Chapter 71

Jon pulled out the remote, she had slept most of the way.  He had hit the drive through for burgers and they stopped at a park and had dinner.  He pulled out a tablecloth and candles.  It was just the two of them, like they were regular people. No one approached the table, he didn’t see any cameras, that didn’t mean they weren’t there.  He had let her sleep as he pulled up the drive.

“Are we there yet?” Lexie sat up yawning.

“Yep,” He turned off the key and turned to face her.  “Happy honeymoon.” He leaned forward and gave her a little kiss.

The headed to the kitchen door, unlocking it, he turned he scooped her up in his arms and carried her into the cabin.  Walking in he took her into the family room, the first place they had made love, and sat her down on the sofa.

“I’m going to unload the car, why don’t you see what’s here and what we need to pick up tomorrow.” He bent down and gave her a kiss. 

“Back to where it all started hum?”  Lexie got up and headed to the kitchen.  They would need fresh stuff, eggs, bacon, something for lunch and dinner.  Pulling out the drawer she pulled out a note pad and pen.  Checking the wine fridge, it was stocked from the last time they were there.  Pulling the freezer open she found coffee, taking it out she added it to the list and the fridge. 

Jon came in with the suitcases and headed up the back stairs.

“Look like snow.”  He said as he came back down.

“November in the mountains who’d a thunk it.” Lexie laughed as she put the pad and pen down.  “Good thing no one rented this since the last time we were here.”  She walked into the circle of his arms.

“About that,” He got a sheepish grin on his face.  “I bought it when I went to turn in the key.  He offered me a great deal.”

“It’s ours?”  She looked up in his eyes. 

“Yep, the kids love it, you love it and we have enough rooms so no one has to share.” Jon laughed.

“I do love it here.”  She stepped back.  “There’s something about this place, I can see us escaping here with the kids.”  She reached up and touched his face. 

“Yeah I can too.”  He reached for her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing her palm.

“You do know, that’s how we got this way.”  Lexie closed her palm over the kiss and reached down and patted her rounding stomach.

“You can hardly tell you have babies in there.”  He dropped down to his knees and lifted up her sweatshirt.  “Hello little Bongiovi’s, this is your daddy.  Please let your momma not be sick anymore in the morning, we’re all on our honeymoon.”  He kissed her tummy.

“We can only hope.”  She said as she helped him up. They moved into the hearth room and Jon turned on the fireplace and the flames kicked on.  “There is plenty of wine.”

Jon looked at her and started to shake his head. 

“I don’t want to drink in front of you.”  Jon told her as he stood by the sofa.

“Jon, you can drink in front of me. I’m not a big wine drinker, but I would like some hot tea.”  She smiled up at him. 

He came back with a glass of wine and a mug of hot tea, she was stretched out eyes closed.  He knew she hadn’t slept much, between the morning sickness, Thanksgiving and the wedding prep she was also writing a new book.  He sat the tea down on the coffee table, pulling down a throw from the back of the sofa, he covered her up and took his wine and sat in the wing chair by the sofa.  Sipping his wine he thought back to the reason he first got to the cabin, Dorothea’s wedding day.  He had been so depressed, she had everything, a new life and his kids.  He hoped by the time they got home, Dorothea would have signed the paper to let Lexie adopt the kids.  They had a family meeting, while Lexie had been writing before the wedding, and they had agreed they wanted this to happen.  He knew with the right amount of money she would sign.  Leaning his head back he looked over at Lexie, God put her in the right place and the right time in his life.  He loved her so much, God don’t let me mess up this marriage too.

Finishing his wine he put the glass in the sink, along with her cooled tea, going back in he lifted her off the sofa and took her up to the bedroom.  She woke up when he put her down on the bed.

“Did I fall asleep?”  She asked him in a sleepy voice. Sitting up to pull her sweatshirt off, leaving the teddy she had worn under her wedding dress.

“Yes, but you have not been sleeping and when you do sleep you wake up sick.”  He got undressed and pulled on sweat sleep pants on.  “But you weren’t out long.”

“It’s our honeymoon, I’m not supposed to be sleeping, and we’re supposed to be making love.”  She lifted her hips and shimmied out of her jeans, leaving on the lacy pair of undies that went with the teddy. 

“Honey, we have the rest of our life to make love, your body is telling you, you need to recharge.” He went over and sat in the bed by her hips, she did look sexy as hell in her lacy teddy, little Jonny approved, but he had to think with his big head not his little head.

