Hard Bastard(214)

I smiled. “Thanks, Dad.” We clinked glasses and drank.

The day wound down that way as we sat around and chatted, catching up. Eventually Dad got tired and decided to head back to his hotel room. We promised we’d see him tomorrow and watched him climb into the cab.

When he was gone, I collapsed onto the couch, right into Cole’s arms.

“Long day?” he asked.

“Yeah, long day. And when did my dad get here?”

“About an hour before you got home.”

“How was that?”

Cole shrugged, kissing my neck. “Not bad. I didn’t tell him that we spend most our time fucking these days.”

“Cole,” I said, giggling. “Cut it out.”

“You know it’s true,” he whispered in my ear.

“So what?” I turned and looked at him. He smiled, and I felt myself sigh, my head dizzy, light and free. I kissed him gently on the lips.

“I love you, dickhead,” I said.

“I love you too, wife.”

I laughed and kissed him harder, pressing my body against his.

Maybe not many relationships began with a marriage. Maybe even fewer began as stepsiblings. But I wouldn’t have traded what we had for anything in the world.

Because every day I was with Cole felt better than the last.

As I let myself get lost in his body, I knew things were going to work out.

He was my husband. Maybe it was just a legal thing, but that was meaning more and more. Because of him, I’d had the strength to go after my news job, to move across the country for it. He made me stronger, more likely to live in the moment.

And he did other things for me. Things I definitely wasn’t telling my dad about.

Cole the fighter, my man. I was going to last with him, one way or another, from now to always.