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“I just think this place is too big for one person.”
He kicked off his shoes and removed his jeans. “It’s not one person. It’s two.” He faced me, standing in his black boxers, ripped and tight despite the heavy meal we’d just devoured. “And eventually, it’ll be four. So I think it’s just fine.”
“Four?” I asked, eyebrows raised.
“You want more?”
“Are you referring to children?”
“Well, I’m not talking about dogs.”
“I didn’t realize you knew exactly how many kids you wanted.”
“Women are the only ones allowed to think about that sort of thing?” He sat on the foot of the bed, knees wide apart, his hands together between his thighs.
“No…I just didn’t think you did.”
“I didn’t enjoy being an only child. I think every kid deserves a sibling.”
“Well, I was an only child, and I was fine with it.”
“You only want one, then?”
“I’m not saying that?—”
“Then how many do you want?”
“I—I don’t know.” I pulled my blouse over my head and tossed it on the armchair then moved to my jeans and shoes. I undressed in front of him, feeling his heavy stare glued to me. “I’m only twenty-five. Not really in a rush, I guess.”
“I’m in my thirties now, so I’m in a different place.” He watched me, his eyes hard. “But I’ll be patient as long as you need me to.”
“You’d want kids right now if I was willing?” I asked incredulously. “We’ve been married a couple months.”
He gave a shrug. “Right this very second? Maybe not. But if we started trying in the next year…I wouldn’t mind that.”
“I’m not sure what to say to that. Normally, you’ve got to twist a guy’s arm to get a ring and a family. They’re too objective to understand the emotional fulfillment of children. All they focus on is the things they’ll lose rather than the things they’ll gain.”
He gave a shrug. “If you asked me this a year ago, I’d probably agree with you.”
“What changed?”
He continued to stare at me, that stare becoming hard as steel. He didn’t speak, but he conveyed so much with that simple look.
I swallowed.
“Come here.” He straightened and patted his thigh.
I moved to him, and instead of my sitting across his lap sideways, he pulled me onto him, adjusting me on his lap as his big hands squeezed my cheeks. He was so tall that we were still eye level even when I was on top of him, and those blue eyes made me weak all over.
He looked into my face like he’d never seen me before, never took the time to look at me. Then he touched his forehead to mine, his hands gripping my cheeks in my thong. His eyes dropped, looking down as he held me close.
My fingers moved into the back of his short hair, and I could feel the pulse in his neck with my fingertips. Soft. Slow. Soothing. An old pain ached in my heart, a pain that I’d shunted long ago. Being around him generated an energy that hurt as much as it felt good, a high that I’d never reached with anyone else. It happened every time I looked at him, every time I saw him smile, every time I felt him treat me like a goddess rather than yesterday’s trash.
He lifted his gaze and locked on mine, his eyes somehow bright despite the darkness in the bedroom. He possessed his own luminance, a radiance that couldn’t be shadowed by the heaviest rain cloud. After a quick glance at my lips, he leaned in and kissed me, a hard kiss that had no preamble. His mouth latched on to mine with intensity as his hand slid into my hair, fisting the strands and getting a hold of me like a rider with his horse. His other arm cradled me to him, keeping me secure on his lap as he kissed me like it was the first time he’d gotten the chance to feel my lips.
No one had ever kissed me with that kind of passion. No one had ever made me feel beautiful the way he did. He was the perfect man, on the inside as well as the outside, and it was easy to forget the way he’d hurt me.
Easy because I really believed he would never do it again.
