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I nodded again.
“Enough to let me be your husband?”
My breath got caught in my lungs, but I still managed to nod while my heart was literally staring back at him through my eyes.
“Enough to let me call Melinda to watch Lexi so we can have a little time to ourselves?”
I raised an eyebrow. “A little time?”
“A lot of time?” he asked with a sexy smirk.
“How about all night?” I countered.
“All. Night. Long?”
I kissed him softly and whispered against his lips, “You bet your sweet ass you’re going to be Lionel Richie-ing me all night long.”
He chuckled. “God, I love you, Win.”
“Save it for tonight,” I whispered and stood up from my seat. “All right, Lexi Lou, we need to leave here in two minutes.”
She crinkled her icing-covered nose. “Where, Mommy?”
“You get to hang out with Melinda today.”
“Yay!” she squealed and hopped up from her seat a lot quicker than I expected. “Let’s go now!” She yanked her little coat off the chair and had it on faster than I could’ve said, Okay. And her little legs were already heading in the direction of the door.
Wes stood directly behind me and held my jacket open so I could easily slip my arms inside. The second I was bundled up in my black pea coat, he wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled my back tight to his chest. “All night long…” he started to quietly sing the chorus into my ear. “All night long…” He punctuated that statement by softly kissing the sensitive spot behind my ear, before patting my ass and ushering me out the door.
Bossy bastard.
Goddammit, I love him.
“Oh, Jesus,” I exclaimed as I rounded the corner from the elevators at Atlantis Resort on Paradise Island, Bahamas and came face-to-nipple with Cassie’s obnoxiously large breast. Coral coloring coated the walls, accents of sea life abounding—I knew from the hours we’d already spent here—but right then, I couldn’t see any of it.
Thatch hovered over Cassie’s shoulder, looking on as his son Ace got ready to feed, but at my shout, his head jerked up and, when he saw the direction of my gaze, his eyes got bubbly with rage. I knew my own had to look nearly schizophrenic.
“Breastfeeding shaming, bro? Not cool.”
“What?” I panicked. “No!” I looked to my side to try to enlist Winnie—clad in nothing more than a bikini, cover-up, and my avid affection—in my defense, but she was too busy trying not to choke on her chortle.
Traitor.
“I figured, with you basically being a father and all, this is the kind of thing you’d understand.”
I shook my head with a little laugh. “Lexi’s six.” How was she relevant to my understanding of breastfeeding?
“Did I ask for her age?” Thatch threatened at a near shout. I held up both hands in a peacemaking
gesture.
“I’m not shaming anything,” I tried to explain. “Breastfeeding is beautiful.”
Winnie squeaked, and I flashed hard eyes in her turncoat direction before looking back to a still brooding Thatch.
“I’m just offended by your wife’s breasts.”
Not good, Wes. Not good.
“Oh shit, baby!” Winnie snapped under her breath. “Are you trying to get killed?”
“Excuse me!” Cassie snapped. Thatch stood up abruptly off the wall, all casual anger gone, and I retreated a few steps while attempting to do the same with my words.
“No, no, no! She’s got a great rack. Seriously. Especially since the baby.”
Winnie grabbed me by the forearm and pulled my attention to her. “Should I step away? Dig that hole any goddamn bigger, and I’m going to fall inside!”
With a scoop of my arm, my instincts engaged, I pulled Winnie behind me as a form of protection. “There’s nothing wrong with her breastfeeding!” I finally got out. “I’m just saying, for me, as one of your best friends, it feels a little incestuous to get a good view of your wife’s…” I nodded in the direction of the evil, tongue-tying, baby-feeders and finished, “That’s all.”
Winnie gave me a condescending pat on the back just as Thatch’s happy face returned.
“Oh. Well, why didn’t you just say so?” he asked, and Winnie dissolved into all-out hysteria behind me.
Christ. I’d just woken up, and I already needed a nap. And this was supposed to feel like a vacation. A working vacation, anyway.
We’d just turned to leave Thatch and Cassie before I could swallow my foot any goddamn deeper when it hit me.
