Chad warred with a fatherly need to tend to his son and a more carnal need for the woman banging her fists on his shoulders. His laughter tumbled from him when he hit the stairs.

“Chad. Put. Me. Down.” The emphatic tone wrapped around his dick and squeezed. Damn. He wanted that emphatic, sultry tone whispering demands in his ear as he took her. “I’m too heavy. You can’t carry me. You’re nuts. Put. Me. Down.”

“I swear all you women are the same, thinking you’re too heavy. It’s ridiculous. A real man wants enough padding to get a good grip.”

“I’m serious, Chad. Hell, even Chloe thinks so.” The last admission was a soft whisper against his throat, one resonate with pain.

“No fucking way she thinks that.” Chad set Megan on the bed and pinned her in place. Confusion warred with lust in her half-hooded gaze as it swept over him.

He loved a woman’s eyes on him like any red-blooded man did, but somehow Megan eye fucking him blasted his entire body to another galaxy. Something about her shy, quiet demeanor melting into a need so great she couldn’t control her baser urges worked for him.

“Why do you think that, Spaz?”

“She’s always trying to get me to the gym with her.”

“Yeah, did you ask her why? Knowing Chloe there’s probably a sexy instructor or someone else she’s scoping out.” He undid her hair and finger combed it until it spilled around her shoulders. “You have no idea how gorgeous you are, Spaz.”

“Chad?” Uncertainty and fear punctuated the word.

“Yeah?” He whispered the response as he cupped her face and angled downward until his lips were near her ear.

“What are you doing?”

“If you have to ask, I’m clearly doing something wrong.” He kissed behind her ear, then clasped her lobe between his teeth and sucked hard enough to earn a gasp. “You’re tense.”

“We should go check on Hunter. He was really upset.”

“Chloe will handle him. We’ll check on him in a bit.” Truth told, Chad was worried too, but he’d abided by the child therapist’s instructions and not coddled him at every moment. “You’re good with him, Spaz. The way you hold him down and scrub his face without comment? Nothing sexier.”

“Yeah, me and ketchup go way back. You should see me with mustard scrubs. We’re tight.”

“Good, he loves mustard more than ketchup. Corn dog nights are an event at my house, sometimes requires a firehose,” he teased. “You in for the next one?”

Her full lips upturned into a grin he felt in his dick. “Maybe, depends on the mustard.”

He’d noticed how good she was with his kid a long time ago, but hadn’t realized they were so close. “You spend a lot of time with him.”

“Chloe has me over when she babysits,” she admitted softly, as if worried he’d have a problem with it.

“You probably spend more time with him than Sheila ever has.” The statement tumbled from him before he could drag it back.

“That’s her loss. He’s a great kid, a hell of a little person. So much like his dad it almost hurts to look.” Her gaze darted away. Crimson rose in her cheeks.

“Hey, Spaz.” He clasped her face and drew her gaze. “I like your eyes on me, sweetheart. We’re not doing the same dance we’ve done, not tonight. I’m starting to think Vegas wasn’t a mistake—it was a wakeup call. You’re into me.”

“No I’m not,” she spat. Fists pounded his chest.

Chad laughed and held her hands over her head. Her gaze widened. A soft gasp escaped her partially parted lips. Skin flushed. He leaned in and kissed along her pulse pound. It banged furiously beneath his mouth. He paused at her ear.

“It’s okay, Spaz. You know why?”

A million lifetimes swooshed by as he waited for her response. The soft “why” was barely audible over his labored breathing and loaded with a landmine of doubt. Some bastard had done a hell of a number on her confidence.

“I’m into you too.”

She froze beneath him, a soft bundle of soft curves and lush desire he wanted to unwrap more than anything, but he’d go slow. For her. For him.

For them.

This was Megan. His Spaz.

He wouldn’t fuck this up, whatever the hell this was.

She shoved and squirmed beneath him. He grunted and shifted until she couldn’t move. “What’s wrong?”

“Let me up.”

“Why, Megan?” He sensed the fear, the unease rolling from her in hard breaths and widened eyes. “What’s wrong?”

“This. This is what’s wrong. This isn’t happening.”

