Chapter Sixteen

~ Zaq ~

"Zaq, are you okay?"

I glanced up, not realizing Patrick had come into the room until he said something. "What?"

There was a glimmer of concern in Patrick's dark brown eyes as he knelt down in front of me. "Are you okay, baby? You're just sitting here on the side of the bed. I thought you were going to take a shower."

My brow furrowed as I frowned. "Did you mean it?"

Patrick's frown was deeper than mine, his eyebrows drawing down over his eyes. "Did I mean what?"

"You told Peter that you loved me."

Patrick's sudden smile wasn't nearly as surprising as the soft flush that filled his cheeks. "Yeah, I meant it. I've loved you for a long time."

My heart thudded heavily. "How long?"

"October eighth, two thousand and five."

I blinked at Patrick. "What?"

"It was a Friday." Patrick brushed the hair back from my face. "It was a varsity football game. It was the end of the third quarter and we had home field advantage, but the opposing team had us down by fourteen points. I was waiting to go out onto the field when I looked up into the stands and there you were." Patrick's smile was almost wistful. "The most beautiful boy I had ever seen in my life."

"Me?" I asked almost breathlessly.

"I stood there like a dummy and just stared at you. You had a couple of friends with you and you were smiling at them. I was so jealous. I wanted you to smile at me. When we took the field again, I played the hardest game of my life. I wanted to win and win big so that you'd see me and maybe give me a smile."

"Did you win?" I whispered.

Patrick grinned. "Thirty-one to seventeen."

I really felt bad that I had no memory of this game. "Did I smile at you?"

Patrick's grin grew wider. "You did and that's when I knew I'd love you for the rest of my life."

Tears sprouted up in my eyes. "Oh, Patrick."

I wish I could say that I remembered that day, but I didn't. I remembered Patrick from high school, but he had been a couple of grades ahead of me. He was like an untouchable godlike idol that I had fantasized about in my dreams.

"I started following you around campus between classes. I even bribed one of the records clerks to give me your class schedule so I'd know where to hang out so that I could see you."

"You didn't," I gasped.

"I did." Patrick chuckled. "My friends all thought I was crazy for fawning over a high school freshman, but once I found you I didn't see anyone else. You were all I wanted."

"You were a junior, weren't you?"

Patrick's eyebrows lifted. "You knew that I was a junior when you were a freshman?"

My cheeks suddenly felt very hot. Feeling a little bit embarrassed, I dropped my gaze down to my lap. "I might have watched you, too."

"Really?" Pure doubt laced Patrick's voice. "I didn't think you even knew who I was."

"Seriously?" There was just as much doubt in my voice. "You played on the football team and you ran track. You were president of the chess club, the math club, and the debate team. You were on the honor roll. How could I not know who you were?"

"You knew all that about me?"

My cheeks still blazing, I nodded.

"If I'd known that, maybe I would have gotten up the courage to actually say something to you in person instead of sending you a bunch of stupid love letters."

My jaw dropped.

"Although, if you liked me, too, why did you never reply to any of the letters I sent you?"

"You sent me a love letter?"

"Several." Patrick's brow flickered. "Did you not get them? I stuck them in your locker."

"I didn't..." I sucked in a sharp breath. "Did you sign them with your initials?"

Patrick nodded.

I jumped and pushed past Patrick and ran out of the bedroom. I heard Patrick call out to me, but I had one goal in mind. When I reached the spare bedroom, I knocked because Jackson was currently using it.

When he opened the door, I gave him a weak smile. "I need to get a box out of the closet."

"Of course." Jackson stepped back so I could enter.

I hurried over to the closet and pulled the double doors open. It wasn't a large closet, but we had a lot of boxes stacked in there, stuff we hadn't unpacked yet.

I looked around until I found the box I was after. I had to move a couple of boxes to get to it. I grabbed the box and carried it immediately out of the spare bedroom.

Patrick was just starting down the hallway when I walked out. He frowned when he saw the box. "Zaq?"

"Come with me."

Patrick didn't say another word as he followed me to the dining room. I set the box on the table and opened it up. I started pulling stuff out until I reached the small silver tin that I'd placed in there when I was packing up my old apartment.

I set the tin on the table and pulled the lid off. I pushed the tin toward Patrick. "Are these the love letters you sent me?"

