Electricity tingled over my skin from the feel of his soft lips there. Goosebumps rose in the wake of the electricity and a shiver ran down my spine.
He dragged his fingertips over my bare thighs before eventually hooking them around my waistband and pulling my skirt and panties down at the same time. Despite the clock I’d put on us, his movements were unhurried as he undressed me.
Parts of his fingers or hands touched me all the time, like he couldn’t bear the thought of not having some point of contact between us. His gaze followed his fingers, caressing me almost as surely as he exposed every inch of me.
Then his mouth joined the party as he kissed and nipped at my sensitive skin. Breathing in deeply once I was naked before him, his lids grew heavy and he let out another soft growling sound.
“I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of seeing you like this,” he said as he brought his hands to the insides of my thighs, dragging his burning gaze over my most private parts. I didn’t mind it, though. Not with him.
In fact, I spread my legs even farther apart and let my head fall back against the firm mattress. “I’ll never get enough of having you looking at me like that, but if you don’t touch me soon, I’m pretty sure I’m going to combust spontaneously.”
“As much as I would love to test that hypothesis sometime, it’s not going to be today. Today, I’m going to make you come until I’m about to combust spontaneously. Then I’m going to make love to you until Hunter comes in tomorrow morning.”
Emotion choked me up for a moment. “Make love to me, huh?” I never thought I would feel this way about him or anyone else, but I did. “I like the sound of that.”
“There will be plenty of fucking in our future, but that’s not what today is about.” He bent down and sucked a nipple into his mouth. As he swirled his tongue around it, I decided not to let out a smartass retort about his assumption that there would be plenty of fucking in our future.
There would be, and we both knew it. Besides, I just didn’t have it in me. Surrendering my body to his soft kisses and tender touches, I was nearing orgasm by the time he blew warm breath over my pulsing clit.
I cried out when he kissed it like it was his long-lost lover. My legs shook as he moaned against me and made me need him even more. His hands were everywhere as he worked his mouth over me, but when one of his long fingers slid inside, I couldn’t hold back anymore.
My orgasm was so powerful that I almost fainted. Stars exploded behind my eyelids and my muscles clenched him so tightly I wasn’t sure I would ever let him go. Even my gums were tingling by the time it subsided.
Chris kissed my skin lovingly, almost apologetically as I lay panting on the bed. He didn’t stop there, though. When I finally caught my breath, he started working me up all over again and sent me hurtling toward the blissful abyss again in no time.
“April,” he moaned when my brain eventually came back online. Trailing kisses up my abdomen, there was a tortured expression his eyes when he lifted them to mine. “I need to be inside you now.”
“So do I.” I didn’t know when he’d gotten naked, but he was very much naked when he crawled over me. His searing-hot cock slid through my slick folds. His muscles were tight with tension, but there was such a storm of emotion in his gaze that it brought tears to my eyes.
That’s how deeply he feels for me. Even in a moment as supercharged as this one, I could still see how much I meant to him.
“You’re everything to me, Chris,” I whispered as I wound my fingers together at the nape of his neck and my legs around his hips. “I love you too.”
He blinked way too many times, but then his lips came down to mine. He kissed me with the kind of passion I thought only existed in movies as he sank into me. His hands found mine and held on to them while we lost ourselves in a sea of love and sensation.
When I felt him tense above me, I was right there with him. It felt like even our hearts were beating as one, our bodies so completely in sync that no words or communication were necessary.
When he finally let go, so did I. The orgasm that washed over me was unlike anything I’d felt before. It was better than taking my bra off after a really long shift or ice cream on a hot summer’s day. And the best thing was that it felt like it would never end.
When it finally did, having Chris in my arms, unable to move or speak as we tried to recover, was somehow even better. That was how I knew that I really did love him. I’d just had the most intense, powerful orgasm of my life, and I was glad it was over so that I could have this moment with him.
Love really is crazy sometimes.
Chapter 39
CHRIS
It had been two weeks since the first time I’d told April I loved her, and I still hadn’t really stopped smiling. Hunter looked up from hammering down the last of the flooring at our new practice and rolled his eyes when he saw me grinning while staring at nothing.
“You’re thinking about it again, aren’t you?” he asked.
I nodded. “I can’t help it. I thought reports of realizing that you loved someone, saying it, and hearing it back from that person were grossly exaggerated, but they’re not.”
“Don’t worry. Adi will be a teenage girl soon. You can braid each other’s hair and gush about how amazing it is to be in love.” He smirked. “Are you going to help me finish this up or keep daydreaming about the day you defiled our office?”
“I didn’t defile our office. I christened it. There’s a difference.” I shrugged. “Besides, what this is really about is you being jealous.”
He pretended to flip his hair and stuck his nose up into the air. “As if. You haven’t given me enough details to be jealous. All I know is that you two made up and said the big L-word.”
“That’s all the detail you need. You know I don’t kiss and tell.” I grabbed my hammer and got back to work. “You’ll see when your time comes. You won’t want to give me any details either and I won’t want to hear it.”
