She didn’t get far before she was knocked down from behind. The large cat, a jaguar, laid on his belly and stared at her. When she pulled out her gun and aimed it at him, he whimpered again.
“Please don’t shoot him.” She didn’t take her eyes off Hawkins as a cat when Lauren spoke to her from her right. “I was coming anyway after you called me, but he asked me to come here and repeat what his sorry ass is saying.” The cat snarled at Lauren and waved his large paw. When he stood up with the hair on his back standing too, Lauren laughed. Like she really found humor in what was going on. “Sit the fuck down before I put you down. You’ve deserved this from her since the moment you set eyes on her. And you called me to help you, so you’ll do it my way, or she’ll walk. And I wouldn’t blame her.” Lauren told him to go ahead and say what he wanted. “Just so we’re clear, I’m not going to help you beyond this. You majorly fucked up, and you have no one to blame but yourself.” Lauren sat in the grass and nodded at her to begin.
“I have nothing left to say to him. I’ve said what I wanted to, and I was leaving.” Lauren laughed. “What do you find so funny?”
“You beat the shit out of him, he said. Then while he was out at some point, you put him in a chair and tied him to it. Clever that, but you do realize that at any point he could have gotten away, right? I mean, he’s a bit stronger than he lets people think he is.” Jamie looked at Hawk and asked him if that was true. “He said that it’s true, but he wanted to talk to you, and sitting there taking what he deserved was the way that he’d get to say his piece.”
“I’ve heard enough of his pieces. He hurt me.” She looked at Lauren. “I’m leaving here, and I’d like for you to make him leave me alone.”
“Honey, that’s not going to happen, I’m afraid. I can no more make him do anything than I could you. And I’m reasonably sure that if I told you to give him another chance, you’d tell me to fuck off. Right?” Jamie nodded at her. “Yeah, thought so. As I said, it’s no less than he deserves, but, and this is just me talking, I think you’ve made your point with him.”
“I don’t need for him to tell me he’s sorry again. I needed him to love me, like I meant something more to him than a quick fuck. Well, it was never quick with him.” She looked at Lauren, completely embarrassed. “I’m sorry.”
“No worries.” She stood up and so did Lauren. “It’s time the two of you had a long conversation, and this time, no beating him up. I’m glad that you did though. Sometimes it takes that to get their full attention. And I’m positive you have his.”
“I’m not going to stay here with him. He’s already said that he doesn’t want me.” She felt herself falling back, but strong, warm arms were around her. Jamie could hear Lauren laughing and wanted to hit her a couple of times. But Hawkins had her down on the ground where she wasn’t able to move. “Get off me, you lug. I swear, why are you forever knocking me on my ass?”
“You have a pretty ass. I don’t think I’ve ever told you that before. And I do love you.” She tried again to get out from under him. “Be still so that I can talk. Think of this as me tying you to the chair.”
“I don’t want you to talk to me.” He kissed her; it was as consuming as it was heady. “You’ve always been good at sex, Hawkins. We have no trouble in that area.”
“No, we don’t. And I’d very much like to have no trouble at all, of any kind. I’m a fool, I’ve said that to you, but I honestly believe it. I have been whiney and a pain in the ass. Had you not pointed that out to me, quite painfully I might add, then there is no telling how long it would have been before someone else did the same thing you did. However, they would have been much harder on me.” She said that she’d been very hard on him. “I know, honey. And you want to know the truth? Yours was more from the heart, while they would have done it so that I’d learn a lesson. Yours, I think, hurt me more than any slug I could get from them. And I can’t tell you often enough how very sorry I am that you had to resort to violence to get my attention.”
“I hurt my hand. Look at it.” He took it to his mouth and licked the wounds closed. She told him that it had hurt her in her heart too. “I don’t think you can lick that and make it not hurt.”
