There will be a breakdown.
I’m prepared for one with Charlie. I’m not sure when it will happen, but it will come.
My phone buzzes. I check the text.
Iron Man. Batman. Thor. – Rose
The corners of my mouth rise at the Fuck, Marry, Kill question. I’m able to concentrate on both the class and the message without missing a moment.
I text: Are you asking for Lily or for yourself?
Rose and Lily are eating lunch at our house with the rest of the children while Ryke, Daisy, Sullivan, and Lo go hiking for the day. Ryke has an expensive backpack-carrier for Sullivan since she’d never be able to hike at her age.
Both, but it doesn’t go against our rules. You’re still required to answer, and answer truthfully, Richard. – Rose
“This is stupid,” Charlie says softly, but his focus is on his twin brother and his older sister. He can see, as well as I do, how nervous Beckett becomes by Jane disregarding the instructed moves in favor of her own.
“He’s okay, Charlie,” I whisper.
Charlie crosses his arms and sinks in his chair.
Rose and I agreed that our children could choose their hobbies, even “trial runs” to potentially see what they liked. If they’re in the hobby or sport for longer than a couple weeks, they have to provide a good reason for quitting. We want our children to finish tasks, not take an easy way out. With their level of privilege, this is extremely important to us.
Today is just the first day of pre-ballet class, and only Jane and Beckett hopped on the idea. Charlie declined but said he wanted to watch, not with the hope of eventually joining. I think he came to support his twin brother.
I find time to text Rose a response.
Marry. Fuck. Kill.
Marry Iron Man. Fuck Batman. Kill Thor.
Thor is ridiculous, and I don’t mean the Norse mythology. I mean the one played by an actor on a movie screen.
Rose is quick.
Of course you would marry Iron Man. He’s as egotistical as you are. – Rose
Another text.
Lily said you’re Batman, so you just fucked yourself, Richard. – Rose
I rub my lips, my grin escalating tenfold. I reply: I have good taste.
I have better taste – Rose
I type fast. You did choose me, so I think we can agree that we both have equally great taste when it comes to sex.
A pause before my phone buzzes.
Fine. We’re equals. It’s cemented. – Rose
Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Jane holding her feet and rocking.
“There she goes,” Charlie narrates.
Sure enough, Jane tumbles over her head and onto her bottom, a laugh widening her smile.
“Jane!” Madame Daphne scolds. “This isn’t gymnastics. We’re doing butterflies right now.” She snaps her fingers. “Back in the circle.”
Slowly, Jane scoots beside her brother. Beckett remains entirely rigid, certain pieces of his hair curlier, others just a little wavy, and he’s only one of two boys in the class. When we arrived, he never batted an eye at the fact.
Beckett suddenly looks to Charlie.
Charlie looks to me.
If they both choose ballet again, we’ll put Beckett in a different class from Jane. I want him to feel comfortable, but sometimes that comes from within.
“Il va bien,” I tell Charlie. He’s fine.
Beckett is enjoying the class, despite his sister’s nonchalance. Twice, he asked Madame Daphne, “Like this?” Just to ensure he’s doing the move correctly. When she praises his technique, he smiles.
Charlie lets out a puff of breath and scans the ballet room filled with floor-length mirrors and windows that overlook Manhattan.
My phone vibrates in my palm again.
I did something. – Rose
I stiffen.
I have to commit to this. I promised I would. – Rose
I’m as intrigued as I am confused. Details, darling. I press send.
Charlie’s demeanor suddenly changes beside me. He straightens and scoots closer to my chair. “Daddy…” His voice spikes just enough for me to catch his worry. My phone buzzes, but I can’t respond or look at the text.
I immediately follow his gaze to one of the mirrors. In the reflection, a woman cups her phone like she’s recording, but she’s not angled on the circle of children. The lens is pointed towards the mirror, directly at my reflection and Charlie’s.
