Chapter 23
Landon
My baby. She was carrying my baby. And she was happy about it. I’d almost lost hope of ever experiencing that, but there it was. In front of me. Sitting on the table in my shop.
“I need you,” I whispered against her ear.
“We’re not exactly in private.”
I looked around. The door locked, but I wasn’t going to risk exposing her or making her uncomfortable. “Upstairs. You can say no.”
She shook her head. “I don’t want to.” She pushed me back with a hand on my chest and slipped off the table. “But there are people here, so we have to be quiet.”
“I’ll try,” I said, opening the door for her to walk out ahead of me.
Gail and Carson were handling customers, not paying us any attention as we snuck to the back stairs and hurried up to my apartment.
“They’re going to know what we’re doing,” Casey said when we made it into the apartment with the door closed and locked.
I pressed her against the door. “You’re pregnant with my child. They’re all going to know soon anyway.”
She chuckled. “True.”
“Are you sure you’re okay with all of this? A baby and me?” I wasn’t sure I’d ever feel like we were secure. Not when I worried she felt stuck with me.
She sighed and cupped my jaw. “When I found out I was pregnant with Mikayla, I was scared. I…” She shook her head.
“I guess I loved Kyle, in a way, but we were young. We weren’t really ready for the realities of life.
Together or with a baby. I was working full time, but we weren’t talking about getting married.
Then I found out I was pregnant, and we both felt like we had no other choice. ”
“That sounds a lot like what’s happening right now,” I admitted. I wasn’t looking to push her away, but I didn’t want it all to end.
She nodded. “Yeah, but the big difference between you and Kyle is I was already thinking about a future with you.”
“What?” I blurted.
She chuckled. “You scared me. A lot.”
I took a step back. “Why did I scare you?”
“Because being with you has been so easy from the start. When we met, I knew I needed to stay away from you because of Reegan.”
I opened my mouth to interrupt her, but she held up a hand.
“I know. But at the time, I didn’t know things were really over. I thought you two were on the way to getting back together, like everyone else in town.”
I sighed, knowing she was right.
“When you asked me to be your date for the wedding, a part of me still thought you wanted to use me to make her jealous. And I figured that was fine because I was interested in the online you, and I went into this with my eyes open. But the more time we spent together, the more I wanted to see you.”
“I feel the same.”
She grinned. “I couldn’t stop myself from loving you, even though I figured it would end up with me on the outside and you and Reegan back together. When I saw her yesterday—”
I sucked in a breath.
Casey smiled. “She said she was happy for us. She’s a really good person.”
I nodded. “She is. It was part of why I stayed with her so long even though I knew we weren’t right for each other.”
“I don’t want you to do that with me.”
I breathed a laugh at the absurdity of that statement. “I want you more than I ever wanted her. Letting you walk away every day was like watching a piece of me leave. With Reegan, she was one of my best friends. I care about her, I loved her, but it never came close to how I feel about you.”
“Yeah?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
“I know all of this didn’t go the way we expected, but I am happy about it. I always wanted more kids. My dream was to have four or five, but after Mikayla, I couldn’t imagine it.”
I tucked her hair back and cupped her jaw. “Why not?”
She smiled sadly. “Kyle was never really there for either of us. He worked, came home and did whatever, then went to bed. He wasn’t involved when Mikayla was a baby and never got more involved as she grew up.
He used to say he didn’t know what to do with a baby.
As she grew up, he said she liked me more. ”
“If you’re the only parent there for her, of course she does.”
She laughed. “That’s what I told him. He just wasn’t all that interested in being a father. He felt trapped, just like I did. Trapped with me, trapped with a kid, trapped in a life he never wanted.”
“I don’t feel trapped, Casey. I want this.
I want you, this baby, a marriage. I want to be there for everything.
I want to go to appointments with you and hold your hand and get you ice chips in the delivery room and do everything I can for you and our kid and Mikayla for the rest of our lives.
And if you want more kids after this one, I want that, too. ”
Tears rolled down her cheeks. “Thank you.”
I wiped her tears with my thumbs. “What do you need right now?”
She looked up at me, fire and passion in her gaze. “You.”
