by Angel Payne
“Unnhhh.” It’s a visceral reaction, glugging out before I can help it. I clutch my husband’s ankle tighter, wishing I didn’t pick now to realize I’ve never told him about my fixation with his sexy-as-hell leg hairs. It’s always just seemed so silly—only now, in this purposefully helpless state he’s surrendered himself to be in, I feel like he needs to know. I love you, Reece Richards—down to your beautiful, all-man leg hairs. But out loud, I say the next thing on my mind. “Guys. Sheez. Is it really necessary to lock him down like a tranquilized animal or someth—”
“Yes.” The group consensus, given in resounding unity, even includes my husband’s voice.
Reece adds, “Now’s your chance to call me a stubborn ox and really mean it, baby.”
“Or just a hard-headed fucker.”
Sawyer’s line, along with his presence, can’t be more perfectly timed. He adds an encouraging smirk while standing next to me, clamping a reassuring grip around Reece’s other ankle—until my husband jerks his head up and impales the guy with a silver glower.
“Hey!”
“What?” Sawyer’s scowl is just as intense.
“Clean up the language around my kid,” Reece barks back. “Or there’ll be a permanent dent in your crotch the size of my ankle.”
A spurt of laughter bursts from my sister, waiting along the wall next to Angelique and Neeta. They’ve come to support their guys as much as me, but I take this moment to lavish my husband’s ankle—and its insanely arousing hairs—with strokes of wifely approval.
Letting him know I’m here.
Letting him know I’m not leaving him.
Letting him know that the electric invasion and the slam of pain and the journey to hell will be worth it. That though his mind and body are going to be controlled and corralled by others again, this whole team is worth it. That this cause has been worth everyone’s sacrifices.
That once the guys get the information on those files decoded, we’re going to see inside the Consortium as we never have before.
We’re going to finally have the upper hand in this damn war.
And our child will know a world where superheroes only champion peace.
I pray for this with every cell in my body and force in my soul.
I believe it.
I have to.
I have no other choice.
Hours later, sometime in the night when the loudest sounds on the ridge are the dancing crickets and the canyon winds, the man’s all about stripping me of choices once again.
Only this time, the abdication promises to be a tad more fun.
About seven and half inches worth of “a tad.”
Reece curls behind me, rustling the sheets and pillows of our bed, turning even those silken shooshes into erotic foreplay with his steady, seductive movements. Not that my libido needs any more encouragement in that department. He had me at the hello of his swollen, persistent length, every inch pressing along the crevice between my ass cheeks.
I’m barely done processing the shudders from that incessant caress against my backside, as well as the tingles it sends through every nerve ending between my pussy and my toes, when the breathtaking bastard goes for some new moves. With the hand he’s curled beneath me, he palms and then kneads through my sleep shirt—really his old Imagine Dragons concert shirt—making my nipples jab hard at the thin cotton barrier between my skin and his.
A high sigh tumbles from my lips.
A low growl rumbles from his.
With an even deeper sound of pleasure, he drags his other hand up my leg, his fingernails scraping along my knee and thigh. He doesn’t stop until traveling his touch past the band of my undies, making enticing circles along my quivering and clenching skin…taking a slow and enticing route for one specific destination…
“Velvet?” His rasp is barely audible, even though he issues it along the bottom curve of my ear.
“Hmmmm.” I barely restrain myself from moaning out all of it. “Uhhh…yeah?”
“You awake?”
I let out a soft giggle. “Guess I am now. Ohhhh!” I buck my hips as he swipes his long, graceful fingers between the quivering folds at my apex. The layers that are already slick and plumped…wet and pulsing…
“Holy God. I can almost taste you on the air, little Bunny.” He works two digits through my lust-drenched center, parting me so he can use a third finger to thrust inside me. “You’re dripping already…”
“Mmmmm.” With a mewl, I rock wantonly against him. I almost forget that I don’t have the same girlish figure he made love to in that lifeguard shack on the Redondo sand. Almost. “How can I not be?” I roll my hips, purposely working my sex up and down the decadent rods of his fingers. “That feels…so good. You feel…so damn good.”
