by Dani Wyatt
I blow some air up toward my eyes where my hair covers my face like Cousin It, then bring both hands over to my face to try to create order out of the strands unwilling to fall into place, especially after Beckett twisted his fingers in it for two hours last night.
I’ve found that I love having my hair pulled. And my ass spanked. And a few other combinations of pain and pleasure. I’m as surprised as anyone that I love it all so much. But, it’s him. That calm, dominant beast I see in him turns me into something I’d never imagined before.
I love having him pull my hair. Especially when he is behind me, inside me and in complete charge of me. Relinquishing control makes me hum and lose myself, and sometimes that is just what a girl needs. A good man with a big cock and just enough of the right kind of pain to make it all the more intense. It makes me smile just thinking about him.
“Beck?” My sleepy whisper turns to a soft yell because now I’m panicking that he might be gone.
“Beck!”
“Babe, I’m right here.” My heart slows down as he comes in the door of the loft. “I was just checking out the building, making sure no one decided to set up a meth lab or start a chop shop.”
He flashes me that devious smile that always makes me feel like everything is going to be okay. For a moment I relax; the morning feels new and watching him walk toward me always makes my tummy do deliciously flip-floppy things.
How can a walk be so dang sexy? I don’t know. But his gives me the special tingles. He has this cadence. He dips down with his left step just a bit more than his right. His strides are long. Solid. Like he knows exactly where each step is supposed to fall. He takes my breath away.
But the moment of bliss is short-lived. As reality seeps into the sleepy first minutes of the day, my heart remembers and suddenly I feel sick. What kind of sister am I to forget the most important thing in my life for even one fucking moment?
Jordan.
In my mind's eye, I can see his stick-straight, blond hair, his skin that matches mine, his effervescent gleaming smile that even our shitty childhood couldn’t stomp out.
Why him? Why now? Just when I finally thought we both had our happy endings. I’d relaxed, believed in happily-ever-after when I shouldn’t have trusted it. He doesn’t deserve this. If ever there was a pure soul on this earth, it’s my brother. For all the hardship and bullshit life has shoved down his throat, he’s stayed sweet. Kind. He still believes in happiness and that people can be good.
“Good morning, baby.” Beckett braces two hands on the bed, locks his elbows and leans over, forming two perfect indents with the solid weight of his torso. He kisses me on the forehead, then the top of my head, then both cheeks like it's some sort of ritual. “How’s my girl?”
Such simple words. But they can have such an effect on me. Every morning he says the same thing and every morning I fall in love with him all over again.
“Fine.” As soon as I say the word I cringe and go red because I know it was a mistake.
Beckett pulls back to glare playfully at me. The left corner of his lips pulls up into a reluctant smile, the light catching the peaks of the textured scars there.
“I mean, I’m worried. I’m not feeling bad, but I can’t stop thinking about Jordan.”
Beckett taught me quickly that when he asks a question, it's real. Those filler words that people use as answers, they're not acceptable. When he asks how I am, he wants to know how I am. When I dismiss him with ‘fine’ or ‘whatever’ not only is it insulting to him, it comes with a minimum of a firm few swats to my fanny.
Not that I mind.
“Me too, babe. I’m working on it. We need to get you something to eat, get organized and get down to see Northrup.” He takes a seat on the edge of the bed. “I can go alone if you’d rather stay here.” He leans down on an elbow as my eyes soak in the way the muscles and tendons in his forearm ripple.
“No, I want to go. It would be worse just sitting here. I almost wish I was back at work. Almost.”
“Babe, if you want to go back to work, you go back. I know they miss you there. That card they sent was something else.”
Bruce must have organized it, but every resident of Windfield had signed the card. It was the size of poster board and featured caricatures of us, standing in our wedding day best, while hundreds of tiny people gathered around our feet, throwing ropes up like we were the giant in Gulliver’s Travels.
“I miss Bruce.” I lift my hand and set it on his arm, unable to stop myself from tracing the lines and indents of the sinuous muscles that move and flex. It’s my Kryptonite.
