“Your daughter’s older than me, then,” I say, trying to make light.
A weighty silence follows.
“It probably should bother me,” he says slowly, roughly. But then he wraps his arms around me fiercely. “The age gap should make me feel like a dirty old man. But you feel so right in my arms, like I’ve been waiting to hold you my entire life.”
He turns me around, keeping me tight against him, keeping me in the solid band of his embrace. His gaze is so intense it takes my breath away. “I know we’re at different life stages. I know that most people will have something to say. Hell, I thought my attraction to you was wrong at first too.”
“Did you?”
“God damn it, Molly, I wanted you from the first moment I saw you. The way you challengedme and brought that spark of energy we needed at exactly the right moment. It was intoxicating. And it took everything in me not to seek you out every day.”
“I tried to get time with youevery day,” I protest. “And you were dodging me!”
“Because I was afraid that if I took that meeting, I’d wind up between your gorgeous thighs, your ass on my desk and my tongue in your mouth,” he growls. “I knew how that would look. Iknewthat was inappropriate.”
“But now …?”
“Now you’re my wife. That grants me certain privileges. And I can’t make myself care about what people would think, not when I know how excited you get when I do get between your thighs.”
I giggle.
“That’s my girl,” he murmurs. “My horny, needy, sexy girl.”
“I am,” I admit. “I like everything about you. Including that you’re older than me, if I’m being honest. I was drawn to you from day one too. When it’s just the two of us, it feels so right. But when you mentioned your daughter…”
“She’s an important part of my life. And so is my grandson.” He rests his forehead on mine. “They’re going to have some adjustment period thoughts about you too, I bet. It’s all right if we ease into that part. We can keep this just forus for a while.”
I press my lips against his, kissing him until his grip on me tightens and his thigh slots between my legs, making me whimper.
When we break apart, he gives me a heated look. “Want to see the rest?”
“Yeah.”
Upstairs, he shows me a suite of guest rooms where his daughter and her family stay when they visit. Soft, brightly colored toys spill out of bins in one corner, and a cowboy hat hangs on the headboard. A nod to the fact that his daughter lives on a ranch far away now.
“When they visit, I never hear Silas cry at night,” he says as he guides me down a long hallway to the other end of the house, where he has his own suite.
“Is that because he’s a very good baby?”
He laughs. “Probably. But the sound proofing in this house is excellent. When they visit, we’ll close the door.”
And then he sets his hands on my hips and guides me to his bedroom.
A king-sized bed dominates the large space. It’s neatly made, but clothes are draped over a chair in the corner, and books with cracked spines are stacked on the nightstand. There are signs everywhere of Jeff living in this space, way more than the kitchen. There’s even a pair of well-used running shoes waiting for him on a treadmill in front of a window overlooking the lake.
“We can move that out of here. I have a gym downstairs too, but I like the view from up here. And it’s easier to get a run in first thing if it’s right in front of me when I wake up. But waking up to you would be even better.”
He tumbles me onto the bed and stretches out on top of me.
“This is a lot to process,” I murmur.
“Let’s take it one thing at a time.” He kisses the corner of my mouth. “How does the bed feel?”
“Good.”
“Good? We can do better than good.” He brushes his lips against the other corner, his breath warming me from the inside out. “This is how I want to spend my days off this season. Turning you on, making you ache… Are you going to put that on my socials?”
“Never, Coach …”
