Briefly, for like a split second, it crossed my mind that the amount of water we’d wasted emptying and refilling half the tub must have been ridiculous.
Then I couldn’t be bothered to care. For once, enjoying the lifestyle of the rich and famous came easily to me.
Ian made it easy. I’d always loved baths with him, and it tickled me pink that he tolerated my preferences for rose-scented products.
But it pleased me even more when his hands moved like that between my legs. I moaned and tilted my head back against his shoulder, lost to the rhythm of his fingers teasing my pussy. Two fingers languidly slid inside me, glided out again, and made another pass over my clit. He lingered and circled it underwater.
My fingers had gone all pruny and wrinkled, and the smell of roses had probably suffused our skin and become part of our souls by now. I didn’t know how long we’d soaked, but the deep muscular ache in my thighs became a distant memory.
He guided me through another orgasm while I rode his hand, patient and tireless. Afterward, he drained the tub, dried our bodies, and guided me to our bedroom.
There, I received the best back and foot rub of my life, though no part of my body was neglected. He covered every inch, from my shoulders to my tired calves, and kneaded the tension from my body. I almost fell asleep—he jolted me awake by putting his face between my legs and wrapping his lips around my clit.
Orgasm number three came soon after.
Afterward, Ian uncorked another bottle of wine, a sweet one from a Texas brewery we’d both enjoyed during my birthday a couple years ago. I wondered if he remembered that.
Of course he did. He was Ian. Nothing happened by coincidence when that man spent weeks planning flawless events down to the last detail.
As much as he teased about being perfect, I was beginning to believe it.
“I missed the hell out of this,” he admitted against my cheek while we sprawled together naked on the couch, the glow of the television on us and my favorite romantic comedy playing. Ian may never love my horror flicks, but he always joined me for a romcom. “Missed having you against me. Missed feeling your skin against mine.”
“Can you believe we both got tired of doing this?”
He nudged with his hips, gliding his cock against my naked slit and leaving it cradled between my thighs. “Mmm, I chalk it up to temporary insanity.”
“Insanity and my ridiculous post-sex posing.”
He chuckled, his breath warm against my ear. “You did look a bit silly with your legs up in the air, except it gave me a great view of your ass.” He slid against my slit again, gliding back and forth in a way that made me totally appreciate the complete waxing I’d had done a few days ago at Jada’s spa. My clit throbbed, core clenching impatiently for the shaft I wanted to fill it.
Who could pay attention to a movie when their husband did things like this to them?
I should have been aching from all of the fingering and fucking, but it all felt so damned good I only sighed in relief when he slipped into me again. He took slow strokes, taking his sweet time while fondling my breasts.
“Fuck, that’s good.”
His chuckle stirred my hair. “It’s always good with you.” One palm smoothed down my tummy, settled between my legs, and teased my clit. How could one bundle of nerves be so sensitive and needy for his touch? I squeezed my thighs together and whimpered as his index finger circled the delicate button, only to cry out and jerk my hips when he pinched it.
“Ian,” I panted, uncertain if I could take slow and teasing. “Faster. I want to come again.”
“Mm, no. Not yet anyway.”
My inner muscles clamped greedily around his cock, squeezing him on every thrust. I clenched, urging him to go faster, but he ignored me and continued the slow-building torture.
Then he slipped free and I squealed in anguish. “Ian!”
And he crawled from the couch, leaving it to stand in front of me, proud cock jutting up below the most chiseled muscles I’d ever see, glistening with my arousal. I didn’t reach for him.
I lunged. I buried him in my throat and sucked him down to the root before he had a chance to fight me off.
He swore.
Revenge was so sweet, even if my pussy was still aching with need, core throbbing with so much desire for the orgasm he’d denied me that I took my angst out on his penis and tried to pretend I was a Hoover, taking him in long and deep strokes that buried my nose against the dark triangle of groomed hair at his base. My fingers pressed into his lean hip bones, anchoring him in front of me.
