Chapter One

Wrapping her hair around his fist, he yanked her head back, and her gaze met his in a hot and wanton embrace. “Say it.” She couldn’t breathe or talk as she gazed up at him, whimpering. He loved it. He craved it. Her fear, it was a drug. “Who am I? Say it, Ash. Say who I am.”

His voice was strained, his body shaking as his cock throbbed so deep inside of her. He almost couldn’t think. Almost. He didn’t know what was happening, he didn’t understand what his body was doing, but he felt it deep in his soul, the need to bury himself inside of her and never leave.

She was his.

“Ash, say it,” he demanded once more, squeezing a fistful of hair and causing her to cry out. It drove him mad, her body shaking against his, her eyes hooded as he looked down the pebbles of her spine to her round ass and small waist. God, he wanted to ruin her for every single man. She was his, damn it! “Now!”

“Daddy,” she cried out, her body squeezing his as his toes curled into the carpet of her apartment. “Daddy… Please fuck me, Daddy.”

His cock throbbed, his eyes squeezing shut as his fist tightened and his hand gripped her. He was about to explode—

Genevieve Stone jumped when her headphones were knocked off her head, Lady Gaga crooning from where they’d landed in her lap before her eyes quickly narrowed. Slamming her laptop shut in frustration, she glanced up and complained, “What the hell?”

Her fiancé, Montgomery, looked down at her, annoyance on his beautiful face as he shook his head. His eyes were narrowed, his full lips pressed together on a face free of hair, looking so clean and tidy as always. But that didn’t stop the expression of pure displeasure on his face. He was wearing a very expensive looking pair of blue slacks and pressed button-up shirt that matched the greenish blue of his eyes. The blue suit jacket was unbuttoned and hung open as he pressed his hands to his hips. “I’ve been calling up to you.”

She glared before placing her headphones on top of her laptop. “I’m working, and you know I always have my sound-canceling headphones on when I’m working. You bought them for me.”

He didn’t seem pleased, but really, he never was. This wasn’t the first time he’d found himself at the bottom of the stairs yelling for her, only to trek upstairs to find her in her zone. Writing her heart out. Not that she cared about his inconvenience; she was working. He knew that. “I understand, but you were also aware that our mothers were coming today for wedding planning. They’re here. Waiting.”

She rolled her eyes, letting her head fall back as she groaned. She had forgotten they were coming. “Mont, please, I’m in the zone. Distract them.”

He didn’t seem to care or have any intentions of distracting his insane mother. Her mother would be just fine sitting down at the table, looking through magazines while she waited. She understood Genevieve’s career. She supported her. “We’re getting married in a little over a month. Your book can wait.”

She tried not to scream. “I’m on a deadline.”

“Which I told you to cancel because of the wedding.”

“I don’t make the deadlines, my publisher does.”

He gave her a dismissive look. “I think they can make an exception for you since you are getting married and there is plenty of smut in the world.”

The fight bubbled inside of her, but she didn’t have it in her today. Not when she had to deal with their mothers, and especially not as they’d had this fight at least once a week since deciding to get married. Yes, as awful as that sounded, they’d decided. They had been together for over five years, lived together for three of them. She loved him, she did. She was comfortable, they were happy, and things worked. He went to work, she stayed home and worked, and they had sex.

When they had time.

When he brought up that maybe they should get married, it seemed like a good idea. Of course, their families were over the moon since they had been asking the two of them to tie the knot for a while. At first, it all went so quickly that it really didn’t seem as though anything had changed. They picked a date, she picked a dress, and things were still good. But then, Montgomery’s mother had started to come over more. She wanted everything planned to a tee, and that’s when Genevieve began to notice her own lack of patience with everything. She just wanted to get married and to go back to their normal, but it seemed like his mother was scratching at her nerves. Soon Genevieve found that she and Montgomery were at each other’s throats more than they weren’t. And more than they had ever been.

Things had always been effortless. But lately, they were not even close to easy. Nothing was good enough: her clothes, her weight, her hair. He always had something negative to say. And when it came to her writing, Montgomery wasn’t supportive. Genevieve didn’t understand it. He hadn’t been like that before. He’d seemed to love her, but she didn’t feel that way all the time now.

Especially when it came to her career.