I didn’t need to be told twice. I picked up the woman I loved and carried her to my bed. I laid her down, keeping my weight off her body so I wouldn’t hurt her or the baby. I kissed her, my cock hardening as her softness molded to my hardness.
Casey wrapped her arms around my neck and tugged at my shirt, lifting it inch-by-inch until she couldn’t pull anymore.
I sat up and yanked my shirt off, tossing it behind me, then helped her up to shed her clothes. Standing in front of me naked, I looked at the swell of her belly and felt a surge of pride and possession I’d never known.
“Mine,” I whispered, sliding my hand over her belly. “You’re all mine.”
“I am,” she said. “And you’re mine.”
“All yours, Casey. Everything I am and everything I have is yours.” I reached for a condom, but she stopped me.
“I’ve only been with you in more than a year. I’ve been tested, and I’m clean. You can say no, but since I’m already pregnant…”
I sucked in a breath. “I’ve never… I’ve always used a condom.”
“Okay,” she said, removing her hand from my arm and moving toward the bed.
“I… Being inside you without one might have me embarrassing myself.”
She chuckled. “I love you. You can’t be embarrassed around me.”
My dick surged at her words. “Fuck, I love hearing you say that.”
“I love you, Landon.”
My cock throbbed. “I need you, Casey. No condoms. Just us.”
“Just us.”
She laid back on the bed, and I pulled her to the edge. I kneeled in front of her and pressed her thighs wide to see her dripping wet and ready for me. “You’re soaked.”
“The man I love said he feels the same. It’s kind of a turn-on.”
“Then I guess I’ll have to tell you more often.”
“I think you should.”
“I love you,” I whispered against her soaked flesh.
She trembled.
“I love you.” I licked through her folds, whispering the words as I loved her body with my mouth. My hands kept her thighs wide, my thumbs teasing her entrance as I took my time enjoying her.
“Landon,” she breathed. “I love you, Landon.”
Fuck. Her soft declaration was a shot to my dick. It throbbed and jumped, wanting in on the action. I groaned and flicked her clit with the tip of my tongue.
She moaned and pressed her hips to my face.
My balls tightened up, giving me no option but to make her come fast. I sucked her clit into my mouth, flicking the tender nub with my tongue. Three fingers sank into her channel, and Casey fought to let her release out.
“Landon. Oh, fuck. Landon. I love you. Love you so much. Landon. Oh, yes. Love you!”
I didn’t let up on her, feeling possessed as she came with my name and her profession of love. My tongue traveled through her folds again, then returned to her clit. I licked over it with the flat of my tongue, making her hips jump.
She whimpered, then moaned.
I added a fourth finger to her core and teased her clit until she stilled, her entire body rigid for a few seconds. Then she released, thrashing and moaning and grabbing my head.
She tugged my hair, pulling me up her body until her lips greedily sucked on mine.
I eased my fingers out of her and lined my bare cock up with her entrance. The feel of her direct heat on me was almost more than I could take.
“Love me, Landon. I want to feel all of you inside me.”
“Fuck, Casey. I love you.”
She pulled my lips to hers again and rocked her hips to take me inside her.
The feel of her soaked channel beckoning me had me slamming into her. Instantly, my body recognized the difference. My balls pulled up tight, my spine tingling, heat flashing over all of me.
“Fuck,” I breathed, tearing my lips from hers. “Fuck.”
“Are you okay?” she asked, worry in her voice.
“I’m trying not to come yet.”
“What do you mean?”
“You feel so damn good that I almost came just now.” I drew a breath and let it out against her throat. “I want to enjoy this a little longer.”
“You can enjoy it for as long as you want. And even better, you can enjoy this every day for the rest of our lives. I know I will.”
“Fuck, Casey. I can’t… I need…”
She tightened her core around my dick, and I lost the fight to hold back.
I pushed back to stand, holding her ankles as I stared at my bare dick disappearing into her plump folds. Her pretty pink flesh was soaked, letting me slide easily into her.
“Landon,” she whispered.
I looked up at her and found her watching me with a look I’d never seen in her eyes.
