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Please continue reading if you’ve read the story starter – a very long Chapter 1 – and you’re ready to dive into the story with me.

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About the story: (short description. Click here for longer)

“Let Me Love You” is a tale of love and sacrifice and a poignant story of self-discovery, celebrating the human capacity to find love in the most unlikely of circumstances.

Please enjoy the current WIP of Iris and El. This will be published freely up to a point, like in the old days, and then the entire book will be posted for full download. I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments. And don’t forget to check out the companion stories. (Wicked Chances, Dreams of Reality, The Convenient Wife, The Other Side of Love, She Works Hard for the Money & Ravenous)

Enjoy, Your Author, Sylvia Hubbard

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Read more: Let Me Love You – Chapter 61✍🏾📚❤️ #SylLit #WIP #livestory 📖💓 #marriedwife #demandedconsensual #darkromance

AUTHOR’S NOTE: I’m in the midst of final editing Essence’s Divinity for publishing. Ugh… so I stopped, did a day of reset and rest, and then jumped back in this story for you. I know I left you on a big cliffhanger,r and I had to get to the rest. It’s a lot, and the story moves fast.

Gotta get them back to Detroit, he needs to be married, I need Blaque to meddle, resolve the father thing, and then kick some butt with the councilmen, El’s sister and Wexford.

Let me know if there is anything I’m missing anything.

Enjoy the read; your author, Sylvia Hubbard

Iris shook her head slightly because she didn’t think she heard El correctly. 

Was the stress of everything he endured finally breaking him, and was he clinging to whatever? No!

Or perhaps this was a dream, and she was finally broken.

Shaking her head some more to wake herself up, she looked around the room to make sure she was still alive and not in some coma this whole time, making up this entire scenario in her head.

When Iris didn’t answer, El pulled out a small box, and she gasped and jumped out the bed like he’d presented her with a roach.

“Are you insane?!” she screamed, grabbing a robe to cover herself, glaring at him in exasperation.

“About what?” he questioned like he’d ask her for the time of day.

Pointing accusingly at the box, she stomped her foot angrily. Iris was coming out of the box as she declared, “You’ve lost your ever fucking mind, El! I can’t marry you! YOU can’t be married. I just got divorced! You’re insane.”

Her boss stood out of the bed in front of her. He took a long, deep breath like he was contemplating her words. El even lowered his head to the floor as if thinking deeply about what she had just said, but when he raised his eyes to her, he still looked determined to get what he wanted. “Tyler can move some things and sway some judges. He’s got some pull in Michigan and Ohio courts. Iris, I’m going to be honest with you on this. It’s not only because you impressed the fuck out of me this morning with that presentation, and I just knew I needed to make you mine forever, but also because if I don’t, my sister is going to get my company and give it to Wexford. It’s a long story, but the only way to save my company, all I’ve worked for, and keep you in my life is to marry you.”

She moved away from him until her back pressed against the bedroom door. “I-I can’t. You’re…” The room felt spinning, but Iris forced herself to stay present. This was too much! He was too much. “El, you’re my boss, and it’s only a contract we have. I was going to leave.” Breathing was getting more complicated. It felt like a humongous weight was pressing on her chest, crushing her slowly as he moved closer and closer to her.     

“I know that, but I can protect you, Iris. I will protect you. Fuck, I have to protect you. You’re everything to me.” He moved to her, slowly identifying her upset, as every step he took made her shake slightly more. “Just focus on me, Iris,” he said. “Take deep breaths. Calm down.”

Her legs started to buckle, and he moved in and pulled her body to him, but when she tried to push away, he tightened her to him.

“El,” she cried. “Please don’t do this. You’ll regret this. I can’t.” She still couldn’t get her breathing together, and her legs buckled again, but he was holding her tightly to him; it only drew her closer to him. 

“Getting out of one marriage of sadness to tie myself to another person who is only using me would be stupid of me, El.”

