Logan devours my flesh. His hot mouth tracks over my skin, searing me in the most pleasurable way. We wrestle it out, hug it out, belt out every cry that our lungs demand. This is no-holds-barred. We may have boarded this coital train last month, but this time we are giving our bodies the stamp of approval to repeat the effort as much and as often as we desire. We’re no longer in hiding, ashamed, second-guessing our need for one another. We are affirming what our hearts already knew. We are right. This is our time, right here, right now, and we will never surrender our love to another again.
Logan trembles over me and lets out a righteous roar, his head tipped back to where I can see the muscles in his jaw distended. He falls over me in a heated heap, his sticky flesh over mine as he rolls to the side and pulls me close.
His amber eyes are glossed over, his breathing erratic.
“Damn, you’re beautiful.” He presses a molten kiss to my lips. “Are you okay?”
“I’m great, and the baby is even better because it is both healthy and blissfully unaware of what just transpired.” I consider my words for a moment. “Sheis both healthy and blissfully unaware.”
“She.” A smile expands over his lips. “We’re going to have a daughter.”
“And the boys will love her.” A single tear streams down my cheek. “How I miss our precious baby girl. I cannot wait to hold her in my arms again.”
“Just a few short months. By this time next year, we’ll already be spoiling her with our affection.” He ticks his head to the side. “Do you want to live at Whitehorse—eventually?”
“At the house you generously built for me with nothing more than your love?Yes. The boys and I belong here with you. Not with Chloe and Gage living next door to Emma. God, I can’t even breathe in that house. Sometimes I think that I was under hypnosis during that entire marriage to Gage. Why didn’t you stop me from buying that place?” I playfully kick my heel over his thigh.
“Because I let you make your own decision.” That side-lying dimple I gifted him goes off. “And you were rife with hormones, sort of the way you are now, and I knew enough to tread lightly.”
A laugh bucks out of me. “You better watch it, Oliver. You’re walking on thin ice.”
“And you just proved my point.”
“Seriously, though. If you ever see me heading for a bear trap, feel free to navigate me in the opposite direction. I’m just thankful that this nightmare with Nathan didn’t turn into some explosive custody battle. I couldn’t handle having my children taken away from me.” My hand covers my belly a moment. “And that’s another reason I’m thrilled to be having this child with you. I will never fear that this child might be ripped from my arms, nor will she ever live under the influence or same roof for that matter as Chloe Bishop. Our baby is safe because I’m safe with you.”
“True as God.” He lands a string of kisses up my cheek. “So, what do we have to tackle next? Do you want to sell the old Walsh house? We can take ’em. By law that house is half yours. But if you wanted it back, I’d make sure you got all of the money you put into it, which was more than half and we both know it. Not that we need it. What’s mine is yours and we have more than enough.”
A ragged breath escapes me. “I think we should, but I think we should wait until this time next year. I want to enjoy my pregnancy. I want to enjoy you—my future husband.” I shake my head. “You do realize you are still my husband and I never let you go no matter what the law says. But to appease the authorities that be, we will have that big wedding. And I’m excited about it.”
“Good. I want you excited.” He dips his hand between my thighs.
A dark laugh bubbles from me. “Everything about you excites me.”
Logan gets right back to the business of doing just that.
Gage expertly dodges Logan and me at the house. Chloe, however, is indifferent to our presence. The novelty of having me under myownroof seems to have worn off, and for the first time in two days I’m feeling well enough to trek with Logan and the boys to the Landon house, where we’ll break the good news to them. Ezrina just stopped by to pick up my latest not-so-greatest batch of vomit. Logan helps me catch it in a bucket and either Ezrina or Nev swings by to get it.
Logan and I offered to buy a freezer to help store it, but Ezrina was emphatic about having it fresh—something about delicate enzymes. Ellis came by once and did a vomit run but ended up puking into the bucket himself, thus polluting the offering.
I’ve only been away for less than a week, and yet the Landon house feels utterly new and strange. As soon as Logan and I unleash the boys into the house, they run straight for their cousins who they’ve been asking about nonstop. As much as I dislike the fact I’m still living at home, it indeed feels like just that, home. Not to mention it’s a virtual familial playground for the boys. For as many things that are wrong with the Landon house, there are twice as many things right.
Logan and I step into the family room, fully expecting to see Ethan and Drake belching in front of the television set, or Mia and Melissa ripping each other’s hair out over their latest boy-toy endeavors, or perhaps my mother giving Demetri a lap dance—all very plausible scenarios—but this?
“Oh my dear God.” The words strum from me numbly as I try to assess whether or not what my eyes are telling me is reality.
Logan grunts, “What in the hell?”
Someway—somehow, an oversized golden throne has erected itself to the right of the dining room table, ornate, heavily carved, padded over the backrest and seat with plush red velvet. A relic from the baroque era, something horrifically gilded and best forgotten. But far more out of place than that chair in the Landon house is the person firmly seated in it.
Logan takes a step forward. “Gage?”
Nathan and Barron run into the room and shout, “Daddy,” in unison before leaping onto his lap.
Nathan points to Gage while looking my way and inadvertently picks his nose. “Daddy—Daddy’s Santa!”
“If by Santa you mean a complete fabrication of my better judgment, then I’m with you on that.” I dig my fists into my hips, and it’s only then I notice the bodies lining up next to the throne of lies. “Laken? Coop? Ellis? G? What are you guys doing here?”
Laken shrugs a moment. “Coop said you were on your way here, so I wanted to see you.” She trots over and offers me a hearty embrace, her stomach already protruding and hard with Wesley’s child.
