by Sasha Gold
“No, baby.”
A steady thrum of an engine rumbles and gets louder as we cross the warehouse. A plane, a sleek jet, sits just outside a huge door on the other side of the building. Workers in coveralls scurry around the plane.
“I’m taking you to the hospital in Austin.”
His mouth is a grim line, his expression resolute and suddenly I’m aware of everything. I’m in Will’s arms. We’re drawing near some sort of million-dollar plane and he’s taking me away.
“You hate leaving the ranch. I’m sure I’m fine.”
“I hate flying even more and I’m still going to fly you there myself.”
I’m so stunned that I can’t say a word. It doesn’t matter much because the plane’s engine would probably drown out my voice anyway. Will climbs the steps of the plane and sets me down on a leather seat. Everything moves so fast I can hardly keep up. I’m buckled in. He pulls the door closed and disappears into the cockpit, and the plane glides away from the hangar.
We taxi for a moment and when the plane lifts from the runway, I look out the window. The hangar, huge and painted a brilliant red, is emblazoned with huge letters. Branson Ranch Aviation. I fall back in the plush seat, too bewildered to notice much of the pain drifting through my body. I fall asleep and don’t wake until later when I’m inside an ambulance.
“Will?” I whisper, to the man putting an IV in my arm. “My husband?”
The tech nods his head. “That big cowboy? Yeah, he’s right behind us in an escort. He’s not going anywhere without you, sweetie.”
Chapter Sixteen
Will
A substantial donation to the children’s wing of St. Mathew’s might be the reason the hospital’s chief of staff oversees Rebecca’s treatment. Or maybe it’s the crazed glint in my eye. Either way, I don’t care. I just want her to get the very best care.
When I knew that I’d been appointed Ben’s guardian, the first thing I did was make sure St. Mathew’s got an annual contribution so they’d know who I was. I hoped I’d never have to bring Ben to the hospital, and fortunately I never have. In the three years I’ve cared for him, I’ve only had to take him for check-ups. Thank God, because I don’t much care for hospitals.
Rebecca doesn’t have a concussion, even though she’s a little mixed up. That’s what the first ER doc says after looking her over. The blood coming from behind her ear is from a cut, but not a bad one. And her leg isn’t broken. Her calf muscle has a nasty wound that I’m sure will need stitches, but right now they want to make sure she doesn’t have internal injuries.
The nurses help her undress and into a gown. They do all this while she lies in the bed and with the efficiency of professionals who’ve done it a hundred times. Rebecca looks so small and fragile in the hospital bed, it almost breaks my heart. The radiologist comes in and tells me he wants to do some imaging.
Alarm flares inside me. I know some stuff, like x-rays could be bad news. “My wife might be expecting.”
“We won’t x-ray her until we’ve ruled that out. X-rays would harm the fetus and the earlier in the pregnancy, the greater the risk. A sonogram is safe.”
I move to Rebecca’s side and hold her hand while they prep her for the test. The room is a beehive of activity. Even though they waived a lot of the preliminary stuff, they still need to do a lot more to admit her. My stomach clenches as I try to avoid thinking of the last time I was in the hospital. It was after the plane accident. I was in ICU for a week for my burns and injuries. The memories still make me break into a cold sweat.
“I think I’m pregnant, Will.” Her gaze is steady but surprised. “I hadn’t thought about the possibility. I assumed it would take…”
She blushes and glances around the room.
For the first time since I found her lying there bleeding beside Ben, I manage a smile. I kiss her forehead and think about how she stepped into the shower this morning to join me. She’s often still shy about sex, but then she’ll surprise me like she did at dawn.
I brush a lock of hair from her face. “You assumed what?”
“Will,” she murmurs. “Don’t say another word.”
Her protest is cut short by a sharp gasp when the radiologist applies gel to her stomach.
“Going to be a little cold,” he says sheepishly.
“Going to be?” Rebecca grumbles.
The voices of the nurses and medical staff lower to a hush. Deep in my chest a dull ache squeezes my heart. I can hardly breathe. What if the sonogram shows a pregnancy, but Rebecca’s bleeding internally? Would she lose the baby?
