Chapter 28 #2
I tried to laugh Adalyn’s comment off, forcing my voice to sound light and unconcerned, but the words stuck like burrs in my chest. I nodded along as she launched into a story about her coworkers at the vet clinic—something about Dr. Peterson’s ongoing feud with the new X-ray technician—but my mind had already spun away from her voice, tumbling down a path I’d been carefully avoiding.
What would that even look like?
The image came unbidden, vivid as a photograph—Bodie, with those big, capable hands cradling an impossibly small bundle, patience written all over his face the way it always was when he dealt with anything fragile or precious.
A house filled with real family, laughter and warmth and the kind of chaos that came from love instead of conflict.
Tiny feet pattering across these hardwood floors, toys scattered in corners, finger paintings stuck to the refrigerator with magnets shaped like farm animals.
A life that wasn’t borrowed or staged or built on legal contracts, but on… love.
Heat swept through me, sharp and startling, when my thoughts jumped further—sex without barriers, nothing between us but skin and sweat and the desperate need to be as close as two people could possibly get.
Sex to actually make a baby, to create something together that would be part him and part me and entirely its own perfect person.
I hadn’t ever really thought about it before, not seriously.
Family was such a complicated thing for me, loaded with so much pain and disappointment, and I hadn’t had any real partner in mind who seemed capable of breaking that cycle.
But with Bodie… I could see it. More than that, a part of me wanted it with a fierce intensity that stole my breath.
My pulse skittered, and I took another gulp of wine, hoping Adalyn would chalk my sudden flush up to alcohol.
She didn’t notice, too busy gossiping about town politics and griping about festival planning—apparently the committee was at war over whether to have live music or a DJ, and everyone had very strong opinions about it.
We snacked our way through her expensive cheese and artisanal crackers, refilled our glasses more than once, and laughed until my cheeks hurt and my sides ached.
It was easy, the way it always was with her, comfortable and familiar like slipping into a favorite sweater.
But under everything, that question kept echoing, bouncing around my head like a pinball.
Are you two planning to jump on the baby-making train?
When she finally stood to go, she hugged me tight, smelling like her signature pear perfume and the faint antiseptic scent that clung to all medical professionals. “Don’t go hiding in marital bliss so deep you forget your friends, okay? I miss you.”
“I won’t,” I promised, though my voice came out softer than I meant, thick with wine and emotion and the weight of everything I couldn’t quite put into words.
I closed the door behind her and leaned against it, heart racing like I’d just run a mile.
The house felt too quiet now, too warm, every thought circling back to Bodie like a moth to a flame.
The wine hummed in my veins, making everything seem more intense, more possible, and I couldn’t shake the images Adalyn’s innocent question had planted in my mind.
The front door opened again not long after, the familiar sound of Bodie’s key in the lock cutting through the silence that had settled around me like a heavy blanket.
There he was—broad-shouldered and solid in the doorway, still wearing those faded jeans that hugged his hips just right and a simple gray T-shirt that stretched across his chest. He smelled faintly of beer and laughter and that particular scent that belonged only to the Gibson brothers when they’d been together too long—part cologne, part bourbon, part something indefinably masculine that made my pulse quicken.
His smile started slow, that lazy curve of his lips that absolutely undid me spreading across his face as he took in my flushed cheeks and wine-bright eyes. Something in me snapped at the sight of him, all that pent-up energy and confusion and raw need finding its target.
I didn’t let him get a word out, didn’t give him a chance to ask about my evening or tell me about his night with his brothers.
Instead, I crossed the space between us in three quick steps and fused my mouth to his, pouring all those churning emotions into the kiss—the wine making me bold; the questions making me desperate; the love making me reckless.
My husband needed no further encouragement.
His hands found my waist, fingers digging into the soft curves as he boosted me up without breaking the kiss, nudging my legs around his waist. I could feel him already hard for me, could feel the heat of him through denim and fabric as he carried me toward the stairs, our mouths still locked together, breathing hard and wanting.
We made it to the bedroom in a tangle of hands and whispered endearments, where he tumbled me onto the bed with a gentleness that belied his urgency. Here, finally, we lost ourselves in the one piece of this whole complicated situation that still made total, perfect sense.