Patrick took the letters and started looking through them. After a few minutes, he looked up at me in wonder. "You kept them?"

I grabbed one of the letters, pointing to the initials at the bottom. "Is this you?"

Patrick nodded.

"That son-of-a-bitch!" I dropped the letters and then sat down in one of the dining chairs. "I can't believe he lied to me."

"What are you talking about, Zaq?" Patrick asked. "Who lied to you?"

"Peter!" I snapped, and then felt guilty when Patrick winced. I sighed heavily and lowered my tone. "This is a box of stuff that I had intended to leave for Peter when I moved, stuff he had either given me or left at my apartment, but I never got around to it. I always thought once we got settled I'd mail it to him. I didn't want to give him any reason to come after me, especially him saying I kept his stuff."

Patrick snorted. "He would have felt totally justified in doing something like that."

That had been my thought as well.

I picked up a couple of the letters and stared at them. "I never knew in high school who had sent these, but I kept them anyway. It was the only thing like this that I had ever received and it felt nice to know someone wanted me, even if I didn't know who that someone was."

Patrick laid his hand over one of mine, giving it a gentle squeeze. "I wanted you."

I wish I'd known that then.

"Peter and I had been dating for about two months when he was over at my house one night. I had been going through some stuff and Peter saw this tin. He laughed and told me he couldn't believe I had saved the old love letters he'd sent me."

"Peter said he sent them to you?"

I nodded. "The initials were the same. I had no reason not to believe him." Tears sprouted to my eyes again. "If you hadn't said anything, I never would have known."

I wasn't sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't for Patrick to get up and place everything back into the box except the tin of letters. He closed the lid, carried the box over and set it near the front door, and then came back to place all the letters back into the tin, put the lid on it, and then hold his hand out to me.

"Come with me."

I took Patrick's hand and then followed after him as he led me back to our bedroom. He sat down on the side of the bed and then pulled me down next to him.

There was an odd little smile on his face when he opened the tin and started pulling letters out, one by one. "I started writing these to you a week after I saw you at that football game."

"One a week for the whole school year," I whispered, still in a little bit of awe that these letters came from the man I was now married to. "It'll be a great story to tell our children to one day."

Patrick lifted his head and glanced at me. "You want children?"

"I do," I admitted without hesitation. "I realize that isn't something we ever discussed, but—"

"I want children, too," Patrick interrupted. "Not right away, but maybe sometime in the next five years. I'd like to get our private practice up and running first. It takes a lot of money to raise a family."

I smiled as I scooted closer to Patrick. "So, five year plan then?"

"Now, hold on here." Patrick held up his hand. "I want to negotiate."

I lifted an eyebrow.

"I think this needs to be at least a fifty to sixty year plan. The first five years, we start to build our medical practice, the next five years we start to build our family."

"And after that?"

"I think we should have a new plan every five years." Patrick started flicking up his fingers one by one. "Be happy, be in love, be happy, be in love, be happy, be in love, and so on."

"Can we start the be happy, be in love plan now?"

Patrick grinned as he grabbed me and pushed me back onto the mattress, coming down on top of me. "I thought you'd never ask."

"Shouldn't we be writing all of this down?"

"Sshh." Patrick nuzzled into my beck and began kissing the skin behind me ear. "I'm still negotiating."

I shivered as his lips trailed down my neck to the collar of my shirt.

Patrick suddenly lifted his head, a fanatical light burning in his eyes. "Get undressed."

I quickly scooted out from under Patrick and crawled off the bed. I watched Patrick undress as I did the same. The moment the last piece of clothing hit the floor, I climbed back onto the bed. I rolled over onto my stomach then stretched out.

A moment later, I felt Patrick's larger body come down over mine. When I felt Patrick's cock poke me, I pushed my butt back. It was only half-hard, but I still wanted to feel it deep inside of me.

I yelped when I was flipped onto my back.

"Someone wants a cock buried deep in their ass, doesn't he?"

"Patrick," I whimpered as a hot wave of lust swept through me. "Please, I need."

"You need me." Patrick's deep whiskey voice floated over me like a soft caress.

"Yes!"

God, did I need him.

Patrick growled as he shifted between my legs. He manacled my wrists, bringing them above my head with one hand as the other skimmed down my side.

