The Pregnancy Contract

by Yvonne Lindsay

  She lifted her face to look at Wade who had seated himself opposite her on the matching sofa, his legs outstretched, his feet crossed at his ankles. He looked as relaxed and as comfortable as a man could get but she could see the lines of tension around his mouth and eyes. He was waiting for her to respond.

  “So we’re all systems go, then,” she said, her voice cracking on the words and making a total lie of her insouciant shot at delivery.

  “Yes, we are.”

  She waited for him to say something more but instead he just sat there, watching her. She felt her skin prickle under his regard, but it wasn’t an uncomfortable sensation. More stimulating than unpleasant. She shifted on the sofa, trying to ease the tension building inside her. She should have known it would be futile. The movement made her thighs brush together, causing her inner muscles to involuntarily clench.

  She swallowed and reached for her glass of port, taking a sip before putting the glass down again.

  “And when do you suggest we begin to…?”

  She couldn’t bring herself to say the words. Not out loud. Wade, it transpired, had no such compunction.

  “Make our baby?” he asked. “No harm in starting right now.”

  She froze in her chair. “N-now?”

  “What’s the matter, Piper? Do you have any objections?”

  He rose from his seat then settled his body down on the sofa next to hers. Instant heat emanated along her side. Heat that spread across her shoulders as he draped one arm casually across the back of the sofa, behind her.

  “No,” she denied, even though everything inside her screamed yes.

  “Then you won’t mind me doing this,” Wade said softly.

  He lifted one hand and turned her face toward him, then moved forward to seal her lips with his in a smooth movement that spoke volumes as to his determination. His lips were gentle against hers, teasing, coaxing. Not the ravishment she’d expected. Inch by inch she felt her body relax. The man certainly knew how to kiss.

  His fingers traced lightly along her jawline, before sliding behind her ear to cup her head.

  “I’ve wanted to do this for days,” he groaned against her mouth.

  She was lost for a reply. Part of her was insanely glad he’d been suffering the same desires as she had—with the emphasis on suffering. But the other part of her was in a state of chaos. She had known all along this day, or night, would come. But now it was here, she knew she was most definitely not ready. Oh, yes, on a physical level there was no question she was up for this. In fact it would be a relief to actually get down and dirty with him. But on an emotional level? She didn’t know if she could come out of this without some serious harm.

  Wade’s lips began a new onslaught, this time down the fine cord of her neck. Oh, she thought—as fire raced through her, sending all her senses aflame and clouding the thoughts that tossed around in her mind—he remembered. Her neck had always been a major erogenous zone for her. Especially that part just behind—

  “Oh!” she gasped as his lips found the tender skin behind her ear.

  “You still like that?” he growled softly.

  In response she let her head fall to the other side, exposing her sensitive spot and giving him unobstructed access. He didn’t let her down. He used his tongue and his lips in an alternating assault, while his hand lifted the edge of her top and his fingers traced a steady path to her breasts. She squirmed as he allowed his hand to linger on its journey, her body all but screaming out for his touch in other tender places.

  “Let’s get rid of this, shall we?” he said, now gripping the bottom of her top with both hands and beginning to pull it off for her.

  She assisted as much as she was able, her breath catching in her throat as he paused and allowed his eyes to feast upon her naked breasts. The stark appreciation evident there sent a flood of heat to her core.

  “And you,” she said, her voice shaking. “Let’s get rid of yours as well, hmm?”

  He helped her pull off the black sweater that had clung to his muscled shoulders and coasted over his upper torso. And what a torso. If a man could ever be described as beautiful, Wade was very definitely that man. While not bulked up with muscle, there was no denying the latent strength beneath his pale golden skin. A light smattering of hair sprinkled from the middle of his chest, before thinning out into a line that arrowed down to the waistband of his trousers.

  She reached for his belt buckle and murmured a tiny sound of protest when he grabbed her hands in his. But the protest turned to a deep-throated sound of satisfaction when he pulled her to her feet and continued to undress her. Skimming the elastic-waisted yoga pants she’d worn down her legs, then removing the tiny scrap of sheer satin and lace panties with equal grace.

  He even moved beautifully, she registered as she watched him undo his belt buckle and zipper and remove his pants and briefs in one smooth motion. Next came his socks and then he was standing there before her, male perfection in all its glory. Wade bent and gathered the soft cushions off the sofas and cast them on the floor in front of the fireplace before guiding her down onto them.

  She expected him to join her but he crossed the room and flicked a switch, turning off all the lights so that she was bathed only in the illumination of the fire and the golden glow cast by the candles above it. She stretched against the pillows and smiled as he walked back toward her.

  Without saying a single word, he lay down beside her and began to touch, at first featherlight caresses designed to titillate and tease. And tease they did. She felt her nipples tighten into hard buds, felt moisture gather at the apex of her thighs. Felt her need for him, for his total possession, increase in steady increments until she was mindless for anything else.

  And then he changed his tactics. He shifted his body over hers, stretching up her arms above her head and securing her wrists with one hand while supporting his weight with the other. The torture began with his tongue and his mouth, with the hot, heavy weight of his arousal against her body.

