Wilde Magic (Wilde Women Book 3) (63 page)

Caleb wasted no time taking her hand and adorably dragging her from the huge building. He seemed to be in a hurry so they walked quite briskly for a few blocks before she spied his Explorer. When he let go of her hand, she heard the clicking beep of him remotely unlocking the vehicle. From his haste you’d get the impression a meteor was about to hit them unless they got out of there in a hurry. Yanking open the passenger door, he pushed her against the side of the vehicle, growled, “Don’t move,” ripped the shopping bag out of her hand and stashed everything in the back seat.

Instead of helping her into the car, he slammed the door, grabbed hold of her and kissed her until she was little more than a puddle of goo. Right there, in broad daylight, on a street in the City of Brotherly Love—he staked his claim. And did it most effectively.

Eventually a horn honked and somebody yelled at them as they drove by, “Yo, buddy. Rooms by da hour!” After all, it was Philly. What else did she expect?

Though the kiss ended, Caleb remained plastered against her—gently touching her face and looking into her astonished gaze.

“You came early,” she mumbled nonsensically. He snickered and half rolled his eyes. She only recognized the sexual innuendo after speaking.

“Excuse me Baroness, but I must disagree. I came,” he sniggered, “exactly at the right moment.”

Hmph
. There was more than a little truth in his statement. “Does Nana know you’re here?” She frowned and a dozen more questions crowded her mind. “How did you know where I was? Is Brynn here too?”

Caleb smirked. She loved his smirk. It wasn’t like anyone else’s and when he directed it at her, every nerve ending she had short-circuited.

“Yes. She told me. And, no.”

His kiss rendered her stupid so connecting the dots took a bit of effort. “Yes, Nana knows. She told you where I was and no, Brynn’s not here?”

He tapped her nose and grabbed her chin to hold Charlie still. “You catch on quick, ‘tessa.”

After a quick but very, very lovely kiss on the lips, the passenger door opened and she was gently guided into place. Charlie couldn’t help but put her fingers in his hair when he leaned across her to fasten the seat belt.

“Kiss me again,” she pleaded.

“Hold that thought,” he replied—his eyes twinkling with what she prayed was happiness.

After he was buckled into the driver’s seat and they were making their way threw the back streets he told her, “I have more to say, Charlize. But not in the car, okay?”

She nodded. Was okay with her. Would give her a chance to organize her thoughts. But in the meantime, she was just gonna sit real still and drink him in.

The scruffy beard was fantastic and made him seem—unpolished. It was a good look. So was the leather jacket and the plain white button down underneath. His jeans were black and molded to his manly physique in all the right places.

And the boots. Good lord. Those heavy work boots gave Charlie a bad case of the tummy twinkles. Something about his muscular thighs and those shit kicking boots never failed to get her all swoony. That and the way his cock swung when he came at her naked, except for the boots. She liked that. It felt kinky and wicked and dammit. She was getting embarrassingly wet thinking about it.

Letting her naughty daydreams have their way, Charlie gave in to the pull of his overwhelming masculinity. It wasn’t just sex with Caleb. She was made for him. He was inside her even when he wasn’t. The admission gave her a tiny thrill and made her shudder.

She was out of the Explorer and walking at his side, her hand through his crooked arm before she registered where they were. Swinging her head, she looked around and tried to make sense of what was happening.

“Where are we?” she asked quietly with a tug to get his attention.

He stopped walking, put a hand atop hers, and look down into her eyes. “This is my hotel. Nana Wilde wanted me to stay at the house along with the newlyweds. I declined.”

She laughed. “Oh, you declined did you? And how may I ask did she react?” Nana didn’t allow declined invitations. It just wasn’t done.

He grinned. Eh, wait a minute. Caleb didn’t so much grin as puff up and look mighty damn pleased. “She made the reservation.” He replied. His amused chuckle made her gape at him.

“Whaaat?”

“That’s right,” he crowed proudly. “Your crazy grandmother took my refusal in stride. Made a couple of wildly inappropriate for an eighty year old remarks about our sex life.” He lowered his voice and told her, “She also had a few suggestion for keeping things interesting.”

Charlie giggled. “Oh God. Do I even want to know?”

“Definitely not,” he assured her with amused gravity. “And I’m now ruined for life knowing what kind of
interesting
is the preferred kink of Bryanna Charles.”

“So, we’re walking into a five star hotel, in jeans and sneakers, with no luggage. Not a situation I ever imagined…so you better make the interesting
way
interesting to make up for my embarrassment. Every single person seeing us knows exactly what we’re up to.”

Caleb puffed up even more and glanced around. “Good. Let ‘em look. I’m okay with that.”

His alpha-swaggery was on full display all through check-in and their long, slow progress into a luxury suite that blew her mind. Nana went for the gold this time.

She felt like Cinderella dressed in rags at the door to the palace.

“Caleb?”

He’d picked up the phone, but dropped it immediately when she spoke.

“Will you have someone bring up my bag from the back seat of the car?” He made a strange face and she quickly added. “My purse is in there and I, uh … need it.”

Charlie wandered around the beautiful suite while he spoke with the front desk. A knock sounded at the door and he gestured with his head for her to see what was up.

To her amusement and delight a cart piled with every imaginable canapé and finger food imaginable, along with a lovely Chardonnay, was wheeled in. Nana thought of everything.

