Page 10 of Hot Chicken (Sunday Brothers #6)
CHAPTER FIVE
LUKE
I opened the back of my SUV and heaved a sigh at the mound of groceries there, which seemed to have doubled during my two-hour drive home.
“‘Move to Vermont,’ they said,” I muttered under my breath as I grabbed a cooler filled with frozen food. “‘Enjoy rural living,’ they said. Nobody talks about how far it is to Costco.”
A deep chuckle emerged from the barn, and I turned to find my husband with one boot propped back against the siding, thickly muscled arms crossed over his equally muscled chest, watching me with a smirk.
“Hey, gorgeous,” he said softly. He curled his fingers in a come-hither gesture. “C’mere and kiss me.”
I rolled my eyes. Webb’s hair was damp with sweat, his legs and boots coated in flecks of grass clippings, his blue T-shirt and jeans streaked with substances I couldn’t immediately identify…
and probably shouldn’t try to. But his eyes were filled with the same absurd level of affection, adoration, and lust as they’d been during our weird, wonderful, ass-backward courtship.
Three and a half years after drunkenly blowing a bugle and finding ourselves hand-fasted—three an d a half years of mostly joy and occasionally heartbreak—Webb Sunday still made my heart stutter.
So of course, I did as he requested, dropping my box of groceries and sauntering toward him… but slowly , pretending to play it cool.
I failed miserably, if the way Webb’s smirk grew was any indication.
When I got close, he lifted a hand—probably the only part of him that had been recently washed, I noticed with amusement—to grip my chin. Then he lowered his lips to mine and kissed me, hard and deep and claiming, until my toes curled inside my sneakers.
Ask anyone in Little Pippin Hollow, and they’d tell you Webb Sunday was kind of a Renaissance man. A business owner, an heirloom orchardist, an amazing father, a Scout volunteer, a brother who’d do anything for his siblings, a pillar of the community.
But what I knew—and what no one else around here would ever learn, if I had anything to say about it—was that Webb’s greatest talent was kissing .
Webb kissed me like I was his sole focus, like he had all the time in the world and planned to spend every second of it imprinting his love for me right into my bones.
So it was zero surprise that I forgot all about my long drive, about The Big Conversation I knew Webb and I needed to have, about the popsicles dying a slow, sticky death in the cooler.
I sucked in a big lungful of cut grass and clean sweat and chased the taste of Blue Raspberry Gatorade—Webb’s summertime hydration of choice—with my tongue.
Sometime later, Webb pulled back just far enough to press our foreheads together. “Mmm. Missed you,” he murmured.
I huffed out a laugh, still breathless and swamped by love. “Since you got out of bed this morning?”
“Morning comes early in summer, baby. You know that.”
I nodded. Webb was out of bed with the birds, especially when it was forecast to be beastly hot, as it had been for the past week…
And especially -especially when staying in bed meant a greater-than-zero chance of me forcing him to have The Big Conversation.
“Besides,” he continued, setting his hands on my hips and giving me a smile full of intent . “I knew you were dropping Aiden and the dog at Porter and Theo’s place?—”
“Porter was already hauling out his ‘Special Effects for Beginners’ kit when I left them this morning,” I interrupted. “He and Aiden are going to build a working volcano, recreate a battle from Return of the King , and make hot fudge from scratch.”
Webb shook his head. “God help the professor.”
“Nah, Theo looked suspiciously excited. Pretty sure your brother’s letting him be Gandalf.” I grinned broadly. “Your family’s the best.”
Webb’s green eyes flared hotter as he tracked my smile.
“They are. But they’re also always fucking here .
” His fingers tightened on my hips. “Tonight, though, Aiden and Bear are gone, Em’s visiting her college friend, and your mom and Aunt Sue are still on their Irish wool tour. You know what that means?”
I pretended to think about it. “There’s a possibility the pint of ice cream I put in the freezer yesterday isn’t empty and that I’ll be able to crochet more than two rows of my temperature blanket while we talk without interruption?”
He wrinkled his nose. “Sadly, no. I caught Aiden shutting the freezer guiltily last night and smelling distinctly like Boston Cream Pie. But!” He pulled me against him. “It means we’re alone. Truly alone. And I’m thinking we can find something way more fun than crocheting to do.”
I noticed he didn’t mention anything about talking .
“More fun than crocheting?” I ran a hand over his chest, his hard muscles warm under my hand. “I don’t know. I really like crocheting.”
