“Good. I don’t want anything from my past to affect us.” He sighed contentedly.

“That’s unrealistic though,” I said. “Everything from our past is going to play some role in how we treat each other, and how we respond to the way we’re treated.”

“What do you mean?”

I sighed, deciding since he’d been so honest last night, it was time I started sharing too, at least a little.

“Yesterday, when I came in to shower and I asked you about the shampoo?” I slid my face along his chest, looking up at him. He nodded, waiting for me to continue.

“You said you didn’t know what I used so you bought every kind they had. To you, that seemed like nothing, you laughed it off, but to me, that was huge. I’m not used to being cared for like that, it was really sweet.”

He chuckled, his laugh vibrating through my body. “It was just shampoo.”

“Once, when the girls were about six months old, I had just gotten home from working a double at the hospital. It was after midnight when I got home and my car was almost out of gas. I would’ve stopped for it myself, but Zach didn’t let me have the debit card or any credit cards. He controlled the money. Anyway, I asked him to please get up five minutes early the next morning and get me gas, so I’d have enough to get to work the next day.” Brody squeezed me tight as I continued. “I went out in the morning and naturally, he’d blown me off. I went back inside and opened the girls’ piggy banks, but he’d already cleaned those out. My choices were call in sick to work, which we couldn’t afford, or drop the girls at daycare and take the bus from there. So, I hopped in my car and prayed the whole way to the babysitter. About six blocks from her house, my car sputtered to a stop, right past an intersection. I coasted to the side and called him, seven times. The first couple times, it rang before the voicemail picked up. Eventually it just went straight to voicemail. He’d turned it off.”

Brody inhaled loudly as his arm muscles tensed under my head.

“Just as I was pulling Lucy and Piper’s infant carriers out of the car, as if God himself were testing me personally, the skies opened and it started down-pouring on us. Thankfully I had two blankets in the car and I threw them over the girls so they wouldn’t get wet. I walked the rest of the way to the sitter, borrowed change from her and took the bus to work, soaked to the bone and freezing.”

Brody was smashing his teeth so hard, the muscle in the corner of his jaw was popping.

“That’s how our relationship was, that’s all I’ve ever known. So for you to do something for me like fuss over a tiny thing like shampoo was … big.”

“Why did you stay with him?” Brody asked after a moment, shaking his head.

I shrugged. “I wanted my girls to have a family, and I was willing to sacrifice my own happiness to give it to them.”

“Your happiness is just as important as theirs, Kacie. Please tell me you’ve learned that?” He reached down and brushed my cheek with the back of his hand.

I closed my eyes and relaxed into him. “I’m getting there.”

“Good, because if someone ever treats you like shit again, they’re going to have to answer to a very angry hockey player who’s done a good amount of fighting in his career and has a fantastic fucking lawyer.”

The rawness in his voice, the way he threatened and meant it, stirred something in me. I’d never had someone who wanted to protect me before, and it was the single biggest turn-on ever. Suddenly, I was overcome with the need to kiss him.

I rolled onto my side and nuzzled my nose into his neck, gently pushing his jaw up. He tilted his head to the left and eagerly let me have access. I started at the top of his collarbone and licked my way up to his jawline, running my tongue along it.

He moaned and wrapped his arm around me, pulling me in tighter. As fast as he pulled me in, he let me go and sat up. “Hang on a sec.”

I propped myself up on my elbows, watching as he jumped out of bed and fumbled his way down the hall in nothing but blue striped pajama pants. A few seconds later, his footsteps pounded along the hardwood floor as hurried back into my room.

He leapt from the doorway and landed in bed with a thud, almost jarring me off the other side.

“Sorry about that,” he growled, climbing on top of me.

“Where did you go?” I giggled in between kisses.

He sat back and flashed that heart-stopping grin at me as he wiggled his eyebrows. “Brushed my teeth.”

I threw my head back and laughed hard. Brody, taking full advantage of my exposed neck by pressing his lips against my skin, planted kisses as he made his way up to the sensitive spot where my jaw met my ear. It was as if someone swept in and took over my body as I was filled with a neediness I hadn’t ever felt in my life, not even with Zach.

“I want you,” I whispered as I fisted my hands in his hair, tugging at the roots.

He froze and I immediately thought I’d done something wrong.

“What?” I breathed in a panicked tone.

He pulled back slightly and leaned his forehead against mine, breathing hard. “Kacie, I promised you we’d go slow. If you want me to go faster, you’re going to have to tell me.”

His words dripped with sensual promise and I wanted to bathe in it. I ached for his hands all over me, reminding me that I wasn’t just a mom but a grown woman with a thirst that he was more than capable of quenching.

I looked him straight in his eyes, matching him breath for breath, willing the words to leave my mouth.

“Touch me, Brody. Please?”

His eyes grew wild as he licked his lips, still panting. “I said you had to ask, not beg.” With that he crashed into me, pushing me back on the bed. Within seconds, we were a mess of tongues and roaming hands and I couldn’t drink him in fast enough.

He grabbed my hands and pulled me up to a sitting position, dragging my tank top over my head. His mouth was back on mine the minute the fabric crossed us, as he gently pushed me back down on the bed. He sat back and slowly pulled my pajama bottoms off. I felt so exposed, so vulnerable lying on the bed in nothing but panties. My knee jerk reaction was to cross my hands over my chest, but before I could, Brody grabbed my wrist, stopping me.

“Don’t,” he said, pulling my hand away. “You’re so fucking gorgeous, don’t you dare cover yourself. Let me look at you for a minute. I’ve been dreaming about seeing this again since I saw you in that bathroom.” He bit his lip, slowly looking up and down my body, his eyes lingering longer than I would have liked, but he made me feel so comfortable. So beautiful.

He laced his fingers with mine and lay back down on top of me, his own excitement digging into my hip. His hot mouth connected with my nipple and I cried out instinctively from the jolt of absolute pleasure that coursed through my body. It had been so long since I’d been with a man. I’d almost forgotten what it felt to have hands other than my own on me.

His tongue sucked and tugged on my nipple as his hand slowly made its way down to my panties. Just as he was about to cross the threshold inside, he paused and kissed my lips sweetly. “You okay?”

“God, yes,” I moaned into his mouth. “Don’t stop.”

He laughed softly as he kissed me again. “Yes ma’am.”