It seems everyone’s attention is directed at the machine, but I only have eyes for Rebecca.
A nurse pokes her head into to the room. “Sir, we have Dr. Bower for surgery.”
“We’re going to know here in just a minute. I don’t suspect internal bleeding, but I’m going to confirm that.” The nurse waits in the doorway, checking her watch. The room grows quiet again. The only sounds I hear are from the staff talking in the hallways. A cart rumbles past, pushed by an orderly. The sound fades.
“Internal looks good. Let’s see if the stork is going to make an appearance anytime soon.”
And then, a murmur of surprise moves through the cluster of staff. Rebecca’s lips lift with a smile.
“Here we go,” the radiologist says. “That little spot is junior.”
Everyone stares at the screen. A small form floats inside a dark, inky lake in the middle of the screen. A tiny flash draws my attention. When it flashes again I watch. Transfixed. And then I realize it’s a pulse, or maybe a heartbeat. The tiny, shapeless form has a heartbeat. The idea tilts my universe. I’m looking at a baby. Our baby.
I look down at Rebecca. This woman is my mate, my love, my heart. I remember the lust that ignited inside me when I first laid eyes on her. Now I feel something so much deeper I can’t possibly find words for the feeling. Lust, yes. Always. But something more. Something deeper and primitive. Rebecca’s carrying my child, but even if she weren’t pregnant, I know without a doubt I’d die for her.
“Yup, that’s a future ankle-biter.” The doctor turns to face us. “That’s good, right?”
I can’t speak. All I can do is nod to him, but Rebecca answers for both of us.
“Yes.” She lifts her gaze to meet mine. “It’s very good.”
Epilogue
Two Years Later
Rebecca
It’s not fair to say that Will hates theme parks. The most accurate description is that he hates them a little less with every trip. We’ve visited three times, and while he complains about the spinning teacups after the fifth round, he’ll indulge Ben in bumper cars all day.
I watch, holding our daughter and wave when either of them whiz by. Will drives the car past, giving me his this-is-going-to-cost-you look before he chases after Ben. Pearl rests her head on my shoulder. She needs a nap in the worst way, but she’s fighting to stay awake. She’ll nap for Daddy. The minute he settles her in his arms she’ll be out like a light.
Will is the whisperer of cranky toddlers.
When the ride comes to an end, Will grimaces. The cars are too small for him and it’s almost comical to see him get to his feet. He and Ben share a smile and they emerge from the ride, arguing who is the better driver.
Pearl reaches for Will, who lifts her from my arms without breaking his stride. She melts against him, closing her eyes and smiling sleepily.
Our daughter was born in the middle of a stormy night almost a year and a half ago. Will worried about her coming early and booked a suite at a hotel, two weeks before her due date. As close as we were to the hospital, she still was almost born on the way. Fifteen minutes after getting admitted, she arrived.
Both Will and I worried that there might be something wrong, but the doctor just laughed. He said that in all his years of delivering babies, the ones that came fast were always just fine.
The babies born in the back seat of a taxi are always healthy as a hors
e…
His words soothed the dark fear that neither Will nor I ever voiced. Not once during the pregnancy had we spoken the words aloud, the possibility that the baby had been harmed when I was knocked down by the wild mustang. Little Pearl was perfect, in every way.
It seems like yesterday that she was a newborn and now, here we are visiting Disney with a little girl that’s just learning to talk.
Later that night, after we’ve eaten dinner and enjoyed a show, Will helps me settle the children in their rooms. This is Will’s favorite time of the day, the quiet moments where he and Ben talk about what they’d done, or their plans for the next day. After, he’ll rock Pearl, and he’ll have the same conversation. What they’d done and what they would do the next day.
For a long time the conversations with Pearl were one-sided, or course. Now, at sixteen months, she has a few dozen words, so there’s a little more back and forth. I love to listen to them talk, the soft murmur of voices in the evening’s hush.
