Shifting Gears: The Complete Series (Sports Bad Boy Romance) (82 page)

The tour guide gave us a rundown on what
we would do and see. They had given us all brochures and a manual as well.
There was a number to call on the brochure if they lost the card. After about
an hour lesson, the equipment was passed out and we suited up for our adventure.
I was used to the Los Angeles beaches where the water was freezing and you
couldn’t see a thing under the cover of murky water. The Mediterranean waters
were so different. They were so clear that we could see all the way to the sea
bed below. I put on my face mask and snorkel and Paul and I entered the water
hand in hand. The first thing I saw was a big, orange starfish. My only regret
was that I couldn’t squeal and tell Paul to look. Instead I tapped him and
pointed. He looked and smiled. Then as a crab scuttled across the sea bed, I
did the same thing. I may have even pointed out the shoals of fish that were
impossible to miss as they darted first this way and then that. I was in awe of
our new environment and I wanted to take in everything.

We floated on our stomachs and let the
waves carry us along lazily as we watched the sea life below us. It was an
amazing four-dimensional theatre and as we watched it the warm sun warmed our
backs. It was the most awe-inspiring thing I’d ever been a part of and I was
disappointed when the trip came to an end.

We took the ferry back to the pier and
after going back to the hotel to change we had dinner at a place called, La
Dolce Vita. At first I thought it was strange that we were having Italian food
while in Spain, but once we finished I had no regrets. Paul ordered us a bottle
of wine and we had a table near the window where we could look out over the
ocean while we ate. The food lived up to its five-star rating and I was so full
afterwards that I felt like I could have been rolled right out.

We took a walk through the city then. The
sun was just going down and casting an orange glow across everything.
 
We walked through a little plaza where the
pigeons seemed to outnumber the people. There was a fountain in the center of
it and in the center of that, a statue of a mermaid. The mermaid spit out the
water and it would spray up into the air in brilliant colors of red and green
and blue. The tall buildings around the edges were brightly colored and there
were vivid flowers everywhere. As darkness descended on us, the bright, twinkly
lights of the city began to take the place of the sun and cast a dim glow
across everything as far as we could see.

Every day we spent there, we did something
different. We went to museums and parks and concerts, and some days we just
spent hours walking on the beach and collecting seashells. We spent out nights
making love and we would wake up every morning in each other’s arms happy to
start another day together. I woke up on our last day there with a mixture of
excitement because I missed everyone at home, and regret because I was going to
miss Spain like crazy. Paul was already gone from the bed and I found him as I
was sure I would, standing on the balcony watching the sun finish coming up out
of the ocean.

“Hey, good morning.”

“Good morning, beautiful,” he said, “How
did you sleep?”

“I sleep like a log here. I’m going to
miss it. I told him.

“The sleep or Spain? He asked.

“Probably both,” I admitted.

“Yeah, I’m going to miss it too. This was
my first trip out of the country if you don’t count Mexico.” But we have a lot
more adventures to look forward to. Look, I found this for you.” He handed me a
pink seashell. It was huge, about the size of my fist and curled into a perfect
crescent and its smooth exterior looked like it had been polished to a
brilliant shine. That was the other beautiful thing about the beaches here. The
seashells washed up whole more often than not. I had found a whole sand dollar
just the day before.

“It’s beautiful, thank you.”

“Open it,” he said.

“Open it?” I repeated. I was looking
around it and didn’t see any buttons or hooks. I can’t remember what it felt
like.”

“Yeah, it’s hollow inside. Move that
little flap on the end and look inside.”

I moved the delicate little sliver of
shell slowly and carefully because I didn’t want to break it. When that was out
of the way, I looked inside. There was a little white velvet box inside. I
pulled it out, not daring to hope that it was what I wanted it to be, and I
looked at Paul. He had slid down to one knee and when I looked at him he took
my left hand in his right and said, “Jessie, will you marry me?”

I felt the tears streaming down my face
again. He opened the box and I was staring down at a princess cut sapphire set
in white gold. It had a delicate ring of diamonds around the primary stone. I
had never seen a more beautiful ring and I loved most of all because it was
different. I also loved knowing he had gone to pick it out by himself. My hands
were shaking and so were Paul’s.

“Oh my God! Yes! I’ll marry you! Yes! Yes!

 
I
know I sounded like I was having an orgasm, but I didn’t care. I was over the
moon excited and I would tell the whole world if they cared to listen. Paul
took the ring out of the box and took my hand in his. He slipped the ring on my
finger. It fit perfectly. “I love it.” “How did you know the size?” I asked
him.

“Marie helped with that part,” he
said.
 

“It takes my breath away,” I told him
about the ring. “Thank you so much.”

“You make it look good,” he said. “But, I
don’t think this matches,” he took the lapels of my robe in his fingertips and
pulled on it gently.

“What? My robe?”

“Mm hmm, and whatever you have underneath
too. We don’t want anything clashing with the ring.”

“Maybe I should step in off the balcony?”

Paul looked around. “Maybe…You saw that
guy on the beach yesterday though, didn’t you?”

“Which guy?”

“The bare-assed naked man that no one even
seemed to notice but us.”

“Oh yeah,” I said.

“My point is, no one here is too affected
by nudity, and you look a hell of a lot better than that guy.”

“You think?”

He laughed, “I love you…all of you…but if
you looked anything like that guy, trust me, I would have never asked you to
take off the robe.”

I stood up and brushed past him with a
dramatic flourish. Once inside, I took off the robe. I wasn’t wearing anything
underneath. Paul grinned and dropped his robe too. He came over to me and in
one grand swoop; he picked me up off my feet. “What say we try that big tub in
there with the jets?”

“I say you come up with the best ideas.”

