Chapter 11

Britain only had one more day until she had to be in Miami. She had checked her schedule, she had a photo shoot and the contractors were coming to renovate the bathroom in her condo. As much as she would have liked to travel more with Dave, she had things to do back home. Besides, she was making the trip back to Tampa on Sunday for his pay-per-view.

Not only was it hard with the two of them traveling so much, but the fact that they lived five hours from each other didn't help either. Their relationship was truly a testament of will. They had to make the effort to spend time together; otherwise, what was the point?

They often joked that they had sex entirely too much. But when you averaged out how much they actually saw each other: about 7 days a month, times the amount of times they had sex in a month; about 8 to 10, it was equivalent to a normal couple having about once a week.

It didn't help that she was still making him pay for being an ass that night in LA. Although they had made up, were talking to each other and sleeping in the same bed again, she refused to have sex with him. A lesson had to be taught. This game was about will power. She was so tempted to just say the hell with it and jump him, but she couldn't; he wanted her so bad, but he couldn't be the first to cave. They had spent the past nine days making each other crazy, trying to make the other crumble, but all that had resulted in was a lot of cold showers.

Dave and Britain arrived at Emily's house in Tampa for Chase's birthday dinner. As soon as he rang the bell, he was bombarded by Maddy. "Daddy!" Madison screamed and jumped into his arms. At 5'3" she was definitely the shortest of any Batista, Britain had met.

"Hey Pumpkin." He smiled hugging her.

She quickly let go of him and hugged Britain. "So tell me all of the cool places you've been lately." She said looping her arm around Britain's, practically dragging her in the house.

He walked in stood behind Alli, who was listening to her walkman on the couch. She hadn't even heard him ring the bell. He put his hands over her eyes. "Dad?" She said smiling.

"How'd you know it was me, Peanut?" He laughed. He watched as his youngest daughter, got up and walked over to him. She hugged him tightly and went back to the couch. "That's it? That's all I get?" he asked sitting down next to her.

"I'm tired. I started Volley Ball camp this week. I had to run 5 miles." She said with a faint smile. He missed seeing her play.

She smiled when Britain said hello to her. She liked Britain, but she knew her mom didn't. Alli was the closest to her mom and tended to go along with what she thought.

"So where's the birthday girl?" Dave asked standing up. Alli pointed toward the kitchen. Dave walked in and saw Chase and Emily talking. "Hey." He said leaning against the door. Chase smiled and ran over and hugged him. "Happy birthday, Princess." He said wrapping her in his arms.

"You have got to stop calling them those names. They're too old for that." Emily said smiling at him. Their relationship was usually pleasant, but there was a lot of hurt and resentment left on her part.

"Why? I like those names." Maddy said, putting her arm around her dad.

Emily shook her head. "Princess, Pumpkin and Peanut? It sounds like the title of a bad fairytale."

Britain walked into the kitchen and spoke to Emily. Emily gave her a half hearted smile and turned around to get something out of the fridge. This is going to be harder than I thought.

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"So where are my presents?" Chase asked rubbing her hands together.

Emily and Alli had cleared the dishes and had just sat back down around when the table, when she asked. Britain looked at Dave and he nodded. She pulled out a small box and handed it to him, while she held on to the envelope.

Dave handed the box to Chase. She almost cried when she saw the beautiful diamond tiara charm hanging from a thin gold chain. "Daddy, it's beautiful." She said running her fingers over the charm.

"Every princess needs a tiara." He said trying to choke down his emotion.

"This is from me." Britain said handing her an envelope.

Chase opened it and screamed. "Are you serious? Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!" She yelled running over to Britain and hugging her. "An open ticket to Austria." She squealed.

Dave lowered his head. He knew how much Chase wanted to go to Europe, but he didn't want her to go alone and with his schedule, he knew he couldn't take her. Britain could see Emily's nostrils flare. She and Dave had argued over whether it would be ok for Britain to do that. Emily really didn't mind, but it's just that Britain was the one who did it that pissed her off.

"I didn't know what part of Europe you wanted to go to, or when, so I left it open. You got 7 days, go whenever you like. When you go you can stay with my Oma and my aunt Lesil, they're expecting you. Austria's in the middle of a lot. You can take the train into Prague, Italy, Switzerland. It's great." She said before getting bear hugged again.

"Well on my birthday I want to go to Brazil." Maddy said to Britain. "I don't have any family there; if you can settle on Mexico I'll see what I can do...if that's ok with your parents." She said looking at Emily.

As happy as she was about her birthday, all Chase wanted to do was to call Jeff.

"So you up for Universal on Friday?" Dave asked his girls. Both Maddy and Alli seemed excited.

"About that Daddy...can I skip out this time?" She asked hoping he wouldn't zap out.

"Why? You love Universal Studios."

"I know. I kinda wanted to go to Miami this weekend." she said looking at him trying her best to make sad eyes, "I have some friends that rented a house at the beach for the week and I wanted to see them before I go back to school." Even she was impressed, lying wasn't so hard after all. She had Maddy coach her all week.

