Page 68 of His Relentless Angel

James slumps back in his chair.

Bailey grabs the last bit of ice from her plastic cup of water to rub against her neck and chest. “I’ll check on them when I get some more ice,” she says, leaning forward in her lawn chair and pinching her cover up to fan herself.

I stand. “I’ll get it. Why don’t you hop in the pool to cool off?”

“No thanks.” She gives me a small, grateful smile before turning to her Mom when Miranda asks when preschool starts back up for the kids.

I frown as I head inside, grabbing a new red Solo cup from the bulk pack Brianna brought and left on the kitchen island. It’s still over one-hundred degrees outside despite the sun starting to set, and Bailey hasn’t gotten in the pool once today. Come to think of it…It hits me deep in the gut. She never gets in the pool when we’re hosting. Why in the hell have I just now noticed?

Filling the cup with clean ice from our refrigerator’s ice maker, I pass Grayson knocking on the hall bathroom door, trying to get Lainey to open it and let him in to see her cheek. I step into my light caramel brown bedroom and pick up the charger on the nightstand next to my side of the cream-upholstered king-sized sleigh bed to plug in my almost dead phone.

Grayson has disappeared by the time I make it back down the hallway and outside to hand Bailey her cup of ice, counting down the remaining hours until everyone leaves.

Epilogue - Part Two

Bailey

It’s minutes after midnight when we wave goodbye to our remaining family members who had stayed late to help us clean up and put away the lawn chairs and tables. We check on the girls in the nursery, who are conked out and curled together on Mali’s bed, even though they each have their own toddler-sized beds they’ll soon grow out of. I don’t doubt they’ll still end up in each other’s rooms after we add the second story to the house so they can each have their own when they’re older.

My cover up is sticky with sweat and feels grimy against my skin. A cold shower is calling my name when Isaiah and I step into the primary bathroom.

“Crap, I forgot to lock the front door,” Isaiah says, leaving my side for the first time in the last few hours.

I twist the knob on the shower when my phone chimes with a notification seconds later.

My Love: come outside

Attached beneath the text is a picture of his face and bare shoulders, leaning back against the pool’s edge, the underwater lights illuminating his dark skin. There’s just the smallest patch of silver growing in at his temples that we joke all the time is due to the girls and their antics—which they get from me, obviously.

I turn off the shower, then tiptoe through the house with just the overhead kitchen light left on. I ease the French doors open so they won’t make a sound and step out onto the back patio into the night. “Isaiah?”

Isaiah motions for where he wants me to sit and sets his phone on the concrete beside me. He’s tall enough that he can stand in the deep end with only the tops of his shoulders and head above the surface. He lovingly caresses my calves when I drop my feet in the water.

“Scoot closer,” he says with a husky whisper, sliding his hands up my legs to the hem of my orange cover up. “Closer,” he beckons again until my ass is all but hanging off the edge, my legs spread wide to fit his body between my knees. “Perfect.” Isaiah looks me square in the eye and tells me in a low register, “Take your dress off, angel.”

I lift my legs out of the water.

He grips my ankles to stop me. “What are you doing?”

“Let’s go inside.”

He tugs on my ankles. “No. I want you right here.”

I squirm, biting the inside of my cheek. I drop my head back to look up at the few visible stars, trying to decide if I want to follow his directions.

“Now, angel.”

Reluctantly, I drop my legs back in the water and start dragging the hem up over my head, sucking in my stomach as tight as possible until I can hardly draw a breath.

“Breathe, baby,” he urges quietly, fingering the ties of my bikini on either side of my hips.

I don’t know what the hell I was thinking buying this swimsuit instead of a one-piece. I take little sips of air and lean back on my hands, still clenching my stomach muscles.

“I said breathe.” He unties the bows and pulls the front of my red bikini bottoms down, exposing my pussy. It’s when he grabs my ankles and pushes my knees up to set my feet on the edge that I almost pass out from trying to hold it all in. “Breathe!” he whisper-shouts and lightly pops the side of my hip.

I gasp and reach for my cover up, dragging it across my middle.

Isaiah growls, yanks the cover up out of my hands, and tosses it behind me in the water.

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