“I love you,” It’s a barely a whisper as it leaves my lips. I didn’t even realize I said it out loud until Clint is rolling me over and climbing on top of me.
He presses his forehead down on mine, his overgrown five-o’clock shadow tickling my chin.
“What … what did you say?” Clint’s voice is a mix of pain and relief. His muscles tense and contract above me, and I can feel the love and desire rolling off him in waves.
The butterflies in my stomach are fluttering so hard that I almost can’t speak. I’ve never said those words to anyone, not even Chloe and Minka. I didn’t even mean to say them now, but they’re the truest syllables I’ve ever uttered.
“I love you.” I smile sheepishly, giving him exactly what he wants to hear. And exactly what I need to say.
Clint doesn’t wait a second before his lips are meeting mine, stroking and kissing my battered soul while pouring all the love within him into me. Our tongues dance in an erotic and slow tango, lapping at each other until we are so breathless the room is spinning.
Clint breaks it off, inhaling deeply. “Wait. Wait. Let’s … slow down. We need to talk.”
I grab the back of his neck and bring him in again. I’ve gotten a taste of the drug that has me hooked, and I need more. It’s been too long.
I grind my aching sex against him and feel his hard, hot cock twitch even between all the layers we have on.
He breaks off our kiss once again. “Kels, hold on.” He can’t help but grind into me as I lift my hips up to meet him. A groan of pleasure and pent-up horniness rips from his throat.
“We need to have a real talk about this. About us, our future.” He lays a hand on my stomach in a way that has my heart melting into a pile of girly mush. “About the baby.”
A strangled noise comes out of my throat and I realize I’m close to tears again. But really, I’ve cried enough to fill Niagara Falls if there were ever to be a drought that horrific.
“Clint, I know we do. But right now, please, please let me work this out in the way I know best. Sex. Please, have sex with me. We can have all the heart-to-hearts you want later. But right now, my hormones are insane and all I want you to do is put your dick in me. Okay?”
His eyes are wide but I can see the carnal lust swimming in his baby blues. I don’t even give him the chance to answer. I start molesting his mouth and grinding into him like a possessed feline. We begin ripping at each other’s clothes, frantic and sweaty. I can’t get close enough to him, can’t feel his skin in the way I want.
He frees me from my clothes prison and begins biting and clawing his way down my body. There is nothing gentle or loving about what we’re doing; it’s just blind lust fueling us forward until we both reach exactly the place we want to be. It’s been too long for slow and steady, I need this. I crave it.
The whole room smells like sex, and Clint can’t get inside of me fast enough. He’s moving down my body to warm me up, sticking his magical tongue in places that make fireworks explode in front of my eyes. But I stop him.
“I’m ready. Please …”
He knows what I need. In the snap of my fingers, he’s out of his clothes. That big, Thor-like body looms over me. My protector, my sex god. Just seeing his naked flesh after this long has me close to the edge, panting with my impending climax.
Clint pinches the head of his cock, almost painfully, and I know he’s close too. “Is it, uh, okay to be doing this?”
He stares at my stomach like an alien may pop out of my body at any second. I roll my eyes. “Oh my God, get in me before I scream.”
Grabbing onto to those strong hips, I drag Clint’s body forward until he’s fisting his cock and shoving into me.
“Fuck …” We both hiss as he enters me. My body opens to him and then squeezes his tool like a vice, each of us pulsing and throbbing so hard that I can’t tell which one of us is closer to release.
Clint tangles his fingers in my hair and rests his palms on either side of my face. “We’ll talk later, okay? I love you.”
He wants permission to make us lose our minds, and I’m more than happy to give it to him. I nod my head as I whisper “I love you.”
Slowly, he drags out and pushes back in with more force, eliciting breathy moans from us both. Two more times he strokes like that, testing my slickness.
And then he starts to buck and stroke like the world is ending. I can only hang on to those big, broad shoulders, chasing the incredible orgasm high he’s sparked in my limbs.
