Chapter 23 #3
Even then, I knew the statistics around pregnant women being 35 percent more likely to be killed than when they weren’t pregnant.
I’d done my research that night after he’d gone to sleep then made an appointment to get the implant. Waylon didn’t know.
In the end, he’d thought I was “barren.” He had made noises about going to doctors, doing IVF, but I knew he’d never make good on those promises. For once, being poor protected me.
I’d had the implant even after we’d divorced, not thinking too much about it.
Until now.
“I also don’t have any STIs,” I informed Beau. Not sexy or romantic, but very sensible.
I’d been tested after I broke up with Waylon and had been horrified to find out I had chlamydia. Waylon had been my first and only.
Which meant he’d not only been abusing me but cheating on me too.
After I was treated, I never slept with a man again.
I felt desire, I wanted to date, wanted to be able to engage in a pleasurable act.
But I’d been too afraid of men, terrified I’d pick someone like Waylon.
Or worse. I’d picked abstinence instead.
Not things I deigned to tell Beau at that moment in time.
That would well and truly kill the mood.
“I didn’t think you did.” Beau traced my collarbone with his finger.
“And I don’t either.” He chuckled dryly.
“You have to have sex to get those, and I haven’t had sex in a long time.
And the last time I did, I used protection.
” He cupped my cheek. “Taking you raw was not something I did lightly. And I’m sorry for not asking for your permission. ”
“You had my permission,” I quickly told him, shocked at how easily the apology came to him. How genuine it was. “I’m a grown woman. I feel safe with you. If I wanted you to use protection, I would’ve asked for it.”
I was telling the truth. Even though I’d been somewhat of a mess by the time we were naked and about to have sex, I had thought about a condom for a split second. I’d known for sure that if I’d asked, Beau wouldn’t balk. He wouldn’t have made me feel guilty either.
I also knew Beau was noble. Sensible. So if he had any chance of giving me anything, he wouldn’t dream of having unprotected sex.
That might’ve been na?ve given my past, to trust another man. But I didn’t care. I trusted Beau.
“I know,” Beau murmured.
“But you didn’t know I was on birth control,” I countered, my mind clearing.
Beau leaned in to inhale my neck. Tingles scattered over my skin from his beard rubbing against me. It was not an unpleasant sensation in the slightest.
“No, I didn’t.”
I stilled underneath him, grasping on to his chin to tilt upward to me so I could see his face. So I could show him the shock and horror painted on my own.
“You didn’t know I was on birth control, and we had unprotected sex anyway?” I hissed.
Beau didn’t look horrified or shocked. His features were soft as his eyes danced across my face. “I didn’t come inside you, if you recall,” he said playfully.
While this side of Beau was unexpected and would be delightful at any other point in time, I was slightly horrified.
“If you recall, there is a whole MTV series about teenagers who got pregnant using the pullout method for contraception,” I snapped at him.
Beau did not find my ire upsetting. In fact, by the upward turn of his lips, he found it amusing.
“You find the idea of an accidental pregnancy entertaining?” I asked him sharply.
Beau’s eyes continued to sparkle, but his smile flattened.
“I don’t find teen pregnancy entertaining,” he rumbled. “But the idea of you getting accidentally pregnant…” He shrugged.
The man shrugged.
I stared at him, waiting for the punchline.
My muscles tensed at the reality of what he was saying. I felt terrified. Elated. I couldn’t feel my fingertips. “Beau,” I whispered. “That is … crazy.”
“I mean, I’m not planning to get you pregnant in the near future, Hannah,” he replied evenly, threading his hands through my hair. “I’m just saying it’s not something I fear.”
Not planning to get me pregnant. In the near future. As if we had some kind of distant future.
“You’re too fucking young,” he added. “And you’ve got school to finish.”
I felt it then. The chill in his tone. Reality creeping in, snatching away the warmth and mystique of this moment.
I wasn’t ready for that.
So I climbed on top of Beau, fastening my lips to his. He didn’t stall to return the kiss, his hands going to my bare ass.
“If I’m so young, think you can keep up with me, old man?” My teeth snagged his ear before I began to trail kisses down his throat, chest.
