Page 88 of Hooked on Trouble

“Okay,” I say, at peace for the first time since Aspen, nothing but honesty between us. “And you need to learn to give yourself a break. You can’t be everything for everyone.”

He fans his hand across my back and repeats my “Okay.”

The song bleeds into another, Nico’s warmth bleeding into my veins. I can’t imagine dancing with anyone else. “Can I ask you something?”

“Anything.”

“Why did it take you so long to tell me how you feel? I know how the guys joke, how you’re usually pretty quick to fall. What was different about us?”

Left. Right. Back. Forth. He leads; I follow. “I wanted to wait until there was less stress in our lives, and in the past the saying was always too easy. It never burned me up. The words never lodged in my throat like they did with you. I wanted us to be different. Special. Waiting meant more.”

I slip my hands under the bottom of his jacket, his muscles shifting below my touch. “I love you.” It’s the first time I’ve whispered this to anyone, and he’s right—the words do burn.

He stops dancing. The music plays, but he holds me still. “I love you, Raven, but saying it isn’t enough. I plan to show you how much you mean to me.”

I look up at his ocean eyes, no longer worried I’ll drown. “If your show-and-tell involves more touching and less clothing in the privacy of your place, count me in.”

I drop my hand to the curve of his ass, and a growl rumbles from his chest. The kiss that follows is bigger than the galaxy above us and the words we spoke. It’s a promise wrapped in low groans and tangled tongues that shivers across my skin. We’re not the same, Nico and me. We won’t always agree, and we might test each other’s limits, but if he kisses me like this and opens his heart, I’ll be his and his and his. And he’ll always be mine.

Fifteen Months Later

Raven

I must be swaddled in thick blankets and locked in a sauna. Maybe I’ve been banished to live on the sun. It’s the only explanation for this oppressive heat, and the sweltering weight smothering me. The weight moves, tightening and loosening its hold, and my awareness seeps back. Not a blanket. A body. A large body. A kiss lands on my cheek, miles of rippling muscle shifting against me. We could be sleeping in an emperor-size bed, and Nico would still wrap his long limbs around me all night. It’s one of my favorite things about him.

That and the heat he’s packing between his thighs.

He presses his morning wood into my hip. “Hey.”

His voice is all rocks and gravel, his lips and hands everywhere at once, like he’s a mutant squid with three mouths and eighty fingers, caressing my breasts, my belly, my thighs. I’m surrounded, and I love it. Totally engulfed by Nico.

I move, restlessly, turning in his arms, and my face meets his wide neck. I bite, then I suck, and a red mark blooms on his dark skin. My mark on my husband. His answering groan lights a path through my veins, and my blood turns to molten lava. It’s been over a year since the fight that broke us up, and it’s like we’re still making up for lost time. Apologizing. Forgiving. Over, and over. I’m not sure we’ll ever get enough of each other.

His busy hands stroke my back, one thick thigh pushing between my legs, rubbing exactly where I want him. “I’m so wet,” I murmur. “And I’m ovulating.”

Nico grunts and kneads my ass. We slide and drag against each other, nothing but skin for days. Then he says, “I could live like this. With you. Forever. I don’t need anything else.” My (sexy) gentle giant isn’t always much for words, but he sure knows how to make them count.

He only needs me. I only need him. But we want a baby.

I wiggle higher until our mouths are lined up, my hand meandering down the dips and grooves of his chest and abs, along the slide of his hipbone. I kiss him and take his cock in my hand, always amazed at how thick and heavy it is, hot to the touch. Hard for me. Our tongues swirl, once, twice, and his hips glide forward, searching for my rhythm, demanding my attention.

I am rapt.

Still stroking him, I shift my head and look into his eyes. The sky has nothing on his blue gaze. “If we can’t, if it’s not in the cards for us, would you want to adopt?”

I doubt most people would have this conversation while giving their husband a hand job, but we’re not most people. We’ve been known to fall asleep on our front lawn while counting the stars. We choose to stop and kiss in the rain. We dance on the beach. We got married in private, just the two of us and a waterfall. That didn’t stop our friends from throwing us the most outrageous party known to man (punk-meets-country theme; think: hay bales, Mohawks, dueling guitars, and cowboy hats), but Nico and I follow our own rules, even choosing tattoos over wedding bands. Or maybe we follow his rules. He is, after all, the mushiest, most romantic man birthed this century.

All two hundred and seventy pounds of him.

He traces my lips with his finger. “I’d love to adopt. We can try naturally as long as you want, but I’d rather not go the whole doctor and appointment route, unless your heart is set on it. If we can have our own baby, I’ll be thrilled. If we get to give a kid a chance at a good life, I’ll be just as excited. More, maybe.” He places a gentle kiss to my temple. “It’s only been six months. Whatever will be, will be. As long as we’re together.”

Again his chosen words flatten me. I run my thumb over the head of his cock, spreading around his pre-come, watching how his eyes flutter closed, how his broad chest rises faster. It sends my heart skating across the moon.

“I love you so much,” I say.

“Love you, babe. Forever.”

He grabs my hips and lifts me over him, like I’m nothing but a feather, and I straddle his bulk. I rock against his length, not taking him inside me yet, just feeling all that power under me, his hardness rubbing me just right, our breaths guiding us. It reminds me of us dancing on the beach, letting the rush of waves set our rhythm. Faster. Slower. Gentle swaying. Then I lift up, and lower myself down. God. It never gets less intense. Never ceases to amaze me how perfectly we fit together. Two halves of a whole. A really pleasurable whole.