“You do know you’re slow dancing to nothing, don’t you? The music stopped sixty seconds ago.”

Oh, Lord, she was right. The dance floor was completely empty except for them.

“But the rhythm of my heart is beating like a drum,” Rhett said, deadpan.

Shawn lost it, laughter spilling out. That was such a Rhett comeback, and she loved it.

Nolan shook his head. “Bro, my hat is off to you. You managed to find the one woman in the world who doesn’t think you’re a freak.”

* * *

RHETT opened the back door of Harley’s car for Shawn and eyed his wife’s backside as she climbed in.

“I saw that,” Eve told him, sliding past him to follow Shawn into the car.

“I don’t care,” he told her with an unrepentant grin. “And why aren’t you going with Nolan? Not that I don’t enjoy your presence thoroughly, but I would think you’d want to go home with your husband.”

“He has to drive Jared home. He’s shit-faced. I’m dead on my feet, so I’ll get back faster this way.”

“So Harley’s dropping you first, then us?”

“Yes. It’s on the way,” she said defensively.

It was a toss-up whether it was or not, but Rhett didn’t care to argue. He was damn happy. Happy as a dead pig in the sunshine. So he just smiled at her and got in the car. “Switch seats with me, Eve. I want to sit next to Shawn.”

“Kiss my butt,” was her reply. “You can fondle her later. I’m not climbing over the top of you so you can sit next to her. God, so high school.”

“You are tired,” he commented. That was a bit sharp even for Eve.

“I’m exhausted. I drank just enough to dance like a fool, but not enough to not feel the crash. So don’t piss me off or I’ll cream your corn.”

“I’m not afraid of you, big talker.” Rhett leaned around her to talk to Shawn, intentionally getting his elbow in Eve’s face. “Baby, I hope we don’t need to be anywhere first thing tomorrow because I’m not ready for sleeping yet. I’ve got at least two hours in me.”

“Gross,” was Charity’s opinion from the front passenger seat.

He just laughed. Shawn smiled at him, bundled up in her coat. Eve pinched his arm.

“Move it,” she said.

Settling back, he found himself feeling very conversational. “So Harley, you’re quiet up there. Did you have fun?”

“It was fine,” was Harley’s clipped reply from the front seat.

Charity snorted.

“Wrong question, hon,” Shawn told him in a warning voice.

Was it wrong that he was more interested in the fact that Shawn had called him “hon” than whatever was bothering Harley?

The thought guilted him into saying, “I’m sorry, Harley. Didn’t mean to poke a sore spot.”

“I didn’t know you were crushing on him,” Charity exploded at her sister. “If you would actually share something with me once in a while, I wouldn’t have kissed him. You know, it’s really very hurtful that you won’t let me in, Harley. I tell you everything.”

“Wait, so this is my fault?” Harley asked in shock, taking a turn a little hard and running them over the curb.

“Maybe I should drive,” Rhett suggested. “Were you drinking, Harley?”

“No. I cut myself off three hours ago because that’s what I do,” Harley said. “I am the driver and the wallflower while Charity gets drunk and dances half-naked with the guy she totally knew I was into!”

“I’m out,” Rhett said, turning to Eve. “I can’t do the girl-fight thing.”

“Don’t look at me,” Eve said, shrugging. “My suggestion to arm wrestle it out isn’t really practical at the moment.”

But Shawn had it under control. She was already leaning forward, murmuring to the twins, reassuring Harley that Charity had not known about the guy and suggesting to Charity that if she wanted her sister to confide in her, she should consider allowing her a word in edgewise on occasion.

Rhett leaned against the window and watched her sort the whole mess out in a matter of minutes. After they pulled into Eve’s apartment complex and Harley parked the car, there were tears and hugs and apologies, and then suddenly all was okay. It was, in his eyes, as miraculous as Moses parting the Nile.

“That’s why I leave this stuff to her,” Eve told him. “See you tomorrow with my happy face on.” She gave him a smile and got out of the car after he opened the door and stood up to let her pass.

“Thanks. Shawn is pretty amazing, isn’t she?”

“I’m glad to see you realize it,” she told him. Then with a wave to her girlfriends, Eve went into the apartment building she and Nolan had recently moved into after the sale of her condo, and Rhett waited to make sure the door firmly closed behind her.

