Royally Duched Up: (Duched #3)

by Xavier Neal

  We approach in stoic silence but immediately coo in unison at the sight of Soph cradling the newest member to our family.

  It’s so tiny!

  “Kellan…Brie…I would like to you introduce you to your nephew. Keegan Scott Kenningston.” She lets her attention drop to the small boy in her arms. “Keegan, this is your uncle Kellan who will teach you your first bad word and your aunt Brie who will sneak you your first cookie.”

  “Or piece of cake,” she jokes as she cautiously moves closer. When she’s within reach, Soph slides the baby into my wife’s grip.

  Without warning the air in my lungs vacates. My throat swells. The entire world vanishes and the only thing I can focus on is how perfect she looks clutching a child. I attempt to swallow the knot of fear expanding in my throat.

  What if Kris is right? What if this never happens for us because I can’t find fucking balance?

  I try to pull my mind back into the moment.

  “He’s so handsome,” Brie coos, giving the blue eyed baby a small kiss on the forehead.

  “Runs in the family,” Kris and I joke in unison.

  The women roll their eyes but don’t deny it.

  We are an attractive bunch. If there was a baby GQ he’d be on it.

  Brie gives me a loving look. “You wanna hold him?”

  I smile, nod, and allow her to shift the infant into my hands. For a moment, I simply stare down at the perfect creation. The blank slate. The future of our country. The next legacy of our family.

  This is what I am working so hard for every day. To give him something better to govern over. To instill the strength of hope, so one day he can do it for the masses.

  Staring into his blue eyes rearranges some of the shame I’m baring.

  All these long night have a purpose. All these missed dates will make a difference in his life and so many others. I will show my nephew that so much more is possible than he ever knew…than I ever knew. I will show him and our future children.

  My eyes remain pasted on the high ceiling of our bedroom regardless of the fact I can barely see anything at all.

  I don’t recall ever going to bed like this before. Usually we fight, spend a few hours making up, and then crash together in a tangled fit of content. We don’t go to bed angry. That’s now the couple we are. Even at her most pinnacle point of being pissed off at me, she never lets it just fester. She flushes out. Spits venom. But tonight? Tonight it has been Artic shoulder and intolerable silence.

  Brie adjusts her head again on the pillow beside mine. Neither of us is asleep despite the fact we’ve been in bed for at least twenty minutes. She lets out a deep sigh and tugs the sheet to cover her body covered by a loose fitting t-shirt.

  That’s exactly how upset she still is. The gorgeous body I love to be braced against me naked all night is being imprisoned by an old shirt I used to wear to the gym before she started painting in it. Now it’s covered in colorful stains. Okay so that makes me smile. I love knowing even when she’s engaged in her favorite activity, I’m still on her mind the same way she’s still on mine.

  Quietly, I state, “I know you’re livid, Love.”

  “I’m not,” she calmly replies.

  “Please, never lie to me….”

  “I’m not,” Brie swears. “I’m honestly not mad at you anymore.”

  Feels like a trap…

  My face shifts her direction, hating that I am seeing her head full of wavy hair instead of her eyes.

  “I’m disappointed.”

  And that is worse than any anger could ever be.

  Culpability clogs my vocal chords.

  “I know how important Hannah’s Hope is to you, Kellan. I remember your excitement long before it ever had a true inkling it was going to be created. I remember your joy when it was still just a dream on paper. I remember the look in your eyes every time you shut the files. The ache for wanting something that was just out of your reach. The pain of knowing there was a possibility it would never get the chance to exist. I think about those moments every time my anger over being neglected again surpasses what I imagine to be an acceptable amount.” She pauses and the air in the room completely vanishes. “But then I have to ask a question I’m not sure I want the answer to because I fear I won’t like it.”

  My voice barely whispers, “Which is?”

  “Will I…Will…we ever be as important to you as Hannah’s is?”

  The sheer sadness in her voice alone feels as if it could collapse my chest.

  “I’m really afraid of the day I get the answer to that question…” There’s a small sniffle out of her. “But what really disappoints me is the simple fact I even have to ask it.”

  Unexpected tears claw their way up my throat and I do my best to stuff them back down. I roll over onto my side and attempt to slide an arm around her waist. When she tries to pull away, my forehead falls to her shoulder, and I beg, “Please, don’t pull away from me again, Love…It breaks my heart.”

  Brie ceases her retreat.

  Once my arm is secured around her waist, I tug her into me and gently rest my cheek against her arm. “You are the absolute most important thing in my entire life. Past. Present. And future.”

  The pain in her voice is unbearable, “Kellan-”

  “I know it is hard to believe, especially after days like yesterday and today, but I need you to know I truly mean it. I would lay my entire world at your feet for you to step on if it kept you from walking away from me.”

