He hugged her, love making it hard to breathe. “Will you be my daughter? Officially? If it’s okay with you, I’d like to make it official. We can file papers that make me your dad. Your last name would be Brown like mine.”

She looked up at him. “Really?” She turned to her mother. “Did you hear that? He’s gonna marry us both.”

Elise laughed. “I heard it. It’s pretty cool, huh?”

“Can I have a horse?”

Startled laughter broke from his belly.

“Get used to it. That’s how she rolls.”

“You can have a horse doll. And we can go horseback riding. But a horse won’t fit in the backyard.”

“Oh.” She pursed her lips as she sat back at her place and began eating again. “A few dolls would be good, I suppose. And a pink sparkly kite.”

28

“Christ. If the day before I met you, someone had said I’d be head over teakettle in love with a ballerina and her eight-year-old, going on forty, daughter, I’d have told them they were crazy. I wasn’t looking for you, Elise. That I found you anyway is sort of a miracle to me.”

They stood on a balcony overlooking the ocean, newlyweds for less than twelve hours. The wedding had been in Adrian’s backyard. It had snowed, and Elise had never seen anything as beautiful as Rennie in her little pink dress, dancing with Brody at the reception.

Her parents had taken Rennie back to their house, where she’d spend the next week with them while Elise and Brody had a honeymoon in the San Juan Islands, at a vacation house belonging to a family friend. The house sat on a cliff with the Strait of Juan de Fuca spread out under the clear sky, the waters cold and dark.

“I tried not to fall in love with you. I did. But you’re irresistible. Each time I thought I had it in check, you’d do something else to make me love you more,” Elise said and shrugged with a smirk.

He drew her back inside to the bed. He’d built a roaring fire so the space was warm and a pretty glow flickered over the walls.

“It was my cock, wasn’t it?”

She tossed her robe and got on the bed. “It’s one of your finest features.”

“I love you, Mrs. Brown.” He followed her, twining his fingers with hers as he kissed her neck.

“I love you too, Mr. Brown.”

He traced his fingers and then his tongue over the beautiful phoenix on her belly and side. She loved looking at it. He’d done such beautiful work, it fit her body perfectly. She looked down her body at him, at the phoenix on his back, felt that connection, looked to his wrist where he’d added her and Rennie’s initials to the scrollwork in the ivy curling from the base of his hand to his midforearm.

He did little things that softened her inside. Filled her up with kindnesses and care until she couldn’t really remember a time when he wasn’t at her side. He loved her freely and openly, included her and Rennie in his life as if they’d always been there. As Erin neared her due date, they’d all become closer, and Elise and Raven had even reached a sort of mild non-hatred.

Right then with his hands on her, with his mouth on her hip, on her thigh, and then as he lay back and pulled her up and on top of him, she was filled with nothing but love and happiness, with hope for their future.

“No, not yet,” he said, stopping her when she fully planned to put him inside her. “Come up here. Brace yourself on the headboard and hold on. I want to eat you this way.”

Her breath stuttered as she felt a blush work up her body from toes to scalp. “I can’t brace myself on the headboard if I’m not facing it.”

“No, not that way. Sit on my face.”

Oh she loved it when he was blunt like that. “Oh.”

His pirate’s grin sent a shiver through her as she moved up, bracing her hands on the headboard and putting her knees on either side of his body.

She’d never done it this way, but wow, was it good. Her thighs trembled as she lowered herself over his mouth. His beard tickled her inner thighs and against her labia. They really trembled when he licked through her pu**y, finding her clit, teasing it with the tip of his tongue.

She moaned, louder than she usually did, because they were alone and no one would hear. The fingers holding her thighs tightened and she smiled, tucking away that he liked it when she was loud.

The sounds he made as he licked made her crazy. The wetness of his mouth on her, the wetness of her body against his mouth. It felt so good, it sounded so raw and sexual, she had to close her eyes to take it all in.

She rocked just a bit to get more, and he gave it to her. Urging her with his hands and mouth.

“Mmm, that feels so good. Oh god. Yes.”

He stabbed his tongue up and into her entrance and pulled it out, swirling through her folds and up to her clit again. Her muscles tensed and relaxed each time he did it, until she was focused on his mouth on her pu**y and nothing else. Her hands gripped the headboard tight as she rode against his lips and tongue.

Climax hit her hard. Her head fell back as she gasped and then cried out. Her entire body tingled, went numb and tingled some more, until she scooted away from his mouth because she couldn’t take it anymore.

He surged up, keeping her in his lap and kissed her, hard. His mouth on hers, his tongue demanding entrance she willingly granted. His fingers dug into her hips to keep her close as his taste, mingled with hers, flooded her system.

And then he was in her and it felt so good it set off a bone-deep climax she hadn’t expected.