Steven’s reflection returned, filling my doorway, arms crossed over his chest, scowling. I shot him a fake, sweet smile over my shoulder. “Can I help you?”
His scowl deepened. “You can tell me why you’re all dressed up. It’s eight o’clock and you have to be up at five a.m.” He sounded exactly like a dad reprimanding his teenage daughter for sneaking out to meet her boyfriend on a school night. Or so I imagined. I had been too busy helping raise my younger brothers to earn that lecture.
“I’m going to the Painted Cat.” I slicked on an extra coat of pink lipgloss and pouted at the mirror.
“Why are you going to a bar? You can’t drink.”
“No, but I can fuck, and the Painted Cat happens to be the place people go tofindsomeone to fuck.”
Steven fell out of the doorframe in shock. “What the hell, Chloe? You’re pregnant. You can’t let some stranger put his dick in you. There’s a goddamn baby up in there.”
I stared at his reflection in the mirror, then slowly turned to look at the real thing. “Steven, you know the baby is in my uterus, right? The uterus has only one opening. It’s called the cervix. Right now, my cervix is shut tight. Nothing is going in or out. Not that dicks can reach that far anyway.” I suddenly remembered what he said about the sonogram wand and my gaze dropped to his crotch. My cheeks felt hot.
“Eyes up here, Chloe,” he barked. “I can’t think straight when you’re salivating for my dick.”
I jerked my gaze to his face. “I amnotsalivating,” I huffed. “I amconsidering.”
“Well, don’t. Don’t consider something tonight that you’re going to regret tomorrow. I can’t…” He raked a hand through his hair and made a noise of pure frustration. “Dammit, Chloe. I want to be a good man, but I’m still just a man and I’ve used up all my good jacking off in a cold shower every goddamn day this week.”
God, I would have paid good money to see that. Heat unfurled in my center, winging out in all directions until I was flushed from my cheeks to my toes. “Did you think about me?”
Thelookhe gave me. Hot and dark and dirty, like he was reliving every torrid thing we did in his imagination. I swallowed hard.
“Tell me to go, Chloe.” He came closer. “Tell me to get the hell out of here, lock the door behind me, and make use of that vibrator I’ve heard buzzing all week.”
Impulsively, I captured his wrists, just to see if my fingers could reach all the way around. They couldn’t. A delicious shiver of anticipation ran down my spine. “Now, why would I do that?” I asked.
His eyes met mine, jaw tight with barely leashed restraint. “Because if you don’t, then the only man you’re going to fuck tonight is me, princess, and right now I’m past caring if you hate me for it.”
All the air whooshed out of me on a single word. “Please.” My hands scraped up his arms, my fingernails dragging against the flannel, up over the curve of his shoulders until I looped my arms around his neck. “Please, Steven.”
He was so rigid it was like embracing a rock. He stood there, not moving, not even breathing, every muscle tense as he fought himself. I didn’t know what to do with that, so I rolled up on my toes and gently kissed his cheek. His hand shot to the back of my head like a vise and he held me there, twisting his neck to give me an incredulous look.
And then he slammed his mouth to mine.
It was a desperate, hungry kiss that made me needy for more—more touching, more skin, more ofhim—but unwilling to release his mouth for even a second to get it. He arched over me and I arched back to stay with his mouth, and he hooked hishands behind my thighs, boosted me up, and pivoted to the bed, kicking the door shut behind him.
We landed with me beneath him. He hovered over me, all his weight braced on his arms and his knee outside my thigh. My hips tipped up to his, desperate for friction, and he shifted to lower himself closer, but jerked away again before I got what I wanted. I slipped my hands to his belt on either side of his hips and tried to tug him closer, growling with frustration when he resisted.
“What if I hurt Radish?” he said against my throat.
“You’re not—” I started but then stopped. I wasn’t a pregnancy expert, and Steven was a big guy. For all I knew, he’d squish Radish like a pancake. I huffed. “Fine.”
I pushed at his shoulders. He rolled to his back, then shifted back against the pillows so he was half reclining, and I scrambled into his lap, straddling him. My skirt floofed out around me.
His gaze skimmed over me. “You look like a treat,” he said, the words tinged with hunger and disbelief, like he couldn’t believe I was here.
Honestly, I couldn’t believe it either, but I didn’t want to think about it. I wanted todoit, hopefully before my brain turned back on and put a stop to this nonsense.
I kissed him. The first brush of my lips was almost timid, a mere question of a kiss. But then his lips parted, his hand spasmed on my knee, and a low, aching sound emanated from him as our tongues touched, and it was no longer a question. It was an answer.
I got the top two buttons of his flannel undone but then I was too impatient to do the rest and tugged it off over his head, then sat back a little to take him in. He looked even better than I remembered, all those hard ridges of muscle impossibly moredefined. I traced the ridges and valleys of his abs with my index finger, my lower lip caught between my teeth.
When I met his gaze, I found him watching me with a big ole smile on his face. Not smug.Happy. It stole my breath. “What?” I asked.
“Nothing. I’m just…glad you like it.” He gestured to his abdomen. “I’ve been doing core work every morning. Just in case.”
“In case of what?” I asked.
