Page 89 of Bourbon and Proof

I run my fingers along the top of her knee, back and forth, as if touching her in some way is necessary. An eagerness thrums through me as I reach into my pocket with my other hand.

“Did you never settle down with someone because—” she starts to ask, but I cut her off.

“Because anybody else wasn’t you.” I hold up a ring pinched between two fingers. It’s something she would wear—gold and lined with diamonds. Nothing too over-the-top, but something that’s comfortable, beautiful, and just for her. Julian outdid himself with this design. It’s entirely original. “We did this all wrong, sugar.”

Gasping, her hand moves over her eyes, like she’s too overwhelmed to even look. She pulls in a breath first and blows it out slowly, moving her hands away from blue, tear-filled eyes. “I don’t know why I’m so overwhelmed; we’re already married,” she says with a watery laugh.

“That was for show. This one’s for us,” I tell her as I take her hand, sliding the ring above the one that already occupies it.

“Ace...” she breathes out, and I swipe away the tear tracking down her cheek. “This is beautiful.”

It feels pretty spectacular to take this woman’s breath away and make her speechless as she stares at the ring. But I need to tell her how much Iwantthis life with her. “I’ve been trying to catch my breath since the moment you walked into my life. AndI know that I’ve done this all wrong, but I want to make it right.” I steady my voice when I say, “I’m in love with you, Hadley Foxx. We may have already gotten married, but I want to be your husband in every fucking way if you’ll have me. And I don’t want this feeling to ever go away, so I’m asking you to stay married to me. Throw out the rules we’ve barely followed and just keep choosing each other. Let me love you, sugar, like I should have from the start.”

She barely lets me finish as her hands find my face and pull me into a kiss. “Yes. It’s always been a yes from me,” she mumbles across my lips. Wrapping her arms around my neck, she practically tackles me back onto the bed. “I thought the first ring was romantic, but asking me to stay with you...” A soft smile brightens her face as her fingers graze along my hairline. “You would’ve had to find a way to get rid of me, because I was never going anywhere. Even when I was pissed off at you, I was already stupidly in love with you.”

I can’t help the smile that pulls out of me, knowing that she’s been feeling the same way I have. She looks at the ring on her finger, above the metal band from the bottle of bourbon. “I think I’ll wear both. One for loving you and pretending I didn’t and the other for being able to say it whenever I want now.”

I push her hair back behind her shoulders and look up at my beautiful wife. It’s a view I don’t think I’ll ever forget—her smiling at her ring as she lies on top of me and the word “love” being thrown around like it’s the easiest thing in the world to say to someone. To her, it is.

She glances at me and cracks another smile. “What are you thinking about?”

“You.”

A few pieces of her hair fall from the knot on the top of her head as she looks at me curiously. “Why are you smiling at me?”

“A lot of reasons,” I say, drawing my fingers along her bare shoulder. “You don’t have any idea how brilliant you are. Sexy, yeah, absolutely, but...” I tuck a piece of her flyaway hair behind her ear and tell her the simplest truth. “I’m in awe of you. Always have been.” I smile at the way she’s looking at me, like this isn’t obvious to her. “You drained your father’s money and bought up most of Fiasco’s commercial real estate. And you did it to help people.” I shake my head. “Not out of greed or to take something for yourself.” Leaning in, I kiss her pretty lips. “I love touching you, tasting you,” I breathe out. “But I also love the way this thinks,” I say, dragging my fingers along the side of her forehead. “And the things you say.” I swipe my thumb along her lips.

She closes her eyes, smiling. Jokingly, she says, “I’m awesome. We’ve already established this. Plus, I didn’t need any of that money or real estate—that’s what I have you for.” Wiggling her eyebrows, she bops her finger on my nose.Such a brat.

I pinch her nipple, making her screech a laugh. “Kidding. I’m kidding,” she says, out of breath. “That’s what I have Midnight Proof for?—”

“And Foxx Bourbon,” I say, cutting her off. “And whatever else we build out from there.”

“Baby, Foxx Bourbon is yours and your brothers’.”

Thathits me right in the chest.I close my eyes for a second and hum, “I like that one,” I tell her.

She furrows her brow, trying to work out what I’m talking about.

“Babyis good when we’re like this,” I say, and then drag her closer to my lips again as her body wraps fully around mine. My cock rubs up against her barely-there satin shorts. “But when I’m hard or you’re wet, I want you to be a brat and call me Daddy.”

Her cheeks flush pink immediately, and then she bites that pretty bottom lip.

“Say it,” I demand as I drag my nose along the column of her neck.

“Yes, Daddy,” she breathes out.

“And your last name is Foxx, which means Foxx Bourbon is just as much yours as it is mine.” I wrap my hand around her neck, just as she settles her pussy right on my dick. She grinds herself over me as I tug her bottom lip with my teeth. “Tell me okay, so I can flip you over and fuck you again.”

A breathy chuckle escapes her as her eyes blink slowly. “How are you ready to go again?”

“I have more than a decade’s worth of sexual frustration to work out on this pretty pussy.” I move my other hand below the covers to her already slicked clit. Petting it with my thumb lightly, I’m hoping to hear her beg me for more.

Her neck tilts back as she lets out an audible exhale. “You’ve had sex in the last decade.”

I sit up with her on my lap as she tries to grind her pussy into whatever I’ll give her. Dragging my teeth along her pebbled skin, I suck one of her nipples so hard that she cries out. When I pull back, I lick and soothe the divots I just made. “Yes, but I’ve been fantasizing about having it with you for just about that long.”

“You’re...” she trails off as I slide two fingers inside her. “Oh god?—”

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