My Broken Soldier (Love Conquers Life Book 2) (15 page)

“You bet. Be prepared because I plan to beat you.”

“Oh, really, miss I’ve never bowled? How do you plan on doing that?”

She narrows her eyes as she climbs into the Jeep. “I have my ways.”

She starts to giggle, and I shake my head as I drive to the bowling alley. When we arrive a few minutes later, we are surprised that it’s not busier for a Saturday afternoon. There are very few cars in the parking lot. It’s a good thing, though, because we won’t have a problem getting a lane.

We walk in, and there are only about five families bowling. We approach the counter and ask the kid for a lane. He asks us our shoe sizes.

“Seven and a half,” Patty says as she unzips her boots to change her shoes. I tell the kid I’m a size ten. He hands me my shoes and tells us we’re on lane fifteen.

We walk to our lane, place our shoes under the seats, search for a ball. After placing the ball on the ball return, we see the screen above us come to life, so I put our names in. As soon as I’m done, Patty approaches the dots on the floor and slowly walks to the line. She throws the ball and it goes into the gutter. I’m trying hard not to laugh, but she looks so cute when she turns around and pouts at me.

“I thought you were going to beat me?”

“I’m just warming up, so you better watch out,” she says, trying not to laugh. I’m sure she knows she’s in trouble. The ball comes back, and she throws it again. This time she knocks down seven pins.

“There you go, baby.”

“See, I told you I was warming up.”

She winks at me as she watches my shot.
With my first throw, I take
down six pins, and with the second one I take down three more, so I’m really only two pins ahead of her. On her next turn, Patty manages to knock down eight more pins, and now she’s jumping up and down like a little kid. It makes me smile to see her having so much fun.

I can’t believe her parents never took her bowling as a child. She throws her next shot and only hits one more, but she’s still excited. I drop my ball the next time I throw it, knocking down only two pins, and she starts laughing at me. She’s not even trying to hide it. She’s all out laughing.

I scoop her up. “Come here, you. Are you laughing at me?” I ask her as I spin her around.

She laughs harder and says, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I put her down and lower my lips to hers. “I love you, Patty.”

“I love you too. Thank you for coming up with this idea. I’m having a blast.”

About an hour later, we leave the bowling alley to go home for a relaxing night together. We each won one game and all her worries were forgotten, at least for tonight, so mission accomplished.

Chapter 15

Carter

It’s the day before Thanksgiving, and Patty is running around the house, driving me crazy. She won’t sit still, and every time I ask if I can help, she just says to stay out of her way. All she has let me do is make her breakfast. I feel so useless. I took today off so I could help her, but now I feel like I should have gone to work.

The phone rings, so I jump up to answer it.

“Hello, Mr. Montgomery,” the doorman says.

“Hello. What can I do for you?”

“I’m sending up a centerpiece arrangement that was delivered from Mrs. Fitzpatrick-Carmichael.”

“Great, thanks.” I hang up the phone and tell Patty that her mother sent us a centerpiece for tomorrow. There’s a knock at the door, and I see it’s one of the staff. I open the door to receive the arrangement. It’s a nice piece with a glass candle holder. There’s a white candle and fall-colored flowers all around it.

I show it to Patty. She says, “Can you make room in the fridge for those or they’ll never last until tomorrow.” She wipes down the counters for, like, the fifth time today.

“Sure.”

I place the arrangement on a shelf in the fridge. There is no need to worry about making room because there’s no food in the fridge. She didn’t want to do any shopping this week because she was so worried about having enough room for the turkey and the rest of the food she’s preparing. Mind you, I have a huge French door fridge with the drawer-type freezer at the bottom and we’ve only bought a twenty-two pound turkey.

I’ve never seen her so freaked out, and I really don’t know what the problem is. Her mother is the only one who’s never been here, and Patty doesn’t typically care for her opinion. She’s been doing laundry, dusting, vacuuming and putting away some of the things we brought to my place from hers.

She emailed her landlord yesterday to tell her she was moving out and paid her last thirty-day rent. The cleaning crew her father hired came in there on Monday to get everything in shape, so all we have to do is figure out what we’re doing with the stuff she doesn’t need. There are a few items she’s bringing here, like her jewelry armoire and more clothes. She also mentioned she may want a few other small pieces of furniture that she thinks will match what I have. We both agreed it would be best to wait until after Thanksgiving to deal with that since she has thirty days to move out anyway.

