Page 176 of Beautiful Trauma

Lightning obliged Liam by grabbing the carrot.

At the hearty chomps of the horse, Liam giggled. “Is Lightning silly?”

“Silly horsie.”

Once Lightning was finished, I took Liam back into my arms. “Come on. Let’s go see what Daddy is doing.”

As I tromped back up the hill in my wellies, as Kellan called them, I admired the view of the house. We’d done a lot of workon it over the years. I’d started to think Kellan would never be satisfied. But sometime last year, he’d finally gotten it just as he wanted it.

When we got back to the house, I put Liam on his feet. At the sound of a cartoon in the distance, he made a beeline for the TV. I peeked in to see if Kellan was in the living room, but he wasn’t.

I headed down the hallway. Before I got to our bedroom, I peeked my head in the room across the hall. It was dimly lit by the stars encrusting the ceiling. My heartbeat thrummed wildly at the sight of Kellan asleep in the rocker with our daughter asleep on his bare chest.

Even though she was our second child, I never got tired of the sight of seeing Kellan cuddling our babies. Liliya, or Lily as we called her, had just turned six weeks. I could already tell she was on her way to being a ridiculous daddy’s girl. My genes hadn’t totally given up with her like they had with Liam. She had my nose and mouth, but her smile was all Kellan and Liam.

As I walked over to them, Kellan stirred. “Hey,” he murmured drowsily.

“Hey,” I replied with a smile.

Bending over, I pressed a gentle kiss to his lips. “Did she go down pretty easy?”

Kellan nodded. “After she sucked her bottle down, she was out like a light.”

I rubbed Lily’s tuft of light blonde hair. “What are the odds Liam will go down that easy?”

Kellan snorted. “Zero.”

With a laugh, I said, “Let’s put her down, and then wrangle him together.”

A wicked grin flashed on his face. “Why don’t I get him to bed while you get ready for bed?”

Since I’d gotten cleared for sex two days ago, Kellan had been raring to go. Unfortunately for him, there had been an emergency at Bandia that took him away last night.

Even though there was nothing about me that felt sexy, I knew Kellan would be able to get me in the mood. He worshipped my body even when I wasn’t a fan of the stretch marks or loose skin from delivery.

“Deal.”

Although I knew he wanted to be out of the chair like a shot, he eased forward as he cradled Lily gently against his chest. With absolute tenderness, my underworld killer put his daughter down in her crib. “Aisling milis,”he whispered to her.

“Yes, sweet dreams, my love.”

Kellan took me by the hand and led me out of the nursery. “Will you put on something sexy for me?”

“What did you have in mind?”

“That red bustier thing.”

I groaned. “You would pick something I had to squeeze into.”

“At this point, I’ll take you wearing a burlap sack.”

With a laugh, I replied, “Okay, then, I’ll put on some of my maternity panties and a nursing bra.”

At his grimace, I said, “Yeah, I knew you were bluffing about the burlap sack.”

Kellan chuckled. “Go wrestle yourself into the bustier, and I’ll wrestle our son.”

“I think you get the better deal.”