Epilogue
Abby
Two Years Later
Something I always thought would make me love Lanai even more than I already did was being able to see the sun rise over the water instead of setting. The morning sun had just begun illuminating our bedroom.
I was awake, just sort of slipping in and out of wakefulness, enjoying the feel of the sun on my naked body and the sound of Nate's playing infiltrating the rest of the house from the living room.
The wall facing the water in our bedroom wasn't a wall at all. It was all glass, with a sliding door that opened onto a balcony. He had asked for it just for me, knowing how I felt about mornings. We had gone back and forth about the design of the house for months before agreeing on something that was small enough for me to be comfortable in, and grand enough for Nate to feel like he was giving me a gift by having it built.
I had been a little sad about leaving my beachside hut near the Four Seasons, but this place was nice, too. We had designed it from the ground up and Nate had called it my present for our one year anniversary when we had moved in. I had wanted something small and cozy for two people to live in that didn't feel cold and empty. He had drawn inspiration from a beachfront villa he and his parents would stay in when they would come to Hawai'i when he was a child.
The compromise had been a scaled down villa on the eastern coast of the island overlooking the beach. It was secluded, but not isolated. We had our privacy, but the city was less than twenty minutes away when we really wanted to go.
I stretched in the sunlight like a lizard basking on a rock. Nate often played in the morning. His inspiration hit at the strangest times, but I loved when the sun was just creeping up the horizon and his playing infiltrated my fading dreams. I could hear his voice, too; he was singing. He composed and wrote more than he sang, so it was always a treat when he did.
It was time to get up. I wasn't even tired anymore, I was just being lazy. I had graduated a while back and the summer peak season had just come to an end. I was enjoying my days off after a busy season. I climbed out of bed and walked to our split closet. I pulled on a pair of panties and grabbed one of his worn old t-shirts to go downstairs in.
I walked down the stairs, following the music. The closer I got, the clearer I heard the song. I recognized it. It was the one he had written for me his first summer here. He tended to play a lot of the old stuff he had written with Remus, too.
He had distanced himself from the band since he had ventured out on his own solo career, but since he had writing credits on so many of the band's songs, people were constantly finding out about Nate through the band anyway.
If the balcony upstairs was for me, the recording studio basement was for him. I had felt he needed it to make up for the fact that we lived so far from Los Angeles where the people he collaborated with lived. Having a studio at home meant he didn't always have to leave when he needed to record. The times he did have to travel for shows were bad enough, especially when I couldn't join him.
His beautiful grand piano was in the living room. I walked into the room seeing him, but stopped. It was starting to get light outside but the room was illuminated with soft yellow light from candles on the mantle and coffee table. A sea of blood red rose petals covered the floor between me and Nate at the piano. The scene was soft and romantic, but we’d already celebrated two years a couple weeks ago. I didn’t know what this was for.
"Nate?" I called carefully, walking into the room, feeling petals beneath my feet. The playing stopped and he looked over his shoulder at me. He didn't have a shirt on. He was on the bench in just a pair of pajama pants. He smiled seeing me and waved me over.
"Morning, babe," he said, grinning.
"Hey," I said smiling, walking up to the bench. I sat next to him with my back to the piano so I could face him. He kissed me sweetly. "What happened in here?" I asked.
"Do you like it?"
"It's beautiful, but I don't know what we're celebrating."
"Do I need a reason to do something nice for you?" he asked, smiling.
"This is for me?"
"Everything I do is for you, Abby," he said.
It had been two years of hearing him say things like that to me and they still never failed to fill me up with insane pleasure. He was a songwriter, he knew how to say things to make them sound the sweetest, but that wasn't even where it stopped. I believed him when he said things to me because he was generous with his words, his heart, his body, his money. He gave me everything.
"I love it," I said. "Thank you."
"I love doing things for you; don't mention it. I should be the one thanking you," he said.
"Me? What for?" I asked.
"For all the delicious food you make me, for coming with me on tour, for being my biggest supporter," he said making a list.
"I do those things because I love you, Nate. You don't have to thank me."
"I wouldn't be able to do anything without you, Abby," he said.
"Oh, come on. What were you doing before we met?"
"Nothing," he said seriously. "Nothing good. I wasn't making music, I was high all the time; I was a junkie."
I sighed. I remembered. The more distance we gained from the time, the more dire it seemed in my remembrance of it. We were both here on the other side of it, in love and stronger than ever, but when we had met, this man that he was today was somewhere obscured behind the pain of a broken dream, marriage, and addiction. It was hard to think sometimes that he was the same person.
His left arm was covered in beautiful, dark tattoos instead of track scars now. He was inspired and healthy, and through it all, he was still the creative, beautiful soul I'd been drawn to when we met.
"All that happened in the past. You aren't that person anymore. You got better and you took your career back."
