Page 212 of On A Manhunt: Complete Series

SILAS

We were married in the interrogation room of the Hunter Valley Police Station.

Turned out, Eve’s cousin Hunter, the sheriff, wasn’t actually a justice of the peace.

But the station manager was. For the ceremony, there were no flowers.

No rings. No wedding dress; instead a pink Steaming Hotties t-shirt.

Witnesses were two deputies who brought in a drunk and disorderly tourist from Omaha.

If he were sober, he could have signed the documentation, too.

To me, it was perfect because it was Eve I was saying vows to. This was real.

When I asked her to be my wife, had I expected to actually marry her? No. I hoped, crossed my fingers, that she’d perhaps, maybe, hopefully agree to be a fake wife for a few days. It was asking a lot, I knew. Except she didn’t want a fake marriage. She wanted the real thing.

Nothing went as expected with her.

My usual calm, orderly, over-traveled, and boring life had gone a little crazy.

For the good.

As we faced each other, I held her hands in mine, looked into her slightly-stunned gray eyes and vowed to honor, cherish, and protect her all the days of my life. I felt it to my very core.

We’d left directly from the police station and to the airport.

Eve hadn’t packed a bag. With the flight plan submitted and another storm ready to blow in, there had been no time before we had to leave.

Now we were at forty-thousand feet, and I had her all to myself.

Dot, the flight attendant, served us drinks before takeoff and had joined the pilots in the cockpit.

We were all–mostly–alone.

Reaching over, I unclipped her seatbelt, then pulled her into my lap.

“Silas!” she said with a laugh, pushing her hair back from her face.

“I’m going to fuck you before we get to San Francisco, but we need to talk about that asshole Douglas first. I’m not talking about other men when I’m inside my wife.”

Her eyes flared with heat. She liked the idea of joining the mile high club, but didn’t seem too thrilled to talk about her ex. It wasn’t like I wanted to either, but something was going on and I needed to know about it now so I could take care of the problem.

From what she said, he’d been sniffing around for a while and that wasn’t working for me. Not with my wife. I was the only one who should be sniffing her.

Before we left the coffee shop, I’d sent a text to Bradley to find out all there was about Cheney Douglas. But I wanted to hear about him from Eve.

“Why did you introduce me to Douglas as your husband?” I wondered.

“I guess I need you as much as you need me,” she admitted, and I realized she wasn’t talking about sex or orgasms. No, she meant money. Fuck, I started all this by needing her to be my wife because of the Hyport deal–aka a billion dollars–but I knew I wanted her as mine.

It sounded like she never considered the possibility.

Not good. Another thing I needed to take care of. She needed to know that she was important. That she was special. That she was mine to care for. And fuck.

“I went to boarding school in Vermont,” she began.

Since she went so far back as to talk about high school, this wasn’t a simple answer.

“Senior year, when I came back for Christmas, I had dinner with my parents at the club with Cheney and his parents. It was announced over appetizers we were dating.”

What the hell?

“You went along with it?” Obviously she did since the asshole lingered years later.

She shrugged. “I was seventeen. He was handsome. Older. At first he was charming. Plus, it was easier to go along with my parents than to make a fuss. I went back to Vermont and graduated, then went to college. I saw him on breaks.”

“Did you even like him?”

She flushed and glanced away. “If you met my parents, you’d know there were expectations I was supposed to meet. I met them growing up because if I didn’t, they did something like ship me to boarding school.”

I clenched my jaw and stayed quiet. Remembered Bridget’s story about the show chickens.

“After college, I broke up with Cheney. I was back in town full time and couldn’t avoid him. I didn’t want anything to do with him. I started Steaming Hotties using some money from a trust fund left to me by my grandparents.”

She shifted and took off her sweater. Her long hair swung over her back as she dropped it on her empty seat. Yeah, it was getting warm on the plane.

I frowned, trying not to get distracted by the way her Steaming Hotties t-shirt stretched across her perfect tits. “Did you use it all?”

She shook her head.

“Then why did you apply for the James Corp loan?”

“Because I can’t touch it until I’m thirty without permission of the executor. My father.”

“He refused more money, I’m guessing.”

