I will never forgive you for it.”
I smiled warmly. “You can do it all. You can even be the bride.”
He leaned in and kissed me on each cheek. “I would make a mighty fine blushing bride if I do say so myself.”
Roman
My dick was hard, and I hadn’t even opened my eyes yet. Last night was only a small sampling of what I knew was to come, and that I would have Cheri like this—naked, begging, desperate for my touch for the rest of our lives. I would make damn sure of it. I knew she didn’t want the royal life married to me out of obligation, and there was a part of me that hated myself for forcing her to be part of a life she couldn’t stand and had escaped from. But I could not lose her again. She was my everything, and after last night, I knew without a doubt we would be together forever.