Medicine Man (Page 79)

His fingers bury themselves in my sopping wet hair and he leans over me. “Are you going to have my babies?”

A quickening starts up in my belly. “Y-you want to have babies with me?”

“Fuck yes, I do. In fact, I think about it constantly. The baby-making process, I mean.”

It moves down, that quickening, way, way down in my stomach. “You’ll have to come inside me, then. Without a condom.”

“I’m looking forward to that. So fucking much.”

Actually, me too.

I can’t help the blush that overcomes my face, my body. “Okay.”

He kisses me, possessively. “Then, yes. I’ll marry you.”

Grinning, I kiss him back. “So I have some time over my Christmas break. Would you like to do it then?”

Groaning, he drops his forehead on mine. “Christ, Willow. We’re not getting married while you’re in school. You need to finish college first.”

“Why not?”

He shakes his head, looking up at the sky again. “I won’t feel so ancient, for one. And second, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but your mom will kill me.”

I grip his hair in a fist. “I don’t care about my mom. I can’t wait four years.”

Another possessive kiss. “It’s not up to you.”

I rub up against him, making him groan once more. “You like to boss me around. But you do know you’re not my dad, don’t you?”

A lustful glint enters his eyes, his hands going to my ass and squeezing the flesh through my soaked jeans. “You like to act bratty, but you do know you aren’t a little girl, don’t you?”

Before I can react to his statement and his dominating hold on my butt, we hear a couple of guys and their hooted laughter coming from behind me.

Immediately, Simon pushes me toward his car. He gets us in the backseat and shuts the door, with me sitting on his lap.

It all happened so fast that I have to take a second to catch my breath.

Panting and sprawled on him, I ask him, “Wh-What was that?”

Simon’s eyes are focused on the guys that just passed us by. He’s glaring at them. I try to look but he doesn’t let me, grabbing the back of my neck, keeping my gaze glued to his face.

“They were looking at you. Those dickheads.”

I laugh. “What?”

His jaw ticks in anger but he remains silent, making me shake my head. My ice king thinks everyone watches me like he does.

Before, he was the king of the castle, roaming its corridors to keep an eye on me, and then, he became my broken hero, looking for me in this big, bad city.

Gah. I love him so much.

“Not everyone watches me, Simon,” I whisper, tracing his stubble.

His grip flexes and he growls, “If you think that, then I need to lock you up somewhere and tie you to the bed so you can’t even go to the window.”

I rock my body against his, getting unbelievably turned on by his possessiveness. There was a time when I wanted to stay back at Heartstone, all trapped and ill, just so I could stay close to him.

And the truth is that being trapped with him doesn’t sound so bad because being with him sets me free.

Simon’s hands go back to my ass as I keep undulating against him. “Are you still gonna be this possessive when we get married over Christmas?”

He begins kneading the flesh, as he thrusts his hard cock into the juncture of my thighs. He leans up and bites my lower lip in a show of pure dominance. “No. I’m going to be even worse when you officially become mine. Four years from now.”

I laugh again, and Simon grabs my face, looking at me with such intensity that I blush. “What?”

“I… I can’t stop looking at you. I can’t… You’re so fucking beautiful, Willow. So stunning and…” He swallows. “So white and pale and like a snowflake.”

I study him with my watering eyes. That slant of his jaw and that stubborn chin, his perfect nose and those stormy eyes.

“I’m your snowflake.”

“Fuck yes, you are.”

“I love you. I love you so much, Simon.”

 And then, he kisses me.

I love this man with every piece of my brain, heart, and soul.

This man who thinks I’m beautiful and a warrior. Who doesn’t know that he’s so getting laid in the backseat of his car like a teenager. And that no matter what, we’re definitely getting married over my Christmas break.

Five years later…

I’m losing my mind.

Well, not really but it feels like it. And of course, it’s happening at a birthday party.

Her birthday party, no less.

It’s not my usual bad day. At least, it didn’t start out as one. I was perfectly calm when I woke up this morning.

I opened my eyes with a purpose, a clear goal set in my head. I’d taken the day off from my job at the local high school where I work as a guidance counselor, since I had a few things to get done before the party.

Over the past few years, I’ve learned that whenever I get overwhelmed, making lists helps. It started out as an exercise for Columbia when my exams overwhelmed me. But now I use it for almost every aspect of my life.

My husband seems to find my little lists amusing and sexy, all at the same time. But that’s beside the point.

So yeah, I had my list and I was ready to face the day and the party but then she started crying.

God, the sounds she made.

They were so excruciating, so painful to hear. Her soft chin wobbled and her beautiful face scrunched up as big, fat tears streamed down her pink cheeks.

And the worst of all was that she wouldn’t stop.

No matter what I said to her, she wouldn’t stop crying. She went on and on. I tried everything. Talking to her, soothing her, playing her music, reading to her. But nothing.

I even thought of calling my mother, which in itself shows how frazzled I was. I never call my mom for help. Mostly because she thinks my life is a series of bad choices. Besides, Simon hates it if I reach out to her for things.

“You’re coming to me with anything and everything from now on. You got it?” he said to me once.

I remember being mad and, obviously, turned on by his authoritative statement. “Oh yeah? Why?”

He looked at me like I was crazy, and not the useless kind. “Because you’re mine, Willow, and I’m yours.”

Needless to say, I jumped his bones. I almost always do that when he says things like this.

But I didn’t want to bother him today. He was at a meeting with his editors that he couldn’t get out of, and in any case, he was going to be home soon for the party.

Somehow, I got her to calm down enough so she could tell me why she was crying. Turns out, it was because she’d lost her favorite toy and she couldn’t find it.

And here I thought her world was ending.

It would be a hyperbole to some but it’s a very real thing to me.

We did find her toy – a little snow owl inspired by Harry Potter – but her gut-wrenching cries knocked me off my positive mojo. I needed space and I needed happy thoughts.

All the fucking happy thoughts.

I hear footsteps, sure and confident. His.

He’s back.

My ears perk up. In fact, my entire body has perked up as I hear him climbing up the stairs and walking toward our bedroom. He knows that if I’m not downstairs, helping with the arrangements, then this is where he’ll find me.

When we moved to this house, I remember having one of my ugliest bad days. I couldn’t get out of bed. I didn’t even have the energy to breathe. The sun was burning me, sucking off all my energy. So I hid myself in here where it’s all dark and the air is saturated with his rainy smell.