Beau took hold of me, stopping my descent.
“What, you get to make me come with your mouth, but I can’t return the favor?” I asked him.
Beau let out a low growl and let me go.
I continued downward, my lips ghosting over his impossibly robust six-pack. Beau’s hands threaded into my hair as I grasped the base of his already hard cock.
My tongue lapped up the pre-cum already glistening from its head.
Beau pulled at my hair, causing pain to explode across my scalp. I reveled in it. In the power I was holding in my hands.
Without pausing, I took him into my mouth. As much as was possible, at least. Beau grunted in pleasure as he bucked up, filling me deeper.
My eyes watered then tears spilled out the sides as I struggled to contain him. My jaw ached, but it was amazing. Holding Beau in my mouth, his hand at my head, filling me to the point of pain before thrusting upward.
He didn’t buck hard enough to trigger my gag reflex, the movements harsh but short. As if he knew exactly my limit.
As if we were made for each other.
We weren’t asleep.
We should’ve been. Although I’d started running, my cardiovascular fitness was far from optimal, and Beau had pushed all of my physical and emotional limits in just a handful of hours.
And in just a handful of hours, it felt as if my life had changed forever.
I was lying in Beau’s bed. The sheets were impossibly soft and smelled of him. Of us. His worn tee was draped over my body, rubbing over my sore and sensitive nipples. His strong arms were wrapped around me, and he’d plant kisses on my forehead at regular intervals to show he was not asleep either.
The silence was not oppressive or awkward.
It was comforting. It was amazing that I could lay here with him, and it felt like we’d done it one thousand nights before. Like it was something we should’ve been doing all along.
“I found out my ex-wife is dead tonight,” Beau spoke into the darkness.
He said it so mildly that it took me a handful of seconds to compute what he’d just said.
I hadn’t thought anything would make me move from where I was, tangled up with Beau, sated, the happiest I’d been in memory.
That sentence did it.
I sat up so quickly that he didn’t have a chance to fasten his arms around me before I fumbled for the bedside light. It took me a couple of tries because it was dark, my limbs were heavy from the sex marathon I’d just competed in, and it was an unfamiliar room, but I managed.
The room was suddenly bathed in light bright enough to make Beau squint at me. It would’ve been cute to witness his face screwed up like that if not for the current circumstances.
“That’s what you say after the best sex of my life?” I scowled at him. “Was this some kind of fucked-up grief fuck?” My anger burned hot and quick until Beau’s expression changed.
He was no longer squinting, just staring at me intently.
His face wasn’t harsh nor marked with that familiar disdain.
As I stared at him, so naked—in more ways than one—I understood that the mask he wore was not only with me but with everyone.
No one witnessed Beau’s pain, Beau’s sadness.
Because he was too busy being strong for everyone else.
I wasn’t angry anymore, though fear simmered low in my gut that I was some kind of grief sex. My fear could be handled later.
Beau was my priority.
“Are you okay?” I asked him softly, my hand going to his chest.
He blinked slowly, my heart skipping at the reverence that painted his expression. For me. It was so all-encompassing, so very full of emotion that I couldn’t breathe properly.
Then he opened his mouth and spoke.
“Fuck, I love you, Hannah.”
I must’ve been having a small stroke.
Beau’s hand lifted to cup my jaw, holding me as if I were a baby bird, something precious, delicate.
Then his thumb brushed my cheek, wiping away tears I didn’t even know were rolling down my face.
“W-what did you just say?”
Beau grasped my hips, lifting me so I was straddling him. I let out a soft moan as my sensitive flesh grazed against his semi-hard cock. Even though I had been thoroughly fucked and didn’t think my vagina could handle his length again so soon, my body trembled with need.
The tension in Beau’s neck and the twitch in his cock told me he felt the same desire, but he didn’t act on it, just clasped each side of my neck, looking me in the eye.
“I love you, Hannah,” he repeated.
The world tilted on its axis.
“I want to say it clearly so there are no misconceptions, so I don’t confuse you or hurt you.
” He tightened his grip on my neck. “I’ve hurt you.
