Louise: A New Beginning (19 page)

I gave him a pouty look, saying, “Well,
Mr. Cheater
, if you’d like this game of ours to continue, you’re going to have to play fair at some point. . .”

He gave me a sympathetic smile. “Oh, all right. You win this time, but only because I don’t want this to end,” he said, unbuttoning his shirt, and tossing it to a chair across the room. Once the shirt had successfully landed on the chair, he took off his pants, followed by his boxers, tossing them across the room too. Now he was finally caught up, and standing completely naked in front of me.

I gasped, looking at his beautiful body, smiling. “Much better,” I said approvingly. Grabbing him by the hand, I pulled him down so he was lying on top of me.

He laughed, hovering over me. We held each other’s gaze; it was as if we were trying to see who would blink or look away first or, better yet, who would give into the temptation first. Our bodies were barely touching, but I could feel the heat radiating off of Will’s skin. I couldn’t hold back any longer, I finally gave into that temptation so I could touch him.

I reached down, between our bodies, gently wrapping my fingers around his firm cock, stroking it up and down. He was so hard and ready for me, and the firmness of his dick excited me. . . I
needed
to feel it inside me, filling me up.

I lifted my pelvis, touching the wetness of my erotic lips to the tip of his cock, while still rubbing it with my hand. “This is payback for trying to make me come before you even got your shirt off. . .”

He growled, closing his eyes. “You are such a tease. . .”

“You’re welcome.” I giggled, rocking my hips up and down against his arousal. Every muscle in his body stiffened in anticipation.

He grabbed the hand that was fondling him, pulled it up above my head, and pinned it to the bed. Then he lowered himself down on top of me.

He finally slid the tip of his rod inside of me, watching me longingly. I let out a breath when he thrust a little deeper. . .but he still wasn’t deep enough, he wasn’t fully inside of me yet. He was as hard as steel, and naturally, I felt lightheaded from the sensation of his love muscle inside of me, even if I hadn’t taken it all.

He pushed himself inside the rest of the way, and he did it with force; he always seemed to know exactly what I wanted, and at this moment, he knew I wanted him to be rough. For a second, I felt like I might actually pass out from the intensity of our sexual rendezvous. I had so many different thoughts and emotions running through my mind, it was completely overwhelming.

We finally became one. . . We were connected through body and spirit. I didn’t have the words to describe how amazing it felt to be with him again.

Will continued to push in and out of me, thrusting so deep inside of me; kissing me the way only he knew how to kiss me; and touching me in ways I had never been touched by another man before. The entire experience was exquisite, it was beyond anything I had ever felt. Even when we were together in the past, it was nothing like this. In the past few days we had worked out several of the problems between us, and now we could just be together, and love one another, in a way we had never allowed ourselves to do before.

Time and reality no longer existed for us. We were lost in this moment. . . I knew he was as lost in me as I was in him. Everything we did was in sync, even the things we did involuntarily: our hearts beat to the same rhythm, we even took breaths at the same time; our bodies moved at the same pace: I would push my hips up to meet his, and he would push his down to meet mine. Even our lips seemed to be in tune, consistently meeting, and sharing the most sensual kisses. It was such a satisfying feeling. It was love, true and pure. It was so powerful, it could have shattered the universe.

“I love you, Louise,” Will said, showering my face and neck with small, hot kisses. “I want to be with you forever.”

“Is that right? Then forever is exactly what you will have,” I said, looking him in the eye.

He began to breathe heavily, and thrust faster and more forcefully. We were rushing toward the edge of our climax, both helpless against the need to feel the long-awaited relief. I felt like my heart was about to jump out of my chest, it was too happy to restore its normal speed.

I gently dug my nails into his back to show the pleasure he was giving me, and I felt his muscles tighten beneath my touch.

“God, Louise. . .” His hips slammed against mine, throwing me over the edge. The walls of my pussy clenched around him, welcoming the orgasm rolling down my spine and exploding right where I could feel Will’s cock pulsating in his own ecstasy. He came with a loud moan, breaking through the sound of the music still playing in the background.

“I never want to stop making love to you,” he said into the curve of my neck.

He slowly pulled out, and rolled over to lay down next to me. He then took my hand in his, kissing the back of it with this soft lips.

I smiled. “That makes two of us,” I said, turning my head to look at him.

“Are you okay? I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

“I’m great. Though last time we made love, you didn’t seem to care how I would feel in the morning.” By no means did I want to make him feel guilty about what had happened in the hotel. It was one of the best nights Will and I had spent together.

He cursed aloud. “I have told you, I was not myself that night.”

“Yeah, right. . . As if I don’t already know how
lost in the moment
you can be at times.”

“Ugh, you make me feel like a real bastard, who doesn’t care about anything but sexual satisfaction.”