“No, but I can work on that by loving you with all my heart.” She didn’t feel convinced, and that hurt her as well. “I’m going to bite you if you’ll allow it. I want to taste all of you, but biting you will connect us in ways that no one will ever be able to break.”
“Why didn’t you want to do that before now?” He said that he’d been an idiot. “Yes, you have, about a lot of things. And don’t think because you’ve melted my heart a little that I’m going to let you get by with this again. You’re a grown man—you should act like it more.”
“You mean like this?” Hawkins rocked his hard cock into her softness and had her moaning. “How about like this? I do love the taste of your breast, the way that it fits into my mouth so that I can bite it fully.”
“You’re not playing fairly. I’m still mad at you.”
Jamie moaned again when he tore her blouse off and lifted her bra up and over her breast. When he suckled just the tip, making her nipple feel like it was on fire, Jamie held him to her as she wished they were both naked. “I need you.”
“Yes, I need you as well, love.” He slid into her, his body taking over hers on every level. “Give me all that you have, Jamie, and I promise you with all that I am that I’ll never trample over your feelings again.”
~*~
Hawk felt like a shit. Worse than that, really. He’d made her cry, and she’d hurt herself making a point that he should have gotten long ago. Having her naked and beneath him was the best way to get her to love him again, to trust him. Probably for the first time since they’d come together.
He made love to her slowly, fully aware that they were in the yard and completely exposed to everyone and everything. But at this moment, he could care less. Hawk needed her. Needed her more than he’d ever needed anything in the world.
“You’re driving me crazy. Do something.” He laughed, feeling good about that too. It hadn’t been forced in a long time, but today, with her, it felt lighter and more him. “You remember what I did to you in the house? Well, I’m going to do so much worse to you when I get you inside.”
“You are a violent little thing, aren’t you? Who taught you to fight dirty like this? It wasn’t me.” He took her small fist into his larger hand and kissed it before showing her how to make a fist that wouldn’t break her fingers. “This is how you hit someone. Or you can use a chair leg. That might have put me out longer though.”
“I’ll remember that the next time you need your diaper changed.” He kissed her again, thinking that if he had her like this all the time, she’d never want to leave him. But as she had said, they were good at sex—it was the rest that he’d been a failure at, and he told her that. “You’re not a failure, Hawkins. Never that.”
“I was with you.” She shrugged and he kissed her again, this time showing her how much he loved her. “I’m sorry. I know that you’re sick of hearing that, but I can’t explain to you how it felt to have you leave me in the kitchen. I was in panic mode, thinking that if you left, I’d never get to hold you, to love you like you deserve. I want children with you, to see you grow large with our children and hold you to feel them.”
Hawkins kissed his way down her body, telling her with each taste of her skin what it reminded him of. His hands couldn’t be still—he touched, molded, and loved every inch of her. When he finally got to his goal, her beautiful pussy, he kissed her on each hip before he settled between her thighs.
She was wet. Not just that but soaking with her cream. Sliding his tongue through her damp curls, he tasted heaven. Burying his mouth over her, he sucked hard on her clit, then bit down hard enough to have her screaming out his name, bucking him nearly off her when she came.
“Hawkins, I’m so needy. Please, let me have all of you.”
He slid his fingers in
to her as he feasted on her. She was screaming out her releases so many times that he’d lost count. When she was crying while begging him, he moved back up her body the same way that he’d gone down it, kissing and loving every part of her.
“You’re so responsive.” Jamie told him that she needed him, begged for him to do something to take away the need. “I’m going to fill you. Then I’m going to make sure that you never want to leave me again.”
“Please, hurry. Right now I’d take about any punishment just to come hard.” Hawkins teased her pussy with his cock. However, his plan to make her beg for more backfired when her heat, her pussy, seemed to suck him into her. “Hawkins, now.”
Slamming forward, Hawkins cried out with it. It wasn’t painful, but blinding in the way that she seemed to come alive with her release. As he fucked her hard, holding her body to his as he did so, he watched her face. As she was watching him.
