"Yes," I told him.

His eyebrows went up and his face lit up with a huge smile.

"Yes? Really?" he asked. “I thought for sure I’d have to resort to bribery or extortion.”

I nodded my head and laughed. "Yes! We will move in with you so I can monitor the stupid shit you say and punch you in the kidney when you suggest I should be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen again."

***

A few hours later, Liz and I were just finishing our paperwork at her kitchen table. Jim and Carter were sitting at the table with us carrying on their own conversation while Gavin and Jim's eight-year-old little cousin Melissa played.

Gavin was currently in the living room watching a movie, but Melissa had been running through the kitchen at warp speed, yelling as loud as she could for the past fifteen minutes. Carter and I passed each other secret looks every so often about the conversation we had in the car on the way over here. We weren't going to discipline Gavin at all the entire time at their house. We would let Liz and Jim take over and see what they did. I had first hand experience on the type of care-givers they were since they were my best friends, so this was mostly for Carter’s benefit. I knew for a fact that Liz and Jim were wonderful with kids and Carter would be more than willing to assign them as Gavin’s back-up guardians after today.

Surprisingly, we wouldn't need to discipline Gavin anyway. He was being very well behaved. Melissa, on the other hand, reminded me yet again while some animals in the wild eat their young. She was a terror. After her twenty-seventh pass through the kitchen, waving her hands above her head and screaming, Liz finally had enough.

"Melissa! Stop it," she said sternly.

The little terror did indeed stop. For two seconds. Then she started back up and ran out of the room screaming like her ass was on fire. Her ass would be on fire soon if she didn't shut the hell up.

"Is that all you're going to do?" I asked.

"No," Liz replied as she looked up from the paper she was signing. "Next time she runs by I'm going to kick her."

Not conventional by any means, but I was okay with that. I was daydreaming about shoving a Roman candle in her pants and dousing it with lighter fluid.

"So, Melissa seems a little…high strung," Carter said to Jim.

Jim nodded his head in agreement. "She's a cute kid, but I can only stand her in small doses. This one time we took her to dinner with us and she was being a nightmare so Liz made her go sit out in the car while we paid the bill. We got halfway home before we realized she wasn't in the car," he laughed. "Remember that Liz? Hilarious!"

Carter looked at me in horror and I tried not to make eye contact. The whole way here all I did was brag about how good Liz and Jim were with Gavin and how they'd be naturals at parenting. Oops. I forgot about that story. In their defense, Melissa was Satan. I would have driven off without her too.

Melissa made another lap through the kitchen and true to her word, Liz stuck her foot out. The annoying third-grader went sprawling across the floor.

"NO WIRE HANGERS EVER!" Liz yelled at her.

"You're weird," Melissa stated as she stood up and went running back out of the room.

"Nice work there, Mommy Dearest," I told her.

"So, Liz, when you have kids of your own, how are you going to discipline them?" Carter asked.

I gave him a pointed look. We were supposed to be inconspicuous here. Asking blunt questions like that was sure to send up a red flag.

Liz shrugged. "Eh, I'm not big on discipline. If it's funny and no one is bleeding, you're not in trouble. That's my philosophy."

Gavin walked in then and leaned his head on my arm.

"Melissa told me no one is allowed near her no-no zone. What does that mean? I don't like her. She's loud. I told her my mommy wasn't afraid to punch a kid," he said with a sigh.

We heard Melissa yelling in the other room and some loud banging.

"What the hell is she doing in there?" Liz asked.

"The cat's being bad," Gavin said.

Liz and Jim’ cat was known to be a little ball of terror, wreaking havoc on unsuspecting people when they least expected it. One time, when I was on the floor tickling Gavin, she hurtled through the air from God knows where and landed on my back with her teeth and claws inserted two inches deep into my skin. I hated that cat, but I think I hated Melissa more. Hopefully the cat was putting her in her place.

"Did the cat scratch you guys?" I asked, looking over his arms for claw marks.

