“Why?” she whispered.
“Because I need to feel something, with the woman I love, that isn’t ugly. I need to feel something that makes me lighter in here.” He brought her hand and rested it over his chest. “Say no if you’re not in the mood, but don’t try to save me from what I want.”
Love. Had he said the woman I love?
He was in upheaval. She wouldn’t hold him to it. Not now.
Watching him, so still and serious above her in bed, she took a moment to think. Was this what she wanted?
His hand clenched by her side, as if forcing itself not to touch her.
Oh yes. Definitely what she wanted.
She half sat up and kissed him hard, pulling Clay back down over her, letting her body give him an escape. Give him something real to focus on.
He kissed her gently at first, as if he wasn’t sure about her agreement yet. That he wanted to provide her an easy escape. But when she nibbled on his lower lip, he met her voraciousness with a hunger of his own that burned. His tongue moved in to taste and tease. Each time she would get a handle on the rhythm, he would change the angle, the speed, the depth of the kiss.
And then she knew he wanted to be in full control. In a life that had suddenly turned completely upside down for him, he needed a bit of control back. Something to cling to.
She gave up—gave in—trying to anticipate and instead let him work. As if sensing her acceptance, Clay’s body tightened.
He pulled the shirt up high enough to bare her breasts with sharp, jerky motions. Then he pulled the fabric over her head more carefully, before using the shirt to wrap around itself, binding her hands up over her head like a captive.
She wanted to tease him. Ask if they were going to start role-playing now. But the look in his eyes warned her he wasn’t in a teasing mood.
His mouth consumed her breasts, leaving marks she would wear in the morning. His stubble rasped over sensitive peaks and in the valley below the swells. His tongue soothed, then enflamed. And all the while, one hand pulled down her panties, completely baring her to him.
There was no slow slide downward. No sweet, soft kisses over her torso to lead into the next phase. He rolled himself down, lifted one of her legs over his shoulder, and put his mouth directly over her core.
She moaned, then squealed as his tongue lashed her. Remembering Stanley, she bit the inside of her cheek to keep from actually crying out when he sucked her clit between his teeth and bit gently before lapping at the same spot with his tongue. He was going to drive her insane.
Crazy.
Over the edge.
Then he thrust two fingers inside her, and she exploded without warning.
Still caught in the wave of her orgasm, she barely registered him moving up, over, and inside her. His face held a determined, almost grim expression, and she wanted so badly to reach up and smooth a finger over his brow, his cheekbones, his lips. Wanted to arch up and kiss him to soften his mind.
But this wasn’t about soft lovemaking. He was fucking her, and it was so damn good even if she hated why. So she surrendered to the process, to his healing needs, and let him use her body. And when he came and landed over the top of her in an exhausted, emotionally checked-out heap, she felt satisfaction in being the one who had given him even the single moment of pain relief.
Clay woke to the sun shining in his face. A definite first since he was most often already out jogging or at the office when the sun made its daily appearance. The last time he’d slept this late was…well, when he was sick probably.
He rubbed a hand across the back of his neck, then reached across the bed for Kristen. Instead, he came up empty. Sitting up on one elbow, he surveyed her side of the mattress.
Her side. He liked the sound of that. With a smile, he lay back down and stared up at the ceiling, wondering where she was. Not in the bathroom—he could tell from the lack of sound. Probably downstairs, brewing coffee or maybe making him another kickass breakfast. Maybe…
“Oh shit.” Clay bolted upright, his heart dropping into his stomach. “Stanley.”
Without bothering to get dressed, he stumbled on still-asleep legs to the guest room, only to find the lights off and the crib empty. He slid to the ground, not at all sure what the hell that meant. Had he climbed out? No, he was still too young for that. Or was he?
Fuck if he knew what the kid was really capable. He was just supposed to be the fun uncle. Not the forever parent.
At the thought, his head began to buzz as memories of the day before bombarded him. His still sleep-fuzzed brain slogged through it enough to realize Kristen must have taken him downstairs. But he waited for his heart to stop racing before standing to go back and get dressed in his own room.
