Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 87015 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 435(@200wpm)___ 348(@250wpm)___ 290(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87015 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 435(@200wpm)___ 348(@250wpm)___ 290(@300wpm)
I chuckled. He was so fucking adorable. “What kind of books do you read?”
“Romance.”
Why didn’t that surprise me? “You’ll do great,” I said, and a spark ignited in his blue eyes. I wasn’t sure Parker even realized it, which made me want to test my theory. “They’re going to love you…how can they not? You’re sweet, funny, beautiful, and smart. You’re going to have them wrapped around your pretty little finger.” I felt his body relax, felt the air in the room shift as the worry left him. “You’re going to be perfect, and they’re gonna wonder how I landed you.”
Parker was closer, but I hadn’t moved. His breath puffed against my cheek, my words having loosened his body to the point that he was leaning into me, letting me help hold him in place. Oh yes, I was right. Parker was definitely a little praise slut, and damn, knowing this did unexpected things to me too. Made my dick throb even harder, yeah, but more than that, it made me feel like I was on top of the fucking world.
“You’re such a good boy.”
Parker sucked in a sharp breath, then jerked back. Fuck. I’d pushed too hard, too fast. Not that I’d wanted anything from him in that moment except getting him out of his head and making him feel better.
He took a step back, then another, like he was snapping himself out of a trance, his mask slipping into place. “Good boy? So ridiculous.”
I cocked a brow, challenging him. I liked challenging Parker.
“I’m gonna go…upstairs…and finish what I was doing…vacuuming…because I do, in fact, clean,” he rambled. “How long until we leave?”
“Hours still.”
“Oh. Okay. Of course. It’s early. I forgot.”
I fought not to laugh at his short, nervous sentences. Was it because he was thinking about how it felt when I called him a good boy? It wasn’t something I’d played around with when it came to my lovers—not that Parker was that—but it felt right with him. “Okay. I’ll be here. Drinking coffee.” I spoke the same way he had, which seemed to snap him out of it even more, and he flipped me off. “There’s my boy,” I teased.
“I hate you.” But he smiled.
He didn’t hate me at all. I was thankful as hell about that.
Parker went for the stairs. I kept my eyes on him the entire time.
“Stop looking at my ass,” he said, humor in his voice.
Unlike him, I didn’t even deny it. “But it’s such a nice ass.”
“I can’t believe you’re my husband,” he said in a voice low enough that I was surprised I’d heard it, and even more surprised at how amused he’d sounded when he said it.
* * *
Okay, so I definitely understood why Parker had been freaking the fuck out earlier.
It took a while for it to hit me, but now, as we were driving to my parents’ house where I was going to introduce them to my husband, I was afraid I might throw up.
“Do you think we can run away to Mexico?” Parker asked from the passenger seat.
“You don’t know my mom. She would always find us.”
He groaned, then knocked his head against the window a couple of times.
“Please don’t give yourself a concussion.”
“Oooh! A concussion. That’s a good way out of this!”
I chuckled, which helped calm me down a little. I wasn’t the type to stress out about things. I went with the flow and worked well on the fly. Overthinking things wasn’t my usual MO, but then, when had I introduced my parents to my husband before? “It won’t be that bad.”
“It won’t be that bad? What happened to You’re going to be perfect, Parker. It’ll be great. They’ll love you. You’re such a good boy, blah, blah, blah.”
“I knew you liked it when I praise you!”
He sighed dramatically. “I don’t like it.”
“Yes you do, beautiful. You fucking love it, and it’s actually really hot to me, but now’s not the time to get into all that. I do believe it’ll be okay and you’ll do great. It’s just not every day this happens.”
“No, it’s not. We should just rip the Band-Aid off and plan on you meeting my dad next weekend.”
“We can do that if you want.” I turned onto my parents’ road, the ocean in the distance. They lived in a large, white beach house that was my mom’s baby. It was one of the dreams she had fought so hard to achieve.
“I’ll call him,” Parker replied as I pulled into the driveway. The second I did, the front door opened. “Oh God,” he said. “Let’s do this.”
When Parker reached for the door, I touched his arm. “Hey.”
“Yeah?”
“You are my good boy. The best.”
He blushed and couldn’t hold back his smile.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Parker
Oh my God. Why did I like it when Elliott praised me? I’d been about to burst out of my skin, but something about what he said made me nearly melt into a pile of goo instead. Stupid, sexy men. They were my weakness.