by Gabi Moore
I smiled, let my stroking fingers go to her jawline and gave her a peck on the cheek.
“Baby, I’ve seen you beat the crap out of a grown man. I’ve seen you sit on the witness stand and speak your mind with more class than anyone else in that room. You’re a businesswoman. You’re a babe. And I have no doubt that you can be an amazing mother too.” It felt easy to be this gushy with her. Why not? Wasn’t this the life we had both fought so hard for?
“I know. I know you think that. But what if I’m not cut out for that? I don’t even know who I am anymore, you know? My stupid picture is still in the papers. They’re still taking about--”
“Who cares what they’re talking about? Fuck ‘em.”
“But I do care. What work could I possibly do now, Dean? Everyone in this city knows me. And now I’m pregnant on top of everything. Your mom invited me to go out hiking with her the other day and I realized, I don’t even have any clothing that isn’t fucking sexy. I have no normal people clothes. Nothing.”
“Fine. I’ll buy you new clothing. What do you need? I’ll get you a whole new wardrobe.”
“That’s not it, Dean. I can’t go from where I was to being some guy’s stay at home wife. I’m used to making my own money, Dean. To being in charge. That was the whole point…”
I didn’t know what to say. She was right of course. Nora was certainly no suburban mom. She wasn’t meant to drip off some man’s arm or be a trophy – Nora was a wild spirit and even when she followed orders, she did it with a grace that made you feel that she was doing you a supreme honor. I would have given her anything in the world she wanted. But I knew that she wanted a thing I couldn’t give her. She wanted to make her own rules, play her own game.
“You’ll find something, Nora. There’s no question. And you’ll adjust to all this, I know you will. Just be patient.”
“Yeah,” she said and stroked my chest with her fingertips. I leaned in to kiss her again but she pulled back.
“Can we… can you just hold me tonight? I’m not really feeling it,” she said and shot me wide open eyes.
“Of course,” I whispered, suddenly not knowing what to do with my hands. She turned around and lay the back of her body fully against the front of mine. I slipped my arms round her waist and pulled her close, she switched off the bedside lamp and I lay there for a while, taking in the smell of her shampoo and thinking.
If you really want to know, the news of her pregnancy was only just sinking in for me. Long after I felt her drift off and fall asleep in my arms, I lay awake and thought about what she had said.
A baby?
A ring and a wedding and a house and new job for Nora?
It would be our biggest, strangest roleplay so far, that’s for sure.
Chapter 14
Two months later
I didn’t need to be told which classroom was hers – I just followed the muffled sounds of Carmen’s Toreador aria in the halls and found myself looking through a glass window in the classroom door, which was slightly open. The flowers I held crumpled quietly in their cellophane wrapper as I peeked in and looked for her form moving in the tangle of preschool children. She hadn’t seen me.
God, she was radiant.
The bright pink tips of her hair grazed her shoulders as she moved around the classroom, crouching here at a table, crouching there at the next table, as the children worked at unpacking brightly colored plastic boxes filled with markers and paintbrushes and crayons. Along with the music, the chatter of the children, and all the cheerful decorations and posters hanging everywhere in the room, the atmosphere was electric. The children all seemed so happy, scores of little hands arranging the art supplies on the table with the greatest of concentration while Nora moved between the tables, her hand on one shoulder, and then another.
I watched as she moved to the front and clapped to catch their attention. She had only been working here two weeks but it looked like she was born for this work, managing a room of boisterous children like she was the pied piper in a sundress. When Maeve had suggested the job to her, I was sure she’d laugh in her face. An ‘art therapist’? But Nora had snapped it up and now, seeing her like this, it was hard to imagine why I had ever imagined this wasn’t the perfect role for her.
She was holding up a piece of blank paper now, showing the children.
“Now what’s this?” she said with a naughty look.
“It’s nothing! It’s blank paper!” the children all cried out together.