She played with the frayed edges of the hole in the knee of her jeans. I liked the sexy peek at her bare skin.

“He told me I’d had my fun and it was time to close up my little shop and return home and marry Cheney.”

I frowned. “Return home? I thought they lived in town.”

With ease, she toed off one boot, then the other. They thumped on the carpeted floor.

“They do. Up by the resort. I was supposed to marry Cheney, head charitable functions, and push out a few kids.”

I was all for a few kids, but it sounded like they wanted a Stepford Wife.

“I refused, obviously. I’d been broken up from Cheney for a while at that point and none of them accepted my decision. My father shifted the executorship to Cheney.”

I was a businessman, not an estate lawyer, yet I knew this wasn’t normal. “What? Why would he do that?”

It made no sense. Her father had her by the proverbial balls himself. Why relinquish that control besides just being a dick? What father put his daughter’s ex-boyfriend in charge of her trust fund?

“Cheney told me I wasn’t getting any more money from my trust and that I was to come back and marry him.”

“So you married me instead. He can’t be your husband if I already am.”

Her fingers went to the hem of her t-shirt and slid it up her body, baring a delectable inch of her creamy skin at a time.

I reached out and stilled her hands–like a moron–before she got it overhead, although her bra-covered breasts were exposed.

I couldn’t miss her hard nipples through the thin material.

“Um, what are you doing?”

She glanced my way, gave me that sly smile I remembered from the cam room. “You said we were going to fuck.”

“Yeah, but not until after we talk about your ex.”

“Okay, I’m just getting ready then.”

My dick went from semi to rock hard in two seconds flat. I was practically dizzy from it and my fingers itched to touch her. My mouth salivated to taste her.

She didn’t care that the flight attendant might make an appearance.

“Fuck, kitten.”

“The answer to your question is yes.”

Yes? “What was my question?” I asked, my gaze affixed on her tits.

When I let go of her arm, she flung off her t-shirt. It went somewhere behind me.

“If I married you so Cheney couldn’t. Yes. That’s one part of it, definitely.”

All the blood had left my brain and was in my dick. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to know the rest or could process what she was saying.

“The only other way I can take control of my trust–besides turning thirty–is to marry.”

She stood, shimmied her jeans down her legs, then off.

Oh. Fuck.

“Wait,” I said, gripping the arms of the seat. I had to stay focused, but it was nearly impossible with her only in her barely-there panties. If she turned around and I discovered it was a thong, I was going to come all over myself.

“What?” she asked. With her leaning forward, her tits practically spilled out of her bra.

I was practically panting now. “Douglas… Douglas won’t be executor of your trust because you gain full control now that we’re married. You get your money and get rid of the loser.”

She nodded. “Yeah.”

“Why didn’t you ask me to marry you before now?”

Her eyes widened, then she laughed. “What would you have said to the woman who you fucked over a desk if she asked you to marry her?”

If she showed me all of her body like she was now, the answer would have been yes.

“Uh…”

“I know you’ve been with women before, but picture one of them.”

I shook my head, studied the curve of her waist, the hint of her pussy lips through her panties. Was the satin damp? I knew they were fucking drenched.

FUCK.

“Other women, kitten?” I met her gorgeous gaze. “I can’t see their faces or remember their names now.”

“Because they meant so little to you.”

“No, because I only see you. Fuck, Eve.” I grabbed her, pulled her onto my lap again, this time so she straddled my hips. So her pussy settled right on my dick.

Her mouth dropped open. “Oh.”

Yeah, she felt that, too. I rolled her hips as I lifted up mine.

She groaned. I growled.

“I get your point. I’d have thought you were crazy, or after my money.”

“Exactly,” she breathed, starting to rock all on her own.

“I think you’ve made it more than clear that you don’t want any of my money.”

She nodded, stared into my eyes. “It’s just as you told Cheney. I want you for your big dick.”

And that was it. I was done. My willpower was only so strong.

I ripped those panties off and yes, they were a thong, and had my dick out and deep in her in record time.

“Yes!” she cried as she took all of me in one go.

“Fuck, kitten,” I growled as she rippled and clenched around me.

I had questions. A shit ton of them. But now wasn’t the time.

I was fucking my wife. Nothing else mattered.