Batter of Wits (Green Valley Chronicles #22) - Smartypants Romance Page 0,91

that person.

The one who had to ask if their partner heard the biggest thing I'd ever admitted to someone, body still thrumming because it could barely even be categorized as post-coitus. It was like, pre-post-coitus.

"You gonna ask if I heard you or not?" he spoke into my shoulder, dropping a soft kiss onto my skin,

The relief had me laughing. His body shook on top of me because of how hard those laughs shook my frame.

Tucker lifted his head with a grin. "Oh, now it's funny."

"I'm so relieved," I said on a gust of air. "Tucker, you don't even know how relieved I am. I thought I was going to have to ask. And I had this whole speech planned, and now I don't have to worry about it, because I'm the girl who blurted it out during sex."

He straightened, an amused smile on his face, fixing up the front of his pants and turning so that we kinda sorta laid next to each other.

"A speech, huh?"

I nodded, tracing the line of his lips with the tip of my finger. "It wasn't very good, because … well, I kept going in circles when I practiced because it's not very easy to say."

His face was soft and happy. He kissed my finger. "It's not?"

I took a deep breath. "This is going to sound a little crazy, okay?"

Again, he smiled, but he was listening, which was a very important step. "Okay."

Everything I'd practiced circled around my brain like lazy buzzards, and nerves had my words jumbling together faster and faster, so I just … decided to say it. No over-thinking, because this was Tucker, and I loved him and we were meant to be.

No sooner had I opened my mouth to speak, when the sound of a car door echoed through the garage.

“Tucker?”

His eyes closed. “Shit,” he whispered.

My hands shoved at my bra, pulling it down over my chest. “Holy shit, is that your mom?” I hissed, not even remotely prepared to sit up and look, given I was naked from the waist down, save for my muddy boots.

He exhaled, running a hand through his disheveled hair as he sat up. “Hang on, Momma. I need a minute.”

“I reckon you do.”

My face was blazing at the tightness in her voice, because there were two pairs of feet hanging out the passenger door, and she probably didn’t recognize my car.

“If I wasn’t ready to die of embarrassment,” I whispered, pulling my feet up to feel for my underwear, if nothing else, “I’d probably find it hilarious that our interruption streak won’t die.”

Tucker sat up, his face showing no sign of hearing anything I’d said. He leaned over and snagged my shorts from the garage floor. When he handed them over, I flipped to my back on the bench, scooting back so that I could yank them up without showing myself.

When they were buttoned, I glanced down at my sports bra, bare midriff, shorts and boots with a heavy sigh.

“I guess tearing the shirt is only sexy at the time, huh?”

It was my last attempt to get him to crack a smile, but his eyes found mine, and they looked so sad that I sat up without a single thought of whether she could see me. I cupped the side of his face.

“It’ll be okay,” I told him.

“This isn’t how I wanted this to happen.” He pressed a kiss to my palm.

I glanced out the rear windshield of the truck, relieved to find her back turned. My stomach bottomed out, because I was about to meet his mother for the first time. In my bra.

“It could’ve been worse.”

Finally, one side of his mouth lifted. “How’s that?”

I leaned in and gave him a quick peck. “I could’ve been naked.”

Tucker smiled, brief and small, but it soothed some of the nerves that I couldn’t control. I could only hope that she’d love me because I loved her son. He took my hand and lifted it to his mouth so he could kiss my knuckles.

Then he slid out of the truck. I did what I could to fix my hair, because the woman was not stupid. Given the fact that we never heard her car pull up, I had a horrible suspicion that she arrived when things were … louder.

When Tucker closed the truck door behind me, she turned, and I saw him in the shape of her eyes, and the curve of her chin.

Those eyes started at the top of my hair and traveled allllll the way