“Much better than being my pole dancer, right?”
She made a face at him, then sobered. “So you think you’ll make it through this March without doing anything crazy or wild?”
“No.”
She frowned. “No?”
He smiled, then rolled to take her under him. “Because I’m about to get very crazy and wild while I bingo the woman I love.” He laughed at her perplexed expression. “I’ll explain later,” he said, and lowered his mouth to hers.
April 1
RYAN WATCHED THE woman he loved from the pillow beside hers. She was worrying her bottom lip. With his knuckle, he freed it from her front teeth. “What’s going on in your busy brain?”
She slid him a look. “Linus says you become someone else in April. Do you feel...different?”
He rolled his eyes heavenward as if he were taking stock. Then he tilted his head to gaze into her beautiful gray ones. “Nope. Still feel like me. A lucky SOB with a beautiful woman who has promised to be his wife. A lucky SOB who hopes to make her smart boy his boy, too.”
Poppy found his hand, and brought it to her lips. “That means I’ve found that man who’ll love me and who has an open heart for my son. I’m lucky, too.”
He ruffled her hair. “Knucklehead,” he said, just to tease her.
But she was worrying her lip again.
“What now, baby?”
“How’s this going to work?”
“You and me?” At her nod, he smiled. “The usual way, I guess. We’ll love most of the time, fight a few times, occasionally worry over our kids—”
“Kids, plural? We’ll have more kids?”
“Don’t you want that?” he asked softly.
“Yeah,” she whispered. “Oh, yeah.”
“Me, too,” he said, trailing a finger over her cheek. “So...where was I? Oh, yeah. We’ll love, we’ll fight, we’ll worry over our kids. And we’ll laugh, too. We’ll enjoy our families and our friends and always feel a little smug and a little sorry for them because we’ll believe they can’t possibly be as happy as we are.”
“But we’re from two different worlds.”
“We’ll make our own world. It’s going to be great.”
“How can you be so sure?” she asked, an edge of anxiousness in her voice.
Ryan pulled her close, and breathed in the sweet scent of her hair. Breathed in spring and hope and the incredible idea of a future with his mountain girl. “Because I’m a realist, honey. Since I love you so very, very much, Poppy Walker, there’s just no other option.”
* * * * *
Look for Shay’s story,
MAKE ME LOSE CONTROL,
coming soon from Christie Ridgway
and Harlequin HQN!
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ISBN-13: 9781460325377
TAKE MY BREATH AWAY
Copyright © 2014 by Christie Ridgway
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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Take My Breath Away Page 31
