Taming Eric (60 page)

Eric eyed off the hand being held out to him for a moment until he felt Natasha elbow him, telling him to stop just standing there and reluctantly he took the younger man’s hand and sho
ok it.

“So what have you been up to Brodie other than surfing?” Natasha
asked.

“What else is there in life but surfing Nat? I work nights so my days are mostly free. I surf as much as I can because I want to go Pro.” Eric stiffened at Brodie calling his wife Nat. No one, not even him shortened her name and it pissed him off that the bronzed idiot showed that level of familiarity and thought it was ok to abbreviate it. He stood by his wife’s side bristling with indignation and almost missed out on hearing the rest of their convers
ation.

“What about a girlfriend Brodie? Is there no significant other to share your life with?” She asked and Eric tensed as he waited to hear his res
ponse.

Natasha glanced up at him, one eyebrow raised and he smiled innocently at her. He knew that she knew exactly what was going on with him though. She seemed to have no trouble seeing through him. Ok so he was eager to hear what the bronzed idiot had to say, whether he had a girlfriend o
r not.

“Yeah there’s someone. She’s a surfer too. She wants to go Pro like me. She’ll be here later when she finishes work. It would have been good for you to meet Chloe, but maybe some other
time.”

Eric felt relief flow through him and suddenly Brodie wasn’t such a threat to him anymore. He was concerned about his wife though and the fact she’d been on her feet for quite a while. “Baby, don’t you think we should get going? You shouldn’t be on your feet too
long.”

“My feet are fine Eric, but food, I could use some lunch
soon.”

Brodie’s friends started calling to him and when they all looked the other men were putting their wetsuits back on, obviously getting ready to surf
again.

“I’d better get going. Hey, I’ll give you my number so you can let me know when your babies are born and when you have it on your phone, ring my number then I’ll be able to save your number to mine. Have you got your phone on you?” Brodie asked and Natasha dug in her bag until she pulled her phon
e out.

Eric tensed. He wasn’t happy about this at all. There was no need for them to exchange numbers as far as he was concerned. Brodie was never likely to come and see the twins once they were born so what the fuck the palsy exchanging of numbers was for, he didn’t know, but he sure as hell didn’t li
ke it.

They had just finished with their swapping of phone numbers when Brodie was called back by his mates again. He shrugged. “I have to go. Good luck with the babies and congratulations on your marriage.” He turned his gaze on Eric, his expression serious. “You treat her well man, you’ve got a real nice lady there.” And before Eric could come back with a comment which more than likely would have been a sarcastic one, Brodie ran back to his fr
iends.

He watched him go, grinding his teeth in frustration at the younger man’s warning to him. He didn’t need that fucking idiot telling him how to treat his wife. He caught Natasha looking up at him and he turned to her, irritation in his eyes. “Who the fuck does he think he is? I don’t need to be told how to treat you by some young bronzed fucking idiot whose only goal in life is to fucking well spend his days sur
fing.”

Natasha elbowed him hard and he looked at her in surprise at her attack on him. She was staring at him with anger flashing in her eyes. “Oh get over it Eric. Brodie’s just looking out for me. He saw how upset I was last time we were here. He tried to comfort me. He didn’t want me just taking off the way I did, so stop treating him like he’s the bad guy all the time. You should be happy, he’s got a girlfriend, he told us
that.”

“Yeah, so he says. Let’s get out of here and go get you something to eat. You said you were hu
ngry.”

He was relieved when his wife’s expression warmed again and she smiled at him. “I am hungry. You know what I feel like? You’re probably going to cringe. I want a donar kebab with loads of hommus and white sauce,
yum!”

He couldn’t help laughing at her expression. “Fuck baby, I want to be that kebab. How can you make food into something orgasmic all the time? If a donar kebab is what you want, then a donar kebab is what you’ll get. Come on, lets get out of here.” He took her hand and together they started making their way back towards the stairs that led up to the car park. “So where are we going to get this culinary delight from?” He
asked.

“When I came to the beach by myself that time I walked up the road to a big shopping centre. If there isn’t some shop in the eatery there that has donar kebabs, I’ll be very surpr
ised.”

He frowned when she said walking. “How much of a walk is it baby? You weren’t pregnant last time. I don’t want you overdoin
g it.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “I’ll be fine Eric, just don’t turn it into a sprint and I’ll get there. The doctor said gentle exercise is good for the babies and me, so stop worrying. You’re not going to call for the limo when we can walk up the
road.”

They kept walking and had just made it to the bottom of the steps leading up to the car park when Natasha hesitated. “Eric, that’s…” She started to say but trailed off again and he looked over at her curi
ously.

“What is it baby?” He asked, following her gaze up the stairs but he couldn’t see any
thing.

She shook her head at him. “It’s not
hing.”

They continued up the stairs and started the walk to the shops which ended up taking them about 20 minutes since he insisted they go at a leisurely pace. He ignored Natasha’s eye rolling at him when he made it clear he wanted them to take their time and once they arrived they went straight to the eatery to look for somewhere that was selling k
ebabs.

Once their kebabs had been made, Eric found them a table in the busy eatery so they could sit down and enjoy their lunch. Natasha began to moan at her first mouthful, her eyes closed as she savoured the flavours and he watched her, chuckling at her reaction. “They should get you to advertise their product baby. When people see your face, they’re going to flock here to order donar ke
babs.”

She would make a great advertisement for the food because watching her reaction was making him hard. How the hell she could make eating look like she was in the throes of a climax he didn’t know. All he knew was it drove him crazy and he found it hard to concentrate on his own meal when his wife was turning him on so much simply eating her
lunch.