“Eve’s in. We can roll.” And with his sister-in-law safely home, he could cuddle with his wife. His wife. That’s right.

She came willingly when he urged her to tuck in up against his side.

“I’m freezing still,” she said. “It must be thirty degrees out tonight. I know I can always count on you to warm me up.”

He moved his eyebrows up and down.

She laughed. “Well, yeah, there’s that, but what I really meant was that you radiate heat all the time. Your body temperature must be ten degrees higher than most people.”

“I think I would be dead if that were the case.”

Shawn rolled her eyes. “Smart-ass.”

He really enjoyed that Shawn was perfectly comfortable giving him shit. It was one of the things he loved about her.

Love. Funny how that very small, unexpected word could change everything. Rhett bent over and murmured in her ear, “I love you.”

Shawn started and gazed up at him. Her eyes were wide in the dark backseat of Harley’s car, but they were open and honest. “I love you, too.”

What more could a man ask for? Nothing, as far as Rhett was concerned.

When they went inside and kicked off their shoes and hung up their jackets, Rhett loved the way Shawn waited for him at the top of the kitchen landing, her hand out for his.

There was no question in her eyes.

She knew he was going to make love to her. She knew that whatever he did to her, he would put her pleasure first, that she would be satisfied. The way she let him lead her down the hallway, the way she waited in the doorway for him to undress her, the way she kissed him with a deep fervor and abandonment, satisfied Rhett in return. He had never known that he could be this happy, that the restless agitation that had burned inside him would be eased by Shawn’s open affection and perfect willingness to submit to his aggressive desires.

He urged her back down onto the bed, reaching back to flick on the light so he could see her body. She blinked as the harsh overhead light hit her eyes, but she didn’t complain. She knew he wouldn’t go down on her if she did, and that made his mouth hot, his cock throb. Stripping off his own clothes, Rhett took his time, touching her everywhere with teasing, light touches, skirting her clitoris until he felt her quivering, goose bumps on her skin, her need growing more and more urgent.

“Put your ankles on my shoulders,” he told her. He suddenly needed to be inside her.

She did so without question and Rhett entered her, and even without stimulating her with his fingers or tongue, he found her wet and welcoming. Knowing that she got aroused just from his fingers brushing over her bare skin, that she knew her pleasure was a guarantee, was almost as arousing to him as the tight fist her pussy made around his erection.

Breathing hard as he gripped her shins and pumped them both to desperation, Shawn sought his permission with her eyes.

“Yes?” he asked, willing to grant any request she might have at that moment, his body tight and alive, his heart swollen with the knowledge that she loved him.

“Can I come? I really, really need to come.” Her lips were wet, her eyes glassy, her hand lifting off the mattress, then fluttering back down as she remembered she could not do whatever she had been planning to.

Rhett wondered if she’d been intending to bite one of her fingers, to suck it, or if her plan had been to twist and tweak her own nipple with the pads of her fingers.

“Not for another minute,” he told her. “I want to come with you. You’ll know when.”

“Oh,” she panted in agony, her head turned to the side, her legs trembling from the position.

“Suck on your finger,” he told her. “It will help.”

She did without hesitation, though the widening of her eyes and the clasping of her body onto his cock told him that it hadn’t made it any easier for her to hold back. It had made it worse, which was his intention, he had to admit. Watching her struggle to hold off her orgasm, her lips frantically wrapped around her finger, sucking it in and out like she was substituting it for his cock, heightened his own frantic desire.

When he squeezed her legs tight and let himself go, pumping his hot ejaculation into her, Shawn was immediately there with him. Her orgasm blended with his, her cries of anguished ecstasy ringing in his ears, as he held her and gave in to his body, gave in to her. She owned him, there was no question about it. Shawn had his heart and his body, and hell, even his soul, and he felt the most profound satisfaction and sense of triumph that he’d ever felt in his twenty-five years of life.

As he fell onto the bed next to her and pulled her into his arms, their bodies warm and sticky, her fingertips fluttering over his chest, he was inclined to believe there was such a thing as destiny. “Scarlett, you’re one hell of a woman,” he told her.

Her response was to kiss his shoulder. But a moment later, she asked, “What’s your middle name?”