Five minutes later, he walked downstairs and entered something akin to a fantasy.
Kristen stood at the stove, making eggs. The radio in the corner was on low, and she smiled as Stanley made a sound and banged on his high chair table.
“I know, I know. Those Cheerios won’t hold you forever. But I can’t give you any eggs until your uncle gets down here. We have to have his okay first.”
Stan banged a lid-covered cup on the table, likely full of either water or milk, and babbled something.
“You bet!” she answered him cheerfully, as if he’d actually said something worth responding to. “Stanley, what does the animal who makes the egg say?”
More gibberish.
“Bawk bawk!” She clucked, laughing when Stanley tried to imitate. “That’s right! The chicken says bawk!”
“So what’s the animal from your cup say?” Clay asked, smiling when Kristen gasped in surprise and whirled around. Stanley clapped and squealed.
Clay walked over to Kristen first, wrapping his arms around her at the stove and just holding on for a moment. She smelled like baby powder and breakfast. “Moo,” he whispered into her neck, sucking gently under her ear until she snorted with a laugh.
“Have you ever been told it’s not polite to imitate barn animals while you’re kissing a lady?”
“It hasn’t been brought up, no.”
“How’s he on allergies? Anything that’s off the table?”
“Nope. The kid can demolish a peanut butter sandwich like a champ, and nothing else that she told me about either. I know he eats scrambled eggs, for sure, so those are safe.”
“Good.” She let out a breath, then scooped some up on a plate that already held a piece of toast. “No bacon in the fridge means you go without.”
“Aw,” he said but grinned and kissed her cheek anyway.
Stanley banged his cup on his high chair again, effectively ruining the moment.
“Okay, Stan the Man, let’s eat.” He grabbed the plate of eggs and a few sliced berries from Kristen and took them to the table. He set the plastic fork and the plate on the high chair tray, sat down with his own meal, and watched Stanley demolish the plate.
Literally. Food everywhere but actually in his mouth. The few times Clay tried to take the fork from him to get a good bite of egg on there, Stan screamed bloody murder. Apparently, actually eating the food was not the objective of breakfast.
“What… Okay, seriously, is there a secret here?” Exhausted with trying to get his nephew to eat something, he glanced at Kristen to see her hiding a smile in her coffee. “What? What are you not telling me?”
She gave a tiny shrug. “Each kid is different. But…”
“Spill it,” he warned.
“Here.” She sat closer to Stanley and took her own fork off her plate. “Stanley, can we share? Can we share some of these yummy eggs?”
She mimed like she was about to take a bite of Stanley’s egg. Stanley did the same, albeit a smaller, wobblier forkful. Then she pretended to taste her own fork, and the young boy shoved his in his mouth. When she praised him, he gave her an eggy smile, which was a hybrid of disgusting and adorable.
“Let’s do another one!” she cheered, her voice a few octaves higher than normal. “
Let’s try again!” She took another pretend bite of egg, and Stan mimicked. On it went until he finally set his fork down. When she picked it up, he simply opened his mouth like a baby bird and let her feed him the rest.
“He wants to feel independent, but eventually he gets tired of it. He’s still pretty young. Aren’t you, little guy?” she cooed, pressing a kiss to his temple. Stanley caught her chin with an egg-and-slobber kiss of his own, which Kristen accepted with grace. He noticed she didn’t even automatically move to wipe it off when she pulled away.
“You’re Mary freaking Poppins,” he said in wonder.
“Hardly. I’ve just done this rodeo circuit once before. And believe me when I say the second you find out something that works, they’ll get tired of it and you’ll have to start all over. This was a lucky guess. Don’t put me up on the pedestal of childcare.”
“But you knew.”
“Clay.” She took a deep breath, then reached out her hands across the table. He did the same, holding her small, delicate fingers in his. He sensed the seriousness and forced himself not to panic. “I have to tell you the one real secret to parenting.”