Clint locks onto my eyes, stoking the raging fire between us until we can’t speak or breathe.
Clint’s chest is sweaty and rapidly rising and falling as he catches his breath, but I don’t mind as I lay wrapped up in him.
“Do you think that was okay to do with the … baby and all?” He’s still so hesitant on the word baby. I understand, I couldn’t quite get a handle on it at first either. Not that I’m doing much better with that now.
“Well, if the first time didn’t injure it, the second time definitely did …”
“Don’t even joke like that, Roo!” He pinches my ass at my bad joke.
I chuckle, running my nails lightly up and down his arm until I see goose bumps appear.
“So, do you know what it is?” Clint eyes me curiously as he holds my stomach in that way he has since he found out I’m pregnant.
His obvious happiness at the pregnancy has me feeling more normalized about it too. Funny, I’ve spent the last four weeks dreading waking up and dealing with anything. Yet Clint has been here for less than a day and has mostly erased all of that fear. I’m still worried, but I know we are going to face it all together. I have my best friend, my boyfriend, the person I lean on for everything, back.
“Nope. It’s still too early to tell. But the sucker has one hell of a heartbeat.” I gleam proudly. For as depressed as I’ve been the last few weeks, that’s the shining point in all the darkness. When I saw the baby, just a little acorn on the black-and-white screen, I felt something that you can’t describe using words. The feeling was momentous, larger than life. All-consuming happiness and surety. It surpassed the English language.
“Well, of course, he does. Look who his mother is.” Clint nuzzles my hair.
“Did you just say he?”
“I’m going to think it’s a boy up until you tell me it’s not. Just think about it, a father’s dream … a little ball player who will play T-ball and want to play catch.” Clint’s eyes go dreamy and I know I’m in trouble. But, at the same time, my cheeks flush and my heart speeds up because I can’t believe I’m lucky enough to land the good guy. The one who is excited about this unplanned, freaking scary as hell pregnancy.
“Okay, Coach Bellows. So … what do we do now?”
Clint begins to rub my back in the way he knows I love. “Well, we are both unemployed. So, there is that. We have nowhere to live. All of your stuff is in Mitchum. We’ve no money and no prospects.”
He screams this like Charlotte Lucas in Pride and Prejudice and I curse Minka for ever making the boys watch that movie. All they did was snicker and go on about English royalty for months.
“I have money. In my trust at least …”
“But would you really use it? That’s your parent’s money. It’s basically blood money …”
I contemplate that. “You’re right. But I also worked hard on their preserves for years. I earned most of that. Hell, I’m not one of these kids who is righteous and determined to spite my parents by being successful. Fuck that.”
Clint rubs my tummy and I look down. “Sorry, I guess I have to clean the language up a bit now, huh? But really, I mean, I have no qualms over taking the blood money and buying myself a nice little place with it. Those fuckers put me through more than enough. I’ve earned it. And if that makes me a selfish, dirty bitch then so be it. I’m providing for myself and my kid.”
When I look up, Clint has one of those goofy-ass smiles of his gracing those full lips. “You’re the sexie
st spitfire on the face of this planet. And you make me so proud. You’re not selfish and you’re not a bitch. And I love your honesty. You say exactly what everyone is thinking or wishes they could say out loud.”
He sighs and runs his thumb over my lip. “Okay. Not that we can play your infamous strip question game, because we already pretty much handled that. But, where are you going to buy said place?”
Memories of our abandoned strip game come back to me in heartwarming flashes. “I don’t know …”
Clint is silent for a second before he speaks again. “Have you thought about talking to Jackson at all?”
My muscles tense up just at the mention of his name. I feel the tingling at the base of my spine, the indication that I’ll have a full-blown anxiety attack if I begin to tackle the biological dad issue. I have to shut it down now.
“No. And I don’t want you to bring it up. Ever again. I love you and I’m glad you’re here, but not one word about Jackson. Got it?”