“You’ll be using me as well, Iris. You want your freedom, and I promise to make everything worth your time.” 

Angrily, she spat, “Two fucked up people won’t make anything right, can’t you see?”

“Perhaps together we could cancel out all the fuckery and create something-“

“I won’t leave Clem!” she declared loudly. “And I won’t neglect him. He’s important to me.”

His grip on her loosened, and she knew what that meant. Stepping quickly out of his arms, Iris said, “Clem is everything to me, and I won’t let you tear me away from him. I don’t care what you have to offer, and I can’t let him go through any more crap. I know you won’t be able to deal with him with your condition.” 

El stepped away from her and turned slightly away. He gripped the ring box tightly, and she knew the man was contemplating his existence.

“I did think of him, and I know he can’t be affected by us, and I’ll protect him just as hard as I will protect you, Iris, because I understand the sacrifice you’re making for me,” he said. It will be hard, and I’ll have some portions of our living quarters cordoned off for me to… recover, but I’ll endure until I can get things back on track.”

“And then? Once your life and business are better? That would be the end of our marriage.”

He faced her again, straightening his body as if preparing for war. “Yes. There would be no reason to stay, but you can leave whenever you want. Debt or not, and when you walk away, I’ll give you double the amount Dwayne took from the company plus a sizable alimony payment.”

That was more money than she could have ever imagined earning in her entire lifetime—all for a temporary marriage to help him and his business. And the debt would be gone. She would be free and clear, and she wouldn’t be bound to him, only to Clem.

How long had she waited for this? 

The opportunity of a lifetime was standing in front of her in the most deliciously gorgeous package of a man that she could only dream about. 

Looking down at the ring still tightly clutched in his hand, Iris took a deep breath, knowing her following words would change her life completely. 

El assumed she was about to protest, and he got down on one knee, holding the ring box up to her. “Please, Iris Folsom, marry me.”

Iris stepped closer to him and carefully opened the box. Gasping, she looked down at a two-carat rose gold diamond with a diamond-encrusted platinum band. Behind her engagement ring was a thick, matching diamond-encrusted band. 

He’d gotten both of their rings – together.

Together.

That word repeated in her head over and over again.

She would be together with El.

Saying yes could be the biggest mistake of her life, but the opportunity and the closer taste to freedom was so damn appealing.

His words repeated in her head; perhaps together, we could cancel out all the fuckery.

As hard as the words were, why did she feel that was the most romantic thing a guy could say to her?

And her heart? She was sure it had already gone to El, and somewhere deep inside of her, she knew he cared for her, but with his penchant for losing interest, things wouldn’t last for long. She’d be a realist and know at any moment, El’s care for her would go out of the window, and she’d prepare Clem for that day as well.

You can do this! she told herself. For the freedom. The protection from her father.

Those were the two things she had always wanted, but no one had given her anything close to what she needed. Now, this magnificent, complicated man that no one could tolerate was doing what no one would have done for her.

“Yes,” she said softly. 

“What?” El sounded alarmed as if he couldn’t believe what she was saying. 

Rolling her eyes in exasperation. “You heard me.”

El pulled her down in his arms and kissed her. “I promise I won’t give you a reason to regret this, Iris.”

She wanted to believe that, but deep down inside, she wished he had also promised her happiness. That’s what usually happens in a regular proposal. 

Yet, when had normal ever come into her life? This would be the best she would have had, and there was no telling when she would have another opportunity like this. Taking the rings out of the box, she took his hand, placed his ring on his finger, and then put her ring on. on

“I hope so,” Iris said quietly.

El pushed the robe off her body and carried her to the bed, bestowing hundreds of grateful kisses on her face, neck, and shoulders. This part of the marriage she wouldn’t mind, even if it might be for a little while until he became bored of her. 

End of This Chapter | Post your thoughts in the comment | Let the author know what’s going on in your head

Let Me Love You (c) 2024 Sylvia Hubbard All Rights Reserved

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual person, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.
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