ALL HE DESIRES (Voluptuous Woman Series) (24 page)

Justice smiled. Evidently her brother had taken her advice like she had taken his. “Should we clear our throats to let them know that we’re here, Blake?” she whispered.

Blake chuckled softly. “I doubt it will do any good at this point,” he whispered back. “What you see has been a long time coming and I’m glad they’ve finally gotten things together. For a while the cousins and I thought we would have to beat the crap out of your brother to make him see the light, and we regretted the thought of doing that since he is such a good friend and all.”

Justice giggled. “Bryan has always loved Tonya. He told me as much, but he was afraid the type of job he has would interfere with a relationship with her. Evidently, he got things worked out.”

“Well, all I can say is that it’s about time.”

Justice had to agree. When Blake took her hand in his, he led her through an area where the darkroom was located. The room lived up to its name since it was truly dark. After closing the door behind him, he switched on a small lamp in the corner.

“So, what do you want to talk to me about?” he asked, coming to stand directly in front of her.

Breath rushed out of Justice’s lungs in a nervous sigh. She didn’t know where to begin. “I need to know something, Blake.”

He heard the nervousness in her voice and met her gaze as he gently released her from his embrace. “All right. What do you want to know?”

She inhaled deeply. “What we shared the past three weeks, I need to know what it means to you.”

He lifted a brow, confused as to where she was going with things. He searched her face intently. “Maybe I should be asking you the same question, Justice.”

“Yes, but I asked you first.”

Yes, he agreed. She had. And she had definitely put him in a dilemma. If he told her the truth, that he loved her senseless, would she back away because of her fear of commitment? And if he lied and pretended he viewed what they shared as nothing but a no-strings affair, would that make her happy although it would make him miserable?

He sighed and decided he would make a decision with a flip of a coin. He reached out and picked up a quarter that had been left on the table. Heads she got the truth and tails he would lie.

Blake knew Justice was confused with what he was doing but he flipped the coin and it landed on . . . tails.

Damn.

He closed his eyes tight, refusing to believe that the outcome meant he had to lie to her.

“Blake? What is it? What’s wrong? Why did you flip that coin?”

Justice’s question made him reopen his eyes and the only thing he could think about was the fact that he could not and would not lie to her. He had to tell her the truth no matter how she took it, even if it meant she put distance between them by not visiting him in Canada for the holidays. Honesty and not lies had to always be between them. Hadn’t his grandmother preached that one lie only led to another, then another?

He met her confused gaze. “The reason I flipped the coin was trying to make a decision that I didn’t want to make and thought I needed help. Well, the outcome wasn’t what I wanted, so I’m going to do what I know is the right thing and what I should have done in the beginning and follow my heart, no matter how things turn out because I believe in the end the truth will win.”

Justice nodded, although she was still confused and getting more confused by the minute. “All right. Now will you tell me what these past three weeks have meant to you?”

He pulled her back into his arms and met her gaze after inhaling a slow, deep breath. “These past three weeks have meant more to me than you’d ever know, Justice, because I found something that I thought was lost to me forever,” he whispered softly.

Nervous tension swirled around in her belly. “What?”

“Love. Don’t ask me how or why. All I know is we may have started out with one goal in mind but somehow along the way my emotions rebelled and I fell in love with you. In truth, I believe I fell in love with you the first moment I saw you that day, in Tonya’s basement. I never believed in love at first sight until that day.”

Justice blinked back the tears that gathered in her eyes. Acceptance unfolded within her as her mind consumed Blake’s words. She gazed into the depths of his hazel eyes and saw the truth in what he’d said. “I’m glad to hear that Blake, since I’ve fallen in love with you, too. I had issues to work out that were keeping me from committing my life to anyone and now I’m resolving those issues. And I’m free to love and to admit my love and I want to admit loving you. I believe I fell in love with you that day in Tonya’s basement as well.”

That’s all Blake needed to hear and he knew she had spoken from her heart the same way he had. “Does that mean that sometime in the near future there will be a Savoy-Manning wedding?”

Justice laughed throatily as she swiped away the tears from her eyes. “Yes, possibly more than one if I know my brother. Now that he’s staked a claim on Tonya, he won’t waste any time getting her to the altar. But as far as we’re concerned, if marriage is what you want then marriage is what you’ll get.”

“Yes, it’s what I want, among other things,” Blake said, kissing the corner of her lips. “I also want to be the father of all your babies and if you’re not willing to leave here and travel with me, I’ll understand.”

Justice shook her head. She knew Blake’s first wife wouldn’t travel with him and refused to take that same position. Besides, her business was at a point where her office manager could run things quite efficiently. “But I am willing to travel with you, Blake. I’d love to visit all those places you go as your wife, your soulmate and the mother of your children.”

Filled with happiness beyond belief, Blake framed Justice’s face in his hands and lowered his head and kissed her, long and deep, and with all the love in his heart. They both had tempted fate and with a flip of the coin, had lost. But a Higher Being had interceded and decided it was meant for them to join their lives together forever.

And everyone knows that He has the last word.

Four months later

I
t was decided that there would be a double wedding since it wasn’t every day that two Savoys married two Mannings.

It was a beautiful day for a wedding and the church had been packed. The brides, best friends for life, had chosen well and knew they would spend the rest of their lives happy with their mates.

Bryan and Tonya had made plans to go to Bermuda on their honeymoon and Blake and Justice would spend a week in Hawaii before heading for Canada. Justice was excited about the trip and looked forward to going. Bryan and Tonya had promised to visit them the first opportunity they had now that Bryan was no longer an FBI agent out in the field but had taken a teaching position at the Bureau’s academy.

