Authors: R.S Burnett
The first half of the house is a big open area, the living room is lowered, a step down with a sofa facing the biggest plasma television I have ever seen, a black glass coffee table between the two and bookcases surrounding them. The kitchen area is raised, a step up with from what I tell all the latest gadgets already in place, a coffee machine sitting in the middle of the breakfast bar taking it’s place of pride.
Family portraits cover the walls and a few photo’s of Cat and I along with Cat and Toms wedding pictures and a few of Cat, Tom, Travis, Kyle and I.
Then there are five doors along the back wall.
I head to the first door on the farthest side of the right.
This opens up in a big bedroom, a white iron four poster king size bed sits under the big window, more photos stand on the vanity table and my favorite child hood teddy sits on a shelf above the door. A door to the left of the room is open and leads to a fully stocked walk in wardroom and shoe room.
Walking out of the room to the next door is the most luxurious bathroom I have even seen, complete with a huge walk in shower, a claw foot bathtub and a hot tub, two hand basins and a counter with candles and various bath lotions.
The third door leads into heaven – or as close to anyway. A soft blue/green illuminates the room. Artificial rocks surround a hot tub that resembles a rock pool, small lights disguised as flowers are scattered around the room. It’s peaceful and romantic at the same time.
The fourth door opens up into a games room in a soft red glow, there is a billiards table, a small fully stocked bar, a huge television the same as the one in the front room but this one has satellite. Sport paraphernalia is attached to the walls and there are a few old school arcade games along with a darts boards. There is also a monster sound system set up in the corner.
The last room is a swimming pool, with a fully stocked bar taking up the whole of one wall, kneeling down to test the water and it’s heated.
I leave the room and walk back to the door where Cat, Tom and Travis are all taking in the front room silently.
“Go ahead, look around” I smile at them all.
“It’s beautiful” Cat smiles at me.
Grinning I grab her hand “No, this is beautiful” I lead her to the rock room and open the door.
She screams. She screams so loud the boys run over to see what’s happened.
“I’ll get some drinks started, look around” I laugh and head into the kitchen.
* * *
Sat at the breakfast bar I can’t stop grinning and I don’t even care that I have a hangover. Travis is making breakfast which is highly amusing since he’s burnt his hand three times now.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to do it?” I ask around a giggle when fat flies out of the pan landing on his bare stomach.
“Just relax” He winces and throws a wobbly smile my way.
“Such a bossy man” I say into my mug chuckling.
Someone knocks the door and he walks over to answer it leaving me in my happy place.
“Uh babe, you need to get some clothes on” he says holding the door in a way that would block out any view of me in the kitchen.
I’m sat in just my bikini, thinking it was just going to be me and Travis here all day.
“Send whoever it is away, tell them their ruining my happy glow” I poke my tongue out at him but jump down from my stool and head into the bedroom to put on a robe.
When I come back out, Travis is back to cooking breakfast – in just his swim shorts – but I now have the whole Carlton family in my kitchen.
“Morning” I call out and start the process of making more coffee for them all.
“Afternoon you mean” Travis grins and plants a kiss on my cheek.
“Late night?” Mason asks watching me amused.
“Uh ... yeah, I don’t remember much just that I didn’t get that much sleep”
Travis snorts and I close my eyes realizing how that sounded.
“Can we look around?” Amber asks turning to look at the front room.
“Sure” I shrug at her and take the mugs from Travis.
“You might want to do a sweep of the rooms first” he whispers to me and then flashes of the night start coming back to me. When Cat and Tom finally left Travis and I started a game of strip dares.
“Wait!” I shout.
Everyone turns to me.
“Uh .. let me just go in first” I smile weakly and go from room to room collecting various items of clothing.
“Looks like you had fun” Mason guesses looking at the pile of both male and female clothes in my arms.
I ignore him and turn to Amber “You can look now” I mutter and drop the clothes outside the bedroom door.
“Babe, come eat” Travis calls over to me.
Ignoring a glare from Kyle I pull myself up onto my stool next to him and dig into my full English that Travis had so expertly made.
“Anne you have to come and see this room, it’s beautiful” Amber calls out, and I don’t have to turn around to know she’s talking about the rock room.
“I know dear. I helped Elsie design it”
At this news both Kyle and I spin around to face his mother who apparently helped my mother design it.
“Excuse me?” I ask not sure I heard correctly.
“Your mother and I designed this house. It was going to be your ...” she trails of and clears her throat.
“It was going to be my what?” I ask frowning
“Not just yours, it doesn’t matter” she turns her attention to the window but not before her eyes move to Kyle.
Kyle looks at me just as confused and I think back to any conversations my I had with my mom. I remember how she kept insisting that I sold our old house and I would say no just in case he come back and changes his mind but she would say how we shouldn’t share a house until we were... My eyes widen as understanding hits.
“No” I shake my head and look past Kyle to Mason who nods and smiles sadly at me.