“Come with me, Jamie. I want you to tighten around me. Come so hard that when I bite your lovely neck, it only makes your climax better, stronger. Come now, baby.”
He nearly missed the opportunity to come with her, the sight of her tight in her release so beautiful it defied words. Leaning into her neck, feeling his cock fill just for her, he bit down at the exact moment that she screamed that she was coming again. Hawkins did as well, coming hard enough that his eyes rolled to the back of his head. He saw stars while he was there, and sparkles when he came.
She clawed at his back, and he could feel the blood as it pooled at his spine. When she came the third time in as many minutes, he came again as well, feeling as if this climax had sucked him dry and put him away damaged. Hawkins dropped over her.
Neither of them said anything for long quiet moments. He rolled to his back, taking her wilted body with his. Still no words were spoken. They both seemed to be lost, or too exhausted to move, much less talk. At least he was.
“I love you, Jamie. Will you marry me?” She raised her head and looked at him. He could see the confusion on her face. “I want you to be my wife, to marry me for richer or poorer, and beat me when I need it.”
“Oh, you can bet on that, buster.” She laid her head back down on his chest without answering him. “Were you serious about wanting children? I mean, sooner rather than later?”
“I would love a child now, but it’s your body and your decision on that.” She said that had been taken from her at some point. “You mean the ability to have children?”
“No, making the decision to have a child. It seems that we’ve already done that.” He was too relaxed to try and figure out what she was saying. Having her here with him was the greatest—
Hawkins lifted her off his chest and looked at her. The smile on her face was just as telling as her words had been.
“You’re pregnant? Are you sure? Well of course you are. Women, they know this sort of thing. You’re going to be a great mom to our kids.” Hawkins could hardly contain his excitement as he thought of her heavy with his baby. “This is the nicest gift you could have given me. You’re the—” He lifted her up again, more gently this time. “I’m going to be a father. Me. I’m going to be a father because you are a mom.”
“That’s usually the way that it works out for people that have sex all the time.” He nodded and stood up, pulling her up off the ground too. “Are we done talking about this?”
“No. I just want to get you in where it’s warmer.” She looked at the sky and back at him. “Okay, cooler then. But don’t trip on anything. Ah, the hell with it.”
Hawkins scooped her up in his arms and told her to dress. When they were both suitably clothed, he took her back to the house and through the kitchen, where the table and all the chairs were broken. He thought of the look on their cook’s face, Miss Bean, when she saw this.
“You’ll take a nap every day.” She laughed. “I’m serious. Having a baby is hard work, and I want you in good health when you have him or her. Which is it?”
“A baby.” He nodded, as if that answered his question, as he sat down on the couch with her in his lap. “Hawkins, I’m sure I’m not going to go into labor for a few months yet.”
“Yes, but I want to be sure that you’re not overdoing it. We’ll hire a nurse to come in and take care of you. She’ll have one of the rooms on the bottom floor so you can yell for her when you need something. Of course I’ll be here, but I’m always in my own—” Hawkins kissed her hand when she put it over his mouth. “I’m going overboard, I guess.”
“You think so? I will not take a nap everyday unless I feel like I need it. And you will most certainly not hire a full-time nurse. I’ll brain you if you even suggest it again.” Hawkins nodded as he kissed her hand, her fingers. Then, lifting her feet, he began to massage them. “That feels wonderful, but you’re not off the hook yet. I want you to design our baby’s nursery.”
“What?” He felt his face heat up when he remembered some of the other things that had been with his journals. “That was just for fun. While I was in a funk, which was often, I’d try to think of good things that I could do. And of course, I wrote them down so that if I ever read them again, I could tell myself that I had some good left in me. I think it was some project we had to do about filling space wisely, and the memory stuck with me.”