She’s tired. Ben made her laugh all throughout dinner. He’d plucked a banana from the fruit basket on the dinner table, pretended it was a telephone and he was calling to talk to Pearl Branson. Pearl thinks everything her brother does is hilarious and she’s so worn out she can hardly mumble a few replies to her father’s comments.
Sometime later, Will comes to bed, settles behind me and wraps me in a sheltering embrace. He presses against me. I feel his arousal and wriggle even though I’m only half-awake. A low rumble moves through his chest while he trails kisses along my neck.
“You better stop that, Becca.”
“Or.” A soft laugh escapes my lips, ending with a shiver when he cups my breast.
“I’ll lock the door and do unspeakable things to you.”
I don’t get a chance to give him a teasing reply because he’s out of bed before he’s finished his last word. Crossing the room, he passes through a swathe of moonlight that gilds his powerful frame in silvery light. His immense shoulders, banded with thick muscles flex as he strides to the door.
There’s a soft click and he’s back, prowling across the bed and coming to a stop over me, like a huge, predatory beast. His hand clasps my gown and tugs it over my head. Next, he loops his thumbs through my panties and pulls them from my hips and down the length of my legs, tossing them aside. Sometime later, I’ll have to search the room for my lost clothing. When he discards my panties and gown they can end up anywhere in room.
“Beautiful girl,” he murmurs, lowering to nuzzle my neck.
I let my hands drift across the span of his back. His broad muscular shoulders ripple with power.
“Hotel sex?” I whisper.
He chuckles.
The notion of “hotel sex” is the joke we share about having wild sex while we’re on vacation. We always have our children in the hotel suite with us, so it’s not something we’ve explored. Yet. I’ve always told Will I’m afraid of being alone with him in a hotel room and he’s always responded with a wicked grin and a smack on my ass.
He’s big and powerful and from the beginning, the very first moment when I met him, I sensed he worked to keep his restraint with me. He treats me like something fragile and delicate. Often, when he pulls me into his arms at night, he calls me his doll. While I’m not truly afraid of being alone with him, I’m aware of a rough, savage side of him, one he doesn’t show me.
He moves lower, trailing kisses along my chest and pausing at my breasts, where he teases me with soft fluttery kisses. Soon I’m writhing beneath him. To torment me, he deliberately keeps from kissing my sensitive nipples. He knows how much I crave this. The way he works his hot mouth over me, has made me come, too many times to count.
It’s astonishing to me. Before I met Will, I’d never known pleasure, not like what he’s shown me. I always thought there was something wrong with me. That I was deficient in something. A hormone or some elemental thing my body needed. Will always assures me it’s completely true, that what I needed was Vitamin W. A daily dose.
“Please, Will.”
He gives into my pleading and his hot mouth sears my taut nipple. I arch beneath him. I’d like to thread my fingers through his hair, and hold him to my breasts, but he won’t allow me and stops me by lacing his fingers through mine.
I whimper as he strokes me with his tongue. He could make me come like this, but I can tell he won’t. He’s got something else in mind. By the time he moves down my stomach and nudges my thighs apart with his shoulders, I’m mindless with need.
The first stroke of his tongue tears a cry from my mouth. I thrash beneath him. Wild. With each intimate caress, he proves to me that I belong to him. Barely able to breathe as he slowly drives me to a shattering release.
When I come, it’s with a soft, keening cry. Pleasure rushes through my senses.
He moves up my body, taking his time, kissing a trail as he goes, and telling me how perfect I am. When he wraps his arm around my waist, he enters me with a primitive rumble. The orgasm he just gave me has hardly dissipated when a new pleasure tightens my body.
Gripping his hips with my thighs, I cling to him as he takes me hard. The bed creaks and with an especially hard thrust, the headboard crashes against the wall. Will stops. My body hums with need and desire, but I can’t hold back a small giggle.
“Shit, that was loud,” he mutters.
“You’re kind of rough on beds, Will. Remember the bed at the Dolphin?”