Love.
She was looking at me with love.
With the kind of love I’d always wanted to find.
“I love you, Landon. Let me feel you come inside me.”
Her words shot straight to my cock. I pounded into her, losing my mind and needing her. My body took over, slamming so hard the bed shook and her tits bounced wildly.
I looked back at where I entered her, and I lost it. My balls clenched at the same time as her channel, both insisting I stay where I was.
“Casey!” I roared as my orgasm rocketed through me. Every cell flashed hot, then let go, taking all my strength and energy and love and pouring me into her.
She responded with an orgasm, her legs holding me to her and supporting me in a way I didn’t know I needed until they were there. Her core vibrated around me, adding to my orgasm and joining us.
“I love you,” I whispered.
She smiled up at me, a dazed and sated look that told me she was feeling all the same things I was. “I love you, Landon.”
I leaned forward, kissing her gently before slipping out of her. We cleaned up, then got dressed, and I talked her into sitting on the couch with me for a little while.
“I want to buy you a house,” I told her.
“No. You don’t need to do that.”
“My place is too small for four of us, and so is yours. Plus, I don’t want you going up and down the stairs all the time. It’ll be even worse when we have a newborn.”
She drew a breath and let it out slowly.
“Is this moving too fast for you?”
She shrugged. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to change everything right now. And I don’t want to leave everything to you. I need to contribute.”
“I will never tell you what to do. If you want to work, I’m good with that. If you want to stay home, that’s okay, too. The only thing I will ask is that we make decisions together.”
She snorted. “And you saying you want to buy a house is making a decision together?”
I laughed. “Fine, you’re right. But at least I told you and didn’t just buy it.”
She laughed. “True.”
“I do want to buy a house, though. I’ve been thinking about it for a while, but I…”
“You’re comfortable here.”
He nodded. “I am. But that doesn’t mean I should stay here.”
“We have a lot of decisions to make in the next few months. Let’s add that to the list.”
“Okay,” I agreed, only because we had time.
A week after Casey quit the paper, she got a call from one of her former coworkers. Mike told her they’d reported the editor to the owner of the paper. He was going to be the new editor, and he wanted Casey back full time.
“What are you going to do?” I asked her when she told me.
She’d been exhausted and was having trouble being on her feet to clean houses. She assured me it was normal for the first trimester, but I didn’t like her working so hard when I could provide for her. She was stressing herself out.
“I love being a journalist. Especially in MacKellar Cove.”
“It sounds like a pretty easy answer then. Why are you hesitating?”
“Because of the baby.”
“Why?”
She slid her hands over her belly, something she’d been doing frequently.
A protective thing, I assumed. “If I don’t disclose the pregnancy, it’ll feel like I’m hiding something.
I’ll be taking a few months off when the baby arrives, and bosses don’t always take too kindly to learning that information, no matter how early they find out. ”
“What do you think about this guy? Mike?”
She nodded. “Mike has always been a bit of a shark. He won’t let a story go when there’s something to share. But he’s fair. He was the first one to tell me he’d walk out when Gretchen wanted me to make up things about Omar and Natalie.”
“Do you think that means he’ll be on your side?”
“I don’t know. But I think the sooner I talk to him, the better.”
“Call him now. Put your mind at ease.”
She hesitated for a second, then returned the man’s call.
I listened from the kitchen, watching her on the couch as she spoke to the man who might be her boss.
She told him about the pregnancy, and when she thought she was due. She listened, and by the time she spoke again, she was smiling.
“Thanks, Mike. I really appreciate it. I’ll see you next week.”
“Well?”
“He wants me no matter how many kids I have. He said my integrity and talent are worthwhile, and people have babies all the time. It shouldn’t be a reason not to hire someone.”
“Good. I told you it would be okay.”
She stepped into my arms and tilted her chin back for a kiss.
I obliged, lingering against her lips.
“Thank you for supporting me.”
“I always will.”
“I didn’t know love could be like this.”
“Neither did I, but I guess when it’s right, it’s different.”
“It’s definitely right.”
“Yes. Yes, it is. I love you, Landon.”
“I love you, Casey.”