I rolled onto my left side, putting my hand on his chest. “Don’t be ridiculous. I enjoyed every single second of that night.”

“Really?”

“You sound like you didn’t know that already.”

“Well, I still feel like a piece of shit for the way I treated you that night.”

“Like I was your property?”

He cursed again. “You are not helping.”

“Then tell your conscience to shut up. Don’t you think it’s a little too late to be feeling guilty about it? Like I told you before, I don’t regret showing up at your hotel room, I don’t regret making the offer, and I don’t regret acting upon it. And if you remember, I was the one to make the offer in the first place.”

He put his finger under my chin, making me look up at him. “But you would tell me if you didn’t like something or didn’t want to do something, right?”

“Of course, I would.”

“Good.” He kissed me on the lips. “Now, we should probably get some sleep,” he said, reaching over and pushing the button on the remote that shuts off the radio.

I bit my lower lip, thinking about the things we could do instead of sleeping.

“What?” He asked, smirking at my silence. “No need for sleep tonight, young lady?”

“Well, maybe a little later, but definitely not right now. . .”

***

We didn’t get much sleep that night. As a matter of fact, I only managed to close my eyes for about an hour, when my alarm went off, telling me it was time to get up and get ready for school.

“Mmm. . . Don’t go.” Will pulled me by the hand, making me fall back onto the bed.

I laughed. “I have to go, or I will be late for my classes. Don’t you need to get up and get ready for work anyway?”

“What day is it?” He asked groggily, wrapping both arms around me.

“It’s Monday.”

“Ah, then I guess I do need to get up and get ready for work. . . But not until I get a proper, good-morning kiss from my love.”

He pulled me to his lips and kissed me deeply.

I didn’t know how long our kiss would have lasted if Christopher hadn’t knocked on the bedroom door, saying, “Louise, Mrs. Cormac wants to talk to you!”

What? What could she possibly want to talk to me about this early in the morning?

“Just a second!” I shouted, jumping from the bed. I put on Will’s shirt and went to open the door.

“Morning,” Christopher said, handing me the phone.

“Thanks,” I mouthed. I closed the door and said into the handset, “Hello?”

“Good morning, Louise. I’m sorry for bothering you, but I wanted to ask you something. . .”

“Yes, what is it, Mrs. Cormac?”

I caught Will’s troubled gaze on me.

“Would you like to have dinner with me? Regina, a friend of mine invited me to the grand opening of her new café, and she said I could bring a friend with me. I want you to come with me. Regina is a former dancer and I would like you to meet her. What do you think?”

“I. . .don’t know what to say. . . I would be honored. Thank you so much!”

“Great!” Sabine said. “I’ll see you later then? I’ll ask my driver to pick you up and give you a lift to the café. It’s not very far from where I live, so I’ll just meet you there.”

“Okay. And thank you again.”

“No need to thank me, Louise. Good-bye.”

“What did she want?” Will asked, as soon as I hung up the phone. I didn’t like the tone he was using.

“Hey, why do you have an attitude towards Sabine?”

He shrugged, sitting in his bed. “Nothing. I just wanted to know why she would be calling you this early, and on a Monday no less. Is everything all right?”

“Yes, she just wanted to invite me to the grand opening of her friend’s café. She said her friend is a former dancer and she wants us to meet.”

“I see.” Will gave me another troubled look, then got out of the bed and headed for the bathroom, without saying another word. His playful mood had vanished. . .

What the hell is his problem? I take it he doesn’t trust Sabine… But why wouldn’t he? I doubt there is a good reason for his mistrust.

William

“Why today?” Christopher asked, pouring me a cup of coffee.

My brain was about to explode. After the conversation Louise had with her mother, I saw trouble on the horizon.

“Because she asked Louise to go out to dinner with her. Montgomery’s people will see them together, and then who knows what will happen next? Sabine needs to know the truth. She needs to be prepared for anything that might happen if his people see them together.”

“Didn’t you want to wait for a while before telling her Louise is her daughter?”

“Well, now we don’t really have the time to wait. It is now or never. If they go out together, it will put both of their lives at risk. I know I won’t be able to talk Louise out of going, so I need to talk to Sabine and tell her the truth before she meets with Louise.”

“Do you want me to go with you?”

I smirked. “I’m a big boy, Christopher. I think I can handle a conversation with Sabine Cormac.”

“But you have never told a woman her daughter, which she thought had died the day she was born, was not in fact dead. This discussion might be a little more difficult than you think it will be. Just saying. . .”

“Thanks for your concern, but I’ll be fine.” I took the last sip of my coffee, grabbed my phone, and called my secretary. I told her I was going to be a little late today. My conversation with Sabine was the first thing I needed to do this morning.

“All right. I am off,” I said to Christopher.

