I slid my fingers into his hair as he kissed me, and pulled the rubber band out so I could clench the hair in my fists as he ground his hips against mine.
“I’m going to give you blow jobs at least once a week,” I murmured, making Bram chuckle as his lips moved down my neck.
“And I’m going to cook dinner because I like to, but I promise it’ll be good.”
His lips wrapped around a nipple, and I arched my back in response.
“I’ll probably forget anniversaries, but I’ll write them on a calendar to try and remember.”
“Thank you,” he said, running his hand between us to slide two fingers over my clit.
“And I’ll be proud of everything you do, even if I don’t go telling people about it.” I gasped as he slid those same two fingers inside me. “I’ll love you even when you’re being an ass.”
“Hey, now,” Bram said defensively, biting the side of my breast gently.
“Please,” I whispered as his thumb rubbed slowly over my clit.
He kissed me as he positioned himself, and my breath caught as he slid inside, locking us together.
“I’ll—”
“Shh,” he quieted me, pressing his forehead against mine. “We’ll make our promises later,” he whispered. “When you’re wearing a long white dress and I’m in a tux.”
“You want to marry me?” I asked as his hips rocked, my hand moving down his sweaty back.
“I want everything,” he answered, snapping his hips forward.
After that, we didn’t say much. We were too caught up in the dance of our bodies, the sweat that pooled on our skin, the scents and sounds of our coming together. It was the best sex we’d ever had, and it had none of the acrobatics we’d performed in the past. Straight-up missionary, but the emotion made it magnificent.
I still liked that word.
Hours later, I watched Bram as he stumbled around my room.
“Do you want me to just go get them?” I asked, giggling at his attempts to reach the door.
“I got it,” he grumbled, wiping his hand down his face. “You stay in bed.”
He finally left the room to go grab our phones and I fell back onto my sheets with a sigh. Bram wanted to call and check up on Arielle, but we’d left our phones in the kitchen when he’d carried me to my room.
“Mom texted us both,” Bram said as he came back into the room, looking at his phone. “She sent a couple of pictures and said they were going to bed so ‘don’t call and check up on them.’”
I laughed at the scowl on his face.
“What are the pictures?” I asked as he sat down next to me, sliding his bare legs under the sheets.
“One of Arielle in her swing and one of Trevor holding her,” he answered, tipping the phone toward me so I could look at them.
“Has he heard anything from Henry’s baby-mama?” I asked as I looked at Trev’s smiling face on my phone screen.
Ellie, Mike, and Trev seemed to be getting back into the swing of things again, but it was apparent to everyone that they were still in mourning. I’d seen them laugh, and I’d seen them smile, but they still carried an awful expression on their faces when they thought no one was looking. I was pretty sure I wore the same one.
All of the drama with Bram had distracted me, giving me a little breathing room from my grief, even though it hadn’t exactly cheered me up. I wondered if, now that Bram and I were solid, Henry’s loss would magnify again, like the day we’d buried him.
“Trevor called her,” Bram replied, taking the phone from my hands and setting both his and mine on the bedside table. “She was willing to talk, but I don’t know much more than that.”
“Well, that’s good at least,” I murmured as Bram shut off the light and slid down the bed, pulling me with him.
“I think he’s going to head down there in the next couple of weeks.”
My head popped back up, and I looked at Bram in surprise. “Really?”
“Yeah, he wants to meet her—the baby.”
“A little piece of Hen,” I murmured, laying my head back on Bram’s chest.
“I can’t imagine what was going through his head,” Bram said, running his fingers lightly up and down my back. “That’s his baby.”
“Some people aren’t meant to be parents,” I replied with a shrug.
I didn’t understand why Henry had done what he’d done, either. I could barely wrap my head around it. He knew what it was like to have parents that didn’t care, so the fact that he’d followed in their footsteps baffled me. On the other hand, I’d realized over the past few months that some people just couldn’t hack it. If Henry had been one of those people, maybe it was better that he’d walked away from the beginning.
“I want to go get Arielle,” Bram muttered, making my lips twitch. “I know we can get her in the morning, and I know she’s fine with my mom and dad, but I want her here. In her own bed. With us.”
“Let’s just enjoy the full night of sleep,” I said, kissing his chest. “We’re not going to get any again for a while.”
I closed my eyes and relaxed against him.
“I was thinking that we could rent out my town house instead,” Bram suddenly said after a few minutes of quiet.
“Whatever you want,” I replied.
“We could sell it and get a chunk of cash, but the steady income would be nice. Plus real estate is a good investment.”
“Sure.” I could feel myself falling asleep as he continued to ramble on.
“Then you could stay home with Arie,” he said, laughing when my head shot off his chest.
“What?”
“You don’t want to work anymore,” he said with a smile. “I know you don’t.”
“But I—”
“Please don’t knee me in the balls for this,” he said nervously. “But let me take care of you.”
“I don’t need you to—”
“I know you don’t. You’ve already proved that you can take care of yourself and Arielle,” he cut me off, pulling me up his chest. “But you’d rather stay home with Arie. I know you would.”
“Yeah, I’d love that,” I croaked.