He swallowed. “Okay, yeah?”
She sighed, preparing herself for the seriousness of the conversation.
“We’re all just winging it.”
He waited a beat. “That’s it?”
She winked and stood, plate in hand. Stanley occupied himself with his sippy of…whatever was in there. “Yup. Each kid is one hundred percent unique. What worked on Isaac isn’t guaranteed to work on Stanley. What works on Stanley won’t work on another kid. It’s a crapshoot. The point is, the good parents keep trying. And they look for resources or ask for help when the going gets tough. That’s the definition of a good parent, Clay. Pushing on and getting help when you need it. Good parenting isn’t having all the answers at once.”
When she walked around to his side of the table to reach for his plate, he pulled her down into his lap. Her plate clattered to the tile floor, and she shrieked in surprise.
“Clay! I dropped the plate!”
“Didn’t break.” He nuzzled just below her ear until she relaxed into his hold. Stanley banged his cup in excitement. “Thank you,” he murmured. “God, thank you.”
She rubbed the forearm that wrapped around her stomach, leaning into his touch. “You don’t have to thank me. I’d be a monster to not have stepped up and helped.”
“You’re using up personal leave for this. You’re spending your last full summer with your son over here, helping me.”
“I’m pretty sure Isaac had other plans besides hanging out with his mom twenty-four seven for the summer. And I’m not abandoning him. I’m going to his baseball practice tonight. You,” she added when he sucked in a breath, “are not. You’re staying home, end of story. I think everyone is going to be in total agreement with this. Your volunteer coaching days are over for the season. Officially anyway. Family comes first.”
“I’m still going to come to practices.”
“That’s fine but not yet.”
“Not yet,” he agreed. “I love you.”
She sighed and nestled farther into his embrace for about five seconds. It wasn’t the response he wanted, but she also didn’t argue or try to shut his feelings off or dismiss them entirely. He would consider that a decent sign.
Then Stanley made a squealing sound that had them both looking his way.
The scrunched-up face he made, along with the short grunt, was a dead giveaway to the particular activity he was partaking in.
“Uh, I’m going to clean up breakfast. You…can take care of that,” Kristen said quickly, waving a hand in the general direction of the soon-to-be-smelly Stan. “Good luck!” She dashed into the kitchen, plates in hand, before he could argue.
Clay eyed Stanley, who seemed to be delighted with himself now. “Yeah, yeah. I know. The whole thing’s a load of shit. Let’s get you cleaned up, dude.”
“We need some more stuff,” Kristen said as they sat on the couch watching Stanley play with the few toys she’d picked up.
Clay cracked open one eye. The emotional toll the past twenty-four hours had taken on him was clearly catching up. He needed a nap. A real one, with his face down in a pillow, not extended blinking on the couch.
“Need what? You bought an entire baby store last night.”
Kristen laughed and reached out to scratch his head. Clay’s eyes closed again at the sensation. “Oh, sweetie, you’re so cute when you’re wrong. Babies have more accessories than a pampered Park Avenue princess.”
“That’s reassuring.”
Kristen continued scratching, keeping an eye on Stanley as he crawled to the coffee table. He pulled himself up to stand and began banging on the top. “We could take him out for a while. He might like a change of scenery.”
“Hmm.”
She knew an I’m not paying attention male sound when she heard one.
“I know you have some phone calls to make. I can help you with those if you want,” she said carefully. “And we can go out with Stanley, buy what you need, and get some ice cream on the way home as a reward.”
Clay was quiet for a while. Long enough that she began wondering if he’d fallen asleep.
“I don’t want to make those phone calls,” he finally said, voice gravelly. “If I make those phone calls, then it’s real. And for right now, just this minute, I want to have a chance to go back in my mind and erase it. Just for a moment.”
“Okay,” she said, deciding for him. “We’ll put off the phone calls for now. So are you ready for errands? We’ll be quick.”
