After the Climb (River Rain 0.50)

Motherly concern washed into her face and she asked, “Do you talk about him a lot?”

“No. Mostly she bosses me while alternately feeding me and hiding the fact she’s spoiling my animals so this house will never be the same if she’s not in it, which I know is her goal. Chloe Pierce will never leave a place the same as it was before she arrived there. It’s a singular gift. And Tuck is gonna hate me forever when I make it clear the counters are again off-limits.”

She jostled him happily and set her chin on his chest, her eyes shining.

She was proud of her girl, as terrorizing as she was.

And he loved that.

“Gage is gonna have a massive crush on her,” he muttered.

“How old is he?”

“Nineteen going on eleven.”

She started giggling.

“And your older boy? Sullivan? How old is he?” she asked.

“He’s twenty-one, and those hands of time you wrested your glasses from?”

“Hmm?”

“Those were his.”

She giggled harder at that, so much, he felt it against his body.

Now was a better time to kiss her.

And he was going to do that.

God, Christ, tasting Genny again.

He couldn’t fucking wait.

He started to drop his head.

Her laughing eyes grew wider then got serious right quick.

She was coming up on her toes…

“Well, hell.”

They both froze.

“Harvey! I told you!”

Genny leaned to the side to look beyond him.

Duncan didn’t have to look.

But he did anyway, holding her close and twisting his head to look over his shoulder.

Harvey and Beth were standing beyond the railing at the back corner of the porch.

“You didn’t answer your doorbell,” Harvey accused Duncan’s way.

“Yeah, because he’s necking with his girl on his back porch, you big dork!” Beth snapped, smacking her husband’s arm and it looked like she did it hard.

“Woman! How was I supposed to know? Yesterday, she’d barely look at him.”

“Omigod!” Beth turned and homed in on Genny. “He lives with four women and he still has no clue.”

“I know about the three-day shampoo regimen,” Harvey clipped.

“Well bravo for you,” she shot back.

“You two wanna stop yellin’ at each other long enough for me to make you both a cup of coffee, and Beth, I don’t know, maybe before that, introduce you to Genny?” Duncan asked.

“We absolutely, one hundred percent, and I could not stress this more, do not want a cup of coffee,” Beth decreed. “No offense, Genny.”

“I could use some joe,” Harvey said.

Before Beth’s head could explode, Duncan threw out a compromise.

“How ’bout I fill a couple travel mugs for you.”

“We’re leaving,” Beth decreed. And to Genny, “Genny, so nice to not quite but still meet you. I wish I could tell you we weren’t these lunatics, but we totally are. Do with that what you will. If you take Bowie from us, we’ll understand. God granted us more time with him than we deserved anyway.”

“Speak for yourself, wife,” Harvey bit out. And to Genny, “I am not a lunatic. You saw yourself yesterday, doll. I’m your average, everyday best friend to a man who shitty life circumstances tore from the arms of the love of his life and he needed my special guidance to get them back. Therefore, I’m taking total responsibility for this.”

Harvey finished, jabbing his finger toward Duncan and Genny.

It didn’t last long upraised.

Beth grabbed his wrist, yanked it down and started tugging it.

“You’ll come over for dinner. Soon, a couple of days, I’ll make something in the air fryer,” Beth called as she moved, hauling Harvey with her.

“You and that air fryer,” Harvey groused.

“You didn’t complain about that air fryer when I was pulling homemade jalapeño poppers out of it. You were too busy shoving them in your gob.”

They heard this even though Beth and Harvey had disappeared from sight.

“You were wrong.”

At these words, Duncan looked down at Genny.

“She’s scary,” she decreed.

He burst out laughing.

She gave him a squeeze while he was doing it.

And even though he looked down at her and saw her smiling up at him happily, he stopped doing it.

Bent his head.

And took her mouth.

Genny gave him instant access.

So he took it.

She tasted warm and smooth and decadent.

Different and all the same.

But as ever, intoxicating.

And addicting.

He angled his head for more. She pulled her arms from around him to wind them around his neck and pushed up on her toes to give it.

She pressed deep.

He pulled her deeper.

But when his cock started stirring, he ended it, kissing her jaw, the downy skin in front of her ear, then resting his cheek against the side of her head and just holding her close.

“Okay, so, um…it seems we have no problems getting the hang of that again,” she mumbled.

He smiled at his stables. “Nope.”

“Are you going to introduce me to your horses?’

“Yup.”

“And your chickens?”

“Yeah.”

“Your dogs are about to break through the glass.”

“We’ll bring them with.”

“Just so you know, I checked, and you were correct. My building has not had a sanitation emergency.”