He shuddered when I slid him out to the tip and swirled my tongue over the leaking tip.
“God, Leigh.”
I let him slip out, wrapping my hand around him instead. “Not God today, just Leigh,” I teased, throwing his own words back at him.
He growled at me and jerked me up from the couch by a wrist. One moment, I’d been sitting there, preparing to suck him back into my mouth. In the next, he was nudging me over to the floor-to-ceiling windows of our living room, toward a view overlooking Central Park beneath the stars, lit by lanterns and street lamps.
The city spread out below us, hundreds of lights in every color of the rainbow twinkling against the night. Manhattan truly was the city that never slept, and by the gleam in Ian’s eyes, he had the same plans for us. My palms pressed against cool glass, my husband’s cock nestled against my bottom.
“Someone will see us.”
“Mirrored glass. No one can see us, baby.”
As much as I trusted him, if it meant getting an orgasm sooner rather than later, I didn’t care if all of Manhattan saw us.
I spread my thighs apart farther and leaned forward, encouraging him. Then he slipped in on one long, torturously slow stroke that filled me as completely as his love had filled my heart.
Epilogue
One Month Later
Leigh
In the month since our anniversary, everything had been perfect. Of course, I still hated that the doctor couldn’t figure out what was wrong with my body. I hated knowing my womb had broken, that some sort of disease lurked in my reproductive system, waiting to be discovered—but I had decided to live in the moment and spend every day as if it were the last.
She’d ruled out benign tumors, cysts, fibroids, and a host of other problems that could affect my hormonal balances and reproduction system.
All Doctor Kline could confirm was that I hadn’t entered premature menopause. And that if Ian and I did choose one day to use a donor egg, I was a perfect candidate for the procedure.
Speaking of eggs, my attention snapped back to the pan on the stove. Sophia had asked for scrambled eggs and bacon for breakfast, and I’d zoned out. I stirred, giving them a thorough turn over in the pan, then I removed them from the heat and let them rest. Ian made better eggs than I did, which I found comical, considering the man was a bird shifter.
Sophia bounced into the kitchen as I sprinkled black truffle salt on our delicious bounty. “Can Moonfeather have some egg, too?”
I portioned the eggs onto two Hello Kitty plates. “He sure can. I’ll boil him one.” Later, I’d have to check Google to see if bacon was an acceptable, occasional treat. Or ask Ian. He always knew off the top of his head.
I pulled a baking sheet of crisp bacon from the oven, divided that among us, then placed our plates on the table.
The eggs became slimy on my tongue, feeling runny and underdone. I grimaced and forced down the bite despite how much saliva suddenly flooded my mouth. Then I eyed my plate.
They weren’t underdone, but something about them made me feel queasy. Too wet. I nibbled the bacon instead and let the salty, greasy strips of heaven melt in my mouth.
“Are your eggs okay, baby?”
“Yup. They’re really good, Mommy.” Since Sophia cleaned her plate, I gave her mine and steeped a pitcher of chocolate mint tea for both of us to enjoy while Moonfeather’s egg boiled. We served it to him with his morning vegetables
, watched Saturday morning cartoons, then worked on our winter garden in the backyard. We’d planted an assload of winter nummies for Moonfeather and ourselves, including two kinds of chard, squash, kale, and broccoli.
By the time we finished weeding and laying down fertilizer, it was time for lunch. My baby requested a Nutella and raspberry jam sandwich, which under normal circumstances sounded gross as hell, but today, I made one for myself.
Then I dipped a spoon into the jar and shoveled a heap of the gooey chocolate spread into my mouth.
Sophia’s little nose crinkled. “You tell me and Daddy not to do that.”
“Chocolate is bad for Daddy because it makes him sick when he eats too much. And you dip the spoon into the jar again afterward. I’m not going to do that.”
“Oh.”
The moment she left the kitchen, I plunged the spoon into the jar again. And again.
When I stopped, it was only because I’d scraped out the insides and nothing remained of the sweet and delicious hazelnut butter. I licked the back of the spoon.
