dropped her on the bed and began working at the ivory buttons of her bodice while he scattered kisses across her face and throat. "I'm the happiest man alive," he murmured in between kisses. "I just can't believe it. I'm going to be a father." Laughter instilled with pure joy burst from his throat, and he kissed her soundly. "And you're going to be the best damned mother this world has ever seen. Have I mentioned that I love you?"
"Not in the last few minutes." Finally regaining her confidence, Georgina began to work at Daniel's shirt buttons. "We'd better put this bed to good use while we can. My mother says I will be fat and ugly before long, and you won't want anything to do with me."
"Never," Daniel whispered along the expanse of skin his fingers had uncovered. "I'll always want you. And I'll want you even more when you're filled with my child. I can never thank you enough."
"Thank me?" She caught his hair and pulled his head up where she could see his eyes. The gray glittered with unshed tears, and her heart gave an extra leap at the emotion she saw shining there. "Why would you thank me? I love you. I want to have your children."
"That's why I'm thanking you," he answered gruffly. "Now shut up, woman, and let me make love to you."
Georgina gasped as Daniel's hands unfastened her corset ribbons and his mouth found her nipple through the cotton of her chemise. Every fiber of her body tingled as he tasted her there, and she cried out her ecstasy as he released the buttons of her chemise and touched her nakedness. Even after three months of marriage, this was entirely new, because her husband was a different man every time he touched her. Today, he was proud and greedy and demanding, and she had no intention of ever changing him.
Their clothing fell to the polished floor in stages. The heat of a mid-September afternoon caressed their skin as the sun poured through the uncurtained windows. Georgina didn't think they had ever done this in sunlight before, and she opened her eyes to admire the broad expanse of Daniel's chest hovering over her. Gray eyes smiled back, and his hand touched the place where their child grew. And then his fingers slid lower, and Georgina was closing her eyes and arching her hips and begging to receive him again.
He took her gently, with the tenderness of a husband and the knowledge of a lover. He filled her, expanded her, showed her horizons that she could never have experienced without him. In return, she gave him all he asked and more, surrounding him with love, easing his needs, and surrendering her body into his care without a qualm, giving him the child he wanted and the future he dreamed of. The convulsions of joy that overtook them with this physical joining were only a small sample of the union binding them.
Afterward, Georgina lay in Daniel's arms and watched the sun sink toward the horizon, sending a pattern of shadows across their skin. Lazily, she traced the trail of light hairs to his navel. "You're so beautiful," she murmured absently.
Daniel chuckled. "If that's why you married me, you got a bad deal. I've got a couple of brothers who beat me in the beauty department."
Georgina slapped his taut stomach. "No, they don't. And they don't even come close when it comes to courage and intelligence and integrity. You'll have to show them what it takes to be real men."
Daniel grew momentarily silent, stroking her hair over her shoulder. "It's probably too late for that. Peter's planning on leaving as soon as we get the papers signed on this house. He doesn't want anything more to do with Mulloney Enterprises. I can't talk him out of it."
Georgina bounced up and glared down at him. "That has nothing to do with you, Daniel Mulloney. He's a grown man and can make his own decisions. The only thing that matters here is whether or not you want to stay and take up where he left off."
Daniel admired the lovely globes of her breasts hovering over him. The crests were puckered and pink and begging for plucking, but he forced himself to remember her delicate condition. His gaze swerved with interest to the faint swell of her abdomen, and pride surged through him. He had found a woman who loved him enough to carry a child for him. The knowledge