"I didn't do shit, Abby. You're the one who got me here."
"I just didn't let you ignore me," I said, smiling.
"You treated me like I was someone worth saving," he said. "I wouldn't be alive if you hadn’t driven me crazy the first summer I got here." I smiled, remembering how upset he would get when I'd wake him up in the morning.
"Yes, you would, Nate," I said. "I'm not the one who beat your addiction – you are."
"If you weren't there, I wouldn't have been able to do it. You were it, Abby. You still are. I'm alive because of you, and you deserve every last one of the years I have left on this earth." I felt my eyes well up.
"You don't owe me anything, Nate. Here and now with you is enough." He shook his head.
"I don't want here and now Abby; I want every day." I watched him stand and round the bench. "Abby," he said quietly. He took one of my hands and sunk down on one knee. My heart started pounding as I realized what was happening.
"Every good thing in my life I can trace back to you. I had nothing when we met, and you gave me everything. I didn't know what unconditional love felt like before I met you and when I think of the future, you're the only thing I know I can't live without. I have a life because of you and I don't want to live life without you."
I wanted to say something, but I couldn't, my throat was closed and tears were pouring down my face. I saw him reach into his pocket and pull out a ring.
"Abby Terrell, I love you and I don't want to live a life without you in it. Marry me?"
I nodded because I couldn't speak. He slid the ring on my finger and stood up. I looked at it. It was a beautiful pink stone in a rose-gold band.
"I thought..."
"You thought I'd never ask you?"
"I thought you didn't want to do it again," I said.
"I didn't want to do it again with the wrong person," he said. "You're the right person, Abby. You're the only person. Do you want to be my wife?"
"Yes," I said, looking up at him. "Of course. I just want to make you happy."
"You already do, babe," he said. I smiled. He made me happy too. Happy, excited, passionate...full. He was my missing piece to paradise. Now I had everything.
BILLIONAIRE RIDES
By Claire Adams
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2017 Claire Adams
Chapter One
Ethan
"Is there anything else I can do for you, Mr. Colson?"
"Yes: blow me," I stated.
I leaned back in my chair as my beautiful assistant Angela got down on her knees beneath my desk and went to work. I ran my hands through her red hair as her head bobbed up and down and her mouth worked enthusiastically. Within a few moments, her expert tongue would bring me to climax and I'd shoot my load down her eager throat, and then watch as she picked up her files and went back to work.
This was the life, and I was living the dream every man wished for — only it hadn't come easily. I'd started working at 13 when my mother ran out on my father and me for another man. My father had been weak and couldn't take it. He turned to drinking and could never hold onto a job, so it was up to me if we were going to keep from starving out on the streets.
It was tough, but even though I was working full time, I still managed to keep top grades in school. One of my teachers noticed and recommended me for a special internship in the Business Leaders of Tomorrow program at his alma mater. My father had remarried by then, and I knew he'd be okay on his own, so I went ahead and applied, never thinking that I'd really get in — but I did.
They admitted me on full scholarship, and when the program was over, I was offered full-time employment at one of the nation's top manufacturers of engine parts: Krueger Auto Parts. Even without a fancy degree, I could do the job of running the shipping and manufacturing warehouses in every town I was sent to, and soon I was brought to work in their corporate headquarters in Los Angeles.
I worked my ass off, coming in early every morning and staying late every night. I took on all the shit assignments nobody wanted to do and volunteered to work weekends and even holidays. I climbed up the ranks faster than anyone had ever seen, and by 30, I was running the motorcycle parts division for Krueger.
The job was my passion, and I worked closely with scientists and engineers, wanting to learn everything I could about what made bikes run better, faster, and more efficiently. I talked with long-time riders and kids just starting to learn what they wanted in a bike. On my days off, I went for long rides in the California countryside to get a feel for the wind in my face, the tires on the road, and the motor between my legs. It was a powerful feeling, completely freeing, and I wanted more. Most importantly, I understood what drove our customers and how to give them the best riding experience possible.
I took my ideas to the CEO and founder of the company Martin Krueger, but he didn't give a shit.
"Do you have any idea how expensive it would be to start manufacturing this motorcycle? We would have to sell 100,000 to make a profit," Krueger said, crossing his mushy arms over his fat belly. His balding head was always beaded perspiration, and his skin was a shade too pink, like an angry little piggy.
"So, we'll sell 100,000. I'm willing to work with marketing to get our name out there, not just as a parts manufacturer, but as a creator of the country's best motorcycle. Once riders try this bike, they'll sell themselves. I just need our factories to build them," I said passionately.
I believed in the product I had worked so hard to develop. I'd created cost estimates, profit projection reports, and even had a sample of the bike created as an example, using my own savings. The bike had been test-driven by a dozen different riders, and they all loved it. I knew the bike would be a huge success — if only Krueger would give it a chance.
