Page 80 of Wicked Games
“No, we’re going to clean up, and you’re going to get back to work on your first best seller while I take a nap. When I wake up, I want to hear all about Reed’s stones.”
“Best seller? Whatever.” Lucien was out of his mind. I’d be lucky to finish the damn book. Reed and Leo made me nuts. I wanted to throttle them one minute and hug them the next.
“Care to make a wager?”
“What’s the prize?”
“If Leo and Reed become a best seller, then you have to marry me.”
“Did you just propose to me while my dick is softening inside your ass?” I questioned.
“I’m living in the moment here, love.”
“Okay, I’ll play along. What do I get if Reed and Leo are a miserable flop?”
“You get to marry me,” Lucien replied.
“All roads lead to marriage to you?”
“Now, he gets it,” Lucien said smugly. “You’re the one who said my heart is your home.”
“I did say that.”
“So, let’s make it permanent.”
“You haven’t met my family; I haven’t met yours. We don’t know where we’re going to live or work or… None of it matters.”
“Nope. We’ll figure it all out.”
“Okay, so when are we getting married?”
“Not until after you publish your book. Weren’t you listening to the first part of my proposal?”
“That wasn’t a proposal; it was a dare.”
“Fine. Ryder Jameson, I fucking dare you to marry me.”
My heart pounded, and tears pooled in my eyes. Every dream I’d ever had was coming true. “Fine. I will.”
Eight months later…
ICOULDN’T TEAR MY EYESoff Rider’s tongue swirling around and around. I heard him chuckling because he knew what he did to me. I heard a loud bang and turned around to see some poor schmuck pull his bike away from the back of the parked compact car he’d plowed into.
“Look what you did,” I said to Ryder. “The poor chap was so distracted by you performing fellatio on your ice cream cone he ran into a car.”
“He should’ve been looking where he was going,” Ryder said, continuing forward when the guy rode off down the street.
“Love, don’t look now but I think our favorite bookstore is displayingNo Stones Left Unturned.”
“What?” Ryder asked and whipped around so fast he nearly dropped his ice cream cone. Of course, Duke and Duchess, our adopted two-year-old sibling German shepherds, hoped he would. “Oh my God! People might read it.”
“Isn’t that the point of publishing a book?” I asked. “Besides, you published it under the pen name Sebastian Somersby, so no one will know it’s your book unless you tell them.” His near meltdown was causing quite a stir on the quiet street in Hyde Park—the historic Cincinnati neighborhood, not the famous part of London.
After the media fervor over Charles Banks’s sordid life and death by murder-suicide fizzled out, Ryder and I had some serious choices to make. Carmen had offered me a position in her London office overseeing the training of recruits while she worked to expand her role working with law enforcement agencies all over the world to prevent and recover stolen artifacts. Ryder was offered the position of director of the board at the museum. While he was flattered, it was easy for him to turn it down because his passion was in conserving art, not pushing pencils around and being a dick to one and all. Turning Carmen down wasn’t as easy for me. While I loved the position she offered, I knew the location would be an issue.
Ryder belonged in Cincinnati with his family, regardless if he worked for the museum, and I belonged wherever he was. A curious thing happened once we arrived back in the Queen City after our caper. Agents Kiphart and Marshall visited me at Ryder’s flat one day. Not only did Carmen nail Daniel Perez’s gonads to the wall, she did it in a way that implied I was also partly responsible for bringing him down. The bureau wanted to know if I was interested in consulting with them on outstanding cases. I would work in the Cincinnati field office, and I’d only have to travel on occasion.
I jumped at the chance because I thought it was an intriguing opportunity, and I knew it would help me get in Celeste’s good graces. I’d meant what I said to Ryder; I wanted to come clean to his parents so we wouldn’t build our life on lies. Celeste was angry at first, but she came around when she saw how committed I was to making Ryder happy. Iris was every bit as feisty as I believed her to be, and we became cigar-smoking, bourbon-drinking best friends in an instant. Edmond was more concerned about my background than the ladies were and dismissed my transgression once he found out who my father was. As it turned out, he’d heard about my father’s reputation and was looking forward to meeting him.