“That’s funny. It definitely feels like it’s happening to me.” He pressed his hard cock against her. “Tell me why you really want up.”

Chad pinned her to the bed. Pleasure and anticipation rattled around inside her, a hurricane of potential disaster rolling through so fast she couldn’t retreat fast enough. This wasn’t happening. He wasn’t pressing his hard body…his hard cock against her.

“You aren’t into me,” she spat with a shove against his muscular chest. “I’m the pain in the ass Spaz that was always tagging along everywhere.”

Amusement flickered across his handsome face. A chuckle escaped him. “Is that what you think? You never figured out why I called you Spaz?”

“No,” she whispered as his hot mouth returned to her earlobe.

Her entire body melted against his weight as he settled against her again, as if sensing she needed the contact to remain rooted to reality. Her hands loosened their grip on his shirt and wrapped around to his back. A groan of approval rumbled from him.

“Jesus, you feel good against me, Spaz. I want you naked. I want to be buried balls deep in your slick heat until we both explode.” He feathered kissed along her cheek, then hovered a scant distance from her mouth. “The first time I saw you I was fourteen and a stiff breeze would set me off. One look at you, that saucy smile and all that gorgeous hair, I was a goner.”

Oh. My. God.

Megan held her breath, unable to do anything more than listen.

“Then you grew up and filled out, became a sexier than fuck woman barely old enough not to be jail bait. You were so entrenched in our lives, so important I knew I couldn’t ever go there. Not with you. Every relationship I’d had turned into shit and evaporated. I couldn’t lose you, not when it’d affect Chloe.”

She’d had the same reasons and then some for staying away from him. “So why now?”

“Thanks to Vegas, you’re mine. In the eyes of the law. In the eyes of the family. In the eyes everyone I don’t give a damn about right now. All I know is waking up next to you, feeling your hot body against mind felt so damned great, Spaz. Jesus, I’d dreamed it a thousand times and never come close to how good the reality felt.”

“This is nuts. I’m not good enough for you. I’m not even close to experienced enough to please a man like you. I can’t risk it, not for a night, or whatever the hell this is.”

Chad’s gaze narrowed. “Someone did a hell of a number on you, Spaz. I’m gonna need to know who and how at some point, but for tonight I’ll just settle on proving you wrong.”

“Wrong?” she repeated.

“You are more than I ever deserve. I won’t lie. I have no fucking clue what the hell this is between us, but waking up next to you shook my shit loose and knocked me back into reality. Tonight. You with my kid, putting yourself between him and Gramps, keeping him grounded and safe. I’d crawl through hell doused in gasoline a million years to have that for him and me every single day, Megan.”

“You’re an amazing father. The way you are with him makes me wish…” She swallowed the rest of the words, unable to form them beneath the intensity of his gaze.

“Wish what?”

“It doesn’t matter.” She focused on the facts. “This isn’t smart, Chad. I can’t handle the fallout from this.”

“One day real soon you’ll trust me with the words, Megan. And you’ll figure out I’ll protect you from the fallout, because it’s never gonna happen.” He brushed her hair aside and returned to the hover, his lips so close their breaths mingled. “For now, do whatever you’ve gotta do to get okay with this, but I’m going to kiss you.”

No.

Yes.

Oh God.

A thousand retorts flitted through her mind, but she remained silent. His gaze darkened, the intensity nuclear and focused entirely on her. She’d fantasized about kissing Chad too long, imagined his taste. He studied her a moment. Her heart pounded in her chest. Her pulse rattled. Awareness arced between them, an undercurrent more electric than a live wire.

“You okay with this?” he whispered against her cheek.

Megan nodded.

“Give me the words, Spaz. Once I taste you, I’m not going to be able to stop until I’ve had you. I want to swallow your screams as I pound into you.”

Jesus.

Chad talked dirty. And she liked it.

A lot.

For now, for tonight she’d let her inner princess have her fantasy man. Tomorrow she’d return to reality, the one where they’d signed divorce papers and evil trolls—aka lawyers—were working tirelessly into the night to erase Vegas.

