In my room, I took my time removing her clothes and making love to her. I wanted to make her pregnant. I wanted to fill her with my babies and make her my wife. I wanted to make it so nothing would ever come between us and keep us separated again.
I knew it was crazy wanting all those things so quickly. But I had grown up wanting them with her, so it was only natural for them to resurface with her return to Destiny.
Looking down at her, I looked into her eyes. I had won the lottery. I had everything I wanted. I just hoped she felt the same way.
“I love you,” I said. And I had never meant anything more in that one moment. “Tell me what I need to do to keep you with me.”
“I need to take things one step at a time,” she replied soberly.
“We can work things out together.” I wiped a strand of hair from her cheek. Still inside her, I felt her clench around me. “Promise me that we can. That you won’t run away again.”
She nodded and slid her hand behind my neck, pulling me down to kiss me. “I’m not going anywhere,” she whispered against my lips.
I rose up on my forearms again. Sliding my turquoise and silver ring from my finger, I reached for her left hand and slipped it over her ring finger. “You’re my girl.”
“What are you doing?”
“Making you mine for good.”
Surprise turned into a big smile. “Are you asking me to marry you?”
“I don’t want any other girl, Indy. From the moment I met you, we were meant to be together.”
“This isn’t really taking things one day at a time,” she said with a soft chuckle.
I smiled and curled my hand around the ring and her finger. “This is permanent.”
She gave me one of her serious looks. “I won’t cook for you.”
“You can’t cook anyway.”
She grinned “And I don’t iron.”
“Baby, do I look like the kind of guy who gives a fuck about ironing?”
I was hard as fuck now, and when I started to move inside her again, an involuntary moan escaped her parted lips.
“In fact, I won’t wash, clean, or run after you in any way, shape, or form,” she said. She was trying to keep focused on her argument, but the fact that I was slowly fucking her was becoming a distraction.
“And I won’t be at your beck and call, like the other old ladies.” She tried to sound tough, but she was close to whimpering as my cock moved in and out of her. I pressed in deep and hard against her pelvis with mine.
“Aha,” I said, running my tongue along her neck.
“And don’t expect me to wait at home for you to come home. I’m an independent woman.”
I pressed harder into her. “Indy…”
“Yes?”
“Are you always going to be such a pain in the ass?”
I felt her grin against my shoulder. “You can count on it, Cade. I ain’t one of your club bunnies.”
I looked down at her. “Club bunnies?” God, I was in love with her.
“Like Sandy or Candy, or whatever the fuck their names are.”
The beginnings of another orgasm began to swell in me.
“I think I got it. You ain’t no cooking, cleaning, ironing, wait-at-home, club bunny.”
“Exactly.”
When she gasped at my sudden thrust, I knew it wasn’t going to take me long to make her come, and I was right. After moving deep and slow into her, she came beneath me in tiny shudders, pressing her fingers deep into my shoulders and squeezing her thighs tight around my hips. It was enough to set me off. My second orgasm was long and drawn out, sinking into my brain and dragging me away on a hazy wave of bliss.
That’s when I made a silent vow to myself. I would only ever do right by this amazing woman. No matter what it took.
CADE—Aged 23
Then
The room smelled like old timber and aged leather. I glanced around me, taking in the rows and rows of old books in the wall-to-ceiling bookcase, and the old desk in front of me that seemed too big for the room. Outside, rain fell like nails from a grey sky.
“This is very generous of you, Mr. Calley,” said the man behind the desk. He was a good-looking man in a suit. African American and big, he smiled at me as he joined his hands together.
“She deserves it,” I said.
“Yes. It is a shame her scholarship fell through. But your generosity will ensure she gets to complete her education and earn her doctorate.”
I nodded. When Lady told me about Indy’s scholarship falling through, I knew I had to do something. Bolt’s illness had drained money from Indy’s college fund and more. Hefty loans meant Lady and Jackie didn’t have the money to spare. And unless they could find the money for her to finish med school, Indy would have to drop out. The club would help out. There was a lot of money in the club because of their lucrative businesses. They would pay for her to finish, Bull had assured them. But I stopped the club from stepping in because I wanted to pay for it.