It was time for the bridal couples to leave the reception to embark on their honeymoons, and the brides had escaped to change clothes.

Tonya placed several beautiful gift-wrapped boxes in Justice’s arms. Justice smiled, recognizing the red box and black bow as the traditional signature packaging of Tonya’s Temptations. Anyone ordering from the Internet company received their merchandise in the beautiful package. Justice also knew that once she opened the boxes, in each one she would also find the traditional red silk rose lying atop the black tissue paper.

“Should I guess what’s in here?” she asked Tonya.

Tonya laughed. “In those boxes are items you thought you’d never wear since you would never marry but I happen to know of one particular man who would love seeing you in them . . . again.”

Justice giggled, knowing that was true. She had recently discovered that Blake had kept copies of every photo he had turned over to Tonya to use on her Internet site. She had also discovered he had made a few of his own that neither she nor Tonya had known about. They were photos that he claimed were only meant for his personal collection.

The two women hugged. They were no longer just best friends, they now belonged in the same family, doubly so.

Moments later when Justice walked out of the room she was temporarily blinded when a flashbulb went off in her face. As soon as she got her sight back she met her husband’s gaze as he handed the camera back to Tyler. He pulled her into his arms and whispered. “I couldn’t resist, since no matter what you wear, you definitely have a way of making it sexy.”

This story is dedicated to all the beautiful and full-figured women who know how to make it sexy.

I opened to my beloved, but he was gone. My heart stopped.
I searched for him but couldn’t find him anywhere.
I called him but there was no reply.

-- Song of Solomon 5:6
(The Living Bible)

M
egan James’ heart slammed against her sternum as she watched the tall, good-looking, well-built man get out of the SUV and close the truck door behind him. Despite the distance separating them she recognized him immediately.

Tyler Savoy.

Even now at the age of twenty-nine, it was hard to forget the man she had fallen in love with at fifteen, and the memories just wouldn’t go away. Emotions were swirling inside of her and strange as it seemed, it appeared that the feelings she’d always felt for Tyler were still there.

She continued to study him and decided that time had only enhanced his looks. While a teenager growing up he spent a lot of time on her grandfather’s ranch, working after school and during the summers as his assistant. Dr. Matthew James had been the area’s only veterinarian and had encouraged Tyler – who had a strong love for animals – to go after a career in that same profession. She would never forget the day Tyler left Alexandria, Virginia to attend Tuskegee University in Alabama to pursue a degree in veterinarian medicine. To her he had been moving millions of miles away and not just a couple of states over.

They had been two teenagers in love and she’d known that the intensity of their attraction for each other had worried her parents and grandfather. Out of respect for their concerns for their budding romance, Tyler had always tried to keep a tight rein on his passionate side, although she had known and understood that he’d wanted more from their relationship than hand-holding and the kiss they would share every now and then.

And she had wanted more too. It seemed that as a teen she had encountered all kinds of overzealous hormones. On many nights, instead of sleeping, images of Tyler would flood her mind. He would be with her in bed, with his arms wrapped around her tight, kissing her, whispering all kinds of sweet words in her ears, touching her in ways she had never been touched before. Those images had been good and they had been locked safe and secure in her dreams where she could be as naughty as she wanted to be. But during the day-light hours, she had to behave the way she knew her parents and grandfather expected.

Until that one prom night.

Inhaling deeply she pulled her gaze away from the window and headed for the door, not wanting to remember that night and the way it had ended.

Webb Conyers, her stepfather’s foreman, would see Tyler and escort him to the barn where one of the horses had taken ill. And since she was in charge of things for three weeks while her mother and stepfather were away on their honeymoon, she would be the person Tyler would need to talk to.

As she opened the door and walked out she wasn’t sure if she was ready to come face to face with Tyler again, but it seemed that she really didn’t have a choice in the matter.

***

“Hey, boy what’s the matter?” Tyler soothingly murmured to the huge bay as he entered the stall and gave him a gentle pat on the rump. He and Moonshine were old friends and Tyler quickly recalled that this particular horse had been his first patient over ten years ago.

“Like I told you on the phone, Tyler, Moonshine’s been acting funny for the past couple of days. He’s barely eating and everybody knows what kind of appetite he has,” Webb Conyers, the foreman of the Triple Circle Ranch, was saying.

Tyler nodded as he opened his vet bag. “Then let’s see what’s bothering him.”

A few minutes later after giving Moonshine a complete checkup, Tyler couldn’t find anything wrong with the horse. “Do you still let him out into the yard to get an adequate amount of exercise?” he asked. At one time Moonshine had been a well-trained competitor and had received numerous awards in horse shows. He was still a good horse and a real beauty.

Webb nodded. “Yeah, everyday, but because he’s been acting so ornery lately, we’ve been keeping him off to himself.”

Tyler lifted a brow as he leaned against the stall gate. “Ornery? How?”

Webb shrugged as a smile touched his lips. “You know how horses can get this time of the year, Tyler.”

Tyler nodded. Yes, he knew. It was spring, which meant mating for most animals, even humans – especially humans who found time to do it anytime of the year and not just spring. Unless you were like him and were too busy working to become involved with anyone. He couldn’t remember the last time he had slept with a woman. Probably eight months ago, maybe longer. “Then that might be your problem. Moonshine might be old but he isn’t dead. Does Winston intend for him to die of old age without ever mating again?”