  “I’m not leaving you just because we’re fighting.”

  A small breath of reprieve is taken.

  “But I don’t want this to be all our marriage is.”

  “It won’t be,” I promise and plant a kiss on her shoulder. “You said you want there to be room for both Hannah’s Hope and you in my life. That you want me to have a balance of the two…Well, Love, it may not appear this way, but I am trying. I am truly trying my hardest to give you both my attention. My time. My love. But I often get it wrong. I am often at one place when I should be at the other and focused on one when it’s the other that really needs my attention. I am not good at this and it’s killing me.” My confession shifts her face to peer over at me. “I have never been afraid of being a true failure. I’ve always been the one not to care what the world thinks, but Brie, you are my world now. What you think matters. What you feel affects everything. And I…I live in a constant dread that by the time this orphanage is done, I will have failed you as a husband while trying to succeed as a man. Or that I succeed as a husband and fail to deliver a better future for those who have no other hope besides the little I am trying to offer.”

  She rolls completely onto her back. “That’s entirely too much pressure to put on yourself.”

  I don’t argue.

  “You’re not perfect, Kellan. And our relationship, MINOH, and building the orphanage won’t be either. Life isn’t a series of things you have to perfect, baby. It’s a series of things you get to experience. The goods. The bads. The uglies.”

  “And the remarkables,” I add, my hand moving to stroke her face. “I want it all yet feel like I’m missing everything.” She leans her face into my touch. “But while I was holding Keegan in my arms tonight, I realized, I have to keep going. I have to make Hannah’s Hope possible. I have to give my nephew a chance to govern a better class of people. I have to give our future children a better world to live in. I just…I need you to know that I am deeply sorry for disappointing you and that I really am always trying to do what’s best for us and the organizations I’ve built. I want to achieve balance, but it is proving to be a nearly impossible task for me.”

  Her brown eyes soften.

  Look at that. They can fill with something other than hatred for me.

  “The answer to your question will always be the same, Love. You are what is most important to me despite however it may appear from time to time.”

  “Actions are louder than words, Kellan. Remember that, okay?”

/>   I nod and press a gentle kiss onto her lips. It’s intended to be short yet she captures my bottom lip and gives it a light lick. A moan of approval rumbles through me. Brie pulls back, giggles triumphantly, and rolls back onto her side.

  My face falls to the crook of her neck while my hand slips underneath the edge of the t-shirt. “How about I take action right now?”

  She smiles but shakes her head. “I meant that by actually following through with your promises and paying more attention to things outside of work.”

  “Alright. I promise to make you scream my name and pay attention to the beautiful way it sounds.”

  Brie prepares to argue back when my fingers slide towards her inner thigh, receiving a soft sigh of approval. My cock instantly rises to the occasion and echoes my words with a knock against her ass cheek.

  I press my lips lightly to her ear. “And I promise to make you come so hard it’ll be difficult for you to walk in the morning…”

  Guarantee you I’ll keep that one…

  My fingers graze the outside of her bare pussy and she whimpers her compliance. She slightly parts her legs to allow me better access. As my fingers graze her clit, I tug her earlobe, providing her the mixture of small pain with stronger pleasure we both constantly crave. Her body pushes back into mine for encouragement to continue. I roll my finger around in teasing circles and lose myself in the sound of her labored breathing. The feeling of her wetness damping my finger shuts my eyes tightly. My movement remains steady in spite of her growing impatience for more. Brie’s hand lands on top of mine and she desperately digs her nails into it. Another whimper whirls around the room, toying with my willpower. I let my lips fall to her neck and recklessly devour every area of bare skin I can. She syncs the rolling of her hips to that of my tongue, twisting the two of us into a trembling mess of moans and greedy groans. Finally, I slip my finger inside, receiving the most erotic gasp I’ve ever heard. Without remorse I capture her mouth and reinforce my previous pledge. Brie bucks backwards begging for more than a finger. I guide my hand into her hair to guarantee we remain locked together. She squirms for more stimulation. Whines for action. Grinds her request for replacement. Every maddening action she delivers receives a small pull of her bedhead and swift push of my tongue. All of a sudden, Brie’s pussy begins a familiar pulsing and her mouth falls from mine. Her bottom lip hides between her teeth as she surrenders to the orgasm showering over her. I eagerly watch her undoing, absorbing the quakes and quivers like they are the only reason I exist. The sound of her breath heaving pushes me to the point she was pleading for. In one fluid motion, my hand is removed, her body is splayed on its stomach, and I’m buried in a blistering bliss. Her tight pussy worships the invasion with waves of wetness.

  My mouth mindlessly moans, “God you’re amazing…”

  She hums something that sounds like an agreement.

  Every reason in the world to be cocky about it too…If this were ancient Greece statues would be built to worship her the very way I plan to for the rest of our lives.