“Good luck. And please be patient with Sabine. Try to prepare her for the news before just blurting it out. Something’s telling me she is going to be shocked and in disbelief.”

I took a deep breath and nodded, saying, “I’ll do my best.”

I don’t think I ever remembered being as nervous as I was now. I kind of felt like I was about to tell my own mother she had a living breathing daughter, and not Louise’s. She was going to be furious, and shocked. She would probably be sad about the years she missed out on, and pissed when she realized where Louise spent her childhood; and thankful to have her back. Since I wasn’t a mother, I couldn’t really imagine all of the things a mother would feel to figure out her daughter had been alive for almost twenty years.

I went to Louise’s school, made sure she was busy in her class, and headed for the headmistress’s office. I called her secretary on my way to the school and asked her to make an appointment for me. Not that it would make her any less surprised to see me when I showed up in her office.

“William. . . What a surprise,” she said, confirming my thoughts. “What brings you in today? I hope Louise is alright?”

“She is okay. She is in her class right now. But I have something very important to tell you. . .”

“Please, take a seat.” She nodded to the chair across from hers. “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“No, thanks. I have had enough coffee for one morning.” I actually felt like my heart was about to jump out of my chest. I couldn’t tell whether it was from the caffeine or my nerves.

“Okay, so what did you want to tell me?”

I hesitated. I didn’t know how to start this conversation.

“What all do you know about Louise?” I asked.

“Well, not much actually. I know that she grew up in an orphanage, and that she’s a very talented dancer.” She smiled at her own words.

“The thing that I was going to tell you has something to do with Louise’s past, her childhood to be specific. . .”

“You sound so serious, William. I’m getting nervous.”

That makes two us
, I thought to myself. I felt sweat forming on my brow.

“I guess you didn’t know that Louise and I met many years ago, when she was just a girl, begging at one of the train stations.”

Sabine gasped quietly. “She had to beg for a living?”

“Not exactly. The orphanage she grew up in made its children
‘work’
.”

“Oh, my goodness. . . This is terrible.”

“When I first met Louise, I was almost twenty. And she was just a girl that I desperately wanted to help. I wanted to help her because I knew everything there was to know about that particular orphanage. My father grew up there too. And the stories he told me about
Paradise
were awful. That’s why I wanted to do something nice for Louise. I watched her grow up, I knew everything that went on in her life, until the day she turned eighteen and was finally allowed to leave the orphanage. She was sent to work in a club.”

“It was a gentlemen’s club, right? She told me about it.”

“Yes, it was. But Louise’s presence there was not an accident. She was sent there on purpose. . . The owner is her uncle.”

“Really? But that’s great news, isn’t it?”

“Well, it depends. . . Before I found Louise working in his club, I did some research on her past. I wanted to help her find her real family, her biological parents. . . But the results shocked me, because I knew the man who turned out to be her father.”

“Was he a friend of yours?” Sabine asked.

“Not exactly. But my father had known him for many years.”

“Is he someone important? What’s his name?”

I hesitated again.

Now or never
, I thought to myself.

“Fletcher Montgomery,” I said.

Sabine’s face paled. She stared at me, with her mouth open in shock.

“
The
Fletcher Montgomery?” She asked after a short pause.

“Yes, the Senator. . .”

She swallowed, and reached for a pitcher of water sitting on her desk. She poured some water into a glass, and drank it.

Wordlessly, she rose to her feet and went to the floor-length window, opening into a small park.

“I guess it’s not just a coincidence that you came to tell me about Fletcher’s and Louise’s familial bond. You know that he and I. . .used to be together, don’t you?” She turned around and looked at me, waiting for my response.

“Yes, I do.”

“How much do you know?”

“I know that you were supposed to have his baby.”

She nodded, turning back to the window.

“Unfortunately, he was a stillborn.”

“Are you sure about that?” I asked quietly, rising and going over to where she was standing.

She looked at me, frowning. “What do you mean by that?”

“Are you sure your baby didn’t make it?”

Her frown deepened. “I don’t know why you have started this conversation, William, but –”

“Sabine, please answer my question. It is very important. What do you remember about that day in the hospital?”

She blinked a few times, inhaled deeply and said, “Not much, actually. I was drugged. I could hardly think straight.”

“Did they let you see your baby when it was born?”

“No, I didn’t see it. The labor pains started too soon. My mother called the ambulance and the doctors said that the baby had a lack of air and that they needed to get it out of me, as soon as possible. They performed a caesarean section. I had been unconscious for a couple of hours. And when I woke up, they said. . .that my baby didn’t make it.”

Tears filled into her eyes. She tried to hide them from me, but I could see how painful it was for Sabine to talk about losing her baby.

“They said it was a boy.”

“A boy?” I asked, puzzled.