  “Let me touch you,” she whispered. “I want to touch you.”

  “Not yet. A man can only exert so much control, Piper, and I want this to be good for us both.”

  The knowledge that he was holding on by a fine thread only ignited her more. She squirmed against him, feeling his erection at her entrance and wondering just how hard she’d have to push to drive him over the edge of control and into abandon. She didn’t have to wonder for long. His entire body shuddered as she moved sinuously against him.

  “You’re not making it easy for me,” he said.

  “I don’t want it to be easy for you.” She smiled up at him. “I want you to feel everything just as much as I am.”

  “Oh, believe me, I do.”

  He caught her mouth with his and gave her a deep wet kiss that left her in no doubt as to how close he was to capitulating. She gave back as good as she got, taking his tongue into her mouth and suckling it, using every trick she could to get him to give in. And then, oh, glory, he let go of her hands.

  Immediately she reached out to touch him, to stroke his shoulders, his chest, to pull lightly at his nipples. He retaliated in kind, with his teeth and his tongue against her own, drawing her nipples, one then the other, into his mouth and releasing them, over and over. She drifted her hands lower, past his waist, to his hips and then, to his groin. His penis was hard and hot, a drop of moisture already pooling at its tip. She stroked him, holding him firmly in the grip of her fist, and felt him shudder against her again.

  Piper let her legs fall open and guided him to her entrance, rubbing his blunt head against her moisture. His hand covered hers, positioning himself just inside her. His entire body shook as he waited there, his eyes, glittering chips of granite, meshed with hers. She lifted her hips and felt him slide a little farther within her. A tiny cry spilled from her lips. She surged against him again, wanting to take him deeper still—yet his hand over hers prevented it. How could he just stay there? She was desperate now.
Desperate for his full possession.

  “Wade, please?” she begged, her hips still riding him as much as he allowed.

  “Yes,” he answered, the single syllable a raw sound on the air between them.

  He took his hand away and she grabbed at his hips with both of hers, angling her pelvis and waiting for his full possession. When it came, it drove the air from her lungs and thought from her mind as her body clenched around him. His length surged within her, again and again, driving her to higher peaks with each thrust. She couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer, sensation took over her body, starbursts of light danced behind her eyelids. Wave after wave of pleasure built inside her. Wave after wave that grew until her entire body exploded from sheer intensity. Expanding ripples of ecstasy undulated through her, finally easing in force until her body fell back against the cushions filled with a delicious lassitude that invaded every cell in her body.

  Wade collapsed against her, his back slick with perspiration, his buttocks and thighs still clenched beneath her touch. She could feel him pulsing rhythmically within her, feel the heat of his climax against her womb.

  She’d never before felt this level of synchronicity, of bliss—not even with Wade eight years ago. What had just happened between them fell on the scale of cataclysmic. Even through her pleasure-hazed stupor, she was aware of her heart beating erratically in her chest and her pulse skipping through her veins with the speed of a madly galloping stallion. And he was no different. His breathing was ragged, and she could feel his body throb with the velocity of his own pulse.

  “I didn’t hurt you, did I?” he asked, his voice muffled against her neck.

  Piper laughed softly. “Hurt me? You have to be kidding.”

  He went to lift himself off her but she wrapped her legs around his and her arms about his waist and held him close, keeping him trapped inside her at the same time.

  “I’m too heavy for you,” he protested.

  “No, you’re not. Stay, I don’t want to lose this feeling just yet.”

  Wade sighed in response, his breath warm and moist against her sensitized skin. Her inner muscles tensed, pulling against him one more time as an aftershock of pleasure fluttered to her very core.

  She hadn’t felt this good, this satisfied, in her living memory. She wasn’t about to do a single thing to change that right now. Her eyes slid shut and she continued to hold Wade to her, reveling in his heaviness and warmth, and hoping against hope that they’d conceived their baby with all their barriers down—with nothing between them but perhaps the hope that things might just work out after all.

  Piper woke much later to the sound of rain once more hammering against the windows. The candles on the mantelpiece had long since gutted in their containers, the last of the embers in the fireplace now casting the only light in the room.

  Wade’s weight kept her pinned to the cushions and rug beneath her. Not the most comfortable position she’d ever slept in, she thought, but far from the worst, either. She trailed a hand down his back. Oh, how she loved the feel of his skin, especially where it touched hers. He was strength and hardness combined with an intrinsic thread of gentleness woven through at the same time. A man of contrasts.

  He’d make a great father.

  The thought shocked her. She’d never thought of Wade in terms of being a dad. She’d heard him talk about it, allowed herself to be locked into this agreement between them. Allowed? She wrinkled her forehead as she considered the concept, and forced herself to acknowledge that which she’d been trying to avoid all along. She could have just said no to him. Left him to see what the worst was that he could have done to her. She had no money. She had no home. No court in the land could have made her pay what she didn’t have.

  So why had she allowed him to bully her into signing?

