Fallon closes her eyes as we both feel our daughter squirm. Restless. Just like my wife.
“Feelin’ okay?”
She gives me a look. “Oh, I’d be great if it weren’t for the crippling heartburn.”
I chuckle. The woman’s still so hardheaded, still so goddamn beautiful as the day I met her.
My lips curve. “Maybe slow down?”
“No rest for the wicked,” Fallon says, arching a teasing brow.
I hook a finger through my wife’s belt loops and haul her toward me. Drag the strap of her tank top off and kiss her freckled shoulder. Then I lean down and sweep my mouth down the line of her throat. Inhale her spiced whiskey scent. “Lookin’ goddamn beautiful, I say so myself.”
Fallon shivers. A dreamy look overtakes her face. “Jesus, Wyatt,” she moans. “Don’t stop.”
“Have to, baby,” I husk against her pillowy lips. She feigns a pout and pulls away. “Forgetting something?”
Her eyes widen then slice to the calendar on the fridge. “Fuck.” Her pregnancy brain, not to mention her bad attitude and her extreme horniness, have been off the charts with this pregnancy. Fuck, but I love it.
I smother a smile. “Get your shit together, Trouble.”
“Ah, fuck it,” Fallon blasts. “It’s a potluck.” I watch as she dumps a platter of cookies and chips into a chipped bowl. “Dakota always brings more than enough anyway.” Eyes blazing, she slams the bowl down then storms up to me. “Now kiss me, asshole.”
Fitting my hand to the nape of her neck, I pull her against me, crushing my lips to hers. Fallon slides her hands up my chest. The heat between us sears. Tiny whimpers work their way out of her as I drink her in.
My wife. My everything.
Seconds away from slamming her down on the table, the front door blasts open, and the sounds of chaos fill the air.
“Hey, shithead, get your dick in your pants, because we’re comin’ in.”
“Goddammit,” I mutter as Ford’s shit-eating drawl carries down the hall.
Breathless, cheeks pink, Fallon tears her mouth away from mine.
I glare at Ford, who rounds the corner into the kitchen. Perched high on his shoulder, is his yawning two-year-old son, Ellis. “Asshole,” I snarl at my brother then tug on Ellis’s chubby bare foot. “Hey, kid, how was the nap?”
Fallon scowls and socks Ford in the bicep. “You wake up Ada, you’re done for.”
“Snack!” Ellis demands.
“Snacks, yes, please. My son has the right idea,” Reese says, slipping into the kitchen. Her soft blonde hair waves around her slender shoulders.
I give Reese and her pregnant belly a grin. “Think Fallon’s got you covered in the snack department.”
Within seconds, more hard boot stomps.
Charlie marches in, carrying a five-year-old Meadow in his arms like his most precious possession. Ruby, beside him, holds a bouquet of wildflowers, their stems wrapped in her signature bright-yellow Bloom’s Blooms wrapping paper.
Then come Davis, Dakota, and their wild brood. Duke, Lainie, and their two-year-old twins, Hayes and Lincoln. Dakota sets a peach pie and a salad on the table. Lifts a brow at Fallon’s tray of chips. “Let me guess, pregnancy brain.”
Fallon’s coarse laugh sounds. “Shut up,” she says, kneeling down to smack kisses on the twins’ cheeks.
There’s a knock on the wall behind us.
Stede. He’s grinning and carrying a big-as-hell bottle of whiskey. Hobbling forward, he gruffs, “Heard this was where the party is.”
I grin back at my father-in-law. “Heard right, old man.”