He scoffed. “Stop talking like that. My time isn’t coming. I’ve got a business to run, remember? I just need my partner to stop being all starry eyed about his girlfriend and finish installing the floor instead.”
I pointed at the expanse of laminate flooring behind me. “Excuse me? Your starry-eyed partner has done more than half the room.”
“Semantics.” He waggled his brows at me before standing up to examine what we’d done. “You know, if this whole private practice thing doesn’t work out, we can always start a renovating business. We’ve done well here.”
“No thanks.” I wiped sweat off my brow with the back of my arm. “There’d be tools involved. I’d hate to hear the names you could come up with, given that kind of ammunition.”
His eyes lit up. “That’s an excellent point. We could call it ‘Chris and Hunter’s Tools For You’ or ‘Our Tools Are Better Than Yours.’”
“I doubt we’d get much work with those names.”
“Nah.” He grinned. “We’ll market it at women who’ve been trying to get their husbands to start doing all that stuff they’ve been promising they’ll do for six months.”
I laughed, shrugging as I inclined my head. “That might actually work, but we’d get beaten up often.”
He gasped and pointed at his face. “That won’t work at all. Look at this mug. It can’t get messed up.”
“You mean it can’t get more messed up than it already is?” I joked.
Hunter started lifting his middle finger but then quickly dropped it and pasted a wide smile on his face. “Hey, look. It’s the A-Team. Hi, ladies. Come to help us brainstorm names for a renovation business?”
I looked up to see April and Adi walking in, and my heart jumped at the sight of them. April’s brow furrowed and she tucked her chin closer to her chest. “You and names for a renovation business when there are tools involved? I’m sure you don’t need our help to come up with a good one.”
“Great minds think alike,” I said, getting to my feet and going o
ver to pull April into my arms. “You should hear what he’s already come up with. If we use those names, we’re going to have angry husbands targeting us for the rest of our lives.”
She laughed. “Okay, now I want to hear it, but later. Can I talk to you for a minute first?”
My stomach turned to steel as I released her. “Sure, what about?”
Opening her purse about an inch, she showed me an envelope wedged inside. “Outside?”
“Yeah.” I ran a hand over my head. “Sure. Let’s go.”
I glanced at Adi, winking before I pointed at Hunter. “I did most of the flooring, so he promised to clean up. Mind keeping an eye on him while he sweeps so we know he hasn’t just swept everything into the corners?”
She giggled, bouncing her head up and down. “I’ll make sure he does a good job.”
Hunter pretended to be offended but then stepped back as he grabbed two brooms. “You know, you’re moving so well again now it’s like you were never even hurt. How about you sweep with me?”
Taking the broom from him, she moved like she was about to start sweeping but then suddenly wielded the broomstick like a sword. “Think you’ll be able to keep up with me?”
He laughed and mirrored her pose. “Bring it on, little one. I can sword fight for days.”
Adi leaped into action like she was a champion on a mission to defend her title, her laughter echoing in the mostly empty cavernous space. Hunter looked taken aback at first but quickly realized he’d underestimated her.
“She gets better every time I see her,” I said to April, reaching for her hand. Adi knew we were together now and was thrilled about it, but we still tried not to be overly affectionate in front of her.
Not that we’d do anything inappropriate anyway, but with the court case still hanging over our heads, we had to assume our every move was being watched. Howard had warned us that people often hired private investigators against their exes during custody battles and that even one picture of us kissing could be spun as something much, much worse.
Until the hearing was over, which would only be in another two weeks at the earliest, we were unable to really move on. I wanted them to move in with me, but I couldn’t even bring it up right now. Adi wanted me to go to her school’s career day, but Howard said it might look too much like I was trying to muscle Craig out of her life.
April desperately wanted to go away for a weekend, but we couldn’t even do that in case something happened with the case while we were away. Technically, we could do all those things. We just didn’t want to take any chances.
None of what we wanted was worth the risk of losing Adi. I’d had several meetings with Howard by myself. Our back-up plans had back-up plans, but he’d assured me that going through with this hearing was the best possible first step.
Craig had been quiet since his accident. He’d spent over a week in the hospital and had a long road ahead of him in terms of recovery, but he was also still staring down the barrel of criminal charges. Adi never had been his first priority and I was pretty sure keeping himself out of prison had taken precedence over his fight about her.
Howard had been in touch with his lawyer on my instructions. At first, the man said they planned on going ahead with the custody suit. But Howard had assured me he was on it and had been keeping me in the loop every so often when he’d spoken to our opponent.
I knew he’d had a meeting with the man yesterday, and I suddenly thought I knew what was in the envelope April wanted to show me. Excitement whacked me like a truck to the chest. If it was what I thought it was, we’d finally be able to put all the worry about the custody suit behind us.
April’s eyes reflected my excitement when we stopped underneath a tree outside. The sky was blue, the lawn outside the building finally green again.