I’m tall enough that I can see over each head of every woman. I stare directly at the one with a brunette bob and pearl earrings. Only four chairs away. She notices quickly and drops her phone to her lap. When she senses my gaze still on her, she swivels her head. “What?”
I don’t know if she plans to profit off us either financially or by social media notoriety or simply to just show her friends and family the footage. I have an issue, mostly, with the fact that my children haven’t consented to being filmed.
“Do you mind if my security team looks at your video footage before you leave?” My tone is extremely casual. I even offer a smile. “It’s just precaution. They won’t bite.” They will delete anything involving Charlie.
“Sure. Would I be able to get a picture with you before you leave?”
“Just of me, yes.”
She tries to relax her giddy smile before facing the children.
I text a member of my security team who waits outside with a few bodyguards, and I watch Charlie close his eyes in boredom.
I rub his shoulders and scroll through my missed messages.
I gave Lo permission to name our baby. (Only the first name, of course.) – Rose
I’m actually surprised, so much so that my grin overtakes my face.
He wrote down the name and gave it to Lily in an envelope. I can’t take back this promise. I’m about to open the envelope. I swear if he named him “Loren” I will stab Lo in the eye. – Rose
She included “knife” emoticons. I have to wait for her next text, but I think about how she said “he named him”—as in a boy.
We asked to see the gender of our baby this time. This will be our sixth child, and even I hoped for a girl. Not because I don’t want any more children. I do want more, but I know what it would mean to Ryke and Daisy for them to have another.
They’re both too selfless to ask about surrogacy. They’re both too kind to press Rose about the option. They only warmed up to the idea when they thought Rose might have a girl.
Then we all learned that there will be another Cobalt boy.
And they slammed the door shut to surrogacy faster and more forceful than I even expected.
Here I was wishing for an outcome for someone else. I wished my family ended so that theirs could grow. I rarely wish for anyone but me, and my wish didn’t come true.
Rose is still adamant about trying surrogacy, but we’re going to have a harder time convincing Ryke and Daisy now. Ryke is known to be stubborn. It’s like dragging a sitting dog by the leash. I’m not entirely sure he’ll budge.
I only worry about Rose’s health, but if she’s okay, if the doctors say yes, then I don’t see a reason not to try.
My phone vibrates. Rose sent a picture of the note in Lo’s handwriting:
Ben
*named for Ben Obi-Wan Kenobi who mentors Luke Skywalker
*he reminds me of Connor
*I could’ve made him Obi-Wan, Queen Rose, so put away your talons
*this means a lot, so…thanks
Ben.
My grin can’t be restrained at this point.
Another vibration.
He can live another day. – Rose
She loves the name too.
I never thought my choices would contain so much feeling but with each middle name, I only see fractions of logic. This name is melodically pleasant. And so on. And so forth. Most, I chose out of nostalgia, out of something heartfelt and visceral that can’t be described with numbers or bare facts.
I choose Pirrip, as in Philip Pirrip, from Great Expectations by Charles Dickens.
I choose Pirrip as Ben’s middle name because I saw Rose reading that very novel when we were sixteen. She won’t remember because she never saw me. I passed her in the conference room lobby during Model UN. She sat straight as a board on the edge of the hotel’s lobby fountain, the book opened on her lap.
I wanted to stop and talk to her, but I was with three Faust boys. We pushed onward, and my head turned.
I had never looked back in that way before, but for the very first time, I did. I looked back, and I only looked back at her.
2022
“I spread wildfires everywhere I go. It’s a symptomatic quality of being me.”
- Rose Calloway Cobalt, We Are Calloway (Season 4 Episode 09 – Nerd Stars & Raisins)
Connor & Rose Cobalt welcome the birth of their baby boy
BEN PIRRIP COBALT
March 29th, 2022
{ 26 }
June 2022
The Hale House
Philadelphia
LOREN HALE
Beneath my champagne-colored comforter and red sheets, I grasp Lily’s wiry frame to my hard body. On our sides. Coated in sweat. Sheets stick to us from last night’s four-hour fuck. Now morning, we kiss one another desperately. Urgently.