"No, she won't stay in the suitcase," he explained.

All the adults at the table looked at each other in silence. At the sound of another thump from the living room, we all jumped up and ran out of the kitchen.

***

After making sure Melissa hadn't immediately moved herself into serial killer territory by suffocating a cat, we headed home.

"That really wasn't the best representation of their parenting skills," I tried to explain as Carter pulled out of their driveway.

"Hey, Gavin," Carter said as he glanced in the rear-view mirror. "What new word did Aunt Liz teach you today?"

"Ladyboner," Gavin said as he looked out his window.

Carter gave me a pointed look.

"Aunt Liz said you got a ladyboner for Daddy. Did you buy him a present? I want one too," Gavin complained.

After stopping at my house to pick up a few things, we went back to Carter’s and put Gavin down for a nap. Carter finally gave up trying to convince me that Liz and Jim were off the list when I said one word.

Drew.

If I was willing to give that giant child a try, he needed to keep an open mind with my friends. At least we agreed to wait until after the store opening tomorrow to tell Gavin that we would be moving. If we told him now, he would bug us every minute from now until we moved asking if it was time yet. I didn't need to fight the urge to lock him out of the house while I was busy with the store. One person can only take so much.

***

After Gavin's nap, Claire’s dad stopped by to pick him up for a sleepover. He walked right in the front door without knocking and proceeded to make his way through every room. Once he had seen all there was to see, he told me the house was "good enough." Oddly, that was the nicest thing he had said to me since we met, and I kind of felt like we had a moment.

I leaned in to give him a hug and he stopped me with his hand to my forehead.

"You don't want to do that, son."

I stepped back and gave him a sympathetic look.

"Nam, huh? Still hard for you to get close to people?" I asked.

"No. I'm still not sure you aren't g*y and if you try to play grab-ass, it's gonna get real awkward when I have to snap your fingers in two."

I was going to break that man one of these days, mark my words.

We said our good-byes to Gavin and Claire left soon after to head up to the shop and get a few last minute things made for tomorrow's opening.

I offered to meet her up there after I showered and ran a few errands.

Claire had given me a spare key to the shop, so I let myself in through the front door two hours later. It was dark outside and I left the lights to the store off as I carefully made my way to the kitchen in the back.

I heard music playing and rounded the corner of the kitchen to see Claire licking melted chocolate off of her middle finger. My dick sprang to life as I watched her swirl her finger through her mouth and sway her body to the erotic beats of the song that played.

I rounded the edge of the counter where she worked and stood behind her, placing my arms on either side of her with my hands flat on the counter. I leaned my body close to hers, bringing one hand up to move her hair away from her neck and pushed it behind her shoulder. She continued to work, flipping chocolate molds over and tapped the finished product out onto towels so nothing would break, her body swaying to the music and sliding against me every so often. When I put my mouth on the side of her neck, her motions got choppy.

"Are those chocolate penises and boobs?" I asked.

"Yes," she moaned as I let the tip of my tongue taste her skin. "Party favors...shit...mmmmm."

I smiled against her neck when she moaned and placed another open-mouth kiss there, this time letting my teeth graze her skin. I watched as goose bumps flushed her skin and listened to her take a shuddering breath. I continued to nip and gently suck on the side of her neck until she finally got fed up with concentrating on the chocolate molds. She dropped them to the counter and smacked her hands down next to mine, dumping over a bowl of melted chocolate in the process. The warm liquid splattered onto her hand and ran off the edge of the counter, pooling on the floor.

"Shit!" Claire laughed as she lifted her hands from the counter and tried to shake off some of the chocolate on them. She bowed her head to look at the puddle on the floor, and I reached up and moved her hair all the way around to the front of her other shoulder so the back of her neck was wide open. I swiped my finger through the mess of melted chocolate on the counter and then trailed it along the back of her neck, leaving a smudge of chocolate behind on her skin.

