Page 25

Chapter 25

A Walk to Remember

KEENAN

I pace the trailer, waiting for my missing mate. She was supposed to be back thirteen minutes ago. I’m not surprised she’s late. She’s not a particularly punctual human and she’s having a good time, imbibing alcoholic beverages with her friends.

The bang of fireworks goes off outside the trailer, followed by cheering and clapping. We’re attending the film’s wrap up party. Wesselman shot the final scene this afternoon.

Vanessa finished a few days ago, but we decided to stay, along with Spoon and the rest of the cast and crew. According to Rachel, Wesselman is well known for his generosity toward cast and crew. His parties are legendary. Rachel calls it the pre-Oscar-Oscar-party because Wesselman’s films always sweep up in awards season.

I don’t know what half of it means, but I’m learning fast.

“Promise you’ll call? I loved working with you all!” The crunch of gravel outside the trailer and Vanessa’s voice heralds the arrival of more people than I’d planned on hosting. “Come inside, we’re having an after party.”

The door swings open and Vanessa, Rachel, Jessica and Spoon tumble inside.

“We are not having an after party,” I say as they sort themselves out. “You three out.” I point at Jessica, Rachel and Spoon while gripping Vanessa’s arm. “You stay.”

“Ah yes, I get you, old man.” Spoon winks and stumbles out the door. “Have fun rocking the trailer one last time.”

Rachel grins, weaving on the spot. “Totally get it. Good luck!” She disappears with Spoon.

“Wait!” Vanessa calls. “I wasn’t done talking! You said something about a role in the next film…”

Jessica grips Vanessa’s face. “Open your eyes, woman.” Patting Vanessa’s cheeks, she follows Rachel, slamming the door shut behind her.

“Open my eyes?” Vanessa turns on the spot, her eyes widening as she takes in the trailer.

While she was partying with her friends, I was transforming our home away from home. Or is it our home-away-from-home-away-from-home? Anyway, we’ve spent a lot of time in the trailer and over that time I’ve noticed my human gets attached to things and she loves her trailer. We’ll have to say goodbye to it tomorrow, so I planned a surprise for Vanessa tonight.

“Oh my god, they’re so beautiful…” she breathes, wandering the trailer, her eyes wide. I filled it with white roses, the sweet fragrance permeating the space. “This must’ve cost a fortune.”

About $20,000, but what’s the point in being a 700-year-old wolf prince if I can’t spend some of the fortune I’ve accumulated?

“My girlfriend is about to become an international superstar,” I say with a grin. “I have to impress her or she’ll run off with her next leading man.”

She laughs, scooping up a vase and burying her nose in the roses. Her eyes are sparkling when she looks at me. “This is so unbelievably romantic.”

Good, it’s the reaction I was hoping for.

Wiping my sweaty palms down my jeans, I reach into my pocket and run my fingers over the jeweler’s box I’ve had since we visited Wolf-Haven. While we there, I had one of my mother’s rings resized for Vanessa.

“Would you look at this gorgeous arrangement?” she gushes, touching a tower of white roses before moving toward the bedroom. “Wow, there’s more in here.” She peeks in the bathroom and laughs as roses tumble out the door.

“Vanessa.”

She turns to look at me.

We don’t formally propose marriage in my culture, but since meeting Vanessa, I’ve watched dozens of instructional movies on the process. My favourite is Deadpool because there’s sex involved, but her favourite proposal scene is in A Walk to Remember.

Taking her hand, I open the door of the trailer and usher her outside.

“I want to spend time with my flowers,” she protests, reaching back and capturing one before I slam the door shut.

“I have another surprise.”

Her pout fades and she claps her hands together. “Show me!”

Chuckling, I pull her around to the back of the trailer and point at the ladder. “It’s up there.”

She grins, gripping the ladder. “So mysterious.”

I climb up behind her, making sure she doesn’t lose her balance and helping her onto the roof of the trailer.

She gasps as she straightens and catches sight of the telescope. “Is it for me?”

“Look through the scope.”

She does, gasping in delight. “The moon! I can see the craters and everything.”

In A Walk to Remember, the telescope was aimed at a comet, but there are no comets close enough. When that plan failed, I thought to find a planet or something else cool, but the instruction manual for the thing was dozens of pages long, so I’d pointed it at the only thing I could easily find.

Lucky for me, my mate is easy to please.

“I have one more surprise.”

