Ava Reynolds
By the time we finally came up for air, I felt wrung out in the best way.
Reek had fucked me so good that my whole body felt boneless.
My thighs still trembled a little when I tried to close them.
My lips felt kissed raw. Everything about me felt seen, tended to, claimed in a way that made me truly feel like I was his.
For the first time with him, I did not feel like he had just taken from me and was going to leave me to sort through the emotions alone after.
He stayed right there. That was what kept hitting me. He stayed.
I was still lying there in his arms on the couch with my dress somewhere on the floor and my hair probably a mess when he kissed my forehead and said, “Come on.”
I blinked up at him, still dazed. “Come on where?”
“I’m running you a bath.”
That made me smile so hard my cheeks hurt. “A bath?”
“Yeah. Your feet were already hurting before I got in them panties. Now get up.”
I laughed and let him help me to my feet.
The second I stood, the ache between my legs and the heaviness in my body made me grab his arm.
He smirked. “That’s my fault.”
“It is,” I grinned.
He took me to the bathroom, turned on the tub, and started adjusting the water. I sat on the closed toilet watching him, feeling my heart doing all kinds of soft, weak shit. He looked so comfortable in my space now, so sure, so at ease handling me. That alone almost made me emotional again.
When the tub was full enough, he came over and peeled me off that toilet with a gentleness that still felt strange on him.
He helped me step in, careful with my belly, careful with my balance, careful with me.
Then he got in behind me so I could lean back against his chest while the hot water wrapped around us both.
I let out a long breath. “This feels so good.”
I leaned back against him and closed my eyes.
For a little while, we just sat there. His hand rested over my stomach under the water, and his thumb swept slow little strokes across the curve of it.
I felt so peaceful that it almost scared me. This was the part of love I had always wanted and never trusted.
Not just sex, chemistry, or a man wanting me for the few hours that a date lasted.
I wanted this.
He kissed the side of my head and said, “You quiet.”
“I’m happy.”
The words came out so easily that I almost surprised myself.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I smiled to myself. “Like really happy.”
“That’s good.” His hand came up from my stomach to the side of my neck. “I’m sorry I took this long. I’m sorry I made you deal with all that uncertainty.”
I smiled again, and we just settled in the silence for a while.
“You do know this is spoiling me, right?” I teased.
“Good.”
“What if I start expecting this?”
“Then expect it.”
I grunted jokingly. “You’re talking a lot of shit tonight.”
“I’m talking how I should’ve been talking.”
“And you’re not going to wake up tomorrow panicking?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“You promise?”
He looked down at me, serious enough to settle every nervous part of me that was still trying to second-guess this. “I’m not leaving you. I’m not pulling back. I’m not doing that shit where I give you this tonight and then wake up scared tomorrow. I’m here. I’m with you.”
My eyes burned all over again, but I held his gaze and nodded. “Okay.”
He kissed my neck, making me blush.
The best part wasn’t that he’d finally come around. It was that when he did, it felt real. Not forced, dragged out of him, or something I had to beg for. It felt so real that I could finally let my guard down.
I leaned back, watched the man I loved rub my belly under the water, and let myself be happy without waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“Loving you doesn’t feel like a trap anymore. It feels like the kind of peace I was too fucked up to believe in before. But I believe in it now, baby, and you can believe in it too.”
After we got out of the tub, he lotioned my body, kissed my belly, and kept saying little things to Cairo that made me smile.
I was happy. But happiness with Reek came with its own kind of caution now. I had waited so long for him to come around that part of me still didn’t know how to relax all the way into it. Because now I knew exactly how much he could hurt me.
That was the part I could not forget just because he was finally loving on me right.
Still, I let myself have the night and wherever this love was headed, because I wanted to experience all that I could with him.
Eventually, we went to bed, and he stayed wrapped around me with one arm over my stomach and his breath warm against the back of my neck. I fell asleep like that, peaceful in a way I hadn’t felt in a long time.
Then I woke up in the middle of the night feeling miserable. My lower back was killing me. My bladder was full again. My stomach felt heavy.
I let out a frustrated breath and shifted.
Reek was up almost instantly. “What’s wrong?”
“My back,” I muttered, already irritated with myself for sounding so pitiful. “And I have to pee. And I’m hot. And I feel huge.”
He was already rubbing his hand up and down my back before I finished. “Come on.”
He got out of bed first, then helped me sit up and stand. He stayed close while I got myself together enough to shuffle to the bathroom.
By the time I came back out, he had already grabbed me water. I took the glass from him and drank half of it standing there in the dark with one hand on my belly. He watched me the whole time like he was studying what I needed.
Then he sat back against the headboard and held his arm out. “Come here.”
I climbed back into bed slower than I would’ve liked, and he pulled me in until my back was resting against his chest. Then he started to rub my lower back.
I let my head fall against his shoulder and sighed.
“Better?” he asked.
“No,” I whined. “I feel huge.”
He kissed the side of my head. “You’re very pregnant.”
“I just feel so big, Reek. And awkward. And uncomfortable. And everything hurts at night.”
His hand kept working over my back. “I know, baby.”
That “baby” almost took me out.
I closed my eyes and let him rub me. His touch was so gentle that it scared me some. I felt myself falling deeper.
“There’s something I need to ask you.”
“A’ight.”
I stared down at his hand over my stomach. “About Sienna.”
He stilled for half a second, then started rubbing me again.
“I know she betrayed y’all and all of that, but… am I supposed to be scared of you?”
I felt him deeply inhale. “No.”
I turned my head a little.
“I’m not going to lie to you and act like I’m not capable of violence,” he said.
“You know what kind of life I live. You know what kind of shit I’ve done.
I did what I did to Sienna because of what that situation was and what she put in motion.
But you should never be scared of me when it comes to you.
” He kept his hand over my belly and his mouth close to my ear.
“I know I’ve hurt you with my words before.
I know I’ve been mean when I was scared.
But scared of me putting my hands on you?
Or doing something to you? No. Never that. ”
I believed him. So, I nodded once. “Okay.”
After a minute, I said, “There’s something else.”
He let out a quiet laugh. “Damn. It’s one of them nights.” I chuckled as he asked, “What else?”
“Have you ever wanted to find your parents?”
He looked into the dark room. “I know where my mother is. We just don’t have a relationship.”
“You know where she is? And you just… don’t talk to her?”
He shrugged one shoulder. “Ain’t shit to say.”
“And your father?”
“Fuck him.”
There was so much hate in that answer that I didn’t press right away.
After a little while, I asked, “You’re not interested in finding him?”
“No.” His hand slid higher over my stomach and rested there. “The only thing I’m interested in finding is finding out where we’re going from here.”
That quieted me because it was such a grown answer.
I reached down and laced my fingers through his.
“But I do want to know my medical history, for Cairo’s sake. I saw online that we could get genetic carrier screening.”
“Okay. We can do that.”
I closed my eyes after that, and his hand stayed on my stomach. His other kept rubbing slow over my back. The water he gave me had helped. So had the bathroom break and being held against him. My body finally started easing up enough for sleep to creep back in.
I started drifting. The last thing I really remember was him tucking the blanket around me and kissing the side of my face.
“Good night, BB,” he murmured.
My eyes opened halfway. “BB?”
I felt his smile against my temple before he said, “Bad Bitch.”
I laughed softly, too sleepy to do anything else.
Then I went to sleep smiling.