Total pages in book: 98
Estimated words: 94687 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 379(@250wpm)___ 316(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94687 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 379(@250wpm)___ 316(@300wpm)
I’m thrumming with excitement as I wave him over. “This isn’t work. Joel sent the pictures.” He promised to send them as quickly as possible, but I expected that would take weeks.
Henry strides leisurely across the deck to the shaded area where I lay, stomach down. His cerulean board shorts are settled low enough on his waist to show off the cut of his pelvis. “Why are you hiding here?”
“You’re asking me that? Really?” His skin is a rich golden brown after almost a week under the Mediterranean sun. Meanwhile, I burned so badly on the first day of our honeymoon, the only touching Henry got to do for two days was rubbing aloe vera on my inflamed body.
“You’ll be fine. You didn’t put on enough sunscreen before.” Henry pushes my legs apart to straddle my body just below my ass. “I need to touch land. I was thinking we could go to Monte Carlo tomorrow, if you’re good with that? Preston’s there. We could have dinner with him.”
“Can Merrick come?” I tease, earning my left butt cheek a smack as I wait for the satellite reception to find a signal. Had I known Henry owned a yacht that he kept docked off the coast of France, I might have been able to guess his secret plans for our honeymoon. But I’ve never asked him to list his assets and, to be honest, being continuously surprised is more fun.
I already own the only parts of him I care about—his heart, his mind, his adoration.
“Ugh! Come on!” I tap the key repeatedly, wishing my computer would hurry up.
“Relax. It’ll work.” I feel a tug on my bikini string, and then another, and another.
“I really don’t want the staff seeing me naked, Henry.” I add quietly, “Again.” Though the bikinis Margo packed for me leave little to the imagination anyway, but Captain Blain has already caught me straddling my husband’s lap once on this trip.
“I told all of them to stay away from this side of the boat, unless they want to swim to shore.”
“There! It’s up!” I quickly punch in the passcode. Several folders appear. I select the one marked Wedding Day.
I gasp as the first pictures fill the screen.
Henry stretches his warm body out on top of me while keeping the bulk of his weight resting on his elbows. He presses his lips against my bare shoulder. “All right, let’s see how good Joel really is.”
I pause long enough to turn and steal a lingering kiss from his lips and try to ignore his growing erection against the crack of my ass. We’ve been on this yacht for six days, and he’s had me in every position and countless surfaces and seems nowhere near sated.
But right now, I’m determined to relive the most perfect weekend of my life through a screen.
When Joel promised to capture all the moments, he wasn’t exaggerating. There are six hundred perfect moments in this wedding folder, from my first sip of coffee, bare-faced, my hair in a clip, to our last moments at the lodge, as Henry helped me into the pickup truck. We spent our wedding night at the old house with the hearth burning and champagne chilled, our bodies rarely apart.
“Mama looked good, didn’t she?” She was vehemently opposed to the idea of a black mother-of-the-bride gown. “Is this a wedding or a funeral, Abigail?” she’d declared. But when I sent her a designer satin dress to try on, she quickly changed her tune, allowing Celeste to make a few tweaks for sizing.
With her hair and makeup done at the Wolf Cove spa, she looked glamorous—a word I have never used to describe Mama. I noticed her stealing plenty of long, lingering looks at herself in the mirror. I guess the deadly sin of vanity wasn’t a concern that day, and I’m glad for it.
Joel caught an especially perfect picture of us together, Mama teary-eyed as she helped zip up my dress—which she begrudgingly admitted was the prettiest wedding dress she’d ever seen and perfect for me. He also captured a candid shot of her smiling up at Henry during the reception. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the look of fondness was genuine.
Daddy was nothing short of dashing. I’ve seen him in his Sunday best plenty of times, but his Sunday best is not a custom-made tux courtesy of Henry’s personal tailor—who Henry flew to Greenbank for measurements.
I think it’s safe to say they will never forget their trip to Alaska and for all the right reasons. Mama was uncharacteristically composed when I sat them down the day after the wedding to divulge the whole truth about Violet. Shocked, but not cursing the ground that Henry walks on. And when I told them Violet was moving in with us, she nodded with satisfaction, declaring Henry might make a respectable father yet.