Chapter Twelve #2
Only then did he break our kiss to lift his head and offer,
“Fast and hard, or slow and sweet?”
“Fast and hard, um…first,” I whispered.
His eyes darkened but he said, “Been awhile since I tasted
your sweet pussy, baby.”
“Okay, fast and hard after…um, that.”
I got another grin, a different one this time, one I felt
right where he’d be giving me some attention, hopefully soon, then he dropped
his head and kissed me again.
He left the dress on when he eventually went down on me.
But he got rid of it (though, not the shoes) when he fucked
me.
Fast and hard.
But still.
It was all kinds of sweet.
“What did you come to talk about?”
It was after.
I was lying on top of him, naked (he’d finally taken off my
shoes). He’d pulled the covers up over my booty. And he was running the tips of
his fingers up and down my spine.
I was gooey and warm and sated and happy, and his bedroom
was even better than his living room (he had plaid wallpaper behind the bed and
gold lamps and a tan leather bench at the foot of the bed with a buttoned top,
and best of all, super soft sheets, and obviously he took care of his twists,
the pillowcases were silk).
“Everything,” I mumbled into his skin.
He had a smile in his voice when he asked, “Everything?”
I tipped my head back, stacking my hands on his chest,
resting my chin on them and looking up at him.
My breath stopped.
His head and shoulders were propped up on some pillows and
he was gazing down at me like I was the most beautiful girl in the world, and
he was going to shelter me from every storm until the day I died.
“Everything,” I whispered.
He pulled me up his body and rolled me so he was on top.
“Our boy is gonna be home soon,” he reminded me. “And we
haven’t cracked the surface of this everything you need to go over, and I don’t
think either of us are ready for him to see us together, so why don’t you
whittle that down to your top two priorities.”
“I never knew where you lived,” I admitted. “Lena had to
tell me.”
“I didn’t let it be common knowledge.”
“I never asked. I never even thought about it. All I could
think was that I wanted you to be with us.”
“Ah,” he murmured.
“I worry I was being really selfish,” I said, my voice soft
with shame and guilt.
His brows drew together. “Because you loved me and wanted us
to be a family?”
“Because I didn’t think much about you. Just about me.”
“And Liam,” he added.
“Yes, and Liam. But also me.”
“And me, because you loved me.”
“Well, yes, and you, because I loved you. But it was a lot
about me.”
His lips quirked. “You’re pretty fuckin’ determined to make
yourself the bad guy.”
“Darius,” I warned.
He touched his lips to mine, lifted his head, and said,
“Baby, this is what we got. We got a boy who wants us to be together, so you
can be happy, and I can be happy, and we can be a family, which will make him
happy. We gotta get our shit together so we can give him that. And we got two
houses. I like mine, I suspect you like yours, and I hate to break this to you,
but Liam likes mine way better than yours. Though he digs his bedroom.”
He smiled.
I rolled my eyes to study my eyebrows.
I felt his body move with his laughter, and since I didn’t
want to miss it, even if it wasn’t audible this time, I rolled them back.
Yes.
Totally worth getting over my mini-snit.
“But that’s all we got,” he declared. “Don’t invent more
garbage and slights and worries and bullshit. It’s just not there. We got
enough to figure out so we don’t fuck this up. Because I don’t ever want to
hurt you again. And I want our boy to grow to know how solid we are. That it
never ended, that we were always a family, even if we couldn’t be together.
It’s just now, we can be together.”
“You’re right.”
His gaze moved over my face, and something moved over his
when it did.
“Do you forgive me?” he asked.
“For what?” I asked back.
“Any of it. All of it. Lying to you. Keeping us apart.”
I put my hand over his mouth. “I thought all that just
wasn’t there anymore.”
He pulled my hand away and said, “I need to hear the words.”
I shook my head on the pillow. “There’s nothing to forgive.
You, me, our families, we were all just doing the best—”
I stopped talking when his body got tight.
Then I stilled when he pulled the covers up to my chest.
The door opened and I heard, “Dad? Mom’s car is—”
Darius looked over his bare shoulder toward the door.
I realized, belatedly, that I’d left my purse, with phone,
in the car.
Seriously, I was terrible at this.
“My eyes!” Liam shouted then I heard a thud like a body
hitting the wall. “My eyes! I’m blind!”
Darius started laughing.
I took hold of the covers and pulled them over my head as I
slunk down the bed.
“Don’t go that way, baby,” Darius whispered.
I groaned in mortification but stopped moving.
“I’ll never see again! And I’m okay with that!” Liam yelled.
“Boy, get downstairs,” Darius called, his voice filled with
humor. “Your mother and I’ll be down in a minute.”
More thuds and, “I can’t…find the stairs,” Liam lied.
Did we go upstairs?
Boy, Darius could kiss really, really well.
I knew that already, but…yeesh.
“Open a bottle of wine for your mother,” Darius called. Then
to me, “Red or white?”
“I’m not here,” I told him. “I’ve been swallowed by the
black hole of humiliation.”
“Then whose warm, silky skin is this?” Darius asked, his
hand going up my belly to my…
I batted it away. “Stop it.”
“Red!” Darius shouted. “Open a red! From the reserve!”
I pulled the covers from my face and tucked them to my neck.
“The reserve?”
He looked down at me. “The lower floor isn’t only Liam’s
space. There’s a wine cellar down there.”
Darius had a wine cellar?
“I’m totally moving here.”
It was after I said that when I saw the most beautiful thing
I’d seen since my son came out of me bawling.
The happy, carefree, sweet, tender loving smile of Darius
Tucker.