asked from the doorway.
She looked at me, eyes wide. “Sorry.”
I laughed. “It’s okay.”
Anya scampered off to her room, the pounding of her feet on the stairs had Aiden shaking his head.
As he shut the bedroom door and approached the bed, I studied the way he looked in his button-down shirt and black dress pants.
“I like this look,” I told him.
“Yeah?”
He carefully moved aside the metal box and pushed me back onto the bed. My hands tugged his shirt out of his waistband as he gave me a mind-spinning kiss. Aiden always greeted me like this when we were alone—like he hadn’t seen me in weeks—and I would never, ever get sick of it.
His kisses moved down my neck as I moved under him, unhooking his belt.
“What letter is she talking about?” he asked, tugging the strap of my bra down and placing a sucking kiss over my heart.
“Umm, nothing?”
He lifted his head, spearing me with a look.
“It’s silly,” I told him. “But I wanted her to see what kind of stuff I kept in the lockbox from my nan.”
Aiden rolled to the side, snatching the box with one big hand and tugging it closer to us. “Show me.”
With a burning hot face, I pulled the letter out and handed it to him.
His grin was so pleased, so fricken entertained as he got to the part about the purple dress that he started chuckling.
I covered my face. “Now you know why I literally tripped over nothing when I met you.”
He pulled my hands down and took my mouth again. “I love that you kept it,” he murmured. “Just goes to show you’ve always had great taste.”
I smacked his chest. “Of course you make this about you.”
Aiden settled between my legs as we kissed, his hand smoothing up and down my back, settling on my bottom. Even though we could take it further—Anya knew not to open the door when it was closed—I loved that he seemed just as content to kiss me on our big bed in the middle of the day.
He rolled us, tugging my shirt up so he could reach more of my skin. When I settled onto my back, arching my neck, the crinkle of paper had me freezing.
“What?” he asked.
My hand fumbled on the bed until I found the edge of the envelope. “Something else to show you,” I whispered.
His brows lowered as he took it. My hands smoothed up his arms as he pulled it open, and my heart raced as he saw the edge of what was inside.
“Isabel,” he breathed. His eyes snapped to mine. “Seriously?”
I nodded, eyes watering at the awe I saw in his face. Aiden brushed a knuckle under his eye as he carefully tugged the sonogram picture out of the envelope.
He stared at it, then at me.
“We’re having a baby?” he whispered.
My chin quivered. I couldn’t even nod in affirmation because I’d split wide open into happy, messy tears.
“I know …” I paused when my voice cracked, “I know it’s sooner than we planned, and I wanted to be sure before I told you.”
He wrapped me up in his arms so tight I could hardly breathe. “We’re having a baby,” he repeated, voice uneven.
I clung to him, tears streaming down the side of my face, disappearing into my hairline. His mouth was on mine in the next moment, and when he broke away, his eyes were red-rimmed and so full of happiness.
“Does this mean I get to marry you sooner?”
I laughed. “I’d marry you tomorrow, Aiden Hennessy.”
Resting his forehead against mine, he breathed a shaky exhale. “Of course we’d do this sooner than we planned.”
I kissed him again. “It works for us, I think.”
Aiden cupped the side of my face, stared down at me with so much adoration, I almost started with the messy weeping again.
“Yeah. It does.”
“Should we go tell Anya?”
“In a few minutes,” he said, resuming with the lifting of the shirt. He reverently kissed my belly, then moved up until he’d tugged my shirt off.
“Just a few minutes?” I asked skeptically.
Aiden sat up on his knees, between my legs, and yanked his shirt off. “You doubt me?”
With a soft smile on my face, I pulled him back down for a kiss. “Never,” I whispered against his mouth.
The End
Keep reading for a link to a bonus epilogue for Aiden and Isabel.
But first! If you’re curious how Logan and Paige got their epic start, here’s an excerpt from The Marriage Effect.
* * *
“So you’re like …”
I kept my eyes aimed