“Can we cuddle?”  She looked up at him with big green eyes.  Reaching up she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down so their lips came together she smiled and gave him little nibbling kisses. 

Jon moved over her and rolling so she was on top.  His hands moved from her shoulders, looking up in her eyes, he let his hands slide down her arms. He could tell by the look in her eyes, she was fighting sleep.  She looks so sexy sleep rumpled. 

“You know, (Yawn) the last time we were (Yawn) here.”  She ran her hands along his chest.  She hated it when he had it waxed his chest.  He had a furry chest when they first made love, but he had read for a part and bye bye fur. “I wasn’t sure, (Yawn) you even liked me (Yawn) you ignored all my advances. (Yawn)”

Jon thought back to those two weeks they had hooked up, he must have been so fucked up that first few days.  He did started wanting to be with her, the way he made her laugh, she’ll never let him forget he called her the cook. 

“Hey, my kid was there, I couldn’t go all cave man on ya, you know.”  He chuckled.  She was so tired she could hardly keep her eyes open. He was going to let her go till the sandman took her away.

“Little Romeo, he was so cute.  Snowball took up with him right off.  You know (Yawn, Blink blink) I’m so happy (Yawn).”  She leaned down to kiss him.

Jon enjoyed the kiss, his arms came up to hold her in place.  He knew when the kiss ended, she had just laid her head on his shoulder. Hearing her even breathing, he knew she was once again asleep.  Smiling he held her close till he too fell asleep.

Today was the last day of school for the kids, Lexie had already headed down to the river house.  Jon was waiting for the kids them they would close down the townhome and head over the river and through the woods to Red Bank.

Lexie had spent the day with the decorators.  The gate had huge wreaths with red ribbons. The wreaths on the front door matched the gate.  The first tree was in the foyer, over fifteen feet tall.  The decorators were not too happy with Lexie, they were used to dealing with Dorothea.  In other words, she left them alone.  Lexie had them strip the tree, which they had just decorated because, it needed more lights. The head decorator informed her there were a thousand lights on the tree, Lexie said double it.

“You can’t see the lights, you have three ornaments per branch and you can’t see them.” Lexie went over to one branch and removed the ornaments and handed them to the manager.  “I want an old fashioned tree, lots of lights, one ornament on each branch and lots of tinsel. Mix silver and gold.”

“But Mrs. Bongiovi, we have handled the trees the same way for over fifteen years.”  The manager replaced the ornaments.

“That was the other Mrs. Bongiovi, I am the new Mrs. Bongiovi and I want an old fashioned three.  I want the kids to see this tree first and fall in love with it.  So, this Mrs. Bongiovi is the one writing the check, and this Mrs. Bongiovi wants an old fashioned three. Now do you have any questions?” Lexie took the ornaments off and handed them to the manager.

“No Mrs. Bongiovi.”  She got the girls to remove the ornaments and loaded it with lights, spread out the ornaments, and sent her assistant to Walgreens for tinsel in silver and gold.  Stepping back she had to admit the new regime was right, an old fashioned tree was beautiful.

Each child had a two foot tree in their rooms. Stephanie was decorated with pearls, Swarovski crystals and sparkling lights, Jesse tree was Football, Notre Dame and Patriots and for his stepmom the Giants with a touch of lacrosse ornaments.  Romeo’s tree was game ornaments, Zelda, Mario, Pokémon and Infinity ornaments. That left Jacob, he wasn’t into sports like his big brothers or video games like his baby brother, and Jacob was into books.  Potter, Kingdom keepers. Firefly books.  In her office she had two baby trees, both were in pinks, blues and yellows, rattles, pacifiers, tiny bears and bunnies. After one quick check, she handed the ladies a check and saw them off of the property.  Coming back she leaned back on the door and rubbed her tummy.

“Next year, you’ll be here to share the enjoyment.”  She headed back to the kitchen and took the cookies out of the oven, and put the next one in.  Between checking on the trees and making cookies she looked up at the clock.  They were late they were due home over an hour, dinner would be soup and subs.  She had a huge pot on the stove of homemade soup and the stuff out for subs.  She went out to the foyer and made sure the lights were on for the tree and went and checked on the one in the family room, once again she butted heads with the decorator about more lights less ornaments. Next year, she would hire her own decorator.  She made the loop back to the kitchen to pull out the last of the cookies and turned the oven off.  She checked her watch and heard the gate warning beeping that a car was coming in.  She took off her apron and headed to the front door. She had just stepped out when the car stopped at the porch.