“Mommy, is Moonfeather’s egg ready?” Sophia returned again.
I fumbled around and hid the empty jar behind my back, shame rushing a wave of heat to my throat and face. “Almost. I’ll bring it in a moment.”
“Okay.”
I put the spoon in the dishwasher, then hid the empty jar in the trash can beneath wadded paper towel Sophia used to clean up spilled milk and the empty bacon package. Close call. She’d almost caught me making a liar of myself.
The last time I’d wanted Nutella, I’d been nine months pregnant with Sophia and eaten an entire jar of the stuff just hours before my water broke. I normally hated it, but I’d developed the taste for it during the first trimester of my pregnancy, and my boyfriend’s mother would deliver bulk jars from Costco.
Could I…
No. It wasn’t possible. We’d tried so hard to get pregnant, and I hadn’t had a period in months.
Once I took Moonfeather’s egg off the stove, I placed it in ice water to cool it and sliced it down the middle. I gave it to him with the shell on since it’d be fun for him to peel that away on his own. From what Ian explained to us, and from what I’d learned reading books about parrots, foraging was a great part of their nature.
He nibbled a bit of the exposed white, decided he liked it, and began biting away the shell to reveal more of the tender inside.
In a way, having Moonfeather in the house was almost like having a second child. I adored him, and he’d adopted us as members of his flock.
I tried to read a story with Sophia, but my mind returned to the Nutella jar I’d annihilated in a feeding frenzy. A sour taste rushed to my mouth.
A test would be useless, only confirming what I already knew—that I still wasn’t pregnant. But it was worth the peace of mind. After all, I had bought tests in bulk two years ago when Ian and I began to try in earnest to conceive.
To sate my curiosity, and because I was a bit of a masochist, I went upstairs to the bathroom and peed on the stick.
A minute passed before I dredged up the nerve to glance at the little window. A plus symbol materialized beside the pink line, growing darker by the second.
Pregnant. The test claimed me to be pregnant, but I couldn’t trust it to be true, and didn’t dare to let my heart open up to the idea of finally succeeding, only to have my hopes crushed by a false positive.
Regretting I’d emptied my bladder, I capped the test and hurried downstairs to brew more tea. Sophia remained none the wiser, oblivious to my plight thanks to Netflix and Moonfeather. I peeked in on them while the tea steeped, and my heart kind of expanded in my chest. Our once-shy little man had curled up on Sophia’s lap, and he was turning his head left and right while she scratched the little pin feathers under his chin.
Adorable.
The timer on the automated teamaker beeped. In my haste to rush to it and fill my body with enough liquid to pee again, I slammed my hip into the corner of the kitchen island. Swearing, I stumbled to the side and rubbed the tender spot. It’d leave a bruise for sure. A big, deep purple bruise.
“Mommy, are you okay?” Sophia peeked into the kitchen with Moonfeather on her shoulder.
“I’m fine, baby.”
I was not okay.
Too anxious to wait until my tea cooled, I added a handful of ice cubes, then chugged it without sweetener. An hour later, I saturated two more sticks of different brands and capped them.
Two lines. Pregnant.
Finally, pregnant.
I was going to have another baby, and this time, nothing—nothing—could ruin it.
Ian
Someone had taken my Leigh and swapped her with a Stepford Wife.
From the moment I came home, I knew something was up.
Glowing with happiness, she greeted me on the porch—not at the door as I’d grown accustomed to—with a kiss and unfastened my utility belt, promising she’d put the handgun in the safe for me while I showered and unwound from the day.
I left my boots behind outside as had become normal to avoid trekking the history of my working day into our home. The house smelled fresh and clean, suffused with the aroma of sugar and chocolate. My stomach rumbled.
“Cookies, too?”
She beamed. “Three different kinds.”
“You’ll never get me or Sophia to sleep if you feed us all these sweets.”
Her smile widened. “Maybe. But it’s almost Christmas, so why not? I thought I’d get a head start on the holiday baking.”