“Uh-huh. But it’s been nearly a week since you and I… blew a bugle.” He bounced his eyebrows lasciviously. “And evidence suggests you like that, too.”
I snorted. Webb was hot always , but when he gave me that wolfish grin and let me see the goofy side of himself he hid from most people? I was a goner.
He was right, too, that it had been a week since we’d gotten any action. Of course, the reasons for this were less about us finding time alone and more about Webb avoiding The Big Conversation… but when that teasing smile was shining down on me, making my heart race, I didn’t want to quibble.
“Well, you’re in luck, Mr. Sunday. I happen to find myself in a bugle-blowing mood.” I knew I sounded utterly besotted, and I didn’t care one bit. I rubbed a smudge of dirt off Webb’s cheek with my thumb. “Have you been wrestling the tomato vines in my garden with your bare hands again?”
“Not today. I was down with the sheep most of the afternoon. I’d planned to get cleaned up and start a seductive dinner before you got back, but Tater rolled herself straight into a thistle patch again, and Prissy decided to use my distraction to cover her jailbreak.”
I groaned. This was all too familiar. “Please tell me you caught her before she got to the road.”
“Caught her in the orchard, actually. I assume she was excited to check the Black Oxford grafts.” He winked. “But it took a while to get her back in her pen, so I only got back a minute before you did.”
“Just in time to help me put the groceries away.” I tilted my head toward the open trunk and fluttered my eyelashes. “You know, it’s a scientific fact that grocery carrying begets bugle blowing, husband. In case that matters at all.”
“That so?” Webb looked like he was fighting laughter. “ And all this time, I thought old Ernie Spencer at the grocery store was just being nice when he asked if I needed help with my bags.”
I poked my husband in the ribs, then grabbed his hand and towed him, laughing, toward the trunk. But the grocery explosion waiting there sobered him up real quick. “Jesus fuck, baby. I thought we were having just a family cookout tomorrow night, not inviting half the town.”
“Yeah, well. It feels like our family is half the town.” I rubbed the back of my neck.
“Besides, it’s not all ours. You know how it is.
You tell one person in the Hollow you’re going to the big store, and suddenly, sixteen other folks are texting to ask if you could grab them just one tiny thing that Peebles Market doesn’t carry.
Before you know it, you’re filling two carts, and most of it isn’t even yours. ”
“You say that, but I know these industrial-sized boxes of granola bars have Aiden’s name all over them.” Webb hefted a double stack of groceries, including the bars.
“True.” I laughed as I picked up the cooler of frozen stuff and followed Webb around back to the kitchen door. “Along with the dozen frozen pizzas and the high-protein oatmeal he asked me to get.”
“High protein? Since when? Doesn’t he like the kind with high-sugar and candy pieces in it?”
“Seems our boy’s got his sights set on making the travel baseball team next spring. I got a whole earful about it on our drive to Porter’s today. And I’m not saying that’s directly related to Hannah Melo thinking baseball players are the coolest… but I’m also not saying it’s unrelated .”
Webb stopped walking and turned to blink at me. “No way. Aiden doesn’t have crushes. He’s still a little kid. He’s only?—”
“Ten?” I said, mock sadly. “Yes, with the appetite of three grown Sundays, a snarky preteen attitude courtesy of his Uncle Gage, and a penchant for calling both of us bruh . He’s growing up whether we like it or not.
” I summoned a smile. “But, hey, no need for us to get nostalgic just yet, right? Not when we’ll be drowning in diapers by the time baseball season starts. ”
Webb resumed his walk with a grunting noise that could have meant anything. Possibly, I stubbed my toe . Potentially, Yes, but Aiden’s relentless progress toward adulthood is a reminder of my own advancing age, and I’m having an existential crisis.
But since I knew my husband, knew all his best and worst traits, knew every freckle on his shoulders and every worry in his heart, I knew this grunt meant I’m terrified we’ll be disappointed by our most recent attempt at surrogacy again, so I get weird every time the subject comes up .
My chest squeezed a little.
Because I was ever hopeful, though, I kept my smile firmly in place as I followed him up the porch stairs.
“Speaking of our babies,” I said brightly.
“Did you see the ultrasound pics Josie sent yet? The twins don’t look like blobs anymore.
They look like actual, miniature humans with these tiny little fingers and noses.
And I know we decided, before we started surrogacy, that we weren’t going to find out who fathered each of them, but I swear to God, Baby A has your exact profile. Wait until you see the pic?—”
“Fucking Christ!” Webb exploded.
I stopped in my tracks, my smile fading. “Webb?—”