Unfortunately, Krueger was too stodgy and stuck in his ways. He handed me back my research without even taking the time to look at it.
"If we manufactured that many bikes and they didn't sell, it would ruin us. Just stick to your job of managing the parts warehouses and leave it to Harley Davidson to build the bikes. I didn't hire you for your creativity. Why do you think I plucked you out of the intern program instead of going for someone with a business degree? It's because I want someone who will just be a cog in the engine I designed and not try and one-up me with dumb ideas. Don't forget who signs the paychecks around here. Now quit wasting time and get back to work."
That's when I quit. Krueger gave me a nice severance package, after I put the portly piece of shit in a headlock and threatened to expose some of his muddy little secrets to the media.
I used the money, along with what I made selling off all my Krueger stock, to invest in my own motorcycle company. The bank didn't want to give me a business loan at first, but I had a good reference to co-sign with me — my old teacher was now a professor at the Ivy League university where the banker wanted to send his son and the professor promised to give him a letter of recommendation.
It was all I needed, and Speed Motorcycles was born.
I named my first bike The Rebel, and it sold 200,000 units the first year and double that the next year. After that, I designed the Chrome Cruiser and then Highway Man. Each design was more successful than the last, and when Krueger came to me begging for the contract to distribute our patented specialty parts, I did one better and bought the son-of-bitch out. Now, all parts for Speed Motorcycles bikes were manufactured and sold by our own distributing subsidiary, Krueger Auto Parts, and fat, old Krueger gets his paychecks signed by me.
I could have fired him after that and destroyed his company by selling it off bit by bit, but that's not my style. People don't learn from cruelty. They learn from discipline, carefully measured and distributed with thoughtful intent.
That's how I lived my life from the days of my childhood, when I was just 13, and needed to balance work and studies and caring for my old man. It's how I made it through a grueling internship and years of shit jobs climbing up the corporate ladder, and how I managed social relationships and dating after being abandoned by the one woman who should have loved me. I lived my life by a strict code of adherence.
Of course, being disciplined didn't mean one didn't deserve a reward for work well done. That's where my assistant came in.
Angela Stratham was everything I could want in an assistant. She was 26, bright, hardworking, and sexy as hell. She had emerald-green eyes and voluptuous curves she didn't mind showing off. We'd started screwing around in my office about six weeks ago when I came into my office late one night to find her naked, draped across my desk. It had been a rough day at work, and she provided me with just the pick me up I needed. We'd been fucking around ever since, but I wouldn't call her my girlfriend — more like a really attentive assistant who gives great head.
At the age of 42, I'd given up dating years ago. Women were always throwing themselves at me, but it wasn't real. I worked hard to stay in shape with regular workouts in the gym, and I knew I had the kind of looks they found attractive. I kept my black hair cropped short, and I'd been told more than once that my gray eyes flecked with blue and gold looked like swirling clouds in the middle of a thunder storm. It was all bullshit, though.
These women who were always flinging themselves weren't interested in me. They didn't want to know the real Ethan Colson; where I was born, what I liked, what my favorite foods, movies, and books were. They didn't want to know about my hopes, fears, dreams, and ambitions. They just knew I was the owner and CEO of the country's top motorcycle company. They only saw the luxurious suites of our corporate offices, the fancy cars I rode around in when I wasn’t on a bike, and the sprawling estate of my Beverly Hills mansion. When they looked at me, they were only seeing dollar signs.
Seeing the way my mother had destroyed my father when she left him had taught me one valuable thing: never open your heart to a woman. There was always a part of my father that was visibly scared. He catered to her every whim, he was vulnerable and cowardly. He had been broken and the wounds never fully healed.
I tried having a girlfriend once in college, but when she broke my heart, I saw just how vulnerable an organ it was, and I knew I was in danger of suffering the same way my father had. So, after that, I vowed never to put my heart in jeopardy again. Sure, there was always a beautiful date on my arm for parties and special events — and don't get me wrong, I got plenty of sex — but I never had a relationship with a woman. It was too messy and put too much at risk, so I always cut them off after a date or two. This office fling with Angela had already gone on too long and it was time to end it.
It's just that I was getting tired of being alone, of waking up each morning to an empty pillow beside me and not have anyone I could talk about my day with at night. I realized I was getting sentimental; I turned my attention back to the incredible feeling of Angela's hot wet mouth on my throbbing cock.
"Suck it, baby. I want you to drink my come." I ran my hands through her hair, encouraging her to work even more enthusiastically.
Just then, my office door swung open and Keith Wilkes stuck his head inside. He had the California-blonde looks that were so prevalent here in the City of Angels. People liked him instantly, which made him the perfect guy to head up my marketing department.
