Page 63 of The Bitterroot Inn (Jamison Valley 5)
I will not be upset.
His footsteps came my way and then he wrapped me in his arms. “I know we just started but I’m all in, Maisy. I’m serious about you. And serious means I’m helping you paint your son’s ceiling. It means, when we’re done, we’re going to sleep together in your bed. And serious also means that, at some
point, I want you to feel comfortable introducing me to Coby as the man that sleeps in your bed every night.”
Lucky. I was a lucky girl.
“I’m all in too.”
“Good.” He hugged me tighter and pressed his lips to my neck.
Then he let me go and we painted Coby’s ceiling in our underwear.
“Stop!” I shouted, struggling to get free from Hunter’s grip.
I was thirty seconds away from peeing my pants.
He was sitting on top of my hips and his hands had my wrists pinned above my head while Coby was relentlessly tickling my ribs.
“Get her, Coby!” Hunter yelled over my laughing cries.
My son’s fingers dug in harder, then traveled up to my armpits.
“No!” I squealed and twisted, trying to escape, but my struggle was pointless. Hunter was too big and I was laughing so hard I could barely breathe. Tears were running down my temples and into my hair. The corners of my jaw were aching and every muscle in my core was flexed tight.
“Okay! Okay. Stop! Oh my god, stop.” My bladder was about to give way.
Coby took pity on me and stopped his tickling but Hunter didn’t let me up. “Who gets to eat the last two cookies?”
“You do,” I panted. “You guys get the last two cookies. I give up.”
Hunter was off me in a flash, standing up and raising his arms triumphantly in the air. “We won!” Then he bent down to give Coby a high five. “Good job, bud.”
Coby smacked his hand into Hunter’s, then started singing, “Mommy is the loser. Mommy is the loser,” and danced around me still lying on the floor.
“Yeah, yeah,” I muttered, wiping my eyes dry. “You guys won. Again.”
It had been two weeks since Hunter and I had started sleeping together, and in that time, he and Coby had bonded even closer. Their new favorite thing was to gang up on me. Everything was a vote these days. Games. Movies. Even the dinner menu. I’d become a perpetual loser, outvoted two to one every single time. Whenever I’d try and put up a fight, I would get tickle-tortured until I’d cave.
“This is so not fair,” I told Hunter, faking a pout.
He shrugged and smiled down at me still on the floor. “Boys rule, girls drool.”
“Oh my god.” I rolled my eyes as Coby started singing that instead.
I smiled, not really minding that I was constantly outvoted if it brought Hunter and Coby closer together. Besides, I was having fun too. I’d laughed to tears more times in two weeks than I had in all my twenty-nine years combined.
With his victory smirk in place, Hunter stretched out a hand to help me off the living room floor.
“Thanks.” I smoothed out my hair, getting rid of the static from the carpet, and then straightened my chambray shirt. When Hunter wasn’t looking, I quickly tugged my panties and khaki shorts out of my butt crack.
“Okay,” I said. “That was fun and all but I’ve got to get going. Coby, you’re going to be a good boy for Hunter, right?”
“Yep!”
“He always is.” Hunter ruffled Coby’s hair. “We’ll be fine.”
“You’re sure you don’t mind bringing him to the rodeo? I can always bring him with me now. He can just hang out in Mom’s booth and—”