Clay clapped his hands on his thighs and stood. “Guess we’ll give it a go.” He walked to pick up Stanley, tossing him a little, making the boy squeal in delight. “Time for you to learn one of life’s major lessons for a man… Errands with a woman are never quick.”
“That’s sexist!” she called as he walked with Stanley up the stairs to change him for the outing.
“But true!” he yelled back.
And she smiled a little when she heard two laughs from upstairs…one deep and masculine, one high-pitched and full of innocence.
Chapter 16
Clay watched as Kristen agonized over the various forms of crib bedding. Each time she would pick one out, she’d immediately pull back, shaking her head, second-guessing herself.
Stanley wasn’t having any of it. Clay handed him a toy from the cart, hoping to keep him preoccupied. Three seconds later, the boy tossed the toy to the floor and began sending out distress calls.
“Might want to get him out of the cart,” Kristen suggested without looking behind her. Apparently, the need to choose between Winnie the Pooh and bumblebees was too intense to make eye contact.
“Won’t that just teach him he gets what he wants?” Clay picked up the toy, handed it to Stanley, and watched with frustration as the boy chucked it again immediately.
“Pro tip number two,” she said with a small laugh. “A great deal of parenting is about picking your battles. Listening to them scream at the consequence in your own home when you can put your earbuds in and tune it out is different than terrorizing an entire store while you’re attempting to get a chore done.”
Clay debated it for about five seconds, but the first warning sounds from Stanley had him reaching for the kid without delay. High from his perch in his uncle’s arms, Stan seemed happier for the moment. Small price to pay for not having to pick up a toy every three seconds.
“I’ve finally narrowed it down. What do we think, the bumblebees or the basketball theme?”
Clay raised a brow. “What, no football?”
“No football sheets here. I could probably order something online,” she mused, finger still tapping her chin. “Just get some basic sheets in primary colors and go with the simple bumper, then—”
“Bumper?”
“The soft thing around the crib… Never mind.” She waved that off. “There’s no rush. The bedding set
is really more for esthetics than necessity. It just completes the room.”
“Then let’s skip it for now.” Anything to shorten the shopping excursion.
“Aw, how cute!” A woman who looked to be in her sixties walked by, pushing a cart with a large gift bag and a big pink bow. Clearly, shopping for a gift for a granddaughter. “What a sweet little boy.”
“Thanks.” Clay automatically angled his body so Stanley could face the older woman. “He’s a pretty cool dude.”
“And looks just like his daddy.” The lady smiled at Stanley, which meant she missed Clay’s grimace when his heart kicked painfully. “Sorry, Mommy,” she added, glancing at Kristen with a wink, “looks nothing like you.”
“Oh,” Kristen started. “He’s not—”
“Usually this well behaved in public,” Clay cut in, pulling Kristen in for a side hug. He gave the grandmother an indulgent smile. “Lucky us.”
“I’ll say.” With another little wave to Stanley, she pushed her cart on, leaving them alone in the bedding aisle.
Kristen waited until the other shopper was out of sight before stepping out of his grip. “What was that?”
“Just trying to avoid an awkward moment.” Now that Stanley was calmer, Clay put him back in the cart. He didn’t want to look into Kristen’s face and see horror or annoyance. “Didn’t feel like having the ‘Sorry, I’m his uncle, and I have custody because my sister just died’ chat with a perfect stranger.”
He took a long time buckling Stanley back in, half of which was moving Stan’s fingers out of the way of the latch. When he felt a small hand stroke down his back, he relaxed a bit.
“I’m sorry.” Her voice was soft, angelic, remorseful. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t... I wasn’t thinking. I apologize. It just caught me off guard.”
“Yeah. It’s fine.”
Stupid. Stupid of him to think he could just pretend, even for a minute, that this was his family and everything was okay, and there was a future involved that made this a regular outing. Was that what prompted him to add in that little hug for the stranger’s benefit? Subconsciously, was he trying to impress to Kristen how good it felt to be a unit? That this could be something real and special?
Changing Her Plans (Santa Fe Bobcats) Page 14