“Honey, I really feel like I’m forgetting something for tomorrow.” There’s so much panic in her voice, it makes me feel bad.

“Baby, come here and sit down for a minute. You haven’t stopped since breakfast this morning, and you’re running yourself ragged.”

She collapses on the couch next to me, but I pull her onto my lap. “What’s wrong? Talk to me.”

“I want tomorrow to be special. It’s our first Thanksgiving together, and we’re having everyone over. I want it to be perfect.”

“Baby, you’ll do a fantastic job. I know it, but if you don’t calm down you’ll be too beat to enjoy our guests. The house looks great. We have plenty of beer and wine, and the only cooking you have left to do tomorrow is the turkey and potatoes.”

She sighs. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I enjoy cooking, but my mother never let me do it when I lived at home. Celia has always cooked for us, and it always made me feel bad because that meant she wasn’t with her family, where she should have been.”

“That’s awful,” I say as I pull her toward me so she can relax against me for a moment. I really want to hold her so she can take a nice little break.

She kisses my neck as she snuggles against me. I hear her take in a deep breath. She kisses my neck again. This time I can feel her smiling against my skin.

“I love the way you smell.” She licks the vein in my neck to my ear. Then she whispers, “And I love the way you taste.”

I turn and capture her lips with mine, sticking my tongue out, begging for entry. She opens to me, and our tongues meet. I moan into her mouth as my hands glide up her back and under her shirt. My hand slowly slips across her skin to her breast. I give it a squeeze through her bra, and her nipple hardens in my hand.

I pick her up and lay her down on the couch, kissing my way up her jaw to her ear. I nibble on her earlobe and whisper, “You taste pretty damn fine yourself.”

I lick my way down her neck. When I get to her collarbone, I give her a small bite and then lift her shirt. I pop her breasts out of the cups of her bra and nibble on her already hardened nipples. She moans as I suck her nipples. I love the noises she makes.

My cock is getting uncomfortably hard, so I unbutton my pants and slip them off, going for hers next. I unbutton her jeggings, then, with one hand, lift her ass off the couch and peel her pants down. I lower her back down onto the couch.

“Stop,” she practically screams.

“Stop?” I question, confused. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Let’s move to the room. I don’t want to ruin the couch, especially with family coming over tomorrow.”

My eyebrows shoot up because I can’t believe she’s worried about the couch. “Are you serious?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, you wait. I will fuck you on the couch, and soon.” I scoop her up and carry her to our room as she giggles.

“I love when you talk dirty to me,” she says, biting my neck.

“Ow, that hurt.” I toss her on the bed. “I should spank you for that.”

“Someone wants to play a little rough today, huh?” She wiggles her eyebrows, kneeling on the bed as I stand in front of her.

After lifting my shirt over my head, she licks my nipple. Then, as it hardens, she nibbles on it, causing me to flinch. She squeezes my ass and kisses her way down my chest and over my abs. She sits in front of me, taking my cock in her mouth, wasting no time taking me as deep as she can. My hips start to move in rhythm with her. She moans, and I do the same as the vibration from her lips sends a shiver through me.

“Patty, that feels so damn good.” I slip my hands into her hair and give it a slight pull. She moans again as I continue to fuck her luscious, wet mouth. “I’m not going to last. I hope you’re ready.”

Her hands go to my balls, and she massages them as she takes me deep in the back of her throat.

“Fuck, Patty, I’m coming.”

My legs shake as she swallows me down, ensuring she gets every last drop. When she’s done, she licks her lips and says, “Mmm, that was delicious.”

I kneel in front of her, put both her legs on my shoulders, and lay her back on the bed. I bury my face in her pussy. She’s so wet, and she tastes mighty fine. I want her to come so bad. I won’t be teasing or going easy. I lick her hard and fast. I want her to come all over my tongue, and I want it now.

She’s so worked up from sucking me off that in a matter of minutes, she’s giving me what I want. I lap up every last drop of her orgasm as she wraps her hands in my hair, holding me in place. She finally let go, so I stand and slide her up the bed before I join her.

Hovering over her, I look into her eyes. “I love you.”

“I love you,” she says as my mouth lands on hers. I slowly slip my cock into her wet pussy, slowly sliding it in and out of her. She closes her eyes as she takes in the pleasure we’re creating.

“Open your eyes for me, baby.” She does, and I pick up the pace. She moans as she wraps her legs around my waist. I pound my cock balls deep inside of her, and she closes her eyes again, calling out my name.

