There with You (Adair Family 2)

He caressed my cheek, a dark hunger in his expression. “Then you showed up. I knew from your first day on the job, that morning in the kitchen, when I caught you looking at me and I teased you about my hands … I knew you were dangerous to me. Young, vibrant, beautiful, my brother’s almost sister-in-law, with a bit of a reputation that I didn’t know at the time wasn’t earned.”

My heart pounded so hard, it was a wonder he didn’t feel it banging against him.

“But it was the way you were with Eilidh and Lewis that made me realize I was falling for you. The attraction got harder to ignore … and that first night I made to love you … I knew it then.”

“Knew what?” I dared to ask.

“That I’m so in love with you, it scares me.”

My breath caught as tears stung my nose.

He gave me that rueful smile again. “If it had just been about physical attraction, I could have controlled it, ignored it, never touched you, knowing how complicated the situation was. But I couldn’t stay away from you.”

“Me neither.”

“And when you protected Eilidh … I was so far gone for you. I kept telling myself to enjoy what I could, to remember you weren’t staying here permanently.”

“You didn’t trust me,” I whispered, the pain of his faithlessness still fresh.

“No … I just couldn’t get past my own damn insecurities.” He turned into me, clasping my face in his hands. “Regan, to me, you are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known. Inside and out. Sweet and hilarious and kind and smart. Sexy and uninhibited and loving. You could have anyone, go anywhere, do anything you put your mind to. You’re extraordinary. I didn’t trust in myself. I didn’t trust that I was enough for you. That me and the children and Ardnoch are enough for you. I thought we were too ordinary.”

His confession killed me. I wrapped my hands around his wrists. “Ordinary? You couldn’t be ordinary if you tried. Don’t you know you’re everything to me? Only you can make my stomach flutter with just a smile. Only you can make my world perfect just by holding me in your arms. Only you can get me hot with just that look in your eye.”

He grinned wickedly.

“Only you make me feel good about myself, make me feel wanted and at home in my own skin. When we’re all together, you, me, and Eilidh and Lewis, it feels so right, it almost hurts with how wonderful it is.”

He nodded, brushing my tears with his thumbs.

I tightened my grip on his wrists as I licked the salty tears off my lip. “I know with a certainty I’ve never had about anything before that I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I don’t care if that scares you. I need to be honest and up-front, especially after last night, because life is too damn short, Thane. This isn’t ‘let’s see how it goes and cool if it works out or cool if it doesn’t.’ I am madly, desperately, deeply in love with you, and I never want to be without you again,” I sobbed.

He swallowed the cry with a hungry kiss that stole my breath. When he finally released me, it was to pepper kisses over my cheeks, his beard a familiar, delicious tickle across my skin. “I love you, I love you, I love you,” he repeated between kisses. My heart felt like it might explode in my chest. “You’re never leaving us again.” He scattered kisses down my throat and continued to murmur, “I want you back in the house. My bed is your bed, living together out in the open. No more sneaking around. This is us.”

He paused to look me deep in the eye. “You’re my woman and I’m your man, and fuck what anyone else has to say about it.”

I reached for him, pulling him back to my mouth, wanting to seal his promise with a kiss.

“Ahem!”

We broke apart, turning in each other’s arms to find a nurse standing in the doorway. She gave Thane an amused but irritated look. “Do you mind detaching yourself from the patient while I check her over?”

Thane grinned before turning that boyish smile on me.

My belly fluttered.

“I just promised her I’m never letting her go,” he said gruffly, “so I guess you’ll have to do your checks with me right where I am. I’m not going anywhere.”

41

Thane

The sound of Lewis’s light snoring woke him up.

Blinking his eyes open, he waited for them to adjust to the darkness so he could take in the sight before him.

A pain in his neck made itself known, but Thane didn’t dare move. He was in an awkward half-sitting, half-reclined position against his headboard. Lewis was curled into him, his small head on Thane’s chest, his little arm wrapped around Thane’s waist. Thane’s left arm rested down his son’s warm back, while his free hand clasped the book they’d been reading.