Much as he’d have liked to call Henry to come and get them so he could take his wife back to the hotel and fuck her until she moaned and groaned for him and not some damned kebab, he didn’t. He didn’t want to spoil her day after the shit Vivian had caused for them last night so he forced his desire down and simply watched her as she ate and looked around at the crowds of people in the eatery. She was watching a young girl eating chips and gravy, her face covered in gravy which her mother finally wiped off her and Eric watched Natasha’s small smile as she absently rubbed her pregnant stomach. Was she trying to picture herself one day wiping down Erica’s face
maybe?

He asked her what she wanted to do next but she shook her head. “Nothing Eric. Can we go back to the hotel please? I feel a bit t
ired.”

“Of course baby. You need to get your
rest.”

He pulled out his phone to call Henry to bring the limo and pick them up and once that was done, he took Natasha’s hand, pulled her to her feet and together they headed back through the shopping centre to the doors which led outside to where Henry would be waiting for
them.

Back at the hotel Natasha lay down on the bed to have a rest and Eric climbed on with her, curling his arm around her waist. “I’ll stay with you until you fall asleep baby.” He said, pressing his lips to he
r ear.

“I love you Eric.” She told him sleepily and he chuckled quietly at the tone in her
voice.

“I love you too Mrs Rothman, now sleep baby. I’ll see you when you wake up.” He kissed her neck and as he lay there behind her, his arm around her, he felt her body relax and her breathing even out as she drifted off to
sleep.

While his wife slept Eric pulled out his laptop and started going through his emails and answering any that required his attention. He gave Alice a call to find out how the progress with the nursery was going and if her enthusiastic cries were any indication, it was all going well and looking ‘simply beautiful’ as she told him several
times.

He got off the phone with a grin on his face after about half an hour of Alice’s excitable chatter and she didn’t normally do ‘excitable chatter’ so the nursery really must have been coming along n
icely.

Natasha was still sound asleep and he considered going and lying down with her for a little while when his mobile phone rang. He looked at it in surprise since it was only supposed to be ringing if there was an emergency. Given he’d just spoken to Alice, he was curious as to who the hell was ringin
g him.

It was his new PA Alex and Eric sighed. Alex was good but he was no Natasha. He knew he wasn’t supposed to be ringing him unless it was an emergency and anything work related wouldn’t be an emergency since he’d made sure everything was running smoothly before he took the time off work for his wedding and hone
ymoon.

“What is it Alex?” He snapped impatiently down the
line.

“There’s been an incident at the office Eric. A woman has broken into your office and it would appear she’s taken the disc with all the company staff files on it.” Alex’s voice was
tense.

“What the fuck Alex? What do you mean a woman’s broken into the office? Where the fuck were you when this was taking place?” He exploded down the
line.

Alex started explaining that he’d been updating the company staff files and had left the office to go and get lunch. It was when he’d come back to eat in the office that he’d seen a blonde haired woman about to leave and when he’d questioned her, she’d told him she was hoping to surprise Mr Ro
thman.

He’d attempted to question her more but she’d brushed him off and left. It was when Alex had gone back into the office to continue the work he’d been doing before lunch that he noticed the disc was mi
ssing.

“When did this all happen?” Eric sighed impati
ently.

“It was several hours ago now. I’ve been trying to ring you for ages. The hotel’s reception said they’d pass my messages through to you, did you get them?” Alex
asked.

His PA’s words really pissed him off. There had been no messages from the hotel’s reception and he needed to firstly check that Alex had in fact contacted them and if he had, someone had better have a fucking good explanation as to why he’d not received any mes
sages.

He wrapped up his call with his PA and immediately called the police. It sounded like Vivian had been the one in his office and she had stolen something of his and he wanted it back. “Fuck her.” He ground out, raking his hands through his hair impatiently. She had gone too fa
r now.

The police were reluctant to do much given there was no proof it was Vivian since Alex didn’t really know her. She was before his time after all so he couldn’t verify for sure that it was her, but they did agree to go around to her home and question her at
least.

Once he got off the phone he checked on Natasha but she was still in a deep sleep, a small smile curving her lips. He wondered what she was dreaming about to be smiling like that, but he didn’t want to disturb her and he needed to get downstairs and tear the head off whoever it was that hadn’t passed on messages from
Alex.

He headed down in the elevator, bristling with anger. When he got down to the lobby it turned out that the hotel had been through a staff change over for the afternoon to evening shift and somehow the information from Alex had been misplaced. He made it perfectly clear he was pissed off with the service or lack of it and after the manager was brought out to apologise profusely and the staff member who had neglected to pass on the information to the staff for the next shift was contacted and made to apologise, Eric went back upstairs so Natasha wouldn’t wake and find him gone. The manager had offered to fire the employee but as pissed as he was, Eric wasn’t prepared to have the young man fired. It wouldn’t change anything. Vivian would still have gone to his office and stolen the file and as angry as he was, he wasn’t that big an arse. He knew his wife would be upset with him if he’d insisted the hotel fire the employee a
nyway.

His phone rang on the way back up to the suite and it was the police officer he’d spoken to earlier. It seemed Vivian was not at her home and from what neighbours had said, she’d flown out of the country on bus
iness.

When he got off the phone to the police he walked into the bedroom. Natasha was still asleep and he crawled onto the bed carefully. “Baby wake up.” He shook her gently but she simply turned with a sleepy smile on her face and reached out to him. He grabbed her hands holding her back from touching him and her eyes shot open, hurt evident in her gaze. Fuck she didn’t understand why he was holding her back obvi
ously.

He groaned at her expression. “Baby don’t look like that. I need to talk to you and I can’t concentrate if you touc
h me.”

She looked up at him and must have realised there was something going on. “What’s wrong?” She reached up to cup his
cheek.

“Alex called baby. A woman got into the office and has gone through the personal files for ever
yone.”