If I were wearing panties right now, they’d be wet. Just looking at his hands and his forearms does it every time.
“Call him.” Beckett bounces off the bed, reaches over to grab my phone off the nightstand and holds it out to me. I shift and sit up against the mass of pillows behind me.
“I can’t go back to work yet. There's no way I could concentrate, and that wouldn't be fair to the residents.”
My fingers brush his and that familiar jolt of magic rushes over my skin at low voltage. He stands over me, smiling in a way that only he can, and I want to tear his clothes off right now.
He’s usually the one with the off switch that's out-of-order, but the last few days it’s been me. Given everything else that's on my mind right now it feels inappropriate, but there seems to be a near constant purring between my legs.
I take the phone and lean my head back, admiring him. He’s wearing the same soft, worn denim shirt he had on that day when he rescued me from the two men in the building across the street. The jeans riding low on his hips have been well broken in. All I want is to let my tongue follow the valleys of the ‘V’ shape down to where I can see the bulge grow in his crotch.
“Breakfast,” he says, seeing the look in my eye. “You get me started and we will not get to Northrup by nine.”
He spins on a heel and I stare down at my phone.
“French toast is on the menu. Coffee or juice?” he asks as he strides toward the kitchen.
I hear the clank of a skillet meet the cast iron burner on the industrial stove and a loud sizzle as he throws a glob of butter onto the hot surface. Usually, the smell of cooking is even better when I can watch him do it. But today it feels different. The scent of butter browning and coffee brewing makes my stomach do an unpleasant flip and it takes me a moment to reply.
“Coffee,” I mutter as I tap the screen on my phone, pulling up Bruce’s number but I don’t know what to say, so I just put the phone back down.
The smell of the French Toast gets stronger as Beck strides over and puts the mug of coffee next to the lamp on the nightstand.
“Here you go, babe.”
The next second my stomach turns again and that's it. My hand flies to cover my mouth as I bounce out of the bed and barely make it into the bathroom before I’m heaving into the commode. Shit.
I’m covered in a sheen of sweat. Naked, because that’s how Beckett prefers me to be when we are here alone, and barfing like nobody’s business when he bursts into the bathroom behind me. His hands gather my hair and he crouches down next to me.
You know you’ve crossed into something deep when your man holds your hair back and wants to be next to you while you vomit. I wish he wasn’t seeing me like this, but in the same moment, I need him here. Soothing me. In sickness and in health, right?
I huff and my head buzzes as I cough and retch. I'm reaching around for a towel, but Beckett is there handing me a cool washcloth.
“Babe.” His voice is thick with concern as he crouches beside me. “What the hell was that? You need to go to the doctor, like now.”
“No!” I only just get the word out before the lights start to dim and I grab for the closest thing, which turns out to be the toilet seat. I gag again, shaking my hand like it’s covered in fire ants.
“Babe.” Beckett puts the back of his hand over his lips and I see that look in his eyes. “Yes, you are going t
o a doctor.”
I gasp air. “It’s just stress. It’s just everything going on. I mean, one day I’m getting married, the next day my brother is missing and my mom.” I take a breath, calming my stomach, gulp hard. “And the mom that abandoned me comes back from the grave, then the next day she’s OD’d and now she’s on a ventilator in the hospital and I’m listed as her next of kin.” I let it out in one long breath before shifting onto my knees and realizing just how much I’ve had to process in the last forty-eight hours. It’s amazing I’m still conscious.
“Maybe it's just stress, that would make sense. But my number one job in this world is taking care of you, Promise. And when you bolt like the damn Roadrunner and throw up, that falls in my wheelhouse. So we are not going to argue about it. You’re going to the doctor.”
I bite my lip and crunch up my nose because I can see the look on his face and I know he’s not going to budge on this. But anxiety rears its ugly head and I need to tell him something.
“I’m deathly afraid of doctors.” I feel my head clear and I start to stand.