“I love it. And the way that you built everything out of wood is so impressive that I’d like to put it in the baby’s room. As a memento of how his dad was a good architect when he was younger.” He told her that he’d thought of that as a career when he’d been about seventeen. Then he’d met up with Lauren. “You were a good soldier, but you’re going to be a better father.”
“I will too. I mean, how can I go wrong, right? I have you in one corner keeping me in line, and my mom and dad in the other one, begging for me to let them hold our child.” Hawkins kissed her again—it was quick but heated. “Have you been to the doctor? I mean, is that how you know?”
“Jon told me. While I was hiding out from you.” Hawkins said that it must be true then. “He’s a good kid, I’m sure you know that. He told me that he’d not tell anyone where I was, but he thought I was making a mistake by not telling you about the baby.”
“You weren’t going to tell me?” She put her head on his chest and he held her. He thought about it, and knew that he might not have told him either, not the way he’d been to her. “I can understand that. I was a bastard, and what you read, that couldn’t have given you any confidence that I’d be there for you. I’m so glad that you came back to me, Jamie. I love you very much.”
“I’ve never stopped loving you, Hawkins. I was pissed at you, but I still love you.” He kissed her again as he sat her on the couch and put a blanket on her. “This shit isn’t going to be happening, buddy.”
She tore the blanket off her lap and Hawkins laughed. It came from his heart this time. He was genuinely happy. And he was no longer afraid.
Chapter 9
Marshall Pennington looked at the paperwork in front of him again. There could be no mistakes this time. If she really was his daughter, then he was going to demand that someone tell him how this had happened. She was given up for adoption, he’d been told. And nobody, not the staff or anyone else, could tell him who it was or who’d taken her to the orphanage when she’d been an infant.
“You’ve done all the checking? Background as well as financial?” His attorney, Gordon Gibson, nodded. “And this work you have here, I’m not sure what it means to her. Or for that matter, what it means period.”
“That’s what I’m trying to understand as well. They’re medical records that were traced to belong to this woman. Some of those treatments, they’re beyond my knowledge of what they might be used for. And I’m still trying to figure out why the now debunked lab had them on their computer hard drive.” Marshall had paid dearly for those to come to him. And it was still costing him trying to figure out what the hell it all meant. “I’ve got your guys looking into this now. They said that they’d have the breakdown of eac
h of the tests for you in a few days. There are a lot of them, Marshall. It won’t be rushed because you’re excited to have finally found her.”
“You really think it’s her? I mean, there have been so many since we found out about her. What makes you so sure this time?” Instead of an answer, Gordon turned the file he had to the last page. There was a photograph of a young woman that could have been the double for his mistress at the time. “Christ. And to think how much I kept her when she was fat with my child and I didn’t know it. While I never saw her, I continued to pay her rent, give her cash when she asked for it. And now, twenty-four years later, I find out that there was a child and that she’d given it up.”
Becky Simpson, his one-time lover, had died about a year ago now. While he didn’t remember much about her, and only vaguely could put her name to the pictures of her, she had remembered him, and kept up with his life. When he’d been contacted by her attorney saying that he’d been left a letter in her will, he nearly blew it off as a prank. But it had been her confession of sorts. Telling him that he had a daughter and what she’d done to it.
“She said that she did it to punish me. Had she told me then what I know now, I might well have taken better care of her. I surely would have raised my child.” Gordon nodded again, but didn’t speak this time. “When do we get to go and see her? Soon, I’m hoping.”
“Not for another week or so. The problem is, we’re waiting to figure out if she is the same woman that had been in a diner incident where she may or may not have killed someone.” He asked him why they were waiting. “If she did it out of spite or something, that’ll give us a better picture of what you might expect when you do meet her. Is she a money grubbing woman that will sell off your estate when you’re gone? Is she as flighty as your mother? You know as well as I do that the doctor said that it was a faulty gene, and could show up again.”
Hawkins_McCullough’s Jamboree_Erotic Jaguar Shapeshifter Romance Page 10