  I thrust my hips sharply, struggling to keep them from the ruthless course they desire. Brie’s body arches into each precise pound while her hands clutch the sheets. Her beautiful voice surrenders the screams of my name I knew it would. I allow the sweet sound to burrow inside of me until it begins to drive me mad with pleasure. My head lowers itself and cocks an angle to seize her mouth once more. In a gluttonous outburst, my hands, my tongue, and my cock begin to ceaselessly consume every portion of her possible. For hours we cycle through mindlessly chanting one another’s names, slews of curse words spoken during moments of satisfaction, and bed breaking orgasms. By the time we’re sated, not only has the sun begun to rise but are we on the floor across the room near the window.

  Brie’s head is nestled on my thigh and my back is braced against the wall. I let my fingers toy with her disheveled hair while longingly staring down at her sleeping face.

  I hate how she doubts me, but I know it is my fault. I make the wrong choices. I’m the one missing the cues. I’m the one dragging my feet in the battle of building this relationship up. Seeing the toll it is having on her, on her feeling of us, will be the reason I do better. I promise. Both of you.

  Brie

  “You’re going to be fine,” Guy insists from the kitchen of the royal downtown penthouse Kellan and I have been residing at.

  After everything that happened a couple weeks ago with our fight, our nephew being born, and spending days playing tour hosts to our best friends, Kellan suggested we take some ‘personal space’ by staying here instead of the palace. Turns out other than Kellan no one else ever stays at the penthouse anymore. His father more or less originally purchased it for him to have a safe place in the city to always stay. I took the change of scenery as a gesture of trying to bridge the gap we’ve unconsciously developed. So far, it’s slightly better. He doesn’t have to rush away as early in the mornings because we’re closer to the office. With that same logic, he takes his lunch breaks with me and when the night is going to be later than he predicted, I bring him take out before letting him have me for dessert on his couch. Yeah…He really likes when that happens. Starting to wonder if he’s actually working late or just trying to find excuses to have sex in his office….As for paying attention to more than Hannah’s Hope…well that hasn’t exactly changed much. It seems like any time he starts to pay attention to what’s going on with me or stories about his nephew, Felicity calls with an emergency. I swear she’s like the girl who cried crisis. I’m about 75% sure some of those are just ways of pulling him away from me earlier than he wants because she hates his attempt at creating a new system that doesn’t revolve around her or what they’re working on. Could be completely crazy or…most likely completely accurate.

  “Seriously, Brie. Absolutely fine.”

  “But what if I do something stupid?!”

  “Like?”

  “I don’t know…forget my pencil?”

  “It’s on the computer,” he reminds me.

  “My ID?”

  “They already fingerprinted you, remember?” Guy heads towards where I’m sitting at the long white dining room table that is located between the kitchen and living room space. “You don’t need your ID. They already have all your information.” He puts a plate down in front of me. “Any other irrational concerns?”

  I glance down at the disaster on my plate. “That you’re trying to kill me.”

  “It’s carb friendly pizza.”

  “Which is not at all how I like my pizza, thank you very much.”

  He plops down in the chair beside me with a stern expression. “That may be true, but unless you want to wheeze while painting or get winded picking up canvases, I suggest you occasionally opt for a healthier version of your favorite things.”

  My face automatically sneers.

  In a way, he’s worse than Kellan about food. Kellan aims to force me to eat healthy then rewards me by giving me what it is I truly want. Guy simply takes my favorite foods and healthifies them like some sort of corrupt nutrition guru. We almost stopped being friends last week when he fed me cauliflower nuggets instead of actual chicken.

  “Look, you’ve easily become one of my best mates. I truly care about you and would like you to live another forty or fifty years if possible.” He tries to give me a sweet look. “Besides, it’s just the crust that has changed. It’s cauliflower based, but I swear you won’t be able to taste it.”

  “What’s your obsession with cauliflower? Does it owe you money? Do you get paid every time you endorse it?”

  Guy chuckles and lifts his concoction, which looks worse than mine with the sliced pieces of tomato, mushroom, and avocado. “Eat it.”

  I glance down at the mock pepperoni pizza. It has a homemade pizza sauce, low fat mozzarella and an imitation crust made from broccoli’s ugly cousin.

  Just looking at it makes me feel ten pounds lighter. Shouldn’t that be enough?

  “Eat it,” he c
ommands between bites. “You’ve barely eaten anything all day.”

  “I’ve been busy cramming.”

  “For a test I’m fairly certain you could pass while sleeping at this point.”

  His reassurance is met with a smirk.

  “You’re ready.” He gives me a curt nod. “Any more ready and you could write the damn thing. Now eat. Relax. And for the love of God, please make sure you get at least one off tonight. It’ll help you sleep better.”