I take a step toward the sink, turning the water on, soaping my hands and then splashing my face.
“I’ll be with you, babe. Nothing to be afraid of.”
“I mean,” I give him an exaggerated nod before I continue, “like, I’ve not been to a doctor in years. The last one was when—after the—” I swallow the lump in my throat. “After the thing.”
“Seriously?” Beck raises his eyebrows, stretching the deep furrow of the scar from the broken glass that cuts right through over his right eye.
“Seriously. They tried to force me to have an exam—pelvic—when I finally told them what had happened.” For a second, I think about the other doctor I have seen since then, but quickly push it out of my memory. That's not the same thing. Not the same sort of doctor.
I watch Beckett’s face tense; he takes a quick look at the ceiling, pulling his lips back tight over his teeth, then looks down at me, laying his hands on my shoulders as I turn to face him.
I push forward. “I couldn’t do it. I was already so humiliated. Then Jeremy came and took me to the hospital. They started asking me all these questions; they didn’t even tell me what was going to happen. They just pulled out those metal things from the bottom of the table and told me to put my feet in them . . . and open my legs . . . and—” The memory has me clutching my chest, remembering the terror it caused to have strangers standing around impatiently waiting for me to expose myself with Jeremy looking on. I wipe away a buildup of cold sweat.
Beckett pulls me against him. “It’s okay. Okay.” His voice sooths over me as my heart pounds and my face flushes.
A phone rings, breaking through the comfort of just being held, a reminder of all the clouds hanging over us right now.
“Go.” I nod impatiently. “Please, go answer it.” My voice shakes.
Beck looks at me then out toward the open loft and doesn’t move.
“Please answer it,” I plead, my hands push on the hard muscle of his chest. “It could be Jordan.”
He breathes out. “Sit down. I’ll see who that is, then I'll bring you some water.”
Beckett guides me to the big soft chair in the bathroom, then sets another kiss on the top of my head before striding quickly out.
I watch his head cock to one side, trying to locate the ringing, then he steps toward the kitchen where his phone rests on top of a pile of unopened mail.
“Hello.” I can't make out any more words, but I can hear his voice rising until he turns and looks at me, and I hear him say, “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
I barely make it back to the toilet before my stomach comes up again.
Beckett
“I want to go see my mom,” she says before I can catch my breath.
But I don’t care about anything else right now.
“That shit can wait. Northrup can wait.” I march into the loft huffing and puffing, shutting down her little fit before it gets off the ground.
I just ran six blocks down and back to the nearest drug store and my lungs are on fire as I make my way back into the loft. I throw my jacket over the weight bench, holding the small paper bag in my teeth.
The phone call earlier was from the hospital. Holly woke up. The woman apparently has the constitution of a cockroach.
She not only woke up, she pulled out her IVs, her feeding tube and all that shit. Then she left the hospital. A few hours before we came by, they'd removed the ventilator and she'd been breathing on her own. Apparently she briefly opened her eyes, but that was it.
So in about five hours, she’d turned from half vegetable into Wonder Woman. She’s gone AWOL and her slimy ‘tard partner in crime decided to show up some time during the night to help her escape. He knocked down a nurse and generally disrupted the entire ward on their way out.
“So they said my mom was screaming about going to CPS? I think we should try to talk to her. Find out anything we can about Louis. And, Northrup is waiting.” Promise gives me the death stare but I don’t give a shit this time.
She knows I always listen to her, but bottom line, today I’m deciding what’s happening and when. So she can pitch whatever little blue thunder fit she wants. I’m keeping calm. Being solid and unwavering for her is my new vocation.
“I know he’s waiting. Let him wait. He said he would wait. This is more important.” My heart bangs in my chest like the cymbals from one of those wind-up, toy monkeys. Clash, clash, clash.
Promise threw up. Threw up again.
She’s been hornier than I’ve been and I didn’t think that was possible. I should have spotted that.
I count backwards.
