His Pretend Baby

by Theodora Taylor

  After taking a moment to try and make sense of that strange comment, I watch him fidget in his seat and refuse the flight attendant’s offer of a drink.

  “Go?” I finally say, when I can’t take it anymore.

  “Yes?”

  “Do you still like me?”

  He actually seems to think about it before answering, “Yes.”

  “Can I hold your hand?”

  His answer to that is to lace his fingers through mine and grip my hand tight.

  “You sure you don’t want to turn the plane around?” I ask him.

  Again, he considers it. And it’s more like a decision remade than a reassurance, when he says. “No. No, I want to go on a honeymoon with you. Going on a honeymoon. That’s the new plan. Let’s stick to the plan.”

  “Yeah, let’s,” I agree with a happy smile.

  The plane hums around us as we eat up sky miles.

  Eventually he grumbles. “Jason says there’s a rumor going around the office that I have an undiagnosed brain tumor.”

  “Do you have a brain tumor?” I have to ask, because… well, look at me. A little over a month ago I crashed my dead ex-boyfriend’s funeral, and now I’m on a plane with his brother, headed to a honeymoon in the South Pacific. It feels like there’s gotta be something very wrong with at least one of us in this scenario.

  “No,” he answers, and again it feels like a decision. “But I do like you. A lot.”

  12

  Taking a newly planned vacation with Go turns out to be pretty painful. For the sexiest reasons possible.

  The biggest surprise is he doesn’t bring any tech along, not so much as a tablet. Which means he can’t make any multi-point plans for what we’re going to do exactly when. And that means he’s spontaneous as fuck. And I do mean as fuck.

  Like inviting me on a beach run with him, only to pin me down in the sand before we’re even a mile in. Taking me with slow, grinding strokes as the waves crash over us. Luckily for us, we’re staying on a literal private island. One owned by GoBotics’ parent company. The only structures on the pristine island are a collection of over-water bungalows with a large stucco building for meetings and yoga classes set up in the middle.

  Apparently the big tech company flies an advanced team out here to occasionally clean the place between corporate retreats, leaving just one full-time caretaker knocking around. A little Polynesian lady by the name of Dorothy, who shows up at our bungalow three times a day with meals made from ingredients she’s either caught or picked herself. She’s the exact opposite of Go’s smart house, and other than an affable hello and good-bye when she places the tray of food on our lanai, she stays pretty invisible while we’re in residence.

  I can only hope she didn’t bear witness to that time on the beach, or see what happened the one time I invite Go to do morning yoga with me. Or for that matter, hear all my squealing during last night’s skinny dip in the warm lagoon underneath our hut.

  But this is our second night in the bungalow, we’ve finished eating dinner and placed the trays outside the door at least an hour before deciding to read for a little bit in the lanai’s side-by-side deck chairs. So I’m fairly sure I’m safe when I follow a compulsion to reach across the thin slice of space separating us.

  “Nyla,” he warns, when my hand dips beneath the band of his swim shorts. “The plan is to read our physical books for an hour, then enjoy ourselves afterwards. I’m at a good part.”

  His disturbing habit of referring to paperbacks as “physical books” aside, he’s totally right. That is what we agreed to do this morning. But there’s just something so sexy about watching him read, even if it’s a non-fiction book about Pixar.

  Also, the main character in my insanely boring literary novel has just decided to—no joke—dedicate her life to the study of moss. I happily toss my novel aside, and snatch his out of his hand.

  “Lil’ Dis,” I say, fisting my hand up and down on his dick, just the way I know he likes it. “That’s what they call me.”

  His head falls back against the deck chair, and he groans my name. Not going to lie, I love doing this to him. The truth is, nothing in the world has ever made me feel as powerful as ruining this beautiful man’s plans in the nastiest ways possible. I release him, but just so I can get in position to take him in my mouth. I’m already thinking about how I’ll kiss him after I’m done with him. Let him taste his ruined plans on my lips.