It was mildly mind-blowing. She was extremely successful in the romance world as Zoe Jayne. She had hit all the bestselling lists, she had been featured all over the world, there were even talks for movies, but Montgomery didn’t feel it was a career people could know about. According to their friends—and some of his family—she worked in insurance. Before it hadn’t mattered, but as soon as he planned to marry her, they had to lie to all their new friends. Man, she hated hiding her career, but she loved him, and because of that, she respected his wishes.

Except when he pulled shit like this.

“I don’t write just smut, Mont, and you know that,” she complained, rolling her eyes. “Either way, I have to finish this. I only have three more weeks, and I’m not even halfway done.”

He shrugged before heading for the door. “Our mothers are downstairs. Do you want me to send them up, or are you coming down?”

As she watched his retreating back, she felt her blood boil. “I want you to tell them to come back tomorrow.”

But he didn’t acknowledge her words. She even heard him say that she was on her way once he reached the stairs. She knew he was nervous about the wedding. Over three thousand people would be attending. Everyone from his architecture firm would be there, plus his whole extended family and hers. It was a production for sure, but she really needed to get this book done. Not only for her deadline but also for her characters. They were screaming to be written, and it was her job to do so. So why couldn’t the man she was about to spend her life with understand that?

To Montgomery, her writing was just a hobby, not a career. He thought it was a joke. But to her, it was way more than a career. It was a part of her. She had to write, she had to give her characters life, and she’d be damned if anyone would hold her back. As a result, all Montgomery and Genevieve did was argue. How she was wasting her time. How the wedding was more important. He wanted her to quit, but she wouldn’t, and she knew it drove him crazy. She didn’t care.

And she sure as hell didn’t care about this damn wedding.

Why couldn’t they just elope? Go to Vegas or even the courthouse, she didn’t care. She just wanted it over…after she finished her book. She hated the planning process of the wedding and, most of all, the arguing with Montgomery’s mother, Verna. Verna was acting as if she were planning a wedding for the Prince of Wales, it was so pathetically lavish. Of course, Genevieve’s mom was eating it up since she had grown up poor, marrying into money when she got pregnant with Gen. But it wasn’t really Gen’s jam. She liked low-key things, and when she expressed that, she was shot down by Verna and then Montgomery. They were about the extravagant and ostentatious. Gen just wanted somewhere to write and someone to love.

“Gen, honey!”

She groaned loudly at her mother’s overly cheery voice. “Coming,” she called out before reluctantly getting out of her office chair and heading out of the room, locking the door behind her. She was very weird when it came to her work in progress. Not that Montgomery ever showed interest in reading her stuff, but if he had, she’d make him wait. Still, though, she didn’t want anyone seeing or reading her unfinished manuscript, so she always locked her office door.

Heading down the grand staircase and then cutting through the den of the very upscale home Montgomery had inherited when they were younger, Gen let out a long sigh. She couldn’t wait to start decorating their home. Since they weren’t married yet, Verna wouldn’t let her do anything to the bachelor pad Montgomery’s uncle had left him, and she was really sick of the feel of it. It was old and smelled of cigars. She swore it, though Montgomery said she was crazy and constantly agreed with his mother. He was a mama’s boy to the extreme.

As she entered the large dining room where Verna and her mother sat with all the wedding crap known to man laid out on the table, she suppressed a groan when Montgomery stopped her by grabbing her waist and kissing her jaw. “Good luck.”

She leaned into him. Though she was annoyed, she did love this man. Had for most of her adult life. While it hadn’t been by choice, more expectations from her family at first, it wasn’t like that any longer. He made her happy…when he was home and not calling her job stupid. “Yeah, thanks.”

“Don’t pout,” he demanded, kissing her once more. “It will all be done soon.”

She gave him a dry look as she shook her head. “I really need to work,” she stressed once more.

Before he could comment, his mother was speaking, “Oh, Genevieve, your little book can wait. This is your wedding.”

“That we shouldn’t still be planning.”

His mother didn’t like that one bit as her own mother stood, reaching out for Gen’s hand. “I have something to show you.”

Before her mother could pull her away, Montgomery said, “I’ll see you later.”

“Are you working late?”

“Yeah.”

Her shoulders fell. While on one hand, that meant his mother would take forever to leave. On the other, once she did, Gen would be able to work. But it meant Verna had to leave first. “Okay.”

He squeezed her hip before heading out the door, the shoulders of his jacket taut against his wide chest and muscular back. He had gotten a haircut the day before, so his hair was perfectly trimmed, his neck so thick and so sexy that soon a grin pulled at her lips. They had both been so busy for the last couple months that sex hadn’t been a thing that happened often, but realizing his hair was turning her on meant one thing. They needed to fuck.

