Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 81767 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 409(@200wpm)___ 327(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81767 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 409(@200wpm)___ 327(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
“Yeah, is that how you’re going to treat your wife?” she murmurs, only pulling away enough so I can turn my head to face her. “You’re gonna let people think you don’t treat me right?”
“You know I do,” I respond lowly, “and I’m pretty sure I proved it last night.”
A hint of color dusts Fiora’s cheeks, but she doesn’t back down. “For all your talk, you sure aren’t acting like it now. Prove it.”
Even for some stupid baseball interlude game, I’m not one to back down.
I grab the back of Fiora’s head and mash our lips together, the crowd around us hollering with the real kiss. I don’t give a fuck about them. Fiora’s more than eager to respond to my messy kiss, opening her mouth so easily for me. Our tongues push against each other until she moans into my mouth, her fingers clinging to my T-shirt. Fuck, I wish there wasn’t an armrest between us. I’d drag her into my lap and make her forget all about the baseball game, audience be damned.
I squeeze her thigh, my teeth tugging at her lower lip to make her moan again. I push it higher and higher, thumb running over the crotch of her jeans. Just as I pull back to catch my breath and dive in again, her phone pings. Then pings again. And again and again.
Fiora groans and asks for a second, fishing it out of the back pocket of her jeans.
“Oh shit.”
I glance over her shoulder to see her phone screen.
FIORA GODWIN AND BRAKEN FROST CAUGHT KISSING—NEW COUPLE ALERT?
“That was fast,” I muse. “It hasn’t even been five minutes.”
“News travels fast these days,” Fiora murmurs. Her phone continues to blow up until she sets it on silent and pockets it again. “Guess our secret’s out.”
“Guess so.” I grab her chin and force her to look at me again, a smirk rising to my face when I see how flushed she is from that one kiss. “I hope you’re ready.”
Chapter 34
Fiora
“What the hell do you mean engaged?” my sister, Jescie shouts over the phone.
“And you didn’t tell us!” my normally calm sister, Sable yells from somewhere behind her.
I sink further into Braken’s awkwardly comfortable couch in his office. When I said news travels fast, I didn’t want it to be this fast. I wanted to tell my sisters myself after the game, but I haven’t had the chance. By the time the Mariners win, and we make it back to The Vault, our kiss has been plastered all over social media. I don’t even get to pull up my sisters’ numbers before I receive the berating of a lifetime.
“Ugh, you two need to stop hanging out,” I whine. “I can’t take both of you on at the same time.”
“It’s not our fault you were busy.” Jescie’s voice is tinny through the speakerphone.
Sable scoffs. “Too busy to call, apparently!”
“You can ask Papa about that one.” I take a sip of the wine Braken prepared for me and glance over at him. He’s busy fielding his own calls, most likely from stakeholders in his hotels or reporters. “He’s the one who set it up.”
“Well, that’s so much less exciting.” Jescie sighs. There’s a slight pause before she continues, “You’re going through with it?”
“You think we can go against Papa?” Sable’s laugh is angry and tinged with bitterness. Of all the sisters in the family, she’s the one who knows how impossible that is. “That means you’re stuck with Braken Frost ’til death do you part.”
“Don’t make it sound so messed up, Sable,” Jescie says. “You better not be keeping anything else from us, Fiora. If you went shopping for dresses or venues or whatever, I’m going to kill you.”
“Now who’s messed up, Jescie?”
“Both of you, shut up,” I say with a laugh. “You know I wouldn’t go without you because I’d never hear the end of it.”
“Okay good, because—”
My phone lights up with a text message I quickly check as Sable rambles on about needing to make dress appointments immediately. I expect another reporter or acquaintance to ask me all the deets, but my blood runs cold at the sender.
Marco.
Congrats on the engagement. I’m sorry about last time. Can we meet? I want to make it up to you.
The message is innocent enough, but I know better. I can’t get the image of Marco raising his hand out of my mind. That isn’t the action of a man who is truly sorry. This is either the world’s worst clean-up job or he has another idea in mind. A shiver runs through me. I don’t want to know what he intends, but I can’t keep this a secret.
Braken needs to know.
I interrupt whatever Jescie is saying with, “Let me call you guys in a bit. Something came up.”
“Yeah, like Braken’s dick—”
“Jescie!” Sable cackles.