Erase Mrs. Chad Chambers. Megan Chambers.

She rolled the name around in her mind a few times, wondering what it’d be like it if was a real marriage, a complete package with two or three kids. Hell, six or seven if he was willing. Damn. She was head over heels for him and he had zero clue.

“Megan,” he repeated.

Oh, right. Words. How could he expect her to form anything, much less a complete, coherent sentence?

“I’m okay. Kiss me.” There. Four words. That was enough. Right?

Pleasure imploded within her as their lips touched. The kiss started soft, hesitant, a gentle lapping of mouths and tongues in a slow exploration. But fiery need burned within her, a firestorm of carnal hunger she’d contained too long.

Chad Chambers was kissing her. Tasting her.

Her husband.

Hers.

She followed his lead a few moments longer, relishing in the possessive glide of his hands along her sides, the way he pinned her against the bed and held her in place. Where he wanted.

She wrapped her legs around him and deepened the kiss to a carnal tongue fucking. The duels turned hedonistic, promises offered of what would occur next. He severed the kiss long enough to strip down. She started to do the same, but he stopped her.

“Don’t. I’m stripping you.”

Megan leaned back into the bed and enjoyed the show as he stripped off the t-shirt and shimmied out of the board shorts. Her mouth watered as his erect cock jutted out proudly, long and thick.

“Commando to the family dinner. Epic,” she mumbled. “Gramps wouldn’t approve.”

He flashed a wicked grin. “I’m thinking he’s not gonna approve of anything I do to you tonight, Spaz.”

“Promises, promises,” she taunted even though her entire body went radioactive at the possibility.

Her inner minx scampered about in her words, more daring and present than ever before. A brief flash of fear fizzled the erotic high she experienced. Chad froze, one knee on the bed, one leg on the floor.

Jesus, you’re so fat and ugly, no wonder you’re a lousy lay.

“What was that thought?”

“Nothing.” She whispered the lie, then realized she didn’t want this moment ruined by deception of any kind. This was her one night as his wife. “I was just remembering what someone said about me once, hoping they weren’t right.”

“You were his woman?” Chad asked.

“Yes.”

“He let you go?”

“Yes.”

“Then he was an idiot and nothing he said could be true.” He kissed her gently. “We’ll trade ex-war stories after, okay?”

Megan laughed. No doubt he had more than a few battles to recount with Sheila, Grand Bitch Ex. She settled back into the bed as his weight returned. “I love being under you, feeling your weight pressing into me. So good.”

“Fuck, Spaz. You keep talking like that and I’ll finish before you even start.” He slid her t-shirt over her head. His gaze slid over her hungrily as he reached beneath her and unclasped her bra. “Gorgeous.”

He caressed, stroked, massaged and teased her breasts until her entire body throbbed in need. Firm lips grasped a hard nipple between them and sucked, then nibbled with just enough teeth to make her gasp and clutch his shoulders.

“I’m yours, Chad. Do whatever you want. I’m yours.”

He growled and deepened the contact, feasting on one breast, then the other. Deft hands undid her jeans and slid them down her body. He severed contact long enough to strip her bare. Her entire body trembled, from arousal mixed with a hefty dose of doubt. Her tits sagged more than they once did. Her belly resembled jello more than the washboard his was. And her hips. Yeesh, they held too many donuts and iced coffees from Starbucks to count. Add in the pints of Ben and Jerrys on her ass and thighs and she wasn’t exactly the supermodel style woman she imagined he favored.

Somehow she’d avoided knowing much about his love life. Anytime Chloe mentioned Chad’s romantic life, Megan switched the topic. Now she wished she knew something. Anything.

What the hell was he thinking?

“Fuck, you’re gorgeous, Spaz. That’s what I’m thinking.” He gently nudged her knees apart. “What are you thinking?”

“Did I just blurt that out?”

“Yeah.” He smiled and clasped her face. “Hey, it’s just you and me. I’m not going to hurt you. Why are you so nervous?”

“Because it’s been ages and ages since I was under a man, spread naked and wanting him so bad. And none of them ever looked like you. None of them were you,” she whispered. Tears filled her gaze. “I want it to be good. Tell me what to do and I will. I swear I’ll do good.”