  But then he suddenly grabs hold of my wrist, and tugs me forward, settling my pregnant stomach between his thighs.

  Thwap!

  “Ow, what the hell, Go?” I ask as pain radiates across my buttocks.

  “New Plan: I’m disrupting your disruption.”

  Thwap!

  “You’re spanking me? Seriously—”

  I cut off when he slaps my ass again and a whole stream of curses fall out of my mouth.

  Like the worst gentleman, he waits until I’m done calling him every name in the book before he says, “Yes, seriously, Nyla,” as if the answer to my question is obvious. “I think you need to be punished for all these disruptions, and you’ve been tempting me all afternoon in that bikini. Also, I’m curious about what you’re going to look like when you start enjoying this.”

  I would laugh, but he sounds one-hundred percent serious. Also…

  Thwap!

  “I’m not enjoying this—” I start to inform him.

  Thwap!

  “Give it a few more slaps, and if you’re still protesting, I’ll stop.”

  But before I can agree or disagree, he slaps my ass again. I can feel him becoming harder and harder against the side of my solar plexus with every slap. And as it turns out, he’s right about giving it a few more slaps. At first it’s just painful, and nothing but painful. But all that squirming…

  “Are you writhing in pain or trying to stimulate your pussy on my lap?” he asks when I start whimpering.

  “Both,” I admit.

  “Poor Nyla. You know I can help you with that pain. All you have to do is ask.”

  “Please…” I say.

  “Please…what, Nyla? I want to hear you say it.”

  He slaps my ass again, and this time the piercing pain goes straight to my pussy. I feel a sweet rush of cream in my bikini bottoms, and my clit engorges to the point that it feels like a balloon about to burst at any second.

  “Please! Please help me!” I cry, not sure what I’m saying or what I’m asking.

  “Fuck si, come here, Nyla. Right here, right here…”

  In a feat of strength and manipulation, he lifts me out of my prone position and moves my bikini bottom to the side before crashing my sopping wet core down on his hard erection. Then he begins kneading my ass as he rolls me up and down on top of him. The action not only soothes my sore behind, but also allows him to go in so deep, I can feel him against my womb. So deep, my back caves and my face falls into his shoulder unsure of how to feel about all of this.

  He’s the one who hurt me like I’ve never let or trusted any other man to hurt me before. And he’s the one who’s soothing me. In those wild moments, he’s my pain and he’s my cure. I can’t believe he spanked me, but I’m also feeling grateful, because he’s giving me what I need now. So well and hard with his hands tight on my ass. All kinds of danger signals are going off inside my mind, but I can’t stop fucking him. Can’t stop my hips from desperately rolling in rhythm with his hands, as I try to get there with him. I feel hurt and desperate and greedy for more at the same time.

  In other words, I’m completely deranged. And my heart pings around the electricity field my chest has become, trying to figure out how to feel about all this—

  “Stop thinking,” he says, his voice rough through clenched teeth. “Need you to come. Fuck! Don’t look at me. Like how heavy your hips are. You feel so good on top of me.”

  So I’m a lot more bottom heavy than most of the girls Go has dated. That shouldn’t feel like the best compliment, but it does. Espec
ially when he throws his head back like I’m killing him, and says, “Can’t last much longer with these hips. Come right now, Nyla. Come!”

  He’s on the edge of his control, I can tell, but I can’t follow through with his command because suddenly I’m just so sick of being cool. Of the constant patrol my mind keeps around my heart, to make sure I don’t show too much, don’t say the wrong thing.

  And I know…I know it’s not in the plan. I know he likes for me to go first, but…

  “I don’t want to go alone,” I tell him, my voice laced through with pitiful desperation. “Please don’t make me go alone…”

  I cut off because the orgasm’s coming on so strong, I can feel its approach as an urgent thunder inside me, threatening to take me over so I can no longer speak. “Come with me!” I desperately choke out before it can mute me. “Please, Go!”