“What?” Kyle asks but I shake my head and go back to my breakfast not wanting to think about it.
“The rock pools” I manage to sound nonchalant as I peek a look at Mason.
“Yeah” he says quietly.
The rock room makes sense now, the rock pools beyond the woods is where Kyle first told me he was in love with me and then again when he asked me to move in with him.
“Baby come and see this. I want one” Amber calls out. Kyle leaves the table just as I finish my breakfast, I take my plate over to the sink and Travis comes to stand behind wrapping an arm around my stomach he spins us around so he’s leaning on the counter and I’m in his arms, my back to his front.
“Considering what you’ve just found out, you’re doing good” he whispers passing me my coffee.
“You caught that huh?”
“Yeah, don’t worry, still plenty of time. Who knows maybe you’ll both live here one day” he squeezes me tightly for a second and I relax into him.
Amber and Kyle return to the kitchen, Amber looks dreamy but I can’t make out Kyle’s expression.
“You’re doing good son, I’m glad she’s got you” Mason tells Travis smiling.
I grin up at him over my cup.
“It’s a nice house and all but, where would you put the baby?” Amber asks.
“The baby?” I frown at her not following.
“Yeah, I mean you’ll want to start a family at some point” she smiles at me and Travis.
“I’m only twenty five” I point out, probably looking horrified.
“I know silly, but it won’t be long for you either” she says rubbing her stomach.
I tense, wanting to make some sort of comment but Travis pulls me in tighter to his front.
“There’s still plenty of time for children” he says above me. “She’s still young and has a few years to enjoy her life before she has to settle down and worry about dirty diapers and getting up every other hour to fetch a bottle” he tells her calmly.
“Anyway, I’d just take the pool out” I shrug at her.
“Not the rock pool?” she asks.
I grin “Definitely not the rock pool”
“That rock pool is where you’ll conceive your children” she says dreamily.
I cock an eyebrow at her “And where did you conceive yours?”
Everyone falls silent, Travis squeezes me, Mason sends me a wide eyed look, Anne smiles at Amber and Kyle looks at her expectantly then back at me with a look I can’t interpret.
Mason clears his throat and interrupts the awkward silence “Well, I guess we’ll go and leave you two to your morning. I imagine you have a busy day ahead of you?” he turns and asks me.
“Well considering I didn’t even plan on getting dressed today, I don’t have too much going on. You kind of ruined of my day” I wink at him.
“You can always get back undressed, all you did was put on a robe” Travis says above me, amused.
“I guess” I pout up at him “Too much effort though”
“I could always help you ...” he trails off smirking.
“It wouldn’t be the first time you’ve robbed me of my clothes” I laugh.
“And look how that turned out”
We both burst out laughing.
“I don’t know whether to be happy that you’re finally happy again or scold you for talking about such things” Anne shakes his head amused.
“It could be worse” I smirk at her “I could tell you about how Cat and Tom left last night when Trav and I were in the pool and we started to-“
Travis slaps his hand over my mouth, choking on his coffee.
“Yeah, we’d rather not hear the details” Mason scowls at me.
“Sorry” I mumble behind Travis hand.
Kyle narrows his eyes at me and leans over to kiss Amber slowly. I tense in Travis’s arms.
I’ve been around Kyle and Amber plenty of times but I’ve never had to watch them together. I can honestly say, I don’t like it one bit, in fact I think everyone is about to see my breakfast make a reappearance.
Mason catches the move and rolls his eyes.
Travis has other ideas though and slips his hand inside my robe and starts lazily tracing circles on the bottom of my stomach, just above my panties.
I shift on my feet, with it being the first intimate touch I’ve felt in months heat floods my body instantly.
Travis lowers his face to my hair and I hear his quiet chuckle.
“You need to stop that” I hiss at him quietly.
He moves his hand from my stomach but only so he can repeat the movement on my hip.
I clench my thighs together and clear my throat to stop a moan from escaping.
Kyle and Amber pull apart and I grip Travis hand to stop the sensual torture he’s putting me under and lean up to whisper in his ear.
“There is no way you are turning me on and leaving me like this”
He pulls back to look at my expression, when he see’s the seriousness in my eyes he smirks at me.
I cock an eyebrow at him “It’s been
months
”
His eyes widen at my admission.
I shrug at him “Two can play this game you know”
“So are you going to be moving in here permanently then?” Amber asks interrupting our hushed conversation.
I turn to face her and smile brightly “I don’t know yet, I was thinking about just keeping this place as somewhere to go when I need a break, a fun house if you will” I press my backside into Travis crotch and wiggle a little, the move’s so small that no one else will notice it.
“I can see what you mean” she agrees.
I step out of Travis’s arm and refill my coffee before jumping up on to the counter and pulling him between my legs. I wrap my legs around his waist and wrap one of my arms loosely around his neck using my fingers to trace a slow line from his collar bone to his ear.