I know when her last period started and ended because I care about every part of her. I keep track of even that part of her. She’s eight days late. Could be stress I remind myself, but add that up with the other clues and I think we’re about to hit the jackpot.
I’m tearing open the small rectangular box and holding out the plastic, lavender-and-white dip stick as I crouch down in front of my precious girl.
“Come on, babe. Let’s go see.” I nod toward the bathroom. I can’t help but smile. I want to see two lines on that little window more than I want my next breath.
A punch of guilt hits me. She looks tired. Worn. I see Jordan in her and the guilt hits me even harder.
Promise looks like she’s been hit with a freeze ray. Her eyes are ice blue and as wide as soup spoons.
We are caught inside a hurricane. There are so many things swirling around us right now, it takes superhuman strength to concentrate. But if this moment is what I sure as shit hope it is, I want us both all in. Focused. So we remember it for the next hundred years.
She sits cross-legged on the bed, wearing a white silk robe that hits her mid-thigh. The sash hangs loose and she is completely unaware at how otherworldly she looks. The fabric splits open down the front, just enough for the curves of her tits to make my dick sound the siren. Her bare pussy is in the shadows, but I see a wink of pink down there and can't help licking my lips.
“Stop staring.” She wags the little dip stick in my face with a half-hearted grin.
I laugh. “No can do, babe. It’s got me hypnotized. Your pussy cast a spell on me.” I hold out my hand as she shakes her head. Long waves of hair toss back and forth over her shoulders then down the front of the shining fabric.
Her eyes look like they are back-lit. Like two pools of tropical sea with the white afternoon sun behind them. We may not have made it to Fiji, but I have paradise right here. She completely owns me and she still has no idea.
“I don’t want to know.” She pulls her lips to the side as she lays her hand in mine and I gently pull her up next to me.
“Why not? It’s us, babe. It’s so fucking beautiful thinking I put a baby inside you. It will be by far the best thing I’ve ever done in my life.”
She looks down. “What if I turn out like my mom?” There's such sadnes
s in her voice, my heart breaks into a thousand pieces.
“Impossible. That’s impossible.” I tuck her into me and keep us moving forward. “Do you remember that first day at Windfield when I came into my dad’s room? Do you remember what you were doing?” We make it to the bathroom and I turn her to face me, my fingers lightly gripping her upper arms.
She shakes her head, eyes down, so I take one hand and clasp her chin, pushing it up with my thumb until I’ve got her eyes locked on mine.
“You were taking my dad’s blood sugar. But you know what else you did?” Another shake of her head. “You held his hand. For a good thirty seconds longer than you needed to. You just held it and you took my heart right then and there. I’ll never forget it.”
“That doesn’t mean I’ll be a good mom. I’m not great with people. I don’t have any frame of reference for being a mom. No role model. I don’t know how to change a diaper. I don’t know any lullabies. I don’t even know how to hold a baby! What if I don’t hold it right and it gets hurt? What if I drop it?”
“Just pee.” I spin her around to face the commode. “You do know how to pee, don’t you?”
I lift the robe which is barely covering her ass and lay a loud smack down at about fifty percent power.
“Oww!” She swishes her hand back behind her, knocking away the next swat I was loadin’ up. “Out. I’m not peeing in front of you.”
I roll my eyes because honestly, I would watch her open a pickle jar naked and it would make me hard. But she draws the line at some things and I can let her have her bathroom privacy.
“Fine, but I’m standing right here. Listening. So I’m keeping the door open. I can listen to you pee, right? That’s allowed?”
“Shut up, Fitzgerald. I’ll get stage fright and we’ll be here all day.” She giggles for the first time since Northrup knocked on the door and canceled our honeymoon.
It’s a beautiful sound.
The giggle, not the pee.
It’s the longest sixty seconds of my life.
Until Promise–until the first time she took me inside her–I’ve never once thought about being a father. But since that first time with her, I hate to admit it, but there’s been this near constant urge to put a baby in that belly of hers. It’s the fucking crazy animal she’s turned me into.