Hanging the phone up, Caleb turned all his attention on her. “Everything’s good to go. Your bag is on the way up. I’ve made dinner arrangements, and a shop the hotel does business with will be delivering what’s described as couples loungewear. We’re not the first two people who checked in without stuff.”

They looked at each other across the room. She still couldn’t believe he was here. Couldn’t believe she readily confessed her love for him, and could barely wrap her mind around what hearing him say the same thing did to her.

“Are you mad at me?” she asked. “You should be.”

“No. Absolutely not. I learned my lesson, baby. Don’t beat yourself up about leaving. You had to.”

He walked over and cradled her face. “I’ve never had a girlfriend. You’re the first and only, love. I should have told you from the very beginning how I felt but, guys. Ya know?” His mocking shrug was cute as hell.

“Mistakes help form character,” she murmured. “I thought all charming princes came fully loaded and ready to go. I should have said something as well.”

Caleb sighed. His thumbs swept over her cheeks, back and forth. “Can you trust me Charlize? I really hope so because baby, no shit. I can’t live without you.”

Argh.
She groaned aloud. “It kills me that you think I didn’t trust you.”

“You left me in Rome because I broke your trust.”

She wrapped her hands around his waist. “You didn’t break anything. I know that now. What I should have done was stand and fight. Fight for what I wanted.”

“‘tessa,” he ground out. “There’s been no one but you from that first moment. And there never will be anyone but you. I can’t change the past but I can promise you that you’ll be safe with me, baby. Making you happy, having you in my life—that’s all I care about.”

Another short rap at the door broke their embrace. “I’ll get it,” she mumbled. “It’s probably my bag.”

She was right. It was her shopping bag and a tremendous bouquet of flowers.

After the hotel staffer left, he hooked an arm around her shoulders. “I tried to bring you flowers once before. If I remember, you hit me with them and tossed ‘em in my face.”

She chuckled and squirmed. Yep. He described what happened to those flowers pretty accurately.

“Are we re-winding to that moment?”

He looked at the flowers, and then looked at her. “If we do, will you let me out of the shithouse over the whole Jonas thing?”

“You were an ass,” she quipped.

“A jealous ass,” he corrected. “New sensation. Jealousy. Never been down that road before so when I saw him and you, I just lost it.”

“He thinks you’re a dick.”

Caleb grimaced. “Look, I know I was out-of-line and I’m trying really fucking hard not to smash the guy’s face in so it would help a lot if you didn’t plead his side.”

God. He was so cute and sexy when he was out of his comfort zone.

“Understood,” she gravely mocked. With a jaunty salute, she lofted the bag and said, “I need a minute. Why don’t you pour some wine. Be right back.”

And then scurried for the bathroom. Time to suit up the girls and ready a game plan.

T
HEY WERE TOGETHER. FINALLY. HE
almost couldn’t believe it.

Cal threw off his jacket and got busy with the wine. Plucking a couple of grapes off a large cluster, he popped them into his mouth and chewed.

Coming to town early was the best move he ever made. Waiting one more day so they could be the main attraction at a dinner barely disguised as a demilitarized zone wasn’t what they needed. A thought born out by her quick and startling love confession.

She loved him. Holy fuck. All this time and all the stupidity and she loved him.

He turned and looked toward the bedroom. The bed was big, the linens bright white and already turned down—ready to go. Thinking about the hundred ways he planned to love her, Cal didn’t immediately register her presence when she came out of the bathroom.

Moving into his field of vision, he nearly fell off the sofa when he got a good look at her. She’d changed. The jeans were gone. So was the rock n roll T-shirt. The Chucks were still on her feet—such a quirky Charlize thing that it wasn’t even funny.

But her dress? Holy fucking shit.

“I was going to wear this for dinner tomorrow.”

Huh? Were words coming out of her mouth? He couldn’t tell. All he saw was a sexy, tight black dress with way more tit on display than he was comfortable with—if she was in public.

“You, uh,” he cleared his throat. “Were going to wear that? In front of everybody?”

She instantly pouted. Jesus. The girl was really and truly going to be the death of him.

“Well, yeah,” she whined. “Don’t you like it? I got it for you.”

Like it? Shit. He was committing every single detail to memory. She looked like a deadly combination of complete innocent and total slut. It was fantastic.

Cal felt his control slipping. He had to talk and talk fast. No way was he making the mistake ever again of putting their physical relationship ahead of the real stuff. The stuff that mattered most.

“Charlize. Baby. I love it. Thank you.”

She beamed.

“Never wear it out of the house—not unless you want a serious spanking.”

She beamed some more. “Um, would this spanking involve any restraints?”

The picture of her tied to the bed in the loft flashed into his mind. So did an even more wicked vision.

“Tied. Maybe gagged—don’t want the neighbors to hear your sexy cries. Definitely a ‘tessa plug. One with a crystal on the end.”

She looked at him like he was crazy. “What the hell is a crystal ‘tessa plug?”

God. She was so fucking innocent. And so fucking open to what he was suggesting.

“Goes by the name Princess Plug but in your honor my love, I’m renaming the sexy anal toy for my beautiful Contessa. Pink, I think,” he added with a wicked leer.

Her questioning frown was completely charming.

“The crystal on the end. Pink. So when I’m spanking your naughty butt I can watch you squirm with the metal sphere buried in your ass.”

She was a lovely shade of embarrassed red when he stopped talking. As she moved closer, though, he held up his hand and said, “Stop.”