CHAPTER FIVE
AUbrEE
Three days after Tristen dropped the bomb about Oakleigh moving in, I was still trying to convince myself I was okay with it.
The guest suite had been transformed practically overnight.
New linens in a soft sage green that Oakleigh had apparently mentioned liking.
A mini fridge stocked with ginger ale and sparkling water.
A diffuser pumping lavender into the air.
Fresh flowers on the nightstand, replaced every other day by a service Tristen had hired specifically for this purpose.
I stood in the doorway of the suite, surveying the changes, and tried to identify the feeling coiling through my gut.
It wasn't jealousy. I refused to call it jealousy.
It was something more complicated than that, something tangled up with gratitude and resentment and a bone-deep exhaustion I couldn't quite shake.
This woman was carrying my baby. My embryo, my DNA, my last chance at motherhood. Everything Tristen was doing was for the pregnancy, which meant it was ultimately for me. For us. For the family we'd been trying to build for four years.
So why did it feel like I was being slowly erased from my own home?
"The movers are coming Saturday morning."
I turned to find Tristen behind me, his phone pressed to his ear. He held up one finger in the universal sign for give me a minute and continued his conversation with whoever was on the other end.
"Yes, I want the premium service. White glove. She shouldn't have to lift a finger." A pause. "No, bill it to my personal account, not the company. Thanks."
He hung up and slipped the phone into his pocket, finally giving me his full attention. "Hey. You okay?"
"Fine." The word came out sharper than I intended. "Just admiring the transformation. You've thought of everything."
If he noticed the edge in my voice, he didn't acknowledge it. "I want her to feel comfortable. The doctor said stress is the enemy right now."
"I know. You've mentioned that."
Tristen stepped closer, his brow furrowing. "Aubree. Talk to me."
I wanted to. God, I wanted to open my mouth and let everything pour out.
The insecurity, the fear, the creeping suspicion that I was being unreasonable and the simultaneous certainty that my feelings were valid.
But every time I tried to articulate what was wrong, I sounded petty and jealous even to my own ears.
She's pregnant with your baby. She had a health scare. Your husband is trying to help. What is your problem?
"I'm fine," I said again, softer this time. "I'm just adjusting. This is a lot of change very fast."
Tristen reached for me, his hands finding my waist and pulling me against him. I went willingly, because despite everything, his touch still felt like home. His chest was solid against mine, his heartbeat steady under my palms.
"I know this isn't what we planned," he murmured into my hair. "But it's temporary. A few months, and then Oakleigh goes back to her life and we start ours as a family. Just you and me and the baby."
"And the night nurse. And the nanny. And whoever else we end up hiring because neither of us has any idea what we're doing."
He laughed, the sound rumbling through his chest. "Okay, fair. But the point stands. This is a blip. A speed bump. When we're holding our baby for the first time, none of this will matter."
I closed my eyes and let myself imagine it. A warm weight in my arms. Tiny fingers curling around mine. That new baby smell everyone always talked about. After everything we'd been through, all the needles and hormones and hospital rooms, we were finally going to be parents.
"I want to paint the nursery this weekend," I said. "Before Oakleigh moves in. I want to have something that's just ours."
"Done. I'll clear my schedule."
I pulled back to look at him, searching his face for any sign of reluctance. But his hazel eyes were soft and focused entirely on me, and I felt some of the tension in my shoulders begin to unwind.
"I love you," I said. "Even when you make decisions without consulting me."
"I know. And I'm sorry about that. I should have called you from the doctor's office."
"Yes, you should have."
"I was scared." The admission came out quiet, almost reluctant. "When Oakleigh called about the spotting, I just... I couldn't think straight. All I could see was everything we've worked for slipping away."
My heart clenched. I knew that fear intimately. It lived in my bones, had taken up permanent residence there somewhere between the second miscarriage and the third. The terror that every moment of hope was just setting you up for a harder fall.
"I get it," I said softly. "I do. But we're supposed to be a team, Tristen. You and me. I can't be your partner if you keep things from me."
"You're right. I know you're right." He pressed his forehead against mine, his breath warm on my lips. "No more unilateral decisions. From now on, everything goes through both of us."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
He kissed me then, soft and sweet, and I let myself sink into it.