CHAPTER
SEVEN

I started the water in the big sunken tub
in our suite. Paul stood back and ogled my naked body and then all of a sudden
he said, “You got this part?”

“Sure,” I said, wondering what he was up
to. I reached into the basket on the counter of supplies the hotel had given us
as part of our package. There was a bottle of bubble bath oil in there. I
opened it and put it to my nose. It smelled like jasmine. I thought twice about
pouring it in. It was going to make Paul smell like a girl. I smelled it again
and decided that the only one who should care about that was me and I didn’t. I
poured in the entire little bottle.

While the tub filled, I sat down and
admired my ring again. I can’t believe I’m getting married. I can’t believe I’m
marrying Paul. Just a few months ago he was struggling fighter protecting his
family and I was a girl with smelly clothes….how far we’ve come.

The tub finished filling and I turned it
off. “It’s ready,” I called out to him.

“Okay, go ahead and get in, I’ll be right
there. Don’t start any of the fun stuff without me.”

I stepped into the tub and sat back into
the deep bubbles. They smelled really good and the warm water felt great. I
rested my head against the curve of the cool porcelain and waited.

“Are you asleep?”

I smiled and said, “Not yet, but if you
don’t hurry…”

I heard a clink noise and opened my eyes.
There was a brass ice bucket resting in a decanter next to the tub, a whole
slew of scented candles which he was lighting as we spoke and an IPod in a deck
with speakers.

“Wow! What’s all this?”

“It’s our celebration,” he said.

“What are we celebrating?”

He looked shocked as he continued to light
candles. “Our engagement,” he said.

“Oh, yeah…I didn’t forget, I just hadn’t
heard that we were celebrating.”

He finished lighting the candles which he
had lined up along the mirror and then he pushed the button on the IPOD. Music
began to waft slowly from the speakers. His final touch was to shut off the
overhead light. The scented candles were doing the trick. Now, we had ambiance.
He poured two flutes of champagne and sat them on the side of the tub and then
slid in behind me. I felt his hands go around my stomach and gently pull me
back against his chest.

"Mm you feel good." He whispered
into against my hair. The feel of his breath so close to my ear gave me a
chill.

I put my head back against his shoulder
and said, “You feel good too.”

He was running his hands across my body.
The water and slick soap acted as lubricants as he massaged first my thighs and
then shoulders. When he finished that, he put his lips on my neck and after a
few soft kisses, he bit down. It was just a little nibble but it gave me a
shudder. He ran his mouth up along my neck to my jaw and up to my ear. He
sucked my earlobe into his mouth and held it between his teeth. He flicked it
back and forth with his tongue just the way he did with my clit when he eats my
pussy. He had me squirming from side to side and finally I turned my head to
the side and met his lips. It was a soft kiss at first, but it rapidly
accelerated. I pushed my tongue into his mouth and the feel of his warm tongue
against mine elicited a moan from one of us. I was so into the kiss, that I’m
not even sure which one. I had ahold of his face with my palm on one side and I
moved his face back just a fraction of an inch so that I could deepen the kiss.
I ran my tongue back and forth along his, stroking it. I felt his hand slide
down across my stomach and lightly brush against my pussy. I felt him start to
pull it away again but I was in no mood this morning to be teased. I lifted my
legs one at a time and put them on either side of his. Then I took ahold of his
hand and pushed it down between my legs. He licked my bottom lip and let out a
low growl as he felt me guide his fingers inside my pussy lips. His other hand
had found one of my breasts. That was what I was in the mood for. I kept one
hand over his between my legs and slid the other one up and covered the one
that was rolling my hard nipple between his fingers. Then I let my body relax
back into him and I turned my head back so that I could let my tongue slide
back into his mouth.

I just rested my hand on his lightly and
enjoyed the feeling of him stroking my outer lips lightly. The tips of his
fingers were still inside where I put them and after a few seconds, I felt them
begin to move. He let his two fingers slide inside of me slowly I still had my
hand on his and when his fingers moved inside, so did mine. That elicited
another moan from him and caused him to pull harder on the nipple he had in his
left hand.

He pulled his mouth away from mine just
slightly and said, “Is that what you want, baby?”

“Oh yeah, that’s it. Mm hmm…”

He moved his lips down and kissed across
my shoulder to my neck. His tongue took over there and he began to lick and
then suck on my neck. I let my head lie back against his shoulder and I began
to move my hips slowly and moan. It felt amazing, but I wanted more. With the
hand that was still on top of his between my legs, I pushed him a little deeper.
He used his thumb to make circles around my engorged clit and let the fingers
inside of me…his and mine, find their spot and once they did, he pressed down
hard on my clit like it was a doorbell and he was ringing it.

“Oh baby! Oh yeah, that’s it.” He unbent
one of his fingers and let it slide up all the way inside of me. “Oh God,
yes…more, please.” I pulled my hips up and he slid a second finger inside of
me. I was panting by now, it felt so good. He had switched nipples and he was
still sucking on my neck. It was pure, ecstasy. He began sliding those two
fingers in and out of me. I was pushing him at first, so the movements were
frantic. I finally pulled my hand away and let him do the work he knew how to
do.

He reached for that hand with his left one
and brought it up to cup one of my own breasts. I let my hand and my fingers
travel across it and as he stroked harder and faster, my nipple got harder and
harder. I was splashing up and down now and "the more I moved and
squirmed, the faster he would stroke me. He fucked me with his fingers in and
out, up and down and while he did that, I strummed one nipple and he strummed
the other.

I had to bite down on my lip as he
increased his pace and when he saw me do that, he pressed his mouth against my
ear again and said, “Mm, that’s it, baby, come for me.” His voice was deep and
husky and he sounded like he was almost out of breath. The sound of it and the
feel of it against my ear put me over the top.