"Did you just get chocolate in my hair?" she asked distractedly.

My hand snaked around her waist and I pushed it under the hem of her shirt until I touched the smooth, warm skin of her stomach. I moved my mouth towards the back of her neck and slid my hand down into her pants. My fingers slid right inside her underwear and through the soft triangle of curls. I attached my lips to her chocolate-coated skin and gently sucked as two of my fingers slid down and glided through her.

"Oh my God," she moaned softly as I pushed and pulled my fingers through her, coating them with her wetness. "Forget it, you can put chocolate wherever you want."

She felt so good, better than anything else in the world. I could stand here touching her all night and never tire of it.

I nibbled and sucked at the back of her neck, making sure to remove all of the chocolate I'd placed there. I was happy to learn that the spot right below her hairline drove her insane. Every time my teeth grazed that area, she would moan and jerk her h*ps into my hand. I lifted my free hand from the counter and pushed it under her shirt, lifting the cup of her bra up and over one of her br**sts as I went. I cupped the fullness of her in my palm and then took two fingers and circled them all around her nipple. I copied the same motions with my other hand, my fingers circling through the heat between her legs.

The beats of the music and the sound of her soft moans filled the room, and I was about two seconds away from exploding in my pants just by listening to her and feeling her come apart in my hands. I rocked my h*ps into her ass and it was my turn to moan. She was soft against my hardness, wet against my warm fingers and the skin of her neck tasted salty and sweet, like the chocolate covered pretzels she made. I was about to say something really stupid like tell her she was the yin to my yang. But in all honesty, she was. I wanted more than anything for her to be mine. Forever. That thought should have scared me. If it was any other woman, it probably would. But not Claire. Nothing about her scared me, except the thought of losing her.

Her h*ps started moving faster and I kissed my way over to her ear.

"I love you so much," I whispered, sliding my hand lower and pushing two fingers into her tight heat. Claire moaned loudly as I moved my fingers in and out of her and my other hand continued to tease her nipple.

My hands were suddenly empty as they were pulled out of her and off of her breast when she abruptly turned to face me. We both looked down at the front of her shirt at the mess of chocolate that was all over it from my hands and from her leaning into the spill on the counter. I laughed until she brought both of her hands of to my cheeks and wiped the chocolate on them all over my face.

"I love you more than chocolate," she said with a smile.

Her hands slid down the front of my shirt, leaving a trail of chocolate in their wake, and went to work on my pants. Before I knew it, she had them shoved down to my thighs. I reached for her h*ps but she batted my hands away.

"No, no, no. It's my turn to play," she said with a wicked smile on her lips.

My dick jumped against my stomach like it was getting ready to do a jig. When she licked her lips and looked down at it, I whimpered. She reached behind her back for a second, fiddling around with something. Before I could tell her that now was not the time to start cleaning up our mess, she kissed my lips and I felt something warm and wet slide around the head of my penis.

She pulled back, slid down my body and my mouth dropped open.

Oh, sweet Jesus, is that...is she going to...

She wrapped her hand around the base of me and her lips around the head and sucked me into her mouth. I didn't even know what kind of incoherent expletives flew from my mouth. I may have said the words "shamwow" and "jiggidy" somewhere in there. I leaned over her and my hands smacked onto the counter sending splatters of chocolate all over the front of my shirt as Claire began licking all around, making sure to get every last drop of melted chocolate she rubbed there with her fingers when she kissed me.

She was licking chocolate off of my dick. I felt like I was in a porno—a really, really good porno with better music and a superb story line. Not like that really creepy one with the guy who put peanut butter on his johnson and let his dog…

Her lips slid around and down my length, taking as much of me in her mouth as she could, and I forgot about the dick licking dog. Thank God. She started a slow rhythm, moving her head up and down, sucking harder every time she got to the tip, before plunging her mouth back down on me. I felt like I should pump my fists in the air or give Claire a round of applause, but that would quickly turn this into bad porno territory.