He scowled playfully at her. “Fine, I’ll call, but you remember this was your idea.”

“I’ll remember. She should know that you’re never going to be able to make her a grandmother.”

“My four oldest sisters have seen to that. She has sixteen grandchildren between them, don’t worry about that.”

“I thought you had a brother.”

“I had two of them and six sisters. Aren’t you lucky to be on the receiving end of all that sensitivity training they instilled in me?”

“What happened to your brothers?”

“Sadly, they both died young,” he said, amazed by the stab of pain in his breastbone after all this time.

“Oh God. What happened to them?”

“One had cancer. Terrible thing that was. And the other had drug problems. He overdosed about ten years ago.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Twas a long time ago now.”

“So it falls to you.”

“What does?”

“Continuing the family line.” Carolina pulled back from him and sat up in bed, the blankets pooling at her waist. He wondered if she knew how glorious she looked, bare-breasted with her hair rumpled, her face flushed from sleep and her lips red and swollen from his vigorous lovemaking.

“What’s wrong?”

“You’re the last one.”

“The last one of what?”

“The last male in your family. If you don’t have a son, your family will die off.”

“Did you hear how many sisters I said I have? The family will thrive and prosper for generations to come.”

“But none of them will be O’Gradys if you don’t have a son. They’ll hate me for that.”

“I’ve never felt an ounce of pressure to carry on the family name, and I still don’t.”

“Your parents might feel differently.”

“If they do, they’ve never told me so. In fact, I think they gave up on seeing me domesticated quite some time ago. Come back down here with me.”

Carolina snuggled up to him, albeit somewhat reluctantly.

He rubbed her back until she relaxed a bit. “You need to stop manufacturing reasons that this isn’t going to work and start thinking about all the reasons why it will work beautifully.”

“Tell me about those reasons.”

“Well, we could start with the fact that I’m wildly in love with you, and I think you’re wildly in love with me.”

“That’s one word for it.”

Chuckling, he hugged her even closer to him and nuzzled her hair. “For another reason, you’ve apparently decided you’re happier with me than you are without me.”

“What else?”

Pleased that she hadn’t tried to deny it, “I’m a god in bed. You said so yourself last night.”

She groaned loudly. “You caught me in a weak moment. I’d like to retract that statement for fear of it being used against me for the rest of my life.”

“No retractions allowed. You only spoke the truth.”