Her breath exploded in a gasp. Delight, desire—she let herself go, fall heedlessly into both.
They stripped each other. Not a word, too frantic for words before they tumbled back down. She wrapped around him; rose to him. An offer. A demand.
When he buried himself in her she cried out, a sound of relief and release. He struggled for control as he felt her shudder, shudder, shudder. But she rose to him again, and in that single, powerful surge, snapped his will.
He took her, riding on that hot, rising wave of need until his own release ripped through him, emptied him.
She couldn’t get her breath, and wasn’t sure—if she ever did—if she’d let it out with weeping or cheering. She felt foolishly like doing both.
“I can do better,” he mumbled with his face buried in her hair.
“Hmm?”
“I can do better. I kind of rushed that.”
“No, I rushed it, and thanks very much for keeping up the pace. Oh my God, Beckett.” Ah, she realized, she let it out on a long purr. Even better. “Please don’t move yet. Stay.” She wrapped her arms around him to make sure he did.
He stayed—happy to—but rose up to his elbows. “Look at you, Clare Murphy—sorry, Brewster—all mussed and flushed. You’re so damn pretty.”
“I like feeling mussed and flushed and damn pretty. And look at you, Beckett Montgomery, all smug and pleased with yourself.”
“Sure. I just nailed the neighborhood bookseller and town sweetheart.”
She choked out a laugh, pinched his butt. “You’d better not go bragging to the crew.”
“I was going to take out an ad in the Citizen.”
She liked looking into his face, so relaxed now, into his eyes, so deep and blue. “Make sure you say I was amazing.”
“Nothing but the truth.” He bent down to kiss her. “You destroyed me.”
“It’s good to know I haven’t lost my touch.”
He pressed a kiss to the side of her neck, to give himself a moment. He didn’t want to think of her with someone else, not even the man she’d married. Stupid of him, maybe; selfish, certainly. But right then and there, he just didn’t.
He lay quietly awhile until the feeling passed. “I want to see you tomorrow.”
“Oh, Beckett, I can’t go out again tomorrow. The boys.”
“We don’t have to go out. Or we can take them somewhere.”
“They have a birthday party to go to tomorrow afternoon. That’s something that starts now and goes on forever on Saturdays. You could come to dinner on Sunday. It has to be a little early because it’s a school night.”
“What time?”
“Five thirty?”
“I’ll be here.”
He rolled off, took her hand as he sat up. “I should go.”
She wrapped her arms around herself, faked a little shudder. “And leave me in this empty house all alone—without a dog.”
He grinned. “You’re not afraid.”
“No, I tricked you, but I had to get you in bed somehow.”
“And thanks.”
“And now you’re going to make me work to keep you here?”
“The car’s outside in the drive. You know people are going to see it, especially if it’s still there in the morning.”
Amused he’d be concerned for her reputation, she sat up with him. “Beckett?”
“Yeah?”
“Let’s give them something to talk about.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
MONDAY MORNING, WELL SHY OF OPENING, CLARE USED her key to get into Vesta. She heard the enormous mixer chugging along, and went straight back where she knew Avery would be making dough.
“Hi! I wanted to talk to you before—” She stopped dead, stared as Avery rolled already mixed and cut dough into balls. “Your hair! It’s . . . Is that magenta? You dyed your hair.”
“You had sex.”
“I—You dyed your hair because I had sex?”
“No. I dyed it because I didn’t have sex. Okay, not really.” She huffed out a breath as she rolled. “Maybe a little. Mostly I just wanted a change. Something to stir things up.”
“You definitely stirred.”
Avery looked down at her far from spotless baker’s apron all the way to her Old Navy sneakers with their gel inserts. “I’m in a rut, Clare. No, I am the rut.”
“You’re not the rut. I like it. It’s . . . fun.”
“I think I like it. Sort of.” Her hands coated with flour and dough, Avery rubbed an itch on her chin with her shoulder. “I scared myself this morning when I looked in the bathroom mirror. I forgot about it, then it was like eek, who the hell is that! Anyway, it’s just one of those wash-in-and-out rinses. I’ll live with it awhile and see.”