Page 79 of His Hot Mess

Then he flipped me over onto the couch, making me squeal with laughter. His hands went to my waist, sliding up and over my breasts.

“There’s something different about you,” he’d said, cupping them. I’d gasped—they were slightly tender. My body never ceased to amaze me with its reaction to Chris.

“You’re just happy to have me at your fingertips,” I’d said.

“Icouldtake a break,” he said, sliding his thumbs over my nipples, which had formed into hard little rocks under my sweater. A warmth spread down low in my abdomen and I wrapped my legs around him for a brief, delicious moment as he lowered himself onto me.

Then I sighed and pushed him away. “I need to get back down to the shop. The sign says back in 5, and I’m pretty sure we’ve never managed to get things done in that short a window.”

“I’d be willing to try,” he said, his hands running over my hips now, squeezing my slightly thicker flesh with his fingers and growling.

“I’ll be back tonight!” I promised, laughing and wriggling out from under him and leaving him with a kiss on the end of his nose before running back downstairs.

“I’ll text him to be sure,” I said to Lucy now. I reached into my pocket for my phone, but there was nothing there. I remembered I’d left it plugged in upstairs this morning.

“You don’t have it, do you?” she said.

I grinned, sheepishly. “I swear I’m getting better at remembering it.”

She laughed. “One step at a time.”

There was a loud grinding from upstairs—the sound of something heavy being pushed across the floor. “See?” I said. “He’s fine!”

“If you say so,” she said. Then, peering out through the window onto Main Street, worry draped over her features. “It’s really coming down. I better call Gray to come get me.”

Graydon had dropped her off this morning. She said it was because she didn’t have snow tires, then, tears in her eyes, she’d confessed she also no longer fit behind the wheel of her SUV.

I sensed the frustration in her voice at having to get ferried everywhere.

“It’s perfectly normal to get picked up by your husband, you know,” I said.

“How am I going to maintain my independence if I need to be driven around everywhere?”

“You’re going to have to get better at asking for help, that’s all,” I’d said after calming her down. “You’re having twins, remember?”

“I couldn’t do this without you,” she said, and I knew how much she meant it. She was getting better, too.

Then she groaned and clamped her hands on the back of her hips now. “I need my rocking chair,” she said as she went back through to the office to call her husband.

I grinned. She’d loved the rocking chair I snuck into the back of the truck on our trip to Moriarty together. “It’s the only chair that makes my hips feel good now!” she told me.

I said a prayer of thanks I only had to go upstairs to get home, and that my man—my loving, loyal, doting man who Ilived with—was upstairs already.

I’d bought a much too expensive bottle of wine in Moriarty last week to celebrate his official moving-in. Sal had recommended it, promising it was worth the eighty-dollar price tag. Nine months ago, I would have laughed out loud at the thought of spending eighty dollars on a bottle of wine. Two-buck chuck from the Trader Joe’s in Millerville was more my style. But the store was doing well—better than my wildest dreams, actually. An Instagram influencer had discovered the shop last summer, and hip kids from all over had been flocking to it—and spending an unseemly amount of money on the online shop too—ever since.

It was how the woman currently making her way up to the counter with an armful of clothes had probably found me too.

“Thanks so much for coming in on a day like today,” I said as I rang up her order.

“Of course!” the woman replied. “I LOVE Sadie’s Vintage,” she said. “I’ve been shopping from the online store ever since I found you but promised myself I’d make a trip to the actual store as a celebration for finishing my finals.”

So, she was from the university.

“It’s so much better than the vintage shops in the city. Everything there is SO picked over.”

Damn, I guessed wrong.

The bell to the front door dinged just then and I looked up to see Casey coming through in a whirl of flurries from outside. She wiggled her fingers in a wave but went to peruse my new arrivals while I finished up with my customer. I was happy but not surprised to see her—Casey was in here at least once a week. Plus she’d followed through on my request to use her as a model for my promo material. She was practically at home here as much as I was.

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