“Not as good as you.” He’s left the whisper behind, growling with lusty purpose right into the center of my ear. “Not nearly as good as you, my sweet Velvet. Fuck. Fuck, how I’ve missed you.”
I resort to a growl myself—though my intent is different than his. “Language, Mr. Richards!”
He chuckles from low in his throat before biting my earlobe. “I have special amnesty, Mrs. Richards.”
“Excuse the hell out of me?” I retort. “From who?” Though I already have a damn good idea what he’s going to say.
“The emperor himself.” He lowers the hand on my breast to sprawl across my stomach, pushing up the shirt to rub me affectionately. “We have an understanding already, you see.”
“An understanding?” I half laugh it. “Is that so?”
“Very so.” While continuing his caresses across my belly button, he intensifies his strokes deep in my pussy, clearly pursuing his master plan of turning me into a preggo version of worm-on-a-string. Can I be blamed? He’s slowly taking me over, from the inside of my clenching womb to the outer lips of my pouting, pulsing sex. He’s my damn string. My magical, sensual miracle. “We had a talk,” he goes on in a knowing murmur. “And he understands now that when Daddy hasn’t gotten to hold or kiss Mommy for two weeks, words come out of Pop’s mouth that simply can’t be controlled.”
I’m breathing hard. My eyes slide shut as I drown in all the lush cadences of his dark, intoxicating voice. “Th-That so?” I manage to blurt.
“Oh, that’s very so.” He slides his lips up and down my neck, sending shimmers of hypnotizing lust along my shuddering, dazzled form. When I pull my eyes open again, the room is spinning around us: the walls are a kaleidoscope of electric blue and dynamite gold mixed with flashes of white light I don’t understand, nor want to. I only know it has to be the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen…the most stunning, surreal experience of my life.
I’m so swept away, I can’t even be bothered by self-consciousness over my changed body. Right now, I’m just the golden ball at the center of this regal vortex of light, a goddess emboldened enough to say, “So…what else might come out of Daddy that can’t be controlled?”
Reece’s reaction is even better than what I’ve planned for. After his initial choke of sensual shock, he slides his hand away from my pussy—in order to twist a fierce hold on the fabric of my panties and shove them down my legs. Once they’re past my knees, he seizes them in a determined toehold, thwicking them past the tips of my toes. While his insanely talented foot is busy, so are his lascivious hands. After shoving up the shirt to my neck, he yanks it all the way off.
And I’m free.
Naked for him.
Bared for him.
Trembling and torrid and hot and eager for him.
And now, sizzling and flaring for him—as he drops his mouth into the curve between my shoulder and neck, and bites me with blatant, bold intent…with primal, brutal possession.
“You really want to know what I can’t control around you, Mrs. Richards?”
His snarl is the electrified magma I’ve missed so much—but in so many ways, there’s a new force inside me. It’s not just my senses that recognize him now. I feel his heat in the cen
ter of my spirit, through every strand of my soul—and acknowledge it in every syllable from my parted, gasping lips. “Tell me,” I beg, emphasizing with wanton slides of my ass and thighs—now slickened by the liquid that’s seeped through the crotch of his track pants. “No.” I reach back and grab at his waistband, which frees his hot, full erection. “Show me.”
“Oh, fuck.”
I’m beyond even attempting a joke about the profanity now as the man digs his hand so hard into my hip, his fingers are like claws. His breaths, erupting in vicious huffs along my shoulder, flow like scalding Santa Ana winds across my torso, making my nipples stiffen and strain.
“That may be happening sooner rather than later, beautiful. Damn!” His snarl bursts as his cockhead naturally aligns itself between my throbbing lips, nudging inside the tunnel that’s been empty of his force for too damn long. The juncture of our bodies turns into some kind of glowing canyon from an intergalactic war movie—except that the only sensation I’m sure of, as he enters me in one steady, sure slide, is complete and consuming peace.
Even as he swells inside me, stretching me everywhere…
Peace.