  Could it be that she still loved him? As the thought blossomed, she forced herself to acknowledge the real truth. The truth that resounded through her mind with a single word.

  Yes.

  Ten

  She must have made a sound or a movement that disturbed Wade.

  “Are you okay? I didn’t mean to fall asleep on you like that.”

  “It’s all right,” she answered, still reeling from the certainty she’d only just acknowledged.

  Wade shifted his weight off her and traced the bone structure of her face with one hand as he lay on his side next to her.

  “I’d better get to my bed,” Piper said, moving away from him.

  “Why?” he asked.

  “Well, we’ve…you know.” She waved her hand futilely.

  He laughed. She seemed to have that effect on him a lot lately.

  “What’s so funny?” she said, prickling at his response.

  “That you think I’m going to let you go.”

  He got to his feet in a single movement and reached out a hand to help her up. Keeping her hand captive within his, he guided her to a door that led off the sitting room. He swung it open and drew her toward a massive four-poster bed. Swags of heavy fabric, pointed with gold tassels, hung from the four points.

  “Very Lord of the Manor,” Piper commented as Wade pulled back the covers and ushered her within the sheets.

  “Very.” He smiled in return and followed her into the bed.

  The contrast of his warm body and the cool sheets against her skin sent a tingle through her nerves. A tingle that intensified as Wade’s arm curled around her and one hand began to play with the short thatch of hair at her groin, every now and then slipping a little lower to graze against the taut bud hidden there.

  “Hey, that’s not fair,” she said when she could catch a breath.

  “Indulge me,” came the command from behind her.

  His erection slid between her legs and she hitched herself up a little letting him enter her fully.

  “Since you’re so persuasive, I think I will.”

  His penetration hit just the right spot and she could feel the rising pleasure begin to radiate with every drive of his hips. She moved with him, wanting more with every stroke. His fingers didn’t let up their offensive either and it was only a few minutes before she began to feel her body coil tightly as her orgasm built and built.

  “Too much,” she cried into the pillow.

  “Never too much,” he replied, his hips now picking up the pace and driving her over the edge until her body spasmed in paroxysms of satisfaction.

  Wade held on as long as he could, but his body had other ideas. The force and strength of Piper’s orgasm was his complete undoing and he gave over to the gratification his body demanded.

  He continued to hold Piper long after she’d fallen back into an exhausted sleep, his fingers tracing tiny circles on the smooth, soft skin of her belly. Who knew? Maybe they’d already started a new life tonight. The mere thought was enough to make something in his chest clench in anticipation.

  One thing was certain, though, he would do everything to ensure this baby made it. He would be there through every single step of this pregnancy and thereafter. A virtual slide show ran through his head of his child’s life, with him there for him or her at every pass.

  He chose to ignore the quirk of his mind that placed a smiling image of Piper right at his side.

  Wade woke late that morning, surprised to find his arms and his bed bereft of Piper’s warmth. He flicked a glance at his bedside clock and was amazed to see it was already nine o’clock. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept that late, not even with an unhealthy dose of jet lag.

  He hurried through his shower and getting dressed and went downstairs. Piper was seated at the kitchen table, the remnants of her breakfast on the plate pushed to one side, her attention focused on the bundles of paper scattered on the surface in front of her.

  “Good morning,” he said as he came in.

  “Morning,” she replied, not even lifting her head from her perusal of what looked like a prospectus of some kind. “I put your breakfast in the oven to keep warm.”


  “Ah yes, the Dexters are away this whole weekend, aren’t they?”

  Piper nodded. Obviously not up for a huge amount of morning-after conversation, he observed wryly as he lifted his plate from the oven.

  “Hot!” he yelped as he rapidly transferred the plate from his hand to the placemat opposite where Piper sat.

  “I did say I’d put your breakfast in the oven to keep warm,” she said, finally looking up to meet his eyes.

  “So you did.” He lifted the foil off the top of his plate and grinned appreciatively. “I see you haven’t lost your touch with a good old-fashioned breakfast.”

  “I was hungry this morning,” she admitted, a flush of color lighting her cheeks.

  “So am I,” he answered, but kept his gaze very firmly upon her.

  To his delight her blush deepened and spread and she quickly averted her eyes, transferring her attention back to the booklet in her hand.

  “What’s that you have there?” he asked as he poured himself a cup of coffee before sitting down opposite her.

  “Nothing much,” she hedged.

  He reached across the table and with one finger pushed the booklet up in her hands until he could see the front cover clearly. A university prospectus?

  “Looks like a bit more than nothing much to me. Are you thinking about going back to Uni?” Wade fought to hide his surprise.

  She nodded. “Do you have a problem with that?”

  “Not if it doesn’t interfere with your current commitments.”

  “My work at Mitchell Exports? I don’t think you need to worry about that. It’s hardly taxing what I’m doing there.”

  “True, but I was talking about your commitment to me.” More particularly, her commitment to their possibly already conceived child. He didn’t want her to overtire herself or to put herself or their baby at risk.

  She gave him a hard look and pushed her chair back from the table. “Trust me, you won’t have anything to worry about.”