“That’s right. It’s nothing. Now tell me, how do you think it feels to be …nothing? To be so white and empty?” she said and frowned down at the page in her hands. The kids, obviously having played this game with her before, all spoke at once.
“It’s sad! It’s so boring!”
“I think you’re right. A blank page is nice and all, but it’s very lonely, isn’t it?”
The kids squealed.
“If I was a blank page, what do you think I’d like?” she said, and got that naughty look on her face again.
“Colors!” the kids screamed and clapped all at once.
Nora was nodding and smiling, completely engrossed in her part. And to be fair, I was engrossed too, unwilling to burst in and interrupt.
“Yes, I think the white loves colors very much. Shall we put some colors down on the white and see what happens?”
My foot bumped the door and it slowly creaked open in front of me. All the children turned to stare at once at me standing there, giant bouquet of peonies in my arms. Nora looked at me.
“Have you brought us some pink?” a small girl in the back row said. I laughed and Nora walked up to me, laughing as well.
“Look children, look how beautiful these flowers are!” she said, took the bouquet from me and gave me a look so smoldering I dearly regretted we weren’t alone so I could do something about it. She grabbed a paint-stained jar, filled it with water and put the flowers inside it, then placed it on the table in front of the children.
“I think our blank page would love it if we gave it a present – some lovely pink flowers,” she said, and arranged the blooms. “Each one of us can draw one flower, and when we’re done, we’ll put them all together, ok?”
The kids didn’t need much encouragement, and immediately got to work with their stubby fingers diving in to fish out pink, red and purple crayons. Nora sauntered over to me and took my hands in hers.
“I love them,” she said, catching my eyes again.
“I love you.”
She blushed, looked back at her brood and then pulled me out into the hallway.
“Dean, I’m sorry about this morning…”
“Please, don’t apologize. I understand. We’ve been through a lot. You’ve been through a lot.”
She rose up on her toes and kissed me quiet. It had been more than two months since we last had sex. I had pushed her, she was upset, we had fought. Our first fight. Peonies wouldn’t exactly solve the problem, but I wanted to let her know it was all OK. That I understood.
“I’m just… I’m scared the problem’s coming back again …if you’ll pardon the expression.”
“Baby, I already told you, there’s no pressure.”
“I know I know. I’m just worried that…” she stared back into the classroom at the busy children. Her arms were crossed tightly over her chest. I myself couldn’t believe that a woman as sexually mature as Nora, a woman as beautiful and strong and luscious as she was could ever have orgasm problems. But she was a complex creature, I’d give her that.
“What if I’ve like… messed everything up?” she said quietly.
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know. What if all those years working at that job broke something in my brain? And now my body’s forgotten how to do that in a normal way?”
I gave her a kiss and smiled at her.
“That’s ludicrous. You heard what the doctor said. Early pregnancy can be quite a strange thing for the body to adjust to. Once your h
ormones settle a little, we’ll be right back to where we were.”
She sighed.
“Look at me. I actually have my happily ever after, just like I always wanted, and I’m still finding a way to mess it up,” she said and tried to force a smile. I kissed her head again.
“Do you want me to hire a hitman to break into our house tonight to spice things up, hm? You have a kinky idea, baby, and I’ll make it happen, you just say the word.”
She couldn’t help but laugh.
I loved seeing her smile.
“God, you’re terrible,” she said. “But who knows, maybe you’re on to something. Look, the kids and I will be busy another twenty minutes or so…”
“Shall I wait for you in the car and you can come and find me?”
“Nah, come inside and paint a flower with us,” she said, and took my hand to guide me inside.
“Kids, do you know Mr. Cane? This is Dean, and he’s going to draw with us. He’s the man that built this school, did you all know that?” She herded me into a tiny plastic chair then thrust a blank sheet of paper at me.
“Wow, but everyone’s drawn such amazing flowers already,” I said, completely unsure of what to do with the fuchsia crayon that was pressed into my hand.