Our legs tangle. Starved for one another, I part Lily’s lips with mine. I pull her closer before she mumbles out the word. Her legs vibrate against me—Christ. My blood heats, and I deepen the kiss, my tongue slipping against hers.
She clings to my body like she needs to burrow further into my fucking soul. I’m lit up. Our skin-on-skin might as well be sparkplug-to-battery. Every second Lily shakes against me, my cock begs to fill her silent request.
Inside me.
Inside me.
I can practically hear her.
I kiss her raw lips. I’ll take care of you, love.
No one understands her sex addiction better than Lily and me. We fucked all last night because we wanted to. Not because she spiraled out of control and fed into compulsions. Not because she needed to medicate stress with sex.
Because she’s reached this strong place where she can mentally stop before fixating on orgasm after orgasm. Because this isn’t an everyday expectation or need.
It’s a want.
A goddamn head-splitting, mind-blowing want.
I have Lily tucked against my chest, her leg hiked around my waist. I clutch the back of her head and kiss her even more fully. She trembles again.
Jesus Christ. I harden against her body, and she writhes. My muscles coil, taut and searing. Our lips break apart for the first time. My forehead on hers, desire swims in her big green eyes, and my sharp gaze bores through Lily.
Inside me. Inside me. I see the words all over her adorable fucking face.
“You want something, love?” I tease, our lips brushing as I speak.
“Closer,” she begs in a soft whine that grips my cock. Blood rushes out of my head, dizzied.
Still lying side-by-side, I slowly push my erection inside of Lily. She inhales, and her head begins to tilt backwards as she mentally, physically, and emotionally succumbs to this insane pleasure. No trouble getting off.
I thrust with a staggered, unpredictable rhythm that leaves Lily incapacitated. I fuck my best friend who gives herself to me with the simple request of make me feel good.
No problem, Lil.
Lips a breath apart, I close the distance, kissing her deep before rolling on top. I stretch her right leg over my shoulder, the other around my waist. I go from quick, deep thrusts to suddenly short and slow.
She lets out a noise that sounds close to a whimper. “Closer.”
I push so far inside of Lily and just stop.
She quivers, pulsating against my dick. Goddammit. I lean forward, one of my elbows on the mattress. I breathe heavily, and my eyes and hand rake her body. I thumb her hardened nipple before descending to her abdomen and splay my palm on the tiniest bump, almost unnoticeable.
Lily is about eleven-weeks pregnant.
We decided to start trying for another baby at the beginning of the year. We knew we could handle it, and we both wanted another. It took some months, but we’re thankful it happened.
I shift my hand lower and lower, and then I rub her clit.
Her back arches with a sudden gasp. I put my hand on her cheek, holding her head upright. I grind against Lily, my blood blazing. She shudders at the movement again.
Her eyes flutter closed.
“Lily Hale,” I whisper.
She forces her eyes open, but she’s gone. Lost. Sex is on another plane of existence. Her heartbeat races against mine. She clenches around my cock.
A groan scratches my throat. “Goddammit,” I curse, my jaw unhinging then locked tight. I grit my teeth hard, my eyes rolling.
Goddammit. My nerves are on fire. I toss the comforter over us, heat gathering. The smell of Lil almost rams me towards a climax. I almost just come right there. My muscles contract.
I hold her round face while I rock faster and harder.
Just now, the door clicks open. “Daddy, Mommy, can I go swimming please, please, please?”
“Moffy!” I yell, pissed. Lily and I are entirely beneath the covers, so I’m not sure what he can see. This is the first time he’s walked in on us while we’re having sex.
Lily blinks over and over, her cute come-face morphing into horror.
“What are you doing under there?” Moffy asks, walking closer.
