“Dude, really?” Jesse lifts his hands and, though I can’t see Jett anymore, Becca laughing behind the wheel is hard to miss.
She powers down her window and wrinkles her nose beneath her sunglasses. “You just got dissed!”
“Uh huh.” Jesse props his hands on his hips. “I see how I rate.”
Becca chuckles. “I’ll bring him back tomorrow night. Enjoy the time alone.” Waggling her eyebrows, she rolls the window back up and backs around Jesse’s truck to leave.
I smile and crook my finger from the porch. “Come inside, frat boy. I’ll give you his share of love, too.”
He swivels a raised eyebrow my way and has his shirt off before he even hits the steps.
“How much time do we have before dinner’s done?” he asks between kisses as he backs me toward the stairs.
“Twenty minutes,” I pant against his lips and then giggle when he sweeps me up off the ground and jogs upstairs to our bathroom.
“Missed you today.” His hands and mouth are everywhere, just like mine on him, and before I know it, we’re both naked and beneath the hot spray of the shower.
“Missed you, too.” I pepper his chest with kisses, loving extra on the tattoo, while he lifts me against the cool wall, just enough to—“Ahhhh.”
“Been thinking about this all day,” he grunts, as his hips flex and he pumps in and out of my body, like he owns it. Which, of course, he does. “Gonna be quick,” he warns, stroking my clit with his thumb just how I like it.
Little does he know, I’ve been thinking about this all day, too, and I come in record time. He’s right behind me, skin slapping against skin, until he gives a low, guttural groan and spills himself deep inside.
“Have I told you how much I love fucking you?” he asks after he sets me back on my feet and we make quick work of cleaning up, him more so than me, since he worked in the dirt all day.
“Only about a hundred times this week. But if you wanted to tell me more often, I wouldn’t complain.”
“Good. Because I like it. A lot.” He slaps my ass as we climb back out of the shower, dry off, and dress in fresh clothes. “I’m also starving. Kinda glad Jett’s not here, so I can eat his share, too.”
I laugh, and we head downstairs just as the air fryer goes off.
“You want to eat on the patio tonight?” he asks, grabbing plates and silverware from the cupboard while I take out the chicken.
“Ooh, good call. Can we put the twinkle lights on?”
He smirks. “It’s still light outside, babe.”
“So? It’s romantic.” And it’ll set the mood for what I want to talk to him about, too.
“Whatever makes you happy.” He drops a kiss to my temple before grabbing the pasta salad, a beer, and a bottle of water from the fridge.
“Why don’t you take our drinks out back and get the table situated? I’ll be out in a minute with our plates.”
“You sure?”
“Uh huh.”
“All right.” He grabs the bottles and heads for the patio, calling back over his shoulder, “I suppose you want music, too, huh?”
“You know it, frat boy. Gotta set the mood.”
He flashes another grin and disappears outside.
I follow a few minutes later with our plates and a surprise. I know I’m about to go against tradition, but Jesse and I have never been traditional and it’s one of the things I love most about us.
We eat at the table beneath the pergola, draped with white twinkling lights and overlooking the pine plantation in the distance. The sky is still mostly blue, but streaks of gold and pink move in slowly, painting a picture that always brings to mind those summer nights we spent together so long ago. Memories that I get to relive every day now.
“What are you thinking?” Jesse asks quietly after he swallows his last bite of dinner and reaches for his beer.
“Just enjoying the view.” I pull in a deep breath as the breeze teases my hair against my face and the music playing softly from the speakers mounted around the patio changes to a sweet country song. “I’d take this over the city any day.”
“That’s good, because I don’t plan on letting you leave. Ever.” He winks and I smile.
“You don’t?”
He gives his head a resolute shake. “Nope. But if you wanted to try, we could make a game out of it. I’d win, of course, and you’d end up naked and wet.”
My eyes widen above a smirk. “Oh, really?”
He points at the ring on my finger. “I wasn’t playing when I gave you that. You’re mine now, city girl.”
“In that case…” I pull my phone from my pocket and bite my lip. “There’s something I want to show you.”
One eyebrow quirks. “Okay. Should I be nervous?”
“Yup. Very, very nervous.” I open up my photos, take a deep breath, and slide the phone across the table.
He shoots me a suspicious glare before leaning forward to look. “Why am I staring at a picture of Hannah?”
“What?” I snatch the phone back, and shoot, I must’ve scrolled too far. Way to ruin the impact, Hay, jeez. “Here.” I turn it back to him and his eyes dart from the picture to me and back again.
“Holy shit.”
“Is that a good holy shit or a bad one?”
A wide grin stretches across his face. “I guess that depends on whether or not that’s what I think it is.”
“It’s the dress I’m going to marry you in, Jesse Enders.”
He makes a small, throaty sound, his gaze still stuck on the dress as he scrubs a hand over his beard. “You bought it?” he asks quietly, clearing the emotion from his throat.
“Uh huh. It was the first one I tried on, too. I knew immediately.”
“You want to get married?”
I laugh as I relocate myself to his lap and loop my arms around his neck. “I already told you and this entire town that I did, frat boy.”
“When do you want to do it?” He sets his beer on the table and curls his arms around my waist.
“Soon.” I rub the tip of my nose against his and brush a kiss across his lips.
“This year?”
“This summer.”
“It’s already July, babe.”
I nod as a lump forms in my throat and I take his hand, placing it on my belly. “But if we don’t do it soon, my dress won’t fit.”
His eyes shift back and forth between mine for a moment, before it clicks and he stills. “No fucking way.”
“Six weeks.”
“But I didn’t think…” His face flushes and watery emotion fills his eyes. “Babe,” he rasps, as he buries his face in my neck and he squeezes me tight.
We decided to have the IUD removed a couple of months ago so my body could readjust before we started trying in the fall. We should have known better, given our history with baby making. Not that I’m complaining… I’d have a dozen of this man’s babies if he’d let me.
He lifts his head after several long beats, swiping at his eyes and sniffling. “When do we go to the doctor?”
“A few weeks. We should be able to hear the heartbeat by then, maybe even see him or her.”