Page 112 of Trade It All

Chapter 42

Dean

Ididnotknowa house could feel this different with one woman inside it. Same walls. Same staircase. Same bedroom I walked through yesterday with Coleman talking about square footage and resale value and whether I wanted the security company transferred today or tomorrow.

Now? Now it feels alive. Now it feels like something built to hold us.

I’m leaning against the bedroom doorway pretending to give Maddie space to get ready when in reality I have not been able to take my eyes off her for the last twenty minutes.

She moves around our room—our room, in our house, the house I share with my wife—and every time that word circles through my head I have to fight a grin like some lovesick idiot.

Wife. Mine. Home.

Those three words have apparently rewired my entire brain.

She stands in front of the mirror pinning one side of her hair back, then turns toward the bed to dig through the bag we dragged over from her apartment.

My eyes follow every movement.

The black dress hugging her waist. The bare line of her shoulders. The little crease between her brows while she decides between earrings like this is a normal night and not the night she is standing in our bedroom getting ready for her first event as Mrs. Dean Kincade.

My chest feels too tight. Like there is physically not enough room inside it for what I am feeling.

She glances up and catches me staring.

A smile tugs at her lips. “What?”

I push off the frame and walk into the room slowly. “Nothing.”

She snorts. “That is the face of definitely something.”

I stop behind her and meet her eyes in the mirror. For a second I just look. At the woman standing in front of me. At the way she fits in this space like she was always supposed to be here. At the wedding band now back on her finger because there is no way in hell I let her leave this house without it again.

Then I slide my hands around her waist and press my mouth to the side of her neck.

“You’re in my house.”

She laughs softly. “Our house.”

I kiss just below her ear. “My wife is in my house.”

That makes her shoulders shake. “You are dangerously close to sounding like a caveman. Plus isn't it my house since it was a gift?”

I hum against her skin. “Mm. Might drag you back to bed by your hair.”

She turns in my arms, smiling up at me. “You would make us late.”

I look down at her. At the ring. At the dress. At the flushed happiness in her cheeks. And I am struck all over again by the same thought that has been punching me in the ribs since Vegas—how the hell did I get this lucky?

My thumb brushes over her jaw.

“You look beautiful.”

Her expression softens instantly. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” I lean down and kiss her once, slow enough to make her sigh. “Like chest-hurting beautiful.”

She smiles against my mouth. “Well, Husband, you clean up pretty nice yourself.”