Page 191 of Embracing the Change

Jamie loved family time.

Any way he could get it.

Nora

“Someone turn the furnace down.”

I shifted my attention from Jamie, looking resplendent in his dinner jacket, to Byron, who I was standing with.

“In…deed. We’re all about to catch fire,” Bryan, who was also standing with us, added.

Although I felt quite comfortable, I became alarmed. “Do I need to talk to management about adjusting the thermostat? Are you uncomfortable?”

“No, doll,” Ryan joined the conversation. “They’re talking about the lipstick on Jamie’s collar, and the looks you two have been scorching across the room at each other since you got here.”

Jamie was in a very good mood. Jamie had just officially adopted his beloved daughter. Jamie’s son and daughter-in-law were there. Jamie’s grandson was with his cousin Laird being babysat by Elsa’s mother. Jamie’s real father, his wife, and Jamie’s half-brothers were there.

Jamie was in his element.

This being, surrounded by people he loved.

As such, prior to us coming out tonight, things had become rather…

Heated.

Delightfully so.

“It’s not like she doesn’t look at him all the time like she wants to devour him,” Wallace put in.

“Or like she’s remembering having been devoured by him,” Ryan said.

“Or like she’s preening, because he’s staring at her like he wants to devour her,” Wallace added.

“Or like he’s remembering how he just devoured her,” Ryan kept at it.

“I’m jealous, I want a man to look at me like he wants to devour me,” Byron complained.

“Step behind me in that line,” Bryan muttered.

But I was struck.

I turned my attention back to Jamie, only to find him watching me. When he saw my gaze on him, his danced down the length of me, back up to my face, whereupon he smirked in the most delightfully scrumptious way.

Yes, it was like he was remembering devouring me, and he didn’t mind that I got lipstick on his collar when he did so.

Oh my.

“So, do tell,” Ryan said, and as politeness dictated considering he was talking to me, I tore my attention from Jamie to give it to Ryan. “What’s it like having it all?”

There was only one response to that.

Thus, I gave it to him.

“It is, of course, darling, everything.”

Ryan smiled at me.

I smiled at Ryan, and all the boys.

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