” Regret was etched into the words. “I’ll carry that with me till the end of my days, that I didn’t treat you right.
That I was selfish. All because I was fucking terrified of how much I wanted you.
” He laid a kiss on my nose. “I am not used to good things, Hannah. I lost my mother. The woman I thought I loved turned out to be nasty, cruel, heartless. The light of my life, my daughter, my hope that I may have happiness till the end of my days … was almost taken from me.” He caught himself, the words cracking.
“I had to watch her almost waste away in front of me.”
Tears were pouring from my eyes at that point. At the depth of pain in Beau’s voice, the single tear that trailed down his cheek.
“Beau,” I whispered.
“I need to get this out, baby.” He pressed his index finger to my lips.
“None of those things are excuses,” he continued. “There is no excuse for treating you badly, Hannah. I’m deeply sorry that my emotional bullshit hurt you. That I hurt you.”
There it was. An apology. Taking complete ownership for his bad behavior without a single excuse.
“I forgive you,” I immediately replied.
“No, you don’t.” He shook his head, wiping the tears from my cheeks. “It can’t be that easy. Shouldn’t be that easy. I should be groveling for the rest of my life.”
There it was—another permanent statement. Not just alluding to the rest of our lives but straight-up saying it.
After one night of sex.
That did contain an I love you, to be fair.
And I loved him. So recklessly, so painfully, in a way that scarred my insides and changed my very core.
But I couldn’t say it out loud. Not yet. I felt safe with Beau. Safe enough to let him take charge when I was physically naked.
I wasn’t quite ready to be emotionally naked with him yet. My bruises from his treatment of me those past few months still hurt, even with his heartfelt apology. I couldn’t entirely trust that he wasn’t going to hurt me again.
I couldn’t be certain that this was everything I could ever want. That he was. Clara was. There was no way I was going to expect it all to turn out well in the end.
That’s not how life worked.
Even though I wanted, more than anything, to tell him I loved him too, my mouth stayed shut.
Beau didn’t seem the least bit disappointed or angry at my silence. He didn’t even seem as if he expected me to say anything back.
He just pulled me back down, splayed on top of him, and kissed me.
“Go to sleep,” he murmured. “We’ve only got a couple more hours till our girl wakes up.”
My body froze.
Our girl.
Clara.
He said it offhandedly. Natural. As if it wasn’t just as powerful a statement, if not more than, the I love you.
Not to mention the offhand mention of him finding out his ex-wife was dead the same night we had sex for the first time.
How in the fresh hell could I go to sleep with so many emotional bombs obliterating my insides?
Pretty damn well, it seemed, since I was unconscious within minutes.
BEAU
Her breathing evened out and deepened quickly.
She was exhausted.
I’d worn her the fuck out. She’d met every one of my desires, every single one. Not every single one of my fantasies—because we were only human, and I’d been lusting after her for months.
I knew it might take a lifetime to act out every fantasy I had regarding Hannah Morgan.
Which was fine with me.
I thought it might take a lifetime and nothing less to get my fill of Hannah Morgan. I suspected I’d go to my grave wanting more of her.
It had thrown her, hearing me speak like that. In forever type terms, telling her how I felt about her. I knew because she was so expressive. And fuck, if I’d loved that when she was writhing under me, taking my cock. When my face was buried in her pussy. When I’d come all over her perfect tits.
My overworked cock came to life just thinking about it.
She wore her pleasure plain as day, and her pain too. It had haunted me all those months. Every night I went to bed, replaying the furrow in her brow, the downcast eyes, the flush in her cheeks, all created by my harsh words and dismissals.
I had to carry that.
Because I’d thought it was for her own good. For mine.
I still had doubts in dark corners of my mind that I was being selfish. Greedy. That I’d somehow fuck this up and hurt Hannah in ways that should be against nature. That I’d hurt Clara in the process.
But I quickly pushed those thoughts aside.
It was remarkably easy to do so with my arms around Hannah, her body pressed into mine, her hair just an inhale away.
This was not a mistake, bringing her into my bed, into our lives.
The mistake would be doing something to lose her.