Chapter 5 Knight #4
At the back of my mind, I know that instead of remaining in the bed, I should change the sheets, or get dressed, or collect her case from the car, but I know that moving even further away from her is completely out of the question.
I silently count each second that passes without her, forcing my attention to alternate between staring at the closed door and the small puddle of our mixed ejaculate that is slowly drying on my stomach.
Usually, I can’t tolerate being sticky, but knowing that the liquid that’s slowly gelatinizing on my stomach is a mixture of me and my mate seems to settle some of my usual textural difficulties.
When I estimate that three minutes have passed since she entered the bathroom and closed the door between us, I glance up at the clock on the wall, internally chastising myself when I realize it’s after 1300 hours and neither I nor my doll has eaten lunch yet.
Climbing out of bed, I quickly strip the sheets and remake it with fresh bedding.
Even though it’s been decades since I left my parents’ home, the muscle memory and embedded conditioning have me ensuring that the corners of the comforter are perfect and the sheets are tight enough to bounce a quarter off.
Almost eight minutes have passed by the time the bed is remade. She asked for a minute, and I have more than given her that, so I march to the door, vowing silently to myself to never allow a closed door between us again as I open it and step inside.
“Knight, what the fuck?” she gasps, spinning around to face me.
“You asked for a minute. I’ve allowed you eight. Lunch is at 1300 hours. It’s 1325. It’s time to eat,” I say shortly, feeling the discomfort of the disorder squirming under my skin like a swarm of ants.
“I’m not hungry, thanks, and I should go.”
“I usually make soup and sandwiches for lunch,” I say, ignoring her comment about leaving.
“Honestly, I’m fine. I have to find somewhere to live, and I should let Betty and Etta know that I’m in town…” She trails off, exhaling as she turns to stare at herself in the mirror.
Her hair is wet, and she’s wrapped in a towel.
“You showered,” I snap.
“Oh…yeah,” she answers, glancing behind her to the massive shower stall I helped install.
“Next time, I’ll bathe you, like this morning,” I tell her, feeling the rightness of my words the moment I say them.
I don’t like the idea that she’s washed me away, even though I understand her need for cleanliness.
But I enjoyed helping her in the tub this morning, and I’d like to do it again.
In fact, even as I say it, I’m already rearranging my daily schedule to include it.
“Next time?” she squeaks. “What the hell is happening right now?”
“I need to shower, then I’ll make lunch,” I tell her, stepping into the shower stall.
Not bothering to wait for the water to heat, I turn the faucet and quickly clean up.
Two minutes later, I’m done and drying myself with a towel, but my doll is still in the exact same position, her hands braced against the counter, staring at herself in the mirror.
I don’t know what she’s thinking, but her introspection bothers me. Once I’m reasonably dry, I hang my towel up, then scoop her off her feet and into my arms, bridal style.
“What are you doing?” she pants, grabbing onto my neck as I carry her into the bedroom.
“We’ll unpack your clothes after we eat, but for now, you can either stay naked or put on one of my shirts.
I have eighteen—six khaki, six white, and six black.
I’m happy to assign one of each color for your use,” I tell her, lowering her to her feet in front of the closet that I filled with my clothes last night.
Reaching around her, I open one of the dresser drawers and pull out a pair of boxers. Closing the drawer, I open the one above it, then gesture for her to take a shirt.
“You were serious? You literally have six of each color,” she says, taking one of the black folded shirts from the front pile.
“Yes, six khaki, six white, six black,” I confirm.
“You don’t wear any other colors?” she asks, slipping the shirt over her head, only pulling the towel from around her once she’s covered in my clothes from her neck to her knees.
“No,” I tell her simply.
Her lips purse, and I can see she wants to say something, but she doesn’t and instead simply nods.
“Let’s go and eat. I’ll dry your hair once we’re finished with lunch.” Scooping her off her feet again, I stride quickly out of the bedroom and down the stairs, into the open-plan kitchen, living, and dining space.
“Your house is huge,” she says when I lower her to her feet in the kitchen.
“Our house. I designed it to be big enough for us and our family,” I say, before turning away and opening the refrigerator.
“It’s not our house, Knight. We barely know each other. I think maybe what happened upstairs has given you the wrong impression. I don’t normally have one-night stands. In fact, you’re the first. But it’s been a tough few weeks, and when you showed up at my door…” she trails off.