  He groans, deep and rough. Like I’ve punched him. “Nyla…Nyla…”

  But then he explodes inside of me, just as my climax flares out all my senses. We fuck so wild. Yelling into the orgasm’s light.

  And then we float down together, staring at each other, equally bemused. Equally terrified of what just happened.

  “Do you know what it does to me to watch a cool, tough girl like you come all over my nerd dick like that?” he asks me on a hoarse whisper, holding me to him tight. “You fucking melt me, Nyla. I seriously don’t know how to handle what you do to me.”

  I have to laugh, but not at him. At myself, because…“You melt me, too,” I admit to him then.

  “What are we going to do when we get back?” he asks, pressing the side of his face into my chest. I can’t keep myself from relishing the soft feel of his beard between my breasts. “So far I haven’t made it eight hours without needing to take you again.”

  “I guess we’ll have to figure that out when we get home. Maybe we can have a planning meeting about it.”

  I chuckle at my own joke, but he doesn’t laugh. Not even a little bit.

  In fact, his arms tighten and loosen, tighten and loosen. Consternation personified.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask him.

  “I don’t want to go home. I want to stay here with you.”

  “Oh.” I half grin at him. “I don’t want to go home either. But everyone feels like that two days into a vacation.”

  At least that’s what I heard. I’d only been in the working world for a couple of years, and Go was right about my low five-figure salary not affording me many luxurious extras. All of my vacations so far had involved binge-watching shows I hadn’t had time to get to throughout the year. A few months ago, I wouldn’t have been able to imagine taking a vacation to Jamaica, much less a private island owned by GoBotics’ parent company.

  The truth is, this time with Go has been like a dream come true.

  But he sits back in the chair now, kneading my splayed hips like we’ve fallen into some kind of nightmare.

  “Not me, Nyla. I don’t take unplanned vacations. A month ago, I wouldn’t have been able to imagine taking a week off. A month ago, work was like breathing to me, the thing that came to me most naturally. Now all I want to do is spend time with you. Robotics has been my lifelong obsession. Now I can’t even concentrate long enough to read one chapter of a book if you’re sitting next to me. It feels like a virus has gotten into my system. And I don’t know how to get you out. And it’s fucking with my head. You are so unplanned, Nyla.”

  I think most girls would have been insulted. But strangely enough, I understand. The corner of my mouth hitches, “I like you, too, Go.”

  He shakes his head, the setting sun glinting off his prescription Raybans. “I don’t just like you…I really like you. I think I’m… I don’t know…hyper-focusing on you like I do with my plans and my A.I. work. But you’re not a robot. You’re a human woman, and I’m afraid I’m going to scare you away because I don’t just like you. I unhealthily like you.”

  I smile softly because he has no idea—actually, I didn’t even know it until that moment. But I’ve been waiting my whole life to have a guy be as terrified of me as I am of him.

  “I unhealthily like you, too,” I tell him, “And we’ll figure everything out Monday. I’ll come up to your office. Or maybe we can meet at the house. And we’ll do all that stuff I heard couples do when they’re first starting to really like each other. That will help with the hyper-focus issues, and also, I’d really like to have lunch with you, too. Does that sound like a plan?”

  I stop when I notice him grinning up at me, his hands a little less tight on my hips.

  “What?” I ask.

  “I’ve got you, Nyla Weathers-Gutierrez, coming up with plans,” he says with a smirk. “Apparently, I’m even better at disrupting your disruptions than I planned to be.”

  “Oh, my God! You’re so arrogant!”

  “Guess what else I am, Nyla? Again.”

  I don’t have to guess. The evidence is now pulsing inside of me, and I say to him, only half-joking, “Maybe someone like you is good for someone like me, too, Go. Maybe.”

  Go doesn’t pick up the Pixar book again for the rest of the vacation. And by the time our last day comes around, I’m grinning from ear to ear.

  “Why are you smiling so much this morning?” Go asks me when we’re eating our last breakfast on the lanai. “Shouldn’t you be as grumpy as I am, since this is our last day here?”