ASAP.

Inhaling hard, she looked to her mother, ignoring the annoyed look on Verna’s face as her mom pulled her to the end of the table where a box was sitting. “Mom, what is all this?”

Her mother’s gray eyes sparkled as she squeezed Gen’s hand. “Gen, love, I was going through the attic and found this box of your stuff. I had no clue what it was until I opened it and realized it was all your things from when you’d go and stay at Spring Grove.”

Curiosity took over as she moved past her mother to the box. She thought she had everything packed away up in her own attic, but apparently, that wasn’t the case. On the top of all her things was a Polaroid of her laptop on a table with a beautiful lake behind it. Covering her mouth, Gen exhaled hard. “Wow. I took this when I finished, Capture Me, my first book.”

Her mother beamed. “I know. I don’t know how this got left behind.”

“Sorry to bother you, but are we going to get started?”

Gen ignored Verna as she reached for another picture, this one of only the Blu, a B&B back in Spring Grove, Kentucky, with the tulips in bloom. Smiling, she moved through the contents of the box as chills ran down her back. The Blu was her favorite place in the world. When she was younger—and rebellious as hell—she had gone on a road trip. At the time, it was silly, and the trip was only supposed to be for a weekend, a last hurrah before college, but when they arrived in Spring Grove, she found herself at the Blu. So much had happened in the span of three days that before she knew it, she didn’t leave for a month. Oh, everyone was so mad, but she didn’t care. Especially when she wrote her first novel there.

Man, the memories.

“You haven’t been in years.”

She nodded, running her fingers along the tulips. “Four years. I bet the tulips are up.”

“Oh, I’m sure.”

A grin tickled her lips. “Man, I miss that place.”

“You should go back.”

She glanced over at her mother, laughing. “I can’t. So much going on. My book…and the wedding.”

Gen’s gaze returned to the box as her mother thought for a moment. “Don’t you have to have the book finished before the wedding?”

Gen nodded, looking up. “I do.”

“So, go. Don’t you think it would be amazing to finish your last novel as a single woman in the house where you wrote your first?”

Gen grinned at that. “Yeah, it would be awesome.”

“I think it would be silly, and you’re right, we have so much planning to do,” Verna interjected. “We have a lot of work to do.”

But her mother waved Verna off. “That we can handle, Verna, surely. She’s so stressed.”

Verna rolled her eyes. “She wouldn’t be if she’d just quit this silly writing.”

Gen’s mother looked back at Verna and shook her head. “It’s her dream, and I believe in her dreams. I will take more of the load. I’ll text you if I need you. Go, my love, you need this.”

But Genevieve just laughed. “I don’t even know if they’re still open! I haven’t even seen anything about them. I don’t know…” She shook her head. It was a crazy thought, an insane one, but she couldn’t shake the feeling it was a great one. She wasn’t sure if she should or even could. She knew she would definitely finish the book. Every time she went to the Blu to write, her writing juices flowed like the Amazon, and it was almost magical. She loved that place, she did, but could she get away? Would Montgomery be okay with it?

Probably not.

“I’m sure my son would not appreciate his bride leaving weeks before their wedding.”

Rolling her eyes, Genevieve tried to ignore Montgomery’s mother, but her mother was glaring back at Verna. “I doubt Montgomery would even notice with how much he is working lately.”

“Well, Fawn, he is very successful. He has to work.”

“I never said he didn’t,” her mother countered. “But like your son, my daughter is extremely successful, and she needs to get away.”

Verna rolled her eyes. “She can write anywhere.”

Fawn glared. “While this may be true, why don’t you look out for yours, and I’ll look out for mine. She needs a getaway, just her. She’s breaking out.”

“Thanks, Mom.” Genevieve glared as her mother ran her hands along her pimpled jaw. She was like a teenager going through puberty, but it always happened when she was stressed. She knew she was under pressure, but maybe it was more than usual.

Shit, maybe her mom was right.

Shooting her a forgiving smile, Fawn patted her hand. “Go.”

But Genevieve still wasn’t sure.

She wanted to. Lord, did she. She’d leave right that second, with nothing but her laptop and toothbrush, but she didn’t. Instead, she replaced the pictures in the box and sat down to plan her wedding.

While she was sure her mother knew, Gen would never admit to Verna that she wasn’t paying even the least bit of attention to the plans they were making.

Because her thoughts were captivated by all her memories of the Blu.