Even as all his electrons blend with my cream, rocking me with an orgasm that causes the room to spin again…
Peace.
Even as he starts the primitive pounding that keeps time to the boundless rhythm of our mutual heartbeats…
Peace.
Connecting us.
Completing us.
Binding us with more light and love than has ever tied us together before…
And more desire.
And more need.
And more heat and hunger and…
“Ahhhh!” I toss my head back, slamming it against his chest, as my body convulses in another wave of fire, flight, and fulfillment. My buttocks squeeze in, my thighs tremble, my clit blazes, and my senses detonate. “Oh, holy shit! Are you doing this to me again already, Zeus? Shiiiiit…”
“Uh, uh, uh.” The damnable owner of that miracle penis is actually sing-songing the words into my neck—without missing a single slide of the scissoring strokes he’s using to unwrap my senses, ribbon by exquisite ribbon. “Language, Mrs. Richards.”
“Fuck you!” I cry. “No. Just keep fucking me!”
“With serious fucking pleasure.” No more sing-song. He’s growling against my skin, locking me to him by sliding his hand from my hip to the plane between my breasts. As he presses into that valley, my nipples stretch and tauten to painful points of arousal. I welcome the tiny bites into my senses, needing them for my sanity. I swear to God, if this man gives me too much more pleasure, I might become a rocket in my own right. If the swirling lights around the room are any indication, I’m probably already beaming brightly enough for the task. If this is what all the manuals mean by the glow of pregnancy, no wonder everyone calls it the best experience ever.
“Ohhhh, my freaking God. Th-That’s good. Like that. Now d-d-deeper. Harder, Reece. Take me harder with that wand of fucking heaven between your legs!”
“Christ.”
He punches out a gruff sound, a combination of laughter and something else—amazement?—while meeting my demand with carnal, scream-worthy perfection. Dear God. Every one of his coordinated hip rolls, ensuring I feel every angle of every thrust, is a direct gift from the universe. Every slide of his sweaty body along mine, forming us into one creature instead of two, is a reminder of why I was put here into this crazy existence. To be his. To make him mine. To remind every molecule in the cosmos of what passion really is…of what love can truly be. Of the light it can truly wield, if it’s given permission to be free and wild and embraced and trusted.
“Holy hell, Mrs. Richards.” His voice resonates with a third factor now. Pure wonder. “You are one wicked woman, Emmalina Richards.”
“Damn straight, Reece Richards.” I reach back and twist one hand into his damp, thick hair. “And you love me that way.”
“I worship you that way.” He glides his hand back down, curving his long, amazing fingers across the small hill of my belly. “I worship you this way.” Unbelievably, as he sweeps his powerful touch across that stretched expanse, his cock discernibly expands against my inner walls. “Holy fuck. You have no damn idea how glorious you really are right now, do you? How I want your golden, ripe body to just keep suckling on my dick? How I want to stay inside you forever, giving you more of my white-hot seed? How much I want to give you load after load of my come as your tight sugar walls flutter around me?”
Oh, holy shit. There’s no better soundtrack on earth than this man and his finest slut-guy talk. He’s pouring it on thick and hard because he knows how much I revel in it like a kitten in the sun—but in this moment, the gutter gab is rendering a totally different result. I can no more stop it than I can deny it. Knowing I still turn him on like this, though it feels like I’m becoming huger by the hour, guts me to profound and wrenching depths. The tears that flow out are filled with too many emotions to identify. I simply let them come, a confession and a concession and an ultimate exposure, offering them openly from my soul to his.
As they do, I wrap my hands atop his and grip him like he’s my life raft—because he is. I cry for him like he’s my confessor—because he is. And I climax like he’s the comet that’s torn open my star—because he is.
As he goes still inside me, his cock bursting with its perfect heat while he surrenders to a long, low groan, I bear down tighter. I compel my walls to hold him as tight and close inside as I possibly can. I cushion him like the most perfect hunk hero husband on the face of this spinning ball called our planet…
Because he is.