“Yes. Why does that surprise you?”

“Because. . .”

“Wait, you said Fletcher is Louise’s father, right? Then why was she raised in an orphanage? Didn’t he and his wife want a baby?”

“His wife doesn’t know she even exists. . .because she’s not her mother.”

“Oh. . . I see. But why are you telling me this?”

“I think you should sit down,” I said. I knew the thoughts in her head were chaos, and I bet deep down inside she already knew the answer to the main question she was asking herself.

“The doctors lied to you, Sabine. Your baby didn’t die. And it wasn’t a boy, she was a girl. . .”

The tears that she had been trying so hard to suppress ran down her cheeks. She didn’t say a word, she just kept watching me expectantly, she was waiting for me to say the words, telling her Louise was that baby she thought she had lost so long ago.

I proceeded, “You didn’t know you were pregnant when Fletcher and you broke up, did you?”

She shook her head slowly.

“What did he say when you told him about the baby?”

“I never told him I was pregnant with his baby,” she replied quietly. “One of our friends did. Then Fletcher came to me and said that I needed to get rid of the baby, but it was already too late to have an abortion, and I would have never agreed to kill my baby even if it weren’t. So I told him to get the hell out of my house and never come back. And so he did. I never saw him again, until the day I saw those awful promotional banners for his pre-election campaign.”

“Which means you didn’t know he was at the hospital the night your baby was born.”

“I did not….” Her hands were visibly shaking, so I grabbed the pitcher of water and poured more water into her glass.

“Thanks,” she said, picking it up, and taking a slow sip.

I pushed one of the chairs closer to hers and sat down in front of her. I smiled slightly, saying, “You gave birth to a beautiful baby girl, Sabine.”

More tears ran down her cheeks.

“But Montgomery made sure you would never find her. . .or he tried to rather, he just didn’t expect anyone to go looking for her later. He sent her to the worst place in the world, knowing his secret would be safe and carefully guarded. And that place is called
Paradise
. . .”

Sabine shook her head, whispering, “No. . .no, no, no. . .”

“He never expected me, or anyone else to figure out the truth about what he did to you and Louise.”

She hid her face in her hands and sobbed, her shoulders shook. I waited. I gave her a few minutes to comprehend the words I was saying.

Finally, she wiped her tears with her long sleeve and said, “Does she know?”

“No. She only knows who her father is.”

“Have they ever met?”

“Yes. But I can’t say it went well. Louise hates him, and I don’t blame her for that.”

“Neither do I. . .” Sabine mumbled, staring at nothing in particular. Then her eyes found mine and she spoke again, “I can’t have children. . . After that one day of hell, eighteen years ago, the doctors told me I would never be able to have any more kids. And they were not mistaken.” She took a tissue out of her pocket and wiped away her tears. “My husband and I have been trying to conceive for years. All for nothing. . .”

“But now you know the truth. You have had a baby for 18 years. Even though you didn’t raise her, I know she would want to know she is your daughter, and that
you
are her mother.”

“What am I supposed to do now?”

“Be happy,” I said. I was sure one day, Louise and Sabine would be able to talk and tell each other everything they were denied the chance to say before.

“What about Louise? Should I tell her the truth? God, I still can’t believe she’s alive. . . And I can’t believe she is here, going
to school here,
where I work. All this time, she has been so close to me... What if she never forgives me for leaving her in that terrible place, and having to be alone?”

“She knows it wasn’t your fault. And she’s dying to find you.”

“Why didn’t you tell her about me?”

“Because I didn’t want it to complicate her life even more than it already is.”

“It’s because of that Son of a Bitch
, Montgomery
, right? Pardon my French, but you can’t even imagine how angry I am at him right now.”

“Don’t worry, I understand. And yes, it’s because of him. He would be furious to know you have found Louise, and that I helped you in doing so.”

“You said your father knew him for many years. Does he know that you and Louise are together now?”

“Yes, and that scares the hell out of him.”

Then I told Sabine the rest of the story about Fletcher, his past and present life; and about the things he did to my father and my entire family.

“Unbelievable,” she said, stunned. “He dared to tell Louise to stay away from his life? Oh, he’s going to pay. . .”

“Please, don’t do anything reckless, Sabine. As I have already said, there are way too many things that he has to pay for, and we can’t risk him finding out what we are trying to do. We need to wait and find more evidence of his crimes, and then, we will let the bomb explode.”

“I know, I know, William. It’s just that I can’t imagine sitting here and doing nothing.”

I smiled. “You can enjoy your time with your daughter. That is the only thing that matters now.”

She smiled too. “You are right. Though now I have no idea how to act in her presence, because all I want is to run to her class and hug her and tell her how much I…love her. And how sorry I am for not figuring it out sooner.”