I turned back so quickly, Winnie tripped as I threw her off balance. “All right,” she complained. “Is the whole trip going to be like this?”
I smiled and shook my head before kissing her cheek in apology. “I’m sorry.”
She smiled so big, I nearly fell in love all over again. Of course, when I get lost in it, forgetting all about everything else I wanted to say to any other stupid people on the planet, it grew. “Wes,” she called in an attempt to break me from my lovesick trance.
Oh. Right.
I turned back toward the place where Thatch and Cassie were…only they were gone.
“What the fuck?” I asked as Winnie started to laugh.
“I didn’t imagine that, right?” I asked, afraid hallucinations had set in.
“Nope. They’re here. Or they were.”
“What are they doing here?” I asked. She shrugged one bare shoulder.
“Crashing the trip?”
“Ah, Christ.”
“Hey, guys!” Georgia shouted with a wave as she and Kline stepped off of the elevator.
“Ah, double Christ,” I amended, and Winnie laughed again, remarking, “You’re funnier than you used to be.”
I bobbed my head side to side and mock laughed as she practically skipped over to our friends and pulled Georgia into a hug. For the first time maybe ever, it seemed like Winnie Winslow was completely happy—and I’d had a part in that.
God, it feels good.
I walked toward the group more slowly, but smiling all the same. Kline reached out and took my hand and then slapped my back in one of those manly hugs.
“Did you guys know that Thatch and Cassie are here?” I asked.
“Here?” Kline questioned for confirmation. “At Atlantis?”
I laughed at the look on his face and sank my hands into my pockets. “I’ll take that as a no.”
“Casshead’s here?” Georgia squealed. “Does she have the baby?”
Winnie started laughing so hard that it came out silent. When she finally got herself together, it was she who answered. “Oh, yeah. She’s got the baby. Right, Wes?”
I narrowed my eyes in a death stare.
“What am I missing here?” Kline asked, and I waved him off.
“Absolutely nothing,” I said at the same time that Winnie spoke, side eyes on me. “I’ll tell you all about it later.”
Georgia laughed and shoved her way under Kline’s in-no-way-resistant arm. “What are you guys up to? We were just about to go eat a little something and then go on some water slides. Where’s Lexi? Does she want to come with us?”
“Take a breath, Georgie,” I teased.
“She’s with Quinn Bailey.”
“I’m sorry…what?” Kline asked with a laugh. “Your six-year-old daughter is hanging out with the quarterback of a professional football team?”
Winnie laughed. “Yeah. They actually get along really well. They’re on the lazy river with some of the other guys.”
“This work trip reeks of bogus reasoning,” I said to Georgia as I skewered her with suspicious eyes.
She blushed a little but mostly held strong. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“The whole team is on the lazy river!” I said with a laugh.
She swatted a hand through the air. “Don’t worry. All the press and photo ops for our joint charity venture with the Miss Teen USA pageant start tomorrow morning.”
“It’s Miss Teen USA?” I shouted.
Georgia tried to look innocent and failed spectacularly. “I told you that.”
I was shaking my head before she even stopped speaking. “No, no you didn’t.” The space between my eyes felt like it might explode. “This is a publicity nightmare.”
Then I thought of one of the guys getting a little too comfortable with one of the contestants and nearly had an aneurysm. “This is a nightmare’s nightmare.”
“Wes,” Winnie said in an effort to calm me down. I softened my face before turning to her. “I’m okay.”
“I want a team meeting tonight,” I told Georgia, and my voice was serious enough, she nodded.
Kline just smiled, the bastard, before wrapping his arm around his wife’s waist and pulling her away. “Not to worry, Wes,” Georgia called through a giggle as they got farther away.
Not to worry. Yeah, right.
Winnie sighed. “I guess we’re not going to eat now, huh?”
Oh, I was going to eat all right.
I jerked a rough finger to the elevator, and her smile came back.
“In need of tension relief?” she asked hopefully, and just like that, all the anger receded. Still, I played the part since she liked it so much.
“Get in the elevator, Win.”