His lips moved against mine with familiar ease, coaxing my mouth open, his tongue sliding against mine in a way that made heat pool low in my belly.
It had been so long since we'd kissed like this, without the shadow of fertility schedules and hormone injections hanging over us.
"I think you should take me to the bedroom." I whispered against his mouth.
He didn't need to be told twice.
We made it down the hallway in a tangle of limbs and laughter, bumping into walls and nearly tripping over our own feet. Tristen's hands were everywhere, sliding under my shirt, gripping my hips, tangling in my hair. By the time we reached the bed, I was already breathless and aching.
He pulled my shirt over my head and tossed it somewhere behind him, his eyes darkening as they roamed over my body.
I felt a familiar flutter of self-consciousness.
The fertility treatments had left their marks on me, extra weight that clung to my stomach and thighs no matter how much I exercised.
I started to cross my arms over my midsection, but Tristen caught my wrists.
"Don't," he said, his voice rough. "Don't hide from me."
"I look different than I used to."
"You look like my wife." He lowered his head and pressed a kiss to the curve of my shoulder, then another to the swell of my breast above my bra. "You look like the woman I've loved for eight years. You look fucking beautiful."
I wanted to argue, but his mouth was doing things that made coherent thought difficult. He unhooked my bra with practiced ease and let it fall away, his lips closing around one nipple while his hand found the other. The sensation shot straight to my core, and I arched into him with a gasp.
"Tristen..."
"I've got you." He eased me back onto the bed, following me down. "Let me take care of you."
He kissed his way down my body, pausing to trace his tongue along every curve and dip.
My stomach, which I'd always been so self-conscious about, received the same attention as everywhere else.
Soft kisses. Gentle nips. Murmured words against my skin that I couldn't quite make out but felt like worship.
When he reached the waistband of my leggings, he looked up at me with a question in his eyes. I lifted my hips in answer, and he peeled them off along with my underwear, leaving me bare beneath him.
"God, you're gorgeous," he breathed.
Before I could respond, his mouth was on me. Hot and wet and devastatingly skilled. I cried out, my hands flying to his hair, my hips bucking against his face. He pinned me down with one arm across my stomach and devoured me like a man starving.
It had been so long. So goddamn long since I'd felt anything other than bloated and broken and fundamentally defective. But under Tristen's hands and mouth, I felt wanted. Desired. Like a woman instead of a failing incubator.
"Don't stop," I gasped. "Please, don't stop."
He didn't. He worked me higher and higher, his tongue relentless against my clit, until I shattered with a scream that probably scandalized the neighbors. Waves of pleasure crashed through me, and I rode them out against his mouth, my thighs clamping around his head.
When I finally came down, trembling and boneless, Tristen kissed his way back up my body with a satisfied smile.
"Good?" he asked, and the smug bastard knew exactly how good it had been.
"Get up here," I growled, pulling him up by his collar.
He laughed and let me drag him into a kiss. I could taste myself on his lips, salty and intimate, and it only made me want him more. I fumbled with the buttons of his shirt, finally giving up and just yanking it over his head. His pants followed, and then we were skin to skin, nothing between us.
His cock pressed against my thigh, hard and hot, and I reached between us to wrap my hand around him. He groaned into my mouth, his hips stuttering forward.
"Aubree, fuck..."
"I need you inside me, so bad," I said.
He positioned himself at my entrance and pushed in slowly, giving me time to adjust to the stretch. It burned a little at first, a reminder of how long it had been, but the discomfort quickly gave way to pleasure as he began to move.
We found our rhythm easily, instinctively, our bodies remembering patterns that our minds had forgotten.
He thrust deep and steady, one hand braced beside my head, the other gripping my hip hard enough to leave bruises.
I wrapped my legs around him and pulled him closer, needing more, needing everything.
"I love you," he panted against my throat. "I love you so fucking much."
"You do?” I teased.
He did. He showed me with every thrust, every kiss, every desperate sound that escaped his lips.
He showed me until we were both sweating and gasping, until the pressure built to unbearable heights, until I came again with his name on my lips and he followed moments later with a groan that sounded like a prayer.