Despite the sounds of the city all around us, I could hear birds in the tree and Adi and Hunter laughing inside. It was one of those moments that would put us at a crossroads again. I knew I’d remember it for the rest of my life. The only question was whether the memory would be good or bad.
She slid the envelope out of her purse and handed it over. “It’s from Howard. Craig has signed over all of his parental rights to Adi.”
Unable to speak from the intensity of the relief I felt, I could only look at her. Thank God.
“We won, Chris,” she said, taking my hands. She dropped her head back and smiled as she breathed in deeply. “We really fucking won. I can’t believe it, but not one second of Adi’s time has to be spent with Craig. Howard got us everything we asked for and more.”
“I can believe we won.” I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her close. “You’re the best mother anyone could ask for, baby. We were always going to win.”
Lifting her against my stomach, I spun her around and grinned as I looked up into her eyes. They were pinned to mine, happier and brighter than I’d ever seen them.
“I love you,” I said before setting her down.
“Love you too.” She kissed the tip of my nose, a relieved sigh coming out of her. “I don’t even know what we’re supposed to do right now. It feels so surreal that it’s over.”
“It’s over,” I promised, moving my one hand discreetly to my back pocket to make sure my wallet was still in there. “I have a few suggestions about what we could do right now too.”
She laughed and batted her eyelashes flirtatiously, lowering her voice when her laughter subsided. “We can’t do that right now. Adi’s here.”
“I like the way you think, but I wasn’t talking about that.” I reached into my wallet and closed my fingers around the metal inside. “That’s for later, when hopefully we’ll have more than one thing to celebrate.”
Tilting her head at me, she narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “More than one thing to celebrate? What are you talking about? What else are we celebrating?”
I lowered myself down on one knee and opened my palm, presenting her with what I held inside it. It was crazy to ask her this when we hadn’t really discussed it seriously before, but I’d had enough of waiting.
Worrying about them at night kept me awake. Wanting them in my apartment when I woke up created such a sense of disappointment every morning when they weren’t there that I’d had the key cut a week ago.
“Will you move in with me?”
Epilogue
APRIL
My life had never been a fairy tale. I never expected it to turn out like one, either. But for the last eight months, I felt like that was exactly what it was. The most perfect fairy tale that I never even would have dared dream about.
As I stood in the doorway of the practice, the signs now up, the equipment unpacked, and our first full day of patients starting in the morning, I couldn’t quite believe that this really was my life.
Starting tomorrow, I would be the receptionist and administrative manager for The Helping Hands. Tonight was our grand opening, and I stood with Chris’s hand in mine as we welcomed our guests.
Hunter was nowhere to be found, but I’d seen him sneaking off with one of the cocktail waitresses a little while ago. Despite his insistence that he would never settle down, I didn’t really believe him. Even if that was what he believed, Cyrus and I were living proof that even those who were the most cynical about love could inadvertently step right into it on any given day.
Chris and I had moved in together eight months ago, and I’d never looked back. Adi and I had a long talk the night he’d asked me, and after making sure she was okay with it, I’d said yes. He’d moved our stuff in the very next day.
Adi had never been happier, and neither had I. With Craig out of our lives for good—he’d gone to jail, gotten married in Vegas, and was presently living somewhere in Mexico—I was finally able to stop living in fear.
It had taken some time to heal from all the emotional damage he’d inflicted over so many years, but Chris was patient and supportive, as he’d always been, while still being convinced that I was “totally badass” at the
same time.
Slowly but surely, I’d really learned to trust him. I’d put Down on Love behind me and embraced everything real love had to offer with Chris. Because of him, I’d also learned that what I’d had before had been nothing even in the same ballpark as love.
It wasn’t only me who loved him either. Adi loved him more than she did me, or at least that was what I thought sometimes. He’d stepped into the role of her father so seamlessly, with such grace, enthusiasm, and gratefulness that it had made me melt all over again.
She stood on his other side now, his arm draped over her shoulders as he chatted to one of the older doctors from the hospital. The two of them were practically inseparable when he wasn’t working and she wasn’t at school.
A shriek from the side drew my attention away from the two people my heart beat for, and I turned to look where it had come from. Luna was running toward me with Cyrus laughing behind her.
They still made the picture-perfect couple with their dark hair and light, beautiful eyes. Cyrus wore a suit that probably cost more than this building, but he was also pushing a stroller with the sweetest, most gorgeous little girl with lips like a rosebud and eyes like her mommy’s in it.
At just over two months old, little Daisy Anne had kept my friends pretty busy recently. Chris and I had gone to see them a few times, but I’d also wanted to give them space to settle in.
Surprisingly, Cyrus had taken to fatherhood like a fish to water. Not surprisingly, Luna had taken to motherhood the same way. They were both over the moon and head over heels in love with baby Daisy.
Not that I blamed them. Seeing her made even my ovaries swoon, and I’d promised myself a long time ago that this factory was closed for business. But between Daisy and Chris being as great as he was with Adi, I had a feeling the factory might just open up again soonish.
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