Advertising was my one weak point. I liked designing the bikes, figuring out to streamline them and give them more power, crunching the numbers, and finding ways to make things work. I did not like schmoozing people, asking advertisers and investors for more money, or pandering to customers. I left that up to Keith, and he did a terrific job, netting me millions of dollars over the years. There was no one I trusted more. Still, he didn't need to know the secret dirty deed that was happening under my desk.
"We're about to get started with the selections of the models for next month's magazine. Do you want to sit in?" he asked casually.
Angela was completely hidden under my desk, and he had no idea she was there. Still, hearing his voice startled her, and she jerked up her head. I forced her back down, letting her know I wanted her to keep going, and she continued the blow job while I talked to Keith. The excitement of being so close to getting caught doing something so taboo only heightened my pleasure.
"Have you selected a model for the cover yet?" I asked. I was surprised by how normal my voice sounded, even as Angela sucked my shaft with greater fervor and I felt myself nearing climax at an alarming rate.
"No, not yet. I've narrowed it down to the top dozen, and I was going to see how each of them looked on the bike before making a final choice."
"Great, go ahead. I'll be right there." God, what Angela was doing to me felt incredible. I never wanted the moment to end, but I knew it was about to.
Keith nodded in consent and closed the door behind him as he left. No sooner had it clicked shut than I blew my wad, shooting my hot seed down Angela's throat. She guzzled it eagerly and then licked me clean. Afterwards, she zipped my trousers closed, stood up with a smile, and said, "Is there anything else I can do for you, Mr. Colson?"
"That will be all for now." I flashed her a grin and watched her fine ass sway as she walked away.
Yes, she was a mighty fine assistant. The relaxing blow job she'd given me was just what I needed to clear my mind and focus on the photoshoot. We were preparing to launch a new ad campaign for our newest bike, The All-American. The model chosen would be featured on the cover our publication, Speed Magazine, sitting on the bike. In a town like L.A. that was flooded with beautiful young women anxious to become stars, it was going to be one girl's lucky break.
I'd told Keith I wanted a sexy blonde for the photoshoot, and he didn't disappoint. When I walked into the room, it was filled with a dozen gorgeous young blondes, all dressed in bikinis and high heels.
"These are the finalists. What do you think?" Keith slapped me on the back as he saw me walk in.
"Start putting them on the bike one a time so we can see how they look. When I see the right one, I'll know it."
Keith and I sat side-by-side in chairs as the girls were brought up one at time by Keith's assistant to model with the bike. Some of them were clear professionals and knew how to pose on the motorcycle with perfect poise. Others were clearly a little a lost as they did their best to sit on the bike in a sexy position without falling off. One girl in particular seemed to be having a tough time.
"What's your name?" Keith asked her with a frown as he scribbled swiftly on his tablet.
"Kayla Brandt."
She handed us each a copy of her résumé and a quick glance told me she was 21-years-old. Perfect.
I didn't want the baby-face looks of an 18-year-old, but our cover model still needed to look young and vibrant, with no wrinkles, a perfect body, and large breasts. I knew it was crazy in a town like L.A., but I really wanted a girl with natural breasts and not the kind purchased at a plastic surgeon’s office. There was just something about the way those fake breasts never moved that was a major turn off for me. I wanted a real girl, with real, God-given tits; what could be more All-American than that? And I wanted them to be big and perfectly round with that little bit of bounce that made every guy's dick instantly hard.
This girl had that. Everything about her was fresh, and pure, and as American as apple pie.
The photographer positioned her on the bike while the assistant adjusted her bikini top. Then he started snapping some shots as I read the rest of her résumé. It was disappointedly sparse. She worked full-time as a waitress, had no formal training, and basically no references of note. It was the kind of poor résumé I usually tossed right in the trash, but with this girl, I couldn't. Perhaps it was her lack of experience that I found so attractive. She didn't have any of the pretenses most L.A. models had. Everything about her was natural. I closed her file to just sit back, watch, and enjoy.
Kayla was fumbling awkwardly with her bikini top as she posed with the bike, and I heard the photographer tell her to stretch her arms out towards the handlebars. Suddenly, the strings of her bikini came untied and the top came falling down, giving me a full view of her naked breasts. They were magnificent: full, round, and slightly misshapen in that perfect way that natural tits fall when they're ripe and ready to be devoured. I wanted her like I'd never wanted any woman before.
Blushing furiously, she struggled to cover herself and ended up knocking the bike over. It fell to the floor with a noisy crash, and she ran from the room, clutching her top and crying.
"Good riddance to that mess. We can forget her all together," Keith said, but I'd never been more captivated by a girl in my life. I wanted her to be the new cover girl of Speed Magazine, but after that disaster, it was going to be tough. Still, as I thought of the sweetness of her smile and the perfect way her breasts jiggled as she walked, I knew I had to find a way to make it happen.