“That’s it. This isn’t fucking working. It’s over,” I hollered through the wall.

“Avery, come on.” Charlotte’s pleading voice came through the other side. “You said you love me. Can’t we try one more time?”

I shifted back, studying the wooden shelves on the wall. “There’s a reason this rack broke in the first place. Too many damned shoes. You’re not going to fit another pair on this,” I muttered to myself.

She stuck her blond head in the door of her bedroom, holding her hand over the speaker of her cell phone. “What?”

Every time I saw her it was a punch in the gut. It was a feat of superhuman strength not to go weak at the knees at the sight of those eyes full of mischief. The full mouth that did a million things that kept me up at night. The body that fit mine to perfection.

“I don’t care what closet Max Donovan’s built Payton for all her crap,” I muttered. “She’s pregnant, and he’s wrapped around her finger.”

“Payton, I’ll call you back later all right?” my girlfriend said into her phone, then hit a button to disconnect.

Charlotte sent me a teasing smile.

“You, unlike Max, do exactly what you want.”

“You know it.”

“Have I ever told you how much I like a man who works with his hands?” Her voice went straight to my dick.

“Yeah, well. It’s easy. Since I love you so much, I could put another shelf over there.” I gestured to the far wall. Then lifted a shoe and read off the bottom. “For the Valentinos and whatever else doesn’t fit on this one.”

Her eyes warmed. “You said the magic words.”

“I love you?”

“Valentino.”

I groaned. My girl liked her shoes. But they looked hot as fuck on her.

So I guess I liked them too.

“What’s new with Payton?”

Charlotte lifted a shoulder, which had me noticing the coral dress she wore. New? Maybe. But it looked easy enough to take off, which was the most important factor.

“…She does work for you,” I heard her say. “But I think it was a big relief to tell everyone about her pregnancy. And I know she appreciates you working with her to figure out how to get her a few months off and cover her clients.”

“Yeah. It’s easier now that the program’s been rolled out company wide.” And now that corporate banking was safe and one of the top revenue generators in the business.

“Oh, and did you see the thank you card Jimmy sent us from his wedding?”

“Uh-huh.”

Last month we’d visited her childhood home, where I’d met all the Merriweathers.

At once.

I’d earned serious points for that.

I shifted off my knees to look for a screwdriver. We spent most of our time at my place, and maybe it’s egotistical but if I have my way she’ll be moving out of this place and in with me before she can make use of these damned shoe racks.

But if I told her that, it’d start a fight.

Which might end up in bed…

And wouldn’t end for hours.

I added it to my mental to-do list.

“Come on, Avery, we have to go to this birthday party.”

I glanced up to see Charlotte fastening some dangly earrings into her ears.

“Let’s skip it.”

“It’s your birthday,” she insisted. “Your uncle and Kenna are waiting for us.”

I winced. It was true. Kenna’d sprung this on me, but apparently she and Charlotte had been planning it.

Having my girlfriend take class with my sister was a bad fucking idea. I loved that my two favorite people got along, but I’d been thinking it would end with the summer class. Now that Kenna had decided to stay in school, she’d picked a communications elective this fall with Charlotte.

Between the stuff my girlfriend was spouting from class and what she’d brought home from her work at the club? It made me feel like the slacker.

Not that I minded. She was smart and sexy and I loved seeing how she lit up when she talked about it.

By now everyone knew I was dating Charlotte. I’d thought it would be hard to tell them, but when I went to do it, it was easy.

Maybe because I’d been in love with her for as long as I could remember.

Or because I was starting to trust that she loved me just as much.

Just looking at her had my heart expanding in my chest.

“Two minutes,” I insisted. “I’m going to finish this if it kills me. Where are your tools?”

“Tools?”

I crossed to the bed and yanked open the nightstand drawer. “Whoa. This might be a dealbreaker.”

Charlotte crowded in around me as I stared at the selection of sex toys. “What? Oh, come on. Don’t be intimidated. You’re way bigger than any of those.”

“I’m not intimidated.”

I might’ve been, had I seen these a year ago. But I’d been making this woman scream going on six months, thank you very much.

A piece of paper lodged in the edge caught my attention. I yanked it out.

Scratch that, two pieces.

Any uncertainty that’d arisen from opening the drawer was gone in a second. In that moment, the grin on my face couldn’t have been stripped off with turpentine. “Are these part of the Charlotte Merriweather DIY experience?” I held up the first—a picture of me, presumably from her damned calendar.

“Maybe.”

“Then what’s this?” I unfolded the second sheet. It was an image of me at a corporate event nearly two years ago. Big, shiny, glossy…with July over my head.

“Wait—Charlotte, did you do this more than one year?”

“Guilty. You mad?”

I considered. “I had no idea this was such an important part of your life.”

“I might have gotten off to you a few times,” she admitted.

I rubbed my fingers over the paper. “I’m pretty sure this is still wet.”

She shoved me, but I moved too fast, grabbing her by the hips.

Her eyes darkened. Oh, yeah, this was my girl.

I knew it before my hands skimmed up her thighs.

Before her breathy little sigh.

“I already got dressed,” she murmured. “This is what I’m wearing for your birthday.”

My fingers found their way between her legs, where she was already damp through my favorite lace panties.

“Then how about you take it off,” I suggested, my fingers rubbing against her slick skin. “For my birthday.”

Charlotte moaned and like that my dick was pressing against the fly of my pants. What this woman did to me.

“I think that could be arranged,” she sighed as I toppled her onto the bed.

Here’s the thing I never understood before about being in a relationship. It’s not about the fights. It’s having someone for everything.

And this woman was everything.

Not just the scent of her skin that struck me dumb every time I stripped her naked.

Or the way her tits fit in the palms of my hands, like they did now as I impatiently tugged off her lace bra.

Not even the way her eyes changed colors when I pressed inside her.

It was the fact that we’d started out by breaking the rules. But somewhere in the midst of it, we’d found our own way. Our own rules.

Not the ones we thought we needed to play by, but the ones that worked for us.

And if they didn’t work for us? We’d change them.

Because Charlotte wasn’t just what I wanted.

She was what I needed.

I tried like hell to be what she’d needed. When we’d woken up in my bed this morning, we’d both needed slow. Long, leisurely strokes and lazy smiles as we loved each other through an entire Saturday morning.

Tonight, if we were going to make out dinner reservation and avoid pissing off my sister? It was going to have to be fast.

Charlotte was on the plan. From the way her beautiful face flushed, and the sounds she made low in her throat when I sucked a nipple into my mouth, I knew she was ready to pop.

“OhmiGod Avery. Yeah, like that.” She sounded like a wicked angel, the low plea of her voice competing with the sounds of the bedsprings as I pressed into her with long strokes.

When Charlotte came on my cock, her legs wrapped around my waist and her nails in my back, it was the most perfect feeling in the world.

OK, second most perfect.

Her aftershocks had every muscle in me twisting, clenching, until I couldn’t take it.

“Fuck, Duchess,” I groaned when I exploded seconds later. I buried my face in her hair as I murmured whatever stupid things guys in love murmur after they come like a rocket.

Which suited me fine.

Because what they don’t tell you about relationships? The most beautiful thing about being with someone day after day, through the good times and bad, through the fights and the makeups …

The next day you get to do it all again.