“So, do it. I make plenty of money, baby. We’d be fine.”
“But what if—”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
“Are you sure?”
“Why do you keep asking me if I’m sure all the time? Yes, I’m sure.” He leaned down to give me a quick kiss on the lips. “I’d rather Arielle was home with you every day.”
My mouth trembled as he gazed at me happily, the moonlight barely shining enough light for me to catch the expression on his face.
“You’re going to have to find a new office manager,” I hedged, making his grin widen. “A dude office manager.”
“Fine,” he said seriously. “You have to give me more kids.”
“What?” I jerked back in surprise as his eyes searched mine.
“Arielle needs a sibling,” he said quietly, reaching out to cup my face in his hand. “I don’t think I want to foster. I’m not sure I wouldn’t end up running for the border the minute they tried to take our kids away. But if you want to adopt again…”
“Really?” I breathed.
“No one older than Arielle,” he ordered. “So we’ll probably have to wait a few years.”
“But there are a lot more older kids than there are—”
“It doesn’t have to be a baby,” Bram said, shaking his head. “Just younger than Arielle. When Kate was little, my parents fostered this older kid.” Bram swallowed hard. “He attacked her, and he could have really hurt her if Alex and I hadn’t found them.”
“I’ve heard that story,” I murmured.
“After that, my parents didn’t foster any kids older than us. So I’d just feel more comfortable if we did that. Only kids younger than Arie, okay? They don’t have to be babies.”
I dropped my head to his chest and shuddered as I tried to hold back the sob in my throat. I was overwhelmed. E
xcited. Terrified.
Bram just held me like that, letting me get my shit together as he started rubbing his fingers over the top of my shoulders.
“Twice-a-week blow jobs,” I finally promised, raising my head. “I’ll even swallow.”
My lips twitched, and Bram immediately rolled on top of me, laughing hard into the side of my neck.
Epilogue
Abraham
Hey, little sister,” I answered my phone as I walked out of the grocery store with a pack of diapers. Apparently Ani had forgotten to pick any up earlier in the day, and Arielle was down to her last one.
I usually didn’t step foot in the grocery store—Ani preferred to do all of the shopping since I’d moved in almost a month before—but I didn’t mind doing it. It seemed like Ani worked harder once she was staying home with Arielle than she ever had managing the office.
It had only taken a week for me and Trev to hire a new office manager. It was the same guy who’d filled in for Ani when Arielle was born. Even though Ani bitched about the guy doing something to her files while she’d been on maternity leave, she didn’t argue when we told her he had things handled. She was so fucking ready to spend her days taking care of Arie and fixing up the house. It was a work in progress, and I hated when I’d come home to find her standing in the driveway sanding kitchen cupboards while Arie sat bundled up in her bouncy seat on the porch, but I didn’t complain because she loved it and she was really good at it.
“Did you know Trevor was coming down here?” my sister asked accusingly, stealing my attention from the memory of Ani bent over those cupboards.
“Yeah,” I replied, throwing the diapers into the passenger seat of the truck. “He was going to go down a couple weeks ago, but he ended up having to push the trip back. Why?”
“Is he coming to see that woman? Henry’s chick?”
“That’s the plan, yeah.”
“Ugh!” Katie growled. “He refuses to give me her name!”
“That’s because he doesn’t want your crazy ass stalking her.”
“I wouldn’t stalk her!”
“Yeah, you would.”
“Only on Facebook!”
“I rest my case, Your Honor.”
“You guys suck,” Kate huffed, and I imagined the pout she’d perfected when she was little.
“How are you guys doing?” I asked, changing the subject. “Everything good?”
“Yeah, this deployment feels longer than the other one, but we’re hanging in there.”
“Thanks for the shit you sent up for Arielle,” I said, pulling into the driveway of our house. “We won’t have to buy clothes for the rest of the year.”
“No prob. Shit! Gunner, get off the counter!” she yelled in my ear, making me grimace. “I gotta go, Bram. Have Ani call me.”
“Will do.”
“Love you.”
“Love you too.”
I hung up, grabbed the diapers, and hopped out of the truck. The light from the living room lit up the front yard through the windows, and I smiled as I thought about Ani painting the bottom half of the trim on the inside when she should’ve been in bed. They’d looked like complete shit then, but they turned out all right when she’d finished them.
“You’ll probably be taller than me,” I heard Ani say as I quietly came in the front door. Her voice was coming from the kitchen, and I could tell by the tone that she was talking to Arielle.
“Your birth mom is taller than me, and so is your paternal grandmother.”
I stopped in the doorway as I took in the sight that greeted me.
Arielle was in her swing in the corner of the dining room while Ani talked to her over the little island that separated the kitchen space from the dining space. Ani looked like she was trying to make some sort of dough—probably biscuits that would turn out hard as a rock—and her hands and face were dusted with flour. So was the shoulder of her T-shirt, which didn’t surprise me because my woman was constantly on the move, and a little flour on her hands would never stop her from doing fifteen things at once.