So many minutes later—or is it hours, and do I even care?—Reece finally stirs a little behind me. “Mmmmph!” I snort in protest, tugging his arm to keep him wrapped tight and clenching everything down below to try to keep him embedded right where he is there, as well.
“Greedy wench,” he accuses, nuzzling my nape before trailing a string of kisses over to the sensitive column beneath my ear.
“Yeah, yeah,” I volley. “And you love me that way.”
“And I worship you that way.”
The exchange makes me hope we’re already ramping up for more—God knows, my Reece-starved body could use another dunk in his desire—but the second he caresses my belly and palms one of my breasts again, he suddenly stops.
“Okay, so how long did you let me sleep after the download was done?” he prompts. “Because I don’t know a lot of shit about how the baby-growing stuff is supposed to happen, but I do know these fine, fine tits—and they were different when I got home last night. Or…was it…”
“You’ve only been asleep for about seven hours, my love.”
As soon as he finishes with his puzzled grunt—expected—and clutching his grip on my mound a little tighter—also expected—I calmly go on.
“Remember when I said we’d be talking?”
“Hrrrmmm. Vaguely.” He lazily thumbs my nipple, working it into a stiff, aching bud. “Guess I just thought the ‘talking’ part would come once it was time to get up and make coffee.”
“What? You wanted to make other things right now?”
“Like whoopie?” He joins his deep chortle to my giggle, circling his hips to emphasize that the dorky slang comes with serious intent. “Or…nookie?”
I laugh so hard, it takes stuffing my face into a pillow to muffle the burst. “Sorry,” I offer from the muffled depths of the cushion, “but you did this to yourself, mister. Nookie?”
“What?”
He’s adorable in his earnestness, which still defines the rugged beauty of his features as I maneuver around to face him. “I’m not sure whether to kiss you senseless or order you downstairs to fetch me some Oreos.”
His brows do Spiderman-worthy leaps. “We have Oreos in the house?” Then crouch just as impressively. “Does Anya know?”
His reference to our part-time chef, who milks her own goats and knows a hundred
soybean recipes by heart, actually gets my indulgent smile in response. At times, Anya’s enjoyed her gig for LA’s Superhero Stud a little too much, but she has mellowed on the Reece crush since meeting a sexy yoga teacher at Burning Man. Thank God. “She certainly does, but she knows better than to say anything to the feisty pregnant girl,” I supply.
One corner of his mouth quirks up, and I get the feeling he’s about to jab a fist into the air in approval. Instead, he kicks back the covers and tugs up his track pants. “In that case, Bolt-alicious Mama, I’ll be right back.”
As soon as he’s dashed out the door and is padding downstairs to the kitchen, I chuckle—though finish with a resigned sigh. It’s best I get up, as well. It really is better that we talk sooner than later, and doing it over Oreos will make the conversation feel normal. Whatever “normal” even means at this point.
Five minutes later, my husband stands at the door of the upstairs office, where I’ve wandered. He is such a fantasy vision, I almost wonder if I’m still back in bed, having fallen into a dream. If that’s the case, nobody better wake me up. The man is shirtless, burnished, and bearing a tray with three loaded bowls: Oreos, strawberries, and whipped cream. Along with the food are two champagne flutes filled with milk.
I can’t think of a better celebratory snack.
And oh yeah, the food looks awesome too.
He looks tasty enough to lick, even though his face falls into a confused frown. At once, I know why. The office isn’t so much an office anymore. The desk is already gone, having been moved by Sawyer and Alex yesterday, and half the contents of the filing cabinets have been emptied, thanks to Angie and Lydia. Along the wall, we’ve separated things into two boxes, labeled Storage or Shredding. The framed Ansel Adams prints have been carefully removed from the walls and wait next to their padded storage boxes against the far wall.
As Reece slides the tray onto the glass-topped coffee table, he mutters, “What’s this all about?”
“The team is moving forward with the nursery,” I fill in. After throwing him a gaze that confirms his god status for bringing the food, I gesture around the room with a strawberry. “I had to make an executive decision, circumstances being what they are, and figured you’d agree this was the best place for Bean’s nursery.”