Page 173 of Beautifully Reckless

“Be careful Mrs,” Mule says, calling me Mrs like he does every time he decides to speak.

“He’s really here,” I cry, beaming up at Mule in the downpour, and for a brief second, I wonder how his moustache is still perfectly curled at the ends, even out in this storm.

“Yes, Mrs. He is.”

I giggle, bouncing on the spot, letting Ringo make his way to me.

The moment he’s standing before me, I try to leap into his arms… but fail, because my huge belly gets in the way.

“Holy shit, Angel. Look at you.” Ringo beams, ignoring the rain hammering down on us.

Oh wow. Look at his eyes. The way they smile without even seeing his lips.

“Bubs isbasically a cabbage now.” I laugh, seeing Mule slink away in my peripheral.

“Fuck,” he mutters, his eyes roaming the swell of my stomach and then my face. “Come here, Angel. I need to kiss you.”

Bending, Ringo scoops me up in his arms bridal style, and I don’t waste another second. Reaching up, I cup his face, loving the feel of his beard under my touch as our lips meet for the first time in weeks.

We’re moving as we kiss, Ringo’s boots trudging across the sloshy sand driveway before he climbs the steps of the porch.

I hear voices getting closer, and when Ringo finally breaks the kiss, my eyes land on JD’s wide grin, standing just inside the door already chatting to Jols.

“Didn’t take you long,” Jols teases as Ringo slips through the doorway, and I don’t even hate how my cheeks heat at the insinuation.

“Please tell me you’ll at least make it to your bedroom,” Millie complains and I giggle, because while she’s a very blunt person, she’s been decent to me, and we’ve even had a few laughs over the past few weeks.

“On my way there. Where’s Ma?” Ringo asks, his gaze darting around the living space as he stomps his dirty rain-soaked boots across the tiles.

“She turned in early,” Alana announces, stepping out of the hallway that leads to their mum’s bedroom.

I instantly feel guilty, because that’s a lie.

Ringo’s mum has been suffering through a lupus flare up, and while I’ve enjoyed learning all about it and practising some very basic care on Doreen, I hate knowing how much she’s been suffering.

Ringo grunts at his sister, and Isuspect he knows better than to believe her, but right now, he has a one track mind, and he’s determined to get us behind closed doors.

Taking two steps at a time, Ringo has us up to his room in no time, locking us away as his lips claim mine again.

I’ve missed his taste. The brush of his tongue. The tickle of his beard as his lips devour mine. I know there’s no way I’ll handle him leaving me ever again.

I need this.

I need him.

“Fuck. I’ve missed your smell,” he rasps into our kiss, and I giggle against his lips, because his head is in a similar place to mine.

Now in his bedroom, he lowers my feet to the floor while frantically stripping me out of my wet clothes.

“I need to taste you.”

A needy whimper escapes me, but it’s different from last month where I had an insatiable ache.

Now, my ache is for him.

To have him near.

To breathe him in.

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