“She’s a terrible singer, not much better a dancer, though I see signs of improvement. I hurt her once, and I worry she might never forgive me.”
Tears welled, thickening the emotion in her throat. This was supposed to be sexy time! “You dumb Texas lump. There’s nothing to forgive. I’ve just been waiting—”
“Until you were sure you loved me?”
“No, until I was sure you loved me.” Foolish, maybe, but the last month together since he’d tricked her into that job interview had been a test. “I can’t risk being thrown aside, Brody, and I know you say it all the time, but I needed to feel it. Every day, not just in the heat of a sexy moment or a movie-worthy romantic declaration, but also in those quiet times on the sofa with Kevin and at the kitchen island making coffee and when I look up from a textbook and find you eating me alive with your gaze because you can’t believe your good luck. I need to know you have no regrets and I am the best thing to ever happen to you. That’s selfish, perhaps, but I’m trying to be more selfish these days and look out for me.”
Especially as very soon it would be more than just her.
He nibbled at her lip and kissed her, long and sweet. “I love you in the morning, evening, and all the night through. I love you in the office, the penthouse, the strip club, and the million places we’ve yet to have wild, crazy sex in. You are the woman I was meant for, the sun in every room I enter. And I will wait a thousand lifetimes until you’re ready and a thousand more if it never comes.”
She sniffled, ready to say the words at last. “Brody, I—I think you’re such a hot, sexy-as-all-get-out nerd.”
His growl was the opposite of nerd. How she loved her beast.
“And I love you,” she whispered. “So much, baby.”
He closed his eyes, clear relief easing his strained expression. “That’s my girl. My Ms. Strickland, my Chardonnay, my Emma, and soon, I hope, my wife.” He grinned at her gasped reaction. “I can’t let my sister lord that married status over me for too long. What do you say?”
Joy burst like sunbeams in her chest. “Say yes to give you a leg up in your sibling rivalry?”
“Can you think of a better reason?”
“Maybe.” She moved his hand down to her bare midriff and a couple of inches past the border of her shiny hot pants over the curve of her belly.
His grin turned doubly wicked. “Don’t have to be married to get some. You’re kind of easy.”
“Brody Kane, if you would stop thinking with your giant penis for once, you will understand what I’m trying to tell you.” She hauled a breath. “Kevin is going to have a little brother or sister soon.”
His hand splayed on her stomach, practically covering it entirely, and his gaze dropped to where the next generation of Kanes was growing inside her. She held her breath. Given that cargo hold of baggage he was toting, she wouldn’t blame him for having mixed feelings about this. But she saw how he treated Kevin with such reverence and love. This man would make a wonderful father.
“Anger sex in the back room of a strip club for the win.” Deep emotion shone in his eyes. “We’re having a baby. We are having a—freakin’—baby.”
Tears blurred her vision, and she swiped them away, not wanting to miss a moment of the happiness she was giving him. A lifetime love, marriage, a baby—and that was just the start of this amazing journey they were traveling together. Cupping his dark head, she drew him into a soul kiss and sealed with her lips their forever connection.
Wordlessly, they stripped each other, letting the emotion of the moment roll them along. In his silver-gray eyes, like moonlight over a calm stretch of water, she saw her present, her future. Her everything.
Only one more thing could make this absolutely perfect.
“Keep your socks on, Mr. Kane.”