Chapter 17 Wyatt
SEVENTEEN
Wyatt
I didn’t plan on fucking her that night.
I really didn’t.
I thought we needed a moment to breathe—to be together without the sex, without the stupid fucking arrangement, without any of the hormones and the need and the pleasure. But as we got into bed beside one another, as she curled into my chest and I tucked her head under my chin…
…I slid my hand around her stomach and found it resting there.
Knowing I couldn’t feel anything yet but just—just the knowing was enough.
Knowing I’d put a seedling there and that it was starting to grow.
That it was going to change everything for us, for me, after too many years of forcing myself to suffer alone.
Haven’s hand covered mine and she somehow nestled closer, her shoulders against my chest, her perfect ass against my cock.
“You excited?” she asked quietly.
I knew there was a right and a wrong answer to this question. Luckily, the right answer was also the true one.
“Beyond,” I whispered into her hair.
I kissed the back of her neck and she let out a satisfied hum.
“Why wouldn’t I be excited to have a baby with the woman I love?” I added, quieter.
She went very still.
Then she turned over.
She did it slow, careful, until she was facing me in the dark, her eyes searching my face. Close enough that I could feel her breath. Close enough to see the exact moment she decided I meant it.
"Say it again," she said quietly.
"Which part."
"You know which part."
I looked at her. At the particular way she was holding herself—Haven trying not to want something too much, the tell she had, the slight tension in her shoulders.
I slid my hand from her stomach to her hip and pulled her closer.
"I love you," I said. "Have for a while. Didn't know what to do with it."
She let out a long, exhausted, happy exhale.
"I love you too," she said. "I've loved you since I was sixteen years old and you helped me deliver my first calf and you were so—" She stopped. "You were so patient. You never made me feel stupid for not knowing things. You just showed me."
I thought about that. A sixteen year old Haven, serious-faced, learning.
"I remember that calf," I said.
"She was breech."
"You kept your head."
"I was terrified."
"Didn't show," I said. "You were good even then."
She looked at me in the dark for a moment. Her hand came up and touched my jaw, her thumb dragging across the stubble there, and I let her look.
"I've wanted to do that for years," she said. "Just—look at you. Without having to pretend I wasn't."
"Look all you want," I said.
She smiled. Small and private, just for me.
Her hand slid from my jaw to my chest, fingers spreading flat. Feeling my heartbeat, I realized. Just resting there.
I moved my hand slow up her side, over the curve of her waist, and she shifted closer on instinct, the way she always did—always moving toward me, always had, and I'd spent so long pretending not to notice.
"Wyatt," she said.
"Mm."
“Make love to me,” she asked.
And I didn’t plan on fucking her, no.
But I could make love to her.
I lowered my lips to hers to kiss her slow and deep…
Haven underneath me, her hands in my hair, the particular quiet of a house that was ours.
She pulled me closer by the back of my neck and I went, easy, settling my weight over her like I’d learned she liked.
She made a small sound and arched up into me and I felt it everywhere.
Everywhere in my body, that was expected—but now I was letting it hit me deep in my chest, where my heart had been so shut off for so fucking long.
I hooked my fingers in the hem of her shirt and peeled it up slow, and she lifted her arms and let me.
The moon was bright outside, enough light bleeding through the window that I could see her.
I sat back and looked—really looked, the way I hadn't let myself before.
The curve of her waist. The soft skin of her belly, no sign yet of what was growing there.
Her breasts, fuller already, nipples darker and more sensitive than they'd been two months ago—I'd noticed, filed it away, hadn't let myself think about why.
I thought about it now.
I spread my hand flat on her stomach and thought about what the next months would do.
How she'd change. How this body that was already perfect was going to do something extraordinary—rounding out, growing heavy, making room.
Her hips were already built for it, wide and soft, and the thought hit me somewhere animal and deep.
Mine, some part of me said. All of it. Mine.
"What are you thinking about?" she asked quietly.
"You." I traced my thumb along the curve of her hip. "What you're gonna look like in a few months."
Her breath caught. "Yeah?"
"Your belly gettin' round." I leaned down and pressed my lips to her stomach, felt her fingers slide into my hair. "These—" I trailed my lips up to her breast, took one nipple in my mouth, gentle, and she arched, oversensitive already. "Already changing. Already knowing."