I quirked a brow. “Now? A little early, isn’t it?”
“It’s never too early for mint chocolate chip fudge brownies.”
My belly and sweet tooth agreed. When Leigh didn’t follow unusual Pinterest recipes, her baking came out topnotch.
“Go shower. Sophia is riding the ponies with Mateo. I promised Russ a batch of caramel blondies if he’d take her off our hands tonight.”
“I’m liking the sound of this more and more. What do you need me to do?”
“Nothing. Shower and get comfortable. Oh, I cleaned your office by the way.”
Oh no.
“I promise I didn’t throw anything away.”
Phew.
Leigh leaned forward and kissed me, brushing her lips tenderly over mine. No closer, because the weight of the day clung to my skin and uniform. “Clean up.”
Fresh boxers awaited me in the bathroom, a set of glossy silk ones in champagne gold she’d given me for my birthday. I took those and Sophia’s absence as a hint of the night to come. After my shower, I snuck into my home office to survey Leigh’s handiwork. As promised, she’d tidied the room, dusting shelves and removing the old coffee mugs from the desk. I grimaced. No matter my good intentions when it came to picking up after myself, I still failed sometimes. Lucky for me, I had a wife who cared enough to make sure I didn’t end up in a pigsty.
Something else tugged at me, though I couldn’t quite figure out what it was that didn’t belong. Either something was missing, or she had added stuff to my random collection of supplies and mementos. I stared at first, cocking my head and trying to make sense of what was in front of me. I kept all of my pens standing up in a jar on my desk. Next to that, a little plastic cup held three slim white objects.
I picked it up and slid the objects into my hand, wondering what in hell she’d decided I needed for work. It took my brain about five seconds to recognize what they were. Not one, but three pregnancy tests.
My breath caught as I turned each one facing up.
Three positive results.
“Leigh!” Jumping from the chair knocked it over on its side behind me. I would have burst out the room and charged down the stairs to find her, but she was already in the doorway with our camera and smiling at me, her cheeks rosy and smile so jubilant it couldn’t be a prank. It couldn’t be. My heart couldn’t take it. “Really?”
She nodded.
“God. I can’t… I can’t believe it. How—but�
��Doctor Kline said you weren’t able—that you can’t ovulate… These say you’re pregnant. Is it a joke?” Please don’t be a joke.
“No joke.”
“But… the doctor—she said.” I looked down at the tests again, wondering if I’d snapped or if maybe I’d fallen asleep in my office chair and was dreaming the entire thing. My gaze darted back to her, back to the camera. Her big smile only widened more. “These are real?”
“Completely real. You’re going to be a daddy.” After angling the digital cam toward us, she leaned forward and kissed me. I didn’t even care about the blinking red dot that said she was videoing every second. I’d play it for our friends myself. I never wanted to forget this afternoon.
After trying as long as we had, fuck yes, the moment deserved to be immortalized.
“But I’m already a daddy.”
“Again. We did it, Ian. I don’t know how it happened, I don’t know why or how it worked this time… I just know we’re finally pregnant.”
I squeezed her close and buried my face against the fragrant warm hollow beneath her throat. She smelled different lately, more pleasant than clouds and fresh air. Better than springtime, an indescribable scent that I couldn’t get enough of. By some miracle, we’d both been given a gift. My hands slid down to her waist and for a moment, I imagined how she’d look with her belly rounded out by our child.
Beautiful. She’d be absolutely beautiful. I couldn’t wait for the days when the subtle and soft curve swelled with a growing baby.
“I don’t know what to say, Leigh. I...” I hadn’t dared to dream about fathering a biological child in months, not since Doctor Kline had exhausted our options for treatment.
“Tell me you’re happy,” she whispered.
Rather than tell her, I scooped her up in my arms and let a kiss do the talking for me. I didn’t let her go until we were back in our bedroom and on the bed, but I kept her tucked close and stroked her stomach. I’d be content to spend the rest of the evening kissing her tummy.
A Man of Many Talons Page 14