“Don’t worry, Mr. Dean. Everyone draws different but everyone’s drawing is good,” said the same little girl matter-of-factly.
“Oh? And did Ms. Smith teach you that?” I said, and smiled at Nora as she settled in her seat again.
I threw my tie over my shoulder and, with my knees almost folded up to my ears, I sat with the bumblebee art class and drew pink flowers to keep the blank white paper company, under the tutelage and supervision of my future wife and imminent fox, Ms. Smith. When class ended, I helped her pack her bags and we saw the children off, who took turns to lay their finished peonies in a pile at the front of the door, undoubtedly an art project for another day.
The day was warm and clear and easy, and we climbed into my car and set off for home. Nora would work until the last month of her pregnancy, then she’d take some time off for the baby, but she was already talking about having another one. Maybe other people couldn’t have imagined that this was the same woman who had scowled at me and stomped my watch to pieces once upon a time, or that she had once brought an assassin twice her size to the floor writhing in pain. But I had no trouble believing it. It was one of the things I loved about her: her fearlessness in tackling any role that life threw her way. Nora could be anything.
We drove in comfortable silence, both enjoying the sun that streamed freely into the car. Her hand moved silently to my thigh and touched me there, just as sweetly as she had done when we were in that old pickup out in the middle of dusty nowhere, nothing to do but face one another. Life had changed so much since then. The car was an expensive one now, and we were both in the city again, both firmly embedded in a whole new set of expectations, routines, obligations, our life obstacles never amounting to more than organizing Nora’s next doctor appointment, or deciding what to have for dinner.
We arrived home and went inside.
Let me tell you, dear reader: I’ve done some sexy things with this woman. I’ve fucked her in ways that aren’t exactly illegal but probably should be; we’ve done things with one another that still blow my mind to think about, and I’ve whispered things into her ear that still make her blush if I remind her of them today. And yet, the thought of having sex with her now was truly terrifying. I had tried hard to let her know a dip in sexual frequency was normal at this stage of a relationship, and normal given that she was pregnant, too. But the truth was I was also scared. Scared that our relationship was a one-trick pony that would wither out in the real world of bills and maternity. Scared that as amazing as I knew we were together, that maybe we weren’t immune from becoming like every other couple in the world.
I found her in the kitchen, standing in front of the kettle waiting for it to boil. I came up behind her, linked my arms round her waist and let my lips greet the skin of her neck and shoulders. I trailed my hands down and over the soft arc of her hip and tentatively forward, letting her know exactly what I had on my mind.
I needed her to invite me in, though.
I needed her to want it as much as I did.
Her head fell back as she relaxed in my arms. Her neck was exposed to me, and I could have done anything with her just then. I could have ordered her to get to her knees and suck me till I exploded all over those gorgeous lips of hers. I could have held her by the throat and ordered her to lift the hem of her skirt so I could entertain myself exactly as I desired inside that dripping little honeypot she kept hidden between her legs. I could have pulled her hair till tears sparkled on her lashes and ploughed my cock so deeply into her it made her twitch.
But I didn’t want to this time.
She had been on “top.” I had been on top. But now I wanted to know what it felt like to play together for once, as equals. No games.
We touched each other like teenagers in the dark. Like two scared kids who had never felt the thrill of another person’s nakedness before. It’s easy to play a role. It’s easy to speak when the script already exists. But there with her in the kitchen, I tried to forget all that.
“That feels good,” she whispered as my hands worked carefully over her flanks. I stroked further, this time letting my hands explore inside the opening of her collar, and the warmth there.
What did Adam really think… when he saw Eve for the first time? He must have thought that she was a sorceress, causing new and unthinkable sensations in his body. Did she think she was dying, the first time he touched her in that slick, aching place, and showed her what he could do to her? Were they sure that they and only they had discovered some wonderful new secret, some magic alchemy that only happened when the bare flesh of one caressed the bare flesh of the other?