"Wyatt—"
"And these hips." I gripped them, both hands, thumbs pressing in. "Christ, Haven. You were made for this." I looked up at her. "Made for having my babies."
She made a sound that wasn't quite words.
"That okay?" I said. Low.
"Yes," she breathed. "God, yes. Don't stop talking."
I kissed her stomach again. Then her ribs. Then the underside of her breast, and she pulled my hair and I let her.
"Thought about it," I admitted against her skin. "Before I let myself admit anything else. Thought about you pregnant and couldn't—I had to stop thinkin’ about it."
"I didn't," she said. "I let myself think about it."
I lifted my head.
She was looking at me, flushed and honest. "I thought about it a lot, actually. Being yours that way." A beat. "Is that—"
“Don’t ever apologize,” I interrupted. “You’re fuckin’ perfect, Haven Sinclair. Perfect for me. Perfect and forward and…” My tongue flicked out over the peak of her breast, and she moaned. “Bad, sometimes, in this way I love.”
"Tell me," I said against her skin. "What you thought about."
"Wyatt—"
"Tell me." I dragged my tongue up the curve of her breast. "What did you imagine?"
She was quiet for a second. I could feel her heartbeat under my lips.
"You," she said. "Just—knowing it was yours. Knowing you'd—" She stopped. "That you'd put it there on purpose. That you wanted it."
I groaned against her skin.
"I do," I said. "God, Haven, I do." I kissed up her throat, her jaw, found her mouth. "Wanted to fill you up since the first night. Had to keep stoppin' myself."
She shivered. "Why did you?"
"Because I was tryin' to do the right thing." I pulled back and looked at her. "Wasn't thinkin' straight. Couldn't think straight around you, couldn't—" I pressed my hand flat on her belly again, deliberate. "How's it feel? Knowin' I'm already in there?"
Her breath came out unsteady. "Like—like I got what I wanted." She looked up at me, completely honest, no armor left. "Like you're mine."
"I am," I said. "Been yours. Didn't know how to say it."
I reached down and pulled her panties off, worked them down her hips. She helped, lifting for me, and then she was bare underneath me in the moonlight and I took a minute just to look at her.
"You have no idea," I said.
"Tell me."
"Perfect," I said. "Every part of you. And in a few months—" I traced the soft curve of her stomach with one flat palm.
"This is gonna be round. Full." My fingers drifted between her thighs and she sucked in a breath as I pressed them flat against her clit.
"Full of my baby and still wanting me, I'd bet. "
"Yes," she breathed. "God, yes."
"Yeah?" I pressed two fingers against her entrance, felt how wet she already was, and she grabbed my wrist. Not to stop me. "Gonna want me even then?"
"Always," she said. "Always wanted you. Never stopped."
I pressed inside her with my fingers and she arched clean off the mattress.
"Good girl," I murmured. "There she is."
"Wyatt—" Breathless. "I need you. I don't want your fingers, I want—"
"I know what you want."
"Then—"
"Not yet." I worked her slow, watching her face, her lips parted, eyes dark. "Want to hear you say it first. Want to hear you say what you want."
She made a frustrated sound that I felt in my spine.
"You," she gritted out. "Inside me. No condom, nothing between us, I want to feel you—" She grabbed my shoulder. "I want you to come inside me. I want—" Her voice dropped. "I want you to fill me up. Again. Like you already did."
I pulled my fingers free and she made a wrecked sound.
"Turn over," I said.
She turned over without hesitation.
I ran both hands up the backs of her thighs, over the curve of her ass, and she shivered.
Then I brought one hand down in a light slap, just enough to sting, and she gasped into the pillow.
"That's for making me wait two months to say I love you," I said.
"That was your fault," she breathed.
I spanked her again, other side, and she grabbed a fistful of sheet.
"And that's because I felt like it," I said.
She laughed, breathless and wanting, and pushed back toward me.
I gripped her hips and looked at her—moonlight, bare skin, the marks from my hands already rising warm on her ass—and felt something in my chest that had nothing to do with want and everything to do with mine.
"You're so beautiful," I said.
She turned her head and looked at me over her shoulder, hazel eyes dark, hair everywhere.
"Then stop looking and—"
I pushed inside her.