Maddy thought it was romantic that Chase wanted to sneak off and see Jeff. She's the one that came up the scheme in the first place.

Dave shook his head. "I know there's going to be drinking and a bunch of kids on at the beach usually leads to all kinds of trouble."

Britain felt the hair on the back of her neck stand up. He was doing it again. Didn't we just have this conversation? "You can stay with me." She said giving Dave "the look".

Chase pleaded with his eyes. This was unfair. Not only did he have Britain boring holes through his skull, but he had Chase blue eyes piercing his heart. Finally he shrugged. "What do you think?" He asked Emily.

"You think you can handle keeping on eye on her?" She asked in a sarcastic tone, "I mean it's almost like her being with her friends. You're like the same age."

Britain's eyes darted at Emily. "Is that a yes or a no?" She asked rudely.

"Whatever." Emily said as Chase peppered her with kisses.

"Good. You can fly down with me tomorrow and we'll come back on Sunday. I hate flying alone." Britain said hugging Chase.

"I want to come." Maddy whined.

"Oh no. I'm taking the two children that still like me to Universal Studios and that's that." Dave said standing up.

He kissed his girls and said goodnight to them. He told them he would be by tomorrow to take them out and to see Alli at Volley Ball camp.

Just as they were about to leave, Britain got the mailing tube she had left by the door. She pulled Chase aside. "Jeff told me to give this to you."

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Chase sat in her room with her heart racing. Maddy had come in after her mom went to bed to see what Jeff had gotten her for her birthday.

"So what is it?" She asked, sitting on Chase's bed.

"I don't know, it said to call him before I open it." She said reading the words on he had written on the tube.

She picked up her cell phone and dialed his number.

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"I was startin' to think you wouldn't call." He said answering the phone. "You didn't open it yet, did you?" He was relieved when she said no.

"Go turn your web-cam on." He instructed. She did and in a few minutes he saw her beautiful face on his laptop. "Can you see me?" He asked.

"Yup. Nice hair. Purple's a good color on you." She laughed.

"Hi Jeff. I'm Madison, her younger cuter sister." Maddy waved. He waved back. "Happy birthday." Maddy said kissing Chase and she left Chase alone to talk to Jeff.

"Well, open it." He was more excited than she was.

"You didn't have to get me anything for my birthday." She said trying to open the carton.

"I didn't. I wanted to give you something." He said smiling.

She pulled open the tube and then a poster. She unraveled it and she instantly felt her insides turn to mush. It was a portrait of an angel. She was dressed in white, wearing a long flowing robe. She had colorful wings and golden hair. Chase looked closer; the angel had dark blue eyes and dimples. The angel's face looked exactly like hers. He made me an angel, she said to herself trying not to cry.

"You did this for me?" She said looking into the camera.

"I just had to see your face...just needed to know if you liked it." He said softly.

"It's beautiful. I love it." She couldn't believe it. This guy was too much.

"Oh and what birthday is complete without this?" He asked grabbing his guitar. He sung happy birthday to her and she couldn't stop smiling.

When he was done he asked her about Miami. "Britain said yes. I had to lie to my dad. I told him I was going to visit some friends. We're leaving tomorrow."

"Can I see you on Friday? Maybe we can get dinner or somethin'" He asked looking down at his keyboard. His head popped up when she said yes.

"You know, I can see you blushing through the web-cam." She laughed.

"You need to adjust the tent on your monitor." He laughed back.

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Dave couldn't take it anymore. He had been celibate for nine days now and it was killing him. It was easier to be on the road with out sex, when she wasn't around. But just looking at her was tough. It was easy to keep his mind off of Britain while he was with his kids, but now that they were back at his house, alone, it was a different story.

He watched her as she was undressing for bed. The way she had to wiggle out of her jeans, because they clung to her hips made his mouth water; and the way she crossed her arms over the bottom of her shirt to pull it off made him want to rip that shirt to pieces. Good lord! She's wearing the see-through underwear she got me for my birthday last year. You can do this Dave. Just get in the bed and go to sleep.

Britain walked over to the covers and pulled them back. I thought for sure these underwear would break him down, they always did before. She was burning inside. She wanted nothing more than to just say screw it all and take him right there, but she couldn't her pride wouldn't let her. She sank into the bed and turned her back to him. She felt the bed shift with his weight as he got in.

She gasped for breath when his arm came around her as he snuggled up next to her. She could feel that he wanted her as badly she wanted him. She closed her eyes when she felt his breath on her neck. Breathe damn it! You can do this.

He let his finger touch her lips. He was too busy concentrating on the feel of her backside against his pelvis to realize what he was doing. He became suddenly aware when she felt her lips pucker on his finger, followed by the tip of her tongue. He heard himself exhale deeply when he felt her warm mouth take his index finger inside.

"I'm sorry." He said against her ear. "Please don't be mad at me anymore." He whispered.

He didn't care who lost their resolve first, he only knew that he missed her. He leaned over and pulled her to her back. "I love you." He said his lips barely touching hers. He didn't even know if she responded, he could only concentrate on her kiss.

As he made love to her, he promised never to yell at her again.