I lifted her onto the counter to better kiss and explore the front of her body. She carefully worked the little shell buttons at the collar of her dress and released a plume of her scent. Our fingers, lips, and breath mingled and played with one another, in a slow new dance of push and pull that went nowhere and everywhere. Without making it happen, her dress seemed to find its way to the floor and she was now in front of me in her underwear, a simple cotton set that seemed imbued with her warmth and the smell of her perfume. These too came off, and then she was naked.
Each kiss on her bare skin was a compliment. ‘You’re beautiful’ my lips spelled out to the contours of her bellybutton. And ‘you’re beautiful too’ they said to the fine blonde down above her knee, and the totally smooth curves that invited me higher up, to that hot little cleft, hidden slightly in closely-cropped hair but already swelling, already opening up to me like a flower.
Lips locked, she clumsily guided my fingers to that slippery slit that I had explored so many times before, that I knew inside and out but which still seemed like a total mystery to me. She drenched my fingertips and rolled her hips against my hand to stroke her already swollen clit. Wetness flowed down to my wrist as I easily slipped one finger inside her, and then another, her warm body welcoming me in effortlessly. My tongue buried in the sweetness of her lips, and my fingers buried in the sweetness of that hungry little pussy of hers, I felt like I couldn’t get enough of her, like I wanted to claim every part of her, from the inside out.
I slowly slid my fingers from her and watched her buck and arch her spine like a cat follows a caressing hand. My forehead resting against hers, I stared into her eyes and then looked down to unzip and carefully unpack my now tremendously stiff cock, and then carefully rest its veined weight against her glistening opening, admiring how good it looked to see it there, to think of how, soon, all of that would be stuffed somewhere up inside her, and easing it all the way inside would be half the fun.
I rocked my hips back and forward to glide my shaft over her clit, teasing it so that her breath soon became ragged. She played against my dick, my hard versus her soft, and we stirr
ed up something gooey and hot and delicious between us. Each time I slid down to the fat tip, I threatened to penetrate her, to slip inside and show her exactly what I was aching to do. But I would pull back, rub inch by inch over her throbbing clit again until I could go no further, and then made my way back up again.
I loved the effect this had on her. Her breath was soft but erratic, closely following the little fluttering sensations we were stirring up in that hot, desperate place, becoming hotter and more desperate with each stroke, so that I could tell her streaming wetness was flowing down over her ass and onto the counter. It was a thing of beauty, how wet she got. How her entire body melted in preparation for my cock.
There was something deeply naughty about fucking a pregnant woman. She wasn’t showing yet, but it didn’t matter. It drove me wild to think what our bodies had done, what the juice and heat of our animal bodies had created, and now it was in there, our baby, and we were still screwing, and her body was still begging for it, still dripping wet and asking to be opened wide and fucked.
Just the thought of sending everything I had, every last drop deep up into that gorgeous cunt of hers was quickly driving me wild. When her hands went to grab my ass and pull me hard against her, I knew she was right there with me. There was nothing more natural in the world at that moment than to be inside her, as far as I could, and to let go and let the pleasure take us both, wherever it wanted to.
I dragged my fingers through those soaking folds, planted a few teasing circles on her stiff clit and then traced down where I could gently open her up. With one hard thrust, the head of my cock popped neatly inside her and her body sealed hot and tight around me. I gasped and she collapsed her weight onto me. Her body was perched on the counter but now, she could inch slowly off it, gradually letting herself fall with gravity onto me instead, where I stood waiting, cock pointing straight up. I held her waist firmly and eased her off the edge of the counter, and she looped her hands round my neck to steady herself. I’m not a large man, by any means, but I’m thick, and no matter how many times she rode me, we always had to get through this part – the part where she needed to breathe and ease me in slowly, those slick inner muscles stretching to take every last inch of my girth. I held her as she squeezed her eyes shut, her little eyebrows fluttering in sympathy with the fluttering I felt inside her, deep down in those secret places where only I was allowed.