Before she rips off my dick, I pull out and then climb off my wife. I just peek my head from the comforter. My ice-cold glare shrinks my son backwards. He’s already in orange swim trunks, goggles around his neck.
He’ll be seven in a month. He knows to knock.
“Moffy,” I say sharply. “How many times have we told you to knock before you enter someone’s room?”
His chin quivers. “I…I was just asking a question. I didn’t think you’d be mad.”
My heart stings, but he has to listen to us. If he thinks there’s no punishment at the end of this, then he’ll do it again. And next time, we may not be under the goddamn covers.
“Go wait in the hallway.” My voice is like shrapnel. “Close the door on your way out.”
Moffy retreats, worry sparking in his green eyes. Because I usually tell him to try again and knock this time. Once the door clicks closed, I lift up the covers. Lily lies on her stomach towards the other side of the bed. Right near the edge.
Like she planned to reach for her clothes on the floor. Something kept her from diving over. Probably sex. The thought. The want. Still inside of her. She can’t even speak right now.
I’m goddamn hard, ready to burst. I don’t waste time. I come up behind Lily while she’s flat on her stomach, and I raise her hips slightly and slide inside.
Surprise and want jolts her, and she looks back at me, lips parted. Heady and gone again. Pressure squeezes my cock, and my chest rises and falls as quickly as I thrust. I grip the crook of her hip and her tiny ass. Friction builds, and I end this faster than I ever would. My pace like lightning.
She comes with a muffled cry into the mattress.
I choke on a groan, and I don’t linger inside of Lily. I pull out, find a pair of boxer-briefs and black sweat pants. I tug both on. Then I turn to Lily and wipe the sweaty hair off her forehead. She’s still making sense of where she is while sluggishly fighting with the armholes of her baggy shirt.
“I’m going to go deal with our kid,” I tell her.
She finds the energy to kneel and tries to stick her head in her shirt. “It’s…not his fault, Lo.”
I lower my voice so Moffy can’t overhear us. “It is his fault. He knows better. We’ve told him a million goddamn times.”
She fits her head in and pulls the black shirt (my shirt) down. “We shouldn’t have had sex—”
“We’re the parents.” I point at my chest. “I’m allowed to fuck my
wife. You’re allowed to fuck me and not feel guilty about it.” For Christ’s sake, we were doing so well for a minute there. It’s all circular. Addiction. Shame.
Lily hesitates, doubtful and uncertain.
I clasp her face between my hands and say strongly, “I would’ve slept with you this morning, even if you weren’t an addict. Would you still feel guilty if he walked in then?”
She thinks for a second. “Yes…because he should always come before sex.” She cringes at the word come. “Not like that. Notlikethat.”
I comb her hair back again. “It’s not about sex. It’s about the fact that he didn’t listen to us.”
Her brows crinkle, not seeing this from the same lens as me. “It is about sex.”
I let go of her and step back. I lick my lips, thinking. I can’t see away around this, so I make up my mind. “I’m grounding him.”
Lily springs from the bed, her black shirt falling to her thighs. “Don’t, Lo!”
I’m already walking to the door, and she tries to drag me backwards by the waist, but I end up dragging her forwards. When I reach the door, I spin around on Lily.
She crosses her arms, her seriousness tensing the room and me.
I have my hand on the knob. “I’m doing this, Lil.”
“Then we’re in a fight.” She nods resolutely.
My stomach twists. I can’t remember the last time we fought. “Lily…”
Tears well in her eyes. “I don’t want to punish him for this.”
“We have to.”
She shakes her head repeatedly. “We’ll lock the door next time.”
“It doesn’t change the fact that he didn’t listen to us.” Our kids can’t walk all over us. Not when there are things in our lives that are so goddamn dangerous.
Alcohol. I will slam my foot down on the idea, on the concept, on the cold reality. They won’t be able to say, But Dad, the kid next-door drinks; can I have just one beer?
Some Kind of Perfect (Calloway Sisters #4.5) Page 31