Clint nods and I can feel the motion as I snuggle into his incredible abs. “I guess the first thing I need to do is go back to Mitchum. Go through my stuff. We can figure everything out from there.”
27
Kelsey
Standing outside of the ornate double doors of my parent’s Mitchum mansion feels weird. But surprisingly, I don’t feel much. I never spent much time here when I did live in town, choosing to crash at Minka or Chloe’s houses where family actually means something.
All I relate this house to is nannies and holidays spent alone. Stepping inside, our footsteps echo in the grand foyer. This place is like a mausoleum. The place where familial love and happiness come to die.
I rub my shoulders in the eighty-degree heat and Clint comes to wrap his arms around my waist. “Let’s get out of here quickly, yeah?”
We spent another month in New York mapping out a plan before deciding to come down here. Clint came to his first doctor’s appointment with me, my three-month checkup, both of us tearing up as we heard the little acorn swimming around in there.
Turns out we conceived right around when Clint came back from Omaha. I’ve always refused to take birth control, didn’t believe in those hormones in my body. But that means that condoms, as they sometimes do, failed. Which scared me at first, since I was still drinking when I hadn’t known that his boys could swim. But the doctor ran tests, assured me everything is okay with me and the baby.
For the first time, I have a real-life family. Two people to call my very own, who have to put up with me even when I’m being a pain in the ass. I told Clint he had to or else. He just smiled and said, “Gladly.”
Clint has a job interview in Virginia tomorrow at a small nonprofit that deals with childhood obesity. I’m along for the ride, coasting on my trust fund money until he makes a decision about his career. Because, as usual, I go where I please. Only nowadays, I go there with Clint.
I rub my small bump as we ascended the stairs. For as freaked out as I still am, I am getting used to having this tiny person living in my body. He or she is always with me, and our baby is going to be a cute, sassy little mix of Clint and me. And yes, I said sassy because I just have a hunch that this is a girly acorn.
Being back in my childhood bedroom is weird, to say the least. Mostly because, again, I have no attachment to it. I can tell you every nick on the wall in Minka’s bedroom, or exactly where we kept our wine coolers in Chloe’s closet. My room? The most personal thing in it is a poster of Robert Pattinson back from my vampire, punk phase.
“Big Twilight fan, eh? I think I view you in a completely different light now …”
I throw a pillow at Clint to wipe that stupid, smug, judgmental look off his rugged face. Stupid, sexy asshole.
“I had a goth phase, okay? We all went through one.”
“Not me.” He shakes his head. “All boyband phase. I idolized JC Chasez.”
As if this information isn’t embarrassing enough for him, he does a little pop-lock and slide move. I have to bite my lip until the point of breaking the skin to keep my cackles inside.
“You can laugh. I know you want to. Come on, Roo, give me a laugh!” Clint attacks me, tickling my sides until I’m puffing out and saying Uncle.
But it’s the front door shutting that has us both shooting upright, the worry and fear mirrored in the expressions we give each other.
I go to face our unexpected visitor first, moving through the doorway and out onto the open hallway staircase. Clint grabs my waist, half in support and half to stop me from keeling over as we look down on our guests.
Madeline and Hugo stand in the foyer, scowling up at us.
“What are you doing here, Kelsey?”
My brain associates Hugo as my father, but I need to stop labeling him that way. He is just some no-good, cheating bastard who happens to be married to my ice queen mother. I don’t even want to look at him, much less use words to acknowledge him.
It’s Clint who speaks for me. “We’re just gathering Kelsey’s things, Mr. O’Brien, and then we will be out of here.”
Madeline has to butt in. “And who, may I ask, are you? And why are you in my home?” She has her nose upturned, as if she can’t fathom why someone in jeans and a T-shirt would dare enter her home in that attire.
I have the sudden urge to scratch her eyes out. But I have better ammo to lob at her. “His name is Clint Bellows. He is my boyfriend … and also the father of my child. You should probably speak to the father of your grandchild more kindly, Mother.”