  “Maybe,” I answer. “But mostly I’m just happy. Being with you. Being wanted by you makes me happy, Go. Whether it’s here or in Portland.”

  He considers my words with a bemused sideways look. “You need to be careful, Nyla. The baby’s not coming until July and that leaves us plenty of time for another planned vacation.”

  “Mmm, I like the sound of that,” I say, slowly licking the juice from the piece of papaya I just ate off my fingers, sending him a long, lazy look across the table.

  His eyes darken. “Why do I feel like my plan to walk the beach one last time is about to get disrupted?”

  “Because it totally is,” I answer with no remorse whatsoever. “And you know what? I just came up with a plan for how you can punish me for it afterwards. It involves some water torture, so we can get as dirty as we want without me having to take a shower before the boat gets here. And it might even leave us with enough time left over to pack…”

  Go nods, pressing his fingers into a hard steeple in front of his beard. “I like the sound of this plan. Tell me more…Tell me more…”

  The sound of a boat’s large engine interrupts our intimate conversation. So old and large, we can hear it all the way on our side of the bungalow, even though we’re not facing the beach.

  “I thought the boat wasn’t coming until later,” I say, jumping up from the table.

  Have I mentioned we’re both sitting there naked as the day we were born?

  “It isn’t supposed to be here until two.” He glances at his wrist reflexively, before remembering he left his smart watch back in Portland. His eyes go to the sky, and he says, “Based on the position of the sun, it’s only mid-morning.”

  “Maybe we got the time wrong?”

  Go reaches out to the pair of swim shorts drying on the nearby deck chair. “Start packing. I’ll go tell the boat driver he’ll have to wait until we’re done with your plan.”

  I laugh. “You are not going to make that poor guy wait for us to have sex.”

  He just lifts his eyebrow over the rim of his glasses and answers, “I’ve made my feelings regarding the importance of sticking to plans abundantly clear, Nyla.”

  I’m only half-sure he’s joking as we split into our separate missions.

  Hastily pulling on a sundress that I know I’ll have to seriously layer when we get back to February in Portland, I get to work. But I make sure to set up the one suitcase we packed together on the side of the bedroom facing the beach so I can watch Go talk with the boat driver.

  I frown, however, when I see that the nut brown Polynesian man is frant
ically shaking his head at Go’s request for more time and pointing to the boat.

  And despite the warm breeze flowing through our open air bungalow, I suddenly feel very, very cold. Goosebumps rise on my arms, because I know we won’t be staying. Something’s happened back in the real world. And whatever it is, it’s not good.

  13

  Go is mostly quiet on the way home. When I ask him if he knows why Jason called us back so urgently, I get a clipped. “I have some ideas, but I can’t be sure.” And nothing beyond that, except a short “No” when I ask if he wants to tell me about his ideas.

  So we share an uncomfortable boat ride back to a less remote South Pacific Island, then a couple of plane rides back to Portland.

  By the time we arrive at Go’s stone and brick manse on the river, I’m exhausted and rethinking my stance on crying.

  “Nyla Weathers-Gutierrez has entered the house,” the overhead voice announces as we come through the door. “Jason Harvitt and Priscilla Road are in the office with permission.”

  Without a word, Go walks toward the back of the house.

  I don’t know what freaks me out more at that point. All this drama we’ve come back to, or the fact that Go leaves our suitcase behind in the foyer and walks to the office without a word.

  I can tell even before I hear the door close behind him with a distinct click that he doesn’t want me to follow.

  Not really knowing what else to do with myself, I take the suitcase upstairs, since unpacking our things and getting them into the washing machine right away seems like the kind of thing Go would want. I like Go. A lot. Even when he’s confusing me. So I do what I think he’d want me to do without being asked.

  I’m a little relieved when I get back from throwing our dirty clothes in the washing machine. Not just because it only took me about twenty minutes to figure out how the squat robot disguised as an everyday appliance worked, but also because I can see two cars pulling away in the driveway beyond the large foyer’s floor-to-ceiling slit windows.