Page 75 of A King’s Obsession

“She ain't homeless,” he said as he pulled the shirt over his head. “She with E.”

“And that's supposed to make me feel better?” I asked, folding my arms while he straightened his shirt.

He looked at me like the answer should've been obvious. “Yeah.”

I rolled my eyes.

Men.

The problem was, he wasn't entirely wrong.

Jru had spent so much of her life worrying about everybody else that I wanted to see what happened when somebody worried about her for a change. She'd probably fight Ezra every step of the way because that's just who the hell she was, but I couldn't say I hated the idea of somebody making her put her guard down.

I picked up a stack of clothes and started putting them into the dresser. “She gone cuss my ass out when I see her,” I muttered, already imagining the look on Jru's face when we finally came face-to-face.

“Probably.” Malachi didn't even bother looking up, which told me exactly how much sympathy I was getting out of his ass.

“I'm blaming you.” I glanced over my shoulder, making sure he heard me.

“I don't give a fuck,” he replied without missing a beat.

“I know.” I smiled to myself as I folded another shirt.

For a few minutes, the room got quiet. Malachi moved around behind me getting dressed while I continued unpacking. The longer I stood there putting my things into drawers that used to belong only to him, the heavier that little thought I'd been trying to ignore became.

I stopped with one of my dresses still in my hands.

“Malachi?” I called, my voice quieter than it had been a few minutes earlier.

“What's up?” He was still moving around behind me, but I could hear him pause when I didn't answer right away.

I turned around. He was sitting on the edge of the bed pulling on his socks, but something in my face must've told him I wasn't about to say anything funny because his expression changed.

“You ever feel like we moved too fast?” I asked, watching him closely.

His hands stopped.

I rubbed my thumb across the fabric of the dress, trying to put into words something I'd been thinking about since we'd gotten married. “I'm serious. We went from doing what we were doing to married, living together, and now I'm pregnant. Sometimes I just sit here and think, damn. How the fuck did all this happen?”

Malachi watched me for a moment before standing. He crossed the space between us and took the dress from my hands, laying it on top of the dresser.

“Nah,” he said, looking directly at me.

I searched his face, trying to find even the smallest sign that he'd been having the same thoughts. “Not even a little?”

“Ashlynn, I'm thirty-nine years old.” His hands settled on my hips as he pulled me closer. “What the fuck I need three years to figure out if I want you for?”

My mouth twitched.

He wasn't smiling.

“I knew what I was doing when I married you,” Malachi continued, holding my gaze while his thumbs moved slowly against my hips. “Fast don't mean wrong. It just mean I didn't waste no time.”

That shut me up.

His hand slid around my waist, and I rested mine against his chest.

For somebody who got on my damn nerves as much as he did, he had a way of saying shit so simply that I couldn't argue with it.