“Was the traffic bad?” She asked as she watched the kids spill out of the car.

“It was terrible, the bus was late with the boys, and then we got stuck in the tunnel for a while.”  Jon said as he paid the driver and unloaded the trunk.  It was full of gifts and suitcases.  “Hey get out here and help unload.”  Jon called out to the kids as they headed upstairs to their rooms.  He watched Lexie picking up bags of packages and heading into the house.

“Sorry daddy, Oh my gosh, the trees are great Lexie, daddy you should see all the trees in the house.”  Stephanie said as she grabbed her suitcase and one bag of presents.

“You didn’t do it by your self did you Lex?”  He grabbed his go bag and a big package.  The driver helped in the unloading of the car.  The boys ran out to grab bags and packages.

“Daddy I have my own tree in my room.” Romeo yelled as he ran out to get his bag.

“Lex,” Jon called out as he headed into the house.  Stopping short he took in the tree.  It looked great, different from what they had been putting up when he was married to Dorothea.  Loads of colored lights and white twinkling lights.  He took the stairs two at a time to drop off his bag.  He looked into the kid’s room and noticed the trees, as he headed down to master bedroom. Dropping off his bag he headed back downstairs looking for Lexie. Finding her in the family room unloading packages in the family room, half under the tree shifting boxes wrapped in festive paper.

“No Jon, I used the decorators that you and Dorothea used, I found their name in the rolodex.”  She said as she unloaded the bags of packages from the shopping bags.  “I think I’ll change companies next year.”

“What happened?  Lex this is your house now, you do what you want.  What happened?”  He remembered the trees they had in the past, these new ones where brighter and reminded him of the trees he had as a kid.

“If I heard, this is what Mrs. Bongiovi liked, one more time I was going to toss the manager out the front door on her over inflated ego.”   Lexie looked up at him with this smile on his face that scared him.  Lexie imitated the manager’s voice when she spoke.

“As long as I don’t have to get rid of the bodies, I see why you want to change decorators.” He went over and kissed the top of her head.  “Reminds me of when I was Romeo’s age.”  He sat down beside her to help unload the gifts.

“I got a hold of a caterer to handle the Christmas Eve party, I have your turkey to deep fry and a huge ham, with all the trimmings for Christmas lunch.” She grabbed another shopping bag to unload.  “I got a room ready for your mom and dad, Dezi and Matt will head to her parents, so they will not be staying.”  Folding up all the empty shopping bags and let Jon help her up.  “I take the kids to the mall tomorrow to go shopping, I have their money in envelops.”  They went over to the sofa and sat together looking at the tree. 

Soon they were joined by the kids.  Talk was about school and shopping.  They decided to go early and then go eat lunch at Umberto’s, Jon would meet them for lunch.  Then he had plans to take the kids with him for the afternoon, to do his shopping.

Dinner followed and bed early, so they could be at the mall by the time it opened. 

Breakfast was a quick stop at McDonalds drive through.  As she parked her car as close as she could, they headed in the mall main entrance.  “Stephanie, you take Jakey and Jesse you take Romeo, we’ll meet at the food court at noon.”  She handed the older two envelops for them and the younger two.  “Try to stay on budget. Call me if you have problems.”  They disappeared into the crowded mall.

Lexie headed to the men’s shop to look around.  The textures of the dress shirts made her fingers tingle as she ran her fingers over the shoulder.  She loved it when Jon dressed up, the feel of his muscles under the material made her smile.  She picked out one in the same blue as his eyes, then added a tie in the same blue.  Jon loved to wear tone on tone colors, Lexie laughed at his form of Geranimals.  Paying she checked her phone to see if any of the kids had called.  She caught a reflection of someone staring at her.  Thanking the clerk, she headed out to the next store on her list, the book store.  She made sure to turn and look at the person she caught staring at her, but he was not there. 

That same feeling came over her in every store she went to.  The uneasiness made the book store a bust, the same thing at the card shop and they toy store.  She checked her phone and almost called Jon, but shook it off.  She was a mystery writer, a story must be working in her writers mind. Heading to the food court early, stopping at Starbucks, she turned with her strawberries and cream and ran smack into her stalker.