I shivered at the contact.

Patrick's dark brown eyes were intense as he gazed down at me. "I need you, too, baby."

I groaned when Patrick splayed his hand over my throat and kissed me with a hunger that fringed on madness. I opened, taking Patrick's tongue into my mouth as he spread my legs apart with the width of his body.

Patrick was in complete control of me, mastering me, and I loved every second of it. His chest vibrated with a low growl as he ground his cock into me. At that moment, all I wanted was to feel Patrick deep inside of me.

"Please, Patrick. I can't take it." I moaned as Patrick sucked my nipple into his mouth. I was too close to the edge.

Patrick grinned wickedly around the brown disc. "On your knees."

I eagerly rolled over onto my hands and knees and stuck my ass out, waiting for that wonderful huge, fat cock to fill me. I hissed when two fingers pressed into me. The instant burn was intense, but so was the pleasure.

I bit my bottom lip, pushing back as Patrick stretched me. It felt fantastic. Patrick's hand skated up my back, making my skin tingle. I was going to pass out from the sheer pleasure Patrick was giving me.

My eyes shot open when Patrick inserted three fingers inside of me. I squirmed around as Patrick moved his fingers, pressing and twisting, scissoring and bending. I was fucking myself on Patrick's fingers, riding them, in a matter of seconds.

I curled my fingers into the blanket as Patrick's fingers pulled free and the man's thick cock entered me from behind. I could feel myself stretching wide for Patrick.

The pleasure racing through my body left me beyond speech. I whimpered and moaned instead as Patrick plunged into me. I bit a pillow to stop from screaming my damn fool head off.

I cried out, the feelings swamping me threatening to drown me. I spread my legs farther apart as I rocked my ass back and up, wanting Patrick to fuck me until I was unconscious.

Patrick hammered into me, his thick cock filling me over and over again. It was raw, fast, and made my head swoon. I keened and mewled, needing Patrick to take me harder.

"Do you like that, baby?"

"Yes, more. Harder."

I got what I begged for.

Patrick spread my ass cheeks apart and began to pound into me. He turned his powerful thrusts to long, deep penetrating strokes, hitting my sweet spot every damn time he pulled back or pushed in.

I was mewling, begging, whining, and pleading. Patrick just chuckled as if mastering me was his sole purpose in life.

"My beautiful baby," Patrick crooned as his body stiffened and he rocketed into my over-sensitized hole. Fingers dug into my hips as Patrick switched his position, tagging my prostate on every damn stroke.

My body tingled and buzzed, my heart beating faster as I felt the all-too-familiar tingling shoot up my spine. I shoved my face deeper into the pillow as I came while I met Patrick thrust for thrust. White bursts of light lit up behind my eyes as wave after wave of electricity racketed my body.

Patrick suddenly jerked behind me and then stiffened, roaring out his release. He pounded harder into me for a moment before freezing, a growl falling from the man's lips as he shot every last drop of cum in his balls into my ass.

I shuddered as mini orgasms pulled at my sensitive cock. I groaned, holding on to Patrick's arms as I rode through them. Never had sex been this mind-blowing.

I inhaled deeply, the scent of man and sweat and cum filling the air.

It was intoxicating.

I slumped, trying desperately to catch my breath as Patrick gently eased out of me. All I wanted was a nap right now. I collapsed down onto the mattress, wanting desperately to go to sleep cuddled in Patrick's muscular arms.

I grunted when I felt the cooling cum underneath me. I turned and crawled onto Patrick, lying across his wide chest. I shivered when Patrick's callused hands stroked over the skin of my back, starting at the top between my shoulder blades and moving down to the crack of my ass and then over the swell of my ass cheeks.

"Feel better?"

I smiled as I lifted my head so I could face Patrick, resting my chin on my folded hands. "I do love you, you know. This isn't a one sided thing."

Patrick smiled back, his hand brushing the side of my head. "I know, baby. You show me every day how much you love me."

"I guess this is the be happy, be in love part, huh?"

"I don't know." I shrieked when Patrick grabbed me and rolled me beneath him. "Are negotiations over?"

I spread my legs and wrapped them around Patrick, tightening them so his body was pressed against mine. "Not yet."