“I’ve only ever had one-night stands. Until you.
That’s not what this is, what we are. You’re mine, Octavia.
My mate, my wife. Mine. We’re married, we’ve consummated it, and none of that was influenced by your tough few weeks.
My only regret is that I didn’t come and collect you two months ago,” I tell her, efficiently making us both sandwiches while I speak.
“Animals mate, not humans.”
“I believed that too. Until you. Now I believe that we are bound to one another, predisposed to be together. I’m yours. No take-backs.”
When she coughs on a choked laugh, I glance up and find her staring at me incredulously. “Did you seriously just say no take-backs?”
“Yes,” I say, sliding a plate across the counter to her. “I belong to you now.”
“You belong to me?” she splutters.
“And you belong to me.” I point at her sandwich. “Eat,” I order.
Her expression is still adorably confused, but she does as I say and picks up her sandwich, taking a small bite. We eat in companionable silence, me standing on one side of the counter, she on the other.
The clock ticks loudly as each minute closer to 1400 hours passes, driving me to eat quicker than usual, and I’m brushing crumbs from my fingers onto my empty plate before she’s finished half of hers.
“We need to go shopping for furniture,” I tell her. “I bought a few things, so the rooms weren’t empty when we moved in, but we can choose the rest together. Does your gothic aesthetic extend to your interior decor preferences, or is it just your clothes?”
“Knight, I don’t live here. I’m not living here with you.”
“Would you prefer us to live somewhere else? I’m still renting the house on Jumpers Row, a few doors down from Etta. We could live there if you’d prefer, although as I’ve taken a leave of absence for the next six months, the house might be assigned to my replacement.”
Blinking, Doll looks up at me with a haunted, lost look in her eyes. “You really believe all of this, don’t you?”
“I believe that I’m yours and that you’re mine, yes.”
“And you think we’re just going to move in together?”
“We will be living together. Either here, the house on the row, or a place in town, if that’s what you’d prefer.”
“And what if I don’t want to live with you?” she sasses, arching her brows at me.
“You do,” I say simply.
“How can you say that? You don’t know me. I definitely don’t know you.”
“Because you don’t have one-night stands, yet you’ve let me fuck your cunt twice, and I bet if I picked you up, you’d let me slip my cock right back into you again.
You opened the door to me, let me bathe you, then got on a plane with me and let me fly you out of the state.
I don’t know every detail about you, but I know that deep in your soul, you feel how right this is.
That’s why you know that we both needed me to fuck you.
It’s why you know that this is your home.
It’s why you’re standing there naked beneath my shirt and wondering how it’ll feel when I bend you over this counter and fuck my cum back into you again. ”
I’m thirty-eight years old, and this is the most impassioned I’ve ever felt about anything.
I never belonged anywhere until I moved to this town, and it became my home.
My smoke jumper teammates became my brothers and my family.
But Octavia, my perfect doll, is everything, and I won’t let something as stupid as societal conceptions ruin this.
She doesn’t speak, and neither do I. I’ve said what I need to say, and as far as I’m concerned, that’s it, and the wedding tomorrow will confirm it.
Finishing her sandwich quietly, she takes the bottle of water I offer her, then watches pensively as I fill the sink with suds and wash our dishes, drying them with a dish towel before I put everything away.
Once I’ve finished cleaning the counters, the kitchen is immaculate and exactly how it looked before I started preparing our food.
Once I’m finished, I circle the counter, lift her off her feet, then carry her over to the black leather couch I purchased for us and sit down, positioning her on my lap.
My shirt is huge on her, big enough to cover her from her neck to her knees, but with her legs straddling mine, I can feel her bare skin against me as she wiggles to get comfortable.
Reaching for the iPad I left out with this purpose in mind, I unlock the screen, then hand it to her. “Start looking for furniture,” I tell her.
“You should pick it,” she starts.
“I’ve never decorated anything before, so unless you want our home to look like this forever, you should pick what you like.”
“You’ve never decorated your home?” she asks, the surprise evident in her voice.
“This is the first home I’ve ever had.”
“Where did you live before you came to Rockhead Point?”
“I spent two years in Idaho, a few years in Oregon, and before that I was in California.”