She nods, her focus returning to the TV, but now me and Nolan are looking at each other again, and I’m pretty sure we’re thinking the same damn thing.
That bitch.
* * * *
Once Katie’s in bed and safely asleep, we head to bed. Zoey’s asleep with a damp washcloth on her forehead. I know Nolan’s upset about what Katie revealed to us, but neither of us want to wake Zoey up by talking.
He heads into the bathroom to take care of business. He stashed sleeping shorts in here so he’d have them in case he needed to get up during the night for Katie. I open my dresser drawer, get the surprise, and follow him into the bathroom.
Once he’s done, I wait until he’s washed his hands. Before he can reach for his toothbrush, however, I catch his right hand and slip the band on his ring finger. It’s a stainless band with triquetras engraved around it, and he freezes as he stares at it for a moment before looking me in the eyes.
“I’m done waiting,” I whisper. “I’ve waited long enough. I wanted Zoey to be awake for this, but I’m staking claim on what’sours.” I thread my fingers through his hair and cup the back of his head. “You’re ours.”
Slanting my lips over his, I take my time kissing him. So many times in our lives we’ve had to rush and sneak, scurry to conceal what we were doing from parents or others.
This time isourtime now. This man is my husband and I guess it’s safe to say, in my heart, he’s always been my husband.
Nolan’s arms encircle me, holding me as we kiss. He nibbles on my lower lip and I suck on his tongue. Between us, we both harden and start that old familiar grind that’s nearly gotten us into trouble too many times to count. Mostly because the world disappears when we do.
He turns us, pressing me against the counter, then grabbing me behind the thighs and lifting me so I’m sitting on it. Still, we kiss.
He shoves down both our waistbands and fumbles in the drawer for a tube of lube. I wrap my legs around his waist and drape my arms around his neck. He squirts a dollop in his palm and slicks it over both our shafts. With them pressed together, he slowly strokes both of us.
It’s easy for me to lose myself with him. Maybe if it’d ever felt like we had to force this, or like it wasn’t easy, it wouldn’t have lasted so damned long.
Nothing between us has ever felt anything but perfect, and that’s always been the problem. Because we both knew it, and he couldn’t get past his fear, even once he was out from under his family’s thumb and could walk away from them.
Maybe my perspective is different because my parents died a year after I married Zoey. Dad caught the flu and then pneumonia on top of it and died, and Mom died a week later from a heart attack. The doctors said it was a stress-induced coincidence, but no one can convince me she didn’t die of a broken heart.
Life is short. Too damned short to not get what you want from it, and to not show the people you love how much you love them.
Even if it’s the kind of love others want to tear you down over.
Meaning I’m never walking away from this man unless he orders me to go.
Now, it would appear, I don’t have that worry any longer.
I press my forehead against his and stare into his eyes as he strokes us. His brown gaze stares back at me, deep and intense and caught up in our mutual need. “Love you forever, man,” I whisper. “Never letting you go.”
I love the way the outer edges of his gaze soften as he sheds his inhibitions with me. “Love you, too. You’re stuck with me now.”
His lips crash onto mine, bruising and needy and desperate as his hand strokes us harder, faster. I come first with him not far behind me, both of us spilling all over each other and his hand and even our stomachs. We stand there, him leaning into me now, as our breathing slows and evens out again.
He kisses me again, gentle and tender now. “When’s our official anniversary?” he teases.
I kiss him back. “The day your divorce to her became final.”
We clean up and head to bed. Zoey’s got the far side tonight, which puts me in the middle in case Nolan needs to jump out in the middle of the night for Katie. We don’t have a ready excuse yet if she catches him coming out of our bedroom in the middle of the night, and we hope we don’t need one. We can always say we were talking, or watching TV, and fell asleep. I don’t know.
But as I lie there curled around him, I shove back my anger over Katie’s earlier revelation.
I’m hoping Jerilyn isn’t in our lives for another twelve years. But if she tries some bullshit with Katie, I’ll mortgage everything I’ve got and take out a bunch of credit cards, if I have to. to fund the war chest to destroy that woman.
Without hesitation.
And I know Zoey will be right there with me one hundred percent.