I’m squirming beneath him because, despite my teasing, I don’t want him to stop. At all. I can almost feel him shift from passionate lover to protective father and just as I could have predicted, he leaves me in the bed to make sure we didn’t wake the children.
“Will,” I say, petulantly. “They’re fine. A band could march through our suite and they’d keep sleeping.”
“If they wake up, they might be scared. They might forget where they are.”
He grabs a robe and stalks to the bedroom door. Opening it a few inches he listens for any sign of disturbance. The suite is palatial. White marble and soaring ceilings. Sound travels through the large spaces. But it’s silent. Slowly he closes the door, turns the lock and returns to our bed.
“Get off,” he commands.
Will has a few tricks for keeping hotel beds from making noise. Usually they call for pillows shoved between headboards and the wall. He’s always mad about having to rearrange our sleeping area to accommodate our nighttime activities. Usually there’s a little trial and error.
Tonight, he doesn’t want to figure out a solution. He simply fixes it with brute force, lifting the four-poster bed, like it’s no more than a cot and pulling it a foot or so away from the wall.
“This bed better not hit the wall now,” he mutters.
I can make out the fierce desire on his features. He lifts me into his arms and sets me on the bed near the head of the bed. Positioning me on my knees, he coaxes me forward and puts my hands on the top of the headboard.
I let out a soft gasp of surprise. I love when he takes me like this, but it always shocks me. The position seems so primitive. There’s something about being held in his grip that makes me feel both helpless and incredibly aroused. I never last long.
“Beast,” I whisper.
“Beauty,” he replies and adds a sharp smack.
I yelp and jerk in his grip.
“I can’t resist swatting this sweet ass.”
He nudges my knees apart and rubs himself against my slick core. With a hard thrust, I’m impaled. Every stroke, completely controlled by him, sends a shudder of hot pleasure through me. A brush of his hands over my flank, added to a squeeze of my nipple, draws a cry from my lips.
I’m too short for this position. Usually we set pillows under me, but this time both of us forgot. He loops his arm around my waist and lifts so I’m exactly where he wants me. I’m powerless to do anything but to submit to him. My grip on the headboard tightens. Small cries fall from my lips. A nip on my shoulder spikes my please and whe
n he lowers his chest to my back, I know I’m close.
“I’m not your doll,” I whisper. “Not when you fuck me.”
A snarl is his only response. He drives into me harder. The bed groans beneath the onslaught.
My head falls back and he bites my neck, sucks me and kisses me with savageness he rarely shows. I begin to fall. Or is it soar? Or both? Release is a breath away. Maybe two. In the last instant of sanity, I call his name, “Mr. Branson.”
He snarls at the sound of his surname. I almost never offer a dirty word or phrase. For me, this is new territory.
“I’m your ragdoll,” I breathe.
My orgasm rips through my body. I manage to keep the scream inside me, quieted to no more than a whimper. He pounds into me. Savage. I feel him drop his restraint as he takes me harder than he ever has before. A snarl erupts from deep inside his chest as comes an instant after me.
Weak and utterly spent, I let go of the head board. He’s still deep inside me but manages to lower both of us to the bedding. He cradles me against his hard body.
The room darkens as a cloud blocks the moonlight in the night sky. Our breathing slows and the room grows hushed as our pleasure ebbs.
He nuzzles my neck. “Naughty girl, telling me those things with our children just down the hall.”
“Serves you right. Making me get on my knees.”
“You’re beautiful. Perfect. Let me buy you something.”
I sigh as a feeling of bliss settles over me. This again. Will likes to buy me outrageous pieces of jewelry. He’s become an expert on diamonds and gems and pearls too.
“Anything I want?”
“Anything. You know how much I love you, sweetheart.” His voice holds an edge of need. There’s an urgency there that comes over his words when he tells me how much he loves me. I know he’s afraid of something happening to one of us. I should feel terrible for gently teasing him when he shows this side of himself to me, but I want him to fall asleep with happy thoughts. Not worry.
I turn in his arms and cup his jaw. His stubble scrapes my palm. “I want four pair of Mickey ears.”