Her eyes are wide when she looks at me. “How can you possibly top a trailer full of white roses and a really good view of the moon?”

I take her hand and kneel next to her, pulling the jeweler’s box from my pocket. “Do you love me?”

She claps her hands over her mouth before mumbling, “Of course!”

“Then will you do something for me?”

Understanding lights up her features and tears form in her eyes as she gives me the next line from the scene, “Anything.”

“Will you marry me?”

She throws her arms around me and laugh-cries. “Yes!”

I pick her up as I stand, crushing her to my chest, kissing her before setting her on her feet.

“You said your lines perfectly!” She wipes the tears from her cheeks. “Did you rewatch the movie without me?”

God no. I could rewatch Deadpool all day long but not the romantic films. “I watched a clip on YouTube.”

I pull her down onto the blanket and pillows I arranged. We lay together looking up at the stars.

“Where should we get married?” she asks, snuggling into my side. “Wolf-Haven?”

I think about it and reject the idea. “Too much pomp and ceremony.” Before she can protest, I say, “I want you to myself. I don’t want to have to go through royal protocols, the announcements, the banners, the gifts.” I shudder, remembering the chaos surrounding Rush and Magdalene’s wedding. “Something quiet.”

She tucks her head into my neck. “Something meaningful,” she says softly as her breath tickles my skin. “As much as I do love a fuss, I like the idea of it being just us.” She thinks about it, then adds, “And Pinky because she’d burn down Los Angeles if we didn’t invite her.”

Grinning at the sky, I say, “Pinky can come. We need a witness anyway.”

“I’m getting married to my handsome prince,” she murmurs, kissing my freshly healed scar. “And we’re going to live happily ever after.”

The bang of a firework startles us.

“I thought they ran out of those things,” I laugh, pulling Vanessa back to my side.

“Zach and Jason went out to buy more. Apparently, they aren’t done lighting up the sky.”

We watch the fireworks as they explode over the movie lot, turning the night into a palette of colour.

Vanessa turns my face to hers with a hand on my cheek. “I think you’re the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“You think?”

She kisses me. “Definitely you’re the best.”

I roll on top of her, caging her in my arms. She looks like an angel with her red hair spread out in a halo around her head and the white rose held between her fingers.

I take the rose from her and run it from her forehead, down her nose, over her chin and throat, dipping it into her cleavage.

Her breathing quickens as I unbutton her blouse, sliding the cool rose petals over her skin. Gooseflesh sweeps over her as she moans and reaches for me.

I knock her arms aside. This is about her. Worshipping my mate as she deserves.

My lips trace the path of the rose, pressing kisses on her skin as I move down her body. Unbuttoning her jeans, I slide them off her legs, pulling her soaking panties with them.

She moans, wiggling as I toss them away.

“You warm enough?”

Her voice comes out husky. “You make a pretty good blanket.”

“I aim to please.”

I press my nose to her center, inhaling her fragrant scent while tickling her belly with the rose. She gasps and squirms, her core flooding as her body heats up. I lap her juices up, licking her in long leisurely strokes, tasting her essence.

It’s a delicious feast, but my cock is telling me to get on with it. I nip at her clit, sucking it against my teeth and playing with it until she’s writhing and keening her pleasure to the sky.

As she explodes, I move up her body, covering her with mine. I need to undress, but there’s no time. If I don’t fuck my mate now, I’ll die from a cock turned to stone. Dramatic? Yeah, but I’ve been hanging out with actors.

I dip into her head as I reach down to unzip myself and pull my cock from my jeans. Her thoughts are a chaotic whirl of frenzied sex, a long white dress, a rose petal strewn aisle and lots and lots of friends cheering her on.

I thrust into her, pushing her orgasm higher.

She screams into the night, her fingernails raking down my back.

I pull out and arch into her, savouring the squeeze of her pussy as she clings to me. Throwing my head back, I howl as I come, fireworks shooting off overhead, mirroring the explosions in my head.

I collapse next to her, shoving my arm under her head as she rolls into me, flinging a leg over mine.

“We… are… really… really… ” she gasps for breath.

“Good at sex.” I read her mind and finish her sentence.

“Yeah, that.” She giggles, then sucks in a breath as a particularly loud firework goes off. “I bet they’ve got enough to set fireworks off all night.”

“Good,” I say, rolling on top of her with a grin. “Because I intend to do this all night long and it’s fun to fuck to fireworks.”

I swallow her laughter in a kiss.