“Your daddy is tall, so it’s not like you’ll tower over us like a giant or anything,” Ani said seriously while Arielle looked toward her like she was listening intently while sucking on her hands. “You’re going to be gorgeous, I can already tell. You’re happy and sweet, and those are the prettiest types of girls.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I murmured, startling Ani. “I like the sarcastic and rude girls.”
“You would,” Ani snorted, smiling as she rounded the counter and moved toward me.
“Hey, baby,” I murmured into her mouth as she went up on her toes to kiss me.
“Hey, did you get diapers?”
“Of course.”
“Father of the Year,” Ani teased, sliding her hands into my hair and getting flour everywhere.
“Is there a reason you’re discussing birth parents with our three-month-old?” I asked, pulling back a little to look at her face.
“Bethy called today,” she said quietly, making my heart thump hard in my chest. The reaction was instinctual, even though Ani was Arielle’s legal parent forever and ever, amen. “She asked me to send her a picture of Arie.”
“Did you?”
“I waited for you,” she said, one side of her mouth tipping up.
“Thank you,” I breathed, my shoulders slumping. “I don’t care—send her as many as you want—but thank you for asking me.”
“Yep,” Ani chirped.
“I wish Shane would hurry the hell up and get home so we could get married,” I groaned, lifting Ani onto the counter so I could step in between her thighs.
“Only a few more months,” Ani laughed, kissing my cheek.
“You feel like kissing someplace else?” I asked as her hand slid down the front of my jeans.
Ani’s eyebrows rose, but just as she opened her mouth to agree, Arielle squawked loudly from her swing. After grudgingly helping Ani off the counter, I turned toward our daughter, whose face was scrunched up in a supremely pissed expression.
As I lifted Arielle into my arms, I called over my shoulder, “We’re taking a honeymoon, right?”
Did you miss Kate and Shane’s love story?
Please turn the page for an excerpt from Unbreak My Heart.
Prologue
Shane
Why are we going to this shit again?” I asked my wife as she messed with her makeup in the passenger-side mirror.
“Because it’s important to your cousin.”
“She’s not my cousin,” I reminded her, switching lanes.
“Fine. It’s important to Kate,” she answered, losing patience. “I don’t understand why you’re being a dick about it.”
“How often do we get out of the house with no kids, Rach? Rarely. I’d rather not spend our one night alone at some fucking coffeehouse filled with eighteen-year-olds.”
“Damn, you’re on a roll tonight,” she murmured in annoyance. “Kate asked me to this thing weeks ago. I didn’t know you’d be home.”
“Right, plans change.”
“I promised I’d go! I drop everything for you every time you come back from deployment. You know I do. I can’t believe you’re acting like a jackass because of one night that I had plans I couldn’t change.”
“I highly doubt Kate wants me here,” I mumbled back, pulling into the little parking lot that was already filled with cars. “She’s going to hate it when I see her crash and burn.”
I hopped out of the car and walked around the hood to help Rachel out of the car. I never understood why she insisted on wearing high-as-fuck heels while she was pregnant—it made me nervous. She looked hot as hell, but one day she was going to fall and I was terrified I wouldn’t be there to catch her.
“You really have no idea, do you?” she said, laughing, as I took her hand and pulled her gently out of her seat. “How in God’s name did you grow up together and you still know so little about Kate?”
“You know I didn
’t grow up with her.” I slammed the door shut and walked her slowly toward the small building. “I moved in when I was seventeen and left town when I was nineteen. She’s not family, for Christ’s sake. She’s the spoiled, weird niece of the people who took me in for a very short period of time.”
Rachel stopped short at the annoyance in my voice. “She’s my best friend. My only friend. And she freaking introduced us, in case you’ve forgotten.”
“Not on purpose.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? What wasn’t on purpose?”
“She was pissed as hell when we got together.”
“No, she wasn’t,” Rachel argued. “What are you talking about?”
“Never mind. It’s not important.”
“Can you please, please, just be nice and not act like you’re being tortured when we get in there? I don’t know what your deal is with her—”
“I don’t have a deal with her, I just wanted to take my gorgeous wife out to dinner tonight, and instead we’re going to watch her friend sing for a bunch of teenagers. Not exactly what I was hoping for.”
I reached out to cup her cheek in my palm and rubbed the skin below her lips with my finger. I wanted to kiss her, but after all the lipstick she’d applied in the car, I knew she wouldn’t thank me for it.
“We’ll go somewhere else afterward, okay? I think she’s on first, so we won’t be here long,” she assured me with a small smile, her eyes going soft. She knew I wanted to kiss her; my hand on her face was a familiar gesture.
“Okay, baby.” I leaned in and kissed the tip of her nose gently. “You look beautiful. Did I tell you that yet?”
“Nope.”
“Well, you do.”
She smiled and started walking toward the building again, and I brushed my fingers through the short hair on the back of my head.
It wasn’t that I disliked Kate. Quite the opposite, actually. When we were kids, we’d been friends, and I’d thought she was funny as hell. She had a quirky, sometimes weird sense of humor, and she’d been the most genuinely kind person I’d ever met. But for some reason, all those years ago, she’d suddenly focused in on me, and the attention had made me uncomfortable.