“Open your eyes,” I demand. She opens them and looks into my eyes. “I love watching you come.” I can see how much she loves me in that moment, and I can only hope she sees how much I love her. “Come on, baby. Milk me with that delicious pussy of yours.”

I slam into her a few more times, and she does as I request. I can feel her pussy tighten around my cock as I find my release.

I rest on my elbows, hovering over her.

“I love when you make love to me,” she says as I play with her beautiful brown hair.

The phone rings, and I know the manager or the doorman has to be calling from downstairs because they are the only ones who call my home number. Actually, I only have a home number because they require it so they can phone me about guests and deliveries. I slip out of Patty and roll over to answer the call.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Mr. Montgomery. This is Mr. Santos from downstairs.”

“What can I do for you?”

“Well, I wanted to let you know that Benjamin Mancini was here. I told him to stay put while I called to get permission to send him up. Instead of calling you, I was calling the police, hoping to catch him, but he ran off.”

“Are the police coming?”

“Yeah, but I don’t know that us giving them video of him being here will do anything more than give them evidence.”

“Let me know when they’re on their way up, please?”

“Sure will. Sorry, Mr. Montgomery.”

“Not your fault. Thanks for trying.”

I hang the phone up. “We need to get dressed, baby. The police are on their way here. Apparently, Ben tried to get upstairs, past the doorman, but when he realized they were calling the police, he ran off. I’m sure the police are going to get surveillance tapes for evidence, and maybe they’ll have some info for us.”

“Honey, our clothes are all in the living room.”

“I’ll go get them. You get cleaned up.”

When I get back into the bedroom with our clothes, she’s walking out of the bathroom. She quickly gets dressed and brushes her hair out so it’s not a mess when the police get here. I wash my face and join her.

As we’re walking out of the bedroom, the phone rings again. I suspect it’s Mr. Santos letting us know the police are on their way up.

Patty takes a couple of bottles of water out of the fridge, hands me one, and sits at the snack bar. There’s a knock at the door, and I hear, “Carter, it’s Officer Phillips.” I check the peephole and then open the door.

“Officer Phillips, we really need to stop these surprise visits.” We shake hands.

“I wish we could catch this little bastard so you two can move on with your lives, but every time we come close, he disappears. We know where he got the flowers from, but that did us no good because he’s not staying with his father any longer and his father has no idea where he is.”

“Did the cameras downstairs catch anything?”

“Yeah, but that’s no big deal since we know it was him. He had the nerve to tell the doorman that he wanted to apologize to you and had a gift for you.”

“Did he leave the gift behind?”

He shakes his head. “I wish. It might have helped us catch him. We did take the video as evidence, but it won’t help us find him. There are no cameras outside, so we don’t know what he was driving.”

“Did the doorman see what he was driving?”

“He said he walked up, so he probably parked down the street. We have plenty of evidence for when we do catch him. We confirmed the fingerprints in your apartment and the semen left on your bed was definitely his. He had someone else with him, but whoever it was they don’t have prints in the system for us to match.”

“It wasn’t his buddy from the lake house?”

“No. We questioned him, and he said after the last incident he wants nothing to do with him. He wasn’t even expecting the lake house to go the way it did and said he would testify against him.” He looks at Patty. “At this point, we ask that you be careful and please don’t leave the house alone.”

“At this point, I don’t want to leave the house. We’re having Thanksgiving here and we’ve done all our shopping. I have no intentions of leaving until Friday. We have plans to help out with a toy drive that Carter is putting together on Friday. We’ll be visiting two different stores.”

“I’m working,” Officer Phillips says. “Which stores and what time are you going? We’ll stop in.”

“I’ll write them down for you,” I tell him, walking into the kitchen to find a piece of paper. A minute or two later, I hand him the information. “Here you go.”

“Great. This shouldn’t be a problem, but if you don’t see me, Carter, keep her safe.”

“I will.” I shake his hand and lock the door when he leaves.

“I put it on my blog that we were going to be there,” Patty says, concerned. “What if he shows up?”

“That may be a good thing. It’ll be in public, so he won’t be able to hurt you, and if Officer Phillips is there, then maybe they’ll finally catch him.”

She nods, but I can tell she’s nervous about it. I step between her legs and lift her chin, forcing her to look me in the eye. “Baby, I swear I won’t let anything happen to you. Please trust me. I will not leave your side, not even for a moment.”

“Thank you.”