“Slow your roll there, peanut,” I cautioned, holding up my hands in the international sigh for stop it, stop it now. “We have literally nothing planned, this whole thing isn’t even a day old. We haven’t planned a thing, and likely won’t just yet,” I said, taking a deep breath. “Seriously. Settle.”

“Settle. I’ll give you settle,” Mimi said under her breath, shaking her head. “Okay, but, can I just ask one tiny thing?”

“One.”

“What do you think your colors are going to be?” she burst forth, excitement coming off of her in waves.

“Oh boy. I’m going to send you to my mother’s, and you two can plan yourselves into oblivion together,” I said, laughing when I saw how excited that made her.

“Best idea ever! Oh, Caroline, this is going to be so much fun! I’ll call her tonight, see what she’s thinking. Oh, there’s so much to do, I—”

“Mimi. Sweetie. I was kidding. Just slow down, okay? Let me be engaged for a minute without all this wedding stuff, okay?”

Her face collapsed, but she shut it. For his part, Ryan merely said dude a few times, Simon said dude a few times, and they clapped each other on the back. Damn them . . .

By the time we got home that night, I had thirteen emails from my mother riddled with suggestions about venues all over Northern California, and seventeen emails from Mimi with links to dresses, shoes, bridesmaids’ dresses, and cake vendors. I looked up from the desk in the kitchen where I was going through all of these when Simon came up behind me to rub my shoulders.

“That one’s pretty,” he said, pointing to a dress on the screen.

“I can’t believe these two, Mimi and my mother. They’re already starting,” I said, shaking my head in disbelief.

“What, taking over?” he asked, chuckling and digging in with his thumbs and making my head roll back with a groan. I gazed up at him.

“Totally. It’s going to be a shitshow.”

“How can a wedding be a shitshow?”

“I’d let you read these emails, but I think I’m incapable of moving my head right now. Do you know how cute you are when you’re upside down?” I murmured, groaning once more as his hands moved down along my arms, hooking around my elbows and bringing them up to rest on his shoulders.

“I like you upside down,” he murmured right back, leaning down to dust my forehead with the tiniest of kisses.

“How does my ring look upside down?” I teased, holding my hand out in front of me to gaze at it once more.

“Sexy.” Kiss. “Impossibly sexy.” Kiss. Kiss. “Ludicrously sexy.” Kiss. Grope. Grope.

“Ludicrously sexy?” I asked, my eyes fluttering shut as his fingertips danced inside the edge of my bra.

“It’s a word.”

“So is howfastcanyoubenotsodressed?”

“That’s . . . let’s see . . . one, two, three—”

“You’re counting?”

“—four, five—”

“Simon?”

“Hmm?”

“You should stop the counting and go back to touching.”

“Oh. Babe. I’m getting back to it.”

And he really just was. His hands were sure, specific, practiced on my body. We’d been together long enough to know what each other liked, and what each other loved. The night before was full of love and passion. Tonight? Would be full of frantic, frenzied, crazy stupid, straight-up fucking.

His hands went from sure and specific to wild and wanton in an instant, pulling me out of the chair suddenly and spinning me suddenly, tugging at my shirt hard enough that the buttons popped. He pressed me into the wall, my face turned slightly, cheek into the herringbone wallpaper I’d agonized over, but never examined this close up. “Oh,” was all I managed to get out as his mouth closed around the tendon on the right side of my neck, nipping and tugging as he snapped my pants open and guided them roughly down my thighs.

“Off. Take them off. Take everything off,” he said, his voice guttural in my ear, his hands placed on my body, one at my throat and one on my hip. This is why I’d never get tired of Simon. He could go from loving to crazed in an instant, always able to surprise me, keep things interesting. “Off,” he reminded me, pulling me out of my head and back into the present. Where I could feel him, hard and insistent, pressing against my backside.

I slipped my jeans down, pushing my panties along with them. I must have been going too slowly, because he suddenly yanked them the rest of the way down, pushing me harder against the wall. I loved sweet and slow Wallbanger, but I loved Wallbanger Wallbanger the best!

With one hand in the center of my back and the other twisted into my hair, he pressed me against the wall, down and out, angling my hips back toward him. I heard his belt unbuckle, then the unzipping, and then I could feel him ready. Always ready. The hand on my back now slipped down to my hips, anchoring me as he shoved my legs farther apart. I gasped as I felt him, exactly where I needed him to be.

“Tell me you want this, you want me,” he breathed, heavy in my ear.

“Jesus Christ, Simon, of course I do,” I panted as his hand left my hip and traveled to my breast, twisting and turning, pinching sharply and making me gasp once more.

“Tell me you want this,” he said again, accenting his words with a final tug, making me arch into him even more, my hips searching for his.