Page 315 of Trouble from Abroad

“Count my thrusts. Out loud.”

“One… two… oh God?—”

“Start over.” He lands a hard slap on the side of my ass. “Louder. I don’t think the driver heard you. Give the man something to think about.”

I nod, though it barely counts with how hard my body trembles. My manicured nails dig into his jacket. I suck in a breath, and the number scrapes out of me, shaky and stripped of pride.

"One!" That’s all it takes. My body tightens around him, his name a broken record on my tongue as my mind fizzes out to static. Pres follows with a sound that’s all chest and promise, pistoning into me until he spills, and the force of it leaves me shaking.

His breath punches out, chest heaving, and he stays pressed deep inside, forehead lowered to mine. He holds me with the intent of a thousand love letters and kisses me, slow and reverent, like this is actually his favorite part.

Once he softens, he eases back with the utmost care and pulls my panties back into place. Neither I, the Spanx, northe dress will ever be the same after this ride. Pres tries his best anyway, straightening the bow and shaking my skirt into something almost presentable, then looks at me the way artists must look at finished masterpieces.

When the car comes to a stop, we step into the Vegas daylight, fingers linked.

* * *

Inside the Marriage License Bureau, it smells like print toner and nerves. We take a number, and I look around for the bathroom sign. I’m leaking my fiancé’s cum with every step. Beside me, Preston glances down at my shoes once, then back at me, his smug mouth doing a piss-ass job of pretending this isn’t the second highlight of his morning.

“Names?” the clerk asks when we’re called.

We give them, spell them, produce IDs. The clerk stamps and slides the form. Pres fishes my lucky pen from his suit pocket, and we both sign the papers with it. My knees remember the limo, still shaking and aching, but Preston’s palm finds the small of my back and keeps me steady.

He bends close, his voice for me alone. “I’m going to use that pen to write ‘my wife’ just above your pussy. Let’s see how lucky that gets you tonight.”

“Pres,” I whisper, feigning shock but wondering it too.

“I love you too, baby.”

“License is good for a year,” the clerk cuts in, sounding bored. “Congratulations.”

“Thank you.” We step aside for the quick photo—meflushed, him lethal in a suit—and the bow sits crooked as a memento of what we did on the way here.

Back by the door, he turns me, hands cradling my head, thumbs next to my ears, that focused, surgeon look—only softer.

“One more thing,” he says.

“If you say there’s a new list, I’m staging a coup.”

“It’s about my name.”

Huh? “What about it?”

“I want yours next to mine.” He doesn’t blink. “I’m changing it to Preston Jett-Thorne.”

For a beat, I forget my own. Then I remember his—ours. “You know, it’s usually the other way around.”

“I’m not interested in usual.” His mouth tilts. “I want to see your name next to mine on every letter, every bill, every dumb spam email. Because that means I did something right. Because of you, I became the man I wanted to be—and I want my name to remind me of that, every damn day. Keep yours if you want. But I’m taking yours and making it ours.”

It knocks the air out of me and fills me right back up. It’s my turn to ask. “Say it again.”

“Preston Jett-Thorne,” he repeats, tasting each syllable. “Now tell me what you’ll be.”

I rise on my toes, brush my lips over his, and say: “Your wife.” I’m not one bit afraid to overuse those words. They feel magic.

He smiles wickedly and challenges me. “Make it filthier.”

“Your Mrs. Jett-Thorne.” The way his eyeschange tells me I’ll be saying it over and over in our suite tonight. “I’ll go back there and sign it again if you want.”

“Don’t worry. You sign it like that a thousand times,” he says against my mouth. “You can start with the chapel book.”

“So bossy,” I tease.

“Devoted,” he corrects.

“Both,” I say, because that’s the whole truth.

He laces our fingers and lifts them to his lips. Vegas roars outside, its ink and vow in every delicious promise we’ve already started to keep. We turn toward the light—license in hand, names chosen, and ready for a lifetime of ‘yeses’ ahead.

* * *