Her mouth drops open, and it looks like Hugo is going to shit nails. “Wha … what? You’ve gone and got yourself pregnant? Why, you little slut—”
“Enough,” Clint silences my mother, his voice the definition of power and control. I beam up at him. “You will never speak to her like that again. Like I said, we’re getting her things, and we’re leaving.”
“And where do you suspect you’ll go? Huh, young lady? Don’t you expect any more money from us, you failure!” Hugo’s face is a putrid green, his rage and fear mixing to make one awful looking complexion.
And here’s where I lose it. Because I am officially done with these monsters ruling my life.
I march down the stairs, coming toe to toe with my parents, in name only. Madeline suddenly doesn’t look so tough, Hugo not so formidable.
“I don’t want your fucking money. I’m taking my things, and I’m taking my trust, and I never want to see either of you ever again.”
“And who says we are just going to let you take that entire trust that you didn’t even work for?” Hugo thinks he has some leverage on me.
I just chuckle like a psychopathic villain giving their climactic monologue. “Oh, come on, Hugo. You have to try harder than that. I’m going to walk, with my trust, and I will never hear from you again. And you want to know why? Because if you even try to come after me, try to contact me or badger me, I’ll go to the media. I’ll tell them what a sham your marriage is, how many people you’ve been fucking. Or, I can just out you, Madeline. I’m not sure that the media will like that their darling lied about her daughter’s paternity for all these years. Do you?”
The two of them stand there, gobsmacked as I feel Clint grinning behind me. This might quite possibly be the best feeling I’ve ever had. Sticking it to the robots who raised me after all this time, yeah it feels fucking great.
We turn to head back upstairs and throw the rest of my stuff in bags.
“Oh, and one more thing.” I turn on the spiral staircase. “I want the Virginia preserve. You’ll deed it over to me, make me controlling owner, whatever. Just put it in my name and never come back.”
I surprised myself when I demanded the Virginia preserve. I didn’t plan to set foot back here in this lifetime. But as I blew over Madeline and Hugo, I knew I had to face all of my issues.
I’ve never let conflict or problems hang over my life like dark clouds, and I am done letting that happen. Clint is back, we’re on our way to a successful f
uture, and I am a mother-to-be. Adulthood is knocking on the door, and I am going to hit this challenge out of the fucking park. I don’t know any other way to do things.
We stayed in a hotel last night, snuggling naked under the covers until we couldn’t take it anymore and made slow, sweet love while Clint whispered in my ear. I didn’t want to leave that little bubble this morning, but it was time to face the music. Or the tigers.
Clint pulls my little red Jetta up the familiar gravel preserve drive, and the knots in my stomach tighten and harden. Happiness at being back in this place mixes with nauseous fear, and I look down to see my fingers shaking.
“You sure you want to do this, baby?” Clint grabs my hand across the console.
He looks so handsome in his gray suit, and I know he’s probably more nervous for today than I am. I squeeze back, trying to rub off some love and luck for his interview.
“Yes. I have to do this. Especially for the acorn.” I rub my tummy and smile.
“I love you. My sassy, kick-ass lady.”
Clint clears the top of the hill, and I see Jackson’s office come into view. I can feel the nervous sweat start under my boobs, which have already grown a size in my first trimester. Talk about perks of having a baby. I hope I get to keep them.
After pulling to a stop, he palms my chin and turns me toward that now clean-shaven, but still fucking sexy face. It’s all I can do not to pull on that tie until I’m straddling his lap. That’s another thing about pregnancy. The constant horniness. Although, I guess I had that one before.
“Just listen for once, okay? I think Jackson has some things to say that you’ll want to hear.”
He knows me too well. He gives me just enough room so that I still feel like my free, independent self, but has no problem going over my head to make decisions when he knows I’m being a coward.
“All right.” I press my lips to his and mourn the loss of the scratchy stubble. It will be back soon he assured me.
Over the Fence Box Set Page 58