Chad kissed her. The contact eased the tension coiling in her gut. He licked away the tears spilling from her eyes. Then he returned southward, pausing to pay homage to the nipples he’d teased into aching, throbbing buds. He kissed along her midriff and nudged her thighs apart more until he settled between them.

Fiery heat reflected in his gaze at it settled on her. Breaths froze in her lungs as something exploded within her. An awareness so deep she couldn’t identify it. He took her hand, kissed her palm, then settled it on his head.

“You let me know what feels good. Relax, Spaz. I’ve got you,” he whispered against her stomach. Then he drifted lower.

Surely he wasn’t going to…

Holy shit. Heat settled against her core. She angled backward, away from the contact. “Chad, stop. You don’t have to…”

“I’ve wanted to taste you a long time, Megan. Relax and let me enjoy my wife.”

The rightness of the word, the underlying sentiment behind the possessive tone calmed the agitation and flooded her with desire, an unquenched thirst to not only satisfy a man but to be satisfied. Gasps, groans and moans escaped her as his lips, fingers and tongue worked in tandem to draw her closer and closer to a precipice she’d never experienced. White hot heat seared her insides, branding the moment into her memory banks.

She ground against him and growled her frustration when he dragged her so close to an orgasm, then slowed. The taunting torment continued so long her entire body trembled.

“Come for me, wife,” he growled against her. His fingers rocked against her clit as his tongue fucked her. Then they switched and she exploded.

Every bone in her body vanished. The sensations, the heightened awareness while drifting was so unlike what she’d imagined. By the time she returned to some semblance of reality, her entire body was relaxed.

“Beautiful,” he mumbled against her lips as he kissed her.

The carnal kiss, one tinged with the remnants of her arousal awakened something in her. She moaned as he deepened the kiss. He lightly pinched her nipples and chuckled when she groaned and thrust herself into his palm for more.

“You don’t mind it a little rough,” he whispered.

“Chad,” she responded, unsure what to say. His name was more a plea than an answer.

“Next time we’ll explore that, wife. Right now, I need to be inside you. I want to feel your sweet pussy clenching and milking my cock.” He held up a condom. “Will you put it on?”

“I-I…” She was pathetic. She closed her eyes and slammed her head into the pillows.

“Spaz, look at me.”

She peeked one eye open, then the other. Warmth seeped into her chest. He kissed her gently. Eyes open, they tasted one another’s mouths in a slow, leisurely pace that belied the need simmering within her. She reached for him, deepening the duel of their tongues.

“There’s my girl,” he whispered. “It’s just you and me here, Megan. Kick the demons out the door. We’ll slay them together, later. Right now I want you. I need to be inside you.”

“Chad.” She groaned his name and reached for the hardened length settled against the juncture of her thighs.

He ripped the condom open and settled his hand against hers. Together they rolled the condom on as their gazed remained locked, as if they’d fused into one. Then he was on top of her. His hard, thick length pressed slowly into her as his hands steepled with hers and his mouth claimed hers.

Every breath she inhaled was infused with their arousal. Every sound disappeared except the skin on skin rocking of their bodies and the heavy breaths in her ear.

“Mine,” he growled.

“Yours,” she declared without hesitation.

At least for tonight.

She spiraled into the abyss. This time she dragged him along with her. She wrapped her legs around him and moved in time, taking what she needed, what her body demanded. For the first time ever she took without asking. Demanded without begging.

By the time they both collapsed, spent, her entire body was gelatinous. Chad was a god among gods for having the ability to get up and dispose of the condom. Such a talent as walking after that monumental…

Wow.

Megan had no words to describe what she’d just shared with Chad. One glance at him and she knew he’d experienced the same mind-blowing, life-altering wake-the-fuck-up moment. He drew her against him, sealing her against his hot, sweaty body. She couldn’t imagine a happier place to be.

“Get some sleep, wife,” Chad whispered in her ear.

Her heart scampered a few beats. She shimmied her ass against him and sighed in contentment as she grasped both his hands and drew them near her chest. “Night, hubby.”