She moaned into the pillow—long, unguarded, the sound she made when I first filled her every single time, like she forgot every time how much of me there was and remembered all at once.
I stilled. Both hands on her hips. Just feeling her—the heat of her, the clench of her, the specific perfect way she fit around me.
"Wyatt," she breathed.
"I know," I said.
"Move. Please."
I pulled back slow and drove in and she grabbed the headboard.
"There you go," I said. "That's it."
I set a pace—deep, steady, unhurried, the kind that made her crazy and she knew it and I knew it and neither of us cared. She pushed back to meet me, greedy as always, and I brought my hand down on her ass and she clenched so hard around me I had to stop and breathe through it.
"You keep doin' that," I said roughly, "and this is gonna be over too fast."
"Then give me more," she gasped. "I can take it."
"Yeah you can." I gripped her hip and brought my hand down again, watched the color rise. "Take everything I give you, don't you. Always have."
"Yes—"
"Greedy girl." I kept my pace slow and deep, the kind that had her out of her mind inside of five minutes. "All those nights sneakin' in through the back gate just to get this."
"Just to get you," she breathed.
Something in my chest turned over.
I leaned down and pressed my mouth to her shoulder, her neck, kept moving.
Her hands were white-knuckled on the headboard and the sounds she was making were the kind that would've had me clamping my hand over her mouth two months ago—too loud, someone might hear—but we were alone in our house with our puppies and our baby and I wanted every sound she had.
Every single one.
"Don't muffle it," I said against her neck. "Want to hear you."
"Wyatt—"
"Say my name like that again."
"Wyatt."
I groaned and drove deeper and she cried out and grabbed the headboard harder. I straightened up and gripped both hips and looked at her—moonlight on her skin, my handprints warm on her ass, all of her—and felt something so far past want I didn't have a word for it.
I reached around and pressed my palm flat on her stomach.
She made a sound I'd never heard from her before. Something deeper than want, something that went all the way down, and her whole body shuddered.
"Feel that?" I said low.
"Yes—"
"My baby in there." I kept moving, kept my hand spread warm and flat, felt her shaking. "My girl." I pressed harder, deliberate, and she moaned. "You feel how deep I am? Feel me?"
"God—yes—Wyatt—"
"This is where it happened," I said roughly. "Right here. You took me so good, Haven, took everything I gave you and asked for more and now—" I thrust deep and held it and she gasped. "Now you're carryin' it."
"Yes," she breathed. "Yes."
"Gonna look so beautiful." I started moving again, slower now, grinding deep on every stroke. "Belly round, knowin' I did that. Knowin' you're mine." I brought my hand down on her ass again and she sobbed into the pillow. "And you're gonna let me take care of you. Both of you. Say it."
"Yes," she gasped. "God, yes, both of us, yours, please—"
"Ain't ever gonna let you go." My voice had gone rough, Texas thick, and I was past caring. "Should've said it months ago. Should've told you from the start."
"You're saying it now," she gasped.
"Yeah." I drove deeper and she cried out. "Better late than never."
I reached around and found her clit and she jolted forward and I pulled her back by the hip, keeping her where I wanted her.
"Stay," I said.
"I can't—it's too much—"
"You can." I kept working her, kept my pace, felt her shaking apart by degrees. "You take everything I give you. Always have. Take this too."
"Wyatt—" Broken now, completely gone. "I love you, I love you, please—"
"I love you." I pressed my mouth to the back of her neck. "Come for me."
She shattered.
She clenched around me in waves, shaking, saying my name over and over into the dark, and I kept moving through it and kept my hand on her stomach and felt everything—her falling apart, the specific way she said my name when she meant it all the way down, the warmth of her skin under my palm.
I followed her over with my face pressed to the back of her neck, groaning her name, filling her deep, my hand pressing flat on her belly.
Neither of us moved for a long time.
Her breathing slowed. I could feel her heartbeat under my palm.
I pressed a kiss to the back of her neck. Then her shoulder. Then I rolled us carefully until she was tucked against my chest, her back to my front, my hand finding her stomach again.
A puppy made a small sound from the kitchen. Then quiet.
"Wyatt," she said.
"Mm."
She covered my hand with hers. Both of us holding the same place.
"We're gonna be okay," she said.
I pulled her closer.
"We’re gonna be better than okay,” I whispered. “I promise.”